On this page

• Text (2)

  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

• 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

    church , might , with equal truth , and with equal force ad an argument , be now applied to the Church of England , without considering the various other sects of Protestants : " We find her preached to the poor and ignorant Under the canopy of heaven , in many a distant and unfrequented clime ; we find her among the idolaters of the old and the savages of the new continent ; we find her in the east and in the west , in the north and in the south . "

    The visibility and indefectibiiity of the church are next insisted upon , but we shall not enter into his Lordship ' s arguments , which are certainly not so powerful as his eloquence . Though human reason may not always draw the same conclusions from the same premises , what has been revealed has beeft revealed to our reason , and we must make use of our reason to understand it .

    Does not his Lordship make use of his reason in determining on what the power assumed by his church of interpreting Christianity is founded ? With his Lordship , however , we do see a great inconsistency in rejecting the supremacy of the Bishop of Rome and transferring it to the Sovereign . We know not what arguments can support the authority of the Church of England in determining controversies of faith , that would not more clearly carry us back to the bosom of the Church of Rome .

    < Why does a modern isolated church , that has separated itself from the great family of Christendom , that was founded by a haughty and voluptuous prince , not by a meek and mortified apostle , that has modelled its doctrines and its discipline , not by the canons of any general council , but by the acts of a national parliament—why does such a one deny the same power to a

    church which traces through eighteen centuries an uninterrupted descent from the apostles , which stands illustrious b y the piety and learning of a -thousand saints and scholars , which has beheld its pastors assembled from every region of the Christian world , eighteen general councils to bear witness to its faith , and which looks forth upon a hundred nations dwelling within its fold and constituting the true kingdom of God upon earth V *

    We recognize neither candour nor fair dealing in the assertion , that the Protestant clergyman is seldom found by the couch of the dying Christian ^ There may be in the church many who answer to the description of " The jovial youth who thinks his Sunday task As much as God or man can fairly ask ;" but there is also many a Protestant as well as Catholic pastor " who shrinks not from the functions of his ministry from fear of taking the

    disease with which his penitent is afflicted , and of paying the forfeit of his life in the cause of charity . Where is the cabin so wretched that does not find him a ready inmate ; the being so destitute to whom he is not a willing and a faithful friend ; the malady so loathsome or infectious as to drive the messenger of the God of all comfort from the performance of his duty V Even among the sectaries , whom we must say his Lordship frequently mentions with a truly orthodox indignation , we can assure him that the duties of Christian love and charity are performed with piety and zeal .

    In his concluding observations Lord S . again refers to the subject of misrepresentation . That all sects are too apt to blacken and misrepresent both the opinions and the characters of those who differ from them , is indeed a melanchol y truth ; that Catholics have been exposed to calumnies , perhaps more , than any other sect in : this country , cannot be . denied ; but surely he asserts too much when he says , that " none can ever attack Catholicity with **

    Untitled Article

    Review ., —Lord Shrewsbury's Reasons . 465

    Untitled Article

    VOL . II . 2 L

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1828, page 465, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2562/page/33/