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and most desirous to find the truth. I must not, however, be understood to assert that, in my opinion, the probability on both sides of all such questions is equal. Speaking for myself, I must declare that the evidence in favour of excluding such theories as that of the Trinity in Unity, on the ground that they form no part of the New Testament, is sufficient to produce moral certainty. But I grant, from my own experience at one period of my life, that, under certain habits of mind, produced by the usual catechetical and scholastic instruction, and assisted by that deepseated and almost general persuasion, that all spiritual danger lies on the side of believing what is plain, and all the advantages on the side of asserting what is unintelligible and repugnant to reason-I grant that even the Athanasian Creed may appear as an essential part of the Christian doctrine. Having stated the case of Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy in a manner which gives every possible advantage to those who call themselves exclusively Orthodox, I only wish you to compare the fact laid before you with the intent and purpose of the Christian revelation: I require nothing more for my argument.

If saving faith and acceptance of one particular side of the questions agitated between the divines of various Christian denominations are identical things, the means of salvation must be as uncertain as the chance of choosing the right side of those questions. Here we are placed in the dilemma of creating for ourselves some such rule of Orthodoxy as that of the Roman Catholics-a process which removes doubt only one step, and ultimately increases it*; or rejecting Christianity as an imperfect and partial system. What man, therefore, who is thoroughly convinced of the truth of the Gospel, will not instantly see the plain and only way out of this difficulty—i. e. the rejection of the gratuitous hypothesis of Orthodoxy. This negative argument, the proof which arises from the total absence of an authority sufficient to remove the uncertainty (such as I have explained it) in which the scriptures leave the disputed points, is of a nature to satisfy any unprejudiced mind, provided it is not in thraldom to superstitious fear. It is not like positive * Less hard 'tis not to err ourselves, than know

If our forefathers erred or no.

COWLEY.

proofs derived from various texts, where one expression modifies another, where one metaphor must be brought into agreement with another metaphor, and the reading of one manuscript must be staked against other readings. Here the whole question depends upon the absence of some rule, not exposed to uncertainty, by which the uncertainty in the sense of the Scriptures, experienced by multitudes of Christians, may be entirely removed. Probability is of no avail. If the proposed method of removing uncertainty may be reasonably questioned; if the authority, which claims the right of decision, cannot shew a divine appointment, clear, positive, distinct in every respect, it only increases the evil which it was intended to remedy; for it adds a fresh difficulty to those which, on the supposition of the necessity of Orthodoxy, stand, like an impenetrable phalanx, at the very entrance of the way of salvation. Hence, the inevitable conclusion, that to be right upon any of the points so long disputed among Christians cannot be a necessary condition of saving faith; else God would have demanded from us what he evidently has not given us the means to attain. And let it not be forgotten that the distinction between ESSENTIALS and NONESSENTIALS is perfectly arbitrary, and does not remove the difficulty for by what certain rule can we divide the disputed doctrines into those two classes? I repeat it with the most heartfelt confidence: a just and merciful God, when making the greatest display of his love to mankind by allowing his beloved Son to die in confirmation of his divine mission, and for the purpose of endearing to us himself, and his proclamation of peace with God by repentance-God, the author and fountain of the blessings prepared for all mankind in his Gospel, must not be supposed to have made them dependent on doctrines so intricate, so incapable of being proposed in clear and uncontradictory language, so entirely unconnected with the sources of moral certainty. How could the Father of Mercies have bound up the benefits of Christianity within the complicated folds of Orthodoxy, and denied us a clue to solve those riddles? It is almost childish to answer, that we have the Scriptures for that purpose; for, owing to that very notion of Orthodoxy, the Scriptures themselves are, upon those points, the riddle.

Upon this immovable foundation I established the conclusion that the only indispensable condition of being in the way of salvation, through the Gospel, must be that which remains after the removal of all the doctrines which have been constantly disputed between the Orthodox and the Heterodox. And what can that be? Exactly that which we find proposed by the apostles: repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ: i. e. change the habitual direction of your will from sin to holiness, and TRUST the Lord Jesus Christ as your guide to spiritual safety; as your surety for the hope of eternal happiness.

If, retorting my own argument, it should be said that questions may also be raised upon the meaning of these words; I shall request the objector to mark this important difference between such possible cavils, and the prominent difficulties of Orthodoxy. This call of the Gospel is addressed to the WILL of every individual, under the direction of his coNSCIENCE. The conscience itself may indeed be perverted by the will, and the result may be (as we know to our sorrow) a rejection of God's merciful invitation. But this is of the very essence of all offers made to a moral agent as such: moral agency cannot exist without the power of doing what is morally wrong. RIGHT and WRONG, however, in such matters do not depend on any thing external to man, but on the object and direction of his WILL. Between this choice and that of propositions, which fall under the intellectual judgment, there is an immense difference. The means which alone can enable the judgment to be right in asserting or denying one thing or another, are not within us. We must search abroad in the universe, and, after the most anxious inquiry, may be unable to give a judgment which is not opposed by reality. When the judgment relates to the interpretation of words (which is invariably the case in all questions on the sense of scripture), the search is still more difficult. In matters of experience we frequently have the object of our examination at hand. But, in respect to the sense which the authors of the sacred books wished to convey, it is clear that the only fact on which our right judgment depends-the connexion of the writer's ideas with his expressions—is entirely out of our reach. All therefore that remains is conjecture. We are

obliged to take that for the sense of the writer which, when we have endeavoured, to the best of our power, to impress our minds with the character, purpose, and peculiar style of the person whose writings we have before us, appears to us most likely to have been his meaning. But in regard to moral good and evil, the rectitude of the conscience does not depend on any thing external to the individual-that domain over which it reigns by the appointment of the Supreme Intelligence, whose representative it is. To the individual, the voice of his conscience is the voice of God, and there is no appeal from its decision to a higher tribunal. The great duty of the WILL is to obey it; and the highest degree of perfection at which the WILL can arrive, is a state of settled independence from all other powers and influences. It is very true that the moral perceptions, the moral sense, or moral taste (as it might well be called) of the conscience is susceptible of many degrees of quickness and perfection and, indeed, the moral government of God, as far as we know it, is only a method of training the conscience, and, by means of the conscience, the will of man. For this great purpose no trial or discipline is of a higher and more powerful nature than the offer of the Gospel. When men are called upon to repent, or change their will from the indulgence of the selfish passions to the habitual determination of embracing that which, on every occasion, the conscience shall approve as BEST, they cannot answer with any show of reason that they are not able to understand what is proposed to them. There is no hardship or injustice in proposing to men that they renounce a vicious life, because the abstract notions of vice and virtue are primitive, and, not only do not require, but do not admit of explanation. The man who really and truly wishes to be virtuous, is already in the possession of virtue—is JUSTIFIED from that moment. There is nothing like this in regard to abstract and objective truth: the most ardent wish to attain it, is no pledge of our possessing it. Thus it is that Christianity, unadulterated Christianity, is found in perfect harmony with the nature of our moral being. And observe how the announcement, which exclusively constitutes the Gospel, contains not only the simple and infallible method of being justified, or becoming virtuous, but also that of im

proving that incipient moral state, and carrying it to the utmost degree of perfection of which human infirmity, assisted by divine favour, is capable under the peculiar circumstances of each individual. The natural question-how am I to proceed, and what am I to expect when I have given up the pursuit of selfish gratification-is answered by means of the doctrine and person of Christ, as both are known by the report of his life and character, which has already spread over a great part of the world, and which (were it unobstructed by the theories of Orthodoxy) would soon cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. In Christ we have a model of human virtue which every conscience, under the indispensable preparation of repentance (exactly in the order of things which the Gospel proposes), must approve, and which every WILL, subject to conscience, must embrace. How can this Gospel be said to lie under doubts and difficulties similar in the slightest degree to those of the Orthodox doctrines? With what colour of reason can this heavenly call upon mankind, be compared with the theological requisition to believe abstract statements concerning a person with two natures, and a nature with three personalities, which still remains one God? a guilt incurred by proxy, and a justification or state of virtue by a similar substitution? Offer the true Gospel, present the moral image of Christ, with his assurance of pardon, to the ignorant, or even to savages, in whom the seeds of morality are beginning to be developed, and you will find hearts eager to receive him but go through the world with your Orthodox creeds in hand, and the intelligent among the uneducated classes will stare, and the educated will turn away with disdain. It is in vain to expect a diffusion of the Gospel, approaching in any degree to what the Scriptures would make us expect, so long as missionaries, imbued with the essential importance of the Orthodox doctrines, attempt the work of announcing Christ to the heathen. The only missionaries who seem to make a real progress are the Moravians, who, though still burdened with the Confession of Augsburg in their formularies, appear to have been taught by experience the necessity of laying it aside while they publish the message of salvation.

Strong, however, as my expressions may seem, I do not intend

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