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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.
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When we speak of ? t * atwal ; T ^ c ^^ up before us ; the great works of CFeatjpn / tire mighty d | e |) , th ^ everlasting mountains , the heaven with all its shining hosts ; th ^ nearer wonders of our own frames , the miracles of support , preservation , ftiad recovery / all crowd upon our recollection—all come to bear witness of Diviae Power and Good * ness . But how id it , that the power w-hich-is greatec than all material might ; that which summons all nature to its tribunal and is obeyed , should be , as it often is , our last remembered proof of the presence of the
Divinity ? Our speculations concerning external nature are valuable and interesting in their degree > but they fade into nothing as to any power we possess of personal application , when compared to the knowledge which may be gathered up from within . There is , indeed , no natural theology like the theology whose root is in the deep , unfathomable foundations of our own spiritual nature * What is it to us- that goodttess is manifested in our corporeal structure , if the insatiable desires of the soul are unsatisfied by the most plenteous allotment of bodily endowments ? We take counsel with our own spirits : we find , amid all the traces of good which the out- ' ward world may have left there , a fitted * unaccountable idea , that every
separate thing we have beheld Or felt , might be better : no pleasure so pure has visited us ,, no form so perfect has met our view , no proof so strong had been presented to our roinds > but thai something purer , more perfect , more strong , is conceivable . Let human nature be taken at its highest or lowest estate , still the fact is undeniable ; for the question is not , whether , in man's most degraded and savage condition , his ideas of what is perfection resemble
our own ; but whether * just as much as ours , Aw hopes and conceptions do not go beyond hti realities : whether , m proportion to bis degree of cultivation , his proofs of a power superior to himself ate not equally strong with our own . If they are * then we have a ftiot which may truly be called a religious fact * and one which speaks more loudly of a higher ( power than any result of outward examination whatever ; it cannot be from outward realities that we have attained the idea of that which has not been to us
outwardly realized . It cannot be from disappointment that we hayq learnt to hope , nor from eroptinesa that we have imbibed fujinesa . Wb « t is human cannot have Communicated what is divine . To slight ^ vidence ^ fco universall y * indelibly impressed , so intimately interwoven with our whole nature * ( evidences to which no others admit of a comparison ^ is not in character with the creature who is conscious to himself of being-. die effect of creative power and love ; nor Ought wb * because it has pleased the Almighty to su * peradd external proofe , and to ^ ftdufe us with the |^ wer of demonstrating to the
the outward eye the BkMrfbffa ^ preservation of an important part of tb « anjmal organizafion , to disregard those higher powers by whic | v # e # ayp thesd itttetfnai evidences , ^ tea ** l ^ f ^ Going back to first principles * and riot speculating , but calmly considering the original constitution of rnan ^ - * to as our own err or * and weakness allows We tatmot fail of '^( teiving ite ^ owhle ^ fc * of material proofs as
applied to spiritual thiog ^ ftfcd the inequality * between those visible objects winch i ^ rve to the outward ft ^ virtue ^ and the invisible sources of those objects , Exactly in proportion to the degnoe in whtbh the heart has felt the worth of these proofs , will be its value for scripture revelation . Philosophic language may never have been
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NATURAL ^ BraJbtQC-y , * , ^ , -r-: ¦ .. ¦ ¦ .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1828, page 769, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2566/page/41/
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