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    A question of great moment is here suggested . Unitarianism has been tried upon two generations : has the experiment justified Dr . Priestley ' s faith in the devotional influences of truth ? Or , for illustrations of the spirituality which may be conjoined with heterodoxy , must we still point to minds which , like his , have emerged from Calvinism , and may be supposed to have brought their piety thence ? With the most fervent confidence in the moral power of truth , it may yet be doubted whether the largest portion of Unitarian piety has not been imported from

    orthodoxy ; and hence many have been led to conclusions favourable to the rigid system of religious education . The fact may be admitted , and the inference denied . It is in no case the rigour , the ceremonialism , that makes the saint ; regarded by itself , its whole tendency is to produce mental imbecility and disgust and unbelief ; and wherever it has existed as a system , —whenever it

    has been made the instructor ' s main reliance , —these effects , and no others , have followed ; not a gleam of emotion , not an impulse of holy desire , has ever come from it . But , long as it has been the receptacle of all the soul of orthodoxy , it would be strange if its machinery had not often been plied by those who have made it the vehicle of their own piety , and have sent through its dead

    materials that living earnestness of mind , in love of which the young will often undergo much that would else be tedious and revolting . Wherever Sabbatarianism has fallen into such hands , a devotional feeling has resulted , —not , indeed , from the system , but from its preceding spirit . To revive the stiff regimen of our

    forefathers , because it sent forth a Priestley and a Lindsay , would be like re-enacting the Mosaic law , in expectation of another * sweet singer of Israel . ' A ritual system can no more create a soul , than the study of Greek metres can make a poet . It does not , however , follow , because sabbatical constraint fails to awaken

    piety , that laxity must certainly succeed ; and we rejoice to believe that Unitarians are beginning to perceive the error of this retaliative logic;—that , while they discard the enthralling formalities which rendered their fathers more superstitious than devout , they feel , in some degree , the solemn responsibilities of a spiritual faith;—that , while they rely as little as ever on mere externals of devotion , they think more of its interior spirit , and study more earnestly the means for its nurture . Whilst we admit that the conflicts of mind which Dr . Priestley

    describes , may have occasioned a permanent susceptibility to religious emotion , we maintain that it was his subsequent conversion which gave that susceptibility its only value . His mental

    sufferings were accurate corollaries from his faith ; and his mind was too clear-sighted , too sincere , too literal , too little imaginative , speedily to have effected an escape from them which nothing but self-deception and enthusiasm could have accomplished . And where , we would ask , is the efficacy of religious emotion so

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    24 On the Life , Cliaracter , and Works of Dr . Priestley .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1833, page 24, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2606/page/24/