But if these three distinct Persons are not separated, but essentially united unto one, each of them may be God, and all three but one God: for if these three Persons,—each of whom Greek: monadikôs, as it is in the Creed, singly by himself, not separately from the other divine Persons, is God and Lord, are essentially united into one, there can be but one God and one Lord; and how each of these persons is God, and all of them but one God, by their mutual consciousness, I have already explained.

Thus each Divine Person is God, and all of them but the same one God; as I explained it before.

This one supreme God is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, a Trinity in Unity, three Persons and one God. Now Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, with all their divine attributes and perfections (excepting their personal properties, which the Schools call the modi subsistendi, that one is the Father, the other the Son, and the other the Holy Ghost, which cannot be communicated to each other) are whole and entire in each Person by a mutual consciousness; each feels the other Persons in himself, all their essential wisdom, power, goodness, justice, as he feels himself, and this makes them essentially one, as I have proved at large.

St. Austin in his sixth book of the Trinity takes notice of a common argument used by the orthodox fathers against the Arians, to prove the co-eternity of the Son with the Father, that if the Son be the Wisdom and Power of God, as St. Paul teaches (1 Cor. i.) and God was never without his Wisdom and Power, the Son must he co-eternal with the Father. * * * But this acute Father discovers a great inconvenience in this argument, for it forces us to say that the Father is not wise, but by that Wisdom which he begot, not being himself Wisdom as the Father: and then we must consider whether the Son himself, as he is God of God, and Light of Light, may be said to be Wisdom of Wisdom, if God the Father be not Wisdom, but only begets Wisdom.

But what makes St. Gregory dispute thus nicely, and oppose the common and ordinary forms of speech? Did he in good earnest believe that there is but one man in the world? No, no! he acknowledged as many men as we do; a great multitude who had the same human nature, and that every one who had a human nature was an individual man, distinguished and divided from all other individuals of the same nature. What makes him so zealous then against saying, that Peter, James and John are three men? Only this; that he says man is the name of nature, and therefore to say there are three men is the same as to say, there are three human natures of a different kind; for if there are three human natures, they must differ from each other, or they cannot be three; and so you deny Peter, James, and John to be Greek: homooúsioi or of the same nature; and for the same reason we must say that though the Father be God, the Son God, and the Holy Ghost God, yet there are not three Gods, but Greek: mía theótaes one Godhead and Divinity.

Gregory Nyssen tells us that Greek: theòs is Greek: theatàes and Greek: éphoros, the inspector and governor of the world, that is, it is a name of energy, operation and power; and if this virtue, energy, and operation be the very same in all the Persons of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, then they are but one God, but one power and energy. * * * The Father does nothing by himself, nor the Son by himself, nor the Holy Ghost by himself; but the whole energy and operation of the Deity relating to creatures begins with the Father, passes to the Son, and from Father and Son to the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit does not act anything separately; there are not three distinct operations, as there are three Persons, Greek: allà mìa tìs gínetai agathou Bouláematos kínaesis kaì diakósmaesissee previous image—but one motion and disposition of the good will, which passes through the whole Trinity from Father to Son, and to the Holy Ghost, and this is done Greek: achrónos kaì adiarétôs without any distance of time, or propagating the motion from one to the other, but by one thought, as it is in one numerical mind and spirit, and therefore, though they are three Persons, they are but one numerical power and energy.

For I leave any man to judge, whether this Greek: mía kínaesis Bouláematossee previous image, this one single motion of will, which is in the same instant in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, can signify anything else but a mutual consciousness, which makes them numerically one, and as intimate to each other, as every man is to himself, as I have already explained it.

1. Father—Son—Holy Ghost.
2. Son—Father—Holy Ghost.
3. Holy Ghost—Son—Father.

But however he might be mistaken in his philosophy, he was not in his divinity; for he asserts a numerical unity of the divine nature, not a mere specific unity, which is nothing but a logical notion, nor a collective unity, which is nothing but a company who are naturally many: but a true subsisting numerical unity of nature; and if the difficulty of explaining this, and his zeal to defend it, forced him upon some unintelligible niceties, to prove that the same numerical human nature too is but one in all men, it is hard to charge him with teaching, that there are three independent and co-ordinate Gods, because we think he has not proved that Peter, James, and John, are but one man. This will make very foul work with the Fathers, if we charge them with all those erroneous conceits about the Trinity, which we can fancy in their inconvenient ways of explaining that venerable mystery, especially when they compare that mysterious unity with any natural unions.

I am sure St. Gregory was so far from suspecting that he should be charged with Tritheism upon this account, that he fences against another charge of mixing and confounding the Hypostases or Persons, by denying any difference or diversity of nature,
Greek: hôs ek tou màe déchesthai tàen katà physin diaphoràn, míxin tina tôn hypostáseôn kaì anakúklaesin kataskeúzonta which argues that he thought he had so fully asserted the unity of the divine essence, that some might suspect he had left but one Person, as well as one nature in God.

Secondly, to this homo-ousiotes the Fathers added a numerical unity of the divine essence. This Petavius has proved at large by numerous testimonies, even from those very Fathers, whom he before accused for making God only collectively one, as three men are one man; such as Gregory Nyssen, St. Cyril, Maximus, Damascen; which is a demonstration, that however he might mistake their explication of it, from the unity of human nature, they were far enough from Tritheism, or one collective God.

Petavius greatly commends Boethius's explication of this mystery, which is the very same he had before condemned in Gregory Nyssen, and those other Fathers.—That Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are one God, not three Gods: hujus conjunctionis ratio est indifferentia: that is, such a sameness of nature as admits of no difference or variety, or an exact homo-ousiotes, as he explains it. * * Those make a difference, who augment and diminish, as the Arians do; who distinguish the Trinity into different natures, as well as Persons, of different worth and excellency, and thus divide and multiply the Trinity into a plurality of Gods. Principium enim pluralitatis alteritas est. Præter alteritatem enim nec pluralitas quid sit intelligi potest.

That the Fathers universally acknowledged that the operation of the whole Trinity, ad extra, is but one, Petavius has proved beyond all contradiction; and hence they conclude the unity of the divine nature and essence; for every nature has a virtue and energy of its own; for nature is a principle of action, and if the energy and operation be but one, there can be but one nature; and if there be two distinct and divided operations, if either of them can act alone without the other, there must be two divided natures.

But to do St. Austin right, though he do not name this consciousness, yet he explains this Trinity in Unity by examples of mutual consciousness. I named one of his similitudes before, of the unity of our understanding, memory, and will, which are all conscious to each other; that we remember what we understand and will; we understand what we remember and will; and what we will we remember and understand; and therefore all these three faculties do penetrate and comprehend each other.

He proceeds to shew that this unity is without all manner of confusion and mixture, * * for the mind that loves, is in the love. * * * And the knowledge of the mind which knows and loves itself, is in the mind, and in its love, because it loves itself, knowing, and knows itself loving: and thus also two are in each, for the mind which knows and loves itself, with its knowledge is in love, and with its love is in knowledge.

As for the Holy Ghost, whose nature is represented to be love, I do not indeed find in Scripture that it is any where said, that the Holy Ghost is that mutual love, wherewith Father and Son love each other: but this we know, that there is a mutual love between Father and Son: the Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hands.—John iii. 35. And the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him all things that himself doeth.-John v. 20; and our Saviour himself tells us, I love the Father.—John xiv. 31. And I shewed before, that love is a distinct act, and therefore in God must be a person: for there are no accidents nor faculties in God.

Yes; you'll say, that there should be three Persons, each of which is God, and yet but one God, is a contradiction: but what principle of natural reason does it contradict?

For it is demonstrable that if there be three Persons and one God, each Person must be God, and yet there cannot be three distinct Gods, but one. For if each Person be not God, all three cannot be God, unless the Godhead have Persons in it which are not God.

I affirm, that natural reason is not the rule and measure of expounding Scripture, no more than it is of expounding any other writing. The true and only way to interpret any writing, even the Scriptures themselves, is to examine the use and propriety of words and phrases, the connexion, scope, and design of the text, its allusion to ancient customs and usages, or disputes. For there is no other good reason to be given for any exposition, but that the words signify so, and the circumstances of the place, and the apparent scope of the writer require it.

Reconcile men to the doctrine (of the Trinity), and the Scripture is plain without any farther comment. This I have now endeavoured; and I believe our adversaries will talk more sparingly of absurdities and contradictions for the future, and they will lose the best argument they have against the orthodox expositions of Scripture.

Though Christ be God himself, yet if there be three Persons in the Godhead, the equality and sameness of nature does not destroy the subordination of Persons: a Son is equal to his Father by nature, but inferior to him as his Son: if the Father, as I have explained it, be original mind and wisdom, the Son a personal, subsisting, but reflex image of his Father's wisdom, though their eternal wisdom be equal and the same, yet the original is superior to the image, the Father to the Son.

So born before all creatures, as Greek: prôtótokos also signifies, that by him were all things created. All things were created by him, and for him, and he is before all things, (which is the explication of Greek: pôrtótokos pásaes ktíseossee previous image begotten before the whole creation, and therefore no part of the creation himself.)

That he being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, &c.—Phil. ii. 8, 9.

Is a mere creature a fit lieutenant or representative of God in personal or prerogative acts of government and power? Must not every being be represented by one of his own kind, a man by a man, an angel by an angel, in such acts as are proper to their natures? and must not God then be represented by one who is God? Is any creature capable of the government of the world? Does not this require infinite wisdom and infinite power? And can God communicate infinite wisdom and infinite power to a creature or a finite nature? That is, can a creature be made a true and essential God?

And though Christ be the eternal Son of God, and the natural Lord and heir of all things, yet God hath in this highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name, that at (or in Greek: en) the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, &c.—Phil. ii. 9, 10, 11.