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applauses of a train of enthusiasts , and an infatuated multitude repeated them . . But this triumph lasted only for a day . These proud adversaries are dead , and the book lives . Modern ages , witnesses and judges of these contests , are , m respect of books , richer and more difficult to please , than any which have preceded them . Woe to the writer who , without style or method , should attempt to find a public _ to read him . The New Testament has neither method nor style , yet it reigns with more decided sway over our own than over
preceding ages . In a word , at the end of eighteen centuries this book is as applicable , as important , as much respected , as it was at first . It is even more so ; for being now contemplated at a greater distance , and by more enlightened spectators , its general character and its distinguishing features are better discerned . Its contemporaries called it an inspired book ; since that time sixty generations have passed away , and civilized societies still give it the same name . Deep and impartial thinkers declare even , that of all books in existence this is that whicii contains the greatest amount of useful truth and of just philosophy .
" I know not , for my part , how to explain this phenomenon except by divine inspiration , and to me this single proof would be sufficient . Though I had not , in favour of this grand system , either the miracles , the predictions , the rapidly-spread doctrine , or the character of Christ , nor yet the character ofthe apostles , their uniform declarations , and their martyrdom , this fact of the fate of the book , of its intellectual and moral excellence , compared with the incapacity of its authors , would alone convince me . I know by whom this book was written ; i know also what the Jews of that age were able to do :
I study the book , and view it in relation to the wants of our learned and intelligent age . I see it in advance of civilization , still serving as a goal ifor the human race , which progresses and yet reaches it not , sometimes without knowing it . I see that instead of tending to bring me back towards the ages of ignorance , in whicii it was written , it pushes me forward in an indefinite progress of knowledge , virtue , and philanthropy . In one word , I see it not Jewish like its authors , but universal , eternal , heavenly . From this moment ray conviction is complete , and I name it with respect The Word of God . " —Pp . 353—357 .
We find but little to object to in the work before us , and shall only mention , that we cannot agree with Monsieur Celle > ier in thinking that a special interposition of Providence is necessary to account for the success of the Bible Society , N . T . p . 369 ; nor yet can we believe that Uzza was guilty of no sin when lie applied his hand to the tottering ark , 1 Chron . xiii . 9—11 . " Could not He , " asks M . C , " who calls upon all the children of Adam , sooner or later , to give back their mortal covering * to the earth ; who has
made them , what they are , and measured to them according to his good pleasure their portion 01 existence , —could not he without injustice take an innocent man from the world at one moment rather than another , when this death was necessary to the instruction of contemporaries , and would to them appear juBt ? - * -when it would be the means of saving them from crime ? God meant that they who witnessed the infliction , should regard it as the punishment of a fault , and the fault as worthy of death—this is all that we can affirm , but there is no proof that God really meant to punish . How do we know that this death was not even a reward ?"—O . T . p . 45 .
And he afterwards represents the people as contemplating . the corpse of the deceased with terror , " While the soul of the pious Uzza , quitting with joy this world of trouble , rises doubtless in triumph to the abode of bliss—already it reposes with delight in the bosom of its God !"—P . 47-Now to us it appears , that if Uzza was innocent , his death was not to be
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Cellerier ' s Discourses on the Old and New Testament . 691
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1829, page 691, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2577/page/19/
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