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Mr . J . Nelson moved the following resolution : — 5 . 'That we cordially extend to the Scottish Unitarian Christian Association , the same measure of fraternal sympathy which its members have manifested towards us , and deem ourselveTfaWuTet ^
expressing that sympathy to its enlightened and eloquent secretary , the Rev . George Harris ; that we regard his efforts , and those of the institution with which he is connected , as instruments of Providence for imparting to the people of Scotland a form of Christianity , worthy of their reflecting and conscientious character ; and that we anticipate a time , neither distant nor
doubtful , when , by a succession of such powerful agencies , the soul of the ^ Covenanters shal l awake once more , and , with spirit softened and intrepidity refreshed by its sleep of ages , proclaim the glad tidings -of a new reformation , and carry through the land the bloodless triumphs of the law of truth and love over error , intolerance , and gloom . '
It called on the meeting to express its sympathy with the Unitarian Association of Scotland . Interesting as it was to mark the progress of such a society , wheresoever established , it must be peculiarly gratifying to the Irish Unitarians to observe its operations in a country so well fitted to be the theatre of its achievements as
Scotland . There might be seen a people famed for their love of religious study ¦— - famed for their zeal in maintaining what they believed to be religious truth . There was an horizon undisturbed by the tempests that agitated the public mind of Ireland r there , the
feelings of the people were undistracted by the crusading frenzy of fanatics , whose conduct had made Ireland appear little else than an arena for the exhibition of half religious , half political , wholly frantic , polemics . In Scotland the case was different . Her soil was
better fitted for the seed of truth ; and the meeting was called on to express its wish that the labours of the sowers
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might not be in vain . " In the presence , too , of the talented and eloquent individual to whom the Scottish Association was principally indebted for its great efficacy—to the value of whose services the present meeting had already paid the well-earned tribute of 4 ts-timnks ^ they ™ Wjexejci ^ press their joy that Almighty Providence had been pleased to raise men of high talents and honest hearts as instruments for checking the errors and absurdities of Calvinism , and for
giving to the people of Scotland a re * ligion worthy of their conscientious and reflecting character . Scotland was a scene of . peculiar interest . If not the birth-place , it was the cradle of presbyterianism—of that religion
which might / indeed , be for a time perverted and-darkened by the folly or bigotry or worldly-mindedness of its professors ; but whose very essence consisted in protesting against all creeds of man ' s device , and whose eternal ~ watchword was freedom of
conscience . That religion had been in its infancy untrammelled by-articles or confessions : its sinews had grown strong and been braced in the air of freedom that breathed upon the northern mountains . What presbyterian , who ; that might possibly have Scottish blood flowing in his veins , could anticipate without delight the day when the universal mind of Scotland should burst
tlie shackles that bound it—when the errors of a gloomy creed should , pass away- —when reason and revelation should assert before the eyes of all their indissoluble unity—and religious knowledge and religious truth should enlighten every castle and cottage in
the land ? And was that day distant ? Who was blind to the rapid progress of knowledge in every branch- —wfio did not observe the increasing diffusion of education—or was ignorant of the impetus given to improvement by associations like our own ? And when
that clay arrived , what might not the cause of truth expect from the steady zeal and disciplined perseverance of Scotland ? H [ er people were not the
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86 UNITARIAN CHEONICLE .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 1, 1832, page 86, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1717/page/6/
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