Nor hath he onely by these wiles depraved the conception of the Creator, but with such Riddles hath also entangled the Nature of our Redeemer. Some denying his Humanity, and that he was one of the Angels, as _Ebion_; that the Father and Son were but one person, as _Sabellius_. That his body was phantastical, as _Manes_, _Basilides_, _Priscillian_, _Jovinianus_; that he only passed through _Mary_, as _Utyches_ and _Valentinus_. Some denying his Divinity; that he was begotten of humane principles, and the seminal Son of _Joseph_; as _Carpocras_, _Symmachus_, _Photinus_: that he was _Seth_ the Son of _Adam_, as the _Sethians_: that he was less then Angels, as _Cherinthus_: that he was inferiour unto _Melchisedec_, as _Theodotus_: that he was not God, but God dwelt in him, as _Nicholaus_: and some embroyled them both. So did they which converted the Trinity into a Quaternity, and affirmed two persons in Christ, as _Paulus Samosatenus_: that held he was Man without a Soul, and that the Word performed that office in him, as _Apollinaris_: that he was both Son and Father, as _Montanus_: that _Jesus_ suffered, but Christ remained impatible, as _Cherinthus_. Thus he endeavours to entangle Truths: And when he cannot possibly destroy its substance, he cunningly confounds its apprehensions; that from the inconsistent and contrary determinations thereof, consectary impieties, and hopeful conclusions may arise, there's no such thing at all. CHAPTER XI A further Illustration. Now although these ways of delusions most Christians have escaped, yet are there many other whereunto we are daily betrayed, and these we meet with in obvious occurrents of the world, wherein he induceth us, to ascribe effects unto causes of no cognation; and distorting the order and theory of causes perpendicular to their effects, he draws them aside unto things whereto they run parallel, and in their proper motions would never meet together. Thus doth he sometime delude us in the conceits of Stars and Meteors, beside their allowable actions ascribing effects thereunto of independent causations. Thus hath he also made the ignorant sort believe that natural effects immediately and commonly proceed from supernatural powers: and these he usually drives from Heaven, his own principality the Air, and Meteors therein; which being of themselves the effects of natural and created causes, and such as upon a due conjunction of actives and passives, without a miracle must arise unto what they appear; are always looked on by ignorant spectators as supernatural spectacles, and made the causes or signs of most succeeding contingencies. To behold a Rainbow in the night, is no prodigy unto a Philosopher. Then Eclipses of Sun or Moon, nothing is more natural. Yet with what superstition they have been beheld since the Tragedy of _Nicias_ and his Army, many examples declare.