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    be wanting some who . might congratulate me on having made

    good my cause . But . such , assuredly , is not $ the way of con . froming , and still less of overthrowing , direct evidence .

    The remainder of the •* private correspondence between To in kins and Dr . Waits" ( Appendix , &c . ) , xegards the lawfulness of addressfag doxologies to the Holy Spirit : and while it shews that \\ atts ' s sentiments concerning the Deity of the Spirit , were , in truth , not more orthodox than those of

    the persons whom Mr . Palmer % vould characterize as Socinians or modern Unitarians , it also proves how fearful the Doctor was of giving offence and creating suspicion and alarm by any wide

    deviation from received practices and phrases . From the whole of it , and from his conversation with Grove , 1 infer that he no longer embraced genuine Tiinitarianism and the popular tenets respecting

    the nature and degree of Christ ' s agency in the work of our salvation ; . since "he would gladly have ahered those of his hymns which lay i-be stress of our redemption on tht ? compassion of Christ , ra « ther than on the love of God . and

    expressed his wish to make them move conformable to the scripture doctrine . ' * Assuming a tract published in 1802 to have been written by Dr . Watts , who however was

    prevailed upon by his friends to suppress the only previous impression , namely fifty copies , which lu printed in 1745 , I shall reguest , Sir , the attention of your readers to jt + as unfolding some of hifi opinions at that period . He died in 1748 ; and with what pxopriety Mr . Palmer adduces a

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    pamphlet submitted to the world three years before as evidence of the last sentiments of Watts , I must leave him to explain . In all events , its contents ought to be compared with the subsequent pieces entitled , •* Important Ques « lions'' and " The Glory of Christ as God-man / ' but especially with the Solemn Address * , fyc * And I have the same right to avail

    myself of the fact that " the author consented to destroy the edition , which Mr . Palmer has to argue from that work in its present shape . In the extracts which he has made from it I see something

    of the language but very little of the essence of orthodoxy . Judging from those quotations , I should pronounce it greatly inferior to his other controversial publications . The friends to whom he

    shewed it , all persuaded him , that it would ruin his character in his r old a * ge , for publishing such dotage : * they were dissatisfied , no doubt , with its sentiments , or with its criticisms and roasonings- - perhaps with both .

    In the year 1746 he printed two of the tracts vrhich I have mentioned , namely , Useful and Important Questions , 8 fC . and The Glory of Christ , S fC * These , Sir , appear to be far more elaborate and respectable performances than the pamphlet which was the

    subject of the last paragraph ( Notes , " &c . 57— $ l ) : together with certain wild speculations on the pre . existencepf the human soul of Jesus Christ , and on his visible appearances before his incarnation , and also some unsatisfactory explanations of those texts which represent Christ and the Father as - ¦¦ ___ jjui mm wr-ir— -- — ~ ** Letters . &c « 35 f

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    772 JStrictures on a recent Publication of Mr . P / zImer ' s . K& . II .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1813, page 772, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2435/page/20/