: but fair investigation will settle this
difference as well as others; and if not, such variations constitute no
insurmountable hindrance. The essential truth of the Gospel is not
involved in any or all of those modes of expression in which our
respective versions of the Scriptures differ. The difficulties which are
thus originated are of very inferior moment to those by which our
separation is perpetuated, and which depend on our application of the
spirit rather than our interpretation of the letter of the sacred
records. When we can as perfectly agree in our opinions concerning the
person of Christ, as we do in our veneration and gratitude for his
holiness and love; when we shall mutually rejoice in the universality as
well as in the blessedness of the salvation he brought, we shall not
dispute respecting the letter of some of his instructions, or long
lament the difficulty of reconciling some apparent discrepancies. If, as
you declare, the Scriptures are in common use among you, they must be
allowed to be the rule of your faith as well as of your practice; they
must be intended for your instruction as well as your confirmation; they
must supply subjects of thought as well as of feeling. Do us the justice
then, thus to use them as often as you hear us appeal to them. Compare
our interpretation of the Gospel with the records themselves. Compare
our deductions from facts with the original statement of those facts,
and with all which throws light on them from the history, the
discourses, the epistles which follow. To whatever common ground there
is between us, let us repair; and since that common ground is the very
spot where the living waters first sprang up, there can be no doubt but
that a patient search will bring vital refreshment to us all.

We know, brethren, that our mode of belief appears to you under the
greatest possible disadvantage, as being, even more than Protestant
religion generally, divested of the claims and graces of antiquity. You
regard our sect as newly formed from the dispersed elements of other
sects which have melted away. You find no mention of our heresy in the
records of the middle ages, or only such hints of the doctrines now held
by Unitarians as might serve as suggestions of our present opinions: and
you therefore naturally conclude that the parts of our faith to which
you object are but of yesterday, and consequently the impious inventions
of men. If it were so, our present address would