He now had an able coadjutor in the field, one whose written arguments and oral discourses have long been strong barriers to the advocates of the old Athanasian theology. In December, Mr. Badger visited Canandaigua and preached to the people; the most of the time was devoted to the town of his residence, and in supplying the wants of adjoining places. Speaking of this year in the retrospect, he says: "One year more of my unprofitable life is gone. In it I have enjoyed myself well, seen much of God's goodness, attended many funerals, solemnized many marriages, and at its close am seriously reminded that
"'The year rolls round and steals away
The breath that first it gave;
Whate'er we do, where'er we be,
We're tending to the grave.'"
[CHAPTER XI.]
THOUGHTS AND INCIDENTS OF 1819 AND 1820.
Mr. Badger is now in the twenty-seventh year of his age and the seventh of his ministry, and occupies a position that affords him more leisure for reflection than the activities of his itinerant life had yielded him. Among the subjects that he accepted for the action of his own thought was Universalism, whose pillars and foundations he seemed to have thoroughly examined, as set forth in the systems of that day. His mind was led to this by the circumstance that his father, for whom his letters and journal only express the kindest filial feeling and reverence, had, after much study and thought, adopted that system as his favorite form of religious belief. The document which contains his views is entitled "An affectionate Address of a Son to his Father." We offer from this a few extracts, in which the reader can see the candor, cogency and kindness that pervade the whole address, which covers some twenty-three pages of letter-paper, very finely and compactly written. This is the opening paragraph:
"Honored and Dear Father:—With pleasure I once more take my pen to address one for whom I have the most reverential regard, a regard greater than I cherish for any person on earth; one who has with hopeful anxiety watched over the days of my childhood and vanity, and wept at the follies of my youth. My former letters have given you the state of my affairs and prospects in this pleasant part of the country; also, in my several letters, I have noticed the extensive spread of the Gospel, the increase of light, and the effect of those glorious reformations I have been allowed to witness, the subjects of which are now my choice society; and you cannot imagine the unspeakable joy of your son, while a stranger in a strange land, to learn that his aged father has been entertained and comforted by the contents of his letters on those subjects. Permit me, my dear father, in this short treatise, to make a few remarks on the doctrine which you have for years embraced and vindicated relative to the salvation of all men. If this doctrine is true, it is a pleasant thing; if untrue, it is dangerous to rest on the sand. As I have serious objections against the system, I feel it a duty to lay them before you for your consideration, wishing, if I am in error, to be convinced of it; and I hope that, should you find the doctrine you have esteemed as truth, cries 'peace and safety' to those whom sudden destruction awaits, you will be willing to exchange it for that truth which opens to the sinner the worst of his case."
After this kind and gentle introduction, Mr. Badger proceeds to take up the chief arguments which his father had, in other years, employed for the support of the system,—arguments from general reason and from Scripture. He then attempts to show the origin of the system in human causes, and its disagreement with the plain teachings of Revelation, and with the spirit and genius of the Christian experience and life. Such is the plan of his treatise. The period to which these arguments belong, was one in which there was a strong controversial clash of theories, each one of which was undoubtedly a fragmentary and imperfect statement of some essential truth in religion; and as Calvinistic reasoning was then generally in the ascendant, as its bold premises were the main foundation of the plea of its opposite extreme,—the Universalian statement,—the subject seemed to take a fresh interest in the hands of one who approached it from an intermediate region of thinking.
"One of your favorite and powerful arguments in favor of this doctrine is, that in the beginning the soul of man was a part of God, and therefore cannot be defiled, condemned or punished, as Deity will not sentence a part of himself to misery. All the Scripture I ever heard quoted in favor of this view, is that 'God breathed into man the breath of life and he became a living soul,' which carries a very different idea from the one you derive from it. It does not say that the soul is a part of God, or that God breathed into man a part of himself. It means just this, that God breathed into man the breath of life, and that, as a result of this, he became a living, active, intelligent creature.