many great authorities. And against the Arians, 1685. he sheweth how this Son of God is not of any created and changeable essence, but of the very same nature with God his Father: and so is rightly called, very God of very God, and of one substance with the Father. Also against the same he demonstrateth, how this consubstantial Son of God must have had a coeternal existence with the Father. And lastly, against the Tritheists and Sabellians, he argueth the necessity of believing the Father to be the fountain, original, and principle of the Son, and that the Son is hence subordinate to the Father. . cerning the Which four articles being established in this trea- And contise, the heads of the catholic doctrine concerning Holy Ghost. the HOLY GHOST do thence easily also unfold themselves; and are these, according as he hath explained them here, though but incidentally. I.'The Holy Ghost is not a mere energy of the Father, but a distinct divine Person. II. This divine Person is of the same nature and essence with the Father and the Son. III. He not only preexisted before the world, but is eternal as the Father is eternal. Yet, IV. He is not self-originated, but proceedeth from the Father eternally as his original, and is sent by the Son. These are the four capital points, concerning the faith in the Holy Ghost, as defended by our author, which suppose the proof of the foregoing articles concerning the Son; about which therefore it was necessary he should be very large. Now that we may the better comprehend whole design in this elaborate work, it will not be 1 Sect. i. cap. 2. n. 5. sect. ii. cap. 3. n. 13. n. 16. cap. 4. n. cap. 5. n. 9. usque ad finem. his An account thesis, con 8. of Mr. Bull's of Christ. 1685. unuseful to set down the entire plan at once, and to cerning the lay together the several theses which he hath underpreexistence taken herein to defend, against both Arians and Socinians on one hand, as also against Sabellians and Tritheists on the otherm. His first thesis is this: The person called Jesus Christ, before ever he had that name, or was born of the blessed Virgin Mary, had a real existence in a far more excellent nature than the human, and therein did appear to the holy men of old, as a foretoken of his future incarnation, and did preside over, and had care of the church, which was to be redeemed with his blood, so that from the beginning of the world, the whole order of the divine economy was through him all along transacted: yea, that even before the very foundation of the world he was actually present with God his Father, and that through him all this universe was created. This he saith is the unanimous doctrine of all the Fathers of the three first centuries, nor is the truth of it denied by the Arians. But against the Socinians he proveth, first, that all the divine apparitions in the Old Testament are by these ancient writers generally explained concerning the Son of God. For proof of which he appealeth to Justin Martyr, Irenæus, Theophilus Antiochenus, Clemens Alexandrinus, Tertul m [The design of Bull's work is well and concisely stated by Waterland, vol. ii. p. 285. " The plain question between bishop "Bull and the Arians is only this: Whether the Ante-Nicene Fathers, in general, believed the Son to be of an eternal, un"created, immutable, and strictly divine substance, or no? Bishop "Bull maintained the affirmative, and has unanswerably proved "it, in the opinion of most men of true learning and judgment, "whether here or abroad."] lian, Origen, Cyprian, and the very ancient author 1685. of the book de Trinitate". And, that this continued to be the doctrine of the catholic church after the council of Nice, he sheweth from Athanasius, Hilary, Philastrius, Chrysostom, Ambrose, Augustin, Leo the Great, and Theodoret. After which, he proveth also the actual existence of the divine Logos before the world was made, and the creation thereof by him, from the testimony of the apostolical Fathers and others. And lastly, he proveth against the Arians, that they herein betray their own cause, by granting the Father to have made all things by his Son out of nothing; since nothing is more absurd than to suppose that a creature, which is itself made out of nothing, such as by them the Son is conceived to be, can have such a power communicated to it, as is not less than infinite, even to the producing other creatures instrumentally out of nothing; and since nothing also tendeth more to revive the primitive heresy, or rather blasphemy, of the very worst sort of Gnostics, who fancied the world to have been created, at least instrumentally, by certain angels, and inferior demiurgic powers: but more especially, forasmuch as the primitive catholic writers, even before the stirs about Arius, have from the work of creation common to the Son with the Father inferred the common divine nature of them both, and especially averred, that God created the world by nothing that was without him, but by his Word only, which was with him and in him. LVI. His second thesis is this, that it is the An account concerning stantiality the FATHER. q 1685. constant and unanimous opinion of the catholic writers, for the three first centuries, that the Son of his thesis of God is consubstantial to God the Father; not the consub- of any created or mutable essence, but of the very of the WORD selfsame divine and incommunicable nature with with God his Father, and so he is true God of true God. This article of the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son, being that upon which the whole controversy of the catholics with the Arians doth turn, our author thought it worth his while to treat the same more largely and distinctly than the former, which is granted by the Arians to the catholics. After therefore the P explication of his thesis, and vindication of the term made use of by the Nicene Fathers, he beginneth with the ecclesiastical writers of the apostolical 9 age, and sheweth the sense of St. Barnabas, St. Hermas, and St. Ignatius in this matter, and vindicateth St. Clement of Rome, and St. Polycarp, from the misrepresentations of Zwickerus and Sandius. Then he proceedeth lower to Justin Martyr, out of whom he bringeth abundance of testimonies, too hard for the Arians as well as Socinians ever to get over. After whom he calleth in for witnesses Athenagoras, Tatian, and Theophilus of Antioch. His next evidence for the Son's being of the same divine nature and essence with God the Father is St. Irenæus, who is a very clear one. " Clemens Alexandrinus, who followeth him, may not seem perhaps so clear altogether; nevertheless, he is vindicated against the exceptions of Huetius, Petavius, and Sandius. And some testimonies are brought out of his works, for the consubstan¶ Cap. 2. Cap. 4. P Sect. ii. cap. 1. Cap. 3. Ꮓ a tiality of the whole Trinity, which are plain enough. 1685. After these witnesses for the truth of his thesis, he examineth Tertullian, and after him y Caius and Hippolytus, concerning what tradition they had received as to this article: and then is very full in his vindication of Origen from an imputation commonly cast upon him; proving out of his undoubted and most accurate and uncorrupted work against Celsus, that his doctrine, concerning the true and proper divinity of the Son of God, was most catholic, and altogether according to the Nicene faith. That the holy martyr Cyprian, that Novatian, or the author of the book de Trinitate, among Tertullian's works, that Theognostus the Alexandrian, that b Dionysius of Rome, and the other of Alexandria, were of the same sentiment with the Nicene Fathers, as to this point, he hath likewise endeavoured at large to shew. Which he hath farther confirmed, by the profession of Gregory, called c Thaumaturgus, and by arguments drawn from the synodical epistles of six bishops to Paulus Samosatensis, notwithstanding what is objected by Petavius and Sandius; and from the relations concerning St. Pierius of Alexandria, and St. Pamphilus of Cæsarea, with St. Lucianus of Antioch, and St. Methodius of Tyrus; and from observations upon some passages of Arnobius and Lactantius. And thus the doctrine of the Son's consubstantiality, being established by the consentient suffrages of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, taken either from their works. or fragments that are preserved, his coeternity with с |