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will be accepted by him . —On some or other of these points most of our brethren will be found to leave us , who leave the simpler faith that God is onb , and he alone to be worshiped . Candid Christians , of all persuasions , if they would consent to keep- close
to the Scriptures , might unite together with mutual edification ; and they would find that they are nearer than they had imagined : but with those who follow the creeds and systems of men , and guide their worship and their services by them , the Unitarian has too little common ground for the engagements of religious worship . Thus separated from the prevalent denominations of Christians , ought we not to cherish fellowship among each other ? Is Unitarianism so frigid a system that the genial spirit of the gospel must lose in it its warmth and its energy ? If so it is not Christianity .
We may learn much from those who , as we think , have less light than ourselves . It matters not where we see what is good ; it should , if practicable , be our desire to imitate it . It should be nothing to us , whether the good example be set by the Wesleyan , the Calvinist , the Moravian , the Evangelical , or the Orthodox Churchman . If the Unitarian be not above the prejudices of names , he at least ought not to wonder that his opponents are not . I doubt not that the time will come when Unitarians , generally , will manifest no small portion of that zeal , which at present seems to exist most where , as we believe , it is most without knowledge ; and when the Unitarian body , and its various individual communities , shall shew much of the genuine
character of the Church of Christ in its best periods;—when they shall set that example which is now often set them , of zeal for the glory of God , of cordial union with their brethren , and of earnest desire to promote the best interests of all around them . That it is not so as yet , may be the subject of reproach , and sometimes of self-reproach , but not of despair . Within the recollection of those who have not passed the middle of life , —and still more of those who themselves laboured , ( with others who have gone to their rest , ) in comparatively dark discouragement , —the dawnings of a brighter day have increasingly shewn themselves in our horizon . But that it is not yet fully come ,
should operate to urge us to embrace all feasible plans which have in view to strengthen one another ' s hands , and warm one another ' s hearts . If sometimes these appear to cooler calculators ( perhaps themselves too much biassed by the wisdom of the world ) to be in a great measure the offspring of enthusiasm , let them , on their part , produce one thing great and good which has been achieved without enthusiasm somewhere : let them remember , too , that
there is an enthusiasm which the understanding cherishes and approves ; as well as that which is the wild-fire of the feelings and the imagination : and instead of chilling it with their excessive caution , let them , partaking a little of its generous glow , aid it with the direction of their soberer judgment . The caution of benevolent prudence , and the cheering influence of faith and hope , must be united in all objects having directly in view the diffusion of truth and righteousness , as well as in all others which respect human
wellbeing . The darkest appearances often are , in the order of Divine Providence , the precursors of results on which benevolence must dwell with delight . At that all-important juncture , when " from the sixth hour darkness was over the whole land till the ninth- hour , " hope seemed ended , and to the eye of sense all was finished . It was finished , but in a far different import . As far as respected the personal services of the Saviour on earth , the work was done . The seed was sown . It was so sown that the genial influences of heaven might be confidently looked for . It was sown in tears , it was watered with blood ; but he knew that it would be reaped in joy . He knew the great
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Reasons for mutu . il Encouragement and Co-opcrati <* n . 267
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vol . in . T
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1829, page 257, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2571/page/33/
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