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Untitled Article
respecting the existence of general laws also in the moral world cause and effect , cause and effect , cause and effect , —and to a fair examination of the evidence whether the laws of the moral world are more liable to interruption than the laws of the material world . And , thirdly , we shall unite the physical and the moral
evidence in a great practical conclusion , namely , that if mail de « sires to attain all the blessings which physical and moral laws are capable of being made the means of producing , he must leam to use all the powers given him by the Creator , namely , by employing good causes that good effects may follow , and by superseding bad causes in order that bad effects may cease .
I need not tell you that a very different estimate of divine providence and of human duty is too commonly held . In a volume entitled Essays on Cowper , Newton , and Heber , I have endeavoured to develope some important errors which would employ imagination , not for its legitimate objects , but in the place of reason . In the beginning of the volume I have endeavoured
to develope the feelings and imaginations of Cowper and Newton , and Scott and Guion . It is impossible not to sympathize with these excellent persons , whether we consider the interest which attaches to the individual , or the importance which belongs to the subject . I have then endeavoured to follow the plan I have been urging on your attention ; that is ., I have attempted to
proceed from a developement of what was sincerity in the person to a developement of what is truth in the thing . And I hope that those I may interest in the feelings and imaginations of Cowper and Newton , of Scott and Guion , will be led on to investigate the facts and principle respecting human nature and the Divine government , about which , these unquestionably sincere persons had surely not attained to truth . After endeavouring to develope
these truths , as they relate to private life , I have proceeded to an explanation of them , as they relate to public life ; showing that the same errors , which made Cowper desponding and Newton fanatical , have prevented nations attaining the most important blessings , and have hurried them into the greatest evils . I could wish to be permitted to read these essays , adding such illustrations as would occur to me in the perusal , to the members of this institution . A fair illustration would be thus afforded of the
evening readings I have proposed , by which printed books may be prevented becoming dead letters , namely , by being read aloud , commented on , and discussed . As all I ask is a fair hearing and fair discussion , and that in the spirit of serious and earnest inquiry , truth could not be injured , and sincerity ought not to feel offended , by being put to so fair a test .
I cannot consider the subjects I have proposed to you foreign from the objects of your institution . On the contrary , when I see bigotry of opinion and fanaticism of feeling on the one side , and scepticism about foundation truths , and anarchy about the
Untitled Article
8 T 8 The Dijffh * iori of Knowledge amongst the People .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1834, page 278, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2632/page/46/
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