unaccountable Figments of theirs to avoid Scripture Arguments we cannot imagine either that the Scripture should favour them or they the Scriptures or in plain English that they allow the Holy Scriptures to be the Rule or Foundation of their Faith 2ly As their Belief that our Saviour had not a Being before his Incarnation is without and against the Authority of the Scriptures so they confess and seem to glory that all the Ancient Fathers tho' some of them were contemporary with the Apostles and Councils were against them in this great and fundamental Point Accordingly Socinus enters his Protestation against them all The heap of Authorities and Testimonies out of the Fathers and Councils have no force especially against us that are not diffident to dissent from them 5 Tom. 2 Resp ad 2 C. Wick p. 618. 3ly As for the Catholick Church it in no Age in the Times of or since the Apostles ever received this Opinion That our Saviour did not exist before he was born of the Virgin Mary but hath in all Ages rejected and exploded it as the Madness of Heresie For Fifteen Hundred Years together the Catholick Church stood quiet in the possession of the contrary Truth Indeed the Arrians vex'd Her a considerable time about the Eternal Generation and Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father but at last the truth of those Points by diligent search into the Holy Scriptures was so well settled by Fathers and Councils that the Church continued quiet and free from those Arrian Disputes for Twelve or Thirteen Hundred years together But what was this to our upstart Socinianism The Arrians never dreamt of this Conceit they believed that the Son of God was made a God before and was the great God's Instrument in making the Worlds joyn'd as the Learned Bishop Pearson hath noted with the Orthodox in Council to pass an Anathema against one or two that in that Age vented that Point That our Saviour had no Being before he was born of the Virgin and it being so early knock'd in the Head we never read it took Life or stirred again except one Abelardus hit upon it before Servetus's Time Whence should this new Light spring in Polonia so late to the disturbance of the Church the reproach of the Fathers and Councils and the weakening or nulling the Authority of the Holy Scriptures Who can chuse but reflect hence upon the Presumption Pride Confidence and Impudence of this Novel-Attempt to ridicule the Christian Faith and to subvert the Foundation of the Christian Religion If we have any deferrence to the Word of God to the Primitive Fathers and the whole Church we must conclude Socinianism is intolerable Indeed two Arguments render it hardly Christian 1. That they are gone out of the Catholick or Christian Church which is founded in the Trinity both for her Faith and Worship 2. That it makes another Foundation for her Faith viz. her own corrupted Reason besides and contrary to the only Doctrinal Foundation of the Christian Religion viz. the Holy Scriptures as we noted before Have they Doubting or something like Faith in this Matter why do they not follow the Apostle's Rule and keep it to themselves They do not think that all are in a damnable state that are not of their Opinions Is there then no Regard to be had to Peace I fear neither their Charity nor Prudence is better than their Faith Why must the World feel that they are Firebrands as well as Hereticks If we may judge by their modern Writing as they exceed their Fathers the Arrians in their Principles so they succeed them in their Fierceness VIII Faith intelligible Obj. But I must not neglect the great Obstacle They say they are against Mysteries and things unintelligible God hath given us Faculties of Reason and Understandings and by these only we conceive and judge of things to be believed and God cannot expect we should believe without Reason or act beyond our proper Sphere or believe we know not what or what we cannot conceive or apprehend Sol. I am not against Aquinas's Description of Faith Fides est actus animae rationalis quatenus rationalis I know Reason is the Form of Man and the very Principle of Human Actions as such and we must in some measure conceive and apprehend by our Reason both what and why we believe But tho' Ratio be Judex Scriptura est Norma and the Scripture as the Rule of Faith presents us with due Objects to be apprehended by our Understanding and with sufficient reason from God's own Word why we should believe them Hence let us take occasion to enquire what it is these Gentlemen mean when they say they cannot conceive or apprehend the Objects of our Faith Do they not understand the state of the Controversie Do they not know themselves what we would have them and what they refuse to consent to Could any man more distinctly and plainly express the Orthodox Faith about the Son of God than Socinus himself to this purpose All the Fathers dissent from them saith he as they would have Christ exist of the Substance of his Father before the World was made and That he often appeared to the Fathers under the Old Testament yea and the One God his Father made the World and all things by him and whatever he would have us know he hath revealed by him Now did not Socinus understand and conceive what he wrote Did he not then know what we believe And is yet this great Object of our Faith an unconceivable Mystery Again the Rule of our Faith is as conceivable as the Matter of it If the Text propose such a thing to be believed these men of Apprehension are sagacious enough to search into the meaning of the Words and the coherence with the Context and to conceive the true Sence and how to avoid it as any men living And thus also they may understand why we believe as well as what What 's the matter then Where lies the Mystery O they cannot apprehend how it should be that the Son of God should be eternally begotten of and One in Essence with the Father And what if they cannot I think it 's no great matter as to their Salvation whether they do or not believe what is revealed and leave the Mystery some Objects of Faith here are reserved for Objects of Vision hereafter If we are to believe nothing but what we know of the manner of their Being or Working we must be Infidels in Nature as well as in Religion But to come a little closer to them there are two unconceivable Points they say which cannot go down with them the Trinity and the Vnity of our Saviour or his having the same Essence with the Father I shall consider both of them As for the Trinity what is there in it that they cannot conceive either as to the Object or the Rule of our Faith about it Cannot they conceive what the Scripture reveals That there is the
Father the Son and the Holy Ghost that these are Three and that the Father is the God of Christians the Son is the God of Christians and the Holy Ghost is the God of Christians Certainly the Socinians as well as the Arrians may apprehend the matter so far And further That they are all True God for we are not baptized in the Name to the worship of any false God And lastly That as the Apostle saith To us Christians there is but one true God Yes all this they can apprehend as 't is revealed but they know not how to understand three in one and one in three Here I cannot give them better Advice than not to lean to their own Vnderstandings but to believe the Revelation and with Modesty and Humllity to adore the Mystery Quomodo Pater genuit Filium nolo discutias St. Hierom. Yet I must remark that the Mystery as to the Matter of it was conceivable and upon a plain Text not then disputed believed too before the Council of Nice and though I know such Authorities weigh little with our Adversaries and Dr. Bull and Dr. Whitby might have spared their Excellent Pains in evincing such Authorities seeing they protest against them I mean as to them yet I have some reason to mention Two of them The first is that of Tertullian Ex Conscientia scimus c. Of Conscience we know that the Name of God and Father and Son and Spirit do agree so as the Connexion of the Father in the Son and of the Son in the Paraclete makes Three cohering alterum ex altero which Three are One Vnum non unus as it is said I and my Father are One for Unity of Substance not for Singularity of Number De anima c. 14. The other is St. Cyprian De Vnitate c. The Lord said I and my Father are One. And again Of God the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit it 's written And these Three are One Hanc unitatem Those that hold not this Unity hold not the Truth to Salvation These I have noted to shame the Scoffer that shall say We had but two Gods before the Council of Nice as well as to shew that wise and good men of old understood the Object and Rule of our Christian Faith in this great Article and what was then thought of the Oppugners of it Obj. So much for the Trinity but the Eternity of the Son of God and his Co-essentiality with the Father they say is unintelligible But can they conceive how God should be a Father from Eternity without a Son Can they not conceive that which their Brethren the Arrians believed according to abundance of Scriptures that our Saviour did exist before his Incarnation And then that being supposed their own Reason assures them that He must from Eternity as before was observed Can they not conceive that if all things were made by him and without him nothing was made that was made that he existed before any thing was made and therefore was a God born and not made Can they not apprehend that seeing whatsoever is in God is God and therefore the Wisdom and Power in God is the Divine Nature and that if God communicate his own Wisdom c. to his Son he communicates with it his Divine Nature Can they conceive that God was ever without his Wisdom Can they not conceive that Thought is the proper issue of a Mind and that God's Mind is eternal and Thought or Wisdom and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Son of God are eternally begotten of him Have these men peculiar and distinct Faculties from all Mankind The World is divided into Jews Turks Infidels Hereticks and the Church of God 1. As to our Saviour's Eternal Divinity the Apprehension and Faith of the Church of God is sufficiently manifest for Fifteen hundred years after our Saviour before Socinianism was formed And 't is well observed that those supersine Colours that Socinus and his Followers put upon those Texts by which the Catholick Church ever defended the Eternal Divinity of our Saviour were at least most of them never thought on by the Ancient Hereticks and never heard of before Socinus's time 2. The Jewish Doctors hold that the Messias is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Jehovah is a Name given to him that he is the Eternal Character of God therefore the Eternal Divinity of our Saviour was no inconceivable Mystery to them 3. As for the wiser Heathen Philosophers they speak a great deal plainer tho' it is fairly supposed they had their Light from the Jews The Indefatigable and Learned Dr. Whitby after the famous Dr. Cudworth hath given us a great deal to this purpose and observes what Socinus himself insinuates when he tells us we have our Doctrine out of Plato's School That the words of St. John c. 1. taken in their familiar and proper sence do exactly agree with the Sayings of the Platonists and Pythagoreans and other Philosophers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about the Word 1. The Philosophers acknowledge a Second Hypostasis which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Mind Word and Son of the First 2. That this Second Hypostasis did exist from Eternity and declared him to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Sempiternal Word Mens temporis expers sempiterna 3. They pronounced this Word to be a Second God to denote his dependance upon the First 4. They asserted him to be the Cause Principal and Maker of all things such Conceits had these great Philosophers who we may imagine were Masters of as much Reason as the men we deal with Thus our Faith in our Saviour's Divinity was not abhorrent from the Reason of the learned Jews and wisest Philosophers 3. What Apprehension hath the Mahumetan part of the World in this mysterious Article Indeed I was much taken with some Passages in The Turkish Spy when I first saw his Letters which I shall transcribe out of his 31st Letter of Vol. 2. to the Mufti ' Tell me saith he why it is Blasphemy to say that God hath already taken Flesh since our holy Prophet avoucheth that GOD shall assume a Body at the Resurrection If a Body be competible with the Divine Essence it seems not to me a Blasphemy to assert the Incarnation of the Word whom our Prophet calls the Breath of God If this Breath or Word of God be not of the Essence of the Divinity why is that part of the Christian Gospel had in such reverence by the faithful Mussulman In the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and God was the Word If the Word be of the Essence of God then it will necessarily follow that God has taken a human Body since our holy Prophet calls him the Word of God whom the Christians adore for God Incarnate Thus we have the sence of the Turkish Religion itself not the Authority of the Spy whoever he was but Reason grounded upon the very Alcoran Now seeing
THE SOCINIAN Controversie TOUCHING The Son of God REDUCED In a brief Essay To prove the SON one in Essence with the FATHER upon Socinian Principles Concessions and Reason CONCLUDED With an Humble and Serious Caution to the Friends of the CHURCH of ENGLAND against the Approaches of Socinianism By F. F. D. D. Quomodo Pater genuit Filium nolo discutias expete primo si potes quomodo mens quae intra se est generet verbum quomodo coelestis ignis generet ex seipso splendorem Lucis St. Hieron Sempiternus Deus sapiens Sempiternam secum habet sapientiam St. Aug. IMPRIMATUR Geo. Royse R. R. in Christo Patri ac Dom. Dom. Johanni Archiep. Cantuar. Ã Sacris Domest December the 9th 1692. LONDON Printed for A. and J. Churchil at the Black Swan in Pater-Noster-Row near Amen-Corner 1693. TO THE Right Reverend Father in GOD GILBERT Lord Bishop of SARVM May it please your Lordship YOU cannot but remember in how difficult a Post I stood when you came to Exon with the Prince of O. our now most Gracious King I being with some of my Brethren the first Clergy-men that were summoned to appear before him And I cannot forget but shall ever with all due Gratitude acknowledge your Lordships then great Tenderness and Care of us when in those new and strange Circumstances we did not readily observe the Orders sent us But seeing I soon afterwards perhaps the First that in Print endeavour'd to perswade my Brethren to recognize this Happy Government may I not with the more Freedom observe the Prejudices it yet labours with and that the least of them are not the Fears of too many among us that the Church of England may suffer under it I have read over your Lordships late Excellent Treatise called The Pastoral Care with no small Satisfaction and presume to take this Occasion to give you my particular humble Thanks for the same verily believing that if the Rules therein given us were in any good measure observ'd and put in practice it would Cure most of those Fears Since your Lordships greater Wisdom saw no necessity in a Treatise of that nature of taking much notice of the Socinian Leven 't is not fit for me to wish you had done so yet if I may have leave to judge by my own Experience I fear not the least of our Danger is threatned from that Quarter However I doubt not but in the Exercise of The Pastoral Care your Lordship with the rest of our Venerable Fathers will by the Blessing of God timely prevent it after the Example of the Ancients I know your Lordship will pardon this Boldness of My LORD Your Lordships much obliged and humbly-devoted Servant Fr. Fullwood Litton near Dorcester Octob. 14. 1692. THE PREFACE TO THE READER THE Crude Notions of Cerinthus Ebion the Currier Artemon and Samosatenus about our Saviour which were more Jewish and Blasphemous were at last digested and refined by Photinus with the help of his Master Marcellus into that which is now pure Socinianism viz That our Saviour had no Being before or but ex Maria from the Virgin Mary For which very Doctrine as appears by the Sentences of the Councils so strange and horrid it then was to all Christian Ears the said Photinus tho' Bishop of Sirmium was condemned in a Synod in his own City both by the Arrians Semi-Arrians and the Catholiques Photinus and this his Heresie were condemned in six several Councils probably first as Bishop Pearson observes with his Master Marcellus by a Synod at Constantinople 2. By the second Synod at Antioch 3. By a Council at Sardes 4. By a Council at Milan 5. In a Synod at Sirmium he was deposed by the Western Bishops 6. He was again condemned and deposed by the Eastern Bishops in the same City He was so generally condemned too afterwards that his Opinion was soon worn out of the World So suddenly saith Epiphanius was this Opinion rejected by all Christians applauded by none but Julian the Apostate who railed at St. John for making Christ to be GOD and commending Photinus for denying it Vid. Pearson on the Creed new Ed. p. 119 120. Now we heard no more of this Doctrine except one P. Elebardus stumbled upon it in the 12th Century until the Reformation when the blasphemous Servetus and some others not unlike him began to revive it and at last by Faustus Socinus it was formed and perfected into the Body of Socinianism as now it is The said Socinus died about 88 years agone such is the Pedigree and Antiquity of Socinianism THE Socinian Controversie TOUCHING The SON of GOD Reduc'd c. WHEN we have to deal with men that allow no other Principles but those of their own Sect we may endeavour to fetch our Weapons out of the Adversaries Store Whence I propose these Arguments following ARG. I. JESVS CHRIST is to be Adored THE Only GOD which brought Israel out of Egypt that is the only God of Israel or the only true and chief God is to be Religiously adored and worshipped Thou shalt have no other Gods but me But Jesus Christ is to be religiously adored and worshipped therefore Jesus Christ is the only God which brought Israel out of Egypt that is the only God of Israel or true and chief God This is David a very strict Socinian's Argument against Socinus himself Not that he approved but hereby intended to destroy the minor by shewing its absurdity in the Consequence of it That if Jesus Christ was so to be adored he was the true and chief God which they both denied 'T is besides my design to enter upon the Proof of either of these Propositions but I observe and pronounce that Socinus and his Followers have so plainly proved the second That Jesus Christ ought to be Religiously Adored out of the Holy Scriptures that his two great Opponents in that Point namely Frankin and that David nor any of their Followers have or can or ever will be able to answer them On the other side these Adversaries of Socinus have as irrefragably and invincibly maintain'd That the Only God which brought Israel out of Egypt c. ought to be Religiously Adored And 't is David's own otherwise Socinian Reason against Socinus That we cannot adore the Son unless we suppose Christ to be in the Father and the Father in Christ Vnitate Essentiae by unity of Essence The Arguments of both sides you have at large in the Vol. of the Fratres Pol. where you may see how these Learned Socinians fight and conquer each other and make way for this Orthodox Truth that Jesus Christ is that only God that brought Israel out of Egypt c. And methinks Schlectingius comes very near it in those remarkable words in Rom. 1. 15. If GOD saith he give Man Divinity so as that He may be religiously worship'd that man ratione divini religiosi cultus is not diverse and another from God himself but ought to
be esteemed unus idemque cum Deo one and the same with God II. Christ is True God GOD the Father is the only True God Jesus Christ is true God therefore Jesus Christ and God the Father are one and the same God otherwise there would be two true Gods which would be repugnant to the only true God That God the Father is the only true God is expresly the Doctrine of our Saviour Joh. 17. 3. That Jesus Christ is true God is so plain in the Holy Scripture that Socinus and his Followers frequently they say an hundred times assert and maintain it The Argument therefore is as strong as our Saviour and Socinus can make it 1 Note To obviate some trisling Evasions when we say Jesus Christ is true God we consider him not strictly under those Denominations for his Name Jesus was given him as the Son of Mary and he is Christ as anointed to his Office by the Holy Ghost We do not say that in either of these sences Jesus Christ is true God but he is so as he is the Son by eternal Generation as he existed before his Incarnation as he was with God and was God in the beginning of Time and consequently from Eternity the Alpha and Omega the first and the last Rev. 1. 2 Note 2dly Jesus Christ as Man and Mediator may be distinguished though never divided from the Eternal Son of God So the Scripture speaks of him here as Jesus Christ sent by God and as he in 1 Cor. 8 was that one great Lord of Christians distinguish'd from One God the Father which sufficiently solves the Difficulties which Socinians raise from these two Texts especially considering that so many other Scriptures unanswerably prove the Deity of our Saviour 3. It must be noted 3dly and consess'd that the Socinians distinguish betwixt the true God by Nature and a true God by Office and that God the Father is the true God by Nature and our Saviour a true God by Office But the Text destroys the distinction for if God the Father be the only true God though so by Nature there is no room left for another true God by Office or any other way Who sees not the Term is exclusive sees nothing 2dly The Scripture is express that 't is Idolatry to worship those that by Nature are no Gods but 't is no Idolatry to worship our Saviour as Socinus himself desends therefore our Saviour is true God by Nature 3dly I must challenge Proof either from Reason or Scripture that a God by Office only is or ever was said to be true God as our Saviour is consessed ot be And seeing the Text before us speaks not of the Supreme God but of the only true God and makes them all one I must further challenge the great Distinction and only Refuge of the Socinians in this Controversie namely of the Supreme God and a true God and if neither Scripture asserts it nor Reason owns it as certainly they do not the Foundation of Socinianism is evidently subverted III. Cheist made the World The words were made by the Supreme God only This the Socinians generally assert and strenuously prove but the Son of God made the Worlds and this the Arrians unanimously maintain as and unndoubted Truth accordin to the Scriptures From these two Propositions so acknowledg'd and proved by our Adversaries what Conclusion can be more natural than this That the Son of God is one God with the Father i. e. the Supreme God 'T is confess'd that the Arrians say that God first made his Son and then by him made the Worlds Sol. But who told them so So fundamental a Point should have some ground either in Scripture or Reason the Scripture is silent in it and plain Reason abhors it Why should the great and wise God make one Creature to make the rest Was not his own Fiat sufficient to make an hundred Worlds Doth any Cause else appear at the Creation Let the Arrians prove as they do unanswerably that the Son of God did exist at the Creation of the World and the Socinians will acknowledge his Eternal Generation By their Reasons put together the Orthodox Truth is establish'd Indeed if all things were made by the Son of God himself is excluded he is not Deus factus but Deus natus and if he did exist in the Beginning as before he must exist from Eternity Nothing was behind the beginning of Time but Eternity IV. Christ Equal to his Father He that is not only like but equal to God in Power Knowledge and Wisdom must have the same Essence or Nature with God But the Socinians generally assert That Jesus Christ is not only like but equal to God in Power Wisdom and Knowledge therefore by this Reason Jesus Christ must have the same Essence or Nature with God I know they will not grant the first Proposition but these men of Reason methinks should nor deny it They say indeed that this equal Power Knowledge and Wisdom is communicated by God to his Son But must there not be a Capacity and Faculty equal to God's to admit such equal Power c. and to exercise the same And consequently the Essence of God must be communicated which only hath Capacity and Faculty to hold and exercise Power Knowledge and Wisdom truly divine or equal to God's Is it not more agreeable to the Apprehension of a Man to conceive that the Root of all Power c. viz. the Divine Nature is communicated to the Son of God and with that all Power c. is communicated Can equal Power be in any Subject but God himself Will there not then be two Omnipotents and two Supremes Who can understand the Mystery or dare defend it from senceless Contradiction Minor But perhaps it may be doubted whether the Socinians do allow or affirm that Jesus Christ hath Equal Power Knowledge and Wisdom with God himself which is the second Proposition in this Argument I shall therefore prove it by some pertinent Instances Christ was made in Empire and Supreme Power in all things like to God immo aequalem yea rather equal to him saith one And they generally acknowledge that the Father hath communicated to Christ his own Divine Power and Divine Wisdom See Crell in Ro. 1. 15. Rac. Cat. c. 1. sect 4. p. 47. Stegman in Joh. 10. 32. Wolzogenius in Mat. 4. Schect in 1 Cor. 4 5. Volkelius tells us the Apostle Phil. 3. 21. attributes to Christ that most efficacious Power whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Ver. Relig. 63. c. 34 and that He that can subdue all things to himself omnia potest i. e. est Deus omnipotens or Almighty as he is expresly called Rev. 1. and therefore true and supreme God or one with his Father in Power and consequently in Nature as our Saviour himself concludes I and my Father are One Not in Will and Consent only as they would gloss it directly contrary to the Context
but in Power which is inseparable from his Essence None shall pluck them out my Hand or John 10. 28 29 30. my Fathers I and my Father are one Accordingly Wolzogenius acknowledgeth that God made Christ in Authority Power and Wisdom like and equal to himself that he even equally as God might be omnipresent and be able to do what he will by his own Power and Spirit upon Earth So that he is omnipotent omniscient and omnipresent equally with God the Father which necessarily infers the Communication of the Divine Essence or Nature as the Subject or Seat of such Supreme and Divine Attributes or Qualifications 'T is confessed that Wolzog. in Mat. 28. 20. adds That though Christ be omnipresent as is said before 't is not necessary that we should understand it of his Essential Presence But we want a new Philosophy to prove that any thing yea God himself can act physically where he is not essentially present and hence we have a new Argument of our Saviour's Deity He is essentially present every where and therefore true God he is essentially present every where because he can do what he pleaseth every where I conclude this Argument with this note That the Socinians must dash and break upon one or both of these two hard Rocks that a meer man who is circumscribed is essentially present every where or really omnipresent or that a meer Man is able to do what he pleases by his own Power as Wolzeg affirms tho' communicated where he is not essentially that is really present which is one of the Phylosophical Mysteries of Socinianism V. Christ hath the Father's Glory He to whom the Father hath given his own Glory is the same God in Essence with the Father for God the Father protests he will not give his Glory to another But the Father hath given his own Glory to Christ this the Socinians generally acknowledge The Conclusion is necessary therefore Christ is the same in Essence with God the Father They tell us in answer that by another is meant an Idol or a false God Sol. Where the Law doth not distinguish in a Point of so great concernment who shall dare to do it Besides is not an Idol a Creature as well as they say our Saviour is And why should God give his Glory to one Creature rather than another What Scripture or Reason will warrant it Is it not Idolatry to give GOD's Glory to a Creature Or will God dispence with Idolatry in himself and not in us Or lastly how can we in reason imagine that God will frustrate his own ultimate End to glorifie himself above all by giving his own Glory to any Creature VI. Reason is Truth That which is most agreeable to Reason is the Truth This is the admired Maxim of the Socinians But that the Father communicateth his Divine Nature with his Divine Attributes to his Son is more agreeable to Reason i. e. more conceivable than that he should communicate them separately without or divided from his Nature Let us reflect upon their former Assertions that the Father hath communicated his own Wisdom his own Power his own Honour his own Glory and thereby made his Son not only like but equal to himself and let the Masters of Reason tell us any thing more absurd and inconsonant to Reason than to conceive such Qualities which are acknowledged by themselves to be truly and properly Divined to be actually separated from the Divine Substance seeing they also acknowledge that there is nothing in God that is not God himself and his Proprieties can only ratione inadaequato conceptu be distinguisht from his Essence Is it not more agreeable to Reason to conceive that seeing the Father hath communicated his own Wisdom c. to his Son he hath also communicated his own Nature to him forasmuch as we cannot conceive how they should be actually divided for his Attributes and Nature are really one and God's own Wisdom Knowledge Power Presence and Glory are nothing really but himself Thus it is if we consider the nature of God but more grosly absurd and unreasonable it appears if we consider the nature of Man which they would make the Subject of these Divine Qualities How monstrous is it to imagine that a meer Man as they say our Saviour is should be wise as God powerful as God omnipresent as God have equal Worship and the same Glory with God himself and be a meer Man still where is the Capacity the Powers the Seat of these Divine Excellencies of a true God as they acknowledge our Saviour to be in meer Man as they say he is Activity beyond the proper Sphere of the Agent Qualities and Endowments without a capable Subject are as fit for men of Reach and Reason to conceive as to imagine Reason and Religion in a Brute with all the Attributes of the Humane Nature and yet to be a Brute still Let them follow Reason but one step farther and acknowledg that what the Father communicateth to his Son carries the Essence of God with it according to Reason as well as the Scripture and we are agreed in a great Point And now what should put a stop to them seeing their Principles bring them so near us and so much Reason invites them home They acknowledge the necessity of believing Christ to be true God according to the Scriptures They say he is equal to God the Father and Socinus is angry that it should be doubted whether they believed so or not his words are remarkable Falsissimum est c. He saith It is most false that we do not affirm Christ to be true God yea we profess the contrary publickly and in our own both in the Latin and Polonian Tongue in not a few publick Writings And again as if we did deny Jesus Christ tho' he is Man yet to be God and equal to God or the proper Son of God and equal to his Father According to Smalcius our God and the true God summo jure he is so to be called and is so indeed They do generally own his Title Ro. 9. God over all blessed for ever Schlectingius in Joh. 4. 23. saith We must understand by it that Christ is Lord and God not over some things only but over all God and Lord of Heaven and Earth as Stigmannus adds in Joh. 10. 33. I confess Schlect his gloss hereupon is He is true God as true is opposed to false not as it is opposed to non summo or the Supreme God but if the Text be well consider'd and its proper sence allow'd I see not how he can be better signified to be the God of Israel than by the usual appellation of the God of Israel as the Learned note God blessed for ever or how the Supreme God can in other words be more fitly exprest than by these words God over all blessed for ever especially seeing as we have noted before that there is no ground either in Reason or Religion for