It would be a tedious work, and, it may be, not of much profit unto them who are utterly unacquainted with things so long past and gone, wherein they seem to have no concernment, to give a specimen of the several heresies whereby attempts were made against this rock and foundation of the church. Unto those who have in- quired into the records of antiquity, it would be altogether useless.
THE PREFACE. 9
For almost every page of them, at first view, presents the reader with an account of some one or more of them. Yet do I esteem it useful, that the very ordinary sort of Christians should, at least in general, be acquainted with what hath passed in this great contest about the person of Christ, from the beginning. For there are two things relating thereunto wherein then- faith is greatly concerned. First, There is evidence given therein unto the truth of those predictions of the Scripture, wherein this fatal apostasy from the truth, and opposition unto the Lord Christ, are foretold: and, secondly, An eminent instance of his power and faithfulness, in the disappointment and conquest of the gates of hell in the management of this oppo- sition. But they have been all reckoned up, and digested into methods of time and matter, by many learned men, (of old and of late,) so that I shall not in this occasional discourse represent them unto the reader again. Only I shall give a brief account of the ways and means -whereby they who retained the profession of the truth contended for it, unto a conquest over the pernicious heresies wherewith it was opposed.
The defence of the truth, from the beginning, was left in charge unto, and managed by, the guides and rulers of the church in their several capacities. And by the Scripture it was that they discharged their duty, confirmed with apostolical tradition consonant thereunto. This was left in charge unto them by the great apostle, (Acts xx. 28-31; 1 Tim. vi. 13, 14; 2 Tim. ii. 1, 2, 15, 23, 24, iv. 1-5,) and wherein any of them failed in this duty, they were reproved by Christ himself: Rev. ii. 14, 15, 20. Nor were private believers (in their places and capacities) either unable for this duty or exempt from it, but discharged themselves faithfully therein, according unto commandment given unto them : 1 John ii. 20, 27, iv. 1-3 ; 2 John 8, 9. All true believers, in their several stations — by mutual watchfulness, preaching, or writing, according unto their calls and abilities — effectually used the outward means for the preservation and propagation of the faith of the church. And the same means are still sufficient unto the same ends, were they attended unto with conscience and diligence. The pretended defence of truth with arts and anns of another kind hath been the bane of religion, and lost the peace of Christians beyond recovery. And it may be observed, that whilst this way alone for the preservation of the truth was in- sisted on and pursued, although innumerable heresies arose one after another, and sometimes many together, yet they never made any great progress, nor arrived unto any such consistency as to make a stated opposition unto the truth; but the errors themselves, and their authors, were as vagrant meteors, which appeared for a little while, and vanished away. Afterwards it was not so, when other
10 THE PREFACE.
ways and means for the suppression of heresies were judged conve- nient and needful.
For in process of time, when the power of the Roman empire gave countenance and protection unto the Christian rehgion, another way was fixed on for this end, viz., the use of such assembhes of bishops and otliers as they called General Councils, armed with a mixed power, partly civil and partly ecclesiastical — with respect unto the authority of the emperors and that jurisdiction in the church which began then to be first talked of This way was begTin in the Council of Nice, wherein, although there was a determination of the doctrine concerning the person of Christ — then in agitation, and opposed, as unto his divine nature therein— according unto the truth, yet sundry evils and inconveniences ensued thereon. For thence- forth the faith of Christians began greatly to be resolved into the authority of men, and as much, if not more weight to be laid on what was decreed by the fathers there assembled, than on what was clearly taught in the Scriptures. Besides, being necessitated, as they thought, to explain their conceptions of the divine nature of Christ in words either not used in the Scripture, or whose significa- tion unto that purpose was not determined therein, occasion was given unto endless contentions about them. The Grecians them- selves could not for a long season agree among themselves whether ols'ia and vvoaTagig were of the same signification or no, (both of them denoting essence and substance,) or whether they differed in their signification, or if they did, wherein that difference lay. Athanasius at first affirmed them to be the same : Orat. v. con. Arian., and Epist. ad African. Basil denied them so to be, or that they were used unto the same purpose in the Council of Nice : Epist. Ixxviii. The like difference immediately fell out between the Grecians and Latins about " hypostasis" and " persona." For the Latins ren- dered " hypostasis" by " substantia," and irpoeuvov by " persona." Hereof Jerome complains, in his Epistle to Damasus, that they re- quired of him in the East to confess " tres hypostases," and he would only acknowledge " tres personas : " Epist. Ixxi. And Augustine gives an account of the same difference: De Trinitate, lib. v. cap. 8, 9. Athanasius endeavoured the composing of this difference, and in a good measure effected it, as Gregory Nazianzen affirms in his oration concerning his praise. It was done by him in a synod at Alexandria, in the first year of Julian's reign. On this occasion many contests arose even among them who all pleaded their adhe- rence unto the doctrine of the Council of Nice. And as the subtle Arians made incredible advantage hereof at first, pretending that they opposed not the deity of Christ, but only the expression of it by 6/ioovffiog, so afterwards they countenanced themselves in coining