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INTELLIGENCE.
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Untitled Article
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Untitled Article
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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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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Intelligence.
INTELLIGENCE .
Untitled Article
Unitarianism in Guernsey . Sir , The existence of a Unitarian congregation in the island of Guernsey is a fact with which many of your readers are probably unacquainted . Having recently visited the island and become personally
known to some of the members of the congregation , f am desirous of occupying your pages with a few remarks respecting it ; and I indulge the hope that my communication may interest a portion of your readers , and excite their sympathy at least in favour of a church of
Christians which is , in more than one sense , insulated . Before I visifced the island I knew that a few Unitarians resided upon it ; but the circumstances which called for my presence there , were of such a painful
nature as forbade my seeking them on my arrival . As soon as these circumstances permitted , we were introduced to each other , and I must express the satisfaction I experienced in the brief intercourse I had with them before my return .
I need scarcely observe that the congregation is small ; but the principal members of which it is composed are men of inquiring minds , and although , for the most part , closely engaged in business , have possessed themselves of considerable information , especially on religious subjects . They are decidedly Unitarian ; and the course of inquiry
which they have pursued in attaining to a belief in the strict unity of God , whilst it has fully sa'isfied their own minds , has qualified them for defending their oplnious against the attacks of their brethren who differ from them . Before thfcy adopted the sentiments they now hold , they formed a part of the society of Methodists . Dissatisfied with some
of the tenets of that sect , they met together in private for the purposes of examination and discussion : the doctrine of eternal punishment was one of the first subjects to which their attention was directed , and having rejected this as nnscriptural , they proceeded , step by step , to that eminence on which , in my view , they are placed ; they rejected the common dogmas of orthodoxy , and embraced the truth as it is m Jesus .
Untitled Article
That such proceedings would be relished by the society to which they belouged , was not to be expected . On the contrary , they soon incurred the odium which so frequently and unjustly falls upon those who deserve even the highest praises of their brethren . Religious animosity was soon excited against them . Calumnies were invented and circulated
to their prejudice ; and all that bigotry could do was effected to terrify them from proceeding . But they were not to be deterred from the objects of their pursuit by the unrighteous zeal of their neighbours ; they felt themselves bound ,
by a sacred obligation , to seek even at its source the light of truth which was dawning on their minds , and the obligation was fulfilled . The resu . lt of their investigations has been already mentioned— they became Unitarians from the study of the Scriptures alone .
Is it not , Sir , a cause for rejoicing , when we toehold our fellow-Christians gradually emancipating themselves from prejudice and every other bias or the mind , and attaining to that glorious liberty with \ Vhich Christ has made them free ? And does it not add even to the
strength of our own convictions of religious truth , when we know that from the Scriptures , and from these alone , they derive the same convictions ? Such was the case with the small band of inquirers at Guernsey . Ignorant of the existence of Unitarianism , unaided by
the personal services or the writings of those who profess it , they became Unitarians . And such is the consequence of a free , manly , and dispassionate investigation of the volume of revelation—such the power and the majesty of divine truth !
Having imbibed these sentiments , ttyey were no longer able to worship as they had been wont , even if their late associates had desired to retain them in their connexion . They proceeded , therefore , to form themselves into a church , and this they did by solemnly binding themselves to the observance of a small
number of articles , which were not so much articles of faith as of conduct , requiring only such a confession as is purely scriptural , and insisting upon the performance of the many personal aud relative duties prescribed and sauctioned by their divine
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1830, page 134, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2581/page/62/
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