Summary of the Creed.

Obviously taught in the Bible.

personality and divinity of the Holy Spirit, and the doctrine of the Trinity. It teaches that the salvation of the gospel, in no case, delivers men from deserved punishment, that God regards both saints and sinners with the same feelings, that his favor can never be lost, that the actions of this life do not affect in the least degree our eternal welfare, and that man needs no radical change of nature. It denies that, at the resurrection, any will be raised to 'shame and everlasting contempt,' or that there will be a general judgment immediately following that event.

Thus every doctrine, heretofore regarded as sacred, and undoubtedly revealed in the Scriptures, with the single exception of the Unity of God, (a doctrine not peculiar to Christianity,) is unblushingly denied and ridiculed by these New Lights of the world. They are the favored of heaven! Hitherto darkness has covered the earth, and gross darkness the people! But the Lord has arisen upon them, and his glory has been seen upon them! A most palpable blindness has afflicted alike the learned and unlearned, the wise and the ignorant! The Bible, that book given of God to be the light of the world, has, till now, been shrouded in darkness! The book of revelation has proved to all the world beside, and to every preceding generation, a sealed book!

But, what is most of all strange, Universalists maintain, that this system, which they pretend to have gathered from the Bible, lies on the very surface; is the most obvious, most directly taught; and that it argues wilful blindness, and fear of the truth, if any expounder

Said to be clearly revealed.

Contempt of Orthodoxy.

of Scripture does not perceive it. Mr. Grosh, of Utica, in the "Universalist Companion for 1841," says, "We believe that in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments the foregoing sentiments are clearly revealed.” Speaking of " our common English version of the Bible," the younger Ballou says, ('Exp.' I. 273,)" We hazard nothing in repeating a statement in which all good judges appear agreed, that on the whole it exhibits intelligibly, at least, if not with perfect clearness, the general tenor and doctrines of the original text. So far as it respects the means of understanding these, the English reader need not much regret his ignorance of the dead languages."

They can scarcely have any patience with those, who teach the old-fashioned doctrines of the Trinity, atonement, and endless punishment. In speaking of the latter particularly, they can scarcely find words strong enough to express their contempt and abhorrence. It is a "wretched hypothesis;" "a doctrine, which, if true, would disgrace the benevolent author of our being,' ""ascribes a character to God which no language can express-which, indeed, for innate and unprovoked cruelty, infinitely surpasses the loftiest powers of imagination," and "represents God as sustaining a character compared with which, that of Nero is excellence;" "it is an insult alike to reason, and every sentiment of purity and reverence; it is contempt thrown upon the word of God and the character of its author." It is therefore a "horrible dogma," "absurd and blasphemous," "bolstered up by horrid assumptions." (See

They only have eyes.

Awful depravity of good men.

'Letters to Brownlee,' and 'Letters to Remington,' by T. J. Sawyer.) "When," says this mild writer, "will the Christian world have ceased to indulge in these wretched peurilities, and be willing to interpret the word of divine truth in a manner worthy of itself?"

Thus these very modest and unassuming reformers maintain that the Christian world have heretofore indulged themselves in wretched puerilities, and that all their show of learning has amounted to nothing more than mere boys' play. Nay, it is gravely asserted that they (i. e. all who have not adopted this new creed,) have not been "willing to interpret the word of divine truth in a manner worthy of itself." Having eyes they would not see! What a sweeping charge! And this is attributable to their depravity: "Among the most astonishing facts of the moral world, stands this general credulity in all that is dishonorable and blasphemous relative to the universal Creator. It furnishes one of the strongest evidences of man's awful depravity!" ("Sawyer to Remington,' p. 115.)

What awfully-depraved men, according to Mr. Sawyer, were Luther, Calvin, Baxter, Hammond, Patrick, Lowth, Whitby, Henry, Gill, Doddridge, Wesley, Scott, Bloomfield, and Clarke! How strange that such wicked men should have been selected to give tone to nearly all the piety in the world by their "wretched puerilities!" Stranger still that men of such profound and extensive learning, such matured wisdom, and such penetrating intellects, should not, with all their intimate acquaintance with the original language of Scripture, have dis

Superiority to the Apostles.

Leading doctrines.

covered what the merest tyro in the Universalist ministry can now see, without Greek or Hebrew optics, as plain as day! And stranger still, that the Savior, the prophets, and the apostles should have chosen to express themselves in such phraseology, that, whether read in the original, or in the numerous versions into which the Scriptures have been rendered, it has never been known until recently what was their true meaning! What a pity that Ballou, Balfour, and Kneeland had not written the epistles of Paul, Peter, and John! Then we could never have doubted whether there were future and endless punishment, or not.

But, lest the reader should imagine that I have charged, these modern interpreters of Scripture falsely, I proceed, without further preface, to introduce the requisite testimony. My object is not to enlighten the informed Universalist, in regard to the items of his creed, for none such will deny the charge. But I design to show the unthinking many, who compose the mass of the half-million claimed to belong to the denomination, what they must believe, if they become "positive Universalists ;" and to undeceive others in regard to the assumption of the Christian name, by those who "deny the Lord that bought them."

The great and leading doctrine of Universalism, and that for which all its other doctrines were made, is that

Resurrection-power.

Distinctive doctrine.

I. ALL MANKIND WILL EVENTUALLY BECOME HOLY AND

HAPPY.

In this they are all agreed. "The sentiment," says the author of the Plain Guide,' (p. 15,) "by which Universalists are distinguished is this: that at last every individual of the human race shall become holy and happy. This does not comprise the whole of their faith, but merely that feature of it, which is peculiar to them, and by which they are distinguished from the rest of the world." And such is the beginning and end of all their writings.

The text book of Modern Universalism is a Treatise on Atonement' by Hosea Ballou, in the preface to which he remarks, (p. 6,) "Perhaps the reader will say, he has read a number of authors on the doctrine of Universalism, and finds considerable difference in their systems. That I acknowledge is true; but all agree in the main point, viz. that universal holiness and happiness is the great object of the gospel plan.”

At what time this anticipated result will take place does not fully appear. All, however, agree in the belief that it will not be delayed beyond the resurrection. I say, all; for I cannot learn that any of them believe that the misery of the wicked will continue beyond the resurrection of the dead.

"In the resurrection," says A. C. Thomas, (' Theo. Discus.' p. 281,) "universal humanity shall walk forth in the beauty of holiness, redeemed and regenerated by the quickening Spirit of the living God.” Mr. Ballou says, ('Expositor' I. 78,) "that the resurrec