the representation which you have given of the object and tendency of my ministerial labours. "To degrade the Saviour, to lessen the regard and love of his disciples for him, to interrupt the sacred song of worthy is the Lamb,'-to deprecate the presentation of that honour which the Father has commanded us to pay to the Son,--to forbid men to 'glory in the cross of Christ,' and to prevent him who was lifted up' from 'drawing all men unto him,'"-these, you affirm, to have been the objects of my constant endeavour; whereas, the very contrary to all these, I deliberately and solemnly declare to have been, and to be, the purposes nearest my heart, and which, with whatsoever imperfections, (and deeply sensible am I of their number and extent,) I have laboured, and hope I shall never cease to labour, to attain. I believe, indeed, that "there is but one God, the Father." I receive in no ambiguous sense the clear testimony of Jesus Christ himself, that his "Father is greater than he;" but I believe also that, as the reward of his obedience unto death, "God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory"-the supreme and underived glory-" of God the Father." (Phil. ii. 10.) While, therefore, I dare not in thought place one whom I believe to be a created being on an equality with the Creator, I desire to ascribe to him, and to assert for him, all the dignity and honour that in my conscientious opinion he ever claimed for himself. I see him as he is described in scripture, in the midst of the Father's throne, within the circuit of it, but not upon it,* at the right hand of the excellent glory, but never occupying its place. The Roman Catholic may say that the Protestant means to degrade the Virgin Mary, and the holy men of old, when he refuses to acknowledge them as mediators and intercessors; and the Trinitarian may say that the Unitarian's object is to degrade the Son of God, when he asserts

* See "Omniscience the Attribute of the Father only," Note, page 82."

his disbelief of his deity; but the assertion in either case is equally false and groundless, and calculated to operate upon no other than weak or strongly prejudiced minds. The question at issue between us is, "what is the rank which truth and scripture assign to the Son;" nor is there any more wish on my part, I trust, to lower the Son's true dignity, than on your's, to invade the Father's infinite and sole supremacy. I charge upon you no wish to bring down the Father to a level with his creature,-you have no right to charge upon me an intention to degrade the Son, The object of both of us, I hope, is to ascertain the truth, and if this be our sincere desire and endeavour, I have confidence enough in the justice and mercy of God to believe that He will not condemn the errors of the understanding, as if they were crimes of the will. I might, if I pleased, address you in the same objurgatory and hortatory style in which you have addressed me, warning and entreating you not to believe or to teach a doctrine, which, in my mind, cannot possibly be reconciled with the first article of natural and revealed reli

gion-that "God is one." "Your fine powers," I might say, "deserve a better cause. Despise the imputation of interest, and pity the charge of vacillation. Take a reasonable faith. Live for an end to which your soul can lend all its complacency and all its confidence." Call Jesus Lord, and honour, love, and serve him as such; but remember that the Father is Jehovah, Himself alone, to whom there is none equal; that He must have all your heart, and soul, and mind, and strength; that to Him you must bow the knee as a true disciple of that Son who said, “in that day ye shall ask me nothing; verily, verily, I say unto you, whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father, in my name, he will give it you." (John xvi. 23.) "This faith," I might add, "will give intelligibleness to your zeal and scope to your ardour. To tear yourself from long-endeared connections, to pass through so immense a revolution of feelings and conceptions, to retrace a public as well as a private course, will impose a sacrifice whose severity only the honourable mind can know. You are not where you should be, &c." I might address you thus, quite as properly and imposingly

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as you have addressed me. But if I were to do so, how would you reply? Probably by a single word twice or thrice repeated,―prove, prove, prove. This is my reply likewise. I am sincerely obliged by your exhortations and good wishes, but I must have proof, and much stronger proof than you have hitherto produced, before I can relinquish convictions which appear to me to be supported by the clearest deductions of reason, and the most direct and explicit testimonies of Holy Writ. You intimate that I have had, and shall still have, your prayers. I gratefully accept the assurance, and request you to be mindful of it. Ora pro nobisBrethren, pray for us"—this is a request which, I trust, I shall never be ashamed to offer to any fellow mortal, drawing near with a sincere heart to the throne of God. By all means let us, and all religionists, pray for each other. Independently of other blessings which they may draw down from Him before whom, if they be heart-offered, they will ascend as a memorial; nothing, we may rest assured, will tend more effectually to calm our tempers, soften and remove our asperities, and inspire us with mutual good will. Allow me, however, humbly to suggest that the proper prayer for fallible beings is, not that others may be brought over to their opinions, or they to the opinions of others, but that all may be led to the discernment and love of the truth. There cannot be a better prayer than that of the Litany, in which, slightly altered, we can all join, "that it may please God to illuminate all the teachers and professors of religion with true knowledge and understanding of his word, that, both by their teaching and living, they may set it forth and shew it accordingly!" Your absolute certainty that you have already attained "true knowledge,"your fallible infallibility,*-I cannot, I confess, understand, or clearly distinguish from the infallible infallibility of the church of Rome. It be called the assurance of faith, may and may, for aught I know, be Calvinistically orthodox, but, unless it rests upon arguments, of the validity of which the human mind can judge, it cannot, in my opinion, be a rational and well-grounded assurance. At all events, an

* See Letters, pages 10, 12, and 43.

internal supernatural testimony granted to individuals, to which you seem sometimes to allude, can be nothing to others, till those who profess to have received it are enabled to confirm their words by "signs following." Before I conclude this letter, I beg leave to expostulate with you, on the remarks which you have made respecting my congregation, and the result of my labours amongst them. On this subject I cannot think that you are either qualified or authorised to speak. You reprove me for what you pronounce the indecorum of quoting and commenting upon a passage of one of your published discourses in my pulpit: what would you think if I had attempted from the press to estimate the character of your audience, and the influence of your ministrations upon them? Would you not have pronounced this an indecorum far more flagrant, and less excusable? In one sentence you tell me that "the prejudices of irreligion are all in my favour, that the sceptic, the worldling, and the indifferentist, hear me with approbation, or without offence, that I work in the stream of their tide, if all is not rather motionless and stagnant." If this be so, which I beg leave, however, to question, the fault is surely my own. But in the very next sentence I read that I have never" gathered around me the people similar to my taste, or to my unaffectedly solemn feelings of religion." Here it would appear that it is my congregation that are to blame. The riddle is finally solved by imputing the deficiencies and delinquencies of both of us to our creed. Are your congregation, my dear Sir, all that you could desire ? Are there no sceptics, worldlings, or indifferentists amongst them? Do you never tell them of their want of zeal for Christian truth, and their violations of Christian practice ?* And do you never feel, when you are preaching to them, that the preacher himself needs the admonitions that he gives, as much as

* Would you think it right for us to quote your faithful warnings of this kind, as your testimony to the moral state of your people? See page 7, where you have cited a passage from a sermon of Dr. Priestley's, in

this manner.

they, and that nothing but constant watchfulness and prayer can prevent him from falling into the temptations against which he warns his fellow men? I do not pretend that my hearers are all that I could wish; but neither am I all that they could wish,-far from it. What are we but feeble helpers of each other's faith and joy, who all stand in need of mutual forbearance and forgiveness, and who should unite unceasingly to implore of God his pardoning mercy for the past, and his gracious assistance for the future? I am no searcher of hearts, and will say nothing, therefore, of the comparative spiritual attainments of our congregations. This, however, I am competent and happy to say, that I have much to be grateful for in my connection with a society, from the members of which, individually and collectively, I have always experienced the greatest personal kindness, candour, and forbearance, and amongst whom, I humbly trust, that my labours of love, defective as I deeply feel them to have been, have not proved altogether unproductive of immortal fruit. Should my peculiar sentiments be ultimately found erroneous, I can at least vouch for their sincerity, and console myself with the reflection, that I have always exhorted those who hear me to receive no doctrine as divine on my authority, but to refer constantly to the Word and to the Testimony; and, like the noble Beræans, to "search the scriptures daily whether these things be so." My first object has been, and I trust ever will be,-not to lead my hearers to think as I do, but to induce them to exert their best powers, and to seek divine aid, in the search after truth, and the practice of righteousness. One good effect, I hope, that your comments on our individual and relative conduct, unauthorised and improper as I think them in some respects, will produce ;-"Fas est doceri,"-I will not quote the whole, though, notwithstanding your motto, the general spirit of your pamphlet might warrant me in doing so ;-I trust that they will animate us to increased exertion, and bring home to our minds and hearts the admirable exhortation of the apostle-" sanctify