independently of every other proof; for it is abfurd in the extreme to fuppofe him, under circumftances of obvious detection, capable of advancing what was not true; and if Paul's Epiftles be both genuine and authentic, the christian religion is true.-Think of this argument. You close your observations in the following manner:-" Should the Bible (meaning, as I have before remarked, the Old Testament) and Teftament hereafter fall, it is not I that have been the occafion" You look, I think, upon your production with a parent's partial eye, when you speak of it in fuch a style of felf-complacency. The Bible, Sir, has withstood the learning of Porphyry, and the power of Julian, to fay nothing of the manichean Fauftus-it has refifted the genius of Bolingbroke, and the wit of Voltaire, to fay nothing of a numerous herd of inferior affailants; and it will not fall by your force. You have barbed anew the blunted arrows of former adverfaries; you have feathered them with blafphemy and ridicule; dipped them in your deadlieft poifon; aimed them with your utmost skill; fhot them against the fhield of faith with your utmost vigour; but, like the feeble javelin of aged Priam, they will fcarcely reach the mark, will fall to the ground without a stroke. LETTER LETTER X. THE remaining part of your work can hardly be made the fubject of animadverfion. It principally confifts of unfupported affertions, abufive appellations, illiberal farcasms, firifes of words, profane babblings, and oppofitions of science falfely fo called. I am hurt at being, in mere juftice to the fubject, under the neceffity of ufing fuch harsh language; and am fincerely forry that, from what cause I know not, your mind has received a wrong bias in every point refpecting revealed religion. You are capable of better things; for there is a philofophical fub. limity in fome of your ideas, when you speak of the Supreme Being, as the creator of the universe.. That you may not accufe me of disrespect, in passing over any part of your work without beftowing proper attention upon it, I will wait upon you through what you call your-conclufion. You refer your reader to the former part of the Age of Reason; in which you have fpoken of what you esteem three frauds-mystery, miracle, and prophecy.I have not at hand the book to which you refer, and know not what you have faid on thefe fubjects; they are fubjects of great importance, and we, probably, fhould differ effentially inour opinion concerning them; but, I confefs, I am not forry to be excufed from examining what you have faid on these points. The fpecimen of your reafoning, which is now before me, has taken from me every every inclination to trouble either my reader, or myfelf, with any obfervations on your former book. You admit the poffibility of God's revealing his will to man; yet "the thing fo revealed," you fay, "is revelation to the perfon only to whom it is made; his account of it to another is not revelation." This is true; his account is fimple testimony. You add, there is no "poffible criterion to judge of the truth of what he fays."-This I pofitively deny; and contend, that a real miracle, performed in atteftation of a revealed truth, is a certain criterion by which we may judge of the truth of that atteftation. I am perfectly aware of the objections which may be made to this pofition, I have examined them with care; I acknowledge them to be of weight; but I do not speak unadvifedly, or as wishing to dictate to other men, when I fay, that I am perfuaded the pofition is true. So thought Mofes, when, in the matter of Korah, he faid to the die the com"If these men mon death of all men, then the Lord hath not fent me."-So thought Elijah, when he faid-" Lord God of Abraham, Ifaac, and of Ifrael, let it be known this day, that thou art God in Ifrael, and that I am thy fervant;"-and the people before whom he fpake, were of the fame opinion; for, when the fire of the Lord fell, and confumed the burnt facrifice, they faid-" The Lord he is the God." So thought our Saviour, when he faid-"The works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me;" and, "if I do not the works of my Father, believe me not." What reafon have we to believe Jefus fpeaking in the gofpel, and to disbelieve Mahomet fpeaking in the Koran? Both of them lay claim to a divine commiffion; and yet we receive the words of the one as a revelation from God, and we reject the words of the other as an imposture of man. The reafon is evident, Jefus established his pretenfions, not by alledging any fecret communication with the Deity, but by working numerous and indubitable miracles in the prefence of thousands, and which the most bitter and watchful of his enemies could not difallow; but Mahomet wrought no miracles at all.-Nor is a miracle the only criterion by which we may judge of the truth of a relation. If a feries, of prophets fhould, through a courfe of many centuries, predict the appearance of a certain perfon, whom God would, at a particular, time, fend into the world for a particular end; and at length a perfon fhould appear, in whom all the predictions were minutely accomplished; fuch a completion of prophecy would be a criterion of the truth of that revelation, which that perfon fhould deliver to mankind. Or if a perfon fhould now fay, (as many falfe prophets have faid, and are daily faying,) that he had a commiffion to declare the will of God; and, as a proof of his veracity, fhould predi&-that, after his death, he would rife from the dead on the third day; the completion of fuch a prophecy would, I prefume, be a fufficient criterion of the truth of what this man might have faid concerning the will of God. Now I tell you, (fays Jefus to his difciples, concerning Judas, who was to betray him,) before it come, that when it is come to pafs ye may believe that I am he. In various parts of the gofpels our Saviour, with the utmoft propriety, claims to be received as the meffenger of God, not only from the miracles which he wrought, but from the prophecies which were fulfilled in his perfon, and from the predictions which he himfelf delivered. Hence, inftead of there being no criterion by which we may judge of the truth of the chriftian revelation, there are clearly three. It is an eafy matter to use an indecorous flippancy of language in fpeaking of the chriftian religion, and with a fupercilious negligence negligence to clafs Chrift and his apostles amongst the impoftors who have figured in the world; but it is not, I think, an eafy matter for any man, of good fenfe and found erudition, to make an impartial examination into any one of the three grounds of christianity which I have here mentioned, and to reject it. What is it, you afk, the Bible teaches?-The. prophet Micah fhall anfwer you: it teaches us"to do jufly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God;"-juftice, mercy, and piety, inftead of what you contend for-rapine, cruelty, and murder. What is it, you demand, the Testament teaches us? You answer your question-to believe that the Almighty committed debauchery with a woman.-Abfurd and impious affertion! No, Sir, no; this profane doctrine, this miferable ftuff, this blafphemous perverfion of fcripture, is your doctrine, not that of the New Teftament. I will tell you the leffon which it teaches to infidels as well as believers; it is a leffon which philofophy never taught, which wit cannot ridicule, nor fophif try difprove; the leffon is this-" The dead fhall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear fhall live :-all that are in their graves fhall come forth; they that have done good, unto the refurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the refurrection of damnation." The moral precepts of the gofpel are fo well fitted to promote the happinefs of mankind in this world, and to prepare human nature for the future enjoyment of that bleffedness, of which, in our prefent ftate, we can form no conception, that I had no expectation they would have met with your disapprobation. You fay, however," As to the fcraps of morality that are irregularly and thinly fcattered in thofe books, they make no part of the pretended thing, revealed religion."-" Whatfoever |