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    afforded us a glimpse of the meaning they were intended to bear ; they signify that the doctrine of the Trinity is at present the same as it always has been and will be in the Universal Church . In learning that they have a meaning , we have also learnt that they convey a falsehood . To make them true in

    point of history , a negative must be inserted , " As it was not in the beginning / ' With their prophetic conclusion we will not meddle . Prophetic words require a prophetic spirit , and we have as little of that as he who originally penned them . The words have served to spread and perpetuate a most erroneous notion *

    Minerva , we are told , sprang complete from Jupiter ' s head at one blow of Vulcan ' s hammer . Similar , in the apprehension of the many , was the birth of the Trinity . Perfect , entire , lacking nothing , it was , they think , brought forth by Jesus , the author and finisher of our faith ; and complete in all its parts , it has , in their apprehension , been transmitted from age to age ,

    till the present day , suffering no diminution , incurring no augmentation . A most mistaken idea ! On the contrary , nothing in the world has been more changeful than the doctrine of the Trinity . In no two ages of the Christian era has it been the same —in no two parts of the Christian world—in the apprehension , scarcely , of any two Christian professors .

    The Trinity is composed of parts . Of these , each , for the sake of perspicuity , must be separately spoken of . For the first three hundred years of the Christian era , the majority of Christians remained faithful to the great truth taught by the Bible and by nature—that the Father of the Universe is supreme . Within that period , it is true , many corruptions were introduced into the Church of Christ . The simplicity of

    the Gospel was greatly tarnished , the faith of Christians drawn out to a length most alien to the spirit and the teachings of the New Testament . Yet the supremacy of the Father was not lost , till , in the fourth century , Athanasius and his abettors had , by wicked arts , introduced two other Gods , and made belief in them the essential requisite in a Christian's creed .

    The teaching of the New Testament , respecting Jesus Christ , is as positive and clear as that respecting the supremacy of the Father . All the statements which it makes respecting him are only versions or amplifications of these words : — " Jesus of Nazareth , a man approved of God by signs and wonders which God did by him . " To this simple confession the Church at

    large remained attached during nearly the first two centuries of our era . Of this fact we possess the most certain vouchers . Read that confession of faith which , on account of the Apostolical purity of its doctrines , may well be termed the Apostle ' s creed . In that you see the faith of the primitive Church—in that you see a specimen of the confessions of faith which are to be found even ii \ several of those earl y Fathers of the Church who

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    t 6 Rise and Progress of the Doctrine of the Trinity .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1832, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1804/page/16/