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their expenses will soon become such as our institutions cannot bear * But it seems we are not to be allowed to quote the example of the apostles ta justify our preaching in the open air , and going to small towns and obscure
villages to carry the Unitarian doctrine to the : poor inhabitants ; for Mr . 1 . W « pronounces that " It is folly to talk , as some are doing , of imitating the apostles , and preaching to the poor as they did . This is mere youthful effervescence and sheer nonsense ^"
And is this the language of a minister of Jesus Christ , who spoke of it as a proof of his divine mission that " the poor had the gospel preached unto them" ? " We are now in a state of
society v $ ry different from theirs , " ( the apostles ) . But is not the gospel the samey and have not the poor as much need of it ? Is it not as important atid valuable to the poor now as it was then ? Truly , we seem in a very different state ourselves to what the
apostles were ; or we should not call it folly and sheer nonsense to imitate them in preaching the gospel to the poor . I know we have not supernatural or miraculous powers , as the apostles had : but neither are these
any more necessary in preaching the gospel to the poor than to the rich , in obscure villages than in large towns . If to imitate the apostles in preaching the gospel to the poor be to be vile ,
I hope our Missionaries will glory in the degradation ; that they will make it their study to preach as the apostles did , though they be charged with folly for doing so .
Mr- I . W . thinks it " far too soon for us to think of going into small villages and towns about the coast , where the Unitarian worship cannot be established for want of means to
support it / ' Yet in some such villages and . towns Unitarian , worship has been established and is supported : and wherever there are two or three Unitarians , however obscure the village or town may be , Unitarian worship may and ought to be established
and carried on ; by those individuals meeting together to worship the One ( iod , and to read such books as may edify themselves , and instruct their neighbours . This was Dr . Priestley ' s opinion ; and thus the poor people at Thome went on for several years , be-
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J&tVete ?* Sir , December 13 , 1824 * IN the last number of the Repository , ( pp . 652—655 , ) your readers are favoured with some remarks from
Mr . Worsley on Unitarian Missionary preaching . It is not the object of this communication to canvas the general merits of these remarks . None of your readers , probably , will be disposed to deny that they display , in many parts , the good sense and sound
discrimination which usually characterize remarks from the same source ; nor will it be doubted by many , that the plan recommended by Mr . Wors ^ ley is a good plan , whenever and wherever it may be found practicable to adopt such a plan . Nevertheless , it is for our Missionary Societies , and for the supporters and managers of
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Devon and Cornwall Society on Missionary Preaching * * 74 $
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fore they had a minister ; thus the congregation at Glasgow , and thus bate several other congregations , commenced . If in a few instances the
efforts of the Missionaries have failed of success , it has been in some such good towns as Mr . I . W . talks of , not in small towns and villages . Mr . I . W . says , speaking of tneet * ings in the open air r < € Suppose the descriptions of these meetings—which
have been very well got up in the reports of your Missionaries for the Repository— to be correct /* Dftes he mean to say that he suspects the correctness of such descriptions , and that the reports are c * got up" to impose upon and deceive the public , and that thfr Committees who directed their
publication gave their sanction to such deception I If any thing like this be his meaning , he is challenged to the proof of any incorrectness or false colouring in the descriptions or reports to which he refers . The charge which he seems to insinuate is not the less
offensive because- merely insinuated * If he mean to touch the integrity of the Missionaries , let him do it fairly and openly , and take care to have his proofs at hand .
I am sorry to occupy so many of your columns as this paper will fill ; but I felt it necessary to go thus far into the examination of Mr . I . W / s lette r * , R . WRIGHT
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1824, page 749, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2531/page/45/
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