OP THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 329

faint resemblance of this unity of action may be chap.discovered in the societies of men, and even ofanimals. The causes which disturb their har-mony proceed only from the imperfection andinequality of their faculties; but the omnipo-tence which is guided by infinite wisdom andgoodness, cannot fail of choosing the samemeans for the accomplishment of the same ends.hi, Three beings, who, by the self-derived ne- Sabeiiia-]cessity of their existence, possess all the divine m5in ’attributes in the most perfect degree; who areeternal in duration, infinite in space, and inti-mately present to each other, and to the wholeuniverse; irresistibly force themselves on theastonished mind, as one and the same being*®who, in the economy of grace, as well as in thatof nature, may manifest himself under differentforms, and be considered under differentaspects.

By this hypothesis, a real substantial trinity isrefined into a trinity of names, and abstract mo-difications, that subsist only in the mind whichconceives them. The logos is no longer a per-son, but an attribute; and it is only in a figurativesense, that the epithet of son can be applied tothe eternal reason which was with God from thebeginning, and by which, not by whom, all thingswere made. The incarnation of the logos is reduced to amere inspiration of the divine wisdom,which filled the soul, and directed all the actions

* Boctius, who was deeply versed in the philosophy of Plato andAristotle , explains the unity of the trinity by the in-diffurence of thethree persons. See the judicious remarks of Le Clerc, BibliothequeCkoisie, tom. xvi, p. 225, &c.