by a divine decree, and if he came only for their advantage, he accomplished nothing.

Since the coming of Christ has not altered the condition of men, nor provided a method by which it can be altered, why should any believe in him as a redeemer and Saviour? In fact, such a faith would be false. If salvation has been decreed to the elect, he is no Saviour to them; and to the reprobate he is not a Saviour, for they cannot be saved. Where will this end, but in the destruction of the Gospel system, and of every motive to holiness which it supplies?

The doctrine of perseverance assures us, that the elect, after they have been visited by the efficacious and regenerating grace of God made certain by a decree, will never lose this grace, nor be in danger of so far deviating from the way of holiness as to put their salvation in jeopardy. They must be saved in defiance of themselves. This is no more than a consequence of election, and has the same ruinous tendency on morals and religious obligation.

What has the regenerate man to do, but yield without compunction to any wickedness to which his concupiscence, avarice, malice, or other passions and propensities shall prompt him? If conscience chides, what power will conscience have, while he is sure, that no evil can befal him at last? He is elected, and the God of heaven will not circumvent his own determined purpose. Sin and holiness are the same to a man, who is among the elect; they will equally carry him through, and make him an instrument in

aiding the designs of providence, and advancing the glory of God.

Again, in this course of perseverance, what concern have the elect with rules of action, principles of morals, the laws of society, and those wholesome restraints imposed to keep up harmony and peace among men? As far as these redound to their convenience, it may be thought advisable to regard them, but no farther; and not even to this extent from any sense of moral obligation. Men may form systems of ethics, talk of virtue, construct wise laws, confide in the moral sense, and thus hope to curb the licentious and passionate; but all these will be shadowy things in the eyes of the elect. They are under a law superiour to any human fabrication; they are shielded by the promise and power of God; they have a more dignified calling than the mass of groveling mortals; they are chosen vessels, never to be broken; children of light; heirs of an inheritance, which no changes of time or of eternity can render uncertain.

We need not stop with the laws of men, and human principles of right and goodness. In what respect are such favoured beings concerned with the laws of God, the precepts of scripture, the commands of Christ? The decree of perseverance has no conditions. It is not said, be humble. repent, obey, love God, love your neighbour, and then you will be able to persevere. It is a main part of the scheme, that it is not encumbered with conditions. Hence the Gospel rules are useless, the Bible might be blotted from existence without loss to the elect; and in

deed, according to this plan, the christian dispensation itself is only a theatrical exhibition acted over as it was resolved on before the foundation of the world, raising the curiosity and admiration of mortals, but not producing any effect on their character and destiny.

I have dwelt on this topic longer than its real importance demands: The individuals are very few at this period, who believe in the calvinistic doctrine of election, as contained in creeds, and taught by school divines; and the number is vastly smaller, who would undertake to defend it on its original grounds. It comes out of the hands of later writers modified, softened, and moulded into such shapes, as would never be recognized by the warm divines, who pleaded its cause so manfully at the Synod of Dort. They would see only the caricature of its former glory, and be grieved, that it should suffer more from the treachery of friends, than it would have done in their day from the open hostility of enemies. The truth is, it will not bear softening; to modify, is to destroy it; whoever applies himself to this task, deserts the field of Calvinism; he may retain the name, but he has nothing else; let him remove this one stone, and his tower of strength is fallen; he may feed his eyes with the vision of its former grandeur, but it will never again afford him a resting place. A moderate Calvinist is no Calvinist.

If the ingenuity of man were put to its utmost stretch, I presume it would be impossible to invent another doctrine so perfectly at variance with the at

tributes of God, and the reason of man, as this of election and reprobation. Suppose the Deity to be infinitely evil, instead of infinitely good, and his character to be in all respects directly opposite to what it really is, and you might then show a consistency between this doctrine, and the attributes of his nature. However this tenet may seem to others, I cannot resist the conviction, that with its various appendages and outworks of total depravity, human inability, and compulsory grace, it is the most immoral and pernicious, which has ever been started as a doctrine of christianity. Its mischief is extensive, and that it is not more so, is because it is never made a ruling principle of action, nor believed except in a modified sense, and in connexion with other doctrines, which serve as a counterpoise to its perverting tendency.

LETTER IV.

Testimony of History to the Influence of Calvinism.

SIR,

You stated in your Sermon, that the positions you had taken could easily be illustrated and confirmed by tracing the history of American Unitarianism. You were desired to trace this history, and compare it with a similar historical view of Presbyterianism, and let the world see by a fair parallel in what respects Unitarians have fallen so immensely behind their brethren in morals and piety, as to be ranked among Mohammedans and Jews, and not to deserve the name of Christians.

With this most reasonable request you did not think it expedient to comply. "I do not intend," you observe," to follow this gentleman far, in the comparison, which he so zealously and confidently urges, between Presbyterians and Unitarians, on the score of purity of morals." That is, you decline to make the comparison by which alone the accuracy of your very serious charges can be tested. The question is, whether Unitarians are less moral as a sect, than other sects. This question must be decided, if decided at all, by facts and a comparison. You have answered it in the affirmative, but without proof. Those, who come under your censure, do not approve