СНАР. Х.

A Commentary on the Athanasian Creeda.

1. WHOSOEVER will be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic Faith.

By the words, before all things, is meant in the first place. Faith goes before practice; and is therefore first in order, though practice may be, comparatively, more considerable, and first in value, as the end is above the

means.

2. Which Faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.

Which faith, that is, the Catholic Faith before spoken of, which is another name for the true and right faith as taught in Scripture; called Catholic, or universal, as being held by the universal Church of Christ, against which the gates of hell shall never prevail. The meaning then is, that every one is obliged, under pain of damnation, to preserve, as far as in him lies, the true and right faith, in opposition to those that endeavour to corrupt it either by taking from it, or adding to it. That men shall perish eternally for unbelief, for rejecting the faith in the lump,

■ In the Primmer of 1539, and another of 1555, where the version is made from the Latin, and joined with the Popish Service of that time, the English title of the Creed was, The Symbole or Crede of the great Doctour Athanasius, dayly red in the Church.

In King Edward's Prayer Book, A. D. 1549. it is barely entitled, This Confession of our Christian Faith: and it was ordered to be song, or sayed, upon six feasts in the year. At the revisal of the Common Prayer, in 1552, it was appointed to be used on several feasts in the year, the whole number thirteen. But the title still continued the same, till the last review under Charles the Second; when were added thereto, commonly called the Creed of St. Athanasius: from which time the running title has been S. Athanasius's Creed, as before Quicunque vult, in our Prayer Books.

b In King Edward's Prayer Books, and so down to the year 1627, holy was read for what is now whole. Which I suppose was intended for wholly : as one may reasonably imagine from Queen Elizabeth's of 1561, where it is wholy; and from the metrical version, which plainly meant wholly, by holy, answering to undefiledly: and it is certain that holy was the ancient spelling for what we now write wholly.

cannot be doubted; when it is expressly said, (Mark xvi. 16.)" He that believeth not shall be damned:" and as to rejecting any particular branch, or article of it, it must of consequence be a sin against the whole; against truth and peace, and therefore damnable in its own nature, as all wilful sins are without repentance. As to the allowances to be made for invincible ignorance, prejudice, or other unavoidable infirmities; as they will be pleadable in the case of any other sin, so may they, and will they also be pleadable in this: but it was foreign to the purpose of the Creed, to take notice of it in this case particularly, when it is common to all cases of like nature, and is always supposed and understood, though not specially mentioned.

3. And the Catholic Faith is this; That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity.

One of the principal branches of the Catholic Faith, and which is of nearest concernment, (since our worship depends upon it, and the main body of the Christian religion is bound up in it,) is the doctrine of a Trinity in Unity, of three Persons and one God, recommended in our baptism as the object of our faith, hope, and worship. He that takes upon him to corrupt or deprave this most fundamental part of a Christian's faith cannot be innocent; it being his bounden duty to maintain and preserve it, as he will answer it another day.

4. Neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Sub

stance.

Here would be no need of these particular cautions, or critical terms, in relation to this point, had men been content with the plain primitive faith in its native simplicity. But as there have been a set of men, called Sabellians, who have erroneously taught, that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are all one Person, who was incarnate, and suffered, and rose again; making the Father (and Holy Ghost) to have suffered, as well as the Son, (from thence called Patripassians,) hence it becomes necessary to caution every pious Christian against confounding the Per

sons, as those men have done. And as there have been others, particularly the Arians, who have pretended very falsely, that the three Persons are three substances, and of different kinds, divided from each other, one being before the other, existing when the other two were not, as also being present where the other two are not present; these false and dangerous tenets having been spread abroad, it is become necessary to give a caution against dividing the substance, as these have done, very much to the detriment of sobriety and truth.

5. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.

The Sabellians therefore were extremely to blame in confounding the Persons, and running them into one, taking away the distinction of Persons plainly taught in Scripture.

6. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one, the Glory equal, the Majesty coeternal.

The Arians therefore were equally to blame for dividing the substance and Godhead, in the manner before hinted. To be a little more particular on this head, we may go on to open and explain this Unity of Godhead, equality of Glory, and coeternity of Majesty.

7. Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost.

That is, as to their substance and Godhead, there is no difference or inequality amongst them; though there is a difference in respect of some personal acts and properties, as shall be observed in its place. In real dignity and perfection they are equal and undivided, as in the instances here following.

8. The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate, and the Holy Ghost uncreate.

These three Persons were never brought into being by the will of another; they are no creatures, nor changeable, as creatures are; they are all infinitely removed from dependence or precarious existence, one as much as another,