Sermons on Various Important Subjects

鉈
Sermons on Various Important Subjects, by

Andrew Lee, et al
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Title: Sermons on Various Important Subjects
Author: Andrew Lee
Release Date: February 13, 2005 [eBook #15031]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SERMONS ON VARIOUS IMPORTANT SUBJECTS***
E-text prepared by Fredric B. Lozo

SERMONS ON VARIOUS IMPORTANT SUBJECTS: WRITTEN PARTLY ON SUNDRY OF THE MORE DIFFICULT PASSAGES IN THE SACRED VOLUME.
By
Rev. ANDREW LEE, A.M.

INTRODUCTION
This text has been transcribed from the original by Fredric Lozo, Mathis, Texas, January 2005.
The original text was typeset using the convention of the American Colonial Period with a second "s" symbol resembling the letter "f" which makes reading somewhat difficult for the modern reader. The text was thus transcribed using the modern single "s" symbol convention.
The original text was photographed and read with an OCR program and then transcribed word by word. An attempt was made to proofread the final text for transcription errors and wherever an mistake has not been corrected, the transcriber sincerely apologizes to the reader. As for the rest, the transcriber has endeavored to faithfully maintain as much of the historical record as the ASCII TEXT format permits, including the original spelling and grammar. Page numbering was omitted in keeping with e-book format conventions. The reader is encouraged to use the search feature of the text reader to locate chapters listed on the contents page.
The work was published by the son of Isaiah Thomas, who is known both as the father of American printing, and as a Minuteman at Lexington and Concord in the War of Independence.
Some of the thoughts expressed in these sermons are a refreshing return to an earlier time before American religious denominations became fixed in their particular "systematic theology."
Reverend Lee's language and logic give us a glimpse of the purity of mind and soul that followed in the wake of desperate revolutionary conflict and the tumultuous years following independence when the greatest minds of the time formulated the American Constitution and The Bill of Rights. These sermons seem to address the universal issues with which men of all times and places have also struggled, in times of peace as well as war. These issues are articulated here with a clarity that is perhaps only achieved in those times of great testing, tears, and tenuous victory that began in 1776 and that would remain tenuous until after the War of 1812.
Lee lived in a time of great intellectual pursuit and Lee's views of life and the Lord's Providence seem particularly blessed with illumination through the Holy Spirit.
Fredric Lozo, January 2005

SERMONS ON VARIOUS IMPORTANT SUBJECTS: WRITTEN PARTLY ON SUNDRY OF THE MORE DIFFICULT PASSAGES IN THE SACRED VOLUME.
By
Rev. ANDREW LEE, A.M. Pastor of the North Church in Lisbon, Connecticut.
Printed at Worcester: By Isaiah Thomas, Jun. Sold by him, and by the AUTHOR, in Lisbon, Connecticut-Sold also by said Thomas & Whipple, at their Bookstore in Newburyport.
October----1803

"I KNOW BUT ONE BOOK, THAT CAN JUSTIFY OUR IMPLICIT ACQUIESCENCE IN IT; AND ON THAT BOOK, A NOBLE DISDAIN OF UNDUE DEFERANCE TO PRIOR OPINION--CASTS NEW AND INESTIMABLE LIGHT."--Young.

PREFACE
That thick darkness overspread the church after the irruptions of the northern barbarians, and the desolations which they occasioned in the Roman empire, is known and acknowledged. Those conquerors professed the religion of the conquered; but corrupted and spoiled it. Like the new settlers in the kingdom of Ephraim, they feared the Lord and served their own gods. In those corruptions antichristian error and domination originated. The tyranny of opinion became terrible, and long held human minds enslaved. Few had sentiments of their own. The orders of the vatican were received as the mandates of heaven. But at last some discerning and intrepid mortals arose who saw the absurdity and impiety of the reigning superstition, and dared to disclose them to a wondering world! Among those bold reformers, LUTHER, CALVIN, and a few contemporary worthies, hold a distinguished rank. Greatly is the church indebted to them for the light which they diffused, and the reformation which they effected. But still the light was imperfect. Dark shades remained. This particularly appeared in the dogmatism and bigotry of these same reformers, who often prohibited further inquiries, or emendations! They had differed from Rome, but no body must differ from them! As though the infallibility which they denied to another, had been transferred to themselves!
Too many others, and in more enlightened times, have discovered a strand measure of the same spirit.....a spirit which hath damped inquiry and prevented improvement.
Hence, probably, the silence of some expositors on difficult scriptures, and the sameness observable in some others. For the complaint