hand and heart, as knowing no
demonstration can be stronger than this, God hath said so,
therefore it is true. In other things I will take no man's
libertie of judgment from him; neither shall any man take mine
from me. I will think no man the worse man nor the worse
Christian. I will love no man the lesse for differing in
opinion with me. And what measure I meet to others I expect
from them againe. I am fully assured that God does not, and
therefore that men out not to require any more of any man,
than this: to believe the Scripture to be God's word, to
endeavor to finde the true sense of it, and to live according
to it.--CHILLINGWORTH.

* * * * *

Are those enthusiasts who profess to follow reason? Yes,
undoubtedly, if by reason they mean only conceits. Therefore
such persons are now commonly called _Reasonists_ or
_Rationalists_ to distinguish them from true reasoners or
rational inquirers.--WATERLAND.

PREFACE.

There were no prefatory remarks to the first and second editions of the
following work. It was thought, when the printer made his final call for
copy, that a preface might be written with more propriety if the public
should indicate sufficient interest in the book to make its improvement
and enlargement necessary. That interest, owing to the theme rather than
the treatment, has not been withheld. The investigation of the subject
was pursued in the midst of varied and pressing pastoral duties, with a
pleasure which no reader of the result of the labor can enjoy; for,
first, the author felt that Rationalism was soon to be the chief topic
of theological inquiry in the Anglo-Saxon lands; and, second, he
regarded the doubt, not less than the faith, of his fellow men as
entitled to far more respect and patient investigation than it had
usually received at the hands of orthodox inquirers.

The author would probably never have studied the genetic development of
Rationalism in Germany, and its varied forms in other countries, if he
had not been a personal witness to the ruin it had wrought in the land
of Luther, Spener, and Zinzendorf. In compliance with the instruction
of a trusted medical adviser, he sailed for Germany in the summer of
1856, as a final resort for relief from serious pulmonary disease. But,
through the mercy of God, he regained health so rapidly that he was
enabled to ma