LETTER XIII.

Confiderations relating to the Doctrine of the Trinity.

I

REV. SIR,

Own I was particularly defirous of hearing what you could poffibly fay on the subject of my feventh letter, in which I advanced fome general confiderations relating to the doctrine of the trinity; but, unfortunately, you "con"tent yourfelf," p. 136. " with giving only a

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general reply to fome parts of that letter. A "particular anfwer," you fay, "to the feveral "objections which it contains, would lead me "into metaphyfical difquifitions, which I wish to "decline, because in that fubject I forefee that "we should want common principles and a com"mon language."

Now I make no doubt, Sir, but that, if it had been possible for you to have given any plausible answer to the difficulties started in that letter, you would have found fome principle, common or uncommon, on which to found it, and fome language alfo, which might have been intelligible to me and your readers. But as you profefs that you do not expect to convince me, it would have been quite fufficient for your purpose, if you

could

could have found common principles, and com.mon language for others.

I am the more concerned at your filence, as I was in hopes of having fome farther account of your own peculiar notion of the necessary origin of the Son from the Father's contemplation of bis own perfections; but, to my great mortification, I find not one gleam of more light on this curious fubject. You faid that this doctrine was agreeable to the notions of all the Fathers, as well as to the facred writers, and I challenged you to produce any authority for it, except what exifts in your own imagination. In my opinion, nothing can be conceived more abfurd than the idea of the neceffary production of an intelligent being, poffeffed of actual fubftantial perfonality, equal in all refpects to the original intelligent being, from the mere felf-contemplation of that original being's perfections. I faid that nothing in the Jewish Cabbala could be more abfurd. You intimate, p. 149. that I may know but little of the Jewish Cabbala; but for my purpofe it is quite enough, that it is a known proverbial expreffion to denote the extreme of absurdity; and if fo, whatever the Jewish Cabbala may really be (of which I may perhaps know as much as yourself, and of which we may each of us foon learn enough from Bafnage) the phrafe could not be mifapplied.

I find, however, a few other things on the subject of that letter, which are curious enough; fo that, for the amufement, if not the inftruction of my readers, I fhall make fome obfervations on them.

I.

In the first place, I ftill think that you yourself are not perfectly orthodox; for befides your vir tual disapprobation of the damnatory clause in the Athanafian creed, p. 165, you allow a real supe riority in the Father. "If," you fay, p. 145. "from fuch expreffions as my Father is greater "than I, you would be content to infer that the

Almighty Father is indeed the fountain and "the center of divinity, and that the equality

of godhead is to be understood with some myf"terious fubordination of the Son to the Father, you would have the concurrence of the ancient "Fathers, and of the advocates of the true faith in "all ages." But give me leave to say, that any proper fubordination, myfterious or not myfterious, implies inferiority, and is an infringement of the doctrine of the perfect equality of the three perfons; so that it cannot be, as your creed fays, none is afore or after another. You fay, p. 149. "I maintain the equality of the three perfons in

all the attributes of the divine nature. I main"tain their equality in rank and authority, with "refpect to all created things, whatever relations "or differences may fubfift between themselves." But their equal fuperiority to all created beings

is no proof at all of any proper equality among themselves. If fo, all men would be equal among themselves, because all men are fuperior to brutes.

Your notion of a real fubordination, which muft imply inferiority, and indeed imperfection, in any of the perfons in the trinity, is certainly not the orthodoxy that took place after the council of Nice, and that of the Athanafian creed.

nary.

IL.

I now come to fomething ftill more extraordi"I maintain," you fay, p. 148. " that "the three perfons are one being-I maintain that "each person by himself is God; because each poffeffes fully every attribute of the divine na"ture." Then, Sir, I affert, that you maintain as palpable a contradiction as it is in the power of man to form an idea of. The term being may be predicated of every thing, and therefore, of each of the three perfons in the trinity. For to fay that Chrift, for inftance, is God, but that there is no being, no fubftance, to which his attributes may be referred, were manifeftly abfurd; and therefore when you fay, that "each of these perfons is by himself God," you must mean, and in effect fay, that the Father separately confidered, has a being, that the Son likewife, separately confidered, has his being, and likewife, that the Holy Spirit feparately confidered, has

his

his being.

Now, Sir, if you will be pleafed to count them up, you will find that you have got three beings, as well as three perfons, and what can thefe three beings he but three Gods, without fuppofing that there are “three co-ordinate perfons, "or three Fathers, three Sons, or three Holy "Ghofts." If you like an algebraic expreffion better than this, it will ftand thus, 1+1+1=3. Have the courage then, Sir, to speak out, and Jay what you muft mean, if you have any meaning at all, that you worship three Gods.

But you fay, p. 148. that "these three per"fons are all included in the very idea of a God, " and that for that reafon, as well as for the iden"tity of the attributes in each, it were impious "and abfurd to fay that there are three Gods.” If there be any foundation for this remark, it must be impoffible for any man to have an idea of a God, without having at the fame time an idea of these three perfons; and then either there cannot be any fuch thing as an unitarian, denying these three perfons in the godhead, or else all unitarians are in fact atbeifts, having no idea of any God at all.

you

As feem to have bewildered yourself very much upon the fubject of three perfons and one God, I fhall enter a little farther into the metaphyfical analysis of it. By the words being, fubfance, fubftratum, &c. we can mean nothing more

than