fo much as to pretend to. For how fhould the Son be God by Nature, upon your Principles, when the Father Himfelf, whatever his Metaphyfical Nature may be (which the * Doctor allows not to come into Confideration) is GoD by Office only; might not have been God at all, if He had pleased to make no Creatures; and may cease to be God, in the ScriptureSenfe of the word, whenever He will, by letting all Things drop into their primitive Nothing. Now unless Nature and Office fignify the fame, it is not eafy to conceive, upon the Doctor's Principles, how any Perfon can be God, by Nature, at all. You fay, if the divine Powers and Dominion be derived to, and exercised by a Nature, Perfon, or intelligent Subftance, UNIVERSALLY (which is impoffible to fuppofe in a finite Creature) PERMANENTLY (which is contrary to your own Suppofition of a Kingdom which is to have an end) UNALTERABLY, (tho' an Alteration is prefumed in refpect of the Son, and might be fuppofed even in refpect of the Father Himself) If these Things be fo; that is, if Contradictions be true, what then? Then fuch a Being, or Perfon, is God by Nature, &c. And this you give us as the true meaning of Gal. 4. 8. But, I hope, we fhall have more refpect for an inspired Apostle than to Father any fuch meaning upon Him. For the true Senfe and Import of it, I refer you to the † Learned Gen

Script. Doctr. p. 243. 296. alias 210.163. Reply, p. 301. + True Script. Doctr. continued, p. 73, &c. tleman,

tleman, who has fo well defended this Text against Dr. Clarke. You add, Had not the Scriptures this Senfe of the word, God, They could not be intelligible or reconcilable (p.113.) But are you well affured that you understand whatever is intelligible or reconcilable? The Metaphyfical Definition, you fay, cannot be the only Scripture Senfe of the Term, God. You allow then that it may be the Principal, tho' not the only Scripture-Senfe; which I am glad to hear from you. The Learned Doctor will not admit the Metaphyfical Senfe to be ever the Scripture-Senfe of the Term, God. The Metaphyfical Senfe, He exprefly says, is never intended; but the conftant ufage of Scripture is different. The Word, God, in Scripture, is ALWAYS a relative Word of Office: Which tho' the Doctor has no Proof of, nor Ground for, nor is Himself well fatisfied in; yet He knew why He said it, having very good prudential Reafons for it. For, if the Metaphyfical Senfe be ever intended, when the word, God, is fpoken of the Father, no good Reafon can be affign'd why it fhould not be fo always, when spoken of the fame Perfon: And if this be the current and most ufual Senfe of the word, God, in Scripture, we fhall have a fair handle to prove that it was intended in the fame Senfe, when spoken, in fuch and fuch Circumstances, of the Son: Or, at least, the Doctor will have little or no Pretence left, upon his Principles,

Script. Doctr. p. 296. Reply, p. 119, 290.

for

for faying that the Son is truly, and properly, God. You observe, that the Metaphyfical Definition of one Self-existent, underived, independent, fupreme Being would exclude the Son, who is derived. This is the Sum of your Argument, and clearer than you have put it. But I must obferve to you, that this Definition, or fomething like it, hath long paffed current with Men who believed a Trinity of divine Perfons, and were never apprehensive of any fuch Confequence as you would draw from it. It is properly a Definition of the To Jov, the divine Nature, abftracting from the Confideration of the diftinction of Perfons, which is the ufual method that the Schoolmen, and others have taken; and There the Words felf-exiftent, underived, independent, are not confidered as perfonal, but effential Characters. Neceffarilyexifting, uncreated, immutable, all fufficient, are what They mean, in that Definition: Otherwife it is a Definition of the Perfon of the Father only, fingly confider'd. But if instead of Metaphyficks (which must always be content to stand corrected by Gofpel Revelation) we chufe to take our Definition of God from Scripture: Then that of * Melancthon, which I have put into the Margin, will be more full and compleat.

Deus eft Effentia Spiritualis, intelligens, verax, bona, pura, jufta, mifericors, liberrima, immenfæ potentiæ, & fapientiæ, Pater æternus qui Filium Imaginem fuam ab æterno genuit, & Filius Imago Patris Co-æterna, & Spiritus Sanctus procedens a Patre & Filio. Melanct. Loc. Theolog. de Deo.

QUERY XXV.

Whether it be not clear from all the genuine Remains of Antiquity, that the Catholick Church, before the Council of Nice, and even from the Beginning, did believe the Eternity and Confubftantiality of the Son; if either the oldeft Creeds, as interpreted by thofe that recite Them; or the Teftimonies of the earliest Writers, or the publick Cenfures pass'd upon Hereticks, or particular Paffages of the Antienteft Fathers, can amount to a proof of a Thing of this Nature?

U tell me, in Anfwer, that it is not

You clear that the Ante-Nicene Church pro

fefs'd the Notion of INDIVIDUAL Confubftantiality: That the Objector cannot produce one fingle Paffage in all Catholick Ante Nicene Antiquity, which proves an INDIVIDUAL OF NUMERICAL Confubftantiality, in the three divine Perfons. This Anfwer is fcarce becoming the Gravity of a Man, or the Sincerity of a Christian, in fo ferious and weighty an Argument. Did I fpeak of Individual Confubftantiality; or, if I had, could I mean it in your Senfe? I ask, whether the Fathers believed the Three Perfons to be one Substance; and do affirm that They did, univerfally. You Anfier, that They did not affert the Three Per

fons

fons to be one Perfon; which is the constant Senfe you make of Individual. And here, you would make a fhow as if the Objector had been mistaken, and as if you contradicted Him; when all refolves into a trifling Equivocation, and you really contradict Him not at all. That prefent Scholaftick Notion, as you call it, of three Perfons being one Perfon, Hypoftafis, or Suppofitum, is no where prefent, that I know of, amongst any that own a Trinity: Neither is it the Scholaftick Notion; as any Man may fee, that will but look into the Schoolmen, and read with any Judgment. Individual has been generally own'd, but not in your Senfe; and Numerical too, but in a Senfet very different from what you pretend to oppose it in: And therefore, to be plain with you; this way of proceeding, in an important Controverfy, is neither fair towards your Adverfaries, nor fincere towards the Readers; but, at best, is only folemn Trifling. You know, or you know little in this Controversy, that all the Fathers almost to a Man, either exprefly or implicitely, afferted the Confubftantiality of the Son with the Father. Call it Individual, or call it Specifick; that is not now the Queftion. They unanimously maintain'd that the Son was not of any created, or mutable Subftance, but strictly Divine; and fo closely and nearly allied to the Father's Perfon (in a mysterious way above Comprehenfion) that the Substance of the Son might be justly called Cc 2 the