On this page
-
Text (1)
-
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
The collection was formed on the general principle , that , as singing is an act of worship , in which all Christians are to join , it is proper , that those sentiments , which are
peculiar to any of the different sects , should be excluded ; so that no tender conscience may be prevented from taking a share in this part of social devotion . Reasonable , however , and evangelical , as is this principle , it did not prevent his little book—though designed
only for his own society , and not regularly published—from being attacked with a great deal of
asperity ; He was accused , in a contemporary theological journal , of mutilating the hymns of Watts and ^ others , in order to cover a design of suppressing the great doctrines of the gospel by the authority of their names . The charge was sufficiently absurd ; and it is by no nieans desirable or pleasing to revive a forgotten controversy . But ,
as there is a reference to this affair in his private journal , and as the charge affects his personal integrity , and may hereafter meet the eye of those who have not the
means of knowing how unfounded it was , it seems to be a duty to insert the following extract . The observations which introduce it are very striking illustrations of ^ humility , and his habitual and elevated piety .
January 2 , I 8 O 9 . A new year has begun . In looking back upon the events of my life the last year , 1 see little or no improvement , ^ re I am , that my stock of theo . | ° gical knowledge has not been J « creased , though I have some rea-5 to hope that my sermons far Jhe last year have not been inferior | ° preceding . In the trials 0 wk » ch God has exposed me , I
Untitled Article
endeavour to discern the design of his providence . The disorder , to which I am yet subjected , ought to be to me a perpetual lesson of humility . I have sometimes thought , that , if our powers and state of mind , in another world ,
depend at all upon the condition of the understanding , when we leave this , I should prefer to die before my mind shall beirrecoverably debilitated by this disorder .
May this consideration—with otbers—keep me in a state of perpetual willingness and readiness to depart ! My greatest trial this year was theattack upon my selection of hymns for the use of Brattle-street gburch . I cannot but think it insidious and impertinent . If I have indulged any improper feelings
towards the supposed author , I pray God to forgive me ; at least , I trust , they do not appear in my reply . -As to the principal and most important charge in the review , that of unsignified alterations , I can here put down , what it was not necessary to tell the public , that I did not know of them , till they were pointed out by the reviewer . I took the hymns , without altera- , tion , from Dr . Kippis ' s collection /' In the beginning of 1809 , Mr .
Buckminster published a sermon on the death of governor Sullivan ,
the first production of his pen , to which he gave his name . In the course of the year , he wrote the circular address of the Massachusetts Bible Society , an institution in which he took a very lively interest , and of which he was corresponding secretary . He also published an address " on the dangers and duties of men of letters , " pronounced before a literary society at Harvard-college—au enchanting specimen of the variety
Untitled Article
Memoir of the Rev , J . S . Buckminster * 663
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1814, page 663, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2446/page/3/
-