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Untitled Article
prophets no harm . " ( P . 7 . ) Mr . Wild further discusses ail the possible motives that could have prompted' ( the Letter to the Archbishop . Mr . Be * verley writes " from no good-will to the Church" ( p . 9)—this is very clear ; " perhaps from pique * - ~ vre \ l may Mr . Wild apologize in his parenthesis " ( pardon the suspicion ) : " * ' Surely Mr . B * is not an Unbeliever , a Deist ,
or if it were possible , an Atheist ! And yet , Sir , I will candidly confess to you that I am not without my suspicions , " &c * If Mr . Wild were entitled to information on these points , we could relieve him from the apprehension of having touched the putrifying sores of Atheism , by assuring him that his antagonist is thoroughly orthodox in doctrine as any man out of the Church of England can possibly be . These and other preliminaries being disposed of , Mr . Wild discusses the alleged difference between the primitive church
and the English , in the manner already noticed . Other parts of his opponent ' s Letter he professes to answer from his own admissions , and displays , on the title-page , the critical principle professed in his discussion , oc r ? a-6 ^ atqs Kptyti < re . Now , though it is on trifling points that Mr . Beverley is cited to answer Mr . Beverley , he ought certainly to be allowed to speak without an interpreter and without being interrupted . Is this the case ? Is the argument ex tS < t 6 i * utq <; fairly conducted ? Let the following instances shew .
Mr . Beverley had not a little disparaged the learning of the clergy . " I shall be satisfied , " says Mr . Wild , ( pp . 36 , 37 , ) " with resting the whole question upon your own authority I All knowledge , * you distinctly tell us , ( p . 32 , ) both in spiritual and temporal learning , is within the pale of the Church / although choked up and suffocated . * ' The words came out from the adversary ' s mouth in a slightly different order , but with a
wonderfully different meaning , as p . 32 , so boldly referred to , witnesses . Here the writer thus extols the clerical learning which he had elsewhere depreciated : " All knowledge , both in spiritual and temporal learning , is choked up and suffocated within the pale of the Church ; but without it there is a sunshine of information , some slight recompense for the dreary scene within . " We make no comment on this part of controversial tactics ;
but give another specimen not quite so bad i Mr . Beverley , after inveighipg powerfull y against the system of family aggrandizement so notoriously p ractised by the heads of the Church , concedes ( p . 13 ) , that " cceteris paribus , it is not very monstrous for a father to reward his sons , if the reward is not excessive , and if they who receive the reward are at least on a moral and intellectual par with the
majority of those who are capable of receiving such rewards . " How ingeniously is this admission employed in defence of Episcopal greediness , and backed by Scripture into the bargain !
" * That a father , ' even- as a bishop , * should reward his sons / is admitted by yourself % o be * not very monstrous * " ( the proviso is forgotten ) ; " but is made by the word of God a general and imperative duty : ' If any man
Untitled Article
632 Qn ike Corrupt State of the Church of England .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1831, page 632, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2601/page/56/
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