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Life , ' * which he published not long after his settlement at Leeds , vrith the occasional discourses which at different intervals , he has since given to the world , will
trace with pleasure his progress in the art of composition . It is not we are persuaded , an exaggerated statement that < c no one cduld
liabitually and seriously attend upon his ministry , but his mind must have been enlightened , whilst his heart vw&s improved / ' ( P . 166 . ) At the same time , we read with surprize and concern the following sentences in the sermon on
occasion of his death : " I cannot here omit , " says Mr . Wcllbelovcd , and iie is addressing the congregation at Mill Hill chapel , •* another striking characteristic of your late pastor ' s mode of public instruction * His discourses related
almost exclusively to religious practice , rarely to what are called religious principles . He wished to make you practical Christians rather than experienced controversialists ; and whilst all his public
services proceeded upon a system of religious truth which he had carefully deduced from the pages of revelation , and tended silently to recommend the system , and to impress in the most effectual
manner all its essential principles upon your minds , he rarely thought it necessary or wise to point out to you the speculative errors which abound in the world , or to explain and defend that creed which in the exercise of private jud g-
ment he . had adopted for himself . " ( P . 167 . ) As the author of the Memoir confesses himself ( p . 173 . ) an admirer of his friend ' s conduct ii * this respect , we halve an additional inducement to animadvert upon the pleas here alledged in
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justification of ir , and to point out its impropriety and evils . Itiss * id that Mr . Wood ' s * honourable station " - was that of " a preacher of righteousness . " ( P . 167 . ) Such assuredly it was . But there is an intimate connection
between truth and righteousness , as there also is between error and unrighteousness ; and we read , in a volume profoundly revered
by our author , that Christian ministers are " set apart for the defence of the gospel , " which -includes we presume , religious principles no less than religipus practice .
But observes Mr . Wood himself , ( p , 16 S . ) * ' the sermons of Christ were never employed about those matters o { doubtful disputation which have occasioned such violent contention in the Chris * tian world . ' * True : for the
controversies and mistakes alluded to had at that time no existence . The fact however is , that many if not most of our Lord ' s discourses were levelled against the
errors of the day . Surely then concerning the religious errors of the day , whatever they be , tjae Christian preacher of the present age should not be customarily silent ! Imagine that Jehus ' . Ohiist now exercised his personal
ministry among us ; and who can suppose thai he would rarely think it necessary or wise , to vindicate the purity of his gospel , and to expose the corruptions by which it is debased ?
It is further remarked , by the subject of these Memoirs , that " the Son of God whs hot commissioned to entertain mankind with curious questions and nice speculations . " But what if cu . rious questions and nice specula *
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itfO Review . *—Memoirs of the late Re& * IV . Woo d
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1809, page 160, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1734/page/40/
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