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102 Letter on the dread of Uriitariani&M...
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.
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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.
^ — A Letter Written To A Friend, In Rep...
*** y goad friend , Without having well observed the force of those can victions which rise from religion , —whether it be a religion formed upon just or
upon unjust grounds . I tvill imagine your views to be correct , and your fears arising from them to be legitimate ; and when I compare them with similar ones which I have met with
in a Catholic ' s breast , equally # arm with friendship and compassion with your own , I perceive that the influence of both is alike . " Oh I my dear friend , " sajd one of them once to me , c * 1 wish you were a Catholic ; 1 would give any thing if you were a Catholic . " What could ' 1 do but
thank him for his love 9 and esteem the man who I was convinced was in error ? If I could once bring myself to consider the party to which I belong as the only favourites of the Almighty , and alone destined to share his eternal
mercy and benevolence , what should I think of Him who was the object of my adoration ? A very small proportion of his intelligent offspring has heard of salvation by Christ ; therefore , if to believe in him be needful , a
very small part can be partakers in his redemption : but , of this small part , in itself not a teath of the earth ' s population , how very few have been led , by the dispensations of Providence under which they have lived , to believe in Christ as I believe in
him ? Not one in fifty of these holds the faith that I hold : out of five hundred , therefore ^ of the souls that breathe the breath of life , but one can come to salvation by Christ 1 . To whose charge shall I lay the final perdition of the forty and nine > To a God of mercy and love ? To a God who will have all men to be saved ?
I am here lost in a maze of my own creation I I find myself " quite out at sea , nor see the shore '' 1 Surely he who came to save a lost and sinful "world must have expected a greater
good to arise from the sacrifice that he made ; for I , too , believe he offered a rich and an acceptable sacrifice to the Being , whose messenger atad whose beloved san he was I I assure you , my dear~—I think little of those errors of
the understanding which have made one party warship rt bit of bread , another a wocmUmi idol , and a third a compounded deity , like thftt of the
^ — A Letter Written To A Friend, In Rep...
Samaritans , "they know not what . " I think little' of these , compared with the more dreadful results of every monstrous faith , which have robbed the Divine Being of his loveliness , aiid made him a monster in the eyes of all
who have a fellow-feeling for fellow * sinners . If to do justly , to love mercy and to walk humbly with God , be acceptable to him ; if to love the Lord our God with all our Ijeart , and our neighbour as ourselves , be more than alt burnt-offerings and sacrifices ; if
true religion before God , even the Father ,-be to visit the fatherless and widows , and to keep oneself unspotted from the world . ; if this be the character of the disciple of J & sus Christ , then , my friend , it cannot be blindness as to an article of faith in which
] am permitted by God to remain , that will sink me into perdition ; nor will it be the adopting of a metaphysical nicety as to the person of God , which is your lot , that will exalt you to the glories of eternity .
Surely God will hear his humble worshiper ! Surely the prayer of the upright will still be his delight ! Many a cloud encircles the vision of man * At best feeble , the arrogance of
some of his fellows , and the supineness and the timidity of others , keep the world of worshipers in a state of mental delusion and wofal degradation . But we shall see yet brighter , we shall know God and his worshipers better , when the veil of
humanity shall drop , and light burst in upon us from the throne of the Almighty . In the m £ an time , give yourself no concern as to any steps 1 shall take to pluck down any whose salvation is peculiarly dear to you from that envied height at which your faith has
placed them * May you always , and may you long , enjoy all the happiness that your wish to think and to do rightly deserves . It cannot be greater than they enjoy , who regard the great object of their worship arrayed in a more lovely attire ; and , while they know him to be the God of the whole
earth , believe him to be the friend of all that live , and to have given to all under various dispensations , varied , but equally sure , mean ** of cfoing his will and Qbtaining hia everlasting love . '¦" ¦ *• Shonld ¦ - >¦> write to meott the
102 Letter On The Dread Of Uriitariani&M...
102 Letter on the dread of Uriitariani & M . .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 22, 1819, page 102, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/mrp_22021819/page/34/
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