Heathens when Christianity first appeared in the world, Dr. Neander
observes:--It was Christianity which first presented religion under the
form of objective truth, as a system of doctrines perfectly independent
of all individual conceptions of man’s imagination, and calculated to
meet the moral and religious wants of man’s nature, and in that nature
every where to find some point on which it might attach itself. The
religions of antiquity, on the contrary, consist of many elements of
various kinds, which, either by the skill of the first promulgator, or,
in the length of years, by the impress of national peculiarities, were
moulded together into one whole. By the transmission of tales, half
mythical, and half historical, by forms and statutes bearing the impress
of religious feelings or ideas, mingled with multifarious poems, which
showed a powerful imaginative spirit, rugged indeed, or, if animated by
the spirit of beauty, at least devoid of that of holiness,--all these
varied materials were interwoven so completely into all the characters,
customs, and relations of social life, that the religious matter could
no longer be separated from the mixed mass, nor be disentangled from the
individual nature of the life and political character of each people
with which it was interwoven. There was no religion generally adapted to
human nature, only religions fitted to each people. The Divinity
appeared here, not as free and elevated above nature; not as that which,
overruling nature, might form and illuminate the nature of man; but was
lowered to the level of nature, and made subservient to it. Through this
principle of deifying the powers of nature, by which every exertion of
bare power, even though immoral, might be received among the objects of
religious veneration, the idea of holiness which beams forth from man’s
conscience must continually have been thrown into the back ground and
overshadowed. The old lawgivers were well aware how closely the
maintenance of an individual state religion depends on the maintenance
of the individual character of the people, and their civil and domestic
virtues. They were well aware that when once this union is dissolved no
power can restore it again. Therefore we find, especially in Rome, where
politics were the ruling passion, a watchfulness after the most
punctilious observance of traditional religious ceremonies, and a
jealous aversion to any innovations in religion. The belief of a divine
origin of all existence is a first principle in man’s nature, and he is
irresistibly impelled to ascend from many to One. This very feeling
showed itself even in the polytheism of national religions, under the
idea of a highest God, or a father of the gods. Among those who gave
themselves up to the consideration of divine things, and to reflection
upon them, this idea of an original unity must have been more clearly
recognized, and must have formed the centre point of all their inward
religious life and thought. The imagination of the people was to be
engaged with the numerous powers and energies flowing forth from that
one highest Being, while to the contemplation of that unity, only a
small number of exalted spirits, the initiated leaders of the multitude,
could elevate themselves. The one God was the God of philosophers alone.
The ruling opinion of all the thinking men of antiquity, from which all
religious legislation proceeded, was, that pure religious truth could
not be proposed to the multitude, but only such a mixture of fiction,
poetry, and truth, as would serve to represent religious notions in such
a manner that they might make an impression on men, whose only guide was
their senses. The principle of a so called _fraus pia_ [pious fraud] was
prevalent in all the legislation of antiquity. But how miserable would
be the case of mankind, if the higher bond, connecting human affairs
with heaven, could only be united by means of lies; if lies were
necessary in order to restrain the greater portion of mankind from evil!
And what could their religion in such a case effect? It could not impart
holy dispositions to the inward heart of man; it could only restrain the
open outbreaking of evil that existed in the heart, by the power of
fear. Falsehood, which cannot be arbitrarily imposed on human nature,
would never have been able to obtain this influence, had not a truth,
which is sure to make itself felt by human nature, been working through
it,--had not the belief in an unseen God, on whom man universally feels
himself dependent, and to whom he feels himself attracted,--had not the
impulse toward an invisible world, which is implanted in the human
heart,--been able to work also through this covering of superstition.
The geographer Strabo thinks that, in the same manner that mythical
tales and fables are needful for children, so also they are necessary
for the uneducated and uninformed, who are in some sort children, and
also for those who are half educated; for even with them reason is not
sufficiently powerful, and they are not able to free themselves from the
habits they have acquired as children. This is, indeed, a sad condition
of humanity, when the seed of holiness, which can develope itself only
in the whole course of a life, cannot be strewn in the heart of the
child, and when mature reason must destroy that which was planted in the
early years of infancy! when holy truth cannot form the foundation of
the future developement of life from the earliest dawn of childish
consciousness! The thinking Roman statesmen also of the time at which
Christianity appeared, as Varro, for instance, distinguish between the
_theologia philosophica_ [philosophical theology] and the _theologia
civilis_, [civil theology,] which contradicts the principles of the
former, as Cotta in Cicero distinguished between the belief of Cotta,
and the belief of the Pontifex. The philosopher required in religion a
persuasion grounded on reasoning; the citizen, the statesman, followed
the tradition of his ancestors without inquiry. Suppose now this
_theologia civilis_, and this _theologia philosophica_ to proceed
together, without a man’s wishing to set the opposition between the two
in a very clear light to himself; that the citizen and the statesman,
the philosopher and the man, could be united in the same individual with
contradictory sentiments, (a division which in the same man is very
unnatural,) and then he would perhaps say, “Philosophical reason
conducts to a different result from that which is established by the
state religion; but the latter has in its favour the good fortune which
the state has enjoyed in the exercise of religion handed down from our
ancestors. Let us follow experience even where we do not thoroughly
understand.” Thus speaks Cotta, and thus also many Romans of education
in his time, either more or less explicitly. Or perhaps we may suppose,
that men openly expressed this contradiction, and did not scruple to
assign the pure truth to the _theologia philosophica_, and to declare
the _theologia civilis_ only a matter of politics. In the east, which is
less subject to commotions, where tranquil habits of life were more
common, and where a mystical spirit of contemplation, accompanying and
spiritualizing the symbolical religion of the people, was more prevalent
than an intellectual cultivation opposed to it, and developing itself
independently, it was possible that this kind of esoteric and exoteric
religion should proceed hand in hand without change for many centuries.
But it was otherwise with the more stirring spirits and habits of the
west. Here this independently proceeding developement of the intellect
must have been at open war with the religion of the people; and as
intellectual culture spread itself more widely, so also must a disbelief
of the popular religion have been more extensively diffused; and, in
consequence of the intercourse between the people and the educated
classes, this disbelief must also have found its way at last among the
people themselves; more especially since, as this perception of the
nothingness of the popular religion spread itself more widely, there
would naturally be many who would not, with the precaution of the men of
old, hide their new illumination from the multitude, but would think
themselves bound to procure for it new adherents, without any regard to
the injury of which they might be laying the foundations, without
inquiring of themselves, whether they had any thing to offer to the
people in the room of that of which they robbed them; in the room of
their then source of tranquillity under the storms of life; instead of
that which taught them moderation under affliction; and, lastly, in the
place of their then counterpoise against the power of wild desires and
passions. Men saw, in the religious systems of different nations which
then came into contact with each other in the enormous empire of Rome,
nothing but utter contradiction and opposition. The philosophical
systems also exhibited nothing but opposition of sentiments, and left
those who could see in the moral consciousness no criterion of truth to
doubt whether there were any such thing or not. In this sense, as
representing the opinions of many eminent and cultivated Romans, with a
sneer at all desire for truth, Pilate made the sarcastic inquiry, “What
is truth?” Many contented themselves with a shallow lifeless deism,
which usually takes its rise where the thirst after a living union with
heaven is wanting; a system which, although it denies not the existence
of a God, yet drives it as far into the back ground as possible; a
listless God! who suffers every thing to take its own course, so that
all belief in any inward connection between this Divinity and man, any
communication of this Divinity to man, would seem to this system fancy
and enthusiasm! The world and human nature remain at least free from
God. This belief in God, if we can call it a belief, remains dead and
fruitless, exercising no influence over the life of man. The belief in
God here produced neither the desire after that ideal perfection of
holiness, the contemplation of which shows at the same time to man the
corruption of his own nature, so opposite to that holiness; nor that
consciousness of guilt by which man, contemplating the holiness of God
within him, feels himself estranged from God; nor does this belief
impart any lively power of sanctification. Man is not struck by the
inquiry, “How shall I, unclean as I am, approach the holy God, and stand
before him, when he judges me according to the holy law which he has
himself engraven on my conscience? What shall I do to become free from
the guilt which oppresses me, and again to attain to communion with
him?” To make inquiries such as these, this spirit of deism considers as
fanaticism; and it casts away from itself all notions of God’s anger,
judgments, or punishments, as representations arising only from the
limited nature of the human understanding. More lively and penetrating
spirits, who felt in the world an infinite Spirit which animated all
things, fell into an error of quite an opposite nature to this deism,
which removed God too far from the world; namely into a pantheism, which
confused God and the world, which was just as little calculated to
bestow tranquillity and consolation. They conceived God only as the
infinite Being elevated above frail man, and not as being connected with
him, attracting him to himself, and lowering himself down to him. It was
only the greatness, not the holiness nor the love, of God which filled
their souls. Yet the history of all ages proves that man cannot for any
length of time disown the desire for religion implanted in his nature.
Whenever man, entirely devoted to the world, has for a long time wholly
overwhelmed the perception of the Divinity which exists in his nature,
and has long entirely estranged himself from divine things, these at
last prevail over humanity with greater force. Man feels that something
is wanting to his heart, which can be replaced to him by nothing else;
he feels a hollowness within him which can never be satisfied by earthly
things, and can find satisfaction and blessing suited to his condition
in the Divinity alone, and an irresistible desire impels him to seek
again his lost connection with Heaven. The times of the dominion of
superstition also, as history teaches us, are always times of earthly
calamity; for the moral corruption which accompanies superstition
necessarily, also, destroys all the foundations of earthly prosperity.
Thus the times in which superstition extended itself among the Romans
were those of the downfall of civil freedom, and of public suffering
under cruel despots. But, however, the consequences of these evils
conducted man, also to their remedy; for by distress from without man is
brought to the consciousness of his own weakness, and his dependence on
a higher than earthly power; and when he is forsaken by human help, he
is compelled to seek it here. Man becomes induced to look upon his
misfortunes as the punishments of a higher Being, and to seek for means
by which he may secure again for himself the favour of that Being. The
need of a connection with Heaven, from which man felt himself estranged,
and dissatisfaction with the cold and joyless present, obtained a more
ready belief for the picture which mythology presented, of a golden age,
when gods and men lived together in intimate union; and warm
imaginations looked back on such a state with longing and desire. This
belief and this desire, it must be owned, were founded on a great truth
which man could rightly apprehend only through Christianity; and this
desire was a kind of intimation which pointed to Christianity. From the
nature of the case, however, it is clear that a fanatical zeal, where
the heat of passion concealed from man the hollowness and falsehood of
his faith, might be created for a religion, to which man only betook
himself as a refuge in his misery, and in his dread of the abyss of
unbelief; a religion which no longer served for the developement of
man’s nature, and into which, nevertheless, he felt himself driven back
from the want of any other; and that men must use every kind of power
and art to uphold that which was in danger of falling from its own
internal weakness, and to defend that which was unable to defend itself
by its own power. Fanaticism was therefore obliged to avail itself of
every kind of power in the struggle with Christianity, in order to
uphold Heathenism, which was fast sinking by its own weakness. Although
the Romans had from the oldest times been noted for their repugnance to
all foreign sorts of religious worship, yet this trait of the old Roman
character had with many altogether disappeared. Because the old national
temples of the Romans had lost their respect, in many dispositions man
was inclined to bring in to their assistance foreign modes of worship.
Those which obtained the readiest admission were such as consisted of
mysterious, symbolical customs, and striking, sounding forms. As is
always the case, men looked for some special and higher power in what is
dark and mysterious. The very simplicity of Christianity became
therefore a ground of hatred to it.
UNICORN, ראם, Num. xxiii, 22; xxiv, 8; Deut. xxxiii, 17; Job xxxix, 9,
10; Psalm xxii, 21; xxix, 6; xcii, 10; Isa. xxxiv, 7. In each of these
places it is rendered in the Septuagint μονόκερως, except in Isaiah,
where it is ἁδροὶ, _the great or mighty ones_. Barrow, in his “Travels
in Southern Africa,” has given a drawing of the head of the unicorn, “a
beast with a single horn projecting from the forehead;” accompanied with
such details as, he thinks, offer strong arguments for the existence of
such animals in the country of the Bosjesmans. He observes that this
creature is represented as a “solid-ungulous animal resembling a horse,
with an elegantly shaped body, marked from the shoulders to the flanks
with longitudinal stripes or bands.” Still he acknowledges that the
animal to which the writer of the book of Job, who was no mean natural
historian, makes a poetical allusion, has been supposed, with great
plausibility, to be the one-horned rhinoceros; and that Moses also very
probably meant the rhinoceros, when he mentions the unicorn as having
the strength of God.
“There are two animals,” says Bruce, “named frequently in Scripture,
without naturalists being agreed what they are. The one is the
_behemoth_, the other the _reem_; both mentioned as types of strength,
courage, and independence on man; and, as such, exempted from the
ordinary lot of beasts, to be subdued by him, or reduced under his
dominion. The behemoth, then, I take to be the elephant; his history is
well known, and my only business is with the reem, which I suppose to be
the rhinoceros. The derivation of this word, both in the Hebrew and
Ethiopic, seems to be from erectness, or standing straight. This is
certainly no particular quality in the animal itself, which is not more,
nor even so much erect as many other quadrupeds, for its knees are
rather crooked; but it is from the circumstance and manner in which his
horn is placed. The horns of all other animals are inclined to some
degree of parallelism with the nose, or _os frontis_, [front bone.] The
horn of the rhinoceros alone is erect and perpendicular to this bone, on
which it stands at right angles; thereby possessing a greater purchase
or power, as a lever, than any horn could possibly have in any other
position. This situation of the horn is very happily alluded to in the
sacred writings: ‘My horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of a reem,’
Psalm xcii, 10. And the horn here alluded to is not wholly figurative,
but was really an ornament worn by great men in the days of victory,
preferment, or rejoicing, when they were anointed with new, sweet, or
fresh oil; a circumstance which David joins with that of erecting the
horn. Balaam, a priest of Midian, and so in the neighbourhood of the
haunts of the rhinoceros, and intimately connected with Ethiopia, for
they themselves were shepherds of that country, in a transport, from
contemplating the strength of Israel, whom he was brought to curse,
says, that they had as it were the strength of the reem, Num. xxiii, 22.
Job, xxxix, 9, 10, makes frequent allusion to his great strength,
ferocity, and indocility. Isaiah, xxxiv, 7, who of all the prophets
seems to have known Egypt and Ethiopia the best, when prophesying about
the destruction of Idumea, says, that the reem shall come down with the
fat cattle: a proof that he knew his habitation was in the
neighbourhood. In the same manner as when foretelling the desolation of
Egypt, he mentions, as one manner of effecting it, the bringing down the
fly from Ethiopia, Isa. vii, 18, 19, to meet the cattle in the desert
and among the bushes, and destroy them there, where that insect did not
ordinarily come but on command, Exodus viii, 22, and where the cattle
fled every year, to save themselves from that insect.
“The rhinoceros in Geez is called _arwé harish_, and in the Amharic
_auraris_, both which names signify the large wild beast with the horn.
This would seem as if applied to the species that had but one horn. The
Ethiopic text renders the word reem, _arwe harish_, and this the
Septuagint translates μονόκερως, or unicorn. If the Abyssinian
rhinoceros had invariably two horns, it seems to me improbable the
Septuagint would call him μονόκερως, especially as they must have seen
an animal of this kind exposed at Alexandria in their time, when first
mentioned in history, at an exhibition given to Ptolemy Philadelphus, at
his accession to the crown, before the death of his father. The
principal reason for translating the word _reem_ unicorn, and not
rhinoceros, is from a prejudice that he must have but one horn. But this
is by no means so well founded, as to be admitted as the only argument
for establishing the existence of an animal, which never has appeared
after the search of so many ages. Scripture speaks of the horns of the
unicorn, Deut. xxxiii, 17; Psalm xxii, 21; so that even from this
circumstance the reem may be the rhinoceros as the rhinoceros may be the
unicorn.”
In the book of Job, xxxix, 9, 10, the reem is represented as an
unmanageable animal, which, although possessed of sufficient strength to
labour, sternly and pertinaciously refused to bend his neck to the yoke.
Will the reem submit to serve thee?
Will he, indeed, abide at thy crib?
Canst thou make his harness bind the reem to the furrow?
Will he, forsooth, plough up the valleys for thee?
Wilt thou rely on him for his great strength,
And commit thy labour unto him?
Wilt thou trust him that he may bring home thy grain,
And gather in thy harvest?
The rhinoceros, in size, is only exceeded by the elephant; and in
strength and power is inferior to no other creature. He is at least
twelve feet in length, from the extremity of the snout to the insertion
of the tail; six or seven feet in height, and the circumference of the
body is nearly equal to its length. He is particularly distinguished
from the elephant and all other animals by the remarkable and offensive
weapon he carries upon his nose. This is a very hard horn, solid
throughout, directed forward, and has been seen four feet in length. Mr.
Browne, in his Travels, says, that the Arabians call the rhinoceros
_abu-kurn_, “father of the one horn.” The rhinoceros is very hurtful, by
the prodigious devastation which he makes in the fields. This
circumstance peculiarly illustrates the passage from Job. Instead of
trusting him to bring home the grain, the husbandman will endeavour to
prevent his entry into the fields, and hinder his destructive ravages.
In a note upon this passage, Mr. Good says, “The original reem, by all
the older translators rendered rhinoceros, or unicorn, is by some modern
writers supposed to be the bubalus, bison, or wild ox. There can be no
doubt that rhinoceros is the proper term; for this animal is universally
known in Arabia, by the name of reem, to the present day.” The
rhinoceros, though next in size, yet in docility and ingenuity greatly
inferior, to the elephant, has never yet been tamed, so as to assist the
labours of mankind, or to appear in the ranks of war. The rhinoceros is
perfectly indocile and untractable, though neither ferocious nor
carnivorous. He is among large animals what the hog is among smaller
ones, brutal and insensible; fond of wallowing in the mire, and
delighting in moist and marshy situations near the banks of rivers. He
is, however, of a pacific disposition; and, as he feeds on vegetables,
has few occasions for conflict. He neither disturbs the less, nor fears
the greater, beasts of the forest, but lives amicably with all. He
subsists principally on large succulent plants, prickly shrubs, and the
branches of trees; and lives to the age of seventy or eighty years.
UNITARIANS, a comprehensive term, including all who believe the Deity to
subsist in one person only. The chief article in the religious system of
the Unitarians is, that Christ was a mere man. But they consider him as
the great instrument in the hands of God of reversing all the effects of
the fall; as the object of all the prophecies from Moses to his own
time; as the great bond of union to virtuous and good men, who, as
Christians, make one body in a peculiar sense. The Socinian creed was
reduced to what Dr. Priestley calls Humanitarianism, by denying the
miraculous conception, the infallibility, and the impeccability of the
Saviour; and, consequently, his right to any divine honours or religious
worship. As to those texts which declare that Jesus Christ “knew no
sin,” &c, his followers explain them in the sense in which it is said of
believers, “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin,” 1 John iii,
9. Or, if this be not satisfactory, Dr. Priestley refers us to the
“Theological Repository,” “in which,” he says, “I think I have shown
that the Apostle Paul often reasons inconclusively; and, therefore, that
he wrote as any other person of his turn of mind or thinking, and in his
situation, would have written, without any particular inspiration.
Facts, such as I think I have there alleged, are stubborn things, and
all hypotheses must be accommodated to them.” Nor is this sentiment
peculiar to Dr. Priestley. Mr. Belsham says, “The Unitarian doctrine is,
that Jesus of Nazareth was a man constituted in all respects like other
men, subject to the same infirmities, the same ignorance, prejudices,
and frailties; descended from the family of David, the son of Joseph and
Mary, though some indeed still adhere to the popular opinion of the
miraculous conception; that he was born in low circumstances, having no
peculiar advantages of education or learning, but that he was a man of
exemplary character; and that, in conformity to ancient prophecy, he was
chosen and appointed by God to introduce a new moral dispensation into
the world, the design of which was to abolish the Jewish economy, and to
place believing Gentiles upon an equal ground of privilege and favour
with the posterity of Abraham; in other words, he was authorized to
reveal to all mankind, without distinction, the great doctrine of a
future life, in which men shall be rewarded according to their works.”
Mr. Belsham goes on to state the Unitarian opinion to be, that Jesus was
not conscious of his high character till after his baptism; that he
afterward spent some time in the wilderness, where he was invested with
miraculous powers, and favoured with heavenly visions, like St. Paul, 2
Cor. xii, in which he supposed himself taken up into heaven, and in
consequence of which he speaks of his descent from heaven; that he
exercised his ministry on earth for the space of a year or more, and
then suffered death upon the cross, not to exhibit the evil of sin, or
in any sense to make atonement for it, but as a martyr to the truth, and
as a necessary preliminary to his resurrection, which they consider as a
pledge of the resurrection of mankind. Many also believe that Jesus
maintained some personal and sensible connection with the church during
the apostolic age, and the continuance of miraculous powers in the
church. They farther believe that he is appointed to revisit the earth,
and to judge the world,--a difficult task one would suppose, if “he be
constituted,” as said above, “in all respects like other men, subject to
the same ignorance, prejudices frailties,” &c! So this blasphemous
system contains, in this respect, and in almost every other, its own
refutation. See SOCINIANS.
The creed which the celebrated council of Nice established, says Grier,
in his “Epitome of General Councils,” is that which Christians now
profess; the errors and impieties which it condemned are those which,
according to the refinements of Socinus, his followers of the present
day have moulded into their antichristian system. Arius, a presbyter in
the church of Alexandria, a man of consummate talent and address, but of
a cold and speculative mind, impiously maintained that there had been a
time when the Son of God was not; that he was capable of virtue and
vice; and that he was a creature, and mutable as creatures are! It is
true that Arius held a qualified preëxistence, when he said that God
created the Son from nothing before he created the world; in other
words, that the Son was the first of created beings; but such
preëxistence does not imply coëxistence or coëternity with the Father.
After this manner did he deny the divinity of the Son, and his
coëternity with the Father. Seduced by the pride of reasoning, no less
than by his fondness for novelty, did he likewise reject the ὁμοούσιαν,
as it is called, or the tenet of the Son being of the same substance
with the Father. The blasphemies of Arius consisted in the denial of
Christ’s being either co-eternal or consubstantial with God. After a
lapse of twelve centuries, Socinus lowered him another step by declaring
his inferiority to the Father; for that he, as well as all other things,
was subject to the supreme Creator of the universe; and although he held
his mere humanity, yet, inconsistently enough, he would offer him divine
worship! Inconsistently it may be said, because the Socinian, on his own
principles, thereby incurs the guilt of idolatry as much as the Roman
Catholic who worships the Virgin Mary, a mere created being. The
Unitarian, or Humanitarian, sinks the character of the Saviour still
lower, by withholding all worship from him; and while he considers him
as a mere man, and therefore as not possessing the attributes of the
Deity, with an inconsistency as singular as that of Socinus, he
acknowledges his divinity so as to call him God; as if the terms Deity
and Divinity bore different significations, or as if the principle which
constituted the essence of the Godhead were separable from the Godhead
itself! It should be observed, that the lowest denomination of
unbelievers in the descending scale, namely, the modern Unitarian,
combines with his own peculiar errors and impieties all the errors and
impieties of both Arius and Socinus, together with an absolute denial of
the Holy Ghost being a divine Person. Having touched on the shades of
difference which exist between the followers of Arius and Socinus, a
more minute detail of the division and subdivision of the classes into
which they may be ranged may not be unacceptable to the reader: Arians
and Semi-Arians constituted the original distinction; that of a
subsequent day was high and low Arians. The high Arians entertain the
highest views of the mediatorial influence of Christ, and believe in the
entire Scriptures; the low Arians run into the opposite extreme, yet
neither high nor low Arians consider Christ to be truly God. The old
Socinians admitted the miraculous conception, and the worship of the
Son; the modern Socinians do not; a circumstance that identifies the
modern Socinian with the Unitarian. Some high Arians, such as Dr. Samuel
Clarke, &c, thought that Christ might be worshipped; others of them
affect to have no distinct notion of what the Holy Ghost meant, and to
believe that worship is not to be addressed to Christ, but through
Christ! These variations in the Unitarian creed have been deduced from
the evidence of Unitarians themselves, given before the Commissioners of
Education Inquiry in Ireland in 1826, as detailed in their Report to
Parliament; a circumstance that renders them the more valuable, as it
imparts to them a living, speaking authority. It must, however, be
observed, that motley as they are, they all terminate in one point, the
rejection of Christ’s divinity; and that, diversified as the
distinctions appear to be, they all will be ultimately found to be
without a shadow of difference. In short, Arians, Socinians, Unitarians,
&c, not only agree with each other in their antichristian scheme; but
can scarcely be said to differ from the infidel Musselmans, who are
taught by their Koran to regard Christ as a great prophet, and the
forerunner of their own. With Deism doubtless Unitarianism has an
intimate alliance. For Deists reject all the doctrines of the Christian
revelation, while Unitarians reject all its peculiar doctrines: 1. The
Trinity of Persons in the Godhead. 2. The divinity of Christ. 3. The
personality of the Holy Spirit. 4. The miraculous birth of Christ. 5.
The atonement of Christ. 6. The sanctification of the Spirit. 7. The
existence of angels and spirits; 8. And, therefore, of the devil and his
angels. “In what, then,” says the learned Dr. Burgess, bishop of
Salisbury, after this enumeration of the peculiar doctrines of
Christianity, “does Unitarianism differ from Deism? Deists deny the
essential doctrines of Christianity by rejecting the whole of the
Christian revelation; Unitarians reject the Christian revelation by
denying all its peculiar and essential doctrines.”
UNIVERSALISTS. Those who believe that Christ so died for all, that,
before he shall have delivered up his mediatorial kingdom, all fallen
creatures shall be brought to a participation of the benefits of his
death, in their restoration to holiness and happiness. They are called
also Universal Restorationists, and their doctrine, the doctrine of
universal restoration. Some of its friends have maintained it, also,
under the name of universal salvation; but perhaps the former name is
that by which it should be distinguished; for the Universalists do not
hold any universal exemption from future punishment, but merely the
recovery of all those that shall have been exposed to it.[A] They have
likewise a just claim to this title on other grounds; for their
doctrine, which includes the restoration, or “restitution of all the
intelligent offspring of God,” or of all
[Footnote A: This may be true in respect to the Universalists in Europe;
but in America there are those who deny any future punishment whatever.
In this country also they have formed themselves into separate and
distinct societies. AM. ED.] “lapsed intelligences,” seems to embrace
even the fallen angels. They admit the reality and equity of future
punishment; but they contend that it will be corrective in its nature,
and limited in its duration. They teach the doctrine of election, but
not in the exclusive Calvinistic sense of it. They suppose that God has
chosen some for the good of all; and that his final purpose toward all
is intimated by his calling his elect the first-born and the
first-fruits of his creatures, which, say they, implies other branches
of his family, and a future ingathering of the harvest of mankind. They
teach, also, that the righteous shall have part in the first
resurrection, shall be blessed and happy, and be made priests and kings
to God and to Christ in the millennial kingdom, and that over them the
second death shall have no power; that the wicked will receive a
punishment apportioned to their crimes; that punishment itself is a
mediatorial work, and founded upon mercy, and, consequently, that it is
a means of humbling, subduing, and finally reconciling the sinner to
God. They add, that the words rendered “eternal,” “everlasting,” “for
ever,” and “for ever and ever,” in the Scriptures, are frequently used
to express the duration of things that have ended or must end; and if it
is contended that these words are sometimes used to express proper
eternity, they answer, that then the subject with which the words are
connected must determine the sense of them; and as there is nothing in
the nature of future punishment which can be offered as a reason why it
should be endless, they infer that the above words ought always to be
taken in a limited sense when connected with the infliction of misery.
Those who deny the eternity of future punishments have not formed
themselves into any separate body or distinct society; but are to be
found in most Christian countries, and among several denominations.
Their doctrines form part of the creed of some Arians, as of Mr.
Whiston; of many Deists, as of Mr. Hobbes, Mr. Tindal, &c; and of most
Socinians. Nor need we be surprised that libertines and atheists hold
it, and that they strive to bring others over to their opinion. “The
tyranny of priests,” said Dupont the atheist, in the national
convention, December, 1792, “extends their opinion to another life, of
which they have no other idea than that of eternal punishment; a
doctrine which some men have hitherto had the good nature to believe.
But these prejudices must now fall: we must destroy them, or they will
destroy us.” The Mennonites in Holland have long held the doctrine of
the Universalists; the people called Dunkers, or Tunkers, in America,
descended from the German Baptists, hold it; and also the Shakers.
Excellent refutations of this specious system have been published by the
Rev. S. Jerram, and the Rev. Daniel Isaac.
The Arminians are sometimes called “Universalists,” on account of their
holding the tenet of general redemption; in opposition to the
Calvinists, who, from their specifically restricting the saving grace of
God to certain fore ordained individuals, receive the denomination of
“Particularists.” By the epithet “Hypothetical Universalists,” are
designated on the continent those who have adopted the theological
system of Amyraut and Cameron, but who are better KNOWN in this country
as “Baxterians.” See AMYRAUT, BAXTERIANISM, and CAMERON.