plied to the several persons in the Godhead, consistent and intelligible: and though it still leaves us uninformed as to that which is no where revealed, the mode in which the Persons thus subsist under one undivided substance; yet it preserves their united as well as their distinctive properties unimpaired. This was a point, which Bishop Bull had particularly laboured to establish, and had confirmed by the general concurrence of the Nicene and AnteNicene Fathers.

For many other important points discussed in this second Vindication, the reader must be referred to the work itself; a work, in which the whole force of our author's great intellectual powers, and of his extensive and profound erudition, appears to have been collected, for the purpose of overwhelming his adversaries by one decisive effort. Scarcely could it be believed, were not the fact avouched by his personal friend, Mr. Seed, that a production, the result of so much labour and research, was "in two months "finished, and sent to the press.'

His opponents, however, would not suffer the controversy thus to terminate. In the following year, Mr. Jackson, under the newly-assumed title of Philalethes Cantabrigiensis, put forth his Remarks on Dr. Waterland's second Defence of some Queries. Not long after, Dr. Clarke also published, anonymously, a pamphlet with a similar title, Observations on Dr. W's second Defence. Dr. Clarke was perhaps not thoroughly satisfied with his friend's performance; nor chose again to hazard his reputation jointly with him, in a matter so critical.

Yet still, as heretofore, he appears to have shrunk from openly encountering Waterland, and thought it prudent to conceal his name.

Jackson, in the commencement of his Remarks, professes to leave the rejoinder, on the part of Waterland's adversary, to be managed by the same able hand that had replied to his first Defence; which makes it probable that he was aware of Dr. Clarke's intention to undertake the rejoinder himself. Jackson therefore proposes only to consider briefly the three questions under which Dr. W. "had re❝duced and comprised the doctrine of the Trinity," towards the conclusion of his second Defence.

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The three questions were these:-"1. What the "doctrine to be examined is ?-2. Whether it be possible?—3. Whether it be true?" The first question, Dr. W. states to comprise these particulars. "1. That the Father is God, (in the strict sense of "necessarily existing, as opposed to precarious ex"istence,) and the Son God, and the Holy Ghost God, "in the same sense of the word God. 2. That the "Father is not the Son, nor the Son the Father, nor "the Holy Ghost either Father or Son: they are "distinct, so that one is not the other; that is, as "we now term it, they are three distinct Persons, "and two of them eternally referred up to one. "3. These three, however distinct enough to be "three Persons, are yet united enough to be one "God."

The question, whether this doctrine be possible, Dr. W. shews, must depend upon whether the points included in it can be determined in the negative

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

"the distinctive characters of I, Thou, He; and not

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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

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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"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.

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,

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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, dig

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nity, precedence, and authority, on which to found "the mission and the economy (which you allow) "of the Son's acting a ministerial part; being angel or messenger to the Father, by the Father's voluntary appointment, and executing his orders "and commands:" and upon this supposed admis

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