from it, before he is sent down authorized by the state to teach, it as
pure doctrine, and receive a tenth of the produce of our lands.

The Scripture is no one summary of doctrines regularly digested, in
which, a man could not mistake his way. It is a most venerable, but most
multifarious, collection of the records of the divine economy: a
collection of an infinite variety,--of cosmogony, theology, history,
prophecy, psalmody, morality, apologue, allegory, legislation, ethics,
carried through different books, by different authors, at different
ages, for different ends and purposes. It is necessary to sort out what
is intended for example, what only as narrative,--what to be understood
literally, what figuratively,--where one precept is to be controlled and
modified by another,--what is used directly, and what only as an
argument _ad hominem_,--what is temporary, and what of perpetual
obligation,--what appropriated to one state and to one set of men, and
what the general duty of all Christians. If we do not get some security
for this, we not only permit, but we actually pay for, all the dangerous
fanaticism which, can be produced to corrupt our people, and to derange
the public worship of the country. We owe the best we can (not
infallibility, but prudence) to the subject,--first sound doctrine, then
ability to use it.




SPEECH

ON

A BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF PROTESTANT DISSENTERS.