On this page
-
Text (2)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
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.
-
-
Transcript
-
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.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
JtfR . BELSHAM ' s STRICTURES UPON MR . B . CARPENTER ^ DEF £ NCE OF ARIANISM IN HIS LECTURES * LETTER IV , To the Editor of the Mont kit / Repository *
Sie , The title of my friend ' s third Lecture is , f On the Ekttrau daries of Human-Knowledge , ' Materialism ^ Necessity , ** &c «* I have perused this Lecture repeatedly , with a considerable degree of attention , but I confess that I am completely at a Joss to understand the worthy authors meaning in the farrasro of
topics , theological , moral , metaphysical , philosophical , and political , which he has crowded into a very narrow compass ^ One thing , however , is very clear , my friend is a decided enemy to metaphysics . If I understand him right , he means to represent this science as beyond the limits of the human faculties ; and to stigmatize all inquiries into it as c < t dangerous
and hurtful , " p . 51 . It is true , that my worthy friend delivers a very decided opinion upon some points which have been the topics of controversy amongst learned and iitquisitive men ; but this does not at all militate against the position ^ that these topics are beyond the sphere of the human intellect ; for he has had the goodness to inform us , that the system which he advocates is divinely inspired * ; and most assuredly he would never have arrived at his conclusions by the deductions of reason .
Metaphysics f , Sir , is a hard word ; it is a word which few understand , and , unfortunately , it has of late fallen into disre-* See p . 64 . " If this system ( that is , the doctrine of necessity ) be true , we deceive ourselves , and more than this , we are deceived by our Maker . " * And again , p . 65 , " Happily for mankind it will never prevail to any great extent ; for the Creator of man has written a law on his heart , which ' will always oppose and rise superior to these metaphysical speculations . ' * With equal propriety the bi otted Papists denounced the Copernican system as heresy , because it was contrary to the appearances of nature , and to the word of God . In this way superficial spectators of the phenomena , both of the natural and moral worlc ! , will always argue against more accurate observers ; and will always gain credit with superficial judges . The solemn assertion of a baffled disputant , that to controvert his system is to oppose the Almighty , is a stale artifice , which may sometimes overawe a feeble and a timid mind , but it can produce no effect upon an upright and resolute inquirer after truth .
• f To * . make ugliness sti'l more ugly , , rny worthy friend has-permitted hia printer to mis-spell the word * , and to give his readers , almost through the whole Essay , the barbarous terms metaplisics and metaf > hhic <\ ly instead of the propej * expressions , metaphysics and metaphysical .
Untitled Article
i 253 7
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1807, page 253, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2380/page/29/
-