From: Unitarian Principles Confirmed by Trinitarian Testimonies By John Wilson
1. A Christian is one that believes things his reason cannot comprehend. ... 2. He believes three to be one, and one to be three; a Father not to be elder than his Son; a Son to be equal with his Father; and one proceeding from both to be equal with both; he believing three persons in one nature, and two natures in one person. 3. He believes a virgin to be a mother of a son, and that very son of hers to be her Maker. He believes Him to have been shut up in a narrow room whom heaven and earth could not contain. He believes Him to have been born in time who was and is from everlasting. He believes Him to have been a weak child, carried in arms, who is the Almighty; and Him once to have died who only hath life and immortality in himself. — Lord Bacon: Works, vol. ii. p. 410.
[The whole article consists of thirty-four "Christian Paradoxes," so strangely expressed as to have given rise to the suspicion that they are not the genuine production of Lord Bacon, and may have been written for the purpose of deriding a belief in Christianity. But there is no doubt, that, however absurd they may appear when compared with the dictates of reason or with the teachings of the New Testament, the sentiments quoted above are quite Trinitarian in their character; and it is undeniable that Bacon himself was a Trinitarian, and, with all his greatness, not entirely free from the errors of the age in which he lived. These "Paradoxes" have been esteemed so orthodox, and so full of "godly truths," that, about the middle of the last century, they were several times republished in London as a penny tract, with a Preface by a clergyman of the name of F. Green, for the use of "the poorer sort of Christians." See note in Bacon's Works, vol. ii. p. 401.
That the great philosopher to whom we have referred was capable of penning such contradictions, is confirmed by the following remark from his De Aug. Scient., lib. ix., as quoted by Mr. Yates in Vindication of Unitarianism, p. 278, fourth edition: "The more absurd and incredible any divine mystery is, the greater honor we do to God in believing it, and so much the more noble the victory of faith." Well may Papists, in their defences of Transubstantiation, triumph over Protestants who adopt such principles.]
This is the great mystery, Three and One, and One and Three. Men and angels were made for this spectacle: we cannot comprehend it, and therefore must admire it.
O luminosissimae Tenebra! Light darkness. . .. They were the more Three because One, and the more One because Three. Were there nothing to draw us to desire to be dissolved but this, it were enough. — Dr. Thomas Manton: Sermons on John xvii.; vol . ii. p. 307.
That there is one divine nature or essence, common unto three persons incomprehensibly united, and ineffably distinguished; united in essential attributes, distinguished by peculiar idioms and relations; all equally infinite in every divine perfection, each different from other in order and manner of subsistence; that there is a mutual inexistence of one in all, and all in one; a communication without any deprivation or diminution in the communicant; an eternal generation and an eternal procession, without precedence or succession, without proper causality or dependence; a Father imparting his own, and the Son receiving his Father's, life, and a Spirit issuing from both, without any division or multiplication of essence, — these are notions which may well puzzle our reason in conceiving how they agree, but should not stagger our faith in assenting that they are true; upon which we should meditate, not with hope to comprehend, but with dispositions to admire, veiling our faces in the presence, and prostrating our reason at the feet, of wisdom so far transcending us. — Dr. Isaac Barrow: Defence of the Blessed Trinity; in Works, vol. ii. p. 150.
Methinks there be not impossibilities enough in religion for an active faith: the deepest mysteries ours contains have not only been illustrated, but maintained, by syllogism and the rule of reason. I love to lose myself in a mystery, — to pursue my reason to an
O altitudo! Tis my solitary recreation to pose my apprehension with those involved enigmas and riddles of the Trinity, incarnation, and resurrection. I can answer all the objections of Satan and my rebellious reason with that odd resolution I learned of Tertullian, "Certum est quia impossibile est" [It is certain because impossible]. I desire to exercise my faith in the difflcultest point; for to credit ordinary and visible objects is not faith, but persuasion. .. . This, I think, is no vulgar part of faith, to believe a thing not only above, but contrary to, reason, and against the arguments of our proper senses. . . . There is no attribute that adds more difficulty to the mystery of the Trinity, where, though in a relative way of Father and Son, we must deny a priority. — Sir Thomas Browne: Religio Medici, sects. 9, 10, 12; in Works, vol . ii. pp. 332, 334-5.
[Referring to the "Ultrafidianism" of this learned physician, as Coleridge expresses it, Archbishop Tillotson, in Ser. 194 (Works, vol. x. 180), makes the following very sensible remark: "I know not what some men may find in themselves; but I must freely acknowledge that I could never yet attain to that bold and hardy degree of faith as to believe any thing for this reason, because it was impossible."]
I ever did, and ever shall, look upon those apprehensions of God to be the truest, whereby we apprehend him to be the most incomprehensible, and that to be the most true of God which seems most impossible unto us. Upon this ground, therefore, it is that the mysteries of the gospel, which I am less able to conceive, I think myself the more obliged to believe; especially this mystery of mysteries, the Trinity in Unity, and Unity in Trinity, which I am so far from being able to comprehend, or indeed to apprehend, that I cannot set myself seriously to think of it, or to screw up my thoughts a little concerning it, but I immediately lose myself as in a trance or ecstasy. That God the Father should be one perfect God of himself, God the Son one perfect God of himself, and God the Holy Ghost one perfect God of himself; and yet that these three should be but one perfect God of himself, so that one should be perfectly three, and three perfectly one; that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost should be three, and yet but one; but one, and yet three, — oh heart-amazing, thought-devouring, unconceivable mystery! Who cannot believe it to be true of the glorious Deity? — Bishop Beveridge: Private Thoughts on Religion, Art. HL pp. 52-3.
For that any one should be both Father and Son to the same person [to David], produce himself, be cause and effect too, and so the copy give being to its original, seems at first sight so very strange and unaccountable, that, were it not to be adored as a mystery, it would be exploded as a contradiction. — Dr. R. South: Sermons, vol. iii. p. 240.
The doctrine of the Communication of Properties is as intelligible as if one were to say that there is a circle which is so united with a triangle, that the circle has the properties of the triangle, and the triangle those of the circle. — Le Clerc, apud Rev. J. H. Thorn,
The revelation of it [the blessed Trinity] is,... I conceive, an absolute demonstration of its truth; because it is a mystery which by nature could not possibly have entered into the imagination of man. . . . Faith in these [mysteries] is more acceptable to God than faith in less abstruse articles of our religion, because it pays that honor which is due to his testimony; and the more seemingly incredible the matter is which we believe, the more respect we show to the relater of it.— Dr. Edw. Young: Letter on Infidelity; Works, vol. ii. p. 14.
Objections have likewise been raised to the divine authority of this religion from the incredibility of some of its doctrines, particularly of those concerning the Trinity, and atonement for sin by the sufferings and death of Christ; the one contradicting all the principles of human reason, and the other all our ideas of divine justice. ... That three Beings should be one Being, is a proposition which certainly contradicts reason, that is, our reason; but it does not from thence follow, that it cannot be true; for there are many propositions which contradict our reason, and yet are demonstrably true. — Soame Jenyns: View of the Internal Evidence of the Christ. Religion, pp. 134-5.
[If, as we believe, a Triune God and other kindred doctrines were not taught by Jesus and his apostles, one of the strongest arguments for the rejection of Christianity would be annihilated; and our holy religion, when found to be perfectly compatible with the highest reason, would draw the respect, if not the unqualified assent and submission, of every thoughtful and inquiring mind.]
In this awfully stupendous manner, at which Reason stands aghast, and Faith herself is half confounded, was the grace of God to man at length manifested. — Bishop Hurd: Sermons preached at Lincoln's Inn, vol. ii. (Sermon 17), p. 287.
[Bishop Hurd here refers to the incarnation of what he calls "the second person in the glorious Trinity," and to the atonement made by him.]
When it is proposed to me to affirm, that "in the unity of the Godhead there be three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity,— the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost," — I have difficulty enough! my understanding is involved in perplexity, my conceptions bewildered in the thickest darkness. I pause, I hesitate; I ask what necessity there is for making such a declaration. . . . But does not this confound all our conceptions, and make us use words without meaning? I think it does. I profess and proclaim my confusion in the most unequivocal manner: I make it an essential part of my declaration. Did I pretend to understand what I say, I might be a Tritheist or an Infidel; but I could not both worship the one true God, and acknowledge Jesus Christ to be Lord of all. ... It might tend to promote moderation, and, in the end, agreement, if we were industrious on all occasions to represent our own doctrine [respecting the Trinity] as wholly unintelligible. — Dr. John Hey: Lectures in Divinity, vol. ii. pp. 249, 251, 253.
"Theology teaches," says a passage in a Protestant work, "that there is in God one Essence, two Processions, three Persons, four Relations, five Notions, and the Circumincession, which the Greeks call Perichoresis." .... What follows is still more to my purpose; but I cannot bring myself to transcribe any further. — Archbishop Whately: Elements of Logic; Append. I., Art. "Person."
My belief in the Trinity is based on the authority of the church: no other authority is sufficient. I will now show from reason, that the Athanasian Creed and Scripture are opposed to one another. The doctrine of the Trinity is this: There is one God in three persons, — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. Mind, the Father is one person, the Son is another person, and the Holy Ghost is another person. Now, according to every principle of mathematics, arithmetic, human wisdom, and policy, there must be three Gods; for no one could say that there are three persons and three Gods, and yet only one God. . . . The Athanasian Creed gives the universal opinion of the church, that the Father is uncreated, the Son uncreated, and the Holy Ghost uncreated; that they existed from all eternity. Now, the Son waa born of the Father, and, if born, must have been created. The Holy Ghost must also have been created, as he came from the Father and the Son. And, if so, there must have been a time when they did not exist. If they did not exist, they must have been created; and therefore to assert that they are eternal is absurd, and bangs nonsense. Each has his distinct personality: each has his own essence. How, then, can they be one Eternal? How can they be all God? Absurd. The Athanasian Creed says that they are three persons, and still only one God. Absurd; extravagant! This is rejected by Arians, Socinians, Presbyterians, and every man following human reason. The Creed further says that our Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of God and of man, "not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking of the manhood into God." Now, I ask you, did the Divinity absorb the manhood? He could not be, at the same time, one person and two persons. I have now proved the Trinity opposed to human reason. — James Hughes, Roman Catholic Priest, of Newport Pratt. county Mayo; apud Bible Christian for January, 1839.
[It would be an ungrateful task to collect, and to present to the reader, other definitions and descriptions of the dogma of a Triune God, and other admissions of its unintelligibility or its contradictions; for, so far as we can judge, they are all more or less obscure, inconsistent, or absurd. Enough, then, of such jargon; enough of a confusion which could not well be "worse confounded," — of "a counsel darkened by words without" the faintest ray of "knowledge." Let those who choose, "pose their apprehension with the involved enigmas and riddles of the Trinity, and the Incarnation" of a "God the Son;" let those who will, "honor," or as we would say dishonor, the bounteous Author of their intellect by believing, if they can believe, what is "absurd and incredible;" let them reason, or rather abuse their rational faculties by arguing, in favor of the propriety and the duty of "prostrating their understandings" before dogmas which are "impossible;" let one, speaking of "the mystery of mysteries, the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity," exclaim, in the language of superlative nonsense, O
luminosissinae Tenebra! and another acknowledge that at the scheme of redemption, of which this is deemed an essential part, "Reason stands aghast, and Faith herself is half confounded." But for us, sickened by such representations and such confessions, — for us, with a Bible in our hands which says nought of divine pluralities, of holy trinities, of ineffable generations and processions, of tripersonal modes and developments; of distinct hypostases, persons, or subsistences; of infinite minds, sprits, or beings; of triune substances, essences, or natures; of perichoreses, circum incessions, or inexistences and permeations, — for us, when it is contrasted with the daring speculations of Platonic and Christian Trinitarians, there is a sacred and an inexpressible charm in one plain, simple precept, or in one clear and heavenly aspiration, from the lips of the great Master, "When ye pray, say Our Father, hallowed be thy name;" "Father,... this is life eternal, that they might know Thee The Only True God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent;" or in one out of the many explicit statements of Paul's belief, "There is One God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."]
