him and the English Reader to the Paraphrase of the late Learned and Pious Dr. Claget Our Opposers delight in marvelous Doctrines therefore as they pretend that Faith and Newness of Life are effected by God in us by Means so unsutable to the Qualities produced and to the Nature of our Souls as Water Bread and Wine so they assure us farther that the written Word and Word preach'd have no Efficacy toward begetting those Effects but 't is say they the inward Word which sometimes to some and in some measure accompanying the Word written or preach'd first convinces and then reclaims Sinners For my part I would gladly know what kind of thing an inward Word is I had thought all Words had been outward Words and that otherways they could not have been called Words But be that as it will Unitarians are well satisfied that the outward Word as our Opposers are pleased to Nickname the Holy Scriptures and the Word preach'd is sufficient and effectual by the Reasons it suggesteth and the Rewards and Penalties it proposeth to convince and reform our Reasonable Natures and that otherways they were not Reasonable but Brutish Natures This is not ours but the Doctrine of Holy Scripture and that in as express and clear Terms as can be devised First as to the Efficacy of the written Word 2 Tim. 3.15 Thou hast known the Holy Scriptures which are able to make thee wise unto Salvation Then for the Word taught after St. Paul had said Rom. 10.14 How shall they believe on him of whom they have not heard and how shall they hear without a Preacher He makes this Conclusion at ver 17. So then Faith cometh by Hearing And is it not indeed a very strange Paradox of these Gentlemen that the Wisdom of God should make use of a Means that produceth they say no Effect If the outward Word produceth no Effect in him that hears or reads we might as well have been bid to tell twenty in order to the getting Faith and subduing our Lusts as to hear and meditate of God's Word And if that be indeed the case 't is very surprizing that God should expostulate after such an angry manner with lazy and negligent Pastors and should so heartily rouze up others as 't is undeniable he doth Isa 56.10 They are dumb Dogs that cannot bark sleeping lying down loving to slumber Isa 58.1 Cry aloud spare not lift up thy Voice like a Trumpet shew my People their Transgressions and the House of Israel their Sins 1 Cor. 9.16 Necessity is laid upon me and wo unto me if I preach not the Gospel What needed any thing of all this if the outward Word is nothing and 't is only the inward Word which is not in the least tied to the other that only can and does produce the desired Effect About interpreting Holy Scripture IF it be asked how it comes to pass that we differ so widely from the Hereticks about the Doctrines specified in the foregoing Paragraphs while both we and they pretend Holy Scripture to be our Rule and the sole Judg of Controversies and Questions about Religion The Answer is at hand even this That Hereticks being Men of some Wit and Learning and withal carnal are hereupon puffed up are too proud to submit themselves to God's Revelation but only as bowed and subdued to their Reason But 't is all Mens Duty in a Clash between Revelation and Reason whether real or only seeming to submit Reason to Revelation and not subject Divine Revelation to Human Reason 'T is unpardonable Boldness in any to dislike the express words or evident sense of Holy Scripture because our Reason cannot fathom the depths of that Divine Book If I would believe the Doctrine there set down were it not for the Contradiction made to it by Human Reason I am not a Christian otherways than in Name if I do not receive such Doctrine with an implicit Faith without seeking to elude or to correct it by Reason And it is upon this Hinge that all our Controversies with these Hereticks do turn whether we are to follow the express words and obvious natural sense of Holy Scripture or whether we are to interpret Scripture by Reason so as to fly to a Figurative Sense or even to a Catachrestical i. e. somewhat harsh Construction or Interpretation rather than admit any Doctrine that is contrary to Reason The Notes Unitarians think that a real Clash between Revelation and Reason is an absurd Supposition but if we must put that impossible case we think 't is clear that Human Reason must needs be subjected to Divine Revelation But where the Clash is only seeming that is where there are ways of reconciling them as by so interpreting the Revelation as to make it agree with Reason we think 't is as absurd to oppose as Trinitarians do these two Lights to one another we think in that case we ought to use the Expedient of Interpretation If the Interpretation must be made either by a Figurative Sense or by somewhat Catachrestical harsh Construction yet 't is always better to strain Words than Things and there are particular Reasons why we ought so to do in interpreting Holy Scripture and all Interpreters of all Perswasions do it with Approbation of All. Yet this is a thing on which I will not here insist tho it deserveth great Consideration because this is not as Trinitarians pretend our Case or Quarrel with them or the Hinge on which these Controversies turn For we utterly deny that the express Words or the obvious natural Sense of Holy Scripture are on the Trinitarian side we never fly in these Controversies to a Catachrestical or harsh sense no nor have at any time need of a Figurative Sense as hath been sufficiently shown in the brief History of the Vnitarians Trinitarians indeed are forced to those Expedients I do not call them Shifts because 't is plain they must be sometimes allowed not only in interpreting Holy Scripture but in all other Writers and Writings But seeing themselves are forced to use very often those ways of interpreting especially in interpreting the Gospel of St. John and the most part of St. Paul's Epistles they have no right to object such kind of interpreting to Unitarians if indeed we had occasion for it The CONCLVSION THese things have not been said God is Witness to challenge much less to affront other Sects and Denominations of Christians and least of all the Church of England From which Church the Unitarians have not separated as other Dissenters for small and inconsiderable Causes have done We place not Religion in worshipping God by our selves or after a particular Form or Manner but in a right Faith and a just and charitable Conversation We approve of known Forms of praising and praying to God as also in administring Baptism the Lord's-Supper Marriage and the other Religious Offices we like well of the Discipline of the Church by Bishops and Parochial Ministers we have an Esteem for the eminent Learning and exemplary Piety of the Conforming Clergy For these Reasons we communicate with that Church as far as we can and contribute our Interest to favour her against all others who would take the Chair We would not therefore be understood to be Enemies to the Church or as seeking to undermine her Our whole Pretence is this to reform our FAITH by the Rule of Holy Scripture in consistence with evident REASON And the design of this Pretence or Endeavour of ours next to approving our own Souls to God our Judg is to vindicate the common Christianity from the Insults of Atheists or other profane Persons to take from such all just Exception against the most holy and wise Body of Laws that the World ever had or can have even the Christian Religion By making it appear to be a most rational and consistent System as well in the Credenda the Things to be believed as in the Agâ—â—â—a or Things to be done We think this 〈◊〉 such a Design as ought not to be entertaâ—â—â—â— with those Jealousies and aspersed 〈◊〉 those Calumnies and Clamours that are every day raised against us both by the Pulpit and Prâ—ss We hope that the Reasons of our Dissent from the Church in these Doctrines being once known and well considered and the Honesty of our Design in publishing them apparent our Fellow-Christians will less regret our Difference with them about these Questions and will at length acknowledg that however we are mistaken yet we are well-meaning Brethren Thou Father who governest in the Kingdoms of the Children of Men continue to us All the Means of rightly knowing Thee and of living up to the Precepts of the Gospel that we may All at length receive of thee the Inheritance incorruptible undefiled that fades not away reserved in Heaven for us FINIS
't is not only not true but self-contradictory in the sense they use it For how is God most simple and uncompounded if he consists or is made up which is the very English of the word compounded of distinct Beings and divers and several Persons none of which is the other They may with the same Exactness of Grammar and Propriety of Speech say a Common-Council or a Common-Hall is one most simple uncompounded Being one is no more ridiculous than the other for the Propriety of Speech and Exactness of Truth is as verily lost in three as in three hundred or three thousand What is in God is God FOR the other Properties 't is the Orthodox and true Belief that whatsoever is in God is God Not only the Father is God and the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God but whatsoever else is in God by way of Immanence that also is God So the Justice of God is God the Power of God is God the Wisdom of God is God and so too is the Goodness of God Yet we make not hereby so many several Gods because these and all other Properties of God are not only the same with him but the same also with one another The Justice for instance of God differs not really from his Power and Mercy and his Power and Mercy differ not or are not really distinguish'd from his Wisdom but are verily and identically the same with it their distinction is only in our Conceit The Notes See here another brace of Mysteries whatsoever is in God is God and the Divine Properties or Attributes differ not but are the same with one another The Reader may perhaps suspect that when they speak after this wild fashion they have some secret and reserved meaning contrary to the usual Import of the Words or a learned Sense contrary to the vulgar Signification of the Terms but 't is not so they mean as they speak and whole Volumes are written in Defence of these Follies But let us consider what they say Whatsoever is in God is God the Justice for instance of God is God and so also the other Properties and Attributes As who should say every Property of a Being or Nature is that very Being or Nature of which 't is only a Property This is more monstrous than to say a Part is the Whole that very Whole of which 't is only a Part. For a Property being somewhat less than an Integrating Part because it may be away or at least be dormant and unactive without destruction of the Specifick Nature or of the Person an Integrating Part cannot therefore 't is more absurd to say a Property or Attribute is that very Being or Nature to which it belongs than to say an Integrating Part is the Whole Thus Body and Soul are Integrating Parts of Man take away one of them and he is no longer a Man but a naked Spirit and Risibility is an acknowledg'd Property of the Human Nature and yet it may be dormant or wholly away and the Human Nature not be destroyed but remain But they add the Properties or Attributes of God are the same with one another they differ only in our Conceit But why do they not tell us too that God pardons Sinners by his Justice and punishes them by his Mercy that he made the World by his Eternity and will judg it by his Immensity For if Mercy and Justice if Wisdom and Power if Eternity and Omnipresence are the same and differ only in our Conceit then the Effects of any one of these Properties are not to be appropriated to that Attribute or Property but must be equally and indifferently ascribed to all or to any of the rest Thus unlucky are our Opposers both at dividing and compounding they divide what is most intimately the same and they compound unite and identify what are and ever must be diverse and different That Unity of God or that God is one which should have been as carefully guarded as the very Belief of a God they have divided by introducing a Trinity of three equally All-mighty and All-sufficient Persons And the Properties of the Divine Nature to whose Distinction and Variety we must heedfully attend if we will have any adequate Notion of God or right Understanding of his Works and Providences these they confound by affirming they are the same But let us go on to what remains What we are to understand by the Son and Holy Ghost GOD is one substantial and most simple Act yet we say also God is two substantial and really distinct Acts. The two substantial and immanent Acts in God are Vnderstanding and Will For God most perfectly understands himself and also willeth that is loveth himself in the most perfect manner But whatsoever understandeth doth understand by conceiving an Image of the thing understood Therefore God as hath been said understanding himself from all Eternity conceived within himself from all Eternity a most perfect Image of himself Which Image thus conceived and as it were generated or begotten by him is called the Son And this Image being in God and a perfect Image of God and Eternal is God no less than the Father by whom it was conceived or generated in the manner aforesaid namely by his understanding or apprehending himself and his own Perfections But God also willeth and that is another of the substantial immanent Acts that concur to the essentiating the Trinity He willeth or loveth himself and the most perfect Image of himself and the Image willeth or loveth him This Mutual Love of the Father and the Image or Son is what is named the Holy Ghost So that what things in Men are Faculties Actions and Properties in God we must understand them to be Persons and Spirits Which is also farther both cleared and proved by this Observation The second Person or Son is the Understanding or Wisdom of God not Original Wisdom or Understanding for that is the Father but a reflex Wisdom that is the Wisdom which resulteth from the Father's understanding himself and his own Perfections The Holy Spirit as hath been said is the mutual willing Love and Power of Original Wisdom and of the Reflex Wisdom The Notes This they pretend is that Mystery hid from Ages and Generations but now made manifest to the Disciples of Athanasius There is no Parallel for it in all either History or Nature but the Mysteries of the Egyptians For as the Egyptians were at prodigious Cost in making and setting up a great number of Images in and about their Temples by which Hieroglyphicks or sacred Images they pretended to teach Men the Secrets of Natural Philosophy and the Precepts of Morality but when they were ask'd to explain the meaning of these Hieroglyphicks they gave a very mean and trifling Sense or a Sense very absurd and false So after Trinitarians have long amused their Disciples with Terms as Mystical as the Egyptian Hieroglyphicks such as Trinity Eternal Generation Eternal Procession three
Thought as that of David was it came solely from David not from God for in that very Context 2 Sam. Ch. 7. God disallowed and forbad it declaring withal that He had reserved that Work for Solomon the Son of David No one will be so unchristian as to deny that 't was a good Thought and Action in St. Paul and his Company that they attempted to preach the Gospel in Bithynia but it came from themselves not from God for the Text says God suffer'd them not so to do Acts 16.7 7. If our Case were such with respect to Good and Evil as our Opposers pretend that is if all the Good we do and all the Evil we forbear is only by a daily hourly and momentary Grace for so they affect to speak inspired infused or blown into us The Words of the Divine Law should be directed to God's Grace in us not to us But now this is not only not so but the Phrase and Expression used in the Law or Commandment plainly supposes that we can obey by our own proper Powers Such in particular is that remarkable Text at Ezek. 18.31 32. Make you a new Heart and a new Spirit for why will ye die O House of Israel I have no pleasure in the Death of him that dieth wherefore turn your selves and live ye 8. Our Ability to Good as well as Evil is evinced also by this that God declares he will punish the neglect of Duty and every evil Doer after a most terrible and condign manner This would be too apparently unjust and tyrannical if himself hath so made us that we cannot do that Duty or forbear that Evil without a particular and extraordinary Grace and Aid which is in the Gift and Power of God only and which he refuseth or omitteth to bestow on us Our Opposers deny that we can so much as pray for that Grace or Aid of God by which to do Good and forbear Evil for they say the very Affectus orandi the Inclination or Intent to pray is purely the Gift of God As for the Word and Sacraments another means for obtaining God's Grace we shall see hereafter that our Opposers make the outward Word of no Efficacy ascribing all to the inward Word which is not at all in our Power and in order to any Benefit by the Sacraments so called they require a great many previous Graces which are only in the Hand of God So that after all their Subterfuges Evasions and Shifts their Doctrine concerning Grace amounts to this God will punish Men eternally in Hell-Fire for not doing and for not forbearing what 't was not in them to do or forbear without such an extraordinary Grace of God as was wholly in him to give and not at all in them to attain or get As to the Texts by them alledged to prove that all is done by the Grace of God and that we are impotent and averse also to all Good They have been often told by the Socinians and Remonstrants and in the Annotations of the excellent Grotius how those Texts are to be understood To them therefore I refer without ingaging in so long and tedious a Digression Of the Word and Sacraments NOW that the Elect may obtain the before mentioned Grace of God by which to believe aright and to do that which Good is the Trinity have appointed the Word and Sacraments A Sacrament consists of two Parts an outward visible Sign and an inward invisible Grace or Energy The visible Sign of the Sacrament of Baptism is Water the inward Grace is New Birth unto Faith and Righteousness By this Sacrament even Infants are regenerated or born again by the Spirit co-operating that is to say Faith Obedience and other saving Graces are conferred in this Sacrament on Elect Infants In the Sacrament of the Supper the outward Sign is Bread and Wine the inward Energy or Grace accompanying it is first Remission of Sins next the refreshing and strengthening our Souls in Faith and other Graces These things are amply and often taught us by the English Church both in the publick Catechism and in the Offices or Forms of administring Baptism and the Lord's-Supper The Word is another appointed means of Grace but no one is to think that 't is by Arguments used by a Preacher or by the Rewards or Punishments held forth in the Word whether written or preach'd or such-like external and human means that our Minds are savingly convinced or our Wills and Affections rightly disposed No no the inward and ineffable Word which God himself speaks to the Heart and which towards the Elect accompanies the Word preach'd or read when and as oft as God pleases this is that only Word which begets Faith worketh Obedience and in one word that whole Renovation or Change which denominateth a Man or Woman the Child or Servant of God And thus much is plainly and undeniably intimated in the Collects and other Prayers and Offices of our English Service-Book and is the known Doctrine of all the Orthodox of all indeed but Socinians and such as are more or less Socinianiz'd The English Service-Book and the Articles are so clearly for these Doctrines that it hath occasioned this Declaration of what may be meant when Men subscribe to the Articles Homilies and Service-Book to be favourably received even this that Men subscribe not to the Truth but to the use of the Service-Book and again they subscribe to the Articles as to Articles of Peace and Communion which they will not publickly impugn in the station of Preachers not as to Articles of Faith or of absolute and undoubted Verity This is the sense in which perhaps most Men now subscribe to the Homilies Articles and Service-Book and which upon occasion they declare to be the meaning of their Subscription But all such are reformed according to the Model not of our first Reformers but of Socinus Arminius and Episcopius whatsoever the Station may be that they hold in the Church The Notes The Sum of this Doctrine is tho we are so made by God as to be by Nature impotent to all Good and disposed to all Evil yet to cure the Elect tho not wholly yet in part of this corrupt and depraved Condition of our Minds and Souls God has appointed the Word and Sacraments Which are a sort of means that work not by any natural Energy of their own nor by any Harmony Sutableness or Agreeableness to our Powers Faculties or Natures but by a Theurgical Telestick and Mystical Operation Which is to say they work on our Minds as Spells Charms and Incantations and such like obtain their pretended Effects namely by a Praeternatural Power extraordinarily given to them by God or by those Spirits that preside over such Affairs Let a Man in black sprinkle you with some of the Church's Water or give you a bit of Bread or a sup of Wine over which he has pronounced the Wonder-working Words prescribed in Mother Church's Ritual tho by Nature you