Slavery in America, Address of Unitarian Ministers of Great Britain and Ireland to their Ministerial Address on, by James Haughton, Reply of Unitarian Ministers of America to 533 Mr, Animadversions on Mr Burn's Remarks, 427, 509 162 Towns, The Practice of Interment in, Dr Harrison's Pamphlet in Vindication of, Review of Testimonial to the Author of Scriptural Illustrations of, 194 THE CHRISTIAN PIONEER. No. 209. JANUARY 1844. VOL. XVIII. THE NEW YEAR: CHRISTIAN UNITARIANS-THEIR POSITION AND DUTIES. EIGHTEEN hundred and forty-four has commenced; another marked and emphatic revolution of our time on earth has begun its course. Thanksgivings be offered up to the All-wise and Benignant Father, who has so mercifully preserved our lives, and multiplied our enjoyments! The year that has just closed, with all its predecessors, is now numbered with the past, and so also is the record of our exertions for individual improvement, or our negligence in regard to our mental and moral wellbeing; our labours for the welfare of our fellow-creatures, or our indolence and indifference as to human progress; our aspirations and consistent persevering efforts for the diffusion of Christian principles, and the establishment of Christian freedom, and the practice of Christian righteousness, or our carelessness as to the prevalence of right or wrong, of liberty or slavery, of truth or error, of virtue or vice. Rational, elevated, pure, Scriptural conceptions of the character and government of God, may have found in us faithful or faithless friends; the undefiled Gospel of the Saviour may have had our practical exemplification and aid, or only our inane profession of adhesion; the mental and spiritual liberty wherewith Christ has made his disciples free may have had our strenuous advocacy, or only the feeblest lip service. Content with the aphorism that "Truth is mighty, and will prevail," we may have left that which we deem such in Christ Jesus, to enthrone itself in the minds and hearts of mankind A as best it might; and error, containing within itself the causes of inevitable decay, to dissolve in the corruption on which it battens and from which it springs, without the slightest attempt on our parts to expose the false and uphold the true; the national curses of intemperance and ignorance may have met from us with no opposition, or we may have banded ourselves with those whose heart's desire and prayer is to uproot these prolific sources of every evil work and deed of darkness; we may have folded our arms in the struggle of the friends of unsectarian, untrammelled education, and have sat by idle, or sneered with the witling at the principles of the temperance reformation; or we may have applied ourselves practically as well as theoretically, by example as well as precept, to stay the crime of drunkenness, and remove the brand of ignorance from our country; monopoly, in all its shapes, whether as exercised in relation to the supply of food for the body or nutriment for the mind, in political rights, or religious distinctions, of earth or heaven, may have met from us with that determined resistance which its iniquity demands from every believer in the universality of God's benevolence and of Christian brotherhood; or it may have been left to receive its death-wound without our union in the conflict with the monster; the masses may have been regarded with aristocratic supercilious indifference and contempt, and no wish have been felt, or any effort put forth, for their mental, moral, or political elevation; or towards the million we may have felt ourselves drawn by the holy sympathies of a common nature, and ashamed of the conduct of our country towards the uneducated, the destitute, and the sinful, we may have rejoicingly engaged in every well directed plan for the promotion of the physical wellbeing, the moral and Christian instruction, and the political enfranchisement of the entire people. The peace, the liberty, the knowledge, the practice of Christianity, may have been our rules of action, our being's end and aim, the cardinal principles in our judgments, for the guidance of individuals, families, nations; or we may have speculated so long and so abstrusely, and made and unmade theory after theory, and dwelt so continually in our closets, and neglected to go out on the broad theatre of human action, and mingle in the bustle and press of every day existence, as to forget that man is a compound being, of passions to be controlled, as well as of reason to be instructed, of propensities and feelings to be trained and regulated, as well as of intellect to be enlightened, gratified, and perfected; that we live in a changing and dying world; and that it is divine instruction alone, applied faithfully and perseveringly to the daily walk and conversation that can securely lead us through the temptations and perils of a corrupting world, to glory, honour, and immortality. Happy is it for all the creatures of God, that by the arrangements of his Providence in the changing seasons, the closing and the opening year, He calls on his children to pause and reflect on their career; earnestly and faithfully to devote a time to self-examination; to compare past conduct with His all perfect law; to contrast their privileges with their improvement, their obligations with their performance; and wise is it in them to avail themselves of the opportunities to judge righteous judgment, taking warning by the past, and forming high and virtuous resolves for the future, and imploring his strength to crown and bless their efforts in every good word and work. If on any child of the living God the duty of selfexamination and self-culture be obligatory, it is more especially binding on the Christian Unitarian. Whilst "darkness has covered the earth, and gross darkness the people," he humbly, but rejoicingly, believes that he has been enabled through the mercy of God to arrive at a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. He has exchanged darkness for light, bondage for liberty, and, instead of the intolerance, gloom, and presumption of creed profession, he has been blessed with the faith, hope, and charity of the Gospel. He feels its cheering, hallowed, and life-giving power; he is gladdened by its enlightening, benevolent, and sanctifying influences; he gratefully acknowledges that it is the wisdom of God for the moral regeneration of his own heart, as well as the sacred energy which shall advance the present and eternal blessedness of all mankind. How best shall he |