Why I Am What I Am - Brossura

Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1891. Excerpt: ... WHY I AM A UNITARIAN. By Rev. John "White Chadwick, Minister of the Second Unitarian Church in Brooklyn, N. Y. As a matter of fact it is very possible that I am a Unitarian because I was to the Unitarian manner born and reared, my parents attending the Unitarian Church in the old sea-girt town of Marblehead and I following their example. But I am bound to say that, though two better people never lived, for all their simple trust in the eternal goodness and their absolute fidelity in every calling to which they were called, they had " no religion to speak of "-- they were not formally religious; not church members. They held no definite creed, and they took no pains to fashion one for me. But as a boy and youth I went to the Unitarian Church and heard the exposition of its doctrinal position, but for which it is possible my opinions may have taken another turn, for the unconscious influences of youth are powerful both for evil and for good. If it was the environment of my boyhood and my youth that made me a Unitarian, then I am more glad than I can say that it was a Unitarian environment, for the principles and beliefs of Unitarians are now so precious to any mind, and its traditions are so inspiring to my heart, that I am compelled to feel that without them my life would have been far less joyous and serene and satisfactory than it has been so far. But what is wanted of me in this series of confessions is not, I suspect, the historical genesis of my Unitarian belief, but the conscious and deliberate reasons that I give myself and others for holding it so confidently and contentedly as I do. These reasons are such that it seems to me that, if I had been born a Mohammedan or a Buddhist, or an Episcopalian or Presbyterian, I should have been as convinced a Unitarian as I am. For, in my...