no parts if partiri whence they are so called must not and herein he cannot so fool the whole Christian World as to make it concur with him lose its signification to serve a turn Tho' the things be real there partibility is not real If any indeed will call them parts beeause they may be conceived or contemplated apart as parts meerly conceptible are no prejudice to the perfection of the Divine Being so are such conceivable parts acknowledged by this Author himself in express words we cannot comprehend an infinite Being in one Thought and therefore must as well as we can contemplate him by parts God can as little admit to be a part of any thing as to have any thing a part of him And yet 't is no prejudice to the Dignity and Perfection of his Being to conceive of him conjunctly with other things as when we make him a part subject or predicate of a Proposition All his disputation therefore against parts and composition in the Deity is against a figment or no present adversary For my part I am of his mind and I should be obliged to thank him that this once he vouchsafes to let me be on his side when he knows I am if he did not take so vast pains to make others not know it How hard a thing is it for an angry man especially when he knows not why to write with a sincere Mind But hath he in all this fervent bluster a present concern at this time for the Honour of the Divine Being as God forbid I should think he never hath what is that he supposes injurious to it Is it the words parts and compounds or is it the things supposed to be united in the Divine Being The words he knows to be his own and let him dispose of them more ineptly if he can tell how parts that were never put together never parted nor ever shall be the one or other i. e. that never were or will be parts And a compound of such parts But now for the things upon which he would obtrude these words three Essences natures or if you please Infinite minds or spirits signified by the Names of Father Son and Holy Ghost in eternal union but distinct in the Being of God Let us consider his disputation against them united or in union according to its double aspect First upon the Hypothesis or Supposition of them Secondly upon himself First Consider his Disputation as levell'd against the Hypothesis or supposition of such distinct essences natures minds spirits in necessary eternal Union in the Divine Being And one of his arguments against it is in those words of his One principal argument against it here put out parts and composition which are his own and we have no more to do with them is that God is eternal and unmade and whatsoever hath parts saies he hath such essences in it must have a maker And here let him prove his consequence and his business is done viz. both ways as will be seen by and by But let him shew the inconsistency between a things having such distinct essences naturally and necessarily united in it as the supposition to be argued against is and before ought to have been justly stated and it 's being eternal and unmade But how that is to be evinced I can not so much as guess confident affirmation against the most obvious Tenour of Gods own Word is of little account who shall ascend into the heavens or fathom the depths or can have that perspection of God's incomprehensible nature as without and visibly against his own revelation to be able without great rashness to pronounce so concerning him But so toyish an Argument as here follows is worse than the Position i. e. when one shall say that for ought we know there may be three distinct Essences by an eternal unmade union united into one in the Being of God any man should say and be so vain as to expect to be regarded that because they are united by an eternal and unmade union therefore they are not united by an eternal and unmade union If there be not a Contradiction in the terms to disprove a thing by it self is to say nothing or is all one with proving a thing by it self He proceeds to what hath no thing in it like an Argument but against his own Conceit of parts and that very trifling too There can be but one eternal nature in God But if there be three there must be three This 't is now come to proving his Point by its self Here he makes sure work to have nothing deny'd but then nothing is prov'd no advance is made if there be three there must be three But if there be three what eternal parts There must be three different Natures or else they would be the same What tho' distinct But this supposes some body said the first And who himself therefore he is disproving himself If I had said so I would have deny'd his consequence for there may be similar parts Whereas by different he seems to mean dissimilar He says not only distinct but different natures Now you have that wonderful thing talk'd of some times but never brought to view before a distinction without a difference 'T is strange how any things should be distinct and no way different What distinguishes them if they differ by nothing This different apply'd to this present Case is his own word coined to introduce a Notion that is not new to Christians only but to all Man-kind If by different Natures he means as he seems of a different kind who thought of such a difference But I trow things that differ in number do as truly differ however essentially cohaering tho' not so widely His next is that though we have a natural notion of an eternal Being we have no notion of three eternal Essences which again I put instead of his parts which necessarily coexist in an eternal union Doth he mean we are to disbelieve every thing of God whereof we have not a natural Notion Then to what purpose is a Divine Revelation Is this Notion of God pretended to be Natural 'T is enough if such a Notion be most favoured by his own Revelation who best understands his own Nature and there be no evident natural Notion against it He forgot that he had said Defence p. 5. If every thing which we have no positive Idea of must be allow'd to contradict Reason we shall find contradictions enow adding We must confess a great many things to be true which we have no Idea of c. He adds once more we have no notion of an eternal and necessary existence but in an absolutely perfect and infinite nature but if there be I here again leave out his three parts because I design to consider if there be any thing of strength brought against what was supposed possible by the Enquirer not against his fiction which I trouble not my self any further with three spiritual Beings
simple or that Power Wisdom Goodness in the abstract are the same thing and that our difficulty is great to apprehend them really undistinguishable And let me seriously ask himself doth he in good earnest think it is only through the weakness of our understandings that we distinguish the notions of the Divine Wisdom Power and Goodness certainly it were great weakness of unstanding to define them alike I believe he never met with the writer yet that distinguisht them less than ratione ratiocinatâ in contradistinction to ratocinante which implies somewhat corresponding to our distinct notions of them eminently and not formally in naturâ rei And whereas he further says This prepared his way to make Goodness Wisdom Power a natural Trinity n Unity herein the Defender is mistaken This is not the Trinity which the Enquirers discourse was ever intended to terminate in as he himself hath expresly said and the Defender takes notice of it which makes me wonder how he could think it was so intended citing the very passage p. 37. where the Enquirer professes not to judge that we are under the precise notions of Power Wisdom and Goodness to conceive of the Father Son and Holy Ghost But why then were these three so much discourst of before They are three most celebrated Divine Attributes wherein we have our most immediate and very principal concern And some have thought the Trinity was most fitly to be conceived by them The Enquirer did not think so but he thought first it would be requisite to have our minds disentangled from any apprehended necessity of conceiving them to be in all respects the very same things nor are they the very same if they be so distinguish'd as is expressed in the 16 th of the summary propositions where also they are each of them said to be common to Father Son and Holy Ghost whence therefore it is impossible they shou'd be thought to distinguish Father Son and Holy Ghost But that some distinction being admitted even of them this might facilitate to us our conception of the greater distinction which must be of Father Son and Spirit as is express'd p. 38. Indeed he did not think fit to interrupt his discourse by staying to shew reasons why he did not rest in that account alone of the Trinity tho' it might seem plausible or not absurd but proceeded further to what was more satisfying to himself and might be so to other men And as the intervening Series of his discourse leads thereto this is more directly done p. 47. 48. c. especially where he comes to speak of the necessary coexistence and the as necessary and natural order of the Father Son and Spirit towards each other The second being not by any intervening act of will but by necessary eternal promanation from the first and the third from them both And the true reason why Power Wisdom and Goodness were not thought expressive of the distinction of Father Son and Spirit but common to each of them as is said Summary Prop. 16. was thatt the two latter can not but be necessary emanations most connatural to their Original as is truely suggested by the Defender p. 1â—1 If you object as the Defender brings in the Enquirer saying That this gives us the notion of a compounded Deity c. This i. e. the supposition that absolute omnimodous simplicity belongs not to it is the thing which may be thought to give us this notion And he tells us he the Enquirer answers this difficulty by giving us a new notion of a compositum And what 's that which he calls a new notion that a compositm seems to imply a preexisting component that brings such things together and supposes such and such more simple things to have preexisted apart or separate and to be brought afterwards together into an united State And indeed is this a new notion as new as the Creation Let him shew me an Instance through the whole created universe of Beings And for the uncreated Being the Defender now at this time disputes against any composition there and the Enquirer denies any first where there hath been a compositum without a pre-existing component or next the compounded parts whereof if substantial did not in order of nature pre-exist separate i. e. whether esse simplicitèr do not naturally precede esse tale or which is all one to our present purpose whether they were not capable hereof if the Creator pleased Let any man I say tell me where was there ever a compositum made by substantial union that did not consist of once separate or of separable parts But note his admirable following supposition that is to say that if a man suppose who consists of body and soul had been from eternity without a maker and his soul and body had never subsisted a part he could not have been said to have been a compounded Creature This is said with design most groundlesly as we shall see to fasten an absurd consequence upon the Enquirer and see how it lucks Did ever any man undertake to reprove an absurdity with greater absurdity a Creature without a Maker what sort of Creature must this be we have a pretty saying quoted in the Defender's Letter He that writes lies down and we are apt enough too when we write to trip and fall down and ought in such Cases to be merciful to one another even tho' he that falls should be in no danger of hurting his fore-head much more if he be What was another man's turn now may be mine next But let the supposition proceed and put we Being instead of Creature which no doubt was the Defender's meaning for Creature he must needs know it could not be that had no Maker And what then why he should not says he have been said to be compounded though he would have had the same parts that he has now We have here a self-confounding supposition which having done that first can't hurt him whom it was designed to confound being taken in season Grant one and you grant a thousand A Being made up of a soul and a body is so imperfect an entity as could not be of it self Nothing is of it self which is not absolutely perfect If he mind to disprove this let him try his faculty when he pleases against it and which I sincerely believe he never intends together with it against all Religion But besides he hath destroy'd his own supposition himself to put us out of that danger by saying in plain words p. 107. We have no Notion of an eternal and necessary Existence but in an absolutely perfect and infinite nature Now say I what is so perfect and hath whatever belongs to it necessarily though distinguishable things belong to it hath no parts for what are parts but such things as can be parted such things as never were parted and never can be as 't is nonsence to talk of those things being parted that are united necessarily and of themselves are
neither of them can be absolutely perfect and infinite I would rather have said none or no one than neither since the discourse is of more than two I thought the meaning of uter and neuter had been agreed long ago tho' we could suppose their union to make such a perfect Being because they are not the same and neither no one of them is the whole c. This is the only thing that ever came under my notice among the School-men that hath any appearing strengh in it against the Hypothesis which I have proposed as possible for ought I knew They generally dispute against many sorts of Compositions in the Being of God which I am not concern'd in That of Matter and Form which is alien from this affair of quantitative parts which is as alien Of subject and accident which touches us not Of act and power which doth it as little Each subsistent being eternally in utmost actuality And by sundry sorts and methods of argument whereof only this can seem to signify any thing against the present supposition And it wholly resolves into the Notion of Infinity about which I generally spoke my sense in that first Letter to Dr. Wallis And as I there intimated how much easier it is to puzzle another upon that subject than to satisfy one self so I here say that I doubt not to give any man as much trouble about it in respect of quantitative extension as he can me in this I think it demonstrable that one Infinite can never be from another by voluntary production that it cannot by necessary Emanation I think not so In the mean time when we are told so plainly by the Divine Oracles of a sacred three that are each of them God and of some one whereof some things are spoken that are not nor can be of the others I think it easier to count three than to determine of Infiniteness And accordingly to form ones Belief But of this more when we come to compare him with himself And for what he discourses of the aspect this supposition hath upon the Trinity and the Homo-ousion It all proceeds still upon his own fiction of parts and upon the invidious straining of that similitude of the union of soul and body as he himself doth tantum non confess except that he lessens it by saying most untruly that he the Enquirer doth expresly own the Consequence Therefore if he do not own the Consequence then the Defender confesses himself to have invidiously devised it and what is it That if all three by this composition are but one God neither of them by himself is true and perfect God The Divinity is like the English But both his own The Enquirer denies both antecedent which he knows and consequent too Leave out by this composition his own figment and his argument as much disproves any Trinity at all as it doth the present Hypothesis But wherein doth the Enquirer own it because such a Similitude is used as 't is often in that discourse of the union between soul and body declared elsewhere to be unexpressibly defective that therefore the Father Son and Holy Ghost are each of them by himself no more truly Lord or God according to the Athanasian Creed or otherwise than in as improper a sense as the Body of a Man excluding the Soul is a Man or an Humane Person Or as if Deity were no more in one of the Persons than humanity in a Carkass who that looks upon all this with equal Eyes but will rather choose as doubtful a notion than so apparently ill a Spirit Are similitudes ever wont to be alike throughout to what they are brought to illustrate It might as well be said because he mentions with Approbation such as illustrate the Doctrine of the Trinity by a Tree and its Branches that therefore there we are to expect Leaves and Blossoms Is it strange the Created Universe should not afford us an exact Representation of uncreated Being How could he but think of that To whom do ye liken me At least one would have thought he should not have forgot what he had so lately said himself We must grant we have no perfect Example of any such union in nature What Appetite in him is it that now seeks what Nature doth not afford A very unnatural One we may conclude 'T were trifling to repeat what was said and was so plain before that the union between Soul and Body was never brought to illustrate personal union but essential The former is here imagin'd without pretence there being no mention or occasion for the the mentioning of Persons in the place he alledges But to make out his violent Consequence he foists in a supposition that never came into any man's Imagination but a Socinians and his own Which I say contradistinguishing him to them that the matter may as it ought appear the more strange If God be a person he can be but one Is God the appropriate Name of a Person then indeed there will be but one person but who here says so but himself The name God is the name of the Essence not the distinguishing name of a Person But if three intelligent Natures be united in one Deity each will be Persons and each will be God and all will be one God not by parts other than conceptible undivided and inseperable as the Soul and Body of a Man are not Which sufficiently conserves the Christian Trinity from such furious and impotent Attaques as these And the Homoousiotes is most entirely conserved too For what are three spiritual natures no more the same than as he grosly speaks the Soul and Body are no more than an intelligent mind and a piece of Clay by what consequence is this said from any thing in the Enquirers Hypothesis Whereas also he expresly insists that the Father as Fons Trinitatis is first the Son of the Father the Holy Ghost from both Is not the water in the streams the same that was in the Fountain and are not the several Attributes expresly spoken of as common to these three Essential Power Wisdom Goodness which are deny'd to be the precise notions of Father Son and Spirit said by more than a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as that may be understood to signify meer presence how intimate soever but by real vital union as much each one 's as any one 's and all other conceivable perfections besides Why were these words read with Eyes refusing their office to let them into the Reader 's mind whence also how fabulous is the Talk of Powers begetting Wisdom c. against what is so plainly said of the order of Priority and Posteriority c. There had been some prudence seen in all this conduct if the Defender could have taken effectual care that every thing should have been blotted out of all the Copies of that Discourse but what he would have thought fit to be permitted to the view of