1797 A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, in the Higher and Middle Classes in this Country, Contrasted with Real Christianity

Description

First Edition, Leather Binding, Very Scarce

The very scarce first edition. This is the first of five editions published in London in this year.

The work of the British politician and philanthropist William Wilberforce, who was a leader of the movement to abolish the Atlantic slave trade.

Wilberforce authored this work to challenge the complacent faith he observed among the upper and middle class Christians of England, mounting the argument that many professed Christians had reduced their faith to little more than a set of social conventions, lacking true spiritual conviction. 

He contrasted this weak Christianity with genuine faith, which could be observed in expressing an active commitment to moral and social reform.

Rebacked, retaining the original endpapers.

Retaining the errata leaf, with is bound after the contents list.

ESTC T101668

A2 [1], B-2H8, 2I6, 2K8. Collated, complete.

This influential work, widely read in Wilberforce's day, explicitly linked the Christian faith with social activism.