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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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their diversity and their harmony are both illustrative of the progress of man towards perfection . It is in . this view of the progressiveness of its tendency , that I especially advocate Unitarian Christianity . Its principles are my best treasures ; not merely becausethey ariSLreason ' s dictajtes , but because , being identified with the gospel , they possess its spirit of enlarging benevolence . When Christianity sprung forth fresh from the Author and Finisher of our faith , then was the period of its moral power ; its
spirit of philanthropy evinced in its banding in holy brotherhood the Jew , the Samaritan , the Gentile ; its spirit of devotion testified in the sufferings of confessors and the blood of martyrdom . When it became corrupted , when it was contaminated by unholy alliance with courts and thrones , when
its pure simplicity of worship was forgotten , then tyranny and licentiousness ran riot ; then pure Christianity was exiled to the mountains ; and when from these fastnesses it issued once more , the sounds of renovated liberty were uttered first by the believers in God ' s unrivalled majesty and unqualified benevolence . And as
Unitarianism has connected itself with the periods of the gospel ' s greatest moral |> ower , so has it been received by the greatest minds of our race as the truth of God . Those who have read aright the annals of their race know this .
Who was he that unravelled the mysteries of the human soul , and laid his linger of discovery upon the subtleties of thought ; and , enamoured of the truth , was the friend of inquiry , and held forth to the wandering intellect the lamp of knowledge ? John Locke , the Christian Unitarian , whose name
is dear wherever philosophy and liberty are hejd sacred . And who was he , before whose gaze the veil which had enwrapped creation ' s glories , withdrew ; who wandered in thought through regions of the universe , where he grew familiar with the blaze of suns , and crossed the planetary tracks ? Newton , the Christian Unh
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tarian , who , though standing among men as the interpreter of the Creator , deemed his faith dearer and subJimer than his philosophy . And who was he who communed with the heavenly muse on " Sion ' s height , " and by ' Siloa ' s brook , that flowed fast by the oracle of God ; " and thence " invokecT her aicfto EiT ^ Svenlurous song ; " he who raised the soul to heaven by his lofty verse , and vindicated its liberty on earth by his immortal prose ? John Milton , the Christian Unitarian , whose patriotism , inspiration , and theology , dwelt in beautiful harmony within his soul . You know that I might lengthen out
this list : names like these , enshrined in the veneration of mankind , prove that knowledge is the herald of Unitarianism ; and , vice versa , where Unitarianism dwells , knowledge and liberty will not be far . The call which we make to our fellow-men is , Think ; think freely ; if you think with us ,
well ; but at all events , think . Know yourselves , know your religion , know your Saviour , know your God ; know your rights , and maintain them , and then will you dignify your nature . ' * That is not freedom of inquiry which admits of any boundary but those of the human intellect : that is not free
inquiry which Athanasius or Calvin menaces with fire eternal . I look on him as a vassal who is terrified by man ' s frown , or seduced by his smile , from taking the Bible in his hand ) and extracting from its sacred page an uninfluenced and individual faith . I glory in the name of Protestant ; a name associated with the noblest
struggles for spiritual liberty . But if there be abroad in the land a spirit striving to deter the inquirer from his pursuit ; if it warn the people against reading the books of those who are contemptuously pronounced unsound in the faith ; if it call into exercise family influence , and enlist family affection , in behalf of intolerance ; if it convert social intercourse into a sectarian squabble ; and if I am asked to call thte Frotestanjisrn , I will be no party
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68 , uMtTAitiAN ctftidN ^ ei / E .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 1, 1832, page 68, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1813/page/4/
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