not to be

with such a subordination.

1685. of the church, both before and after the determination of the council of Nice, with a more than ordiinconsistent nary application, diligence, and observation, (as his very s enemies cannot deny,) and hath proved it to have been the general belief, that the Father was greater than the Son as to his original, and the Son equal to his Father as to his nature, [κατὰ φύσιν;] and answered at large the principal objection against the natural coequality of the Father and the Son, taken from such passages in the Ante-Nicene writers, as seem to deny the immensity and invisibility of the Son; which are here reconciled with other passages in them, which are express for those attributes being common to him with the Father.

Under the third and last thesis he hath made appear the use and advantage of this doctrine, concerning the subordination of the Son to the Father, notwithstanding the equality of their nature; and hath many judicious observations, about the distinction and union of the divine hypostases or persons; about the consent of both the contending sides, in laying a principle of unity in the Father, (whether that be consubstantial or not consubstantial ;) about internal and external production; and about some other matters for the farther explication both of the monarchy and the Trinity in the Godhead, from the principal Fathers both Greek and Latin. There are various opinions, it is true, concerning his performance of this last part: and different uses have been made thereof by different parties, which is not much to be wondered at. To come to our present 1685. times.

this treatise

Dr. Clarke

LIX. The ingenious and learned Dr. Clarke in The use of particular hath in his Scripture Doctrine of the made by Trinity ", printed this very year, no less than thirty considered. citations out of this very treatise; and almost all of them are represented in a very different view from that which our author certainly had in writing those passages: as are also the citations out of the Fathers themselves, which Dr. Clarke here met with, and hath accommodated to his own purpose, and that frequently, without so much as the least notice taken of the explications and answers given to them by this our author. And here, because some have thought Dr. Clarke's scheme of the Trinity to be in some measure agreeable to that which is delivered to us for the catholic doctrine in this most learned treatise, from the testimony of the three first ages of Christianity, and that it is somewhat supported by the authority of two such great names amongst us as PEARSON and BULL; I shall set it down, as well as I can in a few words, that the reader may compare it with the foregoing theses, and thence judge for himself.

The learned defender of the Nicene faith, having Whose vindicated at large, as we have already seen, both compared the consubstantiality of the Son, and his coeternal with his. existence with the Father, gave occasion for different reflections, by his maintaining, that though the Son be coequal with the Father, as having the same di

1685. vine nature with the Father, without any change or diminution, yet he is subordinate to the Father, as receiving the divine nature from him. This is in short the very sum of his doctrine, which hath been excepted against by some, and misapplied by others; as if such a subordination which he teacheth were in itself inconsistent with a natural or essential coequality of persons. But not to trouble ourselves here with any others, let us proceed to take a view at once of the doctrine of the Trinity, which Dr. Clarke hath advanced for the true Scripture doctrine of it; which is this, viz. "There is one first " and supreme cause, the Author of all being, and " sole origin of all power and authority, who alone " is self-existent, underived, unoriginated, indepen" dent, made of none, begotten of none, proceeding " from none; who is called the Father, and is abso"lutely supreme over all, and the one or only God " in the Scripture language. With whom there hath " existed from the beginning a second divine person, " who is called his Word or Son, deriving his being " or essence, and all his attributes from him, as the " supreme cause; but whether by the necessity of " nature, or the power of his will only, the doctor " will not be positive: no more than he will be, " whether he existed from all eternity, or only be"fore all worlds; and whether he was begotten of "the same substance and essence with the Father, " or made out of nothing; because of the danger of " presuming to be able to define the particular me“ taphysical manner of the Son's deriving his essence " from the Father. With whom also a third person " hath existed, deriving his essence in like manner " from him, through the Son; which person hath

" higher titles ascribed to him than to any angel, or 1685.

" other created being whatsoever, but is no where

" called God in Scripture, being subordinate to the

" Son, both by nature and by the will of the Father." This is the substance of the doctrine of the Trinity, as defended by this doctor, and from which he inferreth, "That absolute supreme honour is due to "the person of the Father singly, as being alone "the supreme Author of all being and power; and " that whatever honour is paid to the Son, who re" deemed, or to the Holy Spirit, who sanctifieth us, " must always be understood, as tending finally to "the honour and glory of the Father, by whose "good pleasure the Son redeemed, and the Holy " Spirit sanctifies us." According to this doctrine, it appeareth that the Son must not be God, strictly and properly speaking, much less still the Holy Spirit, but that God the Father alone is the true and supreme God: and therefore he asserts expressly, that the Scripture, when it mentions God absolutely, and by way of eminence, means the person of the Father; as likewise when it mentioneth the one God, or the only God; though he could not, after having read the Defence of the Nicene Faith, be ignorant that this was contrary to the mind of the catholic Fathers. Neither could he, of what the learned author of the Considerations on Mr. Whiston's Historical Preface, whom he cites, had said to this purpose; though he might not possibly have observed or remembered, that there is a whole chapter in St. Irenæus, purposely to shew, that Christ is in Scripture expressly and absolutely called God, and

1685. that he is the one and only God in the unity of the Father's substance or essence; and very God, in opposition to all those that are improperly called God in the sacred writings. However this might be, certain it is, that Dr. Clarke, who had so ample a collection of testimonies concerning the Trinity before him in this treatise, as well as in Petavius, hath not made that use of them, which this indefatigable and judicious collector did, or which might have been expected from a person of so great a character in the church and learned world, as Dr. Clarke.

The doctor's artful

For the plain and confessed truth is, that we are way of cit- not to depend much upon the quotations by him ing authors brought, for knowing the opinion or judgment of any writer: since this was never so much as designed by him. Wherefore the reader must not wonder, as he himself fairly warneth, if many passages not consistent with (nay perhaps contrary to) those which are cited by him in this book, shall by any one be alleged out of the same authors. So we must not wonder if in above thirty citations, out of our author, according as this ingenious writer hath extracted and applied them, we can hardly find one in ten of them cited with any consistence with, or subservience to that, which we know for certain to have been our author's fixed opinion, and well weighed judgment. For whosoever will be at the pains to compare the several passages cited by Dr. Clarke, as they stand in the places whence they are taken, with other clear and express passages of our learned author, and with the whole scope and purport of his reasonings for the truth of the Nicene doctrine, must evidently perceive, that these are all placed in quite another light by the doctor than in