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C# Concurrency MEAP V03
1. Copyright_2023_Manning_Publications
2. welcome
3. 1_Asynchronous_programming_and_multithreading
4. 2_The_compiler_rewrites_your_code
5. 3_The_async_and_await_keywords
6. 4_Multithreading_basics
7. 5_Async-await_and_multithreading
8. 6_When_to_use_async-await
MEAP Edition

Manning Early Access Program

C# Concurrency

Asynchronous and multithreaded programming

Version 3

Copyright 2023 Manning

Publications
©Manning Publications Co. We welcome reader comments about anything in
the manuscript - other than typos and other simple mistakes.

These will be cleaned up during production of the book by copyeditors and

proofreaders.

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For more information on this and other Manning titles go to

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welcome
Thank you for purchasing the MEAP edition of C# Concurrency:
Asynchronous and multithreaded programming.

I started writing this book after a few months of consulting projects, in each
of those projects I was called in to help with some obscure bug the
company’s developers couldn’t solve. Those were different companies
making vastly different software and the bugs I was called to solve
manifested in different ways – but all of them were caused by incorrect usage
of async-await.

This book is about writing real world software that for some reason (probably
performance) is multithreaded and asynchronous. We will talk about how
multithreading and asynchronous programming work, why they work this
way, and most importantly, the easiest way to use them safely.

I hope this book will help clear the confusion about async-await,
asynchronous programming and multithreading – and help you write better,
faster code with less bugs.

And lastly, your feedback is essential to creating the best book possible,
please leave comments in the liveBook Discussion forum and tell us what
you like and dislike about this book. After all, I may already know how to do
all this stuff, but I need to know if my explanations are working for you!

—Nir Dobovizki

In this book

Copyright 2023 Manning Publications welcome brief contents 1

Asynchronous programming and multithreading 2 The compiler rewrites
your code 3 The async and await keywords 4 Multithreading basics 5 Async-
await and multithreading 6 When to use async-await
1 Asynchronous programming and
multithreading
This chapter covers
What is multithreading.
What is asynchronous programming.
Why we should use them.

Multithreading and asynchronous programming are two ways to make the

computer do more than one thing at the same time. Multithreading is about
making it seem like the computer is doing multiple things (more things than
the number of CPU cores) at the same time and asynchronous programming
is about better utilizing the CPU in all the situations that would normally
cause the CPU to wait.

Making the computer do more than one thing at the same time is extremely
useful; it can help keep native apps responsive while they work, and it is
required to write high performance servers that can communicate with
multiple clients.

Each of those techniques is totally adequate for creating a responsive client

application of server with a handful of clients – but together they can be used
to take performance to the next level and have servers that can respond to
thousands of clients at the same time.

Multithreading and asynchronous programming are not only immensely

powerful, but also, unfortunately, unintuitive, difficult to use correctly and
full of pitfalls.

In this chapter we’re going to talk about what multithreading and

asynchronous programming are and why they are important. In the rest of the
book, we’ll talk about how to do multithreading and asynchronous
programming correctly, specifically focusing on C#. We’ll also talk
extensively about using the C# async-await feature later in the book, the
async-await feature of C# can make multithreading and asynchronous
programming easier – but only if used correctly, and it is a bit confusing and
easy to misuse.

1.1 What is multithreading

Before we begin talking about async-await we need to understand what
multithreading is and what asynchronous programming is, and we are going
to do it with web servers and pizza. We’ll start with the pizza (because it’s
tastier than a web server). The high-level process of making pizza in a
takeout place is:

1. The cook receives an order

2. The cook does stuff - takes preprepared dough, shape it, put on souse,
cheese, and toppings
3. The cook puts the pizza in the oven and wait for it to bake (this is the
longest bit)
4. The cook does more stuff - takes the pizza out of the oven, cuts it and
puts it in a box
5. The cook hands the pizza to the delivery person

This is not a cookbook, so obviously our pizza baking is a metaphor for one
of the simplest server scenarios we have, a web server serving static files.

The high-level process for a simple web server is:

1. The server receives the web request

2. The server performs some processing to figure out what needs to be
done
3. The server reads a file (this is the longest bit)
4. The server does some more processing (such as packaging the file
content)
5. The server sends them back to the browser

For most of the chapter, I’m going to ignore the first and last steps because,
in most backend web frameworks (include ASP.NET and ASP.NET Core),
they are handled by the framework and not by our code. We will talk about
them briefly near the end of this chapter. Figure 1.1 shows us the web request
process:

Figure 1.1 Single-threaded, single request flow

Now back to the pizza. In the simplest version of this the cook will follow the
steps in order, completely finishing one pizza before starting on the next one.
While the pizza is baking in the oven the cook will just stand there staring at
the oven doing nothing (this is the fully synchronous single-threaded version
of the process).
In web-server-land, the cook is the CPU. In this single-threaded web server,
we have straightforward code that performs the operations required to
complete the web request, and while the file is read from disk, the CPU is
frozen doing nothing (in practice the operating system will suspend our
thread while this happens and give the CPU to another program, but from our
program point of view it looks like the CPU is frozen)

This version of the process has some advantages, it is simple and easy to
understand. You can look at what step the cook is doing right now and know
exactly where we are in the process. Because there’s never two things that
happen at the same time, different jobs can’t interfere with each other. And
finally, this version requires the least amount of space and uses fewer
resources at any one time because we only handle one web request (or pizza)
at a time.

This single-threaded synchronous version of the process is obviously

wasteful because the cook/CPU spends most of their time doing nothing
while the pizza is baked in the oven (or the file is retrieved from disk), and, if
our pizzeria isn’t going out of business, we are going to get new orders faster
than we can get them ready.

So, we want to have the cook make more than one pizza at the same time.
One approach to this might be to bring a timer and have that timer beep every
few seconds. Every time the timer beeps, the cook will stop whatever they are
doing and make a note of what they did when they stopped. The cook will
then start a new pizza or continue a previously stopped pizza (ignoring the
unready pizzas in the oven) until the timer beeps the next time.

I this version, the cook is pretending to do multiple things at the same time,
each of those things is called a thread. Each thread represents a sequence of
operations that can happen in parallel with other similar or different
sequences.

This example seems silly, it’s obviously inefficient, and our cook will spend
too much time putting things away and picking up stuff – but this is exactly
how multithreading works. Inside the CPU there’s a timer that signals when
the CPU should switch to the next thread, and with every switch the CPU
needs to store whatever it was doing and load the other thread’s status (that’s
called a context switch).

When your code, for example, reads a file, the thread can’t do anything until
the file’s data is retrieved from disk. During this time, we say the thread is
blocked. Having the system allocate CPU time to a blocked thread would be
obviously wasteful, so, when a thread begins reading a file it is switched to a
blocked state by the operating system. When entering this state, the thread
will immediately release the CPU to the next waiting thread (possibly from
another program), and while in this state the operating system will not assign
any CPU time to the thread. When the system finishes reading the file, the
thread exits the blocked state and is again eligible for CPU time.

The operations that can cause the thread to become blocked are called,
unsurprisingly, blocking operations. All file access and network access
operations are blocking as well as anything else that communicates with
anything outside the CPU and memory, also, all operations that wait for
another thread can block.

Back in the pizzeria, in addition to the time we spend switching between

pizzas, there’s also all the information the cook needs in order to get back to
exactly the same place they were before switching away. In our software,
every thread, even those that aren’t running, consumes some memory, so,
while it’s possible to create a large number of threads each of them using a
blocking operation (and so they are blocked most of the time and not
consuming CPU time) this is wasteful of memory. It will slow down as we
increase the number of threads because we have to manage all the threads and
at some point, we will either spend so much time managing threads no useful
work gets done or just run out of memory and crash.

Even with all this inefficiency the multithreading cook, jumping from pizza
to pizza like a crazy person, unless we get to the situation where we can’t
make progress or crash (I know, the cook can’t crash, no metaphor is
perfect), will make more pizzas in the same time, mostly because the single-
threaded cooks from before spent most of their time waiting while the pizza
is in the oven.

As you can see in figure 1.2, because we only have one CPU core (I know
everyone has multi-core CPUs nowadays, we’ll talk about multi-core CPUs
soon) we can’t really do two things at the same time. All the “processing”
parts happen one after the other and are not truly in parallel – however, the
CPU can wait as many times as you like in parallel. And that’s why our
multithread version managed to process three requests in significantly less
time than it took the single-threaded version to process two.

Figure 1.2 Single-threaded vs. Multithread with multiple requests

If you look closely at figure 1.2, you can see we do pay a price for this, while
the third request finished significantly sooner in the multithreaded version the
first request finished later than the single-threaded version.

Until now we talked about single-core CPUs, but all modern CPUs are multi-
core, so how does that change things?
1.2 Introducing multi-core CPUs
Multi-core CPUs are conceptually simple, they are just multiple single-core
CPUs packed into the same physical chip.

In our pizzeria, having an 8-core CPU (for example) is equivalent to having 8

cooks carrying out the pizza-making tasks. If before we had one cook that
can only do one thing at a time but pretended to do multiple things by
switching between them quickly, now we have 8 cooks whom each can do
one thing at the same time (for a total of 8 things at the same time) and each
of them is pretending to do multiple things by switching between tasks
quickly.

Back in software terms, with multi-core CPUs, you can really have multiple
threads running at the same time. When we had a single-core CPU, we sliced
the work into tiny parts and interleaved the parts to make it seem like they are
running at the same time (while in fact only one thing could run). Now, with
our example 8-core CPU, we still slice the work into tiny parts and interleave
them, but now we can run 8 of those parts in the same time.

Theoretically, with 8 cooks we can make more pizzas than with just one
cook, however, now with multiple cooks, they can unintentionally interfere
with each other. For example, they might bump into each other or try to put a
pizza in the same place in the oven, or they might need to use the same pizza
cutter at the same time – and the more cooks we have the greater the chance
of this happening.

Figure 1.3 takes the same multithreaded work we had back in figure 1.2 and
shows how it would run on a dual-core CPU (just two cores because a
diagram with enough work to for an 8 core CPU would be too large for this
page):

Figure 1.3 Three requests on a dual-core CPU

Note that there is, by default, no persistent relation between threads and
cores. A thread can “jump” between cores at any time (you can set threads to
run on specific cores, it’s called “thread affinity”, and, except for really
special circumstances, something you shouldn’t do).

The dual-core CPU cut the time we spent processing by half compared to the
single-core version but didn’t affect the time we spent waiting, so we did get
a significant speedup however it did not cut the time in half.

Until now we got most of the performance improvement from doing other
stuff while waiting for the hard drive to read the file, but we pay for it with all
the overhead and complexity of multithreading. Maybe we can reduce this
overhead.

1.3 What is asynchronous programming?

Back in the pizzeria, there’s a commonsense solution we ignored. The cook
should make a single pizza, without stopping and switching to other pizzas
like a crazy person but, when the pizza is in the oven, maybe just, you know,
start the next pizza without just sitting there staring at the oven. Later,
whenever the cook finished something, they can check if a pizza in the oven
is ready, and if it is, take it out, cut it, put it in a box, and hand it over to the
delivery person.

This is asynchronous programming. Whenever the CPU needs to do

something that happens outside of the CPU itself (for example, reading a
file), it sends the job to the component that handles it (the disk controller) and
asks this component to notify the CPU when it’s done.

The asynchronous (also called non-blocking) version of the file function just
queues the operation with the operating system (that will then queue it with
the disk controller) and return immediately, letting the same thread do other
stuff instead of waiting. Later we can check if the operation has been
completed, and we can access the result data.

Figure 1.4 Single-threaded asynchronous web server with 3 web requests

Another Random Scribd Document
with Unrelated Content
the insular town, and left nothing but the bare walls to the victor,
which he demolished. What completed the destruction of the city
was, that Alexander afterward made use of these materials to build
a prodigious causeway, or isthmus, above half a mile long, to the
insular city, which revived, as the phœnix, from the ashes of the old,
and grew to great power and opulence, as a maritime state; and
which he stormed after a most obstinate siege of five months.
Pococke observes, that “there are no signs of the ancient city; and
as it is a sandy shore, the face of every thing is altered, and the
great aqueduct is in many parts almost buried in the sand.” Thus has
been fulfilled the prophecy of Ezekiel: “Thou shalt be built no more:
though thou be sought for, yet shalt thou never be found again,”
Ezek. xxvi, 21. The fate of insular Tyre has been no less remarkable.
When Alexander stormed the city, he set fire to it. This circumstance
was foretold. “Tyre did build herself a strong hold, and heaped up
silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets. Behold,
the Lord will cast her out, and he will smite her power in the sea,
and she shall be devoured with fire,” Zech. ix, 3, 4. After this terrible
calamity, Tyre again retrieved her losses. Only eighteen years after,
she had recovered such a share of her ancient commerce and
opulence, as enabled her to stand a siege of fourteen months
against Antigonus, before he could reduce the city; but after this,
Tyre fell alternately under the dominion of the kings of Syria and
Egypt, and then of the Romans, until it was taken by the Saracens,
about A. D. 639, retaken by the Crusaders, A. D. 1124; and at length
sacked and razed by the Mamelukes of Egypt, with Sidon, and other
strong towns, that they might no longer harbour the Christians, A. D.
1289.
The final desolation of Tyre was thus foretold: “I will scrape her
dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock: it shall be a place
for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken
it, saith the Lord God.” “I will make thee like the top of a rock: thou
shalt be a place to spread nets upon: thou shalt be built no more;
for I the Lord have spoken it, saith the Lord God.” Nothing can be
more literally and astonishingly executed than this sentence. Huetius
relates of one Hadrianus Parvillerius, that “when he approached the
ruins of Tyre, and beheld the rocks stretched forth to the sea, and
the great stones scattered up and down on the shore, made clean
and smooth by the sun and waves and wind, and useful only for the
drying of fishermen’s nets, many of which happened at that time to
be spread thereon, it brought to his memory the prophecy of Ezekiel
concerning Tyre, that such should be its fate.” Maundrell, who visited
the Holy Land, A. D. 1697, describes it thus: “This city, standing in
the sea upon a peninsula, promises at a distance, something very
magnificent; but when you come to it, you find no similitude of that
glory for which it was so renowned in ancient times, and which the
Prophet Ezekiel describes, xxvi, xxvii, xxviii. On the north side it has
an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle; beside which, you see nothing
here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, &c; there
being not so much as one entire house left! Its present inhabitants
are only a few poor wretches harbouring themselves in the vaults,
and subsisting chiefly by fishing: who seem to be preserved in this
place by Divine Providence, as a visible argument how God has
fulfilled his word concerning Tyre, namely, that it should be as the
top of a rock; a place for fishers to dry their nets upon, Ezek. xxvi,
14.” Hasselquist, who saw it since, in A. D. 1751, observes as
follows: “None of those cities which were formerly famous are so
totally ruined as Tyre, now called Zur; except Troy. Zur now scarcely
can be called a miserable village, though it was formerly Tyre, the
queen of the sea. Here are about ten inhabitants, Turks and
Christians, who live by fishing.” Bruce, who visited this country about
eighty years after Maundrell, says, that “passing by Tyre from
curiosity, I came to be a mournful witness of the truth of that
prophecy, that Tyre, the queen of nations, should be a rock for
fishers to dry their nets on.” Mr. Buckingham, who visited it in 1816,
represents it as containing about eight hundred substantial stone-
built houses, and from five to eight thousand inhabitants. But Mr.
Jowett, on the authority of the Greek archbishop, reduces this
number to less than four thousand; namely, one thousand two
hundred Greek Catholics, one hundred Maronites, one hundred
Greeks, one thousand Montonalis, and one hundred Turks. Mr.
Jowett observed numerous and beautiful columns stretched along
the beach, or standing in fragments half buried in the sand, that has
been accumulating for ages: “the broken aqueduct, and the ruins
which appear in its neighbourhood, exist as an affecting monument
of the fragile and transitory nature of earthly grandeur.” Mr. Joliffe
states, that there now exist scarcely any traces of this once powerful
city. “Some miserable cabins, ranged in irregular lines, dignified with
the name of streets, and a few buildings of a rather better
description, occupied by the officers of government, compose nearly
the whole of the town. It still makes, indeed, some languishing
efforts at commerce, and contrives to export annually to Alexandria
cargoes of silk and tobacco; but the amount merits no consideration.
The noble dust of Alexander, traced by the imagination till found
stopping a beer barrel, would scarcely afford a stronger contrast of
grandeur and debasement, than Tyre, at the period of being
besieged by that conqueror, and the modern town of Tsour erected
on its ashes.”
As commercial cities, says Mansford, ancient Alexandria and
London may be considered as approaching the nearest to Tyre. But
Alexandria, during the whole of her prosperous days, was subject to
foreign rule; and London, great as are her commerce and her
wealth, and possessing as she does almost a monopoly of what has
in all ages been the most enviable and most lucrative branch of
trade, that with the east, does not centre in herself, as Tyre did,
without a rival and without competition, the trade of all nations, and
hold an absolute monopoly, not of one, but of every branch of
commerce. For the long period of a thousand years, not a single
production of the east passed to the west, or of the west to the east,
but by the merchants of Tyre. Nor for many ages were any ships
found but those of Tyre daring enough to pass the straits of the Red
Sea on one side, or of the Mediterranean on the other. While the
vessels of other countries were groping along their coasts, clinging
to their landmarks, and frightened at a breeze, the ships of Tyre
were found from Spain, if not from Britain, on the west, to the coast
of Malabar and Sofala on the east and south. No wonder that her
merchants were princes, and that they lived in a style of
magnificence unknown in any other country in the same age; or that
she should be considered a desirable prey by the conquerors of the
times. But enterprise and wealth did not alone complete the
character of the Tyrians; they had an undoubted claim to valour of
no common order. Their city, which possessed scarcely any territory
beyond their own walls, maintained a siege of thirteen years (the
longest in history except that of Ashdod) against the whole power of
Babylon; and another of seven months against Alexander, whose
successes had afforded no instance of similar delay. And in neither
case had the captors much to boast of, as the Tyrians had shipped
off their most valuable property to Carthage; and in the former
particularly, as has been already related, they so effectually secured
or sacrificed the whole, that the soldiers of Nebuchadnezzar found
nothing to reward them for their length of labour, during which, by
excessive toil and heat, “their heads were made bald, and their very
shoulders peeled,” but vacant streets, and houses already sacked.
Carthage, Utica, and Cadiz, are celebrated monuments of the power
of Tyre on the Mediterranean, and in the west. She extended her
navigation even into the ocean, and carried her commerce beyond
England to the north, and the Canaries to the south. Her
connections with the east, though less known, were not less
considerable; the islands of Tyrus and Aradus, (the modern Barhain,)
in the Persian Gulf. The cities of Faran and Phœnicum Oppidum, on
the Red Sea, in ruins even in the time of the Greeks, prove that the
Tyrians had long frequented the coast of Arabia and the Indian Sea.
But, through the vicissitudes of time, Tyre, reduced to a miserable
village, has no other trade than the exportation of a few sacks of
corn and raw cotton, nor any merchant, says Volney, but a single
Greek factor in the service of the French Saide, (Sidon,) who
scarcely makes sufficient profit to maintain his family. In allusion to
Tyre in her better days, Forbes observes, when speaking of Surat,
“The bazars, filled with costly merchandise; picturesque and
interesting groups of natives on elephants, camels, horses, and
mules; strangers from all parts of the globe, in their respective
costume; vessels building on the stocks, others navigating the river;
together with Turks, Persians, and Armenians, on Arabian chargers;
European ladies in splendid carriages, the Asiatic females in
hackeries drawn by oxen; and the motley appearance of the English
and nabob’s troops on the fortifications, remind us of the following
description of Tyre, “O thou that art situate at the entry of the sea,
which art a merchant of the people for many isles,” &c, Ezek. xxvii,
3. This is a true picture of oriental commerce in ancient times; and a
very exact description of the port and the bazars of Surat, at the
present day.”
Dr. Vincent has given the following able illustration of the trade of
Tyre as described in Ezek. xxvii, which must be considered as one of
the most ample and early accounts extant. The learned author has
rendered the Hebrew names into others better known in the
geography of more recent times:--Tyre produced from Hermon, and
the mountains near it, fir for planking; and from Libanus, cedars for
masts. From Bashan, east of the sea of Galilee, oaks for oars. From
Greece, or the Grecian isles, ivory to adorn the benches or the
waists of the galleys. From Egypt, linen, ornamented with different
colours, for sails, or flags, or ensigns. From Peloponnesus, blue and
purple cloths for awnings. From Sidon and Aradus, mariners; but
Tyre itself furnished pilots and commanders. From Gebal, or Biblos,
on the coast between Tripolis and Berytus, caulkers. From Persia and
Africa, mercenary troops. From Aradus, the troops that garrisoned
Tyre with the Gamadim. From Tarshish, or by distant voyages toward
the west, and toward the east, great wealth, iron, tin, lead, and
silver. Tin implies Britain or Spain, or at least a voyage beyond the
Straits of Hercules. From Greece, and the countries bordering on
Pontus, slaves, and brass ware. From Armenia, horses, horsemen,
and mules. From the Gulf of Persia, and the isles within that gulf,
horns (tusks) of ivory, and ebony. The export to these isles was the
manufacture of Tyre. From Syria, emeralds, purple, broidered work,
fine linen, coral, and agate. The exports to Syria were the
manufactures of Tyre in great quantities. From Judah and Israel, the
finest wheat, honey, oil, and balsam. From Damascus, wine of
Chalybon, (the country bordering on the modern Aleppo,) and wool
in the fleece. The exports to Damascus were costly and various
manufactures. From the tribe of Dan, situated nearest to the
Philistines, the produce of Arabia, bright or wrought iron, cassia or
cinnamon, and the calamus aramaticus. In conducting the transport
of these articles, Dan went to and fro, that is, formed or conducted
the caravans. By one interpretation, they are said to come from
Uzal; and Uzal is said to be Sana, the capital of Yemen, or Arabia
Felix. From the Gulf of Persia, rich cloth for the decoration of
chariots or horsemen. From Arabia Petræa and Hedjaz, lambs, and
rams, and goats. From Sabea and Oman, the best of spices. From
India, gold, and precious stones. From Mesopotamia, from Carrhæ,
and Babylonia, the Assyrians brought all sorts of exquisite things;
that is, fine manufacture, blue cloth, and broidered work, or fabric of
various colours, in chests of cedar bound with cords, containing rich
apparel. If these articles were obtained farther from the east, may
they not be the fabrics of India, first brought to Assyria by the Gulf
of Persia, or by caravans from Karmania and the Indus, and then
conveyed by the Assyrians, in other caravans, to Tyre and Syria? In
this view, the care of package, the chests of cedar, and the cording
of the chests, are all correspondent to the nature of such a
transport. From Tarshish the ships came that rejoiced in the markets
of Tyre: they replenished the city, and made it glorious in the midst
of the sea, Ezek. xxvii, 5–25. Dr. Vincent observes, that from the
Tarshish last mentioned the ships returned to the ports in the Red
Sea; as from the nineteenth to the twenty-fourth verse every
particular relates to the east, while that referred to in the twelfth
implies the west--Spain, or beyond. We have here some light thrown
on the obscurity which surrounds the situation of this distant and
unknown place. There is, indeed, a clear reference to two distinct
places, or parts of the world, denominated Tarshish; perhaps from
those very circumstances, their distance, and the little that was
known respecting them. That one was situated westward, and
reached by a passage across the Mediterranean, is certain from
other parts of Scripture; that the other was eastward, or southward,
on the coast of Arabia, India, or Africa, is equally certain. See
Tarshish, and Ophir.
 UNBELIEF or INFIDELITY is a want of credence in the word of
God; or it may be defined, a calling in question the divine veracity, in
what God hath either testified, promised, or threatened; and thus it
is the opposite of faith, which consists in crediting what God hath
said, John iii, 18, 33. It is said that the Jews could not enter into the
promised land, “because of their unbelief,” Heb. iii, 18, 19. And the
Apostle, teaching the believing Hebrews what instruction they should
deduce from that portion of the history of their forefathers, says, as
the words literally translated would run, “We are evangelized as well
as they were; but the word which they heard did not profit them,
not being mixed with faith in them that heard it,” Heb. iv, 2. The
meaning is, We Christians are favoured with the good news of the
heavenly rest, as well as Israel in the wilderness were with the good
news of the earthly rest in Canaan; but the word which they heard
concerning that rest did not profit them, because they did not
believe it. Hence it appears that faith and unbelief are not confined
to the spiritual truths and promises of the Gospel of Christ, but
respect any truth which God may reveal, or any promise which he
may make even concerning temporal things. It is a crediting or
discrediting God in what he says, whatever be the subject. Christ
could not do many mighty works in his own country, because of their
unbelief, Matt. vi, 5, 6; their mean opinion of him, and contempt of
his miracles, rendered them unfit objects to have miracles wrought
upon or among them. The Apostles’ distrust of Christ’s promises, of
enabling them to cast out devils, rendered them incapable of casting
one out, Mark xvii, 16; and St. Peter’s distrust of his Master’s power
occasioned his sinking in the water, Matt. xiv, 30, 31. The unbelief
for which the Jews were broken off from their being a church was
their denial of Christ’s Messiahship, their contempt and refusal of
him, and their violent persecution of his cause and members, Rom.
xi, 20.
Adverting to the infidelity which prevailed among the educated
class of Heathens when Christianity first appeared in the world, Dr.
Neander observes:--It was Christianity which first presented religion
under the form of objective truth, as a system of doctrines perfectly
independent of all individual conceptions of man’s imagination, and
calculated to meet the moral and religious wants of man’s nature,
and in that nature every where to find some point on which it might
attach itself. The religions of antiquity, on the contrary, consist of
many elements of various kinds, which, either by the skill of the first
promulgator, or, in the length of years, by the impress of national
peculiarities, were moulded together into one whole. By the
transmission of tales, half mythical, and half historical, by forms and
statutes bearing the impress of religious feelings or ideas, mingled
with multifarious poems, which showed a powerful imaginative spirit,
rugged indeed, or, if animated by the spirit of beauty, at least devoid
of that of holiness,--all these varied materials were interwoven so
completely into all the characters, customs, and relations of social
life, that the religious matter could no longer be separated from the
mixed mass, nor be disentangled from the individual nature of the
life and political character of each people with which it was
interwoven. There was no religion generally adapted to human
nature, only religions fitted to each people. The Divinity appeared
here, not as free and elevated above nature; not as that which,
overruling nature, might form and illuminate the nature of man; but
was lowered to the level of nature, and made subservient to it.
Through this principle of deifying the powers of nature, by which
every exertion of bare power, even though immoral, might be
received among the objects of religious veneration, the idea of
holiness which beams forth from man’s conscience must continually
have been thrown into the back ground and overshadowed. The old
lawgivers were well aware how closely the maintenance of an
individual state religion depends on the maintenance of the
individual character of the people, and their civil and domestic
virtues. They were well aware that when once this union is dissolved
no power can restore it again. Therefore we find, especially in Rome,
where politics were the ruling passion, a watchfulness after the most
punctilious observance of traditional religious ceremonies, and a
jealous aversion to any innovations in religion. The belief of a divine
origin of all existence is a first principle in man’s nature, and he is
irresistibly impelled to ascend from many to One. This very feeling
showed itself even in the polytheism of national religions, under the
idea of a highest God, or a father of the gods. Among those who
gave themselves up to the consideration of divine things, and to
reflection upon them, this idea of an original unity must have been
more clearly recognized, and must have formed the centre point of
all their inward religious life and thought. The imagination of the
people was to be engaged with the numerous powers and energies
flowing forth from that one highest Being, while to the
contemplation of that unity, only a small number of exalted spirits,
the initiated leaders of the multitude, could elevate themselves. The
one God was the God of philosophers alone. The ruling opinion of all
the thinking men of antiquity, from which all religious legislation
proceeded, was, that pure religious truth could not be proposed to
the multitude, but only such a mixture of fiction, poetry, and truth,
as would serve to represent religious notions in such a manner that
they might make an impression on men, whose only guide was their
senses. The principle of a so called fraus pia [pious fraud] was
prevalent in all the legislation of antiquity. But how miserable would
be the case of mankind, if the higher bond, connecting human
affairs with heaven, could only be united by means of lies; if lies
were necessary in order to restrain the greater portion of mankind
from evil! And what could their religion in such a case effect? It
could not impart holy dispositions to the inward heart of man; it
could only restrain the open outbreaking of evil that existed in the
heart, by the power of fear. Falsehood, which cannot be arbitrarily
imposed on human nature, would never have been able to obtain
this influence, had not a truth, which is sure to make itself felt by
human nature, been working through it,--had not the belief in an
unseen God, on whom man universally feels himself dependent, and
to whom he feels himself attracted,--had not the impulse toward an
invisible world, which is implanted in the human heart,--been able to
work also through this covering of superstition. The geographer
Strabo thinks that, in the same manner that mythical tales and
fables are needful for children, so also they are necessary for the
uneducated and uninformed, who are in some sort children, and also
for those who are half educated; for even with them reason is not
sufficiently powerful, and they are not able to free themselves from
the habits they have acquired as children. This is, indeed, a sad
condition of humanity, when the seed of holiness, which can
develope itself only in the whole course of a life, cannot be strewn in
the heart of the child, and when mature reason must destroy that
which was planted in the early years of infancy! when holy truth
cannot form the foundation of the future developement of life from
the earliest dawn of childish consciousness! The thinking Roman
statesmen also of the time at which Christianity appeared, as Varro,
for instance, distinguish between the theologia philosophica
[philosophical theology] and the theologia civilis, [civil theology,]
which contradicts the principles of the former, as Cotta in Cicero
distinguished between the belief of Cotta, and the belief of the
Pontifex. The philosopher required in religion a persuasion grounded
on reasoning; the citizen, the statesman, followed the tradition of his
ancestors without inquiry. Suppose now this theologia civilis, and this
theologia philosophica to proceed together, without a man’s wishing
to set the opposition between the two in a very clear light to
himself; that the citizen and the statesman, the philosopher and the
man, could be united in the same individual with contradictory
sentiments, (a division which in the same man is very unnatural,)
and then he would perhaps say, “Philosophical reason conducts to a
different result from that which is established by the state religion;
but the latter has in its favour the good fortune which the state has
enjoyed in the exercise of religion handed down from our ancestors.
Let us follow experience even where we do not thoroughly
understand.” Thus speaks Cotta, and thus also many Romans of
education in his time, either more or less explicitly. Or perhaps we
may suppose, that men openly expressed this contradiction, and did
not scruple to assign the pure truth to the theologia philosophica,
and to declare the theologia civilis only a matter of politics. In the
east, which is less subject to commotions, where tranquil habits of
life were more common, and where a mystical spirit of
contemplation, accompanying and spiritualizing the symbolical
religion of the people, was more prevalent than an intellectual
cultivation opposed to it, and developing itself independently, it was
possible that this kind of esoteric and exoteric religion should
proceed hand in hand without change for many centuries. But it was
otherwise with the more stirring spirits and habits of the west. Here
this independently proceeding developement of the intellect must
have been at open war with the religion of the people; and as
intellectual culture spread itself more widely, so also must a disbelief
of the popular religion have been more extensively diffused; and, in
consequence of the intercourse between the people and the
educated classes, this disbelief must also have found its way at last
among the people themselves; more especially since, as this
perception of the nothingness of the popular religion spread itself
more widely, there would naturally be many who would not, with the
precaution of the men of old, hide their new illumination from the
multitude, but would think themselves bound to procure for it new
adherents, without any regard to the injury of which they might be
laying the foundations, without inquiring of themselves, whether
they had any thing to offer to the people in the room of that of
which they robbed them; in the room of their then source of
tranquillity under the storms of life; instead of that which taught
them moderation under affliction; and, lastly, in the place of their
then counterpoise against the power of wild desires and passions.
Men saw, in the religious systems of different nations which then
came into contact with each other in the enormous empire of Rome,
nothing but utter contradiction and opposition. The philosophical
systems also exhibited nothing but opposition of sentiments, and left
those who could see in the moral consciousness no criterion of truth
to doubt whether there were any such thing or not. In this sense, as
representing the opinions of many eminent and cultivated Romans,
with a sneer at all desire for truth, Pilate made the sarcastic inquiry,
“What is truth?” Many contented themselves with a shallow lifeless
deism, which usually takes its rise where the thirst after a living
union with heaven is wanting; a system which, although it denies
not the existence of a God, yet drives it as far into the back ground
as possible; a listless God! who suffers every thing to take its own
course, so that all belief in any inward connection between this
Divinity and man, any communication of this Divinity to man, would
seem to this system fancy and enthusiasm! The world and human
nature remain at least free from God. This belief in God, if we can
call it a belief, remains dead and fruitless, exercising no influence
over the life of man. The belief in God here produced neither the
desire after that ideal perfection of holiness, the contemplation of
which shows at the same time to man the corruption of his own
nature, so opposite to that holiness; nor that consciousness of guilt
by which man, contemplating the holiness of God within him, feels
himself estranged from God; nor does this belief impart any lively
power of sanctification. Man is not struck by the inquiry, “How shall
I, unclean as I am, approach the holy God, and stand before him,
when he judges me according to the holy law which he has himself
engraven on my conscience? What shall I do to become free from
the guilt which oppresses me, and again to attain to communion
with him?” To make inquiries such as these, this spirit of deism
considers as fanaticism; and it casts away from itself all notions of
God’s anger, judgments, or punishments, as representations arising
only from the limited nature of the human understanding. More
lively and penetrating spirits, who felt in the world an infinite Spirit
which animated all things, fell into an error of quite an opposite
nature to this deism, which removed God too far from the world;
namely into a pantheism, which confused God and the world, which
was just as little calculated to bestow tranquillity and consolation.
They conceived God only as the infinite Being elevated above frail
man, and not as being connected with him, attracting him to himself,
and lowering himself down to him. It was only the greatness, not
the holiness nor the love, of God which filled their souls. Yet the
history of all ages proves that man cannot for any length of time
disown the desire for religion implanted in his nature. Whenever
man, entirely devoted to the world, has for a long time wholly
overwhelmed the perception of the Divinity which exists in his
nature, and has long entirely estranged himself from divine things,
these at last prevail over humanity with greater force. Man feels that
something is wanting to his heart, which can be replaced to him by
nothing else; he feels a hollowness within him which can never be
satisfied by earthly things, and can find satisfaction and blessing
suited to his condition in the Divinity alone, and an irresistible desire
impels him to seek again his lost connection with Heaven. The times
of the dominion of superstition also, as history teaches us, are
always times of earthly calamity; for the moral corruption which
accompanies superstition necessarily, also, destroys all the
foundations of earthly prosperity. Thus the times in which
superstition extended itself among the Romans were those of the
downfall of civil freedom, and of public suffering under cruel
despots. But, however, the consequences of these evils conducted
man, also to their remedy; for by distress from without man is
brought to the consciousness of his own weakness, and his
dependence on a higher than earthly power; and when he is
forsaken by human help, he is compelled to seek it here. Man
becomes induced to look upon his misfortunes as the punishments
of a higher Being, and to seek for means by which he may secure
again for himself the favour of that Being. The need of a connection
with Heaven, from which man felt himself estranged, and
dissatisfaction with the cold and joyless present, obtained a more
ready belief for the picture which mythology presented, of a golden
age, when gods and men lived together in intimate union; and warm
imaginations looked back on such a state with longing and desire.
This belief and this desire, it must be owned, were founded on a
great truth which man could rightly apprehend only through
Christianity; and this desire was a kind of intimation which pointed
to Christianity. From the nature of the case, however, it is clear that
a fanatical zeal, where the heat of passion concealed from man the
hollowness and falsehood of his faith, might be created for a
religion, to which man only betook himself as a refuge in his misery,
and in his dread of the abyss of unbelief; a religion which no longer
served for the developement of man’s nature, and into which,
nevertheless, he felt himself driven back from the want of any other;
and that men must use every kind of power and art to uphold that
which was in danger of falling from its own internal weakness, and
to defend that which was unable to defend itself by its own power.
Fanaticism was therefore obliged to avail itself of every kind of
power in the struggle with Christianity, in order to uphold
Heathenism, which was fast sinking by its own weakness. Although
the Romans had from the oldest times been noted for their
repugnance to all foreign sorts of religious worship, yet this trait of
the old Roman character had with many altogether disappeared.
Because the old national temples of the Romans had lost their
respect, in many dispositions man was inclined to bring in to their
assistance foreign modes of worship. Those which obtained the
readiest admission were such as consisted of mysterious, symbolical
customs, and striking, sounding forms. As is always the case, men
looked for some special and higher power in what is dark and
mysterious. The very simplicity of Christianity became therefore a
ground of hatred to it.
UNICORN, ‫ראם‬, Num. xxiii, 22; xxiv, 8; Deut. xxxiii, 17; Job xxxix,
9, 10; Psalm xxii, 21; xxix, 6; xcii, 10; Isa. xxxiv, 7. In each of these
places it is rendered in the Septuagint μονόκερως, except in Isaiah,
where it is ἁδροὶ, the great or mighty ones. Barrow, in his “Travels in
Southern Africa,” has given a drawing of the head of the unicorn, “a
beast with a single horn projecting from the forehead;” accompanied
with such details as, he thinks, offer strong arguments for the
existence of such animals in the country of the Bosjesmans. He
observes that this creature is represented as a “solid-ungulous
animal resembling a horse, with an elegantly shaped body, marked
from the shoulders to the flanks with longitudinal stripes or bands.”
Still he acknowledges that the animal to which the writer of the book
of Job, who was no mean natural historian, makes a poetical
allusion, has been supposed, with great plausibility, to be the one-
horned rhinoceros; and that Moses also very probably meant the
rhinoceros, when he mentions the unicorn as having the strength of
God.
“There are two animals,” says Bruce, “named frequently in
Scripture, without naturalists being agreed what they are. The one is
the behemoth, the other the reem; both mentioned as types of
strength, courage, and independence on man; and, as such,
exempted from the ordinary lot of beasts, to be subdued by him, or
reduced under his dominion. The behemoth, then, I take to be the
elephant; his history is well known, and my only business is with the
reem, which I suppose to be the rhinoceros. The derivation of this
word, both in the Hebrew and Ethiopic, seems to be from erectness,
or standing straight. This is certainly no particular quality in the
animal itself, which is not more, nor even so much erect as many
other quadrupeds, for its knees are rather crooked; but it is from the
circumstance and manner in which his horn is placed. The horns of
all other animals are inclined to some degree of parallelism with the
nose, or os frontis, [front bone.] The horn of the rhinoceros alone is
erect and perpendicular to this bone, on which it stands at right
angles; thereby possessing a greater purchase or power, as a lever,
than any horn could possibly have in any other position. This
situation of the horn is very happily alluded to in the sacred writings:
‘My horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of a reem,’ Psalm xcii, 10. And
the horn here alluded to is not wholly figurative, but was really an
ornament worn by great men in the days of victory, preferment, or
rejoicing, when they were anointed with new, sweet, or fresh oil; a
circumstance which David joins with that of erecting the horn.
Balaam, a priest of Midian, and so in the neighbourhood of the
haunts of the rhinoceros, and intimately connected with Ethiopia, for
they themselves were shepherds of that country, in a transport, from
contemplating the strength of Israel, whom he was brought to curse,
says, that they had as it were the strength of the reem, Num. xxiii,
22. Job, xxxix, 9, 10, makes frequent allusion to his great strength,
ferocity, and indocility. Isaiah, xxxiv, 7, who of all the prophets seems
to have known Egypt and Ethiopia the best, when prophesying about
the destruction of Idumea, says, that the reem shall come down
with the fat cattle: a proof that he knew his habitation was in the
neighbourhood. In the same manner as when foretelling the
desolation of Egypt, he mentions, as one manner of effecting it, the
bringing down the fly from Ethiopia, Isa. vii, 18, 19, to meet the
cattle in the desert and among the bushes, and destroy them there,
where that insect did not ordinarily come but on command, Exodus
viii, 22, and where the cattle fled every year, to save themselves
from that insect.
“The rhinoceros in Geez is called arwé harish, and in the Amharic
auraris, both which names signify the large wild beast with the horn.
This would seem as if applied to the species that had but one horn.
The Ethiopic text renders the word reem, arwe harish, and this the
Septuagint translates μονόκερως, or unicorn. If the Abyssinian
rhinoceros had invariably two horns, it seems to me improbable the
Septuagint would call him μονόκερως, especially as they must have
seen an animal of this kind exposed at Alexandria in their time,
when first mentioned in history, at an exhibition given to Ptolemy
Philadelphus, at his accession to the crown, before the death of his
father. The principal reason for translating the word reem unicorn,
and not rhinoceros, is from a prejudice that he must have but one
horn. But this is by no means so well founded, as to be admitted as
the only argument for establishing the existence of an animal, which
never has appeared after the search of so many ages. Scripture
speaks of the horns of the unicorn, Deut. xxxiii, 17; Psalm xxii, 21;
so that even from this circumstance the reem may be the rhinoceros
as the rhinoceros may be the unicorn.”
In the book of Job, xxxix, 9, 10, the reem is represented as an
unmanageable animal, which, although possessed of sufficient
strength to labour, sternly and pertinaciously refused to bend his
neck to the yoke.
 Will the reem submit to serve thee?
Will he, indeed, abide at thy crib?
Canst thou make his harness bind the reem to the furrow?
Will he, forsooth, plough up the valleys for thee?
Wilt thou rely on him for his great strength,
And commit thy labour unto him?
Wilt thou trust him that he may bring home thy grain,
And gather in thy harvest?

The rhinoceros, in size, is only exceeded by the elephant; and in

strength and power is inferior to no other creature. He is at least
twelve feet in length, from the extremity of the snout to the
insertion of the tail; six or seven feet in height, and the
circumference of the body is nearly equal to its length. He is
particularly distinguished from the elephant and all other animals by
the remarkable and offensive weapon he carries upon his nose. This
is a very hard horn, solid throughout, directed forward, and has
been seen four feet in length. Mr. Browne, in his Travels, says, that
the Arabians call the rhinoceros abu-kurn, “father of the one horn.”
The rhinoceros is very hurtful, by the prodigious devastation which
he makes in the fields. This circumstance peculiarly illustrates the
passage from Job. Instead of trusting him to bring home the grain,
the husbandman will endeavour to prevent his entry into the fields,
and hinder his destructive ravages. In a note upon this passage, Mr.
Good says, “The original reem, by all the older translators rendered
rhinoceros, or unicorn, is by some modern writers supposed to be
the bubalus, bison, or wild ox. There can be no doubt that
rhinoceros is the proper term; for this animal is universally known in
Arabia, by the name of reem, to the present day.” The rhinoceros,
though next in size, yet in docility and ingenuity greatly inferior, to
the elephant, has never yet been tamed, so as to assist the labours
of mankind, or to appear in the ranks of war. The rhinoceros is
perfectly indocile and untractable, though neither ferocious nor
carnivorous. He is among large animals what the hog is among
smaller ones, brutal and insensible; fond of wallowing in the mire,
and delighting in moist and marshy situations near the banks of
rivers. He is, however, of a pacific disposition; and, as he feeds on
vegetables, has few occasions for conflict. He neither disturbs the
less, nor fears the greater, beasts of the forest, but lives amicably
with all. He subsists principally on large succulent plants, prickly
shrubs, and the branches of trees; and lives to the age of seventy or
eighty years.
UNITARIANS, a comprehensive term, including all who believe the
Deity to subsist in one person only. The chief article in the religious
system of the Unitarians is, that Christ was a mere man. But they
consider him as the great instrument in the hands of God of
reversing all the effects of the fall; as the object of all the prophecies
from Moses to his own time; as the great bond of union to virtuous
and good men, who, as Christians, make one body in a peculiar
sense. The Socinian creed was reduced to what Dr. Priestley calls
Humanitarianism, by denying the miraculous conception, the
infallibility, and the impeccability of the Saviour; and, consequently,
his right to any divine honours or religious worship. As to those texts
which declare that Jesus Christ “knew no sin,” &c, his followers
explain them in the sense in which it is said of believers, “Whosoever
is born of God doth not commit sin,” 1 John iii, 9. Or, if this be not
satisfactory, Dr. Priestley refers us to the “Theological Repository,” “in
which,” he says, “I think I have shown that the Apostle Paul often
reasons inconclusively; and, therefore, that he wrote as any other
person of his turn of mind or thinking, and in his situation, would
have written, without any particular inspiration. Facts, such as I
think I have there alleged, are stubborn things, and all hypotheses
must be accommodated to them.” Nor is this sentiment peculiar to
Dr. Priestley. Mr. Belsham says, “The Unitarian doctrine is, that Jesus
of Nazareth was a man constituted in all respects like other men,
subject to the same infirmities, the same ignorance, prejudices, and
frailties; descended from the family of David, the son of Joseph and
Mary, though some indeed still adhere to the popular opinion of the
miraculous conception; that he was born in low circumstances,
having no peculiar advantages of education or learning, but that he
was a man of exemplary character; and that, in conformity to
ancient prophecy, he was chosen and appointed by God to introduce
a new moral dispensation into the world, the design of which was to
abolish the Jewish economy, and to place believing Gentiles upon an
equal ground of privilege and favour with the posterity of Abraham;
in other words, he was authorized to reveal to all mankind, without
distinction, the great doctrine of a future life, in which men shall be
rewarded according to their works.” Mr. Belsham goes on to state the
Unitarian opinion to be, that Jesus was not conscious of his high
character till after his baptism; that he afterward spent some time in
the wilderness, where he was invested with miraculous powers, and
favoured with heavenly visions, like St. Paul, 2 Cor. xii, in which he
supposed himself taken up into heaven, and in consequence of
which he speaks of his descent from heaven; that he exercised his
ministry on earth for the space of a year or more, and then suffered
death upon the cross, not to exhibit the evil of sin, or in any sense
to make atonement for it, but as a martyr to the truth, and as a
necessary preliminary to his resurrection, which they consider as a
pledge of the resurrection of mankind. Many also believe that Jesus
maintained some personal and sensible connection with the church
during the apostolic age, and the continuance of miraculous powers
in the church. They farther believe that he is appointed to revisit the
earth, and to judge the world,--a difficult task one would suppose, if
“he be constituted,” as said above, “in all respects like other men,
subject to the same ignorance, prejudices frailties,” &c! So this
blasphemous system contains, in this respect, and in almost every
other, its own refutation. See Socinians.
The creed which the celebrated council of Nice established, says
Grier, in his “Epitome of General Councils,” is that which Christians
now profess; the errors and impieties which it condemned are those
which, according to the refinements of Socinus, his followers of the
present day have moulded into their antichristian system. Arius, a
presbyter in the church of Alexandria, a man of consummate talent
and address, but of a cold and speculative mind, impiously
maintained that there had been a time when the Son of God was
not; that he was capable of virtue and vice; and that he was a
creature, and mutable as creatures are! It is true that Arius held a
qualified preëxistence, when he said that God created the Son from
nothing before he created the world; in other words, that the Son
was the first of created beings; but such preëxistence does not imply
coëxistence or coëternity with the Father. After this manner did he
deny the divinity of the Son, and his coëternity with the Father.
Seduced by the pride of reasoning, no less than by his fondness for
novelty, did he likewise reject the ὁμοούσιαν, as it is called, or the
tenet of the Son being of the same substance with the Father. The
blasphemies of Arius consisted in the denial of Christ’s being either
co-eternal or consubstantial with God. After a lapse of twelve
centuries, Socinus lowered him another step by declaring his
inferiority to the Father; for that he, as well as all other things, was
subject to the supreme Creator of the universe; and although he
held his mere humanity, yet, inconsistently enough, he would offer
him divine worship! Inconsistently it may be said, because the
Socinian, on his own principles, thereby incurs the guilt of idolatry as
much as the Roman Catholic who worships the Virgin Mary, a mere
created being. The Unitarian, or Humanitarian, sinks the character of
the Saviour still lower, by withholding all worship from him; and
while he considers him as a mere man, and therefore as not
possessing the attributes of the Deity, with an inconsistency as
singular as that of Socinus, he acknowledges his divinity so as to call
him God; as if the terms Deity and Divinity bore different
significations, or as if the principle which constituted the essence of
the Godhead were separable from the Godhead itself! It should be
observed, that the lowest denomination of unbelievers in the
descending scale, namely, the modern Unitarian, combines with his
own peculiar errors and impieties all the errors and impieties of both
Arius and Socinus, together with an absolute denial of the Holy
Ghost being a divine Person. Having touched on the shades of
difference which exist between the followers of Arius and Socinus, a
more minute detail of the division and subdivision of the classes into
which they may be ranged may not be unacceptable to the reader:
Arians and Semi-Arians constituted the original distinction; that of a
subsequent day was high and low Arians. The high Arians entertain
the highest views of the mediatorial influence of Christ, and believe
in the entire Scriptures; the low Arians run into the opposite
extreme, yet neither high nor low Arians consider Christ to be truly
God. The old Socinians admitted the miraculous conception, and the
worship of the Son; the modern Socinians do not; a circumstance
that identifies the modern Socinian with the Unitarian. Some high
Arians, such as Dr. Samuel Clarke, &c, thought that Christ might be
worshipped; others of them affect to have no distinct notion of what
the Holy Ghost meant, and to believe that worship is not to be
addressed to Christ, but through Christ! These variations in the
Unitarian creed have been deduced from the evidence of Unitarians
themselves, given before the Commissioners of Education Inquiry in
Ireland in 1826, as detailed in their Report to Parliament; a
circumstance that renders them the more valuable, as it imparts to
them a living, speaking authority. It must, however, be observed,
that motley as they are, they all terminate in one point, the rejection
of Christ’s divinity; and that, diversified as the distinctions appear to
be, they all will be ultimately found to be without a shadow of
difference. In short, Arians, Socinians, Unitarians, &c, not only agree
with each other in their antichristian scheme; but can scarcely be
said to differ from the infidel Musselmans, who are taught by their
Koran to regard Christ as a great prophet, and the forerunner of
their own. With Deism doubtless Unitarianism has an intimate
alliance. For Deists reject all the doctrines of the Christian revelation,
while Unitarians reject all its peculiar doctrines: 1. The Trinity of
Persons in the Godhead. 2. The divinity of Christ. 3. The personality
of the Holy Spirit. 4. The miraculous birth of Christ. 5. The
atonement of Christ. 6. The sanctification of the Spirit. 7. The
existence of angels and spirits; 8. And, therefore, of the devil and his
angels. “In what, then,” says the learned Dr. Burgess, bishop of
Salisbury, after this enumeration of the peculiar doctrines of
Christianity, “does Unitarianism differ from Deism? Deists deny the
essential doctrines of Christianity by rejecting the whole of the
Christian revelation; Unitarians reject the Christian revelation by
denying all its peculiar and essential doctrines.”
UNIVERSALISTS. Those who believe that Christ so died for all,
that, before he shall have delivered up his mediatorial kingdom, all
fallen creatures shall be brought to a participation of the benefits of
his death, in their restoration to holiness and happiness. They are
called also Universal Restorationists, and their doctrine, the doctrine
of universal restoration. Some of its friends have maintained it, also,
under the name of universal salvation; but perhaps the former name
is that by which it should be distinguished; for the Universalists do
not hold any universal exemption from future punishment, but
merely the recovery of all those that shall have been exposed to it.
[A] They have likewise a just claim to this title on other grounds; for
their doctrine, which includes the restoration, or “restitution of all
the intelligent offspring of God,” or of all
[Footnote A: This may be true in respect to the Universalists in
Europe; but in America there are those who deny any future
punishment whatever. In this country also they have formed
themselves into separate and distinct societies. Am. Ed.] “lapsed
intelligences,” seems to embrace even the fallen angels. They admit
the reality and equity of future punishment; but they contend that it
will be corrective in its nature, and limited in its duration. They teach
the doctrine of election, but not in the exclusive Calvinistic sense of
it. They suppose that God has chosen some for the good of all; and
that his final purpose toward all is intimated by his calling his elect
the first-born and the first-fruits of his creatures, which, say they,
implies other branches of his family, and a future ingathering of the
harvest of mankind. They teach, also, that the righteous shall have
part in the first resurrection, shall be blessed and happy, and be
made priests and kings to God and to Christ in the millennial
kingdom, and that over them the second death shall have no power;
that the wicked will receive a punishment apportioned to their
crimes; that punishment itself is a mediatorial work, and founded
upon mercy, and, consequently, that it is a means of humbling,
subduing, and finally reconciling the sinner to God. They add, that
the words rendered “eternal,” “everlasting,” “for ever,” and “for ever
and ever,” in the Scriptures, are frequently used to express the
duration of things that have ended or must end; and if it is
contended that these words are sometimes used to express proper
eternity, they answer, that then the subject with which the words are
connected must determine the sense of them; and as there is
nothing in the nature of future punishment which can be offered as
a reason why it should be endless, they infer that the above words
ought always to be taken in a limited sense when connected with
the infliction of misery.
Those who deny the eternity of future punishments have not
formed themselves into any separate body or distinct society; but
are to be found in most Christian countries, and among several
denominations. Their doctrines form part of the creed of some
Arians, as of Mr. Whiston; of many Deists, as of Mr. Hobbes, Mr.
Tindal, &c; and of most Socinians. Nor need we be surprised that
libertines and atheists hold it, and that they strive to bring others
over to their opinion. “The tyranny of priests,” said Dupont the
atheist, in the national convention, December, 1792, “extends their
opinion to another life, of which they have no other idea than that of
eternal punishment; a doctrine which some men have hitherto had
the good nature to believe. But these prejudices must now fall: we
must destroy them, or they will destroy us.” The Mennonites in
Holland have long held the doctrine of the Universalists; the people
called Dunkers, or Tunkers, in America, descended from the German
Baptists, hold it; and also the Shakers. Excellent refutations of this
specious system have been published by the Rev. S. Jerram, and the
Rev. Daniel Isaac.
The Arminians are sometimes called “Universalists,” on account of
their holding the tenet of general redemption; in opposition to the
Calvinists, who, from their specifically restricting the saving grace of
God to certain fore ordained individuals, receive the denomination of
“Particularists.” By the epithet “Hypothetical Universalists,” are
designated on the continent those who have adopted the theological
system of Amyraut and Cameron, but who are better KNOWN in this
country as “Baxterians.” See Amyraut, Baxterianism, and Cameron.
UPPER ROOM. The principal rooms anciently in Judea were those
above, as they are to this day at Aleppo; the ground floor being
chiefly made use of for their horses and servants. “The house in
which I am at present living,” says, Jowett, “gives what seems to be
a correct idea of the scene of Eutychus’ falling from the upper loft
while St. Paul was preaching, Acts xx, 6–12. According to our idea of
houses, the scene is very far from intelligible; and, beside this, the
circumstance of preaching generally leaves on the mind of cursory
readers the notion of a church. To describe this house, which is not
many miles distant from the Troad, and perhaps, from the
unchanging character of oriental customs, nearly resembles the
houses then built, will fully illustrate the narrative. On entering my
host’s door, we find the first floor entirely used as a store: it is filled
with large barrels of oil, the produce of the rich country for many
miles round: this space, so far from being habitable, is sometimes so
dirty with the dripping of the oil, that it is difficult to pick out a clean
footing from the door to the first step of the staircase. On
ascending, we find the first floor, consisting of an humble suit of
rooms, not very high; these are occupied by the family for their daily
use. It is on the next story that all their expense is lavished: here my
courteous host has appointed my lodging: beautiful curtains and
mats, and cushions to the divan, display the respect with which they
mean to receive their guest. Here, likewise, their splendour, being at
the top of the house, is enjoyed by the poor Greeks with more
retirement, and less chance of molestation from the intrusion of
Turks: here, when the professors of the college waited upon me to
pay their respects, they were received in ceremony, and sat at the
window. The room is both higher and also larger than those below;
it has two projecting windows; and the whole floor is so much
extended in front beyond the lower part of the building, that the
projecting windows considerably overhang the street. In such an
upper room, secluded, spacious, and commodious, St. Paul was
invited to preach his parting discourse. The divan, or raised seat,
with mats or cushions, encircles the interior of each projecting
window; and I have remarked that when the company is numerous,
they sometimes place large cushions behind the company seated on
the divan; so that a second tier of company, with their feet upon the
seat of the divan, are sitting behind, higher than the front row.
Eutychus, thus sitting, would be on a level with the open window;
and, being overcome with sleep, he would easily fall out from the
third loft of the house into the street, and be almost certain, from
such a height, to lose his life. Thither St. Paul went down, and
comforted the alarmed company by bringing up Eutychus alive. It is
noted that ‘there were many lights in the upper chamber.’ The very
great plenty of oil in this neighbourhood would enable them to
afford many lamps; the heat of these and so much company would
cause the drowsiness of Eutychus, at that late hour, and be the
occasion, likewise, of the windows being open.”
URIM AND THUMMIM. The high priests of the Jews, we are told,
consulted God in the most important affairs of their commonwealth,
and received answers by the Urim and Thummim. What these were,
is disputed among the critics. Josephus, and some others, imagine
the answer was returned by the stones of the breastplate appearing
with an unusual lustre when it was favourable, or in the contrary
case dim. Others suppose, that the Urim and Thummim were
something enclosed between the folding of the breastplate; this
some will have to be the tetragrammaton, or the word ‫ יהוה‬Jehovah.
Christophorus de Castro, and after him Dr. Spencer, maintain them
to be two little images shut up in the doubling of the breastplate,
which gave the oracular answer from thence by an articulate voice.
Accordingly, they derive them from the Egyptians, who consulted
their lares, and had an oracle, or teraphim, which they called Truth.
This opinion, however, has been sufficiently confuted by the learned
Dr. Pococke and by Witsius. The more common opinion among
Christians concerning the oracle by Urim and Thummim, and which
Dr. Prideaux espouses, is, that when the high priest appeared before
the veil, clothed with his ephod and breastplate, to ask counsel of
God, the answer was given with an audible voice from the mercy
seat, within the veil; but, it has been observed, that this account will
by no means agree with the history of David’s consulting the oracle
by Abiathar, 1 Sam. xxiii, 9, 11; xxx, 7, 8; because the ark, on which
was the mercy seat, was then at Kirjathjearim; whereas David was
in the one case at Ziklag, and in the other in the forest of Hareth.
Braunius and Hottinger have adopted another opinion: they
suppose, that, when Moses is commanded to put in the breastplate
the Urim and Thummim, signifying lights and perfections in the
plural number, it was meant that he should make choice of the most
perfect set of stones, and have them so polished as to give the
brightest lustre; and, on this hypothesis, the use of the Urim and
Thummim, or of these exquisitely polished jewels, was only to be a
symbol of the divine presence, and of the light and perfection of the
prophetic inspiration; and, as such, constantly to be worn by the
high priest in the exercise of his sacred function, especially in
consulting the oracle.
Michaëlis observes: That in making distributions of property, and
in cases of disputes relative to meum [mine] and tuum, [thine,]
recourse was had to the lot, in default of any other means of
decision, will naturally be supposed. The whole land was partitioned
by lot; and that, in after times, the lot continued to be used, even in
courts of justice, we see from Prov. xvi, 33; xviii, 18; where we are
expressly taught to remember, that it is Providence which maketh
the choice, and that therefore we ought to be satisfied with the
decision of the lot, as the will of God. It was for judicial purposes, in
a particular manner, that the sacred lot called Urim and Thummim
was employed; and on this account the costly embroidered pouch, in
which the priest carried this sacred lot on his breast, was called the
judicial ornament. “But was this sacred lot used likewise in criminal
trials?” Yes, says Michaëlis, only to discover the guilty, to convict
them; for in the only two instances of its use in such cases which
occur in the whole Bible, namely, in Joshua vii, 14–18, 1 Sam. xiv,
37–45, we find the confessions of the two delinquents, Achan and
Jonathan, annexed. It appears also to have been used only in the
case of an oath being transgressed which the whole people had
taken, or the leader of the host in their name, but not in the case of
other crimes; for an unknown murder, for example, was not to be
discovered by recourse to the sacred lot.
The inner sanctuary, within the veil of the tabernacle, observes Dr.
Hales, or most holy place, was called the oracle, 1 Kings vi, 16,
because there the Lord communed with Moses, face to face, and
gave him instructions in cases of legal difficulty or sudden
emergency, Exod. xxv, 22; Num. vii, 89; ix, 8; Exod. xxxiii, 11; a high
privilege granted to none of his successors. After the death of Moses
a different mode was appointed for consulting the oracle by the high
priest, who put on “the breastplate of judgment,” a principal part of
the pontifical dress, on which were inscribed the words Urim and
Thummim, emblematical of divine illumination; as the inscription on
his mitre, “Holiness to the Lord,” was of sanctification, Exod. xxviii,
30–37; Lev. viii, 8. Thus prepared, he presented himself before the
Lord to ask counsel on public matters, not in the inner sanctuary,
which he presumed not to enter, except on the great day of national
atonement, but without the veil, with his face toward the ark of the
covenant, inside; and behind him, at some distance, without the
sanctuary, stood Joshua, the judge, or person who wanted the
response, which seems to have been given with an audible voice
from within the veil, Num. xxvii, 21, as in the case of Joshua, vi, 6–
15; of the Israelites during the civil war with Benjamin, Judges xx,
27, 28; on the appointment of Saul to be king, when he hid himself,
1 Sam. x, 22–24; of David, 1 Sam. xxii, 10; xxiii, 2–12; xxx, 8; 2
Sam. v, 23, 24; of Saul, 1 Sam. xxviii, 6. This mode of consultation
subsisted under the tabernacle erected by Moses in the wilderness,
and until the building of Solomon’s temple; after which we find no
instances of it. The oracles of the Lord were thenceforth delivered by
the prophets; as by Ahijah to Jeroboam, 1 Kings xi, 29; by Shemaiah
to Rehoboam, 1 Kings xii, 22; by Elijah to Ahab, 1 Kings xvii, 1; xxi,
17–29; by Michaiah to Ahab and Jehoshaphat, 1 Kings xxii, 7; by
Elisha to Jehoshaphat and Jehoram, 2 Kings iii, 11–14; by Isaiah to
Hezekiah, 2 Kings xix, 6–34; xx, 1–11; by Huldah to Josiah, 2 Kings
xxii, 13–20; by Jeremiah to Zedekiah, Jer. xxxii, 3–5, &c. After the
Babylonish captivity, and the last of the prophets, Haggai, Zechariah,
and Malachi, the oracle ceased; but its revival was foretold by Ezra,
ii, 63, and accomplished by Christ, who was himself the oracle,
under the old and new covenants, Gen. xv, 1; John i, 1. See
Breastplate.
USURY, profit or gain from lending money or goods. Moses
enacted a law to the effect that interest should not be taken from a
poor person, neither for borrowed money, nor for articles of
consumption, for instance, grain, which was borrowed with the
expectation of being returned, Exod. xxii, 25; Lev. xxv, 35–37. A
difficulty arose in determining who was to be considered a poor
person in a case of this kind; and the law was accordingly altered in
Deut. xxiii, 20, 21, and extended in its operation to all the Hebrews,
whether they had more or less property; so that interest could be
lawfully taken only of foreigners. As the system of the Jews went to
secure every man’s paternal inheritance to his own family, they could
not exact it from their brethren, but only from strangers. As the law
of nature does not forbid the receipt of moderate interest in the
shape of rent, for the use of lands or houses, neither does it prohibit
it for the loan of money or goods. When one man trades with the
capital of another, and obtains a profit from it, he is bound in justice
to return a part of it to his benefactor, who, in the hands of God, has
been a second cause of “giving him power to get wealth.” But should
Divine Providence not favour the endeavours of some who have
borrowed money, the duty of the lenders is to deal gently with them,
and to be content with sharing in their losses, as they have been
sharers in their gains. The Hebrews were therefore exhorted to lend
money, &c, as a deed of mercy and brotherly kindness, Deut. xv, 7–
11; xxiv, 13. And hence it happens that we find encomiums every
where bestowed upon those who were willing to lend without
insisting upon interest for the use of the thing lent, Psalm xv, 15;
xxxvii, 21, 26; cxii, 5; Prov. xix, 17; Ezek. xviii, 8. This regulation in
regard to taking interest was very well suited to the condition of a
state that had been recently founded, and which had but very little
mercantile dealings; and its principle, though not capable of being
generally introduced into communities that are much engaged in
commerce, may still be exercised toward those who stand toward us
in the relation of brethren.
UZ, Land of, the country of Job. As there were three persons of
this name, namely, the son of Aram, the son of Nahor, and the
grandson of Seir the Horite, commentators are divided in their
opinion as to the situation of the country meant by the land of Uz.
Bochart, Spanheim, Calmet, Wells, and others, place it in Arabia
Deserta. Michaëlis places it in the valley of Damascus; which city
was, in fact, built by Uz, the grandson of Shem. Archbishop Magee,
Bishop Lowth, Dr. Hales, Dr. Good, and others, with more reason, fix
the scene of the history of Job in Idumea. This is also the opinion of
Mr. Horne, who refers for a confirmation of it to Lam. iv, 21, where
Uz is expressly said to be in Edom; and to Jer. xlix, 7, 8, 20; Ezek.
xxv, 13; Amos i, 11, 12; Obad. 8, 9, where both Teman and Dedan
are described as inhabitants of Edom. In effect, says Mr. Horne,
nothing is clearer than that the history of an inhabitant of Idumea is
the subject of the poem which bears the name of Job, and that all
the persons introduced into it were Idumeans, dwelling in Idumea;
in other words, Edomite Arabs.

VEIL. Women were wont to cover their faces with veils in token of
modesty, of reverence, and subjection to their husbands, Gen. xxiv,
65; 1 Cor. xi, 3, &c. In modern times, the women of Syria never
appear in the streets without their veils. These are of two kinds, the
furragi and the common Aleppo veil; the former being worn by some
of the Turkish women only, the latter indiscriminately by all. The first
is in the form of a large cloak, with long straight sleeves, and a
square hood hanging flat on the back; it is sometimes made of linen,
sometimes of a shawl or cloth. This veil, reaching to the heels,
conceals the whole of the dress, from the neck downward; while the
head and face are covered by a large white handkerchief over the
head dress and forehead, and a smaller one tied transversely over
the lower part of the face, hanging down on the neck. Many of the
Turkish women, instead of the smaller handkerchief, use a long piece
of black crape stiffened, which, sloping a little from the forehead,
leaves room to breathe more freely. In this last way, the ladies are
completely disguised; in the former, the eyes and nose remaining
visible, they are easily known by their acquaintances. The radid is a
species of veil, which Calmet supposes is worn by married women,
as a token of their submission and dependence, and descends low
down on the person. To lift up the veil of a virgin is reckoned a gross
insult; but to take away the veil of a married woman is one of the
greatest indignities that she can receive, because it deprives her of
the badge which distinguishes and dignifies her in that character,
and betokens her alliance to her husband, and her interest in his
affections. This is the reason why the spouse so feelingly complains: