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Untitled Article
ciples had I taken less pains in the business than I actually have , —and because I have thought it my duty to take pains in acquiring thorough information upon the subjects treated of in the lectures , —behold , I am all at once incapacitated for the office I sustain , and am doomed , together with my lucubrations , to retire to silence , solitude , and oblivion . After all , I don ' t repent of what I have done . —I am in the hand of a wise and good Providence . —If I
am to be honoured as an instrument of further service , some door of usefulness will be opened before me ; and though it is painful to be laid aside in the midst of life * yet if such is the will of my heavenly Father , I would bow to his disposal with an unrepining heart , and say , ' Thy will be done . ' <( Believe me , my dear friend , " Yours very sincerely and affectionately , T . Belsham .
< Daventry , March 3 , 1 / 89 . " The lingerings of human feeling , the decision of a sincere lover of truth , and the humble resignation to the Divine Will of a genuine servant of Christ , are beautifully exemplified in these letters . If we look to the fruits of this conversion to Unitarianism , none of those deadly symptoms are to be perceived which should have followed an apostacy from saving truth to fatal error . Unitarianism is said to tend to Infidelity ; and Mr . Belsham ^ s mind was not one to stop short of the legitimate consequences of any tenet which he held , however obnoxious those consequences might be . What are the traces of this tendency during the forty years of his life which followed , and which were dedicated to the service of
Christianity with an undiminished sense of its worth , reliance on its promises , and zeal for its promotion ? His latest and his constant feeling on this subject appears in the last paragraph of his last published work . He is discoursing on the Cessation of Miraculous Powers after the Age of the Apostles , and concludes thus :
" There is in the divine religion of Jesus , as it is exhibited in the records of the New Testament , a simplicity , an energy , a majesty , which at once irradiates the understanding and convinces the judgment , which captivates and rules the heart . It disdains the disgraceful support of fictitious miracles and pious frauds . It asks not the continuance even of those real and splendid displays of divine power which were necessary to its first introduction .
Christianity stands alone . Under the protection of Divine Providence , it has home the shock of more than seventeen centuries . And it is now more deeply rooted than ever . It shall endure and flourish till the end of time ; and revolving centuries shall but add to its beauty and its glory ; till in the end its branches shall extend over the whole earth , and all the nations shall he gathered under its shadow . Hasten , O Lord , this glorious period . May thy kingdom come !"—Sermons , Vol . II . p . 495 .
This is not the language of a mind which was disaffected towards Divine Revelation , and it well corresponds with the tenour of his feelings and conduct . No deficiency of zeal for what he deemed sacred truth will be alleged against him ; and yet his piety was unimpaired by his habits of controversy . The deep reverence of his devotion was exceedingly impressive ; yet it was
not further removed from the offensive familiarity in prayer which some assume , than from the slavish terror of superstitious worship . Of his faithfulness as a Christian pastor , we shall have to speak presently . Of his deportment in social life , how many of us there are who can attest the accuracy of the picture which A Sincere Mourner has drawn ! " Nothing could exceed the amenity of Mr . Bclshain ' s manners in social life . With talents and attainments that rendered him so much an object of
Untitled Article
On the Character and Writings of the Rev , T . Belsham . 81
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1830, page 81, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2581/page/9/
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