God and them The Mutual-consciousness of the three Divine Persons is the Perichóresis and Circumincession mentioned by the Fathers and the Schools For Perichóresis or that the Father is in the Son and Spirit and the Son in the Father and Spirit and the Spirit in the Father and Son is nothing else but their universal Mutual-consciousness We ought not to entertain a gross material Idea of the Perichóresis as if the three distinct Divine Persons were in one another by a mutual Contract of Parts for they have no Parts the only Vnion and Perichóresis of Minds and Spirits is that they are conscious each to others Thoughts and Wills as perfectly and inwardly as to their own And thus also it is that the three Divine Persons are one God they are one God and in one another by perfect Mutual-consciousness The Vindicator often says that this Explication of the Trinity maketh a Trinity in Unity as easy and intelligible as the Notion of One God or but one who is God But being aware that 't is not enough that an Explication be intelligible if it be not also the true Explication therefore he pretends to prove this Mutual-consciousness of the Father Son and Spirit from Joh. 1.18 10.15 30 38. 16.14 15. 1 Cor. 2.10 11. Then for the Fathers tho they do not once name Mutual-consciousness yet he thinketh they meant it He alledges a few Passages out of Gregory Nyssen and St. Austin who are all the Fathers he quotes and his Citations are not only not to his purpose but some of them clearly overthrow it I shall shew him the respect to consider what he hath said 1. Whereas he saith that Mutual-consciousness maketh the three Divine Spirits to be as truly and properly numerically one and as much one as each Spirit and every Man is one with himself If this were indeed true it would as much over-do what the Vindicator expects from it as he thinketh all former Explications are short of their Design For the Unitarians desire no more than that it be owned God is as truly and properly numerically one as every Spirit and Man is one with himself for every Spirit and Man is so one with himself as to be but one Person Had the Vindicator no way to defend the Athanasian Creed but by running into Heresy could he make out the Unity of the Trinity no other way but as the Creed speaks by confounding the Persons or by making them but one Person I challenge him or any other for him to avoid this Consequence of his Doctrine He saith in above twenty places this Mutual-consciousness maketh the three Divine Spirits and Persons as much one with one another as any Spirit or Man is one with himself then say I they are but one Person for that is the Oneness or Unity the only Unity of every Spirit or Man with himself No Spirit or Man has any other but a Personal Unity with himself 2. Mutual-consciousness cannot be a good Explication of the pretended Trinity because it will equally salve the most absurd Doctrine of the Transubstantiation For as according to the Vindicator's Doctrine the Godhead or the One true God is numerically One tho there are three Infinite Persons each of which is God and a God because these three Persons are mutually conscious to or have an inward Sensation of one another So will a Papist say there is but one Body-head or but one Numerical Body of Christ but in the Unity of this Body-head or Body there is first the Original Body of Christ and then abundance of Sacred Hosts in divers places each of which is a true Body of Christ and is by Mutual Sensation and Consciousness for there is no Sensation without Consciousness numerically one Body with the Original Body in Heaven 'T is true the Body in Heaven is the Source and Fountain of the rest as the Father is of the other Divine Persons but they are all substantially and numerically one Body by Mutual-consciousness or Sensation And this mutual inward Sensation or Consciousness they must needs have because they are all of them Personally wâ—ited to one Infinite Spirit or Person who as all Trinitarians say is Whole and All every-where present Totus in toto totus in qualibet parte By this Explication or Hypothesis all Mr. Johnson's Demonstrations against the Transubstantiation are made to vanish into Smoke All his Objections from the nature of Time and Extension are nothing they are all salved by Mutual-consciousness of the Hosts with the Body in Heaven for Dr. Sherlock has assured us that Mutual-consciousness or Sensation doth make an Essential Substantial and Numerical Vnity or Oneness between any number of Persons or Things The Reason holds for Things as well as Persons and for a thousand as well as for three 3. If as the Vindicator often says Mutual-consciousness is the only Vnion of Spirits or Minds such a Mutual-consciousness by which they are universally or wholly or pefectly conscious to each other this would as much prejudice the Incarnation or Hypostatical Union as the Vindicator hopes it will help the Doctrine of the Trinity The Vindicator confesses at p. 269 and 270 that the Human Nature or Reasonable Soul of Christ is not universally or wholly conscious to the Divine Person of the Son yet he says in perhaps forty places that a Mutual-consciousness to all one anothers Thoughts and Wills and Actions is necessary to make an Union of Minds or Spirits I say it follows from these Premises that the Reasonable Soul or Spirit of the Lord Christ is not united to the Divine Person of the Son If universal Consciousness is the only possible Vnion of Spirits 't is impossible there should be an Incarnation or an Hypostatical or Personal Union of the Divine and Human Spirits in Christ The Vindicator seems to have been in some measure aware of this Objection For in the Conclusion of his Book when he comes to the Doctrine of the Incarnation or Hypostatical Union he says Where different Natures are united into one Person this universal Consciousness is seated only in the Superior Nature and in the Inferior only so far as the Nature is capable and as the Personal Union requires But I will forgive the Vindicator if he can so escape from me First If as he says a partial Consciousness in the Inferior Nature be sufficient to effect an Hypostatical or Personal Union it will follow that all pious Men are hypostatically or personally united to the Holy Ghost For the Holy Spirit is universally conscious to all their Thoughts and Actions and they are partially conscious to his Suggestions and Motions and that by such an Internal Sensation as they are to their own Thoughts and Inclinations They cannot discern one from the other Secondly If a Partial Consciousness between two or more Spirits where but one of them is universally conscious to the rest will make them numerically one Person or what is the same thing will effect
and from the Tempter 5. If there were indeed such a thing as the Vindicator's mutual Consciousness I do affirm it would be so far from being or from effecting a numerical Unity or Oneness that it would be the very thing which would most of all prove the three pretended Divine Persons are numerically three Spirits and three Gods For since according to the Vindicator's Descriptions each of these Spirits or Persons has his own Personal Understanding Will and Power of Action and his own Personal absolutely perfect Wisdom Power and Goodness three such Persons are so far from being one Spirit or one God by Consciousness to each other Wisdom Power and Goodness that the more such Persons are mutually conscious so much the more their separate Existence and Divinity is proved For the more that any of these Spirits knows and feels of Thoughts and Actions arising in the other Spirits or Persons and to which he is only conscious but is not the Personal Fountain of them the more and more certainly he must needs know and feel that himself has a divers and separate Existence from them and therefore being an Infinite Person or Spirit is a divers and separate God I challenge the Vindicator to tell me any other possible way for three Divine Persons to be assured of their separate Existence and Divinity that is that they are three Gods but by Mutual-consciousness or by knowing and feeling as he speaks the Thoughts and Actions of one another not as their own but as the Thoughts and Actions of other Divine Spirits How should the Father for example know He is a separate Spirit and God from the Son but by knowing and feeling the Actions of the Son not as his the Fathers Actions but as the Actions and Thoughts of another Divine and Infinite Person It was therefore a great Incogitance in the Vindicator to urge the pretended Mutual-consciousness of the three pretended Divine Persons as their numerical Unity or Oneness when it demonstrates them to be numerically three separate and divers Beings Spirits and Gods Had the Vindicator said there are three Infinite Spirits who are mutually conscious THEREFORE there are three Gods all Mankind would have allowed his Consequence as certain and self-evident from that Proposition But to say there are three Infinite Spirits conscious to one another THEREFORE there is but one God this all Men of Sense will laugh at as a palpable Falshood 'T is a Contradiction in the Terms to tell us of One only God mutually conscious for in plainer English 't is to say One only God conscious to or with other Gods Or One only God conscious to more Gods 6. But the great Matter is still behind that after all our Blessed Saviour himself has declared that there is not this Mutual-consciousness between the supposed Divine Persons which the Vindicator has made to be the Substance of his Answer to the Brief Notes and the Brief History Of that day and hour the day and hour of the last Judgment none knoweth no not the Angels which are in Heaven nor the Son but the Father only Mark 13.32 Mat. 24.36 Here it is expresly denied that the Son knows the time of the last Judgment and as clearly intimated that the Father and the Father only therefore not the Holy Ghost if we take the Holy Ghost for a particular Person knows that time Therefore say I the Son and Holy Ghost are not conscious to all the Knowledg Will and Thoughts of the Father and consequently are not Gods or God To avoid this Argument the Vindicator and his Party answer that Christ in that Text speaks of himself only as he is a Man not as he is God or a God Well but how shall we salve the Honour of the Holy Ghost for 't is there also said that the Father only knoweth that day and hour Why for that the word Father here does not signify the Father only but includes the Father Son and Holy Ghost But when mention is made of the Father and the Son in the same Period and they are opposed to each other 't is much that neither the Son should signify the Son for the Human Nature or Christ as Man according to the Trinitarians is not the Son nor the Father signify the Father but the Father and two other Persons If this be not to form the Scriptures to our preconceived Opinions and not our Opinions by the Scriptures let the Vindicator himself tell me what is Should a Socinian distort the known sense and use of Words at this rate what Out-cries should we have against them Nor was it our Saviour's manner to answer after this equivocal delusory fashion But when the Disciples were more inquisitive than he liked of he was not wont to shift off the matter by an Equivocation but plainly to tell them They asked after what 't was not permitted to them to know Wilt thou at this time restore the Kingdom to Israel say the Disciples at Acts 1.6 7. 'T is not for you to know saith our Saviour How unlike is this direct sincere Answer to that which the Trinitarians have made for him about the Day of Judgment For their Answer runs thus As to the day and hour of Judgment of which you enquire none knoweth it not the Angels not the Son himself but my Father only But when I say the Son that is I my self know it not I mean saith he to himself according to my Human Nature which indeed is not the Son and when I say only my Father knoweth it I mean saith he again to himself only my Father and my self and the Holy Ghost This is such an over-grown Equivocation and Mental Reservation as in our Town would pass for a gross Lie but that the Vindicator and his Party have assured us that our Saviour himself spake thus But I do not think any sensible and honest Man will believe 'em if he considers it twice 'T is thus also that they have dealt with God himself speaking in the first Commandment Thou shalt have no other Gods but Me saith God in the words of the first Commandment And to render this his Soveraign Revelation and Will the more awful and regarded by us he delivered it in Thunders that shook the Heavens and the Earth Notwithstanding this and tho every one knows that the Stile of Laws is plain and simple and the words to be understood in a popular familiar Sense because they are delivered to the meanest as well as the highest Capacities yet have those who call themselves the Orthodox and the Catholick Party eluded this Revelation and Law to which all the rest refer and on which they depend and have made room for other Gods besides him Thou shalt have no other Gods besides Me that is say they Thou shalt have no other Gods but Vs no other Gods but God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost Thou shalt have no other Gods but three Infinite Almighty All-knowing Persons whereof one is the Father another his Son and the third an holy Spirit distinct
from both I perswade my self that no Man can think that so much as one Person of the six hundred thousand Israelites who assembled to hear God speak did or possibly could understand that to be his meaning but on the contrary when they heard Thou shalt have no other Gods but Me they did and their Posterity to this day do understand it no otherways but thus Thou shalt never know or own more than one Divine Person even Me who now speak to thee When Points of Faith are turned into Laws we ought to be careful how we elude their plain and obvious Sense by Subtilties for such things will not excuse the Breach of Laws especially of the first and chief Law the ground of the rest to which they all refer as their chief Design Rather we should interpret all other dubious and disputable Scripture-Expressions by such solemn Principal and Chief Revelations and Laws The Vindicator 't is said is writing a Book to prove that there are more Persons the Son and Spirit besides the Eternal God and Father of our Lord Christ who are Gods or God that is he is writing a Book against the first Commandment And I confess that as his Party have ordered the vulgar Editions and Translations of the Holy Bible it will be no hard matter to alledg some very plausible Texts to such as know not the Deceits that have been used to make some Texts of Scripture contradict others But I challenge him before-hand to produce but one such Proof or Text for his purpose as is not of such suspected Credit and Authority in the Originals that no prudent Man would build any thing on it much less oppose it to the first Commandment or is so manifestly saulty in the English Translation that some of the most Learned of his own Party do reject it as no Proof or finally is not only not to his purpose but proves what the Unitarians contend for the Unity of God or that God is One But this was a Digression I left off at our Saviour's words Of that day and hour the day and hour of the last Judgment none knoweth but my Father only which I hope were sufficiently vindicated from the Perversions of Dr. Sherlock and others But let our Saviour say what he will and as expresly as he will the Doctor will prove against him that there is this perfect Mutual-consciousness between Him the Holy Spirit and the Father His first Objection is from Joh. 1.18 The only Begotten Son which is in the Bosom of the Father hath declared him To be in the Bosom of another signifies says the Vindicator to be conscious to that Person 's Mind and most intimate Secrets therefore the Son is conscious to the Father Answ But why did not the Vindicator produce some Texts to confirm this Interpretation The truth is the Scripture-Sense of this Phrase To be in the Bosom of another is this to be most dear to that Person as is clear from Deut. 28.54 56. 2 Sam. 12.3 So the Sense of the objected Text is only this The only Begotten Son who is most dear to the Father hath declared him i. e. hath made known his Will and Commands in the Gospel He objects Joh. 10.15 As the Father knoweth me so know I the Father Answ If the Vindicator had look'd into the Critical Commentators of his own Party he would have seen that to know in this Text is to love But allowing him his Sense of the words I answer as much is prophesied of all Christians in Gospel-times Jer. 31.34 They shall all know me from the greatest to the least of them Nor does as here note Equality of Knowlenge in the Son but Likeness only as at Mat. 5.48 Be ye perfect even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect Therefore the Sense is the Father knoweth me and I also know the Father not by Natural or Congenit Consciousness but by his Revelation See Rev. 1.1 Joh. 10.30 I and the Father are One. This Oneness or In-being saith the Vindicator is a Mutual-consciousness and inward Sensation of each other Answ But our Saviour explains this Oneness to be such an Unity or Oneness as is or should be among all Christians which is not by Mutual-consciousness or inward Sensation but Mutual and Inward Love of one another John 17.11 Father keep those whom thou hast given me that they may be One as we are Ver. 22. That they may be One even as we are One. Again he urgeth Joh. 10.38 The Father is in me and I in him The Vindicator insisteth much on this as a clear Indication of an inward Consciousness between the Father and Son Answ But here again our Saviour has otherways explain'd himself namely thus that he means such an In-being as is between all Christians and the Father an In-being by Love and the Gift of the Spirit on the part of the Father and on our part by Love and Obedience and Profession of the Truth Joh. 17.21 That they all may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they may be One in us 1 Joh. 3.24 He that keepeth his God's Commandments dwelleth in Him and he in him 1 Joh. 3.13 Hereby we know we dwell in him and he in us because he hath given us of his Spirit Ver. 15. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God God dwelleth in him and he in God Ver. 16. He that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God and God in him Joh. 16.15 All things that the Father hath are mine Answ See what hath been satisfactorily said to this in the Brief-History pag. 103. 1 Cor. 2.10 11. The Spirit searcheth all things yea the deep things of God For what Man knoweth the things of a Man but the Spirit of a Man which is in him even so the things of God knoweth no Man but the Spirit of God Answ The Emphasis lies here that the Spirit knows the things of God even as the Spirit of a Man knows the things of a Man Now adinitting that the Holy Ghost or Spirit were a Person as many Unitarians particularly the Bidellians and Arians believe he is chief of the holy Spirits or Angels and called the Spirit by way of Excellence and the Holy Spirit to discriminate him from Satan who is chief of the Wicked and Apostate Spirits or Angels Admitting I say that the Holy Spirit is a Person yet what hinders that he may know the things of God that is appears by Ver. 9. the things that God has prepared for them that love him as fully and perfectly as the Spirit of a Man knoweth the Designs and Counsels of a Man towards other Men Cannot God as fully reveal those things of God to this holy and super-eminent Spirit as any Man knows his own Will and Designs of Good towards others and is it not thus that our Saviour also is said to know the
A Person is such a Being as has Understanding Will and Power of Action P. 66. They are Three distinct and Infinite Minds Three Intelligent Beings P. 258. They are Three Holy Spirits P. 67. These Three Infinite Minds are distinguished just as Three Finite Created Minds are by Self-consciousness Each Divine Person has a Self-consciousness of its own and knows and feels it self as distinct from the other Divine Persons The Father has a Self-consciousness of his own whereby he knows and feels himself to be the Father and not the Son or Holy Ghost The Son feels himself to be the Son and not the Father or Holy Ghost The Holy Ghost feels himself to be the Holy Ghost and not the Father or Son P. 104. The Persons are as really distinct as Three Human Persons or Three Men are P. 105. Father Son and Holy Ghost are as really distinct Persons as Peter James and John P. 149. We must believe Three distinct Divine Persons each of which is God P. 98. We must allow each Person to be a God So also at P. 47. and elsewhere He not only contends each Person is God and a God but 't is his Belief in some places of his Vindication that each Person is a most consummate and absolutely perfect God For he ascribes to each of them a Personal absolutely perfect Wisdom Goodness Justice and Power I say a Personal perfect Wisdom c. besides the Wisdom Goodness c. common to them all by their Mutual-consciousness His words are these P. 81. There is no Contradiction that three Infinite Minds should be absolutely perfect in Wisdom Goodness and Power for these are Perfections that may be in more than One. P. 84 85. The Father has his own Personal Wisdom and by Internal Consciousness all the Wisdom of the Son and Holy Ghost The Son has his own Personal Wisdom and by the same Consciousness the Wisdom of the Father and Holy Ghost The Holy Ghost has his own Personal Wisdom and all the Wisdom of the Father and Son At P. 78. He denies there is in God an Infinite Wisdom Goodness Power c. but only perfect Wisdom Goodness c. He acknowledges at P. 97. and frequently else-where that if the Divine Persons were distinct and separate Persons they would be Three Gods but they are he saith distinct but not separate Persons Yet he saith there each of these Persons is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 singly and by himself God tho not separately God P. 48. A Finite Spirit 's Numerical Oneness can be nothing else but every Spirit 's Unity with it self and its distinct and seperate Subsistence from all other Created Spirits And this Self-unity can be nothing else but Self-consciousness or that it is conscious to its own Thoughts Reasons Passions c. which no other Finite created Spirit is conscious to but it self Let us put this remarkable Doctrine concerning the Three Divine Persons into a short Creed and then make Brief Notes upon it Dr. Sherlock's Creed I Believe there are Three distinct Intelligent Infinite Beings Minds Spirits and Persons distinguished just as Three Finite Created Minds or Spirits are as really distinct as three Men or as Peter James and John Each of them has a Self-consciousness whereby he knows and feels himself as really distinct from the other two Divine Persons Also each of them has his own absolutely perfect for there is no Infinite Wisdom Goodness and Power and by a Mutual-consciousness each Person of these has the whole Wisdom Power and Goodness of the two other Persons Each Person has his own Understanding Will and Power of Action Finally each of these Beings Minds Spirits Persons is God nay each of them singly by himself is a God This Creed is not only the Vindicator's Sense but his very Words which he has often repeated in his Book Let us deliberately and minutely consider whether it be the Faith of Christians or consistent with Scripture or Reason I believe there are Three Infinite Spirits Minds and Beings 'T is the first time I ever heard so in my Life That God is unum summum Ens one Supream Being that he is Animus Mens Spiritus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Mind a Spirit is the Voice not only of Scripture but the agreed Doctrine of all Christians Let the Vindicator shew me either in Holy Scripture or in any Catholick Writer that these words are used of God in the Plural Number Do any of them like this Doctor call God Animi Mentes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Minds Spirits Beings Himself is the first who has dared thus to speak in express words and the reason is because he saw not what they all saw that three Infinite Minds Spirits or Beings are Three Gods For if one Infinite Mind or Spirit is One God Three Infinite Minds must be Three Gods else we cannot distinguish between One and Three nor discern that the Definition being multiplied the thing defined is also multiplied God saith our Saviour at Joh. 4.24 is a Spirit No saith the Vindicator at p. 258 and p. 66. God is Three Spirits Minds or Beings and to teach the contrary is both Heresy and Non-sense Before a Man bestows such Complements he ought well to consider on whom they may reflect for tho he thinks that such as Socinus and the Note-maker deserve not that common Humanity and good Manners be shown them yet he should have had some regard for his Saviour Well but what if Holy Mother Church be in the same Nonsense and Heresy Mr. Savage who has also written against the Brief Notes will tell him at p. 4. of his Answer that the Lateran Council hath defined that the Three Divine Persons are not Three Beings but that all together they make Unum summum Ens One Being And I will tell him that the fourth Council of Lateran often repeats it that God is not Aliud Aliud more Beings or Things but Vna quaedam Res One Thing or Being Mr. Marlow in his late Book concerning the Trinity written as should seem by the Preface on occasion of the Brief History and Brief Notes describeth God at p. 64. One single Being he adds there More than one Infinite Being cannot subsist But it were endless to cite particular Authorities in this matter therefore in a word all Catechisms Systems Institutions of Theology Christian Writers and even Jews and Mahometans that have spoken of God do with our Saviour define him a Spirit one Mind one Being never three Spirits three Minds or three Beings I dare not ask it of the Vindicator because he always answers according to the present Exigence only but I would ask any other learned and sensible Man What is the adequate Notion or true definition of Three Gods I make no doubt every such Person would answer without any the least Hesitation three Infinite Spirits or Minds or Intelligent Beings are three Gods Which is the Vindicator's Definition of one God But to involve himself yet
more he believes These Three Infinite Spirits Minds Beings and Persons are distinguish'd just as Three Finite Created Minds or Spirits are they are as really distinct as three Men or as Peter James and John This is Polytheism or Plurality of Gods with a witness 'T is as gross Polytheism as the Greeks or Romans were ever guilty of If a Man had asked the Greek Philosophers suppose Porphyrie and Hierocles What Conception we ought to have of the three great Objects of Greeian Worship Jupiter Neptune and Pluto They would have answered as the Vindicator does concerning his Trinity they are three Divine Beings Minds or Spirits distinguished as really and just as three Men or as Peter James and John This was their Polytheism not that they believ'd or worshipped a false God for that was simple Idolatry but that they distinguish'd the Divinity into three or more Minds and Beings as really and just as they distinguished three Men or as Peter James and John The Vindicator will not be able to give a Rational and Intelligible Account why it should not as much be Polytheism in him to distinguish as really and just as the Heathens did It will not excuse him to say that Jupiter Neptune and Pluto were but supposed Divine Persons but his are really Divine Persons for granting so much to him for this time yet to mistake the Object of their Faith and Worship was only Idolatry their Polytheism consisted in distinguishing the Object of Worship the Divinity into more Minds or Beings as really and just as the three Men Peter James and John are distinguish'd Therefore the more Learned Trinitarians have been so far from saying the three Divine Persons are distinguish'd just as Peter James and John that they never durst say they are really distinct but modally something more distinguish'd they say between one another than from their common Essence yet not really distinct They considered that real Distinction makes Alterity and Diversity but the Unity of God does not permit that he should be Alter Another either from Himself or from any thing that is Himself Since the Essence of a thing is that by which it is what it is whatsoever things are really distinct things must also be Essentially distinct but now the three Divine Persons having but One Numerical Undivided Essence by Confession of all Trinitarians therefore they cannot be Essentially distinct and therefore not Really but Modally only I suppose therefore the Vindicator's Friends will prevail with him to abate in his next very much of his as really distinct and distinguished just as these three Men Peter James and John Each of these Divine Persons has a Self-consciousness whereby He knows and feels himself as distinct from the other two Divine Persons This Assertion implies what he afterwards adds that each of them has his own proper Vnderstanding Will and Power of Action Now I say this is so great and clear an Alterity or Diversity that no greater can be supposed between any sort of Intelligent Beings God and his Creatures are not more truly divers than by having each their own proper Understandings Wills and Powers of Action and by really Being and Knowing and Feeling themselves as distinct from one another Intelligent Beings may indeed be farther differenced by Essential Perfections or by Degrees of Perfection in the same Nature as Angels are differenced from Men by Essential Perfections and Peter from John by Degrees of Human Perfection and God from his Creatures both by Essential Perfections and by Degrees of those Perfections that are common to him and them but the meer Alterity or Diversity of Intelligent Beings or Minds is no other but what the Vindicator has imputed to the Divine Persons themselves namely that each such Being has his own Understanding Will and Power of Action and both is and knows himself as really distinct from all others Persons or Spirits so distinct are as really divers or are no more one another than the Angel Michael is the Man Peter or than Peter is Charles the Lion in the Tower The Vindicator has discoursed â—all along so inconsequently that I have no hopes he can advert to a Demonstration that requires any Attention of Mind but I cannot doubt that others of his Party will readily own he has very much overshot himself and that there cannot be such Alterity or Diversity in God the most simple of all Beings Can there be any thing in God as divers and distinct as Michael and Peter nay as God and his Creatures They will not say it for 't is to deny his Simplicity and Unity and to compound him not only of several and divers Parts but of divers and several Beings which is too manifestly both Heterodox and Impossible Can He be most Simple and Vncompounded who is made up of three distinct Understandings Wills and Powers of Action and who is constituted of three Beings or Minds that know and feel themselves distinct from one another as distinct as Michael and Peter and even as God and his Creatures If so then it may also be said that God and his Creatures are One most Simple Vncompounded Being That is the next Paradox the Vindicator has to defend As for his Mutual-consciousness I shall demonstrate in its proper place that it does not only not heal these Breaches but incurably widens them because I shall shew 't is so far from being or effecting any real Unity and Simplicity that it implieth and supposeth an Essential Diversity and a seperate Existence of the Three Persons Also each of these Persons has his own Personal absolutely perfect for there is no Insinite Wisdom Power and Goodness and by a Mutual-consciousness each of them has all the Wisdom Power and Goodness of the two other Persons This is still somewhat a clearer Explication of his Doctrine of Three Gods than any we have yet had For since each of these Spirits Minds or Beings has his own Personal absolutely perfect Wisdom Power and Goodness and that besides the Consciousness and Sensation of the absolutely perfect Wisdom Power c. of the other two there can be nothing wanting to make each Person of them an absolutely perfect God If there be indeed three really distinct Spirits or Persons each of which has his own Personal absolutely perfect Wisdom c. and therefore is unabsolutely perfect God I doubt whether there be a Man in the World besides the Vindicator who will not acknowledg upon that Supposition that there are three really distinct and absolutely perfect Gods But as far as he seems to be sunk in his Incogitance I will put to him one Argument 'T is the most general and allowed Proof that there is but One God because one God or one Infinite Wisdom Power and Goodness is sufficient as sufficient as a thousand and there cannot be in God any thing that is needless useless or in vain Therefore I say if any one of the Vindicator's Divine Spirits Minds Beings or Persons as