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Untitled Article
We have endeavoured with some care to ascertain what , in the opinion of the author , is the nature of that faith which secures the blessings of redemption ; but , though the longest of these discourses is devoted to the subject , our endeavour has been ineffectual . Our only satisfaction is in finding what it is not . It is not a cold persuasion of the truth of Christianity , or a speculative belief of its essential doctrines : it is not the particular act of "
laying hold on the righteousness of Christ ; " it is not the Antinomian grace which flourishes the more eminently the more it is disconnected with works ; nor is it an arbitrary condition of salvation , the purpose of which can no more be discerned by us than by Abraham , the first eminent example of it . If the writer means to give his own views in saying , that " the essence of
justifying faith consists , not in the reception of any one particular truth , but in the disposition to receive all truth on the testimony of God , " we need only remind him that this justifying faith , evidenced by holy works , has been and is entertained in an eminent degree by very many whom the doctrines of his church and the anathemas of its ministers have consigned to perdition .
The effect of the practical teachings of this volume is considerably impaired by the indistinctness of thought and expression which we have already noticed , and which must be in part ascribed to the darkness and perplexity of the system of doctrines of which they treat . It grieves us to observe how the bright . revelation which is at the same time expansive enough to overinform the loftiest intellect and simple enough to be comprehended bv the
humblest , should be so encumbered by false metaphysics , so parcelled out by man ' s cunning , and so perverted by his folly , as to retain thousands in the bondage of doubt and fear , and overthrow instead of establishing the the peace of a multitude of its believers . The author of these discourses seems fully to share our regret ; for , in treating of the nature of a saving faith , he says ,
" It seems improbable that a matter of immediate practical importance , interesting to the most unlettered of the followers of Christ , should require abstruseness of reasoning " , or the aids of a recondite philosophy , to make it intelligible . In fact , to a simple mind , a humble heart , an unsophisticated soul , it presents no real difficulties . Nor would it have occasioned so many fruitless controversies , had not a narrow and technical , theology usurped the place of that divine religion , which , rising above every species of metaphysical refinement , and spurning * the trammels of human system , addresses itself to the
conscience and to the heart . There are questions in philosophy and in religion which the human intellect can neither solve nor reconcile . We are ignorant of the first principles , the universal truths by which they might be explained , and into which they are resolvable ; and by the premature attempt to reduce every thing to system , while boundless regions in the universe of mind remain still unexplored , even the few truths we possess are perverted ; and the majestic simplicity of the gospel being loaded with artificial distinctions , presents no reply to the urgent inquiry , ' What must I do to be saved ?' but a perplexing riddle . "—P . 61 .
The awful consequences of perplexity respecting the conditions of salvation may be anticipated by the reflective mind ; and prophecies and warnings have been held out since the first days of Calvinism by the enlightened advocates of a simpler faith . That the evils predicted by them have long gained ground in the church of Calvin , we have been fully aware ; but never before have we met with so ample a testimony to the low spiritual state of the sect as is given in the work before us . It is no spy from the enemy ' s camp who reports that a pestilence is weakening the forces ; it is a
Untitled Article
Hull's Discourses . 593
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1830, page 593, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2588/page/9/
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