be a just and modest Reprehension of him and what I am sure the Man will meekly take But to make him black and odious by all Arts and to talk of reforming him out of the Church for his peaceable Desires and Well-meaning is imperious beyond Measure and what another would call Tyrannical nor will he name what Spirit it bespeaks especially when the great Argument or Foundation of all against what he has said is no better than a Petitio Principii or taking for granted the prime Matter in question namely that the Doctrine of the Trinity as Dr. Sherlock has stated and does defend it is a Fundamental of the Christian Faith This the Dean in his Apology has not offered one Word to prove but quitting his Adversaries and shutting both Eyes and Ears against all that has been said against his Novelties on this Subject violently falls upon exposing the peaceable Man which was indeed much the easier Project but whether either Christian or Honourable the World will judg The melancholy Stander-by had asserted in his 7th Page the Doctrine of the Trinity as duly stated to be one of the Fundamentals of Christian Religion And it is most plain by what he propounds as the Medium of Peace that the stating it according to Scripture and in Scripture-Language he esteems the most due stating it the Dean likes not this says it is a Proposal of old Hereticks and not only would have the Philosophical Terms now a long time usual in this Point received for Peace-sake but as Fundamental in Faith Nay and not content herewith he gives new Definitions of or affixes new Notions to these Terms and would have all pass upon us still under the Colour of Fundamentals The melancholy Stander-by to speak the whole Truth neither could nor can admit either of these namely either that Philosophical Terms never used by Scripture and besides of various Use or uncertain Signification should be made Fundamentals of Faith or that the Doctor 's new Explication of them should pass at all and his Reasons may perhaps appear anon But in what he writ he express'd not this his Dissent so as to contest either of these Points Only as he would not enter into the Controversy himself so he desired chiefly by reason of the Mischief he thought he saw arising from thence it might be at present forborn by all and he is still as willing as ever to decline engaging on either Point only in his own Defence against what the Dean has endeavoured to load him with he must now say that if any should join Issue with the Dean upon the first Article of the Nicene Creed I BELIEVE IN ONE GOD c. which is a Fundamental and the true Catholick and Apostolick Faith It will soon appear that Dr. Sherlock has in his Book contradicted and to his Power overthrown that Faith as much as ever Johannes Philoponus or Joachim the * So the Text of the Decretal stiles him Florentine Abbot or as others the Abbot of Floria or Flency the two greatest and most antient Leaders of the Tritheists ordinarily assigned ever did for according to the best Accounts of them neither of these expresly maintained more Gods than one nay they expresly disclaimed such Assertion only they so taught the Nature and Distinction of three Persons as that their Doctrine inferred three Gods from which Charge the Invention of mutual Consciousness will never clear Dr. Sherlock ' s Definition of a Person in the Godhead for such Consciousness whatever he says to the contrary can infer only an Vnity of Accord not of Substance and Nature whereas it is an Unity of Substance and Nature that the Council and Fathers have held but these things require more Words than the present Design admits To make the Sum of my Sentiments or what I would be at plainer §. 3. The holy Scripture states the Trinity under the Notion of Three bearing witness in Heaven for I have much more to say for that exagitated Text than to allow it wanting in any Copies on any other Reason but their Imperfection and affirms these three one but how they are one it determines not And Faith being a Belief of the Witness of God and Baptism a Seal or Badg of Faith when we are baptized we are baptized 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost as owning and assenting to or professing and vowing to acquiesce in their Witness touching all the whole Will of God and Method of Salvation published in the Gospel This is Scripture and here the melancholy Stander-by would stop as to Faith in this Point of the Trinity To the Incarnation there is yet no occasion to speak The Fathers in the Council of Nice did not as far as ever I could perceive by any genuine Monuments of theirs vote the Term three Persons the Incarnation of the Son of God or his Divinity though made Man was the Controversy before them rather than the Trinity and the great Product of that Council was the word Homoousion in Assertion of the Son 's being of the same Substance with the Father But the Greek Fathers of that Age did soon use the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in this Case is most aptly rendred Subsistence and contend for three 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Subsistences Now as to the common Definition of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in divinis that is to my best Memory pretended to be taken out of Justin Martyr by Damascen a Father of much latter Age I said to my best Memory for my Condition is such at present and has been such upward of four Years that I am without the Use of the best part of my Books and now near 150 English Miles distant from a Library Yet I thank God I am Master of Justin and Damascen more ways than one be it spoken without Affront to Dr. Sherlock in case of my having read other Books I had read them near two and thirty Years ago But to return to the Definition spoken of as now I take it out of my old perhaps too imperfect Notes runs thus In the Holy Trinity an Hypostasis is an unbegun or if the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Damasâ—en Dialectic cap. ult Word may be pardoned a beginningless manner of the eternal Existence of each that is of Father Son and Holy Ghost So that according to this Author it superadds nothing to the Divine Essence which is one and common to all the three save a bare manner of Existence or Subsistence Only by the way I must note as to the Authority of that Piece in the Works of Justin Martyr whence this Definition comes namely the Expositio rectae fidei it is sufficiently proved by Scultetus Rivet and others to be none of Justin's genuine Works The Latin Fathers which came soon upon the Heels of the Council and of the Greek Fathers above spoken of suspected this Word Hypostasis and St. Jerome particularly contended there
my Author last cited the Subject to be beyond Expression For saith he our Thoughts of God are commonly more true than our Expressions But God more truly is than we can think But to return again to History and Mr. Dean The Coessentiality or Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father was the Point determined against Arius in the Council of Nice which was indeed previous or preliminary to one Part of the Doctrine of the Trinity but the Controversy of the Trinity of Persons was not raised but by the Followers of Arius not by himself as Baronius both witnesses and proves and therefore could not be decided in the Council of Nice If therefore we were to stand only to the Decrees of the Council of Nice in the Matter of the Trinity our Faith herein would be comparatively very short For by that Council neither was there affirmed a Trinity of Persons nor Unity of the three It is not therein so much as determined what the Holy Ghost is Mr. Dean therefore did me wrong if he intended those Words The Council of Nice Pag. 13. on whose Authority we must rest namely in Point of the Trinity should be understood to be my Words He may be permitted to confound the learned and subtil Disputations of Athanasius in behalf of the Divinity of Christ which Point indeed was determined in the Council of Nice and the Controversy of the Trinity in Unity to which there was some considâ—â—â—â—â— Advance made in the Council of Constantinople he I say may be admitted to confound these two together and to rest for both upon the single Authority of the Council of Nice because in that Council he will find Athanasius and so may hope to hook in the Confession commonly called the Creed of St. Athanasius I use the Terms of our own Liturgy but I expresly avouched the Authority of the Nicene and first Constantinopolitan Councils in Conjunction as having betwixt them setled the Doctrine of the Trinity yet not in the hard Words which after-Ages used For in these two Councils though there be in effect three Persons declared yet is not the term three Persons used but both the Matter and the Language wherein the Decision is made looks much liker that of the Scripture than what we find in a certain later Creed when Men proceeded to draw Consectaries from these Councils Definitions and put such their Consectaries into hard artificial and intricate Terms and then imposed all for Faith with so much Nicety that it is at least as easy to mistake as to understand the Truth and sometimes really the Mistake is much the more obvious I cannot forbear an Instance or two out of the Creed just now mentioned usually ascribed to Athanasius but if Vossius be in the right compiled much after his Age by one Anastasius as he conjectures if my Memory fail not for I have not my Book by me that Creed then thus proceeds THE FATHER IS ETERNAL THE SON ETERNAL AND THE HOLY GHOST ETERNAL AND YET THEY ARE NOT THREE ETERNALS BVT ONE ETERNAL AS ALSO THERE ARE NOT THREE INCOMPREHENSIBLES NOR THREE VNCREATED BVT ONE VNCREATED AND ONE INCOMPREHENSIBLE Suppose now a Man should thus argue hence If there are three yet not three uncreated but one uncreated then two of the three must be created For the three must be either created or uncreated that is eternally existent But it is further also added that there are not three Eternals but one Eternal therefore supposing the Father to be uncreated and eternal as of the three most properly and essentially Uncreatedness and Eternity belongs to him insomuch as the Son is his Begotten and the Holy Ghost proceeds from him supposing I say the Father uncreated and eternal it seems hence unavoidably to follow the Son and the Holy Ghost are created and not eternal for there are not three Uncreated nor three Eternals The same may be said in like manner as to the other Attributes of Incomprehensible and Almighty And if any should profess the Son and Holy Ghost created or not eternal would not all cry out immediately Heresy Blasphemy It will not be sufficient here to say It is confessed before that the Son is uncreate and the Holy Ghost uncreate c. for that Confession is now contradicted by saying there is but one uncreate What shall we then do to extricate our selves from the Niceties of this Creed How few of the People have the Clew Verily not one in a thousand of the Laity that ' Hic ponuntur adjectivè istae dictiones viz. coaeterni c. ibi autem adjectivè Glossa ad verbum Coaeterni De summa Trinitate c. 1. Firmiter credimus say sing or receive this Creed and it may be not one in an hundred of the Clergy But to salve all behold a wholesom Distinction out of a known Gloss When we say the Father Son and Holy Ghost are all three uncreate we take Uncreate as an Adjective and then the Proposition is true When we say there are not three uncreate we take it as a Substantive For if we should say there are three uncreated taking it as a Substantive it were Heresy And so in the case of Eternal when we say the Father is eternal the Son eternal the Holy Ghost eternal and all three eternal we take Eternal as an Adjective But if we should take Eternal as a Substantive then we must deny that there are three Eternals surely then by the way must we also deny that there are three infinite Minds and that even according to Athanasius himself But to come again to the Gloss Can now any Man living give me a Reason why Uncreate or Eternal should be less an Adjective when understood of an uncrete Substance or Essence than it is when understood of an uncreate Person And yet taking it either substantively or adjectively if I should so use it as to deny there are three uncreated Persons I am as much a Heretick as if I should say there are three uncreated Essences There is therefore very happily a further Remedy in the said Gloss namely that Hic designat Personas ibi Essentiam Gl. ubi supra when we profess all three are uncreate and coeternal we must understand or supply the word Person When we say there is but one Uncreate and one Eternal we must understand Essence or Nature In fine then if we have not Metaphysicks enough and Grammar enough to find out when a Word is to denote the Essence and when the Person or perhaps when it is to be taken adjectively when substantively we shall be led by the very Letter of this Creed to profess Heresy and Blasphemy instead of the true Faith Were it not now better that this Creed were either made plainer or totally laid aside than urged and used as it is But indeed neither of the two Councils mentioned made any such Creed as this nor as I really believe did Athanasius himself He and others of the
recommend his Judgment as more sincere and competent Now these three of the first Reformers I shall abide by at present as having censured the Divinity of the Schools much more severely than I did after them But these were not our English Reformers and I censured even them for retaining Scholastick Cramping Terms in their publick Prayers By Mr. Dean's Favour I censured them not only I modestly wished they had used the same Temper as did the foreign Reformers in banishing hard or Scholastick Terms out of our Prayers By these Terms he says I mean the Beginning of the Litany And how came he to know my Thoughts I will assure him I meant not that alone I will not touch upon divers Collects But what does he think of that Preface in the Communion Service ordered to be used before the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on Trinity Sunday Has not that School-Divinity enough in it all address'd to God by way of direct Adoration However because he has pitch'd upon the other I am content to stick by it and shall only give him touching it the Sense of two of the first Reformers I confess not ours in England for I express my Sorrow that they observed not such Caution but two the most eminent who led the way to them Luther lest that Petition O Holy Blessed and Glorious Trinity c. out of the Liturgy as not only his Enemies Bellarmine and others accuse him to have done but the German Office to this Day evidenceth And Gerard Brochmand and other learned Lutherans not only confess but defend him for it saying the German Word which they use for the Trinity signifies Triplicity rather than Trinity But if that had been all why could not Trinity have been adopted into High Dutch as well as into English There was another Reason for it which I am loth to speak Calvin not only omits it but thus censures it It is good says he to forbear such Forms of speaking which are either too rough or remote from the Vse of the Holy Scripture The Prayer so Utile est supersedere à formulis loquendi nimiùm asperis vel à Scripturae usu remotis Precatio vulgo trita sancta Trinitas unus Deus miserere nostri mihi non placet ac omnino Barbariem sapit Epist quâ fidem admonitionis confirmat ad Polonos Tom. ult p. 687. common with the People O Holy Trinity one God have Mercy upon us does not please me and altogether savours of Barbarity Had the Socinians been the only Persons who except against it more might be said for the retaining it But as to its Original it was certainly never in the publick Prayers till introduced by Pope Gregory the Great the Compiler of the Litany for the main part or the Body of it though not perfectly in the Form it now stands in and Ethnici in summâ rerum ignorantiâ quem potissimum Deûm aut Dearū orarent nesciebant omnes igitur precabantur c. Casaub what other Innovations came in with it is sufficiently known No less a Man than Casaubon will tell us whom the Church imitated or what Precedents she had in such accumulate repeated Invocations Exercitat p. 327. Edit Londin A. D. 1614. Or Ad An. D. XXXII N. 14. And not only in a manner all our Nonconformist Countrymen elder or later but Foreigners of great Learning have strong Exceptions against this Part of the Litany If any will answer those which amongst others the learned Johannes Forbesius in his Instructiones Historico-Theologicae Part. 1. Qu. 31. a. 1. brings I will acknowledg to owe great Satisfaction to such a Person For however Hâc formulâ periculosè disperguntur cogitationes conceptiones precantis veluti ad diversa objecta quas recolligere conatur collectione objectorum in unum Nullo nititur praecepto vel exemplo sacrae Scripturae vel catholicae antiquitatis imo ab eisdem à doctrinâ saniorum Scholasticorum ab ipsâ ratione Theologicâ Discrepat c. Forbes I acknowledg some Men may use the prescribed Form without Sin yet I cannot but judg it much safer not to go so near dividing the Deity and so far to distract Devotion Much more than this could I say which I cannot answer so well as I would on this Subject but this may suffice to shew the Glance I gave was not without Cause And the reducing divers of our Prayers to more Scriptural Forms would much recommend our Reformation to foreign Divines as well as to those of our own Country whom we ought if possible to bring in and unite to us But this is only a plausible Project much talked of of late and such §. 9. Pag. 6. which Hereticks in former Days were the first Proposers of The Arians objected this against the Homoousions that it was an unscriptural Word By Mr. Dean's Favour he herein contradicts St. Athanasius himself who accuses the Arians that they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first began to fight against God from unwritten Terms or Arguments and particularly objects against them using the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or unbegotten pleading that it was an unscriptural Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Athanas in Epist de Synod Nic. contra Haeresin Arian decretis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lb. p. 282. and therefore suspitious having also various Significations but that the simple written and truest Terms which had but one Signification were those in Scripture the Father and the Son that unbegotten was used by the Heathens who knew not the Father nor the Son but that of the Father was known to be from our Lord 's own Mouth And doth he not at the same time apologize from the Necessity that lay upon the Council for the Use of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 though not in Scripture and together confess that the most accurate Expressions or Notions of the Truth are rather to be taken from the Scriptures than other Books It were to be wished this Father had been more constant to this his ingenuous Acknowledgment Again did not St. Ambrose also in the like Case disputing against the Arians say as much of Ingenitus in Latin that it was no Scripture-term and therefore refuse it I am under great Infelicity that I am without so many of my Books and so being oftentimes to trust Memory or old Notes cannot make my Answers so close and pertinent as otherwise I might But I am sure St. Ambrose and I think in his Book of our Lord's Incarnation answering the Arians Argument for proving the Father and the Son not to be of the same Nature and Substance namely that one was ingenitus unbegotten the other genitus begotten now said they the same Nature and Substance cannot be begotten and unbegotten returns roundly In sanctâ Scripturâ nusquam invenio non legi or to that purpose Unbegotten is no where in Scripture I am not I am sure far from his very Words Now was this
to imitate §. 24. my Saviour and answer one captious Question with another 1st He asks Whether I will allow them whom I grant to be in Possession of the Faith of the Trinity and Incarnation to keep Possession of it to teach explain and confirm it to their People And I will ask him Whether he never saw certain Royal Injunctions assigning fit Subjects for Sermons Some in Queen Elizabeth's Time and others since ordinarily transmitted to the Clergy by the Primate of the Kingdom that Preachers shall in their Sermons purely and sincerely declare unto their Hearers the Word of God and in the same exhort them to good Works to Works of Faith as Mercy and Charity that they shall forbear difficult and controversial Points Now although this of the Trinity be not that I remember mentioned yet I am sure there is the same Reason of it as of those that are And by his Favour I will ask him further whether it be not fit to obey such Injunctions or whether the Doctrine of the Trinity be not as difficult and remote from the common Peoples Understanding as is the Doctrine of Predestination and God's Decrees Notwithstanding this I yield In the Name of God let Ministers at due Season as on Trinity-Sunday and the Feast of the Nativity of our Lord preach to their People as they judg it most edifying the Doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation only let them do it plainly easily purely and sincerely according to Scripture and not with Innovations of their own His 2d Particular I expected would have been a Question also as he promised but he had either forgot his Promise or changed his Mind and so he puts the Case categorically thus I hope says Mr. Dean he that is the melancholy Stander-by does not propose this Negative Belief as he calls it as a Term of Communion that though we know them to deny the Trinity and Incarnation yet if they will agree not publickly to oppose and contradict this Faith we shall receive them to our Communion Now though he has not proposed this in form of a Question yet I will answer it with a very short one Why not At least as far forth as we know that is as they profess they can in Conscience join with us Nay has not Mr. Dean done it or would he not in the Case I shall now put namely Suppose him or me to be in the Pulpit beginning our Prayer before Sermon either as some do with the Collect Prevent us O Lord c. or with some Form or Conceptions of our own in which notwithstanding is nothing of Controversy intermix'd and to subjoin to our own Prayer that of our Lord's Suppose in like manner after Sermon we should use either that Collect Grant we beseech thee c. or some Prayer of our own and then give the Blessing to the whole Congregation promiscuously Admit now that in the Beginning of our very first Prayer we should have seen a Person whom we know to be a good Liver and professing the common Christianity in other Points but so unhappy as that he cannot be convinced of the Doctrine of three Persons in the Godhead as it is ordinarily taught or of the Incarnation of the second Person though he does from his Heart believe and confess Jesus Christ to be the Son of God and hold all other the Articles of the Apostles Creed would or should either Mr. Dean or I in such case stop as soon as we saw that Person in the Congregation and bid him go out refusing he should join with us in those Prayers or receive his Share in that Blessing to both which he heartily says Amen that is Shall I not admit him to Communion as far as I know he does consent and desire to communicate with me and other Orthodox Christian People I know the Story of St. John the Evangelist and Cerinthus but Cerinthus was anotherguise Heretick than such Person as in the Character supposed I might animadvert as I pass that in pag. 27. Mr. Dean imputes sundry Points very iniquitously stated to the Socinians which yet they hold not as he states them I am not concerned to defend the Socinian Errors but as I love Truth and Peace I cannot forbear observing that he here wrongs them First as to what he speaks of the Object of Christian Worship if he as some in the World had had personal dealing with the Generality of his Parishioners as to Matters of Conscience he would say that the Ignorance of many Church-People and so the Errors of their Conceptions both touching God and touching the three Persons in the Godhead much more alter as to them the Object of the Christian Worship than do the Errors of the Socinians Again whereas he says the Socinians deny that the Son of God offered himself a Sacrifice to expiate our Sins I do so far depend upon my Memory as to avow they affirm our Lord Jesus to have been Victimam verè expiatoriam a Sacrifice truly expiatory they are the Words of the Author of the short Exposition of the Apostles Creed whether Slicktingius as I rather think or Crellius I cannot now tell having not seen my Book divers Years Nor do they deny the Love of God to Mankind in giving his only Son to be our Prophet and Saviour and Redeemer too nor his Intercession as their High Priest in virtue of his Blood shed as an Atonement for our Sins They differ from us perhaps in explaining the Nature of Expiation and Satisfaction but both an Expiation and a Satisfaction they allow Some Men write against them without understanding them But I forbear further intermeddling in these kinds of Injuries though to use Mr. Dean's Words it were easy to enlarge on this Argument I am not writing a Defence Pag. 28. of the Socinians only I am vindicating a peaceable Design in a Man that is none but loves Godliness Vertue and good Works where-ever he meets with them and who may chance sooner to perswade many Socinians to be silent by making it apparent he would not wrong them however odious others make them by unjust Charges than will those be able who try their Skill and strain their Veracity in fierce and haughty Disputes against them Men may have Wit enough if they have Justice done them to understand when it is fit to be quiet who will scarce sit down silent under publick Calumnies In the next Place Mr. Dean falls upon me for saying very much is done §. 25. namely for present Union by the late Act in Favour of Dissenters and taxes me here again according to his wonted Civility with pretending to give Account of Acts of Parliament as I do of other Books without seeing them A strange kind of Incredulity touching my Reading has possess'd this Gentleman Must I not be believed to have read Books except I produce Witnesses that heard or saw me read them I can produce Witnesses now in London where I bought this