Gregory Nyssen, Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus and Damascen were charged
with "a kind of Tritheism" by Petavius and Dr. Cudworth, who, according
to Sherlock, have "mistaken their meaning." See pp. 106-9, of this
"Vindication."
Ib. p. 117.
For I leave any man to judge, whether this [Greek: mia kinaesis
Boulaematos], this one single motion of will, which is in the same
instant in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, can signify anything else but
a mutual consciousness, which makes them numerically one, and as
intimate to each other, as every man is to himself, as I have already
explained it.
Is not God conscious to all my thoughts, though I am not conscious of
God's? Would Sherlock endure that I should infer: 'ergo', God is
numerically one with me, though I am not numerically one with God? I
have never seen, but greatly wish to see, Waterland's controversial
tracts against Sherlock. Again: according to Sherlock's conception, it
would seem to follow that we ought to make a triad of triads, or an
ennead.
1. Father--Son--Holy Ghost.
2. Son--Father--Holy Ghost.
3. Holy Ghost--Son--Father.
Else there is an 'x' in the Father which is not in the Son, a 'y' in the
Son which is not in the Father, and a 'z' in the Holy Ghost which is in
neither: that is, each by himself is not total God.
Ib. p. 120.
But however he might be mistaken in his philosophy, he was not in his
divinity; for he asserts a numerical unity of the divine nature, not a
mere specific unity, which is nothing but a logical notion, nor a
collective unity, which is nothing but a company who are naturally
many: but a true subsisting numerical unity of nature; and if the
difficulty of explaining this, and his zeal to defend it, forced him
upon some unintelligible niceties, to prove that the same numerical
human nature too is but one in all men, it is hard to charge him with
teaching, that there are three independent and co-ordinate Gods,
because we think he has not proved that Peter, James, and John, are
but one man.
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