On this page
-
Text (2)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
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.
-
-
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.
Untitled Article
explain this total change of the Jewish people ; and one , who shewed the inadequacy of all previous explanations ^ asserted as the true cause of this , the obvious fulfilment of the prophecies uttered and written cbhcernmg the Babylonish captivity : but even this cause can be true only in as much as it takes for
granted the then ennobled notions concerning God . The Jews must have now first recognised , that the working of miracles and prophesying futurity belong to God alone , both of which they had formerly ascribed to the false idols ; on which account even miracles and prophecies had produced so transient an effect on them .
S . 42 . It is beyond a doubt that the Jews , ' under the Chaldaeans and Persians , became better acquainted with ( he doctrine of the immortality of the soul , and more familiar with this doctrine , in the schqjls of the Greek philosophers in Egypt . S . 43 , But this doctrine stood not in the same relation to
the Sacred Writings , as the doctrine of the unity and qualities of God ; for while this latter had been ep reiriouslv overlooked * the former was still to be sought ; and with respect to this doctrine previous exercises had been necessarv before thev were
capable of receiving it , and therefore nothing but allusions and intimations could be given : hence the belief in the immortality of the soul could never naturally be the belief of the collected people ; it was and remained only the belief of a certain sect of it .
S . 44 . I call , for instance ^ an exercise or preparation for the doctrine of the immortality of the soul , the divine threat to visit the sins of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation . This accustomed the fathers to live in
thought with their latest posterity , and to anticipate in sentiment the evil they had brought on their innocent descendants . S . 45 . I call an allusion , what was merely to excite curiosity and occasion inquiry ; as the frequent phrase " being gathered to his fathers" for " dying . " \
S . 46-. I call an intimation , that which contains in it some seed , out of which the truth , which is still kept back , may be developed . Of this kind was the inference of Christ from theappellation " The God of Abraham , and Isaac , and Jacob . " This intimation seems to me unquestionably to be capable of being wrought to a strict proof .
S . 47 . In such exercises , allusions , intimations , consists the positive perfection of an elementary book ; and in like manner its negative perfection lies in its not standing in the way of the truths still kept back , or rendering their acquisition more difficult . S . 48 . Add to this , its outward forjn and style , l . The out-
Untitled Article
The Education of the Human Race . . 419
Untitled Article
" 8 H 2
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1806, page 419, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1727/page/27/
-