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adopted the most effectual means of extending the blessings of Unitarian Christianity , The ministers of the gospel who cautiously abstain from preaching the peculiarities of Trinitarianism , and merely inculcate the fundamental articles of religion , in which
all professing Christians are agreed , cannot certainly be charged with disseminating error ; but until human nature be changed , they cannot be supposed to render it every assistance in their power , in its attempts to discover and enjoy the truth . All
discoveries whatever , whether of a moral or a physical nature , which are not the effect of mere accident , result from comparison ; and every idea we can entertain proceeds from the same
source . Had we never experienced pain , we could have had no knowledge of pleasurable sensations . Had we never experienced the effects of sin , we could have felt no admiration and love of virtue . Did we not know
the tendency of error , we could not have formed the least idea of the value of truth . In short , the existence of what is denominated physical and moral evil is absolutely necessary to apprise us of the existence and nature
of good . This constitution of nature , which has been established by the wisest and best of Beings , would lead us to infer , a priori , that no Unitarian minister , wherever he may reside , whether in Geneva or in London ,
whether in the town or in the country , can , to the extent of his power , instruct : his hearers in the sublimity and value of truth , unless he bring it into one view with the errors which have falsely assumed its name , and
been propagated in its stead . It has indeed been said , that it is the duty of the minister simply to state the truth , and to leave the people to make the comparison ; and this might be a little plausible , were it evident to all his hearers that the doctrines which
he inculcates are directly opposite to what he regards as erroneous . But so far is this from being the case , when he is addressing a Trinitarian audience , that as long as he preaches
nothing but ** negative Antitrinitarianisiu , " they can assent to every syllable he advances , and remain ia the peaceful possession of all their pernicious errors and absurdities . And even when he is called to officiate
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before a mixed congregation of our own denomination , he will find that the most immediate and lasting im-s pression will be made , if he unreservedly expose the nature and tendency of error and iniquity , by contrasting them with the purity and excellence
of evangelical truth and righteousness . But , Sir , independent of this presumptive reasoning , 1 was not aware that Unitarianism had made such progress at Geneva , as decidedly to recommend that negative , method of
diffusing the truth by which it is stated to have been established there . The Genevan pastors have been indirectly undermining Triuitarianism ; they have never defended its doctrines , but have uniformly insisted upon the fundamental and universall y believed
truths of religion for more than two hundred years : and wonderful indeed would have been the effect had they not succeeded in establishing such principles in the minds of the people , as would disqualify them for a belief in the horrors of i alvinism Bat , Sir , had they been influenced by the
spirit of a Paul or a Priestley , or had they remembered the zeal of theis : celebrated predecessor , who not only assisted in establishing the principles of the Reformation in their own city , but most successfully co-operated in more completely disseminating them in France , Italy , Germany , England and Scotland : in less than one third
of two centuries they might , in all probability , have become a kind of centre sun in the hemisphere of Chris * tian churches , and have illuminated the whole world with the rays of Unitarian truth .
Nor is it , perhaps , quite correct to say that they have never gone beyond what is now called the indirect method of diffusing the truth . They have been pub tidy and repeatedly prohibited , or have voluntarily prohibited themselves from preaching upon the
peculiar doctrines of Trinitarianism . This is rather more than negative proceeding , and would doubtless lead to a pretty good understanding of their sentiments . At least , 1 imagine that one of our English bishops would
look in vain for preferment , if , in a charge to the clergy of his- diocese , he should strictly prohibit them from preaching , *• 1 . On the manner in which the
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Umtanamsm at Geneva * 181
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1818, page 181, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2474/page/29/
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