THREE LETTERS ADDRESSED TO THE VEN. AND REV. FRANCIS WRANGHAM, M. A. ARCHDEACON OF CLEVELAND, IN REPLY TO HIS REMARKS ON UNITARIANISM AND UNITARIANS, Contained in his Charge to the Clergy of his Archdeaconry, "As people in general, for one reason or other, like short objections better SECOND EDITION. York: Printed by Thomas Wilson and Sons, High-Ousegate. SOLD BY LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, PATER- LETTER I. "Mea fuit hæc in hac re voluntas et sententia, quemvis ut hoc mallem de iis qui essent idonei, suscipere quam me; me ut mallem, quam neminem." REVEREND SIR, WHEN the design, the spirit and the tendency of your last Charge, delivered to the Clergy of the Archdeaconry of Cleveland, are considered, it will hardly be deemed necessary for me to offer any apology for the liberty I take in addressing you. In that Charge, and especially in the Appendix and Notes which accompany it, you have chosen to attack not merely the principles, but the character of Unitarians; and, adopting the unfounded calumnies of those who have preceded you in the same inglorious, but not unprofitable labours, you have greatly traduced and misrepresented both. Believing most firmly and conscientiously, that the doctrines of Unitarianism constitute that "faith which was once delivered to the saints," by the authorized messengers of God, and that the more widely they are diffused, the more surely will the interests of true religion and virtue be promoted; feeling also the most sincere respect for the illustrious defenders of these doctrines, both living and dead, whom you have endeavoured to hold up to the unmerited contempt or indignation of mankind, I should regard it as a most blameable dereliction of duty, were I not, in the absence of some better advocate, to attempt, at least, to vindicate the principles and the persons that have been so unjustly traduced. B |