For proofs that the Grecians worshiped a Trinity in Unity, the reader may consult the Classical Journal, Vol. IV. p. 89. It is there shewn that their Trinity was the Jupiter (that is, the Iao) Machinator.
Speaking of the doctrine of the Chaldeans, Thomas Burnet says,[1] “In prima ordine est Suprema Trias. Sic philosophatur Psellus.” Though he gives no account of what this Trias consisted, there is not much room to doubt that it was the Hindoo, Zoroastrian, Platonic Triad.
Mercury was called Triceps; Bacchus Triambus; Diana Triformis; and Hecate Tergemina.
Tergeminamque Hecatem, tria virginis ora Dianæ.[2]
ΣΩΤΕΙΡΑ occurs as a title of Diana on the brass coins of Agathocles.[3]
Plutarch[4] says, διο και Μιθρην Περσαι τον Μεσιτην ονομαζουσι. Orpheus also calls Bacchus Μισης Mediator, the same as Mithra of the Persians.[5] Proserpine had three heads; the Triglaf of the Vandals had also three heads; and Mithras was called Τριπλασιος.
The Trimurti was the Trimighty of the Saxons, the Trimégas of the Greeks, and the Ter-magnus of the Latins.[6] The Trinity is equally found amongst the Druids of Ireland in their Taulac Fen Molloch.[7]
Navarette, in his account of China,[8] says, “This sect (of Foe) has another idol they call Sanpao. It consists of three, equal in all respects. This, which has been represented as an image of the most blessed Trinity, is exactly the same with that which is on the high altar of the monastery of the Trinitarians at Madrid. If any Chinese whatsoever saw it, he would say the San Pao of his country was worshiped in these parts.”[9]
I must now beg my reader to turn to Book I. Chapter II. Sect. 4, and read what I have there said respecting the material or Pantheistic Trinity, endeavoured to be fixed upon Plato and the Orphic and Oriental philosophers, and I think he must be perfectly satisfied of the improbability that the persons who held the refined and beautiful system which I have developed, could ever have entertained a belief that the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth, were the creators or formers of themselves.
6. As the whole, or nearly the whole, of the ceremonies of the Jews were borrowed from their Gentile neighbours, it would be very extraordinary if their most important doctrine of the Trinity had not been found in the Jewish religion. I shall, therefore, add several more authorities to those already laid before my reader, in Book II. Ch. II, Sect. 5, and particularly that of the celebrated Philo.
Mr. Maurice[10] says, that the first three sephiroth of the Jewish cabala consist of first the Omnipotent Father; second Divine Wisdom; and third the Binah or Heavenly Intelligence, whence the Egyptians had their CNEPH, and Plato his Νους δημιουργος. But this demiourgos is supposed to be the Creator, as we have before seen that he must necessarily be, if he be the Destroyer. Thus some of the early Christians confounding these fine metaphysical distinctions, and at a loss how to account for the origin of evil, supposed the world to be created by a wicked demiourgos. The confusion arising from the description of three in one, and one in three—the community of Persons and unity of Essence—the admitted mysterious nature of the Trinity, and the difficulty, by means of common language, of explaining and of reconciling things apparently irreconcilable, may nevertheless be easily accounted for. On the subject of the Destroyer Mr.
- ↑ Cap. iv. p. 29.
- ↑ Æneid, iv. 511; Maur. Hind. Ant. Vol. IV. p. 238; Parkhurst, p. 347.
- ↑ Payne Knight, Essay, Gr. Al. Sect. v. p. 105.
- ↑ De Iside et Osiride, p. 43.
- ↑ Stukeley, Palæog. Sac. No. I. p. 54.
- ↑ D’Ancarville, p. 95.
- ↑ See Celtic Druids, Ch. v. Sect. xix.
- ↑ Book ii. Ch. x., and Book vi. Ch. xi.
- ↑ Parkhurst, p. 348.
- ↑ Hind. Ant. Vol. IV. pp. 183, 184.
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