720 



1MTARIAN. 



I'nitarianisni in England dates almost as far back ! 

 as the earliest translation of the Bible. Strype, in 

 his Alemoiis of Archbishop Cranmer, says, " There 

 were other heresies now (1548) vented abroad, as 

 the denial of the Trinity and the Deity of the Holy 

 Ghost;" and, two years after, the same writer re- 

 ports, " Arianism now showed itself so openly, and 

 was in such danger of spreading further, that it was 

 thought necessary to suppress it by using more 

 rugged methods than seemed agreeable to the 

 merciful principles of the profession of the gospel." 

 In 1551, a German, named George van Paris, was 

 burned at London, for this heresy, and, four years 

 after, another person, at Uxbridge. Joan Bocher, 

 sometimes called the maid of Kent, was a more dis- 

 tinguished victim. She was a lady of family and 

 education, and of heroic courage. Alluding to an 

 opinion entertained byJier concerning the corporeal 

 substance of the Saviour, " it is a goodly matter," 

 said she to her judges, " to consider your ignorance. 

 Not long ago, you burned Ann Askew for a piece 

 of bread, and yet came yourselves to believe and 

 profess the same doctrine for which you burned 

 her. And now, forsooth, you will needs burn me 

 for a piece of flesh ; and, in the end, you will come 

 to believe this also, when ye have read the Scrip- 

 tures, and understand them." (Southey's Book of 

 the Church.) Edward VI. could hardly be prevailed 

 upon to consent to her execution, and signed the 

 warrant, saying to Cranmer that he must be respon- 

 sible for the sin. Under James I. a large number 

 of persons, some of them of rank and consideration, 

 were executed for the same offence. In Cromwell's 

 time, they seem generally to have had milder treat- 

 ment. Biddle, their leader, was at last, however, 

 thrown by the dictator into prison, where he died 

 in 1662. The posthumous works of Milton, first 

 published in 1825, shows him to have adopted their 

 sentiments. An act of the long parliament, in 1648, 

 making the profession of Unitarianism a felony, was 

 so far mitigated, after the revolution, by statutes 

 of the eighth and ninth of William III. as to make 

 the offence punishable, in the first instance, by 

 certain civil disabilities, and, in the second, by three 

 years' imprisonment, and virtual outlawry. These 

 statutes were not repealed till 1813. In the latter 

 part of the seventeenth, and the beginning of the 

 eighteenth century, however, besides other names 

 of the first distinction, their claim to which is dis- 

 puted, we find, among avowed English Unitarians, 

 those of Firmin, Emlyn, Whiston, Samuel Clarke, 

 and Lardner; and, to go higher, of Locke and 

 Newton. Towards the close of the last century, 

 several clergymen of the established church (Lind- 

 sey, Jebb, "VVakefield, Disney, and others) resigned 

 their benefices, in consequence of having adopted 

 Unitarian views, while, at the same time, among 

 numerous converts from the dissenting sects, ap- 

 peared the names of doctors Priestley, Price, Aikin, 

 Rees, and others of scientific and literary note. 

 The English body of the three denominations, as it 

 is called, is composed of the Presbyterians, Inde- 

 pendents and Baptists. Of that portion of the 

 latter class called General Baptists, a majority are 

 acknowledged Unitarians. Such was, towards the 

 close of his life, Robert Robinson, the author of 

 the Village Sermons, and doctor Toulmin, the 

 learned editor of Neale's History of the Puritans ; 

 and the Presbyterian churches, throughout England, 

 are understood to be, in many cases, occupied by 

 congregations of this sort. Their number was 

 reckoned, twelve years ago, at more than two hun- 



dred. (Unit, in Ang. Fid. Hist. Slat. Frcrsent. 

 Brev. JErpos.) In the Presbyterian churches in 

 the north of Ireland, a vehement controversy has 

 been lately carried on, the event of which is under- 

 stood to have been to detach about forty churches 

 from the body of that communion, and unite them, 

 as professed Unitarians, into a society of their own, 

 consisting of several presbyteries. There are ;I!M> 

 congregations of this character in -Dublin, and in 

 other southern cities of the kingdom. In Scotland, 

 there are Unitarian chapels in Edinburgh, Glasgow, 

 and other places. The principal supply of ministers 

 is from Manchester college, at York ; others come 

 from the Scotch universities, and from that of 

 Dublin. 



As early as 1690, some English ministers com- 

 plained to a synod, convened at Amsterdam, of the 

 growing heterodoxy of the Genevan church. The 

 first public measure of importance in the connexion, 

 was a decree of the Company of Pastors, in 17--J. 

 dispensing candidates for ordination from subscrip- 

 tion to the Helvetic confession, and substituting 

 for this a profession of holding " the true doctrine 

 of the holy prophets and apostles, as comprised in 

 the books of the Old and New Testaments, and 

 summarily set forth in the catechism." Vernet, 

 theological professor in the academy, published, not 

 long after, his disbelief in the consubstantiality of 

 the Son. In 1757, the article Geneva, in the 

 French Encyclopaedia, announced, that " many of 

 the ministers disbelieved the divinity of Jesus 

 Christ, of which Calvin, their leader, was the zeal- 

 ous defender." In 1788, the catechism of Calvin 

 was superseded by another, of a character to indi- 

 cate the justness of this statement. In 1807, a 

 liturgy, expurgated upon Unitarian principles, \vas 

 substituted for that anciently in use ; and, two 

 years earlier, a professedly amended version of the 

 Scriptures, which had been in preparation upwards 

 of a century, was published under the authority of 

 the Venerable Company of Pastors. At the pre- 

 sent time, the twenty-seven pastors of the estab- 

 lished church of the canton are understood, with 

 two or three exceptions, to hold to Unitarian 

 opinions. A controversy on the subject brake out 

 in 1816, which, though much discouraged by the 

 magistrates, continues to the present time. M. 

 Cheneviere, rector of the academy, the most dis- 

 tinguished writer of the dominant party, published, 

 in 1831, an Essai du Systeme Theologique de la 

 Trinite, and an Essai du Peche original, in which 

 are argued, at length, Unitarian views upon these 

 points. 



In America, Unitarian opinions appear (president 

 Adams's letter to doctor Morse) to have been ex- 

 tensively adopted in Massachusetts as early as the 

 middle of the last century. In 1756, Emlyn's 

 Humble Inquiry into the Scripture Account of 

 Jesus Christ, was published in Boston, chiefly, it 

 is said, by the agency of doctor Mayhew, of the 

 West church, and came into wide circulation. One 

 of the three Episcopal churches of that city adopt- 

 ed, in 1785, a liturgy excluding the recognition of 

 the Trinitarian doctrine. In 1805, attention was 

 extensively drawn to the subject by several publi- 

 cations, occasioned by the appointment of a distin- 

 guished Unitarian to the divinity chair of the uni- 

 versity of Cambridge. In 1816, the controversy 

 was revived by a republication, in that country, of 

 a chapter from Mr Belsham's Life of Lindsey, with 

 the title American Unitarianism. Up to this time, 

 the doctrine had been hardly discussed out of New 



