On this page
-
Text (1)
-
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
another in ludicrous order : for example , No . 828 is upcm early piety , - No . 829 upon the removal of the General Post Office , and 830 upon ladies wearing light stays . This odd mixture of topics , as well as the homeliness of certain of them , would seem to
shewmuch ease not to say carelessness in the composition of the work ; yet the author , who is the best evidence in this case , speaks feelingly in his concluding paragraph of the labour and pains expended upon it :
" Many have been the midnight hours which this work has cost me . Many have been the fearful anxieties , and anxious hopes , which have attended the preparation of this book for public perusal . Many have been the hours of rest which have been sacrificed to its
production . Many have been the abridgments of personal ease which its completion rendered indispensable . A book of this description cannot be completed ad libitum . Those who know the
difficulty of such a task will peruse the book with a liberal feeling . Those who know the author will , I hope , conclude , that what he has written , he sincerely believes to be true . Those who do not
know him will , I trust , give him credit for candour and consistency , and pardon his faults . To the public 1 humbly consign the work , and whilst In form 1 dedicate it to no individual , in substance I devote it to the service of every one /'P . 393 .
Mr . Thomas speaks his mind upon topics on which fashion { describes silence . He says , for instance , of Gibbon ' s infidel chanter what most men think , t ho null few would dare to
May it publicly : cc Gibbon has been bitterly censured lor introducing his sceptical views with regard to Christianity into his History of the Fall of the Roman Empire , but I question much whether there is a full measure of independent justice in the reproach . Had the theme been other than religious , the gall of his calumniators would have been less virulent . Let
fair and impartial men answer the questions which I am about to propose to them , in the sincerity of their hearts : — - Was Gibbon under any obligation to the world to conceal his honest opinions
with respect to the growth of that faith , the progress of which he related historically ? Or was it any thing more than candid for him to divulge , without deceit or dissimulation , doubts which occurred to hint on that same subject of
Untitled Article
which he was writing ? Suppose , fof . instance , that I , a Christian by conviction , were to write a history of " Turkey in the course of which I must necessarily allude to the progress of Muhameddan - iam : should I subject myself to just condemnation by stating explicitly the
reasons which I believed to have operated in accelerating the growth and nourishing the creed of Mussulmen ? And would it lessen my worth , if my speculations upon that subject were untrue ? Would it not be a sufficient defence of rny character , if not of my literary reputation , that my declarations or suggestions wer ^
sincerely avowed ? And yet , what alone would constitute the real difference between Gibbon and myself ? He has written of Christianity ; I should write of Muhameddanism . He expressed what he thought . So should 1 express myself . The inference is clear . "—Pp 25 , 26 .
In the same spirit , he writes very freely , Imt we think very justly , of thie affected terror at the names of three other celebrated Unbelievers : ** A thrill of horror generally succeed * the mention of the names of Voltaire , Rousseau and Paine . But why should we despise the memory of those men ? Because they were mistaken in their opinions—because they erred in their
conclusions—because they opposed our system—or because they laboured iudefatigably in what they believed to be the cause of truth ? No , forbid it , generosity ! Forbid it , all ye Christian virtues \ ' But / say many , * it was impossible , had they diligently and sincerely searched for truth , for them not to discover it . ' Does every man , then , who diligently and sincerely seeks the truth find it ? Is no one involuntarily mistaken ? Is it a crime to be in error ? Arc we doinj * as
we would be done by , when we unhesitatingly and unthinkingly condemn lu > stubborn hypocrites , men whose intellectual powers were majestically
grandmen whose eagle-eyes sought for the . sun of truth , but could not find it—but who , had they happily discovered that orb of glory , would have gazed at it without confusion and with intense delight ? The authors to whom I refer greatly expanded the intellectual horizon of man , by their arduously-philosophical inquiries , notwithstanding their opposition to our theological system . They thought as few men can think—they wrote as few men can write , and pure Christianity will rather pity than vilify them , for the errors which we believe them to have fallen into . Their erroneous views <> the ChrifUian dispensation will not injure
Untitled Article
356 Review . — Thomas ' s Thought-Book .
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1826, page 356, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2549/page/40/
-