rying the Decree of the Synod with him, to have it fubfcrib'd there. But St. Chryfoftom refus'd to fubfcribe, judging it very hard and unequal, and not according to the manner of Ecclefiaftical Cenfures, that a Perfon of fo great Learning and Piety, who had been fo ferviceable to the Church, who liv'd two hundred Years before, whofe Books no Council had condemn'd, fhould now be condemn'd by a fmall pack'd Synod of his profefs'd Enemies. But Epiphanius was refolv'd to go thro with his Work, being abetted in it not only by the falfe and implacable Theophilus, but also by the Empress her felf, and fome potent Men in the Court, and feveral licen tious Priefts, who had a pique againft Chryfoftom for his free reproving of their Faults; and therefore in the moft invidi ous manner he could, before all the People, he recited the Decree, exprefly naming fome of the Origenijs, to wit, thofe whom the wrathful Theophilus fo caufelefly perfecuted, with oblique Reflections alfo upon Chryfoftom as the Patron of them. And this fervent Zeal of his for the Truth, as he conceiv'd, was the more eafily boil'd up to this irregular height because of fome Difciples of Arius, who fince the Condemnation of their Mafter and his Doctrine, not daring to avow his Herefy under that Title, craftily and moft falfly endeavour'd to pro pagate it under the unmeet Cover of the plaufible name of Origen. If I was concern'd in the Opinions of Origen more than barely to give you an hiftorical Account of them, or took fo great an Intereft in his Quarrel, as to be an Adverfary to his Adverfaries, I could mention to you, that Chryfoftom gently fnubbing Epiphanius by Seraphion for this pragmatical Defign of his (as fome would call it) and meddling fo much where he had fo little to do, and kindly bidding him beware left from the Stir and Commotion he had put the People in any danger fhould redound to himself; the good Man forthwith upon this advertisement hafted from Conftantinople to his own See, but died by the way. I could alfo tell you what befel Cyrinus Bishop of Chalcedon, a bitter Enemy of Chryfoftom's, when the pack'd Bishops were there who were to compofe a nother Synod against that pious Father. There are not wanting who draw fuch Accidents into Argument against their unrighteous Proceedings against two fuch excellent Perfons, and think they were the Rebukes of Providence: But fuch Events are of too lubricous a confideration to be taken notice of by any but an Adverfary and an Orator; but I am neither in this Work you have impos'd on me. Only this you may plainly gather from what I have now related, that the great Heat and Bitterness against the Opinions of Origen had fach beginnings as no Man now would dare to own, viz. the fatisfying

fatisfying the Revenge of an impious Diffembler, and the discountenancing a Do&trine which almoft all the Chriftian World believes for true. But the eager Contention against this one Opinioh would neceffarily difcover many others which were like to be fufpected likewife; for Origen's rais'd Genius could not but light on fuch Conclufions as were of an higher and more remote Speculation, which to Heads unus'd to fuch Theories, would firft appear ftrange, and then falfe because we are very unwilling that any thing should be true which we never heard of before, and which we do not now understand. Many of which Conclufions fagotted together by fome malicious or quarrelfom Reader of his Works, would make fuch a thow to his Difadvantage in the Judgment of the Simple and Unlearned, that without any fcruple they would be fet againft him as a Man of moft monftrous Conceits,

Qur third Query is, What his Dogmata are?

By which Queftion I prefume you do not mean all the
Doctrines that are in his Writings, which cannot be found in
the common compendious Creed of the Chriftian Church,
nor amongst the Articles of particular Churches, no nor yet
in the nfual Systems of Theology; for it would be as hard
to tell you what his Opinion is in all those Questions he pro-
prounds and difcuffes in his Books, as it is unworthy in him
who hath heap'd up feveral of them together as his Opinions,
when yet he profeffes of them that he does not propound
them as the Sentiments of his own Mind, but only as noble
and illuftrious Arguments of our Contemplation, very well
worthy to be further enquir'd of: but your meaning, I fup.
pofe, is of the moft material of them, and which moft offend
our otherways taught Ears. Thofe of this fort may be re-
duc'd to thefe Six,

1. His Doctrine concerning the Holy Trinity, among the
Hypoftafes whereof, they fay, he puts an Inequality.
2. That the Souls of Men do pre-exift.

3. That thro their Fault and Negligence they appear here
Inhabitants of the Earth cloth'd with Terreftrial Botlie
4. That the Myftery of the Refurrection is this, that we
Thall be cloth'd with heavenly or æthereal Bodies.

5. That after long periods of time the Damn'd fhall be
deliver'd from their Torments, and try their Fortunes again
in fuch Régions of the World as their Nature fits them for.

6. That the Earth, after her Conflagration, fhall become habitable again, and be the manfion of Men and other Aniimals; and this in eternal Viciffitudes.

These

These are the chief Matters wherein Origen is conceiv'd to have mightily tranfgrefs'd; and of which Jerom fays, Cum bac rejeceritis & quafi cenforia virgulâ feparaveritis a fide Ecclefia, tuto legam catera: nec venena jam timebo, cum antidotum prabibero.

HOW

TOW he afferts the fe, and upon what Grounds and Reafons, is your fourth Query, which in order comes now to be anfwer'd.

Concerning the First of them, whether Origen ever us'd the very Term Inequality or Inequal in his Speculations of that myfterious and bleffed Effence, I cannot fay, Sure I am, I never met with it in his Writings; and, what is a better Argument that he us'd it not, none of thofe object it to him who have made Collections of his Errors and dangerous Speeches. And therefore if the thing it felf be laid to his Charge, it must be infer'd from fuch Paffages as these they take notice of, and have excerpted out of his Writings, Pater non videtur a Filio, Pater non comprehenditur a Filio, Filius, qui eft imago invifibilis Patris, comparatus Patri non eft Veritas, &c. But if he did hold a kind of Inequality amongst the bleffed Hypoftafes of the moft Sacred Trinity, a Man would probably guefs from what he finds in his Writings that his Grounds were thefe.

1. The Difference of their Effential Characters and Idiomata, which is fuch as might eafily induce him to think that the Divine Hypoftafes, which fubftantially were thofe Idiomata or Properties, did alfo differ one from another according as the Perfections differ'd fignify'd by thofe Effential Properties. They are thefe, Original Goodnefs, or firft Plenitude of Life and Being, All-comprehenfive Wifdom or Reason, and Demiurgical Love; which tho they all be truly and properly univerfal Natures, yet there is manifeftly in the two latter and derivative Hypoftafes a verging towards Particularity, if compar'd with the firft Primitive Fountain of the Deity; and this drawing towards Particularity is greater in the Third than in the Second. For all things are in the First in than indiftinct manner, and in fuch Exuberances flow from him, that our Minds cannot particularly fet out this and that: bur emptying himself into the Second, we then find them, according to his Name and Nature, limited and bounded and divided into their respective Reafons and Ideas, but without deftroying his Effential Unity, for he is them all; from whom they being further carry'd down to the Third, are by his Almighty and never-failing Power diftinctly brought forth into vifible Life and Exiftence, exactly accord

ing

ing to those eternal Reasons and Ideas which fhone into him from the Second, and faithfully govern'd the Operations of his Power. And if we defcend from this higher Metaphyfical Speculation, and take a view of these three Excellencies, not as they are Subftances in the Deity, but as Dispositions and Qualities in created Beings; we cannot but pronounce that there is fuch plain difference in their Notions, that if they were from their accidental Nature exalted into Subftantial life, they would there alfo ftill retain their difference.

2. There seems fuch a Neceffity of Nature, that all Effects and Productions whatever, whether voluntary or emanative, fhould decline fomething from the fupereminent Excellency of the Cause and Producer, that it is fcarce poffible to keep our Minds from thinking but that the Rule holds alfo in the Divine Emanations; efpecially when the very Names of Father and Son, and the Modes of Derivation, being begot by the Father, and proceeding from both, do fo fairly countenance the Truth of it.

3. Tho the Divine Hypoftafes be acknowledg'd Three in respect of their proper Effences, (for fo, for more plainnefs, I fhall crave leave to speak) and thofe three different, or alius atque alius; and not only fo, in regard of three different Names, or a threefold Order (as the Church hath rightly determin'd, againft Sabellius, I take it:) yet if we abftract from them in our Minds their Names and Order, and barely contemplate thofe Effences, we can find nothing in them (according to the Hypothefis of the Equalifts) why one should be call'd the Father or Son rather than another: which must needs have feem'd very harsh to Origen's contemplative Spirit, if not derogatory to him who is fimply Firft in that everbleffed Triad.

4. The ftrict Equalifts could not give him any reason why the Deity was not rather multiply'd into an Infinity of Hy poftafes, than have its Progreffions ftop'd at Three. Nay, it feems neceffary by their Hypothefis, that the Multiplication fhould be Infinite. For the firft Original Good communica ting of him elf to his firft Productions, according to the ema native fertility of his own exuberant Fulness, if they did as fully receive his Life and Power, as he their Author was himfelf poffefs'd of it, the Third would be as able, and by the neceffity of equal plenitude, would be as much contrain'd (as I may fo fpeak with reverence) to produce Three more, and fo on perpetually. And for them to fay that the Nunber was limited to Three by explicit Will and Counfel, is to hazard the neceffary Exiftence, and confequently the Divinity of the two latter Hypoftafes, and to induce fuch an Indifferency in

to

to the firft and earlieft Operations of the Author of all things, as is inconfiftent with infinitely-full Goodness. Wherefore Origen was forc'd to conclude that the Number was limited in a Triad by their unequal Declenfion from the First, in such a measure and proportion that thofe Three did perfectly comprehend and make up together in their Effential Idiomata, whatever Perfection goes to the conftituting the entire Otov, or Divine Effence.

5. Since God is an Effence infinitely perfect, and fince all the Perfections worthy of the Divine Nature, as Goodness, Wisdom, Power, c. are neither of the fame Nature; nor of the fame Worth and Excellency; if every Hypoftafis be effentially all those Perfections, they are three Gods; if one be one of them, another be another, they are not effentially equal.

6. He was encourag'd to think these his Reasons good, and his Conclufion true, from the fair Confirmations of it in Holy Scripture: ex. gr. My Father is greater than I. 1 live by the Father. The Son can do nothing of himself. 1 can of my felf do nothing. The words that I speak unto you, I speak not of my self. And of the Holy Ghoft it is faid, that be proceeded from the Father, and is fent into the World by him. That he is the Spirit of the Son. That be shall not speak of himself. He shall receive of mine. All which places, that I may name no more, do moft naturally imply fome kind of inequality; and after the Reafons given, may pafs for an evident Teftimony of the Truth of Origen's Doctrines which fome Men fay is neceffary to be establish'd and believ'd, left otherwife we be as facrilegious to the Honour and Majefty of the Father of all things, as the antient Hereticks were impudently injurious to the other two bleffed and ever-to-beador'd Hypoftafes. And if the temerarious and confounded Conclufions of the meddlesom School-men be receiv'd with a like temerity, they think there will be as much need to mul tiply Councils in this latter Age of the Church, to affert the Honour due to God the Father, as there was of old to reftore the Son and Holy Ghost to their deferv'd Dignity of Nature in the Beliefs of Chriftians, from whence the faucy Ignorance and Impiety of fome bold Men had detruded them. Thus, Şir, you have fome of thofe Reasons upon which Origen founded his Doctrine of Inequality. Which Hypothefis of his he hath fo warily and judiciously form'd, that it hath been faid by fome, that neither the fubtiler Attacks nor more rude and boisterous Shocks of his Adverfaries have been able hitherto' to fhake or disorder it, much lefs utterly to deftroy the Reafonableness and Concinnity of it. And what fome have too haftily fancied, and as clamorously pronounc'd, viz. that it maile the

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