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to the unhallowed misnomer . The rack and the fire are not there indeed ; but is there not a prostration of mind at variancewith genuineProtestantism ? It matters little whether the Bible be put into the hands of the people , or be shut up , if the people are , after all , to judge of it by proxy . - ' -If I ~ am-to 4 > ow ~ -down ~ to ~ authority ^ give me not the charter of my liberties to mock me . There is no medium
between " the Bible and the whole Bible , " and a degrading vassalage to authority : and Unitarianism , withholding that Bible from none , and prescribing no creed to fetter its interp retation y secures the possession of that liberty and knowledge which are the destined inheritance of every creature of the living God . Unitarianism ,
by the views it unfolds . of God as , a kind parent , and of main as his beloved child , make the promotion of knowledge and happiness the duty of all its believers . And in the performance of this duty they will imitate that Being whose highest glory . it is , that He is the , fountain of universal good . They
^ will unmask all those false and specious forms of good which tyranny has dressed up for the delusion of the nations . There is that scourge of humanity , that path to renown , stained with blood and haunted by images of crime and death , that Moloch , war . When religion was pure and fresh , the arms of the warrior were laid at the
foot of the cross ; but when potentates took Christianity under their royal patronage , then the banner was raised again . And the restoration of pure religion , the prevalence of Unitarianism , would be the prevalence of universal peace . Men would learn the
difference between the false glory , the mushroom greatness , which , in the service of selfishness , desolates the earth , and that true greatness , whose interpretation is usefulness ; that pure glory , whose essence is a love of duty toiling for the general good;—the glory , not of the soldier , but of the philanthropist ;¦—the glory of principle , of probity ,-of truth , of justice ,
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of benevolence ;—the glory ,, not of governing men as machines , but of instructing them to educate and govern themselves . There is that insult to humanity , slavery ; and be it black or white , our sympathy is with the wronged and outraged ; and would men but regard God as their Father ,
these-thin gs—could—exist—no—Ion gen But while God is thought of as a tyrant , and earth as an accursed prisonhouse , and man as an outcast , slavery has a plea of sympathy with faith . The soul is branded to men ' s hands already : to enthral the body is but an
insignificant improvement on God ' s own system . A West Indian colony realizes the picture which Calvinism gives of God ' s creation . It is to the energies of pure religion that we look for the abolition of slavery * Too long has the black looked around him , and asked , " Am I not a friend and a brother ?"
too long has he looked to heaven and cried , " Hast thou but one blessing , my Father ? " Friends of freedom ! reflect that the rights for which you contend are the rights of mankind ; and
that he who would encham man , raises his arm against heaven . I call on all who hear me , not to cease from their exertions , till the last slave-ship shall have visited Africa ;—till the Ethio < - pian from Egypt to the Cape shall stretch forth his hands to the true
God , 4 criminal code of our country is constructed on merciless principles , at variance with the proper objects of punishment . It would seem to regard the gallows as the best preventive of crime , and the hangman as the teacher of social morality . And as long as m&n . continue to believe that God burns his
creatures in hellTfire for ever , with no other object than the infliction joj ; agony , they may well conclude that revenge may be the object of law , rather than reformation . In cases of heretical faith bigots have longthought that to kill was as short a method as to convert , and somewhat easier too ; in cases of guilty conduct * the la \ tr thinks so still . The inhuman pxin-
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-TJNlTAJUAiN CHRONICi , J 2 . @Q
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 1, 1832, page 69, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1813/page/5/
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