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To the Editor , Sir , Your ingenious correspondent , Clericus Cantabrigiensis , in his remarks on Mr , Elton's Second Thoughts , has joined that gentleman in a complaint against the Unitarians , for what he calls their ultra-orthodox statements of doctrines , and their exaggerated representations of the orthodox creed . I
shall trouble you with a few remarks upon this topic ; and , lest I should be charged with unfairness , I shall first quote your correspondent ' s language . He states ( p » 644 ) , that Unitarians , " in their controversies with the Established Church ,, fix upon the ultra-orthodox statement of the doctrines in dispute , and think that if they can succeed in shewing them to be indefensible in that exaggerated form , the truth of their own tenets will be the
inevitable result . This accusation is more particularly applicable to the three leading points on which Mr . Elton has recently changed his sentiments , and we flight , really imagine that respecting the Trinity , Original Sin , and the . Atonement , there was but one mode of explanation , and that no perceptible distinction existed between the opinions of Waterland and Wallis , or , in . more recent times , between those of Dr . Hawker , of Plymouth , and Dr . Hey , our late Norrisian Professor at Cambridge . "
What is here meant by " ultra-orthodox statement , " I do not exactly apprehend . If it mean the statement given by those who have themselves come forward in defence of orthodoxy , then let them bear the odium of it , but let not those who rise up to oppose them be blamed . If it mean the statement of doctrines presented by Unitarian controversialists , even then I am at a loss to discover what injury is done to the cause of truth . Whatever exaggeration they may be guilty of , if their arguments are levelled against the doctrines in their exaggerated form , they combat only a shadow , and the reality is untouched . Be their language what it may , no harm is done .
It is clear , according to Clericus himself , —it is , indeed , the very foundation of his complaint , that , in the Church of England , different persons understand the words Trinity , Original Sin , Atonement , &c , in very different senses , and they all call themselves orthodox . He has mentioned some distinguished names . He might have mentioned many more . In regard to the Trinity , one mau is an Athanasian , and another is a Sabellian ; one believes that the three persons are co-existent , co-essential ,, the same in substance ,
equal in power and glory , and another is of opinion , that the Father is the fount of glory to the other two ; one says they are as truly and arithmetically three persons , as Peter , John , and James , are three persons , and another contends , that no one of them is a person , properly speaking , in the same sense as one individual man is a person . Now , in the midst of these diversities of explanation , what is to be done ? Are we to wait till it shall be decided which of all these discordant interpreters is possessed of the true
light ? Must we not venture to combat the doctrine of the Church of England on this point , because some of her own members have fallen into the greatest mistakes about it ? Are we not permitted to contradict any of them , because they all contradict one another ? It would be difficult to write an attack upon the Trinity , which should not be valid against some view or other of it ; and the fact is , that Unitarian writers have generally expressed clearly enough , what that view of the doctrine has been which they have been directly opposing . If that view has not happened to be the
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C 871 )
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ON THE STATEMENT OP TRINITARIAN DOCTRINES BY UNITARIANS .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1827, page 871, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1803/page/15/
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