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Necessity of a Religious Education , " or by some such title . The author , however , is unable to do justice to his subject , from the very narrow and imperfect view he takes of things . We cannot think his work calculated to advance either
the improvement or happiness of mankind . Mr Antrobus brings forward the French Revolution as an instance of popular depravity , produced by irreligion ! Why , tbe popular
depravity , as he terms it , was the madness produced by long submission under an oppression which was truly depraved ; and the irreligion was the fantastic attempt of newly released superstition , conscious that its reverential feelings had been cruelly mocked , to shape
a religion which should be consonant with worldly wisdom and the pseudo-classicism and rationality of a race of men impatient to assert their intellectual equality . This , we regret to say , is but one among many instances of the lagging of Mr Antrobus behind the " March
of Intellect . ' He is probably a very good-hearted man , and we would recommend him to pluck up a little more moral courage , and believe there are numberless good hearts where he little suspects to find them .
The Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome , truly Represented : in answer to a book entitled , " A Papist Misrepresented and Represented . " By Edward Stillingfleet , D . D ., Bishop of Worcester . A new
Edition , with Introduction and Notes , by William Cunningham , Minister of Trinity College Parish , Edinburgh . Fraser and Co . ; Smith , Elder , and Co . ; H . Washbourne ; W . Curry , jun . and Co . 12 mo . pp . xlii , 316 . If is difficult to conceive the pre-
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cise object for which Dr Stillingileet ' s work is published at the present time , unless to serve ( and it would do so but awkwardly ) some
party purpose . The editor claims the sympathy of the Radicals ; but , ( if he be sincere in his Radicalism ) he goes to work in a most unhappy way to advance the Liberal cause . His work would have a
considerable tendency , if read , to alienate a great body of Radicals , namely , the Irish Catholics , and many of the most intelligent of the English Catholics . This is " Tory-Radicalism" with a vengeance Luckily the Catholics of both countries have profited too much by the
advances in knowledge of a better kind to be provoked to political disunion by illiberally construed differences in religious forms . The Catholic Church is a portion , and not the smallest ! of the great Christian family ; and the dangers appertaining to some of its tenets have been neutralised in this
country by political and intellectual changes ; and are to be so neutralised in other countries hereafter , — even in supine Italy , and semi-barbarous Spain .
Such works as the new Edition of Dr Stillingfleet ' s " Doctrines and Practices , " if they had any effect , would but add to the zest of persecution . The revival and continuance of the absurd and ridiculous stories , originating with a
poor , half-witted and abused slanderer , respecting the Catholics of Montreal , treated as they are in the volume before us , compel us to believe either in considerable ignorance , or mischievous insincerity , on the part of the writer .
Dr Stillingfleet ' s work had a very laudable purpose in the reign of the miserable James ; but Mr Cunningham must have been strangely bewildered to see any
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142 Critical Notices .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 1, 1837, page 142, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1834/page/70/
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