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Untitled Article
ing better , cry out " Infidel , ' * and give the cue to the ignorant or the bigoted . That his knowledge is not overburdensome we infer from another passage of his letter to the Editor of the Congregational Magazine . •« The Society of Friends has invariably believed in the divinity of Christ , redemption through his blood , and the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures . "
The man who could make such an assertion ( the italics in which invariably is written are his own ) can know next to nothing of history , or must otherwise be actuated by a wicked mind . Before we go on to the proofs of his assertion , we beg our readers to notice the insinuation contained in the above citation , that Unitarians do not believe in the divine authority of the Scriptures . To this we might add , taking the words in their literal meaning , " redemption through the blood of Christ . " Unitarians , whatever the
Quaker may insinuate , believe both these points , and are not , as the Quaker intimates , contradistinguished by these particulars either from the society of Friends , or any other society of Christians . We . are , we confess , in spite of all the exhibitions of a bad spirit or of culpable ignorance on the part of the orthodox , no little surprised to find a member of the meek-looking and meekspoken society of Friends thus traducing his neighbours . We would recommend him to put off some of the outward and visible signs , in exchange for more of the inward and heavenly grace . In proof of the invariable orthodoxy of the society of Friends , " our American brethren , " he says , " have * collected quotations which make up a thick octavo volume . " Out of this he makes some extracts . Let our readers judge how far the following proves that the Quakers , or rather that the writer , believed in the deity of Christ : " Jesus Christ , who is the express image of the invisible God , the first-bora
of every creature , by whom were all things created that are in heaven and in earth . " This quotation is taken from G . Fox , and is , we may suppose , the strongest that could be adduced . It proves , what ? That Fox believed in the supreme deity of Christ ?—that he was really and truly God ? No ; it proves that Fox was an Unitarian . Thus have believed and thus now believe thousands who have been branded with the name of heretic .
If any of our readers have the happiness to be acquainted with the Rev . J . J . Tayler , of Manchester , they will believe either that the writer of the following sentence has lost his wits , or that Mr . T . has recently undergone a metamorphose greater in extent and more grotesque in character than any found in Ovid . Thus speaks the Reviewer of Mr . Tayler ' s Sermon on Communion with Unbelievers , in the Congregational Magazine : " It is well
that the great enemy of God and man" ( that is , we suppose , Mr . Tayler , or Unitarianism in him embodied ) " is not always permitted successfully to veil himself in the garb of an angel of light . In his attempt to put on the fleecy cloud which does not belong to him , and to etherealize himself to the view of mortals , the arch-fiend" ( alias Mr . Tayler ) " is often found to fail ; and we clearly discern through the disguise the hideous and malignant features
of the apostate spirit and the father of lies . " ( It is not long since we saw Mr . T ., and then he looked as mild and as benevolent as ever : the writer must be beside himself . ) He goes on , however , " We were led to this reflection in opening the pamphlet before us "—( what , in the very opening of it 1 Surely the writer has strange sights . We have just looked into the pamphlet , and we declare that it has a most bland and composed aspect ) —
" which we think is charged with the rankest distillation , the very quintessence of infidelity , under the colour of reason and Christian candour , the show of which we have often regarded as an engine of spiritual seduction adopted by the power of darkness of almost equal force with his accomplish-
Untitled Article
The Watchman . 269
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1829, page 269, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2571/page/45/
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