1685. the authority of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, to promote the interest either of Arianism or Popery; but that it proceeded purely from a certain boldness and rashness in censuring the ancients, which was familiar to him. But howsoever this might be, most certain it is, that the modern Arians found themselves not a little gratified by his labours; and the orthodox on the other hand complained, that he had wronged both the Nicene and Ante-Nicene Fathers.

How Petavius was

in this con

Curcellæus.

LII. Now the very same thing which was charged succeeded upon Petavius, a popish, was unhappily likewise troversy by charged upon Curcellæus, a protestant writer: and it cannot be denied, but that the Arians made their advantage of both these learned authors, and endeavoured to persuade the world, that they were really of their side; howsoever, for prudential reasons, they might think fit to disguise a little their own sentiments. His preface to the works of Episcopius b made him first to be suspected, and Maresius, an hot Calvinist, and one who had also a personal pique against him, took thence occasion of accusing him publicly of heresy in the points of the Trinity and Incarnation. It is true, that Curcellæus d complained, that Maresius had injured him in a very unchristian manner, and that his accusation of him was

b [Opera Theologica, 1650 and 1665.]

C

[Joanna Papissa restituta, &c. cum brevi Refutatione Præfationis Apologetica Curcellæanæ, 1658. and again, Defensio Fidei Catholicæ adversus Steph. Curcellæum, 1662.]

d Stephani Curcellæi Quaternio Dissertationum Theologicarum adversus Samuelem Maresium, Opus posthumum. Amstel. 1689.

utterly false and ungrounded: and Maresius, in his 1685. Anti-Trinus, having frequently called him an Antitrinitarian, he made answer, that he was very far from deserving that name, forasmuch as he could be no Antitrinitarian, or enemy of the blessed Trinity, who acknowledged the doctrine thereof, as laid down in the holy Scriptures. He challenged his adversary to shew, that he had any ways deviated from the faith which was delivered by the apostles of Christ, or even from the explication thereof, by the most ancient and approved writers of the church: loudly asserting, that the orthodox doctrine concerning Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, was by him believed and maintained, according as it was revealed to the church; and that it was a gross falsehood and injustice therefore to pretend, that he was an adversary to it, or had expressed any manner of dislike to it by word or writing. He pleaded moreover his baptism in the common and catholic form with all Christians, and his solemn profession when grown up with the church universal, "That he believed in one "God, the Father Almighty, the Creator of heaven "and earth, and in his only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, in whom, besides the human nature, there was also the divine nature, which not only existed "before his birth of the Virgin Mary, but even from 'eternity; and in the Holy Ghost, who proceedeth "from the Father, and is sent by the Son."

66

66

66

This is the summary which he hath given us of his belief of the holy Trinity, and which he explaineth and defendeth by arguments and testimonies from antiquity; to which he was not such a stranger as his master Episcopius, having taken a

1685. great deal of pains to sift this matter as well as he could, and to run it up to the head. For though he every where declareth himself for sticking closely to none but the Scripture account of this article, and is for discarding thence the use of scholastical terms in this whole controversy; he is nevertheless busied much to prove, that his exposition thereof is conformable to that of the ancients, and no ways disagreeable to the true sense of those very terms, concerning the use whereof he had some scruples upon him.

Thus if you take his own account, there would be no man more orthodox and catholic than he is in the doctrine of the Trinity, as also in that of the incarnation of Christ. And he insisted, that both from the pulpit and from the chair he had always taught and vindicated that faith, into which he had been baptized, and which he had publicly professed in the congregation, according to the form generally received; and did even teach and vindicate the same at that very time, when the charge of Antitrinitarianism was brought against him. Yea, he expressed so great a zeal for the orthodox doctrine in this great fundamental, as he would seem forward to seal the truth thereof even with his blood, if, as he said, God should vouchsafe him this honour. Notwithstanding all this, it is notoriously known, and that from his own very apology, that he was no less an enemy to the first council of Nice than his master before him, if not more than he; that he was no friend at all to the use of the word Trinity; that he so explained himself concerning that mystery, as to assert no more than a specifical unity in the

divine persons; that he defended the cause of Va- 1685. lentinus Gentilis, beheaded at Bern in Switzerland, for Tritheism, maintaining his doctrine to have been the same with that of the primitive Fathers; particularly of Ignatius, Justin Martyr, Irenæus, Athenagoras, Tertullian, and Clemens Alexandrinus; that he impeached the common (which he called the modern and scholastical) doctrine of the Trinity, for approaching so very near Sabellianism, as hardly to be distinguished from it, and charged it to be a thousand years younger than that which was taught by Christ and his apostles; that he exploded the notion of consubstantiality, in the sense in which it is now generally taken, when applied to the Father and Son, that he was very much afraid to have his mind perplexed with the divine relations, or with the manner of generation and procession in the Deity, or with modes of subsistence and personalities, or with mutual consciousness, and the like; and therefore was for discarding at once all such terms and phrases as are not expressly legitimated by the sacred writers; that he fully believed the Godhead of the Father to be more excellent than that of the Son, or of the Holy Ghost, even so far as to look upon this superiority as a thing unquestionable, and to appeal to the consentient testimony of the primitive church for evidence; and lastly, that he took care to recommend Petavius, and the authorf of Irenicum Irenicorum, a learned physician at Dantzick, whom I shall have an occasion several times hereafter to mention, to the perusal of his readers, for the sake of that collection of testimonies which is to be found in them, as wherein they might [In 1566.] .. f[Daniel Zuicker.]

с

1685. easily find an account of the primitive faith, concerning these great articles.

The different designs

læus.

The design of Curcellæus was evidently different of Petavius from that of Petavius: the one was to reconcile the and Curcel- differences about the mysteries of our religion, among the several sorts of Christians; the other was not to reconcile them, but to put an end to the controversy a shorter way, by endeavouring to shew the necessity of an absolute submission to authority, for the determining articles of faith: the one was to make the Scriptures the sole rule and standard for ecclesiastical communion in this great point; the other was to make the present church of Rome the sole arbiter and judge in this cause, and her decrees decisive, how little soever agreeing with the language of antiquity, and of the sacred writers themselves. But Mr. Bull was not satisfied at all with the design either of the one or of the other; forasmuch as he apprehended from them both the like dangerous consequences, and the same use to be made by the enemies of the catholic faith. He thought Episcopius and Curcellæus attributed too little, and Petavius, and others of his church, too much, to the power and authority of ecclesiastical synods, for the declaring of articles of faith.

A mistake

Meaux,

concerning

LIII. And it is hence plain, that the late bishop of Bossuet, of Meaux, with whom I had the honour to be acbishop of quainted, and who is known to have had a particuMr. Bull. lar esteem for our author, is mistaken, in supposing him to hold the infallibility of this council of Nice; for had the bishop but proved this once, all that Mr. Bull had written in defence of the faith there established would have been altogether superfluous.