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can make none. If it be said that we are not to determine what is scripture, and what not, by our private judgments; I confess it in places not controverted; but in disputable places, I love to take up with what I can best understand. It is the temper of the hot and superstitious part of mankind, in matters of religion, ever to be fond of mysteries; and for that reason, to like best what they understand least. Such men may use the apostle John as they please; but I have that honour for him, as to believe that he wrote good sense; and therefore take that sense to be his, which is the best; especially since I am defended in it by so great authority. For I have on my side the authority of the Fourth General Council, and, so far as I know, of all the churches in all ages, except the modern Latin, and such others as have lately been influenced by them; and that also of all the old versions, and Greek.manuscripts, and ancient Latin ones; and nothing against me, but the authority of Jerome, and the credulity and heat of his followers.

For to tell us of other manuscripts, without ever letting us know in what libraries they were to be seen; to pretend manuscripts, which, since their first discovery, could never be heard of; nor were then seen by persons whose name and credit we know; is plainly to impose on the learned world, and ought not to pass any longer for plain dealing The Spaniards tell us plainly that they followed the Latin, and by the authority of Thomas left out the clause, "And these Three are One," in the eighth verse, as inserted by the Arians. And yet St. Ambrose, St. Austin, Eucherius, and other Latins, in the Arian age, gathered the unity of the Deity from this clause; and the omission

of it is now, by printing it, acknowledged to be an erroneous correction. The manuscript in England wanted the same clause, and therefore, if there was any such MS, it was a corrected one, like the Spanish edition, and the manuscript of Valesius. Erasmus, who printed the triple testimony in heaven by that English manuscript, never saw it; tells us it was a new one; suspected its sincerity; and accused it publicly in his writings on several occasions, for several years together; and yet his adversaries in England never answered his accusation; never endeavoured to satisfy him and the world about it; did not so much as let us know, where the record might be consulted for confuting him; but, on the contrary, when they had got the Trinity into his edition, threw by their manuscript, if they had one, as an almanac out of date. And can such shuffling dealings satisfy considering men? Let manuscripts at length be produced, and freely exposed to the sight of the learned world; but let such manuscripts be produced as are of authority; or else let it be confessed, that whilst Jerome pretended to correct the Latin by the Greek, the Latins have corrected both the Latin and the Greek by the sole authority of Jeroine.

Spirit of Orthodoxy in the West.

THERE has been handed us a pamphlet, published in Lexington, Kentucky, which proves, we are sorry to say, that the impolitic, as well as bigoted and rancorous opposition to President Holley, in that place, on account of his religious opinions, has lost nothing of the fierceness, with which it assailed him when he first

took charge of Transylvania University. The publication before us is an answer of Mr. William G. Hunt, to an attack made on himself, in a newspaper, by the Rev. Nathan H. Hall. Four distinct charges are replied to with considerable force and spirit; but that with which we were most interested, is the one which refers to Mr. Holley. The charge is thus stated by the writer of the pamphlet.

"I am called 'the echo of the President and his party;' it is asserted that I am known to go all lengths with them;' and I am said to be 'under the wing of the President of Transylvania University,' who is evidently referred to under the title of my master.”

To this abuse Mr. Hunt replies in an indignant and independent manner. Take for instance the following

paragraph.

"What right has Mr. Hall, directly or indirectly, to pronounce me an infidel in disguise, or, which is the same thing, to say that I go all lengths with those whom he chooses to pronounce infidels in disguise? Every man, according to this system, who does not join these crusaders in their anathemas against the president, and aid them in their efforts to destroy the university, is liable to be denounced as irreligious, immoral, socinian, and infidel. It is time for the community, for the really pious and sincere among the professors of religion of all denominations, to set their faces against this unchristian and vindictive spirit of persecution. I care not for the denunciations of Mr. Hall, Mr. McFarland, or the whole host of reverend slanderers. As it respects my religious opinions, I do not acknowledge any of them for my father confessors, and however heretical they may choose to suspect or pronounce me to be, I trust i shall never be found guilty of wantonly defaming my neighbour, or of exhibiting the spirit of a demon under the guise of a meek and humble follower of the Lamb."

He then notices, and directly contradicts, the coarse slanders which have been connected with Mr. Holley's name. "Never have I witnessed," he says, "a more rancorous and vindictive spirit of persecution than has been exhibited towards Mr. Holley. Were he a mon

ster in human form, he could not have been more virulently and violently assailed." He professes his admiration of Mr. Holley's talents; his conviction that the university owes to his exertions its present prosperous state; and his own satisfaction in having given him his warm support; and he warns the enemies of that gentleman, that if they succeed in effecting his dismission, they will inflict a mortal wound on the success of the seminary over which he presides.

We believe that this opposition will have no lasting bad effect on the reputation and usefulness of President Holley. But it saddens us to witness such narrow, ignorant, fanatical attacks on those who are labouring for the best interests of the country.

Geneva Catechism-Third Part.

THE third part of the Geneva Catechism, consisting of questions and answers on the Duties of the Christian Religion, has been lately published at Boston. It completes the work. The three parts, bound together, will make a neat duodecimo volume, and furnish to those who would train up their children in the way they should go, an almost unexceptionable initiation into the system of Christian doctrine and duty.

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