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Art . IV . —An Account of the Extraordinary Proceedings against Mr . Joseph Player , of Saffron IFalden , lute one of the Deacons at the
Abhey-Lane Meeting there ; containing a Copy of an Address from the Rev . William Clayton to him . In a letter to a Friend , by an Enemy to Priestcraft . 12 mo . pp . 12 Kirby , Warwick Lane . Ad . \ S 22 , rjpHE late Robert Robinson said JL that Antichrist might be found in a Meeting-house : certainly , priest-
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craft may , and if we do not mistake , we have here a case in point . It appears that there is a small Society at Saffron Walden " professin g the doctrine of Free and Soverei gn Grace , " that is , avowing honest Calvinism , with its crowning tenet of Reprobation . The minister of this people is son of Mr . Player , who was
until lately , deacon ofMr . W . Clayton ' s congregation of the same town . Without deserting his own religious friends , the father attended occasionally upon his son ' s preaching . In consequence , he received the following letter , the first and the last on the subject , from his spiritual guide :
Saffron TValden , " Sir , July 11 , 1822 . cc As this is the last communication i purpose ever to have with you , and as I wish to furnish you with materials for penitent reflection , when those corrective
visitations shall come upon you , which , if you are a partaker of grace , will most certainly overtake you , I shall place your sin in order before you , and forewarn you , from the sacred page , of approaching calamities .
" You have for thirteen years past received from your pastor uninterrupted , disinterested , lahorious and expensive tokens of affectionate regard . Your children too , some under circumstances of mental and moral trouble , and some in the hour of death , have been
gratuitously attended ; as they were also bap * tized and buried without the customary expressions of respect on your part , required by 1 Cor . ix . 9—11 , or without the expression of regret for inability , which , as I should have declined all other recompence , should not have been withheld .
" Since your elevation to the office of Deacon , an event 1 unfeignedly regret , you have insidiously injured the interests of the cause you should have sustained ; you have attempted to restrain your minister from delivering the whole counsel of God , and since a disorderly faction , or
a company of Autinomian heretics has arisen , —which tney are you best can tell —one or the other they must be , —you have not only atteuded yourself with very considerable regularity , but have used your utmost influence—feeble , indeed ,
through God ' s mercy it has proved— to sanction this Society of persons , for whom I have at least this kind of respect , that they have acted openly and consistently y and not as yourself , hi the language of the old proverb , * holding with the bare , and running with the hounds / -
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504 Review . —Rev . W . Clayton ' s Proceeding * against 31 ? . Player
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ment , and to its perpetual reference to the rites and ceremonies of the Old Testament . To understand these figures and analogies requires more patient examination than readers in common are disposed to give . The sound of scripture is often very
different from its sense . It is , we conceive , by the mere sound of the Bible that the systems , presumptuously and ridicuously called " orthodox / ' impose upon the ignorance , the prejudices ,
and the superstitious fears of the multitude , and especially on the subject of the death of Christ , which they represent in such a manner as to obscure , if not extinguish , the pure and merciful character of the Father
Almighty , and to pervert the scheme of Christian redemption into an awful tragedy , or at best a tremendous mystery . Mr . Wright has added to his many and great services to the Unitarian cause , by this seasonable and judicious
attempt to explain the scriptural doctrine of " Christ Crucified . " The title-page expresses the plan of the Essay . Under the general heads are numerous sub-divisions , well defined
and ably filled up . The third Part , which is , in the language of divines , an improvement of the subject , is a happy exposition of Dr . Young ' s sentiment , that " the best morality is love of Christ . "
The " Essay" will find its way , we doubt not , into all the catalogues of our Unitarian Societies for the distribution of books ; and if it be as generally read as we wish and anticipate , it will bring out of the prison-house of slavish systems , many a mind that is now " sitting in darkness and in the shadow of death . "
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1822, page 504, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2515/page/48/
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