NEW EVANGELICAL MAGAZINE, AND Theological Review. NOVEMBER, 1824. SOME ACCOUNT OF LORD TEIGNMOUTH, PRESIDENT OF THE BIBLE SOCIETY. We have long wished to present our friends with a Portrait of this distinguished Nobleman, and nothing but the extreme difficulty of doing it in a way that was satisfactory to ourselves, has prevented us from effecting it long ago. And though it is not our practice to give memoirs of persons still living, we, for once, have resolved to deviate from the beaten track, and present the friends of our Magazine with an outline of his history. For this, we hope no apology will be thought necessary; since his Lordship, independent of those private virtues which ennoble the most exalted stations and give to title a dignity that neither birth nor princes can confer, has a claim to biographical notice, from the situation he has long held as PRESIDENT OF THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY. This nobleman was born in Devonshire, October 8th, 1751. His family name was Shore, of Heathcote in Derbyshire; but at an early stage of life he quitted his native country, and went out to India, in the civil service. While there, he contracted an intimacy with Warren Hastings, Esq. formerly Governor General of Bengal; about which time he was created a Baronet, and was well known under the title of Sir John Shore. He was the bosom friend of Sir William Jones, and succeeded him in the Presidentship of the Asiatic Society, in which capacity he delivered a handsome eulogy on his predecessor, which was printed, together with some well written Essays of his composition, in the Transactions of that learned body. VOL. X. In 1786 he was appointed a member of the supreme council at Fort William in Bengal; and in 1792 he was chosen to succeed Lord Cornwallis as Governor General of India, a situation which he continued to fill, till March 1798, when he resigned his high station into the hands of the Marquis Wellesley, and returned to his native country. The year 1804 gave birth to the British and Foreign Bible Society, of which, from its first formation, Lord Teignmouth was called to fill the exalted station of President. From that moment to the present, his indefatigable labours in its behalf satisfactorily evince that he engaged in the undertaking from a purity of principle which alone could preserve him from growing weary in well doing. As the circulation of the Holy Scriptures, through the medium of this excellent Society, its subordinate branches and ample correspondence, extends over a considerable portion of the habitable globe, the name of its noble President cannot fail to excite a general interest; nor can we doubt that it will hereafter be mentioned with veneration and respect, not merely in the British empire, but in foreign nations. His Lordship is now in his seventyfourth year, and according to the ordinary course of nature, fast descending into the vale of life. May the Holy Scriptures, which he has been the means of sending into many of the benighted regions of the earth, cheer his passage to the silent tomb, and diffuse a ray of celestial light over the gloomy mansions of the grave! 2 X The following lines have been applied to Lord Teignmouth, and he is certainly not undeserving of the eulogy which they were designed to convey. "Admir'd and valued in a distant land, and published it with eagerness. The crimes with which he is charged are not trivial; his accusers must feel that he is bound to deny them in a public manner; if they do not like the method in which he now does so, he wishes them to remember that they have compelled him to adopt it. AN EXTRACT FROM THE BAPTIST THE LETTER. "To the Editors of the Baptist Magazine." "GENTLEMEN, "TO CORRESPONDENTS." "We have received a letter from the Author of "An Address to Deists," complaining that one paragraph of the Review of that pamphlet, in our last Number, was not correctly quoted. We respectfully inform him, that it was not intended to be a quotation of the author's words, but as conveying the sense of his statement. Surely, if he regret that blasphemy should be punishable by the common and statute laws of the realm, it was not unfair to conclude, that he I cannot perhaps reasonably expect that you should allow me to reply to your review of my pamphlet; but as I have been more than twelve years an occasional contributor to your work, you will, I hope, indulge me so far as to permit me to say, that it is no part of my design to be an "apologist for published infidelity and blasphemy," or a defender of those who like Carlile have blasphemed God and his Christ." My concern is not for those wretched men, whose mischievous conduct I bewished those laws should no longer believe to arise from the most impious regarded; and then all the consequences motives, and whose dreadful responsi mentioned must naturally follow. bility to God, I have endeavoured to urge EDITORS." upon their partisans; my anxiety is for Christianity; for the honour of my Saviour; and for the compliance of his followers with his recorded instructions. If you will suffer this explanation to appear in your next Number, I will thank you; but I must, at any rate, claim from you one act of justice. It is that you will inform your readers, that the paragraph which begins, “The author of the pamphlet says," does not contain a single phrase of my writing. What follows, in inverted commas, I never wrote, but should be ashamed to have written. You will not, I am persuaded, allow the assertion to remain on your pages uncontradicted, now that it is pointed out to you. The sentence the Reviewer refers to must be this: “That Christianity is part and parcel of the common law of the land, may for ought the writer knows, be good constitutional doctrine; it may have been so held in preceding ages; it may be incumbent therefore on an upright and impartial judge, when Christianity is impugned, to rule that it is so now; but if it be, the writer, strongly as he is attatched to revealed religion, must be permitted to regret it; for to be part and parcel of the common law or of the statute law, of any land, is The Author of "An Address to Deists" considers himself imperatively called upon to give publicity to the letter to which this notice refers. For if it should be supposed that he had complained but of one thing, and that a mere verbal inaccuracy, it would appear as though he had acquiesced in the other representations given by the Reviewer, and was content to be deemed AN APOLOGIST FOR BLASPHEMY. His pamphlet is before the world, and he cheerfully leaves it to its readers; but when sentiments and feelings are attributed to him which it would be treason against the Majesty of Heaven to entertain, he conceives he is under obligation to disavow them. He endeavoured to write what the Editors of the Baptist Magazine might insert without dishonour to themselves. His object was not to argue, but to explain; and not to vindicate his opinions, but his character. He expressed no anger; he made no comment; he even asked as a favour what he might have demanded as a reparation. If the Editors believed the imputations they had cast upon him, it might have been expected that they would have received such a letter with joy, 335 their hopes. Such conduct is, undoubtedly, highly reprehensible; and the more so, as the means of knowledge are, in the present age, so many, and so easy of access.-Where "much has been given, much will be required" of men by the Great Author of our religion; and if we would remove the prejudices, and promote the knowledge of others, we must first study the cultivation and improvement of our own minds. Sept. 4, 1824. I have been led to these remarks by what I have long and sorrowfully observed in the bulk of religious profes Oct. 7, 1824. Whether the writer has not something more to complain of, than that " one paragraph was not correctly quoted," impartial readers will be able to decide, if the Editor of the New Evangelical Ma-sors, and by a desire that their attengazine will have the kindness to permit tion may be directed judiciously and this statement to appear in his next successfully to the word of God, which, Number. with all treasures, is so much neglected. Through the medium of your Journal, I wish to invite Christians to the elucidation of the prophecies, which testify of Christ: and as it is read by many who have not time to devote to deep and critical studies, it has been, and may be still more, the organ of conveying scriptural knowledge. I wish to elicit from those who have studied the prophecies, and are mighty in the scriptures," such an explanation of them, as shall prove their fulfilment in Jesus of Nazareth, and show that the intervindi-pretation of them by the apostles is the only true one. In communicating such knowledge to the public, they may confer an important benefit upon ordi 66 christians, and even on the young preachers of the day, who, in general, attempt nothing higher than mere declamation and common place, instead of informing the understandings of their hearers. ON THE PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE MESSIAH. in his view, quite inconsistent with the, nature of Christianity." This is very different from the language attributed to me; and of the remainder of the paragraph in the critique, not one syllable is mine. I am, Gentlemen, Your fellow servant, To the Editor of the New Evan. Magazine. It is a matter of great moment, that all who profess the gospel should know the grounds on which Christianity rests, and should be able to assign a solid reason for their conviction of its truth. But it is much to be lamented, that as there are many Dissenters who have never examined the reasons for nonconformity, and cannot cate their separation, so there are many Christians, whose belief is founded rather in a conviction of its utility, and in an experience of its value to them-nary selves, than in any examination of the powerful evidence for the divine origin of the gospel. Such men are often highly zealous for the conversion of mankind. They ardently desire, that the Jews may be "turned to the Lord;" but they are unqualified to reason "out of the Scriptures," with a Jew. They believe in the Prophets; but they cannot exhibit from the prophets, any evidence that "Jesus is the Christ," They believe in the New Testament application of the prophecies, which "witnessed beforehand" of the coming of the Messiah-but they cannot vindicate this application of them against the objections of the Jew, and feel no concern about those means, which are essential to the success of their zealous efforts. They believe in the scriptures; but are contented to remain in ignorance of many glorious truths embodied in the sacred volume, which would establish their faith, and confirm There is a prophecy in Isa. vii. 10— 16. which in the gospel of Matthew is said to be fulfilled in the conception and birth of Jesus; "Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which, being interpreted, is, God with us." Matt. i. 22, 23. The principal objections of the Jews to this application of the prophecy are the following. 1. That the original word, translated a virgin, does not mean a virgin only, but any young woman, married or unmarried, and in Prov. xxx. 18. is used to express a woman, who is an adulteress. Moreover, the person spoken |
0 Ressenyes Les ressenyes no es verifiquen, però Google comprova si hi ha contingut fals i el suprimeix quan l'identifica. Escriu una ressenya |