That the doctrine of a state of pre-existence was believed in our Lord's days will not, I apprehend, is there in it that could be so cited and strange doctrine is not anyof which it may not be said that where connected with it in the it is not to be found in the other discourses of our Lord recorded evangelists, and therefore their si- by the evangelist John. Separate lence is fatal to the argument? this new and strange doctrine "I affirm," says Mr. B., from that of the pre-existence of without fear of contradiction, Jesus Christ, and the whole fores that if Christ was, as my learned and energy of Mr. B.'s. reasoning friend maintains, the grand agent is lost. Is not Mr. B. guilty of employed by the supreme being the same fault which he would be in creating and governing the ready enough to charge on the world, and the immediate dis- opposers of Christianity, that they peuser of all things, the evangelists attack its corruptions and not must have been well informed of Christianity itself, as left in the this fact at the time they wrote New Testament? Will he say in their respective histories." "It reply, that he finds this new and will not then" he adds, "for a strange doctrine, maintained as a moment bear a question whether doctrine of scripture by his learnthey knew of the pre-existent ed friend to whom he is writing? dignity of Christ, if that doctrine So may they say, that those corwere true." But he asks, "Is it ruptions, as we call them, are possible that the evangelists could maintained as Christianity by its have known these amazing facts, advocates. and yet that in their histories of the life and ministry of this extraordinary person they should pass them over in total silence? be disputed, and that it was beWould not the mind of a Jew who Leved by his diciples is highly had never heard of delegated cre- probable from the question which ators and subordinate Jehovahs, they put to him, respecting the have been overwhelmed with man who was born blind. Beastonishment when this new and lieving then the pre-existence of strange doctrine was first disco- others, would they be overwhelmvered to him?" I think it cer- ed with the astonishment Mr. B. tainly would, and I apprehend supposes, had they been informed the astonishment would have been that their lord and master had increased by the reflection that existed before he was born into they (the Jews) had been imposed this world? Or would they have upon by Moses and the prophets, supposed merely because he had who uniformly teach that there pre-existed, that he, any more is but one Jehovah, who stretched than the blind man, must have out the heavens alone, who spread been of a super-angelic nature, abroad the earth by himself, and the delegated creator and governor whose hand, and not that of a of the world, and the immediate delegated creator or subordinate dispenser of all things? It then Jehovah had laid its foundation. the discovery of the fact would But supposing the doctrine of the have excited no extraordinary pre-existence of Jesus Christ to surprise, was it impossible for be true, it is certain that this new them to sit down and write t life and ministry of Jesus Christ, lists, in which alone, if he taught (of which the fact of his pre-ex- the doctrine of his pre-existence, istence made no part) without we may expect to find it, and frequently recurring to it? ought to look for it, and not in the other evangelists; their silence therefore as to that fact, is no argument against its truth or crc. dibility. The pre-existence of Jesus Christ, if it were a fact, could only be known from his discourses. Now it does not appear to have been the object of the three form- I intend in another Letter; er evangelists to record those dis- with your permission, to state the courses; they confine themselves evidence for that fact arising from chiefly to his actions, his mira- the discourses of our Lord recorded cles and his parables, of which by the evangelist John and from little is to be found in the gospel some passages in the epistolary of John; it was not natural there- books of the New Testament, and fore for them to introduce into to examine the arguments by their histories the doctrine of his which Mr. B. endeavours to set pre-existence. On the contrary, aside that evidence. In the mean it was the principal object of John time I remain, in his gospel to record the discourses of Jesus, none of which are recorded by the other evange Your's, &c. JOHN MARSOM. ERROR IN MRS. CAPPE'S MEMOIR OF MR. WOOD. SIR, To the Editor of the Monthly Repository. June 11, 1808. to question his authority,) I find I wish to correct an error in that Dr. Priestley was reconi Mrs. Cappe's Memoir of the mended to his lordship as a late Rev. Mr. Wood, inserted in person qualified to be a literary your last Repository; and your companion to him." And furrespect for truth will, I am per- ther that "his office was nomisuaded, induce you to admit this nally that of librarian, but that gentle corrective. Mrs. C. states he had little employment as such Mr. Wood's being chosen to the besides arranging his books, takministry of Mill hill chapel in ing a catalogue of them and of Leeds in 1773, "on the removal his manuscripts, which were nuof the late Dr. Priestley to super- merous, and making an index to intend the education of the two his private papers. In fact, he sons of the Marquis of Lans- was with him as a friend, and in downe." Now, upon looking the second year made with him into the Memoirs of Dr. Priestley the tour of Flanders, &c." See written by himself, of which in- Memoirs, &c. page 71, 72. deed, I had some faint remembrance, (and I am inclined to think Mrs. C. will not be disposed Thus it appears to me that Dr. Priestley had nothing to do with the education of Lord Lans downe's sons, as represented by minster; the particular friend of Mrs. C. and the Dr.'s statement the late Mr. Wood, and to whom perfectly agrees with the well is ascribed the just and generous known truth, that their educa tribute to his memory in a metion was committed entirely to moir in the Athenæum for May, the care and direction of the Rev. p. 480 and 487. Mr. Jervis, now minister of the chapel in Princes-street, West I am Sir, your's GOGMAGOG'S ANIMADVERSIONS ON A HORRID CLERICAL FARCE. To the Editor of the Monthly Repository, SIR, London, June 8, 1808. ner: he was condemned and left I am tempted to renew my for execution. Between his concorrespondence with you, which demnation and execution he disfrom indisposition and other caus- played, it is stated, the utmost es I had considered as wholly depravity and ferocity; uttering closed, by the indignation I have the most dreadful oaths and imfelt on reading in the New Annual precations on all who came near Register of last year*, an account him, threatening to murder the of a horrid clerical farce. clergyman who attended the goal, At Wisbeach, July 10, 1807, and refusing to listen to any reliRichard Faulkner, a lad under gious advice or admonition. This sixteen years of age, was capitally is truly shocking, but not unacconvicted of the wilful murder countable. The awful apparatus of George Burnham, another lad of a court of criminal justice, about twelve years of age. The the dreadful solitude of a duncause of the murder alleged in geon, with the clanking of chains the An. Reg. is that the prisoner on every motion, and the expecta had been insulted by the mother tion of speedy death by strangu. of the deceased. Mercy, if mer- lation could not fail of making cy were not sometimes a stranger an ignorant boy raving mad, at to British courts of justice, would least at intervals. In such a have pleaded for the young cri- situation, the goaler was perhaps minal. The feelings of the coun- justified in chaining him, hands try would have been sufficiently and feet, to the floor of his cell. respected by transporting him for But who would imagine any hu life. A boy-murderer may be a man beings, capable of playing monstrous, but he is not a terrific tricks with the wretched youth? character; and his execution who would believe that such bewould scarcely have the effect of ings were actually found in the making boys peaceable, or of dis- garb of clergymen? It fills me with arming men of revenge. The horror to state, upon the authority court which tried Faulkner, did of the New An. Reg. what I hope not however reason in this man- is not true, that with a view to *1807, Principal Occurrences p. 177. frighten the boy into penitence, out of the world in a fright! For "the expedient was devised of my part, I confess that 1 regard procuring a child about the size of this imposture, considering all the one murdered, and similar in the circumstances attending it, feature and dress, whom two cler- the time, the place, the years gymen unexpectedly led between of the criminal, and the agents them, by the hands, into the cell, in it, a child and two clergymen, where he laid sulkily chained to with not less horror than the the ground." Good heavens! A murder itself which put the boy ghost scene, to terrify the dying in the power of the Wisbeach young wretch! A child dragged clergy. They it may be said de into a goal, to carry on a cruel vised the plot in mercy; but this imposture! Clergymen acting (li- is only an additional proof of terally so,) in a condemned cell, what requires not to be provedthe part of! All this in that the tender mercies of zealots England, in the nineteenth cen- are crucl. tury!――――The effect of this Had the boy died under the scheme (worthy of inquisitors) hands of these spiritual operators, on the prisoner, may be easily on whose head would the guilt of conceived. "On the approach murder have rested most heavily? of the clergymen with the child, The attempt to convert a sinhe started, and seemed so com- ner by a virtual lie is one of the pletely terrified that he trembled abominable artifices of the basest every limb, cold drops of sweat fanaticism; and it is possible that profusely falling from him, and the two clergymen, as they are was almost momentarily in such called in the account I have made a dreadful state of agitation, use of, were no other than two that he entreated the clergyman" of the vagrant enthusiasts, who (the cheat being no doubt discovered,) to continue with him, and from that instant became as contrite and penitent as he had before been callous and insensible. In this happy transition he remained till his execution on particular and minute as it is, to Monday morning the 13th July, having fully confessed his crime and implored by fervent prayer the forgiveness of his sins from a merciful God." under pretences of divine inspiration have infested certain parts of the country, to the terror of women and children, and the grief of sober Christians of all parties; and that the story was intended, expose the inhumanity and folly of the methodistic practice of shaking dying men over the pit of hell, in order to save them from falling into it. The artifice thus succeeded; You have, I perceive, corresthe boy was converted by a con- pondents in Wisbeach." I earspiracy; and the clergy and ma- nestly entreat their attention to gistrates of Wisbeach have the this communication, and beg of satisfaction of reflecting that in them to inform me whether the their wisdom and through their facts as quoted from the New An. dexterity they sent a fad, hardly Reg. did really take place. If arrived at years of understanding, that should prove to be the case Your readers will fill up this blank, remembering that the spirits who usually attend dying sinners, are (according to Mr. Hervey,) "not beneficent angels." STILL PLEAS'D TO PRAISE, YET NOT AFRAID TO BLAME." POPE ART. I. Sermons on various Subjects, by George Walker. F. R. S. late Professor of Theology, in the New College, and President of the Philosophical and Literary Society, Manchester. 4 vols. Svo. Johnson. Concluded from p. 332. The subjects discussed in the ble pleasure we announce their volume, that now offers for our re-publication. They possess so examination, (vol. iv.) are, high a degree of merit as mental "(1.) The Son, in whom God is well productions, and of interest and pleased; from Matt. xvii. 5. (2.) On religious persecution, John xvi. 2. (3.) importance on account of the On the enlargement of the heart, Psalm sentiments they contain, that it exix. 32. (4.) On the parental cha- would be a ground of sincere and racter of God, Matt. v. 48. (5.) On just regret, if they fell into obfuture punishments, Prov. xi. 21. (6.) livion and perished with the mass Fast-day, December 13th, 1776. Rom. i. 28. (7.) Fast-day, February 27th, of temporary and local discourses. 1778. 1 Chron. xxii. 16. (8.) GeIn the two first discourses unneral thanksgiving, July 29th, 1784. der our present review, though Ps. xlvii. 7. (9.) Christian fortitude, the text on which they are Heb. xii. 3. (16.) The right of individual judgment in religion, Acts, iv. 19. (11.) Virtuous remembrance, Isaiah, lvii. 1. A sermon sacred to the memory of the honoured dead, and particularly of the late JAMES CURRIE, M. D. F. R. S. preached Nov. 17th, 1805." grounded, relates only to the testimony borne to the character of Jesus by a voice from heaven, on the mount of transfiguration, the author connects with it the same testimony borne in his favour at The whole number of discours- his baptism. His object is first, es comprised in the four volumes to establish the credibility of these amounts to sixty-three; of these, divine testimonies on the ground six in the last volume have been of the general credibility of the already before the public at dif- gospel history: and secondly to ferent times, soon after they were strengthen the conviction they delivered from the pulpit. They produce by showing that they are do not therefore now fall under not singular; that they are only our Review; though, with sensi- specific forms of a general class, VOL. III. 3 F |