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blasphemous principles would have been attributed to us. This, then, is one of the advantages naturally resulting from the adoption of a confession of faith; an advantage of which we ourselves, as well as others, placed in like circumstances, have had ample experience.

Intimately connected with this, there is another benefit, one which affects essentially the interests of the laity; also plainly evident as being the result of the adoption of a creed. We

hear of the rights of private judgment; now, we esteem those rights, and we would wish to protect them; and these are firmly secured to the people by an acknowledged standard of faith belonging to the body with which they are connected. If they dislike the doctrines of the creed, they have only to leave the communion of that church and unite themselves to another, whose religious sentiments are in accordance with their own. They are not, then, imposed upon by a minister preaching to them in language of a dubious acceptation, which may be interpreted by him to mean any thing or nothing. During the period when Arianism prevailed in the Synod of Ulster, thousands of the people never knew what the opinions of their ministers were; nay, some of the Arian clergymen made a boast that they had preached for years, and those who had sat all that time under their ministry, were still ignorant of their belief. That this was true, has been amply evidenced by the almost total desertion of the houses of worship where Arians preach, which took place when once their opinions became known, and they were compelled to drop the mask by which they had so long deluded their congregations. Now, any evil like this is guarded against, when a creed has been adopted, and when the licentiates of the church are required to signify their belief in its doctrines, before they can be ordained to the pastoral charge of any congregation in connexion with it. The people know the religious sentiments of their ministers, if they dislike these-if they differ from them, they are not hidden, and they can leave the congregation and the church; but supposing they accord with them, there is no chicanery practised of foisting in upon them men, who must preach, if they preach conscientiously any doctrine whatever, sentiments and opinions hostile to their views of revealed truth. Thus are the natural, the inalienable rights of the people secured to them. They run no hazard of choosing a minister, or of having one imposed upon them, from whose religious instructions they cannot receive benefit, and with whose doctrinal opinions they cannot agree. Where no such right is

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secured to the people-where no creed is acknowledged by the church to which they belong, even a DEIST might be introduced as a teacher of the doctrines of the Gospel, and as a minister of the sublime truths of revelation. If such a person would not thus be introduced, then the principle upon which he would be excluded from filling the functions of the ministerial office must be that of a creed, and a creed applied to the exclusion of a man from the church, in consequence of his opinions. Unitarians must act in this manner, which they object so strongly to when adopted by us, or they must acknowledge that they would ordain as a preacher of the Gospel of Christ, a man who believed that Gospel to be " a cunningly devised fable," a falsehood, an imposition upon the world. We have a better opinion, however, of Unitarians, than to believe that they would induct into the ministerial office, a person holding such opinions; and if they would not, then do they inflict a penalty upon a man for the free exercise of his private judgment; then are they equally intolerant, to use their own phrase, with the "Orthodox,"-then are they guilty of the very conduct, which they abuse-which they condemn-which they vituperate, when adopted by us. But may be replied, by way of objection to this, that the Deist would not present himself as a candidate for the ministerial office; but this evasion evidently militates strongly against themselves and their arguments. One of their principal objections to creeds is, that they tend to foster hypocrisy; and that persons subscribe them, through selfish or interested motives, whilst they, at the same time, utterly disbelieve the doctrines which they contained. Now those who are opposed to the doctrines of a Trinitarian creed, so far as that article of faith is concerned, must be Unitarians, if they deserve the name of Christians in any sense whatever; and do they say that the Deist will, upon conscientious grounds, refuse to subscribe a creed which he does not believe, whilst they admit, in their objection, that the Unitarian may be induced to do it? Surely this objection of theirs lowers them far farther in the scale of moral principle than ever we would have attemptedsurely it holds them forth in a light to the public, in which even their opponents in religious doctrine never would have represented them,-that the Deist has a degree of conscientious honesty, which they do not themselves pretend to possess. But if thre Deist really would not be guilty of endeavouring to have himself located as a pastor in a Christian Church, for the sake of filthy lucre,-then do we at once award to Unita

rians a like degree of conscientious honesty; and we say we believe that they would not be guilty of the vile, the abominable hypocrisy, of subscribing to a Trinitarian creed; that they might enjoy, at the expense of integrity, in a matter of the most awful importance to man, the emoluments of the ministerial office. Thus do they furnish to us the weapon in this objection, by which the argument against creeds, from their tendency to foster hypocrisy, is annihilated for ever. But the evasion still presses severely upon them, from another consequence which may be deduced from it :-it takes for granted, that a Unitarian may be induced to sign a Trinitarian creed; but have we ever heard of a Trinitarian sacrificing his conscience and his integrity by joining with a Unitarian church, and professing his belief in its doctrines, whilst in his heart he disbelieved them? No, such conduct has never been imputed to a Trinitarian, although some of the most lucrative establishments belonging to the Presbyterian Church in this country, are connected with Unitarian congregations. From this, then, it would appear, that they are apprehensive of Unitarians being guilty of a crime, of which it has never entered into the head of any man to charge a Trinitarian. Surely they must be aware, when they argue in this manner, that Unitarians value their opinions at an extreme trifle, if they could thus east them off, and trample them under their feet for the enjoyment of the paltry pittance of a few pounds during the uncertain period of human life.

It has been again and again asserted, in the late controversies with Unitarians, that the imposition of a creed is a species of the most unjustifiable tyranny exercised towards those who present themselves as candidates for the ministry; yet is this assertion totally without any reasonable or just foundation. Were the creed kept a secret from the candidate until the time when he would be required to sign it; and were he then coerced by some external agency, or compelled, under the terror of pains and penalties, to give his reluctant consent to its doctrines, there would be some plausible grounds upon which to rest such a charge. But this is not the case; young men have this creed open to their inspection from their boyhood; they know that if they connect themselves with the church which has adopted it as a confession, they will be required to sign it; but there is no compulsion compelling them to connect themselves with that church; they may join another communion with whose principles their own accord, and none dare injure them for their liberty of choice.

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If they cannot subscribe to the doctrines conscientiously, and as honest men, even those who really do believe them, would advise them to connect themselves with some other religious society. There is no tyrannical despotism here; there are none of those horrible acts of persecution, with the imaginary pictures of which Unitarians sometimes regale their fancy, or with which they excite the horror of their audiences, when they wish to make a display of their eloquence and their poetic fictions.

It is also frequently stated, that when a creed is adopted by any church, the character of infallibility is attached to it, and we are represented as reviving amongst Protestants the dogma of the Church of Rome, without having even the shadow of a foundation, such as it professes to have, upon which to rest our pretensions. This objection, we trust, will appear, after a few observations, to be equally baseless with the former. The claim to infallibility has never yet been put forth by the advocates of creeds in any church separate from that of Rome: and when the claim is not made, it becomes those who charge it upon the men who have adopted confessions of faith, to show upon what ground it is preferred, and how it can be legitimately deduced from any of the principles advocated in them, or from the usages of these churches. Now we will venture to affirm, without the fear of contradiction, that no such grounds can be discovered, and that no such consequence can be fairly deduced from the creed or practice of any reformed christian church. The Westminster Confession of Faith asserts the very contrary of the doctrine of infallibility: it avers that all councils and all such compositions may err and have erred, which is certainly rather a curious mode of claiming infallibility. The truth or falsehood of a creed must be tried by the test of Scripture, not by any other standard, as upon that foundation all creeds profess to be based;-have their authors correctly or incorrectly interpreted the Bible?-this is the question to be decided, and this inquiry alone will determine what degree of credence is to be given to them. But this refers to the doctrines which a creed contains, not to the abstract principle of their adoption or rejection by different churches; so that we may perceive the charge of infallibility is preferred, when we understand it aright, against the doctrines which they contain, not against the creeds themselves. The doctrine, however, is the same, no matter whether it may ever have been embodied in a creed or not; so that the question, so far as creeds are concerned, is left out of view, and the simple doc

trine is to be decided upon, whether it be true or false; so that we may perceive the charge is not preferred against the creed, but against doctrines, independently of the creed-doctrines which would have been professed, and against which the same charge might have been brought, had there never been a confession of faith in existence. From this it is evident that the objection does not even remotely apply to creeds, and that when it is directed against them, it is utterly flippant and foolish.

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One other objection we will briefly consider, and then close the present article. It is stated that creeds are contrary to Scripture authority, and receive no sanction from it. If it be said that no command can be discovered enjoining the composition of creeds, we ask in return, has any prohibition ever been given forbidding them? If neither the one nor the other can be discovered, then we have as much Scripture authority for adopting them as others have for rejecting them. shall not at present enter into the examination of what we believe to be the scriptural authority in their favour; but shall justify our conduct by that of Unitarians themselves; although we believe we could make it appear to any unprejudiced mind that we have the positive sanction of Scripture in our favour. Do not Unitarians inculcate the necessity and importance of understanding the Scriptures; and if creeds, as we have before shown, be merely the expression of that understanding, then surely our practice cannot be opposed to scriptural authority, nay, it must be solemnly sanctioned by it. Do not Unitarians insist upon the candidates for the ministry being acquainted with philosophy and science? and we would wish to know where they receive the Scripture warrant for excluding from the functions of the ministry a candidate unacquainted with mathematics. Where have they the Scripture authority for licensing uninspired men to preach the Gospel,-was this practised in the primitive church? When they show us this, then will we at once show to them the authority which we have from the word of God, for framing and adopting, as the confession of our faith, a creed, which we believe is founded upon the eternal truths of revelation. In our next paper we shall endeavour to show that the natural tendency of Unitarianism is to Popery on the one hand and infidelity on the other.

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