the Father, and the Father the Son, and consequently that the Holy Ghost is the same with both. And all they come very near this heresy, who acknowledge only a modal distinction between the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. What is tritheism, he also shews us plainly, viz., that it is to hold that the three persons in the trinity are of a different nature, or separated and divided from each other, or that there is more than one fountain or principle of the Divinity. According to which account, Dr. Sherlock is certainly clear from the charge of tritheism: the Catholic doctrine he declares to be this, 'That there are three really distinct hypostases in the godhead, and yet that there is but one God, because the Father only is the head of the Divinity, and the Son and Holy Ghost as they are derived from him, so they exist in him, and are inseparably united to him.'"

Hence we see that so long as Dean Sherlock maintained this doctrine of the three hypostases, he was at liberty to understand those three distinct hypostases to be three distinct intelligent agents, three distinct infinite minds or spirits, or three distinct infinite beings, and and yet not err from the faith of the Catholic Church, or that of primitive antiquity; while, on the other hand, those who maintained one numerical essence of the Deity, in opposition to the doctrine of the specific unity, and that the persons of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost were modal distinctions of that one numerical essence, had come very near the heresy of Sabellianism.

Now when we consider that each party disclaimed the errors imputed to them by the other, that for instance Dean Sherlock declared that his doctrine was not Tritheistical, and South, Wallis, and others, that their doctrine was not Sabellian, it is clear that there was a misconception somewhere of what is Sabellianism and what is not, and of what is Tritheism and what is not.

First, then, with regard to Sabellianism, let us hear Dr. Whitby. (See Last Thoughts of Dr. Whitby.) "It is rightly observed by Justin Martyr, in the beginning of his exhortation to the Greeks, that an exact scrutiny into things doth often produce conviction that those things which we once judged to be right were, after a more diligent inquiry into truth, found to be otherwise. And truly I am not ashamed to say that this is my case. For when I wrote my Commentaries on the New Testament, I went on too hastily, I own, in the common beaten road of other reputed orthodox divines; conceiving first that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in one complex notion, were one and the same God, by virtue of the same individual essence communicated from the Father. This confused notion I am now fully convinced, by the

arguments I have offered here and in the second part of my Reply to Dr. Waterland, to be a thing impossible and full of gross absurdities and contradictions. And then, as a natural consequence from this doctrine, I secondly concluded that these Divine persons differed only in the manner of their existence. And yet what that can signify in the Son according to this doctrine, it will not, I think, be very easy intelligibly to declare. That the difference can be only modal, even Dr. South has fully demonstrated; and that this was the opinion generally received from the fourth century may be seen in the close of my first part to Dr. Waterland. And yet the right Rev. Bishop Bull positively affirms that this is rank Sabellianism in these words: 'A person cannot be conceived without essence, unless you make a person in divine matters to be a mere mode of existence, which is manifest Sabellianism.' And the judicious Dr. Cudworth tells us that, the orthodox Anti-Arian fathers did all of them zealously condemn Sabellianism, the doctrine whereof is no other but this, that there is but one hypostasis or single individual essence of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and consequently that they were indeed but three names, or notions, or modes, of one and the selfsame thing; whence such absurdities as these would follow, that the Father's begetting the Son was nothing but a name, notion, or mode of one deity begetting another, or else the same deity under one notion begetting itself under another notion. And when again the Son or Word is said to be Incarnate and to have suffered death for us upon the cross, that it was but a mere logical notion or mode of the deity under one particular notion or mode only.' That the doctrine of the Sabellians was exactly the same with that of those who style themselves the orthodox, asserting that the Father and the Son are numerically one and the same God, is evident from the words of Athanasius and Epiphanius, both testifying that to say the Father and the Son were μονουσιοι or ταυτουσιοι, of one and the same substance, was Sabellianism. And surely of consequence to contend that this is the doctrine of England is to dishonor our church, and in effect to charge her with that heresy which was exploded with scorn by the whole church of Christ, from the third to the present century. In a word, all notions of the word person, besides the plain and obvious one, signifying a real and intelligent agent, have been already so excellently baffled and learnedly confuted, that I own I am not able to resist the shining evidence of truth."

It will here be seen that Dr. Whitby, before the alteration of his views from orthodoxy to alleged Arianism,-maintained that there was one substance of the deity having three modal distinctions or persons. That

he considered this to be the orthodox faith, and to be the faith of all the orthodox clergy with whom he was acquanted; that it was under this impression that he wrote his Comments on the Gospels and Epistles, which to this day are reputed orthodox. On the other hand, Bull, Waterland, South, and others, maintain that this is not the opinion of the fathers, as Whitby and others had asserted, but is Sabellianism. The difference between the two appears to be this: according to South and others, a person is a substance modally distinguished; according to Whitby, a person is a modal distinction. The former considered the person to be the substance, having a given mode, or modally distinguished; the latter considered the person to be the mode, as contemplated separately from the substance. Without entering into the dispute, which is sufficiently unprofitable, I shall have occasion in the second chapter to point out, in the application of the doctrine of Bishop Bull, a plain departure from it among the orthodox, and to shew that they separate the person from the substance, and the substance from the person, equally with those whom they denominate Sabellians. With regard to Dr. Whitby's view of Sabellianism, certainly if his were a true statement of the doctrine of Sabellius*, we should regard it as absurd; and we should make no hesitation in saying, that to suppose a person to be a mere mode, and not a substance is nonsense. To say that Swedenborg held such a doctrine, as some affirm, is pure fiction. His view of the Trinity in Unity, is, that God is one substance; that this one substance is one person, who is that one substance, and not a mere mode separated from the substance; that in this one substance, which is one person, there are three real distinctions, and not merely nominal as it is said Sabellius held; that these three distinctions are those of goodness, wisdom, and power; consequently that there is one divine substance and person, distinguished according to degrees (not modes) in a three-fold manner, as expressed by Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; that between these three there is a subordination of the second to the first, and of the third to the second, the same with that of wisdom to love, and of power to wisdom.

Thus much will suffice with regard to Sabellianism; let us now revert to the subject of Tritheism. This question belongs entirely to the members of the Roman and the Protestant Churches; none of which, I believe, have as yet thought of imputing this error to the New Church, although this imputation would be quite as reasonable as others which they make.

* There are so many different statements of what were the doctrines of Sabellius, that one is obliged to be very cautious in receiving them.

The doctrine of the trinity has become so perplexed, that almost every word connected with it, has been made to have an ambiguous and equivocal meaning. One would think that the question as to what are three Gods, and what is one, is exceedingly plain and simple. By no means; for when logical terms are introduced, any one thing may be proved to be any other, or may be proved not to be any thing; because, either what that is which corresponds to the terms, the disputants are at a loss to conceive, or else the deity himself, is taken to be something so different from all other objects of thought, that what would be contradictory and absurd in created things, is not conceived to be so in him. Let the question be raised, for instance, whether God is one, what ordinary simple mind would have any difficulty on the subject? but when the learned come to debate it, see what a mystery it becomes. "You can never," says Dr. Waterland, "fix any certain principle of individuation. It is for want of this, that you can never assure me, that three real persons may not be, or are not, one numerical or individual substance. In short, you know not precisely what it is that makes one being, or one essence, or one substance." Vol. 2, p.215.-" The great difficulty is to determine what makes an individual, or to fix a certain principle of individuation. I called upon you for it before," says Waterland to his opponent, "knowing that very wise men thought it as difficult a problem as to square the circle." Vol. 3, p. 298. Again, he observes, "Individual is something undivided in such respect as it is conceived to be one; and one is something single, and not multiplex, in that respect wherein it is conceived to be one. I pretend not to make any man wiser by such an account as this; but it is proper to confess our ignorance where we know nothing." Ibid p. 302.

We know nothing, then, it seems, of what constitutes the Deity an individual being: to attempt to attain that knowledge is as difficult as to square the circle. This being the case, why need we wonder at so many disputes, as to what is tritheism, and what is not? Why need we wonder, that those upon whom it is charged, repel the imputation? that one should regard that, as signifying three divine beings, which another denies to have that signification? In respect to men, the question as to what makes them three individual beings, is very easily answered; though even that has been attempted to be obscured, by the doctrine of the specific unity! But in regard to God, to attempt to determine what is, and what is not, one divine individual being, very wise men, it seems, have thought it as difficult a problem as to square the circle. Alas! we cannot but think, that had they not been so very wise, the problem would have been very easy. The Arians

generally repelled the imputation of believing in three Gods, and denied that they held the doctrine of tritheism; at the same time, some would acknowledge, that they maintained the existence of three divine beings, each of whom is God; for to say that there are three Gods, was to them as absurd as to say there were three manhoods: whereas there is only one manhood, but many beings, each of which is man. The difference between the tritheism of Arianism, and the tritheism of orthodoxy, is this; that the Arians believed God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, to be created beings, and, consequently, not con-substantial with the Father: the orthodox either express or imply that they mean three uncreated beings, coequal and con-substantial with each other, each of them being God. This is pretty clearly signified in the following observation of Dr. Burton, wherein, conformably to his view of the meaning of the word person, as a separately existing being, an individual substantial existence, the transition is easy (if any indeed be required), to the contemplation of God and Christ, as two beings, and this under the ancient pretext of opposition to Sabellianism.

"The Sabellian hypothesis," says he, "removes some of the difficulties in the doctrine of the trinity; but it does not remove the whole of them, and it creates new difficulties of its own. It saves us from inquiring into the mode of the divine generation, and simplifies the notion of the unity of God; but it fails to explain why the apostles constantly used such figurative language, and why God is spoken of as being Son to Himself. It assigns no reason, why God should be called the Son, when viewed as the Redeemer of mankind; and the notion of the Son's interceding with the Father, of his having made satisfaction to his Father, and of his being a mediator between God and man, must lead us to the notion of two beings, who in some way or other, have distinct individuality. That Sabellianism, when it appeared in the third century, was looked upon as a heresy, is not a matter of speculation, but of history." (Testimonies to the Divinity of the Holy Ghost, taken from the Ante-Nicene Fathers. Introduction, p. 12.) It is clear from this and other passages, that Dr. Burton conceived the Ante-Nicene Fathers to maintain the existence of three Divine Beings, and one God; which is the doctrine of the specific unity, which Dr. Burton himself appears to have held; nevertheless, he would disclaim the doctrine of tritheism.

We have now completed our proposed sketch of Tritheism and Sabellianism. The subject of Patripassianism is reserved for the next chapter. We shall here observe, by way of conclusion to this part of the subject, what of course the reader might naturally be prepared for,