under the show of respect for revelation, there is, after all, a want of subjection to its authority, and a determined hostility to all that we believe constitutes its peculiarity and its glory; we cannot but rejoice that those who have fallen into its deadly snares have been recovered from them. The parties themselves to whom we are most opposed on this subject, must give us credit for this kind of feeling. We must be inconsistent and insincere if we did not entertain it, We could easily give extracts from this valuable and interesting compilation; but as the recent numbers of our Magazine have contained official documents in reference to the Corporation and Test Acts; and there is no doubt of the extensive circulation of Mr. Beldam's volume, we forbear; and shall close our article by urging all the friends of religious liberty to be firm, united, and persevering in their applications, until claims founded on justice, and supported by all the principles of a common Protestantism, and a common Christianity, are recognized and confirmed by the high authority of the British legislature. ་་་་་་་་་་ SECESSIONS FROM UNITARIANISM, Second Thoughts, on the Person of WE trust, it will not be supposed Both the cases now before us possess considerable interest, and we think it best to let the writers tell their own story. Mr. Elton, a man of most respectable talents and attainments as a scholar, and very respectably connected, appears to have embraced Unitarianism a few years ago. His ac-. count of this step, and of its retraction, is as follows. "The writer of these sheets had adop ted Unitarian sentiments from the difficulty which he found in reconciling a Trinity, as scholastically defined, with the unity of Jehovah, as declared in the Scriptures; and the atonement, with their declarations of his mercy. "While following the course of study, which a new theological literature naturally threw in his way, the writer's attention became deeply interested in certain works, professing to remove the objections to God's benevolence, grounded on the existence of evil. These works, assuming chiefly as their basis philosophical necessity, the government of the world by general laws, and the tendency of evil, including, of course, moral evil or sin, to the production of good, affected his mind inversely to their direct design. They induced a doubt of the benevolence of God. The burthen of it was insupportable: and in this disquieted state of his thoughts, he chanced to call to his recollection a remark of Mr. Soame Jenyns, in his work on the Christian Religion, to the effect, that'repentance could not undo sin.' This led him carefully to review the testimonies of liberty of the human will, the lapse of our Scripture in respect to moral evil. The nature from original righteousness, the incapacity of this lapsed nature to fulfil such righteousness, were the gradual dis coveries, for such they were, that unfolded themselves to the writer's mind. A way was opened to his understanding for the reception of the necessity, and the reality of an atonement. Of this he has been newly schooled to think, as incompatible with God's merciful attributes: yet the result of his changed convictions was, that, from the moment of his yielding to these apparent evidences of scripture his full assent, all doubt of the benevolence of God was instantaneously removed, like a veil withdrawn from the eyes. "If the writer before felt it as a Christian duty to give a reason for the hope which was in him,' he feels that duty more imperative now: if he has been the uneonscious agent in the dissemination of error, let him be forgiven the zeal, which would bring to the altar of truth an offering of reparation."—Preface, pp. iii, iv. Mr. Elton's reasons for returning to the bosom of the church, and ceasing to be a nonconformist, as soon as he ceased to be a Unitarian, we think are far from satisfactory. If he has no stronger reasons than those assigned in his preface, we think he had far better said nothing on the subject. They are utterly unworthy of his good sense, and afford to his quondam friends the strongest ground for insinuating that his doctrinal change has been produced or influenced by other considerations than those which are avowed. We beg to assure him, that neither our "religion" nor our " dissent is a thing of spite;" and the man who thinks so, we cheerfully hand over to another church, which we suppose is beyond the reach of any such suspicion, without feeling any thing of spite, either towards it or him. The "Second Thoughts," (we have not seen the first) are a desultory sort of running fire, directed against the Unitarian interpretation of those scriptures which relate to the deity and atonement of Jesus. They discover Mr. Elton's classical knowledge and critical acquaintance with the Bible; but render it difficult to give any analysis of his reasonings. They show how deeply read the author had been in the theology of the system which he has abandoned; but we fear will not always succeed in rescuing the Scriptures from those perversions which have been imposed on them. The field which Mr. Elton has endeavoured to occupy could not be cultivated without greater labour than he has bestowed upon it, in this work. We will try and select some specimens. The following passage on the subject of mediation we think very excellent. "The Scripture states the dispensation hands of a mediator. It would appear, that of God's pardoning mercy through the to magnify his righteousness, and thus ultimately to lead back to holiness the transgressors of laws instituted for the benefit of his creatures, by increasing their reverence of his Majesty, and consequently their awe, when tempted to offend against it, God chose to be approached through a mediator: to dispense his mercy through an advocate and an intercessor. How this provision of mercy, illustrated by its very tendency to prevent the abuse of grace, to ensure perseverance in a course of amendment, and by necessary consequence the happiness of the creature, implies that the mercy itself is not self-originated or abuudant, it were vain to ask: and how far the Unitarian's argument, characteristic of the school from whence it issues, avails any mediator, and the high priest, under the thing-namely, that Moses is also called a Levitical law, an intercessor, and therefore Christ must have been a mediator and an intercessor in the same sense-which may be called no sense at all-must be decided on the consideration, whether the whole Levitical law does not recognize the very necessity here attempted to be denied: for if the mediator and intercessor were necessary under the old dispensation, and God chose not to be approached by his people, but through the advocacy and interposition of Moses and of Aaron, with the proofs of which the whole Old Testament History is fully fraught, they, by legitimate deduction, were types of Christ: who had an unchangeable priesthood,' Heb. vii. 24.; and the very thing is proved by the very fact chosen to disprove it. ་ raise up unto thee a prophet, from the "The passage the Lord thy God shall midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me, unto him shall ye hearken,' Deut. xviii. 15, which is adduced to prove an identity the very fact under discussion: the simiof human nature in Jesus, proves rather larity of office as mediating between man and God; and points to the priesthood of Christ, as the real great intercessor :- Heb. to the uttermost that come unto God by vii. 25, wherefore he is able to save them him; seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them; for such a high priest 318 Review of Books:-Secessions from Unitarianism. became us, who is holy, harmless, unde- "It is pretended that this is a figure of consecration to a figurative priesthood: borrowed, which it certainly is, from the usage of the Levitical law: but what was the drift or purpose of that consecration under the Levitical law we are not told; and, in truth, it had either none at all, or it had a prospective reference to the consecration of Christ as the perpetual intercessor for his people. "The remarkable identification of the office of Christ with that of the high priest, and of his death with the sacrifice of the sin-offering, is got rid of, in the usual manner, by the inference, that because the sinoffering respected ceremonial pollutions, therefore the death of Christ could not sacrificially cleanse from moral pollutions: because the blood of bulls and of goats could not take away sin,' Heb. x. 4.; the blood of Christ could not be typified by it: although it is easy to observe that the Apostle was drawing, a directly contrary conclusion: asserting, first, the necessity of the sacrifices under the law, and, then, the necessity of a better sacrifice under the new dispensation, by way of perfecting or consummating the former: thus affirming with as much plainness, as is consistent with the different genius of an ancient and peculiar language (for the Hebrew character is imprest upon the Greek) that the former were types of the latter. Now as it never was pretended, before the rise of the Unitarian school of criticism, that a type should be the same, in all particulars, as its anti-type, neither could it be reasonably expected, that the sacrifice of the altar should have, in all things, an exact similarity with the sacrifice of the cross: so that all the technical argumentation about the necessity of a priest offering the blood, in order to constitute a proper sacrifice, the impossibility of the priest and the victim being one and the same, and the ceremonial nature of the sin-offering, proves absolutely nothing against the affirmation of the propitiations under the law prefiguring the great atonement."-pp. 47--50. The following extract does credit to the author's acuteness, and regard to the moral interests and influence of the Gospel. "Having divested of their peculiar significancy those things which, we are told, the angels desire to look into,' the Unitarians naturally exaggerate the value of that remnant of gospel which they have [June, moral precepts of Jesus, and the manifestretained for themselves. It consists in the ation of a life to come. "But it is a phenomenon, which learned infidels have been quick to perceive, that instances, been anticipated by enlightened the precepts of Jesus have, in some striking for arguing that he could not have been heathens; and it has been made the pretext a teacher sent from God.' The proper inference is, that he was sent to raise the moral dignity of man by other methods. "If, by nature, as the Apostle affirms, we cannot do the things that we would,' (the would implying a lapsed, not a lost condition) the assent to the fitness or beauty of morals will not enable us to reach their standard. To convince the reason is not preaching may do the former, but there is to obtain a mastery over the heart. Moral broad evidence, stamped on the face of human society, that, even when supported by retribution, the latter is beyond its power. the terrors and glories of a future state of general, is moral in his own eyes: every The truth is, that every man, taken in the man has a salvo for his own vice, a quicksightedness for that of his neighbour: a false estimation of his own merits, his owa strength, his own state of security. He will select from moral sermons, in order to approve such as laud the virtues which he thinks he has, and in order to disapprove such as condemn the vices to which vices, which he has, take the name of he may be unfortunately inclined. The frailties, (for that is the word) and frailties he resolves into the wise purposes of his Maker, who, as he supposes, made him what he is. Such a man will compliment let a minister arise, who is not ashamed of moral preachers as practical preachers: but word of God, which is sharper than any the Gospel, and let him but handle the thoughts and intents of the heart,' so as two-edged sword and is a discerner of the to pierce through the mail of this man's conscience, he will be ready with his answer like Hazael, is thy servant a dog preacher of the atonement will be, in his that he should do this great thing?' The eyes, a fanatic; a visionary who inculcates gloomy notions of God; a decrier of good works. But the way to make men righte ous is to break through the outworks of self-righteousness: to sap the deceitfulness of the natural heart: to cast down proud imaginations: to preach Christ crucified :' to convince the hearers of sin. Do men By their fruits ye shall know them.' gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? pp. 77-80. His conclusion is excellent. "The collateral circumstances, which brought together, of the progress of schothe Unitarian theological historians have lastic theology, and of Romish emblematic 1827.J Review of Books:-Secessions from Unitarianism. (it would be neither candid nor just to say idolatrous) superstition, are quite extraneons to the point attempted to be proved; that the divinity of Christ's person and the reality of his atonement, are superstitious innovations on the ancient faith. effect intended is, that the latter presumpThe tion may pass current, from its being associated with the existence of those gradual corruptions, which Dr. Middleton has detailed, in his 'Letter from Rome. The Unitarians have, however, totally failed, unless garbling of authorities, and verbal torturing and unwarrantable largeness of inference may pass for proof, in substantiating the popular opinion of the Logos, in the first ages, to be merely a display of the Divine wisdom, through the agency of Christ: a position about equivalent to a display of the Divine wisdom through the agency of Newton. They have still more notably failed in their gratuitous audacity of assumption, that the atonement is a modern invention of the reformers, adopted in contravention of the Romish doctrine of merit. "It is this-involving consequences so much more vital to the moral character and to the eternal hopes of man, than any metaphysical speculation on the mode of God's existence, that constitutes, in the Unitarian community, the blindness of mind,' ascribed by St. Paul to the Israelites to those, as to these, his words have a searching application, even to this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their hearts,' 2 Cor. iii. 15. "It is this, which the writer recognises as the plague-spot on the walls of the Unitarian temple, and therefore he passes from its portal. It is this, which intelligibly speaks in the echoing silence of its recesses, at the very time that the courts, in which the crucified redeemer is proclaimed, are thronged with feet that wear the pavement of the sanctuary. "The fact reflects a light, like that of the fulfilment of prophecy, on the words once uttered by a disciple of Wesley of which he, that heard them, acknowledged, then, only the eloquence, but of which he has since felt the depth of the reasoning: If there shall come a time when the cross shall cease to be preached in the tabernacle of Christ, the grass will grow on the path that leads to its doors: all men will pass it by; and will exclaim to each other, 'THEY HAVE TAKEN AWAY OUR LORD, AND WE KNOW NOT WHERE THEY HAVE LAID HIM."'"--pp. 108, 109. From Mr. Elton, we now turn to Mr. Gilchrist, whose pamphlet contains a tale of horrors; and as we apprehend that it furnishes disclosures of what has passed in many minds as well as his own, 319 we shall be the more copious in our extracts. After giving us some account of his imbibing, at an early age, the spirit and the sentiments of Sandeman, of his devotedness to biblical criticism; the gradual loss of the spirit of of his becoming a Baptist; and of piety, he proceeds to tell us of the progress of his mind towards Unitarianism. "The history of my connexion with Unitarianism now commences, and with it wholly regardless of consequences. When a state of mind so unsettled as to be often the late Dr. Evans resolved to become one of the ministers of Worship Street, the the grave of his piety.' Chatham was the late Dr. Stennett told him, it would be grave of my piety. It had been declining considered as dead and buried. and dying before, but now it might be "Up to this time I had read nothing professedly Unitarian, but I had heard a great deal about the superior intellect and reason of the Unitarians; first at Hull, next at Birmingham, then at Melbourn, conviction, that what I had heard so much and now at Chatham; and I had a sort of about, must be some real entity. A lady, my hands an oration delivered at the laywhose understanding I respected, put into ing of the foundation stone of the New Gravel-pit Chapel, Hackney, which was to be consecrated to the worship of the highly excited; an oration at the dedione God. Of course my expectation was cation of the temple to the one God, by the celebrity in the whole Unitarian world, Reverend Robert Aspland, of intellectual and the editor of the Monthly Repository, and the Secretary of the Unitarian Fund, There was much to give note of preparaand the champion of Rational Religion! tion to my poor mind, almost distracted with doubt and difficulty. the oration; hesitated; looked at it again; and broke silence by asking the admirer became somewhat composed and confident, thought this Unitarian oration was worth of the author's intellect, if she really printing. I perused This interrogatory was the more disconcerting, that the same person used to think me too lavish of my admiration of authors, that she was kind enough to read to me; for I would often interrupt the reading to comment on the originality, beauty, force, sublimity, or other excellence of the thought and diction. "The first experiment with Unitarian intellect very much abated my confidence in it, and not a little mortified my pride. The next Unitarian of high renown, to whom I approached, was the Reverend Thomas Belsbam. This distinguished di vine, as the Monthly Repository designates him, was something more than merely intellectual; he was reported to be very philosophic. Of course it was with considerable stretch of expectation that I en tered upon the Calm Inquiry concerning the person of Christ.' But I was soon so tired of it, that I could not refrain from offending the person who lent it to me, by calling it the Dull Inquiry. I read it about half through, and then threw it aside; for its chief effect was that of shaking my confidence yet more in the word of God. "It is well known to several persons, that though connected with them, I never admired the more prominent Unitarians, or the Unitarian writings; and I doubt not I was thought to be actuated by envy, jealousy, or malignity; but the fact is, that I could not sincerely speak otherwise than I did; and therefore I endeavoured, as much as possible, to be silent. I was become, by a train of influences already indicated, by aversion to mystery and divine influence, and by affection for rationality, unfit for Trinitarianism; but I was hardly more fit for Unitarianism; for notwithstanding all its boastings and self-accredited excellences, it possessed very little that could interest either my understanding or my heart. With all its pretended rationality, it could not satisfy my reason; and its moral and religious poverty and nakedness often disgusted and shocked me. It appeared to my mind the more 1 became acquainted with it, alike destitute of moral power, the majesty of intellect, and the beauty of holiness. Its religious and moral inefficacy only tended to overthrow my weak and wavering faith; and if I could have been satisfied with what differs from it more in name than in nature, I would have sought refuge in professed infidelity. There was but one feature in it which could be amiable or attractive to me; its forbearance towards myself, notwithstanding my sentiments, which I took very little pains to conceal, or rather, which I pretty freely expressed both by speech and by writing; but even for this I felt no gratitude, for I knew full well that it proceeded from latitudinarian indifference. "After remaining a few months at Chatham, I was requested to preach before the General Assembly of General Baptists, holden at Worship Street. I complied with the request and the sermon was printed by desire, and was entitled the Pattern of Social Prayer, given by Jesus to his disciples. I find this sermon sufficiently indicative of the state of my mind, even at this early stage of its Unitarian history; though there was still much good left, which Unitarianism might (and did) destroy, but which it has no power to impart. Upon inspection I do not wonder that the notes and the appendix, sent forth with the sermon, were not very grateful to the Unitarian leaders. "In consequence of the sermon preached before the General Assembly, I received an invitation to Worship Street, as minister of the church meeting in the afternoon of the first day of the week, and to which an endowment is attached, of which I have regularly received eighty pounds a year. I accepted the invitation, because I was very willing to remove from Chatham; because I had some desire to reside for a time in London; and because there was an endowment, which I thought would prevent me from being, or seeming to be, burdensome to a few individuals, as appeared to be the case in the situation from which I was anxious to remove. "I was now, from my coming to London, in the focus of Unitarianism, and could not but act with the Unitarians, without taking a position for which I was not then prepared. I had rejected Trinitarianism, but I could not make up my mind to reject Christianity, though there was a considerable tendency to its rejection in my habits of thinking and reasoning ; and my discourses and writings were for some time Unitarian, merely as Unitarianism is a system of negation. Indeed, my mind was often so unsettled, that I knew not what to think, and it was frequently so reckless, that I cared not what I said or wrote. Such was particularly the state of my mind, when I published, by request, A Discourse, delivered at Southampton, before a Society of Unitarian Christians, established in the South of England, for promoting, by the distri bution of books, the true knowledge of Holy Scripture, and the practice of Virtue.' I preached the said discourse in a state of mind bordering on distraction, with doubt and perplexity (which was too frequently the case when called to preach Unitarian Lectures) ; and when I wrote it out for the press, I may truly say, such was the desperation of my spirit, that I neither feared God nor regarded man. "As my great difficulty was concerning the divine origin of Christianity, or the credibility of the gospel, Unitarianism, instead of relieving me, only added to my distrust and disquiet; on the other hand, the more I became acquainted with infidelity, both as theoretically and practically exhibited to my reflection, the greater was my dread of it as a gulf of religious and moral perdition, I had experienced the religious and moral power of the gospel, and I had witnessed it in others; and this kind of evidence was often an anchor to my soul both sure and stedfust, when other evidences seemed to fail; but I never had any convincing proof of the religious and moral power of Unitarianism; on the contrary, I had much convincing proof of |