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    Pawl published a piece entitled- ^ -Some Serious Reflections on that part of Mr . Hunyans Confession ^ f' Faith touching Church Communion with Unbaptized

    Believers . These gentlemen treated John very cavalierly . Your conclusion , say they , is devilish topfull of ignorance and prejudice : but this we forgive them , for John was a tinker without dish

    or spoon , and at best but a country teacher , and the Rev . Mr . William Kiffin was a London minister and worth forty thousand pounds . ' * The interest which we take in this controversy , and our regard to the name of JBunyan , induce us to lengthen this extract from Robinson . t € The next

    year , Mr . Bunyan published an answer , entitled Differences in Judgment about tVater Saptis ? n no 13 ar to Communion . To this piece of Mr . Bunyan ' s , Messieurs Danvers and Paul replied , and John answered them in 1674 , in about two sheets in twelves , entitled Peaceable Principles and True . In all these he continued uniform in his

    sentiments , declaring he would abide by his faith and practice till the moss should groiv upon his eye-brows . I mention this because the editors of his Works in folio have inserted a Discourse entitled An Exhortation to Peace and

    Unity , \ n which it is declared that baptism is essential to church communion ; but it is evident JBunyan never wrote this p iece . " Our autrior is a friend to religious inquiry and discussion , but he is not

    always consistent . For example he says truly and well , p . 428 , ' It is a distinguishing feature of truth that it invites inquiry : to stifle it is the mark of a bad cause , and the certain resort of bigots . " In two pages afterwards , however , he relates of ICiffin ' s second

    son , that ** having an inclination to travel abroad , he was accompanied by a young minister as far as Leghorn , and proceeding by himself to Venice , there , entered too Jreely into conversation

    upon religious subjects , and was poisoned by a Popish priest" This narrowminded reflection we are willing to believe that Mr . Wilson h , as injudiciously copied from some one of his old authorities .

    We meet in the H istory with frequent stories of the judgments of God upon persecutors , and in p- 436 there 19 an apology for them . We must , relyiark , once for all , that such narrations

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    betray g reat credulity and an evident inattention to the ordinary course of Divine Providence , under which all things come alike to all . There is an offensive vul garism , in p . 441 , where , relating a journey which Sayer Rudd made to France without the consent of his congregation ( Devonshire Square ) , Mr . Wilson says " he took which [ what ] is commonly called French leave . '

    In the account of John Ma cgowan pastor in the place last-mentioned , who is known b y his audacious and malignant pamphlets against reputed " Socinianism , " Mr . Wilson is not sparing of his censures on controversial

    outrageousness and artifice : he says very judiciously , p . 453 , " We have better evidence for the doctrines of the gospel than those afforded by ghosts and spectres . " This refers to a piece of Macgowan ' s , entitled " The Arian ' s and Socinian ' s Monitor , " in "which a

    story is told of a young minister who saw his tutor ( the learned and venerable Dr . John Taylor ) rolling in hell-flames , and received of course due warning against < damnable heresies . ' Is it credible that Trinitarians should still circulate this abominable libel , and that any readers should be found ( as we ^ are informed there are ) of such

    depraved understandings , as to receive the impudent and wicked fiction for truth ? Macgowan published another notable piece , in letters to Dr . Priestley , entitled Chnst proved to be the Adorable God or a Notorious Impostor . On this instance of polemic craft , the decorum to which we are constrained forbids us to

    make the proper comment . It is akin to the wisdom of certain disputants in conversation , who declare if some favourite notion be not scriptural they will burn their Bibles . In the same temper and with the same degree oi

    understanding , the Pagans , when their prayers were unanswered , in the rage of disappointment demolished their gods . N Of Macgowan , Mr . Wilson yet

    declares , p . 451 , " his humility was very remarkable !" A fact related of the Meeting-house in Miles s Lane reminds us of the late proceedings against the Pi otestants m France : it has been said of popery , f ) Ut may more trul y be said of pers ecution , that it is alumys the same .

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    548 > Review *—Wilsons Dissenting Churches 0

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1816, page 548, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2456/page/48/