men, it is possible that the particular views of religion which they profess may not, after all, be so bad as they have been represented; that Unitarianism, though often vilified as the refuge of fools and sciolists, and the half-way house to infidelity, if not to atheism, may contain some of the elements of truth; nay, may perhaps be the very truth, though now imperfectly conceived and uttered, which was once proclaimed by Heaven through the lips and writings of prophets and apostles, and manifested in the teachings, the works, the prayers, the sufferings, the life and death, of the Son of God.

We have said, that, along with a great deal of uncharitable language, it was usual to reply to the arguments and interpretations of Unitarians, by adducing from the Bible, in favor of a Trinity in Unity, a vast number of passages, which had nothing whatever to do with the question at issue. In the heat of controversy, where victory is aimed at as much as the possession of truth, and where sectarian passions are as likely as the qualities of discretion and sober judgment to be enlisted in the cause of dogmas, this over-doing in the collection of proof-texts is to be more or less expected, not only from Trinitarians as such, but from all who, with more zeal than knowledge, are engaged in the defence or the demolition of particular points in theology. Amongst all denominations will be found men who have more intensity and warmth of feeling than candor or wisdom, more zeal to propagate their opinions by every means at hand, than a disposition to acknowledge difficulties, or a spirit to welcome truth from whatever quarter it may proceed. But it will not follow, that, because some portions of the evidence adduced for a certain doctrine are sophistical or irrelevant, all the other portions are equally false or invalid, and the doctrine itself without any foundation. The fallacy of one argument does not imply the fallacy of all other arguments. When, therefore, an injudicious commentator or controversialist adduces Ps. xxxvi. 9 ("With thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light") in favor of a personal Trinity, or Ps. xlv. 1 ("My heart is inditing a good matter") in favor of a plurality of hypostases

in the Godhead, or of the eternal generation of Christ, it would by no means be justifiable for one to infer, that all other appeals to Scripture, in support of these doctrines, are as futile and absurd. The only fair and legitimate effect of the production of arguments so obviously groundless should be, not disbelief in the doctrines themselves, but an apprehension of the possibility that there may be a lack of more substantial evidence, when so much stress is laid on what is obviously trifling; and a determination, on the part of the inquirer, to examine and sift that testimony which appears to bear greater marks of plausibility or of truth.

This much we are willing to concede; for it is an unquestionable fact, that every good and great cause· every truth in science, in morals, or in religionis liable to be injured by the production of unnecessary and futile evidence. It is therefore not impossible, that, while for its support much of what is insignificant and useless has been adduced, the doctrine itself of a Triune God may yet be true. It is not impossible that the removal of the false supports which have been placed in the temple of Trinitarianism, — their destruction by the hands of the candid and distinguished of those who worship at its altar,- may have the tendency rather to exhibit the strength and durability of the fabric than the weakness of its foundation.

We freely admit all this, in order to show that we would not extend the argument against Trinitarianism, employed in this work, beyond its legitimate bounds. But, at the same time, we have no hesitation in affirming, that this argument. drawn from the involuntary concessions of our opponents assumes an air of far greater probability, and rises into evidence which may justly be considered as presumptive, when it is derived from the startling and unquestionable fact, that the texts on which Trinitarianism must rest if there be any truth at all in the doctrine, have been disposed of in a precisely similar way as those to which we have referred. Let us suppose, for example, what will scarcely be denied, that there is no passage in the whole compass

of the Bible so likely to countenance the doctrine of Christ's identity of nature with the essence of the Father as John x. 30, "I and the Father are one." Now, if it be found that the believers in this doctrine — those amongst them who by universal consent are regarded as the most learned and judicious critics are forced to acknowledge that the oneness spoken of is a moral, not a metaphysical, union, a union similar to that which Christ prayed to God might subsist between his followers and himself, then is there a strong presumption that the Scriptures contain no evidence whatever for the dogma of Christ's real or essential identity with the Father.

Let us take another illustration, in respect to the evidence for the doctrine of a Triune God. We will assume as a fact, what indeed no one can gainsay, that the grounds for controversy on this point have been greatly narrowed. All, at any rate, admit that certain texts are, or appear to be, much more favorable than others to the doctrine in question. Of these it is impossible to select two which are more to the purpose than Matt. xxviii. 19, and 1 John v. 7; the former containing the command of Jesus to the apostles, that they should "teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost;" and the latter stating that "there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one." If, in the volume of divine revelation, there be any thing which approaches in phraseology or in meaning to the terms used in the formulas of modern Orthodoxy, it is surely the language and significance of these passages; and, more regardful of the nominal resemblances than of the real differences, a Trinitarian might, with some show of reason, exclaim, “Here, here, at least, if nowhere else in the Bible, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, are declared to be three persons in one God, the same in substance, and equal in power and glory." And yet what are the facts of the case, as admitted by the interpretations and criticisms of not a few Trinitarians themselves? That neither of these passages demonstrates the doctrine in question; that neither of these contains

a syllable respecting equality of perfections, or unity of essence; that neither utters a word about the essential Deity of the Son or of the Holy Ghost; that neither teaches the dogma of there being three persons in one God; - that the baptismal formula merely implies the great truth, which all believers were to profess, that Christianity originated from God, was communicated to men by Christ, and was confirmed by the gifts and influences of the Holy Spirit; and that the oneness of the three heavenly witnesses was nothing more than a unity of testimony.*

But not only have many learned, judicious, and candid writers in the orthodox body been unable to discern satisfactory proof for the doctrines of a Triune God, and the personal Deity of Christ and the Holy Ghost, in those texts, singly and separately considered, which have been deemed by others as perfectly demonstrative: not a few have conceded that there are whole classes of passages and entire books of the Bible which afford no evidence whatever for Trinitarianism. Thus it has been acknowledged not only by Roman Catholic but by Protestant divines, of whom the number is increasing every day with the increase of knowledge as to the true modes of investigating the sense of Scripture, that the Old Testament affords nought but the faintest glimmerings of the dogma of a Triune God; by others that it is altogether silent on the subject of a plurality in the divine nature; by others, again, that the great Teacher himself, the Founder and Perfecter of our Faith, taught not these and other related tenets of Orthodoxy; and that the apostles, even after they were furnished with the fullest supplies of inspiration, when they obtained

* For the sake of illustration, and to give the utmost possible benefit to the Trinitarian argument, we have taken for granted that the passage was written by St. John. But, by a majority of critics of all denominations, this is denied; and the amount of evidence which they adduce for their opinion cannot but be regarded as sufficient to banish it for ever from a place in the Sacred Volume. Strict accuracy requires it to be said, that the interpolation is contained in a portion both of the seventh and the eighth verse, as follows:-"In heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth."

such ideas of the nature of Christ's kingdom as they had been incapable of comprehending from the lips of their Master, did not, in their oral discourses, deliver those doctrines concerning God, Christ, and the Spirit, which have been commonly regarded by "evangelical" writers as saving truths of the gospel. The eminent and good men who make these admissions rest their faith chiefly on a few texts in the writings of John and Paul, — texts, however, of a kind which, from their obscurity or their susceptibility of being rendered or explained in different and contrary ways, cannot, according to principles professedly adopted by almost all Christians of the present day, be consistently regarded as affording undoubted evidence for the truth of any controverted point. Generally speaking, indeed, the principles of interpretation which are now laid down by the most intelligent and the most esteemed critics in orthodox churches, while leaving intact the web of divine truth, as to the Unity of God, which is so beautifully woven by patriarchs, prophets, evangelists, and apostles, necessarily sweep away unnumbered cobwebs as to essences, hypostases, personalities, and distinctions, which have been spun by dogmatic and mystical divines, and hung by them on every leaf of Sacred Writ.

But still more: with scarcely a dissentient voice, the most distinguished theologians of all sects have acknowledged that reason and revelation alike proclaim the existence of one, and of only one, Supreme Mind, one self-existent Being, one unrivalled and infinite Intelligence, the original Source of all existence, of all that is great and good and blessed; and, with a harmony but partially interrupted, they have also acknowledged, — what, indeed, seems inseparable from the former admission, — that the doctrine of three co-equal and co-eternal persons in the divine nature- - the doctrine that calls one person, God; another person, God; and a third, God; and which pronounces these three to be only one God - is a doctrine that cannot be discovered by the use of the highest powers of the human intellect; is a mystery respecting which philosophy and metaphysics may speculate, but which they cannot prove to be true; on which the