Maclear and Williams on Article I: Of Faith in the Holy Trinity

i. Subject. The first Five Articles, as we have seen, treat of the Fundamental Doctrines of the Catholic Faith. Of these the first relates to the Holy Trinity, and the Title has remained uniform in Latin and English since 1553.

ii. Source. The source of the Article is the cor- responding First Article of the Augsburg Confession1, derived apparently through the medium of the Thirteen Articles of 1538. The language has suffered no material alteration since the first draft.

1 Compare the words of the First Article of the Augsburg Confession: “De Unitate Essentia? Divinae et de Tribus Personis, censemus decre- tum Nicenae Synodi verum, et sine ulla dubitatione credendum esse, vide- licet, quod sit una Essentia Divina, quae et appellatur et est Deus, aeternus, incorporeus, impartibilis, immensa

potentia, sapientia, bonitate. Creator et Conservator omnium rerum visi- bilium et invisibilium, et tamen tres sint Personae ejusdem essentiae et potentiae, et coaeternae, Pater, Filius, et Spiritus Sanctus.” Comp. also the Reformatio Rerum Ecclesiasticarum, De Summa Trinitate, c. L

iii. Object. The object of the Article is to defend the doctrine of the Trinity against unbelievers, Polytheists and Pantheists1, and against all, who, under the disguise of Anabaptists, were reviving in the sixteenth century some of the chief errors of Arianism, Sabellianism, and kindred heresies.

iv. Analysis. The Article may be divided into two parts : —

(1) It treats of the existence, unity and attributes of God ;

(2) It states the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity in Unity.

Part I. (a)

The Existence of God.

v. The Existence of God. This, the fundamental conception of religion, the Article assumes on Scriptural grounds, for he that covieth to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rcwarder of them that seek after Him (Heb. xi. 6). It is indeed impossible to demonstrate the existence of God in such a way as shall admit of no contradiction. Were it possible, it would involve the exclusion of faith, and of the moral qualities which arc inseparable from faith. The evidence, however, of His existence, which comes from several different and indepen- dent sources, may be arranged as follows : —

(1) The Evidence of Consciousness :— The thought of God is latent in the human mind, its earliest,

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bant, bonum et malum ; item Valen- tinos, Arianos, Eunomianos, Mahome- tistas, et omnes horum similes.”

its most universal, its most ineradicable con- ception. The most ordinary and fundamental ideas, those, for instance, of time, space, growth, and the like presuppose the existence of a Being superior to time or space. “The soul does not willingly consent to regard so inspiring a conception as a mere thought. To consider it as unreal, with no counterpart in the realm of actual existence, is felt as a bereavement and a pain1.” Man cannot help thinking of God. ” He learns to pray before he learns to reason’2.”

(2) The Evidence of General Consent: — There is no age so distant, no country so remote, no people so barbarous, but they have testified in some form or other to the existence of One higher, greater, than themselves. This is a great spiritual fact, running through the entire history of the human race in all ages, and it is im- possible to conceive that this universal belief in God is the result of accident. We trace the conviction of the being of One, Who is the Foundation of all existence, in the Vedic3 and

on the Socialist Bill, Oct. 1878, Prince Bismarck is reported to have said that ” he would not desire to live a day longer, if he had not what Schiller calls the ‘belief in God and a better future ’.” Ibid. p. 36, n. Even Cicero speaks of ” insitas Deorum, vel potius innatas cognitiones,” as holding their place in the background of all hearts, De Nat. Deorum, i. 17. 44, and see Christlieb, Modern Doubt and Chris- tian Belief, p. 141. Transl., Edin- burgh, 1874.

3 In speaking of the Vedic deities, Prof. Max Muller makes the follow- ing comment : ” Whenever one of

Zoroastrian1 systems, in those of Greece and Rome2, in that of Confucius3, in the religion of ancient Egypt4, as well as in those of the Kaffir and Zulu races and the tribes of Central Africa, amongst the lowest as well as the highest races of mankind6.

(3) The Evidence of Nature. The feeling of man, common alike to the child and to the scientist, in the presence of Nature is one of wonder. Such wonder is, if not the basis of, at least closely allied to religious awe6. But Nature does more than thus impress us ; she invites us

these individual gods is invoked, they are not conceived as limited by the powers of others, as superior or in- ferior in rank. Each god is to the mind of the supplicant as good as all gods. He is felt, at the time, as a real divinity, as supreme and absolute.” Chips from a German Workshop, i. p. 27. See the remarkable Hymn re- ferred to by Max Muller, Rig Veda, x. 129, translated in Muir’s Sanskrit Texts, Vol. iv. p. 4.

GROUP r.

both to trace, her to her source, and to investi- gate her special purposes and her general end. Causation leads the enquirer to the limit of the ken of science, where he is left in the presence of the Great Unknown. We trace effects back to their causes ; but these causes are found to be also effects1. The path is endless. There is no goal. There is no rest or satisfaction2, save in the assumption of the existence of a ” Causa Causans,” a supreme First Cause, itself more exalted than all, and therefore self- existent and eternal, and which can be no inert or formless matter3. (4) The Evidence of Design. When we attend to the various objects of which we take cognizance in the world of nature, we discover something more than the properties, which distinguish them one from another, and the causes which bring them into being. In the process of investigation we are struck with the fact that there is a co-operation of physical causes for

1 “There is an absurdity involved in the idea of an endless regress, of an infinite series, in the succession of whose limits no causal energy, or cause answerable to the demand of reason, is contained.” Prof. Fisher, Grounds of Thcistic and Christian Belief, p. 42. ” Napoleon’s savants, Bourrienne tells us, in that voyage to Egypt, were one evening busily occu- pied arguing that there could be no God. They had proved it, to their satisfaction, by all manner of logic. Napoleon, looking up into the stars, answers, ’ Very ingenious, Messieurs ; but who made all that ?’ The Atheistic logic runs off from him like water ; the great Fact stares him in the face, ‘Who made all that?’” Carlyle’s

Lectures on Heroes, Lect. VI. p. 385. ” I had rather believe all the fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a mind.” Bacon’s Essays, Atheism, ad init. For Scriptural statements of the knowledge of God as derived from Nature, see Psalm xix. 1 ; Isai. xlv. 18; Acts xiv. 15 — 17 ; Rom. i. 19, 20.

• Flint’s Theism, pp. 118 — 124.

3 ’ ’ No one has ever yet built up one particle of living matter out of lifeless elements; every living creature, from the simplest dweller on the confines of organization up to the highest and most complete, has its origin in pre- existent living matter.” Prof. Allman, Address to British Association.

the production of definite effects1. These causes are so disposed as to concur in the production of the effect, and that of necessity. We assume that they concur in order that the result may follow. This assumption of design is the result of no effort on our part. It is spontaneous. The conviction of design is brought home to us by the objects themselves. ” We see a thought realised and thus recognise in it a /be- thought2.” The observation of order and adap- tation in nature inspires the conviction of a designing Mind concerned in its origination3, which possesses the full intelligence4 of all these adaptations to definite ends, and is itself the Supreme Cause of all5.

(5) TJie Evidence of Conscience. Conscience is man’s faculty of knowing together with God (con- scientia), the relation of his personal being to God1. Every man has a voice within him, which says to him, ” This is right, this is wrong ” ; ” This is your duty, this is not your duty.” ” This voice within gives no proof, appeals to no evidence, but speaks as having a right to command, and requires of a man his obedience by virtue of its own inherent su- periority2.” Now it is impossible to dissociate this mysterious Voice, which utters ” the moral imperative” within the soul3, from the Being of all beings, the supreme Vindicator of the moral Law, to whom we stand in a personal relation, and who has a claim upon the obedience of us all4.

(6) The Argument from History : — At first sight nothing is more intricate and anomalous than the history of the different nations of the earth.

3 Butler, in his Sermons on Human Nature, says of the conscience, ” Had

it the power as it has manifest au- thority, it would absolutely govern the world.” But authority presup- poses power. The conscience has au- thority because it witnesses to a law, a purpose, of One Who has the power upon which its own authority must rest. Strong’s Syst. Thcol., p. 46 ; Liddon’s Some Elements, pp. 66 — 70.

3’

It seems at first an inextricable coil of men and actions. Then it seems a constant recur- renee of the same events under different forms. Then on closer observation it is discovered that it contains a providential order and a moral order within it1. Thoughtful men2 admit that the course of human history exhibits continual progress towards a more and more perfect exhibition of righteousness and goodness3. The history of social life, of nations, crime, law, and religion, supplies abundant evidence of this. But a moral government of the world and an education of the human race imply a moral Governor and Educator. For an unconscious government, an unconscious education of the human race according to moral laws, is a con- tradiction in terms, a simple impossibility4.

vi. The Force of the arguments thus advanced for the existence of God is cumulative, and sufficient to pro- duce in any unprejudiced mind a moral certainty that He exists6. They do not originate our faith in His existence. They justify it, and lead us to infer that our worship is due to God, and that our lives must be conformed to His will, however made known6.

2 The evidences of physical and moral disorder in the world do not destroy the force of this argument ; for (a) the most they can be said to prove is that the complete fulfilment of God’s design has not yet been attained ;

(b) whatever may be the nature and origin of evil, it does not defeat the continual moral progress of the world ;

(c) there are abundant indications that God so overrules the forces of evil

that He makes them instruments in accomplishing His own good designs.

3 Butler’s Analogy, Pt i. chap. vii.

The Unity of God.

vii. The Unity of God. Belief in the existence of God implies a belief also in His Unity, as testified by the Nicene and other Eastern Creeds. If we rest our rational belief in the being of God upon the idea of cause, and speak of the necessity of conceiving an origin for the physical universe and for all phenomena, it is self-evident that we must needs conceive of only One cause. The idea of two first causes, self-existent and supreme, involves a manifest contradiction. The unity of God means the absolute distinction of His being1, as original and indepen- dent and self-existing, from all other being. All other being must be regarded as dependent upon and derived from Him. He is the power of all being, the eternal life, self-originating and self-sufficing. He is His own eternal act, and hence the end and origin of all things2. The Unity of God is constantly and expressly affirmed in Holy Scripture, and was the great doctrine which Moses delivered to the Israelites : — ■

(a) Hear, 0 Israel, he saith, the Lord our God is one Lord (Deut. vi. 4) ;

(/3) The Lord He is God ; there is none else beside Him (Deut. iv. 35) ;

(7) This is the life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God (John xvii. 3) ;

1 The integral unity of God does not signify the absence of real distinc- tions in His nature, but the absence of divisions simply. His tri-personal subsistence is not inconsistent with this. See Mason’s Faith of the Gospel,

2 “Deus si non unus est, non est… omnium conscientia agnosset, Deum summum esse magnum… si fuerit aliud summum magnum, adsequabitur, et si adxquabitur, non erit jam summum magnum.” Tertullian adv. Marcion. »• 3-

(8) We know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one (i Cor. viii. 4)1.

The Unity of God, that which other religions were feeling after and tending towards2, stands out clearly and distinctly as the characteristic of the religion of Israel, and is fearlessly claimed as an inheritance from the patriarchal age.

(y)

The A ttributcs of God. viii. Connection. Having spoken of God as One, the Article proceeds to deal with His attributes : — and it states,

(i) That He is “living,” “true,” “eternal”;

(a) Living, ” Vivus.” He is not simply vivens, but vivus, the source of life, the only efficient principle, to Whom all things owe their existence3.

1 The Unity of God thusset beforeus is not numerical. There is no special virtue in the number one, which mathe- maticians describe as unity. It does not simply deny the existence of a second God. It is integral, denying the possi- bility of division. ” Deus, cum unus dicitur, unus, non numeri sed universi- tatis vocabulo nuncupatur, id est, qui proptcrea unus dicitur quod alius non sit.” Rufinus in Symb. Apost. c. 5. This is explained by Moses Maimonides thus : ” God is one, not two, or more than two, but only one ; whose unity is not like that of the individuals of this world ; neither is it one by way of species, comprehending many indi- viduals ; neither one in the manner of a body which is divisible into parts and extremes ; but in one, as no unity like His is to be found in the world.”

See the passage quoted by Bp Pear- son on the Creed, Art. i. ; Bp of Car- lisle’s Foundations of the Creed, p. 39.

3 Vivus denotes that God is the rniyy} fwTjs, the source of life, Fons et Origo Vita;. Or as He is called in Scripture 6 £uv 0e6s=the living God. Comp. Acts xiv. 15; Rom. ix. 26; 2 Cor. iii. 3; vi. 16; 1 Thess. i. 9; 1 Tim. iii. 15; Heb. iii. 12, and ob- serve in each passage the emphasis laid upon the participle, whether by position or otherwise. See S. Thorn. Humnt. Theol. i. 18.

M.

(ft) True, ” Verus1,” for He is the one real, absolute God, in opposition to the unreal, false gods of heathenism, who have no substantial ex- istence ;

(7) Eternal, “^Eternus,” for He hath neither be- ginning nor end2. He never began to be and never can cease to be. He is the one eternal

” Now,” from everlasting to everlasting* (Ps. xc. 2).

(ii) That He is “without body, parts, or passions”: — (a) Without body, ” incorporeus V We are apt to think of God in terms of human understand- ing, to acquire the habit of regarding Him as “a magnified, non-natural man.” He has no body such as the human body. He is im- material, He is spirit5 (John iv. 24). (/S) Without parts9, ” impartibilis,” for in Him

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2 Time is a relation of created things and of finite events. When of things, it expresses their duration ; when of events, it is the measure of their succession. But Divine eternity is an idea which transcends duration, and excludes all but logical succession. The Schoolmen describe it as “Inter- minabilis vitse tota simul et perfecta possessio.” S. Thos. i. 10 C.

3 In the correct sense the Eternal is the supra-temporal, it is that which is without change and without suc- cession ; for time is the measure of change. As time is a fleeting Nam that ever eludes our grasp, so eternity

is a stationary Now, that is constantly present and constantly invariable. And this necessary association be- tween the variable and the temporal leads us to conceive of the eternal God as the abiding and the real, and of the life of God as the Life which really if, “the Life which is Life indeed.” “Fuisse et futurum esse non est in ea (vita divina), sed esse solum, quoniam sterna est. Nam suisse et futurum esse non est seter- num.” S. Aug. Con/, ix. 10. 24.

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6 Impartibilis generally appears in the form impertibilis, from in and /«>‘//c;r=“that cannot be divided into parts, indivisible.”

there is nothing divisible, inchoate, or in- complete, He is whole in Himself, in substance and essence, perfect and simple1. (7) Without passions, ” impassibilis.” He is not subject, like man, to varying emotions which affect the perfect justice of His actions and His orderly conduct of the universe2. Thus in Numb, xxiii. 19 we read, God is not a man that He should lie, nor the son of man that He should repent; and again, Mai. iii. 6, He Him- self says, / am the Lord, I change not ; and S. James describes Him as the Father of Lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning (J as. i. 17)3.

(iii) That He is ” of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness.”

(a) Of infinite* power, ” immense potential,” for

1 ” God is one in the simplest and strictest sense… as truly one as any individual soul or spirit is one; nay infinitely more so, for all creatures are imperfect, and He has all per- section.” Newman, Par. Sermons,

3 Scripture, however, justifies the ascription to God of such feelings as anger, jealousy, and the like, because such language is the only means of expressing to us that disturbance in the operation of the Divine attributes which is caused by sin. On the other hand, Scripture tells us that God is Love, but the attribute referred to as Love is something very different from

the human emotion, for it is the very Divine Essence itself eternally opera- tive between the Sacred Persons of the Blessed Trinity. His Love is that passionless and changeless move- ment of His essence,whereby He desires to gather into union with Himself all who are good. S. Thomas Summ. Th. i. 20 ; Martensen’s Dogmatics, §51; Mason’s Faith of the Gospel, pp. 39, 40. Thus S. Augustine, commenting on the expression toO TioC ttjs <X7d7r7)s Avtou, says, “Charitas quippe Patris quae in Natura Ejus est ineffabiliter simplici, nihil est aliud quam Ejus ipsa Natura atque Substantia.” S. Aug. de Trinit. xv. 19. 37.

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He is Almighty, and can do all things that do not imply imperfection and that consist with His Attributes, so that none can stay His Hand or say unto Him, What doest Thou? (Job xlii. 2; Dan. iv. 35). His omnipotence signifies (a) His infinite energy and freedom to do all that is con- sistent with His nature; (d) His sovereignty over all that is or can be done1.

(|S) Of infinite wisdom, ” sapientise.” His wisdom is His absolute infallibility of judgment, by virtue of which He provides perfectly for all things and cannot err in any question of action. Prudence has been defined as choosing the best means to a certain end ; Wisdom as choosing the best means to the best end. Now God alone knows what is the best end ; He is the only, wise God* (Rom. xvi. 27), and as the Psalmist says, great is His Power, yea and His wisdom is infinite (Ps. cxlvii. 5). His wisdom, according to the teaching of S. Paul, is markedly exemplified by the economy of Redemption3.

(7) Of infinite goodness, ” bonitatis.” The term ” goodness,” as an attribute of God, is equiva- lent to the Greek word translated ” kindness ” in the Authorized and Revised Versions. It

f.illi non potest, mentiri non potest, et quod ait Apostolus, negare Se Ipsum non potest.” Ad Catech. ii.

1 See S. Thos. Summ. Th. i. 15; Schouppe El. Th. Dog., v. 161 — 165; Martensen’s Dogmatics, § 49.

• Et sapientiae ejus non est numerus. Vulg. The wisdom of God ” non tan- tum cognitionem includit, sed etiam

cognitioni operationem consenta- neam.” He is the yuovos <ro<pos Beds, and has the characteristic of soleness, aloneness, in His wisdom. See Yaughan in loc.

3 See 1 Cor. i. 23, 24; ii. 7; Eph. iii. 8 — 11, and note especially the phrase t) rdXvrotnXot <ro<pia tov &cov, Eph. iii. 10.

denotes the Divine Will realising itself in im- parting happiness to the creature, according to the capacities of the creatures, and the counsels of Divine Wisdom1. It is that which in regard of human demerits we term ” grace,” in regard of human misery, ” pity.”

(iv) That He is “the Maker and Preserver of all things visible and invisible.” The Article here refers almost in the language of the first clause of the Nicene Creed to the exercise of the operative attributes of God in the creation and preservation of the universe2. (a) The Maker, Creator3.

For of His Almighty power He has given the most signal proof by creating and calling into being all things that exist in the heavens above and the earth beneath. All the gods of the nations, says the Psalmist, are idols, but the Lord made the heavens (Ps. xcvi. 5). Thou, Lord God, exclaims Jeremiah, hast made the heaven and the earth by Thy great power and stretched-out arm, and there is nothing too hard for Thee (Jer. xxxii. 17); and

1 Bonitas in Latin, in Greek xpv^rd- M D. i. 43. 121 ; “facit pa-

tt)%. See Rom. ii. 4; xi. 22; Tit. iii. 4. rentes bonitas, non necessi-

The Latin bonitas = tas,” I’haedr. iii. 15. 18.

(i) Natural goodness, i.e. the Comp. French bonte. good quality of a thing, e.g. 2 As applied to God bonitas denotes soli, Caesar, B. C. i. 28; Constans Dei voluntas communication vint, Plin. xiv. 4. 6. felicitatem suis creaturis, secundum

(ii) Moral goodness, i.e. the conditionem earum, et consilia sapientice conformity of the free will suce. Schouppe, Elem. Theol. Dog., i. with right reason, e.g. ” earn p. 297.

potestatem bonitate retine- 3 Creator et conservator omnium

bat,” Corn. Nep. Milt. viii. turn visibilium turn invisibilium =

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3S

the song of the celestial host as heard by S. John is, Thotc art worthy, O Lord our God, to receive the glory and the honour and the power; for Thou hast created all tilings, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created (Apoc. iv. 1 1). (b) The Preserver1, Conservator.

But God is not only the Creator of all things, He is the sovereign, and preserves and upholds all things. His relation to the universe did not, as the Deists hold, cease at Creation. He is the ” Vigor tenax rerum,” and exercises an all-sustaining power, upholding all things by the Word of His power (Heb. i. 3)2.

Part II.

The Doctrine of the Trinity in Unity.

ix. The Trinity. Having dealt with the essence and the attributes of God, the Article proceeds to deal with the doctrine of the Trinity3, and states that ” In Unity

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ward to their end of all created things was attributed by Jewish writers to God no less than their creation. The action of God is in this passage re- ferred to the Son : conf. Coi. i. 17. He in the words of CEcumenius irepiayti Kal <riWxe’ Ka-l in/5aXtowxf’-”™ aopara Kai to. dpara irepi<p{pwv Kal Kvpepvuv. See Barrow’s Sermons on the Creed, vol. iv. p. 163; Westcott’s Historic Faith, p. 37.

of this Godhead there be three Persons, of one sub- stance, power, and eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”

x. The word Person1, as applied to God, is inadequate, for it symbolizes that which transcends our experience and our comprehension. But, according to the definitions of the ancient Church, we acknowledge that in the one Divine Essence there are three Persons2, inseparably united, co- equal in eternity and perfection.

xi. The Evidence of the Old Testament. Intima- tions that ” the Name of the One God, when written out in full, is a threefold Name,” are traceable in the Old Testament : — Thus

(i) At the Creation of Man we hear God saying, Let US make man in OUR image, after OUR likeness (Gen. i. 26), and yet in the following verse we read, And God created man in HIS own image (Gen. i. 27).

(ii) After the Fall we hear God saying, Behold, the man is become as one of US (Gen. iii. 22); while, when He reveals Himself to Moses at the

1 Persona (fr. personare = to sound andria, A.D. 362, at which the matter

through) denotes was discussed, Persona and utrScrTaais

(i) A mask, i.e. that through have generally been accepted as equi- which the sound of the valent. See Introd. to the Creeds, voice passes; p. 49, n. 3.

(ii) A character represented by 2 Or Hypostases. ” The word an actor ; vithmaan was a metaphysical word,

(iii) An individual person. for which we have no exact equiva- The use of the term by the Latins lent. Having originally meant the

was regarded with suspicion by the sediment at the bottom of a fluid, it

Greeks on account of its equivocal came to mean the substratum or ground

meaning, while the Latins were alike of qualities, and so a person, that is,

suspicious of the Greek v-wt>araai%, the underlying reality upon which

which they could only translate by various characters and experiences are

substantia, as suggesting that the three based.” Strong’s Manual of Theo-

Persons had not the same Essence. logy, p- 183. Since, however, the Council of Alex-

burning bush, He bids him tell the people, I AM hath sent Me unto you (Ex. iii. 14) ;

(iii) The Psalmist says, The Lord said unto my Lord ; Sit Thou at My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool (Ps. ex. 1);

(iv) In the vision of Isaiah the Seraphim cry one unto another, Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts ; the whole earth is full of His glory (Isai. vi. 3).

Here, however mysteriously, we have a foreshadowing of a plurality in the Godhead1, intimations that the one Personal God is a Living Monad2, at the same time “Tres et Unus3,” a Divine Three.

xii. The Evidence of the New Testament. The obscure intimations, however, of the Old Testament become express revelations in the New. Thus

(a) The account of our Lord’s Baptism reveals to us the Son baptized, the Father acknowledging Him from heaven, the Holy Ghost descending upon Him in the form of a dove (Matt. iii. 16, 17);

(/3) Again, while our Lord expressly declares Himself to be one with the Father4 (John x.

30), He yet says, / will pray the Father, and He shall give you anotlicr Comforter, that He may be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth (John xiv. 16, 17);

1 Comp. the threefold priestly bene- Athanasian Creed, diction under the Jewish Law, Numb. 4 ‘E7& koX 6 irarrip h> eo-fiev, I and

vi. 24 — 26, with the counterpart bene- the Father are one. ” Every word in

diction of 2 Cor. xiii. 14. this pregnant clause is full of meaning.

• “More really one even than an It is /, not the Son; the Father, not

individual man is one.” Newman’s my Father; one essence {& Vulg.

Grammar of Assent, p. 12 r. ununi), not one person (eis Gal. iii.

3 “Unus,” not merely “unum.” 28, unus); are not am.” Bp West-

This may be called the keynote of the cott in loc.

(y) But with still greater clearness, when He gives His Apostles their last commission, He com- mands them to go into all tlie world, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing tlicm into the Name1 of the Fathe r, and of the Son, and of the Holy GJwst (Matt, xxviii. 19)2. Thus the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity is taught us not primarily and originally by any Apostolic teacher, or any Apostolic Council, but by our Lord Himself.

xiii. The Unity of the Godhead. The Three Persons of the Trinity have, as we have seen3, a common Divine Nature, which is numerically One4, as our Lord Himself says, / and the Father are one5 (John x. 30). This Unity of the Godhead the Article upholds, when it asserts that the Three Persons are ” of the same essence, power, and eternity,” in other words, that each is God, and each expresses the whole fulness of the Godhead with all His Attributes6. For the Catholic doctrine is that,

(1) The Father is the One Eternal Personal God,

(2) The Son is the One Eternal Personal God,

(3) The Spirit is the One Eternal Personal God.

• S. Paul’s final benediction to the Corinthians is a commemoration of our Lord Jesus Christ, God, and the Holy Ghost (2 Cor. xiii. 14).

4 Numerically, not collectively. A collective Unity is a Union and there- fore a Composition of Parts. This latter the attribute of Simplicity ex- cludes from God.

Each Person possesses all the Divine attributes, which are inherent in the Divine Essence. Each, in the language of the Athanasian Creed, is Uncreate ; each is Infinite ; each is Eternal ; each is Almighty ; each is God ; each is Lord.

xiv. The Characteristics of the Three Persons.

In speaking, indeed, of the Three Persons we are wont to speak of the Father as the first, the Son as the second, and the Holy Ghost as the third Person in the Trinity. We use this language, not because one Person is <; afore or after other,” either prior or posterior in time, either superior or inferior in rank, but because there is in the Godhead a certain order of source or origin. Thus it is the property or characteristic

(i) Of the FatJier,

to be unbegotten, the Fountain and Source of being1 ;

(ii) Of the Son,

to be begotten of the Father2 ;

(iii) Of the Holy Ghost,

to proceed3,

2 “Filius est Vita in Semetipso sed a Patre.” ” He is of the Father alone, neither made, nor created, but be-

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3 Spiritus Sanctus a Patre et Filio, non factus, nec creatus, nec genitus est, sed procedens. Athan. Symb.

but while there is this order of source or origin, whereby One Person may be, not before the other, but from the other, all the three Persons are equally God and equally Lord, for the whole perfection of the Divine Nature is in each1.

1 “The Catholic dogma may be said to be summed up in the formula on which St Augustine lays so much stress, “Tres et Unus” not merely “Unum”; hence it is the key-note, as it may be called, of the Athanasian Creed. In that Creed we testify to the Unus Increatus, to the Umis Immensus, Omnipotens, Deus, and

Dominus ; yet each of the Three also is by Himself Increatus, Immensus, Omnipotens, for Each is that One GOD, though Each is not the Other; Each, as is intimated by Unus In- creatus, is the One Personal GOD of Natural Religion.” Cardinal New- man’s Grammar of Assent, p. 121.

Notes

• See The Grounds of Theistic and Christian Belief “by Professor Fisher, p. 40 ; McCosh’s/ntuitionsof the Mind, p. 191, n. ; Flint’s Theism, p. 264.
• Mansel’s Limits of Religious Thought, p. 115, ” Man feels within him the consciousness of a Supreme Being, and the instinct of worship, before he can argue from effects to causes, or estimate the traces of wisdom and benevolence scattered through the creation.” “Belief in God. ..has an intellectual foundation deeper than al- most any other article of the Creed.” Bp of Carlisle, Foundation of the Creed, p. 32. Speaking in the Debate
• “The Duad, with the Monad brooding behind it,” as has most truly been said, “is the fundamental principle of the Avesta, and of the old and once wide-spread faith that is set forth in its venerable Hymns.” Bp Ellicott’s The Being of God, p. 36. Eor Bishop Butler’s reference to ” the general consent of mankind,” see Analogy, Introduction, i. p. 7.
• ” Even through the vista of the mixed deities of the pantheon of Rome, half national and half utilitarian, we just catch sight of one supreme and ultimate Being, a Jupiter Optimus- Maximus of whom all other deities were but the manifestations and at- tributes.” Ibid. p. 37.
• See Legge, Life and Teachings of Confucius, p. ioo, alluded to by Bp Ellicott, p. 38, ft.
• In ancient Egypt I am that I AM appears, almost beyond doubt, to have been the object of esoteric wor- ship which was taught to the initiated. Clarke, Ten Great Religions, pp. 242, 251. On the avowedly atheistic feature of Buddhism, see Bp Ellicott’s Being of God, pp. 40, 41 ; Prof. Flint’s Antitheistic Theories, p. 282 sq.
• ” The result of my investigation,” says De Quatrefages, ” is this : Obliged, in my course of instruction, to review all human races, I have sought atheism in the lowest as well as in the highest. I have nowhere met with it, except in individuals or in more or less limited schools, such as those which existed in Europe in the last century, or which may still be seen at the present day.” The Human Species, p. 482 (E. Transl.).
• ” The mysteries of the Church are child’s play compared with the mys- teries of nature. The doctrine of the Trinity is not more puzzling than the necessary antinomiesof physical specu- lation ; virgin procreation, and resus- citation from apparent death, are ordi- nary phenomena for the naturalist.” Huxley, Letter to the late Dean of Wells, quoted in Gore’s Bampton Lectures, pp. 246, 247.
• See Ebrard’s Christian Apolo- getics, Vol. i. pp. 170 — 172. English Translation, 1886.
• “This thought has impressed the philosopher and the peasant alike. Socrates enforced the argument by the illustration of a statue, as Paley, two thousand years later, by the illus- tration of a watch.” Prof. Fisher, Grounds of Belief, p. 43. See Flint’s Theism, Lec. v., vi. ; Liddon’s Some Elements, pp. 53 — 55; Mozley’s Es- says, Vol. ii. pp. 363—413.
• ” When we see a purpose carried out, we are impelled to trace the operation to an intelligent Author, whether the end is obtained by an agency acting from within or from without. The accurate mathematics oftheplanetary bodies, marking out for themselves their orbits, the unerring path of the birds, the geometry of the bee, the seed-corn sending upward the blossoming and fruit-bearing stalk, excite a wonder, the secret of which is the insufficiency of the operative cause to effect these marvels of intelli- gence and foresight.” See Bp Elli- cott’s Being of Cod, pp. 84— m.
• ” Science will not allow us to say that things made themselves, or are their own causes. The only alterna- tive is that they were made by some external power, and any power which could contrive and execute all the complex machinery of the heavens and the earth, or could initiate any- thing capable of developing such ma- chinery, must be practically infinite and must possess those attributes of superhuman power and superhuman wisdom which belong only to God.” Sir William Dawson, Present Day Tracts, vii. 5 ; Martensen’s Christian Dogmatics, p. 79, E. T.
• The Psalmist says (xciv. 9), ” He that made the ear, shall He not hear ? And He that made the eye, shall He not see?” Why not add? “He that made the mind shall He not think?” Liddon’s Some Elements, p. 53. Scientific study favours the view that matter itself is an effect. If we accept the hypothesis of molecules as the ultimate forms of matter, Sir John Herschel finds in each of these, as related to the others, “the essential qualities of a manufactured article.”
• ” Every man bears in himself the ethical law as a determinateness of his peculiar essence. ..In the ethical law the personal, holy God gives prac- tical proof of Himself as One address- ing Himself to the will of man.” Ebrard’s Apologetics, Eng. Trans, i. p. 250. Martensen’s Christian Dog- matics, p. 6, E. T.
• See Bp Temple’s Hampton Lec- tures, p. 47. ” Conscience is no de- scendant of our will or our reason. It is no product of our own mind. It is the product of a moral spirit above and beyond ourselves, whose voice speaks to us through conscience.” Luthardt’s Fundamental Truths, p.
• ” Ethical enquiry, where it is true to its subject matter, postulates an absolute and superhuman law of righteousness, with which men are as truly brought into relation through conscience, as they are, through the eye, into relation to the objective reality of light ” ; Gore, Hampton lectures, p. 31 ; see also Liddon, Some Elements of Religion, pp. 69, 71.
• Fisher’s Grounds of Belief , p. 69 ; Flint’s Theism, pp. 227 — 261.
• Flint’s Theism, Lecture viii. ; Liddon’s Some Elements, pp. 142 —
• Barry’s Boyle Lectures, 1876, Lect. iii. ; Strong’s Syst. Theol., p. 5° ; Mason’s Faith of the Gospel, chap. i.
• See S. Aug. De Fide et Symbolo, cap. 2; The Doctrine of God, F. J. Hall, pp. 46—55.
• For the wayin which the traditional polytheism was challenged in Greece by Plato and Xenophon, see Lux Mundi, pp. 60, 70, and the passages quoted from The Republic, pp. 377 — 38.5 ; Theaet. 1 76, C.
• Verus, iXrjdtvSs, not verax, d\7j0j;s. For the difference between the two words see Introduction to the Creeds, p. 83, n. For the application of the word to God see Joh. xvii. 3; rhv /xbvov a\t]dmbv ffebv ; 1 Thess. i. 9,
• See Westcott in loc., and Dr Dollinger’s Conversations, p. 2 1 9, Engl. Transl.
• Impassibilis, from in and patior. The word is not found in Latin classical writers. It occurs only in ecclesiastical Latin. Thus Tertull. Apol. 10, “Deus impassibilis.” For the use of the term in the Creed of Aquileia, comp. Introd. to the Creeds, pp. 21, 22.
• Conservator. The word is not uncommon as a divine epithet among classical writers, e.g. “Pro dei im- mortales, custodes et conservatores hujus urbis atque imperii.” Cic. Fest. xxiv. 53. In inscriptions it occurs as an epithet of Jupiter. The preposition in composition has an intensifying force, and denotes to keep thoroughly, toretain in existence, to tiphold and preserve. Hence God is Omnitenens as well as Omnipotens. See Martensen’s Chris- tian Dogmatics, p. 214; Mason’s Faith of the Gospel, pp. 34, 35.
• The word “Trinity” does not occur in Scripture. It is first found in Theophilus of Antioch, A.D. 170. His Greek Tptas first occurs in its Latin equivalent in Tertullian. See Intro- duction to the Creeds, p. 62, 3.
• E19 t6 ovo/J-a, not tv ivbixari. ” By choosing without repetition to say ‘the Name,’ He teaches that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are One. The revelation of each of the Three is the revelation of the other Two. They cannot be known apart.” Mason’s Faith of the Gospel, p. 44.
• See above, p. 39.
• “Absolute Pater Deus et Filius Deus Unum sunt, non Unione Per- sonce, sed Substantia; Unitate.” S. Hilar., De Trin., cap. iv.
• See Cardinal Newman’s Grammar of Assent, p. 133. ” To each person in one passage or other of the New Testa- ment are ascribed the same titles and works ; each is acknowledged as Lord; each is eternal each is Creator; each wills with it supreme will ; each is the Author of the new birth ;… what is all this but the Father Eternal, the Son Eternal, and the Holy Ghost Eternal ; the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost Omnipotent ; the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost God”? Comp. the Athanasian Creed.
• II»py7) ©66t??tos ; ‘Apxv ; AWi ; Principium ; ”Totius Divinitatis, vel, si melius dicitur, Deitatis, principium Pater est.” S. Aug. de Triii. iv. ?o. Comp. Introduction to the Creeds, pp. 65, 66, 209. ” ’ Pater est Vita in Semet- ipso non a Filio,’ as S. Augustine says in another place ; He is above time and beyond space, His own law, His own sufficiency, His own centre, His own end.” Bp Forbes On the Articles,