God-head before the Incarnation For this account will admit the Personality of Christ to be founded first †P. 32. in the Humane Nature according to some of his Lordship's Criticks which he dares not contradict who place the foundation of the Sonship in the lower Nature Yea this Description will admit the Patripassian Heresie of but one Person in the Deity For if the Eternal Word were no Person distinct from the Father the Union thereof with the Humanity constitutes the Father an incarnate Person or otherwise by this State of his Lordships Doctrine the Father Son and Holy Ghost may be conceived as one incarnate Person Whereas his Lordship well knows our Faith to be clear That the Eternal Word is personally distinct or a distinct Person from the Father and alone assumed the Humanity into a Personal Union with himself and so alone was the Person of Christ exceptively of the Father and the Holy Ghost from this Personality and Character § 5. Now if a Man would enquire into the Motives of this affected obscurity in his Lordship that leaves open a gap to so many Heresies his Lordship's Words would lead one to a conclusion or at least a fair jealousie that his Lordship does not believe any Distinction really Personal between the Father Word and Holy Spirit but that the true and real Personality of Christ is proper to the Humane Nature For he teacheth us that those whom the Church calleth Persons the Scripture only calls by the Names of Father Son or Word and Holy Ghost Where that artificial Word only derogates from the propriety and fitness of the term Person as if the Scripture terms did not come up to it nor justifie it And if his Lordship will stand by the †P. 45. plain intention of his Words elsewhere he places Christ's Personality only in his Manhood in these words That Divine Person in whom dwelt the Eternal Word So that the Word must be different from the Person in whom it dwelt which must be the Heresie of Sabellius Maâ—… or Nestorius In short while he 〈◊〉 the Canonical term of Person to contain some notion in it not imported in the Scripture terms he seems for that cause to censure it for that the Scripture does not come up so far as to teach three Persons but only Father Son or Word and Holy Ghost But when he says this third Opinion is than by the Incarnation God and Man truly became one Person I would fain know whether the term Person be proper for the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or no If not the Doctrine is to be blamed that teaches him to be truly one Person since the truth of a Character is the greatest propriety and if it be not true the Doctrine that teaches it is to be cashiered But if to avoid this it be true then I would fain be instructed whether the Church does not use the term Person in the same formal intention concerning the Father Son and Holy Spirit when She calls them three Persons as She does when She calls Christ or the Son of God incarnate a Person For if She uses the term in the same formal intention then if the Christ be a proper Person so are the Father and Holy Spirit two other Persons properly and truly distinct in the sense of the Church but if the Church has one intention in the Term when applied to Christ 〈◊〉 God-man and another when applied to the Eternal Trinity let this be made out by just Authority and I have done § 6. But the Order of his Lordship's Discourse obliges me to break off a little from this Disquisition till the next Section where we must resume it For he tells us if we will believe him that the term Person by those of our Perswasion came to be applied to the three to discover those who thought that these three were different names of the same thing which were for the most part and were generally called Patripassians and were expelled as Hereticks from the Church Now wherein lay their Heresie Why in this That the Father Son and Holy Ghost were not three co-essential Persons really distinct which was the Catholick Faith instead of which they coined this pretence That those Names had not three distinct subjects of which they were predicates or denominations but only were three titles of God the Father who became incarnate and suffered for us Now hence it appears that their Heresie consisted in the denial of what was ever before received in the Church That the Father Son and Holy Ghost were three Persons And if so then is his Lordship's insinuation false and injurious that the term Person had its rise and occasion from Patripassianism and consequently is of a later Date that by this fraudulent Hypochronism the term and the sense of it may be taken for not Primitive and Traditional but a mere later and artificial invention Now to prove what I say to be true I am to produce authentick Testimonies Now in the Latin World the first I ever have read of that taught Patripassianism was Praxeas against whose Heresie herein Tertullian wrote and charged in for denying the Eternal Word to be a * Tert. ad Praxeam Non vis enim eum substantiâ—um habere in re per substantiae proprietatem ut res persona quaedam videri possit substantial and real Person which Tertullian though then a Montanist then asserted with the Church though his †Tert. ibid. Itaque Sophiam quoque exaudi ut secundam Personam conditam Sic Filius in suâ personâ profitetur Patrem in nomine Sophiae Novatian de Trinit secundam Personam efficiens terms and senses were sometimes very singularly odd concerning the production of the second Person In the Eastern Church several lapsed into the like Error the most famous of which was Sabellius from whom the Heresie was entitled Sabellianism which denied what that Church also had ever asserted That the Father Son and Holy Spirit were three Persons instead whereof they asserted them to be but one Person For the truth hereof I shall recite the Words †Athan. con Sabell Greg. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of St. Athanasius as beyond all Exception valid From whence it appears that the Sabellians asserted but one Person against that Plurality of Persons fore-acknowledged in the Church And now I leave it to his Lordship to explain how the denial of three Persons could be Apostasie as this Father calls it had not the Faith of them been before expresly avowed and received For Heresie is an opposition of true received Faith and Apostasie must be from an antecedent Profession So that the Doctrine of a Personal Trinity was not later than Patripassianism but the Original Faith Nor does his Lordship seem candid in concealing this which was the substance of that Heresie while he mentions only their teaching three Names of one thing or Person which was a Conâ—ectary or at least a Colour added to
the Son on which account he hath personal and distinctive Pronouns and Attributes given him Which shews the form of distinction to be Personal and the different Mode of their descent origination and mission So much therefore of the Modes of their distinction being taught by the Scriptures is also well taught by the Church and ought to have been so by his Lordship though other Modes of this Subsistence that are not revealed pass our measures and capacities and Men's inauthentick speculations on them are not to be admitted for Catholick or Canonical § 4. And now we come to consider the exorbitances of the Fathers in their teaching the Respects and Modes of this Unity and Distinction †P. 31. In this saith his Lordship too many both Ancients and Moderns have perhaps gone beyond due bounds while some were pleased with the Platonical Notions of Emanations and a foecundity in the Divine Essence Now here it must be noted that the Ancients and Moderns which his Lordship here speaks of are the Defenders of the Faith of the Trinity against the Arian and other Ancient Heresies Now as great Friends as my Lord and Petavius are I would fain know how they can be reconciled herein For if * Petav. citat Bullo in Prooem Defens Fid. Nicen. p. 8. Arius were a genuine Platonist in the created pre-existence of the Logos how came any of the Anti-Arian Ancients to be Platonick in their Doctrines of Eternal Pre-existence and Emanations 'T is hard that Arians and Catholick Fathers should both be in the same Platonick Errors in a point in which they were contradictory and in which alone their great division was founded But as for the Eternal Emanations asserted by the Fathers they were taught purely from all ill mixtures of Platonists and others in that while they from sacred Tradition assert those Effluxes yet they all deny them to be like corporeal Emanations by corporeal abscissions or divisions of parts It would be endless to cite places of this kind Let it suffice that the Doctrine of Emanation * Sap. Sal. 7.25 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was pure Jewish Theology by which term received into the forms of Christian Theology they meant the derivation of the whole Divinity from the Father to the Logos and the Holy Spirit without †Athan. Expos Fid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Id. de Syn. Nic. con Arian decret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 any division or partition of Substance For the truth of which I referr instead of many to one Athanasius that spake the sense of the whole Church in his time and of the Fathers before him Now the Fathers all denying an emanation which like that of Bodies consists in abscission of Parts will hereby be discharged from the fancies of Platonick Emanations which the * P. 28. Defender of Dr. Sherlock's Notion of a Trinity in Unity charges with such Abscission in the Platonick Triad We are not yet advanced to the Beatisick Vision nor the tongues of Angels nor if we were could we adequately describe the glorious Mysteries of these Divine Subsistences yet God himself gives us leave to speak of his revealed Truths herein according to our infirmities that we who see these Mysteries remotely and only by dark resemblances may communicate those notions in as remote forms of expression while we keep however to the Schemes himself has set us and embase those Theories with no Humane Corruptions And hence I freely allow the words of Emanation as being taken from the Images of corporeal Effluxes not to be fully equal to the Mystery intended but such as would be apt to lead us into crass and material conceptions of the Deity did not our Theology expresly forefend us But under this guard the terms are not only innocent but Authentick and that Authority with the Fathers descended not from Plato but from Canonical and allowed Scriptures which have set corporeal Emanations as dark Symbols of these internal Communications of the Divine Essence in the Trinity of which sort of Similes are the * Athan. ad Serap Sp. S. non esse Creaturam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Id. de Syn. Nic. con Arian Decret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vid. con Arian Orat. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Rays and Emanations of Light and Glory and the streams of Fountains from which in the Scriptures the Fathers have taken those Emanatory forms of expression which therefore owe not their Authority or Reception to Plato that so his Lordship should call them Platonical in derogation to the Grandeur of the Christian Theology like the reproach of Amelius upon St. John as if he also had preached the Philosopher 'T is true indeed the Primitive Fathers writing for our Faith against Gentilism do often cite this Philosopher not as an Author of our Principles but as a good witness to the Greeks for their Credibility though sometimes when upbraided with him by the Heathens they freely call him a plagiary of the Jewish and Sacred Theology which he afterwards cook'd up after a Greek Mode Now the Corruptions in Plato's Doctrine of the Trinity the Fathers use not nor are pleased with but those seeds of true Theology that are in him they love and cherish not as Plato's but as God's the Wisdom of God having graciously permitted some Notions and Rudiments of Faith to be conveyed to the Wise of the Heathen before the publication of Christianity to prepare a way for its after-reception and vindication among them And having thus vindicated the Ancients in their Doctrines of these Essential Emanations let me observe how tectly sly and abusive his Lordship's Reflexion on them is Some saith he were pleased with the Platonical Notions of Emanation as if all the Catholick Ancients had not the same Notions of Emanation but some were for and some against these Emanations But here it had been fair to have graced the Margin with the Catalogue of the Emanatory and Antiemanatory Ancients and I do here urge and challenge his Lordship to produce them in foro to speak for themselves before sentence be passed upon them This I doubt is an hard task but a demand that cannot be denied me without shame But it seems these Platonick Ancients were grown old unto Dotage and become Children again and as such were pleased poor Souls with the pretty Baubles that Plato invented for them and thus we have made a good beginning upon the Fifth Commandment if the Sense thereof may extend to the Fathers of our Religion and the Church § 5. To the absurdity of Emanations succeeds that of foecundity in the Divine Essence which his Lordship taxes in both Ancients and Moderns that is most eminently in St. Athanasius and Bishop Pearson that were in their respective Ages the exactest and gravest Divines in the World without exception or diminution
grant such a conception allowable that there may be three that may have a diversity of Operations as well as Oeconomies For if he be no Tritheist in allowing this Conception why does he reflect on it as Tritheite in the Fathers And yet his Lordship diversifies the Operations much more exclusively each of other Person than any Fathers do and in such a manner as inferrs a Tetrad in the Deity in which according to his Lordship the Father must be a second Principle For his words run thus †P. 42. In the Divine Essence which is the simplest and perfectest Vnity there may be three that may have a diversity of Operations as well as Oeconomies By the first God may be supposed to have made and to govern all things by the second to have actuated and been most perfectly united to the Humanity of Christ and by the third to have inspired the Penmen of the Scriptures and the Workers of Miracles and still to renew and purifie all good Minds all which notwithstanding we firmly believe there is but one God Now whatsoever acts by another is distinct from that other by which it acts and prior in the Agency by the order of Reason If then God acts by the first which is the Father that God is in Nature and Subsistence antecedent to the Father and the first hath a former and if God who acts by three be distinct from those three by which he acts there are then four Distincts and Distinctions in the Deity or else the three are not essential in the Deity but only operant and unsubstantial Powers and Qualities Yet is it against Faith to say that God acts or creates by the Father because it makes him secondary by an unallowable conception the Canonical Faith herein being that God original or God the Father acts by his Son and Holy Spirit But whether we make the Father primary or secundary if we attribute the Creation to him exclusively of the Logos and Holy Spirit and the Inspirations to the Spirit exclusively of the Father and the Son and the Divine Operations in the Union of our Nature with the Logos to the Logos only exclusively of the Father and Holy Spirit according to his Lordship's scheme of conceptions we rove from truth from Scripture from Catholick Tradition which ascribes these to the single Persons by a peculiar respect of Oeconomick Order but not by an exclusive propriety of Operation And yet though his Lordship recommends this conception of such a separate Agency in his three Divine Anonymities yet can he find no such incongruities in the received Doctrines of those his despised Fathers But 't is time to take breath and consider what reformation following extinguished this Tritheism in the Catholick Church and Faith Why Others therefore laid another foundation in one numerical Deity or Being Now what is this but to insinuate nay openly to assert that the former Fathers that believed Emanations and Foecundity and argued from the specifick Homoousion with the respective Operations did not fundamentally own one individual Deity And yet how could they that stuck to the Nicene Creed deny the fundamental Article of one God which yet all the taxed Fathers defended as the Faith of all the former Fathers who made the Monarchy a fundamental Principle against Gentilism and were herein exactly and professedly followed by all their Successors Nay the feature of his Lordship's reflexion seems to attaint all Antiquity of Tritheism till after the Doctors of the specifick Homoousion and distinct Operations ceased as not holding the Unity of the Godhead for his conjunction therefore makes this Unity a post-nate Principle taken up upon the apprehension that the former Doctrines of the Church were Tritheite according to his Lordship's general Imputation § 14. And now it seems high time to observe upon what fancies for they are represented as such these Tritheite Principles were reformed by these over seri patrum nepotes * They then observed †P. 32. that the Sun besides its own Globe had an Emanation of Light and another of Heat which had different Operations and all from the same Essence And that the Soul of Man had both Intallection and Love which flowed from its Essence So they conceived that the Primary Act of the Divine Essence was its Wisdom by which it saw all things and in which as in an Eternal Word it designed all things This they thought might be called the Son as being the generation of the Eternal Mind while from the fountain Principle together with the inward Word there did arise a Love that was to issue forth and that was to be the Soul of the Creation and was more particularly to animate the Church and in this Love all things were to have life and favour This was rested on and was afterwards dressed up with a great deal of dark nicety by the Schools and grew to be the universally received explanation So that it seems these conceptions these reforming conceptions are very novel and the Doctrine derived from them became not universal but by the Definitions of the Schools § 15. But before we come to justifie their due Antiquity let us consider whether as his Lordship represents them the Tritheism of the former Fathers were really amended by them For in this Simile here are two Emanations from the Globe of the Sun Light and Heat which have different Operations which if they represent different Operations of the different Persons in the Deity this reduces that Tritheism which the Simile was designed to avoid So unhappy were these Theological Tinkers in mending the former Theories § 16. But however let us see whether these Theories had not really a more early Original and Reception in the Universal Church I begin with the Simile of the Sun †Apolog c. 21. sup citat §. 7. Vide. Now Tertullian the most ancient of all our Latin Writers used this Simile and says that in respect thereof the Logos was ever backward celebrated under this Title as the Ray of God So * Instit l. 4. c. 29. ille tanquam Sol hic quasi radius à Sole porrectus Lactantius had learned the same Simile from Tertullian or his Church So †In Evan. Joh. c. 5. Tract 20. Si separas candorem Solis à Sole separa Verbum à Patre St. Austin an African likewise had from his Fathers derived the same Example of the Sun The Greek Fathers that lived in and just after the Nicene Council so often so uniformly and canonically use it who yet argued from the specifick Sense of the Homoousion that the citations of them would fill a Volume so this Fancy is not later than these Tritheit Homooufiasts And to let his Lordship see that it was an Ante-Nicene Simile not only the Scripture term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may convince but the express production of it * Theognost ap Athan de Syn. Nic. con Arian Decret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
word though so very variously significant is however used either absolutely as when it 's said God is a Spirit or Angels are ministring Spirits a Spirit hath not Flesh and Blood and other sayings of the same formal intention in the Word or else relatively and attributively to something whose Spirit it is or is called Of this latter form is the characteristick Title of the Spirit of God or Holy Spirit of God and Christ c. And the Word Spirit thus relatively attributed to Beings simply immaterial denotes an active Principle Power or Virtue in them and this either Potential or Moral Thus it is mentioned as a potential Principle Josh 5.1 Esa 19.3 Luk. 1.17 as a moral Principle Ezr. 1.1 5. Psal 32.2 and 34.18 and 51.10 17. Esa 57.15 Ezek. 11.19 and 36.26 Matth. 5.3 Luke 9.55 Joh. 4.23 24. Rom. 8.15 16. 1 Cor. 4.21 Eph. 4.23 1 pet 3 4. and so in infinite other places So likewise the Spirit of God seems oft to denote in him what we commonly call a Principle acting potentially but chiefly and most especially in the sanctifical Operations of all which the Holy Spirit is the proper and immediate Spring and Original Hence the Works of the Creation as attributed to the Spirit of God Job 26.13 and 33.4 where I see no reason to depart from the ordinary and canonical and characteristick sense of the Term. From which places in my opinion we may best interpret Gen. 1.2 where it is said that the Spirit of God moved or hovered upon the face of the Waters In this potential way of Operation the Spirit of God acted the Prophets Judges and other Worthies of Israel in their mighty Words and Works that exceeded the Power of Humane Nature as may be seen in very many Texts of Scripture Thus the Holy Spirit came upon the Virgin Mary and the Power of the most High did over-shadow her Luke 1.35 For I here preferr the Catholick Interpretation of the Creeds which teach this to be the supervention of the Holy Spirit from other like Texts and Universal Tradition before the sense of * Ad Autolyc p. 81. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Theophilus Antiochenus who applies them to the Logos as speaking by the Prophets though the †Symb. Constantinop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Catholick Church hath determined the Divine Spirit that spake by them to be the third Person Which Spirit acting Elias was feared by Obadiah that it would carry the Prophet out of all discovery 1 King 18.12 And according to this potential notation we call all subtle and vigorous Powers in Nature Spirits as also the courage and activity of any animal I know the Rabbins Crellius and others make this potential Spirit to be a created effluent Virtue but the permanency of it in God with its other properties and descriptions every where exhibited in the Scriptures do evince the contrary reason it self also witnessing that God never was without an omnipotent Spirit of Holiness which may very properly consist in the essential Love of God than which what can be more vigorous active influential and productive We see how strong the Spring and Spirit of an ardent love is toward the most mighty adventures and how infinitely more must it be in the Divine Nature from which it gave Life and Spirit to universal Nature and blessed every thing according to its order and cherishes all things by a lively and penetrating Providence and drives on all the Motions and Springs of the whole Creation by a perpetual and constant impulse and at times exerted miraculous Operations to the manifestation of its transcendent Power Goodness and Holiness and thereby to the conversion of Men to the Living God But this Principle if I may so call it without offence as I design without error more exhibits its own appropriate celebrated Character of Holy to our Conceptions by actual Inspirations of Sanctity into all sanctified Minds And such is the sense of the Catholick Antiquity For being * Orig. Hom. 11. in Numer 18. de Princip l. 1. c. 8. Greg. Thaumat in Symbol Revelat. Athan con Arium Disp Dial. de Trinit Naz. de Heron Philosoph Basil con Eunom l. 5. de Sp. S. Episcop Philosopho in Concil Nicen. ap Socr. Eccl. Hist l. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pseudo-Chrys in Matth. 7. Hom. 18. Aug. de verb. Dom. in Evan. Matth. c. 12. Ser. 11. Faustin ad Flaccil Imperat. de fide con Arian original Holiness it self it 's most connatural and consimilar Operation is the sanctifical for which cause it is signally called Holy as the substantial immediate Principle of all communications of Sanctity and Goodness to the Creatures And as a †Clem. Alex. Strom. l. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Christiani 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 good and holy temper in the Soul of Man is called a good and holy Spirit which therefore acts accordingly and gives us thereby a Theory of the Holy Spirit of God So the essential Spirit of Holiness in God is if my infirmities may be permitted to speak my sense as it were the very temper of his Nature called often also his Heart and Soul under the same connotation which the impious Man is said to grieve Esa 63.10 Eph. 4.30 as being an internal and essential Principle offended by those Wits to which it bears an eternal and unalterable aversion which is also very strong and potential being †Ambr. de dignit hum condit c. 2. Greg. Nyssen de homin Opisic c. 5. Aug. in Ep. Job Tract 6. in Evang. Job c. 2. Tract 9. in c. 17. Tract 105. expresly called by some Fathers the substantial Love of God from the Authority of St. John From this property of Love Goodness and Holiness it is called by St. Paul the Spirit of Holiness Rom. 1.4 for I see no reason to recede from the canonical propriety and by Nehemias and David the good Spirit of God teaching and leading Men unto righteousness Neh. 19.20 Psal 143.10 And the Psalmist describes the Holy Spirit of God and a right Spirit in Man as consimilar Principles of moral Goodness the one as the temper of the Divine the other as the Temper of an Humane Mind Psal 51.10 11. which being by Sanctification likened to the Spirit of God is said to communicate of the Holy Spirit 2 Cor. 13.13 Philip. 2.1 whereby we are said to be one Spirit with God 1 Cor. 6.7 by being herein transformed into his Image 2 Cor. 3.18 and purified in obeying the Truth by the Spirit unto an unfeigned love of the Brethren 1 Pet. 1.22 And when St. Paul asserts the fruits of the Spirit to be Love Joy Peace Long-suffering Gentleness Goodness Faith Meekness Charity Righteousness and Truth Gal. 5.22 Eph. 5.9 by the Fruit he shews the nature of the Root and Principle viz. that the Spirit of God is by Nature Loving Good and Holy and by Grace endearing and sanctifical And this Character of
is distinguished from and asserted the Author of those Operations and Graces there the Spirit cannot be those very Operations or Graces produced by them as those middle Virtues and Qualities must be See 1 Cor. 12.1 to 12. 2 Thess 2.13 1 Pet. 1.2 Gal. 5.22 Joh. c. 14. c. 15. c. 16. 1 Joh. 5.7 In which last the Holy Spirit is said to be in Heaven and consequently can be no middle Quality in us and yet in Heaven personally distinct from the Father and the Word which I take to be a good Argument from a good Authority in despite of Hereticks and defective Libraries to which I could add very many more were it necessary But the truth is the Texts alledged by Crellius do not all manifestly denote by the Spirit of God a mere created Virtue or Quality but may except some few to be by and by considered denote the essential Spirit of God supervening upon Men and creating in them the Spirits of Wisdom Vigour Prophecy Life c. And particularly where Elihu Job 33.4 saith the spirit of God hath made me he implies the prae-existence of that Spirit before himself and so not after effected in him being indeed a Virtue operant not operated but a precedent cause of the Operation it self And though according to the literal form of the Hebrew the evil Spirit that troubled Saul is called the Lords evil Spirit 1 Sam. 16.15 16 23. and 18.10 and 19.9 yet this may denote not a divine Operation surely which is not evil but a wicked infernal Personal Spirit the Lictor or Carnifex which God sent to punish him But if we keep to Crellius's Notion and let the evil Spirit here be a Quality effected in Saul it must be from some inspiring Agent which the Quality being evil cannot be God and so must be an evil Spirit of darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Sam. 16.14 sent from the Lord. And if so how can it be evinced that the Term evil Spirit does not denote the Person of the Evil Angel but only the effect of his infernal Operation And as to the Spirit of Wisdom with which God had filled some Persons for making the Priests habits c. Exod. 28.3 it appears not to be that effected Wisdom it self but the Divine Principle efficient thereof from Exod. 31.1 Where God says he had filled Bezaleel with the Spirit of God in Wisdom and Understanding c. where the filling Power i. e. the Spirit of God is distinguished from its effect i. e. that Wisdom and Understanding inspired by the Spirit of God into him And that Spirit of God producent of that Wisdom Exod. 31.3 might well be called the Spirit of that Wisdom which it produced as likewise Esa 11.2 So that in all these places I am verily perswaded that the Spirit of God signifies not a mere Divine Operation nor a mere Virtue divinely operated but a Principle and Substantial Power operant But that the Term Spirit of God may be sometimes put for the Grace effected thereby nay and that actions of Subjects are many times elegantly attributed to their Adjuncts as it may also happen to the effect for the efficient I shall not gainsay but such mere Metonymies do not presently exhibit a formal Prosopopoecia of those Adjuncts or Effects without other technical Schemes such as usually appear in Poetick or Dramatick fancies not in serious Prose plain Discourse didactick Institutions especially in the Simple Catechetical and Inartificial Rules of Faith delivered by Christ and his Apostles Besides with Poets and other Painters personated Qualities put on the feminine Veil Face and Sex but Christ describes his Holy Spirit * Joh. 14.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 16.13 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ita 15.26 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. as a Masculine Person when he calls him Paraclete with a Personal Pronoun He to shew him as it were exactly both in Nature and Person Where as Bishop Pearson well observes on Joh. 16.13 14 c. upon the Article of the Holy Ghost those personal Attributes of the Spirit can be by no means applied to God the Father nor to the Apostles by any Metonymy whatsoever according to the Socinian pretention But further that supreme Spirit of God is only one which yet by manifold Operations creates many kinds of Virtues which therefore are plurally called Spirits 1 Cor. 12.10 1 Cor. 14.32 § 29. Now to break off this blow Crellius coins a double sort of Unity for the Holy Spirit One generical consisting in this that all such Spirits how numerous and various soever are yet of one Genus of Spirit as all individual Bodies and sorts of Bodies are included in one Genus of Body But such Unity is but merely notional and uncapable of individual Acts and Offices which yet are ascribed to the one Holy Spirit For when †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one and the self same Spirit is said to distribute all gifts according as he will it is manifest that many single and many sorts of Graces are given by the will of one only Spirit individually One. For individual and actually existent effects must be the products of individual and actually existing Cause or Causes not from mere Genus and Species which are not the subjects of Historical Relations For it cannot be said of Substance or Body in general that one and the self same Substance or Body produces all Physical effects in the material World nor of Man in Specie that one and the self same Man performs all the Acts and Offices that are done by all and every single Man Nor is Genus and Species capable of Personal Unities and Distinctions But now the Apostle distinguishes both the Operations and Effects of one and the self same Spirit both from themselves and that Spirit not only numerically but specifically and yet asserts them the products * 1 Cor. 12. of one and the self same Spirit one and the self same Lord one and the self same God shewing at least the Unity of the Spirit to be such and the same as is the Unity of the Lord and God which must be therefore most perfectly Individual But if each particular Divine Inspiration or it s produced Graces had been so many distinct Holy Spirits of God in themselves since there are such multitudes and multiplicities of them there was no reason why in the same breath he should assert them many and manifold and yet but one operant Spirit only which therefore must be distinct from them as the Cause from the effect as the Author from the product and as the Donor from the gift § 30. His second sort of Unity is that of Origine by which he pretends the Spirit to be called One because though infinitely manifold or divisible in it self yet it proceeds from one God and in this respect may be called One But neither will this last fit For the Terms one and the self same are too narrow and express a closer
but only in the Humanity if one could see his inside since he * 45. That Divine Person in whom dwelt the Eternal Word c. makes the Manhood it self a Person distinct from the Eternal Word that dwelt therein and instead of confuting †P. 32. helps those Criticks that place their first Conceptions of the Sonship in the Humanity and as to the Union he is so ambiguous that he tells us not whether the Father and the Holy Spirit came into this resulting Personality or no only saying without any peculiar restriction that God and Man became one Person thus leaving a latitude for various Heresies in this Mystery § 11. So much then for the Personality Advance we next to the Deity of the Messias * P. 40. We believe saith he that Christ was God by vertue of the Indwelling of the Eternal Word in him The Jews could make no Objection to this who knew that their Fathers had worshipped the Cloud of Glory because of God's resting upon it And this he lays as a foundation on which he may properly Deifie Christ's Humane Nature But this Jewish Doctrine is absolutely false and is but either an heedless or willfull Depravation of the Learned Dr. Whithy's chast and accurate * Tractat. de ver Jes Christ Deitat p. Theories herein To make which appear in its proper visage let us consider what Worship is in the sense of his Lordship with whom it imports †Lord of Sarum P. 38. not only Incurvation of Body which may be paid to Creatures but Acts of Faith and Trust Prayers and Praises c. Now will his Lordship stare me or any Man in the face and say that the Jews did thus Worship the Cloud of Glory This I think will be routed by one Syllogism whatsoever the Jews worshipped according to the Law was God The Cloud of Glory was not God Ergo the Jews did not Worship the Gloud of Glory I take it for granted that this Syllogism is impenetrable and let his Lordship try his skill upon it if he please It is indeed agrecable to truth and learned Men teach that Isreal worshipped God in the Cloud over the Ark in the Temple as in all the Symbols and Places of his especial Presence but the Symbols or Places themselves were not the Objects of the Jewish Adoration though Papists bend this to the Adoration of the Host And as simple as the Fathers are they can inform his Lordship †Just Mart. Dial. cum Tryph. ad ista Psalm 24. Quis est Rex Gloriae Dominus Exercitumm c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that every Man whatsoever will own that in Psalm 24. neither Solomon nor the Tabernacle or Ark of the Testimony was the King of Glory which they adored Yet that his Lordship's Concelts may have fair usage I am content to lay together all that he has said to this purpose to try whether they are in truth sound or adulterated or whether they can bear a fair Tryal He therefore teaches †P. 36. that 't is evident from several forms of expressing that Cloud of Glory that a constant and immediate visible Indwelling of the Jehovah was according to Scripture Phrase said to be Jehova which was applied to nothing else This the Greek render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Term the Apostles universally applying to our Saviour could mean no other but that he was the true Jehovah by a more perfect dwelling of the Deity in him c. Now here are two great Absurdities first that the visible Indwelling of the Jehovah is in Scripture phrase called Jehova and secondly that this Name was applied to nothing else For first 't is he that dwelt between the Cherubims in a symbol of Glory over the Ark first in the Tabernacle after in the Temple is called Jehovah not his very Habitation 'T is the Title of the Resident not the Residence and so his Lordship himself applies it also in contradiction either to himself or the Scripture if he expounds it rightly That which perhaps led his Lordship into this fancy is that Shechinah Grammatically signifies Habitation and is thence taken by the Rabbins in a sense peculiarly sacred for the Majestick Presence of God between the Cherubims c. and that he takes to be called Jehova But his Lordship was not at leisure to apprehend that the Rahbinick use has turned the Grammatical notation of Habitation that is but an accident and made it to import that substantial Light and Glory the Symbol of the Divine Presence the Scripture word Glory and the Rabbinick Term Shechinah being equivalent For the Rabbins by Shechinah mean not mere presence but that Lucid Glory by which God presentiated himself But if his Lordship will excuse this unacouracy and say That This Glory is called Jehova in the Scripture yet this is also false and will not serve his turn For this Shechinah is called * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Glory of Jehovah and God is called †Psal 24. the King and * Act. 7.2 God of Glory with relation to the Shechinah yet no Man will change the terms Glory of Jehovah thus The Jehovah of Jehovah or the God or King of Glory into this form The God or King of Jehovah which yet might be done if Jehova were the name of that Glory When Moses asked Jehovah to see a greater and more Majestatick Glory of the Divine Presence and that Jehovah made his Glory to pass by Exod. 33.18 21 22. The Glory is plainly distinguished from the Jehovah For Moses would not pray thus O Jehovah shew me thy Jehovah nor would the Jehovah say my Jehovah shall pass by Jehovah therefore was not the mere Shechinah either God's Habitation or the Cloud of Glory but he that presentlated himself therein And hence the ritual Worship of Israel though performed toward that Cloud was yet performed not to it but to him whose Majesty so appeared in or by it Nor does this Symbol adequately come up to the Mystery of the personal Union for God's inhabiting in a Cloud of Glory did not make a personal Union between God and the Cloud as the in habitation of God in Christ Humane Nature being of an higher and more intimate and unitive Connexion did which yet however doth not really turn our Nature in Christ into Deity except we will go over to Eutychianism and a confusion of Substance nor do we adore his Humanity as so Deified but we Worship the Eternal Son of God united to and mediating for us in our Nature § 12. But whereas his Lordship has out-pitched all Mortals in saying That in Scripture Phrase Jehova never imports any thing else but a constant and visible immediate Inhabitation which has been sufficiently baffled in the precedent Section I will adventure to advance and say that in the Scripture the word Jehovah is used for God without any imaginable respect to such a Shechinah In the Book of Job it is