On this page

• Text (1)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    94 The Nonconformist* No, VII.

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    The Nonconformist. No. Vii. An Inquiry I...

    coming forward in Germany , who professed to make the Scriptures the -standard of their faith and practice . That many whom Mosheim designates as Anabaptists , with so many harsh epithets , were guitty of numerous crimes aver which it would

    delight every lover of his species , and every friend of Christianity , could he cast the veil of . oblivion—cannot be denied . But their excesses are too familiar to every reader of ecclesiastical history to need being recited here .

    That there weve many concurring causes of the excesses into which these people ran is most certain ; and I shall take the liberty of stating a few of the most probable * Luther had not only laid it down as an indisputable principle and as a

    justification of his opposition to the See of Rome , that the Bible was the only standard of faith * , but on the applica-¦ tion of the Old Vaudois , ( who to secure his friendship and countenance had given him an account of their

    faith , ) had declared his disapprobation of infant baptism . " He told them , it would be better wholly to omit baptizing children , than to baptize them without faith ; " quoting the saying of Christ , " He that believeth and is baptized , shall be saved /'

    Was it , then , unnatural that those who looked up to him as a guide , should act upon his principle when thus enforced by the authority of Jesus Christ himself ? Yet upon the circumstance alone of his early followers carrying his own principles into

    action , did this great but self-sufficient man conceive against them a mortal hatred , and , by exercising or instigating a succession of the most arbitrary and cruel measures , urge them on to those very excesses which have

    covered their names with infamy . That their first principles were not of that dangerous and pernicious tendency which he , and Mosheim in particular , attributed to them , is , I think , abundantly evident . The latter gives the following enumeration of them :

    " That the church of Christ ought to be exempt from all sin—that all things ought to be common among the faithful—that all usury , tithes and tribute ought to be entirely abolished *—that the baptesm of infants was an inveution of the devil— -that every

    The Nonconformist. No. Vii. An Inquiry I...

    Christian was invested with a power to preach the gospel , and consequently that the church stood in no need of ministers or pastors—that in the kingdom of Christ , civil magistrates were absolutely useless— -and that God continued to reveal his will to chosen

    persons by dreams and visions / ' This outline of their opinions , given by an arrogant German , ecclesiastic , might perhaps be more correctly drawn thus : That all the members of a Christian church ought to be sincere , pious

    and strictly virtuous—that , in imitar tion of the first disciples , they should be ready to ^ minister to each other ' s necessities even to the extent , if requisite , of all their property being thrown into a common stock *—that if there

    must be a distinct class of men to fill the office of ministers , they should be supported by the voluntary contributions of their respective flocks—that the baptism of infants was not founded on Scripture authority—that he who understands Christianity has sufficient authority for teaching it—and

    consequently that he has no need of episcopal ordination—and , lastly , that in religions affairs , the civil magistrate ought not to interfere ; or , that when Christian knowledge and Christian practice should become universal , the office of the civil magistrate would be wholly unnecessary .

    Their claim to immediate divine inspiration was only the common pretence of all other parties . Certain it is , that many of their leading principles were such as will stand the test of examination , for they are founded in reason and Scripture .

    Their appeal to both in defiance of ecclesiastics and princes , was probably the foundation of all the rigorous measures adopted against them ; for tyrants have ever regarded appeals to reason and justice as damnable and unpardonable sins . I make this remark because it would be an act of

    the highest injustice to these people to omit mentioning another powerful cause of the excesses into which they

    ran . Of all the teachers of religion in Germany at this time , " says Robert k ... tn , - i _ . i - - m > mp * 9 * •¦ " . ' - ¦ - — - w « . - , — ii > « t > . i <^ -.:, i .. ih ,. * , •*» ¦¦ " ¦* - — "" " * In this sense the Quakers may be considered as always having * had aoomnmuity of # pods , thjeir poor never beii > £ » # o \ wd to suffer actual want .

    94 The Nonconformist* No, Vii.

    94 The Nonconformist * No , VII .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 22, 1819, page 94, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/mrp_22021819/page/26/