if there were more than one which were from none, it could not be denied but there were more gods than one. Wherefore this origination' in the divine paternity hath anciently been looked upon as the assertion of the unity: and therefore the Son and Holy Ghost have been believed to be but one God with the Father, because both from the Father, who is one, and so the union2 of them.

Secondly, It is necessary thus to believe in the Father, because our salvation is propounded to us by an access unto the Father. We are all gone away and fallen from God, and we must be brought to him again.

Eph. ii. 18.

John L 12

person can

under which we can be brought to God as to be saved, but
the notion of the Father: and there is no other
bring us to the Father, but the Son of that Father: for, as
the apostle teacheth us, through him we have an access by one
Spirit unto the Father.

Having thus described the true nature and notion of the 41 divine paternity, in all the several degrees and eminences belonging to it, I may now clearly deliver, and every particular Christian understand what it is he speaks, when he makes his confession in these words, I believe in God the Father: by which I conceive him to express thus much:

As I am assured that there is an infinite and independent Being, which we call a God, and that it is impossible there should be more infinities than one: so I assure myself that this one God is the Father of all things, especially of all men and angels, so far as the mere act of creation may be styled generation; that he is farther yet, and in a more peculiar manner, the Father of all those whom he regenerateth by his Spirit, whom he adopteth in his Son, as heirs and coheirs with him, whom he crowneth with the reward of an eternal inheritance in the heavens. But beyond and far above all this, beside his general offspring and peculiar people, to whom he hath given power to become the sons of God, I believe him the Father in a more eminent and transcendent manner, of one singular and proper Son, his own, his beloved, his onlybegotten Son: whom he hath not only begotten of the blessed Virgin, by the coming of the Holy Ghost, and the overshadowing of his power; not only sent with special authority as the King of Israel; not only raised from the dead, and made heir of all things in his house: but antecedently to all this, hath begotten him by way of eternal generation in the same Divinity and Majesty with himself: by which paternity, coeval to the Deity, I acknowledge him always Father, as much as always God. And in this relation, I profess that eminency and priority, that as he is the original Cause of all things as created by him, so is he the fountain of the Son begotten of him, and of the Holy Ghost proceeding from him.

I BELIEVE IN GOD THE FATHER ALMIGHTY,

AFTER the relation of God's paternity, immediately followeth the glorious attribute of his omnipotency': that as those in heaven in their devotions, so we on earth in our confessions might acknowledge that Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Rev. iv. 8. Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come. That in our solemn meetings at the Church of God, with the joint expression and concurring language of the congregation, we might some way imitate that voice of a great multitude, as the voice Rev. xix. 6. of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying Allelujah; for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth3.

This notion of Almighty in the CREED, must certainly be interpreted according to the sense which the original word beareth in the New Testament; and that cannot be better understood than by the Greek writers or interpreters of the Old, especially when the notion itself belongs unto the Gospel and the Law indifferently. Now the word which we translate Almighty, the most ancient Greek interpreters used sometimes for the title of God, the Lord of Hosts, sometimes for his name Shaddai, as generally in the Book of Job: by 42 the first, they seem to signify the rule and dominion which God hath over all; by the second, the strength, force, or

1 For the oldest and shortest Creed had always this attribute expressed in it. Insomuch that Παντοκράτωρ was ordinarily by the ancients taken for the Father, as Origen, cont. Celsum, 1. vii. § 10. [Vol. I. p. 700 E.] 'Expǹv dè αὐτὸν ἐκθέσθαι αὐταῖς λέξεσι τὰς προφητείας εἶτ ̓ ἐν αἷς Θεὸς Παντοκράτωρ ἐπηγγέλλετο εἶναι ὁ λέγων, εἴτ ̓ ἐν αἷς ὁ Υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ, εἴτε καὶ ἐν αἰς τὸ Πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον λέγον εἶναι ἐπιστεύετο. And according to this general confession did Polycarp begin his prayer at his martyrdom: Κύριε ὁ Θεὸς ὁ παντοκράτωρ, ὁ τοῦ ἀγαπητοῦ καὶ εὐλογητοῦ παιδός σου Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ πατήρ. Eccles. Smyrn. Epist. [c. 14.]

2 Οἱ παῤῥησίαν ειληφότες, τὸν παν τοκράτορα θεὸν καλεῖν πατέρα. Constit. Apost. L i. Proam.

3 Παντοκράτωρ, translated by Ter

tullian and St Augustin [De Genesi
ad Lit. lib. iv. c. 12. § 22. Vol. III.
p. 167 E.] Omnitenens (as Tertullian
translates κοσμοκράτορας munditenen-
tes,) [adv. Valentinianos, c. 22.] by
Prudentius Omnipollens, by all Omni-
potens (as St Hilary translated koσ-
μокpáтopas mundipotentes), [Tractat.
in Ps. lix. c. 14. p. 141 F.] and, as I
conceive, it is translated, Capax uni-
versorum, by the Latin interpreter of
Hermas. 'Primum omnium credere
quod unus est Deus, qui omnia creavit,
et consummavit, et ex nihilo omnia
fecit. Ipse capax* universorum, solus
immensus est.' Mand. 1. Which by
the interpreter of Irenæus is thus
translated: 'Omnium capax, et qui
a nemine capiatur.' 1. iv. c. 37.
[iv. 20. 2, p. 253.]

* The Greek here is πάντα χωρών, μόνος δὲ ἀχώρητος ών.

Gien, ii. 1. power by which he is able to perform all things. The heavens and the earth were finished, saith Moses, and all the host of them: and he which begun them, he which finished them, is the ruler and commander of them. Upon the right Isni. xlv. 12. of creation doth he justly challenge this dominion. I have made the earth, and created man upon it; I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded. And on this dominion or command doth he raise the title of the Lord of Hosts': which, though preserved in the original language both by St Paul and St James, yet by St John is turned into that word which we translate Almighty. Wherefore from the use of the sacred writers, from the3 notation of the word in Greek, and from the testimony of the ancient fathers, we may well ascribe unto God the Father,

1 Κύριος Σαβαώθ.

2 Εἰ μὴ Κύριος Σαβαὼθ ἐγκατέλιπεν ἡμῖν σπέρμα. Rom. ix. 29. the words of Isa. i. 9. Καὶ αἱ βοαὶ τῶν θερι σάντων εἰς τὰ ὦτα Κυρίου Σαβαώθ εἰσεληλύθασιν. Jam. v. 4. which are the words of St James in relation to Deut. xxiv. 15. "Αγιος, ἅγιος, ἅγιος, Κύριος ὁ Θεὸς ὁ παντοκράτωρ. Rev. iv. 8. which are before in Isaiah. "Αγιος, ἅγιος, ἅγιος Κύριος Σαβαώθ. Isa. vi. 3. Τὸ δ ̓ ὅμοιον ἐροῦμεν καὶ περὶ τῆς Σαβαώθ φωνῆς, πολλαχοῦ τῶν ἐπῳδῶν παραλαμβανομένης· ὅτι εἰ μεταλαμβά νομεν τὸ ὄνομα εἰς τὸ Κύριος τῶν δυνάμεων, ἢ Κύριος στρατιῶν, ἢ παντοκρά τωρ (διαφόρως γὰρ αὐτὸ ἐξεδέξαντο οἱ ἑρμηνεύοντες αὐτό), οὐδὲν ποιήσομεν. Origen. contra Cels. 1. v. [§ 45. Vol. 1. p. 613 A.]

8 That παντοκράτωρ should have the signification of government in it, according to the composition in the Greek language, no man can doubt, who but only considers those vulgar terms of their politics, δημοκρατία, and ἀριστοκρατία, from whence it appears that μονοκρατία might as well have been used as μοναρχία: and in that sense αὐτοκράτωρ is the proper title given by the Greeks to the Roman emperor, as not only the latter historians, but even the coins of Julius Cesar witness. Hesych. Αὐτοκράτωρ, αὐτεξούσιος, κοσμοκράτωρ: because the

Roman emperor was ruler of the known world. So the devils or princes of the air are termed by St Paul, κοσμοκράτορες, Eph. vi. 12. which is all one with ἄρχοντες τοῦ κόσμου, 25 will appear, John xii. 31. and xiv. 30. and xvi. 11. As therefore Κράτος signifieth of itself rule and authority, Hesych. Κράτος, βασιλεία,—ἐξουσία· Κράτει, ἀρχῇ, ἐξουσίᾳ· to which sense Eustathius hath observed Homer led the following writers by those words of his, σὸν δὲ κράτος αἰὲν ἀέξειν, Iliad Μ. 214. τὸ μὲν κράτος συλλαμβάνεται τι τοῖς ὕστερον τὴν βασιλείαν κράτος λέγουσι· whence Æschylus calls Aga. memnon and Menelaus 'Αχαιών δίθρονον κράτος, [Agam. 109.] and Sophocles after him, δικρατεῖς ̓Ατρείδας, [Αj. 251.] and as κρατεῖν to rule or govern, (Κρατεῖ, κυριεύει, ἄρχει from whence Κρατύς, ἄρχων, ἐξουσιάζων·) so also in composition, παντοκράτωρ, the ruler of all. Παντοκράτωρ, ὁ θεὸς πάντων κρατῶν. Hesych. Παντοκρατορία, πανταρχία. Suid.

4 Αἱρετικοὶοὐκ οἴδασιν ἕνα παντοκράτορα θεόν παντοκράτωρ γάρ ἐστιν ὁ πάντων κρατῶν, ὁ πάντων ἐξουσιάζων. οἱ δὲ λέγοντες τὸν μὲν εἶναι τῆς ψυχῆς δεσπότην, τὸν δέ τινα τοῦ σώματος, οὐδέτερον αὐτῶν τέλειον λέγουσι; τῷ λείπειν ἑκάτερον θατέρῳ; ὁ γὰρ ψυχῆς ἐξουσίαν ἔχων, σώματος δὲ ἐξουσίαν μὴ ἔχων, πῶς παντοκράτωρ; καὶ ὁ δεσπόζων

in the explication of this article, the dominion over all, and the rule and government of all.

This authority or power properly potestative is attributed unto God in the sacred scriptures'; from whence those names or titles, which most aptly and fully express dominion, are frequently given unto him; and the rule, empire, or government of the world is acknowledged to be wholly in him, as necessarily following that natural and eternal right of dominion.

What the nature of this authoritative power is, we shall the more clearly understand, if we first divide it into three degrees or branches of it: the first whereof we may conceive, a right of making and framing anything which he willeth in any manner as it pleaseth him, according to the absolute freedom of his own will; the second, a right of having and possessing all things so made and framed by him, as his own, properly belonging to him, as to the Lord and Master of them, by virtue of direct dominion; the third, a right of using and disposing all things so in his possession, according to his own pleasure. The first of these we mention only for the necessity of it, and the dependence of the other two upon it. God's actual dominion being no otherways necessary than upon supposition of a precedent act of creation; because nothing, before it hath a being, can belong to any one, neither can any propriety be imagined in that which hath no entity.

But the second branch or absolute dominion of this Almighty, is farther to be considered in the independency and infinity of it. First, it is independent in a double respect, in reference both to the original, and the use thereof. For God hath received no authority from any, because he hath

σωμάτων, μὴ ἐξουσιάζων δὲ πνευμάτων, πῶς παντοκράτωρ; S. Cyril. Hieros. Catech. 8. [§ 3. p. 122.] 'ns yàp Tò πῦρ ἰσχυρότατον τῶν στοιχείων, καὶ πάντων κρατοῦν, οὕτω καὶ ὁ Θεὸς παντοδύναμος καὶ παντοκράτωρ, ὁ δυνάμενος κρατῆσαι, κτίσαι, ποιῆσαι, τρέφειν, αὔξειν, σώζειν, σώματος καὶ ψυχῆς ἐξου olar Exwv. Theodotus apud Clem. Alex. ex Script. Proph. Eclog. c. 26. [p. 996.] Unus est Dominus Jesus Christus, per quem Deus Pater dominatum omnium tenet; unde et se

PEARSON.

quens sermo Omnipotentem pronunciat Dominum. Omnipotens autem ab eo dicitur, quod omnium teneat potentatum. Ruffin. in Symb. 3 5 [p. 60.]

1 'Eşovola. Luke xii. 5. Acts i. 7. Jude 25. Rev. v. 13. [xpάTOS.] • As 1778 κύριος, δεσπότης. Εν μὲν τὸ κυρίως καὶ πρώτως ὄν, οὗ ἐν τῇ χειρὶ πάντα, καὶ ὃς ἁπάντων δεσπόζει· τὰ γὰρ σύμπαντα δοῦλά σα. Phot. Ep. 162. [Quæst. 89 ad Amphil. § 1. Vol. 1. p. 561.]

6