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being "strengthened with might in the inner man, they may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height," of that living Principle, at once the Giver and the Gift! of that anointing Faith, which in endless evolution "teaches us of all things, and is truth!” For all things are but parts and forms of its progressive manifestation, and every new knowledge but a new organ of sense and insight into this one all-inclusive Verity, which, still filling the vessel of the understanding, still dilates it to a capacity of yet other and yet greater Truths, and thus makes the soul feel its poverty by the very amplitude of its present, and the immensity of its reversionary, wealth. All truth indeed is simple, and needs no extrinsic ornament. And the more profound the truth is, the more simple for the whole labour and building-up of knowledge is but one continued process of simplification. But I cannot comprehend, in what ordinary sense of the words the properties of plainness and simplicity can be applied to the Prophets, or to the Writings of St. John, or to the Epistles of St. Paul; or what can have so marvellously improved the capacity of our laity beyond the same

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class of persons among the primitive Christians; who, as we are told by a fellow apostle, found in the Writings last-mentioned many passages hard to be understood, which the unlearned, as well as the unstable, were in danger of wresting and misinterpreting. I can well understand, however, what is and has been the practical consequence of this notion. It is this very consequence, indeed, that occasioned the preceding remarks, makes them pertinent to my present subject, and gives them a place in the train of argument requisite for its illustration. For what need of any after-recurrence to the sources of information concerning à religion, the whole contents of which can be thoroughly acquired at once, and in a few hours? An occasional remembrancing may, perhaps, be expedient; but what object of study can a man proposé to himself in a matter of which he knows all that can be known, all at least, that it is of use to know? Like the first rules of arithmetic, its few plain and obvious truths may hourly serve the man's purposes, yet never once occupy his thoughts. But it is impossible that the affec tions should be kept constant to an object which gives no employment to the understanding. The energies of the intellect, in

crease of insight, and enlarging views, are necessary to keep alive the substantial faith in the heart. They are the appointed fuel to the sacred fire. In the state of Perfection all other faculties may, perhaps, be swallowed up in love; but it is on the wings of the Cherubim, which the ancient Hebrew Doctors interpreted as meaning the powers and efforts of the Intellect, that we must first be borne up to the "pure Empyrean": and it must be Seraphs and not the hearts of poor Mortals, that can burn unfuelled and self-fed.

"Give

me understanding (exclaimed the royal Psalmist) and I shall observe thy law with my whole heart. Teach me knowledge and good judgment. Thy commandment is exceeding broad: O how I love thy law! it

is

iny meditation all the day. The entrance of thy words giveth light, it giveth understanding to the simple. I prevented the dawning of the morning: mine eyes prevent the night-watches, that I might meditate upon thy word." Now where the very contrary of this is the opinion of many, and the practice of most, what results can be expected but those which are actually presented to us in our daily experience?

There is one class of men who read the Scriptures, when they do read them, in order to pick and choose their faith; or (to speak more accurately) for the purpose of plucking

* Whether it be on the increase, as a Sect, is doubtful. But it is admitted by all-nay, strange as it may seem, made a matter of boast,-that the number of its secret adherents, outwardly of other denominations, is tenfold greater than that of its avowed and incorporated Followers. And truly, in our cities and great manufacturing and commercial towns, among Lawyers and such of the Tradesfolk as are the ruling members in Bookclubs, I am inclined to fear that this has not been asserted without good ground. For Socinianism in its present form, consisting almost wholly in attack and imagined detection, has a particular charm for what are called shrewd, knowing men. Besides, the vain and half-educated, whose christian and sir names in the title pages of our Magazines, Lady's Diaries, &c. are the successors of the shame-faced Critos, Phileleutheroses, and Philaletheses in the time of our Grandfathers, will be something and now that Deism has gone out of fashion, Socinianism has swept up its Refuse. As the main success of this sect is owing to the small proportion which the affirmative articles of their Faith (rari rantes in gurgite vasto) bear to the negative, (that is, their Belief to their Disbelief) it will be an act of kindness to the unwary to bring together the former under one point of view. This is done in the following Catalogue, the greater part if not the whole of which may be authenticated from the writings of Mr. Belsham.

away live-asunder, as it were, from the divine organism of the Bible, textuary morsels and fragments for the support of doctrines which they had learned beforehand from the higher

1. They believe in one God, professing to differ from other Christians only in holding the Deity to be unipersonal, the Father alone being God, the Son a mere, though an inspired and highly gifted, man, and the Holy Spirit, either a Synonime of God, or of the divine agency, or of its effects.

2. They believe men's actions necessitated, and consistently with this affirm that the Christian Religion (i. e. their view of it) precludes all remorse for our sins, they being a present calamity, but not guilt.

3. They believe the Gospels, though not written by inspiration, to be authentic Histories on the whole: though with some additions and interpolations. And on the authority of these Writings, confirmed by other evidence, they believe in the Resurrection of the Man, Jesus Christ, from the dead.

4. On the historic credibility of this event they believe in the Resurrection of the Body, which in their opinion is the Whole Man, at the last Day: and differ from other Churches in this only, that while other Christians believe, that all Men will arise in the Body, they hold, that all the Bodies that had been Men, will arise.

5. A certain indefinite number of Mankind thus renewed to life and consciousness, it is the common be lief of them all, will be placed in a state of happiness and immortality. But with respect to those who have died in the calamitos condition of unreformed Sinfulness, (to what extent it is for the supreme Judge to de