thing to charge saints with blasphemy, and to call those differed from, blasphemers, even when the charge can be substantiated by the most clear demonstration; but when with lightness and levity such solemn awful words are thrown at those eminently godly; when men owned and honoured of God are thus stigmatised, because they bow not to the idol set up, what remains but to carry out the Apostolic command, and have nothing to say to him, “Who is called a brother, if he be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolator, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner.” Those who originated the charges know they are false; and one who not long ago stigmatized Mr. Müller and Mr. Craik as “those two blasphemers in Bristol,” wrote to the latter beloved servant of God, on his dying bed, calling him his “dear brother,” and wishing that “although ecclesiastically separated from him,” he might be blessed with every blessing, as the Lord might see he needed in his present circumstances. There must be either falsehood or hypocrisy in this, for that one with the slightest regard for the Lord’s honour, could write in the language above to one whom he really considered a blasphemer, would seem surpassingly strange, had not such conduct become but too painfully common with the upholders of this system of discipline.
There are, we have said, those who know these charges of blasphemy to be unrighteous and false, but there are those who do not—those who, on the strength of statements made by others, spread everywhere the poison of the slander they have received, and for which God holds answerable both originators and circulators. A slander is welcomed before it is circulated. Who could but be filled with godly indignation after the removal of that faithful servant of the Lord, Mr. Craik, who had laboured so long in his Master’s vineyard, to hear it said “he was a Socinian!!”—a man than whom we are bold to say there are few, whose views of the blessed Lord’s person were more clear and scriptural, and whose heart and soul more adoringly worshipped Christ as his Lord and his God. This wicked accusation has not come from one quarter only; and though traceable to the same source, has been widely and industriously circulated among those whose ignorance makes them an easy prey to falsehoods and misstatements. One of the most painful features of this system is its falseness: it stands on a lie, and justifies the rejection of saints by the invention of false charges first, and then acting on the assumption that they are true. Had Mr. Craik been still amongst us, we would not have alluded to this subject; but now that he has been removed, and the memory of his holy life and his faithful teaching alone remains, we feel it a sacred duty to raise the voice
