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is a slight ,, and , if the expression be allowable , a venial ope , upon the hypothesis of the simple humanity of the sufferer . That he was not unappalJed by the sufferings he contemplated , is evident from hijs prayer , that , if possible , the cup might pass from him . Though
prepared to suffer and to die , it is no violent presumption that his actual sufferings might he more acute than he had anticipated , —and , in a paroxysm of agony , this , perhaps convulsive , expostulation might break
from him without any definite meaning . It was followed by a second cry of lamentation - 9 and both were uttered just before his dying and more collected declaration , ( John xix . SO , ) "It is finished /'
He had submitted to all that it behoved him to endure , but did not sustain the extremity of suffering without the expression of such a sense of it , as was natural to a simply human being , and in words neither weighed , nor resembjing any language that he had ever used , or was capable of using , in a state of mental composure . There is nothing , therefore , staggering in the inconsistency which has been suggested . But another far more important consideration is behind .
What will the orthodox say to it ? Will they contend it to be possible that " God made man , " or that a
man , in any profoundly mystical identity with God , could have ejaculated such a sentence ? That Jesus in his blended character could thus have expostulated with hiniself ? That such
a preposterous interrogation could have passed the lips of a being conscious of the divinity within him , and that God had neither forsaken , inor could forsake him ?
Really , Sir , what I have thus committed to paper stares upon me in such a guise of absurdity , that I shrink from it with a sensation not to be defined ; but , as our Lord and Master reaspned with the Jews upon their own principles , so are we constrained to parley with the modern Pharisees on theirs .
Upon the Unitarian hypothesis the passage is of easy explication ; but , on the orthodox scheme , it involves ( especially in conjunction with the
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476 On the Divine Injkimce *
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prayer in the garden ) such a real and revolting inconsistency , as furnishes a problem for them , which I suspect to be of somewhat more difficult solution . BREVIS .
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Liverpool ^ Sir , Jnly 24 , 181 9-IT is not my intention to take out of the hands of Dr . Carpenter , who is so much more able than I to
do justice to the subject , the elucidation of the doctrine of the Divine Influences , to which he is invited by your CorrespondentL . J . J . in the last Number of the Repository , [ p 419 ] , But as L . J . J . intimates [ pp . 367 , 368 ] that he does not understand how
Unitarians can consistently make use of expressions , implying a belief in that doctrine , some of which he quotes from two hymn books , which have been recently compiled for the use of the Unitarian congregations in this town , such as ,
" With truth and virtue feed our souls /" I wish to explain what I conceive to have been the views of the compilers , in admitting into their collections such expressions as are here
alluded to . And , first , I think it may be distinctly stated that they did not mean to convey the idea , that supernatural communications from the Deity are to be expected as the result
of our petitions for divine illumination , any more than when using the words of the Lord ' s Prayer— " Give us this day our daily bread , 11 they would expect to receive a miraculous supply of food .
Petitions for divine aid to the mind appear to stand upon the some footing as those for every other blessing , or rather on a better . For , if we are to pray for any thing , what objects arf so proper * as wisdom and virtue f Other things may be good or Imd according to the use we make of then ? , but these are always good .
In fact , your Correspondent ' s difficulties seem to relate to prayer in general - , against which philosophical objections may , no doubt , be urged ; though , perhaps , even on the principles t > f natural religion , they are not insuperable . But whatever force there may be in these objections , it is -suffi-
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1819, page 476, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1775/page/16/
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