INTELLIGENCE. Somerset and Dorset Unitarian Association. THE Half-Yearly Meeting of this Association was held at Taunton, on Tuesday, April 9th. The Rev. Mr. Bowen, of Ilminster, delivered a discourse from John xvii. 5, on the analogy between Natural and Revealed Religion. In the evening, the Rev. W. Hincks, of Exeter, preached from 1 John iv. 1, with particular reference to the doctrine of immediate Divine Influence. Ten new members were added to the Association, and nearly thirty of its friends dined together at the Bell Inn. The Rev. William Wilson, of Crew kerne, is engaged to preach at the next Meeting, which will be held at Yeovil, in October. G. B. W. Swansea on the 27th of June next, and at which Mr. J. Thomas, of Pant-y-defaid, is to preach the Welsh sermon. The ministers are to meet at Gelli-onnen on the 26th, where Mr. Thomas Evans, of Aberdâr, is to preach at eleven o'clock. J. JAMES. April 13, 1822. Opening of Unitarian Place of Worship in the Borough. OWING to the shutting up of the chapel in St. Thomas's, in the Borough of Southwark, and the removal of Dr. THOMAS REES'S congregation to Stamford Street, Blackfriars, the remaining members of the late Mr. Brown's congregation at Horselydown, who chiefly reside at a distance, which renders their worshiping at Stamford Street inconvenient, and sometimes impracticable, have, in cou Quarterly Meeting of Unitarian Mi- junction with a few other zealous indi nisters in South Wales. THE Quarterly Meeting of Unitarian Ministers in South Wales was held at Blaen-y-gwrach, on Thursday last. There was service. at the Meeting-House on the preceding evening, when Mr. E. Lewis, a student in his last year at the Caermarthen College, introduced, and Messrs. J. Jones, of Bridgend, and J. Thomas, of Pant-y-defaid, preached; the former from Acts ii. 36; the latter from Eph.i. 7. On Thursday morning, Mr. J. Griffiths, of Llandy-fân, conducted the introductory part of the service; and J. James, of Gelli ounen, preached from 1 Tim. iv. 8; and Mr. D. Davies, of Neath, in English, from John ix..3.. After concluding the service with a prayer, an open conference took place, Mr. W. Williams, minister at the place, in the Chair. The subjects discussed were, Reason and Zeal in Matters of Religion; what they are, and how far useful. There were present about ten preachers, and the audience, though not very numerous, was respectable and attentive, and consisted of men of very different and opposite sentiments. The friends of Unitarianism seemed to be much pleased with what they had heard, and its opponents were perhaps in an equal degree dissatisfied; some of whom, the writer has been informed, expressed (though not publicly in the Meeting) their disapprobation, if not in the mildest, yet in very significant terms. The summer's Quarterly Meeting is united with the Annual Meeting of the Unitarian Society, which is to be held at viduals, engaged a large and commodious room for Unitarian worship, in White Horse Court, High Street, Borough. This was opened on Sunday, April 14, when a sermon was preached in the morning by Mr. DAVID EATON, from Psalm xcv. 6, to a congregation of about 130 persons, and another in the evening, by the Rev. S. W. BROWNE, A. B., the minister of Monkwell Street, from John xiii. 7-9, to a very crowded audience. Mr. Browne has generously offered his gratuitous services to the congregation for three months on the Sunday evening. In this service the Essex-Street Liturgy is used, fifty copies of which have been presented to the Society by Mr. AGAR, through the kind offices of the Rev. T. BELSHAM. -As the individuals who have opened this chapel are, for the most part, in humble circumstances, they respectfully solicit the aid of their Unitarian brethren, and of the various Fellowship Funds, in discharging the necessary expenses. They have consulted rigid prudence in the whole of their expenditure, and they conscientiously believe, that, with the Divine blessing, on which they rely, much good will result to the cause of Christian truth and piety from their humble undertaking. Any further particulars may be learned of Mr. W. WOOD, Treasurer, 63, High Street, Borough. Eastern Unitarian Society. THE Yearly Meeting of the Eastern Unitarian Society will be held at Diss, on Wednesday and Thursday, the 26th and 27th of June, when the new chapel will Secretary. The Annual Meeting of the Southern Unitarian Society will be held at Newport, Isle of Wight, on Wednesday July 24, 1822, when the Rev. J. B. Bristowe, of Ringwood, is expected to preach before the Society. Service to begin at THOS. COOKE, Jun. twelve o'clock. Secretary. Managers of the Society for the Re- 1822. dissolve the injunction which had been granted in this case, to restrain the defendant from printing, publishing and disposing of a book under the above title. He stated, that Mr. Lawrence was a professor of surgery, and lecturer defendant was a respectable bookseller in to the Royal College of Surgeons: the the Strand. The injunction was granted in contention were delivered by the plainon the ground of piracy. The Lectures tiff, at the College of Surgeons, and he afterwards printed them; the defendant had put them together, and published them in one volume, and this was the piracy complained of. What he (the learned counsel) had to contend for was, that the plaintiff had no copyright in the work, for it was a publication denying Christianity and revelation, which was contrary to public policy and morality. He would not have his Lordship take it on his ipse dixit that they were so, but those Lectures had undergone criticism by persons in the habit of performing that duty; they were reprobated by the writers of the Edinburgh Medical Review, the Quarterly Review, by the Lecturer on Christianity in the University of Oxford, and by the Rev. Mr. Whitfield, of Bath, as being irreligious, and of such a tendency that public policy ought not to tolerate them. The object of the publication was to send out to the world the doctrine, that when man dies, his soul dies with him; denying the immortality of the soul. He would admit that the Lectures were most ably and eloquently written, which only tended to give the poison they coutained greater influence over weak minds. It was impossible that he could express his opinion of the mis Ebenezer Maitland, Esq., Clapham Common, Treasurer, William Ashlin, Esq., Belton Street, Long acre; the Rev. Joseph Barrett, Mecklenburgh Square; Joseph Bradley, Esq., Clapham Common; Joseph Bunnell, Esq., Southampton Row, Bloomsbury; the Rev. John Clayton, Sen, Shore Place, Hackney; William Burls, Esq., Lothbury; James Collins, Esq, Spital Square; John Danford, Esq., Aldgate; James Esdaile, Esq., Bunhill Row; James Gibson, Esq., Lime Street, Fenchurch Street; the Rev. Thomas Griffin, Mile End Green; Joseph Gutteridge, Esq., Camberwell; William Gillman, Esq., Bank Buildings, Cornhill; George Hammond, Esq., Whitechapel: Samuel Jackson, Esq., Hackney; William Marston, Esq., East-Street, Red Lion Square; John Towill Rutt, Esq., Clap-chievous tendency of the Lectures better ton; John Rogers, Esq, Swithin's Lane; Thomas Rogers, Esq., Clapham; Josiah Roberts, Esq., Terrace, Camberwell; Robert Sangster, Esq., Denmark Hill, ditto; Thomas Saville, Esq., Clapton; Benjamin Shaw, Esq, London Bridge Foot; James Smith, Esq., Hamper Mill, Watford, Herts.;, Thomas Stiff, Esq., New Street, Covent Garden; William Titford, Esq., Walworth; and Thomas Wilson, Esq., Highbury Place, Islington. "LAW REPORT. Court of Chancery, Lincoln's Inn, Lawrence's Lectures on Physiology, LAWRENCE v. SMITII. than it was expressed in the Edinburgh Medical Review-that they could not believe that the plaintiff would have attempted to have brought his pupils into a state of total darkness; for what was the doctrine of the plaintiff ?-that a man had no more soul than an oyster, or any other fish or insect. The learned counsel then quoted several passages from the Lectures, to prove, that the death of the soul was announced to them in as strong terms as it could be pronounced; it was no accidental doubt that was expressed in them, but it was a positive assertion, and read at the Royal College of Surgeons. He not only denied that the race of man sprang from Adam and Eve, but in the deluge. Having called his Lordwent so far as to say there was no truth ship's attention to the passages, it would be for him to decide whether the plaintiff Mr. Wetherell on Thursday moved to could have a copyright in such a work, to send its poison out to the world. It was scarcely necessary for him to allude to the place in which the Lectures were delivered-it was a place licensed by royal charter; but he would contend, if such Lectures were allowed to be delivered there, that the charter would be as bad as the plaintiff's copyright: he, however, understood that the plaintiff was no longer Lecturer there. He had nothing, certainly, to do with the place where the Lectures were delivered; but he would deal with him in his character of an author, and he would dilate on the poison disseminating from him as a lecturer to a school, the pupils of which were afterwards to become practitioners of surgery, Looking at it as the work of an author, it did not require criticism to shew its evil tendency, for it was as clear as the sun at noon. The learned counsel was proceeding with his argument, when he was interrupted by The Lord Chancellor, who stated that he should stop there for the present, as he was obliged to attend elsewhere. Mr. Wetherell this day resumed his argument. He had but little further to add to what he had said on Thursday. The article in The Quarterly Review called the work in question an open avowal of the doctrine of Materialism. It was also reprobated for the pernicious tendency of its principles by The Edinburgh Medical Review, which said that it was calculated to lead the minds of his pupils into darkness worse than the darkness of the valley of death; and by the vicar of Kensington, who was the Christian Lecturer in Cambridge. The book, he contended, had the same object as the doctrine of the French Imperialists, namely, to establish the belief that death was an eternal sleep, and that, therefore, we were not hereafter to be accountable for our actions in this life. The learned counsel concluded, with expressing his regret that such great learning, taste and talent, as this work evinced, should be combined with such dangerous principles; which, being calculated to subvert the doctrines of our religion, deprived the work of all claim to protection on the score of copyright; he therefore submitted that the injunction ought to be dissolved. Mr. Rose followed on the same side, and referred to Dr. Priestley's case, where it was determined that, although a work might contain much valuable information, yet if it was directed against the institutions of the country, the law would afford it no support. He also referred to the case of Mr. Southey's book, and the work of Lord Byron the other day, in which the Court, to use the language of the poet, refused to "set its seal on Cain," and sent him forth a wanderer through the world. The pernicious principles contained in these Lectures were not the native growth of this country, but were sought for in the doctrines of foreign professors, and imported here from the German and French schools. The learned counsel then read a passage from the Dedication, which he said was the first passage complained of; the second was in page 98, where the learned professor said, that the Mosaic account of the origin of mankind, as contained in the book of Genesis, did not make it quite clear that all the world had been peopled by the descendants of Adam and Eve; and treated the account of the circumstances of the deluge as a zoological impossibility. Mr. Lawrence (Mr. Rose continued) had subtilely condensed into one passage all the venom coutained in a whole chapter of Gibbon. He then read an extract from page 422, in which Professor Lawrence contended, from the peculiar organization of the brain, that it was the seat of the sentient principle, which necessarily depended upon it for existence, and that the annihilation of the one must inevitably involve the annihilation of the other. He also read other passages, in which it was stated that many writers had doubted the inspiration of the scriptural writers: and containing other observations, the tendency of which, the learned counsel argued, was subversive of our faith; and they were the more dangerous, from the author's scholarlike command of language, and his scientific manner of treating his subject; which, acting upon undisciplined minds, was calcalated to subdue and bring them under its controul, and thereby work the greater mischief. Mr. Shadwell, on behalf of the plaintiff, suported the injunction. He was obliged to his friend, Mr. Wetherell, for the manner in which he laid the question befor the Court. He had condemned the work on the ground of its professing the doctrine of Materialism. The docrine of Materialism was two-fold. One species of Materialism limited the existence of man to this world only. That was a doctrine which he (Mr. Shadwell) would be the last person in existence to say one word in defence of. But there was another species of Materialism, which says, the sentient principle of man depends upon the organic structure of the body, and therefore cannot have a separate existence; but does not deny that both may exist hereafter, when the resurrection of the body takes place. That was perfectly that consistent, Mr. Shadwell contended, with the doctrine of the Christian religion, as laid down in the Holy Scriptures; while, on the contrary, the doctrine of the im mortality of the soul, as a distinct and independent principle, was quite foreign from our church. There was not a single passage in Scripture recognizing the existence of the soul in the intermediate period from the death of the body to its resurrection; while there were many which went to confirm the belief in the total suspension of the sentient principle during that interval. The words of the Apostles' Creed, "to judge the quick and the dead," implied this notion, as did those of the Nicene Creed, "both the living and the dead" they, however, left it doubtful; but the Creed of Athana sius left it wholly unambiguous, for it said, "at whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies, and shall give account for their own works." Mr. Shadwell then quoted several passages from the New Testament in support of his position. In the first book of Jose phus Antiquities, he alludes to the story of Abraham sacrificing his son Isaac, and saying that "the soul of the son would hover round the father and protect him;" from which it appeared that he believed in the immortality of the soul; but St. Paul, in his Epistles, shewed that he was wrong. Our Saviour was described as having risen "in body;" and the bodies of the saints who had been dead to have appeared to many in the Holy City. In the 15th chapter of Corinthians, St. Paul, talking of our Saviour being seen of 500 of the brethren at once, says, "of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep ;" and again, " of them which are fallen asleep." From which one must infer a state of non-existence before their resurrection. The resurrection of the dead is talked of, but there is not a single passage in revelation mentioning a distinct spirit, independent of the body; and, indeed, the Book of Genesis applies the term "soul" to the brutes and fishes. In our English trans lations that term is not used; the pas sage is, "And God said, let the waters bring forth the moving creature that hath life, &c.; but in the original Hebrew the word is nephesh; and in the Septuagint pauche, each of which signifies soul; and it was therefore impossible to make out that the soul was separate from the living principle: so that it was perfectly con sistent with Scripture to say that the Sentient principle of man cannot be sepa rated from his body: nor did that deny the doctrine of his accountability hereafter, when the resurrection of the body took place. Mr. Shadwell, after refer ring to the second volume of Locke, where he held it to be impossible for human reason to discover these points without the assistance of the inspired writings, spoke of the wisdom of our church in laying down no doctrine which might not be simply reconciled with what was stated in Scripture, excluding all metaphysical positions; and therefore nowhere setting forth that the soul was immortal, or had a separate existence from the body. There might be some passages found, which would seem to imply its existence in the intermediate period, between the death of the natural body, and its resurrection; but there was not one which asserted it. The learned counsel then quoted passages from the works of several eminent divines in support of his argument. Bishop Law said that no man could quote passages from Scripture to prove that the soul existed unconnected with the body. Mr. Taylor asserted, that all natural arguments to prove the existence of the soul separate from the body were vain: experience shewed the contrary; and as to the faculties of a dying man retaining their vigour to the latest moment of life, when the body was nearly powerless, it was only beause the brain was the last part of the system which was attacked by death. Bishop Butler had endeavoured to give metaphysical reasons for a separate existence of the soul, from the strength of a dying man's faculties when his body had nearly failed; but Mr. Pitt declared that that doctrine of the learned Bishop raised more difficulties than it solved. Dr. Bayly's doctrine went still further than that of Mr. Lawrence; for the latter confined himself to the formation of man as a zoological creature. Archdeacon Blackburne said that the New Testament always spoke of the interval between death and the resurrection as a state of sleep. He (Mr. Shadwell) did not believe it was so: but St. Paul, in alluding to it, constantly used the word "slept." It would be useless to waste the time of the Court in quoting passages from Drs. Watson and Warburton's works. He had done sufficient to shew that great and eminent men in the church had entertained, if not avowed, the doctrine which had been denominated the poison of the present work. It was a work containing 600 pages, on physiological and scientific subjects; the readers of which were more likely to have their attention attracted by its learning and science, than by an abstract point of doctrine contained in an insulated passage. It was not like a work of a light nature, easily read, and therefore extensively circulated, like the one which came before his Lordship the other day: he thought the present question materially affected the liberty of the press. It was by the liberty of the press that this country had grown great: he did not speak of it in its licentious sense. This gentleman had not spoken of Scripture with disrespect. He had certainly said that some persons had entertained doubts of the inspiration of its writers; but he himself spoke in terms of the highest eulogy of the New Testament. He called it "a religion of peace and love, as unfolded by the apostles." He qualified his denial of those doctrines which he controverted by saying that, "physiologically speaking," it was impossible to believe them, calling them, at the same time, sublime doctrines, and admitting that they had existed in all places and in all ages, and therefore depended not on his inferences. He talked of Paschal, who was the best friend of Christianity, as "the profound, fervent, and pious Paschal." In short, if there were any exceptionable passages in the book, there were others which contained their antidote, and the whole work should be taken together. He (Mr. Shadwell) would rather drop down lifeless upon the ground, than attempt for a moment to uphold the doctrine of Materialism, as tending to overturn belief in a future state. But the principles in the book before the Court were quite consistent with the notion of existence in a future world; and a valuable work of this kind ought not to be condemned, and the author to lose the price of his labour, because there might happen to be a passage or two in it which might as well have been omitted. Mr. Wilbraham followed on the same side with Mr. Shadwell, and said that the defendant had no claim to the favour of the Court, who had taken to himself the fruits and profits of the plaintiff's labour without any moral right whatever to the work; but merely because he thought there were a few passages in it which disentitled it to the protection of the law. The learned gent. then contended that the doctrine contained in the Lectures was perfectly reconcileable with Christiabity; and argued from a passage in the burial service, in addition to what Mr. Shadwell had cited, that a mutual existence of the soul and body was the result after death. In the sentence "the dead shall be raised," &c., the words in the Greek were oi nekroi, and not ten nekren in the neuter. Dr. Butler had said that that doctrine depended on revelation only, and not on natural principles. Mr. Lawrence's Materialism was confined to this life, and contained no principle con trary to the immortality of the soul here after, when the resurrection took place; and it was countenanced by Scripture. With respect to his doctrine of mankind having descended from different parents, that opinion was strengthened, not only by the different complexions of nations, but also by the difference in their features, the formation of their bones, and the substantive parts of the body: and he only said that "the Mosaic account did not make it clear," &c. And as to saying that many doubted the inspiration of the scriptural writings, he was surely entitled to say what were the opinions of others; but that was not stating that they were his own. On the contrary, he spoke of their simple grandeur, and said that "they were not inferior to the uninspired writings of the East," from which the inference was, that he looked upon them as inspired. The Mosaic account of the deluge, the collection of two of every description of animal on the earth, he stated to be a zoological impossibility; but he did not deny the fact, that it took place miraculously. With respect to a passage in Mr. Wetherell's speech, in which he stated that Mr. Lawrence was no longer Lecturer to the College of Surgeons, he should state that he laid down the office of his own accord, in consequence of his increased practice; and the imembers of the College had expressed their regret at his so doing. These Lectures were delivered in 1816 and 1817: in 1819 he delivered other Lectures, but in the interval these had been published. The College of Surgeons, therefore, had not only heard them delivered, but had them in prist before 1819, and what was their opinion of them? (Mr. Wilbraham here read an affidavit of Mr. Lawrence, by which it appeared that he had received the thanks of the College of Surgeons for his luminous Lectures delivered in 1816, 1817, 1818 and 1819.) The learned counsel then resumed his argument, and insisted that the author of our planetary system might as well be condemned for impugning the passage in Scripture which ascribed motion to the sun, and affirmed that it stood still on one day; as Professor Lawrence's Lectures, because they asserted the zoological impossibility of one or two facts stated in Scripture. He concluded, by expressing his hope that his Lordship would continue the injunction. The Lord Chancellor.-Mr. Wetherell, I shall hear you in reply on Tuesday: you will lose nothing by the delay, for la shall have an opportunity of reading the book in the mean time. (To be continued.) |