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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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( 599 )
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CONSCIENTIOUS DEISM .
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I can fancy an amiable , but , as I conceive , mistaken Deist , devoutly desiring to pass the time of his sojourn here holily and happily . I can believe that his ideas , of the Divine Being are , in the main , pure , correct , and efficacious , ( though to their maintenance in the heart one striking means be wanting , ) because I believe that , whether the Unbeliever discerns
it or no , they are really derived from Christian sources ; and I doubt not that such a man may make out , completely to his own satisfaction , and for the right governance of his conduct , the doctrine of a future state . He may feel as strongly persuaded of the indestructibility of the spiritual part of man and of the necessity of its purification from the defilements of earth before it can truly be at peace with its Creator , as any Christian . There is no occasion to number up all the hopes and fears , the emotions of adoration , love ,
trust , and joyful gratitude , which may visit the mind of such an one , during his pilgrimage through life ; for these , to a certain degree , will be the same with those of the more comprehensive believer ; like him , he will have constant communings in his own spirit with celestial wisdom ; like him , though not in the same words , nor refreshed by the memory of the same examples , nor strengthened by the same sweet words of promise , will he pray : God in his mercy add unto him what is wanting , and inspire all
Christian hearts with all that he possesses of sincerity , simplicity , and honest desire to know and do what is right ! Allowing to the Deist so ranch as this , and believing that he sometimes , in high moral excellence , may deserve to rank with the brightest lights of the Christian world , my heart is better prepared to speak with him of the gospel of Christ . I view him , not as a scoffer , or " accuser of the brethren ; " were it so , the division would begin from the root , and in vain might we look for a similarity of thought , or feeling , or idea , on which to ground our union . But in a Deist ,
such as I have depicted , there is the root of Christianity ; it is impossible to deny it . Love to God and love to man , the two great requirements of the law , regulate his actions , and so far he is , most assuredly , and call him so I must , a Christian . And will he not helieve me , then , when I say that I sorrow for him , not with low , contemptuous , or arrogant pity , but as beholding " wisdom at one entrance quite shut out" from the mind of a brother and a friend ? I see him closing and forsaking the volume from whence I believe his purest thoughts , his richest consolations are derived . I trace in his soul the lineaments of the blessed Jesus , and can I do
otherwise than grieve to think that a train of sophistical reasoning , while it has had no power to corrupt his heart , has blinded the eyes of his understanding , and taught him to consider that Being , in the view of whose pure and lovely character he never can be a sceptic , as either a deceiver or deceived , as pretending to a Divine commission , while every part of his conduct displayed abhorrence of deceit , guileless purity , and self-denying virtue ? The state of such a man's mind is altogether an unnatural and painful
contem plation . We know of nothing analogous to it . Receiving and yet rejecting ; loving , yet denying the justice of his grounds for love and esteem ; doing violence to his own heart , or to the Sacred Record every hour . From such a state it is not possible a man should be extricated by any process of reasoning ; he must be touched by a feeling of his own inconsistencies ! : we could not perhaps , indeed , wish him worse than that his argumentative powers might be quickened and sharpened to their utmost by some formidable attack from a learned opponent , for then he would be tinder the
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1830, page 599, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2588/page/15/
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