world grows on him in importance. The very word "rest," meaning so little to the child, has become to him a precious promise. The change is like that of the Apostles after the resurrection of their Master. The Christ of his admiration and love is no longer merely a benignant man upon the earth; his Christ is in heaven, and therefore the comforter is sent down into his heart. Yet all this is the self-same religion; the self-same story, told in the self-same words; but the mind has more strength, more experience, more wants, more capacities; and that same plain tale that delighted the child, proves that it can minister to all these, supply and fill them all, pervade the whole of the extended space, and be the religion of man; of uncultivated man; but of man, thinking, sinning, sorrowing, and hoping; and that with as much facility and perfectness as it was the religion of the very child.' Vol. 11. pp. 6-8.

The following is a specimen of the manner in which he treats doctrinal subjects in connexion with the character of Christ.

'All Christians have seen in his character the pattern of perfection. They were right. All Christians have felt it draw towards him the affections of their hearts; all love Christ: they are right in that too. And then they have generally represented the Deity with most unlike qualities and attributes; and in that they have gone wrong; the more wrong the farther they departed from this rule. And this is the fundamental error of the prevalent systems of religion; the basis of the worst corruptions of the Gospel. If, instead of speculating on the divinity of Christ's nature, they would but reason consistently on the reflected divinity of his character, how speedily would our theological differences be brought to a close, and all minds and hearts be irradiated by "the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ!"' -p. 286. The

ologians say that God avenged the honor of his broken laws, and satisfied the claims of his justice, and made a needful opening for the exercise of his mercy to the repentant sinner, by imputing the sins of mankind to Christ, and visiting their punishment on his head. They never learned that either, by observing the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. His heart and life neither exhibited nor recognised any such moral principle as this sort of vindictive justice. It was not thus that he dealt with those who offended against him. Nothing could be so prompt, rich, and free, as his forgiveness, unless that of God, as he taught, and we believe it to be exercised, in the parable of the prodigal son. Had the principle, ascribed by this faith

to God, been that of Christ, how would he have acted, for instance, when Peter denied him? Think of the enormous discrepancy which his then adopting it would have introduced into the gospel. Suppose him forgiving Peter, notwithstanding those tears of bitterness, and that subsequent life of devotion to his cause, only on condition that John, the beloved disciple, should, in his own mind and body, endure some penalty of heavy anguish, the outpouring of the vials of Jesus' wrath for the apostasy of Peter, imputed to him; would this have strengthened the precept to love Christ? Would this have been a scene

for us to admire and venerate? Yet if God be the God of vindictive justice, thus should his glory have shone in the face of Jesus Christ. It was a purer light that beamed from his eye, when, in the midst of his false asseverations, "the Lord turned and looked upon Peter." That glance of affectionate upbraiding, of reproachful tenderness, of frank forgiveness, shone into his heart, as it does still into ours: "that is the true light." When the yet unconverted Paul was rushing on in his career, it is true the glorified appearance of Jesus struck him to the earth. But it was no blow of vengeance. Though he had aided in the infliction of death on Christians, there was no demand of blood for blood, his own, or that of a substitute; it was the blaze of mercy which blinded his eyes to irradiate his mind; it was the voice of godlike compassion which said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" And then, with godlike generosity, came his apostolic commission and his Master's promise. Now, I say, that if we are to see, as this same Paul tells us in the text, glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ"; if the moral character of Jesus be really a picturing forth to the world of the moral attributes of the Deity; then the common doctrines of atonement and satisfaction are utterly inconsistent with that character and those attributes, and have nothing to do with that eternal life which is in the knowledge of the Father, the only God, and Jesus Christ whom he sent.' · Vol. 1. pp. 289–291.

"the

We would gladly take much from the next discourse, on 'The Power of Christ's Character,' but must confine ourselves to one brief passage.

'I verily believe that the charatcer of Christ has operated materially, and will increasingly so, in preventing unbelief in some minds, and mitigating the hostility of unbelief in others. How many there have been, who, while they rejected Christianity, have yet paid homage to the beauty of the Saviour's - character! They could not wage war with that. They felt as Titus when he would have spared the temple, while he gave"

Jerusalem to desolation, and its sons to slaughter or captivity. Respect for the character of Christ draws a line of demarcation between the different classes of unbelievers. It almost universally distinguishes the nobler from the baser sort; the skeptic from the scoffer; the infidelity of misguided minds from that of vicious passions. And I have known its efficacy, where other means had failed, in preserving, and even in converting, from unbelief.' pp. 305, 306.

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There seems to us great sweetness in the paragraphs which follow.

'On two occasions, especially, we are informed that Jesus wept; the one a case of private, the other of public calamity. The first was at the grave of Lazarus ; of Lazarus, his personal and intimate friend, in whose house he had abode, and with whom he had taken sweet counsel; - of Lazarus, whom he loved, and his affection was of no ordinary strength; whose sisters were looking up to him in all the first helplessness and agony of bereavement; and for whom many voices were raising the wail of lamentation over a lost benefactor; that wail which, proclaiming the worth of the blessing that is gone, though it may be at last balm for the mourner's wounded soul, at first deepens and aggravates the smart to intensity. Then he wept; wept though he knew that Lazarus was about to rise; though his prayer was heard and granted for the aid of Omnipotence; though he was advancing towards the spot where he should pronounce the wondrous command to the dead, "Come forth," and where the dead heard and obeyed that command, and 66 came forth.”

'The other occasion sprung out of this. Lazarus had been raised; the fame of the miracle had gone abroad; the feast of the passover was close at hand; Jesus had fulfilled his personal ministry; there remained to the Jewish nation but the choice of his solemn acceptance as the Messiah, or his rejection; he avowed his pretensions to that character; he approached Jerusalem sitting upon an ass's colt, in the simple state of her ancient sovereigns; an immense multitude attended his progress; they descended the Mount of Olives; and there lay Jerusalem before them in all her extent, her beauty, and her pride; her white towers and palaces glittering in the sun; the city of God, with his peerless temple majestically rising above all other buildings, as if awaiting and looking for the coming of the Messenger of Jehovah's covenant, to give it a holier consecration, and kindle in its empty ark a brighter glory of the Lord; and then the popular enthusiasm burst forth like a torrent; and

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palm-branches were snatched, and waved around, and strewn in the path of the lowly, but then triumphant prophet; and the acclamation resounded to all the hills of Zion, "Blessed be the king that cometh in the name of the Lord; peace in heaven, and glory in the highest!" And so rolled on that beautiful pageant; beautiful, but O how brief! -for the storm was up which should scatter it abroad; and the clouds were brooding that should wrap it in a pall of blackest darkness.

'He, around whose head these evanescent glories shone, was weeping.' — Vol. 11. pp. 80-82.

We had marked other passages for quotation, but are obliged to desist. We hope soon again to meet our author in the work which he proposes as a sequel to the present, on the Apostles and their Preaching; and trust that he will not pause in his labors until he has completed the plan which he has announced in his Preface, of a survey of the Holy Scriptures, their History, Morality, Poetry, and Philosophy.'

Malices. [For the Christian Examiner.]

ART. IV. Unitarianism vindicated against the Charge of Skeptical and Infidel Tendencies.

MEN may take their religion on trust, or make it a matter of inquiry and rational conviction. Unitarians prefer and adopt the latter course; holding it to be their privilege and duty` to do so, and essential to consistent Protestantism. With them it is not enough that the church has decided in favor of a particular doctrine; or that the doctrine belongs to the religion established by law; or that it was held by their ancestors, and is still held by the majority. On the infinitely important subject of religion, and with the Bible in their hands, they do not feel themselves at liberty to waive the right to read for themselves, and judge for themselves. One of the consequences of acting on this principle is, as might be expected, that they come to some conclusions differing materially from those commonly received; and also that they do not agree exactly with one another; nor the same man with himself at different times, for of course as he continues his inquiries he may receive more light. This circumstance, however, has

afforded occasion for one of the most common and serious objections urged against them. Their way of proceeding, it is said, has a tendency to unsettle men's minds, and introduce a general skepticism; and the whole system has been branded as the half-way house to infidelity.

We propose to take up this single charge, and give it a careful and thorough examination. After a few preliminary remarks on the nature of faith, and the history and present state of the particular question at issue, we shall be prepared to demonstrate, that there is nothing in Unitarianism itself, nor in its rejection of certain popular doctrines, nor in the general manner in which it has been, or is, defended and maintained, to warrant the suspicions and imputations just named.

It does not follow necessarily that a man believes a particular doctrine, merely because he thinks he does; for he may be mistaken in regard to this fact, as well as in regard to any other. To know whether we believe a particular doctrine, we must know, in the first place, what the doctrine is; in the second place, we must know what our own ideas on the subject really are; and in the third place, we must compare the doctrine and our own ideas together, and see whether they agree. Now we hazard nothing in saying, that many never think of going through this process; and those who undertake it, are liable to mistake at every step, and of course may be mistaken in the conclusion. The truth is, and why should men try or affect not to see it? - most persons adopt the religious phraseology which happens to prevail where they are brought up; and as they do this in early childhood, they do it before they can be expected to use such phraseology understandingly, and a habit of using it vaguely and mechanically is formed and perpetuated. It is no sufficient evidence, therefore, that a man believes the popular doctrines in religion, merely because he uses the popular language; for he may use this language in a different or qualified sense, or, which is still more probable, he may use it in no determinate sense. As a general rule, indeed, we suspect that conversions to Unitarianism, especially when they take place among serious and devout people, do not imply any material change in their convictions, but only that they have ascertained what their real convictions are, and are not restrained by considerations either of interest or fear from avowing them.

VOL. XI. -N. S. VOL. VI. NO. II.

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