ter ! Risum teneatis? They are not agreed whether they have an immortal soul; or whether they have any soul at all; whether they are walking in glorious liberty, or are bound in the adamantine chains of inexorable necessity! Such are the consistencies of all-searching, all-discerning, all-knowing reason! When men, instead of ascending to heaven on a ladder let down from above, agree to build a tower of which the foundation shall be on earth, and the summit shall reach the skies, no wonder that God confounds their language!

"To bring to light this disagreement among themselves, was the design with which Mr. Yates was cited. The citation is intended to show, first, that as the heathen philosophers, without the aid of revelation, could discover and detect error, but could not find out truth, or agree among themselves on that great question, What is truth? and therefore could never enlighten the world by their instructions; so, when philosophical divines bring the doctrines of revelation to the test of human reason, and make their own conceptions the rule by which they are to judge, they can easily agree to discard many points of doctrine which in their own opinion ought not to be taught, because they are false, but have among themselves no positive revealed truth on which they are agreed, and therefore are as unfit to instruct mankind as their elder brethren: and secondly-that as by the philosophy which some of the first Christianteachers adopted, Christianity was neutralized; so by the negative and skeptical philosophy of modern teachers, Christianity is destroyed."-Hare.

"In whatever point of view,' says an able author, 'the subject be placed, the same arguments which show the incapability of man, by the light of nature, to discover religious truth, will serve likewise to show, that, when it is revealed to him, he is not warranted in judging of it merely by the notions which he had previously formed. For is it not a solecism to affirm, that man's natural reason is a fit standard for measuring the wis

dom or truth of those things with which it is wholly unacquainted, except so far as they have been super-. naturally revealed?"

'But what, then,' (an objector will say,) is the province of reason? Is it altogether useless? Or are we to be precluded from using it in this most important of all concerns, for our security against error?'

"Our answer is, that we do not lessen either the utility or the dignity of human reason, by thus confining the exercise of it within those natural boundaries which the Creator himself hath assigned to it. We admit, with the Deist, that Reason is the foundation of all certitude:' and we admit, therefore, that it is fully competent to judge of the credibility of any thing which is proposed to it as a Divine revelation. But we deny that it has a right to dispute (because we maintain that it has not the ability to disprove) the wisdom or the truth of those things which revelation proposes to its acceptance. Reason is to judge whether those things be indeed so revealed: and this judgment it is to form, from the evidence to that effect. In this respect it is 'the foundation of certitude,' because it enables us to ascertain the fact, that God hath spoken to us. But this fact once established, the credibility, nay, the cer‐ tainty of the things revealed, follows as of necessary consequence; since no deduction of reason can be more indubitable than this, that whatever God reveals must be true. Here, then, the authority of reason ceases. Its judgment is finally determined by the fact of the revelation itself: and it has thenceforth nothing to do, but to believe and to obey.

"But are we to believe every doctrine, however incomprehensible, however mysterious, nay, however seemingly contradictory to sense and reason?'

"We answer, that revelation is supposed to treat of subjects with which man's natural reason is not converIt is therefore to be expected, that it should communicate some truths not to be fully comprehended

sant.

by human understandings. But these we may safely receive, upon the authority which declares them, without danger of violating truth. Real and evident contradictions, no man can, indeed, believe, whose intellects are sound and clear. But such contradictions are no more proposed for our belief, than impossibilities are enjoined for our practice: though things difficult to understand, as well as things hard to perform, may perhaps be required of us, for the trial of our faith and resolution. Seeming contradictions may also occur: but these may seem to be such because they are slightly or superficially considered, or because they are judged of by principles inapplicable to the subject, and without so clear a knowledge of the nature of the things revealed, as may lead us to form an adequate conception of them. These, however, afford no solid argument against the truth of what is proposed to our belief: since, unless we had really such an insight into the mysterious parts of revelation as might enable us to prove. them to be contradictory and false, we have no good ground for rejecting them; and we only betray our own ignorance and perverseness in refusing to take God's word for the truth of things which pass man's understanding.

"The simple question, indeed, to be considered, is, whether it be reasonable to believe, upon competent authority, things which we can neither discover ourselves, nor, when discovered, fully and clearly comprehend? Now every person of common observation must be aware, that unless he be content to receive solely upon the testimony of others a great variety of information, much of which he may be wholly unable to account for or explain, he could scarcely obtain a competency of knowledge to carry him safely through the common concerns of life. And with respect to scientific truths, the greatest masters in philosophy know full well that many things are reasonably to be believed, nay, must be believed on sure and certain grounds of con

viction, though they are absolutely incomprehensible by our understandings, and even so difficult to be reconciled with other truths of equal certainty, as to carry the appearance of being contradictory and impossible. This will serve to show, that it is not contrary to reason to believe, on sufficient authority, some things which cannot be comprehended, and some things which, from the narrow and circumscribed views we are able to take of. them, appear to be repugnant to our notions of truth. The ground on which we believe such things, is the strength and certainty of the evidence with which they are accompanied. And this is precisely the ground on which we are required to believe the truths of revealed religion. The evidence that they come from God, is, to reason itself, as incontrovertible a proof that they are true, as in matters of human science would be the evidence of sense, or of mathematical demonstration."Watson.

CHAPTER II.

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE
TRINITY.

"Before we enter upon the examination of the scriptural proofs of the Trinity, it will be necessary to impress the reader with a sense of the importance of this revealed doctrine; and the more so as it has been a part of the subtle warfare of the enemies of this fundamental branch of the common faith, to represent it as of little consequence, or as a matter of useless speculation. Thus, Dr. Priestley, All that can be said for it is, that the doctrine, however improbable in itself, is necessary to explain some particular texts of Scripture; and that, if it had not been for those particular texts, we should have found no want of it, for there is neither any fact

in nature, nor any one purpose of morals, which are the object and end of all religion, that requires it.'

"The non-importance of the doctrine has been a favorite subject with its opposers in all ages, that by allaying all fears in the minds of the unwary, as to the consequences of the opposite errors, they might be put off their guard, and be the more easily persuaded to part with the faith delivered to the saints.' The answer is, however, obvious.

1. "The knowledge of God is fundamental to religion; and as we know nothing of him but what he has been pleased to reveal, and as these revelations have all moral ends, and are designed to promote piety and not to gratify curiosity, all that he has revealed of himself in particular, must partake of that character of fundamental importance, which belongs to the knowledge of God in the aggregate. This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.' Nothing, therefore, can disprove the fundamental importance of the Trinity in Unity, but that which will disprove it to be a doctrine of Scripture..

2. "Dr. Priestley allows, that this doctrine 'is necessary to explain some particular texts of Scripture.' This alone is sufficient to mark its importance; espécially as it can be shown, that these particular texts of Scripture' comprehend a very large portion of the sacred volume; that they are scattered throughout almost all the books of both Testaments; that they are not incidentally introduced only, but solemnly laid down as revelations of the nature of God; and that they manifestly give the tone both to the thinking and the phrase of the sacred writers on many other weighty subjects. That which is necessary to explain so many passages of holy writ; and without which, they are so incorrigibly unmeaning, that Unitarians have felt themselves obliged to submit to their evidence, or to expunge them from the inspired record, carries with it an