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have themselves made towards defraying the expenses incurred by building their two chapels.

Thus, with peculiar pleasure, I have witnessed the close of my missionary labours in Thorne and its vicinity, in the full attainment of their object; in the complete settlement of the united churches of Stainforth and Thorne, in decent chapels, and with a highly acceptable and useful minister.

It only remains to sketch the present prospect of success to the Unitarian cause in the district I have mentioned. The congregations which assemble in the chapels at Thorne and Stainforth are respectable; the friends have much simplicity, Christian affection and zeal. The worthy young minister who is placed among them, seems well suited to the situation. He has much zeal in the cause, and is unwearied in his exertions to promote it. Already he enjoys the esteem and confidence of his friends in no low degree. He preaches at Thorne in the morning, at Stainforth in the afternoon, and at Thorne again in the evening. He also intends to deliver a week evening lecture at Hatfield, a neighbouring village, and hopes to get into other villages. He has actually commenced the lecture at Hatfield, and has also established a Sunday school at Thorne. The Unitarian doctrine has spread pretty widely, and made a considerable impression on the minds of individuals, in the country around Thorne. As might be expected, all this has not been done without much alarming the reputed orthodox, who are, some of them, violent in their opposition. This can do us no harm while we suffer ourselves to be hurried into nothing uncandid or uncharitable, nor our Christian zeal to diminish. By perseverance in proper measures, there is a rational prospect, that in no long time, Unitarians will be the preponderating party in Thorne and its vicinity.

It is hoped that the foregoing account, which shews the effects of perseverance in a good cause, may stir up others to exert themselves, however unfavourable the circumstances, and to continue their exertions, though for a time they should have little success. With this view I t to the Monthly Repository, and God, you may have many such

instances to record of the fruits produced by the Unitarian Fund, and of the persevering exertions of the friends of truth. R. WRIGHT.

Legality of a Quaker's Affirmation. SIR, Temple, Nov. 8, 1817. As the inquiry, may prove im

S the inquiry made by Dr. Walker

portant to some, who, while they are not within the communion of the Society of Friends, conscientiously adhere to their leading principles, I hasten to state concisely the opinion I have formed respecting it. The solution of the difficulty seems to me exceedingly simple. Courts of justice know nothing, and can know nothing, of the Quakers as a body, or take cognizance of any of those internal regulations by which they admit or expel individuals. This has been established by cases in which the King's Bench have refused all interference on behalf of persons excluded from their fellowship. But the Acts for the allowance of Quaker affirmations being intended to provide for the conscientious scruples of a parti cular class of men, extend to all who regard themselves as Quakers, and who think fit to claim the privilege. If a witness, in a civil cause, being required to make oath, declines on the ground of Quakerism, the court have no right to enter into the question how far he belongs to a particular society, or is acknowledged as a Quaker by others. It is enough that he feels the scruple on Quaker principles. This is clearly established by the case of Marsh v. Robinson, 2 Anstruther's Reports, 479, in Chancery, where an answer was put in on affirmation, and a motion made to the Court to take it off the file, on the ground that the party making it was not a Quaker. He was proceeding to prove the fact disputed, when the Court said, "It is unnecessary; by filing his answer as a Quaker without oath, he undertakes that he is a Quaker; if he were indicted for perjury upon it, he would not be permitted to contradict this assertion."

I shall not enter here into any discussion of the general rules respecting the reception of affirmations, and of the oaths of those who either are not Christians, or decline to swear in the

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common way; as I shall do this at large in the work on the Laws affect ing all Sects, which I am now preparing. I take this opportunity of ear. nestly requesting any of your readers, who may be in possession of any cases at all bearing on the laws of toleration, or may be able to suggest any hints for my assistance in the prosecution of my plan, to oblige me by their communications, addressed to me at No. 5, Inner Temple Lane.

T. N. TALFOURD.

Reply to Mr. Belsham by Ignotus.
SIR,
Nov. 10, 1817.

perusal. I read it again with my pen in my hand, and at one time I had a thought of making public my observations upon it. But on looking over my extracts, I found that they would occupy too large a space, and the occurrence of the babe-sprinkling at Paris, afforded me an opportunity of saying as much as the subject appeared to me to deserve in the Repository. This, I trust, will exculpate me entirely from the charge, which I should think a highly criminal one, of censuring a work without giving it a perusal.

As to the next point, that I have controverted “ an argument which it

OUR friend Belsham is one of the is plain that I do not understand," that

best creatures in the world, except when he takes pen in hand: but when he has seated himself at his desk, and a polemical fit is upon him, adieu to his usual urbanity, his general suavity of manners. Too many instances have occurred in your Repository of this unhappy temper, and he has received repeated admonitions on his mode of writing, which never assists his argument, and is improper whether the writer is considered in the character of a gentleman or a Christian. In the course of my observations on public affairs, I have made an allusion [p. 448], to a work, written by our friend, in vindication of babe-sprinkling; for I will not profane the term of baptism, by applying it to the ceremony, for which he is an advocate. This has excited his wrathful indignation; and he has vented it [pp. 606 -609], in the usual manner of polemical divines. He has shot his bolt, telum imbelle sine ictu; and, if my character alone were concerned in it, I should willingly have passed it over in silence. But in his attack he has used such language, respecting the Unitarians, that I cannot allow his sarcasms to pass unnoticed.

Mr. Belsham thinks the title to my monthly_remarks “quaint.” On this subject I do not think it worth while to make any observation; but when he says, that I have passed a censure upon “a work which I probably never read," this is an imputation not to be overlooked, and I shall reply to it by a simple statement of the fact. I heard accidentally of Mr. Belsham's publication, and procured a copy of it soon after. I read it with no small degree of astonishment at its contents; but I was not satisfied with the first

must remain with your readers to determine. I cannot allow our friend to be a proper judge in this case.

I come next to a very severe charge against myself and a numerous class, it seems, whom he distinguishes by the epithet of of λλo, in plain English, the multitude. I am said to be one, "with whom confidence of assertion and a contemptuous sneer supply the place of proof." Now, this sort of language is so common with polemic divines, that it escapes their pen almost as a thing of course, like the signature of your very humble servant at the end of a letter. But here I cannot allow our friend Beisham to be a judge. I differ from him certainly, and should be very sorry if his charge was true: but he evidently writes under a degree of irritation too natural to him, when his opinions are controverted. As to the multitude of whom he speaks in such contemptuous terms, I trust that he is mistaken in his estimation of them: and I hope that of πολλοι ἐν εσμεν ἐν Χρισῳ.

Our friend Belsham, in his usual way, beats about the bush to look for something independent of the matter in he finds in the title of the Monthly Rehand, to attach to his opponent. This trospect, and he amuses himself with the terms Political Christian and Christian Politician. Now this is just as much pamphlet on his Plea, and interlardeď to the purpose, as if I had published a it with the terms Metaphysical Divine and Divine Metaphysician, intending by that to convey the same contempt of our friend's divinity and metaphysics, as he does of my politics and Christianity. But this mode of writ ing is, to say the least of it, in very bad taste.

I am reminded again, "that it might be advisable just to take the pains to understand a question, before I publish my remarks upon it." To this I have already replied; and I can only add, that I believe no one has read the Plea with so much attention as I have done, or is likely hereafter to do it.

Our friend now deluges us with a quantity of perhaps's. Perhaps I think this, and perhaps I think that, all of which are intended to convey insinuations against my creed. This may do very well in a polemical divine; it is a ruse de guerre with these gentry, with which I have no concern: but when he takes upon himself to assert, that infant circumcision and the Lord's supper stand upon no better foundation than his babe-sprinkling, he must give me leave to demur. I shall observe only on the first, that the command for the rite is upon record, and that it has been observed from the time of Abraham to the present moment. He has no command to shew for his babesprinkling; and that it was the uniform, universal, undisputed practice of the primitive church, from the apostolic age, is a mere assertion without proof. Indeed, the sprinkling, instead of baptizing, is of a date far posterior to the age of the apostles.

Belsham. From what I see of them, they will not permit, and I hope they never will permit, any domineering Rabbi to prescribe rules for their faith.

With this sentiment of mine, which I cherish in common with the mixed multitude of my Unitarian brethren, I trust that the readers of your Repository cannot, from any writing of mine, be led to believe that I should have a wish to "wield the theological hatchet with a more ruthless mind than the savage throws his tomahawk." I hope and trust, that I have learned better our Saviour's precept, judge not and ye shall not be judged. I have no where said, nor ever intimated, that babe-sprinklers should be excluded from eternal salvation. Much greater errors than this may be entertained by those that stand at the last day before the righteous Judge, who, in his prophetical description of it, points out to us things of far greater importance.

But I am not only charged with being an advocate for an exclusive system, which I abhor, but to excite a greater horror against me, I am coupled with "the noted John of Leyden." Our friend probably takes me for a baptist, and through me he advances this tirade against that respectable body of Christians, with whom, if I am not united in the necessity of retaining the rite among Christians, yet I respect their observance of it, as they follow the precept in its real sense, really baptizing their disciples, and not admitting them, till they are capable of becoming disciples.

I come now to our friend's tirade against the Unitarians, who do not agree with him in his exclusive system; "the mixed multitude," as he delights in calling them, "who for one reason or another claim the title, and who gather in such swarms around the Unitarian standard, that they alI am amused with the introduction most remind one of the old sayingHow we apples swim!" Whence he of Messrs. Jerome and Augustine, gained this delicate allusion, I will not Pelagius and Celestius, in this constay to inquire: but for my own part, troversy, who, with the most eminent I should have thought it a cause of men of the fifth century, are to decide triumph, that such swarms gathered it. They might as well be authorities around the Unitarian standard. I joined for all the absurdities that then preit long ago, when our friend, I believe, vailed in the Christian world. It is was still in the chains of Calvinistic, not their assertion on this or any other theology; and the prospect of a mul- point, that has weight with me. Intitude being under the same banners fant baptism had crept in among I Christians before their time, but their would have been very cheering. testimony is of no validity in this quesrejoice that the Unitarian cause is now in a very different situation from what tion. The doctrine of tradition has it then was. I trust that more and been well discussed by Popish and Protestant writers, but I have in vain more will be daily added to that assembly, which worships the God and looked for satisfactory information on this subject in the Plea for Infant Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Baptism. though they may differ as much as Í do from the theological system of Mr.

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As to the desire stated by our friend

for farther information from me, on what he chooses to call doctrines endangering men's salvation, as I have not stated any such in the quotation he has given in his letter, nor even alluded to them, he must excuse me from saying any thing farther on the subject. I am not in the least inclined to enter into any controversy with him, as my time can be much better employed. In his present temper of miud it would lead only to vain discussion, endless genealogies, and strife about words. Πολιτεια ήμων ἐν Βράνοις.

W

IGNOTUS.

SIR, London, Nov. 14, 1817. WHATEVER may be the amount of evidence produced by our highly esteerned friend Mr. Belsham, for the continued practice of Infant Baptism by the Christian church, I must take the liberty to say, it is very far short of that evidence by which the observance of the Lord's Supper, as a positive institution by the Founder of the Christian religion, is supported. The assertion of Mr. Belsham from which I dissent is made in the Mon. Repos. for October, p. 607, and is as follows: "For these external rites, (the Lord's Supper and the Lord'sday,) however reasonable and useful in themselves, yet, as Christian institutions, they stand upon no other foundation, nor can a better be desired than Infant Baptism."

Admitting that the practice of the early church has been at all times equally uniform, as regards the rite of Infant Baptism and the observance of the Lord's Supper, yet when infant baptism is traced to the earliest records of the church, we must have recourse to a hypothesis to establish it as of apostolic authority. And although the evidence for this hypothesis amounts to a very high degree of probability, yet the perpetual obligation of the rite is a conjecture supported by a very inferior degree of probability.

This appears to me to be the state of the question, after an attentive reading of the "Plea for Infant Baptism." With regard to the institution of the Lord's Supper, we know the practice of the early Christian church to have been constant and regular, their testimony invariable to the genuineness and authenticity of the gospels which contain an account of the first institu

VOL. XII.

4 Q

tion of this rite, and also to the Epistle of Paul to the church of Corinth, in which he declares that the Lord Jesus had made a particular communication to him of the institution of the Lord's Supper, and its perpetual obligation until his “coming again."

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Here the whole chain of evidence is complete, uniting itself to a positive command from that authority which no disciple is at liberty to question. No room is here left for hypothesis or conjecture. No possibility of being free from the obligation of that authority, which a "prophet sent from God" has an indisputable right to exercise. And that he has so exercised his authority, is established by a mass of evidence, sufficient in all cases to uphold unhesitating belief.

If this be a true statement of the case, the fair inference, I think, is as follows: That the observance of the Lord's Supper is commanded by an authority we dare not disobey; but Infant Baptism must be referred to those observances about which the apostolic rule is, "Let every one be satisfied in his own mind." The one. may be obligatory, the other must not be questioned.

How far the concurring testimony of antiquity, sufficient satisfactorily to establish the genuineness and authority of ancient writings, may not be suffi cient to uphold the authority of ritual observances, ought to be decided by a careful induction of particular facts: and the inquiry would perhaps tend to elucidate some very curious laws of association, which govern the phonomena of the human mind; and to which I may one day ask your permission to call the attention of your readers.

SIR,

Co

T. G.

Nov. 5, 1817. NONSIDERING the Russian rescript referred to in your last Number (p. 628), a document worthy, from the truly Catholic and benign spirit which dictated it, of more permanent preservation than the mere record of a common journal can afford, I beg to transmit you a copy I had extracted for my own portfolio, under the full impression that you will con cur with me in thinking its insertion will not discredit the pages of the Monthly Repository.

It may possibly too, and I hope it will, excite the attention of some reader able to supply us with more detailed information as to the origin and principles of a new sect that has had the courage to assert its religious liberty under the most despotic European government. No public record, I believe, yet exists of the tenets of these Christians, except that it is intimated that they resemble the Paulicieus of the eighth century, described by Gibbon, and, if I am not mistaken, by Mosheim also.* We may infer, therefore, that they approach to the original Protestant churches. You have very justly observed that the course prescribed by the Emperor of Russia in regard to these sectaries from his established church, is (though in a milder form) a resemblance of Trajan's celebrated letter to Pliny, Liber x. Ep. 98. V. M. H.

New Sect in the Crimea. A sect of Christians, deviating from the Greek Church, has sprung up in the south-eastern parts of the Russian empire, and a curious Rescript has been issued by the Emperor Alexander, containing directions for its treatment. The Russian

converts to the new faith are said to have been already driven from their homes, and placed in an insulated situation in order to prevent proselytism. They are called Duchoborzi: and the Rescript, which is addressed to the Military Governor of Cherson, is as follows:

:

Rescript to the Military Governor of
Cherson.

From your two representations to the Minister of Police respecting the removing of the Duchoborzi from the circle of Meletopolsk, in Tauris, I perceive that you have been induced to such a representation by the reports you have received of the alleged blamable way of life, of the dangerous principles of the Society, and of their endeavour to diffuse them more

and more. Upon this representation, and on the receipt of a Petition from the Duchoborzi to be protected from oppression, I have already ordered the Minister of the Police to collect circumstantial accounts of the affairs of the Duchoborzi, and consider it to be necessary to call to your mind the first beginning and the cause of the removal of this sect from the Ukraine and other Governments into the circle of Meletopolsk, in Tauris. This removal was made (as you may see from

* Not having Mosheim at hand to refer to, I can only speak from recollection.

my order given on the 25th January 1802, to the Governor of New Russia, Miklus Chewsky,) partly in consideration of their former distressed state, and partly to protect them from improper and unmerited mortifications on account of their religious opinions. This sect is there sufficiently insulated to have no immediate commu

nication with the other inhabitants, and they are thereby kindered from spreading. The Government not having received for many years any complaints from one side or the other, or other reports of disorders, had every reason to suppose that the measures adopted were sufficient.

The departure of this sect from the true faith of the Greco-Russian Church is cer

tainly a deviation which is founded on some erroneous representations of the true worship, and of the spirit of Christianity: but they are not without religion, for they seek for what is divine, though not with a right understanding. And does it then become a Christian government to employ barsh and cruel means, torture, exile, &e. to bring back to the bosom of the church those who have gone astray?

The doctrine of the Redeemer, who came into the world to save the sinner, cannot be spread by restraint and punishment; cannot serve for the oppression of those who are to be led back into the paths of truth. The true faith can take root viction, instruction, mildness, and, above only with the blessing of God, by con all, by good example. Harshness never convinces, but inspires aversion. All the measures of severity exhausted upon the Duchoborzi in the course of thirty years, up to 1801, were not able to extirpate this sect, but only increased the number of its adherents.

All these circumstances sufficiently prove that a removal of the Duchoborzi is wholly out of the question, and that, on the contrary, they are to be protected from

unmerited insults on account of the dif

ference of their faith, and in the freedom of conscience, and that neither persecution nor constraint can be admitted. By being removed to another settlement they would be again placed in a hard situation, and be punished on a mere complaint, without examining the truth of the accusations, and if she desires to receive these strayed without proof. And can the true church, children into her bosom, approve of measures of persecution, which are so wholly inconsistent with the principles of her Chief, Christ the Redeemer?

spirit of true Christianity, that the desired It is only by following this spirit, the object can be attained. I therefore recommend this colony to your special superintendence and particular care. Without regarding false allegations, without preconceived opinion, you will examine inte

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