One Person which are Two Persons or something as like Two Persons as their Natures will permit when they subsist apart And I should have thought such a severe Censurer should have been more Cautious than to have attributed any part of Personality to the Body in the same Chapter wherein he so civilly Schools the Dean for seeming to attribute Personality to a Beast when Personality belongs only to a reasonable Nature and Beasts have no Reason which is more than he knows for why may not Beasts have some Reason as well as some Men have such brutish Passions and more than as Wise Men as himself think to be true for there are various degrees of Reason and where ever there is a conscious Life there must be some degree of it and that entitles them to as much share in Personality as they have in Reason but no Man will pretend that a Humane Body though united to a reasonable Soul has any Reason or any Sence either though by its Vital Union to the Soul the Soul feels all the Impressions made on the Body And this brings us to a fair State and an easie decision of this Question for if Personality belongs only to a reasonable Nature it is certain that the Soul makes or constitutes the Person or if I may so speak is the Center of Personality whatever else be vitally united to it and by such a vital Union is incorporated into the same Person If there be but one principle of Reason Sensation and a conscious Life that is the Person for a Person is the individual Substance of a Rational Nature But is not a Humane Body part of the Person to whom it belongs Answ. It is part of the Man and in that Sence part of the Person but no part of the Personality that is it does not make the Person but is taken into the Person by a vital Union and so becomes part of the Man and part of the Person as belonging to it I am of opinion notwithstanding the Animadverter's Animus Anima that there is but one Soul or Mind or Spirit in Man which performs all the Offices of a Rational and Animal Life which understands reasons wills and feels all the Impressions of the Body whether Pain or Pleasure though with respect to such different Offices and Powers it may be of some use both in Philosophy and Divinity to call it by different Names Now if all Life Reason Sensation be only in the Soul there must be the whole Personality though the Soul when united to a Body is not the whole Person for the Person reaches as far as the Self-conscious Life does by a Vital Union but the Personality is whole and entire in the Principle of a Rational Life and is neither more nor less a Person though by vital Unions or a dissolution of them more or less may belong to the Person We may find some resemblance of this in Works of Art Whether you add or take away some Wheels from a Clock it is the same Clock still while there is the same Spring of Motion though it communicates Motion to more or fewer Wheels And thus the Body becomes One Person with the Soul neither by an hypostatical Union which is the swallowing up a natural Personality in its Union with a superior Person which can never be between two Beings one of which by Nature is no Person as the Body it self is not and cannot be Nor by the Body being joyned with the Soul as one part joyntly concurring with another to the composition of the whole Person which is the Animadverter's way and a very absurd one as you have already heard to talk of a compounded Personality but there is another way which he never thought of and that is by a vital Union which makes the Body part of it self without adding to its own Personality by making all bodily Sensations its own And thus though the Soul be an entire Person a Man when united to a Body is not an imperfect accidental Compound which he says Philosophy calls unum per accidens a thing made up of two such Beings as cannot perfectly coalesce and unite into One for his own beloved Philosophy never called things vitally united unum per accidens and I would desire him to inform us how two things can more perfectly coalesce than in One Life However by the power of Metaphysicks he can prove That if the Soul be an entire Person a Man must be an imperfect accidental compound For a compleat Being as every Person essentially is having received the utmost degree of Subsistence which its Nature can give it if it comes afterward to be compounded with another Being whether compleat or incompleat it must necessarily make such a loose unnatural Union and Composition I do not wonder he is so fond of School-Terms for they serve him very often instead of Sence but before I particularly consider them by his good leave I must ask him a Question or two Whether the Divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Word before the Incarnation were a compleat Being as he must be if he be the second Person in the Trinity for every Person he says is essentially a compleat Being and then whether he will have the Humane Nature a compleat or incompleat Being the Question is Whether the Personal Union of the Humane Nature to the Divine Word be necessarily such a loose unnatural Union and Composition To say That this is not a natural Union is to say That the Divine and Humane Nature are not united into One Person in Christ for I take a Union of Natures to be a natural Union by what Power soever it be done at least so far that there is no natural repugnancy to such an Union for then no Power could do it and therefore according to this bold assertion either the Hypostatical Union must be loose and unnatural or if the Divine and Humane Nature be perfectly united into One Person then the Union of two compleat Beings does not necessarily make such a loose unnatural Union and Composition But to quit these School-Terms and to speak what we understand our selves and what others may understand the Soul may be a compleat and perfect Person and not a perfect Man and therefore notwithstanding it is a compleat Being may require a vital Union to a Humane Body to perfect its Nature That is a perfect Humane Person which has entirely in it self all the Powers which are essential to a Humane Person such as Understanding Will and Sensation which are as entire and perfect in the Soul without the Body as with it though some of them either cannot act at all or at least not so perfectly without a vital Union to the Body which conveys external Impressions and by them excites internal Sensations in the Soul To represent this plainly let us consider a Soul vitally united to a Body but to such a Body whose Organs are so indisposed for Sensation that the Man
will afford us any Conception of it Now suppose That after all these fair Appearances a spiteful Wit could start some difficulties in this Notion as it is not to be expected that in a matter of so high a Nature we should have such a perfect comprehension of it as to leave no difficulties unexplained ought not the Dean to have met with as fair Quarter as other Writers have done in the same cause Has he not given us as intelligible a representation and it is intended for no more of a Trinity in Unity as the Sun its Light and Splendor a Tree and its Branches a Fountain and its Streams or a Mathematical Cube Are not all these Accounts much more chargeable with Tritheism or Sabellianism are not the Sun its Light and Splendor as much Three but not so much One as Three Conscious Minds Can there be a Trinity in Unity unless there be a real and substantial Trinity What work could our Animadverter have made with the Ancient Fathers and some late Writers had he thought fit to have treated them as he has done Dr. Sherlock But it is in vain to expostulate when the Man not his Notions is in Fault and the only Comfort in such cases is That Malice is as blind as Love and so it has happened to the Animadverter as I shall make appear But before I particularly answer the Animadverter's Arguments against Self-consciousness and Mutual-consciousness and Three eternal Minds it will be necessary to Discourse something in general concerning a Trinity in Unity and the words whereby to express it For a Trinity in Unity is such a distinction and such an Union as is peculiar to the Godhead and though there are some faint resemblances of it in Nature yet Nature has nothing like it and then it is impossible we should have any words that can adaequately express it It may help to allay the heat and virulence of Disputation among those who heartily believe a Trinity in Unity as I hope the Animadverter does to discourse this matter plainly and briefly The Scriptures both of the Old and New Testament every where assure us That there is but One GOD and not to take notice now of the more obscure intimations of a Trinity in the Old Testament Christ in his Gospel and his Apostles after him have ascribed the Name and Character and incommunicable Attributes of GOD to Three Father Son and Holy Ghost we are by the Command of Christ Baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and we are blessed in their Name The Grace of our Lord Iesus Christ and the Love of God and the Communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all Amen Christ declares himself to be the Son of GOD and to be One with his Father and St. Iohn tells us That he is that Word which was in the beginning and was with God and was God That by him all things were made and without him was not any thing made that was made And the like Divine Attributes are ascribed to the Holy Spirit and therefore though there be One GOD we must acknowledge if we believe the Gospel that there are Three Father Son and Holy Ghost in the Unity of the Godhead This is the true simplicity of the Christian Faith to believe Father Son and Holy Ghost to be One GOD that the Father is not the Son nor the Holy Ghost that the Son is not the Father nor the Holy Ghost that the Holy Ghost is not the Father nor the Son but that the Father is God the Son God and the Holy Ghost God and all Three but One God Now one would have thought that the Authority of Christ and his Apostles had been a sufficient Foundation for this Faith without any farther enquiries but the Devil very well knew That the whole Oeconomy of our Salvation by Christ and consequently the whole Christian Religion depended on this Faith and that the curiosity of Mankind the weakness of their Understandings and their vain presumption in measuring GOD himself by their narrow Conceits might easily be managed to unsettle these Foundations and therefore here he made some of his earliest Attempts The ancient Christians before this was made a matter of Dispute contented themselves with professing their Faith in One God Father Son and Holy Ghost but when Heresies in several Ages of the Church were broached and some to secure the Unity of the Godhead made Father Son and Holy Ghost no more than Three different Names belonging to Three different Appearances and Manifestations of the same One God others if they were not misunderstood or misrepresented did not only distinguish but separate Father Son and Holy Ghost and made Three absolute independent Gods of them and others denied the Divinity of the Son and of the Holy Ghost which preserved the Unity of the Godhead by reducing the only begotten Son and the Holy Spirit of God into the rank of Creatures This forced the Orthodox Fathers into a Dispute where they wanted Words adaequately to express their Sence The Doctrine which they constantly affirmed and defended against Hereticks of all sorts was this That Father Son and Holy Ghost were Three as really distinct from one another as Three humane Persons are and that each of them is true and perfect God and has all Divine Perfections in himself and yet that all Three are essentially One and the same eternal and infinite God But when they came to say what these Three are and how they are One by what Name to call this wonderful distinction and Unity here Words failed them as of necessity they must because there is no such Distinction and Unity in Nature and therefore no Name for it For the Names of distinction in ordinary use do not only distinguish but divide and separate their Subjects and the Names of Unity signifie singularity also which admits no number And this has occasioned most of our cavilling Disputes and raised all the noise and clamour about Absurdities and Contradictions in the Doctrine of the Trinity and there is no help for this if Men will ask such Questions as the proper and natural signification of Words cannot reach the Mystery of and not allow such a Theological use of Words as a little alters their natural Signification to accommodate them to represent some divine and supernatural Mysteries Thus for Example A Person signifies a reasonable understanding Being which actually subsists and is distinguished from all other Beings of the same kind but then it signifies more than this not only a distinct but a separate Subsistence for so all created Persons are not only distinct but separate Beings who have a compleat absolute independant Subsistence of their own But when we use this Word Person in a Theological Sense as applied to Father Son and Holy Ghost in the ever-blessed Trinity we only use it in the sense of distinction not of separation to signifie that each of these Holy Three has
all the Perfections of infinite Mind and Understanding distinctly as other Persons have but not separately as created Persons have And since there are Three in the Unity of the Godhead thus really distinguished from each other without a separation I know no reason why we may not use this Word Person in this limited Sence to signifie Three who are as really distinct from each other but not separated as other Persons are For when it is known in what sence we use the Word when applied to the Trinity it is trifling to dispute against Three Persons in the Godhead from the signification of the Word Person when applied to Creatures and yet this is the Sum total of all the Socinian Arguments against Three Persons and One God and of all the Contradictions they pretend to find in it Three Divine Persons they say must be Three absolute compleat independent Gods because Three Humane Persons are Three compleat absolute Men who subsist independently on each other and therefore it is as manifest a Contradiction That Three Divine Persons should be but One God as it is that Three Humane Persons should be but One Man which signifies nothing if we do not use the Word Person in the same Sense and all the World knows we do not when applied to the Holy Trinity as when applied to Men For it is meer trifling to dispute against us from such a Sense of the Word as we reject and declare to all Men that we do reject The most that can be made of this is that we use an improper Word and ought not to call Father Son and Holy Ghost Three Persons because that is to make Three Gods of them as Peter Iames and Iohn are Three Men But when the importunity of Hereticks forces us to find Names for that which nothing in created Nature can answer if they will not give us leave we must take leave to use the properest Names we can find though not every way proper and such the Name of Person is when applied to the Persons of the Trinity For all that this Word Person signifies except a separate Subsistence belongs to the Persons of the Holy Trinity An intelligent Nature and all personal Acts of Understanding Volition c. do as distinctly belong to each Person as to any Humane Persons and it is this makes a Person not a separate Subsistence which belongs only to finite and created not to infinite and eternal Persons And therefore the Word Person is properly enough applied to the Three Divine Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost because all that is essential to the Notion of a Person belongs to each of them though they do not subsist separately as Humane Persons do But yet Men are very apt to judge of the Divine Persons by what they see in Humane Persons and to fancy these Three Persons in the Deity to be like Three Men who have the same Humane Nature but subsist and act separately and are One only by a moral Consent and Unity And therefore to prevent this Imagination which betrays Men to down right Tritheism others without rejecting the Name Person have thought fit more expresly to signifie what kind of Persons they are by calling them Three Subsistences that is Three who have all the Perfections of the Godhead and do really and distinctly subsist for else they could not be Three Subsistences but yet do not subsist as separate Persons but are essentially One God For Subsistence does not necessarily infer Separation for Three may distinctly subsist though essentially and inseparably united And this is the difference between Person and Subsistence that according to the most usual acceptation of the Word Person which it is hard to correct for that Idea which in common use belongs to a Word is apt to stick close to it Three Persons signifie Three who subsist apart and as separately as Three Men do But Three Subsistences are Three Persons who subsist distinctly without Separation For Subsistence necessarily signifies a distinct and real but not a separate Subsistence for if Three really subsist without a Separation they are Three real Subsistences and therefore it is in vain for the Socinians to dispute against Three Persons that they must be Three separate Persons unless they can prove that they cannot really subsist without a Separation which none of them ever yet undertook and yet all their Talk of Contradictions and Three Gods vanishes without it What I have said of the Word Person is with equal reason applicable to the Word Mind The Animadverter objects against the Dean That a Mind or Spirit is an absolute Being Nature or Substance and I grant it is so in the common use of the Word as apapplied to created Minds and Spirits but so is Person also as much as Mind and if we allow of a Theological use of the Word Person why not of Mind too to signifie an intelligent Subsistence which is a Mind too but not a separate Mind and therefore not such an absolute Being Nature and Substance as a created Mind is And when the Dean speaks of Three distinct infinite Minds which are essentially and inseparably One he could mean nothing more than three distinct intelligent but not separate Subsistences And he needs ask no other Pardon but for the use of a Word which the Schools have not consecrated But there is greater want of Words to express the Unity and Oneness of the Divine Nature and Essence than the distinction of Persons The Nicene Fathers in their Controversie with Arius of which if there be occasion more hereafter who denied the Divinity of Christ and made him no more than a Creature though as perfect and as like to God as a Creature could be used the Word Homoousion which was not first invented by them to serve that turn but was used either in Words or Sence by the Anti-Nicene Fathers as the learned Dr. Bull has proved But what is this Homoousion or Sameness of Nature This is the difficulty for there is not any one Word to explain it by which adequately answers the full Notion of the Divine Unity and that is no great wonder because there is no perfect Example in Nature of any such Unity They very often explain this by Examples of a Specifick Unity That the Father and Son have the same Nature as Abraham and Isaac have and therefore they call Men who have the same Specifick Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so they do the Sun its Light and Splendor the Tree and its Branches c. And this is in part a true representation of the Homoousiotes or Sameness of Nature in the Persons of the Holy Trinity for if there be not that which perfectly Answers though it much out-does also a specifick Sameness and Unity their Nature cannot be the same and accordingly they prove against the Arians that Christ cannot be the Son of God if he be not Homoousios to his Father because every Father begets a Son in his
LICENS'D ERRATA PAge 9. line 3. for usual r. unusual p. 21. l. 8. f. any r. an l. 24. f. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 22. Marg. l. 9. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 11. p. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A DEFENCE OF Dr. SHERLOCK's NOTION OF A Trinity in Unity In ANSWER to the ANIMADVERSIONS upon his Vindication of the Doctrine of the Holy and ever Blessed TRINITY With a POST-SCRIPT Relating to the Calm Discourse of a Trinity in the GODHEAD In A Letter to a Friend LONDON Printed for W. Rogers at the Sun over-against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet-street MDCXCIV A DEFENCE OF Dr. SHERLOCK's NOTION OF A Trinity in Unity c. SIR I Had heard very often and very much of the Animadversions upon Dr. Sherlock's Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity but I had also heard such a Character of it which both Friends and Foes agreed in that I could not perswade my self to read it For a Satyrical Wit is no diversion to a Wise Man except in a Play and where it hurts no Body and I could never think that true Divine Wisdom rests on an ill-natured and perverse Spirit But your late Letter awakened me for I could not but think that Book whatever other Faults it had must be worth reading which you could think worth answering and seem so impatiently to expect when the Dean or some body for him should Answer it As for the Dean he has given Testimony to the World that he has not been Idle all this while but much better employed And to speak my Mind freely I don't see how he is obliged to Answer unless you think a Man bound to Answer Ballads and Lampoons for he is as little concerned in it as you are that had it not been for the Title Page and some particular Expressions which the Dean uses and the Animadverter furiously opposes without understanding them I could never have guessed against whom he had Writ I had a little before read over the Vindication and the Notions lay fresh and easie in my Mind but as soon as I dipt into the Animadversions they were all on a sudden confounded and put into disorder The Animadverter Disputes earnestly subtilly and triumphantly opens his whole Armory of Metaphysicks and because they are thin airy Weapons which do no great Execution he points them with Wit and Satyr to make them pierce the deeper It was the Saying of a very Witty Man that He who Writes lies down but it is to be supposed he forgot it when he made the Experiment himself But I must say this for the Animadverter That he is as fair an Adversary upon this account as one would desire as he spares not those who lie down before him so he very civilly takes his turn and lays himself as fairly open to Satyrical Wit if the Dean or any of his Friends would condescend to exercise it upon him When he ventures upon any thing like Wit he always makes himself a Jest and never so much insults and triumphs over an Enemy as where he is certainly himself in the Wrong I will not entertain you with particular Remarks of this Nature read over his Book again if you have the Patience and see if this be not true But Sir as well as I love you I 'm resolved to humble you for giving me the trouble of reading this Book not by giving a particular Answer to the whole which would be too unmerciful but by convincing you that it needed no Answer and to let you see what a trifling Author you have either admired or feared will prove some little Humiliation to you But I shall do it in short to save my self as much as I can the pains of Writing and you of Reading and therefore shall consider only the main Points of Dispute between the Animadverter and the Dean concerning Self-Consciousness Mutual-Consciousness and Three eternal and infinite Minds He rages furiously against the Dean according to his Custom in a whole long Chapter for discarding those good old Terms of Essence Substance Nature c. for his own new-invented Terms of Self-consciousness and Mutual-consciousness that any one who reads it would believe That the Dean would not allow GOD to be a real Substantial Being or to have any Nature or Essence whereas he no where denies That these are very good Words and not only useful but necessary in some cases but yet very apt to confound us with Material and Sensible Images when we go about to form a Notion and Idea of GOD. We know not the naked Substance or Essence of any Thing not of Matter much less of Spirit and much less of an infinite and eternal Spirit and therefore as we can form no other Idea of Matter but by its sensible Qualities so we can form no Idea of a Spirit but by such Attributes and Powers as are proper and essential to a Spirit which is so far from being a Novelty that it is to think and speak with all the considering part of Mankind but let this pass which the Dean is no more concerned in were his Words and Sence truly and candidly represented than the best Christian Writers both Ancient and Modern as were easily shewn did I not fear the Animadverter should he know it would rail at them all for his sake for there is not a more Capital Crime than to speak any thing well of the Dean or to say any thing that he says That which the Dean is more immediately concerned in is the Idea he has endeavour'd to give us of a Trinity in Unity and all that he positively asserts of it is That it is a possible and intelligible Notion and no other in Sence and Substance than what the ancient Fathers made use of to represent this great Mystery by though expressed in other Terms To prepare you to judge equally in this Cause you must remember That the Substance of the Article is not concerned in it here is no Dispute about a Trinity in Unity This the Dean asserts in as full and ample words as the Athanasian Creed it self which some Trinitarians themselves boggle at but without reason as he thinks for whoever will acknowledge Three Persons in the Godhead each of which distinctly considered is GOD and has all the Perfections of the Divine Nature and yet are all Three but one GOD must as he undertakes to prove own the Terms and Explications of that Creed He has been careful to preserve a Real not a meerly Nominal distinction of Persons and yet asserts the Unity of the Godhead in as high terms as ever the Schools did even a Natural Numerical Unity and there is no reason to suspect he dissembles his Sence for then he might have concealed it too having no other obligation to engage in this Cause but a Zeal for this truly Ancient Catholick and Apostolick Faith Since then here is no Innovation made in the Faith nor any alteration of the least term in it what is the
Fault Truly no other than what the best Writers both Ancient and Modern have been equally guilty of if it can be called a Fault Those who are acquainted with this Controversie know that the great Objection against the Catholick Faith of the Trinity in Unity is not its contradiction to any plain and express Principle of Reason but the unconceiveabless of it It is certain that Three should be One and One Three upon different accounts is no contradiction and then what Principle of Reason does a Trinity in Unity contradict But we must grant that we have no perfect Example of any such Union in Nature and therefore cannot frame a compleat and positive Notion and Idea of such an Union and this some Men miscall Contradicting Reason but if every thing which we have no positive Idea of must be allowed to contradict Reason we shall find Contradictions enow and which is worse must be forced to believe Contradictions for we must confess a great many things to be true which we have no Idea of and cannot conceive how they should be But yet since the unconceivableness of this Union is the great difficulty and great Objection though in truth it is no Objection at all to any one who considers how unconceivable and incomprehensible the Divine Nature is the Ancient Fathers endeavoured to help our conception and imagination of this by some sensible Images Such as the Co-essentiality and Union of the Sun its Light and Splendor of a Fountain and its Streams a Tree and its Branches as the Dean has observed and as every one knows whoever looked into the Fathers But these are Material Images and may serve for Allusions and to render the Notion of a Trinity in Unity possible and credible when we see some faint resemblances of it in the Material World but they cannot help us to conceive what kind of Union there is between the Divine Persons the Union of Matter and Spirit differing as much as Matter and Spirit do which have no likeness or resemblance to each other And therefore the Dean was certainly so far in the right to seek for some Image and resemblance of this Mysterious Union in the Unity of a Spirit For a Mind and Spirit is the truest Image of God that is in Nature for God is a Spirit and therefore it is more likely to find some Image of the Unity of the Godhead in a Spirit than in Matter and yet we know nothing of a Spirit but what we feel in our Selves and can Philosophize no farther about it for as Mr. Lock has truly observed we can form no Idea but either from external Impressions or internal Sensations and therefore we can know no more of the Unity of a Spirit neither than what we feel Now whoever considers how he knows himself to be a distinct and separate Person from all other Men will be able to resolve it into nothing else but Internal Sensation which the Dean not improperly calls Self-consciousness The Unity of Matter consists in the Unity of its parts and we can see how far its Unity extends and where it ends for its Unity extends as far as the continuity of its parts extends and ends where that ends But we know of no extension or parts in a Spirit and therefore the very Nature of a Spirit consisting in internal and vital Sensation the Unity of a Spirit consists in the continuity if I may so speak of its Sensation So far as a Man feels himself or is Self-conscious so far he is One entire Person where this Self-conscious Sensation ends he becomes a distinct and separate Person For it is a Self-evident Proposition that in an intelligent Self-conscious Being Self can reach no farther than he feels himself And I would desire any thinking Man to tell me how he knows himself to be a distinct and separate Person from all other Men but only by this that he feels his own Thoughts Volitions and Passions Pains and Pleasures but feels nothing of all this in other Men. I have been forced to explain this more at large to help the Animadverter to some conception of it who I find understood not one word of it as will appear presently But to proceed The Dean having thus observed that the Unity of a single Mind or Spirit consists in such a Natural Self conscious Sensation this led him on to that other Notion of a Mutual-consciousness which may be between Three distinct Spirits and make them naturally One as much as Three can be One. For if a Natural Self-conscious Sensation makes a Spirit One with it self why should not a natural Mutual-conscious Sensation unite Three into One For if natural Unity extends as far as Conscious Sensation then if Conscious Sensation extends to Three why should not these Three be acknowledged to be naturally One That as a natural Self-consciousness makes One natural Person so natural Mutual-consciousness should make a naral Trinity in Unity For my part I believe it is much easier to cry down this representation as a Novelty than to offer one word of Sence against it or to make any other representation of this Mystery with so fair and natural an appearance of Truth and Reason For this Mutual-consciousness being a natural Sensation is not a meer Moral but a natural Union not a Cabal of Gods as a Socinian Writer Prophanely speaks but one supream natural Deity This indeed forced the Dean to speak of the Three infinite and eternal Persons in the Godhead under the Character of Three infinite and eternal Minds for this conscious Sensation whether Self-consciousness or Mutual-consciousness can belong only to Minds and if every Person in the Trinity considered as a distinct Person be not a distinct infinite and eternal Mind there is I confess an end of the Dean's Notion but then I doubt there will be an end of a Trinity of Persons also and we shall have nothing left but a Trinity of Modes and Postures and Names not in the Unity of the Godhead but in the Unity of one Person who is the whole Deity and Godhead But if every distinct Person in the Godhead considered as distinct be an infinite and eternal Mind as it must be if every distinct Person be GOD unless any thing else than an infinite Mind can be GOD though it be an usual way of speaking to call them Three eternal Minds yet there is no Heresie in it nor any intended by it as will appear before we part Nor ought this to pass for meer Fancy and Invention for as the Dean has shewn the Phrases and Expressions of Scripture whereby the Union between Father Son and Holy Ghost is described do naturally represent this conscious Union and cannot well be understood without it for that the Father should be in the Son and the Son in the Father so as perfectly to comprehend and be comprehended with several like Expressions is made very possible and intelligible by a mutual conscious Sensation but nothing else
〈◊〉 as Gregory Nazianzen speaks Deum viventis Dei vivam imaginem as St. Hilary tells us that Christ is God the living Image of the living God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Damascen speaks That the Son is the living natural invariable Image of the invisible God having the whole Father in himself and being upon all accounts identically the same with him excepting the Principle and Cause of Being that is that He is begotten eternally of the Father but the Father is unbegotten But then though he be the Son and the begotten Image of the Father he is not his Image meerly as other Sons are the Images of their Fathers who though they partake of the same specifick Nature may be very unlike them and are not the same but as Gregory Nazianzen tells us in the place above-cited Christ is the living Image of the living Father 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But a more invariable Image than Seth is of Adam or any Child of his Father for the Nature of such simple and unmixt things as an Image is is not to be partly like and partly unlike as Children are to their Parents but that the whole represents the whole as the impression does the Seal and rather to be the same than to be like But St. Gregory Nyssen gives us the most exact Description of Christ's being the living Image of his Father of his Will and of his Goodness which he says is just as if a Man saw himself in a Glass for the Image in the Glass does in every thing conform it self to its Prototype the Face which looks in the Glass being the Cause of the Face which is seen there and therefore the Image in the Glass neither moves nor inclines it self of its own accord but as its Prototype moves or inclines but always moves with it Thus we say the Lord Christ the Image of the invisible God is immediately and instantly affected together with his Father Does the Father will any thing the Son also who is in the Father knows the Father's Will or rather is the Father's Will Whether this be not the Dean's mutual Consciousness which must of necessity be between a living Image and its Prototype or that whereof it is the Image and is the most natural and inseparable Union of all let any Man judge It were easie to fill the Margin with such Quotations as these as you who are conversant in the Fathers very well know but I shall only farther observe at present that the Fathers made use of this Notion of the Son 's being the living Image of God his Father both in their Disputes against the Arians and Sabellians They proved from hence against the Arians that the Son was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the same Nature with his Father which is a plain and necessary Consequence and needs no proof for if the Father and the Son be the same as a Prototype and his Image there can be no Diversity of Nature between them Thus St. Hilary St. Basil St. Cyril St. Ambrose St. Athanasius Greg. Nyssen St. Austin and all the Fathers who were concerned in the Arian Controversie reason at large And thus they proved against the Sabellians That God was not One single Person distinguished only by Three Names because the Son is the living subsisting Image of the Father and the Image and the Prototype cannot be the same but must be Two no Man is his own Image nor is an Image the Image of it self This is so self-evident and so frequently occurs in the ancient Writers that I shall not detain you with particular Quotations at present This real distinction of Three in the same individual numerical Nature the Ancients expressed by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That the same One individual Nature subsists thrice in Three real Subsistences not by multiplying but only by repeating it self As a Man and his living Image would be Two real Subsistences but not Two Men nor Two Humane Natures but the same Man and the same Nature subsisting twice in Two different manners not like Two Men but as the Prototype and the Image which are really and distinctly Two and yet but One Man Thus Father Son and Holy Ghost are really Three but have the same individual Nature and are the same One God and differ only in their manner of subsisting That the same Divine Nature subsists originally in the Father and subsists again in the Son as in a living Image of the Father and subsists a third time in the Holy Ghost by an eternal Procession from Father and Son in eternal living substantial Love In this Sence the Ancients understood the Word Subsistence not in the Abstract as some modern School-men do and as the Animadverter seems to do if I understand him or he understands himself but in the Concrete for that which does really and actually subsist which does éxstare and is called by them Extantia and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is very intelligible that there are Three real Subsistences or Three that really subsist in the numerical and individual Unity of the Divine Nature But to talk of Three Subsistences in the abstract without Three that subsist or of One single Nature which has Three Subsistences when it is impossible that in Singularity there can be more than One Subsistence is too fine and metaphysical for me and I envy no Man that can understand it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among the Greeks is res subsistens substantiva as Petavius proves a subsisting and substantial thing And St. Ambrose abhors the thoughts that the Son should not be a Substantial Son who gives Substance to other things Non esse filium insubstantivum qui aliis dedit habere substantiam And Facundus tells us that these Words Person and Subsistence were used by the Fathers in opposition to the Sabellian Heresie and therefore must signifie Three that did really and substantially subsist as St. Hilary teaches Non unum esse subsistentem sed unam substantiam non differentem That there is not One who subsists but One Substance without any diversity that is in three different Subsistencies There could not have been more proper Words thought on to represent a Trinity in Unity than Three Subsistencies in One individual Nature which differ in nothing from each other but in their different manner of Subsistence For it is certain here are Three different kinds of Subsistence which are not to be found in any One thing in the World besides Nothing else has any more than one real Subsistence for every Being in Nature besides is singular or has but One single Subsistence Every Man and Angel is a single particular Creature subsists singly and separately by it self and is singly One but if there be a Trinity in Unity the same Divine Nature must subsist wholly entirely and substantially in Three but in a different manner to make them Three And it is as certain that the Father and
Hypothesis only as a possible and intelligible Notion every Body indeed might guess what the Dean's private Opinion was and so they may what the Enquirer conceives about it but he was far enough from imposing upon other Men by asserting That thus it must be and it cannot be otherwise He was only concerned to represent a possible and intelligible Notion and that the Enquirer pretends to as much as he and therefore falls under the same Condemnation Nay the Enquirer is much more exposed to the Charge of Tritheism by asserting Three distinct Essences Three individual Natures and Three spiritual Beings than the Dean was who never said any such thing and the Animadverter charges him with it only by consequence That Three Minds are Three distinct Substances and Essences which he may deny and I deny for him but the Enquirer says it in express words The Dean allows but One Divine Essence and One individual Nature in the Godhead repeated in Three Persons but without multiplication as I have already explained it and how to own Three Essences and Three individual Divine Natures in the Godhead without making Three Gods seems to have some difficulty in it For Three individual Natures in the Deity seem to sound very like Three individual Natures in Humanity which make Three Men. But though the Enquirer has distinguished Father Son and Holy Ghost by their singular Essences much more than the Dean has yet he thinks he has also made a more close Union between them and therefore is not so liable to the Charge of Tritheism For as he says reflecting upon the Dean's Notion An Hypothesis in this Affair which leaves out the very Nexus the natural and eternal Union or leaves it out of its proper place and insists upon Mutual-consciousness which at the most is but a consequence thereof wants the principal thing requisite to the salving the Unity of the Godhead If Two or Three created Spirits had never so perfect a mutual Perspection of one another that would not constitute them One thing tho' it probably argue them to be so and but probably This is all a mistake of the Dean's Notion of Mutual-consciousness as I have sufficiently shown which is not a Mutual-perspection or Mutual-insight into one another but a feeling each other in themselves and if such an internal vital Sensation be not an essential Union I believe no Man can tell me what it is It is certain the Dean took it to be so and therefore he did not leave out a natural eternal Union Whatever the Nexus as he calls it be if they are united into a Mutual-conscious Life they are essentially One and I am sure he can never form any Notion of the Union of Spiritual Essences without it But I have said enough of this already and therefore shall now briefly consider how the Enquirer unites these Three distinct Essences Three spiritual Beings Three individual Natures in the Unity of the Godhead And I believe the Dean will like his Unity of the Godhead as little as his distinction He represents this by the Union of Soul and Body which makes One Man and by the Union of the Divine and Humane Nature which makes One Christ as you see by what I have already cited But these are Personal Unions and therefore cannot be the Unity of the Godhead in which is a Trinity of distinct Persons And yet as far as I can possibly understand him and if I mistake him I shall be glad for many Reasons to be better informed no other Unity will satisfie him but such an Union of Three Spiritual Beings and individual Natures as by their composition constitute the Godhead as the composition of Soul and Body make the Man For this reason he disputes earnestly against the universal absolute omnimodous simplicity of the Divine Nature and will not allow that Wisdom Power and Goodness are the same thing in God and distinguished into different Conceptions by us only through the Weakness of our Understandings which cannot comprehend an infinite Being in one Thought and therefore must as well as we can contemplate him by Parts This prepared his way to make Three spiritual necessary Beings of these Three Divine Attributes Goodness Wisdom and Power the natural Union of which make One God and a natural Trinity in Unity If you object That this gives us the Notion of a compounded Deity or of a composition in it he answers this difficulty by giving us a new Notion of a Compositum which he says seems to imply a praeexisting component that brings such things together and supposes such and such more simple things to have praeexisted apart or separate and to be brought afterwards together into an united State that is to say That how many Parts soever any thing consists of you must not say it is a compound Being unless its Parts were once asunder and put together by some other Being That if a Man suppose who consists of Body and Soul had been from Eternity without a Maker and his Soul and Body had never subsisted apart he could not have been said to have been a compound Creature though he would have had the same Parts then that he has now that is Soul and Body and therefore though God does consist of Parts of those Three spiritual Beings and individual Natures the Union of which makes the Godhead yet he is not a Compounded Deity because he eternally and necessarily is what he is without a Maker and these Three spiritual Beings never did praeexist apart but were eternally united to each other The Summ of which is no more but this That God is not a made Compound but an eternal unmade Compound but a Compound he is as a Compound signifies a Being which consists of distinct Parts united to each other But I always thought That the whole Christian World who have always denied any Parts or Composition in God did not by this mean that he was not made but that he had no Parts and one principal Argument against all Parts and Composition in God is That he is eternal and unmade and whatever has Parts must have a Maker There can be but One eternal Nature and yet if there be Three eternal Parts of the Deity there must be Three eternal Natures not only distinct but different Natures or else they could not be Parts in the Composition for they would be the same Three Spiritual Beings One of which is Goodness another Wisdom and a third Power are Three different eternal Natures how closely soever they are united for as he argues Goodness is not Wisdom nor Wisdom Power nor Power Wisdom or Goodness and Three different eternal Natures is a new Notion among Christians And though we have a natural Notion of an eternal Being we have no Notion of an eternal Union of eternal Parts or of Three eternal Parts in the Deity which necessarily coexist in an eternal Union Once more We have no Notion of an eternal and necessary