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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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654 Mn JVofsley on Unitarian Missionary PreMching .
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casionally assist ia promoting such a design , leaving the Missionary to do duty in their chapels , if a provision
was made for the expenses of journeying . Admit even that a Missionary , so stationed , employ some years before he can accomplish the formation of societies , able to maintain their
worship , it must appear to every one , that there is a better prospect of ultimate success with such a scheme , than there can be in the flying visits which have been made from time to time to distant places , but which were
not repeated . I have now in my recollection a case in point . Before Mr . Wright became a regular Missionary he resided at Wisbeach ; he then went out occasionally and visited some towns in Lincolnshire and in
Yorkshire , making them periodical visits in such a way that they expected to see him at certain distances of time . By these visits he was instrumental in reviving the congregation at Lincoln , confirming it in Unitarian principles ,
and inducing the few people who assembled to engage a Unitarian minister . They have since maintained their worship , and are , I hope , in an improving state . During the same time , and for some years afterwards , he proceeded in his journey as far as
Thome , a small market town on the south side of Yorkshire ; he there began to preach to a very small number . I think I have heard him say there was only one person whom he could consider Unitarian ; but by degrees more were added , who became confirmed in that doctrine by his
regular visits . He passed , as ] well remember , in bis route , through Lincoln , dropping a word of exhortation as he went along there and in other towns , until the society at Thorne had grown up to a sufficient maturity to build a chapel , and raise a stipend for a minister .
This is the way in which the few Missionaries we can obtain should proceed for the present , visiting always and regularly good towns or villages 3 where they can find a welcome reception even from a very few , who
may , with safety , calculate upon hearing them again j meeting hi a licensed room , and never in yards 9 or on quays , or in tiny open places ; thus maintaining the respectability . of the cause they are advocating , and giving inducement
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for those to join them in their good work , who have the means of assisting the ^ cause both by their influence aiid by their wealth . Let it not be said , that in acting thus we are despising the poor ; it is for from my thoughts . There are poor in good towns as
well as in retired villages , and if we will promote our cause among thetn , it must be in those places where it can be promoted . It is folly to talk , as some are doing , of imitating the apostles , and preaching- to the poor as they did . Tim is mere yoathful effervescence and sheer nonsense . We
are now in a state of society very different from theirs , and * moreover , we have not the same powerful and effectual instruments to work with . We rnust be satisfied with those that are
in our power , and make the best use of them to produce the best effect . The poor of a small town cannot maintain their worship ; we cannot find them ministers to maintain it for
them , however great may be our wish to do so . But we may , by our united exertions , plant the gospel in many of the principal towns in which it is not now thriving , where are insulated
individuals who would gladly water it , and where , when it has grown , it may spread its branches yet wider , and offer its refreshing shade to those neighbouring places in which at first it would have wanted nourishment .
Yes , Sir , like that celebrated banian tree , of whjch we read in the Indian history , tb ^ branches of the parent tree , spreading widely around , would throw out roots , which striking deep in the earth , will gradually grow into trunks , which shall form their own offspring too .
It affords me pleasure to find , that a professed Missionary Society has been formed at Exeter , for the purpose of supporting a preacher in these counties . I beg to offer its members my advice upon the subject ; that they
break up the good ground before they make any attempt upon the downs and the moors around us > that they labour steadily in cultivating that good ground ; it is not wanting here ; —that they endeavour to form
Unitarian societies in the good towns of this and the neighbouring county , before they think of employing their resources in smaller places and on the aea-shores - that they take good
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1824, page 654, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2530/page/14/
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