with sufficient certainty. If they can, the doctrine then will be proved to be impossible; if they cannot, it must be allowed to be possible. Some short and plain reasons are added, to shew that the negative of these positions never has been, nor can be, clearly and satisfactorily proved.

The third question, whether the doctrine be true, is to be resolved by Scripture and antiquity, not by arguments drawn from the nature of the thing; because such arguments belong only to the other question, whether the doctrine be possible; and the possibility is presupposed in all our disputes from Scripture or from the Fathers.

Thus it appears, as Dr. W. observes, that the controversy of the Trinity may be easily brought to a short issue. The strength of the adversaries lies in the question of the possibility: and if they have any thing considerable to urge, it may be despatched in very few words; one demonstration (if it can be found) being as good as an hundred. If none can be found, the proofs from Scripture and antiquity cannot be overthrown.

The method here proposed is acknowledged by Jackson to be "rational and fair;" and he sets himself to debate the subject upon these grounds. But, instead of debating it on these "fair and rational” terms, or demonstrating the impossibility of the doctrines, in the sense in which they are proposed by Waterland, he affixes to them a sense or interpretation of his own, and then argues to shew their falsehood and absurdity. Thus Dr. W. in explaining the different acceptations of the word person, had said, "A single person is an intelligent agent; having

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"the distinctive characters of I, Thou, He; and not divided, or distinguished into more intelligent agents, capable of the same characters." This was stated as a general definition, including not only human individuals, but the Persons in the Godhead also, so far as one has any characters distinct from the others. "But," says Dr. W. " to clear this mat"ter a little farther, we must next distinguish per"sons into several kinds; and first, as divided and "undivided. All persons, but the three divine Per"sons, are divided and separate from each other in "nature, substance, and existence. They do not mutually include and imply each other: therefore they are not only distinct subjects, agents, or supposita, but distinct substances also. But the "divine Persons, being undivided, and not having any separate existence independent on each other; they cannot be looked upon as substances, but as "one substance distinguished into several suppo"sita, or intelligent agents." Notwithstanding the express distinction here made between the personality in the undivided substance of the Godhead, and the divided substance, as well as personality, of all other beings, Mr. Jackson has the effrontery to say, "You will give me leave to understand you to

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mean, that as one person is an acting substance, "an agent in the singular number, so three are "the plural number, i. e. three acting substances, "or, as you expressly admit, three agents; and "that you really mean three acting substances dis

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tinct, though not separate or disunited:" and having thus assumed a meaning absolutely disclaimed by Waterland, he proceeds to reason upon the im

possibility of the thing, as involving a direct contradiction.

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Again; Waterland, in order to shew that the subordination of one Person in the Godhead to the other does not affect the real divinity of that Person, had said, "If it be pleaded, that such subordination is "not consistent with the unity, though it might be "with the equality of nature, our ideas of the unity "are too imperfect to be reasoned solidly upon: nor "can any man prove that every kind of unity must "be either too close to admit of any subordination, " or else too loose to make the Persons ONE GOD. "How shall it be shewn, that the distinction may "not be great enough to answer the subordination, "and yet the union close enough to make the Persons one God? Our faculties are not sufficient for "these things." Elsewhere he had said; "When I apply supreme to the word God, I mean, as I ought to mean, that the Son is God supreme, (knowing no superior God, no divine nature greater, higher, or more excellent than his own,) "not that he is the Supreme Father: who, though superior in order, is not therefore of superior "Godhead; for a supremacy of order is one thing, a supremacy of nature, or Godhead, another." Yet Mr. Jackson says, "I conclude you must mean "a subordination of some sort of prerogative, dignity, precedence, and authority, on which to found "the mission and the economy (which you allow)

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of the Son's acting a ministerial part; being an

gel or messenger to the Father, by the Father's "voluntary appointment, and executing his orders "and commands:" and upon this supposed admis

sion on the part of his opponent, he grounds all his subsequent observations.

With such an adversary it would have been useless further to contend. Dr. Waterland accordingly passed over this production in silence, until Dr. Clarke thought fit to take the matter into his own hands, by publishing the anonymous Observations already mentioned.

To this latter pamphlet Dr. W. replied in a short tract, entitled, A Farther Vindication of Christ's. Divinity, 1724; in the Introduction to which, he observes, that since the publication of his second Defence, he had waited to see what farther attempts might be made by the Arians; that the first effort to renew the contest appeared under the title of Remarks &c. by one Philalethes Cantabrigiensis; but that having no acquaintance with the author under that name, and finding little in the piece but tedious repetition and studied confusion, he thought himself not obliged to take notice of it. But upon the appearance of these Observations, stated to be by the author of the Reply to his first Defence, he conceived it to be incumbent upon him again to come forward. "Whether it be Dr. Clarke," he adds, "or whether it be Mr. Jackson, (for though it be " doubted which, all agree that it lies between them,) "they are both men whom I must attend to: one, "as he is the principal in the cause, the other, as "he is second, and had the first hand in committing "my Queries to the press, engaging me ever after "in the public service." Probably, however, Waterland was well aware, that Dr. Clarke was in this instance his real opponent.

In animadverting upon the Observations, Dr. W. takes notice, that Dr. Clarke's friends had not cleared his scheme of the charge of making two Gods; one supreme, and another inferior; that they had not removed the difficulty of supposing God the Son and God the Holy Ghost to be two creatures ; had not been able to defend creature-worship; had not invalidated the proofs of divine worship being due to Christ; nor accounted for divine titles, attributes, and honours being ascribed to a creature; nor given satisfaction as to Christ being both Creator and creature; nor established Dr. Clarke's pretences to Catholic antiquity. Having thus failed in the defensive, the writer of the Observations (says Dr. W.) had now undertaken the offensive part; and, unable to vindicate his own scheme, sought to retaliate upon his opponent by false and injurious charges, by misrepresentations, or by invective and declamation.

The first charge relates to the supremacy of the Father. The Observer accuses Dr. Waterland of asserting, what the Ante-Nicene Fathers would have deemed the highest blasphemy, viz. that the Father "has no natural and necessary supremacy of "authority or dominion at all; has no other supremacy of authority and dominion, than what is "founded in mutual agreement and voluntary con"cert; but has, naturally and necessarily, a pri

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ority of order only." To this Waterland replies, that he had repeatedly and plainly declared, "that " provided the Son's necessary existence be secured, "that he be acknowledged not to exist precariously, "or contingently, but necessarily, that his co-eter