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    the Globe and Traveller , evening papet , of the same day ; and , on the 17 th instant , the following official paper , from our body , was published in the Times : " The elders and deacons of the London branch of the church of God , commonly known as Freeth inking Christians , having observed that the late conduct of two of their members , in

    " Because it is not a service enjoined in the Scriptures , but is an assertion only of the uuscriptural claims of the Church to decree rites and ceremonies . " Because the service implies a re .

    protesting against the marriage ceremony , has exposed them to the marked animadversions of a leading daily journal , feel themselves called upon , through the same medium , to submit to the public the grounds and reasons of their conduct .

    < c Marriage is regarded by the law of England , and it is held by the Freethinking Christian , to be a civil contract ; and even if the language of the Liturgy be adopted , which represents matrimony as * instituted of God in the time of man ' s first iunocency / it is certain that marriage must then have been performed without the intervention of a priest *

    " If in the progress of society it has been thought necessary to superadd a religious solemnization to marriage , in order to increase the sanctions of that state , the very reasons which superinduce such necessity must be defeated unless the solemnization be consistent with the conscience , and accordant with the faith of those who are to be bound thereby .

    " By a comparatively recent act of parliament , ( 26 Geo . II cap . 33 , ) a submission to the marriage ceremony , as performed by the Church of England , was , for the first time , imposed on all who sought to obtain a legal sanction to marriage , Jews and Quakers alone excepted .

    " Derived chiefly from the Roman ritual and mass books , the marriage ceremony of the Church of England appears to the Freethiuking Christian to be Popish in its doctrines ; superstitious in its forms ; and unsuited in its terms to the refinement of the age , or the occasion on which it is used .

    " Bound in all things by the authority of Scripture , and the dictates of conscience , the Freethinking Christian refuses to yield a voluntary submission to the marriage service , which , if the above

    representation be correct , it is difficult to suppose can be approved by any serious , well-informed Protestant . The objections of the Freethinkiug Christian , however , to this service , may be categorically stated as follows : —

    " Because that service is part and parcel of the religion of the state , and must , as such and of consequence , be opposed to the religion of Jesus .

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    cognition of the doctrine of the Trinity and directs divine honours to * the man Christ Jesus . ' " Because performed as a religious service , by a person * in pretended holv orders , ' it carries with it an admission of the claims of the priesthood ; which claims , whether to be regarded as a

    separate body among Christians , as the minis , ters of Christ , or the exclusive teachers of religion , are unfounded in Christianity . " Because it is a public outward act of joint and social prayer , and as such is contrary to the spirituality of the Christian religion , and the instructions of him who taught his disciples to pray in secret to their Father .

    " Because mo earthly tribunal can possess the right to propose a test for religious opinion , much less to render the violation of conscieace the condition of obtaining a civil right . " Because , in several particulars , it is not accordant with that purity of mind which should at all times characterize the Christian .

    " With these objections to the marriage , ceremony , as imposed upon him by the law , the Freethinking Christian offers his protest against that ceremony , or rather against a forced recognition of" that ceremony in his instance . He disclaims all belief in the doctrines he is compelled to subscribe ; he declares it is by an act of compulsive conformity alone , that his submission is obtained to the forms of

    the Church ; he disowns the sacred functions of the minister about to perform the service ; and he purges his conscience from all assent to unchristian doctrines aud practices , both iti the sight of God and of man . " This protest he delivers publicly , in the Church , be / ore the * altar , ' and to the

    minister . Publicly —because the ceremony is public . In the Church—because iu the Church he is compelled to submit to such ceremony . Before the * altar' —because before the * altar' he is required to

    yield an especial homage . To the minister—because the minister is the legal , the immediate , and the willing agent in performing a service which , under the circumstances , must be held to be as great an infraction of conscience as it is a

    profanation of religion . " The Freethinking Christian , then , according to his apprehension , delivers his protest at the time , iu the place , aud to the party—when , where , and to whom it is most suitable to be delivered ; ant *

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    470 Controversy on a Marriage Protest of < s Freethinking Christians . "

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1825, page 470, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2539/page/18/