30 CHAPTER 3 Showing That There Is A Trinity Of Persons In The Unity Of The Divine Essence.
the Godhead, who are holy ones, and watch over the saints for their good; and over the wicked, to bring evil upon them. They are called watchers and holy ones, to express a plurality in the Deity; and they are called the Most High here, and the watcher, the holy one, in the singular number, ver. 13. to secure the unity of essence. This I take to be the true sense of there words: Nor am I alone in it35. There are now some of the proofs of a plurality in the Godhead, which the scriptures furnish us with; there are many more which I might have collected; but as they also prove a Trinity, I have referred them for their proper place. CHAPTER 3 Showing That There Is A Trinity Of Persons In The Unity Of The Divine Essence. Having, in the former chapter, proved that there is but one God, and yet that there is a plurality in the Godhead; I now proceed, III. To prove that this plurality is neither more nor fewer than three; which three are the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: Or, in other words, that there is a Trinity of Persons in the Unity of the divine Essence. The doctrine of a real distinction of three Persons in one God, is denied by the Sabellians, called so from Sabellius, who lived in the middle of the third century; and held that there was but one subjectum, suppositum, hypostasis or person in the Godhead. This was not first broached by him; for before him Noetus strenuously asserted36, that there was no plurality in the Godhead; that the Father and Son were but one person. From him his followers were called Noetians, and sometimes Patripassans; because they held, in consequence of their former notion, that the Father was incarnate, suffered and died. Yea, before Noetus, Praxeas37, who was strengthened by Victorinus, was much of the same opinion; against whom Tertullian wrote, and by whom his followers are called Monarchians. The fame Christian writer tells us38,
35 Vid. L’Empereur not. in Jachiad. in loc. And Allix’s judgment of the Jewish Church, etc. p. 152, 153 36 Vid. AuguR. de Haeret. c. 36. 37 Tertullian. de praefeript. Haeret. c. 53. & adv. Praxeam, c. 1. 2. 38 De praeicript. Haeret. c. 52
