66 stretched or curtailed on the Procrustean bed of conformity. She had an Abernethy, a Duchal, a Mears, and a Leland, who were as the sons of God without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, amongst whom they shone as lights in the world." In our own time, CATHOLICUS VERUS has spoken with a voice most sweet and eloquent. Would that it were raised again to a higher note, and like a trumpet make the welkin ring! Here, as in Cork, a Unitarian Christian Society has been formed, by the exertion of some individuals, who stand high in the scale of civic respectability, and mental cultivation. They have opened a friendly correspondence with their brethren in England, and established a Repository for such publications as they deem best calculated to promote evangelical truth. They have among them wealth, influence, talent, learning, and high moral integrity; and these, if liberally and energetically employed in the best and noblest of causes, must eventually succeed in promoting their desired object. Let them be only constant and zealous in their endeavours, by frequent meetings, by mutual exhortation, by circulating tracts, and encouraging every effort in their behalf, both of the pulpit and the press; and fear not, that under a gracious Providence, they will be mainly instrumental in advancing the interests of true religion. In proportion as the Scriptures are read and understood, and as men learn to think and judge for themselves, must the reign of superstition and idolatry be brought nearer and nearer to a close. Abroad, Unitarianism is spreading like the light of heaven." The mountains and vallies of Switzerland are re-echoing her halleluiahs, while Malan and his fanatics are howling a funeral dirge over the "lifeless carcass" of Calvinism.* The erudite Brahmin in the East has commenced her hosanna to the Son of David, and proclaimed that Jehovah is One. But we must turn to the land beyond the western ocean, to the land of the learned and pious Channing, to see how she can triumph when she has an open arena, and is not opposed by fashion, worldly interests, and those inveterate prepossessions of custom and education, which chain men to Popery and Calvinism in Europe. Half a century has not elapsed, since she could not boast of more than one congregation in that great division of the globe-now she has many;† may it soon be all her own! She is rapidly progressing, and scattering wide the good seed of the Word, which, in due season, *—" The priestlings of Moloch are loud in their wail, And the might of grim Calvin smote down by the word, A gentleman, just arrived from America, has informed the author, that in Boston alone, there are fourteen congregations of Unitarian Christians-1827. S will shoot above all the noxious tares that would impede its growth. In that new world, the prejudices of Europe find no appropriate soil. There the religious mind has room to expand, unchecked by the blighting influences of established error. There Calvinism will cease to cast its heart-withering shade, to exhale its azotic effluvia, or encumber the ground with its jagged and poisonous roots. Trinitarianism will be cleared away by the sickle and the hoe of true labourers in the vineyard of the Lord; for " every plant," saith our blessed Saviour," which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up." It must, therefore, be extirpated from all Christian ground, and the religion of the Redeemer produce its genuine fruits-"love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." These are the true fruits of Christian principles; and it is written, "by their fruits ye shall know them." There it has been calculatad, that seven-eighths of the Society of Friends have renounced the doctrine of the Trinity. The "Christians," the Universalists, and the Congregational Unitarians are, every day, becoming more and more numerous; and besides these, there are many who are well known "to cherish our opinions, having drawn them from Scripture, and matured them in their own thoughts, without knowing that they harboured the heresy of Unitarianism." All North America is turning to the worship of the only living and true God;-soon may the universal conversion be complete! Then shall "the wilderness and solitary place be glad; and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose ;-it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing **** they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.' "It may not be generally known, that since the beginning of the present century, there has sprung up in this country a very numerous sect, who, abjuring all distinctive names, call themselves the Christian Denomination. Originally they were Seceders from the Presbyterian, the Baptist, the Methodist bodies; of course, they were all nominally Trinitarians, having been educated in that doctrine. The doctrine, however, was soon canvassed, brought to the test of revelation, and universally rejected, with all its concomitant doctrines, as unscriptural. Within 25 years, their growth has been wonderful, particularly in the Western States of the Union, and chiefly among the common people. They have now 500 ministers, from 700 to 1,000 churches, and they number about 200,000 persons, who have embraced their principles and doctrines. One of their principal preachers says, 'We are evangelical Unitarians in preaching, and applying the Unitarian doctrine; and it is this mode of preaching and applying it, which has crowned our labours, with such a rich harvest; it is this which gives us access to the common people, who constitute the greatest part of our congregations.""-See an American Tract, entitled "Evangelical Unitarianism adapted to the Poor and Unlearned." Mon. Rep. Oct. 1830, p. 700. + This is stated on the authority of one of their own body, a gentleman of Philadelphia, of known veracity and candour, now on a visit to Dublin. Nov. 1830. Such intelligence is exhilarating to the friends of true religion at home. Let them not despair-the great Reformation has commenced, and if they will lend their aid, it will go prosperously forward. The authors of the last Reformation only half executed. their task. They did much, but more remains to be done. They did all that could reasonably be expected of men emerging from midnight shades, and awakening from a profound slumber: but their vision, long habituated to darkness, could not bear the full radiance of Gospel truth. They still hovered on the confines of their ancient haunts. They wanted the eagle eye and the eagle pinion that could sustain and direct them, in more elevated flights towards the Sun of Righteousness. It is left to men of the present and coming age to complete the task which they began; to establish the doctrine of the divine unity; and make the religion of the Bible the only religion in the world. Let Mr. Pope employ his talents in promoting this design-disenthral his mind from the spiritual chains by which it has been confined-take more enlarged views of nature-(how can a mind like his admit the monstrous idea that nature is under the curse of her Creator?) and adopt more expanded sentiments of Providence, and Revelation, and more worthy of the name and profession of him, who has taught such heart-touching lessons of the inexhaustible benevolence of his and our heavenly Father, who feeds the fowls of the air, and clothes the lilies of the field; who causes his sun to shine, and his rain to fall, on the unthankful and the evil. Instead of persisting in a fruitless advocacy of the unscriptural doctrine which he has espoused, let him dare to become a champion in the cause of truth. Whitby, Watts, Lindsey, Robinson of Cam "We have been told by the acutest champion of Popery in our own times, that Unitarians are of all Protestants the most consistent, and carry the principles of the Reformation to the fullest extent;‡ and in this declaration, though intended by its author as the bitterest taunt, we acknowledge a truth, while we despise a sneer. The orthodox Protestant, who has come to the contest, expecting an easy triumph over the Catholic, by proving to him how little of his creed is found in Scripture, will be staggered when the Catholic proves to him in his turn, how little of his own can be derived from it. will find that he can escape from the admission of transubstantiation, only by that plea of figurative language which the Unitarian takes up to prove, that a great deal of the popular theology is built on figures of speech, never designed by those who used them to be taken in a literal sense.' He Obstacles to the Diffusion of Unitarianism. A Sermon, by John Kenrick, M. A. London, 1827. The author recommends this Sermon to the serious perusal of his readers, as pious, learned, eloquent-and to the friends of Gospel truth, cheering and consolatory, The Unitarianism of Watts is disputed. No wonder. The hymns written by him when a young poet, are too full of Calvinism for their author to be easily given up by the advocates of that heart-withering system. Watts would have purged them of their unchristian sentiments; but they had become the property of booksellers, who would not suffer their popularity to be Lingard's Tracts, (1826) pp. 42-132. bridge, and a host of others, who have written, and written as well as men could write in support of false principles, have at last discovered their error, and with magnanimity to avow it, turned to the worship of the One God. If Mr. Pope and Mr. Maguire would follow their great example, each would win a more permanent, and more glorious wreath of triumph, than will ever be gained by the victory of one corruption of Christianity over another. injured by such a purgation. A letter, quoted by the late Rev. and learned Samuel Merivale, of Exeter, to Dr. Priestley at Leeds, exhibits the most authentic account of Dr. Watts's last sentiments concerning the person of Christ; from which it appears, that in Dr. LARDNER's estimation, Dr. Watts became, in the strict and proper sense of the word "an Unitarian.” The reader who wishes for further satisfaction, may see a letter of Lardner's on the subject, in Belsham's Life of Lindsey, pp. 220, 221. In this letter he states, that "Dr. Watts's last thoughts were completely Unitarian.” It is much to be lamented that Dr. Watts's papers were not preserved and published, that they might have shewn how the light of Unitarian Christianity first dawned upon his soul, and dissipated the dark clouds of Trinitarian prejudice, by which it had been so long and so darkly enveloped. "The feelings of his humble, pious, and inquisitive mind are beautifully exhibited in that devout address to the Deity, from which Mr. Lindsey has made copious extracts, of which the following are an interesting specimen.". "Hadst thou informed me, gracious Father, in any place of thy word, that this divine doctrine is not to be understood by men, and yet they are required to believe it, I would have subdued all my curiosity to faith. But I cannot find that thou hast any where forbid me to understand it, or make these inquiries. I have, therefore, been long searching into this divine doctrine, that I may pay thee due honour with understanding. Surely, I ought to know the God whom I worship, whether he be one pure and simple being, or whether thou art a threefold Deity, consisting of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. "Thou hast called the poor and the ignorant, the mean and the foolish things of this world, to the knowledge of thyself and thy Son. But how can such weak creatures ever take in so strange, so difficult, and so abstruse a doctrine as this, in explication and defence whereof multitudes of men, even men of learning and piety, have lost themselves in infinite subtilties of dis putes, and endless mazes of darkness? And can this strange and perplexing notion of three real persons going to make up one true God, be so necessary and so important a part of Christian doctrine, which, in the Old Testament and the New, is represented as so plain and easy even to the meanest understanding?"-The Life of the Rev. Isaac Watts, D. D. by Samuel Johnson, L. L. D., with Notes, containing Animadversions and Additions, 1785. Quoted from Belsham's Life of Lindsey, p. 218. END OF THE ESSAY. REVIEW OF THE REV. JAMES CARLILE'S BOOK, ENTITLED "JESUS CHRIST, THE GREAT GOD OUR SAVIOUR." THE first edition of the preceding Essay had scarcely appeared before the public, when it was attacked by a host of polemics, as by a simultaneous impulse, and almost every pulpit in Dublin rang with declamations against the soul-destroying heresy. In the van stood the Rev. James Carlile, one of the Ministers of Mary's Abbey Meeting-house. Not contented with hurling his oral fulminations against it week after week-he determined to give the fruit of his oratorical labours to the world in the permanent form of paper, ink, and type. Great expectation was excited-mighty efforts were made among the orthodox, so called, of his own persuasion, to encourage him in the task-subscrip. tions were received the work proceeded the hour of parturition at length arrived "The mountain laboured—and a mouse was born?" No-but an overgrown semi-animate nondescript lusus theologiæ, which expired a few days after its birth, and which it is our business to dissect for the instruction of students in theological anatomy. This new birth came out, branded with its dogmatical and idolatrous title, in the shape of a heavy volume, swollen with verbiage and tautology, containing 471 pages, with a preface of xv. In this, our author acknowledges his obligations to Dr. Wardlaw, whose old panoply, dinted and shattered as it was in the conflict with the Unitarian Yates, he is contented to stitch clumsily together, and to buckle on. He acknowledges his obligations to old Andrew Fuller, in whose putrid relics he had been raking in search of materiel to be employed in his sortie against the Unitarians. He "damns with faint praise" the Synod of Ulster, and evinces what spirit he is of, by treating as a Unitarian forgery that prayer of |