United States' African School PUB. AFF.-Ceylon St. Helena NUMBER XII. RELIG. COM.-Cursory Remarks on Christ crucified the great Instru- 792 The Effects of Moral Means and Family Sermon, on John v. 39 .. 784 Cowperiana. No. II........ 790 True Date of Cyrus's Reign 793 REV. OF-Brougham's Letter to Sir Appendix to Brougham's Letter ib. Miss H. Sinclair's Principles 817 for 1817; District Committees; Bible; Deaths of Missionaries; Society for promoting Christi- liary Societies; Improved State baptised; Continental Jour- Society for the Propagation of Emoluments of Missionaries. 864 Associations; Missions; Schools, THE CHRISTIAN OBSERVER. No. 193.] JANUARY, 1818. [No. 1. Vol. XVII. RELIGIOUS COMMUNICATIONS. For the Christian Observer. CURSORY REMARKS ON UNITARIANISM, AND THE ARGUMENTS BY WHICH IT IS USUALLY SUPPORTED. No. I. HE arguments by which Unitarianism is usually supported have recently been embodied in a work of a cheap form and popular texture, entitled, "A plain View of the Unitarian Christian Doctrine, in a Series of Essays on the one God, the Father, and the Mediator between God and Men, the Man Christ Jesus: with an Appendix, containing an Explanation of the principal Passages of Scripture, which are urged in Support of the Doctrine of the Trinity, and the Deity of Christ: and an Answer to the chief Objections of Trinitarians: by Richard Wright, Unitarian Missionary." When, in the dedication of this work, I learned that there exists an Unitarian fund and missionaries, a treasurer, and all the apparatus of a regular institution, actively engaged in disseminating Unitarian principles - principles which I, for one, conscientiously believe to be hostile to the Gospel of Christ, and fatal to the peace of the soul-I deemed it my duty to peruse with care some of the numerous publications which are employed in diffusing those principles throughout the land. Among these the work of Mr. Wright seemed to me to demand particular notice, being a comprehensive, and at the same time a temperate and popular work, calculated for extensive circulation, and easy to be understood. I therefore resolved to examine it CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 193. minutely and I now submit the result of that examination to the public, through the medium of the Christian Observer, in the hope that it may tend to confirm the faith of its readers, while it fortifies them with additional arguments for the defence of the truth; and that it may also prove instrumental, under the Divine blessing, in reclaiming some who may have been unhappily bewildered by the sophistical reasonings of this Unitarian missionary and his associates. The work in question consists of a series of essays on subjects connected with the peculiar system of Unitarianism, most of which have been published separately, but which are now collected into a volume, so as to furnish, as the author says, "a view of the Unitarian doctrine, suited to the common sense and common leisure of mankind." The first of these essays is on the use of reason in matters of religion; and the former half of it is devoted to disprove the monstrous position, that reason ought to be discarded in examining the truths of revelation; in which, consequently, I should see nothing to quarrel with, but for the application of it at the close of the following sentence:-" Most absurdly would that man be thought to act, who should call upon his fellowcreatures to shut their eyes that they might see objects aright; but not more absurdly than those who contend that reason, the eye of the mind, must be disused in judging of the truths of Revelation: yet such absurdity has too often disgraced the professors of Christianity." B |