SOCINIANISM LEADING TO DEISM.

In the former volume of our work, (page 261,) we published a communication from "A Subscriber," in which he clearly proved, by extracts from the "Memoirs of President Jefferson," the truth of the fact intimated in the above title. To this article we appended, in a note, a brief summary of its contents; we warned our brethren of the dangerous tendency of this heresy, and expressed our fervent desire, that now, when we hear of a "Unitarian Association in Dublin," and of "Unitarian Churches in the North," God would protect his people from such deadly enemies to the truth!

That our position was unassailable, and our warning most seasonable, was soon evidenced by the storm of Arian ire which immediately burst forth. Our brief comment was, it appears, even taken into the pulpit, that it might be the more regularly and officially denounced; and an Arian Scribe, heedless of the proof on which our statement of the tendency of Unitarianism was founded, and equally regardless of his own character, has spoken of it in the following terms, which we shall not attempt to characterize:"It is full of filth-has been most justly denounced from the pulpit as a known and wilful false hood-and affords an example of defamation most atrocious and unprincipled."

Encouraged by this honourable notice, we are anxious to call the attention of our readers once more to the same most important topic. It is highly necessary, in these days of bold and rampant and seductive error, that the Christian public be fully persuaded of the downward tendency of every departure from the truth. For this purpose we lay before our readers the following extracts from a most valuable work, entitled, "ERRORS REGARDINGRELIGION," lately published by James Douglass, Esq., a gentleman of large fortune in the South of Scotland. This volume, with its counterpart, "THE TRUTHS OF RELIGION," by the same eloquent and pious writer, we most warmly recommend. They are works of no ordinary interest and value, especially at the present moment, and in this country. The first extract with which we present our readers, is the instructive history of Priestly's changes in religious. sentiment:

Priestly began his career, with being an Ultra-Calvinist. He was much distressed,' according to his own account, that he could not feel a proper repentance for the sin of Adam;' from this distress he found a refuge first in 'Baxterianism,' and 'thinking farther on these subjects,' he became an 'Arminian.' 'Believing that a new birth produced by the immediate agency of the Spirit of God, was necessary to salvation; and not being able to satisfy myself, that I had experienced any thing of the kind, I felt occasionally such distress of mind, as it is not in my power to describe, and which 1 still look back upon with horror. Notwithstanding I had nothing very material to reproach myself with, I often concluded that God had forsaken me, and that mine was like the case of Francis Spira, to whom, as he imagined, repentance and salvation were denied. In that state of mind I remember reading the account of the man in the iron cage in the Pilgrim's Progress, with the greatest perturbation.' He adds, that the remembrance of what he felt at these times, gave him a peculiar sense of the value of rational principles of religion,' that is, of those principles which reject the peculiar doctrines of Christianity.

"As the tide in his own mind was setting in strongly towards heresy, so the academy to which he was sent, was well fitted to encourage the growth of presumption and error. In my time, the academy,' says Priestly, and he says it not ironically, was in a state peculiarly favourable to the serious pursuit of truth, as the students were about equally divided upon every question of much importance, such as liberty and necessity, the sleep of the soul, and all the articles of theological orthodoxy and heresy, in consequence of which, all these topics were the subjects of continual discussion.' Our tutors also were of different opinions, Dr. Ashworth taking the Orthodox side of every question, and Mr. Clark, the sub-tutor, that of heresy, though always with the greatest modesty. Both of our tutors being young, at least as tutors, and some of the senior students excelling more than they could pretend to do in several branches of study, they indulged us in the greatest freedoms; so that our lectures had often the air of friendly conversations on the subjects to which they related.' In this situation,' adds Dr. Priestly, very naturally, I saw reason to embrace what is generally called the heterodox side of almost every question.' He was assisted in arriving at these conclusions by the course of the lectures, containing no lectures on the Scriptures, or on eeclesiastical history.' He adds, by the students in general, (and Mr. Alexander and myself were no exceptions,) commentators in general, and ecclesiastical history also, were held in contempt.' It was in this situation, and so richly furnished as he has described himself, with all the aids of erudition and instruction, that he composed the first copy of his Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion,' aided by the observations of his heretical friend, Mr. Clark; a work which does credit to his deficiency of lectures on the Scripture,' and to his 'contempt of commentators, and ecclesiastical history also.'

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"It was at the academy that he exchanged an unqualified belief of the atonement, for a qualified belief' of it. But being now engaged in the work of the ministry, he thought it high time to commence the new and arduous task of 'perusing the whole of the Old and New Testament." 'The consequence of this was, a full persuasion that the doctrine of atonement, even in its most qualified sense, has no countenance either from Scripture or reason.' But while he made this

discovery, that the doctrine of the atonement was not contained in Scripture, he was at the same time satisfied, as might be expected, that the reasoning of St. Paul was in many places far from being conclusive, and in a separate work I examined every passage in which his reasoning appeared to me to be defective, or his conclusions ill supported, and I thought them to be pretty numerous.' No wonder, just as if some Socinian geometer should deny that the doctrine of the three angles of a triangle being equal to two right angles, was any where to be found in Euclid, and should discover in the same lucid moment, that Euclid was a very inconclusive and contemptible reasoner.

Having discovered that the Apostles were inconclusive reasoners, he could now easily help them to whatever conclusions he chose. He threw out doubts about the immateriality of the soul, and I advanced my objections to the doctrine of the miraculous conception of Jesus and his natural fallibility and peccability,' not objections to his natural fallibility, as a reader might suppose from the structure of this sentence of a writer, whose grammar, (as Priestly himself remarks,) gave David Hume his first insight into the niceties of the English language, but on the contrary, arguments for his natural fallibility and peccability. It is not surprising that Priestly was told by some professed Atheists at Paris, 'that I was the only person they had ever met with, of whose understanding they had any opinion, who professed to believe in Christianity.'

"His consolations on his death-bed were of a piece with his previous opinions. Good men among the Gentiles consoled themselves at least, with the immediate prospect of Elysium; Dr. Priestly solaced himself with the thought that Hell was but a temporary purgatory, from which we should all escape sooner or later. 'We shall all meet finally; we only require different degrees of discipline, suited to our different tempers, to prepare us for our final happiness."

"All Dr. Priestly's canons of criticism, are favourable for wide and liberal interpretation. The language of the Scriptures is often highly figurative, which may account for the unknown source of evil being personified in them, so as to be called Satan in Hebrew, and Diabolus in Greek.' The fall of the angels appears to me to be very problematical, and though it cannot be said that the thing is absolutely impossible, it seems upon the face of it to be very improbable.' Many a doctrine is condemned by Priestly, merely on the face of it.' Questions too are tried by the number of witnesses, not by their competence. Priestly rejects a story,' because it is only found in one of the Evangelists.'

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"Sacrifices arose from the notion, that consumption by fire, was the manner in which God took things,' and that the only way of offering a present to the Deity, was to destroy it. Of the doctrine of the Trinity, he makes short and easy work: If it had been found there' that is, in the Scriptures, it would have been impossible for a reasonable man to believe it, as it implies a contradiction which no miracles can prove; hence, the Socinians might save themselves all trouble in wresting the Scriptures, and the Trinitarians might be left to themselves, since their great error consists in believing that which it is impossible to believe.' The doctrine of Christ's having made the worlds is not expressed by any of the Apostles, in a mannner so definite and clear, or so repeatedly, as its magnitude naturally requires.' It is not cer tainly, from some casual expressions which so easily admit of other inter

-pretations, and especially epistolary writings which are seldom composed with so much care as books intended for the use of posterity, that we can be authorised to infer, that such was the serious opinion of the Apostles. But if it had been their real opinion, it would not follow that it was true,' a declaration which might supersede any discussion upon the subject.

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"As to the Fathers, though Priestly is fond of citing any thing from them which wears even a doubtful aspect towards his cause, he easily gets rid of their testimonies against him, by calling out loudly, Interpolation, which few writings of so early an age have escaped.'

"It is even doubtful,' Priestly says, 'whether, in some cases, what are called angels, and had the form of men, who even walked and spoke like men, were any thing more than temporary appearances, and no permanent beings, the mere organs of the Deity, used for the purpose of making himself known and understood by his own creatures.'

Priestly was as great a Unitarian in philosophy, as in religion; he was as much offended at the notion of two substances, as of two Gods: Even when I first entered on metaphysical inquiries, I thought that either the material or immaterial part of the universal system was superfluous,' it mattered not which remained, provided only one was left. 'If they say that upon my hypothesis there is no such thing as matter, and that every thing is spirit, I have no objection, provided they make -as great a difference in spirits, as they have hitherto made in substances.' The Deity himself must be material, according to Priestly's philosophy, for how an immaterial substance can act upon matter, is a difficulty which, in my idea, amounts to an absolute impossibility.' Besides, if God is not extended, he bears no relation to space, and therefore cannot properly be said to exist any where.' But as matter consists, according to Priestly, of nothing more than points, and powers of attraction and repulsion,' the Deity of Priestly being material, could only be a huge congeries of attracting and repelling points, so that, in strict reasoning, Priestly, far from upholding the unity of the Deity, deprived him of all unity whatsoever. Not content, however, with depriving his imaginary Deity of unity and spirituality, he makes him, in express terms, the author of sin; in this only does the God of Priestly differ from wicked men, that he commits sin, (for he is the only agent, men are but machines,) from a 'good motive,' and thus the end justifies the means. With this blasphemy we conclude the self-drawn likeness or portrait of the chief and representative of the Socinians."-Errors Regarding Religion, pp. 184–192.

In our next Number, we shall give a few more extracts from this valuable work. Our readers will perceive how the statements we made respecting Unitarianism, and which excited the especial indignation of our Northern Arians, are borne out by the evidence of Priestly himself. Though this arch-heretic did not venture, like Jefferson, to call the Evangelists rogues, or Paul an impostor, yet, with this exception, what we stated in our wrath-provoking note, we now repeat, and leave our readers to judge of its atrocious defamation:-"Let the Presbyterians of Ulster then beware. Unitarianism sets up a man's opinion in

opposition to the Lord Jesus!-pronounces him in errorcalls the miraculous conception a fable!-declares any one of the Evangelists unworthy of belief, unless supported by the other three !-and pronounces Paul a very defective and inconclusive reasoner!" To these conclusions did Unitarianism conduct Dr. Priestly, a man whom his brethren are ever busied in exhibiting both as a philosopher and divine. And if these conclusions be not really Deism, we should be glad to learn wherein they differ from it.

REFLECTIONS ON THE BEAUTY OF ABSALOM.

ONE of the French Atheists thought that he demonstratively proved the non-existence of God, by alleging that if he did exist, it was impossible that he would not have taken immediate vengeance on him, as being his boldest enemy. This audacious blasphemer had spent his life in opposing God, and his impunity was imagined by him to be incontrovertible evidence of the non-existence of his enemy. And assuredly if God were such a one as man, the observation would be just;, for it is natural to man to take immediate vengeance.

The above argument is founded on a sentiment that is universal among those who are ignorant of the divine character; and is to be found, in some measure, among those who profess Christianity, as well as among Atheists. No fallacy can be more plausible than, that if God governs the world, his friends and his enemies should visibly be treated according to their character. Yet so far from executing immediate vengeance on his enemies, and distinguishing his servants by visible marks of his approbation, God, in the conduct of his providence, frequently loads his enemies with earthly advantages, and subjects his friends to the severest privations and sufferings. These reflections will occur to Christians in their daily experience; but, in the present instance, they have been suggested by the extraordinary-the unparalleled beauty of Absalom. It is said of this worthless, this wicked man, But in all Israel there was none to be so much praised as Absalom for his beauty: from the sole of his foot even to the crown of his head, there was no blemish in him.”2 Sam. xiv. 25.