*

argued that, as from the first moment of its being the sun was the source of radiation, so from eternity the Father was the fountain of our Lord's Deity. We do not adduce this to explain the subject, but as illustrating the possibility for an infinite and perfect spirit to be eternally a source of existence. Were paternity essential to a spiritual being he would, of necessity, be a father as soon as he began to be; and, supposing paternity and filiation to be the essential relations of the first and second Persons in the Trinity, it is plain that, from eternity, the one must have been a Father, and the other a Son.

The reader will bear in mind, that these remarks are neither expected nor intended to render the doctrine in question comprehensible. Their only object is to show, that the pre-existence of a father is by no means essential to filiation; and that, in the vast variety of modes of being, it is supposable that, with respect to duration, a father and a son may precisely co-exist. As in the natural world, a cause and its effect may synchronize, although, in the order of idea, the one always precedes the other, so in the spiritual world there may be a similar coincidence; although, in consequence of the feebleness of our faculties, we cannot apprehend both ideas in the same moment, nor conceive of them at all, expect in relation to succession.

It is impossible to deny, that there may be modes of generation and sonship wholly dierffent from any of which we can conjecture. And if there be a divine filiation with respect to its mode, it must, of necessity, be inscrutable. But all that, even to our conceptions, is

cession of the Holy Spirit, as by Athenagoras, (Legat. p. 40,) and others.

* It is however a scriptural illustration of our Lord's relation to the Father. Heb. i. 3. Vide CHAP. V., sect. ii., and note (L) infra.

essential to sonship, may consist with proper Deity; and hence, in the relation itself, there is nothing which forbids us to predicate it of the second Person in the Godhead. As therefore it is possible that among the distinctions of the divine subsistences may be those of paternity and filiation, it remains that we inquire into the fact. But, in this investigation, human reason will avail us nothing. For what we know upon the subject we must be indebted wholly to revelation. Our business is to ascertain the simple and unsophisticated meaning of Scripture testimony.

NOTE (A), p. 25.

Citations, with additional Remarks, illustrative of the Argument against the Eternal Sonship of our Lord.

“Jam igitur, quod Filius Dei ab omni æternitate ex essentia Patris genitus esse affirmatur; hoc firmiter constituendum est, sententiam istam et absurdissimam, et plane ex eorum numero esse, quæ fieri nulla ratione possunt; ac proinde nec sacrarum literarum testimoniis confirmari posse. Se enim ipsam evertit. Nam si generatus est Filius,—ab omni æternitate non extiterit, sed fuit tempus aliquod, cum nondum existeret. Omnis enim generatio, præsertim substantialis, quam vocant, ac proprie sic dicta, est mutatio a non esse ad esse."-VOLKELIUS, De vera Religione, lib. v., c. xi., p. 470.

"Necesse est, ut persona vere Divinæ, et generationis proprie dicta ideas inter se conferamus, eaque ratione, an cum idea Deitatis generationis illa proprie dictæ conciliari possit, intelligamus. Fieri enim nequit, ut proprie dicta generatio de persona vere Divina affirmari queat, si per eam evertatur idea Deitatis.-Sique generatio activa illi tribuatur qui cum conscientia operatur, ut enti mere rationali, vel ratione saltem prædito, voluntarius sit oportet generandi actus. Ex quibus apertum est, in istiusmodi proprie dicta generatione, generantem esse genito priorem.-Et cum proprie genitum esse notet ex alio originem habere, et eandem essentiam ab alio per generationem accepisse, fieri nequit ut persona Divina proprie genita sit, cum in idea ejus contineatur existentia necessaria et independens ab omni alia causa. Porro, cum nunquam de persona divina verum esse potuerit eam non fuisse, repugnat eam productam esse, quocumque demum sensu id affirmetur. Est enim contradictorium, produci quod est, atque ab æterno aliquid produci. Eternum enim esse, est nunquam non fuisse, non posse non esse, atque adeo sua natura, et a se esse. Et cum præterea quod generat eo ipso producat id quod generat, illique existendi causa sit, necesse est ut genito præexistat. Quomodo enim

gignet quod non existit, aut gignetur quod existit?"-ROELL. De generat. Filii, pp. 21, 22, 27.

"As for the other clause [of the Athanasian Creed], 'None is afore or after other,' it is just as true as that there is no difference between afore and after. I ask, whether the Son doth not, as he is a Son, derive both life and Godhead from the Father? All Trinitarians grant he does: grounding themselves on the Nicene Creed, which expressly calls the Son 'God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten not made.' But if the Father gave to the Son life and Godhead, he must have both before he could communicate, or give either of them to the Son, and consequently was afore the Son was. No effect is so early as its cause; for if it were, it should not have needed or had that for its cause. No proposition in Euclid is more certain or evident than this."-Brief notes on the Creed of St. Athanasius, cited by Sherlock on the Trinity, p. 259.

"As father and son are relative terms, denoting superiority and inferiority in regard to time amongst us, from whom they are taken, (in condescension to our capacities,) they can never in propriety be attributed to a father and a son, or a first and second person, who are co-equal and co-eternal; for a father with us is always in order of time antecedent to the son, not as a father, but as a person.”—Antiquity no certain Guide in Religion, by PHILALETHES, a strict Trinitarian, p. 9.

"If the word son convey any ideas whatsoever, they are those of derivation, and of inferiority, both in dignity and time. And this notion will be found to accompany the term in all its multiplicity of singular acceptations in the eastern languages. An eternal Son is a contradiction in terms, and absolute nonsense."—WAKEFIELD's Inquiry concerning the Person of Christ.

p. 42.

"An eternal generation, in the true philosophical sense of the word eternal, is another contradiction. For generation supposes a production from and by some other; and, consequently, that other who begets must exist prior to that which is begotten

the production, therefore, cannot be properly and absolutely eternal. The invention of men hath been long enough on the rack to prove, in opposition to common sense and reason, that an effect may be co-eternal with the unoriginate cause who produced it. But the proposition has mystery and falsehood written in its very forehead, and is only fit to be joined with transubstantiation and other mysteries of the same nature.And Arius argued very justly, 'If the Father begat the Son, he that was begotten had a beginning of his existence.'' H. TAYLOR. Ben Mordecai's Letters. Let. viii., c. xi., p. 1126.

“Here, I trust, I may be permitted to say, with all due respect for those who differ from me, that the doctrine of the Eternal Sonship of Christ is, in my opinion, anti-scriptural, and highly dangerous. This doctrine I reject for the following

reasons:

"1st. I have not been able to find any express declaration in the Scriptures concerning it.

'2dly. If Christ be the Son of God as to his divine nature, then he cannot be eternal: for son implies a father; and father implies, in reference to son, precedency in time, if not in nature too. Father and son imply the idea of generation; and generation implies a time in which it was effected, and time also antecedent to such generation.

"3dly. If Christ be the Son of God, as to his divine nature, then the Father is of necessity prior, consequently superior to

him.

"4thly. Again, if this divine nature were begotten of the Father, then it must be in time; i. e., there was a period in which it did not exist, and a period when it began to exist. This destroys the eternity of our blessed Lord, and robs him at once of his Godhead.

"5thly. To say he was begotten from all eternity is, in my opinion, absurd; and the phrase eternal Son is a positive selfcontradiction. ETERNITY is that which has had no beginning, nor stands in any reference to TIME. SON supposes time, generation, and father; and time also antecedent to such generation. Therefore the conjunction of these two terms Son and eternity is absolutely impossible, as they imply essentially different and opposite ideas.”—DR. A. CLARKE. Com. on Luke i. 35.