gment and condemn you
for founding Christ's worship so meanly upon I know not what powers
given after His resurrection. They founded it upon reasons antecedent to
His incarnation, upon His being God before the world, and Creator of the
world of His own power.'

Waterland showed his strength in defence as well as in attack. He boldly
grappled with the difficulties which the Catholic doctrine of the
Trinity unquestionably involves, and his method of dealing with these
difficulties forms not the least valuable part of his writings on the
subject.

Into the labyrinths, indeed, of metaphysical speculation he distinctly
declined to follow his opponents. They, as well as he, acknowledged, or
professed to acknowledge, the force of the testimony from Scripture and
the fathers. He is ready to join issue on this point, 'Is the Catholic
doctrine true?' but for resolving this question he holds that we must
have recourse to Scripture and antiquity. 'Whoever debates this question
should forbear every topic derived from the _nature_ of things, because
such arguments belong only to the other question, whether the doctrine
be _possible_, and in all reason possibility should be presupposed in
all our disputes from Scripture and the fathers.' He consistently
maintains that our knowledge of the nature of God is far too limited to
allow us to dogmatise from our own reason on such a subject. 'You can
never fix any certain principles of individuation, therefore you can
never assure me that three real persons are not one numerical or
individual essence. You know not precisely what it is that makes one
being, one essence, one substance.' There are other difficulties in the
nature of the Godhead quite as great as any which the doctrine of the
Trinity involves. 'The Omnipresence, the Incarnation, Self-existence,
are all mysteries, and eternity itself is the greatest mystery of all.
There is nothing peculiar to the Trinity that is near so perplexing as
eternity.' And then he finely adds: 'I know no remedy for these things
but a humble mind. If we demur to a doctrine because we cannot fully and
adequately comprehend it, is not this too familiar from a creature
towards his Creator, and articling more strictly with Almighty God than
becomes us?'

Is the Trinity a mysterious doctrine? 'The tremendous Deity is all over
mysterious, in His nature and in His attributes, in His works and in His
ways. If not, He would not be divine. If we reject the most