, while its
philanthropies have been of the same broad and enlightened kind as those
which enrich the American record.

II. IDEAS AND TENDENCIES

More important to the general public is the question of ideas which now
prevail among Unitarians. Our preceding sketch has shown some of the
results of the freedom claimed by them in one generation after another.
We have now to see in what respects the nineteenth century effected a
further change.

In the first third of the century there can be no doubt that Unitarians
adhered tenaciously, but with discrimination, to the idea of the final
authority of the Bible. In this respect they were like Protestants
generally, and though they nevertheless brought 'reason' to bear on
their reading of the Scriptures, other Protestants did the same, if to a
less degree. Both in the United States and in England this attitude was
still common up till nearly the middle of the century, and instances
could easily be found later still. The miraculous element was thus
retained, though as we have seen as early as in Priestley's case there
was a tendency to eliminate some part of the supernatural. That a
thoroughgoing belief could be stated in good round terms is evident from
the following sentence taken from a book issued by _Dr. Orville Dewey_
(1794-1882), one of the most eloquent pulpit orators of his day. The
book is entitled _Unitarian Belief_, its date is 1839. Referring to the
Bible the author says, 'Enough is it for us, that the matter is divine,
the doctrines true, the history authentic, the miracles real, the
promises glorious, the threatenings fearful.' There is good ground for
taking this as a fair example of the ideas prevalent among American
Unitarians at that time. Perhaps the statement was made the more
emphatic in view of some remarks recently uttered by two young men whose
influence, along with more general tendencies, proved fatal to the old
doctrine.

One of these young men was _James Martineau_ (1805-1900), who at the age
of thirty-one was already known as a writer and preacher far above the
average. He was then resident in Liverpool, where he wrote a remarkable
little book with the title _The Rationale of Religious Inquiry_ (1886).
More than fifty years later he published an even more remarkable book,
_The Seat of Authority in Religion_. There is, indeed, half a century of
development between the two books, yet the germinal thought of the
second may be detected in the fir