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tion of the public m general , agrees with Mr . Locke and many other liberal and enlightened Christians , that the faith of future life through Christ is the one true faith , the only faith which can have the requisite influence on the conduct of mankind . In the first part of his volume he has collected the authorities from which he deduces this satisfactory
conclusion . It appears to have been the uniform tenor of the apostles' preaching , as reported by St . Luke , more especially of the Apostle Paul , who himself declares to the Ephesian elders that he kept back nothing that was profitable unto them , testifying both to Jews and
Greeks , repentance towards God and faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ . This , therefore , we have every reason to conclude , is the faith delivered to the saints ; which , if firmly and devoutly received , and manifesting its influence on the heart and life , is declared to be sufficient for salvation . " Whosoever
beheveth that Jesus is the Messiah is bom of God . " " Jesus saith unto her , I am the way , and the truth , and the life ; he that believeth in me shall never die . " The remainder of the volume is occupied with an elaborate examination of
several controverted doctrines , particularly the opinions by various sects on a future state , on atonement , redemption , and the new covenant , on original sin , and on the Lord ' s supper . On the first of these points , he maintains the doctrine of an intermediate state of
consciousness between death and the resurrection , founded in a great measure on a literal interpretation of such passages as the parable of the rich man and Lazarus . In drawing this conclusion , he frankly acknowledges in the preface , that he has been influenced by a sort of partiality which we are at a loss to comprehend . < c The prospect of an unconscious sleep until the day of judgment , is so extremelv cheerless and
unconsolatory , appears , from the length of time the unconsciousness may continue , to be so near and like to eternal death ; that he experienced , he must own , and he thinks every other man in the same inquiry must experience — a hope too cJosely allied with particular idesire to leave the mind uninfluenced by a . tendency to prefer the doctrine of intermediate being , in a state of sensibility , to life . " P . xviii .
Upon this , which after all is a question of feeling merely , we shall be contented to speak for ourselves , and declare that if there is one doctrine more
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than another maintained , as we think without sufficient authority by Christian sects , which appears to us unsatisfactory , cheerless and gloomy , fitted to inspire the soul with dread and anxious solicitude , it is that of an intermediate state . The scriptural notion of death as a sleep ( not of the body only , for though this writer insists Upon it , no such distinction is to b , e found there ) appears beyond all comparison more soothing and consolatory . As for the length of time the unconsciousness may continue , ( granting for the sake of argument that this long period is really to elapse , — which again is an idea founded solely on the literal interpretation , perhaps unwarranted , of the highly figurative descriptions of the day of judgment , ) it cannot , we should think , be a difficult matter to convince any person , who ever passed a night in sound sleep , that this is a mere fallacy , and that relatively to each individual the thousauds of years supposed to intervene between death and the resurrection will be annihilated ;
so that the practical effect is the same as if no interval , or only such a one as a night spent in sleep , divided the two events . Nothing , we conceive , can be more fanciful and precarious than the arguments so frequently drawn from the minor and ( if we may be allowed the expression ) ornamental details of our Saviour ' s parables . In the present instance we may learn what the parable appears to have been intended to teach , — a valuable lesson on the use and
abuse of riches , and on the different comparative estimate of moral character and the outward distinctions of this life , in the sight of God and of men ; but any minute particulars as to the time or place 3 or manner of our existence between death and the resurrection , there is no reason to believe that it was intended to communicate . The author forcibly argues against
eternal punishments , but contends for that of the destruction of the wicked , which he somewhat strangely maintains to he no punishment . This portion of the work is concluded by a short reference to the question of mutual recognition in the next world , in which the
author inclines to the negative opinion . The same principle of reasoning , to whose influence he pleads guilty in the former discussion , would here induce us to espouse the affirmative ; and to us the passages usually relied upon , which are duly produced , appear not indeed decisive , but sufficient to encourage the be-
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Crkicfd Notices . —Theological . 629
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1830, page 629, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2588/page/45/
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