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Thou bold discoverer in an unlmown sea Of happy Isles and happier tenants there , I ask thee not to prove—a Sadducee—, Still dream of Paradise thou kwow ' st not where , And Iov ' st too well to T > id thine erring brother share V
Mr , Dallas , his friend , however , expostulated with his Lordship on its extreme sceptical tendency ; when melting into a softer mood , he sent the subsequent % es [ to be inserted in Its stead , marked by a peculiar pathos and beauty :
** Yet if , as holiest men have deem'd there be 5 A land of souls beyond that sable shore , To shame the doctrine of the Sadducee , And sophists , madly vain , of dubious lore :
How sweet it were in concert to adore - «¦ < With those who made our mortal lahours light , To hear each voice we fear'd to hear no more ; Behold each mighty shade revealed to sight ; The Bactrian Samian sage , and aljl who taught the right V *
Such , indeed , are the endearing hopes , such the transcend ant prospects of a blissful immortality ! Much hath been advanced respecting the manner after which unbelievers should be treated in their rejection of Christianity . I have no hesitation in
declaring , that mild but firm expostulation is the alone method suggested f > y reason and sanctioned by revelation . For , every man ta give a reason of the hope that is in him with meekness and fear , is the apostolic injunction ; and My kingdom is not of this viorld , is
the declaration of the Saviour of mankind . — Reproach irritates , violence confounds ; both are alike hostile to rational conviction . Pious Herbert , the brother of Lord Herbert , the father and the best of English Deists , hath thus sweetly sung in strains never to be
forgotten" Fear frightens minds , whilst love , like heat , Exhales the sCul sublime to seek * her native seat . To threat the stubborn sinner-oft is hard , Wrapp'd in his crimes , against the storm prepared .
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But when the milder beams pt metcy He melts , and throws his cumbrous cloak away ; Lightnings ^ and thunder proclaim the Almighty ' s style , then disappear ; The stiller sound succeeds—and God is there !"
The unholy infliction of " pains and penalties" only serves to stir up the evil passions—deafening us with the clamours of a perverse arid-cobdurate infidelity ! Ever since the blessed era of the Reformation , truth * emanating
from the Sacred Scriptures ^ is disclosing her unrivalled beauties , and , chasing away every cloud whieh hath obscured her effulgence , will at length hold an undivided empire throughout the world .
But on this important subject I have already borne my humble testimony , at the close of the article on Deism in the last , or 14 th , edition of my Sketch of the Denominations .- — The paragraph having had the honour of $ being read in court at the trial of
the unhappy and deluded Carlile , now immured in the dungeons of Dorchester , may form no improper conclusion . €€ Though the pernicious tendency of infidelity is to be reprobated , yet the prosecution of Deists is altogether contrary to the genius of Christianity * It extends the evil deprecated ,
and affords a miserable specimen of the spirit by which we are actuated . See an interesting correspondence , affixed to Eippis ' s Life ofDr . Lardner , between the Bishop of Chichester and Dr . Lardner , who thiia writes with his usual good sense and liberality :
c Your Lordship freely declares Wollaston ought not to be punished for being an infidel , nor for writing at all against the Christian religion , which appears to me a noble declaration I If the governors of the Church and
civil magistrates had all along acted up to this principle , I think the Christian religion had been before now nearly universal . But I have supposed it to be a consequence from this sentiment , that if men have an allowance
to write against the Christian religion , there must also be considerable indulgence as to the manner likewise . This has appeared to jne a part of that meehness and forbearance which the Christian religion obliges us to , who
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6 Dr . Evans on , Lord Bi / ron ' s JnfBeliiy .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1825, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2532/page/6/
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