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poses go secretly to mass , and are Catholics without daring to confess it . In the Reformed Church the evil is still greater ; Protestantism has a still larger number of secret disciples , who may be divided into two classes . In the first we may place all those Catholics , who are Catholics no longer , whose hearts have renounced the worship , and who neglect even its exterior observances . These have but one step more to make towards us , but this
last step they do not take ; they are on the threshold , but they enter not ; they touch the door of the holy place , and they sometimes lift up their hands , but they do not knock . Ah , that they could be persuaded that the door will not open of its own accord ! In the same class we must place those who are Protestants by birth , education , and name , who were communicants in their youth , and who appear to have renounced their worship and forgotten the road to the temple . Perhaps , with the hel p of an almanac
, ) hey may recollect the birth of their Saviour on the 25 th of December , or his resurrection the first Sunday after the first full moon of the vernal equinox , and they may undertake to present themselves and perform an act of devotion with their brethren . They are Protestants every where but in a Protestant church . This fatal dread of making a profession extends even to
Judaism : Jews have been known to baptize their children , and to continue Jews . Let us not shun to declare that they thus offend both Moses and Christ . —We will now examine the motives which keep these lukewarm admirers at a distance from the God they adore ; let us weigh them in the balance , and call this species of piety by its true name . An over anxiety about the things of this world is a principal ingredient in it .
There are many who do not allow themselves leisure to be religious , or to profess any religion . Amongst their days there is no Sabbath ; they know , indeed , that one day in seven , courts of justice , government offices , counting-houses , and shops , are all shut , but it never occurs to them that the temples are open . Such men live for the purpose of living , and only forget that life is terminated by death , and revives in eternity . Another actuating motive in the two classes of anonymous Protestants which we have
mentioned is pride . They have conceived a distaste for the worship whose simplicity they theoretically admire . Their fastidiousness is annoyed at the unpolished plainness of expression in our beautiful Liturgy ; the obsolete words in our Psalter offend their critical acumen ; they cannot worship God in such an antiquated style ; our old-fashioned melodies grate on their ears , and how few of our preachers would they condescend to hear
to the end ! How few sermons are there deep enough to afford them instruction , or striking enough to engage their attention ! A Sermon Ithe very word disgusts them ; the word is condemned ; and Irving , the only English preacher who ever competed for a moment with the celebrated Chalmers , was so well aware of it , that , by a pitiful stratagem , he changed the name as he could not change the thing , and put forth four of his discourses under the whimsical title of " Four Orations for the
Oracles of God . " It may easily be imagined after this that edification is another obsolete word in their vocabulary . They have lost the habit , and can never resume it , till a form of worship is devised more in accordance with their superior wisdom ! In the mean time they keep aloof , and dwell in a higher sphere ; they go , like Moses , to present their devotions on the top of Mount Sinai , and like him they are hidden from the vulgar gaze by the clouds which cover its summit—the only difference in their case is , that God has not called them . Pretences as worthless as these are sufficient to detain the timid half-way between the Romish and Protestant Churches .
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# 98 Duty of avowing vur Religious Opinions .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1830, page 398, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2585/page/38/
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