signifies to initiate or enter one into Sacred Rites or Doctrines or from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 another Greek word and that in the judgment of Eustathius and Stephanus more regularly and naturally signifying to shut or close up and most commonly apply'd to the shutting of the eyes or mouth the solemn posture of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Initiati in the Rites of the Gentile Worship And lastly one of no small Note for Critical as well as other Learning will needs run it up even to a Hebrew Original deriving it from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies res abscondita aut secretum Concerning which it must be confessed That there is a more than ordinary agreement between the Hebrew and Greek word both as to Sound and Signification But whether this be not wholly accidental is lest to the Criticks in these Languages to determine In the mean time most account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a word purely and perfectly Greek And the Original of it lies so manifestly in one of the two fore-mentioned Greek words that it seems a needless Curiosity or rather a meer Fancy to seek for it elsewhere But whatsoever the Origination of the word is it always imports something hidden or concealed especially with reference to Sacred or Religious Matters And in this Sence it occurs frequently if not always in prophane Writers from whence the Holy Pen-men of the New Testament seem to have borrow'd and apply'd it to some of the Great and Arduous Truths of Christianity such as human Reason cannot give a clear and explicit Account of This therefore being the undoubted Notation and Signification of the Word I shall deliver the Nature of the thing it self in this Definition viz. That a Mystery is a Truth reveal'd by God above the Power of natural Reason to find out or comprehend This I take to be a full and proper Definition of a Mystery And accordingly I shall consider the several Parts of it distinctly As First That it is a Truth By which we exclude every thing from being a Mystery that is absurd or contradictious since a Truth can by no means be so And consequently hereby stand excluded also the Fooleries and Falsities of all other Religions how Mysterious soever they may be pretended to be and with how much Solemnity and Confidence soever delivered Secondly The next Qualification is That it be revealed by God viz. as to its Existence That there is such a thing For otherwise as to the Nature of the thing it self and several other respects in which it may be known the Revelation of it is not suppos'd to extend so far In a Word as a Mystery implies some Revelation of a Thing so it follows That all Revelation does not overthrow the Mysteriousness of it But only such a plenary and entire Revelation of it as leaves nothing in the Nature of it abstruse or undiscovered But now though Revelation be a necessary Ingredient in this Definition yet it is not sufficient something more being still required Since nothing hinders but that the same thing may be both revealed by God and known upon other accounts too As the Moral Law was revealed by God to his People and may be drawn and demonstrated from Principles of Natural Reason also And therefore the Third Property of a Mystery is That it surpass all the Power of Natural Reason to discover or find it out And that not only as to the Quid sit or particular Nature but also as to the Quòd sit of it too For that there are or should be such or such things to consider only the bare Existence of them no Principle of humane Reason by its own natural or improved Light could ever have found out as might be easily shewn by Induction through the several Mysteries of our Religion such as are the Trinity the Incarnation the Mystical Union of Christ with the Church the Resurrection of the Body and the like of all and each of which meer Reason could never have made a discovery Fourthly The fourth and last Condition of a Mystery express'd in the foregoing Definition of it is That it be such a Thing as bare Natural Reason even after it is discovered cannot comprehend I say comprehend that is know it perfectly and as far as it is capable of being known I do not say That it is or ought to be wholly Unintelligible For some knowledge no doubt may be had of it As first we may know the Signification and Meaning of the Words or Terms in which it is delivered or revealed to us Likewise as to the thing it self we may have some imperfect defective knowledge of that too Such as the Apostle Paul calls a knowing in part and seeing as through a glass darkly 1 Cor. 13. 12. which words manifestly and naturally import That something is known though in a very imperfect manner and degree and that something also remains still unknown which shall hereafter be clearly and fully discovered and made known unto us So that I think nothing could give us a truer and more satisfactory account of the Nature of an Evangelical Mystery than this Scripture viz. That it is a Truth of which we know something at present though very imperfectly but are ignorant of a great deal more belonging to it And this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this obscure and abstruse part of it is that which properly constitutes and denominates a Sacred Truth a Mystery and consequently we may reckon the Account given us of a Mystery by St. Chrysostome a true and exact Description of it by its principal Property viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Homily 7. on the 2 Corinth and Homily 19. on the Epistle to the Romans Where I desire the Reader still to observe that I do not affirm That this last Acception of the Word is either the Original Sence of it or that the Heathen Writers used it in this Signification all that they intended to signifie by the Word Mysterium seeming to have been only that it was Quid sacrum secretum But this I affirm That the Fathers and Writers of the Christian Church generally used it in the Sence specified that is They affix'd a farther Sence to it of their own but still such an one as carried with it something of Analogy and Cognation to the first whereby it signify'd only something obscure or occult in sacred Matters So that now if any one should argue That in the Writers of the Christian Church Mysterium signified only Quid sacrum secretum because it signified no more in the Heathen Writers from whom they borrowed it this would be very inconsequent and ridiculous and all one as if because Sacramentum in the Heathen Writers signified only a Military Oath Therefore in the Ancient Christian Writers it must signifie so too For the Christian Writers apply it to signifie those two great Rites of Christianity Baptism and the Holy Eucharist though still in this instance as well as
much at present That the Greek Writers in expressing the Godhead or Divine Nature whensoever they do not use the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 constantly express it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and sometimes by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 while 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were commonly used in the same sense And likewise the Latins where they express not the same by Deitas or Divinitas do as constantly express it by Natura and Substantia which words stand now particularly condemned by this Presuming Man and that not only in Defiance of all the Ancients but also of the Church of England Her Self which has set her Authorizing Stamp upon those Two Words Substance and Person by applying them to this Subject both in her Articles and Liturgy In the first of them teaching us That in the Unity of the Godhead there are three Persons of one Substance Power and Eternity Artic. 1. And in her Liturgy rendring the Athanasian Creed by the same words Neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance As likewise that Passage in the Nicene Creed by the Son 's being of one Substance with the Father And again in the Doxology at the Communion on Trinity Sunday it gives us these full and notable words One God one Lord not one onely Person but three Persons in one Substance After all which with what face can this strange Anomalar Son of the Church while he is sucking her Breasts and at the same time poysoning the Milk with which she should feed her Children I say with what Face can he aver to the World That this word Substance thus embraced owned and used by her ought to be thrown away as the Direct Cause of all the Errours Men are apt to fall into about this great Mystery And that we can have no Notion of Substance but what implies in it something gross and material Which were it so can any one imagine that the Church of England would ever have made use of such a word as could serve for nothing but a Snare and a Trap to betray the Understandings and Consciences of Men into such Errours as may cost them their Souls This is so fouly Reflexive upon her that I would have any Man living give me a good Reason Why this Author should not be call'd upon by Publick Authority to give the Church satisfaction for the Scandal given to all the Orthodox Members of it by the Contumely and Reproach which he has passed upon those Terms and Words which She has thought fit so solemnly to express her Faith and her Devotions by But some Men such is the Regard had to her Laws and Discipline will venture to utter and write any Thing that the Bookseller will pay them for though they throw their Conscience and Religion into the Bargain But God himself who resisteth the Proud seems to have took the Matter into his own Hands and to shew his Controlling Providence over the Minds and Hearts of Men has at length brought this Scornful Man to eat his own words the hardest Diet certainly that a proud Person can be put to and after all the black Dirt thrown by him upon the School-men and their Terms to lick it off again with his own Tongue So that after he had passed such a Terrible Killing Doom upon these words Essence Substance Subsistence Suppositum Person and the like here in his Vindication all on a suddain in a relenting Fit he graciously reaches out his Golden Scepter of Self-Contradiction and Restores them to Life again in his Apology And that the Reader may behold both sides of the Contradiction the more clearly I think it the best and fairest way to give him the Sense of this Author if it may be so call'd in his own Words Vindication I Have not troubled my Reader with the different signification of Essence Hypostasis Subsistence Persons Existence Nature c. which are Terms very differently used by the Greek and Latin Fathers and have very much obscured this Doctrine instead of explaining it P. 101. l. 12. The School-men have no Authority where they leave the Fathers whose sense they sometimes seem to mistake or to clog it with some peculiar Niceties and Distinctions of their own P. 138. l. 28. The Truth is that which has confounded this Mystery viz. of the Trinity has been the vain endeavour to reduce it to Terms of Art such as Nature Essence Substance Subsistence Hypostasis and the like Pag. 138. l. the last P. 139. l. 1. And speaking of the Ancient Fathers in the same Page he tells us They nicely distinguished between Person and Hypostasis and Nature and Essence and Substance that they were three Persons but one Nature Essence and Substance But that when Men curiously examined the signification of these words they found that upon some account or other They were very unapplicable to this Mystery Hereupon he asks the following Questions in an upbraiding manner viz. What is the Substance and Nature of God How can three distinct Persons have but one Numerical Substance And What is the distinction between Essence and Personality and Subsistence And Lastly At the end of the same Page He confesses that some tolerable Account of the School-Terms and Distinctions might be given but that it would be a work of more difficulty than use Apology HE viz. the melancholy Stander-by is very angry with the School-Doctors as worse Enemies to Christianity than either Heathen Philosophers or Persecuting Emperours Pray what hurt have they done I suppose he means the corruption of Christianity with those barbarous terms of Person Nature Essence Subsistence Consubstantiality c. which will not suffer Hereticks to lie concealed under Scripture-Phrases But why must the School-men bear all the blame of this Why does he not accuse the Ancient Fathers and Councils from whom the School-men learn'd these Terms Why does he let St. Austin escape from whom the Master of the Sentences borrowed most of his Distinctions and Subtleties But suppose these unlucky Wits had used some new Terms have they taught any new Faith about the Trinity in Unity which the Church did not teach And if they have only guarded the Christian Faith with an Hedge of Thorns which disguised Hereticks cannot break through is this to wound Christianity in its very Vitals No no They will only prick the Fingers of Hereticks and secure Christianity from being wounded and this is one great Cause why some Men are so angry with the School-Doctors tho' the more General Cause is because they have notIndustry enough to Read or understand them Apology P. 4 5. I have to prevent all exceptions given the Reader the whole Paragraph in which the last Clause strikes Home indeed tho' in such Cases some think this Author would do well to take heed of striking too Home and Hard for fear the Blow should rebound back again and do execution where
nothing is so but a Mind or Spirit it may as I have said imply a Mind but it does not directly signifie it But admitting that it does both does this expression prove That the Son is a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 distinct from the Father By no means For not only the Son but the Father may be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Holy Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet they are not Three 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Reason of this is because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is an Essential Attribute following the Divine Nature and therefore common to all the Three Persons and not a Personal Attribute peculiar to any one of them So that granting the Son to be as truly and properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as this Author would have him yet we absolutely deny That he is a distinct 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the Father And this Expression I am sure is far enough from proving him to be so From Nyssen he passes to St. Athanasius who he tells us observes out of these words of our Saviour John 10. 30. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that our Saviour does not say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that by so speaking he gave us a perfect Duality of Persons in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and an Unity of Nature in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All which is very true and that this distinction of Persons overthrows the Heresie of Sabellius and the Unity of their Nature the Heresie of Arius But then this is also as true that all this is nothing at all to our Author's Purpose For how does this prove either that the Three Divine Persons are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits Or that Self-Consciousness is the proper ground or Reason of their distinction Why yes says He If the Father be an Eternal Mind and Wisdom then the Son is also an Eternal but begotten Mind and Wisdom Very true but still I deny that it follows hence That the Eternal Mind or Wisdom Begetting and the Eternal Mind or Wisdom Begotten are Two distinct Minds or Wisdoms but only one and the same Mind or Wisdom under these Two distinct Modifications of Begetting and being Begot But he pretends to explain and confirm his Notion of a distinct Mind or Wisdom out of those words of the Nicene Creed in which the Son is said to be God of God Light of Light very God of very God By which words I cannot imagine how this Author thinks to serve his turn unless that by Light must be meant Infinite Wisdom or Infinitely Wise Mind and that this must also infer the Father and Son to be Two distinct Infinitely Wise Minds or Wisdoms one issuing from the other But if so then the same words will and must infer them also to be two distinct Gods and very Gods For all these words stand upon the same level in the same Sentence and then if we do but joyn the Term Distinct equally with every one of them we shall see what Monstrous Blasphemous Stuff will be drawn out of this Creed In the mean time let this Author know once for all That Light of Light imports not here Two distinct Lights but one Infinite Light under Two different ways of Subsisting viz. either by and from it self as it does in the Father or of and from another as it does in the Son All which is plainly and fully imported in and by the Particle of signifying properly as here applyed Derivation or Communication in the thing which it is applyed to And this is the clear undoubted sense of the Word as it is used here In the mean time I hope the Arians and Socinians will joyn in a Letter of Thanks to this Author for making such an Inference from the Nicene Creed In the next place he comes to St. Austin where though I am equally at a loss to find how he proves his Point by him any more than by those whom he has already produced yet I will transcribe the whole Quotation into the Margin that so both the Reader may have it under his Eye and the Author have no cause to complain that he is not fairly dealt with Now that which he would infer from thence seems to be this That God the Father is Infinitely Wise by a Wisdom of his own distinct from that Wisdom by which the Son is called The Wisdom of the Father and consequently that they are Two distinct Infinite Wisdoms or Infinitely Wise Minds This I say is that which he would inferr and argue from St. Austin or I know not what else it can be But this is by no means deducible from his words for the Father is wise by one and the same Infinite Wisdom equally belonging both to the Father and the Son but not by it under that peculiar Formality as it belongs to the Son For it belongs to the Son as Communicated to Him whereas it belongs to the Father as Originally in and from Himself And whereas it is objected That if the Father should be Wise by the Wisdom which he Begot then he could not be said to be Wise by a Wisdom of his own but only by a Begotten Wisdom proper to the Son I Answer That neither does this follow since it is but one and the same Essential Wisdom in both viz. in him who Begets and in him who is Begotten Though as it is in him who is Begotten it is not after the same way in Him who Begets So that it is this determining Particle as or Quatenus which by importing a distinction of the manner causes a quite different application of the Term while the Thing is still the same For the Father himself is not denominated Wise even by that very Wisdom that is Essential to Him considered as Personally determined to the Son for so it must be considered as Derived and Communicated and no Divine Perfection can agree to the Father under the Formal Consideration of Derived and Communicated albeit the Thing it self which is Derived and Communicated absolutely considered may and does In a word the Father is Wise by one and the same Wisdom which is both in himself and in his Son but not by it as it is in the Son But by the way it is worth observing That this Man who here in the 102 and 103 Pages denies the Father to be Wise by this Begotten Wisdom which the Son is here called and which in the Sense we have now given of it is very true and alledges St. Austin and Lombard to abett him in it This very Man I say Page 131. Line 24. affirms That the Son is that Wisdom and Knowledge wherewith his Father knows himself Where If for the Father to be Wise and to know himself be formally the same Act and as much the same as his Wisdom and Knowledge can be as it is manifest they are then I leave it to this
Constantinople being the Fifth General one in the Year 553 for Condemning of the Tria Capitula we have a large and Noble Confession of Faith made by that Emperour and owned and applauded by all the Council and inserted amongst the Acts of it And in this we have the Three Divine Persons several times expressed by so many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a Term equivalent to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and indeed importing withall the Personality or Formal Reason of the same and that so fully and plainly that nothing could or can be more so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That is We profess to Believe One Father Son and Holy Ghost Glorifying thereby a Consubstantial Trinity One Deity or Nature or Essence and Power and Authority in Three Subsistences or Persons And again to the same purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We worship says he an Unity in Trinity and a Trinity in Unity having both a strange and wonderful Distinction and Union that is to say an Union or Singularity in respect of the Substance or God-head and a Trinity in respect of Properties Subsistences or Persons with several more such Passages to the same Purpose and Signification And then as for the Council it self the first Canon of it speaks thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is If any one Confess not One Nature or Substance One Power and Authority of Father Son and Holy Ghost a Coessential Trinity and One Deity to be Worshipped in Three Subsistences or persons Let such an one be Accursed In the next place we have the Sixth General Council and the Third of Constantinople called by Constantinus Pogonatus against the Monothelites in the Year 681. In the Acts of which Council Article 6. we have the Council owning the same Thing and in the same words which a little before we quoted out of the Council of Chalcedon And moreover in the Tenth Article the Council declares it self thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That is We believing our Lord Iesus Christ to be the True God do affirm in him Two Distinct Natures shining forth in One Subsistence or Person Agreeably to this the Council immediately following called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by the â—atines Concilium Quini Sextum Consisting chiefly of the same Persons with the former and called by the same Constantine about Ten Years after for the making of Canons about Discipline by way of Supplement to the Fifth and Sixth Councils which had made none This Council I say in the first of its Canons which is as a kind of Preface owns and applauds the Nicene Fathers for that with an Unanimous Agreement and consent of Faith they had declared and cleared up one Consubst antiality in the Three Hypostases or Subsistences of the Divine Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. And Lastly in the Florentine Council held in the Fif teenth Century in which the Greeks with their Emperor Iohannes Palaeologus met the Latines in order to an Accord between them touching that so much controverted Article about the Procession of the Holy Ghost In this Council Isay we have the Greeks also expressing the Personality of the Holy Ghost by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For whereas the Latines affirmed that the Holy Ghost the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is to say stream or flow from the Son the Greeks desired them to explain what they meant by that Expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and whether they understood that he derived both his Essence and Personality from him and that in these words very significant to our purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By which we see that even with these Modern Greeks also the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is all one with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie Essence and Person as applyed to the Persons of the Blessed Trinity Hist. Concil Florent in the last Chapter and Question 7. of Section 8. Pag. 246. set forth by Dr. Creyghton 1660. I cannot think it requisite to quote any Thing more from the Greeks upon this Subject it being as clear as the Day that both Fathers and Councils stated the Personalities of Father Son and Holy Ghost upon Three distinct Hypostases or Subsistences of one and the same God-head Essence or Substance distinguished thereby into Three Persons And so I pass from the Greeks to the Latines whom we shall find giving an Account of the same partly by subsistences and Modes of subsistence and partly by Relations But not equally by both in all Ages of the Church For we have before shewn That there was a long and sharp Contest between the Greeks and the Latines about the Word Hypostasis and that the Latines dreaded the use of it as knowing no other Latin Word to render it by but Substantia which they could by no means ascribe plurally to God and as for the Word Subsistentia that was not then accounted properly Latin and it was but upon this occasion and to fence against the Ambiguity of the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it came at length into use amongst the Latines And even after all it must be yet further confessed That notwithstanding that fair foundation of Accord between the Greeks and Latines laid by the forementioned Council of Alexandria and the hearty Endeavours both of Athanasius and of Gregory Nazianzen after him to accommodate the business between them the Latines were not so ready to come over to the Greeks in the free use of the Word Hypostasis as the Greeks were to comply withthe Latines in the use of the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answering to their Persona And therefore in vain would any one seek for an Explication of the Divine Persons in the Trinity by the Terms Subsistentiae or Modi Subsistendi in the earlier Latin Writers such as Tertullian about the latter end of the second Century and St. Cyprian about themiddle of the Third and Lactantius about the latter end of the same and the beginning of the Fourth Nevertheless find it we do in the Writers of the following Ages And how and in what sence it was used by them shall be now considered And here we will begin with St. Ambrose who is full and clear in the case in his Book in Symbolum Apostolicum Cap. 2. Tom. 2. in these Words Ità ergò rectum Catholicum est ut unum Deum secundùm Unitatem Substantiae fateamur Patrem Filium Spiritum Sanctum in suâ quemque Subsistentiâ sentiamus A Passage so very plain that nothing certainly could more effectually declare That this Father reckoned the Personalities of the Three Divine Persons to consist in their several and respective Subsistences The next whom we shall alledge is St. Hilary who flourished in the Fourth Century and wrote Twelve Books
it so quote this Word out of that very place of St. Basil's Hexaemeron where now it stands wrote 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which surely proves that they found it not there so wrote then when they quoted it from thence But admitting that it may be so wrote viz. with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well as with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet what does or can this make for our Author 's new-coined 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For till there can be found such Greek Words as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to derive it from which none ever yet met with nor ever will in vain shall we seek for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 any where but in this Author In the next place to pass from Greek Words to Latine or such at least as are Latinized I would gladly know who those Anti-Nicene Fathers were who are mentioned by him Pag. 24. Lin. 5. And whether they were Arians or Novatians who as I take it were the great Opposers of the Nicene Council But that I find cannot be since our Author tells us That thâ— Pâ—â—sons spoken of by him were of the same Faith with thâ— â—â—cene Fathers So that upon that Account 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 think it ought to be the Ante-Nicene Fathers And 〈◊〉 so I think the Author would do well to take notice that there is a great difference between Anti-Nicene and Ante-Nicene between such as lived before the Council and such as were against it And the more particular and exact notice ought he to take of it here since tho' the difference be only in an Iota he yet knows what a Disturbance this little Letter made in the Homoousian and Homoiousian Controversie even so great as to occasion the Convening of this Famous Council Nevertheless that this word Anti-Nicene passed for good and current with this Author is evident from hence that it is as well as some others free of both Editions of this extraordinary Book Again in Page 105. Line 8. we are told of the Favourites of some Opinions As to which I had thought that Men use to favour and countenance Opinions and not to be countenanced and favoured by them And yet the Word Favourite signifies passively and so must be taken for one who receives favour and not actively for one who shews it And therefore if to represent any one as the Favourite of an Opinion be not good sence I know no way but by striking it out and putting Favourer in the room of it to make it better In Page 106. Line 16. I read Intension used in the same sence with Intention or Purpose and I must declare that I never found it so used before And in Page 108. Line 31. I am told of the Council of Lateran and I wondered a good while what Council it should be for though I had heard of several Lateran Councils yet I never heard of the Council of Lateran till I met with it here Likewise I find an Extraordinary Person in Page 43. Line 1. named Lucifer Carolitanus and was thereupon in some thoughts with my self whether there might have been any place called in former times Carolina or by some Name like it But then out comes the Second Edition and alters it into Caralitanus which in my poor Opiniou looks very suspiciously as if some Body had a mind to Correct it but knew not how As for Lucifer Calaritanus so called from Calaris now Cagliari the Metropolis of Sardinia I have heard much of him but I will suppose our Author had some Body else in his Eye And upon this occasion I cannot but take notice of some other Writers quoted by him whom the World seems as much unacquainted with as with this Carolitanus As for instance St. Hillary in his Apol. P. 15. at the latter end And Albaspinus in his Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet Pag. 165. Line 22. And Nonnâ—s in his Knowledge of Christ Page 218. Now St. Hilary indeed a Famous Father of the Church and Bishop of Poictiers and Albaspinaeus Archbishop of Orleans Eminent for his Learned Works and Nonnus who Wrote a Paraphrase upon St. Iohn's Gospel in Greek Verse are every one of them known and celebrated by all But as for St. Hillary Albaspinus and Nonnas I never heard of them till this Author was pleased to bless the World with these New Names As for Erronious instead of Erroneous and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 instead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they are small things and ought to make no difference amongst Friends though I have known many a poor School-boy forced to Water his Plants for a less Mistake But there is a Word of singular note which I have met with at least six or seven times in this Book and four times in one Page viz. 227. and it is Prosopopaea which also as well as its Companions has given the Catalogue of Errata the slip and so weathered it out in Two Editions But what to make of it I cannot tell There is indeed a certain Figure in Rhetorick called Prosopopoeia which I know well enough but Prosopopaea I am wholly a Stranger to And surely this Author could not mean the Figure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 forasmuch as the strict Literal signification of that is fictio Personae And I cannot imagine how this Author should mistake about this Word of all others having had so Excellent an Hand at the Thing signified by it as having I dare say made more Persons than ever God thought fit to furnish the World with And to shew the Reader that our Author's store extends much further than one Book I will present him with some more of the like Rarities out of some of his other Pieces As first in Page 65. of his Answer to the Protestant Reconciler he makes mention of Exorcisme Chrysom Unction Dipping Trine Immersion c. as rejected by the Church of England And here I was extremely at a loss to learn what Chrysom was and after all my search no Lexicon could inform me till at last I hit upon a certain little Lexicon called The Bill of Mortality and there I found a Word very near it as differing from it but by one Letter which was Chrisom signifying a Child that dies presently after it is born But then considering again that the Church of England did not declare her self to reject such I was as much at a loss as ever till at length setting my Guessing Faculty on work I concluded that certainly it should be Chrisme which is a Greek Word for Unction as Immersion is a Latine one for Dipping And this our Author should have taken notice of for though he quotes it out of the Reconciler yet since he neither rectifies it nor reflects upon him for it we may very reasonably suppose that he took it for good Payment and really thought that it ought to be Chrysom as he found it Otherwise he who had been so quick and sharp upon him at other turns would
what concerns the Licensing this Book so severely and so justly reflected upon by Dr. Owen it did it must be confessed meet with a Person as it were framed for the very purpose For none certainly could be so fit to stamp an Imprimatur upon a Book Wrote against Christ 's Satisfaction as One who while he was Eating the Bread and Wearing the Honours of the Church could stab the Doctrine of it to the Heart by Writing for Transubstantiation And then in the next place for it s passing Uncontrolled it had really been to be wished That the Clergy in Convocation in the last especially in which so many of them acquitted themselves so exceeding worthily upon other Accounts would have vouchsafed to wipe off this foul Blot from the Church by a due Censure passed upon the forementioned Positions so reproachful to that and so Contumelious to our Common Christianity For what vast advantage the Dissenters have taken from hence to Scandalize and Bespatter the Government and Governours of our Church is but too well known and cannot be too much Lamented and I heartily wish That it had been a Scandal only Taken and not Given And the rather do I represent this as a Work fit for the Convocation since this Author has given the World such a Notable Proof That nothing but a Convocation can Convince or work upon him And thus I have given the Reader a Specimen of the Doctrines of this Author in these Two Books of his In the former of which he affects to be the Socinian 's humble Servant by Ridiculing and Exploding Christ 's Satisfaction of God 's Iustice and so in effect the whole Mystery of the Gospel And in the latter he pretends to oppose them by such a Vindication of the Trinity and of Christ's Incarnation as one would think were Wrote by Themselves But whatsoever it is that he either pretends or intends as it is hard to know the latter by the former this Character I shall give of him as a Writer That there is hardly any one Subject which he has Wrote upon that of Popery only excepted but he has Wrote both for it and against it too Not that I say that he has Printed all which he has so Wrote but Printing is not the only way of Publication and this I will say besides That where he has not Printed he has Acted it with a Witness And yet even for Printing could any thing be Wrote and Printed more sharp and bitter against the Dissenters than what this Man Wrote in his Answer to the Protestant Reconciler And yet how frankly or rather fulsomely does he open both his Arms to embrace them in his Sermon Preached before the Lord Mayor on Novemb. 4. 1688 Though I dare say That the Dissenters themselves are of that Constancy as to own That they were of the same Principles in 88 that they were of in 85. But the Truth is Old Friendships cannot be so easily forgot And it has been an Observation made by some that hardly can any one be found who was first tainted with a Conventicle whom a Cathedral could ever after cure but that still upon every cross Turn of Affairs against the Church the irresistible Magnetism of the Good Old Cause as some still think it would quickly draw him out of the Good Old Way The Fable tells us of a Cat once turned into a Woman but the next sight of a Mouse quickly dissolved the Metamorphosis cashiered the Woman and restored the Brute And some Virtuosi skilled in the Useful Philosophy of Alterations have thought her much a gainer by the latter change there being so many unlucky turns in the World in which it is not half so safe and advantagious to Walk Upright as to be able to fall always upon one's Legs But not to hold the Reader too long in the Entrance of the Work which I am about to present him with I do here assure him That in the following Animadversions I have strictly pursued this Author in every part of his new Hypothesis I have answered all his Arguments not omitting so much as one or any Thing that looks like one And if I have thought fit sometimes in a short Remark or two here and there to refresh the Reader and my self by exposing his Bold and Blind side together yet this has still been my method throughly to dispatch the Argument before I offer to divert upon the Author As for that part of his Book which peculiarly concerns the Socinians I leave him and them to fight it out My business is to shew That the Doctrine of our Church is absolutely a stranger to his Novel and Beloved Notions It knows them not It owns them not nor ought we to look upon him so far as he Asserts and Maintains them to be any True and Genuine Son of it And consequently whether he worries the Socinians or which is much the more likely the Socinians worry him the Church of England is not at all concerned The Contents of the Chapters CHAPTER I. REpresenting the Sence and Signification of the Word Mystery as also a Vindication of the Use and Application of it to some of the most Difficult and Sublime Truths of the Gospel and lastly a full Proof That the Account given by this Author of his Explication of the Article of the Trinity is wholly inconsistent with the Mysteriousness of it together with some Remarks upon his needless Apology for Writing against the Socinians CHAP. II. Containing an Account of several Terms commonly made use of in discoursing of the Divine Nature and Persons and particularly shewing the Propriety of Applying the Words Essence Substance Nature Infinity and the like to this great Subject and lastly proving this Author's Exceptions against the use of them about the same False Groundless and Impertinent With some further Remarks upon his forementioned Apology CHAP. III. In which this Author 's New Notion of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness is briefly declared Self-Consciousness made by him the Formal Constituent Reason of Personality in all Persons both Create and Increate and on the contrary proved against him in the first place That it is not so in Persons Create CHAP. IV. In which is proved against this Author That neither is Self-Consciousness the Formal Constituent Reason of Personality in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity nor Mutual-Consciousness the Reason of their Unity in one and the same Nature CHAP. V. In which is proved against this Author That the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity are not Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits CHAP. VI. In which is considered what this Author pretends to from the Authority of the Fathers and the Schoolmen in behalf of his New Hypothesis and in the first place shewn That neither do the Fathers own the Three Divine Persons to be Three distinct Infinite Minds nor Self-Consciousness to be the Formal Reason of their Distinction CHAP. VII In which is shewn That the Passages alledged by this Author
out of the Fathers do not prove Mutual-Consciousness to be that wherein the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity does consist but that the Fathers place it in something else CHAP. VIII In which is set down the Ancient and Generally received Doctrine of the Church concerning the Article of the Blessed Trinity as it is delivered by Councils Fathers Schoolmen and other later Divines together with a Vindication of the said Doctrine so explained from this Author's Exceptions CHAP. IX In which this Author's Paradoxes both Philosophical and Theological as they occur in this Discourse are drawn together Examined and Confuted CHAP. X. In which this Author 's Grammatical and other such like Mistakes as they are found here and there in his Writings are set down and remarked upon CHAP. XI In which is given some Account of this Author's Temper and insolent way of Writing as well in Extolling himself as in Depressing and Scorning his Adversaries in both which he has not his Parallel CHAP. XII Containing a Brief Review and Conclusion of the whole Advertisement IT having been found requisite to make some Alterations and Additions in this Second Impression of these Animadversions c. yet that those who have bought up the former may suffer thereby as little as may be the Author has thought fit for their use and benefit to cause the said Additions and Alterations to be Printed in a Sheet or two by themselves Some of the most Considerable Errata of the Press are thus to be Corrected PReface Page 5. Line 2. of the Quotation for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 7. l. 5. of the Quotation for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 8. l. 23. for at read as Book p. 6. l. 20. for asserter r. Assertor p. 51. l. 10. for Analagous r. Analogous p. 71. for Chap. II. r. Chap. III. p. 72. l. 29. for destinct r. distinct p. 103. l. 17. for it r. that p. 116. l. 4. for Spirits r. Spirits p. 126. l. 7. for one and another dele and l. 17. for infiinite r. infinite p. 131. l. 23. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 25. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 132. l. 7 8 9. r. campósque lucentémque Titaniáque totámque p. 138. l. 28. for of Deity r. of the Deity p. 143. l. 8. instead of me read Men p. 155. l. 19. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 157. l. 10. of the Quot for utrûm r. utrùm p. 160. l. 31. for Denaeus r. Danaeus p. 161. l. 5. for our read our l. 8. in Quot for genetricem r. genitricem p. 164. l. 31. for gratis r. gratis p. 168. l. 14. dele one to p. 173. l. penult for imploying r. implying p. 196. l. 8. of the Greek Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 198. l. 21. for separately read separately p. 205. at the end of the second Greek Quot for quarta read quartâ p. 207. l. 18. for of Three read of the Three p. 215. l. 11. for specificully read specifically p. 220. l. 19. for quod sic read quòd sic l. 20. for quod non read quod non p. 224. l. 28. for in self r. in it self p. 229. l. 2. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 231. l. 2. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 6. of the Gr. Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 232. in the 3d Gr. Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 233. l. 1. of the 4th Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 234. l. 6. of the second Quot ex-eâ r. ex eâ p. 237. l. 14. for the Unity r. That Unity p. 253. l. 6. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 260. l. 3. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 9. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 263. l. 16. for ergò r. Ergo p. 266. l. 16. for audiérant r. audierant p. 268. l. 22. for Beotius r. Boetius and ibid. l. 25. for Difinition r. Definition p. 278. l. 17. for Nicaenae r. Nicenae p. 283. l. 6. for on r. upon p. 284. l. 1. for Bu r. But p. 285. l. 7. for Metaphisician r. Metaphysician alibi p. 288. l. 5. Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 17. for Concession r. a Concession p. 289. l. 6. Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 8. Quot for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 291. in the Latin Quot l. 2. for tantummodo r. tantúmmodo l. 8. for quarc r. quáre p. 310. l. 25. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 322. l. 25. for asserter r. Assertor p. 333. l. 13. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 335. l. 31. for Archbishop r. Bishop p. 343. l. 30. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 351. catch word for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. Greek Errata p. 352. Correction the 25th for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 362. l. 16. for wreaking r. reeking p. 364. l. 8. for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 365. l. 24. for ita r. itá If the Reader chance to meet with any more Faults in Accents he is desired to Correct or Excuse them together with all Mispointings which in Books of any length are commonly too many to be particularly and exactly set down Besides that here through the faintness of the Character several Letters Points and Accents do scarce appear in some Copies though legible in others Animadversions c. CHAP. 1. Representing the Sence and Signification of the Word Mystery as also a Vindication of the Use and Application of it to some of the most Difficult and Sublime Truths of the Gospel and lastly a full Proof That the Account given by this Author of his Explication of the Article of the Trinity is wholly inconsistent with the Mysteriousness of it together with some Remarks upon his needless Apology for Writing against the Socinians IN Order to the better Examination of what this Author has wrote about the Holy Trinity I think it requisite to premise something concerning the Signification Sence and Nature of a Mystery For certainly the Unity of One and the same undivided God-head in a Trinity of distinct Persons is one of the greatest Mysteries if not absolutely the greatest in our Christian Religion Now a Mystery according to the common signification of the word is derived either from the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which
in the former with some Analogy Reference and Affinity to the first use of the Word viz. That as by this Military Oath Soldiers did solemnly devote themselves to their Emperor's Service so in these two Religious Rites Men do much more solemnly devote and bind themselves over to the Obedience and Service of Christ according to all the Rules and Precepts of his Holy Religion I conclude therefore by a Parity of the Case That Mysterium according to the Christian Use of the Word imports not only Quid in sacris secretum by reason of an actual Concealment of the same but moreover something that is so much a Secretum in Religion as to transcend and surpass all Human Comprehension And it is the Authority of the Ancient Writers using the word thus which I state this Sence of it upon as abundantly sufficient to enfranchise and render it Authentick in the Church Though I confess as to the Adversary whom I am to deal with my purpose would be sufficiently serv'd against him even by the first and narrowest Signification of the Word as it imports only something in Religion actually secret hidden and not open to a common view or perception I have now given the Notation Signification and Definition of the word Mystery But after all there is a new Light sprung lately into the World which tells us the use of the Word in Scripture determines the Case quite another way for that the Scripture knows no such signification of the word as we have insisted upon nor that any thing that is Incomprehensible is or ought to be accounted a Mystery The Asserter of this as we may well perceive is a bold Man but being at present engaged with a much bolder I shall only say thus much of this Socinian Tract here viz. That as to the Argument which the Author would raise against the Trinitarians as he calls them from the Sence of the Word Mystery as he has there stated it it has been throughly baffled and overthrown by a Learned Person in a short Discourse in Vindication of the Mysteries of the Christian Faith c. And when this Anti-Trinitarian has answer'd that Learned Person if there appears need of any further answer to the foremention'd piece he may all in good time receive one in a distinct Discourse by it self And so I immediately address my self to the Author undertook by me who by pretending to defend the great Article of the Trinity has given the Adversary those great Advantages against it which the bare Article left to defend it self as the Faith is generally its own best Defender could never have given him The Socinians charge it with Paradox and downright Contradiction For the repelling and staving off which Charge from this Doctrine our Author has thought fit to give us some Rules to judge of a Contradiction by and in so doing has laid down this Remarkable Assertion viz. That it is a vain and arrogant presumption to say what is or what is not a Contradiction when we confess we do not understand or comprehend the thing we speak of p. 4. This I say is a very remarkable Assertion and the first thing remarkable in it is That according to a Custom very usual with him he promiscuously joyns together words as if they were of the same Import and Extent of Signification when really they are very different For to understand a thing is to know it in any respect or degree in which it is knowable and to comprehend a thing is to know it in every respect in which it is knowable And as it is certain that we cannot know God this latter way so it is as certain that we may know him the former For we do and may know him by inadequate and imperfect and uncommensurate Conceptions as that he is Just Wise Good and the like which are several Inadequate ways of representing him to our mind But now if this Author's Assertion should take place viz. That we cannot say what is or what is not a Contradiction when we confess we do not comprehend the thing we speak of then we cannot pronounce these Propositions Iupiter Olympius is the Supreme God the Sun is the Supreme God or the World is the Supreme God to be Contradictions Forasmuch as it is certain that speaking here of God we do not comprehend the thing we speak of And yet since Iupiter Olympius the Sun and the World are all of them finite Material Beings and God both Infinite and Immaterial I doubt not but that to affirm one of the other is a real and manifest Contradiction And to shew that it is so this Author should do well to consider That a Contradiction is not properly or universally at least oppos'd to the compleat and adequate knowledge of a thing but to the true knowledge of it And we may have a true knowledge even by such inadequate imperfect incomplete Conceptions of it as we have mention'd For he who knows God to be Just though he cannot comprehend every way and respect in which he is or may be so and much less all his other Perfections has thereby a true knowledge of God though an Imperfect one That is he knows and understands though he does not comprehend him But according to this Author's Assertion we cannot say that any thing is a Contradiction with reference to God since it is certain and evident that we neither do nor can comprehend him And what absurd and insufferable Consequences this must needs draw after it in our Discourses of God I leave to any one but the Author of this Assertion to judge But the Consequences of it as bad as they are do not stop in God For in the 7th Page our Author proceeds farther and affirms That it is so far from being a wonder to meet with any thing whose nature or rather the Nature of which we do not perfectly understand that he knows nothing in the World which we do perfectly understand or in his other word comprehend for to understand a thing perfectly and to comprehend it I take to be the same And now let us apply his former Rule viz. That we cannot say what is or is not a Contradiction when we confess we do not comprehend the thing we speak of I say let us apply this Rule here also and since he positively avers That there is nothing in the World which we do comprehend or perfectly understand it must roundly follow That there can be no such thing as a Contradiction since whatsoever is so is and must be a Contradiction to something or other Now for the Truth and Reason of his Assertion I cannot undertake but certainly the Prudence and Forecast of it is admirable as being like to do him Knight's Service as I shall shew hereafter at many a turn and next to a Convocation-Book help him out at a dead Lift. In the mean time let us see how our Author makes good this strange and loose Proposition
viz. That there is nothing in the World that we perfectly understand And in order to this Let us bring and lay together what he Asserts in several places And here first in Page 7. line 20. c. It is agreed by all Men That the Essences of things cannot be known but only their Properties and Qualities and that the World is divided into Matter and Spirit and that we know no more what the substance of Matter than what the sâ—bstance of Spirit is And then he enumerates some of the Essential Properties of each and owns that we know them in Confirmation I suppose of his fore-going Assertion that we know nothing After which in Pag. 8. line 15. he adds As for the Essential Properties Operations and Powers of Matter Sence Experience and Observation will tell us what they are And then I hope we may know also what they are when Sence and Experience has told us So that we see here what our Author asserts But may we rely upon it and hold him to his Word Alas That I fear may prove something hard and unkind For a Man to whom a whole Convocation has given a large scope and liberty of thinking and who has given himself as large an one for speaking loves not of all things in the World to be held too strictly to what he says For in Page 4. line 25. reckoning up some of the Absurdities and Contradictions attending the Doctrine of Transubstantiation he tells us That we know them to be so because we know the Nature of a Body and this also we must suppose said in further Confirmation of his other Assertion that we know not the Nature of any thing and moreover That we know that such things as he there mentions are a Contradiction to the Essential Properties of a Body line 26. All this he says here and that in very plain terms But in Page 7. in which it is high time for a Man to forget what he said in the 4th He tells us That the Essences of things cannot be known and consequently one would think That the Essence of a Body could not be known And yet for one to know the nature of a Body which in Page 4. he says we do without knowing the Essence of it which in Page 7. he says we cannot know is I conceive a way of knowledge peculiar to this Author In the next place as for the property of things he tells us very positively in Page 8. line 33 34. That the Properties and Operations both of Bodies and Spirits are great Secrets and Mysteries in Nature which we understand nothing of c. And yet in Page 7. line 32. he tells us That we know the Essential Properties of a Spirit that it is a thinking substance with the Faculties of Understanding and Will c. Now to know the Essential Properties of a Spirit And yet for these Properties to be such Secrets and Mysteries in Nature that we understand nothing of them both which this Author expresly affirms in the compass of two Pages is another sort of knowledge which ought in all reason to be reckon'd peculiar to himself And thus having consider'd some of his Assertions in Contradiction to one another if there be any such thing as a Contradiction I will consider some of them severally by themselves And here as I have already shewn That he says positively Page 4. line 28. That we have no clear and comprehensive Notion of a Spirit So he adds in the next words That it is impossible to know what is contrary to the Nature of a Spirit if we know not what the Nature of a Spirit is i. e. Comprehensively as he must still mean But this by his favour I very much question and desire him to tell me Whether we may not know That it is contrary to the Nature of a Spirit to be Material to be extended and to be compounded of the Elements c. These things I take to be such as are contrary to the Nature of a Spirit and such as may be certainly known to be so and consequently such as may safely rationally and consonantly to all Principles of Philosophy be pronounced to be so And therefore this Author's Assertion viz. That it is impossible to know what is contrary to the Nature of a Spirit if we have not a clear comprehensive Notion of the Nature of a Spirit is apparently False Absurd and Ridiculous But to proceed This Author having said That he knows nothing in the World that we do perfectly understand And for the proof of it alledged That the Essences of Things cannot be known and for the farther proof of that affirm'd That the whole World is adequately divided into Matter and Spirit the Natures of which as he says are wholly unknown to us Suppose now I should as I do deny this whole Argument and affirm That there is a third sort of Beings which are neither Matter nor Spirit which yet as to some of them at least may be perfectly understood and known by us and these are Accidents which according to the ablest Philosophers hitherto do together with substance make a much better and more comprehensive Division of the whole World than Matter and Spirit For certain it is That Accidents as contradistinct to Substance are real Beings and have their respective Essences and Properties belonging to them and such as may be matter of Demonstration which kind of Argument is known to be the proving of any Property or proper Attribute of its Subject by a third thing or Principle bearing an Essential Connexion with both And amongst Accidents I do particularly affirm this of Numbers Figures and Proportions that they are such things as may be perfectly understood by us in the strength of Natural Reason For I think it may be perfectly and comprehensively known That two and two make four and that a Circle is a Figure every part of the Circumference whereof is equidistant from the Centre and a thousand more such things all which are capable of being Scientifically made out to us by Demonstration And this indeed to such an height that as some will admit of no Demonstrations but in the Mathematicks viz. in Numbers Figures and Proportions So there are few or none but readily grant That the Demonstrations about these Matters are the Clearest the most Scientifick and Convincing of all other Demonstrations whatsoever From all which I conclude That what this Author has affirm'd viz. That there is nothing in the World but Matter and Spirit and withal That there is nothing which we do perfectly understand is not only a crude loose unwary but really and in strictness of truth a very false Assertion And therefore though this Author pleaseth himself with a fanciful Harangue about our Ignorance of the Philosophy How the Fire burns and the Waters are condens'd as he calls it into Ice How Stones fall to the Ground and Vapours ascend and thicken in Clouds and fall down again to the
simply and absolutely plain And in this sense also it can admit of none and much less of Infinite degrees of plainer and plainer since that which excludes all doubts certainly can exclude no more Or 2dly The word may be taken in a Lax Popular and Improper sense for that which is so Plain as to have no considerable doubt or difficulty remaining about it But now the Notion which Men have of God or of the Trinity can never be truly said to be Plain in either of these Senses and therefore not at all For in the first to be sure it cannot No nor yet in the second For let Men know never so much of any Object yet if there remains more of that Object actually unknown than either is or can be known of it such a knowledge can never render or denominate the Notion of that Object even in the common sense of the word Plain And so I hope our Author will allow it to be in the knowledge Men have of God and the Blessed Trinity And whereas he lays no small stress upon this That Men may write plainer and plainer of these matters every day I must here remind him of two Things 1. That he would be pleased to tell us How Men can write plainer and plainer of the Trinity every Day after his new Notion of it has solved all the Difficulties about it as in the forecited Page 85. line 27. he positively tells us it does For as I take it where there remains no difficulty there must be the utmost degree of Plainness and withal when Men are once come to the utmost of any Thing they can then go no further 2. I must remind him also That the word Plainer in the Comparative Degree does not couch under it the positive signification of Plain but denotes only a less degree of difficulty and signifies no more than That a Thing or Notion is not quite so difficult or obscure as it was before which it may very well be and yet be far from being Plain in either of the two foregoing senses laid down by us And therefore tho' we should admit That Men might write plainer and plainer of the Trinity every Day yet I affirm notwithstanding that the Notion of a Trinity in Unity can in no sense be truly said to be plain and easie and much less very plain and easie nay so very plain as to have all the Difficulties of it solved as this Author has expresly affirmed So that if this be a Scandalous Imputation it is easie to judge to whom the Scandal of it must belong But besides all this I see no cause to grant this Author that which he so freely takes for granted for I think it very questionable viz. That Men may write plainer and plainer of the Trinity every Day For so far as the Writers of the Church have informed us about this great Mystery the Catholick Church for above these 1200 Years past has not only had and held the same Notion of a Trinity but has also expressed it in the same way and words with the Church at this very day And for so much of this Mystery as Divines could give no Account of then neither have they given any clearer Account of it ever since nor has the Church hitherto advanced one step further in this Subject Which is an evident demonstration that it has already proceeded as far in it as the Reason of Man could or can go And as for any further Discoveries of it which this Author pretends to from two Phantastick words found out by himself it will not be long before they shall be throughly weighed in the Balance and found as inconsiderable as the Dust of it But there is one thing more which I must not pass over and it is this That in the Passage I transcribed from him he lays down that for a certain Principle which is indeed an Intolerable Absurdity viz. That where the Object is infinite there must be infinite degrees of knowledge Now it is most true That nothing but Insinite knowledge can adequately comprehend an insinite Object For which reason God alone can comprehend himself and he does it by one simple indivisible act uncapable of Parts or Degrees But as for Degrees of any sort whether of knowledge or any thing else nothing but a Finite Being is capable of them and therefore for this Man to assert infinite degrees of knowledge when Uncreated knowledge is uncapable of Degrees and Created knowledge uncapable of Infinite Degrees is a gross thick piece of Ignorance in the first and commonest Rudiments of Philosophy But to return to his Absurdities about the plainness and easiness of the Notion of a Trinity in Unity and therein to be as short with him as I can I shall only demand of him Whether he does in this Apology retract and renounce all that in his Vindication he has Asserted quite contrary to what he has since delivered in his Apology If he does let him declare so much and I have done but till then no regard at all ought to be had to his Apology as serving for nothing else but to shew That according to his accustomed way and known Character he has denied some things in one of his Books which he had positively and expresly affirmed in another and consequently proving That the Apology which denies a Trinity in Unity to be comprehensible and easie and the Vindication which forty times over affirms it to be plain and easie nay very plain and easie ought to pass for the genuine undoubted Works of this Author though they had never born his Name Wherefore upon the Result of all what shall we or what can we say to the fore-cited Particulars which with so much positiveness over and over assert the plainness and intelligibility of the Notion of a Trinity Which yet has hitherto amazed and nonplus'd the whole Christian Church For if it be really so plain and intelligible as this Author tells us it must to my Apprehension unavoidably follow either that a Mystery is a very plain intelligible Notion or that the Trinity is no Mystery I shall not here presume to take this Author 's beloved word out of his Mouth and cry Nonsence and Contradiction But certainly if the Trinity be a Mystery and a Mystery in the nature of it imports something hidden abstruse and by bare reason not to be understood then to say we may have a plain as well as an intelligible Notion of it nay plain even to a demonstration this to say no more is as like a Contradiction as ever it can look But really our Author has shewn himself very kind and communicative to the World For as in the beginning of his Book he has vouchsafed to instruct us how to judge of Contradictions so in the Progress of his Work he has condescended to teach us if we will but learn how to speak and write Contradictions too There remains therefore only one favour more viz. That
conclusion therefore I do here assert That the gross and Material Imaginations which Men form to themselves of Substance proceed not from the thing it self but from the grossness and fault of the Persons who take up these Imaginations And accordingly I affirm to this Author That that Assertion of his in Page 69. That we can form no Idea of Substance but what we have from Matter is false and manifestly proved to be so And moreover That it is not only as possible but as easie to form in the mind a conception of a Substance or Being Existing by it self which is all one as abstracted from and strip'd of all conception of Matter and Corporeity as it is to frame to our selves a conception of Truth or Wisdom or of a Being eternally True and Wise separate from all those gross Qualifications And consequently that the word Substance with others of the like import may be most fitly and significantly applyed to the Divine Nature and the Persons of the Holy Trinity which was the thing to be proved But because our Author avers in Page 70. That if we consider God as Truth and Wisdom which is his true Nature and Essence without confounding our mind with some material conceptions of his Substance as he had already affirmed all conceptions of Substance must needs be then these things viz. the Difficulties before-mentioned concerning our Apprehensions of God are all plain and easie Where by the way it is observable That he calls Truth and Wisdom the true Nature and Essence of God whereas in this very Page as well as in 68. he had excepted against the Term Essence no less than that of Substance as by reason of the gross Material Ideas raised by it in the Mind very unfit to be applyed to God So happy is this Author above other Men that he can rectifie the most improper words and expressions barely by his own using them But because he is so positive in making the Terms Truth and Wisdom an effectual Remedy against all the Inconveniences alledged from the Terms Essence and Substance as applyed to the Deity this brings us to our second Proposition viz. That the same Objection lies against the Terms Truth Wisdom Goodness c. as applicable to the Deity that are made against Essence Substance Existence and the like In order to the proving of which I shall observe That Truth may be taken in a three-fold sense First For the truth of Propositions which is called Logical Secondly For an Affection of Being which is Truth Metaphysical And Thirdly and Lastly As it is a Qualification of Men's Words and Actions and consists properly in an Agreement of the Mind with both Concerning all which I observe That the Truth of Propositions is no further eternal than as it exists in the Mind of God That the Metaphysical Truth of Things is eternal or not eternal as the Being or Thing it belongs to is or is not so And for the Moral Truth of Men's Words and Actions it is no more eternal than the said Words and Actions the proper Subject of them can be said to be This premised I would here ask our Author Whether the first Notions we actually entertain of Truth and Wisdom are not drawn from the Observations we make of these things in Men that is in Beings sensible and Material and consisting of Body as well as Soul and accordingly cloathed with sensible Accidents and Circumstances I cannot imagine that he will deny this since we do not speak immediately or converse visibly with God or Angels and I suppose also that he now speaks of Truth Wisdom Goodness c. not as they are exhibited to us in Books or Propositions but as they actually exist and occur in persons and consequently as they are first apprehended by us in Concretion or Conjunction with Men that is with Beings so Compounded Qualified and Circumstantiated as above expressed and as we find see and observe them in Men's Words and Actions in what they speak and what they do and these are certainly very sensible things and such as incurr into and affect the sence as much as Matter it self can do And if so I desire to hear some satisfactory Reason Why the Observation of Substance in Material Beings and our first Occasional collection of it from thence should so necessarily pervert and cause such a grossness in our Conceptions of it as to make it hardly if at all possible to conceive of Substance without the gross Conception of Matter and yet that the same consideration and cause should not equally take place in Truth and Wisdom and equally pervert and thicken our Apprehensions of them when they are equally drawn from sensible gross and Material Objects viz. the Words and Actions of Men which they both Exist in and Converse about For I can see no ground why the same Reason should not infer the very same thing and the same Antecedents draw after them the same Consequents whatsoever they are applyed to For the Argument à Quatenus ad omne c. is certain and infallible If it be here said That Truth and Wisdom in the proper Notion and Conception of them imply no Communication at all with Matter I Answer That as the Notion of them is Abstracted and gathered up by the Discourses of Reason it does not but so neither does that of Substance after such an Act of the Mind has passed upon it So that hitherto the Case is much the same in both But to carry the matter a little further Truth and Wisdom as observed in and amongst Men are certainly finite Things For whatsoever exists in a finite Subject whatsoever the Object be which it converses about or is terminated upon is certainly it self finite also And here I would have this Author tell me Why a Notion drawn off and borrowed from finite Things should not be as apt to perplex and confound our Minds when applyed to an Infinite Being as a Notion abstracted from a Material Being can be to distract and confound our Thoughts when applyed to an Immaterial I must confess I can see nothing alledgeable for one which may not be as strongly alledged for the other All that can be said is what has been mentioned already viz. That Reason may and does extract some Notions from a finite Being that may be properly applicable to an Infinite due allowance made for the disproportion between both and in like manner I affirm That it can and does draw Notions from a thing endued with Matter which may as well agree to Things Spiritual and Immaterial So that I cannot perceive that Truth Wisdom or Goodness have upon this Account any Preheminence or Advantage over Essence Substance Existence and the like Terms at all but the one may be applyed to the Divine Nature as well and properly as the other But this is not all for I affirm in the 3d Place That Essence Substance Nature Existence and other Terms equipollent to Being considered precisely
Subject he has as great or greater a Quarrel at the word Infinite as applyed to God and I shall here give his Exceptions against it in his own words being such as I believe few would dare to utter but himself and approaching so near or rather quite coming up to Blasphemy that it may be truly said That he has not spoke more blasphemously of God's Vindictive Iustice in his Book of the Knowledge of Christ than he has spoken of God's Infinity in this For in the 77 78 79 Pages he expresses his Thoughts of it thus The truth is says he this very word Infinite confounds our Notions of God and makes the most perfect and excellent Being the most perfectly unknown to us For Infinite is only a Negative Term and signifies that which has no end no bounds no measure and therefore no positive and determined Nature and therefore is Nothing mark that and withal That an Infinite Being had not Use and Custom reconciled us to that expression would be thought Nonsence and Contradiction Which I am so far from granting him that I affirm if there had never been any thing in the World besides God alone it had yet been most True and Rational But he goes on For says he every Real Being has a certain and determined Nature and therefore is not Infinite in this sense which is so far from being a Perfection that it signifies Nothing Real Thus he discourses And yet this word Infinite has been universally received and applyed to the Divine Nature by Learned Men in all Places and Ages and I desire this Man to tell me How if this word Infinite were so liable to be thought Nonsence and Contradiction this could possibly come to pass For what he speaks of Use and Custom reconciling us to this Expression is Impertinent and begs the Thing in dispute For still I would know of him how a word so utterly unfit to express the Thing it was applyed to could ever pass into Use and Custom so as to be took up approved and made use of by all Mankind Let him prevail with the whole World to speak Nonsence and to use words that signifie nothing if he can But this Man before he played the Aristarchus at this rate should have done well to have considered That every Term is not Negative which has a Negative Particle in the Composition of it Of which innumerable Instances may be given And if he does not know this for all his flirting at his Socinian Adversary as if he knew neither Greek nor Latin P. 95. it is a scurvy sign that he is not so over-stocked with either of them as to have any to spare And therefore whereas he goes on in Page 78. and pretends there to explain this word Infinite he might have kept his Explication to himself For no body ever used it otherwise but so as to signifie a Positive Perfection by it but yet withal connoting an Illimitation belonging to it It signifies I say a Thing Real Absolute and Positive but still with a Connotation of something which is to be removed from it and denied of it such as are all bounds and limits in respect of that Substantial All-comprehending Perfection of the Divine Nature In a word the Thing principally signified by this Term is Positive the Thing Consignified or Connoted which is but Secondary and Consequential is a Negation And this sufficiently overturns all his odd Descants upon it But if after all our Minds cannot fully master this Notion Persons as thinking as he can be know and acknowledge that it is not the word Infinite but the Thing Infinite that renders them so short and defective in this matter But it is pleasant to see him take his Turns backwards and forwards in speaking of this Thing There is says he Page 78. a measure of the most Absolute and in this sense Infinite Perfections and if such a measure there be then I hope there is as much Nonsence and Contradiction in the word Immense as in the word Infinite and withal if there is even in the most Absolute and Infinite Perfections a no plus ultrà and an ultimum quod sic as the School-men who were never bred at St. Mary Overies are apt to speak then I confess That an Infinite with all these Qualifications about it must needs according to his beloved Dialect be Nonsence and Contradiction and that of the highest Rank And again P. 79. We know not says he how far Infinite Wisdom and Power and Goodness reaches and thus much is very true but then says he again we certainly know that they have their Bounds and that the Divine Nature is the utmost Bounds of them By which words if he means That they have their fixed determinate Notions whereby they are formally distinguished among themselves as well as from other Things it is right For the Notion of Infinite Wisdom is so bounded that it cannot be said to be Infinite Power or Infinite Power to be Infinite Goodness or the like but still the Thing couched under all these is Infinite and neither has nor can have any Bounds set to its Being And if he should here reply That then the Notion of Infinite Wisdom Power and the like are false Notions as not answering the Things they are applyed to I answer That they are indeed imperfect and inadequate as not fully answering the Thing it self but they cannot be said to be false for all that But on the contrary if he will needs have the Thing hereby signified to have any Real Bounds or Limits of its Being then it will and must follow That in the forecited words he has with Accurate and Profound Speculation presented to us An Infinite with Bounds and the Divine Nature which has no Bounds made the Bounds of it These are the very words he uses and withal delivered by him with such a Magisterial Air and Contempt of the whole World besides who have hitherto approved and made use of these Expressions and that in a Sense and signification not to be born down by every self Opiniator after so long and universal a Prescription that so much Confidence cannot be sufficiently wondred at nor too severely rebuked And therefore to review a little the foregoing particulars and thereby to take some estimate of the Man Where shall we find such another Instance of a private Presbyter who in the Communion or rather in the very Bosom of so pure and Orthodox a Church as this our Church of England ever before durst in so great an Article of the Christian Faith draw his Pen against all the Writers of the Church Ancient and Modern Fathers and School-men and with one dash of it explode and strike off all those received Terms by which they constantly explained this Mystery as not only useless but mischievous in all Discourses about it Whereas not to anticipate what I intend more particularly and fully upon this Head in my Eighth Chapter I shall only affirm thus
Purposes of Argumentation Accordingly I affirm That the Notions of Mutual-Consciousness and Self-Consciousness in the Subject now before us ought to be rejected not only as New and Suspicious but as wholly Needless For what can be signified by those which is not fully clearly and abundantly signified by that one plain Word and known Attribute the Divine Omniscience And what are Mutual-Consciousness and Self-Consciousness else if they are any thing but one and the same Omniscience exerting it self several ways and upon several Objects As to apply it to the Matter before us does not every one of the Divine Persons by vertue of the Divine Nature and of this Omniscience therewith belonging to him Perfectly Intimately and Intirely know himself as a Person and all the Actions Motions and every thing else belonging to him No doubt he does for that otherwise he could not be Omniscient And does not the same Person again by the very same Omniscience know all that is known by the other Two Persons and the other Two Persons by the same Mutually know all that is known by him No doubt they may and do Forasmuch as Omniscience knows all things that are knowable and consequently all that is or can be known of or in any one or all of the Divine Persons joyntly or severally considered But to argue the Matter yet more particularly Either Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness are one and the same with the Divine Omniscience or they are distinct sorts of knowledge from it If they are the same then they are useless and superfluous Notions as we affirm they are but if they import distinct sorts of knowledge then these two Things will follow 1. That in every one of the Divine Persons there are three distinct sorts of Knowledge viz. A Knowledge of Omniscience a Knowledge of Self-Consciousness and a Knowledge of Mutual-Consciousness too which I think is very absurd and ridiculous 2. And in the next place If we affirm them to be distinct sorts of Knowledge from that of Omniscience then they must also have Objects distinct from and not included in the Object of Omniscience since all such difference either of sorts or Acts of Knowledge is founded upon the difference of their Objects But this is impossible since the Object of Omniscience comprehends in it all that is knowable and consequently if Mutual-Consciousness and Self-Consciousness have Objects distinct from and not included in the Object of Omniscience those Objects must be something that is not knowable for that Omniscience as we have shewn claims all that is knowable or possible to be known for its own Object From all which it follows That Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness considered as distinct from Omniscience are two empty Chimerical Words without any distinct Sense or Signification In a word Every Person in the Trinity by one and the same Act of Omniscience knows all the Internal Acts Motions and Relations proper both to himself and to the other Two Persons besides And if so what imployment or use can there be for Self-Consciousness or Mutual-Consciousness which Omniscience that takes in the Objects of both has not fully answered and discharged already If it be here said That Omniscience cannot give Personality forasmuch as the Personality of each Person distinguishes him from the other two which Omniscience being common to them all cannot do This I grant and own it impossible for any Thing Essentially involved in the Divine Nature to give a Personal Distinction to any of the Three Persons but then I add also That we have equally proved that neither was Self-Consciousness the Formal Reason of this Personal Distinction by several Arguments and more especially because that Self-Consciousness being a Thing Absolute and Irrelative could not be the Formal Reason of any thing in the Nature of it perfectly Relative as the Divine Persons certainly are For this is a received Maxime in the Schools with reference to the Divine Nature and Persons Repugnat in Divinis dari Absolutum Incommunicabile Greg. de Valen. 1 Tom. p. 874. And it is a sure Rule whereby we may distinguish in every one of the Divine Persons what is Essential from what is Personal For every Attribute that is Absolute is Communicable and consequently Essential and every one that is purely Relative is Incommunicable and therefore purely Personal and so è converso Upon which Account Self-Consciousness which is a Thing Absolute and Irrelative cannot be Incommunicable nor consequently the Formal Reason of Personality in any of the Persons of the Blessed Trinity as we have already at large demonstrated So that still our Assertion stands good That all that can be truly ascribed to Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness with reference to the Divine Nature and Persons may be fully and fairly accounted for from that one known Attribute the Divine Omniscience And therefore that there Is no use at all either of the Term Self-Consciousness or Mutual-Consciousness to contribute to the plainer or fuller Explication of the Blessed Trinity as this Author with great fluster of Ostentation pretends but has not yet by so much as one solid Argument proved But when I consider how wonderfully pleased the Man is with these two new-started Terms so high in sound and so empty of sence instead of one substantial word which gives us all that can be pretended useful in them with vast overplus and advantage and even swallows them up as Moses's Rod did those pitiful Tools of the Magicians This I say brings to my Mind whether I will or no a certain Story of a Grave Person who Riding in the Road with his Servant and finding himself something uneasy in his Saddle bespoke his Servant thus John says he a-light and first take off the Saddle that is upon my Horse and then take off the Saddle that is upon your Horse and when you have done this put the Saddle that was upon my Horse upon your Horse and put the Saddle that was upon your Horse upon my Horse Whereupon the Man who had not studied the Philosophy of Saddles whether Ambling or Trotting so exactly as his Master replys something short upon him Lord Master What needs all these Words Could you not as well have said Let us change Saddles Now I must confess I think the Servant was much in the right though the Master having a Rational Head of his own and being withal willing to make the Notion of changing Saddles more plain easie and intelligible and to give a clearer Explication of that word which his Fore-Fathers how good Horse-men soever they might have been yet were not equally happy in the explaining of was pleased to set it forth by that more full and accurate Circumlocution And here it is not unlikely but that this Author who with a spight equally Malicious and Ridiculous has reflected upon one of his Antagonists and that for no Cause or Provocation that appears unless for having Baffled him may tax me also as one Drolling upon Things sacred
Term One True God or One only True God and the Term One True God or One only True God including in it no more than the Term One God and consequently if he asserts That these Terms cannot with equal Propriety be attributed to and predicated of the Son and the Holy Ghost we have him both Arian and Macedonian together in this Assertion And I believe his Adversary the Author of the Notes could hardly have desired a greater Advantage against him than his calling it as he does a Corruption of the Athanasian Creed to joyn the Term One True God to every Person of the Trinity adding withal That upon the doing so it would sound pretty like a Contradiction to say in the close That there was but One True God These are our Author's words but much fitter to have proceeded from a Socinian than from one professing a belief and which is more a defence of the Trinity But in answer to them I tell him That the repeated Attribution of The One True God or Only True God to each of the Three Persons is no Corruption of that Creed at all Forasmuch as these Terms The One True God and the only True God import an Attribute purely Essential and so equally and in Common belonging to all the Three Persons and not an Attribute properly Personal and so appropriate to some one or other of the said Persons And if this Author would have duly distinguished between Essential and Personal Attributes he could not have discoursed of these Matters at so odd a rate as here he does And therefore I deny it to be any Contradiction let it sound in his Ears how it will to conclude That the said Three Persons notwithstanding this Repetition are not Three True Gods but only One True God But he says That such a Repeated Application implies as if each Person considered as distinguished and separated from the other were the One True God To which I Answer 1. That to imply as if a thing were so and to imply that really it is so makes a very great difference in the case indeed so great that this Author must not think from words implying only the former to conclude the latter which yet must be done or what he here alledges is nothing to his purpose But 2. I Answer yet farther That the forementioned words do indeed imply and which is more plainly declare That the Three Persons who are said to be the One or only True God are while they sustain that Attribute really distinct from one another but it does not imply That this is said of them under that peculiar Formality as they are distinct and much less as separated which latter they neither are nor can be The truth is what he has said against the repeated Application of this Term to every one of the Three Persons may be equally objected against all the repeated Predications in the Athanasian Creed but to as little purpose one as the other since albeit all these Predications do agree to Persons really distinct yet they agree not to them under that formal and precise consideration as distinct For nothing but their respective Personal Relations agree to them under that Capacity and this effectually clears off this objection But here I cannot but wonder that this Man should jumble together these two Terms distinguished and separated as he does twice here in the compass of eight Lines when the signification of them as applyed to the Three Divine Persons is so vastly different that one of these Terms viz. distinguished necessarily belongs to them and the other which is separated neither does nor can take place amongst them Nay and when this Author himself has so earnestly and frequently contended for the difference of them as all along asserting the distinction of Persons and as often denying their separation But he proceeds and says That this Expression of The One or only True God is never that he knows of attributed to Son or Holy Ghost either in Scripture or any Catholick Writer Which words methinks as I cannot but observe again do not look as if a Man were Writing against the Socinians Nevertheless admitting the Truth of his Allegation That this Term the One True God is not to be found expresly attributed to the Son or the Holy Ghost will he infer from hence that therefore it neither can nor ought to be so For if that be attributed to them Both in Scripture and Catholick Writers which necessarily and essentially implys The One True God and does and must signifie the very same Thing is it not all one as if in Terminis it had been ascribed to them Doubtless there are several other Expressions in the Athanasian Creed as hardly as this to be found elsewhere However the Thing being certain from other words equivalent this exception is of no force at all nor by any one who understands these Matters is or ought to be accounted so and much less can I see to what end it should be insisted upon by any one while he is encountring the Socinians And therefore whereas he says This Attribute or Title viz. The One True God cannot so properly be ascribed to any one Person but only to the Father whom he tells us the Fathers call the Fountain of the Deity what he here designs by the words so properly which seem to import degrees of Propriety I cannot well tell But this I ask in short May it be properly attributed to the Son and to the Holy Ghost or may it not If not then they are not properly The One True God nor consequently are they properly The True God For whatsoever any one properly is that he may be properly said to be And as for the Father 's being the Fountain of the Deity I hope he looks upon this Expression only as Metaphorical and such as ought not to be stretched to the utmost of its Native Sence for fear the Consequences of it may engage him too far to be able to make an handsome Retreat which I assure him if he does not take heed they certainly will But in a word I demand of him Whether the Father 's being the Fountain of Deity does appropriate and restrain the Thing expressed by the One True God to the Father in contra-distinction to the other Two Persons or not If it does then the same Absurdity recurs viz. That neither is the Son nor the Holy Ghost the One True God and consequently neither simply really and essentially God But on the other side if the Father 's being the Fountain of the Deity does not appropriate the Thing signified by the One True God to the Father then it leaves it common to the other Two Persons with Himself and to each of them And whatsoever is so may with the same Propriety and Truth of Speech be ascribed to and affirmed of them as it is often ascribed to and affirmed of the Father Himself The Truth is this Man 's adventurous and unwary way of
expressing himself in this sacred and arduous Subject to give it no worse word whatsoever it may deserve affords the Arians and Socinians no small Advantages against this Doctrine should it stand upon the strength of His Defence as thanks be to God it does not But I must not here omit that Passage which in the former part of this Chapter I promised more particularly to consider a Passage which indeed looks something strangely It is that in P. 258. line 27. where he tells us that he allows That in the Blessed Trinity there are Three Holy Spirits but denys That there are Three Holy Ghosts so natural is it for false Opinions to force Men to absurd Expressions But my Answer to him is short and positive That neither are there Three Holy Spirits nor Three Holy Ghosts in the Blessed Trinity in any sense properly belonging to these words However the Thing meant by him so far as it is reducible to Truth and Reason is and must be this viz. That when the Third Person of the Trinity is called the Holy Ghost there the word Holy Ghost which otherwise signifies the same with Holy Spirit must be taken Personally and consequently Incommunicably but when the Father or Son is said to be a Spirit or Holy Spirit there Spirit must be understood Essentially for that Immaterial Spiritual and Divine Nature which is common to and Predicable of all the Divine Persons All which is most true But then for this very Reason I must tell our Author withal That as Holy Ghost taken Personally is but Numerically one so Spirit or Holy Spirit as it is understood Essentially is but Numerically one too And therefore though the Father may be called a Spirit or Holy Spirit and the two other Persons may each of them be called so likewise yet they are not therefore Three distinct Spirits or Holy Spirits nor can be truly so called as this Author pretends they ought to be and we have sufficiently disproved but they are all one and the same Holy Spirit Essentially taken and which so taken is as much as one and the same God And moreover though Spirit understood Personally distinguishes the Third Person from the other two yet taken Essentially it speaks him one and the same Spirit as well as one and the same God with them and can by no means distinguish him from them any more than the Divine Essence or Nature which Spirit in this sence is only another word for can discriminate the Three Persons from one another So that upon the whole Matter it is equally false and impossible That in the Blessed Trinity there should be Three Holy Spirits or Holy Ghosts Terms perfectly Synonymous either upon a Personal or an Essential account and consequently that there should be so at all For as the word Spirit imports a peculiar Mode of Subsistence by way of Spiration from the Father and the Son so it is Personal and Incommunicable but as it imports the Immaterial Substance of the Deity so indeed as being the same with the Deity it self it is equally Common to all the Three Persons but still for all that remains Numerically one and no more as all must acknowledge the Deity to be And this is the true state of the Case But to state the difference between the Holy Ghost and the other Two Persons upon something signified by Holy Ghost which is not signified by Holy Spirit as the words of this Author manifestly do while he affirms Three Holy Spirits but denies Three Holy Ghosts this is not only a playing with words which he pretends to scorn but a taking of words for things which I am sure is very ridiculous And now before I conclude this Chapter having a Debt upon me declared at the beginning of it I leave it to the Impartial and Discreet Reader to judge what is to be thought or said of that Man who in such an Insolent Decretorious manner shall in such a point as this before us charge Nonsense and Heresie two very vile words upon all that Subscribe not to this his New and before unheard of Opinion I must profess I never met with the like in any Sober Author and hardly in the most Licentious Libeller The Nature of the Subject I have according to my poor Abilities discussed and finding my self thereupon extremely to dissent from this Author am yet by no means willing to pass for a Nonsensical Heretick for my pains For must it be Nonsence not to own Contradictions viz. That One infinite Spirit is Three distinct Infinite Spirits Or must it be Heresie not to Subscribe to Tritheisme as the best and most Orthodox Explication of the Article of the Trinity As for Non-sence it must certainly imply the asserting of something for true concerning the Subject discoursed of which yet in truth is contradictory to it since there can be no Non-sence but what contradicts some Truth And whereas this Author has elsewhere viz. P. 4. declared it unreasonable to charge a contradiction in any Thing where the Nature of the Thing discoursed of is not throughly comprehended and understood I desire to know of him whether he throughly understands and comprehends the Article and Mystery of the Trinity If he says he does I need no other Demonstration of his unfitness to write about it But if he owns that he does not let him only stick to his own Rule and then he may keep the Charge of Non-sense to himself But what shall we say to the Charge of Heresie in which St. Austin would have no Person who is so charged to be silent Why in the first place we must search and enquire whether it be so or no And here if my Life lay upon it I cannot find either in Irenaeus adversùs Haereses or in Tertullian's Prescriptions contra Haereticos Cap. 49. Nor in Philastrius's Catalogue nor in Epiphanius nor in St. Austin nor in Theodoret nor in Iohannes Damascenus's Book de Haeresibus nor in the latter Haeresiologists such as Alphonsus à Castro Prateolus with several others I cannot I say find in all or in any one of these the Heresie of not asserting the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity to be Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits no nor yet the Heresie of denying them to be so But where then may we find it Why in this Author's Book And therefore look no further it is enough that so great a Master has said it whose Authority in saying a Thing is as good as another Man 's in proving it at any time And he says it as we see positively and perhaps if need be will be ready to take his Corporal Oath upon it That such as deny his Hypothesis are Hereticks Now in this case our Condition is in good earnest very sad and I know nothing to comfort us but that the Statute de Haeretico comburendo is Repealed And well is it for the Poor Clergy and Church of England that it is so for otherwise this Man
would have kindled such a Fire for them as would have torrified them with a vengeance But as he has stocked the Church with such plenty of New Hereticks and all of his own making so could he by a sway of Power as Arbitrary as his Divinity provide for them also such a Furnace as that of Nebuchadnezzar whom in his Imperious Meen and Humour he so much resembles yet he must not think That the Sound and Iingle of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness how melodiously soever they may tinkle in his own Ears will ever be able to Charm Me◠over to the Worship of his Idol or make them Sacrifice their Reason and Religion either to Him or to the New Notions which he has set up And indeed I cannot but here further declare that to me it seems one of the most preposterous and unreasonable things in Nature for any one first to assert Three Gods and when he has so wel furnished the World with Deities to expect that all Mankind should fall down and Worship Him CHAP. VI. In which is Considered What this Author pretends to from the Authority of the Fathers and School men in behalf of his Hypothesis and shewn in the first place That neither do the Fathers own the Three Divine Persons to be Three Distinct Infinite Minds nor Self-Consciousness to be the Formal Reason of their Distinction I Have in the foregoing Chapters debated the Point with this Author upon the Reason and Nature of the Thing it self But that is not all which he pretends to defend his Cause by endeavouring to countenance it also with great Authorities and that in these positive and remarkable words This is no New Notion says he but the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools Page 101. These are his very words and I desire the Reader carefully to consider and carry them along with him in his Memory For as they are as positive as Confidence can make them so if they are not made good to the utmost they ought severely to recoil upon any one who shall presume to express himself at such a Rate And now that we may do him all the right that may be The way to know whether this Author's Hypothesis be the Constant Doctrine of the Fathers and Schools is in the first place truly and fairly to set down what this Author's Doctrine is and wherein it does consist as we shall declare what the received Doctrine of the Fathers and Schools is in our Eighth Chapter Now we shall find That the whole Doctrine delivered by him concerning the Blessed Trinity is comprehended under and reducible to these four Heads First That the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits Secondly That Self-Consciousness is the Formal Reason of Personality and consequently that each of the Divine Persons is such by a distinct Self-Consciousness properly and peculiarly belonging to him Thirdly That the Three Divine Persons being thus distinguished from one another by a distinct Self-Consciousness proper to each of them are all United in one and the same Nature by one Mutual Consciousness Common to them all And Fourthly and Lastly That a Trinity in Unity and an Unity in Trinity by this Explication and Account given of it is a very Plain Easie and Intelligible Notion These four Heads or Particulars I say contain in them a full and fair representation of this Author 's whole Hypothesis concerning the Oeconomy of the Blessed Trinity And I am well assured That the knowing and Impartial Reader neither will nor can deny that they do so In the next place therefore that we may see how far our Author makes good all the said Particulars by the Authority of the Fathers as he has peremptorily promised and undertook to do I think it requisite to consider how the Fathers expressed themselves upon this Subject and how this Author brings the said Expressions to his purpose For surely the natural way of knowing any Writer's Mind is by the Words and Expressions which he pretends to deliver his Mind by But concerning these we have our Author declaring First That he has not troubled his Reader with the signification of Essence Hypostasis Substance Subsistence Person Existence Nature c. Pag. 101. and some of his Readers could give him a very good Reason why though I fear too true for him to be pleased with But the Reasons which he himself alledges for his not troubling his Readers either with these Terms or the Explication of them are First That they were very differently used by the Fathers themselves Page 101. And be it so yet still for all that used by them they were and that not so very differently neither the chief difference having been about the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which yet was fairly accorded and well high setled between the Greeks and the Latines before the end of the 6th Century as shall be further made to appear in our Eighth Chapter And his next Reason for his not troubling his Reader forsooth with these Terms is Because they have as he tells us very much obscured the Doctrine of the Trinity instead of explaining it Page 101. which being one of the chief Things which he might conclude would assuredly be disputed with Him for Him thus to presume it before he had proved it is manifestly to beg the Question In the mean time certain it is That these and these only were the Terms which the Father 's used in their Disputes about the Trinity and by which they managed them and consequently were they never so Ambiguous Faulty or Improper as they are much the contrary yet whosoever will pretend to give the Sence of the Fathers must have recourse to them and do it by them and to do otherwise would be to dispute at Rovers or as the word is to speak without Book which may much better become our Author in the Pulpit than in the management of such a Controversie And now let the Reader whom he is so fearful of troubling with any Thing that is to the Purpose judge Whether this Man has not took a most extraordinary way of proving his Doctrine the very same with the Fathers For neither in the first place does he set down what the Doctrine of the Fathers concerning the Trinity was which yet one would have thought was absolutely necessary for the shewing how his own Doctrine agreed with it which he professed to be his design Nor in the next place does he either use or regard or offer to explain those Terms which the Fathers all along delivered that their Doctrine in but is so far from it That he reproaches explodes and utterly rejects them as serving only to obscure this Doctrine instead of explaining it Which in my poor Judgment is such a way of proving the Fathers on his side as perhaps the World never heard of before and will be amazed at now But it is his way and it will
is more like to be known by than ever admired for and so much happiness attend him with it But as little success as we have had in seeking for his Darling and peculiar Notion of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness in the Ancient Writers of the Church we are like to find no more in seeking for his other equally espoused Notion and Opinion there viz. That the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits We find indeed the Terms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. but not one Tittle of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 except where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as I hinted before is sometimes used in the same sense and signification with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in this case I am sure no difficulty of framing Words or Terms as might possibly in some measure be pretended in the Case of Self-Consciousness can with any colour of Reason be alledged for our not finding this Notion in the Fathers had the thing it self been at all there For can there be any words more Obvious and Familiar than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek or than Tres Spiritus or Tres Mentes in the Latine But neither one nor the other are to be met with any where amongst them as applied to the Subject now before us But in Answer to this I expect that our Author will reply That they are not the words Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits or those other of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness but the things meant and signified by them which he affirms to be found in the Fathers But this is the very thing which I insist upon against him viz. That the Non-usage of these words nor any other equivalent to them in the Works of those Ancient Writers while they were so particularly and nicely disputing this Matter is a solid Argument That neither are the things themselves there For that all those Great and Acute Men should mean the very same thing with this Author and not one of them ever light upon the same words is not rationally to be imagined For What Reason can be given of this Was either the Thing it self as I noted before of such deep or sublime Speculation as not to be reached by them Or the Language they wrote in too scanty to express their Speculations by Or can we think that the Fathers wrote Things without Words as some do but too often write Words without Things So that to me it is evident to a Demonstration That the Fathers never judged nor held in this Matter as this Author pretends they did And besides all this there is yet one Consideration more and that of greater weight with me than all that has been or can be objected against this Man's pretensions viz. That it seems to me and I question not but to all Sober Persons else and that upon good reason wholly unsuteable to the wise and good Method of God's Providence That a clear Discovery of such a Principal Mystery of the Christian Religion as the Trinity is should now at length be owing to the Invention or lucky Hit of any one Man's single Mind or Fancy which so many Pious Humble as well as Excellently Learned Persons with long and tedious search and the hardest study and these no doubt joyned with frequent and servent Prayers to God to enlighten and direct them in that search have been continually breathing after but could never attain to for above Sixteen Hundred Years together This I freely own and declare That I judge it morally impossible for any serious thinking Person ever to bring himself to the belief of and much less for any one not intoxicated with intolerable Pride to arrogate to Himself To which sort of Persons God never reveals any thing extraordinary for the good of the World or of themselves either But since I am now upon Disputation which has its proper Laws and that this Author may have no ground of Exception I will proceed to examine his Quotations out of the Fathers and try whether his Hypothesis may be found there where it is certain that we can find none of his Terms And here he first begins with the Distinction of the Divine Persons where I must remind him That it is not the bare proving a Distinction of Persons which none who acknowledges a Trinity either doubts of or much less denies which will here serve his turn but He must prove also That they stand distinguished as Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits and that this Distinction is owing to Three distinct Self-Consciousnesses belonging to them otherwise all his Proofs will fall beside his Hypothesis This premised I will consider what he alledges And in the first place he positively tells us Page 101. That no Man who acknowledges a Trinity of Persons ever denied That the Son and Holy Spirit were Intelligent Minds or Beings To which I Answer First That it is not sufficient for him who advances a Controverted Proposition that none can be produced who before denied it but it lies upon him the Advancer of it to produce some who have affirmed it Forasmuch as a bare non-denial of a Thing never before affirmed can of it self neither prove nor disprove any Thing But Secondly I Answer further That if none of the Ancient Writers did ever in express Terms deny this it was because none had before in express Terms asserted it But then I add also That the Ancients have expresly asserted that which irrefragably inferrs a Negation of the said Proposition For they have affirmed That the Son and Holy Spirit are one single Intelligent Mind and consequently that being so they cannot possibly be more And this is a full Answer to this sorry shift for an Argument I am sure it deserves not to be called But he proceeds from Negatives to Positives and tells us Page 101. That it is the Constant Language of the Fathers for it seems he has read them all That the Son is the Substantial Word and Wisdom of the Father and that this can be nothing else but to say That he is an Intelligent Being or Infinite Mind And he is so I confess But does this inferr That He is therefore a distinct Intelligent Mind or Being from the Father This we deny and it is the very Thing which he ought to prove And it is not come to that pass yet that we should take his bare affirmation for a Proof of what he affirms He comes now to Particulars and tells us That Gregory Nyssen though since he neither mentions Book nor Page this ought not to pass for a Quotation calls the Son 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which this Author renders Mind or Intellect And I will not deny but that it may by consequence import so much but I am sure it does not by direct Signification 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies properly Res quaedam Intellectualls or Intellectu praedita And since
Sum of his Argument from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In Answer to which before I address my self to his Argument I will give some Account of the Quotation In which by his Favour we are to take the sense of the Father's words from the Father himself and not from the Inferences which he who Quotes them thinks fit to draw from them how good soever he may be at that Work Now what St. Gregory means by them appears plainly by his manner of Reasoning The Question before him was Whether the Three Divine Persons were Three Gods Which St. Gregory denies and amongst other Proofs says That God is the Name of Energy and from the Unity of Energy proves the Unity of the Deity and that three Persons are but one God because the Operation is the same in all To this he raises an Objection from the Sameness of Faculty Office or Operation amongst Men as Geometricians Husbandmen Orators whose Office Business and Operations in their respective way are the same which yet does not hinder but that they are still Three or more several Men. To which he Answers that these act seperately and by themselves but that it is not so in the Divine Nature no Person in the Holy Trinity doing any Thing by himself only or acting separately from the other Two but that there is one and the same Motion ond Disposition of Will passing from the Father through the Son to the Holy Ghost This is the force of St. Gregory's Reasoning and the plain meaning of it is no more but this That Three Men acting the same Thing are still Three Men because they act separately and by themselves but that the Three Persons in the Trinity are but One God because they do not act separately but that there is the same Motion and Disposition of Will in all the Three Persons as on the contrary Three Men's not having one and the same Motion of Will equally proves That they are not One but Three several Men and accordingly makes a manifest difference between Three Men acting the same Thing and the Operation of the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity which is the Sum of St. Gregory's Answer to the forementioned Objection And now what does all this prove Why truly neither of those Two Things which this Author must prove or he proves nothing viz. That this Unity of Motion and Disposition of Will is properly and formally Unity of Divine Nature And next That this Unity of Divine Nature is properly Mutual Consciousness These two Things I say it is incumbent upon him to prove But how it can be done from the fore-mentioned Words or Argument of Gregory Nyssen I believe will pose the Learned'st Man alive to shew The proper Answer therefore to this Argument will be much the same with that just before given to the Argument drawn from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of which this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is but a Branch and it proceeds thus First I deny the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be any more than a proof of the Unity of the Divine Nature just as either the Effect or the Causality is a sure proof of the Cause but for all that is not the Cause or as a Consequent proves its Antecedent without being the Antecedent or that wherein the Nature of the Antecedent does consist Secondly In the next place I deny that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is formally and properly the same with Mutual-Consciousness any more than an Act or Motion of the Will is formally the same with an Act of the Understanding And before this Author takes it for granted which is his constant way of proving things I expect that he make it appear That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie formally one and the same Thing And it was boldly done of him to say the least to appeal to his Reader about a Thing in which if he understood the difference between an Act of Volition and an Act of Intellection he must certainly judge against him But it may be reply'd That this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does at least inserr a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I grant it may But affirm That this is nothing to his Purpose unless it could follow from hence that that which inferrs or proves a Thing is the very Thing which it inferrs and proves which it neither is nor for that Reason can be As for what he adds That this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cannot be in the Three Divine Persons without such a Mutual-Consciousness I do readily grant this also But in the mean time is not this Dictator yet old enough to distinguish between the Causa sinè quâ non or rather the Condition of a Thing and the Ratio formalis or Nature of that Thing Between That without which a Thing cannot be and that which that Thing properly is There can be no such Thing as Sight without a due Circulation of the Blood and Spirits But is such a Circulation therefore properly an Act of Sight Or an Act of Sight such a Circulation To dispute this further would be but to abuse the Reader 's Patience And last of all if this Author should take advantage of those words from Gregory Nyssen That God is the Name of Energy Besides that it is not the bare Notation but use of the Word that must govern its signification I would have this Author know That God may have many Names by which his Nature is not signified as well as several others by which it is and may be But I must confess it is a very pleasant Thing as was in some measure hinted before to prove the Divine Nature to be Energy because the Name God does not signifie Nature but Energy or Operation whereas in Truth if it proves any thing it proves that Nature and Energy applyed to God do by no means signifie the same Thing And so I have done with his Argument from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and effectually demonstrated That there is not so much as the least shew or semblance of any proof from this That Mutual Consciousness is properly that wherein the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity does consist 3. His Third Argument is from the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 commonly Translated Circumincession and signifying a Mutual-Inexistence or In-dwelling of each Person in the other Two The Word was first used in this sence so far as I can find by Damascen a Father of the 8th Century But the Thing meant by it is contained in those words of our Saviour in Iohn 14. 11. 21. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me which I confess are a solid and sufficient proof of the Unity and Identity of the Divine Nature both in the Father and the Son and withal a very happy and significant Expression of the same
case abundantly sufficient St. Cyril of Alexandria says expresly Christ's saying that he is in the Father and the Father in him shews the Indentity of the Deity and the Unity of the Substance or Essence And so likewise Athanasius Accordingly therefore says he Christ having said before I and my Father are one He adds I am in the Father and the Father in me that he might shew both the Identity of the Divinity and the Unity of Essence And so again St. Hilary The Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father by the Unity of an inseparable Undivided Nature By which Passages I suppose any Man of sense will perceive That the thing which the Fathers meant and gathered from those words of our Saviour since expressed by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was no Unity of Mutual Consciousness which they never mention but an Unity of Essence or Nature which they expresly and constantly do Nor does this very Author deny it as appears from his own words though he quite perverts the sence of the Fathers by a very senceless Remark upon them Page 125. lines 20 21. This Sameness or Unity of Nature says he might be the Cause of this Union in the Divine Persons viz by a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but not explain what this Intimate Union is Now this Author has been already told That the Question here is not what explains this Union but what this Union is But besides this his mistake of the Question I desire him to declare what he means by the Cause of this Union as he here expresses himself For will he make an Union as he calls an Unity in the Divine Persons by Sameness of Nature a Cause of their Intimate Union by a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mutual In-being of them in each other and affirm also this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be the same thing with Mutual Consciousness If he does so he makes the same thing the Cause of it self For the Sameness of Nature in the three Persons and their Mutual In-being or Indwelling are the very same thing and the same Unity though differently expressed But however if we take him at his own word it will effectually overthrow his Hypothesis For if the Sameness of the Divine Nature in the three Persons be as he says the cause of this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be the same with Mutual Consciousness it will and must follow That this Sameness or Unity of Nature can no more consist in Mutual Consciousness than the Cause can consist in its Effect or the Antecedent in its Consequent And this Inference stands firm and unanswerable against him But as to the Truth of the Thing it self though we allow and grant the Unity of the Divine Nature in the Three Persons and the Mutual In-being or In-dwelling of the said Persons in each other to be the same Thing yet we deny That this their Mutual In-being is the same with their Mutual Consciousness But that their Mutual Consciousness follows and results from it and for that cause cannot be formally the same with it And so I have done with his 3d. Argument which he has drawn from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and is indeed nothing else but a bold down-right Perversion of Scripture and a gross Abuse of the Fathers 4. His fourth Argument is from an Allegation out of St. Austin who though he does not as our Author confesses Name this Mutual Consciousness yet he explains a Trinity in Unity as he would perswade us by Examples of Mutual Consciousness particularly by the Unity of three Faculties of Understanding Memory and Will in the same Soul all of them Mutually Conscious to one another of the several Acts belonging to each of them And his 9th Book is spent upon this Argument In which he makes the mind considered with its knowledge of it self and its love of it self all three of them as he says but one and the same Thing a faint Resemblance of the Trinity in Unity And this is what he Argues from St. Austin To which I Answer First That Faint Resemblances are far from being solid Proofs of any Thing and that although similitudes may serve to illustrate a thing otherwise proved yet they prove and conclude nothing The Fathers indeed are full of them both upon this and several other Subjects but still they use them for Illustration only and nothing else And it is a scurvy sign that Proofs and Arguments run very low with this Author when he passes over those Principal Places in which the Fathers have plainly openly and professedly declared their Judgment upon this great Article and endeavours to gather their sence of it only from Similitudes and Allusions which looks like a design of putting his Reader off with something like an Argument and not an Argument and of which the Tail stands where the Head should For according to the true Method of proving things the Reason should always go first and the Similitude come after but by no means ought the Similitude ever to be put instead of the Reason But Secondly To make it yet clearer how unconclusive this Author's Allegation from St. Austin is I shall demonstrate That this Father does not here make use of an Example of Mutual Consciousness by shewing the great disparity between the thing alledged and the thing which it is applyed to and that as to the very Case which it is alledged for For we must observe That the Mutual Consciousness of the Persons of the Blessed Trinity is such as is fully and entirely in each Person so that by virtue thereof every one of them is truly and properly Conscious of all that belongs to the other Two But it is by no means so in those three Faculties of the Soul Understanding Memory and Will For though the Understanding indeed be Conscious to all that passes in the Will yet I deny the Will to be Conscious to any Thing or Act that passes either in the Understanding or the Memory and it is impossible it should be so without exerting an Act of Knowledge or Intellection which to ascribe to the Faculty of the Will would be infinitely absurd It is true indeed That one and the same Soul is Conscious to it self of the Acts of all these three Faculties But still it is by virtue of its Intellectual Faculty alone that it is so And the like is to be said of its Knowledge and of its Love of it self For though it be the same Soul which both Knows and Loves it self yet it neither knows it self by an Act of Love nor loves it self by an Act of Knowledge any more than it can Will by an Act of the Memory or Remember by an Act of the Will which is impossible and amongst other proofs that it is so it seems to me a very considerable one That if a Man could remember by his Will this Author in all likelyhood would not forget
other of these in Conjunction with Essence or Substance we give account of all the Acts Attributes and Personalities belonging to the Divine Nature or God-head This is the constant unanimously received Doctrine of Divines School-men and Metaphysicians in their Discourses upon God and without which it is impossible to Discourse intelligibly of the Divine Acts Attributes or Persons And as it stands upon a firm bottom so it may well be defended And if this Author has ought to except against it I shall be ready to undertake the defence of it against him at any time But still that he may keep up that Glorious standing Character of Self-Contradiction which one would think to be the very Ratio formalis or at least the Personal Property of the Man Having here in Page 130. made a very bold step by Asserting the three Divine Persons to be three distinct Acts and so distinct that they can never be one Simple Individual Act. In the very next Page but one viz. 132. line 13. he roundly affirms That the Father and the Son are one single Energy and Operation Now how safe and happy is this Man that no Absurdities or Contradictions can ever hurt him Or at least that he never feels them let them pinch never so close and hard What remains is chiefly a Discourse about the different way of the Son 's issuing from the Father and the Holy Ghost's issuing from both As that the former is called Generation because the Son issues from the Father by a Reflex Act and the latter termed Procession because the Holy Ghost issues from both by a Direct Act. But why a Reflex Act must needs be termed properly a Generation and a Direct Act not be capable of being properly so accounted this our Acute Author very discreetly says nothing at all to though under favour all that he says besides leaves us as much in the Dark as we were before And for my own part I cannot think my self concerned to clear up a Point wholly foreign to that which alone I have undertook the Discussion of And thus I have finished my Dispute with Him concerning the Authorities of the Fathers alledged in behalf of his Notion of Mutual Consciousness as that wherein he places the Unity of the Divine Nature belonging to the three Blessed Persons The Sum of which whole Dispute is resolved into this single Question viz. In what the Father 's placed the Unity in Trinity And if they placed it in the Sameness or Unity of Nature Substance or Essence words applyed by them to this Subject at least a thousand Times and still used to signifie one and the same thing then it is plain that they did not place it in an Unity of Mutual Consciousness For I suppose no Man this Author himself not excepted will say That Essence or Substance and Mutual Consciousness are Terms Synonymous and of the same signification And as the whole Dispute turns upon this single Question so in the management of it on my part I have with great particularity gone over all the Proofs by which this Author pretends to have evinced his Doctrine from the Fathers The utmost of which Proofs amounts to this That the Fathers proved an Unity of Nature in the Divine Persons from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 common to them all And moreover sometimes illustrated the said Unity by the three Faculties of the Understanding Memory and Will being one with the Soul which they belonged to And lastly That they resolved the Unity of the Trinity into an Unity of Principle the Father being upon that account styled Principium fons Deitatis as communicating the Divine Substance to the Son and together with the Son to the Holy Ghost And what of all this I pray Do all or any of the fore-mentioned Terms signifie Mutual Consciousness Why No But this Author with a non obstante both to the proper signification and common use of them all by absolute Prerogative declares them to mean Mutual Consciousness And so his Point is proved viz That Mutual Consciousness is not only an Argument inferring the Unity of the Divine Nature in the three Blessed Persons which yet was all that the Fathers used the fore-mentioned Terms for but which is more That it is that very thing wherein this Unity does Consist This I say is a true though a short Account of all his Arguments upon this Subject and according to my custom I refer it to the Judicious Reader to judge impartially whether it be not so and withall to improve and carry on the aforesaid Arguments in his behalf to all further advantage that they may be capable of But in the issue methinks the Author himself seems to review them with much less confidence of their Puissance than when at first he produced them For if we look back upon the Triumphant Flag hung out by him at his Entrance upon this part of his Work the only proper time for him to Triumph in and when he declared That his Explication of the Trinity was the Constant Doctrine of the Fathers and the Schools Page 101. lines 24 25. who could have imagined but that he then foresaw that he should prove his Point with all the strength and evidence which his own Heart could desire And yet alas Such for the most part is the vast distance between Promises and Performances that we have him bringing up the Rear of all with this sneaking Conclusion Page 138. line 22 c. It must be confessed says he That the Ancient Fathers did not express their sence in the same Terms that I have done But I leave it to any Indifferent and Impartial Reader whether they do not seem to have intended the same Explication which I have given of this Venerable Mystery These are his words and I do very particularly recommend them to the Reader as deserving his peculiar Notice For is this now the Upshot and Result of so daring a Boast and so confident an Undertaking to prove his Opinion the constant Doctrine of the Fathers viz. That though the Fathers speak not one word of it nay though they knew not how to express themselves about it Page 125. line 18. yet that to an Indifferent Reader and a very indifferent one indeed he must needs be in the worst sence they may seem to intend the same Explication he had given of it So that the sum of his whole Proof and Argument amounts to this and no more viz. That to some Persons videtur quod sic and to others videtur quod non For see how low he sinks in the issue First of all from the Fathers positive saying or holding what he does it is brought down to their Intending it and from their Intending it it falls at last to their seeming to intend it and that is all And now is not this a worthy Proof of so high a Point And may it not justly subject this
in us an Adequate Notion thereof Hitherto both Divines and Philosophers have judged the Divine Nature absolutely Incomprehensible by any Adequate or Complete Conception of it And for my own part I account the Unity of it in Trinity much less capable of having an Adequate Notion formed of it than the Deity considered barely in self is and consequently that it is as much as Humane Reason can reach to to have a true and certain Notion of it though very Imperfect and Inadequate But as for an Adequate Notion of the Unity of the God-head in three Divine Persons if this Author can form to himself such an one let him enjoy it as a Priviledge peculiar to himself and not obtainable by any other Mortal Man whatsoever And this is not the first Instance of his misrepresenting the Fathers Secondly Whereas this Author in the latter end of Page 138 and the beginning of Page 139. explodes the Terms Essence Substance Subsistence Hypostasis Person c. as useless Niceties and serving only to confound the Mystery of the Trinity and yet nevertheless in line 12 c. of Page 139. acknowledges That these very Terms were found out and made use of to encounter the Heresie of Sabellius who had turned this Sacred Mystery into a Trinity of Names or at most of Offices I desire to know of him what greater Proof he could have given of the exceeding usefulness and importance of these Terms than by thus deriving the invention and use of them from such an Occasion And especially when notwithstanding all the Curious Examination since passed upon them whereby he says they were found in some respect or other defective as what Terms are not when applyed to God experience yet shews that they have maintained their Use and Credit from that Age all along to this very Day Certainly it is a great Unhappiness when a Man can neither forbear Writing nor yet know when he Writes for a thing and when against it Thirdly I desire to know of this Author whether in the very same place viz. Page 130. in which he professes to explain an Unity in Trinity by an Unity of Principle he does well to tell us in line 19. of the said Page That there is nothing but Essence and Substance in God having so often and so positively declared That these Terms serve only to obscure and confound Men's Notions of God And whether he accounts such Terms as serve only thus to confound Men's thoughts and notions about the God-head and the Unity thereof the fittest to explain the Unity of the said God-head with reference to the Divine Persons Which is the thing there promised and undertaken by Him Fourthly and Lastly Since this Author has condemned all the fore-mentioned Terms both as useless and sit only to obscure and confound instead of explaining the Doctrine of the Trinity I desire to know of him why he tells us at the close of Page 139. That he does not think it impossible which is only a Figure called a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying that it is very possible and easie to give a Tolerable Account of the said School-Terms and Distinctions For since by a Tolerable he must mean if he means any thing to the Purpose such an Account of them as shews them to have a Rational Sence and meaning under them I desire him to tell me whether every Rational Sence is not as such also a True one And if True whether one Truth can any more obscure perplex and confound than it can contradict another Truth Which being invincibly evident as to the Negative I desire this Author in the last place to tell me whether it does or can become a Man consistent with himself to pass so Reproachful a Character upon the Terms of the Schools in the beginning of Page 139 and afterwards to give so contrary and commendatory an Account of the said Terms in the latter end of the very same Page I hope the Reader will be pleased to take this Notable Instance also of this Author's Consistency with himself so far as Self Contradiction may be so called into his Consideration And so these are the Four Questions or Queries which I would have him resolve me or rather the World in for I am sure it concerns him and his Credit so to do Having thus followed this Author both in his Reasonings and Quotations and found him equally Impertinent in both I must again desire my Reader to joyn with me in admiring the strange Confidence of the Man I have already noted with what a daring Assurance he vouched his new Opinion for the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools Page 101. line 24. c. After which Peremptory Asseveration who could have expected but that he would have appeared in the Head of Thirty or Twenty Fathers at least Greek and Latin together to have rescued his beloved Hypothesis from the Imputation and Charge of Novelty which he seems so desirous to Ward off P. 100. l. 22. And that besides Gr. Nyssen Athanasius Maximus Nazianzen Damascen and these for the most part quoted upon an Account not at all relating to his Hypothesis and St. Cyril who is not so much as quoted but only Named we should have had Iustin Martyr Irenaeus Origen Clemens Alexandrinus St. Basil Theodoret Epiphanius with several more all alledged in his behalf And amongst the Latins that we should besides St. Austin whom alone he quotes and St. Ambrose whom he only mentions about the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Page 107. line 10. have heard also of Tertullian Lactantius St. Cyprian St. Ierom and St. Hilary with a great many others And then lastly for the School-men who could have expected fewer of them also than Ten or Twenty And that we should have seen Alexander Alensis the first who Commented upon the Oracle with Durandus Aquinas Scotus Major Biel Soto Vasquez Cajetan Gr. de Valentiâ Estius and many more of the Scholastick Tribe all drawn forth in Rank and File to have fought his Battels But when after all none but poor Peter Lombard comes forth like a Doughty Captain with none to follow him this methinks looks more like the Despair of a Cause than the Defence of it For though our Author calls Peter Lombard the Oracle of the Schools and all know his Sentences to be the Text which the School-men undertake to Explain and Comment upon Yet Experience has told us That the Responses of this Oracle as well as of those heretofore are often found very Dubious and Ambiguous Witness Thomas and his Followers expounding them one way and Scotus and his Disciples understanding them another and several amongst whom Durandus and Greg. Ariminensis going a different way from both So that sometimes there is but too much need of a good Interpreter to fix the sence of this Oracle as great a Veneration as the Schools may have for him And therefore since his Text is not always so very plain and easie as to
make an Explication of it superfluous this Author having quoted Peter Lombard in such or such a sence ought in all Reason to have produced the Major and more eminent part of the School-men and Writers upon him and shewn their Unanimous Concurrence in the same Sence and Notion which he took him in and quoted him for And this indeed would have been to his Purpose and look'd like proving his Opinion to have been the Doctrine of the Schools Otherwise I cannot see how the Master of the Sentences can be called or pass for all the School men any more than the Master of the Temple can pass for all the Divines of the Church of England Unless we should imagine that this Peter Lombard had by a kind of Mutual Consciousness gathered all his Numerous Brood into Himself and so united them all into one Author So that the Sum of all is this That this Author having declared his Opinion the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools to make his words good has produced for it Three or Four Greek Fathers and Two Latin though even these no more to his purpose than if he had quoted Dod and Cleaver or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of Homer and lastly One Sentence out of one School-man Which if it be allowed to pass for a good just and sufficient Proof of any Controverted Conclusion let it for the future by all means for this our Author's sake be an Established Rule in Logick from a Particular to infer an Universal And now that I am bringing my Reader towards a close of this long Chapter I must desire him to look a little back towards the beginning of the foregoing Chapter wherein upon this Man 's Confident Affirmation That his Opinion was the constant Doctrine both of the Fathers and the Schools I thought it necessary to state what his Opinion was and accordingly I shew'd that it consisted of Four Heads 1st That the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity were three distinct infinite Minds or Spirits which how far he was from being able to prove from the Authority of any of the Fathers cited by him was sufficiently shewn by us in the preceding Chapter The 2d Was That Self Consciousness was the formal Reason of Personality in the said three Persons and consequently That whereby they were distinguished from each other which in the same Chapter I shew'd he was so far from proving from the Authority of those Ancient Writers that he did not alledge one Tittle out of any of them for it nor indeed so much as mention it in any of the Quotations there made by him And as for the 3d. Member of his said Hypothesis viz. That the Unity of the Divine Nature in the three Blessed Persons Consisted in the Mutual Consciousness belonging to them This we have Examined at large and confuted in this Chapter But still there remains the 4th And last to be spoken to as completeing his whole Hypothesis and resulting by direct Consequence from the other Three viz. That a Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity explained by the three forementioned Terms or Principles is a very plain easie and intelligible Notion which having been in a most Confident Peremptory manner affirmed by him all along as I shew in Chap. 1. and upon that Score making so great a part of his Hypothesis ought in all reason to be proved to have been the Sence and Doctrine of the Fathers concerning this Article But not one word does he produce upon this Head neither Nor for my own part do I expect ever to find the least Sentence or Syllable in any Ancient Writer tending this way And I challenge this Author to produce so much as one to this purpose In the mean time how and with what kind of words I find these Ancient Writers expressing themselves about this venerable Mystery I shall here set down Only I shall premise a Sentence or two out of this Author himself and which I have had occasion to quote more than once before from Page 106. line 7. viz. That the Unity in Trinity being as he confesses so great a Mystery that we have no Example of it in Nature it is no wonder if it cannot be explained by any one kind of Natural Union and that therefore it was necessary to use several Examples and to allude to several kinds of Union to form an Adequate Notion of the God head and moreover Page 139. line 26. c. That there is nothing like this Mysterious Distinction and Unity and that we want proper words to express it by All which Passages lying clear open and express in the fore-cited places of this Author I must needs ask him Whether all these are used by him to prove the Unity in Trinity a plain easie and intelligible Notion as he has frequently elsewhere asserted it to be As to go over each of the Particulars First Whether we must account it plain because he says It is a great Mystery of which we have no Example in Nature And Secondly Whether we must reckon it easie because he says That it cannot be Explained by any one kind of Natural Union but that several Examples must be used and several sorts of Union alluded to for this purpose And Lastly Whether it must pass for Intelligible because he tells us That we want proper Words to express it by that is in other Terms to make it Intelligible since to express a Thing and to make it Intelligible I take to be Terms equivalent In fine I here appeal to the Reader Whether we ought from the forementioned Passages of this Author to take the Unity in Trinity and Trinity in Unity for a plain easie Intelligible Notion according to the same Author's affirmation so frequently inculcated in so many Parts of his Book But I shall now proceed to shew as I promised how the Fathers speak and declare themselves upon this great Point And here we will begin first with Iustin Martyr A Singularity or Unity says he is understood by us and a Trinity in Unity is acknowledged But how it is thus I am neither willing to ask others nor can I perswade my self with my Muddy Tongue and Polluted Flesh to attempt a Declaration of such Ineffable Matters And again speaking of the Oeconomy of the blessed Trinity the nature and manner says he of this Oeconomy is unutterable And yet again speaking of this Mysterious Oeconomy of the Deity and the Trinity as one of the greatest Mysteries of the Christian Faith I cry out says he O wonderful For that the Principles and Articles of our Religion surpass and transcend the Understanding Reason and Comprehension of a Created Nature In the next place Dionysius the Areopagite or some very Ancient Writer under that Name calls it the Transcendent Superessential and Superlatively Divine Trinity In like manner Gregory Nyssen we apprehend says he in these viz. the three Divine Persons a certain Inexpressible Inconceivable
Spiration which Three Divine Persons superadd to this Divine Nature or Deity Three different Modes of Subsistence founding so many different Relations each of them belonging to each Person in a peculiar Uncommunicable manner so that by vertue thereof each person respectively differs and stands distinguished from the other Two And yet by reason of one and the same Numerical Divine Nature or Godhead equally existing in and common to all the Three Persons they are all but One and the same God who is blessed for Ever This I reckon to be a True and Just Representation of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church so far as it has thought fit to declare it self upon this Great and Sacred Mystery Not that I think this sets the Point clear from all Difficulties and Objections For the Nature and Condition of the Thing will not have it so nor have the Ablest Divines ever thought it so for where then were the Mystery But that it gives us the fairest and most consistent Account of this Article both with reference to Scripture and Reason and liable to the fewest Exceptions against it of any other Hypothesis or Explication of it whatsoever And the same will appear yet further from those Terms which the Writers of the Church have all along used in expressing themselves upon this Subject And that both with respect First To the Unity and Agreement of the Three Divine Persons in one and the same Nature And Secondly To their Personal Distinction from one another And first For their Unity and Agreement in one and the same Nature The Greeks expressed this by the Terms 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And the Latines by Consubstantialitas and Coessentialitas By all which I affirm That they understood an Agreement in one and the same Numerical Nature or Essence For tho this Author has affirmed That the Nicene Fathers understood no more by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than a Specifick Unity of Nature this Matter has been sufficiently accounted for and his Assertion effectually confuted in the foregoing Chapter In the next place As for the Terms expressing the Distinction and Difference of the Divine Persons from one another the Greeks make use of these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Trinity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Subsistences or Persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Modes of Subsistence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Properties 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Marks of Distinction 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 distinguishing Properties 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Notes of Signification And agreeably to them the Latines also make use of the following Terms Trinitas Personae Subsistentiae Modi Subsistendi Proprietates Relationes and Notiones seu Notionalia By which last the Schoolmen mean such Terms and Expressions as serve to notifie and declare to us the proper and peculiar distinction of the Divine Persons And they reckon four of them viz. the above mentioned Paternitas Filiatio Spiratio Processio all of them importing Relation To which some add a fifth which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the Latines Innascibilitas a Term not importing in it any positive Relation but only a meer Negation of all producibility by any Superiour principle and upon that account peculiar to the Father who alone of all the Persons of the Blessed Trinity is without Production Touching all which Terms I cannot think it necessary to enlarge any further in a particular and more distinct Explication of them since how differing soever they may be in their respective significations they all concur in the same use and design which is to express something proper and peculiar to the Divine Persons whereby they are rendred distinct from and Incommunicable to one another But these few general Remarks I think fit to lay down concerning them As 1. That albeit most of these Terms as to the Form of the Word run abstractively yet they are for the most part to be understood Concretively and not as simple Forms but as Forms in Conjunction with the Subject which they belong to In the former abstracted sence they are properly Personalities or Personal Properties viz. Those Modes or Forms by which the Persons whom they appertain to are formally constituted and denominated what they are but in the Latter and Concrete Sence they signifie the Persons themselves 2. The Second Thing which I would observe is That there has been in the first Ages of the Church some Ambiguity in the use of the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Persona For neither would the Latines at first admit of Three Hypostases in God as taking 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the same Thing for that they had no other Latin Word to Translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by but Substantia by which also they Translated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word Subsistentia being then looked upon by them as Barbarous and not in use so that they refused the Term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for fear of admitting of Three distinct Substances or Essences in the Trinity which they knew would lead them into the Errour of Arius Nor on the other side would the Greeks acquiesce in a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor admit of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for fear of falling thereby into the contrary Errour of Sabellius for that they thought the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imported no real Internal difference but only a difference of Name or Attribute or at most of Office and for them to allow no more than such an one amongst the Divine Persons they knew was Sabellianisme And this Controversie of Words exercised the Church for a considerable time to appease and compose which amongst other Matters a Council was called and held at Alexandria about the Year of Christ 362. in which amongst many other Bishops Convened from Italy Arabia Aegypt and Lybia was present also Athanasius himself And in this Council both sides having been fully heard and found to agree in sence though they differ'd in words it was ordained That they should thenceforth Mutually acknowledg one another for Orthodox and for the future cease contending about these words to the disturbance of the Church By which means and especially by the Explication given of these words by Athanasius whereby as Gregory Nazianzen tells us in his Panegyrick upon him he satisfied and reconciled both Greeks and Latines to the indifferent use of them and indeed that Oration made by Nazianzen himself in the Council of Constantinople viz. The second General before 150 Bishops not a little contributing to the same the sence of these Terms from that time forward came generally to be fixed and the Ambiguity of them removed and so the Controversie by degrees ceased between the Greeks and Latines and the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Personae and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Subsistentiae grew
of the Trinity and some other Tracts upon the same Subject against the Arians He I confess frequently and particularly in Book 4. de Trinit p. 36. Basil. Edit 1570. calls the Three Divine Persons Tres Substantias but it is evident that he took Substantia in the same sence with Subsistentia or Hypostasis forasmuch as he else where often affirms that which must of necessity infer this to be his meaning As for instance in his Book de Synodis contra Arianos Page 223. he tells us That Nullam diversitatem aut dissimilitudinem admittit Geniti Gignentis Essentia And again That there is Indifferens in Patre Filio divinitatis substantia p. 224 And nulla differentis Essentiae discreta Natura ibid. And nulla Originalis substantiae diversitas ibid. And that there is between them nulla diversitas Essentiae p. 225. None of all which Propositions could possibly be true if the Divine Persons were three distinct Substances according to the proper sence and signification of the Word Substance And therefore the Learned Forbesius in his Historico-Theological Instructions Book 1. Chap. 2. quoting the aforesaid Passage after the Words Tres substantias subjoyns these of his own Eo nempe sensu quo Graeci dicebant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And accordingly St. Hilary explaining himself further in his fore-cited Book de Synodis contra Arianos p. 226. says That though between the Father and the Son there was nulla diversitas Essentiae yet they did respuere Personalium Nominum Unionem ne Unus Subsistens sit qui Pater dicatur Filius Which Words manifestly infer That the Father is said to be a Father and the Son to be a Son by a distinct Subsistence proper to each of them And again speaking of those Fathers who opposed the Heresie of Sabellius says of them Idcircò Tres Substantias esse dixerunt Subsistentium Personas per Substantias edocentes non substantiam Patris Filii Spiritus Sancti diversitate dissimilis essentiae separantes p. 228. By which Words he speaks all that the Greeks meant by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Latines of the following Times by Subsistentia For which reason it is that the Learned Collator and Editor of this Father's Works uses now and then to such Passages as these to add an Explicatory Marginal Note to this purpose as in Page 36. Book 4. de Trinitate he puts in the Margin Tres Substantiae id est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in this Book de Synodis c. p. 227. he remarks in the side Trina in Divinis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which manifestly shews what the Judgment of Learned Men was concerning St. Hilary's sence in the use of the words Tres Substantioe with reference to the Divine Persons From St. Hilary we pass to St. Ierome who indeed scrupled the use of the Word Hypostasis as applyed to the Divine Persons in Epistle 57. to Pope Damasus But that he did only scruple it and not absolutely refuse or reject it is evident from several other Passages in that Epistle which shewed his Judgment to be that there was nothing of it self ill and hurtful in the use of it For had he judged otherwise surely he would not have told Damasus that he was ready to own the Expression of Tres Personas Subsistentes And moreover That if Damasus would command the use of the Term Hypostasis he would use it But his Exception against it for it was not the Word Person as a great Man mistakes it but the Word Hypostasis which St. Ierome demurred to the use of was built upon these Two grounds both expressed in the same Epistle First That Hereticks abused or made an ill use of this Term to deceive and impose upon the Minds of Weak and Unwary Persons And in good earnest that must be a very extraordinary Word indeed which is uncapable of being one way or other abused by some and misunderstood by others Secondly The other ground which as there is great reason to believe was the main and principal cause of St. Ierome's dislike of this Term was its being imposed by an Incompetent Authority viz. That some of the Greek Church would needs command him and him a very warm Man too who was of the Latin Communion to the use of that which the Latin Church had not obliged him to And Calvin in Lib. 1. Chap 13. of his Institutions Sect. 5. shrewdly intimates the peculiar Pique which St. Ierome bore to the Eastern Bishops to have been the chief if not the sole cause of his Exception against this Word adding withal that it was not fairly done of him which Calvin was a very Competent Judge of to Assert as in that Epistle he does that in omnibus Scholis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was nihil aliud quà m Hypostasis which Calvin there says Communi tritóque usu passim refellitur But after all it seems St. Ierome could relent from his stiffness and reconcile himself to this so much scrupled Expression For in his Epistle or Discourse ad Paulam Eustochium de assumptione Beatoe Marioe speaking of our Saviour's exercising Two distinct kinds of Operation according to his Two Natures combining in one Person has these Words Per hoc quod audiérant quod viderant quod tractârant viz. Apostoli verbam vitoe erat nihil aliud ex duabus Naturis quà m Unum juxta Subsistentiam vel Personam Hieronym Tom. 9. p. 113. Edit Paris apud Nivellium 1579. So that I am in good hopes that for the future St. Ierome's Authority will not be alledged against expressing the Divine Persons by Hypostases till it be proved that there cannot be a Greek and a Latin Word for one and the same Thing For what 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies in the Greek That it is certain Subsistentia signifies and declares to us in the Latin As for St. Austin though he looks upon the Word Hypostasis or Subsistentia as new and strange to the Latines in the sence in which it was used by the Greeks yet he is so far from a bridging the Greeks in their way of speaking that he very amicably allows even of those Latines also who chose to follow the Greek Expression as to this Particular in his 5th Book de Trin. Chap. 8 9. where he tells us Qui hoec tractant Groeco eloquio dicunt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Latinè ista tractantes cùm alium modum aptiorem non invenirent quo enuntiarent verbis dicunt Unam Essentiam vel Substantiam Tres autem Personas ibid. By which this Father manifestly shews That the Latines indeed undestood the very same Thing by Persona which the Greeks did by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that they really rendered one by the other though they were not generally so ready to use the Term. And here I suppose the Reader will easily perceive that my Intent is not to establish the use of the
Words hitherto pleaded for upon the Authority of St. Austin for the Case needs it not but only to shew That albeit this Father does both particularly consider and expresly speak of the said Terms yet he does not in the least reject or disallow of them But however in the same Book he proceeds to another Topick very much to our present purpose viz. his stating the Divine Personalities upon Relation in these Words In Deo nihil secundùm Accidens dicitur quia in eo nihil est mutabile Nec tamen omne quod dicitur secundùm Substantiam dicitur sed secundùm Relativum Quod tamen Relativum non est Accidens quia non est mutabile ut filius dicitur Relativè ad Patrem c. Whereby as we have said founding Personality in and upon something Relative he sufficiently proves That the same neither is nor can be placed in Self-Consciousness this being a Term in the import ' of it perfectly Absolute and containing nothing Relative in it at all Next to St. Austin we will produce Ruffinus a Writer of the 4th Century and flourishing about the latter end of it who in the short Account he gives us of what was done in the forementioned Synod of Alexandria for the Peace of the Church and the closing up the Division between the Greeks and the Latines about the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Chap. 29. of the first Book of his History tells us That although some thought that both these Words were Synonymous and consequently that as Three Substances were by no means to be admitted in the Trinity so neither ought we to acknowledg Three Subsistences therein yet that others and those much the greater and more prevailing part judged quite otherwise in these Words Alii verò quibus longè aliud Substantia quà m Subsistentia significare videbatur dicebant quòd Substantia rei alicujus Naturam rationémque quâ constat designet Subsistentia autem uniuscujusque Personoe hoc ipsum quod extat subsistit ostendat ideóque propter Sabellii Hoeresin tres esse Subsistentias confitendas quòd quasi Tres Subsistentes Personas significare viderentur ne suspicionem daremus tanquam istius fidei sectatores essemus quae Trinitatem in Nominibus tantùm ac non in Rebus ac Subsistentiis confitetur So that we see here a full and clear Account both of the Sence of this Word and of the Reason Why the Church thought fit to establish the use of it with reference to the Persons of the Blessed Trinity Another Testimony shall be from Beotius who flourished about the beginning of the 6th Century He in Chap. 2. of his Book de duabus Naturis in unâ Personâ Christi first gives us this Difinition of a Person that it is Rationabilis Naturae individua Subsistentia according to which our Author's Warr-Horse is like to fall from his Personal Dignity And afterwards having discoursed about the difference of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he concludes the said Chapter thus Hoec omnia idcirco sunt dicta ut differentiam Naturae atque Personoe id est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 atque 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 monstraremus Quo verò nomine unumquodque oporteat appellari Ecclesiasticae sit locutionis Arbitrium ut tamen hoc interim constet quòd inter Naturam Personámque differre praediximus By all which he gives us a very Plain Rational and Scholastick Account of this Matter The next whom I shall produce to Vouch the same Thing is Rusticus Diaconus who lived and flourished about the middle of the Sixth Century He in Chap. 6. of his Book contra Acephalos tells the Nestorian Heretick whom he is there by way of Dialogue disputing with That Subsistentia interdum Personam significat non nunquam verò Substantiam And accordingly that the Council of Ephesus distinguished in our Saviour aliud aliud viz. in respect of his Two Natures but not alium alium in respect of his Person which was but One And this quite contrary to what we observe in the Trinity Illic enim alius alius ne Subsistentias confundamus non verò aliud aliud Unum enim Tria idem Deitate To which Words of the Synod this Author subjoyns these of his own Ecce manifestissimè Synodi Universalis Authoritas Subsistentias pro Personis suscepit atque laudavit This also I think is very full and satisfactory I shall close these particular Testimonies with Two Passages in the Appendix to the Breviary of Liberatus the Deacon who also lived about the middle of the Sixth Century as I find it in Crabb's Collection of the Councils Tom. 2. P. 126. Col. 2. and which the very Learned Dr. Cave observes is the only Edition of the Councils where it is to be found The first Passage is this Idem Natura Substantia quod commune non proprium significat idem Persona Subsistentia quod proprium non commune declarat And the other follows about Ten Lines after in the same Column Sanctae ergo Trinitatis una quidem est Natura atque Substantia Communis est enim Trium Substantia non autem una Subsistentia seu Persona Trium viz. Patris Filii Spiritûs Sancti sed Tres Subsistentiae sunt In which certainly we have so very clear and pregnant a Declaration of the Thing Contended for by us that a clearer cannot possibly be given nor reasonably desired And therefore to add no more Private or Single Authorities I shall conclude all with that of a Council not a General one indeed but that Lateran held under Pope Martin the first of 105 Bishops about the Year 649 or 650 and by way of Preparation for the Sixth General one and of Constantinople the third called as we have already shewn by Constantinus Pogonatus and held the following Year against the Monothelites The first Decree of which said Lateran Synod is this Siquis secundùm Sanctos Patres non confitetur propriè veraciter Patrem Filium Spiritum Sanctum Trinitarem in Unitate Unitatem in Trinitate hoc est unum Deum in Tribus Subsistentiis consubstantialibus aequalis gloriae unam eandémque Trium Deitatem Naturam Substantiam Virtutem c. sit condemnatus Now this does as manifestly place the Three Divine Persons in Three distinct Subsistences as it is possible for words to express For it is evident that by Subsistentiis cannot be here meant Substantiis forasmuch as Substantiis consubstantialibus would neither be Truth nor Sence And now all that I pretend to from the foregoing Testimonies and Quotations is not to prove that the Latin Church has alway made use of the Terms Hypostases Subsistentiae Modi Subsistendi about the Explication of the Trinity for I own it to have been otherwise but that from the Fourth Century downward those of that Communion
Estius let us cast our Eye upon Suarez speaking much the same Thing with those before mentioned Advertendum est says he hoc nomen Subsistentia apud Antiquos Patres frequentiùs accipi in Vi concreti ad significandam Hypostasim seu Personam In quo sensu nulla est Quoestio inter Catholicos nam de fide est dari in Trinitate Tres Subsistentias realiter distinctas id est Tres Hypostases Suarez in 1 m Thomae de Trinitatis Mysterio lib. 3. cap. 4. And then again for the Relative Nature of the said Subsistences he gives this Account of the Divine Persons and their Personalities Ex his quoe hactenus diximus c. concluditur Relationem Personalem esse etiam proprietatem constituentem Personam seu quâ constituitur Persona De Trinit lib. 7. cap. 7. in the beginning To all which I shall add Martinez Ripalda a short but Judicious Writer upon the Sentences speaking of the Term Hypostasis in these Words Hoeretici says he referente Hieronymo eâ voce abutebantur ad decipiendum fideles jam eâ significantes Essentiam jam Personalitatem incommunicabilem Subsistentiam By which last Expression this Author manifestly shews That he takes Personality and Incommunicable Subsistence for Words Synonymous and consequently that such a Subsistence is and must be that by which a Divine Person is constituted formally what he is I cannot think it necessary to quote any more of this sort of Writers nor am I sollicitous to alledge many of them because I am well assured according to the forecited Saying of Cajetan that these are the Terms and this the Language of them all upon this Subject Only I think fit to remark this That whereas I have alledged some of the School-men and particularly Durandus Thomas and Suarez expressing the Divine Personalities by Relations as well as by Hypostases or Subsistences as they do in both these mean but one and the same Thing viz. a Relative Subsistence or a Subsisting Relation so by both of them they equally overthrow this Author's Hypothesis deriving the Divine Personalities from Self-Consciousness Forasmuch as Subsistence is in Nature before it and Relation is opposite to it it having been demonstrated by me in Chap. 4. That Self-Consciousness is a Thing wholly Absolute and Irrelative and therefore cannot possibly be the Formal Reason of that which is Essentially Relative In a word Self Consciousness is neither an Hypostasis nor a Relation and therefore can have nothing to do here whatsoever other Employment this Author may have for it And now I shall at last descend to the Testimony of several Modern Divines and all of them Men of Note in the Times in which they lived And amongst these let us first hear Philip Melancthon in his common places speaking thus upon this Head Satis constat says he veteres Scriptores Ecclesiae solitos haec duo vocabula discernere 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dicere unam esse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est Essentiam aeternam Patris Filii Spiritùs Sancti sed tres 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 From him we will pass to Chemnitius who Wrote upon Melancthon's Common Places He in the first Chapter of his Book de duabus in Christo Naturis gives his Opinion thus Hypostases seu Personae Trinitatis omnes unum sunt propter Identitatem Essentiae suae atque adeò non differunt Essentialiter nec separatim una extra aliam sinè aliâ subsistit And presently after this Relatione autem seu 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 modo scilicet Subsistendi realiter differunt After Chemnitius let us consider what Calvin says in Book 1. of his Institutions Chap. 13. Sect. 2. Filium Dei Apostolus characterem Hypostaseos Patris nominans haud dubiè aliquam Patri Subsistentiam assignat in quâ differat à Filio Nam pro Essentià accipere sicuti fecerunt quidam Interpretes c. non durum modò sed absurdum quoquè esset And again in Sect. 6. of the same Chapter Personam voco Subsistentiam in Dei essentiâ quae ad alios relata proprietate incommunicabili distinguitur Subsistentiae nomine aliud quiddam intelligi volumus quà m Essentiam In the next place Peter Martyr gives us the same Account of the same Subject Multò rectiùs says he veriùs intelligemus ex isto loco nempe 2 Samuelis Cap. 7. Commate 23. Tres Personas in Unâ Naturâ Divinâ Patrem inquam Filium Spiritum Sanctum quae cùm sint Tres Hypostases tamen concluduntur in Unam Essentiam Petrus Martyr Loc. Com. p. 50. col 2. Loco de Dei Attributis Sacro-Sanctâ Trinitate Likewise Wolfgangus Musculus in his Common Places under the particular Head or common Place de Deo declares the Matter thus Est itaque Deus Essentiâ Unus quemadmodum Naturâ Divinitate Hypostasi verò Trinus And a little after Haec sunt manifestâ fide tenenda Deum viz. Esse Unum Essentiâ Naturâ Divinitate sententiâ Motione Operatione Trinum verò Tribus Personis quarum singulis sua est Hypostasis Proprietas Musc. Loc. Comm. Cap. 6. p. 7. And a little before speaking of the difference of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in what sence the Ancients understood these Words Voce Essentiae says he id expresserunt nempe Veteres quod commune est in Sacrâ Triade per Hypostasim verò quod Unicuique Personae proprium in illâ est significârunt p. 6. ibid. Piscator also in his Theological Theses speaks after the same manner Quum igitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 semper fuerit Filius Dei quis non videt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 de quo loquitur Iohannes semper fuisse Personam seu Hypostasim rem scilicet per se Subsistentem Loc. 2. de Deo p. 57 58. Agreeably to this Tilenus an Eminent Divine expresses himself in his Body of Divinity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says he sive Personae sunt illa ipsa 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quae in singulis Personis est Tota ipsae verò Relationibus sive Proprietatibus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sunt distinctae And again Simpliciter dicimus Proprietates istas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 esse diversos 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hoc est modos Subsistendi Tilen Syntag. par 1. cap. 20. p. 129. The Learned Ursinus in his Theological Treatises under the Head De tribus Personis in Unâ Deitate declares the same Tenendum est nequaquam eandem esse Patris Filii Spiritûs Sancti Personam sed Tres esse Personas seu Hypostases Divinitatis reipsâ distinctas nec plures nec pauciores Ursini Oper. Theol. Quaest. 4. Thesi 2. By which we see that this great Divine reckons Subsistence to be so much the Ground and Reason of Personality that he uses Persona and Hypostasis as Terms
it must be either from some distinct Substance or some Accident or some Mode of Being for I defie him or any Mortal breathing to assign a fourth Thing besides these But it cannot be from any distinct Substance for that would make a manifest Composition in the Divine Nature nor yet from any Accident for that would make a worse Composition And therefore it follows That this Distinction must unavoidably proceed from one or more distinct Modes of Being This I affirm and according to my promise made to this Author in the foregoing Chapter I shall be ready to defend the Truth of this Assertion against him whensoever he shall think fit to engage in the Dispute Secondly In the next place for the proof of this from Authority I affirm that all Metaphysicians School-men and Divines at least all that I have yet met with do unanimously concurr in these Two Things 1. That they utterly deny any Accidents in God And 2. That they do as universally affirm Modes of Being to be in God and to belong to him Nay and which is more That they do in these very Modes state the Ground and Reason of the Personalities and the distinction thereof respectively belonging to the Three Persons of the Godhead And for a further proof of what I have here affirmed and withal to shew how unable this Man's Memory is to keep pace with his Confidence whereas in the forementioned page 47. He affirms That all Men mark this Word deny Accidents Qualities and Mâ—des to be in God He himself afterwards in page 48. Owns That the School-men hold these different Modos Subsistendi in the Godhead and accordingly there sets himself as well as he is able to confute them for it Now how shall we reconcile these blind Assertions that so cruelly buâ—t and run their Heads against one another For will he say That the School-men do not grant such Modes to be in God after he himself has done his poor utmost to confute them for holding it Or having said That all Men deny these Modes to be in God and yet that the School men grant and hold it will he say That the School-men are not Men and so come not under that Universal Appellative What the School-men hold and assert in this Matter has been sufficiently shewn already But I must needs tell this Author upon this occasion That he seems to have something a bad Memory and withal to have more than ordinary need of a very good one There is one Thing more which I think fit to observe and it is something pleasant viz. That our Author having exploded all Modos Subsistendi in God and Chastised the School-men for holding them even to a forfeiture of their very Humanity he yet vouchsafes afterwards by a kind of Correctory Explication to allow them in this sence viz. That the same Numerical Essence is whole and entire in each Divine Person but in a different Manner P. 84. Lines 12 13 14. By which Words it appearing that he grants that of the Manner which he had before denied of the Modus it is a shrewd Temptation to me to think That certainly this Acute Author takes Modus for one Thing and Manner for another In fine I appeal to the Judicious and Impartial Reader Whether a Man could well give a more convincing Argument of his utter Unacquaintance with the True Principles of Philosophy and Theology than by a Confident Assertion of these Two Positions 1. That Accidents and Modes of Being are the same Things And 2. That such Modes are not at all to be allowed of or admitted in God Secondly His Second Objection against our stating the distinction of the Divine Persons upon Three different Modes of Subsistence is That these Modes are little better than Three Names of One God Which was the Heresie of Sabellius P. 83. To which I Answer Two Things First In direct and absolute Contradiction to what he asserts I affirm That the difference between Three Modes of Subsistence in the Godhead and only Three distinct Names applyed to it is very great For Names and Words depend only upon the Will and Pleasure of the Imposer and not upon the Nature of the Thing it self upon which they are imposed and for that cause neither do nor can Internally affect it But on the contrary all Modes of Subsistence spring from the Nature of the Thing or Being which they affect both antecedently to and by consequence independently upon the Apprehension or Will of any one So that altho neither Man nor Angel had ever considered or thought of or so much as known that there were such or such things yet the Modes of Subsistence proper to them would have belonged to them as really and as much as they do now And if this Author cannot by this see a vast difference between these and so many bare Names thanks be to God others can both see and defend it too But Secondly Whereas he says That these Three Modes are but little better than Three Names I answer That his very saying so is Concession that they are something at least more and better To which I add further That this something as small a Difference as it makes is yet sufficient to discriminate things which are only Distinguishable and no more For separable or divisible from one another I am sure they are not Nay this is so far from being a just and rational Exception against placing the difference of the Divine Persons in so many different Modes of Subsistence that in the Judgment of very Great and Learned Men it is no small Argument for it For St. Cyril says That the difference between the Divine Persons by reason of the perfect Unity of their Nature as it were blotting out or taking away all Diversity between them is so very small as but just to distinguish them and no more and to cause that One of them cannot be called the other the Father not the Son nor the Son upon any Account the Father c. I thought fit to Transcribe the whole Passage tho' the latter part viz. from the Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. is most immediately and directly to the Purpose which I here alledge the whole for And Thomas Aquinas tells us That the Divine Persons ought to be distinguished by that which makes the least distinction In like manner Durandus affirms That the first Instance of Plurality or remove from Unity ought to be the least And therefore that the distinction of the Divine Persons since it is the first ought to be by distinct Relations compatible in the same Essence Which for that cause is a less distinction than any that can be made by Things Absolute And Lastly Bellarmine averrs pofitively That the distinction of the Divine Persons ought to be the least that is Possible Supposing all along that it must still be Real and not barely Nominal or Imaginary This was the Judgment of these Learned Men who as they
examined and laid open in the foregoing Animadversions I shall now set down without any further Descant or Enlargement upon them or at least with very little But as for those which I there passed over without any Notice or Remark as I did it all along with full purpose to treat of them by themselves so I shall particularly insist upon them now And the Reader may please to take them as they follow PARADOX It is a vain and arrogant presumption says this Author to say What is or what is not a Contradiction when we confess we do not understand or comprehend the thing we speak of p. 4. And again I know nothing in the World that we do perfectly understand p. 7. line 19. Answer According to these Two Assertions taken together I affirm That though a Man discourses never so falsly and inconsistently of God or indeed of any thing in the World besides yet he cannot justly be charged as guilty of a Contradiction And moreover since this Author affirms page 97 That for any one to say That Three Divine Persons who are divided and separated from each other are each of them God and yet that they are not Three Gods but one God is a direct Contradiction I desire to know of him Whether he comprehends what the Godhead and what the Divine Persons are And if not Whether according to his own Rule it is not a vain and arrogant Presumption in him to say what is a Contradiction when he professes himself not to comprehend the thing he is speaking of and about which the Contradiction is said to be PARADOX This Author having declared the Intimate and Essential Unity between the Father and the Son from those Words of our Saviour John 14th Chap. 10. Ver. I am in the Father and the Father in me Subjoyns That this Oneness between them is such an Union as there is nothing in Nature like it and we cannot long doubt what kind of Union this is if we consider that there is but one possible way to be thus United and that is by this Mutual-Consciousness p. 57. Answer These Words I charge with Contradiction and consequently with Absurdity upon two Accounts First because they Contradict our Saviour's Words And Secondly Because they Contradict the Author 's own Words 1. And first concerning those of our Saviour Whereas this Author says That this Oneness between the Father and the Son is such an Union as there is nothing in Nature like it Our Saviour in Iohn Ch. 17. where this whole Passage is repeated twice affirms something to be like it viz. in ver 11. where he prays to his Father That they viz. Believers may be One as We viz. his Father and Himself are One And again ver 21. That they may be One as thou Father art in me and I in thee So that our Saviour expresly asserts a Likeness of something to this Union on the one side and this Author as expresly denies it on the other In which according to his blundering undistinguishing way he confounds Likeness and Sameness of kind as all One as shall presently be further shewn In the next place our Saviour as plainly as Words can express a Thing says That he and his Father are One by a Mutual In-being or In-existence in one another And this Man as expresly says That there is no possible way for them to be one but by Mutual-Consciousness But I on the contrary deny That Mutual-Consciousness is Mutual-Inexistence or Mutual-Inexistence Mutual-Consciousness any more than that Being or Existence is properly Consciousness or Knowledge and therefore if they cannot possibly be one but by Mutual Consciousness it is certain that they are not so by Mutual-Inexistence which yet our Saviour in Words properly and naturally signifying Inexistence affirms that they are And the more intolerable is this Assertion in this Author for that in Pag. 56. he affirms that these Words of our Saviour ought to be understood properly and if so I hope they do not only exclude Metaphors but all other Tropes and Figures also for Proper is not adequately opposed to Metaphorical but to Figurative whatsoever the Figure be And I do here affirm That if our Saviour's words be understood of Mutual-Consciousness they do not signifie properly but figuratively and the Figure is a Metonymy of the Subject for the Adjunct forasmuch as in God Being or Inexistence are to be look'd upon as the Subject and Knowledge and the like Attributes as the Adjuncts And therefore I do here tell this bold Man again that for him to say as he does that the forementioned words of our Saviour ought to be understood properly and yet to interpret them to a sense not Proper but Figurative which by interpreting them of Mutual-Consciousness he evidently does is both an Absurdity and a Presumption equally insufferable But in the 2d Place I charge the forecited Passage of this Author with the same Absurdity for being as Contradictory to his own words as it was to those of our Saviour For whereas he here says First That this Oneness between the Father and the Son expressed in those words I am in the Father and the Father in me can be no other kind of Union than an Union by Mutual-consciousness And Secondly That it is such an one that there is nothing in Nature like it I desire him to turn to Page 106. of his Book where he tells us That the Fathers use several Examples and allude to several sorts of Union thereby to form a Notion of the Unity of the Godhead in the Three Divine Persons Let him I say read this and tell me Whether those Examples and Allusions could be of any use to form a Notion of that Unity to which they bore no Resemblance at all For I for my part ever thought that there can be no Allusion of one thing to another without some similitude between them and that a similitude is always on both sides it being not possible for Peter to be like Iohn but Iohn must be like Peter too And if this Man does not yet blush at such contradictory Assertions let him turn a little farther to Page 126 127. where he tell us particularly that St. Austin explains this Unity by Examples of Mutual-Consciousness and by several Similitudes mark the words of which the Unity of Understanding Memory and Will with the Soul of Man is alledged by him for One and that a notable one too for that these Faculties as he there says are mutually in one another and the Example of Love and Knowledge in the same Mind is alledged by him as another such a Simile affirming them in like manner to be mutually in one another Now I say after all this ought not the Reader to stand amazed when he reads the Man first affirming that the Unity between the Father and the Son mutually existing in one another by virtue of the Mutual-Consciousness between them has nothing like it in Nature nor has any Example Metaphor or
which can be nothing besides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And then the whole Sentence will be properly and plainly translated thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God having cast or thrust them viz. the Apostate Angels down into Hell or the Lower Regions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 delivered or put them into Chains of darkness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 kept or reserved to or for Iudgement And this is sence and propriety of Speech agreeable both to the Natural Signification and the Grammatical Syntax of the Words But the Translation so imperiously and ignorantly given by this Man in correction of that of the Church is agreeble to neither For it both divides one part of the Sentence from the other from which it must not be devided and then makes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be governed by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which cannot govern it and quite cutting it off from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which alone can And now ought it not to be matter of Amazement to all Men of Sense and Sobriety to see a Puny who is not able to master three words of Greek presume to controul such great Masters of that Language as the Translators of the New Testament into English undoubtedly were Nay and thereby to reflect upon the Church her self which has received and owned this Translation and to whose Judgment and Authority if he be so nearly related to her as he pretends he ows so great and filial a Deference Let him rather instead of correcting the English Translation a Work which he was never born for thank God and the Translators for it there being few Men living more beholden to it than himself And therefore leaving his forlorn Criticisme as new every whit as his Divinity to shift for it self I for my part like my English Bible for his dislike of any part of it better than before For I can by no means see any force or consequence in this Argument viz. That because this Author is much better at quoting a Greek Sentence than at construing it therefore the English Translation of this Text in St. Peter is a very bad Translation I say I cannot admit or yield to this Consequence And thus I have presented the Reader with some of this Author's Ways and Forms of Expression which Grammarians call Loquendi Genera From all which according to the singular skill he has shewn in this sort of Learning it is to be hoped that as he has already blest the World with a New Divinity and Philosophy so he will in due time oblige it with a new Grammar too And great need as we shall presently see there seems to be of such an one In order to which I shall mention but one more of this Author's Pieces And that is a Book Intituled A Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet c. In the beginning of which there is a Table of Errata prefixed that fills almost a whole Page so that I verily thought that it had so clearly carried off the whole Crop as to leave no Gleanings behind Nevertheless I shall present the Reader with this small Spicilegium of what I gathered up after it not mentioning any one Word that stands Corrected there In Page 53. therefore and Line 10. He tells us of a Counterfeit Epithite but what that is I do not know I have indeed often heard of an Epithete from the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying quid appositum aut adjectum and imports properly an Adjective joyned to a Substantive and giving the Substantive a Denomination accordingly But as for this Author's Epithite it may for ought appears signifie something to stop Botâ—les For as for any other Signification that I know of it has none In the next place Page 64 65. he quotes Baxter for an Expression used by him viz. of such people as talk through a Window on the West-end of Moore-Fields and calls it Mr. Baxter's Elegant Paraphrases for Madmen But here besides the mistake of Paraphrases for Paraphrasis which is only one Number put for another our Learned Author must give me leave to tell him That by this Passage he seems not to understand what a Paraphrasis means For a Paraphrasis or Paraphrase to put it into English for his sake signifies properly a Translation of some Writing with Additions and Enlargements to Illustrate and Explain the sence of it and is therefore usually called Liberior Translatio In which sence we read of this or that Paraphrase upon the Psalms and Erasmus's Paraphrase upon the New-Testament and the like So that unless the Mad-men here spoken of were a certain Book or Writing and Mr. Baxter's Words concerning them an Explicatory Translation of the said Writing this Great-Good Man could not properly call them a Paraphrase But what must we call them then Why truly the forementioned Words might be properly enough called a Periphrasis or Circumlocution which being so like the word Paraphrasis might easily deceive a Man who cares not what he Writes and when it is so taken it is a certain Figure in Speech whereby we express a Thing by several Words which otherwise might and for the most ' part is expressed by one As Sophronisci filius is a Periphrasis for Socrates and the Man who Conquered Pompey the Great is a Periphrasis for Iulius Caesar and so to bring the matter home to Mr. Baxter's Instance that forementioned Expression of Men who talk through the Windows at the West-end of Moore-Fields is a proper Periphrasis for Mad-men But as for a Paraphrase upon Madmen I leave it to this wonderful Person to make a Paraphrase upon any Man whether Mad or Sober if he can Likewise in Page 112. and the last Line he tells us out of Calvin's Epistles of a Publica praecum formula Concerning which though I must confess that I do by no means aspire to be one of the Number of this Author 's Excellent Persons who were for altering our Liturgy or Publick Form of Prayer Yet if it were expressed by Publica praecum formula I should be one of the foremost who should desire that Praecum might be altered into Precum In the mean time why should any one who had reà d but a Page in Calvin quote him for such a word as could not possibly drop from so Learned a Pen But it would be endless to descant particularly upon all this Author 's New-found Latine and Proprieties of Speech And therefore to set them down briefly as they offer themselves In Page 122. in the Quotation in the Margin the Reader will find a most choice word viz. Conscionator not to be met with in any such puny Author as we commonly call Classick but cited by him instead of Concionator out of the 57th Canon of our Church which I must tell him is not an ordinary slip but a foul stumble attended with Two more in the same Quotation viz. Sique for Siqui and a lesser one which is Utrum for Utrum for that is no greater
Haughtiness for the future to forbear calling his Antagonists Little Writers till by his Answers he has made them so A further discovery of his rude undecent way of treating such as he writes against is the Language he has bestow'd upon a certain Writer a Nonconformist indeed but yet a Man of Learning as a much greater Man than this Author has found by experience whom he calls a Trifling Scribler who understands little more than Quibbles and Iests Charging him withal with Pertness and Folly to complete his Character p. 15. of his Preface to his Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet And in the 12. page of the Book it self and the five first lines He represents him under the name of the Inquirer as one who cannot understand plain and familiar sense nor carry the Connexion of three or four Sentences together Very civil Language indeed becoming a Scholar a Divine and a well-bred Man to a Person who had not in the least provok'd Him For my own part I have no knowledge of the Man but from his Writings and upon the Stock of that knowledge have often wondred that one so able to humble this Reviler would take such gross Reproaches at his hands But the Truth is when I consider as I noted first in my Preface how patiently our whole Clergy has hitherto suffered him to call them Fools and Hereticks by charging all those as such who concur not with him in holding the Three Divine Persons to be Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits which I dare say not one of them held at the time of his uttering this Lewd Reproach I say when I consider this I have cause to surcease all wonder that any Private Man should indure this Insolent Huff to insult over him in such a manner But I shall insist no further upon this master-piece of his Scurrility having in some measure accounted with him for it already Only I shall add this That as it is beyond Example marvellous that any one single Member of a Church should presume to load all the rest with such a charge so it is yet a greater marvel that all should bear it It would be endless to set down all the dirty stuff that has flowed from his Billingsgate Pen. But to repeat and bring together so much as we have taken notice of the Reader may be pleased to bear away in his Memory such Expressions and Appellations as these viz. Epicurean and Ridiculer of Providence Popishly inclined and looking towards an Infallible Interpreter Disaffected to and a slanderer of the Government Little Writers Fools and Hereticks Errant Fopp Trifling Scribler shamefully Ignorant and Impudent Fit to be sent to School again One that understands little else but Iests and Quibbles One that cannot understand plain and familiar sense One that understands neither Greek nor Latine and the like These are the choice Embellishments of his Style But above all that beloved word Nonsense is always ready at hand with him and out it flies at all Persons and upon all Occasions And hardly can he write three or four Pages together but right or wrong he throws it in his Adversary's Face One would think that he was Born with the Word in his Mouth and that it grew up with him from his Infancy and that in his very Cradle he Cryed Nonsense before he could Speak it But to check this ungovern'd Humour of his in thus using this word at all Adventure Let me tell him that it is both a very rude unmannerly Word and most commonly as applyed by him a very false Charge As for the rudeness of it since he owns himself a Son of the Church of England I think he would be much his own Friend if he would remember the Reprimand given him by his old Acquaintance and Antagonist Dr. Owen who in his Vindication c. p. 72. having upon occasion of some of his profane Scoffs called him Goodly Son of the Church of England Immediately subjoyns That he intended it not as a Reflexion upon the Church it self but only to remind this Man of his Relation to that Church Which he there says to his Knowledge taught better Learning and better Manners In the next place as for the falseness of the Charge in his usual application of this Word I would have him know That the Charge of Nonsense does not properly lie against every one who asserts a false Proposition or is guilty of a mistake For Nonsense is not properly opposed to strict Truth but to such plain and manifest Truth as is obvious to Common sense For Truth oftentimes lies deep and abstruse and requires a more than ordinary sagacity to reach and fetch it out which that low Pitch of Reason which we call Common sense cannot always do For in Discourse a Man may be sometimes mistaken in laying his Foundation or Principle and yet be very Clear and Rational in the Consequences he draws from it and sometimes he may fail in drawing Consequences from a True and well-laid Principle in both which cases the whole Discourse is certainly False and Inconsistent Nevertheless according to the common acception of the Word this cannot be called Nonsense It may indeed be called Error or Mistake which is a weakness cleaving too close to Humane Nature for any one of the same Nature to reproach another for it But on the contrary if every Thing that is not strict Demonstration and certain Truth must pass for Nonsense I fear it would overlay whole Volumes and not only prevent the 2d 3d. and 4th Editions of many Books but shrewdly also endanger the Sale of the First Especially if 2d and 3d. by the unlucky escape of some scattering Copies should chance all to appear in the space of Three or Four Days As in the first Publication of a certain Book Entituled The Case of Allegiance c. it fell out But great no doubt is the Art of Bestowing several Title-Pages importing divers Editions upon Books of one and the same Impression And may serve to teach the World what a fruitful Thing the Press is when impregnated by the Prolifick Genius of some Writers and that when it is for the credit of any extraordinary Book and it's Author it can bring forth four five or six Editions of it at the same time Which certainly is a most Ingenious Contrivance but whether it were the Author 's or the Bookseller's is a Question though some think it uses to be done by a kind of Mutual-Consciousness between both But to return to the Point in hand According to the common use of the Word Nonsense He who Discourses of Things obvious to the ordinary Apprehensions of Men with gross and palpable Contradictions of one thing to another or with a plain manifest Incoherence of one part of his Discourse with the other that Man is properly and justly chargeable with Nonsense And let those in the Name of Sense and Reason take it to themselves who have most claim to it But because the
best way of Illustrating Things is by example I shall also take this course here Thus for instance For any one to own a Thing for a great and sacred Mystery the very Notion and use of the word Mystery importing something Hidden and Abstruse and at the same time to affirm it to be very Plain Easie and Intelligible is Nonsense To say That in Men Knowledge and Power are Commensurate nay That Knowledge is Power so that whatsoever a Man knows how to do he is by vertue thereof also able to do it is contrary to the Common Sense of all Mankind and consequently Nonsense To say A Beast is a Person and yet to say withal That a Person and an Intelligent substance are Terms reciprocal is both Nonsense and Contradiction too with a Witness To affirm That a specifical Unity can make any Thing or Person Numerically One is Nonsense To affirm That there are two distinct Reasons and two distinct Wills in each Man and those as really distinct as if the same Man had Two distinct Souls is Nonsense And to affirm That the Body which is utterly void of any Intellectual Power or Faculty is conscious to all the Dictates and Commands of the Will is gross and inexcusable Nonsense So that whereas this Author according to his mannerly way charges his Adversary with unintelligible Nonsense p. 227. l. 6. it must needs be granted that he has much the advantage of him in this Particular since all must acknowledge that his own Nonsense is very Intelligible And here I could easily direct him where he may be supplyed with several more such Instances as those newly alledged but that I think these may suffice for the Purpose they are produced for In the mean time I would advise him for the future to use this rude Word more sparingly and cautiously and to apply it only where the generally received way of speaking applies it And now and then also to cast his Eye upon his own Writings These things I say I would advise him to and to consider withal how unreasonable and unjust it is for him to bestow about the Word so freely upon others while he keeps the Thing to himself CHAP. XII Containing a Brief Review and Conclusion of the whole Work I AM at length come to a close of that Work which I should much more gladly have been Prevented than engag'd in by being a Reader rather than the Author of a Reply to this Man 's strange unjustifiable Innovations upon this great Article of our Religion But it is now a considerable Time that the Book here Animadverted upon has walked about the World without any publick Control And though in private Discourse generally censur'd by all yet as to the Point undertook by me hitherto Answered by none which may well be Matter of Melancholy Consideration to all Hearty Lovers of our Church and Ancient Christianity Whereas I dare say had this Heterodox Piece been wrote and published in a Language understood by Foreigners we should long since have had several Confutations of it sent us from abroad and probably not without some severe Reflexions upon the English Church and Clergy for their silence in a Cause which so loudly called for their Defence To take off therefore this Reproach from our Church in some degree at least I have while others far more able to Defend it chuse rather to sit still and enjoy it ventur'd to set my weak Hand to the Vindication of a Principal Article of her Faith against the rude Attacks of this bold Undertaker In which though I freely own that all that has been done by me in it is extremely below the Dignity of the Subject which I have employed my self in yet I am well assured that I have fully and effectually answered this Man and if it should prove otherwise I must ascribe it to a peculiar Misfortune attending me since none besides has hitherto wrote against him but has confuted him In the Work I have here presented the Reader with I have examined and gone over all that I conceive requires either Answer or Remark and that according to the following Method and Order which I shall here briefly set down I have in the first place laid my Foundation in the Explication and State of the Sense of the Word Mystery which I shew in General signifies something Concealed Hidden or Abstruse in Religious Matters and amongst Christian Writers not only that but something also neither Discoverable nor Comprehensible by bare Reason According to which I shew that this Author 's frequent affirming that his Hypothesis and Explication of the Trinity rendred the Notion thereof very Plain Easie and Intelligible was utterly incompatible with the Mysteriousness of the same I shew also upon what absurd Grounds he stated the Nature of a Contradiction according to which joyned with another of his Assertions I shew That no Man could be justly charged with Contradiction though he discoursed never so incoherently and falsely upon any Subject whatsoever From hence I proceeded to consider the Ancient Terms constantly received and used by Councils Fathers and Schoolmen in speaking of the God-head and Trinity which this Author in his Book had confidently and avowedly condemned as obscuring and confounding Men's Notions about these great Matters and upon a distinct Explication of each of them I shew the Propriety and singular usefulness of them both against all his Exceptions and above those other Terms which he would needs substitute in their Room And under the same Head I laid open the Contradiction of his Vindication and his late Apology to one another as I had done before in my Discourse about the Nature of a Mystery From hence I passed to his New Notions of Self-Consciousness and Mutual-Consciousness in the strength of which two Terms he pretended to make a Trinity in Unity a plain easie and intelligible Notion nay so very plain as to solve all Difficulties about it these being his very words And as he pretended Self-Consciousness to be the formal constituent Reason of Personality Universally both in Beings Create and Uncreate I first Demonstrated the contrary in Created Beings and that both from the general Reason of Things and from Two manifest Instances and withal examined and confuted several extremely absurd Propositions and Assertions advanced by him concerning Personality From this I passed on and proved that neither could this Self-Consciousness be the formal Reason of Personality in the Divine Persons shewing the impossibility thereof by several clear and unquestionable Arguments And in the next place with the same Evidence of Reason I proved That Mutual-Consciousness could not be the Ground or Reason of the Unity or Coalescence of the Three Divine Persons in one and the same Divine Nature and all this upon known allowed Principles of Philosophy as well as Divinity And so I Naturally went on to the examination of that monstrous Assertion of his by which he holds and affirms the Three Divine Persons to be
to the Phrase and Expressions of Scripture I hope amongst these some consideration ought to be had of such Texts of Scripture As that forementioned one in the 1 Corinth 13. 12. Where no doubt with reference to the Mysteries of the Gospel of which this is one of the chief we are said to see but as through a glass darkly and to know but in part c. neither of which can I perswade my self to think is only another Expression for knowing a thing plainly easily and intelligibly and without any difficulty The like may be said of that place in 1 Pet. 1. 12. where the Apostle speaking to the Saints he wrote to of the things reported to them by such as had preached the Gospel amongst which this Doctrine doubtless had it's place or an equal difficulty at least he adds That they were such things as the Angels desire to look into The Greek word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which all Interpreters lay a peculiar weight and Emphasis upon as importing both the earnest intention of the Inspector and the difficulty of the object inspected from the Posture of such as use to stoop down for the better discerning of such things as cannot otherwise be well perceived or look'd into And now is not this think we a most proper and fit posture for such as view and look into things very plain obvious and intelligible And yet I doubt not but the Angels who are said to use it could very easily give us the Philosophy of Rain Snow and Ice of the Fires burning and the descent of Stones and other heavy Bodies which yet this Author will allow no Man of sense and reason without forfeiting the reputation of both to presume to give a Philosophical Account of Whereas in the mean time the Trinity is declared to be a very plain easie and intelligible Notion even to such Persons as can give no such Account of the other And thus much for the Agreement of his Hypothesis with the Phrase and Expressions of Scripture The next head of its commendation is That it preserves the Majesty of this great Article as he words it But in much the same sense I suppose as his Refusing the Oath preserved the Majesty of King William and his taking it the Majesty of K. Iames But that it preserves it so as to have a singular virtue to encrease Men's Veneration of it this I very much question and demur to Forasmuch as that old Observation that Familiarity breeds Contempt holds too frequently as well as undeservedly no less in Things than in Persons which we are more apt to venerate at a distance than upon a clear plain and full knowledge of them I do not say That Men ought to do thus but such is the present state of Nature that thus they use to do And it is worth our marking That where a Man is said to know a thing perfectly he is said To be Master of it and Mastership one would think is not naturally apt to create in the mind any great awe for the thing it is thus Master of But be it as it may this I am sure of That as the Scripture tells us That things revealed belong to us so the same Scripture tells us also That there are secret things which by a kind of sacred enclosure belong only to God Deut. 29. 29. And till God shall think fit to reveal to us the Nature of the Trinity I for my part shall reckon it amongst those Secret things And accordingly with all the Pious submission of an humble Reason falling down before it adore and admire it at a distance not doubting but that for this very cause That Men should do so God in his Infinite Wisdom thought fit to spread such a Cloud and Veil over it And therefore I cannot but think that that Man expressed the due measures of our behaviour to this and the like Mysteries extreamly well who being pressed in the Schools with an Argument from the Trinity in opposition to the Question held by him gave it no other Answer but this Magister hoc Mysterium Trinitatis ex quo argumentaris est potiùs flexis genibus adorandum quà m curiosâ nimis indagine ventilandum The Respondent who made this Reply had the Repute of a Learned and Eloquent Man and I think this Reply represents him a very Pious and Discreet one too And therefore as for the third and last Topick upon which our Author would recommend his Hypothesis about the Trinity viz. That it solves all the difficulties of it I fear from what hath been last said that it will prove as far from being a Commendation as it is from being a Truth especially when the Author himself after his saying so in Page 85. immediately adds and that in the very next words Page 86. line 1. That there may be a great deal more in this Mystery than we can fathom c. But now if our Author will in this manner utter one Assertion and immediately after it subjoyn another which quite overthrows it who can help this For that a great deal more should remain in this Mystery than we can fathom or that there can be any thing unfathomable in that in which there is nothing difficult or that any thing can be difficult after such an Explication given of it as solves all the difficulties of it for that is his very word in Page 85. the last Line I must freely confess surpasses my Understanding to conceive and God bless his Understanding if it can It must be confessed indeed as I hinted before in my Preface that in a short Treatise lately Published by him and entituled An Apology for Writing against the Socinians he seems to deny the Notion of a Trinity to be comprehensible and easie Page 15. telling us That there must be infinite degrees of knowledge where the Object is Infinite and that every new degree is more perfect than that below it And yet no Creature can attain the highest degree of all which is a perfect Comprehension so that the knowledge of God may encrease every day and Men may write plainer and plainer about these matters every day without pretending to make all that is in God even a Trinity in Unity comprehensible and easie which he calls a Spightful and Scandalous Imputation By which angry words it is manifest that he would fain rid himself from those Inconveniences which his former unwary and absurd Assertions had involved him in But by his favour the Truth of the Charge shall take off the Scandal from such as make it wheresoever else it may fix it For I have fully shewn That in this his Vindication c. he has frequently and as clearly as words can express a thing affirmed a Trinity in Unity to be a plain easie intelligible Notion Where by Plain must be understood either 1st Such a Plainness as excludes all Doubts and Difficulties whatsoever In which sense alone a thing can be said to be