please you by doing a thing in it self so inept and so insignificant to you I shall better do both if I shall offer any thing to you concerning this mentioned Subject your further consideration whereof may prove a further benefit to the World In what you have already said concerning it you have used that great Caution and so well guarded your self as not so far as I can apprehend to give an adversary in this single point the least advantage That which I would in the general humbly offer is whether you have said so much as with safety might be said and as the Case may require for the gaining of a just advantage to the common Christian Cause We design in fight not only to keep our selves safe but to overcome and not in praelio only but in bello In Wars indeed of this sort both our own safety and victory are less to be valued than truth Which being of a piece can be injured in no part without some dammage to the whole frame of congenerous Truth And as it is very possible while an Enemy is withstood attacking some one Fort a greater loss may not be provided against elsewhere it may so fall out in Affairs of this kind too that the Care of defending some one Truth may be accompany'd with a present not attending to the jeopardy of divers others The nearer we approach an Adversary within just limits in these rational decertations the less he can have to say against us But being well resolved our selves about the main point of disagreement we then take Care not to come so near as to fall in with him pass into his Tents and give away our main Cause I am worthiest Sir far from assuming so much to my self or detracting so much from you as to give a judgment that this really is done in your Discourses about the Trinity I only submit it to your own most penetrating judgment what may be further requisite and possible in this matter to take away any appearances hereof and prevent ill consequences that may too easily ensue I have for my own part long impos'd it upon my self to abstain from any positive Conceptions concerning the Godhead beyond what I find expresly contain'd in the divine revelation or what the reason of things either antecedently thereto or consequentially thereupon doth most evidently perswade and require and do greatly approve the same caution which I cannot but observe with you But desire it may be weigh'd whether such measures may not and must not lead us further As for the word person you prudently profess not to be fond of it the thing being agreed thô you also truly judge it a good word and sufficiently warranted For the Notion signify'd by it you all along seem to decline that of the Schools or the Metaphysical one which you know makes it to be a rational or intelligent suppositum and to take up with what I think I may wanting a fitter i. e. a more comprehensive word call the Civil Notion of it which will allow the same man to be capable of sustaining three or more persons supposing his circumstances or qualifications to be such or such as to that purpose you speak both in your Letters and Sermons Now whereas you have also told us Letter 1. that by personality you mean that distinction whatever it be by which the three persons are distinguished each from other that which with great submission and most profound respect to you I propose to your further Consideration will be capable of being resolved into these two Enquiries 1. Whether only such a distinction of the Divine Persons as this amounts to will be sufficient to found the several attributions which the Holy Scriptures give distinctly and severally to them and to preserve the Scheme of Christian Religion entire which is wont to be deduced from these Sacred Writings 2. Whether some further distinction may not be admitted as possible consistently with the salved unity of the Godhead As to the former 1. Whereas you think the word Person to be a good word and sufficiently warranted by Scripture Heb. 1. 3. where the Son is called the express Image of his Father's Person alledging that so we render the word Hypostasis which is there used and do mean by it what you think to be there meant I desire you would please to consider whether the word Hypostasis according to the common use of it will admit to be so taken as you explain your self to mean by the word Person For thô the Latine word persona as you say according to the true and ancient sense may well enough admit to be so taken as that the same Man might sustain three persons I offer it to your re-consideration whether ever you have observ'd the word Hypostasis in any sort of Authors when it signifies any Person at all for I know that it frequently signifies somewhat else than a Person to be taken in that sense And whether one Hypostasis so taken as it uses to be when it signifies a Person may not be capable of sustaining three of those Persons which you here describe And whether according to this sense you mean not God to be only one such Hypostasis 2. Be pleas'd further hereupon to consider how well it agrees with this supposition of God's Being but one Hypostasis or intelligent suppositum so frequently to speak as the Holy Scriptures do of the Father Son or Word the Spirit or Holy Ghost as three distinct I's or He 's The Lord possessed me as the Divine Word or Wisdom is brought in speaking in the beginning of his way I was set up from everlasting Prov. 8. 22 23. When he prepared the Heavens I was there vers 27. Then was I by him vers 30 c. The Word was with God Joh. 1. 1. He was in the World vers 10. We beheld his glory vers 14. And of the Spirit He dwelleth with you Joh. 14. 17. The Holy Ghost whom the Father will send in my name He shall teach you all things vers 26. And whom I will send you from the Father he shall testifie of me Chap. 15. 26. And when he is come he will reprove the World Ch. 16. 8. And the observation seems to me as weighty as it is usual that in some of the mentioned Chapters the somewhat hard Synthesis of construing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not the nearer Suppositum but in one place a very remote one and one would think too remote to be referr'd to ch vers 13 14. is rather chosen to be used than that the Spirit should not be spoken of as a distinct he or rather than he should be called it which could not so fitly notifie a Person If the same man were a King a General and a Father I doubt whether that would give sufficient ground to his being called He and He and He. 2. But the distinct Predicates spoken
similitude viz. a natural union of these supposed distinct essences without which they are not under the greatest union possible and which being supposed necessary and eternal cannot admit these should be more than one God 2. I note that what he opposes to it so defectively represented is as defective that the Christian Trinity doth not use to be represented thus c. What hurt is there in it if it can be more intelligibly represented than hath been used But his gentle treatment of this hypothesis which he thought as he represents it not altogether unintelligible and which with some help may be more intelligible became one enquiring what might most safely and with least torture to our own minds be said or thought in so awful a Mystery It however seems not proper to call this an hypostatical union much less to say it amounts to no more It amounts not to so much For an hypostatical or personal union would make the terms united the unita the things or somewhats under this union become by it one hypostasis or person whereas this union must leave them distinct persons or hypostases but makes them one God In the use of the Phrase hypostatical or personal union the denomination is not taken from the subject of the union as if the design were to signifie that to be divers hypostases or persons but from the effect or result of the mentioned union to signifie that which results to be one person or hypostasis As the matter is plain in the instance wherein it is of most noted use the case of the two Natures united in the one Person of the Son of God where the things united are not supposed to be two Persons but two Natures so conjoyn'd as yet to make but one person which therefore is the Negative result or effect of the union viz. that the person is not multiply'd by the accession of another Nature but remains still only one But this were an union quite of another kind viz. of the three hypostases still remaining distinct and concurring in one Godhead And may not this be supposed without prejudice to its Perfection For the Schools themselves suppose themselves not to admit a composition prejudicial to the Perfection of the Godhead when they admit three modes of subsistence which are distinct from one another and from the Godhead which they must admit For if each of them were the very Godhead each of them as is urged against us by you know who must have three Persons belonging to it as the Godhead hath And your self acknowledge three somewhats in the Godhead distinct or else they could not be three I will not here urge that if they be three somewhats they must be three things not three nothings for however uneasie it is to assign a Medium between something and nothing I shall wave that Metaphysical contest But yet collect that simplicity in the very strictest sense that can be conceiv'd is not in your account to be ascribed to God either according to his own word or the reason of things It may here be urged how can we conceive this Natural Union as I have adventur'd to Phrase it of the three Persons supposing them distinct things substances or Spirits Is such an Union conceivable as shall make them be but one God and not be such as shall make them cease to be three distinct things substances or Spirits We find indeed the mentioned unions of Soul and Body in our selves and of the two Natures in Christ consistent enough with manifest distinction but then the things united are in themselves of most different Natures But if things of so congenerous a Nature be united will not their distinction be lost in their union I answer 1. That a Spirit and a Spirit are numerically as distinct as a Body and a Spirit And 2. That we may certainly conceive it as possible to God to have united two or three created Spirits and by as strict union as is between our Souls and Bodies without confounding them and I reckon the union between our Souls and Bodies much more wonderful than that would have been Why then is an unmade uncreated union of three Spirits less conceivable as that which is to be presupposed to their mutual consciousness I shall not move or meddle with any Controversie about the Infinity of these three supposed Substances or Spirits it being acknowledged on all hands that Contemplations of that kind cannot but be above our measure And well knowing how much easier it is to puzzle oneself upon that Question An possit dari infinitum infinito infinitius than to speak satisfyingly and unexceptionably about it to another And tho' I will not use the expressions as signifying my formed judgment that there are three things substances or Spirits in the Godhead as you that there are three somewhats yet as I have many Years thought I do still think that what the learned W. J. doth but more lightly touch of the Son and the Holy Ghost being produced which term I use but reciting it as he doth not by a voluntary external but by an internal necessary and emanative Act hath great weight in it In short my sense hath long lain thus and I submit it to your searching and candid Judgment viz. That tho' we need not have determinate thoughts how far the Father Son and Holy Ghost are distinguished yet we must conceive them in the general to be so far distinguished as is really necessary to the founding the distinct attributions which the Scriptures do distinctly give them And that whatever distinction is truly necessary to that purpose will yet not hinder the two latters participation with the first in the Godhead which can be but one because that tho' we are led by plain Scripture and the very import of that word to conceive of the Father as the Fountain yet the Son being from him and the Holy Ghost from them both not contingently or dependently on will and pleasure but by eternal natural necessary promanation these two latter are infinitely distinguisht from the whole Creation Inasmuch as all Creatures are contingent beings or dependent upon will and pleasure as the Character is given us of created things Rev. 4. 11. Thou hast made all things and for thy pleasure they are and were created But that whatever is what it is necessarily is God For I have no doubt but the Dreams of some more anciently and of late concerning necessary matter and the Sophisms of Spinosa and some others tending to prove the necessity and identity of all substance are with what they aim to evince demonstrably false The Summe of all will be this 1. That we can be more certain of nothing than that there is but one God 2. We are most sure the Father Son and Holy Ghost are sufficiently distinguished to give a just ground to the distinct attributions which are in Scripture severally given to them 3. We are not sure what that sufficient distinction is
these is God and the other God I know a formal distinction is commonly admitted i. e. that the conception of the one is not included in the conception of the other But are these different conceptions true or false If false why are they admitted if true there must be somewhat in the Nature of the thing corresponding to them But if we say they are distinct but most intimately and eternally united in the Divine Being by a necessary natural Union or that it is not impossible so to be what we say will I think agree with it self and not disagree with any other conception we are obliged to have concerning the blessed God In the mean time I profess not to judge we are under the precise Notions of Power Wisdom and Goodness to conceive of the Father Son and Holy Ghost nor that the Notions we have of those or any other divine Perfections do exactly correspond to vvhat in God is signify'd by these Names but I reckon that vvhat relief and ease is given our minds by their being disentangled from any apprehended necessity of thinking these to be the very same things may facilitate to us our apprehending the Father Son and Spirit to be sufficiently distinct for our affirming or under standing the affirmation of some things concerning some one without including the other of them XIV But some perhaps will say while we thus amplify the distinction of these glorious three we shall seem to have too friendly a look towards or shall say in effect what Dr. Sherlock is so highly blam'd for saying and make three Gods I answer that if with sincere minds we enquire after truth for its own sake we shall little regard the friendship or enmity honour or dishonour of this or that man If this were indeed so doth what was true become false because such a man hath said it But it is remote from being so There is no more here positively asserted than generally so much distinction betweeen the Father Son and Spirit as is in it self necessary to the founding the distinct attributions which in the Scriptures are severally given them that when the word or wisdom was said to be with God understanding it as the case requires with God the Father in the creation of all things we may not think nothing more is said than that he was with himself that when the Word is said to be made flesh 't is equally said the Father was made flesh or the Holy Ghost that when the Holy Ghost is said to have proceeded from or have been sent by the Father or the Son he is said to have proceeded from himself or have sent himself But in the mean time this is offered without determining precisely how great distinction is necessary to this purpose It is not here positively said these three are three distinct substances three infinite minds or spirits We again and again insist and inculcate how becoming and necessary it is to abstain from over-bold enquiries or positive determinations concerning the limits or the extent of this distinction beyond what the Scriptures have in general made necessary to the mentioned purpose that we may not throw our selves into guilt nor cast our minds into unnecessary straits by affirming this or that to be necessary or impossible in these matters XV. The case is only thus that since we are plainly led by the express revelation God hath made of himself to us in his Word to admit a trinal conception of him or to conceive this threefold distinction in his Being of Father Son and Spirit since we have so much to greaten that distinction divers things being said of each of these that must not be understood of either of the other since we have nothing to limit it on the other hand but the Unity of the Godhead which we are sure can be but One both from the plain Word of God and the nature of the thing it self since we are assured both these may consist viz. this Trinity and this Unity by being told there are three and these three i. e. plainly continuing three are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one thing which one thing can mean nothing else but Godhead as is also said concerning two of them elsewhere there being no occasion then to mention the third I and my Father are one thing We are hereupon unavoidably put upon it to cast in our own minds and are concerned to do it with the most religious reverence and profoundest humility what sort of thing this most sacred Godhead may be unto which this Oneness is ascribed with threefold distinction And manifestly finding there are in the Creation made Unions with sufficient remaining distinction particularly in our selves that vve are a soul and a body things of so very different natures that often the Soul is called the Man not excluding the Body and the body or our flesh called the Man not excluding the Soul we are plainly led to apprehend that it is rather more easily possible there might be two Spirits so much more agreeing in nature so united as to be one thing and yet continuing distinct and if two there might as well be three if the Creator pleased And hence are led further to apprehend that if such a made Union with continuing distinction be possible in created being it is for ought we know not impossible in the uncreated that there may be such an eternal unmade union with continuing distinction And all this being only represented as possible to be thus without concluding that thus it certainly is sufficiently serves our purpose that no pretence might remain of excluding the eternal Word and the eternal Spirit the Godhead as if a Trinity therein were contradictious and impossible repugnant to reason and common sense Where novv is the coincidency XVI Nor is there hereupon so great a remaining difficulty to salve the Unity of the Godhead when the supposition is taken in of the natural eternal necessary Union of these three that hath been mentioned And it shall be considered that the Godhead is not supposed more necessarily to exist than these three are to coexist in the nearest and most intimate union with each other therein That Spiritual Being which exists necessarily and is every way absolutely perfect whether it consist of three in one or of only one is God We could never have known 't is true that there are such three coexisting in this one God if he himself had not told us What Man knoweth the things of a Man but the Spirit of a Man that is in him even so the things of God none knoweth but the Spirit of God In telling us this he hath told us no impossible no unconceivable thing It is absurd and very irreligious presumption to say this cannot be If a Worm were so far capable of thought as to determine this or that concerning our Nature and that such a thing were impossible to belong to it which we find to be in it we should trample
delicious if he had some one to whom to express his sense of the whole We are not I say strictly to measure God by our selves in this further than as he himself prompts and leads us But if we so form our Conception of Divine Bliss as not to exclude from it somewhat whereof that Delight in Society which we find in our selves may be an imperfect faint resemblance it seems not altogether disagreeable to what the Scriptures also teach us to conceive concerning him when it brings in the eternal Wisdom saying as one distinct from the prime Author and Parent of all things then was I by him as one brought up with him and daily his delight XXIII However let the whole of what hath been hitherto proposed be taken together and to me it appears our conception of the sacred Trinunity will be so remote from any shadow of inconsistency or repugnancy that no necessity can remain upon us of torturing Wit and racking Invention to the uttermost to do a laboured and artificial violence by I know not what skrews and engines to so numerous plain Texts of Scripture only to undeify our glorious Redeemer and do the utmost despite to the Spirit of grace We may be content to let the word of God or what we pretend to own for a divine revelation stand as it is and undistorted speak its own sense And when we find the Former of all things speaking as WE or US When we find another I possessed by the Lord in the beginning of his way before his works of old so as that he says of himself as distinct from the other I was set up from everlasting from the beginning or ever the Earth was And when he prepared the Heavens I was there c. When we find the Child born for us the Son given to us called also the mighty God and as in reference to us he fitly might the Everlasting Father When we are told of the Ruler that was to come out of Bethlehem-Ephrata that his goings forth were from everlasting That the Word was in the beginning with God and was God That all things were made by him and without him nothing was made that was made That this Word was made flesh That His glory was beheld as the glory of the only begotten Son of the Father full of grace and truth Even that same he that above was said to have been in the beginning with God and to be God That when he who was said to have come down from Heaven was even while he was on Earth at that time said to be in Heaven That we are told by himself he and his Father are one thing That he is not only said to know the heart but to know all things That even he who according to the flesh came of the Israelites is yet expresly said to be over all God blessed for ever That when he was in the form of God he humbled himself to the taking on him the form of a servant and to be found in fashion as a man That 't is said all things were created by him that are in heaven and on earth visible and invisible thrones dominions principalities powers and that all things were created by him and for him than which nothing could have been said more peculiar or appropriate to Deity That even of the Son of God it is said he is the true God and eternal Life That we are so plainly told he is Alpha and Omega the first and the last he that was and is and is to come The Lord Almighty the beginning of the creation of The searcher of hearts That the Spirit of God is said to search all things even the deep things of God That lying to him is said to be lying to God That the great Christian Solemnity Baptism is directed to be in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost That it is so distinctly said there are three that bear record in Heaven the Father the Word and the Spirit and that these three are one thing I cannot imagine what should oblige us so studiously to wiredraw all this to quite other meanings XXIV And for the leaving out of this last mentioned text in some copies what hath been said not to mention divers others by the famously learned Dr. Hammond upon that place is so reasonable so moderate so charitable to the opposite party and so apt to satisfie impartial and unprejudic'd minds that one would scarce think after the reading of it any real doubt can remain concerning the authentickness of that 7 th verse in 1 Joh. 5. Wherefore now taking all these texts together with many more that might have been mentioned I must indeed profess to wonder that with men of so good sense as our Socinian Adversaries are accounted this consideration should not have more place and weight viz. That it being so obvious to any Reader of the Scriptures to apprehend from so numerous Texts that Deity must belong to the Son of God and that there wants not Sufficient inducement to conceive so of the Holy Ghost also there should be no more caution given in the Scriptures themselves to prevent mistake if there were any in apprehending the matter accordingly And to obviate the unspeakable consequent danger of erring in a case of so vast importance How unagreeable it is to all our notions of God and to his usual procedure in cases of less consequence How little doth it consist with his being so wise and so compassionate a Lover of the souls of men to let them be so fatally expos'd unto so inevitable and so destructive a delusion That the whole Christian Church should thorough so many Centuries of years be even trained into so horrid and continued Idolatry by himself who so severely forbids it I cannot allow my self to think men of that perswasion insincere in their professing to believe the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures when the Leader and Head of their Party writ a book that is not without nerves in defence of it But I confess I cannot devise with what design they can think those Scriptures were written Or why they should count it a thing worthy of infinite wisdom to vouchsafe such a revelation to men allowing them to treat and use it as they do And that till some great Socinian wits should arise 1500 years after to rectify their notions in these things men should generally be in so great hazzard of being deceived into damnation by those very Scriptures which were professedly writ to make them wise to Salvation XXV Nor is it of so weighty importance in this controversie to cast the ballance the other way that a noted Critick upon what introducement needs not be determined chang'd his judgment or that his Posthumous interpretations of some texts if they were his interpretations carry an appearance of his having changed it because he thought such texts might
That cannot be his meaning nor be consequent from it if he only mean that the Deity comprehends in it three such essences If indeed he think those three beings are as distinct as Peter James and John what is said by W. J. against him I think irrefragable that then they are no otherwise one than Peter James and John and by him against himself for Peter James and John are not mutually self-conscious as they are asserted to be which mutual self-consciousness since it is supposed to make the three divine Persons one cannot be supposed to leave them so distinct as they are with whom it is not found As to what is observed of the defective expression of this unitive Principle by the word consciousness that bare Consciousness without consent is no more than bare Omnisciency Sure it is not so much For Consciousness doth not signifie Omnisciency We are conscious to our selves yet are not omniscient But I reckon as I find he also doth that even consent added to consciousness would yet leave the expression defective and still want the unifying power which is sought after For it would infer no more than a sort of moral union which in the kind of it may be found among men between whom there is so little of natural union speaking of the numerical nature that they are actually separate But now may we not suppose as that which is possible and actually is for ought we know what may be fundamental to both Consciousness and Consent a natural union even of the numerical natures Such an union would not infer an Unity or Identity of these Natures Essences Substances or Beings themselves For as W. J. hath well argued Letter p. 5 6. Substances upon Union are not confounded or identify'd or brought to unity of Substance but continuing numerically distinct Substances acquire some mutual community or communication of operations c. And deferring the consideration a while what this would signifie towards the unity notwithstanding of the Godhead shall take notice how accommodately to our present purpose W. J. speaks in what follows where instancing in the chief unions that are known to us he says Our Soul and Body are two substances really distinct and in close union with one another But notwithstanding this they continue distinct substances under that union In like manner the humane soul of Christ is in union with the Logos or second Person of the Trinity which we call an hypostatical Union But neither doth this union make an unity of substance For the two substances of the divine and humane natures continue distinct under that union 'T is true he addes which must not be allowed in the Unity of the Godhead where there can be no plurality or multiplicity of substhaces Nor do I say that it must I only say Do we know or are we sure there is no sort of Plurality But if we are sure that there are temporal unions i. e. begun in time as in our selves for instance of two substances that make but one man and in our Saviour an humane nature and divine that make but one Emmanuel How do we know but that there may be three in the Godhead that make but one God And the rather because this being supposed it must also be supposed that they are necessarily and eternally united and with a conjunct natural impossibility of ever being or having been otherwise whereof the absolute immutability of God must upon that supposition most certainly assure us And such a supposed union will be most remote from making the Deity an aggregate And for any thing of composition I reckon we are most strictly bound to believe every thing of the most perfect simplicity of the Divine Being which his Word informs us of and to assent to every thing that is with plain evidence demonstrable of it But not every thing which the Schools would impose upon us without such testimony or evidence For as none can know the things of a Man but the Spirit of Man which is in him so nor can any know the things of God but the Spirit of God Nor can I think the Argument concluding from the imperfection of a Being in which distinct things concur that were seperate or are de novo united to the impersection of a being in which things some way distinct are necessarily and eternally self-united Nor can therefore agree with W. J. that we are to look universally upon real distinction as a mark of separability or that clear and distinct conception is to us the rule of partibility For tho' I will not affirm that to be the state of all created Spirits yet I cannot deny it to be possible that God might have created such a being as should have in it distinct assignable parts all of them essential to it and not separable from it without the cessation of the whole But now as the accession of the humane Nature to the divine in the hypostatical union infers no imperfection to the divine so much less would what things we may suppose naturally necessarily and eternally united in the Godhead infer any imperfection therein I easily admit what is said by W. J. Letter pag. 8. That we have no better definition of God than that he is a Spirit infinitely perfect But then being so far taught by himself my conception of him I must include in it this trinal distinction or a triple somewhat which he affirms of himself and without which or any one whereof he were not infinitely perfect and consequently not God and that all together do make one God As you most aptly say of your resemblance of him a Cube there are in it three dimensions truly distinct from each other yet all these are but one Cube and if any one of the three were wanting it were not a Cube Set this down then for the Notion of God that he is a Spirit infinitely perfect comprehending in that omnimodous Perfection a trinal distinction or three persons truly distinct each whereof is God What will be the consequence that therefore there are three Gods Not at all but that each of these partaking Divine Nature give us an inadequate and all together a most perfectly adequate and entire Notion of God Nor would the Language of this Hypothesis being prest to speak out as he says in his Letter be this these are not fit to be called three Gods but not possible with any truth to be so called And whereas he after tells us these three being united by similitude of Nature mutual consciousness consent cooperation under the greatest union possible and in that state of union do constitute the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the entire all-comprehensive Godhead and adds this looks somewhat like a conceivable thing To this I Note two things 1. That he makes it not look like so conceivable a thing as it really may do For he leaves out the most important thing that was as supposable as any of the rest and prior to a meer