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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.
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Tke ^ dilem ma proposed , that " if God immediately disposes mankind to good , he also immediately disposes them to evil / ' is irrelevant to the sort of divine influence which is the subject in dispute . It is nat supposed that
God arbitrarily disposes the mind by irresistible grace to follow what is good : it cannot , therefore , be inferred that he arbitrarily directs the mind to follow what is evil . If God dispenses aid to those who seek it , there is
implied a predisposition to goodness : if God dispose to evil , it is where the heart is wilfully prone to evil ; and this is illustrated in 2 Thess . ii . 11 , 12 , and Rom . i . 24 . It is contendedthat from God's
, immediate communications , knowledge cannot be excluded ; because Christ
says , " Every man that has learned of the Father cometh unto me : " " He will guide you into all truth : " " He will teach you all things . " Now the question properly is , whether doctrinal truth is here intended ? For this was
the sort rof truth which it was doubted that God imparted to men , since the ceasing of the gift of his miraculous energy or spirit—a doubt which is founded on the absence of all authority that he does so , and which derives strength from the great improbability that he should interfere to direct the
natural understanding of men , when his written word , transmitted from the hands of prophets and apostles , and the traditions of Christ's primitive church , are within their reach . The diversity of doctrine , in those who equally pretend to divine aid , is of itself-a demonstration that doctrinal
truth is not communicated : but if we can produce no proof of the communication of spiritual influences , independent of illumination on points of doctrine , no one can demonstrate their non-existence . The argument of the writer respecting if supernatural periods , " might
here be retorted upon him ; for if it be allowed that the truth spoken of was doctrine , it might be said that the teachings of mysterious knowledge were imparted in the apostolic age ; but it does not follow that they are imparted still . The application of these texts , however , is a mere trifling with words . The divine truth here mentioned had nothing to do . with the metaphysical nature of God , or . any question about
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the person of Christ , which alone would tye to the writer ' s purpose , and in connexion with the subject in band ; for these questions . had not then been originated . No diseiple of Jesus had any doubt of the unipersoa&l nature of
Jehovah , or of his self-originating mercy , or of the humanity of Jesus , who was " called the Son of Qod . " What the Jews had to learn , was that disposition of heart which would bring them to acknowledge Jesus of
Nazareth as the Christ ; and the knowledge of all things , to which the apostles were to be guided by the Spirit , related to the designs of the gospel dispensation . Knowledge , truth and ivisdom
are , moreover , equivalent , in scripture language , to a religious spirit , or a knowledge of the will of God , as is evident from that fine chapter , Prov . ii . To confound this with accurate
theological doctrine , in the modern sense of orthodoxy , is to quibble with sounds . As the writer is apprehensive that the example of Christ in the garden
( Luke xxii . 41 ) may have misled people into this foolish application to the " God of all hope and consolation , " he shews an anxiety to invalidate this piece of gospel history , as if there were no other occasions on wliich Jesus
betook himself to prayer . He seems , however , to do him justice , perfectly indifferent whether the passage be spurious or Christ amenable to censure . The question has been mooted , very unnecessarily , to say the least of it , whether Jesus were clear from human
sm , in circumstances winch did not respect his ministry ? Now , as sin implies a wilful or conscious breach of some known commandment of God , it would be rather difficult to conceive how Je 3 us could yield to gin ( whether little or great , in human computation , is indifferent , for , as respects the
pure and perfect ( God , * ' he that keepeth the whole law , yet offends in one point , is guilty of all" ) and jcould , at the same time , be " tUe beloved Son of God in whom he was well pleased . *'
It was reserved * however , for the present writer to impute sin to Jejsus in the very office of his Messiahship . I shall pass over the curious proof of the spuriousness of this whole relation from the impugned authenticity of the 42 nd and 43 rd verses , which clp not include the circumstances to which his
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Christianity not Natumlhm . 75
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1821, page 75, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2497/page/11/
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