122 THE NATURE OF THE PERS nature towards the human, which we have before de- scribed. (4.) Neither soul nor body have any person- al subsistencebefore their union: but the sole founda- tion of this union was in this, that the Son of. Godwas a self -subsisting person from eternity. S. There are other unions in things natural, which are by mixture or composition. Hereon something is produced, composed of various parts, which is not what any of them are. And there is a conversion of things, when one thing is substantially changed unto another, as the water, in the miracle that Christ wrought, was turned intowine. But this union bath no resemblance unto any of them. There is not a x;iëns, a mixture, a contemporation of the divine and human natures into one third nature, or the conversionof one intoanother. Such notions of these things some fancied of old. Eu- tyches supposed such a composition and mixture of the two natures in the person of Christ, as that the human nature at least should lose all its essential properties, and have neither understanding nor will of its own. And some of the Arians fancied a substantial change of that created divine nature which they acknowledged, into the human. But these imaginations instead of professing Christ to be God and man, would leavehim indeed neither God nor man; and have been sufficiently confuted. Wherefore the union we treat of, bath no si- militude unto any such natural union, as is the effect of composition or mutation. 4. There is an artificial union wherewith some have illustrated this mystery; as that of fire and iron in the same sword. The sword is one; the nature of fire and that of iron different; and the acts of them distinct; the iron cuts, the fireburns; and the effects distinct; cut- ting and burning; yet is the agent or instrument but one sword. Something of this nature may be allowed tobe spoken in wayof allusion; but . it is a weak and imperfect representation of this mystery on many ac- counts: for the heat in iron is rather an accident than a substance, is separable from it; and in sundry other things diverts the mind from due apprehensions of this mystery. 5. There is a spiritual union, namely, ofChrist and be- lievers; or of God in Christ and believers, which is ex- cellent and mysterious, such as all other unions in na- ture are made use of in the scripture to illustrate and re- present. This some among us do judge to be of the ON OF CHRIST, AND THE same kind with that of the Son of God and the man Christ Jesus; only they say theydiffer in degrees. The eternal Word was so united unto the man Christ Jesus as that thereby he was exalted inconceivably above all other men, though never so holy; and had greater communications from God thanany of them. Where- fore he was on many accounts the Son of God in a pe- culiar manner and by a communication of names is called God also. This being the opinion. of Nestorius, revived again in the days wherein we live, I shall de- clare wherein he placed the conjunction or union of the two natures of Christ, whereby he constituted two dis- tinct persons of the Son of God, and the Son of man, as these now do, and briefly detect the vanityof it. For the whole of it consisted in the concession of sundry things that were true in particular, making use of the pretence of them, unto the denial of that wherein alone the true union of the person of Christ did consist, Nestorius allowed the presence of the Son of God, with the man Christ Jesus, to consist in five things. 1. He said he was so present with him, ..,à axgzrzc,r, or by inhabitation, as a man dwells in an house or a ship to rule it. He dwelt in him as his temple: so he dwells in all that believe, but in him in a more especial manner. And this is true with respect unto that fulness of the Spirit, whereby God was with him and in him, as he is with and in all believers, according unto the measures wherein they are made partakers of him. But this answers not that divine-testimony; that in him dwelt all the fulnessof the Godhead bodily," Col. ii. 9. t' The fulness oftheGodhead" is theentire divine nature. This nature is considered in the person of the Son, or eternal Word; for it was the Word that was made flesh? and this couldno otherwise dwell in him bodily, really, substantially, but in the assumption of that nature to be his own: and no sense can be given unto this assertion to preserve it from blasphemy; that the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth in any of the saints bodily." 2. He allowed an especial presence, xxrz rior, as some call it, that is, by such an union ofaffections as is be- tween intimate friends. The soul of God rested always in that man; in him was he well pleased, and he was wholly given up in his affections unto God. This also is true; but there is that which is no less true, that ren- ders it useless unto the pretensions of Nestorius. For he allowed the divine person of the Son of God. But
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