us to confider all mankind as brethren, and is never found inconfiftent with true dignity, except when it is mifconceived by the ignorant, affected by hypocrites, or affumed by knaves.

Study humility in this fenfe therefore as the true source of focial love; and fhould you ever be inclined to think unjustly of the world, before you cherish the hateful principles of mifanthropy, carefully examine your own bofom, and afk if no pharifaical pride lurks there, which fills you with ideas only of your own merit, and makes you defpife others; confider if no fenfe of guilt feeks for juftification from the worft examples; no felfJove, or erroneous opinions, that make you view men with unprejudiced eyes.'

Sermon X. is on the frailty of human virtue and the neceffity of guarding againft temptation. The text is, Lord, is it I?' XI. On unanimity: here our author inveighs against the ribaldry of Voltaire, and the frofty fcepticism of Hume.' XII. On the parable of the good Samaritan. XIII. On death. XIV. On the government of the temper; an excellent difcourfe. XV. The caufes confidered, that made our Lord's word with power.' XVI. On the fufferings of Chrift. XVII. On the birth of Chrift; fhewing how that event was calculated to promote on earth peace, good-will toward men.' XVIII. On the duties of youth. XIX. On the benevolence and mercy of the Deity, who knoweth our frame and remembereth that we are duft.'

We cannot difmifs this article without congratulating the Public on the appearance of a work which deferves their attention, and difplays the genius, learning, and piety of the author. Though we feldom difcover want of power in Mr. Hewlett, yet we cannot always acquit him of hafte and negligence. The language has fometimes a tendency to pleonasm, and a few of the fentences are rather too long. But any little defect that we have obferved in this volume, weighed in the balance againft its general merit, is only as a grain of fand to a mountain. R-m

ART. X. An Elucidation of the Unity of God, deduced from Scripture and Reafon. 4th Edition; to which is fubjoined, A Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury. 8vo. 3s. fewed. Wilkie. 1786.

THIS

HIS piece, which was first publifhed under the title of Reflections on the Unity of God, &c. is here reprinted, with large additions. It ftates at length the arguments for the strict and proper unity of the divine nature, both from reason and fcripture, and is written with great decency and temper. The defign of the Author appears to be, rather to remove what he judges to have been erroneous opinions concerning the Supreme Being, than to eftablifh either the Socinian or Arian hypothefis concerning the perfon of Chrift.

In the letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, the point which the Author [Mr. James Gifford] labours, is, to obtain fuch an alteration of the public forms of religion as fhall remove out of fight the controverfies concerning Jefus Chrift, by speaking of his nature and offices in the LANGUAGE OF SCRIPTURE. The following extract contains fentiments which merit the serious attention of those who are difinclined to liften to any proposals for farther reformation.

The confining our felves within the narrow pale of our forefathers, betrays an inexcufable indolence, and a manifeft lukewarmnefs for the further propagation of the gofpel. It may be confidered as a certain fact, that the wife and benevolent Author of nature, plainly intends (notwithstanding fome partial exceptions), that the rational part of his creation fhall not ultimately decline; fhall not become lefs enlightened; more ignorant and depraved; but fhall affuredly move forward, by gradual fteps, in the paths of ufeful knowledge and improvement. If this be granted, how contradictory to thefe gracious defigns doth it appear, that we should implicitly rely on our remote ancestors for our prefent opinions and practice, and by obftinately or fupinely continuing on the fame ground, contract all our ideas within the circle of their knowledge?

I believe, however, that this laft is far from being now the prevailing inclination. The neceffary diftinction between found faith and thoughtless credulity, is no longer beretical. I greatly rejoice when I reflect, that no inconfiderable number of our most refpectable clergy, not only conceive themfelves to be bound in their profeflion, by fome very hard and illiberal engagements of human conftruction, but many of them are alfo fenfible, that fome further amendments in our doxologies, and forms of worship, are become abfolutely neceffary: they justly think, that thefe may be rendered more generally unexceptionable and fafe, by reducing them to a more direct congruity with thofe of the fcriptures. Were this meafure ftrictly adopted, it must prevent all controverfy and uneafinefs, on the point in queftion (at leaft among the reafonable part of mankind), fo long as our holy records are confidered as the inconteftable rules of our faith. It would be moft injurious to fuppofe, that thofe reverend gentlemen who are zealous for fo defirable a reform, have not the welfare of Chriftianity as much at heart as, their oppofers. Their wishes can proceed from nothing but a watchful and confcientious attention to religion, and a fincere love of it; with a conviction of its infinite importance to the world when rightly understood: and they well difcern, that if fuch a ftep were taken, it would at once free the whole from a weight of anxiety and vexation, which every honeft man would be happy to fee them fairly rid of.'

In this paffage, and indeed through the whole work, the writer expreffes himfelf like an honeft and candid inquirer, and a good

man.

**For our former accounts of Mr. Gifford's publication, fee Review, vol. lxviii. p. 550, Reflections on the Unity of God; alfo vol. xxi. p. 79; and vol. lxxiii, p. 397, Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, &c.

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ART.

ART. XI. Letters to Dr. Horne, Dean of Canterbury; to the Young Men who are in a Courfe of Education for the Chriftian Ministry at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge; to Dr. Price; and to Mr. Parkhurft; on the Subject of the Perfon of Christ. By Jofeph Priestley, LL. D. F. R.S. Ac. Imp. Petrop. R. Paris. Holm. Taurin. Aurel. Med. Paris. Harlem. Cantab. Americ. et Philad. Socius. 8vo. 3s. fewed. Johnfon. 1787.

HIS publication, though mifcellaneous in appearance, is

which Dr. Prieftley, in all his theological writings, purfues with indefatigable perfeverance, the fupport of the Unitarian doctrine.

In the Letters to Dr. Horne, the Author exculpates himself from the charge of having reflected upon the learning and integrity of the advocates for Athanafianifm, and his brethren from that of intolerant principles and intentions: he invites Dr. Horne to give the argument for the doctrine of the Trinity taken from antiquity a farther examination; affuring him, that, after all that has been done by Dr. Horfley and others, the fubject is by no means exhaufted: he infifts upon the neceffity of confidering in what manner three perfons are one God, upon the general principle, that every propofition, before it can be be lieved, must be understood in fome fenfe or other and laftly, he examines the Doctor's explanation of feveral texts of Scripture. On the fubject of a reform in the public Liturgy, Dr. Priestley difcovers a better difpofition toward an amicable accommodation, than we have obferved in any of his former works.

We can now' fays he, join in ufing the Lord's Prayer, and in almoft all the fervice of the church of England, except the Litany; fo that there is very little that is offenfive to an Unitarian in the whole of your afternoon fervice. Remove, therefore, only your fubfcriptions to articles of faith, and reform your morning fervice after the model of that in the afternoon, and I believe you will remove the greatest of our objections. We are not, I affure you, fo fond of fchifm as to ftand out for trifles; but do not compel, or tempt us, to pay fupreme worship to a fellow creature, to a man like ourselves; who, though highly honoured by God for his virtue and obedience, was fo far from confidering himself as God, that, with the moft genuine humility, he always afcribed every thing that he faid, or did, to his Fa ther that fent him, and worshipped him with the fame deep reverence that he inculcated upon all his followers.'

The Letters to the Students in Divinity at the Universities are intended to urge them to a careful examination of the doctrines of religion, to make them fenfible of the difficulties and hardships of their fituation, and to engage them to affociate as petitioners to the Legiflature for the removal of fubfcription, and the reformation of the Liturgy.-Whatever may be thought of the expediency of the measure which Dr. Priestley here propofes, the end which he wishes to obtain is, we have no doubt, an object of earneft de

fire with great numbers, both of clergy and laity, in the eftablished church.

Thefe Letters alfo contain animadverfions on Dr. Purkis's Sermon before the Univerfity of Cambridge on Commencement Sunday, 1786, and on a work recommended to young ftudents by Dr. Horne," Jones's Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity." The former, he cenfures for misreprefenting the tenets and conduct of the Unitarians; and the latter, he convicts of weak and abfurd explanations of Scripture.

Our Author treats Dr. Price with great tenderness, as a friend. At the fame time he endeavours to convince him of the improbability of the Arian hypothefis that a created Being was the creator of the world; and to fhew, that all the paflages of Scripture, which the Arians adduce in fupport of their opinion, admit of a fatisfactory explanation on Socinian principles. In the following paffage the Author reafons as a philofopher, against the Arian doctrine:

You fay, p. 143, "This earth, with its inhabitants and connections, includes all of nature that we have any concern with.— This obfervation is applicable to the account of the creation in the first chapter of Genefis; that account, most probably, being an account only of the creation of this earth, with its immediate depend encies." But in that account, the most exprefs mention is made of the creation of the fun, moon, and ftars. Indeed, if we confider the connections and dependencies of the earth, which you fuppofe to have been made by Chrift, we must admit that the moon, at least, was also made by him, on account of its intimate connection with, and dependence upon the earth; and if the moon, furely the fun alfo, on which they both depend for light and heat; and if the fun, the whole of the planetary fyftem, including the newly-difcovered Georgium Sidus, and all the comets, which belong to the fun. And if the fun, with all that is connected with it, and depends upon it, was created by Chrift, why should we not fuppofe that he made all that cluster, or fyftem of stars, of which our fun is one; and if thofe ftars, all the habitable worlds belonging to them?

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In this manner I do not fee how we can confiftently stop, till we include the whole universe, be the extent of it ever fo great, or even infinite. So great is the uniformity in the fyftem of nature, that we muft pronounce it to be one work, and of courfe conclude that the Author of it is one. This indeed, is the proper argument for the unity of God on the light of nature, and this argument refpects the immediate Maker of the world, whoever that Being be.'

Concerning fome of the opinions maintained in thefe Letters, among which is that of the natural fallibility of Chrift, Dr. Priestley fays:

Some of the opinions on which you have flightly defcanted are, I believe, novel, and a step, as you may fay, beyond what other Socinians have gone; and yourfelf, and others of my best friends, are a good deal itaggered at them. But in a fhort time this alarm, which is already much abated, will be entirely gone off, and then I fhall expec

5

expect a calm difcuffion of what I have advanced; and that doctrine will, no doubt, be established which shall appear to be most agreeable to reason, and the true fenfe of Scripture. May whatever will not ftand this teft, whether advanced by myself or others, foon fall to the ground; but let no fentiment, however alarming at the first propofal, be condemned unheard, and unexamined.'

In Mr. Parkhurft's work, Dr. Priestley finds nothing which requires any farther refutation than is already provided in his Hißory of early Opinions; he therefore enters no farther into the examination of this Writer's arguments, than to expose the futility of his reafoning from the plural form of the word ufed to denote God in the Hebrew language, and to vindicate himself from the charge of deficiency in the knowledge of the learned languages.

In the preface to this publication, Dr. P. expreffes a pretty confident expectation that the prefent difpute concerning the perfon of Chrift will terminate in a general uniformity of opinion upon this fubject. Perhaps a more vifionary expectation was never entertained. If Dr. Price continues an Arian, and Dr. Horne an Athanafian (as our Author fuggefts) from the influence of early prepoffeffions, and in confequence of their frequently recruiting their faith, by perufing their favourite writers, and not paying fufficient attention to arguments on the other fide, it is probable that others will continue to adhere to their respective fyftems from the fame caufes. The fame hoftile difpofition towards every thing that is established,' and the fame rapidity of genius, which have led Dr. P. on from one opinion to another-always in the fame direction-and will not allow him to fay when his creed will be fixed,' may push others beyond the utmoft verge of Socinianifm, into a country

whence no traveller returns. If, in perufing the fcriptures, particular texts never fail to be accompanied with their usual long approved interpretation,' and every one has fome method of difpofing of thofe paffages which feem unfavourable to his opinions, this kind of bias will, probably, always continue upon the minds of different perfons, according to their feveral modes of education and connections in life, and perpetuate different fyftems of theology. From thefe caufes, men of equal ability and integrity will always continue to think differently upon the fe fubj. Ets; and if it be (as our Author pathetically laments) too much to be expected of man, that Dr. Price fhould abandon Arianifm altogether, neither is it to be expected that Dr. Horne fhould abandon Athanafenifm, or Dr. Priestley Socinianifm. As long as the world lafts, the maxim will be true, Quet homines, tot fententiæ.

E.

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