cause of his recalling his letters of recognition. Before this he seems to have come to Africa, and to have had a controversy with Tertullian, been vanquished, and recanted. Tertullian was careful to make him sign a written renunciation of his errors, and he says that he left the document among the orthodox, when he forsook the church. The style of this part of the Tract is so exceedingly obscure, that it is difficult to know precisely what he means to intimate; for he scarcely does any thing more than intimate what took place. Afterwards, it would seem, that he relapsed, and again began to propagate his doctrines, much to the annoyance of his old antagonist, who threatens that by this last attack he means utterly to annihilate him.

Praxeas was a Unitarian; as Tertullian candidly confesses the majority of the church were at that time. It was only the philosophical and the learned, that adopted the economy, as they called the distinction of the Godhead into three persons, Father, Son, and Spirit. The common people looked upon it with horror, as the introduction of polytheism into the church, and as no better than the many gods of the heathen. The views of Praxeas, as far as they can be gathered from the writings of his opponent, were similar to those of Sabellius, which were promulgated about fifty years after. Neither Praxeas, nor Sabellius, nor any of the ancient Unitarians, denied that there was something divine in Christ; but they maintained that it was not a person, distinct from the one God. Their adversaries, thinking this divine something to be an essential part of the person of Christ, imagined that they sufficiently condemned this hypothesis by showing, that it necessarily involved the supposition, that the Father suffered. Its advocates, therefore, were summarily condemned by one word of contempt and reproach, and called Patripassians.

This very fact, if it is carefully considered, betrays a wide discrepancy between the ancient and the modern theory of the trinity. In the present condition of the human mind, no theory of the trinity can be tolerated for a moment, which does not make the three persons equal, "equal in power and glory." If it were a derogation from the glory of the First Person to have suffered, it was no less so for the Second. Indeed, in modern times, all ideas of the Deity's suffering seem to have been abandoned. According to the conceptions of the ancients, VOL. XXXV.—3D s. vol. XVII. NO. II.

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the Second Person might suffer, but the First could not. They were not then of "equal glory."

In the ancient trinity, the Son was a derived being; and though he had always existed in the Father as his reason, still as Son, his existence was comparatively of modern date. We now proceed to the Tract.

TERTULLIAN AGAINST PRAXEAS.

In various ways the devil has attempted to counterfeit the truth. Sometimes he has aimed to shake it by defending it. He vindicates the unity of God, that out of that unity he may make a heresy. He says, that the Father himself descended into a virgin, that he was born of her, that he suffered, and, in short, that he was Jesus Christ. The Serpent must have made a mistake then, in the temptation of Jesus, after the baptism of John, when he approached him as the Son of God, although he was sure that God had a Son, from those very scriptures which he used to tempt him. "If thou be the Son of God, command these stones, that they be made bread." Also, "If thou art the Son of God, cast thyself down, for he hath given bis angels charge concerning thee, that in their hands they should bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against Would he accuse the gospels of falsehood, and say, "Let Matthew and Luke look to the truth of their accounts?" Will he boast, as he might in that case, "I approached God himself; I tempted the Omnipotent, face to face?" Or, “If he were merely the Son of God, I should not have deigned to tempt him? But the devil was a liar from the beginning, and is ready to suborn a man for his purpose, if he can meet such a man as Praxeas.

a stone."

It was he, who was the first to introduce this species of false doctrine into Rome. He was a man always restless, and inflated with the boast of martyrdom, merely from the fact of having suffered the vexation of a short imprisonment. And if he had given his body to be burned, it would have profited him. nothing, because he was destitute of the love of God, and has done every thing he could to destroy his gifts. For when the Bishop of Rome was about to recognise the prophetic character of Montanus, Priscilla, and Maximilla, and by their recognition to give peace to the churches of Asia, it was, he, who

by asserting falsehoods concerning these prophets and their churches, and taking the part of their opponents, compelled him to recall his letters, already sent out, and recede from the reception of their divine gifts. So Praxeas accomplished two works of the devil at the same time, he expelled prophecy, and introduced heresy, he put to flight the Comforter, and crucified the Father. The Praxean tares spread far and near. Here also they were sown; while many, unsuspicious of evil, slept in the simplicity of their own doctrines. Then they seemed to be transformed to something better, by an instrument whom God chose. They even appeared to be thoroughly rooted out. The teacher, who converted him, thought to take security for his better behavior in future, and his written recantation now remains among the Naturalists, (sensualists) in whose communion the controversy was held. For a while he was silent. Soon after, we ourselves were separated from the Naturalists, by our recognition and defence of the Comforter. But it was found, that those tares were not dead. They had only cast their seed. For a while, through hypocrisy, they maintained a secret life, and at length broke out afresh. But with God's leave, by this attempt, they shall be completely eradicated. But, if I fail, I have the satisfaction of knowing, that the day is coming, when all adulterated fruits, together with all things that offend, shall be burnt up in unquenchable fire.

So it is preached, that after the commencement of time, the Father was born, and the Father suffered; that Jesus Christ is God himself, the Lord Omnipotent. But we have always, and now especially, since we were more fully instructed by the Comforter, who leadeth into all truth, believed in one, only God, but with this modification, which we call the economy, that this one God has a Son, his Word, who proceeded from him, through whom all things were made, and without whom nothing was made: he was sent by the Father into a virgin, and born of her, man and God, son of man and Son, of God, and called Jesus Christ: that he suffered, died, was buried, according to the Scriptures, that he was raised up by the Father, and taken again into heaven, sits at the right hand of the Father, and will come to judge the quick and dead, and thence he sent, according to his promise, from the Father, the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, the Sanctifier of the faith of those, who believe in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That this rule of faith has come down from the beginning, and dates

before various other heresies, not to mention this of Praxeas, who is of yesterday, is proved, as well by the modern date of all heretics, as the newness of this Praxean heresy. On this ground, there is a presumption against all heresies, that what is oldest is truest, and that which is most modern is most likely to be corrupted. While we retain the advantage of this prescription, that some who need information may be instructed and guarded, it is proper that we discuss the matter at large, that no perversion might seem to be condemned without a hearing; and especially this, which supposes itself to possess the pure truth, while it thinks that the one God is to be held in no other way, than that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one and the same; as if they are not also all one, provided all are of one, by unity of substance; and thus the sacred truth of the economy is preserved, which disposes the unity in a trinity, dividing them in three, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; three, not in condition, but in order; not in substance, but in form; not in power, but in appearance; but of one substance, of one condition, of one power; for it is one God, from whom these orders and forms and appearances are put forth. But how they can be capable of number without division, this treatise will show as we proceed.

For all the simple, I will not say, the unthinking and the unlettered, which are always a majority of believers, since the rule of faith itself turns them from the many gods of this world to the one only true God,― not understanding that the unity is to be believed under certain conditions of its own,- -are horror-struck at the economy. They take for granted that the number and order of the trinity is a division of the unity; although a unity, deriving a trinity from itself, is not destroyed by it, but maintained. So they boast, that two or three are preached by us, but they assume to be the worshippers of one God, as if unity unreasonably established would not make a heresy, and a trinity reasonably explained would not constitute truth. "We hold," say they, "the Monarchy." And so the Latins, and those of the lowest rank, lay stress upon the very word, insomuch that you would suppose that they understood the Monarchy as well as they know how to pronounce the word. While the Latins zealously cry out, "Monarchy," even the Greeks are unwilling to understand the economy. But I, if I have acquired any skill in each of these languages, understand monarchy to mean nothing else than one undivided dominion; nor do I conceive

that the condition of a monarchy should necessarily be, that he, whose it is, should not have a son, or have made a son for himself, or should not administer his monarchy through those whom he chooses. And I affirm, that there is no government, so exclusively of one, so undivided, so much a monarchy, as not to be administered by other persons next in rank, whom he has provided as his officials. And if he, to whom the monarchy belongs, has a son, it is not immediately divided, does not cease to be a monarchy, if the son is taken to participate in it; but it still continues to belong chiefly to him, by whom it is communicated to the son, and while it is his, it is as much a monarchy as ever, since it is held by two so united.

If, therefore, the Divine Monarchy is administered by so many legions and armies of angels, as it is written;" A thousand thousand stood before him, and a thousand times a hundred thousand were in his presence," and does not therefore cease to be of one, so as to be monarchy no longer, because it is governed by so many thousand powers, why should God appear to suffer division and dispersion in the Son and Spirit, who have obtained the second and third places, sharing as they do the substance of the Father, a division and dispersion of which is not suffered in such a multitude of angels, unlike in substance to God. You consider the parts, the evidences, the instruments, the power, and every thing that belongs to a monarchy, to be the destruction of it, but not with justice. It would be far better for you to regard the meaning of the thing, rather than the sound of a word. You ought rather to consider that to be the destruction of a monarchy, when another, of the same condition and dignity, and therefore the rival of the monarch, is brought in, when another God is introduced against the Creator. Then, such an evil result would follow, when many were introduced, as the Valentinians and Prodicians represent; then, there is an overthrow of the monarchy, when the Creator is destroyed. But, how can I in fact destroy the monarchy, when I deduce the Son from no other source, but the substance of the Father, doing nothing without the will of the Father, deriving all his power from the Father; when I preserve the monarchy in the Son, which was delivered to him by the Father? I may say the same of the third in gradation, since I do not derive the Spirit from any other source, than the Father through the Son. Beware rather, that you do not yourself destroy the monarchy, in denying the