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Untitled Article
subjection but to Him whose yoke is easy and his burden light . The author begins by anxiously bespeaking the reader ' s attention to his explanation of the purpose for which his work was prepared , and of the persons to whom it is offered : he recurs frequently in his subsequent chapters to the danger of false dependence , and of a superstitious regard to forms , and ends with a representation of a more advanced state , when the discipline of life may be allowed to supersede in part that which is self-imposed .
The object of the work , —to aid those who are weak in the faith , —is sufficiently shewn by the " author ' s choice of his first topic . He begins by explaining the nature of religion , and exhibiting the true aim of those who inquire after it : and he then inquires into the power possessed by each individual to achieve this aim . No part of the volume has interested us
more than that which treats of the state of mind in which the pursuit should be embraced ; of the means by which the infant emotions of piety should 4 > e cherished , while they are preserved from the weakening excitements of publicity , and the depraving influences of a sympathy too extensive for their limited powers . The directions as to the conduct of religious reading and meditation are useful and unexceptionable . We should say the same
for the portion on prayer , but that we question whether it be not somewhat too minute in some of its directions , —such as those from pp . 94—96 . We highly approve the remarks and directions respecting public worship , though they help to prove , perhaps unconsciously to the author , that a great change must take place in the conduct of public worship before it can be made so powerful a means of influence as it might become . We are rather surprised at the importance Mr . Ware appears to attach to the rite of the Lord ' s Supper , as a means of religious advancement . We know how important it is to some ( we hope but a few ) to be taught that it is a
tneans and not an end $ but we should scarcely have described its influences so as to imply ( as this part of the work appears to us to do ) that it may be made of equal efficacy with the public and private offices of worship which have the Father for their sole object . Of the temper of this little volume we cannot speak too highly , —of the piety , the benevolence , the meekness , which pervade its entire texture . It in no cases falls below its very modest pretensions ; and if the enlightened and advanced Christian should find nothing new in a treatise which was not designed for such as he , he cannot but be touched by the congeniality of spirit which he will feel breathing from every page . Society owes much to Mr . Ware for thus aiming to direct the formation of the Christian character : perhaps the debt would be more than doubled if he would next illustrate its progression * Such illustrations we are perpetually furnished with , in a partial manner , by the sermons we hear and read ; but there is ample room yet for a display of the various aspects under which Christian progression manifests itself amidst the varieties of circumstance in which
Untitled Article
808 On the Formation of the Christian Character .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1831, page 808, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2604/page/12/
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