And here anticipating, for argument's sake, the worst result, let us
suppose that the exercise of individual inquiry and judgment (such as
the best teachers in the Anglican Church are wont to inculcate) may lead
in some cases even to professed infidelity; is it right and wise and
justifiable to be driven by an abuse of God's gifts to denounce the
legitimate and faithful employment of them? What human faculty--which
among the most precious of the Almighty's blessings is not liable to
perversion? What unquestionable moral duty can be found, which has not
been transformed by man's waywardness into an instrument of evil? Nay,
what doctrine of our holy faith has not the wickedness or the folly of
unworthy men employed as a cloke for unrighteousness, and a vehicle for
blasphemy? But by a consciousness of this liability in all things human,
must we be tempted to suppress the truth? to disparage those moral
duties? or to discountenance the cultivation of those gifts and
faculties? Rather would not sound philosophy and Christian wisdom
jointly enforce the necessity of improving the gifts zealously, of
discharging the moral obligation to the full, and of maintaining the
doctrine in all its integrity; but guarding withal, to the utmost of our
power and watchfulness, against the abuses to which {7} any of these
things may be exposed? And we may trust in humble but assured
confidence, that as it is the duty of a rational being, alive to his own
responsibility, to inquire and judge for himself in things concerning
the soul, with the most faithful exercise of his abilities and means; so
the wise and merciful Ruler of our destinies will provide us with a sure
way of escaping from all evils incident to the discharge of that duty,
if, in reliance on his blessing, we honestly seek the truth, and
perseveringly adhere to that way in which He will be our guide.

It is a question very generally and very reasonably entertained among
us, whether the implicit submission and unreserved surrender of