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l^arbarlj College fLiiirarg 

THE GIFT OF 

SAMUEL ABBOTT GREElf,- M.D., 
OF BOSTON. 

(Clttss of 1851.) 




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AGE OF REASON: 



AN INVESTIGATION 



TRUE AND FABULOUS 
THEOLOGY. 



PiJElT FIRST. 



BOSTON: 
JOSIAH P. MENDUM. 

1*8 5 2. 

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TO MT 

FELLOW CITIZENS 

OF THE 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



I PUT the following work under your protection. It 
contains my opinion upon Religion. You will do me the 
justice to remember, that I have always strenuously sup- 
ported the Right of every tMan to his opinion, however 
different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies 
to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his pres- 
ent opinion, because he precludes himself the right of 
changing it. 

The most formidable weapon, against errors of every 
kind, is Reason. I have never used any other, and I trust 
I never shall. 

Your affectionate friend and fellow-citizen, 
THOMAS PAINE, 

Luxembourg y (Paris,) 8th Pluvioise, 
Second year of the French Republic, one and indivisible, 
January 27, O. 8. 1794. 



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AGE OF REASON. 

PART I. 



It has been my intentioD, for several years past, 
to publish my thoughts upon religion. I am well 
aware of the difficulties that attend the subject, and 
from that consideration, had reserved it to a more 
advanced period of life. I intended it to be the last 
ofiering I should make to my fellow-citizens of all 
nations, and that at a time, when the purity of the 
motive that induced me tq it, could not admit of a 
question, even by those who might disapprove the 
work. 

The circumstance that has now taken place in 
France, of the total abolition of the whole national 
order of priesthood, and of every thing appertain- 
ing to compulsive systems of religion, and compul- 
sive articles of faith, has not only precipitated my 
intention, but rendered a work of tliis kind exceed- 
ingly necessary, lest, in the general >vreck of super- 
stition, of false systems of government, and false 
theology, we lose sight of morality, of humanity, 
and ofthe theology that is tnie. 

As several of my colleagues, and others of my 
fellow-citizens of France, have given me the exam- 
ple of making their voluntary and individual pro- 
fession of faith, I also will make mine* and I do 

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6 * , AGE OP REASON. [PART I. 

this with all that sincerity and frankness with which 
the mind of man communicates with itself. 

I believe in one God, and no more ; and I hope 
for happiness beyond this life. 

I believe the equality of man ; and I believe that 
religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mer- 
. cy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures 
happy. 

But, lest it should be supposed that I believe ma* 
ny other things in addition to these, I shall, in the 
progress of this work, declare the things I do not 
believe, and my reasons for not believing them. 

I do not believe in the creed professed by the 
Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek 
church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant 
church, nor by any church that I know of. My 
o^vn mind is my own church. 

All national institutions of churches, whether 
Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no oth- 
er than human inventions, set up to ten*ify and en- 
slave mankind, and monopolise power and profit. 

I do not mean by this declaration to condemn 
those who believe otherwise ; they have the same 
right to their belief that I have to mine. But it is 
necessary to the happiness of man, that he be men- 
tally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist 
in believing or in disbelieving; it consists in pro- 
fessing to believe what he does not believe. 

It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief^ 
if I may so express it, that mental lying has produc- 
ed in society. When a man has so far corrupted 
and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to sub- 
scribe his professional belief to things he does not 
believe, he has prepared himself for the commission 
of every other crime. He takes up the trade of a 
priest for the sake of gain, and in order to qualify 
himself for that trade, he begins with a perjury. 
Can we conceive anything more destructive to mo- 
rality than this ? 



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TAKT I.] AGE OF REASON. 7 

Soon after I had published the pamphlet " Com- 
mon Sense,** in America, I saw the exceeding pro- 
tMbility that a revolution in the system of govern- 
ment would be followed by a revolution in the sys- 
tem of religion. The adulterous connexion of 
church and state, wherever it had taken place, 
whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, had so ef- 
fectually prohibited by pains and penahies every 
discussion upon established creeds, and upon first 
principles of religion, that until the system of gov- 
ernment should be changed, those subjects could 
not be brought fairly and openly before the world ; 
but that whenever this should be done, a revolution 
in the system of religion would follow. Human in- 
ventions and priestcraft would be detected ; and 
man would return to the pure, unmixed, and una- 
dulterated belief in one God, and no more. 

Every national church or religion has established 
itself by pretending some special mission from God, 
communicated to certain individuals. The Jews 
have their Moses ; the Christians their Jesus Christ, 
their apostles, and saints ; and the Turks their Ma 
homet, as if the way to God was not open to every 
man alike. 

Each of those churches show certain books, which 
they call revelation, or the word of God. The Jews 
say, that their word of God was given by God to 
Moses, face to face ; the Christians say, that their 
word of Grod came by divine inspiration ; and the 
Turks say, that their word of God, (the Koran,) was 
brought by an angel from heaven. Each of those 
churches accuse the other of unbelief ; and, for my 
own part, I disbelieve them all. 

As it is necessary to affix right ideas to words, I 
will, before I proceed farther into the subject, oflfer 
some other observations on the word revelaiion. 
Revelation, when applied to religion, means some- 
thing communicated immediately from God to man. 

No one will deny or dispute the power of the Al- 

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8 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

mighty to make such a communication, if he pleas- 
es. But admitting, for the sake of a case, that some* 
thing has been revealed to a certain person, and no| 
revealed to any other person, it is a revelation to 
that person only. When he tells it to a second per- 
son, a second to a third, a third to a fourth, and so 
on, it ceases to be a revelation to all those persons. 
It is revelation to the first person only, and hearsay 
to every other; and, consequently, they are not 
obliged to believe it. 

It is a contradiction in terms and ideas, to call 
anything a revelation that comes to us at second- 
hand, either verbally or in v^riting. Revelation is 
necessarily limited to the first communication ; af- 
ter this, it is only au account of something which 
that person says was a revelation made to him ; an4 
though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it 
cannot be incumbent on me to believe it in the same 
manner ; for it was not a revelation made to me, and 
I have only his word for it that it was made to him. 

When Moses told the children of Israel that he 
received the two tables of the commandments from 
the hands of God, they were not obliged to believe 
him, because they had no other authority for it than 
bis telling them so ; and I have no other authority 
for it than some historian telling me so. The com- ' 
mandments carry no internal evidence of divinity 
with them ; they contain some good moral precepts, 
such as any man qualified to be a lawgiver, or a le- 
gislator, could produce himself, without havjng re- 
course to supernatural intervention.* 

When I am told that the Koran was written in 
Heaven, and brought to Mahomet by an angel, the 
account comes too near the same kind of hearsay 
evidence and second-hand authoAty as the former. 

♦ It is, however, necessary to except the declaration 
which says, that God visits the tins of the fathers upon the 
children ; it is contrary to every principle of moral jns- 
tice 

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PAET !•] AGE OP REASON. 9 

I did not see the angel myself, and, therefore, I 
have a right not to believe it. 

When also I am told that a woman called the 
Virgin Mary, said, or gave out, that she was with 
child without any cohabitation with a man, and 
that her betrothed husband, Joseph, said that an an- 
gel told him so, I have a right to beKeve them or 
not ; such a circumstance required a much strong- 
er evidence than their bare word for it ; but we 
have not even this — for neither Joseph nor Mary 
wrote any such matter themselves ; it is only re- 
ported by others that they said so — it is hearsay up- 
on hearsay, and I do not choose to rest my belief 
upon such evidence. 

It is, however, not difficult to account for the 
credit that was given to the story of Jesus Christ 
being the Son of God. He was born when the 
. heathen mythology had still some fashion and re- 
pute in the world, and that mythology had prepar- 
ed the people for the belief of such a stoi-y. Al- 
most all the extraordinary men that lived under the 
heathen mythology, were reputed to be the sons of 
some of their gods. It was not a new thing, at 
that time, to believe a man to have been celestially 
begotten ; the intercourse of gods with women was 
then a matter of familiar opinion. Their Jupiter,, 
according to their accounts, had cohabited with hun- 
dreds ; the story, therefore, had notiiing in it either 
new, wonderful, or obscene ; it was conformable to 
the opinions that then prevailed among the people 
called Gentiles, or Mythologists, and it was those 
people only that believed it. The Jews, who had 
kept strictly to the belief of one God, and no more, 
and who had always rejected the heathen mytholo- 
gy, never credited the story. 

It is curious to observe how the theory of what 
is called the Christian church, spi-ung out of the 
tale of the heathen mythology. A direct incorpo- 
ration took place in the first instance, by making 



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10 AGE OF KEABQJS. [PART I. 

the reputed founder to be celestially begotten. The 
tvinity of gods that then followed was no other than 
a reduction of the fonner plurality, which was about 
twenty or thirty thousand ; the statue of Mary suc- 
ceeded that of Diana of Ephesus ; the deification of 
heroes changed into the canoi^ization of saints ; the 
mythologists had gods for every thing ; the Christ- 
ian mythologists had saints for every thing; the 
church became as crowded with the one, as the 
pantheon had been with the other; and Rome was 
the place of both. The Christian theory is little 
else than the idolatry of the ancient Mythologists, 
accommodated to the purposes of power and reve- 
nue ; and it yet remains to reason and philosophy 
to abolish the amphibious fraud. 

Nothing that is here said can apply, even with 
the most distant disrespect, to the rehl character of 
Jesus Christ. He was a virtuous and an amiable 
man. The morality that he preached and practis- 
ed was of the most benevolent kind ; and though 
similar systems of morality had been preached by 
Confucius, and by some of the Greek philosophers, 
many ages before ; by the Quakers since ; and by 
many good men in all ages, it has not been exceed- 
ed by any. 

Jesus Christ wrote no account of himself, of his 
birth, parentage, or .any thing else ; not a line of 
what is called the New Testament is of his own 
writing. The histoir of him is altogether the work 
of other people ; and as to the account given of his 
resurrection and ascension, it was the necessary 
counterpart to the story of his birth. His historians 
having brought him into the world in a supernatur- 
al manner, were obliged to take him out again in 
the same manner, or the first part of the story must 
have fallen to the ground. 

The wretched contrivance with whibh this latter 
part is told, exceeds everything that went before it 
The first part, that of the miraculous conception. 



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PART 1.] AGE OF REASON. 11 

was not a thing that admitted of publicity ; and 
therefore the tellers of this part of the story had this 
advantage, that though they might not be credited, 
they could not be detected. They could not be ex- 
pected to prove it, because it was not one of those 
things that admitted of proof, and it was impossible 
that the person of whom it was told could prove it 
himself. 

But the resurrection of a dead person from the 
grave, and his ascension tl^rough the air, is a thing 
very different as to the evidence it admits of, to the 
invisible conception of a child in the womb. The 
resurrection and ascension, supposing them to have 
taken place, admitted of public and ocular demon- 
stration, like that of the ascension of a balloon, or 
the sun at noon day, to all Jerusalem at least. A 
thing which every body is required to believe, re- 
quires that the prc^f and evidence of it should be 
equal to all, and universal ; and as the public visi- 
bility of this last related act was the only evidence 
that could give sanction to the former part, the 
whole of it falls to the ground, because that evi- 
dence never was given. Instead of this, a small 
number of persons, not more than eight or nine, are 
introduced as proxies for the whole world, to say 
they saw it, and all the rest of the world are called 
upon to believe it. But it appears that Thomas did 
not believe the resurrection ; and, as they say, would 
not believe without having ocular and manual de- 
monstration himself. So neither will /, and tl^e rea- 
son is equally as good for me, and for every other 
person, as for Thomas. 

It is in vain to attempt to palliate or disguise this 
matter. The story, so far as relates to the superna- 
tural part, has every mark of fraud and imposition 
stamped upon the face of it. Who were the authore 
of it is as impossible for us now to know, as it is 
for us to be assured, that the books in which the ac- 
count is related, were written by the persons whose 



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il3 A6£ OF REASOK. [PAUT I. 

names they hear; the best surviving evidence yve 
now have rt^^pecting this affair, is the Jews. Tbey 
are regiilurly descended from the people who lived 
in the times this resurrection and ascension is said 
to have h«}ipened, and they say it is not true; It 
has long af)|)eared to me a strange inconsistency to 
cite the Jews as a proof of the truth of the story. It 
is just the same as if a man were to say, I will prove 
the truth of what I have told you, by producing the 
people who say it is false. 

That sucii a person *as Jesus Christ existed, and 
that he was crucified, which was the mode of exe- 
cution at that day, are historical relations strictly 
within the limits of probability. He preached most 
excellent morality, and the equality of man ; but he 
preached also against the corruptions and avarice of 
the Jewish priests, and this brought upon him the 
hatred and vengeance of the whole order of priest- 
hood. The accusation which those priests brougiit 
against him, was that of sedition and conspiracy 
against the Roman government, to which the Jews 
were then subject and tributary ; and it is not im- 
probable that the Roman government might have 
some apprehensions of the effects of his doctrines 
as well as the Jewish priests ; neither is it improb- 
able that Jesus Christ had in contemplation the de- 
livery of the Jewish nation from the bondage of the 
Romans. Between the two, however, this virtuous 
reformer and revolutionist lost his life. 

It is upon this plain narrative of facts, together wJtli * 
anotJiercase I am going to mention, that the Christ- 
ian Mythologists, calling themselves the Christian 
Church, have erected their fable, which for absurd- 
ity and extravagance is not exceeded by any tiling 
that is to be found in the mythology of the ancients. 

The ancient Mythologists tell us that the race of 
Giants made war against Jupiter, and that one of 
them threw a hundred rocks against him atone 
throw; that Jupiter defeated him with thunder^ and 



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TAA% I.] AGE OF REASON. 13 

confined U'un afterwards under Mount iEtna, and 
that every time the Giant turns himself, Mount iEt- 
Ha belches fire. * 

It i» here easy to see that the circumstance of tlie 
. mountain, that of its being a volcano, suggested the 
idea of the fable ; and that the fable is m^de to fit 
and wind itself up with that circumstance. 

The Christian Mythologists tell us, that their Sa- 
tan made war against the Almighty, who defeated 
him, and con^ned him afterwards, not under a 
, mountain, but in a pit. It is here easy to see that 
the first fable suggested the idea of the second ; for 
the fable of Jupiter and the Giants was told many 
hundred years before that of Satan. 

Thus far the ancient and the Christian Mytholo- 
gists differ very Httle from each other. But the lat- 
ter have contrived to carry the matter much farther. 
They have contrived to connect the fabulous part of 
the story of Jesus Christ with the fable originating 
from Mount iEtna ; and, in order to make all parts 
of the story tie together, they have taken to their aid 
the traditions of the Jews ; for the Christian mythol- 
ogy is made up partly from the ancient mythology, 
and partly from the Jewish traditions. 

The Christian Mythologists, after having confin- 
ed Satan in a yit, were obliged to let him out again, 
to bring on the sequel of the fable. He is then in- 
troduced into the garden of Eden in the shape of a 
snake or a serpent, and in that shape he enters into 
^miliair conversation with Eve, who is no way sur- 
prised to hear a snake talk; and the issue of this 
tete-a-tete is, that he persuades her to eat an apple, 
and the eating of that apple damns all mankind. 

After giving Satan this triumph over the whole 
creation, one would have supposed that the church 
Mythologists would have been kind enough to send 
him back again to the pit ; or, if they had not done 
this, that they would have put a mountain upon 
him, (for they say that their faith can remove a 



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14 AGE or REASON. [PAH*E U 

mountain), or have put him under a mountain^ as 
the former Mythologists had done, to prevent h^ 
getting again among the women, and doing mora 
mischief. But instead of this, they leave him^ at 
large, without even obliging him to give his {Niroie 
— the secret of which is, that they eoUld not do 
without him ; and after being at the trouble of mak- 
ing him, they bribed him to stay. They promised 
him ALL the Jews, all the Turks by anticipation^ 
nine-tenths of the world beside, and Mahomet into 
the bargain. After this, who can doubt the bounti'^ 
fulness of the Christian mythology ? 

Having thus made an insurrection and a battle in 
Heaven, in which none of the combatams could bfe 
either killed or wounded — ^put Satan into the pit^^ 
let him out again — given him a triumph over the 
. whole creation — damned all mankind by the eating 
of an apple, these Christian Mythologists bring the 
two ends of their fable together. They represent 
this virtuous and amiable man, Jesus Christ, t& be 
at once both God, Man, and also the Son of God, ce- 
lestially begotten, on purpose to be sacrificed, be- 
cause they say that Eve in her longing had eaten an 
apple. 

Putting aside every thing that might excite laugh- 
ter by its absurdity, or detestation |by ite profane- 
ness, and confining ourselves merely to an examin- 
ation of the parts, it is impossible to conceive a sto- 
ry more derogatory to the Almighty, more incon- 
sistent with his wisdom, more contradictory to his 
power, than this story. 

In order to make for it a foundation to rise upon, 
the inventors were under the necessity of giving to 
the being, whom they call Satan, a power equally as 
great, if not greater, than they* attribute to the Al- 
mighty. They have not only given him the power 
of liberating himself from the pit, after what they 
call his fall, but they have made that power increase 
afterwards to infinity. Before this fall they repre- 



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PART l] age or RSASON. 15 

Bt^t him only as an angel of limited existence, as 
tbey represent the rest. After his fall, he becomes^ 
l^ their account, omnipresent. He exists every 
where, and at the same time. He occupies the 
vrbole immensity of space. 

Not content with this deification of Satan, they 
represent him' as defeating, by stratagem, in the 
shape of an animal of the creation, all the power 
and wisdom of the Almighty. They represent him 
as having compelled the Almighty to the direct ne- 
cessity either of surrendering the whole of this cre- 
ation to the government and sovereignty of this Sa- 
tan, or of capitulating for its redemption by coming 
down upon earth, and exhibiting himself upon a 
cross in the shape of a man. 

Had the inventers of this story told it the contra- 
ry way, that is, had they represented the. Almighty 
as compelling Satan to exhibit himself on a cross, in 
the shape of a snake, as a punishment for his new 
transgression, the story woukl have been less ab« 
surd— 'less contradictory. But instead of this they 
make the transgressor triumph, and the Almighty 
fall 

That many good men have believed this strange 
fable, and lived very good lives under that belief 
(for credulity is not a crime), is what I have no doubt 
o£ In the first place they were educated to believe 
it, and they would have believed any thing else in 
the same manner. There are also many who have 
been so enthusiastically enraptured by what they 
conceived to be the infinite love of God to man, in 
making a sacrifice of hiihself, that the vehemence 
of the idea has forbidden and deterred them from 
exeniining.into the absurdity and profaneness of the 
story. NThe more unnatural any thing is, the more 
is itcapable of becoming the object of dismal admi- 
radon. 

But if objects for gratitude and admiration are 
our desire, do they not present themselves every 



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16 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

hour to our eyes ? Do we not see a fair creation 
prepared to receive us the instant we are born-^a 
world furnished to our hands, that cost us nothing? 
Is it we that light up the sun, that pour down the 
rain, and fill the earth with abundance ? Whether 
we sleep or wake, the vast machinery of the uni- 
verse still goes on. Are these things, and the bless- 
ings they indicate in future, nothing to us ? Can 
our gross feelings be excited by no other subjects 
than tragedy and suicide ? Or is the gloomy pride 
of man become so intolerable, that nothing can flat- 
ter it but a sacrifice of the Creator ? 

I know this bold investigation will alarm many, 
but it would be paying too great a compliment to 
their credulity to forbear it upon that account ; the 
times'and the subject demand it to be done. The 
suspicion that the theory of what is called the 
Christian church is fabulous, is becoming very ex- 
tensive in all countries ; and it will be a consolation 
to men staggering under that suspicion, and doubt- 
ing what to believe and what to disbelieve, to see 
the subject freely investigated. I therefore pass on 
to an examination of the books called the Old and 
New Testament. 

These books, beginning with Genesis and ending 
with Revelation, (which, by the bye, is a book of 
riddles that requires a revelation to explain it,) are, 
we are told, the word of Grod. It is, therefore, prop- 
er for us to know who told us so, that we may know 
what credit to give ta the report. The answer to 
this question is, that nobody can tell, except that we 
tell one another so. The case, however, historical- 
ly appears to be as follows : — 

When the church Mythologists established their 
system, they collected all the writings they could 
find, and managed them as they pleased. It is a 
matter altogether of uncertainty to us wh^ether such 
of the writings as now appear under the name of 
the Old and New Testament, are in the same state 



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■^ 



PARI^ ].] ' AGE OF REASON. 17 

in which those collectors say they found then^ or 
whether they added, altered, abridged, or dre»ed 
them lip. 

Be this as it may, they decided by vote which of 
the books out of the collection they had made, 
should be the word of god, and which should not. 
TTiey rejected several ; they voted others to be 
doubtful, such as the books called the Apocrypha ; 
and those books which had a majority of votes, 
were voted to be the word of God. Had they vot- 
ed otherwise, all the people, since calling themselves 
Christians, had believed otherwise — for the belief 
of the one comes from the vote of the other. Who 
the people were that did all this, we know nothing 
of; they called themselves by the general name of 
the Church ; and this is all we know of the matter. 

As we have no other external evidence or au- 
thority for l)elieving those books to be the word of 
God than what I have mentioned, which is no evi- 
dence or authority at all, I come, in the next place, 
to examine the internal evidence contained in the 
books themselves. 

In the former part of this Essay, I have spoken 
of revelation. I now proceed further with that 
subject, for the purpose of applying it to the books 
in question. 

Revelation is a communication of something, 
which the person, to whom that thing is revealed, 
did not know before. For if I have done a thing, 
or seen it done, it needs no revelation to tell me I 
have done it, or seen it, nor to enable me to tell it, 
or to write it. Revelation, therefore, cannot be ap- 
plied to any thing done upon earth, of which man 
is himself the actor or the witness ; and conse- 
quently all tho historical and anecdotal part of the 
Bible, which is almost the whole of it, is not within 
the meaning and compass of the word revelation, 
and therefore is not the word of God. 

When Samson ran off with the gate-posts of Ga- 
3 

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18 AGE or REASON. [PART I. 

za, if he ever did so, (and whether he did or not is 
nothing to ns,) or when he visited his Delilah, 0|r 
caught his foxes, or did any thing else, what has 
revelajion to do with these things? If they were 
facts, he could tell them him^lf ; or his secretary, 
if he kept one, could write them, if they were worth 
either telling or writing ; and if they were fictitious, 
revelation could not make them true ; and whether 
true or not, we are neither the better nor the wiser 
for knowing them. When we contemplate the ifti-* 
mensity of that Being, who directs and governs the 
incomprehensible whole, of which the utmost ken 
of human sight can discover but a part, we ought to 
feel shame at calling such paltry stories the word 
of God. 

As to the account of the Creation, with which tlie 
book of Genesis opens, it hai^ all the appearance of 
being a tradition which the Israelites had among 
them before they came into Egypt ; and after their 
departure from their country, they put it at the head 
of their history, without telling (as it is most proba- 
ble) that they did not know how they came by it 
The manner in which the account opens, shows it 
to be traditionary. It begins abruptly : it is nobody 
that speaks ; it is nobody that hears ; it i^ address- 
ed to nobody ; it has neither first, second, or third 
person ; it has every criterion of being a tradition, 
it has nd voucher. Moses does not take it upcm 
himself by introducing it with the formality that he 
uses on other occasions, such as that of saying, 
"TAc Lord spake unto Moses, saying, ^^ 

Why it has been called the Mosaic account of the 
Creation, I am at a loss to conceive. Moses, I be- 
lieve, was too good a judge of such subjects to put 
his name to that account. He had been educated 
among the Egyptians, who were a people as well 
skilled in science, and particularly in astronomy, as 
any people of their day ; and the silence and cau- 
tion that Moses observes, in not anthenticating the 



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PART r,] AGE OF REASON. 19 

a<$coutit, is a good negative evidence that he neither 
told it nor believed it. The case is, that every na- 
tion of people has been world-makers, and the Is» 
raelites had as much right to set up the trade of 
world-making as any of the rest ; and as Moses was 
not an Israelite, he might not choose to contradict 
the tradition. The account, however, is harmless ; 
and this is more than can be said of many other 
parts of the Bible. 

Whenever we read the obscene stories, the volup- 
tuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous execu- 
tions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which 
more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more 
consistent that we called it the word of a Demon, 
than the word of God. It is a history of wicked- 
ness, that has served to corrupt and brutalize man- 
kind ; and, for my own part, I sincerely detest it as 
I detest every thing that is cruel. 

We scarcely meet with any thing, a few phrases 
exre|ited, but what deserves either our abhorrence 
or our contempt, till we come to the miscellaneous 
parts of the Bible. In the anonymous publications, 
the Psalms, and the book of Job, more particularly 
in the latter, we find a great <leal of elevated senti- 
ment reverentially expressed of the power and* be- 
nignity of the Almighty ; but they stand on no high- 
er rank than many other compositions on similar 
suWects, as well before that time as since. 

The Proverbs which are said to be Solomon's, 
though most probably a collection, (because they 
discover a knowledge of life, which his situation 
excluded him from knowing,) are an instructive ta- 
ble of ethics. They are inferior in keenness to the 
. proverbs of the Spaniards, and not more wise and 
economical than those of the American Franklin. 

All the remaining parts of the Bible, generally 
known by the name of the Prophets, are the works 
of the Jewish poets and itinerant preachers, who 
mixed poetry, anecdote, and devotion together — and 

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20 AOE OF REASON. [PA&T L 

those works stilT retain the air and style of poetry, 
tliough in translation.''^ 

There is not, throughout the whole hook ca^I^d 
the Bible, any word that describes to us what we 
call a poet, nor any word that describes what we 
call poetry. The case is, that the word propJtet, to 
which latter times have affixed a new idea, was the 
Bible word for poet, and the word propltesying 

* As there are many readers who do not see that a com- 
position is poetry, unless it be in rhyme, it is for their in- 
forniation that I add this note. 

Poetry consists principally in two things — imag«y and 
composition. The composition of poetry differs from that 
of prose in the manner of mixing long and short syllables 
together. Take a long syllable out of a line of poetry, and 
put a short one in the room of it, or put a long syllable 
where a short one should be, and that line will lose its po- 
etical harmony. It will have an effect upon the line like 
that of misplacing a note in a song. 

The imagery in those books, called the prophets, apper- 
tains altogether to poetry. It is fictitious, and ollen ex- 
travagant, and not admissible in any other kind of writing 
than poetry. 

To show that these writings are composed in poetical 
numbers, I will take ten syllables as they stand in the book, 
and make a line of the same number of syllables (heroic 
measure) that shall rhyme with the last word. It will 
then be seen that the composition of those books is poet- 
ical measure. The instance I shall produce is from Isaiah : 
^'Hear, O ye heavens , and give ear, O earth!** 
.'T is God himself that calls attention forth. 

Another instahce I shall quote is from the mournful Jer- 
emiah, to which I shall add two other lines, for the purpose 
of carrying out the figure, and showing the intention of the 
poet. 

** O ! thai mine head were waters and mine eyes" 
Were fountains, flowing like the liquid skies ; 
Then woukl I give the |pighty flood release, 
'rthe" 



And weep a deluge for the human race. 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. ' 21 

meimt the art of making poetiy. It also meant the 
art of playing poetry to a tune upon any instru- 
naont of music. 

We read of prophesying with pipes, tabrets, and 
horns-— of prophesying with harps, with psalteries, 
with cymbals, and with every other instrument of 
music tlien in fashion. Were we now to speak of 
prophesying with a fiddle, or with a pipe and tabor, 
the expression would have no meaning, or would 
appear ridiculous, and to some people contemptu- 
ous, because we have changed the meaning of the 
word. 

We are told of Saul being among the prophets, 
aad also that he prophesied ; v but we are not told 
what they prophesied nor what he prophesied, The^ 
case is, there was nothing to tell ; for these prophets* 
were a company of musicians and poets, and Saul 
joined in the concert, and this was called prophesy- 
ing. 

The account given of this affair in the book of 
Samuel, is, that Saul met a company of prophets; a 
whole company of them ! coming down with a psed- 
tery, a tabret, a pipe, and a harp, and that they pro- 
phesied, and that he prophesied with them. But it 
appears afterwards, that Saul prophesied badly ; — 
that is, performed his part badly ; for it is said, that, 
an " evil spirit from God " * came upon Saul, and 
he prophesied. 

Now, were there no other passage in the book 
called the Bible, than this, to demonstrate to us that 
we have lost the original meaning of the word pro- 
phesy, and substituted another meaning in its place, 
this alone would be sufficient ; for it is impossible 
to use and apply the word pj'ophesy, in the place it 

* As those men, who call themselves divines and com- 
mentators, are very fond of puzzling one another, I leave 
them to contest the meaning of the first part of the phrase, 
that of an evil spirit of God. I keep to my text — ^I keep 
to the meaning of the word prophesy. 

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22 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

is here used and applied, if we give to it the sense 
tvhich latter times have affixed to it. The maHBisr 
in which it is here used strips it of all religions 
meaning, and shows that a man might then be ft 
prophet, or might prophesy, as he may now be a po- 
et or a musician, without any regard to the morali- 
ty or immorality of his character. The word was 
originally a term of science, promiscuously applied 
to poetry and to music, and not restricted to any 
subject upon which poetry and music might be ei> 
ercised. 

Deborah and Barak are called prophets, not be- 
cause they predicted any thing, but because they 
composed the poem or song that bears their name, 
in celebration of an tact already doae. David is 
ranked among the prophets, for he w%is a musician, 
and was also reputed to be (though perhaps very 
erroneously) the author of the Psalms. But Abra- 
ham, Isaac, and Jacob are not called prophets ; it 
does not appear from any accounts we have that 
they could either sing, play music, or make poetry. 

We are told of the greater and the lesser pro- 
phets. They might as well tell us of the greater 
and the lesser God ; for there cannot be degrees in 

Srophesying, consistently with its modem sense, 
►ut there are degrees in poetry, and tlierefbre the 
phrase is reconcileable to the case, when we under- 
stand by it the greater and the lesser poets. 

It is altogether unnecessary, after this, to offer 
any observations upon what those men, styled 
prophets, have written. The axe goes at once 
to the root, by showing that the original meaning 
of the word has been mistaken,* and consequently 
all the inferences that have been drawn from diose 
books, the devotional respect that has been paid to 
them, and the labored commentaries that have 
been written upon them, under that mistaken 
meaning, are not worth disputing about. In many 
things, however, the writings of the Jewish poets 



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FART 1.] AGE OF REASON. 23 

deserve a better fate than that of being bound up, 
fta they now are, with the trash that accompanies 
$hen>) under the abused name of the word of God. 

If we permit ourselves to conceive right ideas 
of things, we must* necessarily affix the idea, not 
only of unchangeableness, but of the utter impos- 
sibility of any change taking place, by any means 
or accident whatever, in that which we would 
honor with the name of the word of God ; and 
therefore the word of God cannot exist in any 
written or human language. 

The continually progi-essive change to which 
the meaning of words is subject, the want of 
a universal language which reniji^rs translation 
necessary, the errors to which translations are 
9gain subject, the mistakes of copyists and print- 
ers, together with the possibility of wilful alter- 
ation, are of themselves evidences that human 
language, whether in speech or in print, cannot 
be Uie vehicle of the word of God. The word of 
God exists in something else. 

Did the book, called the Bible, excel in purity 
of ideas and expression all the books now extant 
in the world, 1 would not take it for my rule of 
&ith, as being the word of God, because the pos- 
sibili^ would nevertheless exist of my being im- 
posed upon. But when I see throughout the 
greatest part of this book, scarcely any thing but 
a history of the grossest vices, and a collection 
of the most paltry and contemptible tales, I cannot 
dishonor my Creator by call'mg it by his name. 

Thus much for the Bible ; I now go on to the 
, book called the New Testament The JVew Testa- 
ment! that is, the new will, as if there could be 
two wills of the Creator. 

Had it been the object or the intention of Jesus 
Christ to establish a new religion, he would un- 
doubtedly have written the system himself or pro* 
cured it to he written in his life time. But there is 



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24 AGE OF REASON. [fAKT U 

no publication extant authenticated with his nsmie. 
All the books called the New Testament , were 
written after his death. He was a Jew by birth 
and by profession ; and he was the son of God in 
like manner that every other person is — for thQ 
Creator is the Father of All. 

The first four books, called Matthew, Mark^ 
Luke, and John, do not give a history of the life 
of Jesus Christ, but only detached anecdotes of* 
him. It appears from these books, that the whole 
time of his being a preacher was not more than 
eighteen months ; and it was only during this short 
time, that those men became acquainted with hina^ 
They make mention of him at the age of twelve 
years, sittingf they say, among the Jewish doctors, 
asking and answering them questions. As this, 
was several years before their acquaintance with 
him began, it is most prdbable they had this 
anecdote from his parents. From this time there 
is no account of him for about sixteen years. 
Where he lived, or how he employed himself 
during this interval, is not known. Most probably 
he was working at his father's trade, which was 
that of a carpenter. It does not appear that he 
had any school education, and the probability is,* 
that he could not write, for his parents were 
extremely poor, as appears from their not being 
able to pay for a bed when he was bom. 

It is somewhat curious that the three persons 
whose names are* the most universally recordedr 
were of very obscure parentage. Moses was a 
foundling ; Jesus Christ was bom in a stable ; and 
Mahomet was a mule-driver. The first and the 
last of these men, were founders of different syah' 
tems of religion ; but Jesus Christ founded no new 
system. He called men to the practice of moral 
virtues, and the belief of one God. The great 
trait in his character is philanthropy. 

The manner in which he was apprehended^ 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 25 

shows that he was not much known at that time ; 
and it shows also, that the meethigs he then held 
with his followers were in secret; and that he 
had given over or suspended preaching puhlicly. 
Judas coald not otherwise betray him than by 
giving information where he was, arid pointing 
him out to the officers that went to arrest him; 
and the reason for employing and paying Judas 
to do this could arise only from the causes already 
mentioned, that of his not being much known, and 
living concealed. 

The idea of his concealment, not only agrees 
rery ill with his reputed divinity but associates 
with it something of pusillanimity ; and his being 
betrayed, or in other words, his being apprehend- 
ed, on the information of one of his followers, 
shows that he did not intend to be apprehenrlcd, 
and consequently that he did not intend to be cru- 
cified. 

The Christian Mythologists tell us that Christ 
died for the sins of the world, and that he came 
on purpose to die. Would it not then have been 
the same if he had died of a fever or of the small- 
pox, of old age, or of any thing else ? 

The declaratory sentence which, they sjiy, was 
passed upon Adam, in case he eat of the apple, 
was not, that thou shall surely be crucified, hut thou 
shall surely die — the sentence of death, and not the 
manner of dying. Crucifixion, therefore, or any 
other particular manner of dying, made no part of 
the sentence that Adam was to suffer, and conse- 
cjuently, even upon their own tactics, it could make 
no part of the sentence that Christ was to suffei 
in the room of Adam. A fever would have done 
as well as a cross, if there was any occasion for 
either. 

This sentence of death, which they tell us was 
thus passed upon Adam, must either have meant 
dying naturally, that is, ceasing to live, or have 
4 

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26 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

meaDt what these Mythologists call damno^on; 
and, consequently, the act of dying on the part 
of Jesus Christ, must, according to their system, 
apply as a prevention to one or other of these two 
things happening to Adam and to us. 

That it does not prevent our dying is evident, 
because we all die ; and if their accounts of lon- 
gevity be true, men die faster since the crucifixion 
than before ; and with respect to the second ex- 
planation, (including with it the natural death of 
Jesus Christ as a substitute for the eternal death or 
damnation of all mankind) it is impertinently repre- 
senting the Creator as coming off, or revoking the 
sentence, by a pun or a quibble upon the word 
death. That manufacturer of quibbles, St. Paul, 
if he wrote the books that bear his name, has 
helped this quibble on by making another quibble 
upon the word Adam. He makes there to be two 
Adams; the one who sins in fact, and sulOTers by 
proxy; the other who sins by proxy, and suffers 
in fact. A religion thus interlarded with quibble, 
apbterfuge, and pun, has a tendency to instruct its 
professors in the practice of these arts. They 
acquire the habit without being aware of the 
cause. 

If Jesus Christ was the being which those My- 
thologists tell us he was, and that he came into this 
world to suffer^ which is a word they sometimes 
use instead of to die, the only real suffering he 
could have endured, would have been to live^. His 
existence here was a state of exilement or tran- 
sportation from Heaven, and the way back to his 
original country was to die. In fine, every thing 
in this strange system is the reverse of what it pre- 
tends to be. It is the reverse of truth, and I be- 
come so tired with examining into its inconsist- 
ences and absurdities, that I hasten to the con- 
clusion of it, in order to precede something better. 

How much, or what parts of the books called 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 27 

the New Testament, were written by the persons 
whose names they bear, is what we can know 
nothing of, neither are we certain in what lan- 
guage they were originally written. The mat- 
ters they now contain may be classed under 
two heads — anecdote and epistolary correspond- 
ence. 

The four books already mentioned, Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, and John, are altogether anecdotal. 
They relate events after they had taken place. 
They tell what Jesus Christ did and said, and 
what others did and said to him; and in several 
instances they relate the same event differently. 
Revelation is necessarily out of the question with 
respect to those books; not only because of the 
disagreement of the writers, but because revelation 
cannot be applied to the relating of facts by the 
persons who saw them done, nor to the relating or 
recording of any discourse or conversation by those 
who heard it. The book called the Acts of the 
Apostles (an anonymous work) belongs also to the 
anecdotal part. 

All the other parts of the New Testament, ex- 
cept the book of enigmas, called the Revelation, 
are a collection of letters under the name of 
epistles ; and the forgery of letters has been such 
a common practice in the world, that the proba- 
bility is at least equal, whether they are genuine or 
forged. One thing, however, is much less equivo- 
cal, which is, that out of the matters contained in 
those books, together with the assistance of some 
old stories, the church has set up a system of 
religion very contradictory to the character of the 
person whose name it bears. It has set up a 
religion of pomp and of revenue, in pretended 
imitation of a person whose life was humility and 
poverty. ^ 

The invention of purgatory, and of the releasing 
of souls itherefrom, by prayers, bought of the 



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28 AGE OF REASON. [PART I." 

church with money; the selling of pardons, dus- 
pensations, and indulgences, are revenue laws, 
without bearing that name or carrying that appear- 
ance. But the case nevertheless is, that those 
things derive their origin from the paroxysm of 
the crucifixion and the theory deduced therefrom, 
which was, that one person could stand in the 
place of another, and c>x)uld perform meritorious 
services for him. The probability, therefore, is, 
that the whole theory or doctrine of what is called 
the redemption (which is said to have been accom- 
plished by the act of one person in the room of 
another) was originally fabricated on purpose to 
bring forward and build all those secondary and 
pecuniai-y redemptions upon ; and that the passages 
in the books upon which the idea of theory of 
redemption is buih, have been manufactured and 
fabricated for that purpose. Why are we to give 
this church credit, when she tells us that those 
books are genuine in every part, any more than we 
give her credit for every thing else she has told us ; 
or for the miracles she says she has performed? 
That she cotUd fabricate writings is certain, because 
shd could write ; and the composition of the writ- 
ings in question is of that kind that asy body might 
do it ; and that she did fabricate them is not more 
inconsistent with probability, than that she could 
tell us, as she has done, that she could and did 
work miracles. 

Since then no external evidence can, at this long 
distance of time, be produced to prove whether the 
church fabricated the doctrines called redemption 
or not, (for such evidence, whether for or against, 
would be subject to the same suspicion of being 
fabricated) the case can only be referred to the 
internal evidence which the thing carries of itself; 
and this affords a very strong presumption of its 
being a fabrication. For the internal evidence is, 
that the theory or doctrine of redemption has for 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASOIT. 29 

its basis an idea of pecuniary justice^ and not that 
of moral justice. 

If I owe a person money, and cannot pay him, 
and he threatens lo put me in prison, another per- 
son can take the debt upon himself, and pay it for 
me ; but if I have committed a crime, every cir- 
cumstance of the case is changed, moral justice 
cannot take the innocent for the guilty, even if the 
innocent would offer itself. To suppose justice to 
do this, is to destroy the principle of its existence, 
which is the thing itself; it is then no longer jus- 
tice^ it is indiscriminate revenge. 

This single reflection will show that the doctrine 
of redemption is foundjed on a mere pecuniary 
idea, corresponding to that of a debt, which another 
person might pay ; and as this pecuniary idea .cor- 
responds again with the system of second redemp- 
tions, obtained through the means of money given 
to the church for pardons, the probability is, that 
the same persons fabricated both one and the other 
of those theories ; and that, in truth, there is no 
such thing as redemption ; that it is fabulous, and 
that man stands in the same relative condition with 
his Maker he ever did stand, since man existed, 
and that it is his greatest consolation to think so. 

Let him believe this, and he will live more con- 
sistently and morally than by any other system ; it 
is by his being taught to contemplate himself as an 
out-law, as an out-cast, as a beggar, as a mumper, 
as one thrown, as it were, on a dunghill, at an im- 
mense distance from his Creator, and who must 
make his approaches by creeping and cringing to 
intermediate beings, that he conceives either a con- 
temptuous disregard for every thing under ,the 
name of religion, or becomes indifferent, or turas 
what he calls devout. In the latter case, he con- 
sumes his life in grief, or the affectation of it ; his 
prayers are reproaches ; his humility is ingratitude ; 
he calls himself a worm ; and the fertile earth a 



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30 AGE OF REASOrr. [PART 1. 

dunghill ; aud all the blessings of life, by the thanl^- 
less name of vanities ; he despises the choicest gift 
of God to man, the gift of reason; and having 
endeavored to force upon himself the belief of a 
83^stem against which reason revolts, he ungrate- 
fully calls it human reason, as if man could give 
reason to himself. 

Yet, with all tliis strange appearance of humility, 
and this contempt for human reason, he ventures 
into the boldest presumptions; he finds fault with 
every thing ; his selfishness is never satisfied ; his 
ingratitude is never at an end. He takes on him- 
self to direct the Almighty what to do, even in the 
government of the universe ; he prays dictatorially ; 
when it is sun-shine, he prays for rain, and when 
it is rain, he prays for sun-shine ; he follows the 
same idea in every thing that he prays for; for 
what is tlie amount of all his prayers, but an 
attempt to make the Almighty change his mind, 
and act otherwise than he does ? It is as if he 
were to say — thou knowest not so well as I. 

But some perhaps will say — Are we to have no 
word of God — No revelation! I answer, Yes: 
there is a word of God ; there is a revelation. 

The word of God is the creation we be- 
hold: And it is in this word, which no human 
invention can counterfeit or alter, that God speak- 
eth univei*sally to man. 

Human language is local and changeable, and is 
therefore incapable of being used as the means of 
unchangeable and universal information. The idea 
that God sent Jesus Christ to publish, as they say, 
the glad tidings to all nations, from one end of the 
earth to the other, is consistent only with the igno- 
rance of those who knew nothing of the extent 
of the world, and who believed, as those world- 
saviours believed, and continued to believe, for 
several centuries, (and that in contradiction to the 
discoveries of philosophers, and the experience of 



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PASLT I.] AGE OF REASON. 31 

navigators) that the earth was flat like a trencher; 
and that a man might w^lk to%he end of it. 

But how was Jesus Christ to make any thing 
known to all nations? He could speak but one 
language, which was Hebrew ; and there are in the 
world several hundred languages. Scarcely any 
two nations speak the same language, or under- 
stand each other ; and as to translations, every man 
who knows any thing of languages, knows that it 
was impossible to translate from one language to 
another, npt only without losing a great part of the 
origmal, but frequently of mistaking the sense ; and 
besides all this, the art of printing was wholly un- 
known at the time Christ lived. 

It is always necessary that the means that are to 
accomplish any end, be equal to the accomplish- 
ment of that end, or the end cannot be accomplish- 
ed; It is in this, that the difference between finite 
and infinite power and wisdom discovers itself. 
Man frequently fails in accomplishing his ends^ 
from a "natural inability of the power to the pur- 
pose ; and frequently from the want of wisdom to 
apply power properly. But it is impossible for 
infinite power and wisdom to fail as man faileth. 
The means it useth are always equal to the end ; 
but human language, more especially as there is 
not a universal language, is incapable of being used 
as a universal means of unchangeable and uniform 
information, and, therefore, it is not the means that 
God useth in manifesting himself universally to 
man. 

It is only in the creation that all our ideas and 
conceptions of a word of God can unite. The 
Creation speaketh a universal language, independ- 
ently of human speech or human language, multi- 
plied and various as they be. It is an ever-existing 
original, which every man can read. It cannot be 
forged; it cannot be counterfeited; it cannot be 
lost ; it cannot be altered ; it cannot be suppressed. 



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32 AGE OF REASON. [PART Jl» 

It does not depend upon the will of man wheth^ 
it shall be published or not ; it publishes itself froia 
one end of the earth to th^ other. It preacheei to 
all nations and to all worlds ; and this word of G$d 
reveals to man ail that is necessary for man CD 
know of God. 

Do we want to contemplate his power ? We see 
it in the immensity of the Creation. Do we want 
to contemplate his wisdom ? We see it in the un- 
changeable order by which the incomprehensible 
whole is governed. Do we want to contemplate 
his munificence? We see it in the abundance 
with which he fills the earth. Do we want to con- 
template his mercy ? We see it in his not with- 
holding that abundance even from the unthankful. 
In fine, do we want to know what God is ? Search 
not the book called the Scripture, which any human 
hand might make, but the Scripture called the Cre- 
ation. 

The only idea man can afiix to the name of God, 
is that of a Jlrst causCf the cause of all things. And, 
incomprehensible and difficult as it is for a man to 
conceive what a first cause is, he arrives at the be- 
lief of it, fi-om the tenfold greater difficulty of dis- 
believing it. It is difficult beyond description to 
conceive that space can have no end; but it is 
more difficult to conceive an end. It is difficult 
beyond the power of man to conceive an eternal 
duration of what we call time ; but it is more im- 
possible to conceive a time when there shall be no 
time. In like manner of reasoning, every thing 
we behold carries in itself the internal evidence 
that it did not make itself. Evei7 man^ is an evi- 
dence to himself, that he did not make himself; 
neither could his father make himself, nor his 
grandfather, nor any of his race ; neither could 
any tree, plant, or animal, make itself; and it is the 
conviction arising from this evidence, that carries 
us on, as it were, by necessity, to the belief of a 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 33 

filM eause eternally existing, of a nature totally dif- 
ferint to any material existence we know of, and 
by the power of which all things exist ; and this 
first cause man calls €k>d. 

It is only by the exercise of reason, that man 
can discover God. Take away that reason, and he 
would be incapable of understanding any thing; 
and, in this case, it would be just as consistent to 
read even the book called the Bible to a horse as to 
a man. How then is it that those people pretend 
to reject reason ? 

Almost the only parts in the book called the 
Bible, that convey to us any idea of God, are some 
chapters in Job, and the 19th Psalm ; I recollect no 
other. Those parts are true deistical compositions ; 
for they treat of the Deity through his works. 
They take the book of Creation as the word of 
God, they refer to no other book, and «11 the infer- 
ences they make are drawn from that volume. 

I insert, in this place, the 19th Psalm, as para- 
phrased into English verse by Addison. I recol- 
lept not the prose, and where I write this I have 
not the opportunity of seeing it 

The spacious firmament on high, 

With all the blut ethereal sky, 

And spangled heavens, a shining frame 

Their great original proclaim. 

The unwearied sun, from day to day 

Does his Creator's power display. 

And publishes to every land. 

The work of an Almighty hand. 

Soon as the evening shades prevail. 

The moon takes up the wond'rous tale. 

And nightly to the list'ning earth 

Repeats the story of her birth; 

Whilst all the stars that round her buni» 

And all the planets, in their turn, 

Confirm the tidings as they roll, 

And spread the truth from pole to pole. 

9 

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34 AGE OF REASON. [?AILT !• 

What though in solemn silence all 

Move round this dark terrestrial ball ; 

What though no real voice, nor sound, 

Amidst their radiant orbs be found. 

In reason's ear they all rejoice. 

And utter forth a glorious voice. 

For ever singing as thej shine. 

The hand that made us is divine. 

What more does man want to know than that 
the hand, or power, that made these things is 
divine, is omnipotent? Let him believe this with 
the force it is impossible to repel, if he permits his 
reason to act, and bis rule of moral life will follow 
of course. 

The allusions in Job have all of them the same 
tendency with this Psalm ; that of deducing or 
proving a truth, that would be otherwise unknown^ 
from truths already known. 

I recollect not enough of the passages in Job, to 
insert them correctly : but there is one occurs to 
me that is applicable to the subject I am speaking 
upon. " Canst thou by searching find out God ? ** 
"Canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection??* 

I know not how the printers have pointed this 
passage, for I keep no Bible ^ but it contains two 
distinct questions, that admit of distinct answers. 

First — Canst thou by searthing find out God? 
Yes ; because in the first place, I know I did not 
make myself, and yet T have existence ; and by 
searching into the nature of other things, I find that 
no other thing could make itself; and yet millions 
of other things exist ; therefore it is, that I know, 
by positive conclusion resulting from this search, 
that there is a power superior to all those things, 
and that poVver is God. 

Secondly — Canst thou find out the Almighty to 

perfection ? No ; not only because the power and 

wisdom He has manifested in the structure of the 

^ that I behold, is to me incomprehensible, 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 35 

but because even this manifestation, great as it is, 
is probably b(ft a small display of that immensity 
of power and wisdom, by wliich millions of other 
worlds to me invisible by their distance, were cre- 
ated and continue to exist. 

It is evident, that both of these questions were 
put to the reason of t[ie person to whom they are 
supposed to have been addressed ; and it is only by 
admitting the first question to be answered affirm- 
atively, that the second could follow. It would 
have been unnecessary, and even absurd, to have 
put a second question, more difficult than the first, 
if the first question had been answered negatively. 
The two questions have diffi?rent objects ; the first 
refers to the existence of God, the second to his 
attributes; reason can discover the one, but it falls 
infinitely short in discovering the whole of the 
other. 

I recollect not a single passage in all the writings 
ascribed to the men called apostles, that convey any 
idea of what God is. Those writings are chiefly 
controversial ; and the subject they dwell upon, 
that of a man dying in agony on a cross, is better 
suited to the gloomy genius of a monk in a cell, by 
whom it is not impossible they were written, than 
to any man breathing the open air of the Creation. 
The only passage that occurs to me, that has any 
reference to the works of God, by which only his 
power and wisdom can be known, is related to have 
been spoken by Jesus Christ, as •» remedy against 
distrustful care. ** Behold the lilies of the field, 
they toil not, neither do they spin." This, how- 
ever,'ls far inferior to the allusions in Job, and in 
the I9th Psalm ; but it is similar in idea, and the 
modesty of the imagery is correspondent to the 
modesty of the man. 

As to the Christian system of faith, it appears to 
me as a species of atheism — a sort of religious de- 
nial of God. It professes to believe in a man 



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36 AGE OF REASO]!^. [PART ^. 

rather than in God. It is a compound made up . 
chiefly of manism with but little deism, and is a» 
near to atheism as twilight 4s to dancness. It intro- 
duces between man and his Maker an opaque body, 
which it calls a Redeemer, as the moon introduces 
her opaque self between the earth and the sun, and 
it produces by this means a religious or an irreli- 
gious eclipse of light. It has put the whole orbit 
of reason into shade. 

The effect of this obscurity has been thar*Qf 
turning every thing'upside down, and representing 
it in revei'se ; and among the revolutions it has thus 
magically produced, it has made a revolution in 
Theology. 

That which is now called natural philosophy, 
embracing the whole circle of science, of which 
Astronomy occupies the chief place, is the study 
of the works of God, and of the power and wis- 
dom of God in his works, and is the true theology. 

As to the theology that is now studied in its 
place, it is the study of human opinions an4 of 
human fancies concerning God. It is not the study 
of God himself in the works that he has made, but 
in the works or writings that man has made ; and 
it is not among the least of the mischiefs that the 
Christian system has done to the world, that it has 
abandoned the original and beautiful system of 
theology, like a beautiful innocent, to distress and 
reproach, to make room for the hag of super- 
stition. 

The book of Job, and the 19th Psalm, which 
even the church admits to be more ancient than 
the chronological order in which they stand in the 
book called the Bible, are theological t)mtions con- 
formable to the original system of theology. The 
internal evidence of those orations proves to a de- 
monstration that the study and contemplation of 
the works of Creation, and of the power and wis- 
dom of God, revealed and manifested in those 



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PART 1.] AGE OF REASON. 37 

works, made a great part of the religious devotion 
of the times in which they were written ; and it 
was this devotional study and contemplation that 
led to the discovery of the principles upon which, 
what are now called Sciences, are established ; and 
it is to the discovery of these principles that almost 
all the Arts that contribute to the convenience of 
human life, owe their existence. Every principal 
art has some science for its parent, though the per- 
son who mechanically performs the work does not 
always, and but vei*y seldom, perceive the con- 
nexion. 

It is a fraud of the Christian system to call the 
sciences human invention ; it is only the application 
of them that is human. Every science has for its 
basis a system of principles as fixed and unalter- 
able as those by which the universe is regulated 
and governed. Man cannot make principles; he 
can only discover them* 

For example — Every i)erson who looks at an 
Almanack sees an account when an eclipse will 
take place, and he sees also that it never fails to 
take place according to the account there giVen. 
This shows that man is acquainted with the laws 
by which the heavenly bodies move. But it would 
be something worse than ignorance, were any 
church on earth to say, that those laws are a 
human invention. It would also be ignorance, or 
something worse, to say that the scientific princi- 
ples, by the aid of which man is enabled to calcu- 
late and foreknow when an eclipse will take place, 
are a human invention. Man cannot invent any 
thing that is eternal and immutable ; and the sci- 
entific principles he employs for this purpose must, 
and are, of necessity, as eternal and immutable as 
the laws by which the heavenly bodies move, or 
they could not be used as they are to ascertain the 
time when, and the manner how, an eclipse will 
take place. 



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38 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

The scientific principles that man employs to 
obtain the fore-knowledge of an eclipse, or of any 
thing else, relating to the motion of the heavenly 
bodies, are contained chiefly in that part of science 
which is called Trigonometry, or the properties of 
a triangle, wliich when applied to the study of the 
heavenly bodies, is called Astronomy; when ap- 
])lied to direct the course of a ship on the ocean, 
it is called Navigation ; when applied to the con- 
struction of figures drawn by rule and compass, it 
is called Geometry ; when applied to the construc- 
tion of plans of edifices, it is called Architecture ; 
when applied to the measurement of any portion 
of the surface of the earth, it is called Land-survey- 
ing. In fine, it is the soul of science ; it is an eter- 
nal truth ; it contains the mathemaiiccd demonstration 
of which mun speaks, and the extent of its uses is 
unknown. 

It may be said, that man can make or draw a 
triangle, and, therefore, a triangle is a human in- 
vention. 

But the triangle, when drawn, is no other than 
the image of the principle ; it is a delineation to 
the eye, and from thence to the mind, of a princi- 
ple that would otherwise be imperceptible. The 
triangle does not make the principle, any more 
than a candle taken into o room that was dark, 
makes the chairs and tables that before were invisi- 
ble. All the properties of the triangle exist inde- 
pendently of the figure, and existed before any 
triangle was drawn or thought of by man. Man 
had no more to do in the formation of those pro- 
perties or principles, than he had to do in making 
the laws by which the heavenly bodies move ; and, 
therefore, the one must have the same divine origin 
as the other. 

In the same manner as it may be said, that man 

* can make a triangle, so also may it be said he can 

make the mechanical instrument called a lever; 



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rtLRT I.] AGE OP REASON. 39 

bot the principle, by winch the lever acts, is a thing 
distinct from the instrument, and would exist if the 
instrument did not; it attaches itself to the instrii- 
nlent after it is made; the instrument, therefore, 
can act no otherwise than it does act; neither can 
all the efforts of human invention make it act other- 
wise. That which, in all such cases, man calls the 
effect, is no other than the principle itself rendered 
perceptible to the senses. 

Since, then, man cannot make principles, from 
whence did he gain a knowledge of them, so as to 
be able to apply them, not only to things on earth, 
but to ascertain the motion of bodies so immensely 
distant from him as all the heavenly bodies are? 
From whence, I ask, could he gain that knowledge, 
but from the study of the true theology? 

It is the structure of the universe that has taught 
this knowledge to man. That structure is an ever- 
existing exhibition of evei*y principle upon which 
every part of mathematical science is founded. 
The offspring of this science is mechanics ; for 
mechanics is no other than the principles of sci- 
ence applied practically. The man who propor- 
tions the several parts ofi a mill, uses the same 
scientific principles, as ff he had the power of con- 
structing a universe ; but as he cannot give to mat- 
ter that invisible agency, by which all the compo- 
nent parts of the immense machine of the universe 
have influence upon each other and act in motional 
unison together, without any apparent contact, and 
to which man has given the name of attraction, 
gravitation, and repulsion, he supplies the place of^ 
that agency by the humble imitation of teeth and 
cogs. All the parts of man's microcosm must visi- 
bly touch ; but could he gain a knowledge of that 
agency, so as to be able to apply it in practice, we 
might then say that another canonical hook of the 
word of God had been discovered. 

If man could alter the properties of the lever, so 



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40 AGE OF REASON. [PART I« 

also could he alter the properties of the triande ; 
for a lever (taking that sort of lever which is called 
a steel-yard, for the sake of explanation] forms, 
when in motion, a triangle. The line it aescends 
from, (one point of that line being in the fulcrum) 
the line it descends to, and the cord of the arc, 
which the end of the lever describes in the air, are 
the three sides of a triangle. The other arm of 
the lever describes also a triangle ; and the corres- 
ponding sides of those two triangles, calculated 
scientifically, or measured geometrically ; and also 
the sines, tangents, and secants, generated from the 
angles, and geometrically measured, have the same 
proportions to each other, as the different weights 
have that will balance each other on the lever, 
leaving the weight of the lever out of the case. 

It may also be said that man can make a wheel 
and axis ; that he can put wheels of different mag- 
nitudes together, and produce a mill. Still the case 
comes back to the same j)oint, which is, that he did 
not make the principle that gives »the wheels those 
powers. That principle is as unalterable as in the 
former cases, or rather it is the same principle 
under a different appearance to the eye. 

The power that two wheels, of different magni- 
tudes, have upon each other, is in the same propor- 
tion as if the semi-diameter of the two wheels 
were joined together and made in that kind of 
lever I have described, suspended at the part where 
the semi-diameters join ; for the two wheels, sci- 
entifically considered, ai-e no other than the two 
circles generated by the motion of the compound 
lever. 

It is from the study of the true theology that all 
our knowledge of science is derived, and it is from 
that knowledge that all the arts have originated. 

The Almighty lecturer, by displaying the princi- 
ples of science in the structure of the universe, has 
invited man to study and to imitation. It is as if 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 41 

he had said to the inhabitants of this globe, that yf£ 
call ours, " I have made an earth for man to dwell 
upon, and 1 have rendered the starry heavens visi- 
ble, to teach him science and the arts. He can now 
provide for his own comfort, and learn from 

3IY MUNIFICENCE TO ALL, TO BE KIND TO EACH 
OTHER." 

Of what use is it, unless it be to teach man some- 
thing, that his eye is endowed with the power of 
beholding, to an incomprehensible distance, an im- 
mensity of worlds revolving in the ocean of space? 
Or of what use is it that this immensity of worlds 
is visible to man ? What has man to do with the 
Pleiades, with Orion, with Sirius, with the star he 
calls the north star, with the moving orbs he has 
named Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and Mercury, 
if no uses are to follow from their being visible ? 
A less power of vision would have been sufficient 
for man, if the immensity he now possesses were 
given only to waste itself, as it were, on an im- 
mense desert of space glitterftig with shows. 

It is only by contemplating what he calls the 
starry heavens, as the book and school of science, 
that he discovers any use in their being visible to 
him, or any advantage resulting from his immensity 
of vision. But when he contemplates the subject 
in this light, he sees an additional motive for say- 
ing, that nothing was made m vain; for in vain 
would be this power of vision if it taught man 
nothing. 

As the Christian system of faith has made a 
revolution in theology, so also has it made a revo- 
lution in the state of leaniing. That which is now 
called learning was not learning originally. Learn- 
ing does not consist, as the schools now make it 
consist, in the knowledge of languages, but in the 
knowledge of things to which language gives 
names. 

The Greeks were a learned people, but learning 


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42 AQE OF REASON. [PART «• 

with them did not consist in speaking Greek, aoy 
ifiore than in u Roman's speaking Latin, or t 
Frenchman's speaking French, or an Englishman'^i 
speaking English. From what we know of th# 
Greeks, it does not appear that they knew or 
studied any language but their own, and this was 
one cause of their becoming so learned ; it afforded 
them more time to apply themselves to better 
studies. The schools of the Greeks were schools 
of science and philosophy, and not of languages; 
and it is in the knowledge of the things that sci« 
ence and philosophy teach, that learning consists. 

Almost all the scientific learning that now existsi 
came to us from the Greeks, or the people who 
spoke the Greek language. It, therefore, became 
necessary for the people of other nations, who 
spoke a different language, that some among them 
should learn the Greek language, in order that the 
learning the Greeks had, might be made known i» 
those nations, by translating the Greek books of 
science and philosophy into the mother tongue of 
each nation. 

The study therefore of the Greek language (and 
in the same manner for the Latin) was no other 
than the drudgery business of a linguist ; and the 
kinguage thus obtained, was no other than the 
means, as it were the tools, employed to obtain the 
learning the Greeks had. It made no part of the 
learning itself; and was so distinct from it, as te 
make it exceedingly probable that the persons who 
bad studied Greek sufficiently to translate those 
woiks, such, for instance, as Euclid's Elements, 
did not understand any of tho learning the works 
contained. 

As there is now nothing new to be learned from 
the dead languages, all the useful, bodfes being, 
akeady translated, the languages are Jbecome use- 
less, and the time expended in teachiiig and learn- 
iag ihem is wasted. So far as the ftudy of km- 



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PATk!f I.] AOE OF REASON. ^ 43 

Ifoages may contribate to the progress and commu- 
iiioation of knowledge, (for it has nothing to do 
"With the ereation of knowledge,) it is only in the 
living languages that new knowledge is to be 
found ; and certain it is, that, in general, a youth 
will learn more of a living language in one year, 
^lan of a dead language in sev^n ; and it is but 
seldom that the teacher knows much of it himself. 
Th^ difficulty of learning the dead languages does 
not arise from an}' superior abstruseness in the lan- 
guages themselves, but in their beinfr dead^ and the 
pronunciation entirely lost It would be the same 
thing with any other language when it becomes 
dead. The best Greek linguist that now exists, 
does not understand Greek so well as a Grecian 
ploughman did, or a Grecian milkmaid ; and the 
same for the Latin, compared with a plough mair or 
milkmaid of the Romans. It would,' therefore, be 
advantageous to the state of learning to abolish the 
study of the dead languages, and to make learning 
consist, as it originally did, in scientific knowledge. 
The apology that is sometimes made for con- 
tinuing to teach the dead languages is, that they 
are taught at a time, when a child is not capable 
of exerting any other mental faculty than that of 
memory ; but that is altogether erroneous. The 
human mind has a natural disposition to scientific 
knowledge, and to the diings connected with it 
The first and favorite amusement of a child, even 
before it begins to play, is that of imitating the 
Works of man. It builds houses with cards or 
sticks ; it navigates the little ocean of a bowl of 
wmter with a paper boat, or dams the stream of a 
gutter, and contrives something which it calls a 
miU ; and it interests itself in the fate of its works 
wkh a care that resembles affection. It afterwards 
goes to school, where its genius is killed by the 
barren study of a dead language, and the philoso- 
pber is lost in the linguist. ' 



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44 / AGE OF RJCASOir. [PART I. 

But the apology that is dow made for continuing 
to teach the dead languages, could not be the cause, 
' at first, of cutting down learning to the narrow and 
humble sphere of linguistry ; the cause, therefore, 
must be sought for elsewhere. In all researches 
of this kind, the best evidence that can be pro- 
duced, is the internal evidence the thing carries 
with itself, and the evidence of circumstances that 
unites with it ; both of which, in this case, are not 
difficult to be discovered. 

Putting then aside, as a matter of distinct con- 
sideration, the outrage offered to the moral justice 
of God, by supposing him to make the innocent 
suffer for the guilty, and also the loose morality and 
low contrivance of supposing him to change him- 
self into the shape of a man, in order to make an 
ex(njse to himself for not executing his supposed 
sentence upon Adam ; putting, I say, those things 
aside, as matter of distinct consideration, it is cer- 
tain that what is called the Christian system of 
faith, including in it the whimsical account of the 
creation — the strange story of Eve — the snake and 
the apple — the ambiguous idea of a man-god — the 
corporeal idea of the death of a god — the mytholo- 
gical idea of a family of gods, and the Christian 
system of arithmetic, that three are one, and one is 
three, are all irreconcileable, not only to the divine 
gifl of reason, that God hath given to man, but to 
the knowledge that man gains of the power and 
wisdom of God, by the aid of the sciences, and by 
studying the structure of the universe that God has 
made. 

The setters-up, therefore, and the advocates of 
the Christian system of faith, could not but foresee 
that the continually progressive knowledge that 
man would gain, by the aid of science, of the 
power and wisdom of God, manifested in the 
structure of the universe, and in all the works of 
Creation, would militate against, and call into ques- 



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FAIIT I.] AGE OF REASON. 45 

tion, the truth of their system of faith ; and, there- 
fote^ it became necessary to their purpose to cut 
learning down to a size less dangerous to their 
project, and this they effected by restricting the 
idea of learning to the dead study of dead lan- 
guages. 

They not only rejected the study of science out 
of the Christian schools, but tiiey persecuted it ; 
and it is only within aboilt the last two centuries 
that the study has been revived. So late as 1610, 
Galileo, a Florentine, discovered and introduced 
the use of telescopes, and by applying them to ob- 
serve the motions and appearance of the heavenly 
bodies, afforded additional means for ascertaining 
the true structure of the universe. Instead of 
being esteemed for those discoveries, he was sen- 
tenced to renounce them, or the opinions resulting 
from them, as a damnable heresy. And prior to 
that time Vigilius was condemned to j>e burned for 
asserting the antipodes, or in other words, that the 
earth was a globe, and habitable in every part 
where there was land ; yet the truth of this is now 
too well known even to be told. 

If the belief of errors not morally bad did no 
mischief, it would make no part of the moral duty 
of man to oppose and remove them. There was 
no moral ill in believing the earth was flat like a 
trencher, any more than that there was moral 
virtue in believing it was round like a globo; 
neither was there any moral ill in believing that 
the Creator made no other world than this, any 
more than there was moral virtue in believing that 
he made millions, 4nd that the infinity of space is 
filled with worlds. But when a system of religion 
is made to grow out of a supposed system of cre- 
ation that is not true, and to unite itself therewith 
in a manner almost inseparable therefrom, the case 
assumes an entirely different ground. It is then 
that errors, f ot morally bad, become fraught with 



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46 AQE or RBASoir. [taux f. 

the same mischiefs as if they were. It is then that 
the truth, though otherwise indifferent itself, be- 
comes an essential, by becoming the criterion, that 
either confirms by corresponding evidence, or de- 
nies by contradictory evidence, the reality of the 
religion itself. In this view of the case, it is the 
moral duty of man to obtain every possible evi- 
dence that the structure of the heavens, or any 
other part of creation j^Tords, with respect to sys- 
tems of religion. But this, the supporters or parti- 
zans of the Christian system, as if dreading the 
result, incessantly opposed, not only rejected the 
sciences, l)ut persecuted the professors. Had New- 
ton or Descartes lived three or four hundred years 
ago, and pursued their studies as they did, it is 
most probable they would not have lived to finish 
them ; and had Franklin drawn lightning from the 
clouds at the same time, it would have been at the 
hazard of expiring for it in fiames. 

Latter times have laid all the blame upon the 
Groths and Vandals; but, however unwilling the 
partizans of the Christian system may be to believe 
or to acknowledge it, it is nevertheless true, that 
the age of ignorance commenced with the Christ- 
ian system. There was more knowledge in the 
world before that period, than for many centuries 
afterwards ; and as to religious knowledge, the 
Christian system, as already said, was only another 
species of mythology ; and the mythology to which, 
it succeeded, was a corruption of an ancient sys- 
tem of theism.* 

* It is impossible for us now to know at what time the 
heathen mythology began; but it is certain, from the in- 
ternal evidence that it carries, that it did not begin in the 
same state or condition in wliich it ended. All the gods 
of that mythology, except Saturn, were of modem in- 
vention. The supposed reign of Satum was prior to that 
which is called the heathen mythology, ai^ was so &r a 



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^AllT 1.] AGE OF REASON. 47 

It IS owing to this long interregnum, of science, 
and to no other cause, that we have now to look 
through a vast chasm of many hundred years to 
•the respectahle characters we call the ancients. 
Had the progression of knowledge gone on propor- 
tionably with the stock that before existed, that 
chasm would have been filled up with characters 
rising superior in knowledge to each other; and 
those ancients we now so much admire, would 
have appeared respectably in the back ground of 
the scene. But the Christian system laid all waste ; 
and if we take our stand about the beginning of 
the sixteenth century, we look back through that 
long chasm, to the times of the ancients, as over a 

species of theism, that it admitted' the belief of only one 
God. Saturn is supposed to have abdicated the govern- 
ment in favor of his three sons and one daughter, Jupiter, 
Pluto, Neptune, and Juno; after this, thousands of other 
gods and demi-gods were imaginarily created, and the 
calendar of gods increased as fast as the calendar of saints 
and the calendars of courts have increased since. 

AH the corruptions that have taken place, in theology 
and in religion, have been produced by admitting of wlmt 
man calls revealed religion. The Mythologists pretended 
to more revealed religion than the Christians do. They 
had their oracles and their priests, who were supposed to 
receive and deliver the word of God verbally, on almost 
all occasions. 

Since then all corruptions drawn from Molock to mod- 
em prcdestinarianism, and the human sacrifices of the 
heathens to the Christian sacrifice of the Creator, have 
been produced by admitting of what is called revealed 
religion, the most effectual means to prevent all such 
evils and impositions is, not to admit of any other revela- 
tion than that which is manifested in the book of creation, 
and to contemplate the creation as the only true and real 
work of God that ever did, or ever will exist; and that 
every thing else, called the word of God, is fable and im- 
poiitioD. 



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48 AOE OF REASON. [PA&T U 

Tast sandy desert, in which not a shrub appears to 
intercept the vision to the fertile hills beyond. 

It is an inconsistency scarcely possible to be 
credited, that any thing should exist, under the 
name of a religion, that held it to be vrreligi4ms to 
study and contemplate the structure of the uni'» 
verse that God had made. But the fact is too weH 
established to be denied. The event that served 
more than any other to break the first link in tkis 
long chain of despotic ignorance, is that known by 
the name of the Reformation by Luther. From ' 
that time, though it does not appear to have made 
any part of the intention of Luther, or of those 
who are called reformers, the sciences began to 
revive, and liberality, their natural associate, began 
to appear. This was the only public good the 
reformation did; for, with respect to religious 
good, it might as well not have taken place. The 
mythology still continued the same ; and a multi* 
plicity of National Popes grew out of the downfall 
of the Pope of Christendom. 

Having thus shown fix>m the internal evidence 
of things, the cause that produced a change in the 
state of learning, and the motive for substituting 
the study of the dead languages in tlie place of the 
sciences, I proceed, in additicm to the several ob- 
servations already made in the former part of this 
wor^, to compare or rather to confront the evi- 
dence that the structure of the universe affords, 
with the Christian system of religion ; but as I can- 
not begin this part better than by referring to the 
ideas that occurred to me at an early part of life, 
and which I doubt not have occurred in some de- 
gree to almost every other peraon at one time or 
other, I shall state what those ideas were, end add 
thereto such other matter as shall arise out of the 
subject, giving to the whole, by way of preface, a 
^ort introduction. 

My father being of the Quaker profession, it was 



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FARt 1.] AGE OF REASON. 49 

nnf good fortune to have an exceeding good moral 
education, and a tolerable stock of useful learning. 
'Qi^ugh I went to the grammar school,* I did not 
lemm Latin, not only because I had no inclination 
to, learn languages, but because of the objection the 
Quakers have against the books in which the lan- 
guage is taught. But this did not prevent me from 
being acquainted with the subjects of all the Latin 
beoks used lu the school. 

•The natural bent of my mind was to science. 
I had some turn, and I believe some talent for 
poetry; but this I rather repressed than encour- 
aged, as leading too much into the field of imagi- 
nation. As soon as I was able, I purchased a pair 
of globes, and attended the philosophical lectures 
of Martin and Ferguson, and became afterwards 
acquainted with Dr. Bevis, of the society called the 
Royal Society, then living in the Temple, and an 
excellent astronomer. 

I had no disposition for what is called politics. 
It presented to my mind no other idea than is con- 
tiBited in the word Jockeyship. When, therefore, 
I turned my thoughts towards matters of govern- 
ment, I had to form a system for myself, that ac- 
corded with the moral and philosophic principles 
in which I hud been educated. I saw, or at least I 
thosght I saw, a vast scene opening itself to the 
world in the. affairs of America; and it appeared to 
me, that unless the Americans changed the plan 
tbey were then pursuing, with respect to the gov- 
erianeDt of England, and declare themselves inde- 
pendent, they would not only involve themselves 
in tt multiplicity of new diMculties, but shut out 
i\m prospect that was then offering itself to man- 
kind through their means. It was from these mo- 

♦The same school, Thetford in Norfolk, that thepre- 
fent Counsellor Mingay went to, and under the same 



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50 AGE OF REAS027. [PARV I. 

lives that I published the work known by the name 
of " Common iSerwc," which is the first work I ever 
did publish ; and so far as I can judge of myself, I 
believe I should never have been known in the 
world as an author, on any subject whatever, had 
it not been in the affairs of America. I wrote 
^^ Common Sense^^ the latter end of the year 1775, 
and published it the first of Januai'y, 1776. Inde- 
pendence was declared the fourth of July, follow- 
ing. 

Any person, who has made observations on the 
state and progress of the human mind, by observ- 
ing his own, cannot but have observed that there 
are two distinct classes of what are called 
Thoughts; those that we produce in ourselves 
by reflection and the act of thinking, and those 
that bolt into the mind of their own accord, I 
have always made it a rule to treat those voluntary 
visitors with civility, taking care to examine, as 
well as I was able, if they were worth entertaining; 
and it is from them I have acquired almost all the 
knowledge that I 'have. As to the learning that 
any person gains from school education, it serves 
only, like a small capital, to put him in the way of 
beginning learning for himself afterwards. Every 
person of learning is finally his own teacher, the 
reason of which is, that principles, being of a dis- 
tinct quality to circumstances, cannot be impressed 
upon the memor}' ; their place of mental residence 
is the understanding, and they are never so lasting 
as when they begin by conception. Thus much 
for the introductory part. 

FroHuthe time I was capable of conceiving an 
idea, and acting upon it by reflection, I either 
doubted the truth of the Christian system, or 
thought it to be a strange affair ; I scarcely knew 
which it was : but I well remember, when about 
seven or eight years of age, hearing a sermon read 
by a relation of mine, who was a great devotee of 



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PART I.] AGE OP REASON. 51 

tlie church, upon the subject of what is called 
redemption by ttie death of the Son of God. After 
the sermon was ended, I went into the garden, and 
as I was going down the garden steps (for I per- 
fectly recollect the spot) I revolted at the recollec- 
tion of what I had heard, and thought to myself 
that it was making God Almighty act like a pas- 
sionate man that killed his son, when he could not 
revenge himself any other way ; and as I was sure 
a man would be hanged that did such a thing, I 
could not see for what purpose they preached such 
sermons. This was not one of those kind of 
thoughts that had any thing in it of childish levity ; 
it was to me a serious reflection, arising from the 
idea I had, that God was too good to do such an 
action, and also too almighty to be under any ne- 
cessity of doing it. I believe in the same manner 
at this moment ; and I moreover believe, that any 
system of religion, that has any thing in it that 
shocks the mind of a child, cannot be a true sys- 
tem. 

It seems as if parents of the Christian profession 
were ashamed to tell their children any thing about 
the principles of their religion. They sometimes 
instruct them in morals, and talk to them of the 
goodness of what they call Providence ; for the 
Christian mythology has five deities — ^there is €rod 
the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, the 
God Providence, and the Goddess Nature. But 
the Christian story of God the Father putting his 
son to death, or employing people to do it (for that 
is the plain language of the story) cannot be told 
by a parent to a child ; and to tell him that it was 
done to make mankind happier and better, is 
making the story still worse, as if mankind could 
be improved by the example of murder ; and to 
tell him that all this is a mystery, is only making 
an excuse for the incredibility of it. 

How different is this to the pure and simple pro- 



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52 AGE OF REASON. [PART % 

fession of Deism ! The true Deist has but one 
Deity ; and his religion consists in contemplating 
the power, wisdom, and benignity of the Deitjr^ 
in his works, and in endeavoring to imitate him 
in every thing moral, scientifical, and mechani- 
cal. 

The religion that approaches the nearest of all 
others to true Deism in the moral and benign part 
thereof, is that professed by the Quakers ; but they 
have contracted themselves too much, by leaving 
the works of God out of their system. Though 1 
reverence their philanthropy, I cannot help smiling 
at the conceit, that if the taste of a Quaker could 
have been consulted at the creation, what a silent 
and drab-colored creation it would have been! 
Not a flower would have blossomed its gayeties, 
nor a bird been permitted to sing. 

Quilting these reflections, I proceed to other 
matters. After I had made myself master of the 
use of the globes, and of the orrery,* and con- 
ceived an idea of the infinity of space, and the 
eternal divisibility of matter, and obtained, at least, 
a general knowledge of what is called natural phi- 
losophy, I began to compare, or, as I have before 
said, to confront the eternal evidence those things 
afford with the Christian system of faith. 

* As this book may fall into the hands of persons wha 
do not know what an orrery is, it is for their informatioa 
I add this note, as the name gives no idea of the uses of 
the thing. The orrery has its name from the person who 
invented it. It is a machinery of clock-work, represent- 
ing the universe in miniature, and in which the revolutiott 
of the earth round itself and round the sun, the revolu- 
tion of the moon round the earth, the revolution of the 
planets round the sun, their relative distances from the 
sun, as the centre of the whole system, their relative dis- 
tances from each other, and their different magnitudes, 
are represented as they really exist in what we call the 
heavens. 



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VAKT I.] AGE OF REASON. 53 

. Though it is not a direct article of the Christian 
^tem, that this world that we inhabit, is the whole 
•f the habitable creation, yet it is so worked up 
therewith, from what is called the Mosaic account 
of the Creation, the story of Eve and the apple, and 
the counterpart of that story, the death of the son 
of God, that to believe otherwise, that is, to believe 
that God created a plurality of worlds, at least as 
numerous as what we call stars, renders the Christ- 
kn system of faith at once little and ridiculous, and 
scatters it in the mind like feathers in the air. The 
two beliefs cannot be held together in the same 
mind ; and he who thinks that he believes both, has 
thought but little of either. 

Though the belief of a plurality of worlds was 
£similiar to the ancients, it is only within the last 
three centuries that the extent and dimensions of 
tills globe that we inhabit have been ascertained. 
Several vessels following the track of the ocean, 
have sailed entirely round the world, as a ir^an may 
march in a circle, and come round by the contrary 
side of the circle to the spot he set out from. The 
circular dimensions of our world, in the widest 
part, as a man would measure the widest. round of 
an apple, or a ball, is only twenty-iive thousand 
and twenty English miles, reckoning sixty-nine 
miles and a half to an equatorial degree, and may 
be sailed round in the space of about three 
years.* 

A world of this extent may, at first thought, ap- 
pear to us to be great ; but if we compare it with 
the immensity of space in which it is suspended, 
like a bubble or balloon in the air, it is infinitely 
less, in proportion, than the smallest grain of sand 

* Allowing a ship to sail, on an average, three miles in 
an hour, she woald sail entirely round the world in less 
than one year, if she could sail in a direct circle; but she 
^ obliged to follow the course of the ocean. 



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64 AGE OF REASON. PART l,\ 

is to the size of the world, or the finest particle of 
dew to the whole ocean, and is, therefore, but 
small ; and, as will be hereafter shown, is only one 
of a system of worlds, of which the universal cre- 
ation is composed. 

It is not difficult to gain some faint idea of the 
immensity of space in which this and all the other 
worlds are suspended, if we follow a progression 
of ideas. When we think of the size or dimen- 
sions of a room, our ideas limit themselves to the 
walls, and there they stop ; but when our eye, or 
our imagination, darts into space, that is, when it 
looks upward into what we call the open air, we 
cannot conceive any walls or boundaries it can 
have ; and, if for the sake of resting our ideas, we 
suppose a boundary, the question immediately re- 
news itself, and asks, what is beyond that bound- 
ary ? .and, in the same manner, what is beyond the 
next boundary ? and so on, till the fatigued imagi- 
nation returns and says, there is no end. Certainly, 
then, the Creator was not pent for room, when he 
made this world no larger than it is; and we have 
to seek the reason in something else. 

If we take a survey of our own world, or rather 
of this, of which the Creator has given us the use, 
as our portion in the immense system of Creation, 
we find every part of it, the earth, the waters, and 
the air that surrounds it, filled, and as it were, 
crowded with life, down from the largest animals 
that we know of, to the smallest insects the naked 
eye can behold, and from thence to others still 
smaller, and totally invisible without the assistance 
of the microscope. Every tree, every plant, every 
leaf, serves not only as a habitation, but as a world 
to some numerous race, till animal existence be- 
comes so exceedingly refined, that the effluvia of a 
blade of grass would be food for thousands. 

Since, then, no part of. our earth is left unoccu- 
pied, why is it to be supposed that the immensity 



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VART I.] AGE OF REASOIT. 55 

of space is a naked void, lying in eternal waste ? 
There is room for millions of worlds as large or 
farger than ours, and each of them millions of 
miles apart from each other. 

Having now arrived at this point, if we carry 
our ideas only one thought farther, we shall see, 
perhaps, the true reason, at least a very good rea- 
son, for our happmess : why the Creator, instead 
of making one immense world, extending over an 
immense quantity of space, has preferred dividing 
that quantity of matter into several distinct and 
separate worlds, which we call planets, of which 
our earth is one. But before I explain my ideas 
upon this subject, it is necessary (not for the sake 
of those that already know, but for those who do 
not) to show what the system of the universe is. 

That part of the universe that is called the solar 
system (meaning the system of worlds to which 
our earth belongs, and of which Sol, or in English 
language, the Sun, is the centre) consists, besides 
the Sun, of six distinct orbs, or planets, or worlds, 
besides the secondary bodies, called the satellites or 
moons, of wJhich our earth has one that attends her 
in her annual revolution round the sun, in like 
manner as tlie other satellites or moons attend the 
planets or worlds to which they severally belong, 
as may be seen by the assistance of the telescope. 

The Sun is the centre, round which those six 
worlds or planets revolve at different distances 
therefrom, and in circles concentrate to each other. 
ISach world keeps constantly in nearly the same 
track round the Sun, and continues, at the same 
time, turning round itself, in nearly an upright po- 
sition, as a top turns round itself when it is spin- 
ning on the ground, and leans a little sideways. 

It is this leaning of the earth (23 1-2 degrees) 
that occasions summer and winter, and the differ- 
ent length of days and nights. If the earth turned 
round itself in a position perpendicular to the plane 



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56 AGE OF REASON. [pART I. 

or level of the circle it moves in around the Sun, 
as a top turns round when it stands erect on the 
ground, the days and nights would be always of 
the same length, twelve hours day and twelve 
hours night, and the seasons would be uniformly 
the same throughout the year. 

Every time that a planet (our earth for example^ 
turns round itself, it makes what we call day ana 
night; and every time it goes entirely round the 
Sun, it makes what we call a year, consequently 
our world turns three hundred and sixty-five times 
round itself, in going once round the sun.* 

The. names that the ancients gave to those six 
worlds, and which are still called by the same 
names, are Mercury, Venus, this world that we call 
ours, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. They appear 
lai'ger to the eye than the stars, being many mil- 
lions of miles nearer to our earth than any of the 
stars are. The planet Venus is that which is called 
the evening star, and sometimes the morning star, 
as she happens to set after, or rise before the Sun, 
which, in either case, is never more than three 
hours. 

The Sun, as before said, being the centre, the 
planet, or world, nearest the Sun, is Mercury ; his 
distance from the Sun is thirty-four million miles, 
and he moves round in a circle always at that dis- 
tance from the Sun, as a top may be supposed to 
spin round in the track in which a horse goes in a 
mill. The second world is Venus, she is fifty- , 
seven million miles distant from the Sun, and con- 
sequently moves round in a circle much greater 
than that of Mercury. The third world is that we 

* Those who supposed that the Sun went round the 
earth every twenty-four hours, made the same mistake in 
idea that a cook would do in fact, that should make the 
fire go round the meat, instead of the meat turning round 
itself towards the fire. ^ 



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PAB.T I.] AGE OP REASON. 57 

inhabit, and which is ninety-five million miles 
(fistant from the Sun, and consequently moves 
round in a circle greater than that of Venus. The 
fourth world is Mars ; he is distant from the Sun 
one hundred and thirty -four million miles, and con- 
sequently moves round in a circle greater than that* 
of our earth. The fifth is Jupiter; he is distant 
fi-om the Sun five hundred and fifty-seven million 
miles, and consequently moves round in a circle 
greater than that of Mars. The sixth world is 
Saturn, he is distant from the Sun seven hundred 
and sixty-three million miles, and consequently 
moves round in a circle that surrounds the circles, 
or orbits, of all the other worlds or planets. 

The space, therefore, in the air, or in the im- 
mensity of space, that our solar system takes up 
for the several worlds to perform their revolutions 
in round the Sun, if of the extent in a straight line 
of the whole diameter of the orbit or circle, in 
which Saturn moves round the Sun, which being 
double his distance from the Sun,. is fifteen hundred 
and twenty-six million miles ; and its circular ex- 
tent is nearly five thousand million ; and its globi- 
cal extent is almost three thousand five hundred 
millioij times three thousand five hundred million 
square miles.* 

♦If it should be asked, how can man know these 
things ? I have one plain answer to give, which is, that 
man knows how to calculate* an eclipse, and also how to 
calculate to a minute of time when the planet Venus, in 
making her revolutions round the Sun, will come in a 
straight line between our earth and the Sun, and will ap* 
pear to us about the size of a large pea passing across the 
face of the Sun. This happens but twice in about a 
hundred years, at the distance of about eight years from 
each other, and has happened twice in our time, both of 
which were foreknown by calculation. It can also be 
known when they will happen again for a thousand years 
to come, or to any other portion of time. As, therefore 
8 



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58 AGE OF REASON. [PART H. 

But this, immense as it is, is only one system of 
worlds. Beyond this, at a vast distance into space, 
far beyond all power of calculation, are the stars 
called the fixed stars. They are called fixed, b^i- 
cause they have no revolutionary motion, as the 
six worlds or planets have that I have been describ* 
lag. Those fixed stars continue always at the same 
distance from each other, and always in the same 
place, as the sun ^oes in the centre of our system^. 
The probability, therefore, is, that each of those 
fixed stars is also a sun, round which another sys^ 
tem of worlds or planets, though too remote for U8 
to discover, performs its revolutions, as our system 
of worlds does round our central sun. 

By this easy progression of ideas, the immensity 
of space will appear to us to be filled with systems 
of worlds ; and that no part of space lies at waste, 
any more than any part of the globe or earth and 
water is left unoccupied. 

Having thus endeavored to convey, in a familiar 
and easy manner, some idea of the structure of the 
universe, I return to explain what I before alluded 
to, namely, the great benefits arising to man in con- 
sequence of the Creator having made a plurality 
of worlds, such as our system is, consisting of a 
central sun and six worlds, besides satellites, in pre- 
ference to that of creating one world only of a vast 
extent. 

It is an idea I have never lost sight of, that all 
our knowledge of sciencfe is derived from the revo- 

pian could not be able to do these things if he did not un- 
derstand the solar system, and the manner in which the 
revolutions of the several planets or worlds are perform- 
ed, the fact of calculating an eclipse, or a transit of Ve- 
nus, is a proof in point that the knowledge exists; and as 
to a few thousand, or even a few million miles, more or 
less, it makes .scarcely any sensible difference in such im- 
mense distances. 



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BART I.] AGE OF REASON. 59 

^ioDs (exhibited to our eye, and from thence to 
m%T understanding) which those several planets or 
worlds, of which our system is composed, make in 
their circuit round the sun. 

Had, then, the quantity of matter which these 
six worhls contain been blended into one solitary 
globe, the consequence to us would have been, that 
either no revolutionary motion would have existed, 
or not a sufficiency of it to give us the idea and the 
knowledge of science m(P now have ; and it is from 
the sciences that all the mechanical arts that con- 
tributes so much to our earthly felicity and comfort, 
are derived. 

As, therefore, the Creator made nothing in vain, 
fo also must it be believed that he organized the 
structure of the universe in the most advantageous 
manner for the benefit of man ; and as we see, and 
from experience feel, the benefits we derive from 
the structure of the universe, formed as it is, which 
benefits we should not have had the opportunity of 
enjoying, if the structure, so far as relates to our 
system, had been a solitary globe — ^we can discover 
at least" one reason why a plurality of worlds has 
been made, and that reason calls forth the devo- 
tional gratitude of man, as well as his admira- 
tion. 

But it is not to us, the inhabitants of this globe, 
only, that the benefits arising from a plurality of 
worlds are limited. The inhabitants of each of 
the worlds of which our system is composed, 
enjoy the same opportunities of knowledge as we 
do. They behold the revolutionary motions of 
our earth, as we behold theirs. All the planets 
revolve in sight of each other; and, therefore, 
the same universal sch6ol of science presents itself 
to all. 

Neither does the knowledge stojj here. The 
system of worlds next to us exhibits, in its revolu- 
tions, the same principles and school of science, to 



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60 AGE OF REASON. [pART 1. 

the inhabitants of their system, as our system does 
to us, and in like manner throughout the immensity 
of space. 

Our ideas, not only of the almightiness of the 
Creator, but of his wisdom and his beneficence be- 
come enlai^ged in proportion as we contemplate the 
extent and the structure of the universe. The 
solitary idea of a solitary world, rolling or at rest in 
the immense ocean of space, gives place to the 
cheerful idea of a society of worlds, so hapf^ly 
contrived as to administer, even by their motion, 
instruction to man. We see our own earth filled 
with abundance; but we forget to consider how 
much of that abundance is oVving to the scientific 
knowledge the vast machinery of the universe has 
unfolded. 

But, in the midst of those reflections, what are 
we to think of the Christian system of faith, that 
forms itself upon the idea of only one world, and 
that of no greater extent, as is before shown, thMi 
twenty-five thousand miles? An extent which a 
man, walking at the rate of three miles an hoar, 
for twelve hours in the day, could he keep on in a 
circular direction, would walk entirely round in 
less than two years. Alas! what is this to the 
mighty ocean of space, and the almighty power of 
the Creator! ' » 

From whence, then, could arise the solitary and 
strange conceit, that the Almighty, who had mil- 
lions of worlds equally dependent on hb protec- 
tion, should quit the care of all the rest, and come 
to die in our world, because they say one man and 
one woman had eaten an apple I And, on the 
other hand, are we to suppose that every world, 
in the boundless creation, bad an Eve, an apple, a 
serpent, and a redeemer ? In this case, the person 
Who is irreverently called the Son of God, and 
sometimes €rod himself would have nothing else 
to do than to travel from world to world, in an end- 



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PABT I.] AGE OF REA99N. 6 J 

less succession of death, with scarcely a momentary 
interval of life. 

It has been by rejecting the evidence, that the 
word or works of God in the creation affords to 
our senses, and the action of our reason upon that 
evidence, that so many wild and whimsical systems 
of faith, and of religion, have been fabricafed aud 
set up. There may be many systems of religion, 
that so far from being morally bad, are in many 
respects morally good: but there can be but one 
that is true; and that one necessarily must, as it 
ever will, be in all things consistent with the ever 
existing word of God that we behold in his works. 
But such is the strange construction of the Christian 
system of faith, that every evidence the Heavens 
afford to man, either directly contradicts it, or ren- 
ders it absurd. 

It is possible to believe, and I always feel plea- 
sure in encouraging myself to believe it, that there 
have been men in the world who persuade them- 
selves that what is called a pious jfratul, might, at 
least under particular circumstances, be productive 
of some good. But the fraud being once establish- 
ed, could not aflerwards be explained ; for it is with 
a pious fraud as with a bad action, it begets a 
calamitous necessity of going on. * 

The persons who first preached the Christian 
system of faith, and in some measure combined it 
with the morality preached by Jesus Christ, might 
persuade themselves that it was better than the 
heathen mythology that then prevailed. From the 
first preachers the fraud went on to the second, and 
to the third, till the idea of its being a pious fraud 
became lost in the belief of its being true ; and 
that belief became again encouraged by the in- 
terest of those who made a livelihood by preach- 
ingit 

But though such a belief might, by such means, 
be rendered almost general among the laity, it is 



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62 AGE OF REASON. [PART I. 

next to impossible to accoiuit for the contiDU^l 
persecution carried on by the church, for several 
hundred years, against the sciences, and against 
the professoi*s of sciences, if tlie church had not 
some record or ti*adition, that it was originally 
no other than a pious fraud, or did not foresee, 
that it could not be maintained against the evi- 
dence that the structure of the universe af- 
forded. 

Having thus shown the irreconcileable inconsist- 
encies between the real word of God existing in 
the universe and that which is called the word of 
God, as shown to us in a printed book that any man 
might make, I proceed t(t speak of the three prin- 
cipal means that have been employed in all ages, 
and, perhaps, in all countries, to impose upon man- 
kind. 

Those three means are Mystery, Miracle, and 
Prophecy. The two first are incompatible with 
true religion, and the thud ought always to be sus- 
pected. 

With respect to mystery, every thing we behold 
is, in one sense, a mystery to us. Our own exist- 
ence is a mystery ; the whole vegetable world is a 
mystery. We cannot account how it is that an 
acorn, when put into the ground, is made to devel- 
ope itself, and become an oak. We know not how 
it is that the seed we sow unfolds and multiplies 
itself, and returns to us such an abundant interest 
for so small a capital. 

The fact, however, as distinct from the operating 
cause, is not a mystery, because we see it ; and we 
know also the means we are to use, which is no 
other than putting seed in the ground. We know, 
therefore, as much as is necessary for us to know ; 
and that part of the operation that we do not know, 
and which if we did we could not perform, the 
Creator takes upon himself and performs it for 
us. We are, therefore, better off than if we had 



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FART I.j AGE OF REASQN. 63 

been let into the secret, and left to do it for our- 
selves. 

But though every crealed thing is, in this sense, 
a mystery, the word mystery cannot be applied to 
morcd truth, any more than obscurity can be applied 
to light. The God in whom we believe is a God 
of moral truth, and not a God of mystery or obscu- 
rity. Mystery is the antagonist of truth. It is a 
fog of human invention, that obscures truth, and 
represents it in distortion. Truth never envelopes 
itself in mystery ; and the mystery in which it is at 
any time enveloped is the work of its antagonist, 
and never of itself 

Religion, therefore, being the belief of a God, 
and the practice of moral truth, cannot have con- 
nection with mystery. The belief of a God, so far 
from having any thing of mystery in it, is of all ^ 
beliefs the most easy, because it arises to us, as is 
before observed, out of necessity. And the prac- 
tice of moral truth, or, in other words, a practical 
imitation of the moral goodness of God, is no other 
than our acting towards each other as he acts be- 
nignly towards all. We cannot serve God in the 
manner we serve those who cannot do without such 
service ; and, therefore, the only idea we can have 
of serving God, is that of contributing to the happi- 
ness of the living creation that God has made. 
This cannot be done by retiring ourselves from the 
society of the world, and spending a recluse life in 
selfish devotion. 

The very nature and design of religion* if I may 
so express it, prove, even to demonstration, that it 
must be free from every thing of mystery, and un- 
encumbered with every thing that is mysterious. 
Religion, considered as a duty, is incumbent upon 
every living soul alike, and, therefore, must be on a 
level to the understanding and comprehension of 
all. Man does not learn religion as he learns the 
secrets and mysteries of a trade. He leanis the 



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64 AGE OF REASOlf. [PART I, 

theory of religion by reflection. It arises out of 
the action of his own mind upon the things which 
he sees, or upon what he may happen to hear or to 
read, and the practice joins itself thereto. 

When meij, whether from policy or pious fraud, 
set up systems of religion incompatible with the 
word or works of God in the creation, and not only 
above, but repugnant to human comprehension, 
they were under the necessity of inventing or 
adopting a word that should serve as a bar to all 
questions, inquiries, and speculations. The word 
myslery answered this purpose; and thus it has 
happened that religion, which in itself is without 
mystery, has been corrupted into a fog of mys- 
teries. 

As mystery answered all general purposes, miracle 
followed as an occasional auxiliary. The former 
served to bewilder the mind ; the latter to puzzle 
the senses. The one was the lingo, the other the 
legerdemain. 

But before going further into this subject, it will 
be proper to inquire what is to be understood by a 
miracle. 

In the same sense that every thing may be said 
to be a mystery, so also may it be said that every 
thing is a miracle, and that no one thing is a gi-eater 
miracle than another. The elephant, though larger, 
is not a greater miracle than a mite ; nor a mountain 
a greater miracle than an atom. To an Almighty 
power, it is no more diflScult to make the one than 
the other ; and no more difficult to make a million 
of worlds than to make one. Every thing, there- 
fore, is a miracle in one sense, whilst in the other 
sense, there is no such thing as a miracle. It is a 
miracle when compared to our power, and to our 
comprehension ; it is not a miracle compared to the 
power that performs it; but as nothing in this de- 
scription conveys the idea that is affixed to the word 
miracle, it is necessary to carry the inquiry further. 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 65 

Mankind have conceived to themselves certain 
laws, by which what they call nature is supposed 
to act ; and that a miracle is something contrary to 
the operation and effect of those laws ; but unless 
we know the whole extent of those laws, and of 
what are commonly called the powers of nature, 
we are not able to judge whether any thing that 
may appeaf to us wonderful or miraculous, be with- 
in, or be beyond, or be contrary to her natural 
power of acting. 

The ascension of a man several miles high into 
the air, would have every thing in it that constitutes 
the idea of a miracle, if it were not known that a 
species of air can be generated several times lighter 
than the common atmospheric air, and yet possess 
elasticity enough to prevent the balloon, in which 
that light air is enclosed, from being compressed 
into as many times less bulk, by the common air 
that surrounds it. In like manner, extracting 
flames or sparks of fire from the human body, as 
visible as from a steel struck with a flint, and 
causing iron or steel to move without any visible 
agent, would also give the idea of a miracle, if we 
were not acquainted with electricity and magnet- 
ism ; so also would many other experiments in 
natural philosophy, to those who are not acquaint- 
ed with the subject. The restoring persons to life, 
who are to appearance dead, as is practised upon 
drowned persons, would also be a miracle, if it 
were not known that animation is capable of being 
su^ended without being extinct. 

Besides these, there are performances by sleight 
of hand, and by persons acting in concert, that 
have a miraculous appearance, which when known, 
are thought nothing of. And, besides these, there 
are mechanical and optical deceptions. There is 
now an exhibition in Paris of ghosts or spectres, 
which, though it is not imposed upon the specta- 
tors as a fact, has an astonishing appearance. As^ 
9 

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66 AGE OF REASON. [PAl^T I. 

therefore, we know not the extent to which either 
nature or art can go, there is no criterion to deter- 
mine what a miracle is ; and mankind, in giving 
credit to appearances, under the idea of their being 
miracles, are subject to be continually imposed 
upon. 

Since, then, appearances are so capable of de- 
ceiving, and things not real have a strong resem- 
blance to things that are, nothing can be more in- 
consistent than to supple that the Almighty would 
make use of means, such as are called miracles, 
that would subject the person who performed them 
to the suspicion of being an impostor, and the per- 
son who related them to be suspected of lying, and 
the doctrine intended to be supported thereby to be 
suspected as a fabulous invention. 

Of all the modes of evidence that ever were in- 
vented to obtain belief to any system or opinion to 
which the name of religion has heed given, that of 
miracle, however successful the imposition may 
have been, is the most inconsistent. For, in the 
first place, whenever recourse is had to show, for 
the purpose of procuring that belief (for a miracle, 
under any idea of the word, is a show) it implies a 
lameness or weakness in the doctrine that is preach- 
ed. And, in the second place, it is degrading the 
Almighty into the character of a show-man, play- 
ing tricks to amuse and make the people stare and 
wonder. It is also the most equivocal sort of evi- 
dence that can be set up ; for the belief is not to 
depend upon the thing called a miracle, but upon 
the credit of the reporter, who says that he saw it ; 
and, therefore, the thing, were it true, would have 
no better chance of being believed than if it were 
a lie. 

Suppose I were to say that when I sat down to 
write this book, a hand presented itself in the air, 
took up the pen and wrote every word that is here- 
m written ; would any body believe me ? certainly 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 67 

they would not. Would they believe me a whit 
the more if the thing had been a fact ; certainly 
they would not. Since, then, a real miracle, were 
it to happen, would be subject to the same fete 
as the falsehood, the inconsistency becomes the 
greater, of supposing the Almighty would make 
use of means that would not answer the purpose 
for which they were intended, even if they were 
real. 

If we are to suppose a miracle to be something 
so entirely out of the cotfrse of what is called na- 
ture, that she must go out of that course to accom- 
plish it, and we see an account given of such mira- 
cle by the person who said he saw it, it raises a 
question in the mind very easily decided, which is, 
is it more probable that nature should go out of her 
course, or that a man should tell a lie ? We have 
never seen, in our time, nature go out of her 
course; but we have good reason to believe that 
millions of lies have been told in the same time ; it 
is, therefore, at least millions to one, that the re- 
porter of a miracle tells a lie. 

The story of the whale swallowing Jonah, though 
a whale is large enough to do it, borders greatly on 
the marvellous; but it would have approached 
nearer to the idea of miracle, if Jonah had swal- 
lowed the whale. In this, which may serve for all 
cases of miracles, the matter would decide itself, as 
before stated, namely, is it more probable that a 
man should have swallowed a whale or told a 
lie? 

But supposing that Jonah had really swallowed 
the whale, and gone with it in his belly to Nineviih, 
and to convince the people that it was true, have 
cast it up in their sight, of the full length and size 
of a whale, would they not have believed him to 
have been the devil instead of a prophet ? or, if the 
whale had carried Jonah to Ninevah, and cast him 
up in the same public maimer, would they not have 



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68 AGE OF REASON. [pART I. 

believed the whale to have been the devil, and 
Jonah one of his imps? 

The most extraordinary of all the things called 
miracles, related in the New Testament, is that of 
the devil flying away with Jesus Christ, and carry- 
ing him to the top of a high mountain ; and to the 
top of the highest pinnacle of the temple, and 
showing him and promising to him all the king- 
doms of the world. How happened it that he did 
not discover America ; or is it only with kingdoms 
that his sooty highness hqi^ any interest ? 

I have loo much respect for the moral character 
of Christ, to believe that he told this whale of a 
miracle himself; neither is it easy to account for 
what purpose it could have been fabricated, unless 
it were to impose upon the connoisseurs of mira- 
cles, as is sometimes practised upon the connois- 
seurs of Queen Anne's farthings, and collectors of 
relics and antiquities ; or to render the belief of 
miracles ridiculous, by outdoing miracles, as Don 
Quixote outdid chivalry ; or to embarrass the be- 
lief of miracles, by making it doubtful By what 
power, whether of God or the Devil, anything 
called a miracle was performed. It requires, how- 
ever, a great deal of faith in the devil to believe this 
miracle. 

In every point of view in which those things 
called miracles can be placed and considered, the 
reality of them is improbable, and their existence 
unnecessary. They would not, as before observed 
answer any useful purpose, even if they were true ; 
for it is more difficult to obtain belief to a miracle, 
than to a principle evidently moral, without any 
miracle. Moral principle speaks universally for 
itself. Miracle could be but a thing of the mo- 
ment and seen but by a few ; after this it requires 
a transfer of faith from God to man, to believe a 
miracle upon man's report. Instead, therefore, of 
admitting the recitals of miracles as evidence of 



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PART 1.] AGE OF REASON. 69 

Any system of religion being true, they ought to be 
considered as symptoms of its being fabulous. It 
is necessary to the full and upright character of 
truth, that it rejects the crutch ; and it is consistent 
with the character of fable, to seek the aid that 
truth rejects. Thus much for mystery and mi- 
racle. 

As mystery and miracle took charge of the past 
and the present, prophecy took charge of the future, 
and rounded the tenses of faith. It was not suffi- 
cient to know what had been done, but what woi^ 
be done. The supposed prophet was the suppoffd 
historian of times to come ; and if he happened, in 
shooting with a long bow of a thousand years, to 
strike within a thousand miles of a mark, the inge- 
nuity of posterity could make it point-blank ; and 
if he happened to be directly wrong, it was only to 
suppose, as in the case of Jonah and Ninevah, 
that Qod had repented himself and changed his 
mind. What a fool do fabulous systems make of 
man! 

It has been shown, in a former part of this work, 
that the original meaning of the words prophet and 
prophesying has been changed, and that a prophet, 
in the sense of the word as now used, is a creature 
of modem invention ; and it is owing to this change 
in the meaning of the words, that the flights and 
metaphors of the Jewish poets and phrases and 
expressions now rendered obscure, 'by our not 
being acquainted with the local circumstances tr 
which they applied at the time they were used, 
have been ei'ected into prophecies, and made to 
bend to explanations, at the will and whimsical con- 
ceits of sectaries, expounders, and commentators. 
Every thing unimelligible was prophetical, and 
every thing insignificant was typical. ^ blunder 
would have served as a prophecy ; and a dish-clout 
for a type. 

If by a prophet we are to suppose a map to whom 



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70 AGE OF REASON. [PAMM. 

the Almighty communicated some event that woidd 
take place in future, either there were such men, or 
there were not. If there were, it is consistent to 
believe that the event so, communicated, would be 
told in terms that could be understood; and not 
related in such a loose and obscure manner as ib 
be out of the comprehensions of those that heanl 
it, and so equivocal as to fit almost any circum- 
stance that might happen afterwards. It is con- 
ceiving very irreverently of the Almighty to sup^ 
pose he would deal in this jesting manner witk 
n^nkind; yet all the things called prophecies in 
the book called the Bible, come under this de- 
scription. 

But it is with prophecy as it is with miracle ; k 
could not answer the purpose even if it were reai. 
Those to whom a prophecy should be told, could 
not tell whether the man prophesied or lied, or 
whether it had been revealed to him, or whether 
he conceited it; and if the thing that he prophesied, 
or intended to prophecy, should happen, or sonne- 
thing like it, among the multitude of things that are 
daily happening, nobody could again know whether 
he foreknew it, or guessed at it, or whether it was 
accidental. A prophet, therefore, is a character 
useless and unnecessary ; and the safe side of tb« 
case is, to guard against being imposed upon by 
not giving credit to such relations. 

Upon the whole, mystery, miracle, and prophecy, 
are appendages that belong to fabulous and not to 
true religion. They are the means by which so 
many Lo heres ! and Lo theres ! have been spread 
about the world, and religion been made into a 
trade. The success of one im poster gave encour- 
agement to another, and the quieting salvo of doing 
soTne good by keeping up a pious fiaudf (protected 
them from remorse. 

Having now extended the subject to a greater 
length than I first intended, I shall bring it 



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PART I.] AGE OF REASON. 71 

to a close by alwtraciting a summary from the 
whole. 

; First— That the idea or belief of a word of God, 
existing in print, or in writings or in speech, is in- 
consistent in itself for reasons already assigned. 
These reasons, among many others, are the want 
of a universal language ; the mutability of lan- 
guage; the errors to which translations are sub- 
ject; the possibility of totally suppressing such 
a word ; the probability of altering it, or of fabri- 
eating the whole, and imposing it upon the world. 

Secondly — That the Creation we behold is the 
real and ever existing word of God, in which we 
cannot be deceived. It proclaims his power, it de- 
monstrates his wisdom, it manifests bis goodness 
and beneficence. 

Thirdly — That the moral duty of man consists 
in imitating the moral goodness and beneficence of 
God manifested in the Creation towards all his 
creatures. That seeing as we daily do the good- 
ness of God to all men, it is an example calling 
upon all men to practise the same towards each 
other; and, consequently, that every thing of per- 
secution and revenge between man and man, and 
every thing of cruelty to animals, is a violation of 
moral duty. 

I trouble not myself about the manner of future 
existence. I content myself with believing, even 
to positive conviction, that the power that gave me 
existence is able to continue it, in any form and 
manner he pleases, either with or without tliis 
body ; and it appears more probable to me that I 
ahall continue to exist hereafter, than that I should 
have had existence, as I now have, before that ex- 
istence began. 

It is certain that, in one point, all nations of the 
earth and all religions agree ; all believe in a God ;^ 
the things in which they disagree, are the redund- 
ancies annexed to that belief; and, therefore, if 



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72 AGE OF REASON. PART I.] 

ever a universal religion should prevail, it will not 
be believing any thing new, but in getting rid of 
redundancies, and believing as man believed at 
first. Adam, if ever there was such a man, was 
created a Deist ; but, in the mean time, let every 
man follow, as he has a right to do, the religion 
and worship he prefers. 



END OF THE FIRST FART. 



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THE 



AGE OF REASON. 



PART THE SEC?OND. 



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PREFACE. 



I HAVE mentioned in the former part of The Age of 
Beason, that it had long been my intention to publish my 
thoughts upon religion ; but that I had originally reserved 
it to a later period in life, intending it to be the last work 
I should undertake. The circumstances, however, which 
existed in France in the latter end of the year 1793, de- 
termined me to delay it no longer. The just and humane 
principles of the revolution, which philosophy had first 
diffused, had been departed from. The idea, always 
dangerous to society as it in derogatory to the Almighty, 
that priests could forgive sins, though it seemed to exist 
no longer, had blunted the feelings of humanity, and 
callously pr^ared men for the commission of all manner 
of crimes. The intolerant spirit of church persecutions 
had transferred itself into politics; the tribunal, styled 
revolutionary, supplied the place of an inquisition; and 
the guillotine and the stake outdid the fire and faggot of 
the church. I saw many of my most intimate firiends 
destroyed; others daily carried to prison; and I had rea- 
son to believe,* and had also intimations given me, that 
the same danger was approaching myself. 

Under these disadvantages, I began the former part of 
the Jge of Beaton; I had, besides, neither Bible nor 

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76 PREFACE. 

Testament to refer fo, though I was writing against both; 
nor could I procare any; notwithstanding which, I have 
produced a work that no Bible believer, though writing at 
his ease, and with a library of church books about him, 
can refute. Towards the latter end of December of that 
year, a motion was made and carried, to exclude foreign- 
ers from the Convention. There were but two in it, 
Anacharsis Cloots and myself; and I saw I was partici>- 
larly pointed at by Bourdon de I'Oise, in his speech oa 
that motion. 

Conceiving, after this, that I had but a few days of 
liberty, I sat down and brought the work to a ck>se as 
speedily as possible; and I had not finished it more than 
six hours, in the state it has since appeared, before a 
guard came there about three in the morning, with an 
order signed by the two committees of public safety and 
surety-general, for putting me under arrest as a foreignep-, 
and conveyed me to th» prison of Luxembourg. I con- 
trived, on my way there, to call on Joel Barlow, and 
I put the manuscript of the work into his hands, as more 
safe than in my possession in prison; and not knowing 
what might be the fate in France, either of the writer or 
the work, I addressed it to the protection of the citizens 
of the United States. 

It is with justice that I say that the guard who exe- 
cuted this order, and the interpreter of the Committee of 
General Surety, who accompanied them to eramine my 
papers, treated me not only with civility but with respect. 
The keeper of the Luxembourg, Bennoity a man of a 
good heart, showed to me every friendship in his power, 
as did aiao all bis family, \diile he contmned in that 
station. He was removed from it, put imder arrest, and 



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PREFACS* 



7t 



euried before the tribnna], upon a malignant accusation, 
Imt acquitted. 

After I bad been in the Luxembourg about three weeks, 
the Americans, then in Paris, went in a body to the Con- 
vention, to reclaim me as their countryman and friend; 
but were answered by the President, Vader, who was 
also President of the Committee of Surety-General, and 
had signed the order for my arrest, that I was bom in 
England. I heard no more after this, from any perELon 
out of the walls of the prison, till the fall of Robespierre, 
on the 9th of Thermidor— July 27,*1794. 

About two months before this event, I was seized with 
a fever, that in its progress had every symptom of be- 
coming mortal, and from the effects of which I am not 
recovered. It was then that I remembered with renewed 
satisfaction, and congratulated myself most sincerely, on 
having written the former part of ** 7Jie Age of Reason.** 
I had then but little expectation of surviving, and those 
about me had less. I know, therefore, by experience, the 
conscientious trial of my own principles. 

I was then with three chamber comrades, Joseph Van- 
huele, of Bruges, Charles Bastini, and Michael Robyns, 
of liOnvain. The unceasing and anxious attention of 
these three friends to me, by night and by day, I remem 
her with gratitude, and mention with pleasure. It hap- 
pened that a physician (Dr. Graham) and a surgeon (Mr.^ 
Bond), part of the suite of General O'Hara, were then 
in the Lnxembourg. I ask not myself, whether it be con- 
venient to them, as men under the English government, 
tliat I express to them my thanks; bnt I should reproach 
myself if I did not; and also to the physician of the Lux 
mhowrgf Dr. Maricoski. 

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78 pftSFxcx. 

I have some reason to beliere, because I eaanot dis- 
cover any other cause, that this illness presenred me in 
exntence. Among the ps^ers of Robespierre that were 
examined and reported upon to the Convention, by a 
Committee of Deputies, is a note in the band^wrtting of 
Robespierre, m the following words : — 

•* Demander que Thomas Paine soU decrete d'accxuO' 
tioTit pour IHnieret de VAmerique autant que de la 
France,^* 

To dema'nd that a decree of accwaiion he passed 
against Thomas Paine, for the interest of America^ 
as well as of France, 

From what cause it was that the ktention was not pat 
in execution, I know not, and cannot inform myself; and, 
therefore, I ascribe it to impossibility, on account of that 
illness. 

The Convention, to repair as mudi as lay in their 
power the injustice I had sustained, invited me publicly 
und unanimously to return into the Convention, and 
which I accepted, to show I could bear an injury without 
permitting it to injure my princi^es, or my disposition. 
It is not because right principles have been violated, that 
they are to be abandoned. 

I have seen, since I have been at liberty, several publi- 
t^atioDs written, some in America, and some in En^aod, 
as answers to the former part of " The JLge (fBeason,*' 
If the authors of these can imause themselves by so doing, 
1 shall not interrupt them. They may write against the 
work, and against me, as much as they please; they do 
me more service than they, intend, and I can have no ob* 
Jection dwt they write on. Th^ will find, however, by 

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PBxrACE. 79 

this leooiid part, without its being written as an answer to 
them, that they must return to th^ work, and spin their 
cobweb over again. The first is brushed away by acci- 
dent 

They will now find that I have furnished myself with a 
Bible and Testament; and I can say also, that I have 
found them to be much worse books than I had conceived. 
If I have erred m any thing, in the former part of the 
Age of Reason, it has been by speaking better of some 
parts of those books than they have deserved. 

I observe that all my opponents resort, more or less, to 
what they call Scripture evidence and Bible authority, to 
help them out. They are so little masters of the subject, 
as to confound a dispute about authenticity with a dispute 
about doctrines; I will, however, put them right, that if 
they should be disposed to write any more, they may 
know how to begin. 

THOMAS PAINE. 

October, 1795. 



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AGE OF REASON. 

PART 11. 



It has often been said, that any thing may be 
proTcd from the Bible, but before any thing can be 
admitted as proved by the Bible, the Bible itself 
must be proved to be true ; for if the Bible be not 
true, or the truth of it be doubtful, it ceases to hare 
authority, and cannot be admitted as {n'oof of any 
thing. 

It has been the practice of all Christian commen- 
tators on the Bible, and of all Christian priests luid 
preachers, to impose the Bible on the world as a 
mass of truth, and as the word of God ; they have 
disputed and wrangled^ and have anathematized 
each other about the supposed meaning of particu- 
lar parts and passages dierein; one has said and 
insisted that such a passage meant such a thing ; 
another that it meant directly the contrary ; and a 
third, that it meant neither one nor the other, but 
something different from both ; and this they calt 
undentoTtding the Bible. 

It has happened that all the answers which I 
have seen to the former part of the ^e of Reason 
have been written by priests; and these pious men, 
hke their predecessors, contend and wrangle, and 
pretend to understand the Bible ; each u!idirstan<lEr 
11 

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82 AGE OF REASON. [PART 11. 

it differently, but each understands it best; and 
they have agreed in nothing, but in telling their 
readers that Thomas Paine understands it not 

Now instead of wasting , their time, and heating 
themselves in fractious disputations about doctrinal 
points drawn from the Bible, these men ought to 
know, and if they do not, it is civility, to inform 
them, that the first thing to be understood is, 
whether there is sufficient authority for believing 
the Bible to be the word of God, or whether there 
is not. 

There are matters in that book, said to be done 
by the express command of God, that are as shock- 
ing to humanity, and to every idea we have of 
moral justice, as any thing done by Robespierre, 
by Carrier, by Joseph Le Bon, in France, by the 
English government in the East Indies, or by any 
other assassin in modern times. When we read in 
the books ascribed to Moses, Joshua, &c., that they 
(the Israelites] came by health upon whole nations 
of people, who, as the history itself shows, had 
given them no offence ; fhaJt they pvi all those nch 
turns to the aword; that they spared neither age nor 
%f\fancy ; that they iitterly destroyed men, women, and 
children ; that they Ifft not a som to breathe ; expres- 
sions that are repeated over and over again in those 
books, and that too with exulting ferocity ; are we 
sure these things are facts? Are we sure that the 
Creator of man commissioned these things to be 
done ? Are we sure that the books that tell us so 
were written by his authority ? 

It is not the antiquity of a tale that is any evi- 
dence of its truth ; on the contrary, it is a symptom 
of its being fabulous ; for the more ancient any 
history pretends to be, the more it has the resem- 
blance of a fable. The origin of every nation is 
buried in fabulous tradition, and that of the Jews 
is as much to b^ suspected as any other. To 
charge the' commission of acts upon the Almighty, 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 83 

which in their own nature, and by every rule of 
moral justice, are crimes, as all assassination is, 
and more especially the assassination of infants, is 
matter of serious concern. The Bible tells us that 
those assassinations were done by the express comr 
mand of God, To believe, therefore, the Bible to 
be true, we must unhelieve all our belief in the 
moral justice of God ; for wherein could crying 
or smiling infants offend ? And to read the Bible 
without horror, we must undo every thing that 
is tender, sympathising, and benevolent, in the 
heart of man. Speaking for myself, if I had no 
other evidence that the Bible is fabulous, than 
the sacrifice I must make to believe it to be true, 
that alone would be sufficient to determine my 
choice. But, in addition to all the moral evi- 
dence against the Bible, I will, in the progress 
of this work, produce such other evidence, as 
even a priest cannot deny; and show, from that 
evidence, that the Bible is not entitled to credit, 
as being the word of God. 

But, before I proceed to this examination, I will 
show wherein the Bible differs from all other 
ancient writings with respect to the nature of the 
evidence necessary to establish its authenticity; 
and this is the more proper to be done, because 
the advocates of the Bible, in their answers to 
the former. part of the Age of Reason, undertake 
to say, and they put some stress thereon, that 
the authenticity of the Bible is as well establish- 
ed as that of any other ancient book ; as if our 
belief of the one could become any rule for our 
belief of the other. 

I know, however, but of one ancient book that 
authoritatively challenges universal consent and 
belief, and that is Euclid's Elements of Geometry^* 

* Euclid, according to chronological history, lived three 
boudred years before Christ, and about one hundred 



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84 AGE OF REASOir. [PABT U. 

and the reason is, because it is a book of self* 
evident demonstration, entirely independent of it? 
author, and of every thing relating to time, place^ 
and circumstance. The matters contained in that 
book would have the same authority they now 
have, had they been written by any other person, 
or had the work been anonymous, or had the 
author never been known; for the identical cer- 
tainty of who was the author, makes no part of 
our belief of the matters contained in the book. 
But it is quite otherwise with respect to the books 
ascribed to Moses, to Joshua, to Samuel, &c., those 
are books of te'sHmany^ and they testify of things 
natundly incredible ; and, therefore, the whole of 
our belief, as to the authenticity of those books, 
rests, in the first place, upon the certainty that they 
were written by Moses, Joshua, and Samuel ; sec- 
ondly, upon the credit we give to their testimony. 
We may believe the first, that is, we may believe 
the certainty of the authorship, and yet not the 
testimony ; in the same manner that we may be- 
lieve that a certain person gave evidence upon 
a case, and yet not believe the evidence that he 
gave. But if it should be fi>und, that the books 
ascribed to Moses, Joshua, and Samuel, were not 
written by Moses, Joshua, and Samuel, every part 
of the authority and authenticity of those books is 
ffone at once ; for there can be no such thing as 
forged or invented testimony; neither can there 
be anonymous testimony, more especially as to 
things naturally incredible; such as that of talking 
with God face to face, or that of the sun and moon 
standing 'Still at the command of a man. The 
greatest part of the other ancient books are works 
of genius; of which kind are those ascribed to 
Homer, to Plato, to Aristode, to Demosthenes, to 

before Archimedes ; he was of the city of Alexandria, in 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 85 

Cicero, &c. Here, again, the author is not an 
esBential in the credit we ^ive to any of those 
works ; for, as works of genius, they would have 
the same merit they have now, were they anony- 
mous. Nohody believes the Trojan story,- as re- 
hied by Homer, to be true — for it is the poet only 
that is admired ; and the merit of the poet will 
remain, though the story be fabulous. But if we 
disbelieve the mattere related by the Bible authors, 
(Moses for instance) as we disbelieve the things 
related by Homer, there remains nothing of Moses, 
in our estimation, but an impostor. As to the 
ancient historians, from Herodotus to Tacitus, we 
credit them as far as they relate things probable 
and credible, and no further; for if we do, we 
must believe the two miracles which Tacitus re- 
lates were performed by Vespasian, that of curing 
a lame man, and a blind man, in just the same 
manner as the same things are told of Jesus Christ, 
by his historians. We must also believe the mira- 
cle cited by Josephus, that of the sea of Pamphilia 
opening to let Alexander and his army pass, as is 
related of the Red Sea in Exodus.. These mira- 
cles are quite as well authenticated as the Bible 
miracles, and yet we do not believe them ; conse- 
quently the degree of evidence necessary to esta- 
blish our belief of things naturally incredible, 
whether in the Bible or elsewhere, is far greater 
than that which obtains our belief to natural and 
probable things ; and, therefore, the advocates for 
the Bible have no claini to our belief of the Bible, 
because that we believe things stated in other 
ancient writings; since we believe the things 
stated in these writings no further than they are 
probable and credible, or because they are self- 
evident, like Euclid; or admure them because 
they are elegant, like Homer; or approve them 
because they are sedate, like Plato ; or judicious, 
like Aristotle. 



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86 AGE OF REASON. [PART Hi 

Having premised these things, I proceed to exv 
amine the authenticity of the Bible, and I begt^ 
with what are called the five books of Mosed^ 
Oenesisy Exodus^ Leviticus, Mimbers, and Dew^ 
teronomy. My intention is to show that thoso 
books are spurious, and that Moses is not the 
author of them ; and still further, that they were 
not written in the time of Moses, nor till several 
hundred years afterwards ; that they are no other 
thati an attempted history of the life of Moses^ 
and of the times in which he is said to have 
lived, and also of the times prior thereto, writ* 
ten by some very ignorant and stupid pretenders 
to authorship, several hundred years after the 
death of Moses, as men now write histories of 
things that happened, or are supposed to hare 
happened, several hundred or several thousand 
years ago. 

The evidence that I shall produce in this case 
is from the books themselves ! and I will confine 
myself to this evidence only. Were I to refer for 
proof to any of the ancient authors, whom the 
advocates of the Bible call profane authors, they 
would controvert that authority, as I controvert 
theirs ; I will, therefore, meet them on their own 
ground, and oppose them with their own weapon, 
the Bible. 

In the first place, there is no affirmative evi- 
dence that Moses is the author of those books ; 
and that he is the author, is altogether an un- 
founded opinion, got abroad nobody knows hovr. 
The style and manner in which those books ai-e 
written, give no room to believe, or even to sap- 
pose, they were written by Moses ; for it is altc>- 
gether the style and manner of another pereoti 
speaking of Moses. In Exodus, Leviticus, and 
Niunbers, (for every thing in Genesis is prior to 
the time of Moses, and not the Jeast allusion is 
made to him therein) the viiiole, I say, of these 



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AAJLT II.] Ae£ OF RKASON, 87 

books is in the third person; it is always, Vie 
Lord said unto Moses^ or Mosea said unto the 
Lord; or Moses said unto the people^ or th€ 
people said unto Moses; and this is the style 
and manner that historians use, in speaking o£ 
the person whose lives and actions they are writ* 
uig. It may be said that a man may speak of 
himself in the third person ; and, therefore, it may 
be supposed that Moses did ; but supposition proves 
nothing ; and if the advocates for the belief that 
Moses wrote those books himself, have nothing 
better to advance than supposition, they may as 
well be silent. ^ 

But granting the grammatical right, that Moses 
might speak of himself in the third person, be* 
cause any man might speak of himself in that 
manner, it cannot be admitted as a fact in those 

books, that it is Moses who speaks, without render- , 

ing Moses truly ridiculous and absurd ;/for exam* 1 
pie, Numbers, chapter xii. verse 3. " jioW the man ^ ^ 
Moses was very meekf above aU the men which were ^ 
on the face of the earth" If Moses said this of (y i* 
himself, instead of being the meekest of men, he ^ . 
was one of the most vain and arrogant of cox- 
eombsTjind the advocates for those books may., — ^ 
now ta^ which side they please, for both sides 
are against them ; if Moses was no#the author, the 
books ai-e without authority; and if he was the 
author, the author was without credit, because to 
boast of meekness, is the reverse of meekness, and 
hB alie in sentiment. 

In Deuteronomy, the style and manner of writ- 
ing marks more evidently than in the former books, 
that Moses is not the writer. The manner here 
used is dramatical ; the writer opens the subject by 
a short introductory discourse, and then introduces 
Moses in the act of speaking, and when he has 
made Moses finish his harangue, he. (the writer) 
resumes his own part, and speaks tiill he brings 



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88 AG£ OF REASON. [PART »• 

Moses forward again, and at last closes the scene 
with an account of the death, funeral, and charao 
ter of Moses. 

This interchange of speakers occurs four times 
m this book ; from the first verse of the first 
chapter, to the end of the fifth verse, it is the writer 
who speaks ; he then introduces Moses as in the 
aet of making his harangue, and this continues to 
the end of the 40th verse of the fourth chapter ; 
here the writer drops Moses, and speaks histori- 
cally of what was done in consequence of what 
Moses, when living, is supposed to have said, and 
which the writer has dramatically rehearsed. 

The writer opens Ihe subject again in the first 
verse of the fifth chapter, though it is only by say- 
ing that M6ses called the people of Israel together ; 
he then introduces Moses as before, and continues 
htm, as in the act of speaking, to the end of the 
26th chapter. He does the same thing at the be- 
ginning of the 27th chapter ; and continues Mosei^ 
as in the act of speaking, to the end of the 28tli 
chapter. At the 29th chapter the writer speaks 
again through the whole of the first veree, and the 
first line of the second verse, where he introduces 
Moses for the last time, and continues him, as in 
the act of speaking, to the end of the 33d chapter. 

The writer h^ng now finished the rehearsal on 
the part of Moses, comes forward, and speaks 
through the whole of the last chapter ; he begins 
by telling the reader that Moses went up to the top 
of Pisgah ; that he saw from thence the land which 

ithe writer says) had been promised to Abraham, 
saae, and Jacob ; that he, Moses, died there, in the 
land of Bloab, but that no man knoweth of bts^ 
sepulchre unto this day, that is, unto the time in 
which the writer lived, who wrote the book of 
Deuteronomy. The writer then tells us that Moses 
wc(S 110 years of age when he died ; that his eye 
was not dim, nor his natural force abated ; and he 

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PiJlT II.] AGE or REASOlf. 89 

concludes by saying that there arose not a proph«t 
since in Israel like unto Moses, whom, says this 
anonymous writer, the Lord knew face to face. 

Having thus shown, as far as grammatical evi- 
dence applies, that Moses was not the writer of 
those books, I will, afler making a f^w observatioRft 
on the inconsistencies of the writer of the book of 
Deuteronomy, proceed to show, from the historical 
and chronological evidence contained in those 
books, that Moses was not, because he could noi 
bey the writer of them; and, consequently, that 
there is no authority for believing that the in- 
human and horrid butcheries of men, women, 
and children, told in those books, were done, as 
those books say th^y were, at»the command of 
Grod. It is a duty incumbent on every true 
Deist, that he vindicate the moral justice of God 
against the calumnies of the Bible. 

The writer of the book of Deuteronomy, who- 
ever he was, (for it is an anonymous work) is 
obscure, and also in contradiction with himself, 
in the account he has given of Moses. 

Afler telling that Moses went to the top of Pisgah 
(and it does not appear from any account that he 
ever came down again) he tell us that Moses died 
there in the land of Moab, and that he buried him 
in a valley in the land of Moab ; but as there is no 
antecedent to the pronoun Ae, there is no knowing 
who he was that did bury him. If the writer meant 
that he (God) buried him, how should he (the writer) 
know it ? or why should we (the readers) believe 
him? since we know not who the writer was that 
tdls us so, for certainly Moses could not himself 
tell where he was buried. 

The writer also tells us, that no man knowetb 
where the sepulchre of Moses is unto this dcy^ 
meaning the time in which this writer lived ; how 
then should he know that Moses was buried in a 
valley in the land of Moab? for as the writer Hved 
12 

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A A0B OF REASOIV. [PAET II* 

long after the time (^ Moses, as is evident from 'nis 
using the expressimi of unto this day, u^.eanir^^ a 
great length of time after the death of Moses, he 
certainly was not at his funeral ; and, on the other 
band, it is impossible that Moses himself could saT 
that n» man knowelh tehcre the nptdchre is unto this 
da^ To make Moses the speaker, would be an^ 
improvement on the play of a child that hides him- 
self, and cries nobodiif can find me ; nobody can find 
Moses. 

This writer has no where told us how he came 
by tlie speeches which he has put into the moutlr 
of Moses to speak, and, therefore, we have a right 
to conclude that he either composed them himseli^ 
or wrote them frcgn oral trad^on. One or other 
of these is the more probable, since he has given, 
ia &e fiflh chapter, a teble of commandments, in 
which that called the fourth commandment is dif- 
ferent from the fourth commandment in the twen- 
tieth chapter of Exodus. In that of Exodus, the 
reason given for keeping the seventh day is, "be- 
cause (says the commandment) God made the 
heavens and the earth in six days, and rested 
on the seventh;*^ but in that of Deuteronomy^ 
the reason given is, that it was the day on which 
the children of Israel came out of Egypt, and^ 
therefore^ says x\m comrnan^nent, tJue Lord Ha^ 
God commanded thee to kt^ ike sahbath-day. Tku^ 
makes no mention of the creation, nor that of the 
coming out of Egypt. There are also many things 
given 'as laws of Moses in this book, that are not to 
be found in any of the other books ; am<mg whkh. 
is that inhuman and brutal law, chapter xxi. verses 
18, 19, 20, 21, which authorizes parents, the father 
awl the mother, to bring their own children to have 
them stoned to death, for what it is pleased to caH 
stubbornness. But priests have always been fond 
of preaching up Deutercuoonnr, for Deuteronomy 
preaches up tythea ; and it is nam this boc^ chap- 
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FJftT II.] Ae« 09 RXASOir. 91 

ter xxv. verse 4, they have taken the phrase, and 
appRed It to tything, that thou sJudt not muzzle ^ 
ox when he treadeih mt the com; and that this might 
not escape observation, they have noted it in the 
taMe of contents at the head of the chapter, though 
it is only a single verse of less than two lines. O 
priests! priests! ye are willing to be compared to 
an ox, for the sake of tythes. Though it is impos- 
sible fbr us to know idefnJtitciUy who the writer of 
Deuteronomy was, it is not difficult to discover him 
professionally^ that he was some Jewish priest who 
lived, as I shall show in the course of this work, at 
least three hundred and fifty years after the time of 
Moses. 

I come now to speak of the historical and chro- 
nological evidence. The chronology that I shall 
use is the Bible chronology ; for I mean not to go 
out of the Bible for evidence of any thing, but to 
make the Bible itself prove historically and chro- 
Dolb^cally, that Moses is not the author of the 
books ascribed to him. It is, therefore, proper that 
I inform the reader, (such a one at least as may not 
have an opportunity of knowing it,) that in the 
larger Bibles, and also in some smaller ones, there 
18 a series of chronology printed in the margin of 
every page, for the purpose of showing how long 
the historical matters stated in each page happened, 
or are supposed to have happened, l^fore Christ, 
and, ' consequently, ^e distance of tir^e between 
one historical circumstance and another. 

I begin with the book of Genesis. In the 14th 
diapter of Grenesis, the writer gives an account of 
Lot being taken prisoner in a battle between the 
four kings against five, and carried oft*; and that 
when the account of Lot being taken, came to 
Abraham, he armed all his household, and marched 
to rescue Lot ftt)m tiie captors ; and that he pur- 
sued them unto Dan, (verse 14.) 

To show in vrhet manner thiat expression of pu9^ 

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92 AQE OF RSi^SON. [PART IL 

8tiing ihem unto Dan applies to the case in question, 
I will refer to two circumstances, the one in Amer- 
ica, the other in France, The city now called 
New York, in America, was originally New Am- 
sterdam; and the town in France, lately called 
Havre Marat, was before called Havre de Grace, 
New Amsterdam was changed to New York in the 
year 1664 ; Havre de Grace to Havre Marat in the , 
year 1793. Should, therefore, any writing be. 
found, though without date, in which the name 
of New York should be mentioned, it would be 
certain evidence that such writing could not have 
been written before, and must have been written 
after New Amsterdam was changed to New York, 
and, consequently, not tilV after the year 1664, or at 
least during the course of that year. And, in like 
manner, any dateless writing, with the name of 
Havre Marat, would be certain evidence that such 
a writing must have been written after Havre de 
Grace became Havre Marat, and, consequently, not , 
till after the year 1793, or at least during the course 
of that year. 

I now come to the application of those cases, and 
to show that there was no such place as Dan, till 
many years after the death of Moses ; and, conse- 
quently, that Moses could not be the writer of the 
book of Genesis, where this account of pursuing 
them unto Dan is given. 

The plac^ that is called Dan in the Bible *was 
originally a town of the Grentiles, called Laish; 
and when the tribe of Dan seized upon this town, 
they changed its name to Dan, in commetnmoration 
of Dan, who was the father of that tribe, and the 
great grandson of Abraham. 

To establish this in proof, it is necessary to refer 
from Genesis to the 18th chapter of the book called 
the book of Judges. It is there said (verse 27) that 
ihey (the Danites) come unto Laiah to a people (hat 
were quiet and secure, and ihejf smote them unth 1h^ 



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M^T II.] AeE OF REASON. 93 

edge of the sword (the Bible is filled with murder) 
aind burned the dtu with jftre ; and they built a city^ 
(verse 28) and dwm therein^ and they called the name 
of the city Dan, after the name of Van, their father, 
howheit tJie name of the city was Laish at the first. 

This account of the Danites taking possession of 
Laish and changing it to Dan, is placed in the book 
of Judges inunediately after the death of Samson. 
The death of Samson is said to have happened 
1120 years before Christ, and that of Moses 1451 
before Christ, and, therefore, according to the his- 
torical arrangement, the place was not called Dan 
till 331 years after the death of Moses. 

There is a striking confusion between the histo- 
rical and the chronoloffical arrangement in the Book 
of Judges. The five last chapters, as they stand in 
the book, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, are put chronolo^cally 
before all the preceding chapters ; they are made to 
be 28 years before the 16th chapter, 266 before the 
]5th, 245 before the 13th, 195 before the 9th, 90 be- 
fore the 4th, and 15 years before the Ist chapter. 
This shows the uncertain and fabulous state of the 
the Bible. According to the chronological arrange- 
ment, the taking of Laish, and giving it the name 
of Dan, is made to be 20 years after the death of 
Joshua, who was the successor of Moses ; and by 
the historical order as it stands in the book, it is 
made to be 306 years after the death of Joshua, and 
331 after that of Moses ; but they both exclude Mo^ 
fiea from being the writer of Genesis, because, ac- 
cording to either of the statements, no such place 
as Dun existed in the time of Moses,; and, there- 
fore, ^the writer of Genesis must have been some 
person who lived after the town of Laish had the 
name of Dan ; and who that person was, nobody 
knows; and, consequently, the book of Genesis 
is anonymous and without authority. 

I proceed now to state another point of historical 
aod •chronological evidence, and to show therefrom, 



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94 AGE OF REASON. [pAKT Ifj. 

as in the preceding case, that Moses is not the author 
of the book of Genesis. 

In the 36th chapter of Genesis there is givea a 
genealogy of the sons and descendants of Esau, who 
are called Edomites, and also a list, by name, of the 
kings of Edom ; in enumerating of which, it is said, 
verse 31, " And these are the kings that reigned in 
Eifom, before there reigned any king over the children 
of Israel. 

Now, were any dateless writings to be found, in 
which, speaking of any past events, the writer 
should say, these things happened before there was 
any Congress in America, or before there was any 
Convention in France, it would be evidence that 
such writing could not have been written before, 
and could only be written after there was a Con- 
gress in America, or a Convention in France, as 
the case might be ; and, consequently, that it could 
not be written by any person who died before there 
was a Congress in the one country, or a Convention 
in the other. 

Nothing is more frequent as well in history as in 
conversation, than to refer to a fact in the room of 
a date ; it is most natural so to do, because a fact 
fixes itself in the memory better than a date ; sec- 
ondly, because the fact includes tlie date, and serves 
to excite two ideas at once ; and this manner of 
speaking by circumstances implies as positively 
that the fact alluded to is past, as if it was so 
expressed. When a pm*^on, speaking upon any 
matter, says, it was before I was married, o^ be- 
fore my son was born, or before I went to Ajnerica, 
or before I wiut to France, it is absolutely under- 
stood, and intended to be understood, that he has 
been married, that he has had. a son, that he has 
been in America, or been in France. Language 
does not admit of using this mode of expression 
in any other sense ; and whenever such an expres- 
sion is found any where, it can only be under-* 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 95 

Stood in the sense in which only it could have been 
used. * • 

The passage, " therefore, that I ha¥e quoted, 
"that these are the kings that reigned in Edoui, 
before there reigned any king over the children 
of Israel," could only have been written after the 
first king began to reign over them; and, conse^ 
quently, that the book of Genesis, so far from 
having been written by Moses, could not have 
been written till the time of Saul at least. This 
is the positive sense of the passage ; but the ex- 
pression, any king, implies more kings than one, 
at least it implies two, and this will carry it to the 
time of David ; and, if taken in a general sense, it 
carries itself through all the times of the Jewish 
monarchy. 

Had we met with this verse in any part of the 
Bible that professed to have been written after kings 
began to reign in Israel, it would have been impos- 
sible not to have seen the application of it. It 
happens then that this is the case ; the two books 
of Chronicles which gave a history of all the kings 
of Israel, are professedly, as well as in fact, written 
after the Jewish monarchy began ; and this verse 
that I have quoted, and all the remaining verses of 
the 36th chapter of Genesis, are, word for word, in 
the first chapter of Chronicles, beginning at the 
43d verse. 

It was with consistency that the writer of the 
Chronicles could say as he has said, 1st Chronicles, 
chapter i. verse 43, Tliese are the kings that reigned 
in Edoniy before there reigned any king over the child- 
ren of Israel, because he was going to give, and had 
given, a list of the kings that had reigned in Israel ; 
but as it is impossible that the same expression 
could have been used before that period, it is as 
certain as any thing can be proved from historical 
language, that this part of Genesis is taken from 
Chronicles, and that Greuesis is not so old as 



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'96 AGE OF REASON. FART U.] 

Cbronicles, and probably not so old as the book 
of Homer, or ai iEsop's Fables, admitting; Homer 
to have j>een, as the tables of Chronology state, 
contemporary with David or Solomon, and iEsop 
to have lived about the end of the Jewish mcm- 
archy. 

Take away from Genesis the belief that Moaes 
was the author, on which only the strange belief 
that it is the word of Qod has stood, and there 
remains nothing of Genesis but an anonymous book 
of stories, fables, and traditionary or invented ab- 
surdities, or of downright lies. The story of Eve 
and the serpent, and of Noah and his ark, drops to 
; a level with the Arabian Tales, without the merit 
of being entertaining ; and the account of men liv- 
ing to eight and nine hundred years becomes as 
fabulous as the inmiortality of the giants of the 
\ Mytholo^. 

^^ Besides, the character of Moses, as stated in the 
Bible, is the most horrid that can be imagined. 
If those accounts be true, he was the wretch that 
first began and carried on wars on tbe score, or 
on the pretence of religion ; and under that ma^ 
or that in&tuation, committed the most unexam- 
pled atrocities that are to be found in the history 
of any nation, of which I will state only one in- 
stance. 

When the Jewish army returned from one of 
their plundering and murdering excursions, tbe 
account goes on. as follows, Numbers, chapter xxxi. 
verse 13. 

<< And Moses, and Eleazer the priest, and all the 
princes of the congregation, went forth to meet 
them without the camp; and Moses was wroth 
with the officers of the host, with tbe captains 
over thousands, and captains over hundreds, which 
came from the battle ; and Moses said unto them. 
Have ye saved aU the women olivet behold, ^ese 
causea the children of Israel, through the council' 



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FAET II ] AGE OF RKA90N. 97 

of Balaam, to commit trespass against the Lord in 
tiie matter of Peor, and there was a plague among 
the congregation of the Lord. Now, therefore, 
km every male among the little ones, and kill every 
teaman thai Ikdh known a man by lying with him ; but 
aU the women children that have not known a man by 
l^ng loith him, keep alive for yourselves J^ 

Among the detestable villains ^hat in any period 
of the world have disgraced the name of man, it is 
impossible to find a greater than Moses, if this 
account be true. Here is an order to butcher the 
boys, to massacre the mothers, and debauch the 
daughters. 

Let any mother put herself in the situation of 
those mothers ; one child murdered, another des- 
tined to violation, and herself in the hands of an 
executioner ; let any daughter put hei*self in the 
situation of those daughters, destined as a prey to 
the murderers of a mother and a brother, and what 
will be their feelings ? It is in vain that we attempt 
to impose upon nature, for nature will have her 
course, and the religion that tortures all her social 
ties is a false religion. 

After this detestable order, follows an account of 
the plunder taken, and the manner of dividing it; 
and here it is that the profaneness of priestly 
hypocrisy increases the catalogue of crimes 
Verse 37, "^nrf the hordes tribute of the sheep 
was six hundred and three score and fifteen; 
and the beeves was thirty and six thousand, of 
which the Lord's tribute was three score and 
twelve; and the asses were thirty thousand, of 
whi<*.h the Lord's tribute was three score and 
one; and the persons were thirty thousand, of 
whicli the Lord's tribute was thirty and two." 
In short, the matters contained in this chapter, 
as well as in many other parts of the Bible, are 
loo horrid for humanity to read, or for decency 
to hear ; for it appears, from the 35th vei'se of tbia 
13 

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98 AGE OF REASON. [PART TU 

chapter, that the number of woraen-children cojt- 
signed to debauchery by the order of Moses was 
thirty-two thousand. 

People in general know not what wickedness 
there is in this pretended word of (Jod. Brought 
up in habits of superstition, they take it for granted 
that the Bible is true, and that it is good ; they pw- 
mit themselves not to doubt of it, and they carry 
the ideas they form of the benevolence of the 
Almighty to the book which they have been taught 
to believe was written by his authority. Good 
heavens! it is quite another thing; it is a book of 
lies, wickedness, and blasphemy ; for what can be 
greater blasphemy than to ascribe the wickedness 
of man to the orders of the Almighty ? 

But to return to my subject, that of showing that 
Moses is not the author of the books ascribed to . 
him, and that the Bible is spurious. The two in- 
stances I have already given would be sufficient, 
without any additional evidence, to invalidate the 
authenticity of any book that pretended to be four 
or five hundred years more ancient than the mat- 
ters it speaks of, or refers to as facts ; for in the 
case of pursuing them unto Dan, and of the kings 
that reigned over the children of Israel, not even the 
flimsy pretence of prophesy can be pleaded. The 
expressions are in the preter tense, and it would be 
downright idiotism to say that a man could pro- 
phesy in the preter tense. 

But there are many other passages scattered 
throughout those books that unite in the same 
point of evidence. It is said in Exodus, (another 
of the books ascribed to Moses) chapter xvi. verse 
34, "And the children of Israel did eat manna wntU 
they came to a land inhabited ; they did eat manna 
untU they cams unto the borders of the laitd of 
Canaan.^^ 

Whether the children of Israel ate manna or not, 
or what manna was, or whether it was any thing: 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASOir. 99 

more than a kind of fangus or small mushroom, or 
other vegetable substance common to that part of 
the country, makes nothing to my argument; all 
that I mean to show is, that it is not Moses that 
could write this account, because the account ex- 
tends itself beyond the life and time of Moses. 
Moses, according to the Bible, (but it is such a 
book of lies and contradictions there is no knowing 
which part to believe, or whether any) dies in the 
wilderness, and never came upon the borders of 
the land of Canaan ; and, consequently, it could 
not be he that said what the children of Israel did, 
6r what they ate when they came there. This 
account of eating manna, which they tell us was 
written by Moses, extends itself to the time of 
J.oshua, the successor of Moses, as appears by the 
account given in the book of Joshua, after the 
children of Israel had passed the river Jordan, and 
came unto the borders of the land of Canaan. 
Joshua, chapter v. verse 12. "And the manna 
ceased on the morrow, after they had eaten of the 
old com of the land; neither had the children of 
Israel mmvna any more, hut they did eat of the 
fruit of the land of Canaan that yearJ*^ 

But a more remarkable instance than this occurs 
in Deuteronomy ; which, while it shows that Moses 
could not be the writer of that book, shows aU>o 
the fabulous notions that prevailed at that time 
about giants. In the third chapter of Deuterono- 
my, among the conquests said to be made by Mo- 
ses, is an account of the taking of Og, king of 
Bashan, verse 11. ** For only Qg, king of Bashan, 
remained of the race of giants ; behold, his bed- 
stead Vas a bedstead of iron ; is it not in Rabbath 
of the children of Ammon? nine cubits was the 
length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, 
after the cubit of a man." A cubit is 1 foot 
9 888-lOOOths inches; the length, therefore, of 
the bed was 16 feet 4 inches, and the breadth 7 



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100 AGE OF EEASON. [pART U. ^ 

feet 4 iDches; thus much for this giant's bed. 
Now for the historical part, which though the 
evidence is not so direct and positive, as in the 
former cases, it is nevertheless very presumable 
and corroborating evidence, and is better than the 
he^ evidence on the contrary side. 

The writer, by way of proving the existence of 
tlHS giant, refers to his bed, as an ancient relic, and 
says, is it not in Rabbath (or Rabbah) of the child- 
ren of Ammon ? meaning that it is ; for such is 
frequently the Bible method of aflirming a thing. 
But it could not be Moses that said this, because 
Moses could know nothing about Rabbah, nor of 
what was in it. Rabbah was not a city belonging 
to this giant king, nor was it one of the cities that 
Moses took. The knowledge, therefore, that this 
bed was at Rabbah, ahd of the particulars of its 
dimensions, must be referred to the time when 
Rabbah was taken, and this was not till four hun- 
dred years after the death of Moses ; for which, see 
2 Samuel, chapter xii. verse 26. ** And Joab (Da- . 
vid's general) fought against RahbaJi of the children 
of Ammon, and took the royal city." 

As I am not undertaking to point out all the con- 
tradictions in time, place, and circumstance, that 
abound in the books ascribed to Moses, and which 
prove to^ demonstration that those books could not 
be written by Moses, nor in the time of Moses ; I 
proceed to the book of Joshua, and to show that 
Joshua is not the author of that book, and that it is 
anonymous and without authority. The evidence 
I shall produce is^ contained in the book itself; I 
will not go out of the Bible for proof against the 
supposed authenticity of the Bible. False testi- 
mony is always good against itself. 

Joshua, accordrng to the first chapter of Joshua, 
was the immediate successor of Moses; he was, 
moreover, a military man, which Moses was not, 
and he continued as chief of the people of Israd 



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TULT II.] AGE OF EEASON. lOl 

25 years ; that is, from the time that Moses died, 
which, according to the Bible chronology, was 1451 
years before Christ, until 1426 years before Christ, 
when, according to the same chronology, Joshua 
died. If, therefore, we find in this book, said to 
have been written by Joshua, reference to facts done 
after the death of Joshua, it is evidence that Joshua 
could not be the author ; and, also, that the book 
could not have been written till afler the time of the 
latest 'fact which it records. As to the character 
of the book, it is horrid ; it is a military history of 
rapine and murder, as savage and brutal as those 
recorded of his predecessor in villainy and hypoc- 
risy, Moses ; and the blasphemy consists, as in the 
former books, in ascribing those deeds to the or- 
ders of the Almighty. 

In the first place, the book of Joshua, as is the 
case in the preceding books, is written in the third 
person ; it is the historian of Joshua that speaks, 
for it would have been absurd and vain-glorious 
that Joshua should say of himself, as is said of him 
in the last verse of the sixth chapter, that '' his fame 
was noised throughout aU the country^* I now come ^ 
more immediately to the proof. r- 

In the 24th chapter, verse 31, it is said, " that Is- ^ ^ 
rael served the Lord all the days of Joshug^jmd all 
the days of the elders that overlived Joshuq^^ Now, 
in the name of common sense, can it be Joshua that 
relates what people had done afler he was dead ? 
This account must not only ftave been written by 
some historian that lived afler Joshua, but that 
lived also afler the .elders that out-lived Joshua. 

There are several passages of a general meaning 
with respect to time, scattered throughout the book 
of Joshua, that carries the time in which the book 
was written, to a distance from the time of Joshua, 
but without marking by exclusion any particular 
time, as in the passage above quoted. In that pas- 
sage, the time that intervened between the death of 



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r. 



10!l AGE OF REASON. [PART II. 

Joshua and the death of the elders, is excluded de* 
scriptivety and absolutely, and the evidenee substan- 
tiates that the book could not have been written till 
after the death of the last. 

But though the passages to which I allude, and 
which I am going to quote, do not designate any 
particular time by exclusion, they imply a time far 
more distant from the days of Joshua, than is con- 
tained betweej), the death of Joshua and the death 
of the elders.r^Such is the passage, chapter x. verse 
14; where, after giving an account that the sun 
stood still upon Gibeon, and the moon in the 

jv^ valley of Ajalon, at the command of Joshua (a 
tale only fit to amuse children) the passage says, 
"And there was no day like that before it, noi 
after it,^hat the Lord hearkened to the voice of a 

^ man." ^ 
^ This^taie of the sun standing still upon Mount 

Gibeon, and the moon in the valley of, Ajaloo, is 
^ one of those fables that detects itself. j^Sjich a cir- 
cumstance could not have happened wTmont being 
known all over the worldo^^One half would have 
wondered why the sun diet not rise, and the other 
why it did not set ; and the tradition of it would be 
universal, whereas there is noUanatjon in the world 
— . that knows any thing about it. 1 But wfcy must the 
moon stand still ? What ocoMion could there be 
for moon-light in the day-time, and that too while 
the sun shined ? As a poetical figure, the whole is 
well enough ; it is akin to that in the song of Deb- 
orah and Baruk, The stars in their courses fouM 
against Sisera ; but it is inferior to the figurative 
declaration of Mahomet, to the persons who came 
to expostulate with him on his going on. fVert 
thjou^ said he, to come to me tmth the sun in thy right 
handy and the m,oon in thy left, it shotdd not alter my 
career. For Joshua to have exceeded Mahomet, 
he should have put the sun and moon one in each 
pocket, and carried them as Guy Faux carried lu* 



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PAKT II.} AGE OF KRABOV* IDS 

dssk lanthorti, fmd taken them out to shine as he 
might happen to want them. 

The suhlime and the ridiculous are often so 
neady related, that it is difficult to class them sepa^ 
rately. One step above the sublime makes the 
ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous imkAB 
the sublime again : the account, however, abstract- 
ed from the poetical fancy, shows the ignorance of 
Joshua, for he should have commanded the eardi 
to have stood still. 

The time implied by the expression, after it, that 
is, afler that day, being put in comparison with all 
the time that passed before it, must, in order to give 
any expressive signification to the passage, mean a 
great length of time : for example, it would have 
been ridiculous to have said so the next day, or the 
next week, or the next month, or the next year ; to 
give, therefore, meaning to the passage, compara- 
tive with the wonder it relates, and the prior time 
it alludes to, it must mean centuries of years ; less, 
however, than one would be trifling, and less than 
two would be barely admissible. 

A distant, but general time, is also expressed in 
the 8tb chapter ; where, after giving an account of 
the taking of the city of Ai, it is said, verse 28th, 
•* And Joshua burned Ai, and made it an heap for 
ever, a desolation unto this day;^ and again, verse 
Q9ih^ where, speaking of the king of Ai, whom 
Joshua had hanged, and buried at the entering of 
the gate, it is said, " And he raised thereon a great 
heap of stones, which remainetb unto this day," 
that is, unto the day or time in which the writer of 
the book of Joshua lived. And again, in the 10th 
chapter, where, after speaking of the five kings 
whom Joshua had hanged on five trees, and then 
thrown in a cave, it is said, ^And he laid great 
stones on the cave's mouth, which remam unto 
this very day." 

In enumerating the several exploits of Joshua, 



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101. AGE OF REASON. [pART If. 

and of the tribes, and of the places which they con- 
quered or attempted, it is said, chapter zv. verse 63, 
''As for the Jebusites, the inhabitaDts of Jerusalem, 
the children of Judah could not drive them out ; 
but tlie Jebusites dwell with the children of Judah 
ai lerusalem urdo this day,^^ The question upon 
tbis passage is, at what time did the Jebusites and 
the children of Judah dwell together at Jerusalem ? 
As this matter occurs again in the £rst chapter of 
judges, I shall reserve my observations till I come 
to that part. 

Having thus shown from the book of Joshua 
itself, without any auxiliary evidence whatever, 
that Joshua is not the author of that book, and that 
it is anonymous, and, consequently, without author- 
ity, I proceed, as before mentioned, to the book of 
Judges. 

The book of Judges is anonymous on the face 
of it ; and, therefore, even the pretence is wanting 
to call it the word of God ; it has not so much as a 
nominal voucher ; it is altogether fatherless. 

This book begins with the same expression as 
the book of Joshua. That of Joshua begins chap- 
ter i. verse 1, J^ow after the death of Moses, &c., 
and this of Judges begins, JVbtr after the death of 
Joshua, &.C. This, and the similarity of style be- 
tween the two books, indicate that they are the 
work of the same author ; but who he was, is alto- 
gether unknown: the only point that the book 
proves is, that the author lived long after the time 
of Joshua ; for though it begins as if it followed 
immediately after his death, the second chapter is 
an epitome or abstract of the whole book, which, 
according to the Bible chronology, extends its his- 
tory through a space of 306 years ; that is, fro'm the 
death of Joshua, 1436 years before Christ, to tho 
death of Samson, 1120 years before Christ, and 
only 25 years before Saul went to seek Ms footer's 
asses, and was made king. But there is good rea- 



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PART II.] AI9S OF REASON. t^ 

son to believe that it was not written till the time 
of David at least, and that the book of Joshua was 
not written before the same time. 

In the first chapter of Judges, the writer, after 
announcing the death of Joshua, proceeds to tell 
what happened between the children of Judah a»d 
the native inhabitants of the land of Canaan. In 
this statement, the writer, having abruptly men- 
tioned Jeruiulem in the 7th verse, says immediately 
after, in tl0 8th' verse, by way of explanation, 
^Now the children of Judah had fought against 
Jerusalem, fnd taken it;" consequently, this^book 
could not have been written before Jerusalem had 
been taken. The reader will recollect the quota- 
tion I have just before made from the 15th chap- 
ter of Joshua, verse 63, where it is said, that Uut 
JthusUes dwdl loith the children of Judah at Jertuta' 
lem at this day ; meaning the time when the book 
of Joshua was written. 

The evidence I have already produced, to prcKre 
that the books I have hitherto treated of were not 
written by the {>ersons to whom they are ascribed, 
nor till many years after their death, if such per- 
sons ever lived, is already so abundant, that I can 
aftbrd to admit this passage with less weight than I 
am entitled to draw from it. For the case is, that 
so far as the Bible can be credited as a history, the 
city of Jerusalem was not taken till the time of 
David ; and, consequently, that the books of Joshua, 
and of Judges, were not written till after the com- 
mencement of the reign of David, which was 370 
years after the death of Joshua. 

The name of the city, that was afterwards called 
Jerusalem, was originsJly Jehus or Jebusi, and was 
the capital of the Jebusites. The account of Da- 
vid's taking the city is given in 2 Samuel, chapter 
v. verse 4, &c. ; also in 1 Chronicles, chapter xiv. 
verse 4, &c. There is no mention in any part of 
the Bible that ii was ever taken before, nor any ac« 
14 

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106 ■ AGE OF REASON. [PART It. 

count that favors such an opinion. It is not said, 
either in Samuel or in Chronicles, that they vtterli/ 
destroyed men, tvomerij and children; that they left 
net a sovl to breathe, as is said of their other con- 
quests ; and the silence here observed implies that 
it v«ros taken by capitulation, and that the Jebusites, 
the native inhabitants, continued to live in the place 
after it was taken. The account, therefore, given 
in Joshua, that the Jebusites dwell withdhe children 
of Judah at Jerusalem at this day, coftesponds to 
no other time than after the taking the city by 
David. ♦ 

Having now shown that every book in the Bible, 
from Genesis to Judges, is without authenticity, 1 
come to the book of Ruth, an idle, bungling story, 
foolishly told, nobody knows by whom, about a 
strolling country girl creeping slily to bed to her 
cousin Boaz : pretty stuff, indeed, to be called the 
word of God ! It is, however, one of the best 
boAks in the Bible, for it is free from murder and 
rapine. 

I come next to the two books of Samuel, and to 
show that those books were not written by Samuel, 
nor till a great length of time after the death of 
Samuel ; and that they are, like all the former 
books, anonymous, and without authority. 

To be convinced that these books have been writ- 
ten much later than the time of Samuel, and, con- 
sequently, not by him, it is only necessary to read 
the account which the writer gives of Saul going 
to seek his father's asses, and of his interview with 
Samuel, of whom Saul went to inquire about those 
lost asses, as foolish people now-a-days go to a con- 
jurer to inquire after lost things. 

The writer, in relating the story of Saul, Samuel, 
and the asses, does not tell it as a thing that had 
just then happened, but as an ancient story in the 
time this writer lived; for he tells it ip the language 
or terms used at the time that Samuel lived, whic^ 



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P&.IIT II.] AGE OF REASON. 107 

obliges the writer to explain the story in the terms 
or language used in the time the writer lived. 

Samuel, in the account given of him, in the first 
of those books, chapter ix. is called the seer; and it 
is by this term that Saul inquires after him, vei'se 
11, "And as they (Saul and his servant) went up 
tlie hill to the city, they found young maidens go- 
ing out to draw water ; and they said unto them, Is 
the seer ^re?" Saul then went according to the 
direction of these maidens, and met Samuel with- 
out knowing him, and said unto him, verse 18, 
"Tell me, I pray thee, where the seer's house 
isf and Samuel answered Saul and said, lamtlie 
seer,^^ 

As the writer of the book of Samuel relates these 
questions and answers, in the language or manner 
of speaking used in the time they are said to have 
been si)oken ; and as that manner of speaking was 
out of use when this author wrote, he found it ne- 
cessary, in order to make the story understood, to 
explain the terms in which these questions and an- 
swers' are spoken ; and he does this in the 9th 
verse, where he says, " hefore-time, in Israel, when 
a man went to inquire of God, thus he spake. Come, 
let us go to the seer ; for he that is now called a 
prophet, was hef ore-time called a seer." This 
proves, as I have before said, that this story of 
Saul, Samuel, and the asses, was an ancient story 
at the time the book of Samuel was written, and, 
consequently, that Samuel did not write it, and that 
that book is without authenticity. 

But if we go further into'' those books, the evi- 
dence is still more positive that Samuel is not the 
writer of them ; for they relate things that did not 
happen till several years after the death of Samuel. 
Samuel died before Saul; for the 1st Samuel, 
chapter xxviii. tells^ that Saul and the witch of 
Endor conjured Samuel up after he was dead; 
yet the history of the matters contained in those 



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108 AG£ OF REASOir. [PART Jf'* 

books is extended through the remaiDing purt of 
Saul's life, and to the latter end of the life of Da- 
vid, who succeeded Saul. The account of the 
death and burial of Samuel (a thing which he 
could not write himself) is related in the f&ih. 
chapter of the first book of Samuel ; and the chro- 
nology afiixed to this chapter makes this to be 106b 
years before Christ ; yet the history of this Jlrtt 
book is brought down to 1056 years before Christ ; 
that is, to the death of Saul, which was not till 
four years after the death of Samuel. 

The second book of Samuel begins with an ac- 
count of things that did not happen till four years 
after Samuel was dead ; for it begins with the reigo 
of David, who succeeded Saul, and it goes on to 
the end of David's reign, which was forty-three 
years after the death of Samuel ; and, therefore, 
the books are in themselves positive evidence that 
they were not written by Samuel. 

I have now gone through all the books in the 
first part of the^ible, to which the names of per- 
sons are affixed, as being the author of those boolra, 
and which the church, styling itself tlie Christian 
cburch, have imposed upon ibe world as the writ- 
ing of Moses, Joshua, and Samuel ; and I have de- 
tected and proved the falsehood of this imposition. 
And now, ye priests of every description, who have 
preache4 and written against the former part of the 
Jl^e of Reason, what nave ye to say ? Will ye, 
with all this mass of evidence against you, aod 
staring you in the face, still have the assurance to 
march into your pulpits, and continue to impose 
these books on your congregations, as the works oi 
inspired penmen, and the word of God, when it m 
as evident as demonstration can make truth appei|i^ 
that the persons who, ye say, are the authors^ are 
not the authors, and that ye know not who the au* 
thors are ? What shadow of pretence have ye naw 
to produce, for continuing the blasphemous firaud ? 



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PART 1I.J AGE OF REASON. 109 

What have ye still to offer against the pure and 
moral religion of Deisra, in support of your system 
of falsehood, idolatry, and pretended revelation? 
Had the cruel and murderous orders, with which 
the Bible is filled, and the numberless torturing 
executions of men, women, and children, in conse- 
quence of those orders, been ascribed to some 
friend, whose memory you revered, you would 
have glowed with satisfaction at detecting the 
falsehood of the charge, 'and gloried in defending 
his injured fame. It is bemuse ye ai*e sunk in the 
cruelty of superstition, or feel no interest in the 
honor of your Creator, that ye listen to the horrid 
tales of the Bible, or hear them with callous indif- 
ference. The evidence I have produced, and shall 
still produce in the course of this work, to prove 
that the Bible is without authority, will, whilst it 
wounds the stubbonyiess of a priest, relieve and 
tranquilize the minds of millions ; it will free them 
* from all those hard thoughts of the Almighty, 
which priest-crafl and the Bible has infused into 
their minds, and which stood in everlasting oppo- 
sition to all their ideas of his moral justice and be- 
nevolence. 

I come now to the two books of Kings, and the 
two books of Chronicles. Those books are alto- 
gether historical, and are chieffy confined to the 
lives and actions of the Jewish kings, who, in gen- 
eral, were a parcel of rascals ; but these are mat- 
ters with which we have no more concern, than we 
have with the Roman emperors, or Homer's account 
of the Trojan war. Besides which, as those works 
are anonymous, and as we know nothing of the 
writer, or of his character, it is impossible for us to 
know what degree of credit to give to the matters 
related therein. Like all other ancient histories, 
they appear to be a jumble of fable and of fact, 
and of probable and of improbable things; but 
which, diBtance of time and place, and change of 



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110 AGE aV REASlOrC. [part II. 

circumstances in the world, have rendered obsolfete 
and uninteresting. 

The chief use I shall make of those books, Will 
be that of comparing them with each other, and 
with other parts of the Bible, to show the confu- 
sion, contradiction, and cruelty, in this pretended 
word of God. 

The first book of Kings begins with the reign of 
Solomon, which, accorjiing to the Bible Chronolo- 
gy, was 1015 years before Christ ; and the second 
book ends 588 year* before Christ, being a little 
after the reign of Zedekiah, whom Nebuchadnez- 
zar, after taking Jerusalem, and conquering the 
Jews, carried captive to Babylon. The two books 
include a space of 427 years. 

The two books of Chronicles are a history of the 
same time, and, in general, of the same persons by 
another author; for it woujfd be absurd to suppose 
that the same author wrote the history twice ove^ 
The first book of Chronicles, (after giving the gene- 
alogy from Adam to Saul, which tak^s up the first 
nine chapters) begins with the reign of David ; and 
the last book ends, as in the last book of Kings, 
soon after the reign of Zedekiah, about 588 years 
before Christ. The two last verses of the last 
chapter bring the history 52 years more forward, 
that is, to 536. But these verses do not belong to 
the book, as I shall show when I come to speak of 
the book of Ezra. 

The two books of Kings, besides the history of 
Saul, David, and Solomon, who reigned over all 
Israel, contain an abstract of the lives of seventeen 
"kings and one queen, who are styled kings of Ju- 
dah, and of nineteen, who are styled kings of Is- 
ttiel; for the Jewish nation, immediately on the 
death of Solomon, split into two parties, who chose 
separate kings, ^nd who carried on most rancorous 
Wars against each other. 

UtOse ttto boolBs'are Kctle M^re thetn tt faiibtory 



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FAJELT II.] AGE Of REASON. Ill 

of assassinationsy treachery, and wars. The cruel- 
ties that the J^ws had accustomed themselves to 
practise on the Canaanites, whose country they had 
savagely invaded, under a pretended gift from Grod, 
they afterwards practised as furiously on each other. 
Scarcely half their kings died a natural death, and, * 
in some instances, whole families were destroyed 
to secure possession to the successor, who, after a 
few years, and sometimes only a few months, or 
less, shared the same fate. In the tenth chapter of 
the second book of Kings, an account is given of 
two baskets full of children's heads, 70 in number, 
being exposed at the entrance of the city ; ,they 
were the children of Ahab, and were murdered by 
the orders of Jehu, whom Elisha, the pretended 
man of Grod, had anointed to be king over Israel, on 

Eurpose to commit this bloody deed, and assassinate 
is predecessor. And in the account of the reign 
of Manaham, one of the kings of Israel who had 
murdered Shallum, who had reigned but one 
month, it is said, 2 Kings, chapter xv. verse 16, 
that Manaham smote the city of Tiphsah, because 
they opened not the city to him, and aU the tcomen 
ihat were therein that were vfith child they ripped 
up. 

Could we permit ourselves to suppose that the 
"Almighty would distinguish any nation of people 
by the name of his chosen people, we must suppose 
that people to have been an example to all the rest 
of the world of the purest piety and humanity, and 
not such a nation of ruffians and cut-throats as the 
ancient Jews were ; a people, who, corrupted by, 
and copying after, such monsters and imposters as 
Moses and Aaron, Joshua, Samuel, and David, had 
distinguished themselves above all others, on the 
face of the known earth, for barbarity and wicked- 
ness. If we will not stubbornly shut our eyes, and 
steel our hearts, it is impossible not to see, in spite 
of all that long-established superstition imposes Mp« 



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112 AGE OF REASOW. [PART !!• 

on the mind, that the flattering appellation of hU 
chosen people 13 no other than a Tie, wHich the priests 
and leaders of the Jews had invented, to cover the 
baseness of their own characters ; and which Christ- 
ian priests, sometimes as corrupt^ and oflen as cruel, 
have professed to believe. 

. The two books of Chronicles are a repetition of 
the same crimes ; but the history is broken in sev- 
eral places, by the author leaving out the reign of 
some of their kings ; and in this, as well as in that 
of Kings, there is such a frequent transition from 
kings of Judah to kings of Israel, and from kings 
of Israel to kings of Judah, that the narrative is 
obscure in the reading. In the same book the his- 
tory sometimes contradicts itself; for example, in 
the second book of Kings, ,chapter i. verse 8, we 
are told, but in rather ambiguous terms, that afler 
the death of Ahaziah, king of Israel, Jehoram or 
Joram (who was of the house of Ahab) reigned in 
his stead in the second year of Jehoram or Joram, 
son of Jehoshapliat king of Judah ; and in chapter 
viii. verse 16, of the same book, it is said, and in 
the Jijlh year of Joram, the son of Ahab, king of 
Israel, Jehoshaphat being then king of Judah, be- 
gan to reign ; that is, one chapter says Joram of 
Judah began to reign in the second year of Joram 
of Israel ; and the other chapter says, that Joram 
of Israel begen to reign in the JiJlh year of Joram 
of Judah. 

Several of the most extraordinary matters related 
in one history, as having happened during the reign 
of such and such of their kings, are not to be found 
in the other, in relating the reign of the same kiu^; 
for example, the two first rival kings, after the death 
of Solomon, were Rehoboam and Jeroboam ; and 
in 1 Kings, chapters xii. andxiii. an account is given 
of Jeroboam making an offering of burnt incense, 
and that a man, who is there called a man of God» 
cried out against the altar, chapter xiii. verse 2, "O 



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FAJIT II.] AGE OF REASON, tt3 

altar ! altar ! thus saith ^he Lord ; Behold, a cirild 
shall be bom to the house of David, Josiah by 
name, and upon thee shall he offer the priests of 
the high places, and bum incense upon thee, and 
men's bones shall be burnt upon thee." Verse 3, 
" And it came to pass, when king Jeroboam heard 
the saying of the man of God, which had cried 
against the altar in Bethel, that he put forth hi» 
hand from the altar, saying, Lay hold on him ; and 
his hand which he put out against him dried up, so 
that lie could not pull it in again to him^ 

One would think that such an extraordinary case 
as this, (which is spoken of as a judgment) happen- 
ing to the chief of one of the parties, and that at 
the first moment of the separation of the Israelites- 
into two nations, would, if it had been true, been 
recorded in both histories. But though men in 
latter times have believed all thai the prophets have 
said unto them, it does not appear that these pro- 
phets or historians believed each other; they knew 
each other too well. ^ 

A long account also is given in Kings about Eli- 
jab. It runs through several chapters, and con- 
cludes with telling, 2 Kings, chapter ii. verse 11, 
" And it came to pass, as they (Elijah and Elisha) 
still went on, and talked, that behold, there appear- 
ed a chariot of fire and horses of fire, and parted 
them both asunder, and Elijah w&nt up by a whirl- 
wind into heaven," Hum ! this the author of Chron- 
icles, miraculous as the story is, makes no mention 
of, though he mentions Elijah by name; neither 
does he say any thing of the story related in the 
second chapter of the same book of Kings, of a 
parcel of children calling Elisha hold head, bald 
head ; and that this man of God, verse 24, tui^ned 
back, and looked upon them, and cursed them in the 
name of the Lord; and there came ibrtb two she 
bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two child- 
ren of tbem." He also passes over in sileBce the 
15 

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114 AGE OF REASOir. [PART III' 

Story told, 2 Kings, chapter xiii. that when they 
were burying a man in the sepulchre, where Eliiste 
bad been buried, it happened that the dead man, as 
they were letting him down, (verse 21,) " touched 
the bones of Elisha, and he (the dead man) revived^ 
and stood upon his feet J* The story does not tell 
us whether they buried the man notwithstanding he 
revived and stood upon his feet, or drew him up 
again. Upon all these stories,, the writer of Chroni- 
cles is as silent as any writer of the present day,, 
who did not choose to be accused of lying, or at 
least of romancing, would be about stories of the 
same kind. 

• But, however these two historians may dif^r 
from each other, with respect to the tales related by 
either, they are silent alike with vespeet to those 
men styled prophets, whose writings fill up the lat- 
ter part of the Bible. Isaiah, who lived in the time 
of Hezekiah, is mentioned in Kings,, and again m 
Chronicles, when these histovians are speaking of . 
that reign ; but, except in one or two instances ai 
most, and those very slightly, none of the rest are 
so much as spoken o£ or even their existence hint« 
ed at ; though, according to the Bible chronology,, 
they lived within the time tiiose histories were writ- 
ten ; some of them long before. If those prophets^ 
AS they are called, were men of such impoitance in 
their day, as the compilers of the Bible,, and priests^ 
and commentators have since represented tliem to^ 
be, how can it be accounted for, that not one of 
these histories should say any thing about them ? 

The history in the books of Kings and Chron- 
icles is brought forward, as- 1 have already said, ta 
the year 588 before Christ ; it will, therefore, be 
proper to examine, which of these prophets lived? 
before that period. 

Here follows a table of all the prophets, with tbo- 
times in which they lived before Christ, according^ 
to the Chronology^ affixed to the first chapter of 



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PART U.] 



A6X OF REASON. 



115 



each of the iM>oks of the prophets: and, also, of 
the number of years they lived before the books of 
Kings and Chronicles were written. 

Table of the Prophets, untk the time in which they 
lived before Christ, and also before the books of 
Kings and Chronicles were written. 





Years 


Tears brfore 




jVames. 


before 


Kings and 


Observations. 




Christ 


Chronicles. 




Isaiah . . . 


760 


172 


mentioned. 


Jeremiah .... 


629 


41 


gee the note.* 


Ezekiel . . . 


595 


7 


not mentioned. 


Daniel .... 


607 


19 


not mentioned. 


Hosea .... 


785 


97 


not mentioned. 


Joel .... 


800 


212 


not mentioned. 


Amoa .... 


789 


199 


not mentioned. 


Obadiah .... 


789 


199 


not mentioned. 


Jonah ... . 


862 


274 


see the note.t 


Micah .... 


760 


162 


not mentioned. 


Naham .... 


713 


125 


not mentioned. 


Habakkok . . . 


620 


38 


not mentioned. 


Zephaniah . . . 


630 


42 


not mentk)ned. 


STrnhh-.^- 








Malachi \ yew 588 









' This table is either not very honorable for the 
Bible historians, or not very honorable for the Bi- 
ble prophets ; and I leave to priests and commen- 
tators, who are very learned in little things, to set- 
tle the point of etiquette between the two ; and to 
assign a reason why the authors of Kings and. 
Chronicles have treated those prophets, whom in 

* Mentioned only in the last chapter of Chronicles. 

fin 2 Kings » chapter xiv. verse 25, the name of Jonah 
if mentioned on aceonnt of the restoration of a tract of 
land by Jerot)oam; hot nothing farther is said of him, nor 
is any allusion made to the book of Jonah, nor to his ex- 
piditk>n to Ninevah^nor to his encounter with the whale. 



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116 AGE OF RBASOH. [PART It.^ 

the former part of the *^ qf JRecuon, I have con- 
sidered as poets, with as much degrading silence as 
any historian of the present day would treat Peter 
Pindar. 

I have one observation to make on the book of 
Chronicles ; afler which I shcdl pass on to review 
the remaining books of the Bible. 

In my observations on the book of Genesis, I 
have quoted a passage from the d6th chapter, verse 
31, which evidently refers to a time, (i/ler that kings 
began to reign over the children of Israel ; and I 
have shown that as this verse is verbatim the same, 
as in Chronicles, chapter i. verse 43, where it stands! 
consistently with the order of history, which in 
Genesis it does not, that the verse in Genesis, and' 
a great part of the 36th chapter, have been taken, 
from Chronicles ; and that the book of Genesis, 
though it is placed first in the Bible, and ascribed 
to Moses, has been manufactured by some unknown, 
person, after the book of Chronicles was written,' 
which was not until at least eight hundred and sixty 
years after the time of Moses. 

The evidence I proceed by to substantiate this is 
regular, and has in it but two ^ages. First, as !• 
have already stated, that the passage in Genesis re- 
fers itself for time to Chronicles ; secondly, that the 
book of Chronicles, to which this passage refersi 
itself, was not begun to be written until at least eight 
hundred and sixty years after the time of Moses. 
To prove this, we have only to look into the thir- 
teenth verse of the third chapter of the first book 
of Chronicles, where the writer, in giving the ge- 
nealogy of the descendants of David, mentions 
Zedekiah ; and it was in the time of Zedekiah, that 
Nebuchadnezzar conquered Jerusalem, 588 years 
before Christ, and, consequently, more than 860- 
jrears after Moses. Those who have superstitiously 
boasted of the antiquity of the BiUe, and particu* 
larly of the books aacrjb^d to Mosos, have dose H 



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FART II.] AOB OF REASON. 117 

without examination, and without any authority 
than that of one credulous man telling it to an- 
other; for, so far hs historical and chronological 
^evidence applies, the very first book in the Bible is 
not so ancient as the book of Homer, by more than 
three hundred years, and is about the same age 
with iEsop's Fables. 

I am not contending fbr the morality of Homer j 
on the contrary, I think it a book of false glory, 
tending to inspire immoral and mischievous no- 
tions of honor ; and with respect to iEsop, though 
the moral is in general iust, the fable is oflen cruel ; 
and the the cru'elty of tne fable does more injuiy to 
the heart, especially in a child, than the moral does 
good to the judgment. 

Having now dismissed Kings and Chronicles, I 
come to the next in course, the book of Ezra. 

As one proof, among others, I shall produce, to 
show the disorder in which this pretended word of 
God, the Bible, has been put together, and the un- 
certainty of who the authors were, we have only to 
look at the three first verses in Ezra, and the two 
last in Chronicles ; for by what kind of cutting and 
shufiding has it been that the three first verses in 
Ezra should be the two last verses in Chronicles, 
or that the two last verses in Chronicles should be 
the three first in Ezra? Either the authors did not 
know their own works, or the compilers did not 
know the authors. 



Two last verses of 
Chronicles, 

Verse 22. Now in the 
first year of Cyrus, king of 
Persia, that the word of the 
Lord, spoken by the month 
of Jeremiah, might be ac- 
complished, the Lord stirred 
up tho spirit of Cyras, king 
of Persia, that he made a 



Three first verses of 
Ezra, 

Verse 1. Now in the first 
year of Cyrus, king of Per- 
sia, that the jivord of the* 
Lord, by the mouth of Jer« 
emiah, might be fulfilled, the 
Lord stirr«] up the spirit of 
Cjrrus, king of Persia, that 
he made a proclamclieB 



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Its 



AGE OF REASOtZr. 



[part. H. 



proclamation thronghont a]] 
his kingdom, and put it also 
in, writing, saying, 

2S. Thus sailh Cyrus, 
king of Persia, all the king- 
doms of the earth hath the 
Lord God of heaven given 
me; and he hath charged me 
to build him an house in Je- 
rusalem, which is in Jndah. 
Who is there among yon of 
all his people ? the Lord his 
God be with him, and let 
him go .up. 



throngboiit all his kiogdom, 
and pat it also into writing, 
si^ing^ 

2. Thus saith Cyrus, king 
of Persia, The Lord God of 
heaven hath given me all the 
kingdoms of the earth; and 
he hath charged mo to build 
him an house at Jerusalem, 
which is in Judah. 

3. Who is there among 
you of all his people? his 
God be with him, ^ and let 
him go up, to Jerusalem, 
which is in Judah, and 
build the house of the Lord 
God of Israel {he is the 
Crod) which is in Jerusa- 
lem. 

The last verse in Chronicles is broken abruptly, » 
and ends in the middle of a phrase with the word 
up, without signifying to what place. This abrupt 
break, and the appearance of the same verses in 
different books, show, as I have already said, the 
disorder and ignorance in which the Bible has been 
put together, and that the compilers of it had no 
authority for what they were doing, nor we any 
authority for believing what they have done.* 

*I observed, as I passed along, several broken and 
sensdess passages in the Bible, without thinking them of 
consequence enough to be introduced in the body of the 
work; such as that, 1 Samuel, chapter ziii. verse 1, where 
it is said, ** Saul reigned one year; and when he had reign- 
ed two years over Israel, Saul chose him three thousandi 
men, &c." *rhe first part of the verse, that Saul rei|ped| 
one year, has no sense, since it does not tell us what Sany 
did, nor say any thing of what happened at the end of tl 
year; and it is, besides, mere absurdity to say he reigoef 
one year, when the very next phcaBe says ho had reigp&e 



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•PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 119 

Hie only thing that has any appearance of car- 
two; for if he bod reigned ,two, it was impossible not to 
have reigned one. 

Another instance occurs in Joshua, chapter v. where the 
writer tells us a story of an angel (for such the table of 
contents at the head of the chapter calls him,) appearing 
unto Joshua; and the story ends abruptly, and without 
any conclusion. The story is as follows : — Verse f3, 
'* And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that 
he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold there stood a 
man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand; 
and Joshua went onto him, and said unto him, Art thou 
for us, or for our adversaries?" Verse 14, "And he 
said. Nay; but as the captain of the hosts of the Lord am 
I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, 
and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord 
unto his servant? ** Verse 15, ** And the captain of the 
Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy 
foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And 
Joshua did so.*' And what then? nothing; for here the 
story ends, and the chapter too. 

Either this story is broken off in the middle, or it is 
a story told by some Jewish humorist, in ridicule of 
Joshua's pretended mission from God; and the compilers 
of the Bible, not perceiving the design of the story, have 
told it as a serious matter. As a story of humor and 
ridicule, it has a great deal of point; for it pompously in- 
troduces an angd in the figure of a man, with a drawn 
sword in his hand, before whom Joshua falls on his face 
to the «arth, and worships, (which is contrary to their 
second commandment;) and then this most important 
embassy from heaven ends, in telling Joshua to pull off 
his shoe. It might as well have told him to pull up his 
breeches. 

It is certain, however, that the Jews did not credit 
every thing their leaders told them, as appears from the 
cavalier manner in which they speak of Moses, when he 
was gone into the mount ' " As for this Moses, say they, 
we wot not what is become of him." Exodus, chapter 
zzzii. Tone 1. 



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120 JLGE OF REASON. [PART f£ 

tainty, in the book of Ezra, is the time in which it 
was written, which was immediately after the re- 
turn of the Jews from the Babylonian captivity, 
about 536 years before Christ. Ezra (who, accord- 
ing to the Jewish commentators, is the same person 
as is called Esdras in the Apocrypha) was one of 
the persons who returned, and who, it is probable, 
wrote the account of that affair. Nehemiah, whose 
book follows next to Ezra, was another of the re- 
turned }>ersons ; and who, it is also probable, wrote 
the account of the same affair, in the book that 
bears his name. But those accounts are nothing to 
us, nor to any other persons, unless it be to the 
Jews, as a part of the history of their nation ; and 
there is just as much of the word of God in those 
bpoks as there is in any of the histories of France, 
or Rapin's History of England, or the history of 
any other country, 

. But even in mattera of historical record, neither 
of those writers are to be depended upon. In the 
second chapter of Ezra, the writer gives a list of 
the tribes and families, and of the precise number 
of souls of each that returned from Babylon to Je- 
rusalem ; and this enrolment of the persons so re- 
turned, appears to have been one of the principal 
objects for writing the book ; but in this there is 
an error that destroys the intention of the under- 
taking. 

The writer begins his enrolment in the following 
manner:— chapter ii. verse 3, "The. children of 
Parosh, two thousand one hundred seventy and 
four." Verse 4, "The children of Shephatiah, 
three hundred seventy and two." And in this 
manner he proceeds through all the families ; and 
in the 64th verse, he makes a total, and says, the 
whole congregation together was forty and tufo 
thousand three hundred and three scare. 

But whoever will take the trouble of casting up 
the several particulars, will find that the total is but 



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fAET II.] 



A0£ OF REASOS. 



m 



99^18; 80 that the error is 12,542.* What cer- 
taioty, then, can there be la the Bible for any 
thing? 

Nehemiah, in like manner, gives a list of the 
returned families, and of the number of each 
family. He begins as in Ezra, by saying, chiqpter 
vii. verse 8, " The children of Parosh, two thoufand 
three hundred find seventy-two ; " and so on throuffh 
all the families. The list differs in several of tne 
particulars from that of Ezra. In the 6Gth verse, 
Nehemiah makes a total, and says, as Ezra had 
said, " The whole congregation together was forty 
and two thousand three hundred and three score." 



* Particulars of the JFkmUies from Vie second chap- 


itr of 


Ezra. 




Chapter I!. 


Brought forward 15,911 


VeneS - - -2172 


Verse 24 - - - 42 


4- - - 872 




25 - - - 743 


5, - - - 776 




26 - - . 621 


6- - - 2812 




27- - - 122 


7 - - -1254 




28 - - - 228 


8- -' - 945 




29 - - - 52 


9 - - - 760 




30 - - - 156 


10- - - 642 




81 - - - 1254 


11 - - - 628 




32 - - - 820 


12- - - 1222 




83 - - - 725 


13 - - - 666 




34 - - - 345 


14 - - - 2056 




35 - - - 3630 


15 - - - 454 




36 - - -•973 


16 - - - 98 


. 


37 - - - 1052 


17 - - - 323 




88 - - -1247 


18 - - - 112 




89 - - - 1017 


1ft - - - 228 




40 - - - 74 


20 - - - 95 


* 


41 - - - 128 


21 - . - 128 




42 - - - 189 


22- . - 56 




68 - - - 892 


28 ... 128 


Total, 


60 ... 652 


Canied forward 15,911 


* 29,818 


16 




Digitized by GoOQIC 



122 AGE OP REASON. [PART IL 

But the particulars of this list makes a total but of 
31,089, so that the error here is 11,271. These 
w/iters may do well enough for Bible-makers, but 
i)ot for any thing where truth and exactness is ne- 
cessary. The next book in course is the book of 
Esther. If Madam Esther thought it any honor to 
offer hei*self as a kept mistress to Ahasuei*us, or aa 
a rival to Queen Vashty, who had refused to come 
to a drunken king, in the midst of a drunken com- 
pany to be made a show of, (for the account saya, 
they had been drinking seven days, and were 
merry,) let Esther and Mordecai look to that, it is 
no business of ours ; at least, it is none of mine ; 
besides which the story has the appearance of being 
fabulous, and is also anonymous. I pass on to the 
book of Job. 

The book of Job differs in character from all the 
books we have hitherto passed over. Treachery 
and murder make no part of this book ; it is the 
meditations of a mind strongly impressed with the 
vicissitudes of human life, and by turns sinking 
under, and struggling against the pressure. It is a 
highly wrought composition, between willing subi- 
roission and involuntary discontent; and showa 
man, as he sometimes is, more disposed to b^ 
resigned than he is capable of being. Patience 
has but a small share in the character of the 
person of whom the book treats ; on the contrary, 
his grief is oflen impetuous ; but he still endeavors 
to keep a guard upon it, and seems determined, in 
the midst of accumulating ills, to impose upon hinn« 
self the hard duty of contentment. 

I have spoken in a respectful manner of the boo}L 
of Job in the formfer part of the Age of Keasoriy hut 
without knowing at that time what 1 have learned 
since ; which is, that from all the evidence that can 
be collected, the book of Job does not belong to 
the Bible. 

I hhve seen the opinion of two Hebrew com- 



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part; II.] AGE OF REASON. 123 

luentators, Abenezra and~Spinosa, upon this sub- 

iect ; they both say that |he book of Job carries no I * 
internal evidence of being a Hebrew book ; that / >- 
the genius of the composition, and drama of the . . ' 
piece, are not Hebrew ; that it has been translated *^ 
from another language into Hebrew, and that the ("\ ( 
author of the book was a Gentile ; that the charac- ^ , 
ter represented under the name of Satan (which is / 
the fii-st and only time this name is mentioned in » 
the Bible) does not correspond to any Hebrew idea;_j 
and that tlie two convocations which the Deity is 
supposed to have made of those, whom the poem ^ 
calls sons of God, and the familiarity which this 
supposed Satan is stated to have with the Deity, are 
in the same case. 

It may also be observed, that the book shows , 

itself to be the production of a mind cultivated in n 
science, which the Jews, so far from being famous 
for, were very ignorant of. The allusions to objects 
of natural philosophy are frequent and strong, and 
are of a different castto any thing in the books ^.„^^ 
known to be Hebrew.^The astronomical names, f 
Pleiades, Orioo. and Arcturus, are Greek, and not C ., » 
Hebrew names ; and as it does not appear from any / 
thing that is %ohe found in*the Bible, thftt the Jews ' ^^ 
knew any thing of astronomy, or that they studied 
it, they had no translation of those names into their 
own language, but adopted the names as they found 
them in the poem. 

That the Jews did translate the literary produc- 
tions of the Gentile nations into the Hebrew lan- 
guage, and mix them with their own, is not a mat- 
ter of doubt ; the thirty-first chapter of Proverbs 
is an evidence of this ; it is there said, verse 1, Hie 
word of king Lemuel, the prophecy which his mother 
taught him. This verse stands as a prefac^e to the 
proverbs that follow, and which are not the prov- 
erbs of Solomon, but of Lemuel ; and this Lemuel 
was not one of the kings of Israel, nor of Judah, 

Digitized by LjOOQ IC 



134 Aa£ OF REAdoN. [part Ut 

but of some other country, and, consequently, ft 
Gentile. The Jews, however, hfive adopted hit 
proverbs, and as they cannot give any account who 
the author of the book of Job was, nor how they 
came by the book ; and as it differs in character 
from the Hebrew writings, and stands totally un- 
connected with every other book and chapter in the 
Bible before it, and after it, it has all the circum- 
stantial evidence of being originally a book of the 
Gentiles.* 

The Bible-makers, and those regulators of time, 
the Chronologists, appear to have been at a low 
where to place, and how to dispose of the book of 
Job ; for it contains no one historical circumstance,: 
nor allusion to any, that might serve to determine 
its place in the Bible. But it would not have an- 

♦The prayer known by the name of Jlgur^s Prayer y in 
the 30th chapter of Proverbs, immediately preceding the 
proverbs of Lemuel, and which is the only sensible, wdU 
conceived, and well-expressed prayer in the Bible, hat 
much the appearance of bang a prayer taken from th» 
Gentiles. The name of Agar occnrs on no other oocasioit 
than this ; and he is introduced, together with the prayer 
ascribed to him, in the same manner, and nearly in the 
same words^ that Lemuel and his proverbs are introduced 
in the chapter that follows. The first verse of the 80th 
chapter says, "The words of Agur, the son of Iakd>, 
even the prophecy;" here the word prophecy is used 
with the same application it has in the following chapter 
of Lemuel, unconnected with any thing of prediction. 
The prayer of Agur is in the 8th and 9th verses, ** i?e- 
move far froin tm vanity aird lies; give me neOher 
riches nor poverty, but feed me with food convenient for 
^mje : lest I be full and deny thee, and say, JVho is the- 
Lord! or lest I be poor and steal, and take the name (^ 
my God in vain.^* This has not any of the marks^of 
bdng a Jewish prayer, for the Jews never prayed but 
when they were in trouble, and never for any thing hut 
victory, .vengeance, imd riches. 



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PART II.] AGS OF REASON. 1^ 

mvered the purpose of these men to»have informed 
flie world of their ignorance ; and, therefore, they 
have affixed it to the ser^ of 1520 years before 
Christ, which is during the time the Israelites were 
in Egypt, and for which they have just as much 
authority and no more than I should have for say- 
ing it was a thousand years before that period. 
The probability, however, is, that it is older than 
.any book in the Bible ; and it is the only one that 
can be read without indignation or disgust. 

We know nothing of what the ancient Gentile 
world (as it is called) was before the time of the 
Jews, whose practice has been to calumniate and 
blacken the character of all other nations ; and it 
is from the Jewish accounts that we have learned 
to call them heathens. But as far as we know to 
the contrary, they were a just and moral people, 
and not addicted, like the Jews, to cruelty and re- 
venge, but of whose profession of faith we are un- 
acquainted. It appears to have been their custom 
to personify both virtue and vice by statutes and 
images, as is done now-a-days both by statuary and 
by painting ; but it does not follow from this, that 
they worshiped themany more than we do. I pass 
on to the Book of 

Psalms, of which it is not necessary to make 
much observation. Some of them are moral, and 
others are very revengeful; and the greater part 
relates to certain local circumstances of the Jewish 
nation at the time they were written, with which 
we have nothing to do. It is, however, an error or 
an imposition to call them the Psalms of David : 
they are a collection, as song books are now-a-days, 
from different song writers, who lived at different 
times. The 137th Psalm could not have been writ- 
ten till more than 400 years after the time of Da- 
vid, because it is written in commemoration of an 
event, the captivity of the Jews in Babylon, which 
4id not happeui till that distance of time. ^' By th€ 

Digitized by LjOOQ IC 



186 AfiB or KBAoas* [pakt ha: 

riwrs of Babyhn we sat down; ym, we toeptuhem*'\ 
we rerMmbered Zwfu We ha/aged our harp& c^^wii 
the wUhwa, in ^ midst thereof; for there they IM 
carried us away eapti/ce^ required of us a song^ say- 
17^, sing us one of the songs of Zton." As a maa 
woiAd say to an Amepioan, cwr to a FreBcfamaiiy or 
to an Englishman, sing us one of your Anaericair 
songs, or your French song% or your English soi^ 
This remark with respect to the time this Psalm; 
was written, is of no other use than to show (among 
others already mentioned) the general iraposkiiki 
the world has been under, with respect to the aii» ' 
thors of the Bible. No regard has been paid to 
time, place, and circumstance ; and the names oi ■ 
persons have been affixed to the several bookisi 
which it was as impossible they should write^as 
that a man should walk in procession at his own 
funeral. 

The Book of Proverbs. These, like the Psaliii%> 
are a collection, and that from authors belonging to^. 
other nations than those of the Jewish nation, m 1.: 
have shown in the observations upon the book o£. 
Job ; besides which, some of the proverbs ascribed^ : 
to Solomon, did not appear till two hundred audi- 
fif\y yeai*s afler the death of Solomon ; for it is said 
in the 1st verse of the 25th chapter, " 7%6se are dko 
proverbs of Solomon^ which the men of Hkzekiahj king: 
ofJudah, copied out.^^ It was two hundred and fi^ 
years from the time of Solomon to the time o# 
Hezekiah. When a man is famous, and his namec 
is abroad, he is made the putative father of tbingSi 
ho never said or did ; and this, most probably, has; 
been the case with Solomon. It appears to hare 
been the fashion of that day to make proverbs, 9» 
it is now to make jest-books, and &ther them upos^ 
those who never saw them. 

The Book of Ecdesiastes^ or the Preacher^ is also 
asodbed to Solomon, and that with much reascm, 
if not with truth. It is written as the solitaiy nok 



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PAET It.] AOX OF RBASOK, 19T 

flMtioiis of a worn-out debaucheey such as Solo 
mon was, who looking back on scenes he can no 
longer enjoy, cries out, Ml is vanity! A great deal 
of the metaphor and of the sentiment is obscure, 
.most probably by translation ; but enough is left to 
show they were strongly pointed in the original.* 
From what is transmitted to us of the character of 
Solomon, he was witty, ostentatious, dissolute, and 
at last melancholy. He lived fast, and died, tired 
of the world, at the age of fifly-eight years. 

Seven hundred wiveSi and three hundred concu- 
bines, are worse than none ; and however it may 
carry with it the appearance of heightened enj<^- 
ment, it defeats all the felicity of affectionj by leav- 
ing it no point to fix upon ; divided lo^e is never 
happy. This was the case with Solomon ; and if 
he could not, with dl his pretensions to wisdom, 
discover it beforehand, he merited, un pitied, the 
mortification he afterwards endured. In this point 
of view, his preaching is unnecessary, because, ta 
know the consequences, it is only necessaty to 
know the cause* Seven hundred wives, and three 
hundred concubines, would have stood in place of 
the whole book. It was needless afler this to say, 
that all was vanity and vexation of spirit ; for it is 
impossible to derive happiness from the company 
of those whom we deprive of happiness. 

To be happy in old age, it is necessary that we 
aecustom owselves to objects that can accompany 
the mind all the way through life, and that we tal^e 
tke rest as good in their day. The mere man of 
pleasure is miserable in old age; and the mere 
dnidge in business is but little better: whereas, 
natural philosophy, mathematical and mechanical 
aslence, are a continual source of tranquil pleasure ; 
ittid in spite of the gloomy dogmas of priests, and 

* Those Pua look out of the window ahaU be darkened^ 
if aa olweiire figure in tnnriatioB for loss of si^t. 



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128 AGE OF REASON. [PART II. 

• 

of superstition, the study of those things is the" 
study of the true theology ; it teaches man to know 
and to admire the Creator, for the principles of sci- 
ence are in the creation, and are unclmngeable, and 
of divine origin. 

Those who knew Benjamin Franklin will re- 
collect that his mind was ever young ; his temper , 
ever serene ; science, that never grows grey, was 
always his mistress. He was never without an 
object, for when we cease to have an^'object, we 
become like an invalid in a hospital waiting for 
death. 

Sblomon's Songs are amorous and foolish enough, 
but which wrinkled fanaticism lias called divine. 
The compilers of the BiWe have placed these songs 
after the book of Ecclesiastes f and the chronolo- 
gists have affixed to them the sera of 1014 years 
before Christ, at which time Solomon, according to 
the same chronology, was nineteen years of age, 
and was then forming his seraglio of wives and 
concubines. The Bible-makers and the chronolo- 
gists should have managed this matter a little 
better, and either have said nothing about the 
time, or chosen a time less inconsistent with the 
supposed divinity of those songs; for Solomon 
was then in the honey-moon of one thousand de- 
baucheries. 

It should also have occurred to them, that as he 
wrote, if he did write, the book of Ecclesiastes, 
long after these songs, and in which he exclaims, 
that all is vanity and vexation of spirit ; that he 
included those songs in that description. This is 
the more probable, because he says, or somebody 
for him, Ecclesiastes, chapter ii. verse 8, " / got me 
men singers, and women singers, (most probably to 
sing those songs) and musical instrumenis of aU 
sorts; and behold (verse 11,) all was vanity and 
vexation of spirit." The compilers, however^ have 
done their work but by halves ; for as they have 



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PAJIT II.] AGE or REAS017. 1^ 

grven us the songs, they should have given us the 
tunes, that we might sing them. 

The books, called the books of the Prophets, fill 
up all the remaining part of the Bible ; they are 
sixteen in number, beginning with Isaiah, and end- 
ing with Malachi ; of which I have given you a 
list, in the observations upon Chronicles. Of these 
sixteen prophets, all of whom, except the three 
last, lived within the time the books of Kings and 
Chronicles were written ; two only, Isaiah and Jer- 
emiah, are mentioned in the history of those books. 
I shall begin with those two, reserving what I have 
to say on the general character of the men called 
prophets to another part of the work. 

Whoever will take the trouble of reading the 
book ascribed to Isaiah, will find it one of the most 
wild and disorderly compositions ever put together ; 
it has neither beginning, middle, nor end ; and, ex- 
cept a short historical part and a few sketches of 
history in two or three of the first chapters, is one 
continued incoherent, bombastical rant, full of ex; 
travagant metaphor, without application, and desti- 
tute of meaning; a school-boy would scarcely have 
been excusable for writing such stuff; it is (at least 
in the translation) that kind of composition and ■ 
false taste, that is properly called prose run mad. 

The historical part begins at the 36th chapter, 
and is continued to the end of the 39th chapter. It 
relates to some matters that are said to have passed 
during the reign of Hezekiah, king of Judah, at 
which time Isaiah lived. This fragment of history 
begins and ends abruptly ; it has not the least con- 
nection with the chapter that precedes it, nor with 
that which follows it, nor with any other in the 
book. It is probable that Isaiah wrote this firag- 
ment himself, because he was an actor in the cir- 
cumstances it treats of; but, except this part, there 
are scarcely two chaptei-s that have any connection 
with each other ; one is entitled, at the beginning - 
17 



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130 AGE OF REASON. [PARi" H^ 

of the first verse, the burden of Babylon ; another^ 
the burden of Moab ; another, the burden of Da- 
mascus; anothei*, the burden of Egypt; another, 
the burden of the Desart of the Sea ; another, the 
burden of the Valley of Vision ; as you would say, 
the story of the knight of the burning mountain, 
the story of Cinderella, or the children in the 
wood, &c. &c. 

I have already shown, in the instance of the two 
last verses of Chronicles, and the three first in Ezra, 
that the compilers of the Bible mixed and confound- 
ed the writings of different authors with each other, 
which alone, were there no other cause, is sufficient 
to destroy the authenticity of any compilation, be- 
cause it is more than presumptive evidence that the 
compilers are ignorant who the authors were. A 
very glaring instance of this occurs in the book 
ascribed to Isaiah, the latter part of the 44th chap- 
ter, and the beginning of the 45th, so far from hav- 
ing been written by Isaiah, could only have been 
written by some pei-son who lived, at least, a hun- 
dred and fifty years after Isaiah was dead. 

These chapters are a compliment to Cyrus^ who 
permitted the Jews to return to Jerusalem from the 
Babylonian captivity, to rebuild Jerusalem and the 
temple, as is stated in Ezra. The last verse of the 
44th cha[rter, and the beginning of the 45th, are in 
the following wor^s : — " Th4it saith of Cyrus, he is 
my shephefd, and shall perform all my pleasure; even 
saying to Jerusalem, thou sJudt be huilt ; and to the 
temple, thy foundations shall be laid ; thus saith the 
Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand 1 
have holden to subdue nations before him, and I unU 
loose the loins of kings to open before him the two- 
leaved gates, and the gates shall not be shiU ; I will go 
before thee,^^ tfc. 

What audacity of church luid priestly ignorance 
it is to impose this book upon the world as the 
writing of Isaiah, when Isaiah, according to their 



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PART II.] AGE OF REA90?r. 131 

own chronology, died soon after the death of Hezc- 
kiah, which was 698 years before Christ; and the 
decree of Cyrus, in favor of the Jews returning to 
Jerusalem, was, according to the same chronology, 
536 years before Christ ; which was a distance of 
time between the two of 162 years. I do not sup- 
pose that the corapilei*s of the Bible made these 
books, but rather that they picked up some loose, 
anonymous essays, and put them together under the 
names of such authors as best suited their purpose. 
They have encouraged the imposition, wliich is 
next to inventing it ; for it was impossible but they 
must have observed it. 

When we see the studied craft of the scripture- 
makers, in making every part of this romantic book 
of school-boy's eloquence, bend to the monstrous 
idea of a Son of God, begotten by a ghost on the 
body of a virgin, there is no imposition we are not 
justified in suspecting them of Every phrase and 
circumstance are marked with the barbarous hand 
of superstitious torture, and forced into meanings 
it was impossible they could have. The head of 
every chapter^ and the top of every page, are blaz- 
oned with the names of Christ and the church, that 
the unwary reader might suck in the error before 
he began to read. 

Behold a virgin shall conceive, mid bear a son, 
Isaiah, chapter vii. verse 14, has been interpreted 
to mean the person called Jesus Christ, and his 
mother Mary, and has been echoed through Christ- 
endom for more than a thousand years ; and such 
has been the rage of this opinion, that scarcely a 
spot in it but has been stained with blood and mark- 
ed with desolation id consequence of it. Though 
it is not my intention to enter' into controversy on 
subjects of this kind, but to confine myself to show 
that the Bible is spurious ; and thus, by taking away 
the foundation,' to overthrow at once the whole 
structure of superstition raised thereon; I will, 



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132 AGE QF REASON. [PA^T II. 

however, stop a raoment to expose the fallacious 
application of this passage. 

Whether Isaiah was playing a trick with Ahaz, 
king of Judali, to whom this passage is spoken, is 
DO business of mine; I mean only to shftw the mis- 
application of the passage, and that it has no more 
velerence to Christ and his mother, than it has to 
me and my mother. The story is simply this. 

The k'mg of Syria and the king of Israel (I have 
already mentioned that the Jews were split into two 
nations, one of which was called Ji^dah, the capitol 
of which was Jerusalem, and the other Israel) made 
war jointly against Ahaz, king of Judah, and march- 
ed their armies towards Jerusalem. Ahaz and his 
people became alarmed, and the account says, verse 
% ^ Tkeir hearts toere moved as (he trees of the wood 
are moved with the unnd.''^ 

In this situation of things, Isaiah addresses him- 
self to Ahaz, and assures him in the nam^ of the 
Lord (the cant phrase of all the prophets) that these 
two kings should not succeed against him ; and to 
satisfy Ahaz that this should be the case, tells him 
to ask a sign. This, the account says, Ahaz de- 
clined doing; giving as a reason, that he would not 
tempt the Lord; upon which Isaiah, who is the 
speaker, says, verse 14, "Therefore the Lord him- 
self shall give you a sign ; behold a virgin shall con- 
ceive^ and bear a son;^ and the 16th ve^ says, 
^And before this chUd shaU know to refuse the evU^ 
and choose the good, the land which thou abhorrest 
or dreadest (meaning Syria and the kingdom of 
Israel) shall be forsaken of both her kings." Here, 
then, was the sign, and the time limited for the 
completion of the assurance or promise ; namely, 
before this child should know to refuse the evil, and 
choose the good. 

Isaiah having committed himself thus far, it be- 
came necessary to him, in order* to avoid the impu- 
tation of being a false prophet, and the consequence 



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PART II.] AGE or REASOir. 183 

thereof, to take measures to moke this sign appear. 
It certainly was not a diificult thing, in any time 
of the world, to find a girl with child, or to make 
her 80 ; and perhaps Isaiah knew of one before- 
hand ; for I do not suppose that the prophets of that 
day were any more to be trusted than the priests of 
this : be that however as it may, he says in the next 
chapter, verse 2, " And I took unto me faithfu) wit- 
nesses to record, Uriah the priest, and Zechariah 
the son of Jeberechiah, and / tveiit unto the pro- 
phetess, and she conceived and bare a son^ , 

Here, then, is the whole story, foolish as it is, of 
this child and this virgin ; and it is upon the bare- 
faced perversion of this story, that the book of 
Matthew, and the impudence and sordid interests 
of priests in latter times, have founded a theory 
which they call the gospel; and have applied this 
story to signify the person they call Jesus Christ; 
begotten, they say, by a ghost, whom they call holy, 
on the body of a woman, engaged in marriage, and 
afterwards married, whom they call a virgin, 700 
years after this foolish story was told; a theory 
which, speaking for myself, I hesitate not to be- 
lieve, and to say, is as fabulous and as false as God 
is true.* 

But to show the imposition and falsehood of 
Isaiah, we have only to attend to the sequel of this 
story ; which, though it is passed over in silence in 
the book of Isaiah, is related in the 28th chapter 
of the second Chronicles; and which is, that in- 
stead of these two. kings failing in their attempt 
against Ahaz, king of Judah, as Isaiah had pre- 

♦In the 14th verse of the vii. chapter, it 'is said, that 
the child should be called Iinmannel ; hot this name was 
not given to either of the children, otherwise than as a 
character, which the word signifies. That of the pro-* 
phetess was called Maher-slcilal-hash-baz, and that of 
Mary was called JeatiB, 



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134 AGE OF REASON. [PART n. 

tended to foretel in the name of the Lord, they sue* 
coeded ; Ahaz was defeated and destroyed ; a hun- 
dred and twenty thousand of his people were 
slaughtered; Jerusalem was plundered, and two 
hundred thousand women, and sons and daughters, 
carried into captivity. Thus much for this lying 
prophet and impostor Isaiah, and the book of false- 
hoods that bears his name. I pass on to the book 
of 

Jeremiah, This prophet, as he is called, lived in 
tli« time that Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem, 
in the reign of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah ; 
and the suspicion was strong against him, that he 
was a traitor in the interest of Nebuchadnezzar. 
Every thing relating to Jeremiah shows him to 
have been a man of an equivocal character; in his 
metaphor of the potter and the clay, chapter xviii. 
he guards his prognostications in such a crafty man- 
ner, as always to leave himself a door to escape by, 
in case the event should be contrary to what he had 
^^ predicted. 
"\ /In the 7th and 8th verses of that chapter, he 

I V makes Ihe Almighty to say, " At what instant . I 
' \ shall speak concerning a' nation, and concerning a 
^"'kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and de- 
stroy it ; if that nation, against whom I have pro- 
nounced, turn from their evil, I will repent me of 
the evil that I thought to do unto them." Here was 
a proviso against one side of the case ; now for tbe 
other side. 

Verses 9 and 10, " At what instant I shall speal^ 
concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to 
build and to plant it, if it do evil in my sight, that 
it obey not my voice ; then I will repent me of the 
pood wherewith I said I would benefit them," 
Here is a proviso against the other side ; and, ac- 
cording to this plan of prophesying, a prophet could 
never be wrong, however mistaken the Almigluy 
might be. This sort of absurd subterfugeJand this 

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PART II.] AOE OF REASON. 135 

manner of speaking of the Almighty, as one would 
speak of a man, is consistent with nothing but the 
stupidity of the Bible. 

As to the authenticity of the book, it is only ne- 
cessary to read it in order to decide positively, that, 
though some passages recorded therein may. have 
been spoken by Jeremiah, he is not the author of 
the book. The historical parts, if they can be call- 
ed by that name, are in the most confused condition : 
the same events are several times repeated, and that 
in a manner different, and sometimes in contradic- 
tion to each other 5 and this disorder runs even to 
the last chapter, where the history, upon which the 
. greater part of the book has been employed, begins 
i anew, and ends abruptly. The book has all the ap- 
pearance of being a medley of unconnected anec- 
dotes, rejecting persons and things of that time, 
collected together in the same rude manner as if 
the various and contradictory accounts, that are to 
be found in a bundle of newspapers, respecting per- 
sons and things of the present day, were put to- 
gether without date, order, or explanation. I will 
give two or three examples of this kind. 

It appears, from the account of the 37th chapter, 
» that the army of Nebuchadnezzar, which is called 
the army of the Chaldeans, had besieged Jerusalem 
some time ; and on their hearing that the army of 
Phvaoh, of Egypt, was marching against them, 
they raised the siege, and retreated for a time. It 
may here be proper to mention, in order to under- 
stand this confused history, that Nebuchadnezzar 
had besieged and taken Jerusalem, during the reign 
of Jehoiakim, the predecessor of Zedekiah ; and 
&at it was Nebuchadnezzar who had made Zede- 
kiah king, or rather vice-roy ; and that this second 
siege, of which the book of Jeremiah treats, was in 
consequence of the revolt of Zedekiah against 
Nebuchadnezzar. This will, in some measure, 
account for the suspicion that affixes itself to Jeie- 



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136 AGE OF REASON. [pART II. 

iniah, of being a traitor, and in the interest of Nebu- 
chadnezzar ; whom Jeremiah calls, in the 43d chap- 
ter, verse 10, the servant of Grod. 

The 11th verse of this chapter (the 37th,) says, 
** And it came to pass, that, when the army of the 
Chaldeans was broken up from Jerusalem, for fear 
of Pbaf oah's army, that Jeremiah went forth out of 
Jerusalem, to go (as this account states,) into the 
land of Benjamin, to separate himself thence in the 
midst of the people ; and when he was in the gate 
of Benjamin, a captain of the ward was there, 
whose name was Irijah ; and he took Jeremiah the 
prophet, saying. Thou fallest away to the Chal- 
deans ; then Jeremiah said, It is fiilse, I fall not 
away to the Chaldeans. Jeremiah being thus stop- 
ped and accused, was, after being examined, com- 
mitted to prison, on suspicion of being a traitor, 
where he remained, as is stated in the last verse of 
this chapter. 

But the next chapter gives an account of the im- 
prisonment of Jeremiah, which has no connection 
with this account, but ascribes his imprisonment to 
another circumstance, and for which we must go 
back to the 21st chapter. It is there stated, verse 
1, that Zedekiah sent Pashur, the son of Malchiah, 
and Zephaniah, the son of Maaseiah the priest, to 
Jeremiah, to inquire of him concerning Nebuchad- 
nezzar, whose army was then before Jerusalem; 
and Jeremiah said to them, verse 8, "Thus saith 
the Lord, Behold I set before you the way of life, 
and the way of death ; he that abideth in this city 
shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by 
the pestilence; but he that goeth out and falleth to 
the Chaldeans that besiege you, he shall live, and 
his life shall be unto him for a prey." This inter* 
view and conference breaks off abruptly at the end 
of the 10th verse of the Slet chapter; and such is 
the disorder of this book, that we have to pass over 
sixteen chapters, jipon various subjects, in order to 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 137 

come at the continuation and event of this confer- 
ence ; and this hrings us to the first verse of the 
dSth cha|>ter, as 1 have just mentioned. 

The 38th chapter opens with saying, "Then 
Shephatiah, the son of Mattan ; Gedaliah, the son 
of Pashur ; and Juhal, the son of Shelemiah ; and 
Pashur, the son of Malchiah; (here are more per- 
scMis mentioned than in the 21st chapter) heard the 
words th«t Jeremiah spoke unto the people, saying, 
Thus saith the Lord, He that remaineth in this ciixfy 
shall die hy the swordy by the famine, and by the pes- 
tilence ; bid lie that goeth forth to the Chaldeans shall 
live ; for he shall have his life for a prey, and shaU 
live; (which are the words of the conference) there- 
fore, (say they to Zedekiah,) we beseech thee, let 
us put this man to death, for thtis he weakeneth tlie 
hands of the men of war that remain in this city, and 
the hands of all the people in speaking such words 
unto them ; for this man seeketh not the welfare of the 
people, but the hurt : " and at the 6th verse it is said, 
**Then they took Jeremiah, and put him into a 
dungeon of Malchiah." 

These two accounts are different and contradict- 
ory* The one ascribes his imprisonment to his 
attempt to escape out of the city ; the other to his 
preaching and prophesying in the city; the one to 
his being seized by the guard at the gate ; the other 
to his be'ng accused before Zedekiah, by the con- 
ferees.* 



* I observed two chapters, 16tb and 17tb, in the first 
book of Samnel, that contradict each other with respect to 
David, and the manner he becamB acquainted with Saul ; 
as the 37th and 38th chapterii of the book of Jeremiah 
contradict each other with respect to the cause of Jere- 
miah's imprisonment. 

In the I6th chapter of Samuel, it is said that an evil 
spirit of God troubled Saul, and that his servants advised 
him (as a remedv) ** to seek out a man who was a cun« 



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136 AGE OF REASON« [pART 11* > 

In the next chapter (the d9th) we have another - 
instance of the disordered state of this book: for 
notwithstanding the siege of the city, by Nebuchad- 
nezzar, has been the subject of several of the pre- 
ceeding chapters, particularly the 37th and d8th; 
the 39th chapter begins as if not a word had been 
said upon the subject ; and as if the reader was to 
be informed of every particular respecting it; for it 

? 

ning player upon the harp." And Saul said, verse 17, 
<* Provide now a man that can play well, and bring him 
unto me.'* .Then answered oneof bb servants, and said. 
Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse, the Bethlebemite, that 
is canning in playing, and a mighty man, and a man of 
war, and prndent in matters, and a comely person, and 
the Lord is with him; wherefore Saul sent messengers 
unto Jesse, and said, ** Send me David, thy son." And 
(verse 21) David came to Saul, and stood before him, 
and be loved him greatly, and be became bis armor-bearer; 
and when the evil Spirit of God was upon Saul, (verse 
28) David took his harp, and played with his hand, and 
Saul was refreshed, and was well. 

But the next chapter (17) gives an account, all different 
to this, of the manner that Saul and David became ac- 
quainted. Here it is ascribed to David*s encounter wilb 
Goliab, when David was sent by bis father to carry pro* 
vision to his brethren in the camp. In the 65th verse of 
this chapter it is said, " And when Saul saw David go 
forth against the Philistine, (Goliab) be said to Abner, the 
captain of the Host, ** Abner, whose son is this youth ? 
And Abner said. As thy soul livetb, O king, I cannot tell. 
And the king said. Inquire thou whose son the stripling is. 
And as David returned from the slaughter of the Philis- 
tine, Abner took him and brought him before Saul, with 
the bead of the Philistine in his hand; and Saul said unto 
hjm, Whose son art thou, thou young man ? And David 
answered, « I am the son of thy servant Jesse, the Betb- 
lehemite." These two accounts belie each other, because 
each of them supposes Saul and David not to have known 
each other before. This book, the Bible, is too ridiculoafl 
even for criticism. 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 189 

begins with saying, verse l^^In ihe ninOi year {f 
ZedeMah, king of Judahy %n the tenth month, came 
JVtbuehadnezzar, king of BixbyUm, and aU hit ^xxtt^, 
agtmifit JeruaaUmy and besieged i^," &c. &.c* 

But the instance in the last chapter (the 52d) is 
still more glaring ; for though the story ba^ been 
told over and over again, this chapter still supposes 
the reader not to know any thing of it, for it logins 
by saying, verse 1, ^ Zedekiah was one and twenty 
years old when he began to ret^ and he reigned 
eleven years in Jerustdem^ and his mother^ s name was 
^ Hamutaly ike dauglder of Jeremiah qf Ubnahj (verse 
4,) and it earns to pass, in the ninth year of his reign, 
in the tenth month, that J^ebuchadnezzar king of Bab- 
ylon, cams, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, 
and pitched against it, and budt forts against 
iC^ &c. &C. 

It is not possible that any one man, and more 
particularly Jeremiah, could have been the writer 
of this book. The errors are such as could not 
have been committed by any person sitting down 
to compose a work. Were I, or any other man, to 
wiite in such a disordered manner, nobody would 
read what was written ; and every body would sup- 
pose that the writer was in a state of insanity. The 
only way, therefore, to account for this disorder, is, 
that the book is a medley of detached unauthenti- 
cated anecdotes, put together by some stupid book- 
maker, under the name of Jeremiah ; because many 
of them refer to him, and to the circumstances of 
the times he lived in. 

Of the duplicity, and of the false predictions of 
Jeremiah, I shall mention two instances, and then 
proceed to review the remainder* of the Bible. 

It appears from the 38th chapter, that when Jere- 
miah was in prison, Zedekiah sent for him, and at 
this interview, which was private, Jeremiah pressed 
It strongly on Zedekiah to surrender himself to the 
enemy. " y, says he, (verse 17,) thou wiU assuredly 

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140 AGE OF REASON. [PART II. 

ga forth imto the king of Babylon^9 princes, then thjf 
soul shall livt^^ &c. Zedekiah was apprehensive , 
that what passed at this conference should be 
known ; and he said to Jeremiah, (verse 25,J " If 
the prkices (meaning those of Judah) hear that I 
have talked with thee, and they come unto thee 
and say unto thee, Declare unto us now what thou 
hast said unto the king ; hide it not from us, and we 
will not put thee to death ; and, also, what the king 
said unto thee ; then thou shalt say unto them, I . 
presented my supplication before the king ; that he 
would not cause me to return to Jonathan's house 
to die there. Then can|^ all the princes Unto Jer* « 
emiah, and asked him, and he told them according to 
aU the words the king had commandedJ*^ Thus, the 
man of God, as he is called, could tell a lie, or very 
strongly prevaricate, when he supposed it would 
answer his purpose; for certainly he did not go to,. 
Zedekiah to make his supplication, neither did he . 
make it; he went because he was sent for, and he^; 
employed that opportunity to advise Zedekiah to ', 
surrender himself to Nebuchadnezzar. 

In the 34th chapter is a prophecy of Jeremiah to , 
Zedekiahj.in these words, (vei*se 2) "Thus saith the 
Lord, Behold I will give this city into the hands of 
the king of Babylon, and he will burn it with fire ; 
and thou shalt not esca])e out of his hand, but that 
thou shalt surely be taken, and delivered into his 
liand ; and thine eyes shall behold the eyes of the 
I^ing of Babylon, and he shall speak with thee • 
mouth to mouth, and thou shalt go to Babylon. 
Yet Itear the word of the Lord ; O Zedekiah, king of . 
Judah, ttius saith tJie Lord, Thou shalt not die by the 
sword, hid thou shalt die in peace ; and with the bum^^ 
ings of thy fathers, the former kings that were before 
thee, so shall they bum odors for thee, and they tdiU 
lament thee, saying, Ah, Lord *, for I have pronounced 
the word, saith the Lord.^^ 

Now, instead of Zedekiah beholding the eyes of 



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PART II.1 AeS OF REASOir. 141 

the king of BabyloD, and speaking with him mouth 
to mou3], and dying in peace, and with the burn- 
ing of odors, as at the funeral of his fathers (as 
Jeremmh had declared the Lord himself liad pro- 
nounced^ the reverse, according to the 5^ chapter, 
was the case; it is there said, (verse 10) ** That the 
king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before 
his eyes : then he put out the eyes of Zedekiah, 
and bound him in chains, and carried him to Baby- 
lon, and put him in prison till the day <^ his death.** 
What, then, can we say of these prophets, but that 
they are impostors and liars? 

As for Jeremiah, he experienced none of those 
evils. He was taken into favor by Nebuchadnez- 
zar, who gave him in charge to the captain of the 
guard, (chapter xxxix. verse 12,) *' Take him, (said 
he) and look well to him, and do him no barm ; but 
do unto him even as he shall say unto thee.*' Jere- 
miah joined^ himself afterwards to Nebuchadnez- 
ztu", and went about prophesying for him against 
tile Egyptians, who had marched to the relief of 
Jerusalem while it was besieged. Thus much for 
another of the lying prophets, and the book that 
bears his name. 

I have been the more particular in treating of the 
books ascribed to Isaiah and Jeremiah, because 
those two are spoken of in the books of Kings and 
of Chronicles, which the others are not. The re- 
mainder of the books ascribed to the men called 
prophets, I shall not trouble myself much about ; 
but take them collectively into the observations I 
shall offer on the character of the men styled pro- 
phets. 

In the former part of the Age of Reason, I have 
said that the word prophet was the Bible-word for 
poet, and that the flights and metaphors of the Jew- 
ish poets have been foolishly erected into what are 
now called prophecies. I am sufficiently justified 
in this opinion, not only because the books called 



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142 AGE OF REASON. [pARf }t. 

the prophecies are written in poetical language, but 
because there is no word in the Bible, except it be 
the word prophet, that describes what we mean by 
a poet. 1 have also said that the word signifies a 
performer upon musical instrainents, of which I 
have given some instances ; such as that of a com- 
pany of prophets prophesying with psalteries, with 
tabrets, with pipes, with harps, &c., and that Saul 
prophesied with them, 1 Samuel, chapter x. verse 
5. It appears fi*om this passage, and from other 
parts in the book of Samuel, that the word prophet 
was confined to signify poetry and musip ; for the 
person who was supposed to have a visionary in- 
sight into concealed things, was not a prophet but 
a 5eer,* (1 Samuel, chapter ix. verse 9;) and it was 
not till after the word seer went out of use (which 
most probably was when Saul banished those he 
called wizards^ that the profession of the seer, or 
the art of seeing, became incorjwrated into the 
word prophet. 

According to the modem meaning of the word 
prophet and prophesying, it signifies foretelling 
events to a great distance of time ; and it became 
necessary to the inventors of the gospel to give it 
this latitude of meaning, in order to apply or to 
stretch what they call the prophecies of the Old 
Testament, to the times of the New ; but according 
to the Old Testament, the prophesying of the seer, 
and afterwards of the prophet, so far as the mean- 
ing of the word seer was incorporated into that of 
prophet, had reference only to things of the time 
then passing, or very closely connected with it; 
such as the event of a battle they were going to 
engage in, or of a journey, or of any enterprise 

* I know not what is the Hebrew word that corresponds 
to the word seer in English; but I observe it is translated 
into French by La Voyant, from the verb voir to see; and 
which means the person who tees, or the seer. 



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FAUT II.] AGE OF REA80N. 143 

they were going to undertake, or of any circum- 
slance then pending, or of any difficulty they were 
then in ; all of which had immediate reference to 
themselves (as in the case already mentioned of 
Ahaz and Isaiah with respect to the expression, 
Behold a virgin shall conceive and hear a son,) and 
not to any distant future time. It was that kind of 
prophesying tliat corresponds to what we call for- 
tune-telling; such as casting nativities, predicting 
riches, fortunate or unfortunate marriages, conjur- 
ing for lost goods, &c. ; and it is the fraud of the 
Christian church, not that of the Jews; and the 
ignorance and the superatition of modern, not that 
of ancient times, that elevated those poetical — mu- 
sical — conjuring — dreaming — strolling gentry, into . 
the rank they have since had. 

But, besides this general character of all the 
prophets, they had also a particular character. 
They were in parties, and they prophesied for or 
against, according to the party they were with ; as 
the poetical and political writers of the present day 
write in defence of the party they associate with 
against the other. 

After the Jews were divided into two nations, 
that of Judah and that of Israel, each party had 
its prophets, who abused and accused each other 
of being false prophets, lying prophets, impos- 
ters, &c. 

The prophets of the party of Judah prophesied 
against the prophets of the party of Israel ; arid 
those of the party of Israel against those of Judah. 
This party-prophesying showed itself immediately 
on the separation under the fii-st two rival kings 
Rehoboam and Jeroboam. The prophet that curs- 
ed, or prophesied, against the altar that Jeroboam 
had built in Bethel, was of the party of Judah, 
where Rehoboam was king ; and he was way-laid, 
on his return home, by a prophet of the party of 
Israel, who said unto him, (1 Kings, chapter x.) 



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144 . AOB OF REASON. [p^MKI. 

"Jhi ihou ihe man o/* God that came from Judmkf 
and he said lam.^^ Then the prophet of the pii^ 
of Israel said to him, *^Iam a prophet also, a$ Aotf 
arty (sigDifying of Judah) and an angd aptJce umto 
me by the word of ihe Lord^ sayings Bring him badt 
wUh thee unto thine house, thctt he may eat bread and 
drink water: but (says the 18th verse) ^ lied unto 
him^ This event, however, according to the stpiy, 
is, that the prophet of Judah never got back to Ju> 
dah, for he was found dead on the road, by the eon- 
trivance of the prophet of Israel, who, no doubt, 
was called a true prophet by his own party, and the 
prophet of Judah a lying prophet. 

In the third chapter of the second of King% a 
story is related of prophesying or conjuring, tint 
shows, in several particulars, the character of a 
prophet Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, and JorataOy 
king of Israel, had, for a while, ceased their paity 
animosity, and entered into an alliance ; and these 
two, together with the king of Edom, engaged in a 
war against the king of Moab. Afler uniting a«d 
marching their armies, the story says, they were id 
great distress for water, ^upon which Jehoshi^^bat 
said, *'/« there not here a prophet of the Lordy that we 
may inquire of fhe Lord by him ? and one of the atr^ 
vants of the king of Israel said, here is EtMa. 
(Elisha was of the party of Judah.) And Jeho^ta- 
phat, the king of Judahy said, The word of ihe Liord 
ts loUh himy The story then says, that these three 
kings went down to Elisha ; and when Elisha (who, 
as I have said, was a Judahmite prophet) saw the 
king of Israel, he said unto him, ^* What have I to 
do with thee, get thee to the prophets of thy father and 
the vropliets of thy mother. Kay but, said the king 
of tsrad, the Lord hath catted these three kings to- 
gether, Ui^ deliver them into the hand of the kwg tf 
Moab^^ ^meaning because of the distress they were 
in for water.;) upon which Elisha said, ^^Ajstlht 
Lord of hosts Uveth, before whom I stand, 



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fAWr II.] AOB OF REASON. 145 



..sit not that I regard Jehoshapfiat, fewg* of Judah, 
iwotdd not look towards thee, nor see theer Here is 
ail the venom and vulgarity of a party prophet. 
We have now to see the performance, or monner 
of prophesying. 

Verse 15. ^^ Bring me, said Elisha, a minsird: 
and it came to pass^ token the minstrel played, (hat the 
hand of the Lord came upon Wm." Here is the farce 
of the conjuror. Now for the prophecy: ".^rwi 
Elisha said, (singing most probably to the tune he 
wais playing) Thus saith (he Lord, Make this valley 
fiUl of ditches ; " which was just telling them what ' 
every countryman could have told them, without 
• either fiddle or farce, that the way to get water was 
to dig for it. 

But as every conjuror is not famous alike for the 
same thing, so neither were those prophets; for 
though all of them, at least those I have spoken of, 
were famous for lying, some of them excelled in 
cursing. Elisha, whom I have just mentioned, 
WB8 a chief in this branch of prophesying; it was 
he that cursed the forty-two children in the name 
0f the Lord, whom the two she-bears came and de- 
voured. We are to suppose that those children 
were of the party of Israel ; but as those who will 
earse will lie, there is just as much credit to be 
given to this story of Elisha's two she-bears as 
Uiere is to that of the Dragon of Wantley, of whom 
it is said : — 

Poor children three devoared he, 
That could not with him grapple; 
And at one sup he eat them up, 
As a man would eat an apple. 

There was another description of men called 
prophets, that amused themselves with dreams and 
visions ; but whether by night or by day, we know 
not These, if -they were not quite harmless, were 
imt little mischievous. Of this class are 

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146 AGE OF REASON. [PABT II. 

Ezekiel and Daniel ; and the first question upon 
those books, as upon all the others, is, are they gen- 
uine? that is, were they written by Ezekiel and 
Daniel ? 

Of this there is no proof; but so far as my own 
opinion goes, I am more inclined to believe they 
were, than that they were not. My reasons for this 
opinion ai*e as follow : First, because those books 
do not contain internal evidence to prove they were 
not written by Ezekiel and Daniel, as the books 
ascribed to Moses, Joshua, Samuel, &c. &c., prove 
' they were not written by Moses, Joshua, Sam- 
uel, &c. 

Secondly, Because they were not written till after 
the Babylonish captivity began ; and there is good 
reason to believe that not any book in the Bible was 
written before that period : at least, it is proveable, 
from the books themselves, as I have already shown, 
that they were not written till after the commence- 
ment of the Jewish monarchy. 

Thirdly, Because the manner in which the books 
ascribed to Ezekiel and Daniel are written, agrees 
with the condition these men were in at the time of 
writing them. 

Had the numerous commentators and priests, 
who have foolishly employed or wasted their time 
in pretending to expound and unriddle those l)ooks, 
been carried in captivity, as Ezekiel and Daniel 
were, it would have greatly improved their intel- 
lects, in comprehending the reason for this mode 
of writing, and have saved them the trouble of 
racking their invention, as they have done, to no 
purpose; for they would have found that them- 
selves would be obliged to write whatever they had 
to write, respecting their own affairs, or those of 
their friends, or of their country, in a concealed 
manner, as those men have done. 

These two books differ from all the rest ; for it is 
only these that are filled with accounts of dreams 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 147 

and visions ; and this difference arose from the situ- 
ation the writers were in as prisoners of war, or 
prisoners of state, in a foreign country, which 
obliged them to convey even the most triOing in- 
formation to each other, and all their political pro- 
jects or opinions, in obscure and metaphorical 
terms. They pretend to have dreamed dreams, 
and seen visions, because it was unsafe for them to 
speak facts or plain language. We ought, however, 
to suppose, that the persons to whom they wrote 
understood what they meant, and that it was not 
intended any body else should. But these busy 
commentators and priests have been puzzling their 
wits to find out what it was not intended they 
should know, and with which they have nothing 
to do. 

Ezekiel and Daniel were carried prisoners to 
Babylon, under the first captivity, in the time of 
Jehoiakim, nine years before the second captivity 
in the time of Zedekiah. The Jews were then 
still numerous, and had considerable force at Jeru- 
salem ; and as it is natural to suppose that men, in 
the situation of Ezekiel and Daniel, would be med- 
itating the recovery of their country, and their own 
deliverance, it is reasonable to suppose, that the ac- 
counts of dreams and visions, with which these 
books are filled, are no other than a disguised mode 
of correspondence, to facilitate those objects; it 
served them as a cypher, or secret alphabet. If 
they are not this, they are tales, reveries, and non- 
sense ; or at least, a fanciful way of wearing off the 
wearisomeness of captivity ; but the presumption is, 
they were the former. 

Ezekiel begins his books by speaking of a vision 
of cherubims, and of a wheel wUhin a wheels which 
he says he saw by the river Chebar, in the land of 
his captivity. Is it not reasonable to suppose, that 
by the cherubims he meant the temple at Jerusa- 
lem, where they had figures of cherubims ? and by 



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148 AGE OF REASON. [PART II* 

a wheel within a wheel, (which, as a figure, hafl 
always been understood to signify political contri- 
vance) the project or means of recovering Jerusa- 
lem ? In the latter part of this book, he supposes 
himself transported to Jerusalefn, and into the tem- 
ple : and he refers back to the visiop on the river 
Chebar, and says, (chapter xliii. verse 3) that this 
last vision was like the vision on the river Chebar ; 
which indicates, that those pretended dreams and 
visions had for their object the recovery of Jerusa- 
lem, and nothing further. 

As to the romantic interpretations and applica- 
tions, wild as the dreams and visions they undertake 
to explain, which commentators and priests have 
made of those books, that of converting them into 
things which they call prophecies, and making them 
bend to times and circumstances, as far remote 
even as the present day, it shows the fraud or the 
extreme folly to which credulity or priestcraft can 

Scarcely any thing can be more absurd, than to 
suppose that men situated as Ezekiel and Daniel 

^ were, whose country was over-run, and in the pos- 
session of the enemy, all their friends and relations 
in captivity abroad, or in slavery at home, or mas- 
sacred, or in continual danger of it; scarcely any 
thing, I say, can be more absurd, than to suppose 
that such men should find nothing to do but that of 
employing their time and their thoughts about what 
was to happen to other nations a thousand or two 
thousand years after they were dead ; at the same 
time, nothing is more natural, than that they should 
meditate the recovery of Jerusalem, and their own 
deliverance ; and that this was the sole object of all 
tlie obscure and apparently frantic writings contain- 
ed in those books. 

' In this sense, the mode of writing used in those 
two books being forced by necessity, and not adopt- 
ed by clM)ice, is not irrational ; but if we are to use 



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]>ART II.] AGE OF REiiSON. 149 

the books as prophecies, they are false. In the 
29th chapter of Ezekiel, speaking of Egypt, it is 
said, (versp 11,) JVb foot of inan should pass through 
it, no foot of beast should pass throumi it ; neither 
shall it be inhabited for ftyrty years.^^ This is what 
never came to pass, and consequently it is false, as 
all the books I have already reviewed are. I here 
close this part of the subject ^^^ 

In the former part of the .^c of Reason^ I have '^j 
spoken of Jonah, and of the story of him and the 
whale. A lit story for ridicule, if it was written to I 

be believed; or of laughter, if it was intended to i^*^ 
try what credulity could swallow; for if it coul(}\ t\^ 
swallow Jonah and the whale, it could swallow any' > 
thing. 

But, as is already shown in the observations on ,, * 
the bool^of Job, and of Proverbs, it is not alwayS^" 
certain which of the books in the Bible are origi- 
nally Hebrew, or only translations from the books 
of the Gentiles into Hebrew; and as the book of 
Jonah, so far from treating of the affairs of the 
Jews, says nothing upon that subject, but treats 
altogether of the Gentiles, it is more probable that 
it is a book of the Gentiles* than of the Jews; and 
that it has been written as a fable to expose the 
nonsense and satirise the vicious and malignant \; 
character of a Bible prophet, or a predicting priest. -— *- ' 

Jonah is represented, first, as a disobedient pro- 
phet, running away from his mission, and taking 
shelter aboard a vessel of the Gentiles, bound from' 
Joppa to Tarshisli; as if he ignorantly supposed,"* 
by such a paltry contrivance, he could hide him- ' 
self where God could not find hm^ The vessel is -. i 
overtaken by a storm at sea; and "me mariners, all 
of whom are Gentiles, believing it to be a judg- 
ment, on account of some one on board who had 
committed a crime, agreed to cast lots, to discover 
the offender; and the lot fell upon Jonah. But, 
before this, they had cast all their wares and raer- 

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150 AGE OF KRIlSON. [pART II^ 

chandise overboard, to lighten the vessel, while 
Jonah, like a stupid fellow, was fast asleep in the 
hold. 

After the lot had designated Jonah to be the of- 
fender, they questioned him to know who and what 
he was ; and he told them he was a Hebrew : and 
the story implies, that he confessed himself to be 
guihy. But these Gentiles, instead of sacrificing, 
him at once, without pity or mercy, as a company 
of Bible prophets or priests would have^ done by a 
Gentile in the same case, and as it is related Sam- 
^uel had done by Agag, and Moses by the womea 
and children ; they endeavored to save him, though, 
at the risk of their own lives ; for the account says^ 
" J^evertheless, (that is, though Jonah was a Jew^ 
and a foreigner, and the cause of all their misfor- 
tune, and the loss of their cargo) the men rowed 
hard to bring the boat to land ; but they coulE not, for- 
the sea wrought, and was tempestuous against them,^* 
Still, however, they were unwilling to put the fate- 
of the lot into execution ; and they cried (says the 
account) unto the Lord, saying, " iVe beseech thee, O 
Lord, let us not penshfor this man^s life, and lay not 
upon us innocent blood ; for thou, O Lord, has done 
as it pleased thee." Meaning thereby, that they did 
not presume to judge Jonah guilty, since that he 
might be innocent; but that they considered the lot 
4hat had fallen upon him as a decree of God, or as 
dt pleased God, The address of this prayer shows 
tthat the Gentiles worshipped one Supreme Beingj. 
and that they were not idolatoi-s, as the Jews repre- 
-sented them to be. But the storm still continuing,, 
and the danger increasing, they put the fate of the 
lot into execution, and cast Jonah into the sea;, 
where, according to the story, a great fish swallow- 
- «d him up whole and alive. 

We have now to consider Jonah securely housed 
from the storm in the fish's belly. Here we are 
told that he prayed ; but the prayer is a made-up 

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PART n.] AGE OF REASON. 151 

prayer, taken from various parts of the Psalms, 
without any connection or consistency, and adapted ^ . 
to the distress, but not at all to the condition, that ' ^ 
Jonah was in. It is such a prayer as a Gentile, V.a 
who might know something of the Psalms, could \ 
copy out for him. This circumstance alone, were * 
there no other, is suffidedt to indicate that the 
whole is a made-up at4M ^ i The prayer, however, *-— 
is supposed to have answered the purpose, and the 
story goes on (taking up at the same time the cant 
language of a Bible prophet,) saying, " The hord 
spake unto the Jish, and it vomited out Jonah upon 
dry land." 

Jonah then received a second mission to Nine- 
vah, with which he sets out ; and we have now to 
consider him as a preacher. The distress he is 
represented to have suffered, the remembrance of 
his own disobedience as the cause of it, and the 
miraculous escape he is supposed to haVe had, were 
sufficient, one would conceive, to have impressed 
him with sympathy and benevolence in the execu- 
tion of his mission ; but, instead of this, he enters 
the city with denunciation and malediction, in his 
mouth, crying, " Yet forty days, and JS/inevah shaU 
he overthroton,^^ 

We have now to consider this supposed mission- 
ary in the last act of his mission ; and here it is 
that the malevolent spirit of a Bible-prophet, or of 
a predicting priest, appears in all the blackness of 
character, that men ascribe to the being they call 
the devil. 

Having published his predictions, he withdrew, 
says the story, to the east side of the city. But for 
what ? not to contemplate, in retirement, the mercy 
of his Creator to himself, or to others, but to wait, 
with malignant impatience, the destruction of Nine- 
vab. rR came to pass, however, a» the story relates, ^ 7. 
that tn© Ninevites reformed, and that God, accord- 
ing to the Bible phrase, repented him of the evil he 

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\ 152 AGE OF 1U3ASON. [PART II. 

^' bad said he would do unto them, and did it not* 
This, saith the first verse of the last chapter, di*- 
r , »/* pleased Jonah exceedingly^ and he was very angry* 
^f His obdurate heart would rather that all Ninevah 

should be destroyed, and every soul, young and old, 
} perish in its inrilis, than that his prediction should 
i — ^ not be fulfil led. J To expose the character of a pro- 
phet still more, a gourd is made to grow up in the 
night, that promiseth him an agreeable shelter from 
the heat of the sun, in the place to which he is re- 
tired ; and the next morning it dies. 

Here the rage of the prophet becomes excessive, 
and he is ready to destroy himself. " ii w better^ 
said he, for me to die than to live,** This brings on ' 
a supposed expostulation between the Almighty 
and the prophet ; in which the former says, " Doesi 
ihou tveU to be ansry for the gourde And Jonah 
said, I do well to be angry even unto death : Then 
said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for 
which thou hast not labored, iieither modest it to grow^ ^ 
which came up in a. night, and perished in a night ; ' 
and should not I spare Ninevah, that great city^ itk , 
which are more than three-score thousand persons^ 
(hat cannot discern between their right hand and their 
left 9** 

Here is both the winding up of the satire, and the 
moral of the fable. As a satire, it strikes against 
the character of all the Bible-prophets, and against 
all the indiscriminate judgments upon men, women, 
and children, with which this lying book,^the Bible, 
is crowded ; such as Noah's flood, the destruction 
of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, the extirpa- 
tion of the Canaanites, even to sucking infants, and 
women with child, because the sam6 reflection, thcd 
there are more than three-score thousand person^ that 
cannot discern between their right hand and their lej% 
meaning young children, applies to all their cases. 
It satirizes also the supposed partiality of the Cre- 
ator for one nation more than for" another. 

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PART II.J ACFE OF REASON. 153 

As a moral, it preaches against the malevolent 
spirit of prediction; for as certainly as a man pre- 
dicts ill, he becomes inclined to wish it. The pride 
of having his judgment right, hardens his heart 
till at last he beholds with satisfaction, or sees with 
disappointment, the accomplishment or failure of 
his predictions. This book ends with the same 
kind of strong and well-directed point against pro- 
phets, prophecies, and indiscriminate judgments, as 
the chapter that Benjamin Franklin made for the 
Bible, about Abraham and the stranger ends against 
the intolerant spirit of religious persecution. Thus 
much for the book of Jonah. / 

Of the poetical parts of the Bible that are called 
prophecies, I have spoken in the former part of the 
Jigt of Reason, and already in this: where I have 
said that the word prophet is the Bible word for 
poet ; and that the nights and metaphors of those 
poets, many of which have become obscure by the 
lapse of time and the change of circumstances, 
have been ridiculously erected into things called 
prophecies, and applied to purposes the writers 
never thought of. When a priest quotes any of 
those passages, he unriddles it agreeably to his own 
views, and imposes that explanation upon his con- 
gregation as the meaning of the writer. The wkore 
of Bahylon has been the common whore of all the 
priests, and each has accused the other of keeping 
the strumpet; so well do they agree in their expla- 
nations. 
• There now remains only a few books, which they 
call the books of the lesser prophets ; and as I have 
already shown that the greater are impostors, it 
would be cowardice to disturb the repose of the 
little ones. Let them sleep, then, in the arms of 
their nurses, the priests, and both be forgotten to- 
gether. 

I have now gone through the Bible, as a man 
would go through a wood with an axe on his 
20 

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154 AGE OF REASON. [PABV n. 

shoulder, and fell trees. Here they lie, and ^thie 
priests, if they can, may replant them. They may, 
perhaps, stick them in the ground, but they wHl 
never make them grow. I pass on to the books of 
the New Testament 



THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

The New Testament, they tell us, is founded up- 
on the prophecies of the Old ; if so, it must follow 
the fate of its foundation. 

As it is nothing extraordinary that a woman 
should be with child before she was married, and 
that the son she might bring forth should be exe- 
cuted, even unjustly ; I see no reason for not be- 
lieving that such a woman as Mary, and such a man 
as Joseph, and Jesus, existed ; their mere existence 
is a matter of indifference, about which there is no 
ground, either to believe, or to disbelieve, and which 
comes under the common head of, J^ may he S6 ; 
emd tphat then9 The probability, however, is, that 
there were such persons, or at least such as resem- 
bled them in part of the circumstances, because 
almost all romantic stories have been suggested by 
some actual circumstance; as the adventures of 
Robinson Crusoe, not a word of which is true, were 
suggested by the case of Alexander Selkirk. 

It is not then the existence, or non-existence, of 
the persons that I trouble myself about ; it is the 
fable of Jesus Christ, as told in the Nev\( Testament, 
and the wild and visionary doctrine raised thereon, 
against which I contend. The story, taking it as 
it is told, is blasphemously obscene. It gives an 
account of a young woman engaged to be married, 
and while under this engagement, she is, to speak 
plain language, debauched by a ghost, under the 
impious pretence, (Luke, chapter i. verse 35,) that 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 155 

**<Ae Holy Ghost shall come upon thee ; and the power 
of the Highest shall overshadow thee,^^ Notwith- 
standing which, Joseph afterwards marries her, co- 
habits with her as his wife, and in his turn rivals 
the ghost. This is putting the story into intelHgible 
hmguage ; and when told in this nnanner, there is 
not a priest hut nnust be ashamed to own it.* 

Obscenity in matters of faith, however wrapped 
up, is always a token of fable and imposture ; for it 
is necessary to our serious belief in God, that we 
do not connect it with stories that run, as this does, 
into ludicrous interpretations. This story is, upon 
the face of it, the same kind of story as that of Ju- 
piter and Leda, or Jupiter and Europa, or any of 
the amorous adventures of Jupiter; and shows, us 
is already stated in the former part of the vig-c of 
Reason, that the Christian faith is built upon the 
heathen mythology. 

As the historical parts of the New Testament, so 
far as concerns Jesus Christ, are confined to a very 
short space of time, less than two years, and all 
within the same country, and nearly to <he same 
spot, the discordance of time, place, and circum- 
stJince, which detects the fallacy of the books of 
the Old Testament, and proves them to be impo- 
sitions, cannot be expected to be found here in the 
same abundance. The New Testament, compared 
with the Old, is like a farce of one act, in which 
there is not room for very numerous violations of 
the unities. There are, however, some glaring 
contradictions, which, exclusive of the fallacy of 
the pretended prophecies, are sufficient to show the 
story of Jesus Christ to be false. 

I lay it down as a position which cannot be con- 
troverted, first, that the agreement of all the parts of 

* Mary, the sapposed virgin mother of Jesus had several 
other children, sons and daughters. See Matthew, chapter 
ziii. verses 56, 56. 



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136 Acns or reason. [part n. 

a story does not prove that story to be true, because 
the parts may agree, and the whole may be false ; 
secondly, that *the disagreement'Of the parts of a 
story proves tJce whole cannot be true. The agree- 
ment does not prove truth, but the disagreement 
proves falsehood positively. 

The history of Jesus Christ is contained in the 
four books ascribed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and 
John. The first chapter of Matthew begins with 
giving a genealogy of Jesus Christ ; and in the 
third chapter of Luke, there is also given a geneal- 
ogy of Jesus Christ. Did these two agree, it would 
not prove the genealogy to be true, because it might, 
nevertheless, be a fabrication ; but as they contra- 
dict each other in every particular, it proves false* 
hood» absolutely. If Matthew speaks truth, Luke 
speaks falsehood ; and if Luke speaks truth, Mat- 
thew speaks falsehood ; and as there is no authorkj 
for believing one more than the other, there is no 
authority for believing either ; and if they cannd 
be believed even in the very first thing they say, 
and set out to prove, they are not entitled to be be- 
lieved in any thing they say afterwards. Truth is 
a uniform thing ; and as to inspiration and revela- 
tion, were we to admit it, it is impossible to sup- 
pose it can be contradictory. Either then the men 
called apostles were impostors, or the books ascribed 
to them have been written by other persons, and 
fathered upon them, as is the case in the Old Test- 
ament. 

The book of Matthew gives, chapter i. verse 6, a 
genealogy by name from David, up through Josepbi 
Sie husband of Mary, to Christ ; and makes there 
to be twenty-eight generations. The book of Luke 
gives also a genealogy by name from Christ, through 
Joseph, the husband of Mary, down to David, and 
makes there to be forty-three generations ; besides 
which, there are only the two names of David and 
Joseph that are alike in the two lists. I here insert 



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B4BT II.] 



AGS or KJEASON. 



157 



both genealogical lists, and for the sake of per^i^ 
cuity and comparison, have placed them both in the 
same direction, that is, from Joseph down to David. 



Genealogy, according to 
Matthew, 


Genealogy, according to 
Luke, 


Christ 




Christ 


2 Joseph 
S Jacob 


2 
3 


Joseph 
Heli 


4 Matthan 


4 


Matthat 


5 EHeazer 


6 


Levi 


6 Eliud 


6 


Melchi 


7 Achim 


7 


Jaana 


8 Sadoc 

9 Azor 


8 
9 


Joseph 
Mattathias 


10 Eliakim 


10 


Amos 


11 Abiud 


11 


Naum 


12 Zorobabel 


12 


Esli 


13 Salathiel 

14 Jechonias 


13 
14 


Nagge 
Maath 


15 Jesias 


16 


Mattathias 


16 Amon* 


16 


Semei 


17 Manasses 

18 Ezekias 


17 
18 


Joseph \ 
Jada 


19 Achaz 


19 


Joanna 


20 Joatham 


20 


Rhesa 


21 Ozias 


21 


Zorobabel 


22 Joram 


22 


Salathiel 


23 Josaphat' 

24 Asa 


23 
24 


Neri 
Melchi 


25 Abia 


25 


Addi 


26 Roboam 


26 


Cosam 


27 Solomon 


27 


Elmodam 


28 David* 


28 


Er 



* From the birth of David to the birth of Christ is up- 
wards of 1080 years; and as the life-time of Christ is not 
indnded, there are but 27 fall generations. To find, 
^erefore, the average age of each person mentioned in the 
list, at the time his first son was bom, it is only necessary 
to divide 1080 by 27, which gives 40 years for each per- 



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158 



AGE OF REASON. 



[part II. 



Genealogy^ according to 
Matthew, 



Genealogy, according to 

Luke, 

29 Jose 

80 Eliezer 

31 Jorim 

32 Matthat 

33 Levi 

34 Simeon 

35 Juda 

36 Joseph 

37 Jonan 

38 Elakini 

39 Melea 

40 Menan 

41 Mattatha 

42 Nathan 

43 David 



Now, if these men, Matthevsr and Luke, set out 
with a falsehood between them, (as these two ac- 
counts show they do) in the very commencement 
of their history of Jesus Christ, and of whom, and 
of what he was, what authority (as I have before 
asked) is there left for believing the strange things 
they tell us afterwards? If they cannot be be- 
lieved in their account of his natural genealogy, 
how are we to believe them, when they tell ns, be 
was the son of God, begotten by a ghost ; and that 
an angel announced this in secret to his mother? 
If they lied in one genealogy, why are we to be- 

8on. As the life-time of man was then but of the same 
extent it is now, it is an absurdity to suppose that 27 fol- 
lowing generations should all be old bachelors, before they 
married; and the more so, when we are told that Solomon, 
the next in succession to David, had a house full of wives 
and mistresses before he was 21 years of age. So for from 
this genealogy being a solemn truth, it is not even a resr- 
Bonable lie. The list of Luke gives about 26 years for 
the average age, and this is too much. 



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FART II.] AGE OF REASON. 159 

lieve them in the other ? If his natural be manu- 
factured, which it certainly is, why are not we to 
suppose, that his celestial genealogy is manufactured 
also ; and that the whole is fabulous ? Can any man 
of serious reflection hazard his future happiness 
upon the belief of a story naturally impossible; 
repugnant to every idea of decency ; and related 
by persons already detected of falsehood? Is it 
not more safe, that we stop ourselves at the plain, 
pure, and unmixed belief of one God, whifch is 
Deism, than that we commit ourselves on an ocean 
of improbable, irrational, indecent, and contradict- 
ory tales ? ' 

The first question, however, upon the books of 
the New Testament, as upon those of the Old, is, 
are they genuine ? Were they written by the per- 
sons to whom they are ascribed ? for it is upon this 
ground only, that the strange things related therein 
have been credited. Upon this point, there is no 
direct proof for or against; and all that this state 
of a case proves, is dovhtfuLness ; and doubtfulness 
is the opposite of belief.. The state, therefore, that 
the books are in, proves against themselves, as far 
as this kind of proof can gp. 

But, exclusive of this, the presumption is, that 
the books called the Evangelists, and ascribed to 
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John ; were not written 
by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John ; and that .they 
are impositions. The disordered state of the his- 
tory in these four books, the silence of one book 
upon matters related in the other, and the disagree- 
ment that is to be found among them, implies that 
they are the production of some unconnected indi- 
viduals, many years after the things they pretend to 
relate, each of whom made his own legend ; and 
not the writings of men living intimately together, 
as the men called apostles are supposed to have 
done : in fine, that they have been manufactured, 
lis the books of the Old Testament have been, 



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160 AGE or REASON. [PABT H* 

by other persons than those whose names they 
bear. 

The story of the angel announcing, what the 
church calls, the immaailate conception, is not so 
much as mentioned in the books ascribed to Mark 
and John ; and is differently related in Matthew and 
Luke. The former says, the angel appeared to 
Joseph ; the latter says, it was to Mary ; but either, 
Joseph or Mary, was the Worst evidence that could 
have been thought of; for it was others that should 
have testified for them, and not they for themselves. 
Were any girl that is now with child to say, and 
even to swear it, that she was gotten with child by 
a ghost, and that an angel toM her so, would she be 
believed? Certainly she would not. Why then 
are we to believe the same thing of another giii 
whom we never saw, told by nobody knows who, 
nor when, nor where? How strange and incon- 
sistent is it, that the same circumstance that would 
weaken the belief even of a probable stoiy, should 
be given as a motive for believing this one, that has 
upon the face of it every token of absolute impose 
sibility and imposture. 

The story of Herod destroying all the children 
under two years old, belongs altogether to the book 
of Matthew: not one of the rest mentions any thing 
about it. Had such a circumstance been true, the 
universality of it must have made it known to all 
the writers; and the thing would have been too 
striking to have been omitted by any. This writer 
tells us, that Jesus escaped this slaughter, because 
Joseph and Mary were warned by an angel to flee 
with him into Egypt ; but he forgot to make any 
provision for John, who was then under two years 
of age. John, however, who staid behind, fared as 
well as Jesus who fled; and, therefore, the story 
circumstantially belies itself. 

Not any two of these writers agree in reciting, 
exactly in the same words, the written inscription. 



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FART II.j A0£ OF REASON. 161 

short as it is, which they tell us was put over Christ 
when he was crucified : and besides this; Mark says, 
he was crucified at the third hour, (nine in the 
morning ;) and John says, it was the sixth hour, 
(twelve at noon.*) 

The inscription is thus stated in those books. 

Matthew . This is Jesus the King of the Jews. 

Mark • . The king of the Jews. 

Lake . . This is the king of the Jews. 

John . . Jesus of Nazareth king of the Jews. ' ^ 

We may infer from these circumstances, trivial I ? 
as they are, that those writers, whoever they were, \ i 
and in whatever time they lived, were not present ] 
at the scene. The only one of the men, called i .e-- 
apostles, who appears to have been near the spot, 
was Peter ; and when he was accused of being one - 
of Jesus's followers, it is said, ^Matthew, chapter l 
xxvi. verse 74,) " Then Peter began to curse and to 
swear, saying, I know not the man : " yet we are now 
called upon to believe the same Peteis convicted, by 
their own account, of perjury. For what reason, or 
on what authority shall we do this ? 

The accounts that are given of tbe circumstances, 
that they tell us attended the crucifixion, are diflfer- 
ently related in those four books. 

The book ascribed to Matthew says, " Tliere was 
darkness over all the land from the sixth hour unto the 
ninth hour — that the veil of the temple was rent in 
twain from the top to the bottom — that there was an 
earthquake — that the rocks rent — that the graves open- 
ed, that the bodies of many of the saints that slept 
arose and came out of their graves after the resurreC" 
^ , * 

* According to John, the sentence was not passed till 
about the sixth hour, (noon), and, consequently, the exe- 
cution could not be till the afl^oon; but Mark says ex- 
pressly, that he was crucified at the third hour, (nine ia 
the mommg), chapter xv. verse 25; John, chapter xiz. 
verse 14. 

21 

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163 AGE OF REASON. [PART n*^ 

tion^ and went into the holy city, and appeared unto 
many,^ Such js the account which this dashiiig 
writer of the book of Matthew gives ; but in which 
he is not supported by the writers of the other 
books. 

The writer of the book ascribed to Mark, in de- 
tailing the circumstances of the crucifixion, makes 
no mention of any earthquake, nor of the rocks . 
rending, nor of the graves opening, nor of the dead 
men walking out. The writer of the book of Luke 
is silent also upon the same points. And as to the 
writer of the nook of John, though he details all 
the circumstances of the crucifixion down to the 
burial of Christ, he says nothing about either the 
darkness — the veil'of the temple — the earthqui&e— 
the rocks — the graves — ^nor the dead men. 

Now if it had been true, that those things had 
happened ; and if the writers of these books had 
lived at the time they did happen, and had be«i 
the persons they are said to be, namely, the four 
men called ajTostles, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and 
John, it was not possible for them, as true histori- 
ans, even without the aid of inspiration, not to have 
recorded them. The things, supposing them te 
have been facts, were of too much notoriety not to 
have been known, and of too miich importance not 
to have been told. All these supposed aposdes 
must have been witnesses of the earthquake, if 
there had been any; for it was not possible for 
them to have been absent from it ; the opening of 
the graves and the resurrection of the dead men^ 
and their walking about the city, is of greater im- 
portance than the earthquake. An earthquake is 
al^vays possible, and natural, and proves nothing ; 
but this opening of the graves is supernatural, and 
directly in point to their doctrine, their cause, eaid 
their apostleship. Had it been true, it would* have 
filled up whole chapters of those books, and hee& 
the chosen theme and general chorus of all the 

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FART II.] AGE OT REASOIT. 163 

writers ; but instead of this, little and trivial things, 
and mere prattling conversations of he said this, and 
^ said that, are oflen tediously detailed, while this 
most important of all, had it been true, is passed off 
in a slovenly manner by a single dash of the pen, 
and that by one vn-iter only, and not so much as 
hinted at by the rest. 

It is an easy tiling to tell a lie, but it is difficult to 
support the lie after it is tpld. The writer of the 
book of Matthew should have told us who the saints 
wei-e that came to life again, and went into the city, 
and what become of them afterwards, and who it 
was that saw them ; for he is not hardy enough to 
say he saw them himself; whether they came out 
naked, and all in natural buff, he-saints and she- 
saints ; or whether they came full dressed, and 
where they got their dresses ; whether they went 
to their former habitations, and reclaimed their 
wives, their husbands, and their property, and how 
they were received ; whether they entered eject- 
ments for the recovery of their possessions, or 
thought actions of mm. eon, against their rival in- 
terlopers; whether they remained on earth, and 
followed their former occupation of preaching or 
working ; or whether they died again, or went back 
to their graves alive, and buried themselves. 

Strange, indeed, that an army of saints should 
return to life, and nobody know who they were, nor 
who it was that saw them, and that not a word more 
diould be said upon the subject, nor these saints have 
any thing to tell us ! Had it been the prophets, who 
(418 we are told) had formerly prophesied of these 
things, they must have had a great deal to say. 
They could have told us every thing, and we 
should have had posthumous prophecies, with 
notes and commentaries upon the first, a little 
better at least than we have now. Had it been 
Moses, and Aaron, and Joshua, and Samuel, and 
David, not an unconverted Jew had remained in 



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164 AGE OP REASON. [fART ifl 

all Jerusalem. Had it been John the Baptist, and 
the saints of the time then present, every body 
would have known them, and they would have 
out-preached and out-famed all the other apostles. 
But instead of this, these saints are made to pop 
up, like Jonah''s gourd in the night, for no purpose 
at all but to wither in the morning. Thus much 
for this part of the story. 

The tale of the resurrection follows that of the 
crucifixion ; and in this as well as in that, the writ- 
ers, whoever they were, disagree so much, as to 
make it evident that none of them were there. 

The book of Matthew states, that when Christ 
was put in the sepulchre, the Jews applied to Pi- 
late for a watch or a guard to be placed over the 
sepulchre, to prevent the body being stolen by the 
disciples ; and that in consequence of this request^ 
the sepulchre wcis made sure, sealing ike stone that 
covered the mouth, and setting a watch. But the 
other books say nothing about this application, nor 
about the sealing, nor the guard, nor the watch ; 
and according to their accounts, there were none. 
Matthew, however, follows up this part of the story 
of the guard or the watch with a second part, that 
I shall notice in the conclusion, as it serves to de- 
tect the fallacy of those books. 

The book of Matthew continues its account, and 
says, (chapter xxviii. verse 1) that at the end of the 
Sabbath, as it began to dawn, towards the first day 
of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other 
Mary, to see the sepulchre. Mark says it was sun- 
rising, and John says it was dark. Luke says it 
was Mai*y Magdalene and Joanna, and Mary, the 
mother of James, and other women, that came to^ 
the sepulchre ; and John states, that Mary Magda- 
lene came alone. So well do they agree about 
their first evidence! they all, however, appear to 
have known most about Mary Magdalene ; she was 
a woman of large acquaintance, and it was not 

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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 1<^ 

an ill conjecture that she 'might be upon the 
stroll. 

The book of Matthew goes on to say, (verse 2,) 
" And behold there was a great earthquake, for the 
angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and 
came and rolled back the stone from tlie door, and 
sat upon it." But the other books say nothing 
about any earthquake, nor about the angel rolling 
back the stone, and sitting upon it ; and according 
to their account, there was no angel sitting there. 
Mark says the angel was vntkin the sepulchre, sit- 
ting on the right side, Luke says there were two, 
and they were both standing up ; and John says 
they were both sitting down, one at the head and 
the other at the feet. 

Matthew says, that the angel that was sitting upon 
the stone on the outside of the sepulchre, told the 
two Marys that Christ was risen, and that the wo- 
men went away quickly. Mark says, that the wo- 
men, upon seeing the stone rolled away, and won- 
dering at it, went into the sepulchre, and that it was 
the anget that was sitting within on the right side, 
that told them so. Luke says, it was the two an- 
gels that were standing up ; and John says, it was 
Jesus Christ himself that told it to Mary Magda- 
lene ; and that she did not go into the sepulchre, 
bat only stooped down and looked in. 

Now, if the writers of these four books had gone 
into a court of justice to prove an althi (for it is of 
the nature of an alibi that is here attempted to he 
proved, namely, the absence of a dead body by 
supernatural means,) and had they given their evi- 
dence in the same contradictory manner as it is 
here given, they would have been in danger of hav- 
ing their ears cropped for perjury, and would have 
justly deserved it. Yet this is the evidence, and 
these are the books, that have been imposed upon 
the world, as being given by divine inspiration, 
and as the unchangeable word of Grod. 



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166 AGE OF REASON. [PART II* 

The writer of the book of Matthew, after giving 
this account, relates a stoiy that i^ not to be found 
in any of the etiier books, and which is the same I 
have just before alluded to. 

"Now, says he, (that is, after the conversation the 
woman had had with the angel sitting upon the 
stone,) behold some of the watch (meaning the 
watch that he had said had been placed over the 
sepulclire) came into the city, and showed unto the 
chief priests all the things that were done ; and 
when they were assembled with the elders and had 
taken counsel, they gave large money unto the sol- 
diers, saying, Say ye, that his disciples came by 
night, and stole him away while we slept ; and if 
this come to the governor's ears, we will persuade 
him, and secure you. So they took the money, and 
did as they were taught ; and this saying (that his 
disciples stole him away) is commonly reported 
among the Jews until this day." 

The expression, until this day, is an evidence that 
the book ascribed to Matthew was not written bj 
Matthew, and that it has been manufactured long 
after the times and things of which it pretends to 
treat ; for the expression implies a gi-eat length of 
intervening time. It would be inconsistent in us to 
^ speak in this nxmner of any thing happening in our 
own time. To give, therefore, intelligible meaning 
to the expression, we must suppose a lapse of some 
generations at least, for this manner of speaking 
carries the mind back to ancieiU time. 

The absurdity also of the story is worth noticing; 

v^ • for it shows the writer of thdTbook of Matthew to 

^ ^ have been an exceedingly weSk and foolish man. 

\ He tells a story, that contradicts itself in point of 

'\ . possibility ; for though the guard, if there were 

7 ^ any, might be made to say that the body was taken 

]j;' away while they were asleep, and to give that as a 

^* * reason for their not having prevented it, that same 

• sleep must also have prevented their knowing how. 



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PART II.] AGE i^V HK'SOis-. 167 

and by whom it was done ; and yet they arg^made 
to say, that it was the disciples who did it. '^fere a 
mail to tender his evidence of something that be 
should say was done, and of the manner of doing 
it, and of the person who did it while he vvas asleep, 
and could know nothing of the matter, such evi- 
dence could not be received ; it will do well enough 
for Testament evidence, but not for any thing where 
truth is concerned. 

I come now to that part of the evidence in those 
books, that respects the pretended appearance of 
Christ after this pretended resurrection. 

The writer of the book of Matthew relates, that 
the angel that was sitting on the stone at the mouth 
of the sepulchre, said to the two Marys, chapter 
xxviii. verse 7, ^^ Behold Christ is gone before you 
into Galilee, there ye shaU see him; lo, I have told 
youJ'^ And the same writer, at the two next verses 
(8, 9,) makes Christ himself to speak to the same 
purpose to these women, immediately after the an- 
gel had told it to them, and that they ran quickly to 
tell it to the disciples: and at the 16th verse it is 
eaid, " Then the eleven disciples went away into Gali- 
lee, into a mountain where Jesus had appointed 
them ; and, when they saw him, they worshipped 
him." 

But the writer of the book of John tells us a stoi-y 
very different to this; for he says, chapter xx. verae 
19, " Then the same day at evening, being the first 
day of the week, (that is, the same day that Christ is 
said to have risen,) when the doors were shut, where 
the disciples loere assembled, for fear of the Jews, 
came Jesus and stood in the midst of themJ'^ 

According to Matthew, the eleven were marching 
to Galilee, to meet Jesus in a mountain, by his own 
appointment, at the very time when, according to 
John, they were assembled in another place, and 
that not by ai)pointment but in secret, for fear of 
the Jews. 



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168 AGE OF REASON. [PAUt-R II. 

The writer of the book of Luke contradicts tlh&t 
of Matthew more pointedly than John does; f<Hr he 
says expressly, that the meeting was in Jerusalftn 
the evening of the same day that he (Christ) rose, 
and that the eleven were there. See Luke, chapter 
xxiv. verses 13, 33. 

Now, it is not possible, unless we admit these 
supposed disciples the right of wilful lying, that the 
writer of these books could be any of the eleven 
persons called disciples ; for if, according to Mat- 
thew, the eleven went into Galilee to meet Jesus in 
a mountain by his own appointment, on the same 
day that he is said to have risen, Luke and John^ t 
must have been two of that eleven fT^^^i® vmter ' 
of Luke says expressly, and- John implies as much, 
that the meeting was, that same day, in a house in 
Jerusalem ; and, on the other hand, if, according to 
Luke and John, the eleven were assembled in a 
house in Jerusalem, Matthew must have been one 
of that eleven ; yet Matthew says, the meeting was 
in a mountain in Galilee, and, consequently, the 
evidence given in those books destroys each 
other. 

The writer of the book of Mark says noting 
about any meeting in Galilee ;'but he says, chapter 
xvi. verse 12, that Christ, after his resurrection, ap- 
peared in another form to two of them, as they 
walked into the country, and that these two told it 
to the residue, who would not believe them. Luke 
also tells a story, in which he keeps Christ emfdoy- 
ed the whole of the day of this pretended resurrec- 
tion, until the evening, and which totally invalidates 
the account of going to the mountain in GkdSee. 
He says, that two of them, without saying M^ch 
two, went that same^ day to a village called Em- 
maus, threescore furlongs (seven miles and a half) 
from Jerusalem, and that Christ, in disguise^ latent 
^ with them, and staid with them unto the evenliig, 
* and supped with them, and then vanished out of 



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9ART 11.] AGE OF REASON. 169 

their sight, aud re-appeared that same evening, at 
Ae meeting of the eleven in Jerusalem. 

This is the contradictory manner in which the 
evidence of this pretended re-appearance of Christ 
is stated ; the only point in which the writers .agree, 
is the skulking privacy of that re-appearairce ; for 
whether it was in the recess of a mountain in Gali- 
lee, or in a shut up house in Jerusalem, it was still 
skulking. To what cause, then, are we to assign 
this skulking? On the one hand, it is directly re- 
pugnant to the supposed or pretended end— that of 
convincing the world that Christ was risen ; aud, 
on the other hand, to have asserted the puhlicity of 
it, would have exposed the writers of those books 
to public detection, and, therefore, they have been 
tinder the necessity of making it a private affair. 

As to the account of Christ being seen by more 
than five hundred at once, it is Paul only who says 
it, and not the five hundred who say it for them- 
selves. It is, therefore, the testimony of but one 
man, and that too of a man, who did not, according 
to the same account, believe a word of the matter 
himself, at the time it is said to have happened. 
His evidence, supposing him to have been the 
writer of the 15th chapter of Corinthians, where 
this account is given, is like that of a man, who 
comes into a court of justice to swear, that what he 
had sworn before is false. A man may oflen see 
reason, and he has too always the right of changing 
his opinion ; but this liberty does not extend to niat- 
ters of fact. 

I now come to the last scene, that of the ascen- 
sion into heaven. Here all fear of the Jews, and 
of every thing else, must necessarily have been out 
of the question : it was that which, if true, was to 
seal the whole ; and upon which the reality of the 
future mission of the disciples was to rest for proof. 
Words, whether declarations or promises, that pass- 
ed in private, either in the recess of a mountain in 
22 



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170 AGE or REASON. [PART I|. 

Galilee, or in a shut-iip house in Jerusalem, even 
supposing therp to have been spoken, could not be 
evidence in public ; it was, therefore, necessary that 
this last scene should preclude the possibility of de- 
nial and dispute ; and that it should be, as I have 
stated in the former part of the Jlge of Reasorij as 
public and as visible as the sun at noon day: at 
least it ought to have been as public as the cruci- 
fixion is reported to have been. But to come to 
the point. 

In the first place the wrriter of the book of Mat- 
thew does not say a syllable about it ; neither does 
the writer of the book of John. This being tlje 
case, is it possible to suppose that those writers, 
who affect to be even minute in other matters, 
would have been silent upon this, had it been true? 
The writer of the book of Mark passes it off in a 
careless, slovenly manner, with a single dash of* the 
pen, as if he was tired of romancing, or ashamed 
of the story. So also does the writer of Luke. 
And even between these two, there is not an appa- 
rent agreement, as to the place where this final 
parting is said to have been. 

The book of Mark says, that Christ appeared to 
the eleven as they sat at meat; alluding to the 
meeting of the eleven at Jerusalem ; he then states 
the conversation that he says passed at that meet- 
ing; and immediately afler says (as a school-boy 
would finish a dull story) " So then, afler the Lord • 
had spoken unto them, he was received up into 
heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." But 
the writer of Luke says, that the ascension was from • 
Bethany; that lie (Christ) led them out as far as 
Betltany^ and was parted from them there, and was 
carried up into heaven. So also was Mahomet : and 
as to Moses, the apostle Jtide says, verse 9, T%tt 
Michael and the devU disputed about hisfiody. While 
we believe such fables as these, or either of them, 
we believe unworthily of the Almighty. 



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PAUT II.] AGE OP REAS0I7. 171 

r have now ^one through the examination of the 
four books ascribed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and 
John; and when it is considered that the whole 
space of time, from the crucifixion to what is called 
the ascension, is but a few days, apparently not 
inore than three or four, and that all the circum- 
stances are reported to have happened nearly about 
the same spot, Jerusalem ; it is, I believe, impossi- 
ble to find, in any story upon record, so many and 
such glaring absurdities, contradictions, and false- 
hoods, as are in those books. They are more nu- 
merous and striking than I had any expectation of 
finding, when I began this examination, and far 
more so than I had any idea of, when I wrote the 
former part of the Age of Reason, I had then 
neither Bible or Testament to refer to, nor could I 
procure any. My own situation, even as to exist- 
ence, was becoming every day more precarious; 
and as I was willing to leave something behind me 
upon the subject, I was obliged to be quick and 
concise. The quotations I then made were from 
memory only, but they are correct ; and the opin- 
ions I have advanced in that work are the effect 
of the most clear and long-established conviction ; 
that the Bible and the Testament are impositions 
upon the world ; that the fall of man ; the account 
of Jesus Christ being the Son of God, and of his 
dying to appease the wrath of Grod, and of salva- 
tion by that strange means, are all f^abulous inven- 
tions, dishonorable to the wisdom and power of the 
Almighty ; that the only true religion is Deism, by 
which I then meant, and now mean, the belief of 
one God, and an imitation of bis moral character, 
or the practice of what are called moral virtues — 
and that it was upon this only (so far as religion is 
concerned) that I rested all my hopes of happiness 
hereafler. So say I now — and so help mo God. 

But to return to the subject. Though it is im- 
possible, at this distance of time, to ascertain as a 



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173 AGE OF REASON. [PART II« 

fact who were the writers of those four books, (and 
this alone is sufficient to hold them in doubt, and 
where we doubt we do not believe) it is not difficult 
to ascertain negatively that they were not written 
by the persons to whom they are ascribed. The 
contradictions in those books demonstrate two 
things : 

First, that the writers cannot have been eye-wit- 
nesses and ear-witnesses of the matters they relate, 
or they would have related them without these con- 
tradictions ; and, consequently, that the books have 
not been written by the persons called apostles, 
who are supposed to have been witnesses of this 
kind. 

Secondly, that the writers, whoever they were, 
have not acted in concerted imposition, but each 
writer, separately and individually for himself, and 
without the knowledge of the other. 

The same evidence that applies to prove the one, 
applies equally to prove both cases; that is, that 
the books were not written by the men called the 
apostles, and, also, that they are not a concerted im- 
position. As to inspiration, it is altogether out of 
the question; we may as well attempt to unite 
truth and falsehood, as inspiration and contradic- 
tion. 

If four men are eye-witoesses and car-witnesses 
to a scene, they will, without any concert between 
them, agree ^s to the time and place, when and 
where that scene happened. Their individual 
knowledge of the things each one knowing it for 
himself, renders conceit totally unnecessary; the 
one will not say it was in a mountain in the coun- 
try, and the other at a house in town; the one will 
not say it was at sun-rise, and the other that it was 
dark. For in whatever place it was, at whatever 
time it was, they know it equally alike. • 

And, on the other hand, if four men concert a 
story, they will make their separate relations of that 



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PAKT II.] AOn OF RKASOH. 173 

Story agree, and corroborate with each other to sup- 
port the whole. That concert supplies the want 
of fact in the one case, as the knowledge of the fact 
supercedes, in the other case, the necessity of a 
concert. The same contradictions, therefore, that 
prove there -has been no concert, prove also that 
the reporters had no knowledge of the fact (or 
rather of that which they relate as a fact,) and de- 
tect al»o the falsehood of their reports. Those 
books, therefore, have neither been written by the 
men called apostles, nor by impostors in concert. 
How, then, have they been written ? 

I am not one of those who are fond of believing 
there is much of that which is called wilful lying, 
or lying originally ; except in the case of men set- 
ting up to be prophets, as in the Old Testament: 
for prophesying is lying professionally. In almost 
all other cases, it is not difficult to discover the pro- 
gress, by which even simple supposition, with the 
aid of credulity, will, in time, grow into a lie, and 
at last be told as a fact ; and whenever we can find 
a charitable reason for a thing of this kind, wq 
ought not to indulge a severe one. 

The story of Jesus Christ appearing after he was 
dead, is the story of an apparition, such as timid 
imaginations can always create in vision, and cre- 
dulity believe. Stories of this kind had been told 
of the assassination of Julius Ceesar, not many 
years before, and they generally have their origin 
in violent deaths, or in the execution of innocent 
persons. In cases of this kind, compassion lends 
its aid, and benevolence stretches the story. It 
it goes on a little and a little fartheritill itbecomes —^ 
a most certain tnUh, Once start ngtibSifnnd ere- ^ / 
dulity fills up the history of its life, and assigns th9»' • . , 
cause of its appearance ! one tells it one vvay, an- 
other another way, till there are as many stories"^, 
about the ghost and about the proprietor of the ' ' ' 
host, as there are about Jesus Christ in these four 

Dks. 

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174 AGE OF REASON. [PART -Hi 

The story of the appearance of Jesus Christ m 
told with that strange mixture of the natural and 
impossible, that distinguishes legendary tale fronor 
fact. He is represented as suddenly coming in and 
going out when the doors are shut, and of vanish' 
iug out of sight, and appearing again, as one would 
conceive of an unsubstantial vision ; then, again, he 
is hungry, sits down to meat, and eats his supper. 
But as those who tell stories of this kind, never 
provide for all the cases, so it is here : they have 
told US, that when he arose he left his graves clothes 
behind him; but they have forgotten to provide 
other clothes for him to appear in afterwards, er 
to tell us what he did with them when he ascend^^ 
ed ; whether he stripped all ofi^, or went up clothes 
and all. In the case of Elijah, they have been 
careful enough to make him throw down his raani* 
tie ; how it happened not to be burnt in the chariot 
of fire, they also have not told us. But as ima^ 
nation supplies all deficiencies of this kind, we may 
suppose, if we please, that it was made of salaman^- 
der's wool. 

Those who are not much acquainted with ecele*- 
siastical history, may suppose that the book called 
the New Testament has existed ever since the time 
of Jesus Christ, as they suppose that the books as- 
cribed to Moses have existed ever since the time of 
Moses. But the fact is historically otherwise ; there 
was no such book as the New Testament till more 
than three hundred years after the tinie that Christ 
is said to have lived. 

At what time the books ascribed to Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, and John, began to appear, is alto- 
gether a matter of uncertainty. There is not the 
least shadow of evidence of who the persons were 
that wrote them, nor at what time they were writ- 
ten ; and they might as well have been called by 
the names of any of the other supposed apostles, as 
by the names they are now called. The originals 

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FUtT n.] AGE OF REASON. 175 

are not in the possession of any Christian Church 
existing, any more than the two tables of stone writ- 
ten on, they pretend, by the finger of God, upon 
Mount Sinai, and given to Moses, are in the pos- 
session of the Jews. And even if they were, there 
ia no possibility of proving the hand-writing in 
either case. At the time those books were written 
there was no printing, and, consequently, there 
couid be no publication, otherwise than by written 
copies, which any man might make or aher at plea- 
wire, and call them originals. Can we suppose it 
is consistent with the wisdom of the Almighty, to 
commit himself and his will to man, upon such 
precarious means as these, or that it is consistent 
we should pin our faith upon such uncertainties? 
We cannot make nor alter, nor even imitate, so 
much as one blade of grass that he has made, and 
yet we can make or alter words of God as easily as 
words of man.* 

About three hundred and fifty years after the 
time that Christ is said to have lived, several writ- 
ings of the kind I am speaking of, were scattered in 
the hands of divers individuals ; and as the church 

♦ The former part of the Age of Reason has not been 
published two years, and there is already an expression 
in it that is not mine. The expression is, The book of 
Luke was carried by a majority of one voice only. It 
may be true, bnt it is not I that have said it. Some per- 
son, who might know of the circumstance, has added it in 
a note at the bottom of the page in some of the editions, 
printed either in England or in America; and the printers, 
after that, have erected it into the body of the work, and 
made me the author 0/ it. If ^his has happened within 
Buch a short space of time, notwithstanding the aid of 
printing, which prevents the alteration of copies individu- 
ally; what may not have happened in much greater length 
of time, when there was no printing, and when any man 
who could write could make a written copy, and call it an 
original, by Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John. 

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176 AO« OF REASON. [PAUT Wf 

had beguD to form itself into a hierarchy, or churcb 
government, with temporal powers, it set itself 
about eollectinj^ them into a code, as we now- see 
them, called The Xew Testament, They decided 
by vote, as I have before said in the former part of 
the Jlge of Rectson, which of those writings, out of 
the collection they had made, should be the word 
of Gody and which should not. The Rabbins of 
the Jews had decided, by vote, upon the books of 
the Bible l>efore. 

As the object of the church, as is the case in alt 
national establishments of churches, was power 
and revenue, and terror the means it used ; it is 
consistent to suppose, that the most miraculous and 
wonderful of the writings they had collected stood 
the best chance of being voted. And as to the au- 
thenticity of the books, the vote stands in the pUtct 
of it ; for it can be traced no higher. 

Disputes, however, ran high among the people 
then calling themselves Christians ; not only as to 
points of doctrine, but as to the authenticity of the 
books. In the contest between the persons called 
St. Augustine and Fauste, about the year 400, the 
latter says, " The books called the Evangelists have 
been composed long afler the times of the apostles, 
by some obscure men, who, fearing that the world 
would not give credit to lhe\v relation of matters of 
which they could not be informed, have published 
them under the names of the apostles; and which 
are so full of sottishness and discordant relations, 
that there is neither agreement nor connection be- 
tween them." 

And in another place, addressing himself to the 
advocates of those books, as being the word of 
God, he says, "It is thus that your predecessors 
have inserted in the scriptures of our Lord, many 
tilings, which, though they carry his name, agree 
not with his doctrines. This is not surprising, 
oince that we have often proved that these things 



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PA&T li.] AGJB OF RBABOir. 177 

have not been written by himself, nor by his apos- 
ties, but that for the greater part they are founded 
upon tales, upon vague reports, and put together by 
I know not what, half Jews, with but little agree- 
ment between them ; and which they have never- 
theless published under the names of the apostles 
of our Lord, and have thus attributed to them their 
own errors and their lies.^'* 

The reader will see by these extracts, that the 
authenticity of the books of the New Testament 
was denied, and the books treated as tales, forger- 
ies, and lies, at the time they were voted to be the 
word of Grod. But the interest of the church, with 
the a^istance of the faggot, bore down the opposi- 
tion, and at last suppressed all investigation. Mira- 
cles followed upon miracles, if we will believe 
them, and men were taught to say they believed 
whether ihey believed or not But (by way of 
throwing in a thought) the French Revolution has 
excommunicated the church from the power of 
working miracles : she has not been able, with the 
assistance of all her saints, to work one miracle 
since the revolution began ; and as she never stood 
in greater need than now, we may, without the aid 
of divination, conclude, that all her former miracles 
were tricks and lies.f 



* I have taken these two extracts from Bonlanger's Life 
of Paul, written in French; Boulanger has quoted them 
from the writings of Augustine against Fauste, to which he 
rders. 

t Boulanger; in his Life of Paul, has collected from the 
ecclesiastical histories, and the writings of the fathers, as 
they are called, several matters which show the opinions 
that prevailed among the different sects of Christians at 
the time the Testament, as we now see it, was voted to 
be the word of God. The following extracts are fi*om the 
■econd chapter of that work. 

'' The Mardonists, (a Christian sect), assured that the 
23 



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178 AGE or REASOlf. [pART IK 

When we consider the lapse of more than three 
hundred years intervening between the time that 
Christ is said to have lived and the time the New 
Testiaiment was formed into a book, we must see, 
even without the assistance of historical evidence, 
the exceeding uncertainty there is of its authen- 
ticity. The authenticity of the book of H9mer, so 
far as regards the authorship, is much better esta- 
blished than that of the New Testament, though 
Homer is a thousand years the most ancient. It 
was only an exceeding good poet that could have 
written the book of Homer, and, therefore, few men 
only could have attempted it; and a man capable 
of doing it would not have thrown away his owtt 
fame by giving it to another. In like manner, there 
were but few that could have composed Euclid^ 

evangelists were filled with falsities. The Manicheand» 
who formed a very numerous sect at the commencemeal 
of Christianity, rejected as false, all fhe JSTew Testament; 
and showed other writings quite different that they gave 
for authentic. The Corinthians, like the Marcionists, ad- 
mitted not the Acts of the Apostles. The Encraites, and 
the Sevenians, adopted neither the Acts nor the Epistles 
of Paul. Chrysostome, in a homily which he made upon 
the Acts of the Apostles, says, that in his time, about die 
year 400, many people knew nothing either of the author 
or of the book. St Irene, who lived before that time, re- 
ports that the Valentinians, like several other sects of the 
Christians, accused the ^riptures of being filled with im- 
perfections, errors, and contradictions. The Ebionites or 
Nazarenes, who were the first Christians, rejected all the 
Epistles of Paul, and regarded him as an imposter. They, 
report, among other things, that he was originally a Pa- 
gan, that he came to Jerusalem, where he lived some time; 
and that having a mind to many the daughter of the high 
priest, he caused himself to be circumcised; but that not be- 
ing able to obtain her, he quarrelled with the Jews, and 
wrote against circumcision, and against the observation of 
the Sabbath, and against all the legal ordinances.'* 



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f»ART U.] AGE OF REASON. 179 

mements, because none bat an exceeding good 
geoncietrician could have been the author of that 
work. 

But with respect to the books of the New Testa- 
ment, particularly such parts as tell us of the resur- 
rection and ascension of Christ, any person who 
could tell a story of an apparition, or of a man^s 
walkings could have made such books ; for the story 
is most wretchedly told. The chance, therefore, of 
forgery in the Testament, is millions to one greater 
than in the case of Homer or Euclid. Of the nu- 
merous priests or parsons of tlie present day, bish- 
ops and all, every one of them can make a sermon, 
or translate a scrap of Latin, especially if it has 
been translated a thousand times before; but is 
there any amongst them that can write poetry like 
Homer, or science like Euclid ? The sum total of 
a parson's learning, with very few exceptions, is a 
h ah, and hie, hcec, hoc ; and their knowledge of sci- 
ence is three times one is three ; and this is more 
than sufficient to have enabled them, had they lived 
at the time, to have written all the books of the 
New Testament. 

As the opportunities of forgery were greater, so 
also was the inducement. A man could gain no 
advantage by writing under the name of Homer or 
Euclid ; if he could write equal to them, it would 
be better that he wrote under his own name ; if in- 
ferior, he could not succeed. Pride would prevent 
the former, and impossibility the latter. But with 
respect to such books as compose th^ New Testa- 
ment, all the inducements were on the side of for- 
gery. The best imagined history that could have 
been made, at the distance of two or three hun- 
dred years after the time, could not have passed for 
an original under the name of the real writer ; the 
only chance of success lay in forgery, for the church 
wanted pretence for its new doctrine, and truth and 
talents were out of the question. 



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180 AGE OF REASON. [PAAT^iII. 

But as it 13 not uDcommon (as before observed) 
to relate stories of persons umlkiTig after they are 
dead, and of ghosts and apparitions of such as hmye 
fallen by some violent or extraordinary means ; and 
as the people of that day were in the habit of be- 
lieving such things, and of the appearance of an- 
gels, and also of devils, and of their getting into 
people's insides, anji shaking them like a fit of an 
ague, and of their being cast out again as if by an 
emetic — (Mary Magdalene, the book of Mark tells 
us, had brought up, or been brought to bed of 
seven devils ;) — it was nothing extraordinary that 
some story of this kind should get abroad of tbe 
person called Jesus Christ, and become afterwards 
the foundation of the four books ascribed to Mat- 
thew, Mark, Luke, and John. Each writer tdd 
the tale as he heard it, or thereabouts, and gave to 
his book the name of the saint or the apostle whom 
tradition had given as the eye-witness. It is only 
upon this ground that the contradictions in those 
books can be accounted for; and if this be not the 
case, they are downright impositions, lies, and for- 
geries, without even the apology of credulity. 

That they have been written by a sort of half 
Jews, as the foregoing quotations mention, isdis- 
cernable enough. The frequent references made 
to that chief assassin and imposter Moses, and to 
the men called prophets, establishes this point ; and, 
on the other hand, the church has complimented 
the fraud, by admitting the Bible and the Testa- 
ment to reply to each other. Between the Christ- 
ian Jew and the Christian Gentile, the thing called 
a prophecy, and the thing prophesied; the tyge, 
and the thing typified ; the sign and the thing sig- 
nified, have been industriously rummaged up, and 
fitted together, like old locks and pick-lock keys. 
The story, foolishly enough told, of Eve and the 
serpent, and naturally enough, as to the enmity be- 
tween men and serpents, (for the serpent alwajs 



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^VkMir II.] AOE OF REASON. 181 

bttes about the heel, because it caDDOt reach higher; 
' and the man always knocks the serpent about the 
head, as the tnost effectual way to prevent its 
biting;*) this foolish story, I say, has been made 
ifito a propliecy, a type, and a promise to begin 
with ; and the lying imposition of Isaiah to Ahaz, 
Thai a virgin shall conceive and hear a son, as a sign 
that Ahaz should conquer, when the event was that 
he was defeated (as already noticed ^ in the observa- 
tions on the book of Isaiah,) has been perverted, 
and made to serve as a winder-up. *-^ 

Jonah*4Jid the whale are also made into a sign or ^ 
a type. /Jonah is Jesus Christ, and the whale is the 
grave : fer it is said, {and they have made Christ to \ 
say it of himself) Matthew, chapter xvii. verse 40, - ' 
" For as Jonah was ihree days and three nights in the -,' 
whalers belly, so shall the son of man heUhtiee days i 
and three nights in the heart of the earth.2^\But it ^ _J 
happens awkwardly enough that Christ, according 
to their own account, was but one day and two 
nights in the grave ; about 36 hours, instead of 72 ; 
(hat is, the Friday night, the Saturday, and the Sat- 
urday night ; for they say he was up on the Sunday 
moniing by sun-rise, or before. But as this fits 
quite as well as the bite and the kick in Genesis, or 
the virgin and her son in Isaiah, it will pass in the 
lump of orthodox things. Thiis much for the his- 
torical part of the Testament and its evidences. 

Epistles of Paid. The epistles ascribed to Paul, 
being fourteen in number, almost fill up the remain- 
ing part of the Testament. Whether those epistles 
were written by the person to whom they arc 
f»cribed, is a matter of no great importance, since 
the writer, whoever he was, attempts to prove his 
doctrine by argument. He does not pretend to 
have been witness to any of the scenes told of the 

* '* It shall bruise thy fiead, and thou thalt braise his 
A€e2." Geneeis, chapter iii. verse 16. 



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182 AGE or REASON. [PART II.' 

resurrection and the ascension ; and he declares 
that he had not J)elieved them. 

The story of his being struck to the ground as 
he was journeying to Damascus, has nothing in it 
miraculous or extraordinary ; he escaped with his 
life, and that is more than many others have douO) 
who have been struck with lightning ; and that he 
should lose his sight for three days, and be unable 
to eat or drink during that time, is nothing more 
than is common in such conditions. His compan- 
ions that were with him appear not to have suffered 
in the same manner, for they were well enough to 
lead him the remainder of the journey ; neither ^d 
they pretend to have seen any vision. 

The character of the person called Paul, accord- 
ing to the accounts given of him, has in it a great 
deal of violence and fanaticism ; he had persecuted 
with as much heat as he preached afterwards ; the 
stroke he had received had changed his thinking, 
without altering his constitution ; and, either as a 
Jew or a Christian, he was the same zealot SuQh 
men are never good moral evidences of any doc- 
trine they preach. They are always in extremes, 
as well of action as of belief. 

The doctrine he sets out to prove by argument, 
is the resurrection of the same body ; and he ad- 
vances this as an evidence of immortality. But so 
much will men differ in their manner of thinking, 
and in the conclusions they draw from the same 
premises, that this doctrine of the resurrection of 
the same body, so far from being an evidence of 
immortality, appears to me to furnish an evidence 
against it ; for if I had already died in this body, 
and am raised again in the same body in which I 
have died, it is presumptive evidence that I shall 
die again. That resurrection no more secures me 
against the repetition of dying, than an ague fft, 
when past, secures me against another. To believe, 
therefore, in immortality, I must have a more ele- 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 183 

vated idea than is contained in the gloomy doctrine 
of the resurrection. 

Besides, as a matter of choice, as well as of hope, 
I had rather have a better body and a more conve- 
nient form than the present. Every animal in the 
creation excels us in something. The winged in- 
sects, without mentioning doves or eagles, can pass 
over more space and with greater ease, in a few 
minutes, than man can in an hour. The glide of 
the smallest fish, in proportion to its bulk, exceeds 
us in motion, almost beyond comparison, and with- 
out weariness. Even the sluggish snail can ascend 
from the bottom of a dungeon, where a man, by 
the want of that ability, would perish ; and a spider 
can launch itself from the top, as a playful amuse- 
ment. The personal powers of man are so limit- 
ed, and his heavy frame so little constructed to ex- 
tensive enjoyment, that there is nothing to induce 
us to wish the opinion of Paul to be true. It is too 
little for thi8 magnitude of the scene — too mean for 
the sublimity of the subject. 

But all other arguments apart; the consciousness 
of existence is the only conceivable idea we can 
have of another life, and the continuance of that 
consciousness is immortality. The consciousness 
of existence, or the knowing that we exist, is not 
necessarily confined to the same form, nor to the 
lame matter, even in this life. 

We have not in all cases the same form, nor in 
Any case the same matter, that composed our bodies 
twenty or thirty years ago; and yet we are con- 
fscious of being the same persons. Even legs and 
arms, which make up almost half the human frame, ' 
\re not necessary to the consciousness of existence. 
These may be lost or taken away, and the full con- 
sciousness of existence remain ; and were their 
place supplied by wings or other appendages, we 
cannot conceive that it could alter our conscious- 
ness of existence. In short, we know not how 



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184 AGS OF REASON. JPABT II. 

much, or ratlier how little, of our compositioti it is, 
and how exquisitely fine that little is, that creates 
in us this consciousness of existence ; and all be- 
yond that is like the pulp of a peach, distinct 
and separate from the vegetative speck in the ker- 
nel. 

Who can say by what exceeding fine action of 
fine matter it is tliat a thought is produced in what 
we call the mind ? and yet that thought, when pro- 
duced, as I now produce the thought I am writing, 
is capable of becoming immortal, and is the only 
production of man that has that capacity. 

Statues of brass or marble will perish; ttnd 
statues made in imitation of them are not the 
same statues, nor the same workmanship, any 
more than the copy of a picture is the same pic- 
ture. But print and reprint a thought a thousand 
times over, and that with materials of any kind- 
carve it in wood, or engrave it on stone, the thought 
is eternally and identically the same thought m* 
every case. It has a capacity of unimpared exist- 
ence, unaffected by change of matter, and is essen- 
tially distinct, and of a nature different from every 
thing else that we know or can conceive. If, then,' 
the thing produced has in itself a capacity of being 
immortal, it is more than a token that the powei 
that produced it, which is the self-same thing as 
consciousness of existence, can be immortal also ; 
and that as independently of the matter it was first 
connected with, as the thought is of the printing or 
writing it at 6rst appeared in. The one idea is not 
more difficult to believe than the other, and we can 
see that one is true. 

That the consciousness of existence is not de- 
pendent on the same form or the same matter, id 
demonstrated to our senses in the works of the cre- 
ation, as far as our senses are capable of receiving 
that demonstration. A very numerous part of the 
animal creation preaches to us, far better than Pan)) 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 185 

the belief of a life "hereafter. Their little life re- 
sembles an earth and a heaven — a present and a 
future state; and comprises, if it may be so ex- 
pressed, immortality in miniature. 

The most beautiful parts of the creation, to our 
eye, are the winged insects, and they are not so ori- 
ginally. They acquire that form and that inimita- 
ble brilliancy by progressive change?. The slow 
and creeping caterpillar-worm of to-day, passes in 
a few days to a torpid figure, and a state resembling 
death ; and in the next change comes forth in all 
^he miniature magnificence of life a splendid but- 
terfly. No resemblance of the former creature re- 
mains; every thing is changed; all his powers are 
new, and life is to him another thing. We cannot 
conceive that the consciousness of existence is not 
the same in this state of the animal as before ; why 
then must I believe that the resurrection of the 
^me 'body is necessary to contiuue to me the con- 
jciousness of existence hereafter? 

In the former part of the .%c of Reason I have 
called the creation the only true and real word of 
God ; and this instance, of this text, in the book of 
creation, not only shows to us that this thing may 
be so ; but that it is so ; and that the belief of a 
future state is a rational belief^ founded upon facts 
visible in the creation: for it is not more difficult to 
believe that we shall exist hereafter in a better state 
and form than at present, than that a worm should 
become a butterfly, and quit the dunghill for the 
atmosphere, if we did not know it as a fact. 

As to the doubtful jargon ascribed to Paul in the 
15th chapter of 1 Corinthians, which makes part 
of the burial service of some Christian sectaries, it 
is as destitute of meaning as the tolling of the bell 
at the funeral; it explains nothing to the under- 
standing — it illustrates nothing to the imagination, 
but leaves the reader to find any meaning if he can. 
'^ All flesh (says he) is not the same flesh. There is- 

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186 A6E OF REASON. [PART tl.*? 

one flesh of men ; another of beasts ; another of 
fishes ; an^ another of birds." And wliat then ? — 
nothing. A cook could have said as much. — 
"There are also (says he) bodies celestial and 
bodies terrestrial ; the glory of the celestial is one, 
and the glory of the tefrestrial is another." And 
what then ? nothing. And what is the difference ? 
nothing that he has told. "There is (says he) one 
glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, 
and another glory of the stars." And what then ? 
nothing ; except that he says that one star differeth • 
from another star in glort/, instead of distance ; and 
he might as well have told us, that the moon did 
not shine so bright as the sun. All this is nothing 
better than the jargon of a conjuror, who picks np ' 
phrases he does not understand, to confound the 
credulous people who come to have their fortunes 
told. Priests and conjurors are of the same trade* 

Sometimes Paul affects to be a naturalist, and t\ 
prove his system of resurrection from the princi- 
ples of vegetation. "Thou fool, (says he) that 
which thou so west is not quickened except it die.** ' 
To which one might reply in his own language, 
and say, Thou fool, Paul, that which thou sowest is 
not quickened except it die not ; for the grain that 
dies in the ground never does, nor can vegetate. It 
is only the living grains that produce the next crop. 
But the metaphor, in any point of view, is no simile. 
It is succession, and not resurrection. 

The progress of an animal from one slate of be- 
ing to another, as from a worm to a butterfly, ap- 
plies to the case ; but this of a grain does not, and 
shows Paul to have been what he says of others, a ' 
fool 

Whether the fourteen ej>istles ascribed to Paul 
were written by him or not, is a nwtter of indiffer- ' 
ence ; they are either argumentative or dogmatical ; 
and as the argument is defective, and the dogmati- 
cal part is merely presumptive^ it signifies not whft 



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FAUT II.] AGE OF ESA80N. 187 

T^it>te tbem. And the same may be said forllie 
remaining parts of the Testament. It is not upon 
the epistles, but upon what is called the gospel, con- 
tained in the lour books ascribed to Matthew, Mark, 
Luke, and John, and upon the pretended prophe- 
cies, that the theory of the Church, calling itself 
the Christian church, is founded. The epistles are 
dependent upon those, and must follow their fate; 
for if the story of Jesus Christ be fabulous, all rea- 
soning founded upon it as a supposed truth, must 
fall with it. 

We know from history, that one of the principal 
lenders of this church, Athanasius, lived at the time 
the New Testament was formed ;* and we know, 
also, from the absurd jargon he has lefl us under 
the name of a creed, the character of the men who 
formed the New Testament ; and we know, also, 
from the same history, that the authenticity of the 
books of which it is composed was denied at the 
time. It was upon the vote of such as Athanasius, 
that the Testament was decreed to be the word of 
God ; and nothing can present to us a more strange 
idea than that of decreeing the word of Qod by 
vote. Those who rest their faith upon such au- 
thority, put man in the place of God, and have no 
foundation for future happiness; credulity, how- 
ever, is not a crime; but it becomes criminal by 
resisting conviction. It is strangling in the womb 
of the conscience the eflTorts it makes to ascertain 
truth. We should never force belief upon our- 
selves in any thing. 

I here close the subject on the Old Testament 
and the New. The evidence I have produced to 
prove them forgeries, is extracted from the books 
themselves, and acts, like a two edged sword, either 
way. If the evidence be denied, the authenticity 

* Atbanasina died, aeoording to\the chnrch chronology, 
in the year 871. 



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188 AGE OF REASON. [PART 11. 

of the scriptures is denied with it ; for it is scrip- 
ture evidence: and if the evidence be admitted, the 
authenticity of the books is disproved. The con- 
tradictory knppssit^ilities contained in the Old Test- 
ament and the New, put them in the case of a man 
who swears for and against. Either evidence con- 
victs him of perjury, and equally destroys reputa- 
tion. 

Should the Bible and Testament hereafter fall, it 
is not I that have been the occasion. I have done 
no more than extracted the evidence from the con- 
fused mass of matter with which it is mixed, and 
arranged that evidence in a point of light to be- 
clearly seen and easily comprehended ; and havinff 
done this, I leave the reader to judge for himself 
as I have judged for myself. 



CONCLUSION. 

In the former part of the ^e of Reason I have' 
spoken of the three frauds, mystery, miracle, and 
prophecy ; and as I have seen nothing in any of 
the answers to that work, that in the least affects 
what I have there said upon those subjects, I shall 
not encumber this Second Part with additions that 
are not necessary. 

I have spoken also in the same work upon what 
is called reveiatiouy and have shown the absurd mlsr , 
application of that term to the books of the Oldj 
Testament and the New ; for certainly revelation is 
out of the question in reciting any thing of whi^ 
man has been the actor, or the witness. That which • 
a man has done or seen, needs no revelation to t^ 
him he has done it, or seen it; for he knows it 
already ; nor to enable him to tell it, or to write it;^ 
It is ignorance, or imposition, to apply the term 



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PART II.] AGE OP REASON. 189 

revelation in such cases; yet the Bible and Testa- 
ment are classed under this fraudulent description 
of being all revelation. 

Revelation then, so far as the term has relation 
between God and man, can only be applied to some- 
thing which God reveals of his unll to man ; but 
though the power bf the Almighty to make such a 
communication, is necessarily admitted, because to 
that power all things are possible, yet the thing so 
revealed (if any thing ever was revealed, and which, 
by the bye, it is impossible to prove) is revelation to 
the pei-son only to whom it is made. His account of 
it to another is not revelation ; and whoever puts 
faith in that account, puts it in the man from whom 
the account comes ; and that man may have been 
deceived, or may have dreamed it ; or he may be 
an impostor, and may lie. There is no possible cri- 
terion whereby to judge of the truth of what he 
tells ; for even the morality of it would be no proof 
of revelation. In all such cases, the proper answer 
would be, " fFhen it is revealed to me, I will believe it 
to be a revelation ; but it is not, and cannot be incumr 
bent upon m£ to believe it to be revelation before; 
neither is it proper that I should take the word of a 
man as the word of God, and put man in the pluce 
of Gody This is the manner in which I have 
spoken of revelation in the former part of the Jige 
of Reason ; and which, while it reverentially ad- 
mits revelation as a possible thing, because, as be- 
fore said, to the Almighty all things are possible, 
it prevents the imposition of one man upon an- 
other, and precludes the wicked use of pretended 
revelation. 

Bnt though, speaking for myself, I thus admit 
the possibility of revelation, I totally disbelieve that 
the Almighty ever did communicate any thing to 
man, by any mode of speech, in any language, or 
l^ any kind of vision, or appearance, or by any 
means which our senses are capable of receiti^f, 



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190 AGE OF REASON. [pAihlf^t. 

Otherwise than by the universal display of hifil^<^ 
in the works of the creation, and by that repugnance 
we feel in ouraelves to bad actions, and disposition 
to good ones. 

The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid 
cruelties, and the greatest miseries, that have afflict* 
ed the human race, have had* their origin in this 
thing cBlled revelation, or revealed religion. It has 
been the most dishonorable belief against the char- 
acter of the Divinity, the most destructive to moral* 
ity, and the peace and happiness of man, that ev^ 
was propagated since man began to exist. Xt'ls 
better, far better, that we admitted, if it were po^I- 
ble, a thousand devils to roam at large, and ^ 
preach publicly the doctrine of devils, if there W^in6 
any such, than that we permitted one such imp<>S^ 
and monster as Moses, Joshua, Samuel, and tike 
Bible prophets, to come with the pretended word 
of Grod in his mouth j and have credit among uk 

Whence arose all the horrid assassination^ 'of 
whole nations of men, women, and infants, iH& 
which the Bible is filled ; and the bloody persecu- 
tions, and tortures unto death, and religious t/7ttr^ 
that since that time have laid Europe in blood tttid 
ashes ; whence arose they, but from this impious 
thing called revealed religion, and this monstrous 
belief, that God has spoken to man ? The lies of 
the Bible have been the cause of the one, and the 
lies of the Testament of the other. 

Some Christians pretend that Christianity was 
not established by the sword ; but of what period 
of time do they speak ? It was impossible that 
twelve men could begin with the sword ; they htA 
not the power ; but no sooner were the professors 
of Christianity sufficiently powerful to employ llie 
sword, than they did so, and the stake and the f^*- 
got too ; and Mahomet could not do it sooner, nf 
the same spirit that Peter cut off the ear of tfie 
high priest's servant (if the story be true) he would 



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RkKV II.] AeS OF REASOSr. 191 

Imve cut off his head, and the head of his master, 
had lie been able. Besides this, Christianity grounds 
itself originally upon the Bible, and the Bible was 
established altogether bj' the sword, and th{^ in the 
worst use of it ; not to terrify, but to extirpate. The 
Jews made no converts ; they butchered all. The 
Bible is the sire of the Testament, and both are 
called the word of God, The Christians read both 
books ; the ministers preach from both books ; and 
this thing called Christianity- is made up of both. 
It is then false to say that Christianity was not esta- 
blished by the sword. 

The only sect that has not persecuted are the 
Quakers; and the only reason that can be given 
for it is, that they are rather Deists than Christians. 
They do not believe much about Jesus Christ, and 
they call the Scriptures a dead letter. Had they 
called them by a worse name, they had been nearer 
the truth. 

It is incumbent on every man who reverences the 
character of the Creator, and who wishes to lessen 
the catalogue of artificial miseries, and remove the 
cause that has sown persecutions thick among man- 
kind, to expel all ideas of revealed religion as a 
dangerous heresy, and an impious fraud. What is 
it that we have learned from this pretended thing 
called revealed religion ? nothing that is useful td 
man, and every thing that is dishonorable to his 
Maker. What is it the Bible teaches us ? — ^rapine, 
cruelty, and murder. What is it the Testament 
teaches Us? — to believe that the Almighty commit- 
ted debauchery with a woman, engaged to be mar- 
ried ! and the belief of this debauchery is called faith. 

As to the fragments of morality that are urregu- 
lady and thinly scattered in those books, they make 
no part of this pretended thing, revealed religion. 
l%ey are the natural dictates of conscience, and the 
bounds by which society is held together, and with- 
out which it cannot exist ; and are nearly the same 



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192 AOE OF REASOir. [rAB9^. 

ia all religions, and in all societies. The Testam^it 
teaobes nothing new upon this subject, and where 
it attempts to exceed, it becomes mean and ridicu- 
lous. The doctrine of not retaliating injuries, is 
much better expressed in Proverbs, which is a col- 
lection as well from the Gentiles as the Jews, than 
it is in the Testament It is there said, Proverbs 
XXV. verse 9i, " If thine enemy be hungry^ give him 
bread to eat ; and if he be thirsty, give him water to 
drink : "* but when it is said^ as in the Testamimt, 
^^If a man smite thee on the right cheeky turn ta him 
the other also ;" it is assassinating the dignity of ^»r- 
bearance, and sinking man into a spaniel. 

Loving enemies, is another dogma of feigned voor 
rality, and has besides no meaning. It is inconi- 
bent on man, as a moralist, that he does not revei^ 
an injury ; and it is equally as good in a politi^ 
sense, for there is no end to retaliation, each retali- 
ates on the other, antf calls it justice ; hut to lo^e 
in proportion to the injury, if it could be d&m, 

* According to what is called Christ's sermon oa the 
Mount, in the book of Matthew, where, among some Other 
good things, a great deal of this feigned mprsJity is iatm- 
duced, it is therfe expressly said, that the doctrine of ^- 
bearance, or of not retaliating injuries, was not ani^jfurt 
of the doctrine of the Jeios ; but as this doctrine is found- 
ed in proverbs, it must, according to that statement, have 
been copied from the Gentiles, from whom Christ had 
learned it. Those men, whom Jewish and Christian idol- 
aters have abusively called heathens, had much better and 
clearer ideas of justice and morality than are to be fbtfnl 
in the Old Testament, so far as it is Jewish ; or in me 
New. The answer of Solon on the question, •« Which fs 
the most perfect popular government,'* has never been eri- 
ceeded by any man since his time, as containing a noashn 
of political morality. " That," says hOi ** where the Imtt 
injury done to the meanest individual, is considered am #t 
insult on the whole conatitution." Solon lived about 500 
I before Christ , 



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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 193 

woald be to offer a premium for crime. Be- 
sides, the word enemies is too vague and general 
to be used in a moral maxim, which ought always 
to be clear and defined, like a proverb. If a man 
be the enemy of another from mistake and preju- 
dice, as in the case of religious opinions, and some- 
times in politics, that man is different to an enemy 
at heart with a criminal intention ; and it is incum- 
bent upon us, and it contributes also to our tran- 
quility, that we put the best construction upon a 
thing that it will bear. But even this erroneous mo- 
tire in him, makes no motive for love on the other 
part; and to say that we can love voluntarily, and with- 
ottt a motive, is morally and physically impossible. 

Morality is injured by prescribing to it duties, 
that, in the first place, are impossible to be perform- 
ed ; and, if they could be, would be productive of 
evil; or, as before said, be premiums for crime. 
The maxim of doing as we wovM he done unto, does 
not include this strange doctrine of loving enemies^ 
for BO man expects to be loved himself for his crime 
or for his enmity. 

Those whp preach this doctrine of loving their 
enemies, are, in general, the greatest persecutors, 
and they act consistently by so doing ; for the doc- 
trine is hypocritical, and it is natural that hypocrisy 
should act the reverse of what it preaches. For 
my own part I disown the doctrine, and consider it 
as feigned or a fabulous morality ; yet the man does 
not exist that can say I have persecuted him, or any 
man, or any set of men, either in the American 
He volution, or in the French Revolution ; or that 
J have, in any case, returned evil for evil. But it 
is^ not incumbent on man to reward a bad action 
with a good one, or to return good for evil ; and 
wherever it is done, it is a voluntary act, and not a 
duty. It is also absurd to suppose that such doc- 
teine can make any part of a revealed religion. We 
imitatt the moral character of th« Creator by for* 
25 

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194 AGE OF REASON. [PART II. 

bearing with each other, for he forbears with all ; but 
this doctrine would imply that be loved man, not in 
proportion as he was good, but as he was bad. 

If we consider the nature of our condition here, 
we must see there is no occasion for such a thing 
as revealed religion. What is it we want to know? 
Does not the creation, the universe we behold, 
preach to us the existence of an Almighty power 
that governs and regulates the whole ? And is not 
the evidence that this creation holds out to our 
senses infinitely stronger than any thing we can 
read in a book, that any imposter might make am) 
call the word of God ? As for morality, the know-^ 
ledge of it exists in every man's conscience. f 

Here we are. The existence of an Almighty 
power is sufficiently demonstrated to us, though we 
cannot conceive, as it is impossible we should, the 
nature and manner of its existence. We cannot 
conceive how we came here ourselves, and yet we 
know for a fact that we are here. We must know, 
also, that the power that called us into being, cao, 
if he please, and when he pleases, call us to accoi^lt 
for the manner in which we have lived here ; and, 
therefore, without seeking any other motive for tlie 
belief, it is rational to believe that he will, for Wb 
know before-hand that he can. The probabiliQTf 
or even possibility of the thing is all that we ought 
to know ; for if we know it as a fact, we should be 
the mere slaves of terror ; our belief would have 
no merit ; and our best actions no Virtue. 

Deism, then, teaches us, without the possibiliQr 
of being deceived, all that is necessary or proper to 
be known. The creation is the Bible of the Deist. 
He there reads, in the hand-writing of the Creator 
himself, the certainty of his existence, and the im- 
mutability of his power, and all other Bibles and 
Testaments are to him forgeries. The probability 
that we may be called to account hereafter, will, to 
a reflecting mind, have the influence of belief; fyr 



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PART II.] XQE OF REASON. 195 

it is not our belief or disbelief that can make or 
unmake the fact. As this is the state we are in, 
and whicii it is proper we should be in, as free 
agents, it is the fool only, and not the philosopher, 
or even the prudent man, that would live as if there 
were no God, 

But the belief of a God is so weakened by being 
mixed with the strange fable of the Christian creed, 
and with the wild adventures related in the Bible, 
and of the obscurity and obscene nonsense of the 
Testament, that the mind of man is bewildered as 
in a fog. Viewing all these things in a confused 
mass, he confounds fact with fable ; and as he can- 
not believe all, he feels a disposition to reject all. 
But the belief of a God is a belief distinct frpm all 
other things, and ought not to be confounded with 
any. The notion of a Trinity of Gods has enfee- 
bled the belief of one God. A multiplication of 
beliefs acts as a division of belief; and in propor- 
tion as any thing is divided it is weakened. 

Religion, by such means, becomes a thing of 
form, instead of fact ; of notion instead of princi- 
ples ; morality is banished to make room for an im- 
aginary thing, called faith, and this faith has its oH- 
gin in a supposed debauchery j^ a man is preached 
instead of God; and execution is an object for 
gratitude ; the preachers •daub themselves with the 
blood, like a troop of assassins, and pretend to ad- 
mire the brilliancy it gives them; they preach a 
humdrum sermon on the merits of the execution ; 
then praise Jesus Christ for being executed, and 
condemn the Jews for doing it. 

A man, by hearing all this nonsense lumped and 
preached together, confounds the God of creation 
with the imagined God of Christians, and lives as 
if there were none. 

Of all the systems of religion that ever were in- 
vented, there is none more derogatory to the Al- 
mighty, more unedifying to man, more repugnant 



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196 ▲«£ or RSA80II. [part II. 

to reason, and more contradictory in itseH^ than 
this thing called ChristiaiHty. Too absurd for be- 
lief^ too impossible to convince, and too inconsist- 
ent for practice, it renders tho heart torpid, or pro 
duces only atheists and fanatics. As an tuigine of 
. power, it serves the purpose of despotism ; and as 
a means of wealth, the avarice of priesis ; but so 
for as respects the good of roan in general, it leads 
to nothijig here or hereafter. 

The only religion that has not been invented, and 
that has in it every evidence of divine originaHhTi. 
is pure and simple Deism. It must have been the 
first, and will probably be the last that man believes. '- 
But pure and simple Deism does not- answer tblfl 
purpo^ of despotic governments. They canndt . 
lay hold of religion as an engine, but by mixing Ht 
with human inventions, and making their own aa- 
thority a part ; neither does it answer the avarice 
of priests, but by incorporating themselves and 
their functions with it, and becoming, like the gcnr^' 
emment, a party in the system. It is this, thst 
forms the otherwise mysterious connection Of 
diurch and state; the church humane, and l3^ 
state tyrannic. 

Were man impressed as fully and as strongly, fli 
he ought to be, with the belief of a God, his moral 
life would be regulated by the force of that belief| 
he would stand in awe of €k>d, and of himself, and 
would not do the thing that could not be concealed 
from either. To give this belief the full opporta- 
nity of force, it is necessary that it acts alone. Tbte 
is Deism. 

But when, according to the Christian trinitarian 
scheme, one part of God is represenied by a dyhif 
man, and another ])art called the Holy Ghost, by A 
flying pigeon, it is impossible that belief can atUiek - 
itself to such wild conceits.* 

* The book called the book of Matthew, says, cbaptor 

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PART II.] AGE OF REASON. 197 

It has been the scheme of the Christian church, 
and of all the other invented systems of religion, 
to hold man in ignorance of the Creator, as it is of 
government to hold man in ignorance of his rights. 
The systems of the one are as false as those of the 
other, and ate calculated for mutual support The 
study of theology, as it stands in Christian church- 
es, is the study of nothing; it is founded on no« 
thing ; it rests on no principles ; it proceeds by no au- 
thorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate no- 
thing ; and it admits of no conclusion. Not any 
thing can be studied as a science, without our being 
in possession of the principles upon which it is 
founded ; and as this is not the case with Christ- 
ian theology, it is, therefore, the study of no- 
thing. 

Instead, then, of studying theology, as is now 
done, out of the Bible and Testament, the mean- 
ings of which books are always controverted, 
and the authenticity of which is disproved, it is 
necessary that we refer to the Bible of the 
creation. The principles we discover there are 
eternal, and of divine origin: they are the 
foundation of all the science that exists in the 
world, and must be the foundation of the- 
ology. 

We can know God only through his works. We 
cannot have a conception ' of any one attribute, but 
by following sorrie principle that leads to it. We 
have only a confused idea of his power, if we have 

iii. verse 16, that the Holy Ghost descended in the shape 
of a dove. It might as well have said a goose; the crea- 
tores are equally harmless, and the one is as much a non- 
sensical lie as the other. The second of Acts, verses 2, 
8, says, that it descended in a mighty rushing toindt in 
the shape of cloven tongues : perlups it was cloven feet. 
Snch absurd stuff is only fit for tales of witches and 
wizards. 



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196 Aoe or hea-soh.- [fxrt ii« 

not Ae means of comprehending something of itfl 
immensity. We can have no idea of his wis* 
dom, but by knowing the order and manner in 
which it acts. The principles of science lead to 
this knowledge; for the Creator of man is the 
Creator of science, and it is through that me* 
dium that man can see God, as it were, face to 
face. 

Could a man be placed in a situation, and en* 
dowed with the power of vision, to behold at one 
view, and to contemplate deliberately, the structuxs 
of the universe ; to marie the movements of tite 
several planets, the cause of their varyjng appear** 
ances, the unerring order in which they revolv& 
even to the remotest comet ; their connections and 
dependence on each other, and to know the Bf^ 
tem of laws established by the Creator, that governs 
and regulates the whole ; he would then conceiviB, 
&r beyond what any church theology can tetidli 
him, the power, the wisdom, the vastness, the mu- 
nificence of the Creator ; he would then see, ^t 
all the knowledge man has of science, and that all 
the mechanical arts by which he renders his sitnlh 
tion comfortable here, are derived from that source: 
his mind, exalted by the scene, and convinced bj 
the fact, would increase in gratitude as it increase 
in knowledge: his religion or his worship woidd 
become united with his improvement as a man ; 9M 
employment he followed, that had connection wim 
the principles of the creation, as every thing oF 
agriculture, of science, and of the mechanical arts, 
has, would teach him more of God, and of the 
gratitude he owes to him, than any theological 
Christian sermon he now hears. Great objects in- 
spire great thoughts ; great munificence excites greet 
gratitude ; but the grovelling tales and doctrines of 
the Bible and the Testament are fit only to exc^ 
contempt. 

Though man cannot arrive, at least in this life^et 



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FJyfct II.] A«X OF RBASOn. IM 

the actual scene I hare described, he can demon- 
strate it ; because be has a knowledge of the prin- 
ciples upon which the creation is coBstructed.'^ Wo 
know that the greatest works can be represented in 
model, and that the universe can be represented by 
the same means. The same principles by which 
we measure an inch, or aai acre of ground, will 
measure to millions in extent A circle of an inch 
diameter has the same geometrical properties as a 
esircle that would circumscribe the universe. The 
same properties of a triangle that will demonstrate 
tipon paper the course of a ship, will do it on the 
ocean; and when applied to what are called the 
heavenly bodies, will ascertain to a minute the time 
of an eclipse, though these bodies are millions of 
miles distant from us. This knowledge is of di- 
vine origin ; and it is from the Bible of the Crea- 
don that man has learned it, and not from the stu- 
pid Bible of the chcffch, that teaches man no- 
^iing.» 

*The Bible-makers have ondertaken to give ns, in the 
first chapter of Genesis, an accottct of the creation; and 
in doing this, they have demonstrated nothing but their 
ignorance. They make there to have been three days and 
three ni^its, evenings and mornings, before there was a 
•an; when it is the presence or absence of the san that is 
the cause of day and night; and what is called his risiag 
and setting, that of morning and evening. Besides, it is a 
poerile and pitifal idea, to sappose the Almighty to say, 
"Let there be light" It is Uie imperative manner of 
speaking that a conjuror uses, when he says to his cops 
and balls, Presto, be gone; and most probably has been 
taken from it, as Moses and his rod are a conjuror and his 
wand. Longinus calls this expression the sublime; and by 
the same rule the conjuror is sublime too ; for the manner 
of speaking is expressly and grammatically the same. 
When authors and critics talk of the sublime, they see not 
how nearly it borders on the ridiculous. The sublime of 
the critics, like some parts of Edmund Bnike's sublime 

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200 AQE OF REASOir. [PART II. 

All the knowledge man has of science and of 
machineryi by the aid of which his 'existence is 
rendered comfortable upon earth, and without 
which he would be scarcely distinguishable in aip- 
pearance and condition from a common animal, 
comes from the great machine and structure of the 
universe. The constant and unwearied observa- 
tions of our ancestors upon the movements and 
revolutions of the heavenly bodies, in what are sup* 
posed to have been the early ages of the world, 
have brought this knowledge upon earth. It is net 
Moses and the prophets, nor Jesus Christ, nor hie . 
apostles, tbat have done it. The Almighty is tibe 
great mechanic of the creation ; the first philosopher 
and priginal teacher of all science. Let us then 
learn to reverence our master, and not let us forget 
the labors of our ancestors. 

Had we at this day no knowledge of machinery, 
and were it possible that man could have a view, 
as I have before described, of the structure and 
machinery of the universe, he would soon conceive 
the idea of constructing some at least of the me- 
chanical works we now have ; and the idea so con^ 
ceived would progressively advance in practioei 
Or could a mo<lel of the universe, such as is called 
an orrery, be presented before him and put in mo- 
tion, his mind would arrive at the same idea. Such 
an object and such a subject would, whilst it im- 
proved him in knov^ledge usefiil to himself as a 
man and a member of society, as well as entertain- 
ing, afford far better matter for impressing bira with, 
a knowledge of, and a belief in the Creator, and of J 
the reverence and gratitude that man owes to hina, 
than the stupid texts of the Bible and the Testament 
from which, be the talents of the preacher what 

and beautiful, is like a wind-mill just visible in a fiig, 
which imagination might distort into a flying moontain. Of 
an axchangol, or a flodc of wild geese. 



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PAET n.1 AGE or REASON. 201 

tfaey may, only stupid sermons can be preached. 
If man must preach, let him preach something that 
is edi^ng, and fi-om texts that are known to be 
true. 

The Bible of the creatiop is inexhaustible in 
texts. Every part of science, whether connected 
with the geometry of the universe, with the sys- 
tems of animal and vegetable life, or with the pro- 
perties of inanimate matter, is a text as well for de- 
votion as for philosophy — ^for gratitude as for hu- 
man improvement It will, perhaps, be said, that 
if such a revolution in the system of religion takes 
place, every preacher ought to be a philosopher. 
Mo9t certainly; and every house of devotion a 
school of science. 

It has been by wandering from the immutable 
laws of science, and the right use of reason, and 
setting up an invented thing called revealed reli- 
gion, that so many wild and blasphemous conceits 
have been formed of the 'Almighty. The Jews 
have made him the assassin of the human species, 
to naake room for the religion of the Jews. The 
Christians have made him the murderer of him- 
self and the founder of a new religion, to super- 
sede and expel the Jewish religion. And to find 
pretence and admission for these things, they must 
have supposed his power or his wisdom imperfect, 
or his will changeable ; and the changeableness of 
the will is the imperfection of the judgment. The 
philosopher knows that the laws of the Creator 
have never changed with respect either to the prin- 
ciples of science, or the properties of matter. Why, 
then, is it to be supposed they have changed widi 

T3ct to man ? 
here close the subject I have shown in all 
the foregoing parts of this work, that the Bible and 
Testament are impositions and forgeries; and I 
leave the evidence I have produced in proof of it 
to be refuted, if any one can do it : and I leave 
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202 AeE OF REA80£? [PA&T II. 

the ideas that are suggested in the conclusion of 
th€f work, to rest on the mind of the reader ; certain 
as I am, that when opinions are free, either in mat- 
ters of government or religion, truth will finally 
and powerfully prevail. 



END OF THE AGE OF REASON — SECOND PART. 



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LETTER: 



AN ANSWER TO A FRIEND, 

ON THE PXTBLICATION OP 

THE AGE OF REASON.. 



PariSf May 12, 1797. 

In your letter of the 20th of March, you give 
me several quotations from the Bible, which you 
call the word of God, to show me that my opinions 
on religion are wrong; and I could give you as 
many, from the same book, to show that yours are 
not right; consequently, then, the Bible decides 
nothing, because it' decides any way, and every 
way, one chooses to make it 

But by what authority do you call the Bible the 
tDord of God'? for this is the first point to be settled. 
It is not your calling it so that makes it so, any 
more than the Mahometans calling the Koran the 
word of God makes the Koran to be so. The 
Popish Councils of Nice and Laodicea, about 350 
years after the time that the person called Jesus 
Christ is said to have lived, voted the books, that 
now compose what is called the New Testament, to 



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204 LETTER TO A FRIEND. 

be the word of God, This was done by yeds and 
nays, as we now vote a law. The Pharisees of the 
second Temple, after the Jews returned from cap- 
tivity in Babylon, did the same by the books that 
now compose the Old Te8tament, and thit^is all the 
authority there is, which to me is no authority at 
all. I «fti as capable of judging for myself as they 
were, and i think more so, because, as they made a 
living by their religion, they had a self-interest in 
the vote they gave. 

You may have an opinion that a man is insf^red, 
but you cannot prove it, nor can you have kny 
proof of it yourself, because you cannot see ihto 
nis mind in order to know how he comes b^f* his 
tiioughts, and the same is the case with the word 
revelation. There can be no evidence of sueh a 
thing, for you can no iSore prove revelation, than 
you can prove what another man dreams of, neither 
can he prove it himself. 

It is often said in the Bible that Grod spake tinto 
Moses ( but how do you know that Qod spake onto 
Moses? Because, yon will say, the Bible says-^. 
The Koran says, tliat God spake unto MaholBet ; 
do you believe that too? No. Why not? ie- 
cause, you will say, you do not believe it; and 'so, 
because you do, and because ^ou don% is all &e 
reason you can give forbdieving or disbelieri^i^ 
except that you will say that Mahomet was an im- 
poster. And how do you know that Moses was 
not an impostor ? For my own part, I believe ^at 
all are impostors who pretend to bold verbal c^- 
munication with the Deity. It is the way by vmch 
the world has been imposed upon ; but if you ihink 
otherwise you have the same right to your ojMdfim 
that I have to mine, and must answer for it iB ttie 
same manner. But all this does not settle the peSbt, 
if^ether the BiUe be the vnrd qf God, or not. R 1% 
therefore, necessary to go a step further. The i 
then is:— 



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LETTER TO A FRIEND. 205 

Y^ form your opinion of God from the account 
given of him in the Bible ; and I form my opinion 
of the Bible from the wisdom and goodness of 
God, manifested in the structure of the universe, 
and in all the vi^orks of the Creation. The result 
in these two cases will be, that you, by taking the 
Bible for your standard, will have a bad opinion of 
God ; and I, by taking God for my standard, shall 
have a bad opinion of the Bible. 

The Bible represents God to be a changeable, 
passionate, vindictive being : making a world, and 
then drowning it, afterwards repenting of what he 
had done, and promising not to do so again. Set- 
ting one nation to cut the throats of another, and 
stopping the course of the sun till the butchery 
should be done. But the works of God in the cre- 
ation preach to us another doctrine. In, that vast 
volume we see nothing to give us the idea of a 
changeable, passionate, vindictive God ; every thing 
we there behold impresses us with a contrary idea ; 
that of unchangeableness and of eternal order, har- 
mony, and goodness. The sun and the seasons re- 
turn at their appointed time, and every thing in the 
Creation proclaims that God is unchangeable. 
Now which am I to believe, a book that any im- 
posier may make and call the word of God, or the 
Creation itself, which none but an Almighty Power 
could make, for the Bible says one thing, and the 
Creation says the contrary. The Bible represents 
God with all the passions of a mortal, and ihe 
Creation proclaims him with all the attributes of a 
God, 

It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, 
rapine, and murder ; for the belief of a cruel God 
makes a cruel man. That blood-thirsty man, called 
the prophet Samuel, makes God to say, (1 Samuel, 
chapter xv. verse 3,) " Now go and smite Amalek, 
and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare 



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206 LETTEK TO A FRlErTD. 

(hem notf hiU slay both man and woman, infartt^and 
sucJdirtg, ox and sheep, camel and assJ** 

That Samuel, or some other imposter, might say 
this, is what, at this distance of time, can neith^ 
be proved nor disproved ; but, in my opinion, it is 
blasphemy to say, or to believe, that God said it 
All our ideas of the justice and goodness of God 
revolt at the impious cruelty of the Bible. It is not 
a God, just and good, but a devil, under the name 
of God, that the Bible describes. 

What makes this pretended order to destroy th© 
Amalekites appear the worse, is the reason given 
for it. The Amalekites, four hundred years beforfe, 
according to the account in Exodus, chapter 17, 
(but which has the appearance of fable from tbe 
magical account it gives of Moses holding up i^is 
hands) had opposed the Israelites coming into their 
country ; and this the Amalekites had a right to do, 
because the Israelites were the invaders, as tfee 
Spaniards were the invaders of Mexico : and tilis 
opposition by the Amalekites, at that tirp^y is given 
as a reason, that the men and women, infants and 
sucklings, sheep and oxen, camels and asseS; th&t 
were born four hundred years afterwards, should 
be put to death ; and to complete the horror, Sam- 
uel hewed Agag, the chief of the Amalekites in 
pieces, as you would hew a stick of wood. I wfll 
Dcstow a few observations on this case. 

In the first place, nobody knows who the author, 
or writer of the book of Samuel was, and, there- 
fore, the fact itself has no other proof than anony- 
mous or hearsay evidence, which is no evidence at 
aU. In the second place, this anonymous book 
says, that this slaughter was done by the express 
command of God: but all our ideas of the justice 
and goodness of God give the lie to the book, and I 
never will believe any book that ascribes cruelty 
and injustice to God. I therefore reject the Bible 
ius unworthy of credit 



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LETTER TO A FRIEND. 207 

As I have now given you my reasons for believ- 
ing that the Bible is not the word of God, and that 
it is a falsehood, I have a right to ask you your 
reasons for believing the contrary : but I know you 
can give me none, except that you were ^ucated to 
believe the Bible ; and as the Turks give the same 
reasons for believing the Koran, it is evident that 
education makes all the difference, and that reason 
and truth have nothing to do in the case. You be- 
lieve in the Bible from the accident of birth, and 
the Turks believe in the Koran from the same ac- 
cident, and each calls the other infidel. But leav- 
ing the prejudice of education out of the case, the 
unprejudiced truth is, that all are infidels who be- 
lieve falsely of God, whether they draw their creed 
from the Bible, or from the Koran, from the Old 
Testament or from the New. 

When you have examined the Bible with the at- 
tion that I have done, (for I do not think you know 
much about it) and permit yourself to have just 
ideas of God, you will most probably believe as I 
do. But I wish you to know that this answer to 
your letter is not written for the purpose of chang- 
ing your opinion* It is written to satisfy you, and 
some other friends whom I esteem, that my disbe- 
lief of the Bible is founded on a pure and religious 
belief in God ; for, in my opinion, the Bible is a 
gross libel against the justice and goodness of God, 
in almost every part of it. 

THOMAS PAINE. 



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