2.2 God the Father and Christ as also the distinct applications of those words Begetting and Begotten Sending and being Sent with divers others argue the sending forth of Christ as the begetting him is always attributed to the Father the Father sent the Son the Saviour of the world and God have his only begotten Son it s never said nor were it proper to say the Father sent himself or the Son sent himself much less that God sent the Father or the like where there is distinction of sending and being sent begetting and being begotten there is more then difference in denomination for though the same may be denominated in divers respects Father and Son and Husband and Master as we said before yet it s improper to say that the Father begat the Son speaking but of the same in divers respects both Father and Son or that the Father sent the Master or Son when he that is all these in divers respects comes himself being sent of none other then himself Beside its never said the Father was made flesh or the Father suffered for our sins or delivered up himself for our offences but it s often said the Father made his Son an offering for our sins God delivered up Christ for our offences raised him exalted him c. which argues plainly that there is more then a nominal distinction between them as also that Christ is said not to have thought it robbery to be equal with God Now where there is equality there is distinction too for its improper to say of the same indistinct thing that its equal to its self yea Christ himself though he saith his Father and he are one John 10.30 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vnum one Essence or thing not Vnus one personal subsistence or one in way of subsisting yet he speaks of himself and Father as of two witnesses I am one that bear witness of my self and my Father that sent me beareth witness of me John 8.18 And to say no more its evident in this that the word was made flesh and so is become man too There is one God and one Mediatour of God and men the Man Christ Jesus 1 Tim. 2.5 And God will judge the world by that man whom he hath appointed Acts 17.31 But the Father is never affirmed to be man nor could Christ be Mediatour of God and man if not in something distinct from either as well as in something one with either And so for the Spirit it is clearly in that of Mat. 3. and the other places of Isaiah before mentioned distinguished from both Father and Son and is further proved to be so by that of our Saviour John 14.16,17 I will pray the Father and he shall send you another Comforter the Spirit of Truth where all the three are again mentioned and clear distinctions between each of them from other hinted I will pray the Father there 's Father and Son between whom were there no Distinction that phrase were very improper If the Son be the Father he should rather only have said I will send another Comforter then I will pray the Father and he shall send c. and there is the Spirit distinct from both both from him that said he would pray and him to whom he would pray from the Father for he is to send him and is prayed to for him from the Son who prays the Father to send him for he expresly cals him another Comforter that is another from or besides himself that was then with them The Spirit of Truth that is of the Son for the Son is the Truth and is to be glorified by him as in Chap. 16.13,14 When the Spirit is come he shall not speak of himself but he shall glorifie me How shall not he speak of himself it he be Christ of whom he should speak and whom he should glorifie where note by the way that the Spirit that speaks of himself and not of Christ leading the soul to understand the things of Christ and to glorifie him is not â—he true and right Spirit sent forth by Christ â—ut not to inlarge further in this matter what â—…ore plain then that commission â—o Disciple all Nations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or all the Gentiles Baptizing them into the â—ame of the Father and of the Son â—all of the holy Ghost The Name not names â—nd denominations but one Name Power Auâ—ority and Jurisdiction of Father Son and Spiâ—it now what needs this Distinct repeating of â—ather Son and holy Ghost if no distinction â—nt in denomination be put between them â—how can it be said as in 1 John 5.7 that they â—re three witnesses There are three that bear â—itness in heaven the Father the Word and the â—oly Ghost and these three are one Where the â—ord again is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as if they were one in way â—f subsisting or personality as they use to â—eak but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hi tres â—mum sunt these three are one thing one being 〈◊〉 Essence one God but yet three in regard of â—ersonality so as the notes of persons I and â—hou and He may distinctly and frequently â—re in Scripture applyed to them I shall not â—ention that in Rev. 1.4,5 with divers other â—laces to this busines but shall a little further â—pen my conceptions about this so high a busiâ—…ess And so I understand that the Father is the fountain of the Deity as it is in the Son but is not the Son but hath begotten him and giveâ— to him to have life in himself and hath spoken by him and so the Godhead is in the Father aâ— the fountain of Divine power The Son is the Word the essential eternal Word of the Father and so God as flowing from and manifesting the Father who in himself and otherwise then by the Son or Word is not to be known oâ— seen into The divine out-streaming wisdome by whom the Father that fountain of Divine glory put forth his Divine vertue and Created all things and upholds them and hath revealed and declared himself to men who also in due time for the sake of man turned away and fallen from him was Incarnate by the power of God and incorporated in the seed of David according to the flesh and so became also a man and in the nature of man by the heavenly flowing forth of his Divine doctrine and by the things undergon by and accomplished in him he opened represented and declared to us the Father and so the Son is as the flowing or out speaking of the Father and the Spirit is the same divine being but as in both and proceeding from both the power vertue and force that is in and worketh or acteth forth it self from both from the fountain by the stream so as that the Father worketh all things through the Son by the Spirit We may somewhat illustrate it by this comparison as I humbly conâ—eive of it .. The Light that
which do but manifest that while men have copied out these sacred writings they have sometimes either through heedlesness or through difficulty of right discerning or reading some word overslipt or altered some particles or words sometimes setting down some other of a like or neer signification agreeable to the sense and scope of the Text and sometimes perhaps something being noted in the margin by way of conference of like places in the several Evangelists some word or saying hath thence been afterward looked upon as pertaining to the Text and hath been by others inserted thereinto for so sometimes some word or sentence in some copies inserted in some History in Matthew or Mark more then other copies have is found in the same History in Luke or John by consent of all copies And this is clear that there is nothing of faith about which there are diversities of readings but what other places in which all copies agree will guide us to discern what is consonant to truth of them and which of them is corrupted and doth disagree nor any passage of weight in our received copies out of which our Bibles are translated which other places in which all copies agree will not confirm as in that most weighty place about which there are divers readings 1 Joh. 5.7 there are three that bear record in Heaven c. which some copies have not but most have the Scripture else where attests it to be according to truth for we have the same there in Joh. 1.1.33 clearly spoken of and all agreeing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into one as some read it and again in Mat. 29.19 with divers other places which there is no difference or variety of reading in Nay we find the Holy Ghost sometimes varying a word in the Scripture and while the same truth is held forth though with some variety of expression it s still divine truth and not for that variety in expression to be rejected as where Moses said Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and shalt serve him our Saviour repeats it against Satan thus thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve which being both the sense of that place and the scope of divers other Scriptures it was no untruth to say it was so written this objection then is only a frivolous rub put in the way not to be regarded these varieties of readings being found either in matters not essentiall to the faith or if in such yet then they are either so small that they no way alter the truth propounded or are in other places cleared and the right reading attested I know some object against the translating of them that we have them not in their proper language and there is great difference in translations and one Minister corrects one place and another another c. A sorry objection too for 1. we have them in their Originall languages though all understand them not there 2. That languages or words are signarerum the expressions of things and not the things themselves expressed and that the alteration of the sound or name of a thing in severall languages alters not the thing so differently named is clear and that interpretation is needfull in languages not understood to make them understandible is as evident and that there are certain Idioms and properties of speech in every language which are scarce so fully to be expressed in other languages as in their own is confest too by all that understand languages besides that there is variety of signification of some words in most especially the Hebrew and Greek languages which sometimes render sentences somewhat dubious as well in the Original as to the translators and sometime one translator takes a word in one signification sometimes in another which are not cases often obvious but that the scope of the place matter evidence what the use of the word there is though sometimes it doth not so clearly but that there may be diversity of conceptions about it yet this being usually in things less essential to the faith no divine truth essentiall to our beleeving in God and walking aright with him is thereby left uncertain only some instruction or relation of things for our learning and further helpfulness or consolation in the things otherwhere many times more clearly and without all doubt asserted is not so fully made out in some translations as in others which doth but shew an usefulness in giving diligence to understand and make out the properties of the Originall languages by men of learning not at all that we are to slight the divine truths made out to us by the good hand of God upon those who have done their endeavours herein by translating them for us especially seeing we have almost generally left to us in the margin of some editions the diversity of the significations in which such dubious places may be taken that we might consider them both and take either of them as God shall present instructions to us from them and yet the rather too seeing the great mysteries of God and Jesus Christ are in clear and undoubted expressions in all translations amongst us so unanimously represented as that nothing but sloth or unbelief or wickedness can be the hinderance of our attaining to so much of them as may lead us to and preserve us in the way of salvation But yet neither is this all there is yet another wile of Satan that prevails much with many viz. that the Scriptures have another meaning then what the words import a spirituall mystical or Allegorical sense which is the true sense and therefore they are not indeed to be rejected but studied yet not to stick to the literal expression but to find out the spiritual that is the allegorical sense and this comes most up to the old Serpent who did not at the first say God never said ye shall not eat but hath God indeed said or in saying said ye shall not eat c. as if he should say though them words ye heard yet do you think that was the meaning of them there was some other thing in that saying then you think of and not that which the words seem to import this is a very specious temptation and takes with many and the other forementioned are often made of use to usher in this In answering which this I shall say that 1. All Scripture in one sense hath a spirituall sense as by spirituall sense we mean the sense of the Spirit or that the Spirit holds forth but then that is most usually no other but what the words hold forth and express as there is one god one Mediator between God and man the man Christ Jesus who gave himself a ransome for all the sense of the Spirit in that is as is exprest in th◠words and so usually in other places 2. Many Scriptures are indeed parabolically and figuratively exprest and there the Spirit had a further aime then at what the letter of
as well writ earnestly against them as they have exhorted us to contend earnestly with them Jude 3 11,12,13 And yet thou that callest thy self a Saint dost rather bless them and walk with them as brethren But thou wilt say But are we as infallible as the Apostles can we be so sure what is error as they To this I answer That its true we have not so full a dispensation of Spirit from Christ to us as they had that were to lay the foundation they had greater work to do and their talents were proportioned to their work but yet through their infallible doctrine and by the good Spirit of God given us Rom. 8.9 or else we are not Saints or Christs peculiar people we may certainly and infallibly know the foundamental and essential Truths and Principles of Christian Religion which none can be ignorant of and yet be good Christians The infallibility and certainty in Christ and his Apostles which thou pleadest is an argument against unity with all that thou pleadest for for they having been infallibly guided that that is cross to their infallible doctrine is thereby detected to be false and fallible and thou canst not be one with them and yet not dislike and shun that that is contrary to them Sure if we know and love God we shall have some discerning and derestation of such doctrines as blaspheme or dishonor God and beware of those that bring them If we be Christs sheep we have some discerning of his voice from the voice of strangers John 10.5 so much as may render their voice a strange voice to us and such as is not to be approved of us If a man shall come and tell us there was never any such man as Jesus Christ or that if there was he was onely a type and figure of the true Christ in us and not the very Saviour that he rose not nor ascended nor shall come again in glory that he is not the Mediator between God and us that our dead bodies shall not arise that the Scriptures are not to be heeded in their sayings and yet we cannot tell whether these men say truth or not we are plainly blinded and are not sheep of Christ if we cannot discern these voices to be the voices of a stranger Those infallible Writings of the Prophets and Apostles as they tell us that there are and shall be false Prophets and Antichrists VVolves in sheeps clothing deniers of the Lord that bought them and such as bring in heresies of destruction And 2. That such persons and their Doctrines ought not to be heeded and listened to but avoided by us not received to house or bid God speed but held as execrable and accursed 2 Joh. 10,11 Gal. 8.9 Yea 3. That such we are to contend against with earnestness Jude 3. reprove them stop their mouths give warning of them to others that they may not be snared by them Tit. 1.9.11 So they tell us further 4. That real believers have received an holy Unction by which to discern them 1 Joh. 2.20,27 and so have ability of discerning them and indeed that 's intimated too in their precepts and counsels given us to try and avoid them which otherwise were in vain if they were beyond our discerning Nay 5. They have also notably fore described them foretelling us that they would say they are Christ and deceive many Matth. 24.5 that they deny Jesus to be the Christ 1 Joh. 2.22 make a cipher of him call him execrable 1 Cor. 12. deny the Lord that bought them 2 Pet. 2.1 confess him not come in the flesh 1 Joh. 4.3 Will mock at the promise of his coming 2 Pet. 3.4 pretending that there neither is nor shall be any alteration no other coming but that that is and alwayes hath been to all the Prophets and Patriarks in all times deny the resurrection of the body 1 Cor. 15. and say that the resurrection is now made or is already past 2 Tim. 2.18 hear not the Apostles in their doctrines and sayings 1 Joh. 4.6 Speak high swelling words of vanitie promising men liberty while themselves are servants of corruption 2 Pet. 2.18.19 exalt themselves above all that is called God or that is worâ—…ipped 2 Thes 2.4 above Magistrates and Governors if not suitable to their humors yea against Jesus Christ and above him and God in him unthroning him and despising his Ordinances as light and foolish things lawless men that worship not God pray not to him nor call upon him yea in a word by their fruits we may know them Matth. 7.16 for they lead from Jesus Christ the onely begotten of God in whom onely we may meet with salvation either to rest in their own works joyned with or preferred before Christ or else to looseness in principles and practises to walk after their own ungodly lusts self-lovers covetous boasters of their abilities knowledge attainments proud so as to lift up themselves as is aforesaid blasphemers that is speakers evil of Gods Wayes Temple Ordinances and them that worship therein disobedient to parents either natural or spiritual in Christ unthankful to God especially for his love in Christ and for his appointments for their good unholy not living to God and Christ not calling upon him giving thanks to him c. without natural affection to their own relations truce-breakers that keep not Covenants or ingagements to God or men false accusers incontinent fierce despisers of them that are good 2 Tim. 3.1.2,3,4 c. A marvellous thing it is that a man should be a Saint and yet not know the essentials of that Word that sanctifies him should be begotten by the Gospel and yet know not that Gospel by which God hath begot him so as to discern it from other doctrines that God hath writ to us by his servants so plainly of these things and we have the benefit and help of those gifts given by Christ to them that we might be seâ—led and not tossed to and fro like children and yet we know not who say right and who say wrong sure we know nothing then and so know not what charity is or what love we should walk in and toward whom if we know not the Gospel in its first and bottom doctrines cannot discern whether men preach with or besides that doctrine taught or recorded by the Apostles when we hear them speak they never so fully for or against it we have lost our eyes sure and understanding Obj. But must we not do to them as we would they should do to us though we do discern them must we not still love them Answ I answer yes them that are not given over to destraction them that we see not to have sinned to death and to have trampled under foot the Son of God counting the blond of the Covenant after it hath been sanctifying them an unholy or common thing and have done despire to the Spirit of Grace which things as they may be discerned by us so are we
Son Jesus Christ Acts 14.15 as the fountain of and the proper way to that life and salvation See the sum of it in 1 Tim. 2.5,6 That there is one God and one mediatour between God and man the man Christ Jesus Who hath given himself a ransome for All as an evidence of Gods good will to All that he would have all men to be saved and to come to know the truth This ye are to hold forth unto men that there is a God to be adored worshipped submitted tâ— trusted in and served the author of our life and breath and all things the fountain of bliss and happiness and that this God is one in Essence mind purpose faithfulness and so that All other powers that the Heathens have fancied and adored are Idols vanities and confusion all things empty and too weak to save or satisfie besides him that eternal life and happiness consists in the true knowledge and enjoyment of him And yet this unity of the Godhead is so to be held forth that the Trinity therein also may be acknowledged otherwise men shall not rightly apprehend or worship him according to the Christian Faith and Doctrine Concerning which let me a little declare my mind to you though it may seem a Digression because mens errour hereabout I find to be often an inlet to many other evil false conceptions I know some make that Trinity or threefoldness in the Divine being but only a threefold denomination of the same personal subsistence and that there is no other distinction between Father Word and Spirit but only in that diversity of denomination which appears to be an evident falshood in this that by the same rule that God the Father Word and Spirit is called three because they are three denominations He might be called seven or ten or more there being many other denominations in the Scripture given to him as Jehovah Lord of Hosts Jah Elohim Ehjeh Eloah Adonaâ— the Almighty and divers others but yet he is not said to be so many as he hath denominations given him in any part of Scripture Besides different denominations of the same person or personal subsistence may be convertibly predicated of one another as where the same man is Father and Son Husband and Master and Magistrate in divers respects there it may be said the Master is the Father and the Father is Governour c. but so it cannot be said of these three the Father the Son and the holy Ghost The Scripture never says the Father is the Son or the Father is the holy Ghost or the holy Ghost is the Father or the Word or Son is the Father though God is a Spirit and Christ an everlasting Father in regard of us yet not the Father of the only begotten Son nor is the Father the Spirit sent by the Father and yet these three are but one and the same God A great mysterie it is I confess and such as passes expression fully to declare and open yet a truth it is that the Scriptures many ways attest both in the Prophetical and Apostolical writings Moses hints it in speaking of God plurally and yet joyning that plural word with a singular verb as when he says Elohim Bara the Gods or the Mighties he created Heaven and Earth c. And again Nahashu let us make man in our Image plurally and yet by and by he changes the phrase and speaks in the singular number God or the Mighties made man in his Image with which agrees divers other phrases as that in Psal 149.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let Israel rejoyce in his makers and that in Eccles 12.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Remember thy Creators in the days of thy youth and the like in Job 35.10 and yet more fully in 2 Sam. 7.23 what one people in the earth is like to thy people Israel whom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 verbatim The Gods went to redeem to himself The words that we translate God and went being both of the plural number and yet the prâ—noun relative that is added is singular to himself not to themselves The two former words plainly intimating the plurality in way of subsistence and the singular pronoun the unity in Essence which also is held forth in Gods appearing unto Abraham in which he appeared as three men and Abraham sometimes speaks to him as one and sometime in the plural number as to more Gen. 18. Whence some Hebrew Doctors have also written thus upon the word Elohim which is usually translated God See Ainsw in Gen. 1. Come and see the mysterie of the word Elohim there are three degrees and every degree by it self alone and yet notwithstanding they are all one and joyned together in one and are not divided one from another These places with divers others as to instance one more that in Deut. 6.5 Hear O Israel the Lord thy Almighties is one Lord intimate a plurality in unity but other places express that plurality to be a Trinity or threefoldness in unity as that in Psalm 33.6 By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made and all the host thereof by the breath of his mouth or by the Spirit of his mouth for the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies both So that there we have mentioned the Lord Jehovah his Word and Spirit as the like we may see also in Isa 42.1,2 Behold my servant whom I uphold which is spoken of the word made Flesh Jesus Christ Mat. 12. who though he was in the form of God and counted it no robbery to be equal with him yet emptyed himself and came in the form of a servant Phil. 2.6,7 c. Mine elect in whom my soul delighteth I have pat my spirit upon him c. there is the Father held forth under that word I my he whose servant Christ became and whose elected and delightful Son he is and there 's the Son as before was noted and the Spirit of the Father put upon him The like expressions of the Trinity sce again Isa 11.1,2 and 61.1 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me there is the Lord Jehovah the Father and Me that is the Word as incarnate and made flesh and the Spirit or holy Ghost put upon Christ which things are yet more clearly opened in the writings of the Evangelists and Apostles as is to be seen in Mat. 3.17 where we have this Trinity distinctly named Christ baptized the holy Ghost descending upon him visibly in the appearance of a Dove and the Father speaking out of heaven and owning him for his beloved Son Here was more then a threefold denomination of one personal subsistence the Father and Son here are plainly distinguished for he says not of himself I am the beloved Son but of Christ this is my beloved Son c. In 2 John 3. he is distinguished plainly from him Grace and peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ the Son of the Father c. See the like in Col.