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ner averred A truth when he asserted that Dr . Watts ' s last sentiments were , completely Unitarian . I could enlarge with ease and pleasure on the credit which this positive declaration receives from the character of the witness . Of
Dr . Lardner it is admitted by Mr . Palmer ( Letters , p . 4 . ) that he was " one of the most upright of men and most impartial of authors . " This acknowledgment fully agrees with part of the jkfanuscfipt Elogium by the late Mr .
Kadcliff , who remarks that , ' * While his extensive learning qualified him to try the merits of every evidence , his unbiassed in * tegrity and sacred veneration for truth enabled him to pass an im-7
partial sentence . ' In addition to these virtues * he was eminently distinguished by patience and calmness of inquiry . If be has ever been charged with the mutually adverse faults of temerity and of clay-cold caution , both
these accusations , it is plain , cannot be just : nor has either been substantiated ; and Michaelis , who severely blames him for not producing certain quotations from the heretics of the first centuries , was ignorant that he had drawn up a
history of those very heretics . f I am far , Sir , from claiming infallibility for Lardner . But I main * tain , that before we are asked to set aside the testimony of such a man , on a grave and important topic , preponderating testimony ought to be afforded .
On an analysis of his communications to Mr . Merivale , we find thkt he speaks of Dr . Watts as being in earlier life a Trinitarian , but for several years before f Marsha Mictacli * , & « . 35 , 3 &U
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his death an Unitarian , and finally a complete Unitarian . Let us then examine how far this account corresponds with the information that we derive from some other sources concerning Watts ' s histo - ry and writings . 44 When he first wrote of the Trinity , " says Lardner , ' * I reckoned he believed three equal divine persons . " Accordingly , Mr . Palmer in forms us ( Notts , &c , 93 , &c «)> that in the year 1721 , Dr . Watts published his Sermons on
Various Subjects , in which there is one entitled , The Scale of Blesm sedness ; or Blessed Saints , Bles ~ sed Saviour and Blessed Trinity 9 and that , on the review of this discourse in the year 1729 * he saw occasion to insert a note which
implies his dissatisfaction with some things he had there advanced , and contains the following memorable sentence : " There appears to me good reason to doubt whether there can be three
distinct and different principles of consciousness , and three distinct and different wills in the one God , 4 he one infinite Spirit , " Thus far the correctness of Dr .
Lardner ' s representations is unimpeached . It is attempted , however , to controvert the accuracy of his statement , that Watts in thq latter part of his life , and for several years before his death , was an Unitarian . Now . his
deviations from orthodoxy were in fact earlier than even Lardner ' s language imports : and they were wider than Mr . Palmer seems to be aware * In his Christian doctrine of the Trinity , printed so early as the year 1722 , tie discovered his inclination to fcfe' Jfcdwclling Scheme , on account of tvhich Mr . T . Br&dbury , iu " a let-
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Strictures on a recent Publication of Mr . Vaimer ' s . No . II . 76 Q
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T ** . vm . § m
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1813, page 769, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2435/page/17/
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