306 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



Scotland by a desire for an independent justification of 

 personal beliefs and for a philosophical interpretation of 

 religious doctrines such as existed, from the very Ijegin- 

 ning, in German Protestantism. The highest problems 



ceded, and drifted awaj' in the 

 direction of excessive liberty and 

 of ultimate anarchy. ... In the 

 seventeenth century . . . the matters 

 in dispute were of a more interior 

 nature. The use or disuse of the 

 Church's Sacramenta or external 

 means of grace was the question 

 mainly at issue. And here the 

 Baptists represented one tendency 

 of thought and the Quakers the 

 diametrically opposite one. . . . 

 The controversies of the eighteenth 

 century, and the two principal 

 secessions in which those contro- 

 versies terminated, [are] Unitar- 

 ianism on the one hand and 

 Wesleyanism on the other. The 

 questions on which those two con- 

 troversies hinged are of extreme 

 interest and of paramount import- 

 ance. . . . They belong to a still 

 more interior department of the 

 Church's life ; . . . they are, in a 

 word, questions relating to the 

 Church's system of doctrine, to her 

 educational method of procedure. 

 . . . And here Unitarianism . . . 

 went oft' in the pursuit of an un- 

 limited intellectual freedom ; while 

 Wesleyanism . . . handled, with 

 an almost sublime self-confidence, 

 the tremendous spell of an appeal 

 to the mere feelings of half taught 

 and half civilised men." The other 

 work I wisli to recommend is by 

 John James Taylor, a Unitarian 

 minister, with the title ' Retrospect 

 of the Religious Life of England ' 

 (1845). As the title indicates, the 

 subject is here treated under the 

 three headings of The Church, 

 Puritanism, and Free Enquiry. In 

 Chapter III. (p. 131 sqq.), the 

 author proceeds " to contrast with 

 [the Anglican hierarchy] the nature 



and operation of the antagonist 

 principle of Puritanism. It is 

 from the conflict of these opposing 

 tendencies that the peculiar char- 

 acter of our religious life results. 

 The spirit of Puritanism must not, 

 however, be confounded with the 

 principle of Free Enquiry and 

 mental independence, which ulti- 

 mately grew out of it, and by 

 those who were capable of reason- 

 ing to consequences, might have 

 been seen to be implied in it. The 

 fundamental idea of Puritanism, in 

 all its forms and ramifications, is 

 the supreme authority of Scripture, 

 acting directly on the individual 

 conscience — as opposed to a reli- 

 ance on the priesthood and the 

 outward ordinances of the Church. 

 . . . With Puritanism, the range 

 of enquiry is shut up within the 

 limits of the written Word ; it does 

 not venture to sally forth beyond 

 them, and survey the Scripture 

 under a broader aspect from some 

 point of view external to it." 

 " The strict letter of Scripture was 

 received by [the Puritans] as a 

 final absolute rule, ever present, 

 ever applicable, standing in close 

 immediate contact with the exi- 

 gences of man's outward life 

 through the revolutions of cen- 

 turies. On the other hand, the 

 Anglicans regai-ded Scripture as 

 indeed the original depository of 

 Christian truth, in which its germs, 

 as it were, and first principles were 

 shut up, but acknowledged ecclesi- 

 astical tradition as its legitimate 

 exposition ; Scripture and Tradi- 

 tion being viewed by them as 

 equally under the superintending 

 direction of Providence. . . ." (p. 

 286). 



