you would yet acknowledge JESUS CHRIST to be your SAVIOUR. Your declaration, however, if it has any pertinency, plainly imports that you do not. How can you then sit down at HIS table in communion with those who do acknowledge HIM as their SAVIOUR,-and who with undissembled gratitude and devotion unite in the holy ascription,-Unto HIM that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; TO HIM BE GLORY AND DOMINION FOR EVER AND EVER. We worship, Sir, THE FATHER, SON, AND HOLY GHOST. Do you worship this same GOD?

You did look" to me, you are pleased to say, "for a healing spirit." Happy, indeed will he be, who shall be instrumental in "raising up the foundations of many generations," and justly be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in." But wo to him, who would heal the hurt slightly, saying, Peace, peace, when there is no peace!" Few men can have greater inducements, than I have, to listen to the enchanting voice of peace; few could have engaged in this controversy with greater reluctance, or have brought to it greater heaviness and sorrow of heart.-But the servants of HIM who endured the cross, despising the shame, must not confer with flesh and blood: must never forget the ́solemn declaration, He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and he that taketh not his cross and followeth after me is not worthy of me.

You charge me with "studiously magnifying the differences" between orthodox Christians and Unitarians; and with "studiously overlooking the points of agreement." There is certainly no occasion to magnify the differences; they are in themselves sufficiently great. To me, however, it has appeared vastly important, that people should “learn the distinction between Trinitarianism and Unitarianism." This you recommend in your "Note;" and in this recommendation I cordially join. Upon this, however, you proceed to some discussion, as if with a design to shew the "distinction;" and you finally represent it as being little, if any thing more

tran a mere "SOUND." Elsewhere, also, you speak of it as being only a "difference which relates to the obscurest of all subjects, to the essence and metaphysical nature of God." And throughout both your Letter and your Remarks you seem to have laboured, assiduously, to conceal the points of difference betweeen us, and to make the impression that these points are few and of very little importance. This mode of treating the subject appears to me exceedingly improper, and of most deceptive tendency. Is this the way, Sir, to promote the knowledge of truth? Is it thus that you would conduct that candid and impartial research," which according to your Letter, is to "guide mankind to a purer system of christianity, than is now to be found in any church under Heaven,❞—and to bring about a "glorious reformation of the church of God?"

In opposition to this system of concealment, I have thought it right and important to endeavour a developement, and to lay the differences between us open to the publick in their true light. On our part we have no dread of this; no dread of a clear and full developement. It has long been our earnest desire, that your sentiments as well as ours, might be known; and that all christians and all people might well understand the points on which you differ from us. On this account we devoutly rejoice that the subject has been brought before the publick. In our view, it has come forward in a way to answer an important purpose. A "general discussion" of the differences between us, would have been of little avail, while people were utterly unapprised that such differences really existed, and were fast asleep in regard to them. It was first of all desirable that these differences should be disclosed; that people should be made to see them to be not imaginary, but real; not of trivial consequence, but of essential importance; and that their attention would be strongly drawn to them.

It was under impressions of this kind, that I was induced to make the statements, exhibited in my former Letter; and under the same impressions, I now proceed to a still more distinct and detailed statement.

Orthodox christians hold, that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments were given by inspiration of God; and that all which they contain is to be received as truth, ON THE AUTHORITY OF GOD.-But by the principal Unitarian writers, and, so far as is known, by Unitarians generally, the plenary inspiration of the scriptures is denied. The scriptures," says Dr. Priestley,* were written without any particular inspiration, by men who wrote according to the best of their knowledge, and who, from their circumstances, could not be mistaken, with regard to the greater facts of which they were properly witnesses; but (like other men subject to prejudice) might be liable to adopt a hasty and ill grounded opinion, concerning things which did not fall within the compass of their own knowledge, and which had no connexion with any thing that was so. We ought all of us, therefore, to consider ourselves fully at liberty to examine, with the greatest rigour, both the reasonings of the writers, and the facts of which we find any account in their writings; that, judging BY THE RULES OF JUST CRITICISM, we may distinguish what may be depended on from what may not.” Mr. Belsham says, "The scriptures contain a faithful and credible account of the christian doctrine, which is the true word of God; but they are not themselves the word of God, nor did they ever assume that title; and it is highly improper to speak of them as such; as it leads inattentive readers to suppose they were written under a plenary inspiration, to which they make no pretension; and as such expressions expose christianity, unnecessarily, to the cavils of unbelievers."‡

* History of Early Opinions, vol. iv, p. 5.

† Review of Wilberforce, p. 19.

"Perhaps I may be charged with having made a distinction in this place, which gives an unfair representation of Unitarians, inasmuch as they also profess to derive their arguments from scripture. But whether that profession be not intended in mockery, one might be almost tempted to question; when it is found that in every instance, the doctrine of scripture is tried by their abstract notion of right, and rejected if not accordant:-when by means of figure and allusion, it is every where made to speak a language the most repugnant to all fair, critical interpretation; until emptied of its true meaning, it is converted into a vehicle for every fantastick theory, which under the name of rational, they may think proper to adopt:—when in such parts as propound gospel truths of a contexture too solid to admit of an escape in figure and allusion, the sacred writers are charged

Though all Unitarians may not be ready fully to adopt the language or the sentiments on this subject of Dr. Priestley, Mr. Belsham, or others, mentioned in the note below; yet I believe very few, if any of them, admit the plenary inspiration of the scriptures. But, Sir, if the plenary inspiration of the scriptures be denied, where shall we stop? How shall we determine what is the word of God, and what is not? What other test, or criterion, of truth have we, than REASON?

Accordingly the Unitarians very generally seem to have adopted "the fundamental rule" of the old Socinians, "That no doctrine ought to be acknowledged as true in its nature, or divine in its origin, all whose parts are not level to the comprehension of the human understanding; and that, whatever the Holy Scriptures teach concerning the perfections of God, his counsels and decrees, and the way of salvation, must be modified, curtailed, and filed down, in such a manner, by the transforming power of art and argument, as to answer the extent of our limited faculties."* That this is the principle, and this the labour of Unitarians, no one who is conversant

as bunglers, producing "lame accounts, improper quotations, and inconclusive reasonings," (Dr. Priestley's 12th Letter to Mr. Burn) and philosophy is consequently called in to rectify their errors:—when one writer of this class (Steinbart) tells us, that "the narrations," (in the New Testament) "true or false, are only suited for ignorant, uncultivated minds, who cannot enter into the evidence of natural religion;" and again, that "Moses, according to the childish conceptions of the Jews in his days, paints God as agitated by violent affections, partial to one people, and hating all other nations:”—when another, (Semler) remarking on St. Peter's declaration, that prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit, says, that "Peter speaks here according to the conception of the Jews," and that "the prophets may have delivered the offspring of their own brains as divine revelations:"(Dr. Erskine's Sketches and Hints of Ch. Hist. No. 3, pp. 66, 71.)—when a third (Engedin) speaks of St. John's portion of the New Testament, as written with "concise and abrupt obscurity, inconsistent with itself, and made up of allegories;" and Gagneius glories in having given "a little light to St. Paul's darkness, á darkness, as some think, industriously affected:"-when we find Mr. Evanson, one of those able commentators referred to by Mr. Belsham in his Review, &c. p. 206: assert, ( Dissonance, &c. p. i,) that "the evangelical histories contaiu gross and irreconcileable contradiction," and consequently discard three out of the four, retaining the gospel of St. Luke only, at the same time drawing his pen over as much of this, as either from its infelicity of style, or other such causes happens not to meet his approbation." Magee on Atonement, Notes, No. 14.

Mosheim's Eccl. Hist, Cent. 16. chap. 4.

with their writings can doubt. Denying the plenary inspiration of the scriptures, they hold themselves at liberty to subject. those sacred writings to all the torture of the most rigorous criticism; not for the purpose merely of deciding upon ❝various readings," of elucidating obscure passages by reference to ancient customs and manners, or of ascertaining the true meaning of the original words, and their most natural sense in the connexions in which they occur; but for the purpose especially, of explaining the different parts in such a manner as to make them yield a meaning conformable to their views of what is rational. In this mighty work human reason appears in all its pride, and the wisdom of this world in its highest glory.

Here is the primary point of difference between orthodox christians and Unitarians. The orthodox, holding the Bible to be the word of the living God, feel themselves warranted and bound to embrace as divine truth, every doctrine which they find revealed in that sacred volume, however humbling to reason it may be, however mysterious and incomprehensible. But the Unitarians, regarding the Bible in a very different light, are not restrained from using greater liberties with it; are not restrained from rejecting such doctrines, as transcend the comprehension of their own understandings, or do not comport with their views of what is rational; but glory in excluding all mystery from religion. Hence the name which they assume of RATIONAL CHRISTIANS; and hence the imposing superiority which they affect over those, who understand the scriptures in their natural and obvious sense, and believe in doctrines confessedly beyond the powers of the human mind to comprehend.

On the authority of the scriptures, orthodox christians believe that the one Jehovah exists in a Trinity, called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These we call three persons; because we have no better word by which to denote the distinction; and because THEY apply to each other, the personal pronouns I, Thou, and He, and to themselves together, the plurals we, us, and our. This Trinity in the Godhead we acknowledge to be a mystery, which we pretend not to comprehend, and which we would not undertake to explain.