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how easily men $ <* eiri to reason themselves into the opinion , that if they are otherwise virtuous , this is of no consequence . I cannot help thinking
that there is a great deal of mock morality in our country , which some really very well inclined , but weakheaded individuals , take for the sterling article . It was the opinion of the ancients that to ascend the hill of
virtue was a work of difficulty ; and our Lord says , that tc strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life , and few there be that find it . " Now is it not the fashion of the present day to place goodness in acts of very easy performance ? To speak
at meetings of Bible societies , societies for converting the Jews , and for Christianizing Africans , is not very difficult ; perhaps , in some cases , vanity may be an impelling motive ; and to listen to these harangues , when fluently delivered , is not unamusing ; to give to the support of
these societies is no great hardship ; to embrace a very copious faith is not difficult if it is previously determined to adopt a certain rule of Scripture interpretation ; and to have the appearance of holiness by professing pity for the certainly damned state of those who do not embrace the same
belief ; to call cards the devil ' s paper , and the theatre the devil ' s house , is very easy ; but to be really pious and pure , and inflexible in principle , is quite a different matter . Now 1 am inclined to suspect that the virtuous principle is not over and above firm
even with very many of these professors , and I am quite sure that political principle is ill understood by many of them , and by my countrymen at large . I do not wislrto cast any slur upon the above societies ; they must be useful to a certain
extent ; all I desire is , to guard against the idea that the countenancing of these is pre-eminently meritorious , or meritorious hardly at all , unless our hearts be pure ; and to impress upon iny country men , that the Christian obligation " to bear witness to the 1
truth ' cannot b < e confined merely to religious truth ; it cannot be confined to the maintenance , that Christianity is superior to Heathenism or Infidelity or Deism ; but that it is interwoven with all our actions , however ramified and diversified . It requires
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63 D flkara&t&r of Jpb Orton , $ fc >
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us to be honest in om d ^ liagSj jj ^ triotic in our sepate , inconmp % i ^ oup choice of our senators ; jiejt&er ou * . selves cheating , nor suffering our . selves to be the dupes of others . It requires that our laws should be as
bloodless as possible ; that slavery should not be countenanced for the sake of filthy lucre ; that we . should not content ourselves with a copious creed , nor even with a well-sifted and correct creed , but that we should be inflexible in principle and " obstinately just . " JOHJVT FULLAGAIL
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Bloaikarnf Sir , m August 7 > 1826 , 1 WAS surprised to see in the last U number of your valuable Misce
lany ( p . 384 ) the account tba , t ffae Plain Speaker , i . e . Mr . Ha&lUt > gives of the late Rev , Job Or ton . It is the first time that I have ever heard him so described , or thought of such a thing .
Mr . Orton was a native of Salop , a student whom Dr . Doddridge moat highly esteemed , and ardently wished might have been his successor in his academy ; but , from all that I have ever heard on the subject , I conclude that his ideas of the person of our blessed Lord were not what the
founder of the institution required the tutors to be ; it therefore did not take place : nor , I suppose , did the Dr . or Mr . Orton wish it should . Mr . O . was settled at Salop , and when lie had preached about thirty years , he , through bad health , resigned his sacred office and went to Kidderminster ,
in part that he might put himself under the medical care of Dr . Johnstone , who was then in high repute in that town and its neighbourhood . When I was a student at Daventry I dined , ( if at Kidderminster , and 1 was seldom absent from it , ) in all nay
long vacations , once a week , as a settled thing , at Mr . Orton ' s . His family consisted of himself , his housekeeper , a IVlrs . Holland , sister to the Rev . Air . Holland , then at Bolton in Lancashire , and a servant inaid . It
very seldom happened that there was any stranger besides myself , for Mr . Orton may be truly said to h » ve kept no company . Much food , therefore , was not necessary , and 1
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1826, page 530, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2552/page/22/
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