tions of this experience wean him for ever from works professedly religious.

Of course no one will, for a moment, affect to believe that it is our intention to represent the above description as applicable to all religious books. Exceptions there are, and exceptions of a splendid and redeeming character; but they are very few and very far between, and are, for the most part, the production of laymen. In confirmation of our statement we appeal to Dr. Channing, who evidently feels deeply the want which he is, unhappily, unable singly to supply. "It is too true," says he, and a sad truth, that religious books are pre-eminently dull."

Now, what must be the effect of this state of things upon the observant and reflecting reader? He cannot fail to perceive that while works of the most profound, sagacious, and original thought issue daily from the general press, the religious press is, not silent indeed, but most unworthily employed; that, while the various branches of Science, Philosophy, Historical Inquiry, and imaginative Literature, are rendered illustrious by writings full of deep research-of penetrating reflection-of genuine, unforced, intelligible feeling and rendered attractive by all the graces of a chaste, yet impressive and effective style; not one ray of this advancing light, not one scintillation of this fascinating brilliancy is shed over the cold, dark regions of theology; that while all other departments of human investigation quicken and invigorate the intellects that pursue them, theology alone seems to benumb and paralyse the faculties of its votaries: and he is driven to ask, in explanation of this strange phenomenon, "Is it the subject that stupifies the writer, or is it the writer that imparts his own dullness to the subject?" And either alternative is almost equally confounding.

It is not, we think, very difficult to specify a few of the qualities which render religious writings so generally unsatisfactory and unattractive. The nature of the disorder is more easily discovered than either the remedy, or the cause.

In the first place, they bear about them too obviously the marks of a professional origin. They appear, too often, to be the productions of men whose minds have run to seed, or whose intellectual growth has been stunted by living exclusively on one kind of food,-whose range of thought and knowledge is confined to the subject of which they treat, and whose acquaintance with that subject must in consequence be imperfect and superficial. For, if there be one topic whose connection with all others is intimate and necessary,-which is peculiarly fitted both to borrow light from all others, and to reflect light upon them, and which, if regarded in an isolated point of view, is

regarded in a false point of view,-most assuredly that topic is Religion. And yet, while the Writers on other Literature gather, from all kindred walks of knowledge, wisdom to correct their views or illustrations to elucidate their meaning-or flowers to adorn their path,-the cultivators of Theology think to stand alone and unsupported,-disdain adventitious aid;-nay even exult in their barrenness, and boast of the beauties of naked simplicity. The error is a fatal one. Perfect indeed must be that beauty-clear and lustrous beyond cavil must be that truth,-which will bear to be exhibited without all the "decent drapery" which a polished and comprehensive mind can throw around it. To the Writer who is to carry forward theological knowledge, all other branches of knowledge ought to be familiar.

In the second place, the Style of our Theological Writers is seldom a good one. It is often bald-often slovenly-often feeble-and sometimes affected. It is too common in the present day, we are aware, to undervalue and to neglect Style. But this is certainly a mistake; and it is far from being a harmless one. The charm of a clear, graphic, impressive style is felt much oftener than it is acknowledged, or even perceived; and a clumsy, prolix, or inflated style will often render the most valuable matter repulsive, even to the most attentive Reader. Any one who, after reading Bolingbroke or Paley, will take up Chalmers or Coleridge, will feel the force of this consideration. The Religious writer has to compete in interest and attractions with authors whose instruments are all polished and sharpened by long study of the purest models; and if his tools are rusty or unwieldy, he is sure to be worsted in the rivalry. The most noxious matter could scarcely render Rousseau or Southey unattractive Writers. The most admirable substance can scarcely coax us through the dry sawdust of Locke, or the fantastic clumsiness of Bentham.

The third cause of the unattractiveness of Religious Books is, that in general there is so little in them. They seldom give us new matter; and they seldom place their matter in a new light. The same meagre intellectual food is served up to us from year to year, till it becomes more odious than poison; and we are then blamed for the craving depravity of our appetite. Even when these writers do present us with something really new and valuable, it is almost smothered in their cloudy prolixity of language; the grain of gold is beaten out into the most attenuated leaf; the drop of cordial is diluted almost to evanescence ;— the pearl is dissolved-not in a goblet,—but in a sea.

It can scarcely fail to strike minds inured to severe reasoning, that Theology, as now generally received and promulgated, is not a system or a Science, but a miscellaneous collection of incom

patible dogmas; and of course highly unsatisfactory to those whom logical habits have rendered somewhat fastidious in their requirements. Such men apply to the Writings of the appointed Teachers of Theology for enlightenment upon many obscure points. They desire to be informed which, of two inconsistent doctrines, modern researches have exploded. They find in the received Theology much that is certainly true, mixed up with much that is apparently false;-they wish to have the corn separated from the chaff;-and they go to the voluminous writings of some Divine whose reputation, and whose titles, guarantee his competence to instruct them. But, to their surprise, they find every difficult question avoided with a caution almost pusillanimous, every unintelligible dogma involved in additional obscurity;-while a profusion of daylight is thrown upon what was already as clear as the noon—

"For Commentators each dark passage shun,

And hold a farthing candle to the sun.”

There are a thousand perplexing questions connected with various portions of Scripture, which present grievous stumbling blocks to serious and thoughtful minds. Yet, so far as we know, no English Divine has hitherto attempted, with any degree of success, to solve these doubts, or to remove these difficulties ;and the unfortunate inquirer is left with the impression that he has no alternative between receiving all, or rejecting all.

It would not be easy to overestimate the injury done to the cause of Religion by its fugitive and timid Ministers, who fly from the darkness they are appointed to enlighten, to the sunshine in which any one may bask. We are less disposed to spare them, because we feel convinced that the want of moral courage among the Professors and the Votaries of Religion, is the epidemic malady of the day; and shows how far we have fallen off from the faith and the practice of our forefathers-from the goodly fellowship of our Reformers, and the noble army of our Martyrs. We seem to have forgotten that courage was a Christian virtue, and have allowed it to pass altogether to the ranks of our opponents,

The plain truth we believe to be that Theological Sciencethe noblest-the most comprehensive-the most important of all Sciences, has for a long season been stationary among us ;and the materials of those who are always expounding, but never advancing, a science, must, of necessity, be soon exhausted. It is not for a layman to point out either the cause or the cure of the stagnation. But to recur to the statement with which we commenced our remarks-it is certain at least that it is not

the subject, but the manner in which the subject is treated, that revolts men of superior cultivation and refinement;-and that if Religion has not advanced with the advancing knowledge and requirements of the age, the consequences are natural and necessary, and they rest with the Ministers of Religion.

A LAYMAN.

ART. IV. THE COMPARATIVE SAFETY OF UNITARIAN AND TRINITARIAN OPINIONS.

ONE great cause of the prevalence of orthodox opinions is, that the teachers of them have been able to impress their hearers most deeply with a sense of the extreme danger of departing from them, with a horror of reading Unitarian books, hearing Unitarian opinions, attending a Unitarian service, as if we were the very apostles of profligacy and impiety. It is even sometimes said, that supposing it possible for orthodox opinions to be erroneous, it is safer to adopt them, as it is more pleasing to God to believe too much than too little. Though far removed from being a friend to the bitter spirit of controversy, yet we think that on these grounds, and considering also the high tone in which many of the orthodox assert not only that our opinions are untrue, and therefore dangerous, but that they are in a peculiar manner displeasing to God, and worthy His eternal reprobation, that we might sometimes with advantage meet them on their own ground, and proclaim, that we consider their doctrines, not only as utterly indefensible on scriptural grounds, but as being in their nature, if erroneous, much more calculated to provoke the displeasure of God, could we suppose his displeasure to be incurred by any error conscientiously adopted, after sincere and diligent inquiry; and involving consequences much more dangerous to our eternal happiness.

God revealed himself to the Israelites as a jealous God. No command was more strictly enjoined than the worship of one God; no fault was visited by severer punishment, no error appeared so much to provoke his anger as the giving to any inferior being that love, reverence, and worship, due to Him alone. If then the opinions of the orthodox may possibly be untrue, if possibly, Christ, however distinguished by the gift of the Spirit, should be in his nature only a man, may they not, according to their own views, justly fear the wrath of God for blasphemously giving this glory to a creature, for transferring the greatest share of that love which he requires to that creature? Then again if we are wrong, if Christ is indeed God, yet as I suppose no one maintains that he is a separate God, in loving and worshipping God we worship and love all the persons who constitute God, and even if we are wrong in not giving separate love and worship to the manifestation of God in the separate form of Christ, yet surely we may believe that God will regard with more lenity, the error which springs from a fearful sense of the danger of exalting the creature to a level with the Creator, than