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    H without ffea %# hesifeti& ^ I cfare not jRW « tJmtariahis iti , ^ n ^ ai ^ <> fher causey &hjr feather thahjitf promotes a spirit of deep , ^ tftionat and fervent piety . Iret J tf <* ome t 6 viflhatits enemies pre-. dict- ^ let it be scaWered to all the

    winds 6 f heaven , and be without a record '( Bfr at name , if it will not promote t ^ e sacred power of religion among- us . If it is unfriendly to an

    exalted pfety , let it be burned with - * the' wood , " hay « nd stubble f and iiod grant that its honest advocates in&y be * saved , though it € be so as WW !*; - .-

    c * I have , indeed , not one doubt of the ^ fc ruth of its great and le ading priti-< a $# es , arid as little that they will be embraced , like the early instructions , and as the true instructions of Jesus , as fast as men are able to receive them : and on both accounts , because

    they are true and because they must prevail , I am the more anxious that they should not foe made a stumblingblock to thdse who are yet too Weak to receive them . It is a very high responsibility committed to our hands ,

    to hcfld , if we do hold ^ the purest systeto of faith in the world , and it deserves to be seriously inquired if there , be no danger of betraying it . If we think there is none , this only shews there is so much the more

    danger | he less we suspect it . And this , again , is the exposure of which I was speaking . We hear perpetual warnings of our danger , and we are , in consequence , too apt , it may be , to maintain that we are safe . To give an instance or two of this exposure : we are accused of making too

    little of our Saviour , and we forget , perhaps , in our eagerness to defend ourselves , that we are , in common with all men , in danger of thinking too little of him . There is in every good mind , in every Christian breast , a warm veneration and attachment to

    Jesus Christ ; there is a sympathy with him , in his holy plans and purposes , in his compassion to the sinful , in his forgiveness and generou 9 sacrifices , in his bitter sufferings : there is a tender and sacred admiration of

    his person and character . And all this feeling springs up spontaneously with the piety of Christians , and must grow with the growth of all their virtues . And it is liable on the contrary to be checked and chilled by the

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    selfishand iii&oly < passions . Here * then , is a dauber -of . which we ough * to be aware , tmd which in our circumr stances we are too apt to forget * Again , we are accused of making too Httle ' -of-our sins . Now the very circumstance of our having been thus

    accused , may have brought about the very thing with which we are charged * We deny that this is the tendency of our principles , and forget , perhaps , that it is nevertheless the tendency of

    our nature . We are employed about argument when we need-self-exatnina tion . We ate collecting proofs of the dignity of human nature , when we ought to be mourning that it is so fallen in ourselves . "

    A few striking remarks on other besetting dangers of Unitarians are here necessarily omitted , as also a warm animadversion on the coldness

    with which the subject of missions is too often treated among them . We are compelled to pass on to the following passages on " nominal Unitarians . " ¦ - .

    " There are many such who are m different to all religion , who are not under the strong and swaying influence even of any prejudices concerning it , and whose common sense is therefore left to operate more freely and perhaps more justly : who dread all

    superstitious fears , and rightly : who abhor all creeds and systems , and all human authority , and all dominion of fear over men ' s minds , and do so perhaps even too much . However this may be , it is certain that all this will not necessarily make them

    Christians ; and yet it may make them , in their speculative vie ^ ys , as far as thejr have any , Unitarians : just as an opposite cast of mind , a submission to fear and prejudice and authority , may fail to make men Christians , and yet may make them orthodox : in other words , may make them of the

    popular , the prevailing faith . There are also people in the world who dislike restraint , who dislike seriousness , who cannot bear singularity and strictness in religion , nor do they like plain and close dealing from their religious instructors , and who are , therefore , naturally attracted to a system of doctrine and mode of

    teaching , that appears more cheerful and liberal . They prefer to hear those preachers , that do not ( because they

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    Hints to tfnitaridhit , in " Th $ Christian Disciple" ( America ) . 41

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    vol .. xix . u

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1824, page 41, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2520/page/41/