created by the Word of God c. by a Comparison taken from the Kings of the Earth whose Word is the only Instrument they imploy to execute their Wills Indeed God has no need of any Instrument whereby to act he does all by the sole Act of his Will And Ibid. c. 65. The Word of God says he signifies no other than his Will But because Men cannot presently apprehend how a thing can be made by the Will only thinking it necessary that he who will make any thing must either do it himself or cause it to be done by others the Scripture says that God commands that a thing be when he will have it to be not only by comparison to our manner of acting but also because those Expressions do also signify the Will So as often as in the Work of the Creation we meet with the words God said it is the same as God willed And these that the Heavens were created by the Word of God is the same thing as by the Spirit of his Mouth For as his Mouth and his Spirit are Metaphorical Expressions so his Speech and his Word are also Metaphorical the meaning whereof is that things exist by his Will only And lastly in Cap. 66. mentioning these Words of Psal 8. The Heavens are the Works of thy Hands or of thy Fingers he says that the Finger of God is the same thing with the Word of God and the Word of God the same thing with the Will of God Grotius makes almost the same Observation on John 1.1 Because says he Moses wrote God said Let there be Light the Hebrews have thence call'd Devar the Word that Power or Divine Emanation by which God brought things out of Nothing and worketh all that is uncommon and extraordinary Psal 33.6 148.8 That which we read of Isaiah My Hand hath laid the Foundations of the Earth is in the Chaldee I have laid the Foundations of the Earth by my Word St. Peter uses the same Expression 2 Ep. 3.5 And that Paraphrast uses it so when treating of Miracles Prophecy or God's extraordinary Assistance and particularly when the Hebrew says the Eyes the Hand or the Face of God Whence it appears that in Scripture saying that the Hands of God laid the Foundations of the Earth or that he laid the Foundations of it by his Word or by his Spirit are equivalent Expressions and consequently that there is no Mystery in this Term Word or Speech Otherwise we must seek it also in Hand Finger Mouth c. and make of 'em so many Persons of the Trinity 'T would be much more proper to say with the Bishop of Meaux as above noted that thereby is signify'd nothing more with respect to God than that the doing great Works costs him but one single Word In truth this literal Sense is much more reasonable than the suppos'd Mystery But I said in the second place that there is another more excellent Communication when God fills with his extraordinary Gifts and if I may so speak overflows with his Favours those of Mankind whom he appoints to execute his Decrees as his Prophets and other Messengers and particularly the Messiah whom he sent into the World with all the Characters of an extraordinary Consecration This latter kind of Communication is called the Holy Ghost And here again we see on the one hand the Word and the Commission of God address'd to his Minister and on the other the Holy Ghost confirming God's Order to the Minister and conferring on him Power to discharge all the Duties of his Office So true it is that the Word and the Spirit are two united Powers which ordinarily work 〈…〉 I say ordinarily because Cases 〈…〉 een seen where the Communication 〈…〉 ut any Manifestation and on 〈…〉 trary others where God manifested himself by meer Apparitions which do not imply any Union of the Godhead with the Person who was honour'd with them But here it must be observ'd with respect to Prophetical Communication that there are two kinds of it whereof each hath its specifick Character The first which was when God spake by the Prophets was only for particular Dispensations for certain Times and Ministrys The other which was demonstrated in Jesus Christ to whom the Divine Nature was communicated in a much more perfect manner was inseparable and perpetual The first is called the Holy Ghost the second is not only called the Holy Ghost but also the Word because Jesus Christ was not only a Prophet by reason of the Gifts received from the Holy Ghost but also because he was begotten a Prophet and born a Prophet a distinction which raises him infinitely above all other Prophets This is the Truth which St. John design'd to teach us in writing the Preface or Prologue to his Evangelical History viz. that the same Jesus who was born of a Woman was born the Christ or is the Christ in right and by the advantage of his Birth And the reason which he gives for it is that the Holy Ghost or the Word for that 's the same thing did not only make his Flesh but also insinuating himself into it as the antient Doctors speak did there sow the Principles of his Prophetical Operations in the same manner as our bodily Fathers do not only give us Birth but often transmit to us the Seeds of their Inclinations and Vertues Now that which had never been seen in any other Prophet obliged the Evangelist to call Jesus Christ the Word to distinguish him from all other Prophets and Interpreters of God and to express himself in so forcible a manner on the Birth of this great Prophet in saying that the Word was made Flesh The old Translation was Verbum Domini factum est ad Prophetam The new has something more emphatical Verbum Domini factum est caro the Word insinuated it self into the Flesh and prepared it for Prophecy Marius Victorinus to give an Idea of this twofold Divine Dispensation Manifestation and Communication says in his 3d Book against Arius That there is a double Energy or Operation of the Word the one in a manifest way Christ in Flesh the other in a secret way the Holy Ghost Whereupon he calls the Father a Voice in silence the Son the Voice and the Holy Ghost the Voice of the Voice Which shews that the Holy Ghost is the Word of the Son as the Son is the Word of the Father And it is in this manner that St. Basil speaks 5 advers Eunom The Son is the Word of the Father and the Holy Ghost is the Word of the Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now we see by what means Error was introduc'd God having reveal'd himself to his Creature by way of outward Manifestation and by way of inward Communication out of those two Dispensations have been made so many Divine Persons distinct from God the Father that is a second Person was made of the Manifestation and of the Communication was made a third It
us to understand that when the Platonic Fathers applied these losty Expressions of Solomon to their Eternal Word they did not or could not do it but by the way of an Accommodation or Allusion The same Bishop having related the Opinion of some Fathers a little lower who apply the same Expressions of Solomon to the Man Jesus Christ afterwards goes on thus pag. 63. But this saith he not being the sense of the Words which Solomon first intended I shall not build my Paraphrase upon it but take Wisdom here as it signifies in other Places of this Book and hath been hitherto described whom Solomon now celebrates for her most venerable Antiquity and introduces like a most beautiful Person no less than a Queen or rather some Divine Being infinitely to be preferred before that base Strumpet spoken of in the foregoing Chapter Indeed Solomon hath made her speak by introducing her as a Person and exborts young People to give ear to her She speaks of herself that God created her or that she comes to us from God that she was before the World was made because God who is the source of her and communicates her to Men did make use of her in framing this Universe Also that Kings reign by her because Prudence and good Counsels are the Soul of a good Government Notwithstanding this clear and natural sense Prejudice hath abused these Words to apply them to Jesus Christ but there are many other that cannot at all agree to him 'T is true that the Platonick Fathers are alledg'd here who understood this Chapter literally of a Personal Wisdom I own it but the same Fathers have also and that with no less Pomp quoted that Passage of the 45th Psalm My Heart is inditing a good Matter Word to prove the Eternal Generation of J. C. We justly laugh now adays at so ridiculous an Interpretation as well as of that Psal 110. From the Womb of the Morning thou hast the Dew of thy Youth Which the antient Interpreters did endeavour to make subservient to the same purpose Let us then I pray mistrust them as to this Text in the Proverbs they having so grosly deceiv'd us in those two of the Psalms which they made use of for the same ends as frequently and with as much Confidence But after all tho their Testimonies should be produc'd in shoals we can produce better Interpreters of Prov. 8. I mean the Books of the Old Testament it self the Wisdom and Ecclesisticus which tho they are Apocryphal yet are of greater Authority than the Writings of the Fathers who were the Disciples of Plato the Authors of these two having probably known better the Mind of Solomon and the Sentiments of the Jews The Author of the Wisdom having made use of the same Prosopopeia with him in the Proverbs calls Wisdom The Breath Spirit of the Power of God a pure Stream flowing from the Glory of the Almighty the Brightness of the everlasting Light the unspotted Mirrour of the Power of God the Image of his Goodness and that she sits on the Throne of God He goes on like the Author of the Proverbs that when God created the World Wisdom was with him knew his Works was present then knoweth and understandeth all things But to let you see that he speaks only of a Quality or Virtue he adds That he loved her sought her out from his Youth desired to have her for a Spouse was a Lover of her Beauty He desires of God in his ardent Prayers to give her to him to send her out of the Heavens to assist him to teach him that his Works might be acceptable For saith he we hardly guess aright at things that are upon the Earth but the things that are in Heaven who can search out unless God gives Wisdom and send his Holy Spirit from above See Chap. 7 8 9. The same Author speaking further of this Divine Perfection saith That God made all things by his Word form'd Man by his Wisdom Chap. 9. 1 2. taking the Word and Wisdom for one and the same thing viz. for that Power which created the World and whereof Wisdom is but an Emanation Can you imagine now this Author meant that God did create the World by his Son the second Person of the Trinity Can such a Thought enter into a rational Creature Let us come now to the Author of the Ecclesiasticus who expresseth better the Sense we ought to give to the Words of Solomon He introduceth Wisdom speaking thus of her self I came out of the Mouth of the most High he created me from the beginning before the World Hitherto he seems to speak of a Person but explains himself clearly Ch. 24. Ver. 23. where he declares that he meant by this nothing else but the Law of Moses which the Jews name Wisdom by way of Excellency For having spoken of Wisdom under other Figures than that of a Person I mean under the Figure of a Palm-tree an Olive-tree a Vine c he sums up what he had said in these words All these things are the Book of the Covenant of the most High even the Law which Moses gave Can the Law given by Moses be call'd more expresly not only an Olive-tree or a Vine but also the Word which came out of the Mouth of the most High and Wisdom which God created before the World Which are Expressions visibly figurative the which under the Fiction of a Person or the Figure of a Vine represent the Wisdom of God to us sometimes as revealing it self in the Creation of the World and again as replenishing Men with the Fruits of its Knowledg in the Dispensation of the Law This kind of Fictions was familiar to the Moralist Jews and to all the Oriental Philosophers You must be purblind if you discern not immediately the Genius of that People accustom'd to a figurative and parabolick Stile St. John imitates the Moralist Jews and according to the same Ideas hath at one view represented to us the Word or Wisdom of God manifesting himself to Men in two of the greatest of his Dispensations viz. in the Old and the New Creation The Method is the same absolutely you need only put the Gospel or the Author of the Gospel instead of Moses and the Law You may really see him join these two things together viz. The Wisdom of God residing in God himself and presiding at the Creation of the World and the same Wisdom descending upon J. C. in whom it was as it were incarnated and ordering the New World For if according to the Hebrews the Law was the Wisdom or the Word or Precept by way of Excellency much more doth this great Elogium belong to the Gospel namely to be the Word the Wisdom the Truth the Light and the Life by way of excellency An Elogium consequently belonging to J. C. who brought the Word and the Life and was the great Teacher of Truth Whatever the Scripture saith of the First Creation
God And behold here the ground of my Allegory viz. that the Holy Spirit who insinuated himself into J. C. becoming his Director and Master may justly be compar'd to the Son of the Family but J. C. himself having always obeyed the Holy Spirit must be compared to a Servant It is therefore in Allegory that J. C. is the Servant and so likewise in Allegory that the Holy Spirit is the Son of God It is in Allegory that the Church is the first of all the Creatures and consequently in Allegory that the Son of God is more antient than all the Creatures and that he assisted at the Council of God The whole is Allegory in Hermas the whole is Vision Similitude and Parable there The Faith in his Writings Simil. 9. § 13 and 15. and all the other Vertues are called Holy Spirits he ushers them in like Virgins well apparel'd kissing the Son of God who also lie with Hermas himself as with a Brother The Fiction of Persons is so familiar to this Author that if you would find a Person of the Trinity there you shall but catch at a shadow Let it then be acknowledged by all that we ought not to look for any thing but Allegories and Similitudes in this Book of his bearing the same Title Whereas in the second Book entituled the Commandments where the Doctrines are set forth more simply he speaks not from the very first Commandment but of one God the Creator which is the whole Idea he gives us of this supreme Being without any mention of three Persons of an eternal Generation or Incarnation Which demonstrates that he had a different Idea from that of a Consubstantial Trinity or of three equal Hypostases whatever he said elsewhere of the Father Son and Holy Ghost But as this Allegory of Hermas touching Christ misled the Platonic Fathers who took it literally being prejudiced by the Philosophy they were brought up in There is another in the sixth Commandment by which they were no less impos'd on There is saith he two Genius's in Man the one of Justice the other of Iniquity The Greek had it no doubt two Angels and so this Passage is read in the Translator of Origen Hom. 35. in Luc. duos Angelos Hereupon the Fathers have gravely handed down to us that there are two Angels the one of Good the other of Evil that attend a Man from his Birth Just as they have told us that the Angels fell in Love with the Daughters of Men having mistaken the Allegory of the Souls that delight to abide in our Bodies But let the Fathers talk on This being taken in a literal sense is ridiculous and contrary to Scripture especially the evil Angel Can it be doubted here that Hermas intended only to allegorize upon the twofold Inclination in Men towards Good and Evil It is certain that the Chaldeans Jews and Mahometans as also some Pagan Philosophers did affect such like Allegories and personalized these two Inclinations Every thing was an Angel to the Jews especially with the Pharisees when they disputed against the Sadduces who denied their Existence As to the Heathens we have shewn before that the Wisdom of Socrates was his Demon and Genius We have stumbled at this Oriental Philosophy which allegorized upon every thing spiritualized and personalized all It is by the like Mistake that gross Platonism took literally what the subtil Platonism said only in Allegory and made three Hypostases of the three Divine Powers concurring in the Creation of the World Now these Divines who turn'd these two Inclinations in Man into two Angelical Persons are the same that metamorphosed the Power of God which created the World into a Divine Person a Son begotten of God and consubstantial with his Father Will you trust 'em still and boast notwithstanding of the Acuteness and Penetration of our Age yet foolish enough to be besotted with all these Chimeras Shall we never comprehend that what Moses said in a literal sense that by the Word of God or his Command all things were created in the beginning the Apostles spake it in a mystic sense of J. C. who is the Word of the Father which created all things to wit in the new Creation having put all things into a new Form and Order as well the Angels in Heaven as the Men here on Earth It is evident by Clemens Romanus that the Antients made use of continual allusions to the first Creation wherein they sought for a mystic sense in reference to the second performed by J. C. In his second Ep. c. 1. he speaks thus of our Redemption When we were without Understanding and worshipped Stone and Wood God had pity on us for he call'd us when we were not in being and would have us to pass from no Being into a Being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Without doubt he speaks of the New Creation and that in Terms as strong as were used in reference to the First causing us to pass from no Being into a Being as if we were form'd out of nothing when we were reformed by the Gospel These Terms seem to be absolute but we ought not to be deceived by them and will do well if we seek here for a comparative sense considering that Authors neglect very often to use the Particles denoting this Figure which soften the Expression as for example As it were That we may say so If I may speak thus All may perceive that if Clement had said of J. C. as he might have done That he called us when we were not in Being and made us to exist out of Nothing these Words would have been stretched as if they attributed our Creation out of Nothing to J. C. It would have been said Behold here J. C. particularly described to be him that calls Things not in being as if they were Now by a stronger Inference this sense ought to be given them seeing they were spoken of the Father who is the Creator of Heaven and Earth yet we must agree however herein for the Scope of the Subject requires it that they intend only the New Creation and consequently must own that when the Sacred Authors and their Disciples seem to attribute the Creation of all Things to J. C. we have the same Reason to look on such like Expressions as Allegories which set before our Eyes the forming of the New Creature by Representations drawn from the old Creation The same Clement Ep. 1. c. 12. allegorizeth upon the Scarlet Rope of Rahab Good Criticks do not question this tho he speaks as if his Allegoric Sense were the only true one for he praiseth not only the Faith but also the Prophecy of this Woman declaring by it the future Redemption by the Blood of J. C. This Allegory of Clemens saith Cotelier in his Notes is approved of by many of great Note quoting the Fathers that followed him therein Note he calls it an Allegory altho in Clement it hath all the Air of a simple and natural Sense
It 's well known that the Latin Church has always read which was manifested in the Flesh We may be well assured that the whole Greek Church did not read otherwise by Gelazius of Cizicus's putting this Reading into the Mouths of the Fathers of the Nicene Council He says that Macarius Bishop of Jerusalem answering the Argument of a Philosopher cited this Passage of St. Paul But how In the same manner as we read it in the Vulgar Latin The Mystery of Godliness is great which was manifested in the Flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But that Father not fully satisfied with the Letter of the Text added this Gloss that is to say The Son of God a perfectly Spiritual Exposition which being since slid into the Text gave birth to our present Reading God manifested in the Flesh And here an Allegorical Exposition is again taken for an express Text of Scripture It is the same with the Word some one having allegorized according to the Custom of that time on the Words of Moses And God said or on those of the Psalmist My Heart hath uttered a good Word or on those of St. John In the beginning was the Word c. and having expressed his Allegory in too absolute Terms there needed no more to Men prepossessed with false Platonism to make them regard such an allegorical Exposition as the Doctrine of the Church The same thing that happen'd among the Hereticks has also fallen out among those who call themselves Orthodox And we need not wonder that the same Platonism which both the one and the other made profession of cast them both into the same Wandrings This is what I mean and my Conjecture comes near to Demonstration We have seen that Valentine a great Sectary of Plato having allegoriz'd on Divine Ideas and Dispensations and having spoken of them under the Fiction of as many Persons his Disciples not understanding his Allegory made Personal Substances of those feigned Persons If Valentine's Followers misunderstood the sense of their Master can we doubt but that the same thing happened to the Platonist Fathers in their misapprehending the allegorical way of philosophizing used by their Predecessors and in converting mere Divine Manifestations into Personal Substances For my part I do not at all doubt of their having imitated each other The Doctors of both sides had at the same time the same Ideas viz. the Principles of refin'd Platonism delighting in Allegory and the Fiction of Persons And the Disciples of each Party at the same time chang'd their Masters Ideas and fell into gross Platonism which finds Hypostases in every thing Whatever Party Men happened to be ingag'd in they rarely miss following the then prevailing Philosophy and suting themselves to the Humour and Genius of that Age. When Allegory was in vogue all as well Orthodox as Hereticks allegoriz'd each with reference to his own System some under the Fiction of Three Aeons and others under that of Thirty So also when gross Platonism had prevailed all delighted in Hypostases and follow'd the Philosophy in fash on 'T is the Fate of Hypostases the Hamour of the Age regulates them Thus refined Platonism degenerated into gross Platonism and allegorical Expositions into a gross literal Sense It often happening that Disciples much misunderstand their Masters or go further than they to say something new But to conclude which way soever Innovation begins it passes in very little time from Sect to Sect Heathens Hereticks Orthodox all embrace the new Method Their Doctrines are different but their manner of philosophizing on those Doctrines is alike and uniform Perhaps they may not agree in the Nature of what they call Principles nor in their Names Number or Order nor on their Age or Excellence nor in their other Qualities and Prerogatives but however it be with these they shall all agree that they are Hypostases Personal Substances because the Philosophy of the Age requires it CHAP. XIX A Digression concerning the pretended unalterable Faith of the Church T IS pretended that the Church is so faithful a Guardian of the Tradition that it cannot be liable to these sorts of Changes But one must have a slender Acquaintance with Antiquity and less Experience of what happens every day to deceive ones self with so wretched an Answer The Church is jealous of certain Terms and she is a faithful Repository that 's agreed But provided one does not meddle with the Terms which she holds sacred and inviolable one may change the Hypotheses as much as one pleases and they have been changed with Impunity and without giving much Trouble to the Church Dr. Wallis and Dr. Sherlock hold two Hypotheses directly opposite to one another for the first urges so strongly the Vnity of God that he loses the Trinity of Persons and the latter willing to maintain the Trinity has quite lost the Vnity One of these two no matter which has changed the Tradition Let the Church speak therefore and declare herself if she can for one of these Hypotheses Let her condemn and anathematize the other let her chastize the Authors of it and cast them out of her Bosom No she will nor do it she is not concerned whither a false Hypothesis may lead her provided it does not change her Terms which are Sacred and her Favourites For instance suppose that it has always been believed hitherto that three Persons signify but three Modes or three Relations or three Differences c. You may say notwithstanding without fearing the good Matron will formally declare himself that three Persons are no less than three Spirits and three Beings provided you retain the Terms she uses in her Prayers and say devoutly with her O holy blessed and glorious Trinity three Persons and one God have Mercy upon us miserable Sinners The Reason is plainly this she is very quick at hearing if you pronounce these Words one God and three Persons But with what Modesty will she judg of the sense of those Terms having no certain Idea for ' em If instead of three Persons I say four or five the Church will declare me an Heretick this is all she can do In short whether these three Persons are three Modes or three distinct Substances this is a Theology too nice and curious for the Church's Decision and as to this she leaves all her Children to their Liberty of believing as they can The Church has been always the same without doubt she might condemn as Hereâ—â—â—â— those who reckoned thirty Persons or thirty Aeons in the Divine Essence as the Gnosticks did But for others who did but change three feigned and allegorical Persons into three personal Substances she has let them alone or rather she has allowed them as her dear Children to accommodate and sure her to the prevailing Philosophy the better to draw into her Communion the grossest Platonists who made a great Figure in the Schools Isaac Vossius in his second Letter to Rivet goes farther and ventures to say
twofold Operation the one manifest which is Jesus Christ in the Flesh the other secret or hidden which is the Holy Spirit the one by way of Manifestation the other by way of Communication But after all 't is but a twofold Operation of one and the same Power I forbear to take notice of divers other Testimonies of Tertullian of the like kind as for instance at the beginning of his Book concerning Prayer in his Dispute against Marcion lib. 3. cap. 6 16. and in his Discourse of the Flesh of Jesus Christ cap. 19. the Reader may consult 'em if he pleases To the foremention'd Authoritys from Tertullian I will subjoin that of Novatian de Trinitate cap. 19. That which chiefly constituted the Son of God says he was the Incarnation of the Word of God which was formed by means of that Spirit of whom the Angel said the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. For this is the true Son of God who is of God who uniting himself to the Son of Man makes him by that Union the Son of God which he was not before So that the main reason of this Title the Son of God arises from that Spirit of the Lord which descended How the Word of God incarnate by means of that Spirit which descended on Mary Is the second Person incarnate by means of the third Very good Divinity Is it not rather this Divine Operation that bears the Name of the Word which manifested it self in the Flesh of Jesus Christ by means of the Holy Spirit which insinuated it self into that Flesh That is to say that which is called the Spirit on account of its Substance is at the same time called the Word on account of its Manifestation and its Operation For this reason Novatian places not the chief ground of the Filiation of Jesus Christ in a Word which was a different Hypostasis from the Spirit but in the Word which is the Operation of that Spirit of whom the Scripture speaks saying the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. And it would not be understood what the Fathers mean when they confound the Word with the Spirit that over-shadowed the Virgin or when they distinguish these two Powers if it be not laid down for a Rule that by the Spirit they understand the very Nature of the Spirit the Principle or Source whence Prophecy comes and by the Word a certain and particular Operation of that Spirit as for instance the miraculous Conception of our Saviour I have yet an antient Doctor to alledg and he not of the meanest Rank I mean St. Cyprian who does not make any distinction between the Word the Spirit the Son of God the Wisdom c. This Father having cited the second Psalm de Mont. Sina Zion adv Jud. cap. 2. where he speaks of the King whom God had anointed on Mount Sion 'T is upon this Mountain says he that the Holy Spirit the Son of God was establish'd King to proclaim the Will and the Empire of God his Father and in the fourth Chapter of the same Discourse the Flesh of Adam says he which J. C. bore in a Figure that Term has a Tang of Marcion's Heresy this Flesh was call'd by his Father the Holy Spirit which came down from Heaven the Christ the anointed of the Living God a Spirit united to Flesh The same Father elsewhere in his Discourse de Idolor vanit cap. 6. expresses himself thus The Word and the Son of God is sent whom the Prophets had forespoken of as the Instructor of Mankind He is the Power of God his Reason his Wisdom and his Glory the Holy Spirit hath put on Flesh God is mingled or united with Man The Holy Spirit is the Son of God and at the same time the Word is the Son of God and which is more the Flesh of J.C. is called the Holy Spirit which came down from Heaven which could not be true but of its Celestial Origin and as it was formed by the Holy Spirit So that Cyprian seems to intimate thereby that 't is because of this Celestial Origin that the Scriptures say the Flesh of J. C. came down from Heaven that the Son of Man came down from Heaven for it may be very well said that J.C. came down from Heaven since his Origin was from Heaven in his Birth by the Holy Ghost And what is the Holy Spirit but the Word according to this Father The Word is the Holy Spirit which united it self to Man the Word is the Holy Spirit which put on Flesh In short 't is the Holy Spirit which is the Christ of God You 'll say what hinders but the second Person in the Trinity may have also the Name of the third That 's pure Fancy Why should one shut ones eyes when one sees as clear as the day that St. Cyprian alludes to the miraculous Conception of our Saviour and that these sublime Expressions of that Father have no other Foundation but that Mystery As for what Lactantius affords us I hope his Authority will not be contested with me in the decision of a Point wherein he does no more than confirm a Tradition elsewhere well supported and followed This pious Person having said in his Institutions lib. 4. c. 6. That God begat a Holy Spirit which he call'd his Son he resumes this Discourse in the 12th chap. of the same Book thus This Spirit of God says he coming down from Heaven made choice of a pure and holy Virgin into whose Womb he insinuated himself and this Virgin conceived being full of the Holy Spirit which embrac'd her That which Lactantius expresses by these Words descended on a Virgin can it be any other than that which St. Luke expresses in these The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee But the Holy Ghost of whom the Angel speaks is the same according to Lactantius with that Holy Ghost which God begat and which he called his Son Dr. Bull tells us the Fathers understood by the Holy Ghost the Divine Nature of J. C. Very well but why so If not for this Cause that J. C. had no other Divinity than that Spirit of Power and Holiness which form'd his Body in the Womb of a Virgin For in short the Fathers speak after this manner when they explain these words The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee c. or allude to them and always with regard to his Birth of a Virgin But the Holy Spirit in this Passage Luke 1. 35. signifies most certainly that Power which we Trinitarians call the third Person And if the Fathers had a mind to find the second there as is said there 's no knowing what the Words signify for it must be affirmed that they have strangely mistaken the Scriptures and in so unaccountable manner as I may say that there is no longer any certainty to be met with in their Writinâ—â—â—â—ll's in Confusion as in the antient Chaos There 's nothing whereby to discover the Names of the
Divine Persons nor by consequence the Persons themselves Be it as it will the Doctor will find it hard enough to apply his Solution to all the Arguments I am about to mention And if he can do it 't will be no more difficult for him to find the Divinity of J. C. in all the Passages of the Gospel where mention is made of the Holy Ghost I hope also that at last he 'l say that when J. C. promis'd his Holy Spirit to his Apostles he promis'd them his Divine Nature But I must beg my Reader 's Patience a little longer to see what Answer the Doctor will make against the last Authority I am going to alledg And that 's a Letter of the Council of Sardis in the second Book of Theodoret's Hist Eccles The Fathers there drew a Creed in three very distinct Articles the first concerning the Father the second the Son and third Article the Holy Ghost In the last which is so expresly distinguished from that of the Son they speak thus of the Incarnation by the Holy Ghost We believe also there is a Holy Spirit or Paraclet which the Lord promis'd and sent He did not suffer but the Man whom he assumed or took from the Virgin Mary he suffer'd because he was capable of it whereas God is immortal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Is passus non est Where one sees the Pronoun 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 agrees with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is a Neuter Now of this Spirit the Fathers say he cannot suffer but 't was Man whom he put on and took from the Virgin that did suffer This they speak I say of the Paraclet whom they confess after the Father and the Son and not of the Divine Nature of J. C. A Passage express and formal which clearly proves these Doctors understood nothing else by the Holy Ghost but that Power of God whereof the Word is the Manifestation and the Operation confounding the Spirit with the Word and very distinctly assuring us that the Paraclet was incarnate Is the Paraclet the Divine Nature of J. C. or the second Person of the Trinity Here we 'll wait the Doctor 's Answer Valesius not bearing with this Incongruity in the Council had the Boldness to corrupt this Passage in his Version by foisting in the word Christ for thus he has translated it He did not suffer but the Man whom Christ put on The Word Christ is not in the Text which intirely relates to the Holy Ghost or Paraclet In short that Word ruines the whole sense of the Period and strangely confounds all this third Article which belongs only to the Holy Ghost and is distinct from that concerning J. C. Both Translators and Copists are guilty of Falsification in this particular Give me leave to affirm one thing and that is that the Antients have often distinguished the Holy Spirit from the Power of the Highest whereof he is speaking in the same Text calling the latter the Word of God the Son of God and saying only of the former that he overshadowed the Virgin Now even this shews that by the Word they understood nothing but the Power and the Operation of the Holy Spirit which is the same thing with the Power and Operation of the Highest The Holy Spirit signifying the Substance and the Power of the Highest signifying the Operation it follows that the Word which is the Power of the Highest according to the Fathers is not otherwise distinguished from the Holy Spirit than as the Operation is distinguished from its Subject We may conclude therefore from Proofs so very evident that the Antients who have deified J. C. had no other ground for their Theology but the Birth of J. C. of a Virgin by the Holy Ghost that by the Word and the Son of God they always understood this miraculous Operation and that they never advanced any higher in their Discourses towards that which is called an eternal Generation CHAP. XII An Account of the Foundation of the Allegorical Theology of the Fathers concerning the Word and the Holy Spirit I Dare assure my Reader that I can shew him the very Foundation of this Allegorical Theology 'T is known that the Fathers imitated the Gnosticks in many things and particularly in the way of Allegory and Contemplation But 't was Mark the Valentinian as we are inform'd by Irenaeus lib. 1. cap. 12. who was the Author of the Allegorical Exposition on the Birth of J. C. that is the first who elevated it to a sense of Contemplation and Mystery He makes a Quaternity of the Man and the Church which are the first Pair and of the Word and Life which are the second Pair But what sort of Theology does he couch under this Enigma or Allegory Why nothing less than the wonderful Conception of J. C. The Man says he is the Power of the Highest because that acted instead of the Man The Church is the Holy Virgin because she held the place of the Church The Angel Gabriel was instead of the Word and the Holy Spirit instead of Life Nothing can better convince us of the Allegory us'd by the Valentinians than this Passage in which the Angel is the Word and the Spirit is the Life the Power of the Highest is instead of the Man and the Virgin is instead of the Church I might also have produc'd this Passage for a Proof when I was arguing this Point but I have reserv'd it on purpose for this place to shew that the whole Mystery of the Word reduces it self to the miraculous Conception of our Saviour upon which both the Hereticks and the Orthodox have equally allegorized each taking his Flight as his Contemplation led him on And this is that famous Theology so much extolled by the Fathers I know most of them being entangled with their Platonism have mightily embroiled the first and antient Ideas of this matter But I know also that before they came to make two Hypostases of the Word and the Holy Spirit they were terribly perplexed about the latter and could not tell what to do Hence it was without doubt that they so long delayed the deifying of the Holy Ghost The Council of Nice has not at all touched upon its Divinity So far were they from it and the Holy Ghost made so small a Figure at that time that some Fathers of the Council made no difficulty to give its place to the Blessed Virgin by making her the third Person in the Trinity Of which we are informed by Elmacinus and Patricides in Hotting Orient Hist lib. 2. p. 227. The Council of Constantinople durst not speak openly upon the point And in S. Basil's time there was a little Shiness in calling the Holy Ghost directly and formally God 'T is worth our regard what Petavius de Trinit lib. 2. c. 7. § 2. says hereupon The Catholic Church says he accommodating it self for prudential Reasons to human Frailty came not to the full Profession of some
Men because if I may say so these Dispensations were the Figures of the great Oeconomy of J. C. or rather of God the Father manifesting himself in the Flesh of his Son Therefore Irenaeus calls it the Dispensation which was from the Beginning You may see what Vossius saith in his Notes concerning these Allegories of Barnabas and the other Fathers It is known by all saith he how these first Christians interpreted the Scriptures after a mystic and superstitious manner I was like to say childish and foolish Cotelier saith almost the same and shews their Absurdities But take this along with you that these dull Allegories did not by far so much Mischief as that Christianity in Masquerade which some other Fathers borrowed from Plato It is of these you may more justly say than of the Allegorists according to one of our Criticks that the Day these good Fathers were writing so many philosophic Visions they voided a Purge Purgamentum aliquod cacasse Let us now come to Hermas who is as well stored with Visions and Parables as Barnabas At least his Method is the same In his Parable or Similitude the 9th § 12. he saith That the Rock is the Son of God now the Rock is of old because the Son of God is more antient than any Creature inasmuch as he assisted in the Council of his Father in order to form the Creature All this is said in a mystic and an allegoric sense to explain that the Father did all in regard to his Son and the new Creation The Author having said as much in his first Vision § 4. concerning the Church for asking of the Angel Why the Church of God is an old Woman the Angel answers because she was the first thing that was created and that it was by reason of her the World was made It is likely in the Greek it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Translator rendered not per illam but propter illam You see then that this Father saith no more of J. C. than he doth of the Church and that these Words antiquior omni Creatura mean the same thing with anus prima omnium creata which are true only in a mystic sense but false in the Letter Consequently then J. C. is from the Beginning in the same sense that the Church is so I mean in the Decree and Design of God which the Author expresseth by his being in the Council of the Father which he borrowed manifestly from the Author of the Book of Wisdom I shall now produce a remarkable Instance of the Alteration that ensued as to the Tenent it self notwithstanding the Terms remained the same You see that Hermas saith here the Son of God is more antient than any Creature and that he speaks so allegorically Let us get over one Age or two and you shall see Origen making use of the same Expression but in an Arian sense The Holy Scriptures saith he Lib. 5. contra Cels discover the Son of God to us as the most antient of all the Creatures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He means that he was created a little before the World but let us return to our Subject Justin Martyr who first taught the Pre-existence of the Word imitating the Notion of Hermas did teach the Pre-existence of Christians no less than that of Christ himself whilst Apol. 2. he saith That all those who were Partakers of the Word or Reason as well Greeks as Barbarians were Christians and consequently Christians did not commence yesterday or to day but were always and every where a principio saith he from the beginning attributing to them the very Prerogative of the Word it self These good Men turn'd themselves every way to ward off the Reâ—roach of Novelty wherewith Christianity was charged In like manner Eusehius endeavouring to prove that the Christian Religion was not new maintains that the Patriarchs profest it and that it was instituted from the beginning Hist Eccles Lib. c. 4. Thus much he cannot advance but in a mystic sense as he observes it himself because all those who acted justly and served that God who is above all were Christians Consequently then Christ could not converse otherwise with them but in the same manner as they professed Christianity which cannot be true but by way of Analogy and Accommodation Christ then pre-existed as the Christian Religion and Christians did pre-exist Let us return to Hermas It is manifest that he allegoriz'd even by his entituling his third Book where he speaks of the Pre-existence of J. C. Similitudes or Parables which carry on throughout spiritual and mystic senses as is evident by Similitude 5. where he explains the Parable of the Father of a Family in a theological manner in relation to the Father the Holy Ghost and the Son The Father in the Plan of his Allegory is the Landlord the Holy Spirit is the Son of the Houshold and he who out of Allegory is called the Son is but a Servant in the Allegory The Landlord saith he is the same who created all things the Son is the Holy Ghost and the Son of God is the Servant He goes on and adds a little after The Holy Ghost insinuated himself into the Body wherein God was to dwell and this Body whereinto the Holy Ghost did insinuate himself having served the Holy Ghost and having been faithful to him always did obtain the Approbation of God by his Labours and Obedience By the Holy Ghost cannot be meant here the second Person which is called the Divine Nature of J. C. as Dr. Bull pretends for who sees not that Hermas speaks here of that Spirit of Sanctification which prepared the Body of J. C. for Prophecy and consecrated it for a Temple for God to dwell in And seeing this Idea of the Holy Spirit 's being infus'd into the Body of J. C. is so conformable to what the Holy Scriptures deliver concerning it you must be very extravagant if you think that Hermas differed from it Besides what could he mean if his sense were the same with that Dr. Bull attributes to him Would he introduce two Sons of God so opposite one to the other The one who serves and obeys and the other who is served and obeyed and what is yet more strange two Sons of God in the self-same Person of J. C. our Lord. The Son saith Hermas is the Holy Spirit and the Son of God is the Servant Now if the Divine Nature of J. C. be denoted by the Spirit and that the Servant signifies the Human Nature you will have two Sons according to the very Letter Thus the Orthodox embroil all things to fish for Mysteries in Troubled Water whereas nothing is more clear than the meaning of Hermas He allegorizeth and would say By him whom the Parable calls the Son I mean nothing else but the Holy Spirit and by him whom the Parable calls a Servant I mean J. C. our Lord who out of the Parable is the proper Son of
Principle of his Son whom he has made Lord. But the Son is the God of all the Creatures because God the Father has set him at their Head when he made him Lord. Whence it follows that Jesus Christ may well be called God when you consider him at the head of the New Creation which God has subjected to his Dominion But this Title vanishes when the Apostle St. Paul is speaking of the Father and the Son together then the Son can have no other Character but what is fully signified and explain'd in the Notion of God's Minister and Embassador So true is it that before the only True and Supreme God every other Deity must fall down and disappear So that Bp Pearson had reason to say that Ignatius imitates St. Paul for he says in his Epistle to the Ephesians that Jesus Christ was made God in the Flesh which can signify no more than that a Man was raised to Divine Power or Dignity Moreover Ignatius gives Jesus Christ the Title of God without any of those Additions which the Fathers after him make use of He does not call Christ in the Platonick Stile God the Word a God begotten God of God But if it should be said Ignatius has not used the Restrictions of St. Paul and that he calls Christ God simply and absolutely this is not true for he calls him a God made or our God to shew that he is not so but with regard to the Power he received of his Father and exercises over us CHAP. II. The first Fathers did not theologize Jesus Christ i. e. ascribe Divinity to him in the Sense and Terms of the Platonic Fathers who lived in after Ages but merely on the account of his miraculous Birth and Exaltation THAT the most Primitive Fathers gave the Title of God to J. C. in the sense I am about to explain will appear for three Reasons which amount almost to Demonstration My first Reason is taken from the manner wherein Clem. Rom. and Polycarp speak of J. C. Photius says that Clement has given our Saviour the Stile of High Priest but reproaches him for not giving Christ the Characters of a God Is it possible that Clement has done J. C. so great an Injury as not to give him the Character he merits By no means Photius is mistaken and 't is contrary to all reason to imagine so considerable an Omission can be found in a Letter wherein the Church at Rome as Irenaeus tells us lib. 3. c. 2. delivers to the Church of Corinth the Tradition she had received from the Apostles It must be said therefore that this great Critick Photius did not take notice that in the Apostolic Stile of St. Clement the calling J. C. our High Priest and Pontif is the same thing as to call him our God agreeable to the Doctrine of St. Paul who teaches us that when God rais'd his Messias to the Honour of the High Priesthood 't was then he said unto him Thou art my Son this Day have I begotten thee So that there 's nothing in my Opinion more reasonable and just than the Remark of Grotius Epist 347. Par. 2. who proves the Antiquity of this Epistle of St. Clement for this very reason because it does not speak of J. C. in the Platonic Way and Manner as was done by others in after Ages but in a Simplicity or Plainness altogether as St. Paul had spoken As to St. Polycarp one finds in his Epistle the same Character of Simplicity and Plainness as in St. Clement aforesaid which Photius takes notice of in the place forecited And St. Irenaeus l. 3. c. 3. gives Polycarp's Epistle this fair Character That 't is a most compleat and very proper Instruction in the Faith and Doctrine of Truth Yet one meets with no Platonic Titles in this excellent Epistle In vain will you look for these Phrases the Eternal Word the Pre-existence of the Son of God the Generation from the Womb of the Father c. Nay you will not find in this Epistle so much as the Name of God applied to Christ Where then with respect to Christ are Polycarp's Characters of the true Faith and Doctrine Why they are in those Elogies which Polycarp often repeats as that Jesus Christ is the everlasting High Priest that he is the Son of God that the Father hath rais'd him from the Dead and made him to sit at his right Hand For pray observe St. Polycarp's Creed of the Divinity of the Father and the Son To pass over says he the Mistake and Babble of some Persons let us believe in him who rais'd our Lord Jesus Christ from the Dead and hath crowned him with Glory c. Let us keep our selves clear of the vain and false Doctrine of those Persons aforesaid and keep close to the antient Tradition and Word which was left us from the beginning In which Passage this Holy Person being willing to put the Philippians in mind of the vain Discourse of some and to guide 'em to the source of true Tradition which he makes to consist in believing J. C. was deified by his Father he meant no doubt to bring them off from the vain Philosophy of Plato's Second God and to engage them to that Divinity of J. C. which is founded on his Exaltation For 't is clear that Polycarp ealls here by the Name of true and antient Tradition this summary of the Faith expressed in these Terms Believe ye in him who hath raised Jesus Christ our Lord from the Dead c. This Symbol is agreeable to that of the Apostles and is directly opposite to that vain Doctrine he was about to condemn And this Symbol insisting upon nothing but the Glory J. C. acquired by his Sufferings it must necessarily follow that under the Name of Babble or vain Doctrine St. Polycarp censures that vain and false Glory which Platonizing Christians ascribed to Christ by their fancied Pre-existence In short instead of that unintelligible Babble of other Fathers and I know not what Jargon of a Son of God begotten before all Ages and emanated from the Divine Mind which is exactly the reverse of the Gospel Polycarp here speaks of none other Son of God but one who is an everlasting High Priest rais'd to a Sovereign Glory which is the real Gospel the Tradition of the Apostles and the antient Theology My second Proof is drawn from the Consession of the antient Martyrs there can be no doubt but that those faithful Witnesses of J. C. gave his Person the most illustrious and most honourable Testimony that they could and that they heighten'd their Theology as far as they could without the hezard of their Faith Let us hear therefore what as said of 'em in the Acts of those Marty 〈◊〉 St. Polycarp invokes a Trinity but what Trinity three Persons and one God as 't is expressed God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost God forbid He as Euseb tells us Hist lib. 4. c. 16.
J. C. the only Son of God our Lord how I pray is he God's only Son Why that 's explain'd in these Words he was conceiv'd by the Holy Ghost and born of a Virgin his miraculous Generation and Nativity made him a God and how he became our Lord appears in these Words he was raised from the Dead and ascended into Heaven whence he shall come to judge the Quick and the Dead his Obedience and his illustrious Vertue rais'd him to this supreme Dignity These two Articles make up the whole of the antient Theology with respect to the Person of Christ but the latter of the two without dispute was the most important and is only insisted on for our Salvation J. C. never preach'd to the Jews his miraculous Birth but he always proved his Mission from Heaven by Miracles wrought publickly and openly The Apostles in the History we have of their first Sermons have spoken nothing more they insist not on any other Topic concerning their Divine Master but those of his Resurrection and Exaltation St. Paul lost his Life for preaching that last Mystery But in how many Passages does he press as essential and necessary to Salvation the Belief of Christ's Exaltation If thou confessest with thy Mouth that Jesus is the Lord and believest with thy Heart that God hath rais'd him from the Dead thou shalt be saved Rom. 10.9 The earliest Antiquity was of the same Judgment as it appears by two Instances The first is that of Victor Bp of Rome who excommunicated Theodotus altho he believed J. C. was born of a Virgin by the Holy Spirit because as is remarked by the Author of a Catalogue of Heresies suppos'd to be Tertullian Theodotus believed Christ to be a mere Man who had no other Advantage or Prerogative above other Men but what he had from his own Righteousness This is plainly to say that tho he believed him a Man extraordinary in his Birth and his Vertue yet he did not therefore believe him to be that Christ and that Lord whom the Father had rais'd above all other Men and even above Angels whereby Theodotus rejected a fundamental Article of Christianity The other Instance is that of Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho He there owns for his Brethren that there were some Christians of his time who held for a Truth that J. C. was but a mere Man the Son of Joseph and Mary but however believed him to be the Christ which plainly intimates that they did not look upon him barely as a Prophet who only preached Righteousness to the Jews but besides they thought him to be the Messias sent to all Nations and the Lord whom God had made such over all Men and in this they retain'd the fundamental Article of Christianity After this Opinions changed as Pearson before cited has remarked Those says he who wrote just after the purer Ages of the Church borrowed the Sentiments of the Pagans and mingled them with the Christian Religion following those Principles of Philosophy which they had imbibed before they embraced the Christian Religion That was the source of the ensuing Evils the Exaltation of our Saviour which had been esteemed the chief point in Christianity as we have seen in the Writings of Polycarp and Clement was no longer regarded as such But his miraculous Birth was the only Article insisted upon The Reason whereof is plainly this that in their Disputes with the Philosophers they did not so much insist upon the High Offices of the Messias as upon the Excellency of his Nature and Person for they wanted a Parallel with the emanated Word of the Philosophers And indeed this miraculous Birth was much more sutable to the Principles of Plato's Philosophy which enter'd into the Christian Religion upon the Conversion of some Learned Men. An holy Spirit coming down from Heaven upon a Virgin and begetting in her that holy Man who from that is stiled the Son of God An Event I say so extraordinary as this was without doubt the most proper thing in all that Gospel to serve for a Foundation of the Platonic Doctrine 't was easy with a little philosophic Dexterity to find in it the second God the begotten Son the Son of God the Word the Mind or Vnderstanding and in one word the whole Train of the Platonic Preexistence Ignatius Justin Martyr and Irenaeus began with an Accommodation of these Terms more or less You may see in their Writings not that naked downright Platonism as one sees in Origen for example and Clemens Alexandrinus but Platonism in disguise which appeared in the Mask of Christian Religion Plato's Logos or Word and the Holy Spirit which overshadowed the Virgin Mary always keep company in their Writings For this Passage in St. Luke The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee c. one shall meet with blended throughout with their starch'd and most affected Speculation The Platonic Opinion did not enter all at once into Christianity which then would have been sensible of the Innovation but crept in by little and little under the Mask of Explication and Illustration Any change in the Christian Religion was not intended hereby but to set it off to the best advantage and make it fit for the 〈◊〉 of the Philosophers And hereupon they went on philosophizing upon a point incontestably Christian viz. upon the Sovereign Power that form'd the Body wherein Jesus dwelt till they quite lost the sight of it The Philosophers could not endure that so plain a Doctrine as that of J. C. should pretend to combat their Notions They always twitted the Christians with the Unskillfulness Coarseness and Ignorance of their Writers The Christians asham'd of this Reproach endeavour'd to obviate it Some coming fresh from the Pagan Schools made a show of their Learning and mingled it with the Christian Doctrine Others applied themselves so well to human Learning to Rhetorick and Philosophy that they excelled and â—iâ—ied the Pagans but at the eâ—pence of the Christian Religion the Simplicity of which they alter'd I say to obviate the Reproach aforesaid they made use of two Expedients first they dressed up suppositions Pieces containing the most subtil and most refin'd Philosophy and publish'd them under the Names of Dionysius the Areopagite Clemens Romanâ—â— and many others To make it appear that the first Preachers of Christianity were not 〈◊〉 illiterate aâ— was supposed this very Observation is made even by Mons Daille and Dr. Cave Yet those sparious Pleces published for the Credit of the pretended Authors among the Pagans under great Names had this effect besides that they adulterated the Christian Religion In the second place those platonizing Doctors 〈…〉 pted the Simplicity of the Gospel by their Allegories and other Helps to Contemplation to heighten the Christian Doctrine by sublime Terms and profound Notions Thus by the force of a philosophic Management of the Doctrine of the Generation of the Son of God by the Operation of the Holy Spirit this Point
and of Spirit begotten and unbegotten made a God in the Flesh the true Life in Death born of Mary and of God This Father arguing against the Josephites does not oppose to their Error the eternal Generation of the Son of God but his Birth of a Virgin by the Holy Spirit I would say he does not speak of a God incarnate but of a Man who was made God in the Flesh that is to say who was born a God or made a God by his Birth because he was born of God and of the Virgin Mary In this Sense Ignatius assures us that our Physician is partly Flesh and partly Spirit since by his wonderful Conception he partook equally of the fleshly or Human and of the Spiritual and Divine Nature He adds this Physician is begotten and unbegotten since he was begotten of a Woman like other Men and at the same time unbegotten having no Man for his Father Lastly he says that this Physician was born of the Virgin Mary and of God which explains all the rest for 't is as much as to say that he was born of the Virgin Mary by the Power of the Spirit of God and not by her Intercourse with Joseph This word God as you may see being there manifestly oppos'd to Man or to Joseph Jesus Christ our God as Ignatius further says in the same Epistle was conceived of the Virgin Mary according to the Divine Dispensation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being in truth of the Seed of David but by the intervention of the Holy Spirit Where one sees the same Antithesis continued which we observ'd in the foregoing Passage that is between God and Mary and between the Seed of David and the Power of the Spirit The true Oeconomy according to Ignatius is not the Incarnation of the Supreme God but the miraculous Conception of the Messiah who is both God and Man by his Birth of a Woman by the Power of God This is a Physician who was made God in the Flesh being born of the Virgin Mary and of God of David and of the Holy Spirit This is the true Divine Dispensation this is the great Mystery of the Christians The same Author in his Epistle to the Church of Smirna presents us with another Passage sutable to this occasion For thus he speaks of Jesus Christ That he was truly of the Race of David or the Son of David according to the Flesh but the Son of God according to the Will and Power of God in that he was truly born of a Virgin Monsieur Daillé having mark'd out this Passage of Ignatius as Heretical since he makes the Generation of the Son to depend on the Will and Power of the Father Bp Pearson gives this account of it in his Vindic. Ignat. Par. 2. c. 9. That 't is clear this Father does not speak of the Eternal Generation of the Son but of his Incarnation which as the World owns was by the Will and Power of God For which reason adds Pearson the Interpolator having a mind to pervert these Words by applying 'em to the Divine Nature he was forc'd to change their Order 'T is sufficient that this Learned Person affirms that in this Passage there 's nothing of an eternal Generation and that Ignatius speaks not but of Jesus Christ in allusion to the Words of the Angel The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee c. Wherefore that which c. shall be called the Son of God 'T is enough that he owns this Conception was so wonderful as to intitle Jesus Christ to the Name and Dignity of the Son of God As for the word Incarnation which Ignatius does not use we 'll excuse it in Pearson 't is a Term of art unknown to the good Father and signifies in the Platonizing Divinity that the Supreme God was made Man And if it be certain that Ignatius did not speak in this Passage but of the miraculous Conception of Jesus Christ can it be doubted whether he discours'd upon that same Subject and by no means on the eternal Generation in the two other Passages I am about to cite and which are very like to this here In the mean time Dr. Bull has the rashness to produce them for a Proof of that which he calls the two Natures of our Saviour that is that of a Supreme God and that of a Man like one of us in his Judic Eccles p. 5 seq Who would not wonder at the Artifice of Divines who have the Skill to pervert these Passages to serve their Notion of the Eternal-Generation We can furthermore shew you the Footsteps of this plain antient Divinity in other of the Fathers who Platonize more than Ignatius as in Justin and Irenaeus But we shall have another opportunity of examining the Theology of those two Fathers at present the Passage in Ignatius will suffice whereby to judg of the rest The only Reflection that remains is that Ignatius having so often distinguish'd between the Son born of God and of Mary and the Son born of David and the Holy Spirit 't is upon this Foundation that the distinction of the two Natures in Christ is founded in the true sense of it or if you please his twofold Filiation the one Divine the other Human. He is the Son of God says the Author of the Questions and Answers to the Orthodox Quest 66. in that he was born of the Holy Spirit and the Son of Joseph in that he was born of Joseph's Wife 'T is in this the Mystery consists He was born of Joseph's Wife this is but a legal Filiation with regard to Joseph and he was born of the Spirit of God this is a proper and natural Filiation with respect to God So that in this last respect it may be said that he is truly Light of Light and God of God I have already said it and I 'll repeat it again The Fathers thought that the Holy Spirit which overshadowed the Virgin Mary in some sort united it self to the Flesh of Jesus Christ so as never to be separated from it and 't is upon this perpetual Inhabitation that they have philosophized in their manner upon the two Natures of our Saviour Grotius aim'd at this Theology in one of his Notes upon Colos 1.19 The Plenitude of Divine Vertues says he dwelt in Jesus Christ that is to say 't was perpetually and inseparably united and not by intervals as in the Prophets This is what 's called the Hypostatick Vnion This in effect is the personal Union of the Divine with the Human Nature even this Shekinah or this perpetual Inhabitation of the Spirit of God in Jesus Christ To go farther in quest of other Mysteries betrays a Vanity of Mind The Fathers compriz'd all in what I have said and upon it they built those profound Speculations with which their Books are fill'd If at some times they went farther and spoke of the Word in a manner not agreeable with the ground I have laid down 't is
whether it be by an Angel or by an immediate Virtue is the Holy Spirit And all this is call'd the Oeconomy or as Irenaeus saith they are mysterious and extraordinary Dispensations of the Divinity which environ his Majesty to temper its great Splendor and adapt it to our Curiosity For to imagine that this is a second Person of this Divinity as invisible and as infinite as the first would make all the Reasonings of the antient Fathers not only useless but also absurd for they all unanimously declare not only that the Father never makes himself visible but also that he cannot do so It is impossible saith Eusebius Demonstr Evang. lib. 5. cap. 20. That the Eyes of Mortals should ever see the Supreme God to wit him who is above all things and whose Essence is unbegotten and immutable It is absurd and against all reason saith the same Author Hist Eccl. lib. 1. c. 2. that the unbegotten and immutable Nature of Almighty God should take the Form of a Man and that the Scripture should forge such like Falsities God forbid saith Novatian de Trinit cap. 26. that we should say that God the Father is an Angel lest he should be subjected to him whose Angel he were Et ibid. cap. 31. If the Son saith he were as incomprehensible as the Father the Objection of the Hereticks would have some ground that then there are two Gods It is an Impiety say the Fathers of the Council of Antioch Epist adv Paulum Samosat to fancy that that God who is above all things can be called an Angel Lastly otherwise I must transcribe all the Fathers Justin Martyr explains himself on this wise in his Dialogue with Tryphon No body saith he unless he be out of his Wits will dare to advance that the Father and Author of all things did quit the Heavens to cause himself to be seen in a small part of the Earth I thought to have finished but that I can by no means pass by that excellent Passage of Tertullian against Praxeas cap. 16. That he would not believe that the Sovereign God descended into the Womb of a Woman tho even the Scripture it self should say it This Father being persuaded by Reason and Philosophy that the supreme God is immense immutable and invisible demands how it could come to pass that the Almighty God whose Throne is the Heaven and the Earth his Footstool that this most high God should walk in the terrestrial Paradise should converse with Abraham should call to Moses out of a Bush c. and what is yet worse that he should descend according to Praxeas into the Womb of Mary that he should be impeached before Pilate and be shut up in the Sepulcher of Joseph He goes on Really one would not believe this concerning the Son if the Scripture did not speak it and perhaps would not believe it of the Father tho even the Scripture should say it How so would he mistrust the Scripture No he means only that he should mistrust the literal sense and search there for an Allegory Consequently then all these Fathers own that the Word by which the Father makes himself visible is not of a Nature incapable of causing it self to be seen but something sensible which represents God to us It matters not whether they conceive by it an Hypostasis a Spirit an intelligent Being or any other kind of Representation in a bright Cloud animated with a Voice This will always remain true that they did not understand the Word to be a Spirit equal to the Father as invisible by its Nature as the Father but only a certain Emanation where God produceth himself outwardly and discovers himself in a sensible manner And tho they might have sometimes spoken of the Word as of something invisible they meant not by this that it was invisible by its Nature but only that it was not visible to Men out of the time of its Oeconomy retiring it self from their Presence and becoming as it were hid in God Sometimes they would denote by it even the Energy and the Power of God wherewith his Manifestation is always accompanied but never a second Hypostasis in the Divine Nature For we must observe here sincerely once for all that the Word if you consider it only in its Energy is no other thing but God himself but when it is consider'd as it is a Mark of the Divine Presence then it is something sensible a Voice a Light or some external Form such like as was seen in Angels or in the Man J. C. our Lord. CHAP. II. The Antients believed that the Word was Corporeal WHerefore the Antients attributed a Body to the Word as Servetus very well observed Apolog. ad Philip Melanct. and so Tertullian speaks in his Book of the Flesh of Jesus Christ against Praxeas chap. 7. where he proves at large that when God uttered his Word he gave it a Body indeed not a Body of Flesh but an Hypostasis that is Solidity and Substance which is the true Signification of the Word That 's probably what he means when in chap. 6. of the Book of the Flesh of Christ he assures that Jesus Christ appeared to Abraham with Flesh which was not yet born non nata adhuc that is to say not indeed with such Flesh as ours but with a solid Body which had more than appearance A Body I say which he in the 8th Chapter calls the Seed of God from which as from a Heavenly Seed the Messiah was to be born and this Seed is the Holy Ghost or the Substance of the Word which insinuated it self into it Thence the antient Docetes and all the other Hereticks who held the pre-existence of the Word suppos'd that the Word did not take true Flesh of Mary but that he contented himself with the Celestial and Etherial Body which he formerly bore in the Apparitions of the Old Testament which had no more than the Appearance and Figure of a Man which the Scripture calls the Face of God Mons le Moyne did not understand the thing otherwise in his Varia sacra p. 415. The Docetes says he compared the Apparitions of Jesus Christ to the Apparitions of the Old Testament which having been in Etherial Bodies for certain times vanished into the Air as soon as the Dispensation was finish'd imagining that the Body of Jesus Christ was not of any other Nature And it is in the same sense that Cerinthus and Ebion suppos'd that Jesus Christ had not taken true Flesh as St. Jerom assures in the Preface to his Commentary on St. Matthew As Cerinthus held Iren l. 1. c. 25. Epiph. Haeres 28. That the World had been created by a Power he also maintain'd that Jesus who was begotten of the Seed of Joseph and Mary was the Son of the Creator As to the Christ or the Word he made him the Son of another Power superiour to the Creator and attributed to him a Celestial Body which he had always kept without
is however but one and the same God one and the same Divine Person one God manifesting himself one God communicating himself In a word one God who in communicating himself and in manifesting himself varys his Character according to the diversity of his Oeconomies He changes Oeconomy but as we speak without changing Person for I take this Word here according to the Philosophical Ideas which are the same with those of the common People and not in the sense of Classical Authors according to which it is certain God changes Person as often as he changes Character and Dispensation And indeed whether God clothe himself with a Body of most pure Light an Oeconomy proper for Angels or shew himself to the Patriarchs under transitory Forms an Oeconomy proper for particular Circumstances or make his fix'd abode among us in the Person of his Son an Oeconomy proper for the calling of all Nations it is still the same God one God manifesting himself Again whether God give his Creature Life and Motion or kindle in Man the Light of Reason or inspire Prophets or shed forth an immense Influence upon the Messiah whom he sends to us 't is yet always the same God one God communicating himself 'T is the same who appears every where the same who makes himself to be known by Angels thro the brightness which encompasseth him the same who by his powerful Voice commands all things to come out of nothing and they obey him the same who shews himself to the Patriarchs in momentaneous Apparitions of Angels the same who discovers himself somewhat more plainly when he declares his Counsels to us by the Mouths of his Prophets In fine the same who dwelling in Jesus Christ shews us his Majesty openly in all its fulness if I may so express my self after St. Paul In Jesus Christ says that Apostle dwells the fulness of the Godhead bodily in him greater than the Angels better authorized than Moses and more enlighten'd than the Prophets This is a Mystery of Love and Condescension by which that Supreme and ineffable Being who dwells in Light inaccessible comes and dwells among us and accommodating himself to our weak Apprehension makes himself be heard by our Ears seen by our Eyes and even felt by our Hands CHAP. IV. God reveals himself only by corporeal Representations suted to the Narrowness of our Vnderstanding THIS Oeconomy is general It runs throout the whole Scripture where God with the Goodness of a Father explains his Perfections to us by Representations tending to help our Weakness 1. Because we cannot apprehend his Eternity and how he is necessarily Self-existent He speaks of it as a Man telling us that he was before the Mountains were born before the Heavens were stretched out and the Stars lighted Which by the way overthrows the Objection taken from God's necessary Existence to shew that if we deny the Trinity because it is incomprehensible we should for the same reason also deny this necessary Existence as being no less so I say this Objection does not reach us since the same God who in condescension to us declares his Eternity and Existence by Ideas proportion'd to our Capacitys would not have deliver'd this supposed Trinity to us by Ideas not only incomprehensible but even destructive of his Unity and of the Revelation which he has made of it 2. Because 't is impossible for us to apprehend his Immensity he only makes us conceive it by the Idea of a great King whose Throne is the Heavens and the Earth his Footstool And 3. Because we are incapable of framing any true Idea of his Power and of his other Perfections he speaks of himself as of a Man having Eyes Hands Ears Bowels c. to signify to us his Knowledg Power Mercy Wisdom c. St. Augustin so well understood this Stile of the Scripture that he places among the false Ideas which Men have of the Godhead De Trinit l. 1. c. 1. that which is used to express its Perfections in Terms merely Metaphysical and which are not borrowed from any of the things in being The Scripture says he never used any other than corporeal Similitudes to express the Nature of God to us by not that the thing is so but to shew us that it is necessary to speak so As to things which are not He means which are not in the Creature but are presumptuously supposed to be in God or which have no other Being than only in Philosophical Contemplations which are called Ideas or Entia Rationis the Scripture does not from them take any manner of speaking to mark out the Figures of them to us or to make Enigma's that is Mysteries of them for us Nothing is more dangerous than to imagine that in God which is neither in himself nor in any Creature But the Paraphrase of Mr. Du Pin will be less suspected than my Translation Hist of Eccl. Auth. Tom. 3. p. 467. Par. Edit Thus some says he to form an Idea of God which may have nothing in common with the Creature conceive him in a Chimerical manner The Holy Scripture is accommodated to Mens Weakness in sometimes attributing to God such Expressions as properly sure only to Bodys or to imperfect Spirits and has rarely made use of such Names which are agreeing to God only because it is in this Life very difficult to know the Substance and Essence of the Divine Nature To this Paraphrase I will add a few Words of the same Father ib. c. 12. There is not says he in the Scriptures any manner of speaking but what is us'd among Men because 't is indeed to Men to whom it speaks Minutius Felix discourses almost in the same manner on the Knowledg which we can have of that immense and infinite Nature For after having said that God as he is in himself is known by none by himself He add I will say what I think He who believes he knows God's Greatness diminishes it and he who fears diminishing it does not know it Could he more plainly tell us that we cannot have a right Idea of God but in diminishing his Perfections and contenting our selves to compare them to the highest Idea of Greatness which we can frame of them ourselves Conceiving otherwise of him with Eternity which has neither past nor future with Immensity which fills no space with Trine-unity c. is conceiving chimerically of him Let it then be undisputable That God makes himself known to us only by Characters which are common to him with his Creatures or extremely well proportion'd to our Ideas We have hitherto said that 't is a kind of Figure which represents God to us according to the manner of Men But perhaps it has not been observed that this Stile is grounded on the Angel of God's appearing in his Name and by his Authority who was called his Face his Glory his Habitation and his Presence that is to say who was his Word and his Oracle this Angel I say appearing
most commonly in the Shape and Figure of a Man Some of the Antients were bold enough to say that this Word shew'd himself to the Patriarchs in the same shape of Face with which Jesus Christ should one day appear and they suppos'd as Servetus has well explain'd it lib. 3. p. 108 seq That the Word was no other than God's Person that is to say the Image whereby God manifested himself and that that Image was the very shape of Jesus Christ Man there being according to them but one only Divine Person one only Face one only Representation which has always been the same whether in God's immediately shewing himself in created Light or in Angels or in the Messiah who spake to us in his Name And 't is in this sense that we may say that the Person of the Son is Eternal 'T is easy to apprehend the Mind of the Fathers They meant that the Word was no other than the Idea of Jesus Christ Man who being in God's Understanding from all Eternity was put forth in a visible Form God who designed to manifest himself in time by his Messiah having from the beginning even in the Creation of the Universe given Preludes of his great Design in shewing himself to either Angels or Men only under the visible Form which his Son was in time to have which he describ'd in the Symbol of the Manifestation and of his Presence whether by an Angel by Light or by a Cloud So that to speak properly the Word was made Flesh because the same Power which made the World became the Power of Jesus Christ and the same shape of Face which appear'd to the Patriarchs was made the shape of his Face and the Figure of his Flesh I do not defend this Opinion of the Fathers I only shew what it was without obliging my self to maintain it and this ought likewise to be understood of all their other Hypotheses Be that as it will the Patriarchs being by those kind of Apparitions accustom'd to represent God to themselves in humane Shape God was also pleas'd to speak to them of his Perfections in a manner suted to the Idea of his Person which they had fram'd to themselves Whereon Maimonides observ'd that the Chaldean Paraphrast to rectify that Idea of the Deity uses the Term Word to signify in a less familiar manner the several Dispensations of Providence which the Scripture calls the Eyes Hands and Affections of God It is true that the Paraphrast intending to soften all those Expressions which seem to attribute to God corporeal Parts and human Passions unworthy of his Majesty did in their stead use this Term The Word of God which seems to bring into our Minds more Spiritual Ideas of the supreme Deity But he did not consider that if 't is unworthy of God to have Eyes Hands and Ears attributed to him it will not be less so to give him a Mouth Breath a Voice and Speech So that it must be granted that if by a kind of Figure the Scripture mentions the Eyes of God the Hands of God c. it is by the same Figure that we say the Breath of God and the Word of God Whereby all the Mystery pretended to be found in this latter Expression must vanish and we learn not to philosophize so nicely on the Oeconemies wherein God takes various Forms to make himself the better known to us or on manners of speaking which he has suted to our weak Conceptions CHAP. V. How the Philosophers and particularly Plato attain'd the Knowledg of the three Principles A right understanding of the three Principles IT has been said of the most famous Philosophers Pythagoras Socrates and Plato that they heard the Voice of God Which rightly understood signifies no more than that they had heard that silent Language of the Heavens which publish the Glory of God and declare the Works of his Hands Clemens Alexandr Strom. l. 5. p. 547. who so explains it say further That those Philosophers considering the Structure of the Universe heard Moses himself saying God spake and things were made and teaching them that the Word was the Work of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in truth after throughly philosophizing on the Principles of the World they always came thence to conclude and say that it was the Production of an Universal Reason and of an infus'd Spirit which animated it And they held these first Causes to be the Properties of one only Maker I mean the most perfect Being in philosophizing it was natural first to consider whether the World had always existed or whether it had been made 'T is a Question which Clem. Rom. makes to himself Recognit l. 1. c. 27. Some chose to believe the World's Eternity but they were but few and they follow'd the System of Ocellus Lucanus Other who were wiser and more enlighten'd apprehended that it must have had a beginning and these last philosophiz'd according to the Principles of Time is Lacrus The Question was farther to know how and by whom the World had been made The whole System of the antientest Philosophy run upon this Question The Philosophers made their Enquiries on it and after Attention and Study the most knowing among them heard the Voice of God or the Voice of Nature which taught them that the World was the Workmanship of an infinitely good all-wise and omnipotent God Plato was the first who brought this System to Perfection Thales Hermotimus and Anaxagorus discover'd a Spirit which dispos'd Matter and cloth'd it with its several Forms Socrates added that this Spirit which govern'd the World was the Son of the most high God and then Plato philosophizing yet farther fram'd a kind of Trinity 〈◊〉 Pâ—tav l. 1. c. 1. For he conceiv'd a most good God whom he call'd the Father or the Good most wise whom he call'd the Reason or the Word most powerful whom he call'd the Spirit or Soul of the World But then after all as they are three Perfections which are inseparable from the Idea of the Creator he often confounded their Operations As then these three Properties Goodness Wisdom and Power make up the whole Idea which we have of God with respect to the Creation It 's not to be wonder'd that the soundest Philosophy fix'd on these three first Causes when 't was seeking the Origin of the World by studying and contemplating on the World it self The invisible Grandeurs of God says St. Paul Rom. 1.20 as well his Eternal Power as the other Attributes of his Godhead become as 't were visible in being clearly understood by his Works from the Creation of the World 'T is therefore certain that 't was by beholding these Works that the Author of them was found out and that it was discover'd that they were the effect of Infinite Goodness Wisdom and Power And they went no farther because the System of good Philosophy with respect to the Creation proves compleat with these three Principles as has been already
denied when it is only their irresistible Grace that is rejected which they have been pleas'd to conceit as such Sandius who maintain'd a Word brought forth and stood for the Hypostases yet owns Nucl Hist Eccl. lib. 1. that Marcellus Photinus Sabellius Paul of Samosata and even Ebion who believ'd only an Hypostasis of the Father held notwithstanding that in that Hypostasis alone there were two Energies or Divine Operations to wit the Word and the Holy Spirit and that by these two Operations God created the World and manifested himself in J. C. Petavius acknowledges the same De Trinit lib. 1. c. 13. as to Paul of Samosata and Marcellus Dr. Pearson agrees with him That the last Vind. Ignat. Par. 2. c. 3. believ'd an existent Word in the Hypostasis of the Father and which came forth thence as a single Operation to create the Universe Dr. Bull Judic Eccles c. p. 67. recounting the Opinion of Paul of Samosata attributes to him constantly that he believ'd an efficacious Word descended from Heaven on J. C. And by the Word saith he Paul did not intend that Hypostasis which we call the Son of God but a Power and a Divine Virtue which form'd him in the Virgin and which was closely united to him to work the Miracles he did Neither can it be denied that this was the Opinion of Beryllus Those Expressions of Eusebius that have given so much trouble to the Learned are not difficult to be understood provided you supply them with some Particle and add a word or two as you must sometimes in all other Authors In my opinion Eusebius intends nothing else Lib. 6. c. 33. but that this Bishop maintain'd that the Man J. C. did not pre-exist in another Essence or another Nature that was proper to him before he liv'd among Men And consequently that the Deity which dwelt since he liv'd among Men was not an Hypostasis of his own but the Divinity and Virtue of the Father This is a right Notion the Word is nothing else but a Divine Power distinct from the Son and a Heavenly Wisdom descended on J. C. Beryilus Paul and Marcellus had it perhaps from Ignatius who calls J. C. Epist ad Magnes The Eternal Word that came not forth out of silence i. e. that he was not a Word brought forth and be otten with its proper Hypostasis but the Operation and the essential Virtue of God manifesting himself outwardly For I frankly agree that this Passage of Ignatius which hath given so much trouble to the Abettors of his Epistles is not intended against Valentine but I say it attacks those Platonick Doctors who asserted a Generation of the Word a little before the Beginning of the World and who believ'd that it was brought forth and consequently proceeded out of Silence This was the Opinion of Tertullian and many of the Fathers who preceded him that the Word that was brought forth which they believ'd to be the only that was begotten and the only one that might be call'd the Son did come forth in time of another mute Word which they call'd Reason or Wisdom eternal Tertullian teacheth us positively adv Prax. that before the Word that was brought forth came out of the Wisdom or the Divine Reason God had it in himself in his Thought as a silent Word habebat intra semetipsum tacitè cogitando You cannot express more clearly that the Word brought forth came out of Silence This Opinion no doubt began to glide in at the time of Ignatius who laughs at it and refutes it rejecting this Word brought forth and proceeding out of Silence which receiv'd its Hypostasis a little before the Creation as being a Word merely Flatonick and he admits no other Word to be real but that essential Virtue which was eternally in God which is God himself which created the World and was as it were incorporated in J. C. And this Ignatius's way of speaking that J. C. is the eternal Word is grounded on the Words of St. John that the Word was made Flesh that is to say that the same Virtue which created the World is become the proper Virtue of J. C. in such a manner that you may say rightly that J. C. made the Ages by his Power and consequently by himself for that which is done by my Power is done by my self When therefore the Apostles say that all things â—ere made by J. C. or by the Son their meaning is no other but that they were made by the immense Power of the Father which was in J.C. he becoming that Power that Spirit that Wisdom of the Father because all the Miracles effected by that Power are said to be done by J. C. in whom it resided In this sense Simon Magus call'd himself the great Power of God and boasted that he had made the Ages not that he believ'd himself as the Antients would have it to be a Divine Hypostasis sometimes the Father sometimes the Son and sometimes the Holy Ghost He was not so extravagant but only aping J. C design'd to say that the Divine Power which actuated him was the Power of the Father the Son and Holy Ghost the same Power that created the World J. C. is in the same sense call'd the Power of God 1 Cor. 1.24 We may enforce the Explication we have given of Ignatius his Words by the manner how Irenaeus disputes against the Valentinians Lib. 2. c. 47. seq It is true saith he that in regard to Man he is sometimes silent sometimes speaks sometimes he takes his rest and sometimes acts But it is not so with God who being all Understanding all Reason all Spirit is not liable to such like Changes Meaning that God is always a Reason an internal Word but never a Word brought faith as he explains himself afterwards saying That God being all Reason thinking in him is speaking and speaking nothing else but thinking For his Thought is his Speech and his Speech is his Vnderstanding and this Vnderstanding which comprehends all things is the Father himself Further to make us the better comprehend that he speaks thus against the Word brought forth or begotten he accosts the Valentinians with this smart Raillery The Valentinians saith he speak of the bringing forth and Generation of the Son as if they had assisted the Father at his Birth I shall leave you to consider whether this Raillery spares our Scholasticks He that would be at the pains about it needs only make a Parallel of their System concerning the Generation of the Son with that of the Valentinians and he might soon see whether those Hereticks only were ridiculous herein CHAP. XII Plato speaks but aenigmatically His Word is not that of St. John Several Systems of the Platonists explain'd I Could produce many more Platonists but to be brief I come now to Plato himself See then what Clement of Alexandria saith of him Strom. lib. 5. p. 592. of the Paris Edition When Plato saith that it
is difficult to find the Father of the Universe he shews by this not only that the World was generated but also that it was generated as his Son Plato himself gives us the Substance of his System in his 2d Letter to Dionysius with this caution that it is altogether aenigmatical All things says he are round about the King of the Universe the things of the second Order are about the Second and the things of the third Order are about the Third Which is thus interpreted by Marsilius Ficinus The Ideas are about the Good the Angelic Spirits about the Reason and the Forms about the Soul of the World He adds that Plato calls them three Principles not because they are equally such but inasmuch as they are subordinate the one to the other The Good is such of himself the Reason inasmuch as it is the nearest to God and the Soul inasmuch as it is produced by the first and second God Now this Order whatever it be hath no relation at all to an invisible Trinity but is manifestly refer'd to the World and Creation seeing the Second and the Third God are nothing else but the Vnderstanding and the efficacious Will of the supreme God the one being filled with the Ideas of all Beings and the other producing their different Forms Thus you have the Riddle unfolded I am not ignorant that Clemens Alexandr pretends in the same Book I have quoted that these Words of Plato mean nothing else but the Christian Platonic Trinity if I may express my self thus but without any ground as is evident by the Commentary of Ficinus Clement endeavours to shew in this whole Book that there is no Tenent in the whole Christian Religion but what is found in Plato and the other Philosophers Now seeing the Doctrine about the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was the Darling of Plato we need not wonder if the Platonic Fathers search'd for all the possible Resemblances between the Second God of Plato and the only Son of God on whose behalf and to this purpose they imagin'd a Generation and Pre-existence before Time was having chang'd all the Gospel matters of Fact concerning the miraculous Birth of our Saviour into vain and empty Contemplations which suppos'd in him another distinct Nature from that which he received from the Holy Ghost and the Virgin To conclude whoever insists as it is usual on the seeming Resemblance found between the Word of St. John and that of the Divine Plato seems willing to deceive himself seeing the most able Criticks have own'd already that there is no Resemblance at all between these two Words Desiderius Herauldus as he is quoted by Mons Le Clerc Biblioth Vniv Tom. VI. p. 24. remarks judiciously That the Christians of that Time strain'd to their Advantage all the Actions Words and Writings of the Pagans which they often interpreted contrary to the true Meaning of the latter I shall now quote Casaubon who is not at all suspected in this Affair This Critick having related a Passage of Cyril against Julian where this Father pretends that Plato ascribing the Creation of the World to the Word speaks the same with St. John that Critick declares that himself is not at all of that Opinion You have here the Word saith he Exercit. in Baron pag. 5. by the which Plato assures the visible World was made He indeed seems to say what St. John did which is what Cyril pretends to but if we take a nearer view of this Affair this Word or this Reason as Plato would have it which the supreme God employed in the Creation of the World is visibly and wholly different from the Word Jesus Christ whereof St. John speaks which Word is unknown to those to whom the Revelation is known There are found many such like Expressions in the Fathers where the Ambiguity of the Words may deceive those who do not examine them with a requisite Attention See here in brief what may be gathered from the Platonists Writings of the Platonic Philosophers These Philosophers considering the Trinity always with respect to the Creation of the World built three Systems thereon We shall name the first a Theologic System which puts down the supreme Being for the first God the intelligible and Ideal World for the second and the sensible World for the third The first is the Father because he is the Understanding generating the Ideas the other is the Son the internal Word or the Thought of the Father because he is immediately generated and subsists always in the Ideas of the Father the last is the Spirit and Soul or the Creature proceeding from the other two because it receives the Form from the Idea but its Life and its Motion from the first Author of all things I shall name the second System of the Platonists the Ailegoric System which considers a Trinity of Properties in the second God or the Word in relation to the Creation meaning by the Divine Word nothing else but the infinite Goodness the admirable Wisdom and the immense Power which have form'd the Universe as we have observed it above in a Passage of Clemens Hence it appears on what account they called it the Maker and Creator of all things Lastly we will name the third the Physical System which considers in relation to the World an efficient Cause viz. a Creator and a Father a Matter subsisting from all Eternity in this first Author which proceeded from him by the way of Prolation or Emanation and a Form produced resulting from the other two both from the Matter and the first Cause The one is the internal Word the other the Word brought forth and the third is the animated World These three Systems and perhaps many others that may be found in the allegorizing Platonists pregnant with such like Methods are the Cause of Plato's Doctrine being so consus'd and difficult to be penetrated Therefore Mr. le Clerc was in the right when he says Biblioth univ Tom. X. p. 396. That there is a great deal of Confusion in the Platonists System that they have even contradicted themselves not having a clear and distinct Idea of what they would say We may affirm the same of the antient Fathers who follow'd this Philosophy in relation 〈…〉 But he did not observed 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 remarkable hereof proceeds not only from the Diversity of their Systems but also for want of a good distinction between the subtil Platonism for so I shall call it which treated allegorically of the Goodness Wisdom and Power of God under a Figure of three Gods who created the World and the gross Platonism which perceiving not the subtil part of this Allegory and following the Letter made three Hypostases of these three Powers The first Method being allegoric and arbitrary might without contradicting it self change the Name Order and Number c. of the Figures it made use of to express always the same thing This was an ingenious Invention that varied its Representations and
ingenuously in Joan. 1.1 they only meant that the Word was not created in the beginning of all things when God created the Heavens and the Earth after the manner of other Creatures or that of the other generated Spirits because it had a Being then already the Father having begotten it before by an immediate Generation For this Reason the Author of the Recognitions lib. 3. cap. 11. denies formally that the Holy Spirit may be called Son because there is saith he but one ungenerated and but one generated it cannot be said that the Holy Spirit is a Son having been made by another who was likewise made Eusebius delivers this Doctrine as a * Such is the Argument of that Chapter Tradition of the Church De Eccles Theol. lib. 3. cap. 6. The Spirit the Paraclet saith he is neither God nor Son because he took not his Origin from the Father after the same manner as the Son did being of the Number of those things that were made by the Son for whom all things were made All things saith the Evangelist consequently then the Holy Spirit also Origen's Doctrine is the source of all this who maintains in his 1 Tom. upon St. John that the Holy Spirit is a Creature of the Son relying with Eusebius upon this Expression that all 〈◊〉 not excepting the Holy Spirit were made by the Son This Theology of the Antients â—â—â—hing the immediate Generation of the Word at the time of the World's Creation was follow'd by many other Doctors even after the Council of Nice Marius Victorinus is of this Number who would have it in his first Book that the Generation of the Word is only an Effusion and Manifestation of that Power which created the World and which was hid in God before You may join Zeno of Verona with him de aeterna Filii Generatione Serm. 3. who moreover explains this Generation by referring it to the Creation of the World For as he saith it was then that the Word which was as it were buried in the Abyss of the Divine Understanding in profundo sacrae Mentis Serm. 1. was thrust forth and begotten Would Valentine have expressed himself otherwise about his Word which came forth out of the Understanding than this Man doth of his come out of the Deep and Silence But we ought not to forget Rupert who unfolds admirably this Philosophic Cabala saying That the Father actually begot the Word which contain'd potentially all things when he created the Heavens and the Earth Yes he goes on the Father thrust forth this good Word out of his Heart and before the Morning-Star begot him out of his Bosom viz. out of the Bottom of his Substance when he said Let there be Light Nothing can be more like to Origen's Expression That the Generation of the Light is the Generation of the Son Mr. Huel excuseth Origen alledging that he spoke allegorically we do not doubt it all this Theology is Allegorick The Word or Command which God utter'd to the Creature is the Son of God but improperly so and in the same sense that my Thought or my Speech are the Sons of my Understanding which both conceives and brings them forth This is too evident and for this Cause Dr. Ball had reason to retrench out of his Quotation Desen Fidei Nic. p. 395. these last Words of Rupert's Passage That the Father beget the Son when he â—â—id Let there be Light But Lactartius goes beyond all these Doctors I quoted for he allows not to the Word so much as the Advantage of an immediate Generation above the other generated Spirits He finds no difference between them but only in the different manner of their Prolation and in the different Design God had in the begetting of them The Holy Scriptures teach us saith he Lib. 4. c. 8. that the Son of God is the Word of God even as also the other Angels are the Spirits of God For the Word is a Spirit which was brought forth with a significative Voice But because the Spirit Breath and Speech are thrust forth by different Organs the Spirit proceeding out of the Nostrils and the Speech out of the Mouth consequently there is a great difference between this Son of God and the other Angels caeteros Angelos these being come forth out of God as silent and mute Spirits because they were not created to preach the Doctrine of God but only for the executing of his Orders But the Son notwithstanding he is a Spirit yet he came forth of the Mouth of God with a Sound and a Voice like unto Speech because God was to make use of his Voice to instruct the People c. You see manifestly how he confounds the Angel who is called the Word with the other Angels that he makes them all to proceed out of God equally by an immediate Prolation and that the only difference he makes here consists in this that the common Angels proceeded out of the Nostrils of God as mute Spirits design'd only to execute his Orders by Deeds whereas this chief Angel whom he calls the Son doth proceed out of the Mouth of God as a vocal and sounding Speech design'd to deliver his Oracles and to reveal his Will Lastly Origen or some body else under his Name goes beyond even Lactantius himself in that he confounds the Generation of the Word with that of common Creatures Homil. 2. in diversos For tho on the one hand he seems to say That the Word was born before all things and that all things were made by him yet he advanceth at the same time that these Words all things were made by him signify only that at his being born of the Father all things were likewise born together with him the Generation of the Word-God being the same with the Creation of all things And tho he saith That the Son is of a different Substance from the Creature that he hath the same Nature with the Father and that he had a beginning before Time was He seems to destroy all this by adding That the Substance of the Father is the Cause of the Son's Substance and that Jesus Christ intended so much when he said that his Father was greater than he which asserts evidently that the Substance of the Father is greater than that of the Son As also when he goes on To exist before Time is to exist not in Time but with Time His Conclusion will tell us his Meaning We ought then saith he to believe three things the Father bringing forth the Son begotten and the things that were made by the Word the Father speaks the Word is begotten and all things are made Conformably to what he was saying viz. that the Father bringeth forth the Word that is to say begetting his Wisdom all things were then made It is not difficult to sound the Depth of this Philosophy The Word is of the same Substance with the Father because it is the proper Power of the Father but it is less than
If it be so his History of a Phaenix ought not to seem so strange to us it is a Fable containing a great Truth in his Opinion he makes use of it as of an ingenious Allegory that seems to have been made expresly to represent to Men the Doctrine of the Resurrection As to the rest whenever Clement doth not allegorize he explains to us simply his Sentiment about the Word and the Trinity As to the former he saith in Chap. 27. of his 1st Ep. to the Corinthians That God founded all things by the Word of his Power and that he can destroy them by the same Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 utrobique Whence it is evident that the Word in his sense is only the Power and Efficacy of God by which as he created the World he can also destroy it when he pleaseth This agrees with the Scriptures saying By the Word of the Lord were the Heavens made and all the Host of them by the Breath of his Mouth Psal 33.6 and that by the same Breath he destroys the Wicked Isa 11.4 2 Thess 2.8 We cannot find here the Platonic Ideas of a Personalized Word so that Photius had reason to complain Bibl. Cod. 126. that Clement did not speak of J. C. in that sublime Stile which is made use of when God is spoken of His Simplicity has offended those that love only the high-flown Philosophy of Plato For whereas a Platonic Christian would never have omitted on such an occasion to inculcate that God the Father created all things by his Son who is his Word and eternal Wisdom Clement is dumb here and contents himself to attribute the Creation to the Power or the Command of God Elsewhere when he speaks expresly of J. C. he withholds himself from giving him any other Excellencies or Titles than those resulting from the Offices he possesseth by the Gift of God as a Recompence for his Sufferings viz. those of an High-Priest and Lord never quoting any other Passages but those that serve to this purpose As to his Trinity nothing is more simple for being willing to move the Corinthians to Concord and Union he alledgeth this Motive among the rest Have we any other but the same God the same Christ and the same Spirit of Grace shed upon us This is a Trinity of a Man truly Apostolic one God one Messiah and one Spirit shed upon the Faithful CHAP. XVIII Of the Method of the refin'd Platonists and of Allegory in General FROM these Disciples of the Apostles let us come to the Disciples of Plato Peruse the Platonist Writers and you 'll therein find yet some remains of well contrived Platonism They having conceived the Ideas and Archetypes of all Creatures which are in the visible World to be in the intelligible World did easily invent a Spiritual and Intelligible Gospel which is the Substance and First Form of the sensible Gospel a Distinction which Origen did not fail to make as he distinguisht between the exemplary and ideal Word different from the sensible Word and as he expresses it in his second Tom. on John A Word which was in God and which was as different from that which was made Flesh as an Original is from the Copy Substance and Reality from the Shadow They use the Comparison of an Architect who has in his Mind the Idea and Plan of a House he intends to build Whereon they giving themselves liberty find all the Wonders of our Gospel in the Ideas of the Divine Understanding If in the sensible Church there be found an Oracle and Interpreter from God born of the Father by the Holy Ghost making the new Creature by the Power and Wisdom which he has received from the Father To this they make another Answer in the intelligible Church a Word proceeding from the Bosom or Understanding of God begotten of his Substance who is the Eternal Wisdom of God and secondary Cause of all things subsisting in the World Take off the veil of Allegory or rather suppose all that to be Allegory and 't is a rational Philosophy which reduces all to God's eternal Decrees as the prime Cause of all existent Beings but particularly of Christ who being with respect to his Essence the only Son and First born of all Creatures consequently is in God's Vnderstanding the Idea which God immediately begets whereon all others depend He is I say the noblest Idea or as some speak the Idea of Ideas And if they found this Christ in the Ideas and Decrees of God it is not to be wonder'd if they found him also in the antient Dispensation of Angels while 't is not more difficult seeing him in those first Sketches than in the Design and Idea which God had fram'd of him Thus far I perceive right Platonism I see in it the Foot-steps of what it was when in its Purity and I at the same time observe in it fair remains of antient Allegory either of the Jews or of the Chaldaeans who delighted in profound Senses and theological Interpretations But I no sooner cast my eye on those eternal Substances conceiv'd as real Emanations those Emanations as real Generations and those Generations as subsisting Persons than I see only deprav'd Platonism as absurd as the Theology of the Poets and as unpolish'd as the Religion of the most superstitious Vulgar To make this Truth the more evident 't will be necessary to say somewhat of Allegory and of the use which the Antients made of it But we must as I promis'd in Page 64. at the same time shew that Disciples who ofttimes change their Masters Method do nevertheless retain certain Remains of the antient Discipline which betrays them and discovers their Innovations That is we will shew the tracks of the antient manner of allegorizing even in those very men who have abandon'd the Allegory of the three Principles and chosen the literal Sense of three Hypostases I have already given some account of it which ought to be recall'd to mind by the Reader to join to what I have farther to say thereon Allegory is a Figure in Speech whereby one thing is expressed and another intimated by rising from the literal to a nobler and more theological Sense See Grotius on Matth. ch 1.22 I shall not here speak of the Enigmatical Science of the Chaldeans and Egyptians but come directly to the Philosophy which is most known to us But before I come to Particulars I must advertise my Reader that if he would be fully inform'd on this Head he may read all the 5th Book of the Stromates of Clemens Alexandrinus I 'll content my self with quoting thence the following Words which give us a general Idea of the Antients Method in the use they made of Allegory All those says that Father who have treated of Divine Matters as well Greeks as Barbarians concealing the Principles of things wrap'd the Truth in Enigma's Symbols Allegories and Metaphors as intricate as those of the Oracles Even the Poets who
incarnate And what can this Reason be which it merited and which was united to it When the Veil of Allegory is taken off it can be no other than that high Contemplation whereof the Soul of Jesus Christ had by its pre-existent Obedience render'd it self capable or than that degree of Prophecy and that Spirit without measure wherewith God had honoured it and which made it Partaker of the Divine Nature or lastly the very Office of Word or of Interpreter of God whereof God had judged it worthy as the most perfect and noblest of the Spirits which he had decreed to declare his Mind Celsus says he ibid. lib. 7. will not own that he who suffer'd Death can be worthy of the second Honours next to the Supreme God as well because of the Powers he had acquir'd in Heaven as because of those he had acquir'd on Earth Supposing as you see that Jesus Christ had merited in Heaven before he came to merit on our Earth he was very far from believing him to be the most High God Wherefore Origen having said of the Word that it was in God that it came from God that it was made Flesh and affirming the same of the Soul of J. C. this Conformity yields just reason to suspect that the Doctrine of the Word is nothing but the Soul of Jesus Christ theologiz'd whereon they discours'd Allegorically That 's in a manner prov'd by the Hypothesis of the Arians who believ'd that the Word was to Jesus Christ instead of a Soul and consequently by the Word understood only the Soul of Jesus Christ created before all Ages An Hypothesis renew'd in our time by John Turner who has given it a new turn for he maintains That the Word is nothing else but the Soul of Jesus Christ created indeed but eternally united to the Substance of God and by that Union participating all his Perfections A Discourse concerning the Messiah Ep. Dedic p. 154. The same is infer'd from the Use which has been made of some Texts of Scripture as for example these I came from the Father O Father glorify me with the Glory which I had with thee c. Who being in the Form of God c. Our Divines interpret them of the Pre-existence of the Word but Origen and Dr. Rust in his Book intitul'd Origen and his chief Opinions interpret them of the Pre-existence of the Soul of Jesus Christ Whence comes this Confusion of Ideas The reason of it is easily given The former of these Interpretations is mysterious and allegorical and the latter literal So we may conclude that the Fathers allegoriz'd on the pre-existent Soul of Jesus Christ loving our Nature and becoming incarnate for our Salvation which they in their allegorical Stile call'd the Word or the Son of God And consequently those who take this last Allegory in the literal Sense and understand it of a Divine Person united to our Flesh are not less ridioulous than they who stumbling at the Letter of the first Allegory really believ'd that Angels had mix'd themselves with mortal Women The Text for the first Hypothesis that the Sons of God were married to the Daughters of Men serves as well as that for the second I have begotten thee before the Morning This Pre-existence of Souls and particularly of that of Jesus Christ has been very antient in the Church We find it plainly enough express'd in the second letter attributed to Clemens Romanus C. 10. These are his Words As you have been call'd dwelling in the Flesh so you will come in the Flesh Jesus Christ the Lord who sav'd us being the first Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was made Flesh and so called us 〈◊〉 likewise we shall receive the Recompence in the Flesh This Passage supposes the Pre-existence of our Souls as well as that of the Soul of Jesus Christ For he compares our Spirits existing in the Flesh to that first Spirit which was made Flesh to call us He calls Jesus Christ the first of all Spirits whether Souls or Angels because God begat him first a little before he undertook the Creation of the World and afterwards imploy'd him to create the other Spirits according to the Doctrine of Lactantius Instit lib. 4. c. 6. who further teaches us ibid. c. 1.2 That this Holy Spirit descending from Heaven chose the Womb of a Virgin to enter into And the better to carry on the Comparison which he makes of that Spirit to all incarnate Spirits he shews that he was rais'd to the Recompence only by his faithful Obedience and Vertue ibid. cap. 14. His Words are remarkable God says he having sent his Son to Men He hath shewn his Faithfulness in teaching that there is but one God and that he only is to be worship'd and he never call'd himself God because he would have violated his Truth if being sent to take away from the World the Plurality of Gods and to establish the Unity of God he had introduc'd more than one God That had not been preaching One God nor working for the Interest of him who sent him but for his own and it would have been dividing himself from the Father whom he came to glorify Then by his having been thus faithful and in the Design of discharging his Commission not attributing any thing to himself he has receiv'd the Dignity of everlasting High Priest the Honour of Supreme King the Power of Judg and the Name of God By the way these Words of this Father are a curious Paraphrase on those of St. Paul Phil. 2.6 c. Who being in the Form of God did not attribute to himself c. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him and hath given him a Name which is above every Name c. Let us here remember a distinction of the Fathers which has been mention'd already and wherein the Footsteps of antient Allegory visibly appear The Fathers distinguish'd two kinds of Generation of the Word the one eternal and internal and the other external which began with the World and the only one which they properly call Generation Dr. Bull acknowledgeth this distinction only he pretends but without reason that 〈◊〉 the latter which is metaphorical Granting him his desire 't is the same thing with respect to the Question now treated of For it remains nevertheless true that they allegoriz'd on one of the Generations of the Word be it which it will and that 's all I need Let them as long as they please say that the Fathers spake of a Generation of the Word which was proper and literal I shall answer Yes and that 's what I call gross Platonism which has made them philosophize so absurdly But by their own confession the same Fathers have spoken of another Generation of the Word which is metaphorical and allegorical and that 's what I call their refin'd Platonism the fair Remains of sound Philosophy which betrays them and manifestly discovers the absurdity of the other part of their System whereon they
in the 33d and 45th Psalms which they made use of to prove that the term Word had no other Signification than that of Prolation properly so called For he supposes that these Words My Heart hath utter'd a good Word do not signify such a Prolation a proper and literal Generation but a metaphorical Prolation and that from this reason that the word Heart in this Text being figurative the term Word must also be figurative And that we may the better apprehend how far Origen carrys the Figure of this Word the other Text which he quotes from the Psalms so fully clears the matter as to leave no room for cavilling The Valentinians says he believe that these Words The Heavens were created by the Word of God and by the Spirit of his Mouth were said of our Saviour and of the Holy Ghost tho it be certain that one may give them this other Sense That the Heavens were establish'd by Divine Reason and Wisdom ratione Dei as we say that a House was built by that Skill which is the Art of building Houses I leave the Reader to judg whether an Vnitarian could more plainly remove all the Idea of Hypostasis from our Minds Therefore when the same Origen does elsewhere argue concerning the Word as if he himself believ'd it an Hypostasis his so speaking was according to the Principles of the Greek Philosophy For as Porphyry rightly observes Origen having continually apply'd himself to reading the Writings of the Platonists and the Pythagoreans and having therein learnt the allegorical way of those Philosophers expounding the Mysteries of the Greeks made use of it himself in his Interpretation of the Scriptures apud Euseb l. 6. c. 19. See likewise Bibl. univ T. 6. p. 50. That declared Enemy of the Christian Religion is not the only Person who has given that judgment of Origen Mr. Huet does not treat him more favourably in his Origeniana l. 2. c. 2. Origen says he was one of Plato's greatest Admirers insomuch that instead of suting the Platonick Tenents to the Christian Doctrine he regulated the Doctrine of Christianity by the Dogma of the Platonists And a little lower he adds That Origen had been carry'd to those Excesses by the example of his Preceptor Clemens Alexand. who us'd to embelish the Religion of Jesus Christ with the Academick Paint Can any one think that Justin did not discourse by the Principles of this Allegorical Philosophy when in his second Apology he calls the Reason which is in Man a Part and Seed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Divine Word The Divine Word is in his sense only that universal Reason that Source and Fulness of Wisdom-which resides in the Divine Understanding whereof ours is a Stream and a part Is our Reason an Hypostasis distinct from Man How shall we then imagine that this Father ever intended to say that Divine Reason is an Hypostasis distinct from God I may very well say that my Reason has taught me such a thing and that I consulted my Reason without supposing my Reason to be any other Person than my self Then why may we not say God made use of his Reason to create this Universe that his Reason was his Counsellor and his Minister without making a second Person of his Reason Certainly my Reason cannot be personalized any otherwise than by the Power of Allegory neither can that of God be any otherwise Nay it may be that Justin strain'd his Allegory yet farther and that he intended to say that Reason or the universal Seed is no other than the Gospel which is not a part of the Seed as the Precepts of Reason which enlighten'd the Philosophers are but the fulness of that incorruptible Seed which regenerates the Heart I will produce another Example of this allegorical way of interpreting the Scripture St. Cyprian explaining that famous Passage of St. John 1 Ep. 5.8 concerning the three Witnesses on Earth the Spirit the Water and the Blood has spoken of them as of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost which are the three Witnesses in Heaven now found in our Bibles but were not there in the days of that Father Some as Fulgentius having confounded St. Cyprian's Discourse with the Sacred Text did not doubt but that Holy Martyr had spoken literally and as words of the Scripture what he said only in Allegory not observing that what he asserted of the Father Son and Holy Ghost is a spiritual Sense which he had drawn from the Three Witnesses on Earth as if the Spirit were the Father the Blood the Son and the Water the Holy Ghost But Facundus did not suffer himself to be at all deceiv'd by it for he informs us Defens Trinit Capit. l. 1. c. 3. That St. Cyprian will have that to be understood of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost which St. John said of the Spirit Water and Blood which can be only an allegorical Interpretation And that Allegory was followed by St. Augustin contra Maxim lib. 3. c. 12. where he expresly says That the Spirit the Water and the Blood are the Sacrament of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost What 's the meaning of the Sacrament if it be not the Mystery and Allegory Now I pray who can warrant me that the Fathers who so strained the Allegory on the three Witnesses on Earth to find the Trinity therein have not also strained it on the Word of St. John to find in it their Favourite Doctrine Plato's second God If they misapplyed these Words My Heart hath uttered a Good Word and these I have begotten thee in my Bosom before Aurora how can I be assur'd that they have not deceived me or that their Infatuation for Plato has not deceived themselves when they Platonically interpret those other Places where it is said That the Word was God and that the Word was made Flesh However that be it must be granted me That the Fathers made no difficulty of seeking sublime senses in the Scriptures and of raising themselves up very high above its plain and natural meaning That appears by the use St. Cyprian and St. Augustin made of the Epistle General of St. John Now the same Fathers having expressed their Allegories in too absolute Terms without characterizing them by some Mark whereby they might be distinguished from a proper and literal sense it has in succeeding time happened that the literal sense of what they said has been followed We have seen it in the Example of St. Cyprian that Father expressing himself absolutely It is written says he of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost And these three are one Now that was written only of the Spirit the Water and the Blood Then the Allegorical Exposition has been taken for an express Text of Scripture I strongly suspect that the same thing has happen'd to that noted Text of St. Paul 1 Tim. c. 3. v. 16. The Mystery of Godliness is great God manifested in the Flesh
and Oeconomical Mystery of the antient Fathers The Reason of Prudence ceasing since we have now no more Platonists to gain nor Gnosticks to outbrave the Oeconomy of the Logos ought to cease at the same time Yet we do in this as in every thing else we never reform and it often happens that the Religion of Posterity is nothing else but the mere Policy or Oeconomy of their Ancestors I have but one Reflection more to shew the Source of this Allegory Cerinthus was the Man who first brought in this usage of Platonizing As he is the first Author of a Logos or an invisible Christ he is also the first who began to make use of the Oeconomy in the Christian Religion 'T is he who turns the Resurrection into Allegory explaining it by the Evangelical Regeneration or rather by the State of Quietude wherein the Contemplative are when they quit this World to raise themselves to the Speculation of Mysteries and the Knowledg of Ideas The Quietists have not fail'd to frame an Ideal and Allegorical Word or Logos even as they have also taught an Allegorical and Ideal Resurrection Without question they allegoriz'd when they said Christ descended into Jesus meaning that Jesus was anointed and made the Christ when the Holy Ghost descended upon him at his Baptism See Grotius on 1 Cor. 15.1 They did no less allegorize when upon the same ground they added that the Christ which descended on Jesus ascended into Heaven and left him at the moment of his Passion By which they meant as St. Paul says that Jesus humbl'd himself that he laid by the Power and the Spirit with which he was endu'd and left himself to be crucified as a Man feeble and without Power or rather as a Slave Tertul. contra Prax. cap. 30. St. Hilary and St. Ambrose did not understand so much fineness since they made bold to say bluntly and without figure that the Word was divorc'd from the Flesh that the God was separated from the Man and left him to himself In short that which I am saying of the use of this Allegory amounts to this 'T is well known that the Pagans invented three sorts of Allegory the Physical the Moral and the Theological which never fail'd 'em at a pinch to cover the absurdity of their Fables and of the History of their Gods 'T is after this way they defended themselves as we see in St. Clemens his Recognitions lib. 10. cap. 30. saying that the literal Sense of their Fables was contriv'd in condescension to the Vulgar but that they had besides an allegorical and elevated Sense for the Learned That in this last Sense they said for example that Jupiter from his own Brain begat the Goddess Minerva that is Wisdom to shew that 't is by his Wisdom that the Father of all things created the World One may truly say the Christians have in a manner follow'd the same Method For not to mention their many Moral Allegories which they invented to conceal that which seemed to 'em too low and mean for the Majesty of the H. Scriptures 't is sufficient to observe here that all they have told us of an eternal and invisible Son of his incomprehensible Generation and other Speculations of the like nature is nothing else but a theological Allegory by which they varnish'd whatever appear'd too mean in the eyes of Philosophers in the History of Jesus Christ The Pagans and the Christians have hereby equally quitted themselves of a difficulty that expos'd 'em to mutual Reproaches The Pagans were asham'd of their ridiculous Fables and the Christians were of the Cross of Christ and both of 'em surmounted those Inconveniences by a dextrous use of what we call the Wonderful which is to be met with in their Allegory CHAP. XXI An Account of what the Father 's called Theology WHAT the Father 's called Theology is another sort of Machine they acted withal to represent to us a contemplative Gospel formed after the Ideas of Plato which theologizes that is speaks of any Person in the same Stile as one usually speaks of God as if the Person had a miraculous Birth to say he came down from Heaven if he reform'd Mankind to say he created the World if God rais'd him to any extraordinary Dignity to say that he was begotten of God All this so far agrees with the Scriptures but especially with the Stile of St. John who affects throughout his Writings to theologize all the Subjects he treats on I will give you but this one Instance John 3.13 No Man says he has ascended into Heaven c. The foregoing Words do shew that he theologized in this Passage he had said to the Jews How will you believe if I tell you of Heavenly things For no Man has ascended into Heaven c. that is to say plainly that no Man can acquaint you with Heavenly Things but he who came down from Heaven or who drew his Origin from Heaven The sense therefore is this The Son of Man who was born from Heaven by the Holy Ghost and on this account may be said in the theological way to have come down from Heaven The same Son of Man was raised to the Knowledg of all the Secrets of Heaven by the Gifts he received from the same Spirit and on that account it may be further said in the theological Stile That be ascended into Heaven No Man then was rais'd to the Knowledg of the Secrets of Heaven but he who was originally from Heaven that is the Son of Man who was wholly from Heaven After this manner the Jews did theologize when they said that their Law was before the Creation of the World The Mahometans do the same when they speak so magnificently of the Gospel as to say it fell down from Heaven sometimes speaking the same thing of the Alcoran which they call the Word of God which was not made but came down from Heaven Barthol Edessen Confut. Agar They give also the same Honour to Jesus Christ who because he was born without a human Father after an extraordinary manner is in their oriental and theological Stile the Eternal Word the Word of God by way of Excellence that is he is the Word 1. Because he had no other Father than that Word and that Commandment had which made the World from nothing 2. Because he with the assistance of that very Word has distinguish'd himself by a great number of Miracles Hortinger Hist Orient lib. 1. cap. 3. pag. 105. Simon Voyage du Mont. Liban p. 262. Again nothing is more reasonable than that manner of Theologizing things great and extraordinary provided all these pompous Expressions be taken in a metaphorical sense But the Misfortune is that the grosser Platonism has impos'd upon the Fathers who have spoken in this manner of J.C. in the very Letter So that to theologize with them is to ascribe to Jesus Christ the Divine Nature and Substance with all its Attributes or at least
of them being confecrated by the Power of the Word are the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ incarnate The Protestant Writers observe from this Passage as Dr. Stilling-fleet for one in the 35 p. of his first Dialogue of the Trinity and Transubstantiation compar'd That Justin really ascribes to the same Logos or Word of God the Body that was in the Womb of the Virgin and that Body which is upon the Altar and that in like manner the Holy Ghost makes the Elements to become the Body and Blood of Christ not by an Hypostatic Union but by Divine Influence and Operation But I must tell you too that the Fathers understood no more than Operation or Influence by the Word or the Spirit which they say did consecrate the Elements and change them into the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ So also they meant no more than Influence and not a Person by the Word or the Holy Ghost which formed and sanctified the Body of Jesus Christ in the Womb of the Virgin whereby he was properly the Son of God For why should an Hypostatic Union be rather infer'd from this Passage The Word was made Flesh than from This Bread is my Body Either there is an Hypostatic Union of the Bread and Flesh of Christ or there 's none at all of the Word and Flesh of Christ By the Power of the Word the Bread becomes the Body of Christ by the same Power the Man or the Son of Mary was the Son of God the Case is the same What then is to be done Why Mysteries must be had at any rate and the Machines of Platonism will bring upon the Stage as many as you please of the grossest and most absurd You must abandon your Reason 't is rashness to be inclined to hearken to Reason Let Reason submit herself to Faith and give her alone leave to speak The Papists require us to abandon our Senses but the Trin ns will have us renounce our Reason I am no Christian in the Judgment of the latter if I am not a Brute a Brute did I say if I am not a Block Error is fruitful and leads us into the grossest Absurdities and 't is the System of these Absurdities that is stiled Theology CHAP. XXII Of the True Oeconomy 'T IS certain then that the Antients were unacquainted with good Divinity and knew less of the true Oeconomy They believ'd their Platonism whereof they were mighty fond gave 'em great advantages over the Pagan Philosophers and they us'd it for Reasons of Prudence And as they were for the most part Gentiles by birth they knew not the antient Jewish Oeconomy which would have put 'em in the right way or it may be they were rather inclin'd to pursue their own Bigotries Their Oeconomy is this As in a Family the Father and the Son are but One Lord when the Son rules in the Name and by the Authority of his Father who has transfer'd the Exercise of that Right to him 't is the same thing say they in the Church which is the Family of God The Father and the Son are but One by virtue of that Oeconomy which lodges a Power in the Son's hands to dispose of the Father's Favours and to exercise all Authority 'T is thus Tertullian explains the Oeconomy in his Discourse against Praxeas He shews him that he does not destroy the Notion of a Monarchy or the Government of One over the Universe because the Father may exercise it by the Ministry of his Son or such as he shall think fit to substitute in his room as the Angels his Officers and Commissioners but chiefly because the Son does nothing but at the Will of his Father and with a Power he has receiv'd Which is evident even from this that he shall one day surrender it to his Father as the Apostle tells us and the Son himself shall be subject to him Lactantius pursues exactly the Steps of Tertullian in lib. 4. c. 29. When a Father says he has a Son whom he dearly loves giving him the Title of Lord with Authority if notwithstanding this Son continues in his Father's House under him it may be said however according to the Civil Law that 't is but one House and one Master or Lord. So this World is but one House or Family and the Father and the Son who governs it with the Father's Consent are but One God since that One is as Two and the Two as One. And 't is not to be wonder'd at seeing that the Son is in the Father because the Father loves the Son And the Father is in the Son because the Son obeys faithfully the Father's Will and does nothing but what the Father wills or commands him God therefore as Tertullian shews may communicate his Right to all intelligent Creatures and use in a way of condescension their Ministry to make himself known to his Children For as he is by his Nature incomprehensible his Supreme Majesty being far above all his Creatures he stoops as it were by this Method to their shallow Capacities 'T is thus at other times that he us'd the Ministry of Angels and at that day the Ministry of a Man whom he made his Son and Heir of his House In short this Dispensation by his Son under the New Testament differs not from that of the Angels in the old Administration only in this that the latter was temporary and provisional but that of Christ is perpetual The Angels exercis'd their Oeconomy as Ministers commission'd and delegated Jesus Christ exercises his in the capacity of a Son and Heir who continnes always in the House or Family They who know the antient Oeconomy to be such as St. Paul and St. Stephen have discover'd it to be who acquaint us that 't was Angels or an Angel which gave the Law and said I am the Lord c. I am the God of Abraham c. They I say were in no danger of believing that 't was the Incomprehensible and Invisible God who appear'd to the Jews They were assur'd that it was none other than his Angel his Word his Face or his Person by which he made himself to be seen and understood accommodating himself by this Dispensation to the Weakness of Men who could not see God and live But they who comprehended not this Oeconomy of Goodness and Condescension grosly fancied this Angel to be an uncreated One as they call'd him or the Supreme God himself As if it were not the grossest absurdity to imagine that the Supreme God had put his Name upon the Supreme God If this Angel was really Jehovah by Nature could he receive this Name from another Has he in his Manifestations occasion for another Name and another Authority besides his own The same Mistake has happen'd with regard to the true Oeconomy by Jesus Christ The Mystery and Secret of the Dispensation being not known that Man has been taken for the Supreme God or an uncreated Angel who was born of a
invoked God the Father thro his Everlasting High Priest Jesus Christ our Lord in the Holy Spirit Who sees not that he gave Glory to J. C. and that he deified him by stiling him the everlasting High Priest If he could have said any thing greater he would have said it Rusticus Praefect of Rome demanded of Justin Martyr what was the Christian Religion This Confessor answered we believe one only God who is the Creator of all things visible and invisible and we confess that J. C. our Lord is the Son of God foretold by the Prophets and who shall come one day to judg the World Observe here such a Son of God whose whole Pre-existence consists in his being foretold by the Prophets and whose real Greatness is not his having created but because he will judg the World This Creed is Apostolic and has the Air and Simplicity of the first Ages One may dextrously philosophize upon the Christian Religion and speak in the Platonic way in ones Closet as Justin has often done but when he was to make a sincere Consession before the Magistrate and to seal it with his own Blood Plato has nothing to do with it the Confession is made with Simplicity and in conformity to the Holy Scriptures then 't is no longer Justin the Philosopher but Justin the Confessor and the Martyr Lastly Hegesippus acquaints us in Euseb-Eccles Hist lib. 2. c. 23. that James the Just being conjur'd by the Jews to declare to them what he thought of Jesus Why says he do you put this Qacst'en to me concerning Jesus the Since Mâ—n He sits in Heaven at the Right Hand of the Power of God and he must come again in the Clouds of Heaven This Holy Man says the Historian was a Witness very credible both with Jews and Gentiles that Jesus was really the Christ His Confession is not long however it comprehends that which may be said to be the most august and considerable and confirms all the Theology which concerns the Persons of Christ To these Testimonies of antient Martyrs give me leave to add another Instance which is not much from the purpose Eusebius tells us in his Eccles Hist lib. 1. c. 13. That Thaddeus going to see King Agbarus he preached to the King J. C. our Lord and our God the Messias or the Sent of God Valesius remarks in his Notes that the Word God is wanting in good Copies which are in other Passages confirmed by Nicephorus and Ruffinus And I don't think says Mons Valois any one dares deny but that the Reading wherein the Word God is wanting is more agreeable to the Text For 1st the Antients us'd not that Word but of the Father only 2ly If Thaddeus speaking to a King who was a new Convert to and weak in the Faith had call'd J. C. God this might have perplexed him and made him to think that two Gods were preached to him 'T is plain and fair dealing to affirm the Antients by no means gave the Name of God to J. C. but 't is mincing to say that they did it not in the case of weak Christians this is a mere Evasion For why was not the like Tenderness us'd towards others in the following Ages Is it because there was less danger of spreading Polytheism Were not the Catechumens both weak and Novices too whom the Pantaenusses the Clements Alexandrinusses the Origens and the Cyrils taught the second God of Plato with all the Niceties of the mystic Theology Be that as it will it appears from this Passage and many others that one has not good ground to trust much to the Testimonies of the Antients where the Name of God is given to J. C. The Word God has been inserted in such Places by Trinitarian Copists and without doubt many other Terms have been retrench'd as they thought fit What an Abyss of Uncertainty is here then Besides Mons Du Pin believes this History of Thaddeus to be fabulous See his Biblioth Tom. 1. p. 1. Eusebius has amassed all sorts of Memoirs without much Judgment He often misunderstands the Authors he cites sometimes he corrupts them to reconcile them to the Arian Scheme What endless Uncertainties must this occasion Mons Valois himself falls under the same Guilt he taxes in others and we must not only be upon our Guard against the Fraud of Copists but of Translators too Observe how he reads the Text in the eleventh Chapter of the eighth Book of Euseb Eecles Hist The Martyrs of Phrygia as he makes the Historian word it called upon Jesus Christ who is God over all Now these Words God over all are not found in the Greek of Christopherson nor in the Latin Version of Ruffinus nor in Cousin's French Version And Valois takes no notice whence he had this Reading which in other Places is so contrary to the Doctrine of Eusebius himself and to other Invocations to be met with in great Numbers in his History the ordinary Form thereof is to invoke him who is God over all by or through J. C. our Lord and in short is contrary to the Usage and constant Practice of the Primitive Church as we are going to shew in our third Proof CHAP. III. A Continuation of the Proofs that the first Fathers did not deify Christ upon any other account but that of his miraculous Birth and Exaltation I Affirm in the third Place that the Antients grounded their Deification of J. C. upon nothing beyond his being born of a Virgin and his Exaltation in the highest Heavens and that for this decisive Reason because they held all those were Hereticks who gave J. C. the Title of God over all To this purpose speaks the Author of the Apostolic Constitutions lib. 6. c. 26. There are some says he who have the Impiety or are so impious as to say that J. C. is God over all fancying that he is the Father himself and at the same time both Son and Paraclet Can any thing be conceived more execrable Upon this Passage Mons Daille in his Pseudepigr Apost blesses himself and says Then was St. Paul an Heretick and the whole Church is heretical which constantly maintain'd against the Arians that J. C. was God over all So that heretofore 't was Heresy to affirm J. C. to be God over all tho now-a-days 't is Orthodoxy But that Christ was the Father himself and the Son and Paraclet too is a consequence drawn from their Doctrine which they rejected without doubt as 't is disavowed by others in these days The distinction of Persons was not then in fashion which is nothing but three different Names for the same thing as that word is now understood For it must signify with some nothing but a Mode a Relation a nescio qâ—â—d which are words that signify nothing less than what we commonly call a Person Wherefore If the consequence above be good against the antient Hereticks 't is e'en as good against the modern Sabellians After the Author of the
because they have suffer'd themselves to be surpriz'd and their eyes to be dazled with cheir Platonick Philosophy The Wonderful and the Sublime are very tempting Schemes These Platonists are a sort of Philosophers or rather of Divines who have made a Voyage to the World of Ideas and some Christians are so weak as to swallow all their Visions for Mysteries But let us always remember for the honour of the Fathers that how far soever they wander'd in their large Field of Platonick Contemplation they never advanc'd so far as to equal the Divinity of the Word with that of his Father Origen who is one of them that went farthest never carried his Theology to that extreme Whatever lofty Idea he had of the Son he declares however in his 14th Tome on St. John That the Son was so much below the Father as he and the Holy Spirit were above the most noble Creatures Go we now after this and say that the Fathers held the necessity of believing that the Supreme God was incarnate and that Jesus Christ is that Supreme God Monsieur Huet had good reason to acknowledg upon this Passage of Origen that it could not be excus'd and to attempt to find an Orthodox Sense in it could not be consistent with Sincerity or Honesty CHAP. VII The same Proof continued together with an Examination of the Sense of Antient Creeds thereupon WE have no more to do but to consider the antient Creeds and to compare those which were form'd upon the Apostolick Theology with such as were fram'd according to the Platenick Scheme and we shall find in these latter that the Article of the Generation of the Word and of his Incarnation came in the room of that of the Conception of the Son of God which is found in the former Creeds The universal Church says Irenaeus lib. 1. cap. 2. hath received this Faith from the Holy Apostles which is to believe in one God the Father c. and in Jesus Christ his only Son incarnate for our Salvation c. There 's nothing in this Confession of the Faith of the Catholick Church which is not in the very Creed of the Apostles excepting the word Incarnate But 't is clear that it stands in the very place of those other words conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary which are wanting in this Creed of Irenaeus He would say that the Spirit of God united it self to real and not to celestial and aerial Flesh as some Hereticks imagin'd The turn is somewhat Platonizing but after all he did not intend to advance any thing but the antient Doctrine since he disputes against those men who held that Jesus Christ was pure Spirit clothed with celestial Flesh and he on the other hand supposed that Jesus Christ was a real Man true Flesh animated with a Divine Spirit a Man born of a Virgin truly born of the Substance of a Woman altho form'd by the Power of a Spirit Tertullian in one of his Tracts de veland Virg. in initio having given us this plain Rule of Faith which he calls the immutable and unchangeable Rule to this purpose That we must believe in one God alone c. and in his Son Jesus Christ born of the Virgin Mary c. in another Tract de Praescrip adv Haeres presents you with another Rule of the Platonizing Faith which is to believe that the same Word by which God created the World spoke to the Patriarchs and inspir'd the Prophets coming forth from the Spirit and the Power of the Father it lit upon the Virgin and was made Flesh and wrought in J.C. all sorts of Miracles Had he forgot that the Apostolick Faith is not to be changed or reformed No without doubt he does not pretend to change any thing but only gives the antient Opinion of the Conception of J. C. in Platonick Stile in Philosophick Jargon or to speak better he substitutes an Allegory manag'd with force and violence in the room of this Evangelical Expression born of a Virgin by the Power of the Holy Ghost which is plain and literal This Spirit as Tertullian says being an Emanation from the Spirit and the Power of the Father may be said in a mystick and sublime Sense to be the same Spirit who created the World and inspir'd the Prophets St. Cyril in his Catecheses explains a Creed purely Arian which Dr. Bull pretends to be the antient Creed of Jerusalem the Mother of all Churches I believe it says in One God the Father c. and in One Lord Jesus Christ the only Son of God begotten of the Father before Ages true God by whom all things were made incarnate and made Man c. I said this Creed is Arian for 't is expressed in the same Terms as all the Arian Confessions that are now extant And if the Doctor pretends that 't is Orthodox at the best hand it can pass for no more than the Creed of Constantinople as Monfieur Le Vassor has observed Traité de 〈◊〉 Examen ch 6. p. 226. This Creed of St. Cyril says he is almost the same with that of Constantinople especially in the Article concerning the Holy Spirit If it be true that the Catecheses we have are those which Cyril made in his Youth as St. Jerom reports it this Prelate reviewed and augmented 'em after the Council of Constantinople whose Creed he explains almost word for word In this case it will not be certain that the Article concerning the Church was in the Creed of Jerusalem Cyril might have added it to his Catecheses after the Synod If this Conjecture holds as to the Article of the Church much more will it do so as to the Platonick Word We can but say in this case it will not be certain that the Article concerning a Son begotten before Ages was in the Creed of Jerusalem Cyril might add to his Catecheses after the Synod of Constantinople Let 's join with this Learned Proselyte the famous Mons du Pin who in his second Tom. of his Bibliotheque p. 413. inunuates the Novelty of Cyril's Creed upon this account 1. That it has the Article of Life Everlasting which is not in all the antient Creeds And in his 1 Tom. Paris Edit p. 30. he says that Cyril in his Catecheses makes a particular Creed which the Church of Jerusalem us'd at the time that this Father wrote his Catecheses That those who have made Commentaries upon the Creed have omitted among others these Words Life everlasting And that St. Jerom observes in his Letter to Pammachius that the Creed ended with these Words The Resurrection of the Flesh These Words of du Pin are remarkable He says Cyril made a Creed which was peculiar to him and that it cannot be ascribed to the Church of Jerusalem till the time when this Father wrote For 't is certain that this is the sense of their Words in an Author that professes to believe that the Creed is not antient But however
Ghost as to their Nature and Person as we speak I say those three Articles whereupon we dispute are very antient 'T is true the antient Formulas of Faith contain'd scarce any thing besides these which are an Exposition of the Form of Baptism but then 't is of these only we are debating Yea the Liturgy ascribed to St. James and the Oriental Creed of Russinus give us these Articles in the proper Words of Scripture clean of all Platonism Is not such a piece of Antiquity more primitive and even antecedent to Cyril and all the Platonic Fathers But this Creed says Dr. Bull whatever Simplicity it has is to be understood in the Extent or Latitude the Platonizing Fathers took it in who made it always supposing as you see that it was not made till since the Church expounded in her larger Creeds her Platonic Faith I will turn this manner of reasoning upon him and say that supposing on the contrary the antient Liturgy had this Creed in the Simplicity wherein we have it at this time it cannot be understood but in the sense of the Nazarene Disciples of St. James who most certainly did not platonize as indeed we have prov'd Platonism owes not its Rise to the Jewish but to the Gentile Converts and such Gentiles too as were Followers of Plato True Orthodoxy at the very beginning of Christianity consisted in believing that J. C. was begotten of the Holy Ghost and consequently was of a celestial Race or Origin That he had a sort of Pre-existence in this H. Spirit of Power which was united to him and that upon these accounts he was really and in the Letter the proper and only Son of God A Doctrine which the Disciples of St. James maintained against the Cerinthians and Ebionites there being no other Controversy than concerning the Generation of the Son of God For which reason the Creed of Marcellus says barely that the only Son of God was begotten by the Holy Ghost of a Virgin and not begotten before Ages which might have been said with as much ease as t'other and must necessarily have been said if the meaning of the Author of the Creed had been that only Son signifies begotten from all Eternity But after all what will the Doctor say with his Interpretations and his Expositions of the antient Creed I have observed in divers Passages of his Writings that he requires too much to be granted him For instance he will have it in his Judic Eccles p. 141. that this Elogy of the Holy Ghost in the Creed of Constantinople The Living Lord proceeding from the Father who is to be worshiped and glorified with the Father and the Son That this magnificent Elogy was an Interpretation of the Word Paraclet in the Creed of Cyril Wonderful Paraphrase strange Interpretation that the Paraclet should signify all these fine things The Living Lord proceeding from the Father who is to be worshipped and glorified with the Father and the Son Well! after this do we think the Doctor does not desire to be believed when he assures us that the Son begotten before Ages the true God by whom all things were made is the true sense of these Words the only Son of God With the good Leave of this Commentary-Maker 't is more natural to believe in adhering to the Terms of the antient Creed that begotten by the Holy Ghost of a Virgin is the true Sense and the right Exposition In fine this pure simple Creed was not fram'd by a Cabal a Party as the Creeds of the Councils of Nice and Constantinople were c. 'T is not known if I may so speak whence it came 't is as it were fallen down from Heaven 't is the Suffrage of the Universal Church and 't is this Suffrage that has saved the Church from Shipwrack and gain'd her Reverence Ruffinus in his Expos Symb. makes no scruple to say that this Creed was establish'd to be a Mark of Distinction by which they might be known who preach'd J. C. truly according to Apostolic Rules But 't is proper I should here transcribe a fine Passage out of Dr. Hammond upon this Subject in his Discourse of fundamental Points chap. 8. Says he This Creed is the very Badge and Livery of the Apostles the Abridgment of that Faith which was received from the Apostles for altho in their Epistles written to such as were already Christians one finds no one complete Catalogue of these Articles which they taught every where because they suppos'd them sufficiently known yet however the most antient Writers of the Church assure us that in all places where the Apostles went to plant the Faith of Christ they publish'd there distinctly and left there all these Articles which serve for a Foundation to the Christian Life And 't is reasonable to believe that the Apostles Creed was the summary of these fâ—â—â—damental Articles 'T is certain that before the Nicene Creed was made all the Churches in the World us'd this formulary of Faith which they received from their Ancestors and they from the Apostles themselves See Irenaeus lib. 1. c. 2. lib. 3. c. 4. and there is not the least room to doubt but this is the very same with that we at this day call the Apostles Creed Marcellus gives us a Confession of his Faith which he says he received from his Predecessors which is found to be the same with our Apostles Creed See Epiphan Haer. 72. What I am saying may be confirmed by this Observation of St. Austin in his Discourse de Bapt. contr Donat. cap. 24. viz. that 't is reasonable to believe that what has generally been received in the Church and has always been held by it without being instituted by any Council comes to us from Apostolic Tradition also Tertullian de veland Virg. The Rule of Faith says he is one and immutable c. That this Abridgment of our Creed given us by Tertullian is one and immutable can be from no other Cause but from its Apostolic Origin which alone ought to pretend to that Privilege For this reason the same Father says elsewhere contr Prax. cap. 2. This Rule came down to us from the very first preaching of the Gospel 'T is true the Controversy that the Platonizing Christians had at first with the Christians of Judea made the Church when in power despise this Creed which favour'd its Adversaries so that it but rarely appears in its Simplicity but is for the most part clog'd and blended with Platonism But in the fourth Century the Dispute being only between the Athanasians and the Arians both good Platonists holding the Pre-existence this Creed was received for it oppos'd one no more than t'other and neither of these two Parties had then prevailed over one another The Church of Rome made it always her Creed for the Platonic Controversies were not so warm there as in the East But Dr. Bull will return to the Charge and tell us as he has done more than once that to
Testimony Every one frames for himself an Idea of sound Doctrine according to his particular Judgment of things Supposing therefore that this antient Author believed as the Orthodox Doctrine of his time was that J. C. was not the Son of Joseph and Mary and supposing on the other side there was none other Theology of his Birth than this that he was the Son of God by the Virgin Mary Hegesippus might very well say the Nazarene Bishops were sound in their Doctrine of the Person of J. C. without any ground for concluding thence that they held the Platonic Faith and were of Eusebius his Judgment 'T is enough that they were not engaged in the Error of the Ebionites because they were Orthodox To explain this by an example let 's suppose that Eusebius had said of some Arian Eishop that his Faith was sound as to the Person of J.C. could the Doctor and his Friends thence conclude that this Bishop believed the Consubstantiality and Equality of the Father and the Son By no means All they could hence infer is that the Bishop believed the Platonic Pre-existence which was the true Faith according to Eusebius who believed neither the Consubstantiality nor the Equality c. We ought to reason in the same manner from the Words of Hegâ—sippus who held that for a sound Faith which Eusebius would have called impious if he had known it as the Doctor would that which Eusebius thought sound Who does not know that those very Persons who held the Orthodox Faith of the first Ages I mean that of the miraculous Birth of our Saviour were accounted impious in the time of Eusebius Because they would not receive the Notion of the Platonic Word and the modish Philosophy of an Eternal Generation that was rashly superinduced or brought in the room of a plain Doctrine of a Generation in time of Mary by the Holy Ghost that is of a Woman by the Power of God But from the beginning it was not so they had another Theology for the better Demonstration of which I shall shew in the following Chapter that CHAP. X. The Word and the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost according to the sense of the Antients were but one and the same thing I Shall lastly consider that the Word among the Antients and the Holy Ghost in the Evangelists are but one and the same thing and that the Platonizing Writers themselves led by an antient Tradition the Footsteps whereof remain'd a long time have confounded these two Terms having often used 'em in one and the same Signification An evident Proof that the Philosophy of the Platonic Word owes its Birth to Allegories made upon that Divine Power which overshadowed the Blessed Virgin which Power may be indifferently call'd the Holy Ghost or the Word But as the latter Term is more agreeable to the Doctrine of Plato so 't is more frequently used So that at last this Conformity of Terms brought the Platonic Fathers to a conformity in Doctrine with Plato that is to say they fell into two Errors directly opposite to the Doctrine of the Gospel One in that they have made of a Power or a mere Operation an Hypostasis the other in that they have made two Hypostases of the Word and the Holy Ghost which at the bottom are but two diverse Operations Where therefore they made two Hypostases of these two Operations they follow'd their own Philosophy but when they confounded these Operations they built without question upon this Passage of David which says The Heavens were made by the Word of the Lord and by the Breath of his Mouth where the Word and Breath of the Lord are put together as things inseparable which differ not in effect only in this that the Breath is the Substance of the Word and the Word is the Operation of the Spirit to use the Words of Tertullian adv Prax. I shall pass over Hermas who in his 5th 9th Similitudes says That the Holy Ghost is the Son of God I have already shewn that he speaks thus but in parable for which reason his Testimony would be of no use but to serve for an Illusion And I shall say nothing more of Ignatius who salutes the Church at Smyrna in the Inscription of his Epistle with these Words The Holy Spirit which is the Word of God as if he had said by or thro him who is the Holy Ghost or the Word of God This Passage is not very exact or clear so as to perceive the meaning of the Author and to be able to draw from it a convincing Proof Les us begin therefore with Justin Martyr He in his 2d Apol. p. 74 c. having stil'd Jesus Christ the first and principal Power the Son and the Word who had not his Birth from Man but by the Power of God he comes afterwards to examine the Passage in St. Luke The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the Power of the Highest shall over shadow thee c. By the Holy Ghost or Spirit says he and the Power which came from God we ought to understand nothing but the Word which is the first-born of God And for the better understanding what Word he is speaking of he adds all in one Breath That 't is the Spirit which inspir'd the Prophets and which spake in the Person of a Prophet or in the Person of the Father or in the Person of Christ or in the Person of the People Here 's no difficulty either he has said nothing or he has formally said that the Holy Ghost which inspir'd the Prophets and the Power of the most High of which St. Luke speaks and the Word in St. John are all but one and the same thing After a Testimony so express I have no need to heap up other Passages out of the Writings of this Father wherein we may in part discover the same truth As when in his Dialogue with Trypho P. 327. he makes an Opposition between the Word of the Serpent by which Eve conceived and the Word of God by which the Blessed Virgin did conceive These are rather flights of Fancy and starts of Wit in a Preacher than an Exposition of the Christian Faith Only I would have it observ'd how in his 5th Book P. 284. he collects all the Qualities and all the Names which were usually given to the Word and to the Spirit that he may apply 'em to Jesus Christ First says â—he God â—eâ—â—t before all the Creatures a 〈◊〉 â—â—sonable Power which is sometimes called the Spirit the Glory of the Lord sometimes the Son sometimes the Wisdom sometimes an Angel sometimes God sometimes the Lord and the Word For all these Names are given to him either because he is the Minister of the Designs or Purposes of the Father or because he was begotten by his Will All this has much of the air of a theological Allegory by which one would express that Spirit and that Power of God which he imploy'd to execute his Counsels and
which comes not from his Vnderstanding by a necessary Emanation but by his Will by a free Operation That Power I say which may be called his Word or his Spirit according to the different respects wherein one considers it I will produce another Proof of this important Truth from Theophilus Antiochenus in his 2d Book to Autolycus Who says he speaking of the Word being the Spirit of God the Beginning the Wisdom the Power of the Highest came down into the Prophets by whom he spake What could he say more formal to make us understand that he took for one and the same thing the Spirit of God his Word his Wisdom and his Power His meaning cannot be mistaken when one considers that the Spirit and the Word whereof he speaks is the same that inspir'd the Prophets Words that very well agree with those of Justin which I now come to examine These two Fathers understood by the Word nothing but that prophetick Spirit the fulness whereof dwelt bodily in Jesus Christ and that St. Paul calls the fulness of the Godhead This is in effect the Explication that the Author of the Homilies ascrib'd to Origen has given in Diversos Homil. 2. St. Paul says he calls the fulness of the Godhead those mystick Senses or the truth of those legal Shadows which dwelt bodily in Jesus Christ that is to say truly and really because that he is the Fountain and Fulness of Grace the truth of the antient Symbols and the accomplishment of Prophetick Visions But according to the Fathers Jesus Christ was sill'd with this Prophetick Spirit not only when the Holy Spirit descended on him in the form of a Dove and that God made him a Prophet but especially when he was conceived by the Power of the Highest and he was as I may say begotten a Prophet that is to say when by virtue of his Generation his Body was formed for the Office of a Prophet And 't is chiefly this last Consideration that is urg'd against the Josephites because this Privilege of his Birth makes us to regard him not only as a Man who was a Prophet but as a Prophet who was also the Son of God But to return to the Passage from Theophilus if it be read thruout one shall find a fine Allegory upon the Word and the Holy Spirit which he calls the Wisdom of God Sometimes he considers 'em as two Divine Emanations proceeding from the Bowels of God and which God us'd as his two Hands or two Ministers by whom he created the World And sometimes he makes 'em but one Operation and so both are the Spirit and the Word the Wisdom and the Power of God c. Why so If not because that this Spirit takes divers Names either for the diversity of its Prolation or for its different Operations For the Word is the Spirit or Breath prolated with a Sound and a Voice and the Spirit is a Word brought forth tacitely and in silence the one with the other without sound One acts inwardly in a hidden and secret manner and the other outwardly and openly 'T is thus the Fathers speak In my opinion 't is idle to look for any exactness in these sort of allegorical Discourses which are loose and where the Fancy taking its swing drives on in full Career Irendus one of those Fathers who was obliged to urge the miraculous Conception of our Saviour against the Epionites confounded the Holy Ghost with the Word These Hereticks would not own says Ireraeus lib. 5. cap. 1. the Vnion of God with Man Why Because says he they believed the Lord Jesus to be a mere Man How a mere Man Because they believed him to be the Son of Joseph and Mary like other Men and not of a Virgin by the Operation of the Holy Ghost What says the Holy Father to this He laments that they would not consider how in the first Creation the Breath of God uniting it self to the Body of Adam animated the Man and made him a reasonable Creature So in the New Creation the Word of the Father and the Spirit of God being united to the old Substance of Adam hath form'd a living and perfect Man who contains in himself the perfect Father Dr. Bull in his Judic Eccles p. 10. having cited this Passage takes no notice of these words who contains in himself the perfect Father it may be because Irenaeus seems to say that 't was the Father who was incarnate or as 't is more probable because these Words expresly demonstrate that by the Word Irenaeus understood nothing but the very Power of God The living Man of whom he speaks containing in himself the perfect Father only because he was filled with God's Spirit and God's Word which were united to the Man But whatever he himself thought this is a truth that one perceives at first in reading the Text of Irenaeus 'T is at least most evident that he confounds the Spirit of God with the Word of the Father as one and the same Power which formed the New Adam and that he opposes it to the Divine Breath and Spirit of God which animated the first Adam His only aim being to oppose the Ebionites who denied that the Spirit of God interven'd in the Conception of Jesus Christ His only concern is also to establish firmly this miraculous Conception and to make 'em regard Jesus Christ as the most perfect Man whom the Father who is perfect had miraculously begotten by his Word and by his Spirit in the same manner as by the means of his Almighty Word he animated the first Man with the Breath of Life To make Irenaeus his Conception of the Word the same with the Moderns is to see and not perceive In short by reading his Text alone one shall be convinced that in his stating the Divinity of Jesus Christ he goes no farther than his miraculous Conception by the Holy Ghost He not only confounds the Word with the Spirit but calls the Word the Descent of the Holy Spirit into the Womb of Mary He calls it I say the Union and Mixture of God with Man He says the Father wrought at the Incarnation of his Son or at the new Generation with the same Hands excuse his Phrase as he did at the Generation of the Old Adam If we ask him what he means by Hands in this place he tells you in his 4th Book 37 Chap. that he understands thereby the Word of God his Son his Wisdom and his Spirit He means that powerful Command which God us'd in the Creation of things which is called his Spirit forasmuch as it is in God and is in a manner his Soul and which is also call'd his Word and his Son in regard that it came from his Mouth to form the Creation it was in a manner begotten That is to say by the same manner of speaking that the Wisdom and the Power of God are called his Hands by the same they are called his Son his Word
and his Spirit And further to make it clearer that this Father always confounds the Holy Ghost with the Word I must observe that in the last Passage I am about to cite he applies to the Holy Ghost the same Words of Solomon which are ordinarily applied to the Son The Word says he who is the Son was always with the Father and because the Wisdom which is the Holy Ghost was also with God before the Creation it speaks thus by Solomon God hath founded the Earth by his Wisdom c. and again The Lord created me c. There is therefore but One God who hath made all things by his Wisdom and by his Word CHAP. XI A Continuation of the same Proofs that the Antients understood by the Word and the Holy Ghost one and the same thing BUT after all you will say Irenaeus makes an express distinction between the Word and the Spirit I answer Yes But David makes the same distinction too and from him I believe the Fathers borrowed theirs The Heavens says he were formed by the Word of the Lord and by the Breath of his Mouth By the way who will be so weak as to affirm that he did not mean by these two words the same Power of God as if the Word was not the Breath of his Mouth and the Breath of his Mouth the Word Can one forbear smiling when one sees our Divines put David in the number of the Trinitarians In fine Irenaeus extols the Generation of the son of God by the Operation of the Holy Ghost as infinitely more excellent than the Generation of the first Man which was by breathing Life into him or by the Divine Breath Irenaeus affirms it but Dr. Bull denies it maintaining that Jesus Christ was not the Son of God by virtue of his miraculous Conception in a manner more excellent than Adam was by virtue of his immediate Generation or Formation by God's own hand Let us suppose it as the Doctor would have it yet after all he must agree that this Holy Father carries the Parallel that he makes between the first and second Adam no further than their Generation which was equally extraordinary in both This appears in the 31st Chapter of his 3d Book If the first Adam says he had his Being from a Man it might be said with some shew of reason that 't is the same as to the second Adam and that Joseph was his Father But if it be true on the contrary that the first was form'd out of the Earth by the Word of God must not the same Word acting with the same Power as he did at the Formation of Adam carry a resemblance of the same Generation Let this Comparison be a little minded it contains this clearly that God did no more in the Generation of the second Adam in whom he would dwell than in that of the first Adam that Adam and Jesus Christ are the immediate Production of this Word Consequently there 's no more reason to infer the hypostatick Union of the Word with Jesus Christ than with Adam this Word being as you see nothing but the Power of God which having immediately formed the first Man did also form Jesus Christ after the same primitive manner of Generation All the difference is that God was pleas'd to dwell in the latter after an extraordinary manner Let 's see in the next place what Tertullian has to say He was a great Platonist but that Party does not always strictly observe the Rules of Platonism They have their lucid Intervals wherein some Remains of the antient Tradition drop from their Pens Whenever they philosophize according to the humour of that Faction they are to be suspected 't is the effect of their Prejudices but when they happen to speak to the disadvantage of their own Hypotheses what is it that could oblige them to it but the Power of Truth alone Tertullian therefore at the end of his Discourse against Praxeas sisting this matter of the Nature of the Word and the Holy Ghost to the bottom speaks of 'em as one and the same Power 'T is worth while to read the whole throughout but I shall content my self with this following Passage which is decisive and beyond dispute Contra Prax. cap. 26. The Spirit of God i. e. Holy Ghosi shall come upon thee c. By saying the Spirit of God altho the Spirit of God be God nevertheless he not calling it directly God he would have us understand a Part of the Whole which was to attend the Person of the Son and get him the Name that he has This is that Spirit of God which we call the Word also For as when St. John says the Word was made Flesh by the term Word we understand the Spirit so in this Passage we understand the Word under the Name of the Spirit since the Spirit is the Substance of the Word and the Word the Operation of the Spirit and these two are but one For if the Spirit be not the Word and the Word be not the Spirit 't will follow that he of whom St. John says that he was made Flesh will not be the same with him of whom the Angel says that he shall be made Flesh Let us weigh well all these Words By the Spirit Tertullian understands nothing but a Portion of the whole a Beam of the Substance of God as he expresses himself elsewhere because otherwise it would follow according to Praxeas that the Father himself was incarnate He will have it that this Portion makes the Son what he is that is the Son of God He confounds the Spirit with the Word and will have St. Luke and St. John speak the same Language and that the first might have said the Word shall come upon thee and the latter the Holy Ghost was made Flesh since that by the term Holy Ghost the Word must be understood and by the term Word the Holy Ghost and that 't is not likely St. John would speak of one particular Spirit and the Angel of another And more than this he acquaints us what use we ought to make of these two Words which at the bottom signify but the same thing and that is we ought to call this Power Spirit when we would express its Substance and Word when we would express its Operation In short he decides our Question by saying that these two are but one and the same thing that is to say the same Power For the Word says he in his Rule of Faith de Praescript descended from the Spirit and the Power of God into the Womb of the Virgin What does this import viz. the Word descended from the Spirit and the Power of God if not this that the Word is nothing else but an Emanation a Manifestation of the Power which is internal and essential to God And 't is almost in the same sense that Marius Victorin contra Arium lib. 1. states a twofold Power of the Word that is to say a