views of Christianity, of their not being adapted to the mass of mankind, the poor and illiterate. Why have any, professing to hold these opinions, said this of them, or been willing to hear it said, or even thought it possible that it could be true?

One reason I suppose to be, that such persons have never really held unitarian views. They have never understood themselves the truths of which they thus speak, certainly have not known them in their clearness and purity, and right action. They have held them loosely, or seen them through a mist, or been at best but speculative and barren in their faith. Of such Unitarians, no doubt, there are many. And we would gladly be informed of the sect or people, among whom there are not many of the same description. It is foolish, it is childish, to make this an objection to Unitarianism, as if no other system were liable to the same objection; as if none but Unitarians misconceived or misrepresented their own supposed faith. Our faith may be more liable to this misapprehension and evil than some others, because under its present name and form, it is comparatively new with our community, and its principles not so well settled, or so generally and clearly understood, as those which have universally prevailed and been popular for centuries. Yet with all this difference, I should be very willing to put our faith upon the trial, in this respect, at the side of any other that can be named. They who oppose and condemn us are singularly ignorant of their own people, if they do not know, and singularly partial and unfair, if they will not admit, that there are those to be met with in every place, who profess their faith, and are called

now,

by their name, yet deny some of the most important principles and best influences of that faith. More than one have I myself known, and heard of many, who have set all their lives under orthodox ministrations, and yet insisted that the orthodox did not believe Christ to be equal with God. This is but one instance of the vagueness, or stupidity, or indifference to be found in that and every denomination.

Again, it may be that those Unitarians, who object to Unitarianism, that it is designed for the higher classes, rather than for the lower, are themselves of the higher class, and have seen the influence of this system only in connexion with this class. How much this How much this may do to give such an opinion, is easily seen. It is a weakness, but one which all share, to judge of the whole by a part, and that part with which we are most conversant. And it has happened, from various natural causes, that our views have been embraced by a very large proportion of the intelligent and refined in society; a larger proportion perhaps than is to be found in any other denomination. Wherever these views have been proclaimed, they have found many of the highest members of the community, either already holding them, or eager to receive and avow them as soon as made known. This has been one of the reproaches cast upon our faith. Why, or how it is a reproach to any faith, others may be able to tell. I cannot, unless it be by a shameful perversion of some such scripture as this that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called;' and they who can so pervert such declarations, may as well belong to one sect as another, so far as their understand

and most important principles of faith. Besides this, every one knows, who has looked at the matter enough to authorize him to speak of it, that the Christians are a very large and rapidly growing sect there, are really and confessedly Unitarians, and moreover are themselves the very class of which we have been speaking the common people. The number of their distinct societies, cannot be less now than fifteen hundred, and one of their preachers, some years ago, spoke of them in this way, as quoted in the Tract to which we have referred, and to which we commend the doubting on this point: We are Evangelical Unitarians in preaching and applying the unitarian doctrine, and it is this mode of preaching and applying it which has crowned our labors with such a rich harvest. It is this which has given us access to the common people, who constitute the greatest part of our churches and congregations.'

I ask leave to state one other fact, less known perhaps, and more remarkable than any we have mentioned.

Orthodox clergymen, residing in the West, have candidly admitted, and strongly asserted, that in their opinion, Unitarian views are the most likely to find favor with the people of that region, the most likely to be received by them, and to do them good. So strongly persuaded of this are they, that they have desired our preachers to carry or send their opinions there, in order at least to open the way, to engage the attention, and secure the allegiance of those who turn away from Christianity in any other form. This is a well attested fact. Let it speak both to Unitarians and Trinitarians,

And after all, is there not instruction enough on this subject to be derived from the single self-evident position, that whatever views are true must be safe, suited, and best for all? Is Unitarianism the truth? Is it the word of God? What other question is worth asking, in the comparison? If you do not believe in this religion, give it no countenance, no help of any kind. But if you do believe it, if you find it in the Bible, avow it and act consistently with that avowal; proclaim it, aid it, support its institutions, send out its preachers and pages and agents and influences, all; give it a voice, give it extent, show that you do believe it, that you love it and can make some exertion and some sacrifice for it; hold it not back from any, but send its living bread to those who hunger, its unfailing waters to the parched and dying every where.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGIOUS IMPULSES.

ALL extraordinary phenomena in the physical world are apt to be ascribed by the uninformed or the ill-informed to an immediate interposition of the Almighty. The regular succession of the seasons, the agreeable vicissitude of day and night, the genial sunshine and showers, the gentle breathing of the wind, the ordinary processes of vegetation, everything that is common, and neither appalling nor startling, is referred by persons of all descriptions to the operation of established

laws. But when men look out on the lightning, the earthquake, or the whirlwind, they are apt to regard it as being in a peculiar sense an interposition of Deity. Further inquiry and information, however, convinces them, that there is no ground whatever for this distinction; that the lightning which shivers at a single blow the proudest monuments man can rear, and the earthquake which engulphs cities, and the whirlwind which sweeps over and lays waste whole districts, are all nevertheless as resolvable into natural causes, as the falling of a leaf, or the shooting of a blade of grass.

So likewise in the moral world changes which are common and ordinary, and are gradually produced by example or education, or other known causes, are understood by all to be in accordance with fixed and acknowledged laws of the human mind. But when these changes are sudden and striking, induced, perhaps, in unaccustomed states of society, and by hidden influences, so that their connexion with the causes producing them cannot be traced; in all such cases the uninformed, or the ill informed, are prone to ascribe them to a preternatural agency. Hence in savage and semibarbarous nations, most disorders affecting the mind are regarded as cases of demoniacal possession, or at least as immediate and preternatural visitations of God, not subject, like other diseases, to known and fixed laws. The principle seems to be this, that whatever the popular philosophy for the time being is incapable of tracing to natural causes, will be supposed by the multitude to have a preternatural origin; to argue an immediate interposition of God, or of good or bad spirits. They do not appear to reflect that the ac