o that which is abundantly sufficient
for our purposes in the conduct of our most important worldly interests.
A charge was thereupon brought against him of authorising doubt and
opening a door to the most radical disbelief. The attack scarcely
deserved Tillotson's somewhat lengthy defence. He had but re-stated what
many before him had observed as to the exceptional character of
demonstrative evidence, and the folly of expecting it where it is
plainly inapplicable. A religious mind, itself thoroughly convinced,
may chafe against possibility of doubt, but may as well complain against
the conditions of human nature. Yet the controversy on this point
between Tillotson and his opponents is instructive in forming a judgment
upon the general character of religious thought in that age. Tillotson
appears, on the one hand, to have been somewhat over-cautious in
disclaiming the alleged consequences of his denial of absolute religious
certainty. He allows the theoretical possibility of doubt, but speaks as
if it were essentially unreasonable. He shows no sign of recognising the
sincere faith that often underlies it; that prayerful doubt may be in
itself a kind of prayer; that its possibility is involved in all
inquiry; that there is such a thing as an irreligious stifling of doubt,
resulting in a spiritual and moral degradation; that doubt may sometimes
be the clear work of the Spirit of God to break down pride and
self-sufficiency, to force us to realise what we believe, to quicken our
sense of truth, and to bid us chiefly rest our faith on personal and
spiritual grounds which no doubts can touch. In this Tillotson shared in
what must be considered a grave error of his age. Few things so
encouraged the growth of Deism and unbelief as the stiff refusal on the
part of the defenders of Christianity to admit of a frequently religious
element in doubt. There was a general disposition, in which even such
men as Bishop Berkeley shared, to relegate all doubters to the class of
Deists and 'Atheists.' Tillotson strove practically against this fatal
tendency, but his reasonings on the subject were confused. He earned,
more perhaps than any other divine of his age, the love and confidence
of many who were perplexed with religious questionings; but his
arguments had not the weight which they would have gained if he had
acknowledged more ungrudgingly that doubt must not always be regarded as
either a folly or a sin.

Tillotson had learnt much