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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
word_n	nature_n	person_n	unity_n	2,746	5	9.5752	5	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60380	The judgment of the fathers concerning the doctrine of the Trinity opposed to Dr. G. Bull's Defence of the Nicene faith : Part I. The doctrine of the Catholick Church, during the first 150 years of Christianity, and the explication of the unity of God (in a Trinity of Divine Persons) by some of the following fathers, considered.	Smalbroke, Thomas.; Nye, Stephen, 1648?-1719.	1695 (1695)	Wing S4000; ESTC R21143	74,384	80

they propose such an Explication how three infinite Minds and Spirits are but one God as all Men of Consideration will take to be a Declaration and Assertion of three Gods for they will have three infinite Minds to be one God because they have three distinct Divine Substances qualified each of them with all distinct Divine Properties when these Substances and Properties are the very Marks and Notifications of their distinct Divinities or that they are distinct Gods But themselves also acknowledg that if Origination from the Father and to be specifically consubstantial with him were sufficient to make the Son and Spirit one God with the Father then James and John being originated from their Father Peter and consubstantial in all Respects with him it will follow that Peter James and John are not three Men but one Man or Peter James and John are one Man with Peter To get rid of this they advance a third Bull more ridiculous than either of the two former it is this 3. If the originated and consubstantial and Divine Persons are propagated from the first Person by an internal Production so that they are always and inseparably in the Person that produced them they are thereby most truly one God with him Here the Reader needs only to consider that we are arguing concerning three such Persons as are confess'd by these Opposers to be three distinct Substances Now to say of two of these Substances that they are propagated by an internal Production is a Bull to add that that they are inseparably in the Person that produced them is another but 't is worst of all to say that by their Inexistence in the Father the Son and Spirit are one God with him this I say is a worse Blunder a more inexcusable Oversight than internal Production or inseparable Substances Internal Production when said of Substances is a Contradiction both in the Sense and Terms 't is as much as to say a Production not produced a Generation not generated And a Substance being that which can exist separately or by it self and needeth not as an Accident to inexist in something else therefore an inseparable Substance is a Substance without being a Substance or a Substance and no Substance Dr. Bull will answer it may be the Substances of the Son and Spirit are always and inseparably in the Father not from a natural Inhability to subsist as they are Substances by themselves or separately but only because the Nature of the Divine Unity requires that the second and third Persons of the Godhead should always inexist in the first and he in them But if this be the Meaning of inseparably it is impertinently as well as falsly added Impertinently because the word always had been enough and only proper to be here used Falsly because things are not inseparable if only they are not actually separated but of their own Nature have an Hability to exist separately The Bull therefore remains against whatsoever Excuses but were that which the Doctor aims to say never so true we shall see presently it will not in the least avail his Cause For as I said the greatest Blunder and Inobservance of all is what Dr. Bull and the Fathers take to be the Strength of this Hypothesis namely this that the second and third Persons being always in the first are therefore one God with him For it is to be noted that these Gentlemen hold not only that the Son and Spirit are in the Father but he also in them it is the mutual Inexistence of all the three Persons and not only of the Son and Spirit in the Father that maketh them to be one God I ask hereupon whether this mutual Inexistence Immeation or Penetration of the three Persons be such that their Substances become continuous as the Parts for Instance of the same Piece of Gold are or only contiguous like more Pieces of Gold that are heaped or bagged together Are the Substances of the three Divine Persons I say continuous as to use another Instance the Parts of the same Angel or Soul are continuous and indiscerpible or are the only contiguous as God or the Divine Substance which pervades all things Spirits as well as Bodies is contiguous to the things which it pervades and immeates If Dr. Bull says that the Divine Persons Minds and Spirits or the three Divine Substances have such a mutual Inexistence that they become continuous as the assignable conceivable Parts of each Person 's own Substance are or as the Parts of an Angel or Soul are He says thereby and therein that the Substances and Persons are identified which is Heresy because as the Athanasian Creed speaks it confounds the Persons If the Substances are continuous and thereby identified the Properties also of the three Substances in Mr. Bull 's Hypothesis will be identified too for in this Hypothesis there cannot be distinct Understandings Wills and Energies if the Substances are not distinct but continuous and thereby identified But we need not to insist on this for Dr. Bull dares not say that the Substances of the Divine Persons are identified or continuous he must say and will say that they do so inexist in one another that they are only contiguous there is only a Contact of their Substances not an Identification or Continuity But if there be only a Contact of the three Substances they are as much three Gods and separate Substances in the Physical Sense of the word separate as three Men imbracing one another are three distinct Men not one Man or as God and the Creation are separate Substances tho he inexists in pervates or immeates the Works he hath made and they again exist in him The Fathers that were Philosophers when they said the three Divine Persons or Substances are in one another meant by their mutual Love and Agreement but those Fathers that were not learned or understood only the Platonick Philosophy which is wholly moral and metaphysical and never meddles with the natural Reasons of things I say the Fathers that were not natural Philosophers imagined such an Inexistence of the three Persons that the said Persons were physically and substantially in one another and thereby say they one God They knew not that a substantial Inexistence must either be by the Continuity of the Substances which confounds the Substances or Persons or only by Contiguity or Contact which can no more make three Divine Persons and Spirits to be one God than three Men fitting close on the same Bench are thereby one Man or than God who is in all Spirits whether Angels or Souls and they in him are the same Being or the same Substance not separate Substances In short Dr. Bull and these Fathers say the three Divine Persons are three distinct several Substances and do substantially immeate or inexist in one another yet so that they are not continuous or identified as the Parts of the same numerical Substance are but only contiguous We say hereupon that this will never make

Nature and Quality of the Action that is imputed to the Person who bears the Names Jehovah and God evinces that the Person spoken of is Jehovah and God only by Representation But let us now weigh Dr. Bull 's Answers He saith first the Divine WORD who is true God might be called an Angel when he appeared to Moses in the Bush Because God appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear But we cannot grant that if God appears in suchmanner as Angels are wont to appear God may therefore be called an Angel tho Dr. Bull desires us that of all Love we would grant it for he only says it and offers no manner of Proof of so absurd and in very deed impossible a Supposition And we give this incontestable Reason why the Person who appeared in the Bush to Moses and is called sometimes Angel sometimes God was only an Angel who was called God on the Account that he represented God because if he were God and therefore spoke these Words I am the God of thy Fathers in his own Name not in the Name of another or as representing another He should have been called God only and not Angel which is to say Messenger Nor do I know why Dr. Bull pretends here God is called an Angel in this Place Because he appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear there was no Cause at all why he should say so at least there is nothing in the Text or Context to countenance his so saying But our Argument is extremely probable while we say if it was indeed not an Angel but God himself that spake these Words I am the God of thy Fathers he could be only called God and he was not at all an Angel that is a Messenger Briefly 't is say I a Chimera founded on nothing what Dr. Bull here says that the true God is called an Angel in this Context because he appeared in such manner as Angels are wont to appear for the manner of appearing here was wholly unusual there never was any such Appearance whether by God or Angel either before or since But we argue solidly and concludingly when we alledg if it be not an Angel that speaks here in the Name and Person of God but God himself and in his own Name 't is against all Propriety and Grammar that he is called both by Moses and St. Stephen the Angel or Messenger of the Lord. But Dr. Bull has a 2 d Evasion Several Fathers said an Angel indeed appeared in the Bush but God was in the Angel and it was not the Angel that spoke but God in the Angel This is a Whimsy tho he should quote an hundred Fathers for it For if God himself was in the Fire and the Voice was from God not from the Angel what need was there that an Angel should be there at all Lastly he says 't is an impious Opinion that Angels ever as it were acted the Person and Part of God by assuming the incommunicable Name Jehovah and the Authority and Attributes of God No Ambassador he saith ever took on him the Name and Stile of his Prince but the Ambassador says only thus saith my Master He is a bold Man to charge even Angels themselves and so many Writers of holy Scripture as ridiculous and impious for giving the Name God to those that represent God Has not our Saviour himself told us that they also are called Gods to whom the Word of God comes that is the Magistracy as all confess And for the Name Jehovah which Dr. Bull calls the Incommunicable Name I ask how comes Jehovah to be a greater Name or more incommunicable than God And why has he said nothing to so many Instances as the Socinians and his own viri quidam doctissimi give of Persons and even of Places on which the Name Jehovah is bestowed in the Historical Books of Scripture What he says of Ambassadors serves only to show that he has forgot some part of his Academical Learning and is but little acquainted with the World There is no Freshman in Oxford or Cambridg but will inform him out of the Roman Antiquities that Publick Messengers were wont to assurne the Name and whole Stile of the Persons whom they represented The Fecialis or Herald at Arms denounced War in these Terms I the King and People of Rome denounce and proclaim Hostility and War against the King and People of N. At this present time in the Christian Countries Ambassadors in some Cases take on them the Name and Stile of their Prince as in all Espousals and some other Cases but they always retain the Majesty and Dignity of the Prince or State from whom they come they always speak with the Hat on and their Persons are sacrosanct that is they cannot be arrested confined or punished they can only be required to depart out of the Kingdom This whole Defence therefore of Dr. Bull is either groundless or directly false For if it had been God who spoke to Moses out of the Bush he being present and speaking in his own Name these Words I am the God of thy Fathers he could not have at all been called an Angel that is Messenger And if God himself as Mr. Bull pretends was in the Fire there was no Occasion that an Angel also should be there And 't is utterly false that publick Messengers do not assume the Name or the Stile or Dignity of the Sovereigns that send them and whom they represent I shall therefore thank Dr. Bull for giving up his Cause to the Socinians For if it was the WORD or Son as he says that appeared in the Bush to Moses it follows that the WORD is not God but the Angel or Messenger of God for he can never elude our Argument that if the Person that spoke these Words I am the God of thy Fathers had been God himself speaking in his own Person and there present he could not have been called a Messenger of the Lord either by Moses or St. Stephen Dr. Bull must of necessity grant either that the WORD did not appear in the Bush which is to yield that his Fathers mistook in the chief Ground on which they built our Saviour's Pre-existence or that the WORD is but a Messenger not God which is to yield his Cause 2. It is argued again against Dr. Bull 's Fathers by the viri quidam doctissimi that indeed it is said at Exod. 20.1 God spake all these Words namely the ten Commandments but other Texts inform us that God is said to have spoke the Commandments and given the Law because it and they were given and spoke by an Angel attended or accompanied by other Angels in the Person and Name of God or as representing God Acts 7.53 They received the Law by the Disposition of Angels Gal. 3.19 It was ordained by Angels in the Hand of a Mediator i. e. it was commanded or spoken by Angels yet not immediately to the People but by