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shall render our conceptions pure , our love will be also pure ; that is , we shall be perfect . It is clear that our conceptions must become refined and exalted in proportion to the advancement of the intellect : that the philosopher who explores the recesses of the human mind , and watches the operations of its -atmft * m _ . _ -A .
delicate machinery , must form a less inadequate idea of the wisdom of its maker than the being who is scarcely conscious of having a mind : that the philanthropist who acquaints himself with the joys and sorrows of the inhabitants of every clime , must have a truer notion of Divine Benevolence than the mind , however sensitive , whose range of sympathies is confined within a narrow circle . It is true that all the knowledge which has ever been attained appears to be little more than an indication of what remains to be
unfolded ; but every acquisition makes us better acquainted with the wisdom which planned so vast a creation , the power which effected it , and the goodness which gradually discloses its wonders and its beauties . Not only are our conceptions of the Divine perfections enlarged by the growth of the intellect ; they are also purified by its activity . Apparent imperfections vanish , difficulties disappear , and perplexities are unravelled as our inquiries proceed , till we are enabled not only to hope but to believe that all blemishes exist in the organ of vision alone , and not in the object contemplated .
When we discover that a variety of purposes is answered by an instrument of whose use we were once ignorant , that apparent evil issues in a preponderance of good , and that the good in which we rested as an end is still made subservient to some greater good , we rise to a higher and a higher conception of our ulterior destination , and , consequently , to a more correct understanding of our present duty . While bound to obedience as strictly as when a parent ' s frown awed our childhood , that obedience becomes
exalted towards perfect freedom ; because the more justly we appreciate the relations of things to each other , the more nearly we view them as God views them , the less inconsistent will be our desires , the less opposed our wills to his . While we stand in the circumference of the world of mind , our observations must be not only obscure but partial ; and the nearer we
approach the centre , the more correct will be our views , and the more will they approximate to His who is there enthroned : the more clearl y shall we see that to acquaint ourselves with Him is to be at peace ; that toils issue in satisfaction , sufferings in repose , struggles in victory , obedience in perfect liberty .
It is clear that these enlarged conceptions are at open war with the popular notions whose prevalence yet causes so fearful an amount of misery to feeling hearts and tender consciences . The transports of the elect and the horrors of the reprobate can derive no sanctions from the discoveries of the advancing intellect , and are already subsiding into a more rational appreciation of the obligation to obedience , and of its promised rewards . It is more readily admitted than formerly , that creeds cannot effect an uniformity of
belief , and that the will of God may be more clearl y understood . from his word , than through the interpretations of unauthorized persons . The more able we become to form our conceptions of the Divine perfections from the elements which he administers , the more willing we stall be to trace out his purposes for ourselves ; to inform ourselves from the most authentic source respecting the obligations of duty , and the true spirit of the laws by which our obedience is to be regulated . By the exercise of this freedom of in-
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Essnys on the Art of Thinking . 819
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1829, page 819, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2579/page/3/
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