as.

SERM. II. fand Years are but as one Day, and one Day
as a thousand Years.
For the Deity had
exifted a whole Eternity Yefterday, and
can have existed no more than a whole E-
ternity to Day: or in other Words, unli-
mited Duration cannot be lengthened or
fhortened; because, what can be lengthen-
ed or shortened, enlarged or narrowed, must
have Limits. It is demonftrable therefore,
that what has exifted from Eternity must
exist in a Manner quite different from what
we do, and of which we can have no Ide-
And if fo, what crude indigefted No-
tices must they entertain, who can argue,
that because three separate human Perfons
are three Beings, therefore three divine Per-
fons must be fo too? In fhort the divine Na-
ture not only infinitely transcends our Nature,
it infinitely tranfcends our very Conceptions
of it: the Deity not being only infinitely
above what we are, he is infinitely above
what we can think of him. If we would
filence our Imagination, a delufive Faculty,
and liften to the Voice of cool Reason,
we should perceive no abfolute Impoffibili-
ty
that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
though distinct from each other, and fubfift-

ing in a different Manner, may be undivid- SERM. II. ed ; and to what is undivided and incapa-.

ble of any Difunion, we may, with at least as ftrict Propriety of Speech, afcribe the Denomination of one Being, as we can to any Thing, of which we have a pofitive Idea, in the whole Universe.

Again, the Understanding may perceive that it implies no Contradiction, that there may be fuch a Relation in the divine Nature, as, according to our poor and low Ways of thinking and fpeaking, greatly disproportioned to the Originals which they should reprefent, is beft fhadowed out to us by that of a Son to a Father, to which it may bear fome faint Refemblance. But the Imagination falls immediately to work, and afcribing it to the Deity in as ftrict a Sense, as when it is applied to the human Nature, forms as many abfurd Conclufions, its own Workmanship, as it does, when it argues from our fucceffive Duration to, what is infinitely different from it, the Duration of God. Whatever Abfurdities fome People may fancy upon this Subject, they have all been occafioned by this, that they have confounded Strength of Reason, and Strength of Imagination: they did not perceive any

SERM. II. Difagreement in the Ideas themselves, Ideas of pure Understanding, they only perceived a Difagreement in the Ideas of Imagination which it borrows from created and even material Beings; whereas it is evident that no Ideas of the Imagination, none but thofe of pure Intellect, ought to be employed, except by Way of Figure, in describing a pure intellectual and spiritual Being. Something like this happens in the Point of God's Omniprefence. The Understanding clearly proves, that the Deity must be present to every Thing, which he made and governs. But the Imagination, ever obtruding beyond its Sphere, is impatient to bring down this Doctrine to its own. Level; and not being able to conceive the Presence of any Being that is unextended, it confiders the Deity under the grofs Idea of infinite Extenfion, of infinite Length, Breadth, and Height; and then a numerous Train of Contradictions break in upon us; as that Extenfion implies Parts; that Parts by the very Term imply Imperfection, which cannot belong to an All-perfect Being; that there must be as many distinct Confcioufneffes as there are diftinct Parts, and confequently an infinite Number of di

1

ftinct Consciousneffes in what is infinitely SERM. II.
extended. The only Remedy for which is,
to confider, that as there is a Demonstrati-
on that there is one fpiritual Being which
is present, so there is a Demonstration too,
that he must be present in a Manner, about
which we can imagine nothing at all; be-
cause no Imagery of a spiritual Being, or
it's Prefence, can be drawn on the Fancy,
as that of material Beings is.
It is thus too
as to the Trinity. Though we have Ideas
of Union and Diftinction, and know well
enough what we mean by them, when we
apply them to the Divine Nature, yet thofe
Ideas are fo defective that we cannot exact-
ly compare them: and, where our Ideas
are fo defective that we cannot exactly
compare them, there we cannot have an
evident Perception of a Contradiction or
Difagreement of Ideas,
which depends
entirely on a full and exact Comparison of
Ideas.

Arianifm feems to be divided from De-
ism, and that again from Atheism, by thìn
Partitions. The Man who is obftinate in
the Disbelief of his Saviour's Godhead,
must be, one would think, ftrongly tempt-
ed to reject the Scriptures, as a Book big
with

E 3

SERM. II with Blafphemy, fince every Idea diftinctive of God from his Creatures is there exprefsly afcribed to him; unless Paternity, a mere Relation of Order, be the distinctive Idea of God; which yet is fo far from implying any Inferiority, that it proves the very Reverse. For unless only Son and only begotten fhould fignify the only created (the Confequence of which would be, that our Saviour is the only Creature in the Univerfe) it must follow, that he is uncreated and of the fame Nature with his Father. Well, fuppofing him now turned Deift; the Tranfition from thence to Atheifm or Scepticism would be almost unavoidable, because Eternity, Omniprefence, and Foreknowledge are encumbered with as great Difficulties as the Doctrine of the Trinity. Some Writers, who set out with oppofing the Divinity of the Son, have at laft, by a natural Gradation of Error, ended in combating the Prescience of God; and made at leaft very near Approaches to Atheism. For next to believing there is no fuch Thing as an infinitely perfect Being; the greatest Abfurdity is to believe, there is an infinitely perfect and wife Being, who does not know, what to

morrow,