1

what both Strahlenberg and colonel Grant have mentioned, concerning the TRIUNE BEING, worshiped by the Tangutians and Lamas of Thibet, and a proof of the great antiquity of the notion that such a Being was to be worshiped by mankind, however perverted, before its being made manifest in Christianity.

BUT I cannot forbear, in this place, to fhew that great pains have been taken by a late author, in his Essay on Spirit, to prove the second and third perfons in the HOLY TRINITY to be created Beings, by quotations from feveral of the prophets, every one of which, fairly confidered, prove the direct contrary: the answers to the following fhort queries will prove it beyond all doubt, and fhew how that learned author entangled himself in his own argumentation, to bring about the degradation of the divinity of the Son and HOLY GHOST.

1. IF CHRIST be the only begotten Son of GOD, Jehovah, is it not a contradiction to all animadverfion, phyfical or metaphyfical, to call him a created Being? If he was begotten, he could not be created; and, if he was begotten, there never could be an instant, from all eternity, in which CHRIST was not with the Father; it is abfurd, if not blafphemous, to think otherwise.

2. THE HOLY SPIRIT is allowed to proceed from the FATHER and the Son; if fo, can there have been an instant, from all eternity, in which the HOLY SPIRIT was not with the FATHER and the SON? Can it, therefore, be faid, that this Divine Perfon was a created Being? By proceeding from, we cannot understand created by, the FATHER and the SON. Therefore the three perfons are truely one JEHOVAH, from all eternity.

It is allowed, that by the SON, GOD created the worlds; because all judgment was committed to him.

Now, could the creation of worlds be committed to created beings, who themfelves had no exiftence before a creation?

Does not the creation of worlds, therefore, fuppofse an infinitely OMNIPOTENT, OMNISCIENT, and OMNIPRESENT CREATOR? NOW to fuggeft, any created being could poffibly be endowed with thefe attributes, would be fuppofing that God could create infinite eternal beings, like himself; a most rank absurdity: and as all judgment is said to be given to the Son, what is this, but saying, that he was OMNIPOTENT, &c. and when the prophets call him the JEHOVAH OF JEHOVAH, the GOD of GOD, can that be an appellation of a created angel? He is alfo called the second effence by the prophets, and ancient Jews, who gave this fecond effence the name Michael, and, to the third effence, they gave the name Gabriel. Now, the notion the ancient Jews had of these two DIVINE Effences of the FATHER, will appear from the interpretation of these names, by which both prophets and Jews called them; for the former fignifies ficut Deus, the only likeness of GOD, and the latter denotes, the ftrength and power of GOD. What higher or more divine appellations could be made use of, by any human expreffion, to denote the divinity of the Son and HOLY GHOST, than these? They believed, therefore, three effences in the DEITY: the firft, the FATHER; the second, his essential fimilitude; and the third, his essential strength and power, who is frequently called, in the Old Teftament, the HOLY SPIRIT, the Spirit of

GOD, the Spirit of JEHOVAH. Can a created being be the Spirit of JEHOVAH ?

THIS wandering author lays great ftrefs upon its being said, in the New Teftament, that the law was given by angels: what has that to do with perfons in the bleffed Trinity? Angels are meffengers to do the will of God, and are believed to be ministering fpirits; but is it faid, any where, that angels created angels, worlds and men? To conclude, let us fee what Eufebius fays of the notion among the Jews, of three perfons, to cach of which they paid divine honours: this writer tells us, as he is quoted by the author of the Effay on Spirit, in his Prepar. Evang. lib. 7. cap. 15. that, "after the second effence, comes the "HOLY SPIRIT, which they place in this royal dignity and "degree of the principality of those inferior beings, who

may want his assistance; who, therefore, obtaining the "third place, confers on thofe, who are inferior to him, "those excellent virtues which he himself received from "another, to wit, from the Divine Locos, his fuperior, "whom we faid before was the fecond to the Supreme, “Unbegotten and Almighty GoD. So, fays Eufebius, all "the Hebrew divines, after that GOD, who is over all, and "after this first-born WISDOM, pay divine worship to the "third and HOLY POWER, which they call the HOLY "SPIRIT, by which they themselves are illuminated, when

they are divinely infpired." And Zechariah, in his seventh chapter, verfe 12, complained, that "the people “ hardened their hearts, left they should hear the law, and "the words which the JEHOVAH of Hofts hath fent by his "Spirit, in the former prophets."

I THOUGHT it neceffary, and my duty, to mention these matters, in this place, to fhew that a plurality in the DEITY, was always believed by the patriarchs, and the Jews after them; and to profess my own faith in the Holy, Bleffed and Glorious TRINITY, three perfons in one GOD, bleffed for ever.

XXXXXXXXX

XXXXXXXXXXXX)

XXX

CHAP.

VIII.

Obfervations upon certain passages in Jofephus Acosta's account of Mexico and Peru; and in Muller's relation of the feveral Ruffian expeditions to the North-East ; and fome animadverfions upon the first inhabitants of Mexico and Peru.

YE

HIS author, in his History of the Indies, has

been very extensive in his account of the reli

gious and other ceremonies of the Peruvians, as well as of other Indians: and, in the twenty-eighth chapter of his fifth book, he describes their monthly feasts and facrifices, and the purposes for which they were celebrated; wherein he has the following remarkable paffage: as it is tranflated into English, and published in 1604.

"IT is ftrange, fays he, that the Devil, after his manhath brought a trinity into idolatry; for the three

ner,

images of the fun, called Apomti, Churunti and Intiquafqui; which fignifieth, Father and Lord-Sun; the "Son-Sun; and the Brother-Sun. In the like manner, "they named the three images of Chuquilla, which is the "God that rules in the region of the air, where it thunders, "rains and fnows. I remember, that being at Cuquifaca, an honourable priest shewed me an information, which “I had long in my hands, where it was proved, that "there was a certain guaca, or oratory, where the Indians ❝ did worship an idol, called Tanga-Tanga, which they "faid was one in three, and three in one.

THIS information, in my opinion, is a very important discovery, and lays open a most interesting scene towards elucidating more points than one in ancient history. Let us consider it, as having a near relation to the Tangutian idol; and we shall find fufficient reafon to believe it is the very fame with that described by Strahlenberg; because, the name of the third perfon in the Tangutian Deity, is Tangara; and the name of that in the oratory at Cuquifca, which the priest gave an account of to Jofephus Acofta, is Tanga-Tanga, which the natives faid was one in three, and three in one.

Now, it would be difficult to feparate these agreements (which are in themselves very surprizing to me), or to attribute them to chance. Can it be faid, that chance produced an idol in Tangutia, Tibet, and Peru, that the people intended to worship, as a Triune Deity, in each of these places? or, could it happen, that the name of the third person of that of the Lamas at Tibet, or Tangutia, which is Tangara, fhould be the appellation of that of Peru, Tenga

Ff 2