On this page
-
Text (2)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
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.
-
-
Transcript
-
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.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
grace from the Bible . Allow the departure from trust deeds in this instance , and where will you stop ? The concession implies all that the Presbyterian s ask for their own justification . The Calvinist trustee or tutor or
beneficiary who comes under this case , may plead , that had the benefactors lived in our times they would have been of our mind 3 n this particular ; he has no other defence ; but this is a defence equally t ) f Presbyterians that hold Unitarianism , administering trusts founded by Presbyterians that were Trinitarians and Calvinists .
I will suggest only one more case ; that of an endowment for the distribution of the Bible , by a person who knows no language but his mother tongue , and has no idea of any Bible but King James ' s English Translation :
there is no doubt , we will suppose , of this being his view of the Bible , and he provides for its being given without note or comment , or any alteration , addition or subtraction . But , by and by , the government call upon the heads of the church to revise the
translation , and to accommodate it to the present sense of propriety , and to the actual state of Biblical knowledge . They go to work , and take for the New Testament Griesbach's text , and the Improved Version is set forth by authority as the English Bible . Now , in what way will the trustees in this
case act ? Will they circulate the testator ' s Bible , with many acknowledged errors and interpolations , and thus , in fact , set themselves against Divine revelation ; or will they take up the new and corrected Bible , reasoning that they best fulfil the mind of the
mstitutor by disregarding the letter of his instructions ? This would surely be a moral duty ; though some grave theological schoolmen might assail them with the cry of " thieves , " and denounce them as excluded , for this exercise of their best moral judgment , from the kingdom of heaven .
Let me make one observation more : the chapels held by Presbyterians in the present day are none of them scarcely cases of unmixed Trinitarian or Calvinistic endowment . The
originators of the establishments might be of this description , but they only began the work which has been carried on by their children or successors ever since , and every new generation has
Untitled Article
made good their title to the property in question by repairs , rebuilding , ornamenting and additional bequests . Now he must be a good casuist who can determine which race of
worshipers , m a century and a half , is entitled to be considered , on account of property expended or bequeathed , as having authority over the faith and worship of those that shall come after . " Whose wife is she of the seven , for the seven had her to wife ?"
If the Trinitarians of the present day me £ n to try the whole question in a court of law , let them make haste ; their time is short ; there is no hope for them but in the present Lord Chancellor , and he may have his doubts - A lawyer , worthy of the
character of a statesman and of the age in whioh he lives , and superior to the pitiful prejudices of underlings at Oxford three quarters of a century ago , would repel applicants in such a cause with indignation and scorn , and send them home to learn what that
meaneth , " "I hate robbery for burnt-offering . ' There wanted not , Sir , this practical exhibition of Calvinism to shew your readers its true character ; but
Calvinists themselves may see in this emanation of their zeal , " what manner of spirit they are of ? and I would Fecommend the history of the project to be inserted in the next book that
shall be written to prove thkt'Galvinism is vital godliness , because CaU vinists are more meek , more spiritually-minded 9 more religiously-benevolent , more righteous and more holy than Unitarians . The motto of such
a book is at hand : God ! I thank thee , that I am not as other men are—EXTORTIONERS . A Presbyterian Trustee .
Untitled Article
Sir , TTT ^ ROM the obliging answers of Dr . MJ Pye Smith , I learn that , in his opinion , God will hereafter deal with mankind according to the principles
of strict equity ; that all who habitually attend to the obligations of virtue will be made happy ; that none will be excluded ; and that in apportioning to all men their future condrtion , due allowance will be made for
the circumstances of their present lives , and for the deficiency of their moral cultivation resulting from them .
Untitled Article
264 Mr . Gibson in Reply to Dr . J . P . Smith .
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1825, page 264, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2536/page/8/
-