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Untitled Article
the strengtlt of ours ; for what does the Unitarian want but to force his opponent to a close contest , to draw him from a waste of time and words by desultory controversy , and to bring him within such an open , yet circumscribed field , as shall oblige him to meet the weight of the arguments tendered against him , as well as to
exhibit his own ? The author of the " Examination " takes his ground upon an assumption of the suffrage of the immortal Locke ( chiefly ) and of Newton , and upon the use of two ostensible golden keys of
his own manufacture , for the purpose of unlocking my questions ; but the instant we begin to handle these keys , we plainly discover them to be nothing fetter than brass , and truly brazen ones they are . As to the Unitarianism of Locke and Newton , in so
far as regards the question of the Trinity , I assert , and am ready to maintain it , that the proofs we are now enabled to bring forward , are so ample and decisive in their nature , that when duly presented , no Trinitarian of sound judgment and having a proper regard for the character of his understanding , as well as for the character of these
two great men , can venture to resist the conviction ; and as for the two keys or €€ propositions , " they are not only mere trumpery , where they are p laced , as serving to " exhibit the foundation of ( Unitarian ) objections , " but , in truth , may admirably serve to
uniock the arcanum of Trinitarians , and , in ray conviction , to expose such a degree of awful responsibility as no man , holding the doctrines Trinitarians actually do , can possibly entertain , except under the grossest delusion and the most irratiqnal conceptions of the Supreme Being . I feel
satisfied that no man of acknowledged ability and having a due regard for it , will take up Unitarian questions upon the ground this " Trinitarian" nas done ; and at the same time I am as fully persuaded , that , being founded both upon scripture and reason , they are not to be met but by means of the
same nature , and perhaps not much less palpably evasive . I might state , as a further objection to auy set reply to this * ' Trinitarian /' that lie has expressly identified himself with those who join in raising a < - 'ry of blasphemy , and who fly in the race
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of our legislators for abolishing penal laws which , even as a de ^ ad letter , they deemed too disgraceful to remain any longer upon our statute-book . , This consideration alone is sufficient to . condemn his work , since it is now notorious that such men are uniformly as weak in judgment as they are violent
in spirit $ and I must express my surpr ise and concern , that the respectable pastors of our National Church , and Trinitarians generally , should so long have stood by and witnessed with indifference thp manifestation of a spirit , as hostile to the true interests of
the Church , as it is injurious to pure Christianity . The author of the " Examination " has evidently proceeded upon the haughty and most odious principle of infallibility , which gave birth to that sanguinary spirit which has proved to
be the abomination of desolation ^ which , in the language of the amiable Watts , ** has made a slaughter-house of the church of Christ ; " which in former days crimsoned over our native soil , and which still haunts us ; which , under a more efficient form , dictated
the late horrible persecutions in France , and which now , leagued with despotism , thirsts to overthrow the altar of liberty in Spain , and to sink its ruins in the blood of its abettors . But if respectable Trinitarians can think that in our condemnation of this
violence we are not guided by views to peace and good will , but only seek to ward off the weight of the accusation , then let their heated zealots proceed with redoubled ardour , let them blow their trumpets as it were in the new moon , let them vociferate in our
market-places , let them proclaim blasphemy from our house-tops , under all the vehemence their rage would naturally dictate , —whilst Unitarians stand and look at them with equal surprise , pity and contempt . What a feast do these
animosities and bitter revilings afford to the Deist ! How have they continued to disfigure Christianity in the eyes of the whole Infidel world ! It is high time then that Christians of every name should unite to put the perpetrators of such offences to utter shame .
and to rescue Christianity from such a terror . In common with every Unitarian , I proffer the right hand of good fellowship without reserve to all denoinina-
Untitled Article
Capt . Giffbrd on the late "Examination of his Remonstrance . " 66 Y
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1822, page 551, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2516/page/31/
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