him, they are accountable to him alone for their exercise, and not to any human authority whatsoever. They therefore reject all human ordinations, appointments, or control, or any designation by man of an order of men to preach the gospel, as invasions of his rightful prerogative.

Amongst the prevailing sins, against which they feel bound to bear testimony, are slavery and war; and it is alleged as the main reason why many of them have disconnected themselves from the professedly Christian denominations to which they belonged, that those bodies gave their sanction to those anti-Christian practices. Iney believe slaveholding to be sinful under all circumstances, and that, therefore, it should be immediately abandoned. They believe, not only that national wars are forbidden by Christianity, but that the taking of human life for any purpose, by governments or individuais, is incompatible with its spirit. A large proportion or them, also, consider all resort to punishment, as a penalty for crime, equally inconsistent with the law of love. Hence they deem it their duty to withhold their voluntary sanction or support from human governments, and all institutions which claim the right to exercise powers which they thus regard as unlawful.

In various places, these persons hold meetings on the first day of the week, which are conducted consistently with their views of Christian freedom and equality. It is understood that the object of thus meeting together, is to promote their spiritual welfare. For this purpose, they encourage a free interchange of sentiment on religious subjects, without any restraint or formality. They have no prescribed exercises, but every one is left free to utter his thoughts as he may feel inclined; and even those who differ from them in opinion are not only at liberty, but are invited, to give expression to their thoughts. They believe this to be the only mode of holding religious meetings consistent with the genius of their religion, and for an example of like gatherings they refer to those of the primitive Christians.

CHAPTER XIV.

HUTCHINSONIANS-MILLENARIANS-MILLERITES-FOLLOWERS

OF JOANNA SOUTHCOTT-WHIPPERS--WILKINSONIANS--MYS

TICS-MORMONITES

HUTCHINSONIANS.

HUTCHINSONIANS, the followers of John Hutchinson, born in Yorkshire, 1674, and who in the early part of life served the Duke of Somerset in the capacity of a steward. The Hebrew Scriptures, he says, comprise a perfect system of natural philosophy, theology, and religion. In opposition to Dr. Woodward's Natural History of the Earth, Mr. Hutchinson, in 1724, published the first part of his curious book, called Moses Principia. Its second part was presented to the public in 1727, which contains, as he apprehends, the principles of the Scripture philosophy, which are a plenum and the air. So high an opinion did he entertain of the Hebrew language, that he thought the Almighty must have employed it to communicate every species of knowledge, and that accordingly every species of knowledge is to be found in the Old Testament. his mode of philosophising, the following specimen is brought forward to the reader's attention: "The air (he supposes) exists in three conditions, fire, light, and spirit : the two latter are the finer and grosser parts of the air in motion; from the earth to the sun, the air is finer and finer till it becomes pure light near the confines of the sun, and fire in the orb of the sun, or solar focus. From the earth towards the circumference of this system, in which he includes the fixed stars, the air becomes grosser and grosser till it becomes stagnant, in which condition it is at the utmost verge of this system, from whence (in his opinion) the expression of outer darkness, and blackness of darkness used in the New Testament, seems to be taken."

Of

The followers of Mr Hutchinson are numerous, and number among others the Rev. Mr. Romaine, Lord Duncan Forbes, of Culloden, and the late Dr. Horne, Bishop of Norwich, who published an abstract of Mr. Hutchinson's writings. See also the preface to Bishop Horne's Life, second edition, by William Jones. They have never formed themselves into any distinct church or society.

MILLENARIANS.

The Millenarians are those who believe that Christ will reign personally on earth for a thousand years; and their name, taken from the Latin, mille, a thousand, has a direct allusion to the duration of this spiritual empire. The doctrine of the millennium, or a future paradisaical state of the earth, is not of christian, but of Jewish origin. The tradition is attributed to Elijah, which fixes the duration of the world in its present imperfect condition to six thousand years, and announces the approach of a sabbath of a thousand years of universal peace and plenty, to be ushered in by the glorious advent of the Messiah! This idea may

be traced in the epistle of Barnabas, and in the opinions of Papias, who knew of no written testimony in its behalf. It was adopted by the author of the Revelations, by Justin Martyr, by Irenæus, and by a long succession of the fathers. As the theory is animating and consolatory, and when divested of cabalistic numbers and allegorical decorations, probable even in the eye of philosophy, it will, no doubt, always retain a number of adherents.

But as the Millennium has for these few years past attracted the attention of the public, we shall enter into a short detail respecting it :

Mr. Joseph Mede, Dr. Gill, Bishop Newton, and Mr. Winchester, contend for the personal reign of Christ on earth. To use that prelate's own words, in his Dissertations on the Prophecies :-" When these great events shall come to pass, of which we collect from the prophecies, this is to be the proper order :--the Protestant witnesses shall be greatly exalted, and the 1260 years of their

:

prophesying in sackcloth, and of the tyranny of the beast, shall end together; the conversion and restoration of the Jews succeed; then follows the ruin of the Othman Empire; and then the total destruction of Rome and Antichrist. When these great events, I say, shall come to pass, then shall the kingdom of Christ commence, or the reign of the saints upon earth. So Daniel expressly informs us, that the kingdom of Christ and the saints will be raised upon the ruins of the kingdom of Antichrist, vii. 26, 27 :— 'But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and destroy it unto the end and the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.' So, likewise, St. John saith, that, upon the final destruction of the beast and the false prophet, Rev. xx., Satan is bound for a thousand years; and I saw thrones and they sat on them, and udgment was given unto them; and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus Christ and for the word of God; which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image; neither had received his mark upon their foreheads or in his hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. It is, I conceive, to these great events, the fall of Antichrist, the re-establishment of the Jews, and the beginning of the glorious Millennium, that the three different dates, in Daniel, of 1,260 years, 1,290 years, and 1,335 years, are to be referred. And as Daniel saith, xii. 12: Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the thousand three hundred five and thirty days.' So St. John saith, Rev. xx. 6:—- Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection.' Blessed and happy indeed will be this period: and it is very observable, that the martyrs and confessors of Jesus, in Papist as well as Pagan times, will be raised to partake of this felicity Then shall all those gracious promises in the old Testament be fulfilled-of the amplitude and extent, of the

peace and prosperity, of the glory and happiness of the church in the latter days. Then, in the full sense of the words, Rev. xi. 15:-Shall the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.' According to tradition,* these thousand years of the reign of Christ and the saints, will be the seventh Millenary of the world: for as God created the world in six days, and rested on the seventh; so the world, it is argued, will continue six thousand years, and the seventh thousand years will be the great Sabbatism, or holy rest to the people of God. One day (2 Peter iii, 8) is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.' According to tradition, too, these thousand years of the reign of Christ and the saints, are the great day of judgment, in the morning or beginning whereof, shall be the coming of Christ in flaming fire, and the particular judgment of Antichrist and the first resurrection; and in the evening or conclusion whereof, shall be the General Resurrection of the dead, small and great; and they shall be judged, every man according to their works." s." +

This is a just representation of the Millennium, according to the common opinion entertained of it, that Christ will reign personally on earth during the period of one thousand years! But Dr. Whitby, in a Dissertation on the subject; Dr. Priestley in his Institutes of Religion; and the author of the Illustration of Prophecy, contend against the literal interpretation of the Millenium, both as to its nature and duration. On such a topic, however, we can

* See Burnet's Theory.

† Mr. Winchester, in his Lectures on the Prophecies, freely indulges his imagination on this curious subject. He suggests, that the large rivers in America are all on the eastern side, that the Jews may waft themselves the more easily down to the Atlantic, and then across that vast ocean to the Holy Land; that Christ will appear at the equinoxes (either March or September), when the days and nights are equal all over the globe; and finally, that the body of Christ will be luminous, and being suspended in the air over the equator for twenty-four hours, will be seen with circumstances of peculiar glory, from pole to pole, by all the inhabitants of the world!