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Untitled Article
or eligible disposition of a considerable portion , than in testifying our grateful sense of the service rendered US by a distinguished Member of
Parliament , of a noble family , itself distinguished in the annals of rational liberty , who cheerfully undertook , ably performed , and successfully accomplished for us , the primary object of our Institution . The mode of its
application I thought peculiarly appropriate in itself , and fortunate in its consequences ;—congenial to the service performed , —sucli as could be accepted with honour , —which incidentally yielded opportune assistance to another of our highly valued friends , and certainly produced an effect far exceeding in advantage the magnitude of the means employed .
* On the vote respecting the London University , in which I was most specially implicated , I shall only say , that the practice of the two national universities , in requiring subscription to the articles of the Church , previous to taking degrees , not merely in divinity , but in any faculty whatsoever ,
and even in the initiatory degrees in arts , appears to me to be grounded on the identical principle , and to be as liostilely exclusive , as the very laws of which we so justly complained ; and therefore , that when an opportunity presented itself of obtaining a place of liberal education , unfettered
by such injurious trammels , we were almost bound , in consistency with our own principles , and with the very purpose of our Institution , to embrace it , and give all the assistance in our power ; and , though accidental circumstances may have impeded its immediate prosperity in that degree ¦ which some of its friends looked
forward to with sanguine expectation , I am convinced that the insinuations which have been thrown out against it are unfounded , and that in this , as well as in many other cases , the next and future generations will find ample reason to approve and bless the work of their fathers .
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* One other subject remains , which , if it be not absolutely necessary to introduce , is yet , in my view , so important , and so intimately connected with all that we hold dear , as to call
loudly for notice . It is an old observation , that " external pressure tends to cement iirternaFumorT ; " of the converse of which , I regret that any circumstance in the history of English Dissenters should furnish an
illustration . It is , however , but too true , that scarcely were we relieved from the heavy hand of legal oppression , when " wars and rumours of wars' * among ourselves began ~ to arise ; some , even of our own brethren , seemed to think that differences of
opinion on controverted points of theology were sufficient grounds of separation , even as to the common intercourse of life in civil affairs . I will not pretend to estimate the importance of any such questions , or the weight of the arguments on each side respectively—far less to
comment on the scenes recently exhibited at Exeter Hall , chiefly among members of the same establishment , and professing uniformity . These matters are not of the essence of our question : but I must ask , What is the whole foundation of the right of dissent on religious subjects , of every kind , and in every degree , but the right op
p rivate judgment , limited only by the conscience of the inquirer , and by the duty of exercising that right with the decent respect which the serious and weighty nature of the subject will dictate to every sincere examiner desirous only of discovering truth ? If the law of the land may speak , how stands the declaration demanded of
Dissenting Ministers and Schoolmasters ? Only that of being Protestants and Christians , and acknowledging " the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament as of divine authority , and containing the rules of doctrine and practice ;"—conceding this all-important right by the clearest implication . JBut on what other grounds does Pro-
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3 & UNITARIAN CHRONICLI ^
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 1, 1832, page 38, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1809/page/6/
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