Superstition, which lays undue stress on outward forms, and
fanaticism, which gives credit to preternatural impulses, and
professes a particular kind of inspiration differing not at all from
infallibility, are the Scylla and Charybdis, through which, over
stormy waters or serene, we have to make our steady way. Both are
equally intolerant, and both are condemned by the genius of
Protestantism, the constitution of the Church, and the spirit of the
Bible.
It is devoutly to be desired, that none who are more regardful of
truth than of party, that none who are alive to the real state of
the times, and to the character of the respective interests which
may hereafter be brought into unhappy collision, may hesitate,
through fear or favour, to act in this crisis with moral courage
tempered with holy charity. Let them discountenance all extreme
innovations, from whatsoever quarter they may proceed, or by
whatsoever distinguished names they may be sanctioned. Let them rise
with manly integrity above the mean suggestions of temporizing
policy, and look only to the substantial and permanent interests of
the Church, which are those of truth and charity, of freedom in
alliance with order, of Christianity in its most ennobling form, and
of the public welfare of the British Empire.
If the spirit of rigid Calvinism, under any plausible disguise,
should be widely diffused through the Anglican Church, we need no
prophetic mind to announce, that it will lead to consequences fatal
to her peace and liberty, introducing a spiritual despotism whose
power will be felt throughout the length and breadth of the land,
overawing, as in the days of John Knox, the majesty of princes, and
spreading its morbid gloom to the sequestered cottage of the
peasant, in the remotest regions and most unfrequented provinces.
History proves, that the men who are deeply imbued with this spirit,
merge all other interests in their devoted zeal to its propagation.
Those of that party who, like Mr. Noel, think "our venerable Church"
means no more than "our venerable _selves_," will be ready to betray
her into the hands of her adversaries, whensoever they may be deemed
strong enough to carry her outworks, and to supplant the orthodox
clergyman by the Calvinistic minister;--while those who reverence
the Apostolical succession, or the general order of the Church, will
form within our pale an intolerant party, intriguing for dominion,
restless and oppressive, never to be satisfied until they have
crushed or excluded all who have dared to profess their rejection of
the Calvinistic theology.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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