tures of that eminent man, first in manuscript and afterwards in print, continued to be the text-book in the academy; and the opinions of the respective divinity tutors, down to the year 1789, were Calvinistic; while the abilities, the assiduity, the worth and manners of those gentlemen, were singularly calculated to prepossess the students in behalf of prevailing and established creeds. In such circumstances was not the triumph of orthodoxy to be most securely and confidently expected? What could be wanting to ensure its victories? Why, the tutors were enlightened and consistent Protestants, and, therefore, did not forbid impartial, unbiassed investigation. Hinc ille lacrima: heuce "the erroneous opinions," which Mr. H. fancies and laments. cised unaffected candour, The lec- on a much controverted doctrine. For the nature and the effects of this con→ sistent endeavour to do justice to both sides of the question, we shall make a reference to some of his own writ ings." It was an obvious and a great improvement on the text-book, that hitherto had been employed with very little reserve. However, a still more excellent-we must indeed subjoin, the most excellent-method of teaching the doctrines of the Scriptures, is the critical study of the original Scrip tures themselves. Not that it constitutes the whole of a theological education: but then the theological education which does not include it, will be wretchedly superficial and incomplete. We cannot be satisfied with any mode of teaching divinity, which comes short of this: and we hail the existence of an academical institution among us, which illustrates the prac ticability and the advantages of lectures that are exclusively scriptural + What is styled the religious world, will never become thoroughly Protestant and Christian, until the Records of Revelation are investigated by the light which themselves afford and reflect; and not by systems which men have previously framed. Now will he maintain the converse of the proposition, which he has virtually laid down? Will he affirın or intimate that Truth cannot be embraced by the pupil, unless he read upon only one, and that the reputedly orthodox side of the question, unless the tutor interpose his own sentiments, nor hold the balance "betwixt the contending systems" with "steady impartiality"? Mr. H.'s principle and reasoning, if they be correct, lead to this conclusion, which, once admitted, is fatal to his cause, in the eyes of all who believe that the BIBLE, interpreted by itself, is the religion of Pro testants. The mode of teaching theology at Daventry, was, for the most part, inauspicious to free examination; and this, as the tendency of the structure and arrangement of Doddridge's lectures to bring orthodox sentiments into fuller view than any other tenets. But the spirit of the tutors was such as we have described it, fair, manly and truly liberal: it graced their characters, endeared their labours, and will contribute to embalm their memories. The venerable survivor of them, within the two or three last years of his connexion with the Academy, introduced an elaborate and a far more impartial plan of lecturing Mr. H. calls the Academy at Daventry "this vortex of unsanctified speculation and debate." Does he mean to assert or insinuate, that the students pursued their inquiries with an irreligious spirit? In this and in every sense, his accusation falls pointless to the ground: and, in his cooler moments, he will surely blush, that it was framed by his prejudices and recorded by his pen. Perhaps, there was, after all, less of speculation and debate than our biographer's imagination has conceived. Be this as it may; we deny that they were "unsanctified." The greater proportion of the students, were, far from being remiss in cherishing religious habits: the prescribed allotments of their time, and the voluntary societies which they instituted, aided those habits and who among the pupils at Daventry can look back on the devotional lec Belsham's Memoirs of Lindsey, p. 286, &c. Calm Inq., &c. Preface. Mon. Repos. XI. 406, 407 ; and see Dr. J. Jebb's Works, Vol. I. 1; Vol. II. 237, &c. tures that were periodically delivered, without warmly grateful recollections, without justly and humbly ascribing to them instrumentally, if not the existence at least the strength and fervour of qualities which he would not exchange for "the wealth of Ormus or of Ind"? Even this gentleman's sense of equity and candour, must compel him to acknowledge, that the instructions and the discipline of Daventry possessed a share in forming the moral and religious character of Mr. Toller. That character was indeed most estimable and lovely; a charming portrait of "the wisdom that is from above." No vulgar orthodoxy was ever concerned in producing such a temper: and we are persuaded that this excellent person owed something more and higher than " a certain general manner of stating the peculiar doctrines of the gospel" to the seminary where he passed so important a portion of his early life. "At so tender an age," he must have been susceptible of good as well as of injurious impressions. His biographer can hardly be of opinion, that ignorance is the mother of devotion, that sincere and free investigation is in the inverse ratio of a man's piety. Yet, if we knew Mr. H. only from some passages of the Memoir before us, we might infer that such is his conviction. He employs grossly exaggerated language, when he states, that the tutor who presided at Daventry seldom or never interposed his own opinion, and still less betrayed the slightest emotion of antipathy to error, or predilection to truth. In this instance, again, the testimony of the celebrated Priestley confronts him: "Dr. Ashworth," says that great man, 66 was earnestly desirous to make me as orthodox as possible." Mr. H. should have relieved us from the painful necessity of transcribing this sentence: but the partial uses to which he has applied Priestley's narrative, and the colour he has given it, are extremely censurable; and we are constrained to pronounce, that this gentleman seems little careful of the means by which he accomplishes his design: he accuses, but does not inquire; he strikes, but will not hear. From statements of which we have proved the incorrectness he arrives at the following conclusion: "Thus a spirit of indifference to all religious principles was generated in the way for the prompt reception of doctrines first instance, which naturally paved the indulgent to the corruption and flattering to the pride of a depraved and fallen nature." Had the biographer described "a spirit of indifference to all religious principle," as producing this supposed effect, we should have understood his argument, while we remonstrated against his application of it to the students in the Academy at Daventry. By his selection of the words "religious principles," he must evidently mean to fix the attention of his readers on the theological opinions which divide the Christian world. His language is somewhat ambiguous: but the connexion in which it stands, explains it; and nothing can be more solid or important than the distinction that we have taken. Let all our inquiries into the tenets of religion, be pursued in the spirit, and in the exercise of the principle, of religion: to the systems and formularies of men, however, to such religious principles, if indeed they should be so denomi nated, as are embraced previously to a critical examination of the Scriptures, and independently on it, let the mind of the pupil be perfectly indifferent, when he sits down to the study of prophets, evangelists and apostles. This is the duty, the privilege, of those who "name the name of Christ." Mr. H.'s remarks imply that the youth who discharges this obligation can scarcely fail of adopting 66 erroneous opinions," or, in other words, Anti-Trinitarian and Anti-Calvinistic sentiments. Such is the datum which his observations assume; such the conclusion, to which they lead. We cannot and will not disturb him in the possession of this belief. But against his eminently unjust and uncharitable intimation, that the doctrines of which he speaks as being so promptly received are indulgent to the corruption and flattering to the pride of a depraved and fallen nature, we most seriously protest. For his own sake, we particularly wish that this sentence had not fallen from his pen, but that, in writing the life, he had imbibed a portion of the humble, modest, catholic and, in all respects, truly Christian spirit of the subject of his Memoir. In a man of education, like Mr. H., we might naturally look for something higher and better than a disposition to charge upon any individuals, or body of individuals, that the doctrines which they hold, after inquiry and on evidence, are promptly received by them, because those doctrines flatter pride and are indulgent to corruption. We lament that he has so learned Christ: and from these harsh, disgusting anathemas, pronounced by a fallible mortal, we appeal first to that celestial Tribunal which cannot err, and next to those of our fellow-men and fellow-christians, whose judgments are not blinded by prejudice, and whose kind and equitable feelings are not impeded by any overweaning attachment to seets and parties. It is the least evil of such denunciations, from a person of Mr. H.'s character and station, that they, contract and embitter the intercourses of social life: † they have a humble temper. "The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans." Even in a country and age boasting to be enlightened, how often and how painfully is the fact exemplified! When such men as Mr. H. fulminate their bitter exclamations, and, whether from the pulpit or the press, level, as ex cathedra, their invectives against those "who follow not with them," the natural consequence in respect of the mass of the people is, that the odium theologicum gains fresh vigour. This temper and this conduct on the part of avowed Christians towards each other, has multiplied unbelievers. Yet bigotry of this sort is not peculiar to avowed Christians. See a far worse tendency, and exert a still more pernicious influence; inasmuch as they divert the regards of the bulk of professed Christians from the only legitimate standard of the truth or falsehood of religious doctrines, from the Sacred Volume exhibited in a genuine text, and interpreted agreeably to the soundest criticism. Whenever Mr. H. shall appear in the field of honourable warfare, and "contend lawfully;" whenever he shall not be reluctant to stand exclusively and fairly on the ground of scripture, he may perhaps be rendered sensible of the difference between reasoning, on the one hand, and declamation and invective, on the other. To argue, will scarcely injure any man's reputation, even should he argue unsuccessfully to deal only in unweighed charges and assertions, cannot be permitted even to the biographer of Mr. Toller; and, indeed, in the biographer of such a man it is peculiarly unbecoming. As a relief from this train of thought, and from the very offensive passage which called it forth, we gladly turn to a topic of another kind: "Of the conduct of his academical studies" [Mr. Toller's] "nothing memo rable is recorded. From a very accomplished man, who, I believe, was his fellow-student, I have merely heard that he had no relish for the mathematics, a circumstance which has been often recorded in the biography of men of indisputable intellectual preeminence."-P. 6. There may be justness in our author's remark, popularly taken: yet its real accuracy or inaccuracy depends on the meaning affixed to the words If this language denote a mind of great "intellectual preeminence." general powers, we doubt, whether many such a mind has felt no relish for the mathematics, in the course of its elementary education: but if, by "intellectual pre-eminence" we are to understand pre-eminence in taste and sensibility and delicate perception, then the observation is less inadmissible. We shall refer to the opinion of a most competent and impartial judge: and we beg to caution our remarkable anecdote in Niebuhr's Trav. (Amsterd. 1776,) I. 240. * Memoirs of G. Wakefield, I. 82, 83. readers against the practical error of supposing, that a youth's disrelish to the elements of mathematics, is a characteristic, universal, or even common, indication of genius, or of "indisputable intellectual preeminence." "I can scarcely account," says Mr. Wakefield, "for an indisposition to such theories, but from a defect of judgment or dexterity, in the teacher." To the biographer's criticisms on the style, &c., of Mr. Toller's sermons, we shall attend in a future and a separate article. Nothing remains for us, at present, but just to notice his excursus on church discipline, under which head he further digresses (pp. 21, &c.) to renew certain insinuations and charges, that have been already the subject of our animadversion. What is the scriptural constitution of a Christian Church? The question is important, but accompanied with difficulties. In resolving it, let the genius of the gospel be consulted. With Mr. Hall, we deprecate secularity: we would utterly exclude, if possible, the spirit of the world, and therefore spiritual pride and the love of having preeminence. A pious man may be ignorant and illiterate and it is not every thing which should be entrusted to individuals of this description. Our author's immediate predecessor at Cambridge, was accustomed to speak of "a Lord-brother" as one of the worst monsters" in a church professing to be a church of Christ: with at least the genus Mr. H. cannot be unacquainted. ART. II. Tracts. N. 1 and 2,) "for the Serious Consideration of Trinitarians," dated Calcutta, May 9 and 12, 1823. These Queries are taken from The Christian Reformer, Vol. I. pp. 87, &c., and Vol. III. 24, &c. They have been frequently reprinted in England, and we are glad to see them in an East-Indian type, persuaded that they are well adapted to awaken inquiry in the minds of candid readers. No. III. contains "Two Dialogues," dated Calcutta, May 16, 1823. The first, "between a Trinitarian Missionary and three Chinese Converts," is a theological jeu d'esprit taken from The Christian Reformer, Vol. IV. pp. 10, &c., of which the point is likely to be felt by an Oriental reader. The second, "between an Unitarian Minister and an Itinerant Bookseller," from the same work, Vol. II. pp. 19, &c., being one of a number of "Recollections, or Religious Anecdotes," furnished by Mr. Wright. No. IV. is "A Selection of Passages from the Old and New Testaments in proof of the Unity of God," signed WM. ADAM, and dated Calcutta, May 20, 1823. This paper concludes with the following appeal: "The Unitarians say, that if there be any meaning in language, the above quotations prove God to be numerically one; and they call upon Trinitarians to prove, by passages equally plain and decisive, that in the Unity of the Godhead there is a Trinity of persons." No. V. is "A Faithful and Wellauthenticated Report of the Theological Discussion which took place in Calcutta, on Tuesday, May 20, 1823, East-India Unitarian at a Meeting assembled by Dr. R. Tytler, who had intimated in the newsliver the 6th of a Course of Lectures papers that he would that evening deon Theology, and publicly challenged those who might dissent from the Doctrines advanced to state their objections." Dr. Tytler is of the medical profession, but has been led by religious zeal to devote himself to theological studies. His system is ultraTrinitarianism, of the Hutchinsonian school. He makes a great parade of erudition, but his learning is less cer"a complete tain than his being master of the vulgar tongue." (Report, p. 1.) He was confronted at the public discussion" with none but HE Unitarian controversy is agiTiated with eagerness and zeal at Calcutta. Besides the publications of Rammohun Roy and the Missionaries, several pamphlets have appeared on both sides of the question, of which, by the favour of a friend, we have obtained, and now proceed to give an account of, no less than nine. Nos. I. and II. are "Queries" (Pts. To Mr. T.'s single sermons, already mentioned in p. 178, should be added, one that he printed on the death of the Princess Charlotte. laymen, but these seem to have been fully able to grapple with his violence and bigotry. Rainmohun Roy, from the beginning, and Mr. Adam, after a time, declined meeting so wild and furious an antagonist. After the debate, the Doctor proclaimed a victory. This occasioned the present "Report" In the true spirit of bigotry, the Doctor also announced that the judgment of Heaven had fallen upon one of his opponents, who died suddenly soon after the meeting: this subject was taken up in the native newspaper, the Bengal Hurkaru, and the cruel defamation received its merited chastisement. (The Report, &c., is inserted in the number for this month of The Christian Reformer, to which the reader is referred.) No. VI. is Dr. Tytler's "Substance of a Discourse in Vindication of the Divinity of our Lord," dated Caleutta, May 25, 1823. This is a curious piece of Cabbalistic lore, interlarded with denunciations against he retics, blasphemers and the like fearful characters. It is unanswerable because unintelligible or ridiculous. We give a short specimen : “Jesus is, therefore, the Alpha and Omega, and he is so because there are two languages sauctified to the great purposes of religion, the Hebrew or language used in the Church founded upon Moses and the Prophets, and the Greek employed in the Church founded upon the Apostles, of which Jesus Christ is the chief Foundation Stone. Hence he is A Alpha or, the incipient letter of Elohim in Hebrew or Aleim, and a Omega, because he revealed himself to St. John in Greek, and this is the incipient letter of ON,-"I am HOON' which is the translation in the Septuagint Version of AHEE ASHUR AHEE, 'I am that I am,' in English."-Pp. 17, 18. No. VII. is a "Dissection of Dr. Tytler's 'Substance.' By Jeremy Carver, M. D.," dated Calcutta, June 6, 1823. This is an ironical picce, quite ad hominem. No. VIII. is an answer to the above by the redoubted M. D., entitled, The Glorious Triumph of Truth; or, The Unitarian's Recantation extorted by Dr. Tytler," dated June 7, 1823. There is nothing in the pamphlet answering to the flaming title. It begins, "Upon the memorable evening of the 20th of May, 1823, Socinianism received from my hands its final overthrow in Calcutta," &c.; and concludes-" this subtilty, this boasted Reason will not always avail there is one SIN, one BLASPHEMY, declared to be unpardonable; and Satan, aware of the wretched state to which he has reduced both himself and his deluded tools, trembling through the mouths of his advocates, affects to deny the divinity of his Lord and Maker, or is now seen supplicating for mercy,-by obstinately maintaining that the Holy Jesus was a mere man, as it is impossible, say they, JEHOVAH would, for the salvation of mankind, have subjected himself to CRUCIFIXION; and hence the Unitarianism of the present age is more a sign of the Devil's terror than Satanical presumption. It is the last corner into which the malignant influence is driven, that commenced with Cain, was exhibited by Judas and Caiaphas, has wandered from Arius to Mahomet, from the latter to Socinus, from him to Priestly, (Priestley,) and lastly is seen in those who are at present deluging Calcutta with infidel tracts," &c. No. IX. The last pamphlet of the series (we take them in the order in which they are numbered by some pen in India) is "A Vindication of the Incarnation of the Deity, as the Common Basis of Hindooism and Christianity, &c. &c. By Ram Doss." Calcutta, June 3, 1823. This is really a curious pamphlet. It is a bona fide attempt by a Hindoo to shew that Hindooism and Trinitarian Christianity are kindred religions! side what Maurice and some other The zealous Brahmin is doing on his Christians have done on theirs. They go far to prove their point, but writing for Christian readers, we may say that every argument that assimilates Trinitarianism to Pagan idolatry shews that it is in opposition to genuine Christianity. Ram Doss is so remarkable a theologian, and his pamphlet presses so directly upon the vital part of the Unitarian controversy, that we must allot to him singly a place in the Review in our next Number. |