On this page

• Departments (1)
  • 
• Text (4)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS. >

  • 

    Untitled Article

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Untitled Article

    aiR . belsham ' s vindication of his , account of modern AiilANS ; WITH A POSTCRIPT IN REPLY TO ** A CHURCH * MAM ' s" ATTACK ON THE UNITARIANS . To the Editor of the Monthly Repository .

    Hackney , sir , April 16 , 1808 . Not being a bush-fighter . I do not think myself botmd to enter the lists with every assailant , who draws his bow behind the covert of an anonymous signature . Your reader * however , may perhaps expect , that 1 should make some defence against the accusation

    exo hibitedin your last Repository by a correspondent , who signs himself A , p . J 34 . hi the first place , in bar of the prosecution , I plead a flaw in the indictment . Your correspondent charges me with having affirmed of the Modern Arians , ( for so h seems they are now christened , ) that u no motive can be found for their usurping the name of Arians , unless it be to screen themselves

    from the reproach that is annexed to the obnoxious term Sochf'an , and perhaps to save the credit of their orthodoxy , by joining occasionally in the popular hue and cry against those who profess the primitive faith of the proper humanity of Jesus Christ . " This , Sir , is contrary ,, to fact ; I do not make the peremptory assertion

    which your correspondent imputes to me . My words are these , it 3 not indeed easy to conceive why they cliuse to assume a name with which their tenets so little correspond , unless it be , &c . Thjese «*]> ressions , it'I am * iot mistafea ,

    Untitled Article

    ( 1237 )

    Miscellaneous Communications. ≫

    MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS . >

    Untitled Article

    ^ ul . a n ,. 2 i

    Untitled Article

    are of a very different import from those which your correJ spondenthas been pleased to

    substitute , and which wouLd , to be sure ? have answered his purpose better . I think therefore that on this ground , I am clearly entitled to a noli prosequi , if not to a verdict in mv favour . Waving however this privilege , I will fairly meet your correspon * dent ' s charge ; not indeed upon his ground , but my own . It 1 % not easy to conceive why modern Arians assume a name with which their tenets so little correspond , unless to ' screen themselves from

    the reproach annexed to the ob « i noxious term Socinian ? What is there invidious ^ * or uncharitable in this insinuation . But , says your correspondent * is it not

    accusing them of insincerity ? I answer , not in the least . They assume a name which I not they think improper , to avoid an epithet which they deem reproachful , and which certainly does not in any sense apply to them . Greatly as I venerate the memories of those eminent reformers Laelius and < Faustu « Socinus , I as little

    relish the appellation Socinian , as any modern Arian can do : and for that reason amongst others , I chuseto call myself an Unitarian . Others may not approve my motive , but I should wonder if I were taxed with insincerity for it *

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1808, page 237, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2392/page/9/