our comprehension. They assume that we can understand the Ahniglitj unto perfection and search out all his ways ; whereas it is obvious that with regard to a Being who is eternal and not subject to the limitations of time, we are using words without meaning when we speak of successive duration in reference to Him. If with God there is no past or future, it is vain to ask what He was doing before creation. It Avas stated, when treating of the attributes of God, that there are two methods of determining oui conceptions of the divine nature and opei-ations. The one is to start with the idea of the Absolute and Infinite and make that idea the touchstone ; affirming or denying what is assumed to be con- sistent or inconsistent therewith. Those who adopt this method, refuse to submit to the teachings of their moral nature or the reve- lations of the Word of God, and make Him either an absolutely unknown cause, or deny to Him all the attributes of a person. The other method is to start with the revelation which God has made of Himself in the constitution of our own nature and in his holy Word. This method leads to the conclusion that God can think and act, tliat in Him essence and attributes are not identical, that power and wisdom, will and working in Him, are not one and the same, and that the distinction between potentia (inherent power) and act applies to Him as well as to us. In other words, that God is infinitely more than pure activity, and consequently that it is not inconsistent with his nature that He should do at one time what He does not do at another.
2. A second remark to be made on these objections is that they prove too much. If valid against a creation in time, they are valid against all exercise of God's power in time. Then there is no such thing as providential government, or gracious operations of the Spirit, or answering prayer. If whatever God does He does from eternity, then, so far as we are concerned. He does nothing. If we exalt the speculative ideas of the understanding above our moral and religious nature, and above the authority of the Scriptures, we give up all ground both of faith and knowledge, and have nothing before us but absolute skepticism or atheism. These objections, therefore, are simply of our own making. We form an idea cf the Absolute Being out of our own heads, and then reject whatever does not agree with it. They have, consequently, no force except for the man who makes them.
3. The scholastic theologians, who themselves were in the tram- mels of such philosophical speculations, were accustomed to answer these cavils by counter subtleties. Even Augustine says that God