came interrupted :-still she was tranquil, and her features perfectly placid; at halfpast five, she underwent a momentary struggle, and ceased to breathe.' pp. 192--194.

We regret that our limits will not allow us to point out to our readers many passages in the extracts from the correspondence, which do equal honour to her head and her heart. But these volumes must be read entire. We cannot, however, but repeat our honest and unqualified eulogy, that no author on education has, in our judgment, done more, if so much, to promote the interests of young persons of her own sex. Her correct scriptural and moral taste; her exquisite tact into human character; her perception of whatever is beautiful in virtue and religion; and the benevolence and piety by which it is obvious her efforts are directed, have given her a high niche in the temple of the benefactors to mankind. Other female authors have evinced a more splendid imagination, and have attired human life in more romantic colouring; but this has usually been at the expense of truth. The efforts of JANE TAYLOR'S genius bear the invariable stamp of utility, and are uniformly characterized by a pious aim, and the most perfect good sense. We only add that we cordially recommend these volumes, and particularly her own writings in general, to the public perusal, and especially to her own sex.

An Answer to the Lord Chancellor's Question, "What is a Unitarian?" By J. G. Robberds. Second Edition. London: Hunter, St. Paul's Church-yard.

THIS pamphlet is an answer from the pulpit to the above query from the bench, "What is a Unitarian?" It was primarily designed, it seems, for the edification of the Lord

Chancellor, in which laudable concur: and it has attained suffipurpose, we of course heartily cient popularity among the body whose creed it professes to exhibit, to induce the demand for a second edition, after having been first delivered as a sermon to the author's own congregation at Manchester, and subsequently repeated before the East York and Lincoln "Unitarian" Association, assembled at Hull. This is our reason for giving it a place in our humble pages, rather than any intrinsic merit as a composition which it might be supposed to possess.

It is founded on St. Paul's encounter with the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers at Athens, recorded in the seventeenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles; and his Lordship's question stands arraigned at the right worshipful bar of Unitarianism, as bearing a resemblance to the "contemptuous" interrogatory of these heathen sages at Mars' Hill," May we know what this new doctrine whereof thou speakest is? For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears: we would know, therefore, what these things mean." A due portion of rebuke is awarded to "so grave and learned" a person as the Lord High Chancellor of England, for requiring information on a subject so notorious as the doctrine of the Unitarians, and especially on account of the motive with which

the inquiry was made.

"The declared object," says the author, "of the wish to be informed What a Unitarian is?' was to know whether, as such, he be entitled to the same protection of the laws with his fellow-subjectswhether, instead of asking for any further indulgence to the scruples of his conscience, he ought not to ask permission to avow with impunity the opinions on which his scruples are founded?"

We cannot but seriously join the author in his regret that such queries as these should still form a topic of legislative or judicial deliberation. When will it be

recognized as a principle by states and governors, that as mere religious opinions are incapable of being suppressed by law, so they cannot, without injustice, be considered as in any shape amenable to its bar? No system of religion, however true in itself, can be enthroned in the heart and conscience by Act of Parliament, nor will any penalties or privations ever be able to repress the activity of the mind, or prevent it from deviating into the mazes of error. Overt acts which are immediately opposed to the peace and welfare of society, constitute the sole province over which the arm of the law can wield a legitimate or effective dominion-the chambers of imagery in the mind it cannot reach; nor can these ever be broken open, and cleansed by any force it is able to command. If Galileo, after being summoned to appear at Rome, for having published his dialogues on the Copernican Theory of the Universe, actually recited the seven penitential Psalms once a week, pursuant to the absurd and iniquitous order of inquisitorial tyranny, he did not on this account the less believe the earth's motion, or that the sun is the centre of our planetary system. Nor is it of importance to the case whether a speculative opinion be true or false, since, once formed, it will not cease to exist, unless opposed, by what appears to him who entertains it, adequate and convincing evidence to the contrary.

We long to see the day, when the enlightened spirit that characterizes the government of our beloved country, shall have energy enough to shake off the yoke of bigotry and intolerance, and at length acknowledge, to the utmost extent, the independence of the human soul-the freedom of the judgment, and conscience of man, from all secular impositions and

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restraints the birth-right of an accountable being. A common subterfuge, which is resorted to by those who do not recognize these claims, is, that the majority have a right to prescribe to the minority; than which it is difficult to conceive any argument, as applied to the present case, more ridiculous or unjust; unless it can be proved, that the majority are competent to determine what shall be the final account each of the minority will have to render at the bar of Omniscience!

The disparagements under which Dissenters from the Established Church labour in general, fall, in some respects, on the Unitarians with peculiar weight. We confess, our perspicacity is not sufficient to enable us to perceive the justice of denying to them what is granted to Jews and Quakers-we allude to the right of celebrating their own marriages. It is of no consequence, whether the objection be to the Messiahship of Christ, to a ceremonial institute, or to the gloria Patri. To enforce a submission to religious forms from which the conscience professedly revolts, and of which the connection with civil rights is merely arbitrary and circumstantial, would certainly better suit the genius of the fifteenth, than of the nineteenth century, which claims pre-eminently to be the age of light and reason. We freely sympathize, therefore, with Mr. Robberds, in his surprise, that it should be doubted by the legislature of the country, whether the opinions of his denomination can properly be tolerated without any kind of impediment or restraint: nor does it seem less strange to us than to him, that the public avowal of them should in any way be regarded as virtually a crime against the state. Though not altogether insensible, we trust, to the blessings we enjoy under the paternal dynasty of Hanover,

we must acknowledge, that we have never liked the word Toleration; we can scarcely tolerate it in our uncourtly vocabulary. The actual enjoyment of the right of framing our own theological opinions, and of worshipping God according to our private convictions, is, we think, more accurately to be termed religious freedom. So long as in those opinions, and in that worship, there is nothing directly subversive of the common laws of morality, and the peace of society, every disparagement, however slight, attaching to their advocates as such, can be regarded with propriety in no other light than as a species of persecution. Our humble verdict, therefore, on this point, is, let Unitarianism have free course-of its being glorified, we entertain no apprehensions.

Turn we now, however, to the "moot point, the very jet of the question.' Between plain and and honest Christianity and downright infidelity, there is a chasm, which scepticism, and the proud audacity of human reason have laboured to fill up, from the days of Basilides and Cerinthus, till the present, with their conjectural theories and specious demonstrations. Mr. Robberds undertakes to teach us at what point in the distance Unitarianism has taken its stand. We believe our readers will agree with us in thinking, that it is in the 'limbo of vanity,' and hard by the frigid zone of all unbelief.

For

their satisfaction in general, and for the benefit of the junior part in particular, we shall subjoin a brief analysis of the author's statements, especially as we believe him to be a respectable and worthy representative of the class to which he belongs.

The first three general heads under which the creed of Unitarians is here arranged, comprise only those topics on which, as the author states, all who profess the

Christian religion are agreed. These are, that the Deity has communicated a revelation of his will to mankind, by miraculous interposition-that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament contain a history of this revelation; and that these Scriptures, exclusively, are a sufficient rule of faith and practice. Here the author thinks it important to distinguish the Unitarian from the Deist, the Jew, and the disciple of the Koran; for which some of his readers will, perhaps, feel themselves obliged, since it must be confessed there is a pretty strong family likeness between them all. He next proceeds to reject the idea of in the Godhead, and adds,

persons

nies that he can find, in the records of re"The Unitarian, in fact, solemnly develation, any such doctrine as that of a Trinity in Unity-any such persons as God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost."

As it is not our author's object to argue, but only to state his belief, or rather, (we trust he will pardon our uncharitableness,) his unbelief, we need only say in reply to this, that we as solemnly affirm, that we cannot help recognizing this mystery in various parts of the New Testament. We may, however, remind him, in one single hint, of that little phrase, "THE WORD WAS GOD," which still resists all the efforts of his friends to expunge or modify it. We may add, that believers are said to be "temples of the HOLY GHOST;"

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temples of the LIVING GOD;" and we are constrained to believe, that there is in divine revelation "such a doctrine" as that of a "Trinity in Unity," since the baptismal formula stands in the name of the FATHER, and of the SON, and of the HOLY GHOST; and is stamped with the same authority as the declaration, "the Lord our

God is ONE LORD."

Under the fifth head, the plenary commission of Jesus, as a teacher sent from God, is allowed; but it

is contended, that his power and wisdom, as evinced in his miracles and sayings, were entirely dele gated from the Father. Mr. R. regards the question, as to the nature of the Being who was thus officially exalted, as a matter of small moment, compared with his perfect competency to be our instructor and guide. The Holy Spirit is regarded as nothing more than a name for those miraculous gifts, influences, and inspirations, which were bestowed on the Apostles.

The sixth article relates to practice, on the obligation to which there is no dispute. The last paragraph of the summary, avows belief in the resurrection, a day of retribution and degrees in the happiness of the world to come.

Such is the meagre form which our author introduces to us as the Christianity of the New Testament. On his principles it is scarcely to be denominated a revelation; it is little more than a republication of the law of nature; a confirmation of what has been conjectured from the earliest ages of philosophical inquiry-a system of mere natural religion, having little respect to man as a fallen, guilty, depraved creature. Indeed, we find in the pages before us, no traces of the fall, excepting the indications of it, which we think are so amply involved in its rejection as an article of faith; not a word concerning a vicarious sacrifice offered on the cross by the Word of God, incarnated in human flesh, as the basis of our pardon and justification; no acknowledgment of a divine influence renovating the heart, and producing uniformity to the law of God, and the image of Christ; no recognition, and here lies the root of all the evil-no definite recognition of the proper inspiration of the writers of the New Testament.

Much as we desire to cherish the sentiment of charity towards those who differ from us, we have

not entirely forgotten the concomitant duty of" holding fast the form of sound words," and " speaking the truth in love." We do not, therefore, hesitate to say that if orthodoxy be true, by which we intend the leading doctrines of the Reformation, then Unitarianism must be "another gospel." How far it may deserve the attention of Mr. R. and those who think with him to reflect on the fatal consequences which may possibly attach to advocating such a gospel, as to be apprehended from the style of the Apostle Paul's remarks to the Galatians, it will be deemed, no doubt, weakness, or dogmatism in us to suggest; or if it be regarded as at once begging the question, which our limits will not allow us to discuss, let it at least stand as one of the reasons why we are not Unitarians. If the one system be that of the New Testament, the other, it appears to us, must be nothing less than Idolatry ; or, on the contrary, if Trinitarianism be not idolatry we do not see how the opposite doctrine can escape the charge of a criminality, contrary indeed, but no less great— namely, a species of Atheism. If the former do not involve the religious worship of a mere creature, the latter would seem to involve the denial of God. Unquestionably the two systems are pletely at antipodes to each other. They stand apart by so wide an interval, that their respective advocates may reciprocally say, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us that would come from thence.-That there is some triplicity in the mode of the divine existence we believe clearly revealed; nor is this at all, we humbly think, more beyond human comprehension than that existence itself. The mind is as much overpowered and confounded with the idea of a Being who had no beginning and

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no cause, as by the Trinitarian doctrine, of the Godhead; and it were presumptuous and unreasonable in us to pretend to determine, à priori, in what number of modes or personal distinctions (we speak it with reverence) the one Divinity may possibly exist. We think, however, that on this awful subject preachers should be solieitous strictly to adhere to the terms and phrases of inspiration, since we believe that the flippant usage of Athanasian phraseology has done much harm. A few words more and we have done. It has always appeared to us, that the advocates of Socinianism would do well to take a lesson from the philosophy of LORD BACON. We should not fear to subject our orthodoxy to the ordeal of the principles of the Novum Organum, against which we think our opponents are very apt, in their arguments and apologies, to transgress. It was the felicity of that master spirit who composed it, to throw illumination over all the paths of human knowledge, and to point out the road to the attainment of moral as well as physical truth. He not only taught the immortal NEWTON to scale the heavens, and reveal to mankind the true harmony of the spheres, but the modern advocates of Christianity have caught the inspiration of his analogical genius, and the effect has been seen in their superiority to the ancient apologists in the skill and method with which they have conducted their arguments for the Christian faith. We think Socinianism as unphilosophical as it is unscriptural. The usual mode in which its advocates proceed is, as it appears to us, first to frame a theory, then to force in the service of Scripture to its support; to presume first to determine what it is right and fit that the Almighty should do—what a revelation must be; then to reject every part of it that does not harmonize with the theory. This impression we have felt in reading

Mr. Belsham's Answer to Mr. Wilberforce, and we think the same principle is commonly to be found pervading the Socinian writers. Hence arises the rejection of the doctrine of plenary inspiration, a necessary refuge to those who, if they determined, like true philosophers, to follow truth whereever it might lead, and renounced at the outset the idolatry of à priori reasoning and preconceived theory, would, we think, find the topics involved in the evidences of Christianity sufficient to lead them at least to acknowledge, however they might dislike the announcement, that the very essence of the Christian revelation consists in the doctrine of man's vicarious redemption, as achieved by the manifestation of God in human flesh. This we believe to be the basis on which the whole of Christianity rests; the key-stone of that arch which the benevolence of the Deity has thrown across the dreary gulf of human ignorance and guilt, the pathway over which, the Unitarian abandons, as it seems to us, in the perilous and infatuated attempt to navigate the gloomy abyss, in the frail bark of human speculation. We are glad, not from party feeling, but for the sake of all that in

our view is momentous in the destinies of men, that the number of those who advocate such a gospel is comparatively few :

Adparent rari nantes in gurgite vusto. If any of our readers wish for arguments, let them have recourse to such works as those of Dr. Wardlaw, on the Socinian Controversy; and of Dr. Smith on the Person of Christ; which we believe to be unanswerable.-Towards the Unitarians, as men, we would cherish good will; whatever social virtues they possess, we would admire and imitate; though we confess the "Manchester Controversy" gives no very favourable exemplification of their principles as men of justice and