heresies that were about the doctrine of the Trinity, what arguments the sectariés used, and which way the churchmen answered.. It will appear that the doctrine of the church was such an unity of essence in the Divine Persons as we call Nutherical.

I shall mention one heresy before the Council of Nice and one after it; because the pretence is for the time of that council, and for some time before and after it, that the Christians held the persons in the Trinity to be so many different beings; and to be one in essence

no otherwise than as three men have the same common nature among them. If this were true, than farewell fathers, and the church of Christ for all that time; for this would never justify them from an imputation of Tritheistn; but the contrary, God be thanked, has been fully shewn by Bishop Stillingfleet, as I said, and by many other learned men, and needs no shewing to any one that will read the books themselves.

1. The first notable heresy that rose about the doctrine of the Trinity, was that of Praxeas, against which Tertullian wrote the book we spoke of; and it was after his time carried on by Noetus and Sabellius; from the year 200 [100] to 260 [163]; after which time the men of that sect were called Sabellians. They held, that there is but one Person in the Godhead, as I said; and this they pretended not to be any new doctrine set up by them (for they and all people at that time owned this for a certain rule, as it undoubtedly is, That whatsoever is new in the fundamentals of religion is false; but they maintained stiffly that it was the very sense of the Christian church before them. Now I say, that these men could never have so far mistaken church's sense, as to assert one person in number, unless the general doctrine had owned that there is but one essence in number; for if the church had held, that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, had each a distinct numerical essence, as three men have, the Sabellians could never have run into that mistake of the church's meaning, as to think it to be, that there is but One Person, and consequently that the Father suffered; which they

the

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did, and were, therefore, called Patripassians; and on the other side, the church would have had no difficulty in answering the objections of the Sabellians, who argued, That since there is but one God, there can be but One Person in the Godhead; for if the church had held, as before, that the three persons have only the same specific or common essence, and not the same numerical essence, it had been no more a mystery that the Son should take flesh, and the Father not, than it is that of three men, that have all the same common nature of man, one should do or suffer any thing, and the other not; and they could not have avoided answering so; whereas, on the contrary, the fathers find it a very tedious and difficult thing to answer the objections of those men (witness Tertullian's book against Praxeas) and do always fly to the incomprehensible nature of the Divine Essence.

When the Arian disputes arose, the Catholics that maintained the clause of one substance, were constantly by the Arians reproached with Sabellianism, i. e. of holding but one person in number; which could not have been, but that they explained themselves so, as to shew that they meant but one substance in number. This was the first and main ground of Arius's falling off from the church; for so Socrates relates the matter *.

"Alexander, the bishop, sitting on a time with his presbyters and other clergy, discoursed something nicely of the Holy Trinity; how there is in the Trinity μovas, a unity [or singularity]; but Arius, one of the presbyters of his church, a man not unskilful in logical quirks, thinking that the bishop did set up the doctrine of Sabellius, did himself, out of contention, set up the directly opposite extreme to that of that Libyan.'

And a little after that the Council of Nice had inserted into the creed that phrase, [230] that the Son is (μośσtos) co-essential [or of one substance] with the Father,-the same historian tells, how there were great contests about the import of that word; and he says (lib. 1, c. 23)

* Hist. lib. 1, c. 5.

They that disliked that word, thought, that the approvers of it did set up the opinion of Sabellius; and so called them Blasphemers, as if they had goue about to take away (Tape) the substance [or distinct personality] of the Son of God; and they, on the contrary, that approved that term, reckoned that their opposers brought in Polytheism [or several gods]; and Sozomen gives the very same account, lib. 2. c. 18, 19.”

This plainly shews, that the Catholics, who owned the word vuosios, explained themselves so as to mean one substance in number; for else the accusations ought to have run quite contrary; and not the denyers of that phrase, but the approvers of it would have been accused of Polytheism or Tritheism, as they are now by these men; but they were then upbraided with Sabellianisin, the direct contrary extreme; and the defenders of the Nicene Creed against the Arians, do take most pains in vindicating themselves from that imputation; which could have had no appearance, if they had not been understood to hold one substance in number,

This made them to be accused of "taking away the subsistence for distinct personality] of the Son of God;" because they teaching that there is in the Trinity but one substance in all, and the others extending what they said of (soia) substance, to vдapğıç) subsistence, concluded that they thereby made but one subsistence in all; and so the Sou could have none; whereas if they had meant, as these slanderers represent their meaning, three substances in number, or any thing that would have amounted to what that reviler calls Three Consubstantial Gods, they would have been so far from taking away his rape, that they had given him a distinct soia, essence or divinity, and had made him a distinct God from God the Father.

If there were time to enter into any of the particulars of the history of the men of that time [225-260], such as Eustathius, Meletius, &c. and other chief defenders of the Nicene faith, that would plainly shew the falsehood of this accusation; for if this accusation were true, these men would have been, by the Arians, hated and deposed under any pretence, sooner than that of

Sabelliahisin; which, as Socrates* and Theodoret † tells us, was the chief pretence against them.

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2. Now, to coine to some later times, and the heresies then arising, we shall see how directly contrary to history that opinion is, that pretends that it was after the fifth century that the doctrine of one individual essence was received;" for it places the beginning of the Catholic religion in opposition to Tritheism, just at the time when Tritheism, in opposition to the true religion, was first of all vented. For Joann. Philopontis, in the sixth century [470], was the first man of all that owned the Son and Holy Spirit to be God, that ever offered to deny "the doctrine of ohe Individual essence" in the Godhead, and to affirm that each Person in the Trinity had his own essence or substance distinct; and so that there were three substances or natures in number, as well as Three Persons..

The quotations concerning him, and concerning his being condemned for this doctrine, might be easily produced, being a plece of history so well known and uncontroverted. It is only to spare time (having too far digressed already) that I desire the reader to take the account of his heresy, in the words of the learned Dr. Cave, who giving a short account of him (as he does of all other writers) relates the ordinary history concerning him thus:He vehted several doctrines contrary to the faith. Having taken for granted, from Aristotle's philosophy, of which he had been a great student, that Hypostasis is the saine with Natura, he thence concluded that there is but one nature in Christ; and rejected the Council of Chalcedon; and afterward, when the Catholics objected to him that there are in the Trinity three Hypostases, and yet but one nature; to get clear of that objection, he ventured to maintain that there are three natures of substances in the Trinity; yet still positively denying that there are three Gods of Deities. He was for this reason accounted, and is to

* Lib. 2. c. 9. de Eustathio.

Lib. 2. c. 31, de Meletio. Hist. Literaria Part 1. verb Joann. Philopontis.

this day accounted, the author and ringleader of the sect of the Tritheists."

The Socinians themselves, when they think it for their purpose, do instance in the condemnation of this man; saying, of an opinion which they would represent the same as this, That "it was condemned by the antients in the person of Philoponus; and in the middle ages, in the person or writings of Abbot Joachim," &c.; and can there be any thing fouler, than to impute to the antients an opinion which they condemned as soon as they heard it vented? Would they have condemned him for expressing that which was their own meaning?

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All that has any appearance of truth in this accusation of the fathers, is this: First, That they being used to a style that is fitter for an honest plain man to signify his meaning, than for a logician to hold a dispute in, and yet being forced to speak much of the Trinity, do many times express themselves so, and use such comparisons, paraphrases, &c. as a captious man may take his advantage of, if he will single out some particular places; and, 2dly, That their disputes being against Arians, Eunomians, &c. who not only denied the numerical unity, but even the specifical unity or equality of essence in the Trinity, do sometimes use such arguments as prove a specifical unity, not that that was all they would have, but to overthrow one error first; and on this head they sometimes use the instance of three men being (óuosoioi) of one substance. Such is that place of Gregory Nyssen which Curcellæus urges, and Bishop Stillingfleet confesses to be the hardest place in all antiquity; but in such places their aim is to argue thus: - If three men, though differing as three individuals, yet having all the same sort of essence, are in some sense styled of one substance with one another, how much more may the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be so styled, who do not differ as three men, but have an essence that is (arμnros, auéporos) unparted, undis(ἄτμητος, tinguished, — and that is (axwpioτws kai adiaipérws)?

* Considerations on the Explication of the Trinity, pag. 12. VOL. II.

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