Of the Church fiue bookes. By Richard Field Doctor of Diuinity and sometimes Deane of Glocester.

CHAP. 33.

Of the heresie of Nestorius, falsely imputed to Beza and others.

THe next heresie, it pleaseth this heretical Romanist to charge vs with, is that of the Nestorians. Let vs see how he indeauoureth to fasten this impiety vpon vs. First, saith he, the Nestorians contemned the Fathers, and so doe the Protestants, therefore they are Nestorians. The conse∣quence of this argument we will not now examine. But the Minor proposition is most false. For we reverence and honour the Fathers much more then the Romanists doe, who pervert, corrupt, and adulterate their writings, but dare not abide the tryall of their doctrines, by the indubitate writings of antiquity.

Secondly, (saith he) the Nestorians affirmed, that there were two persons in Christ, and so divided the vnity of his Person. But the Protestants thinke so likewise. Therefore they are Nestorians. The assumption we deny, and he doth not so much as indeavour to proue it, but proceedeth particularly to proue Be∣za a Nestorian heretique: in which hee hath as ill successe as he had in the rest of his slanderous imputations.

Beza (saith he) teacheth, that there are two hypostaticall vnions in Christ; Ergo two hypostases or persons: which was the heresie of Nestorius. The conse∣quence of this argument is too weak to inforce the intended conclusion. For when Beza saith, There are two hypostaticall vnions in Christ, the one of the body and soule, the other of the nature of God and man, hee doth not con∣ceiue that the vnion of the body and soule doe in Christ make a distinct hu∣mane person or subsistence, different from that of the Sonne of God: (for hee euery-where confesseth, that the humane nature of Christ, hath no sub∣sistence, but that of the Sonne of God, communicated to it) a 1.1 but hee there∣fore

calleth it an hypostaticall vnion, because naturally it doth cause a finite & distinct humane person or subsistence, and so would haue done here, if the na∣ture flowing out of this vnion, had not beene assumed by the sonne of God, and so prevented and stayed from subsisting in it selfe, and personally sustained in the person of the sonne of God. This doctrine is so farre from heresie, that he may justly be suspected of more then ordinarie malice, that will traduce it as hereticall. Yet hath Beza, to stop the mouthes of such clamorous ad∣uersaries, long since corrected and altered this forme of speech, which hee had sometimes vsed.

Notes

• a 1.1

  Deus dupli∣citer habet esse in creaturis. 1 per illapsum in omni naturâ & creaturâ. 2 per circuminsessionem in naturâ assumpts, & licet per illapsum Deus sit intimus omni creatura, & interior quam ipsa sibi aut forma materiae, tamen per circuminsessio nem fit intimior naturae assumptae, quia necesse est naturam assumptam amittere proprium esse subsistentiae, si quod an∣te assumptionem in eâ fuit: velsi nunquam ipsum habuit, subintrare esse subsistentiae naturae ad quam assumitur, vt sit idem suppositum subsistens in duplici naturâ. Picus Apolog. q. 4.