ways what it is, or the produced is co-eternal with the producer; the first destroys the immutable idea of God, and involves contradiction; therefore, we must necessarily assert the perfect equality in the eternity of the one and of the other. Let it be observed, that the intellectuality and the perfect spirituality of the divine essence being once established on solid and unshaken foundations, there must needs be admitted in it a production altogether spiritual and intellectual, after such a manner as may be worthy of the Deity. Moreover, let notice be taken, that the producer does not produce with the intellect but only one natural and necessary product, because this terminates and exhausts all its infinite power, and also because God, acting with infinite activity, naturally operates with his intellect in one sole act with all that intensity of strength with which it is possible for him to act by the same intellect. These truths being once established, why should I not be allowed to say, that this production, being by the means of the intellect, natural and necessary, the produced is, for the very same reason, the image of the producer? Who can reasonably blame me, that I should call such a productive act, because natural, by the name of generation? Shall I not be allowed to call him Father, who produces, and his product, Son; this being equally immense, equally amiable, equally great, and a perfect image of the other? Shall I not be allowed to style such a Son, the word and wisdom of the Father, because he is produced by the intellectual comprehension of himself? I find no reason to the contrary; nay, a certain congruity and propriety, it would seem, entice me to such denominations.

SECTION VIII.

The same subject continued.

CX. The producer understands and knows himself; he understands and knows the whole beauty, the whole sublimity, the whole perfections, which he communicates to his product. He turns towards him the immense overflowings of his great

est, of his most ardent and intense complacencies, and beholding in him another self, he cannot but be sweetly delighted in him, nor can his will refrain from loving him with all the love of which his will is capable, that is, with infinite love. The produced equally intelligent, seeing that he has his origin from the producer, and that he comes from him great, excellent, perfect, and wholly equal unto him, beholds himself endowed with a will capable of infinite love; beyond all doubt, therefore, that will and that love is tending from him towards his producer, who is his origin, his principle, another self, with all intensiveness and with all sweetness: Therefore the Father most ardently loves the Son, and the Son most ardently loves the Father. But this reciprocal love of the Father to the Son, and of the Son to the Father, is neither the Father nor the Son; it is therefore, I know not what of, a third thing, but in the divine Essence as being most simple, accidentalities repugn, therefore that third thing is not accidental, but has a true and real subsistence, different from the subsistence of the Father and of the Son, in the common nature of the Father and of the Son. Love co-eternal to the one and to the other, because the one and the other eternal and immutable were never for the smallest instant without loving each other with the same ardour and intenseness, with which at present they love each other, and will love each other for ever. Infinite love, fullness of all beauty, of all greatness, of all perfection, because he proceeds from the Father, who retains within himself all beauty, all grandeur, all perfection, from the infinite Father, who infinitely loves; and because he proceeds from the Son, in all things equal to the Father, from the infinite Son, and who infinitely breathes love.

CXI. Behold the two distinct productions in God, I say, two only, because God by two operations turns himself to himself, viz. by knowing himself thoroughly and by loving himself infinitely; but one of these operations is by the way of the understanding, and the other by the way of the will, and from these two operations, two products really distinct among themselves, and distinct from the producer, come forth. These

products are perfectly equal, because they have the same. identity of essence, the same divinity; as the Son is equal in all things to the Father, and the Father to the Son, so the Holy Ghost is in all things equal to the Father, and equal in all things to the Son. We call him the third, because he proceeds from the Father and from the Son, but he is co-eternal with the Father, and co-eternal with the Son. We call him the third with regard to his origin, not with regard to time. The Father, the head and fountain of the Deity, has his being of himself, and as Father, the Son receives the essence from the Father, and is co-eternal with the Father, nearly after the same manner as if the sun were eternal, his ray would be coeternal with him, but this same essence is in him as in the Son, not as in the Father. The Holy Ghost receives his being from the Father and the Son as from one only principle, but this being is in him, not after the manner of a Father or after the manner of a Son, but after the manner of one that proceeds from both, because he proceeds and comes from the will of the Father and from the will of the Son, he being the love of the Father and the love of the Son.

SECTION VI.

The subject concluded.

CXII. It is altogether incomprehensible to the human mind how one and the same indivisible substance can be really found in several distinct persons. All the efforts of the most assiduous and profound contemplation serve only to make us conceive that this may be so, but not that it is so. Let us see the matter still clearer. Experience, as we have just seen, shows, that the more noble and worthy the various. kinds of creatures are, the more they recede from plurality, and approach in some manner to unity. The nature of reasonable animals, of men, is one nature only in its species, but not in number, and although human nature be found in all men, notwithstanding they are entirely distinct and independent from each other, still the same individual nature of the

one is not the same individual nature of the other, although it be human nature in all. Why therefore might we not allow a degree of unity more to the uncreated and infinitely more noble nature of God? Why should we not be permitted to say that the divine nature is one only, not only in its species, but also in number, and that the same individual nature of the Father, is the same individual nature of the Son, and that the same individual nature of the Father and of the Son, is the same individual nature of the Holy Ghost? We are compelled, by solid and irresistible arguments, to admit a perfect unity and a perfect indivisibility in the divine nature; next, from not less strong and forcible reasons, we see ourselves reduced to assert, that there exists in the divine nature a plurality of persons. We must reconcile one truth with the other. But what combination can be more natural, more congruous, more adapted than this of which we are speaking? If divine nature surpasses and infinitely exceeds human nature, why should not the divine nature exceed at least one degree the unity of human nature? Shall we then deny that one and the same infinite and individual substance may exist in three persons really distinct, and shall we deny it merely because we cannot conceive the mode of the mystery. But do we indeed comprehend the mutual commerce of the soul with the body, and so many other mysteries of nature, and still who is there that will deny them, and give the lie to his own experience? Do we understand the great mystery of vision; how a ray penetrates our eye, strikes our retina or optic nerve, and depicts on it, not the image of himself, but of the body by which it is reflected? Do we understand, how our mind sees at once an immense expanse, and distinguishes millions of creatures? Natural philosophy with each succeeding day places before our eyes inexplicable prodigies, and geometry demonstrates truths which are intrinsically incomprehensible..

Reason alone makes us conceive that the power, the understanding, the will, and all other attributes, are the same in God with his Divine Being, and are only one and the same

thing every one is forced to admit it, and still no one understands it. And if I affirm, on solid and firm foundations, that three persons exist in one and the same nature, shall this be denied, merely because it cannot be understood? Such a procedure would look strange, indeed, and could only proceed from a want of considering, as we have just remarked, that experience forces us to admit, for certain, some truths which reason cannot comprehend, and that, on the contrary, reason makes evidently known to us other truths, which we shall in vain attempt to prove by experience. See our 1st Number.

SECTION VII.

Recapitulation of what has been discussed in this Chapter. CXIII. Let us awaken our mind from the sweet and profound contemplation of the sublime, the infinite divine nature, in which it has been hitherto absorbed; let us look round and consider how far we have soared above ourselves, and, bending our heads, let us see whence we are come. Amazement and wonder, will cause us to view, with pleasure, the roads which we have travelled over.

In contemplating the divine essence, we have said, that in God there is a natural, intellectual, intrinsic production, which does not divide the essence, although it be communicated to him; in a word: God of God, as light of light.

By the means of this production, we come to discover another similar one, not of the understanding, but of the will. We have said, that the Father is uncreated, unbegotten, and of himself; that the Son originates and comes from the Father, and that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the one and from the other, and that, in fine, this production always lasts, as the Father does not cease to produce and continually to love the Son, and the Son to love the Father; finally, we have said, that all that is created, or shall be created, is and shall be, drawn from nothing by the Father, by the Son, and by the Holy Ghost, as by one common principle: we have said But what have we said of the infinite and adorable essence of