ANALOGY OF FAITH Is the proportion that the doctrines of the gospel bear to each other, or the close connexion between the truths of revealed religion, Rom. 12:6. This is considered as a grand rule for understanding the true sense of scripture. It is evident that the Almighty doth not act without a design in the system of Christianity any more than he does in the works of nature. Now this design must be uniform; for as in the system of the universe every part is proportioned to the whole, and made subservient to it, so in the system of the Gospel all the various truths, doctrines, declarations, precepts, and promises, must correspond with and tend to the end designed. For instance, supposing the glory…

BIGOTRY Consists in being obstinately and perversely attached to our own opinions; or, as some have defined it, "a tenacious adherence to a system adopted without investigation, and defended without argument, accompanied with a malignant intolerant spirit towards all who differ." It must be distinguished from love to truth, which influences a man to embrace it wherever he finds it; and from true zeal, which is an ardour of mind exciting its possessor to defend and propagate the principles he maintains. Bigotry is a kind of prejudice combined with a certain degree of malignity. It is thus exemplified and distinguished by a sensible writer. "When Jesus preached, prejudice cried, Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? Crucify him, crucify him, said bigotry. Why? what…

HERESY This word signifies sect or choice; it was not in its earliest acceptation conceived to convey any reproach, since it was indifferently used either of a party approved, or of one disapproved by the writer. See Acts 5:17; 15:3. Afterwards it was generally used to signify some fundamental error adhered to with obstinacy, 2 Pet. 2:1; Gal. 5:20. According to the laws of this kingdom, heresy consists in a denial of some of the essential doctrines of Christianity, publicly and obstinately avowed. It must be acknowledged, however, that particular modes of belief or unbelief, not tending to overturn Christianity, or to sap the foundations of morality, are by no means the object of coercion by the civil magistrate. What doctrines shall therefore be adjudged…

ERROR A mistake of our judgment, giving assent to that which is not true. Mr. Locke reduces the causes of error to four. 1. Want of proofs.--2. Want of ability to use them.--3. Want of will to use them.--4. Wrong measures of probability. In a moral and scriptural sense it signifies sin.

SUSPICION Consists in imagining evil of others without proof. It is sometimes opposed to charity, which thinketh no evil. "A suspicious temper checks in the bud every kind affection; it hardens the heart, and estranges man from man. What friendship can we expect from him who views all our conduct with distrustful eyes, and ascribes every benefit we confer to artifice and stratagem? A candid man is accustomed to view the characters of his neighbours in the most favourable light, and is like one who dwells amidst those beautiful scenes of nature on which the eye rests with pleasure. Whereas the suspicious man, having his imagination filled with all the shocking forms of human falsehood, deceit, and treachery, resembles the traveller in the wilderness, who…

LIBERALITY OF SENTIMENT A generous disposition a man feels towards another who is of a different opinion from himself; or, as one defines it, "that generous expansion of mind which enables it to look beyond all petty distinctions of party and system, and, in the estimate of men and things, to rise superior to narrow prejudices." As liberality of sentiment is often a cover for error and scepticism on the one hand, and as it is too little attended to by the ignorant and bigoted on the other, we shall here lay before our readers a view of it by a masterly writer. "A man of liberal sentiments must be distinguished from him who hath no religious sentiments at all. He is one who hath…