Learning my troubles, and with a view to alleviate them, the minister gave me a book called “Catechism,” but unfortunately, owing to the peculiar state of my mind, it made the matter worse still. In it for the first time I read expressions like the following, “As the very God of very God,” “begotten, but not made,” “one in three, three in one,” “yet distinct,” which to me sounded anything but rational. I begged the minister to explain these things to me as they appeared contradictory among themselves. I believed the very God is always very God, and the very man is always very man,--they cannot be otherwise; that humanity and Deity are two distinct things, so that they cannot be made identical. Again, the word _Trinity_ was something new, which, in my study of the New Testament I did not meet with. I was told that these things lie beyond the reach of human conception; that our best effort to understand or to explain them would be fruitless; that although they seem contradictory and absurd to us, in reality they are not so, because they are unfathomable truths,--the children of the Revelations. This did not satisfy me, for I could not believe that our reason would contradict what the Revelation has to say. In looking at the matter with a simple and earnest mind, we see that Revelation brings us new and important truths and is not afraid of the close inspection of reason. Revelation owes much to reason, without which it cannot perform its mission. God gave Revelation unto _us_, who are endowed with reasoning faculties, that we might examine, reflect upon, and receive its contents. Reason, then, is the key to open Revelation. Again, there is _no failure_ in God; whatever he wishes to do is done in the best manner possible. So if he wished to bless his children with new truth in relation to his own nature, under the new dispensation, he could do it distinctly, intelligibly, and to their satisfaction. Our reasoning faculties do not object to the sublime truths like these, “Behold, Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord,” “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” etc., because these and their kindred ones are substantial truths that men can live and die by. Men of different religions, culture, age, and accomplishment almost unanimously regard the above-mentioned precepts with reverence. There is no controversy about them. Thus truth stands on its own ground, self-existent, self-supporting forever. “A thousand honest doubts are more manly than a single cowardly assent to a proposition,” are the words of a Boston clergyman. I realized the beauty of his doctrine in this stage of my inquiry. As I had got over the fear of being damned, for not believing what my reasoning powers bore testimony against, and what _my Teacher_ does not speak of, I bade _farewell_ to the Christian minister with reluctance, and directed my steps towards home.