Locke, in his _Essay on the Human Understanding_, enters at large upon the question of the boundaries between reason and revelation--a question involved in what he says on the Reasonableness of Christianity. He asserts most plainly the principle, that revelation cannot be admitted against the clear evidence of reason, but then, immediately afterwards, he adopts the distinction between things contrary to reason and things above reason--citing, as examples of the latter, the fall of angels and the resurrection of the dead. Anything not contrary to reason, he contends, is to be believed if taught by revelation; “whatever proposition,” he says, “is revealed, of whose truth our mind, by its natural faculties and notions, cannot judge, that is purely matter of faith, and above reason.” Revelation in such matters “ought to be hearkened unto.” Indeed, Locke goes so far as to say, that in those things concerning which the mind “has but an uncertain evidence, and so is persuaded of their truth only upon probable grounds, which still admit a possibility of the contrary to be true, without doing violence to the certain evidence of its own knowledge and overturning the principles of all reason: in such probable propositions, I say, an evident revelation ought to determine our assent, even against probability.” Afterwards dwelling upon the evils of enthusiasm, of which he had a great horror, he goes on to remark: “Reason must be our last judge and guide in everything;” which, strictly taken, would mean that no revelation can be a final authority; but he proceeds in the next sentence to tell us: “I do not mean that we must consult reason, and examine whether a proposition revealed from God can be made out by natural principles, and if it cannot, that then we may reject it, but consult it we must, and by it examine whether it be a revelation from God, or no. And if reason finds it to be revealed from God, reason then declares for it, as much as for any other truth, and makes it one of her dictates.”[443] This explanation restricts the office of reason to an inquiry into evidence, as to whether what is thought to be revealed is really such, and leaves faith to rest ultimately, not in the apparent truth of a doctrine, but on the revelation making it known. To some, Locke in all this will not appear to have diverged from an orthodox treatment of evidences; to others, he will seem to have vacillated a little, leaning now in a rationalistic, and then in an opposite direction; by none, I think, can he be fairly regarded as holding the modern doctrine of a verifying faculty--a doctrine based on a philosophy different from his, and leading to conclusions at variance with his belief. Whatever might be Locke’s abstract opinions, it is quite clear that he had no sympathy with the Socinian party, of whom he speaks as “positive and eager in their disputes;” “forward to have their interpretations of Scripture received