presented to

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THE

OP

THOMAS DICK, LL. D

FOUR VOLUMES IN ONE.

viz.

AN ESSAY ON THE IMPROVEMENT OF SOCIETY

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE:

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION:

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER:

THE CONNECTIONOF SCIENCEAND PHILOSOPHY

WITH RELIGION.

HARTFORD:

PUBLISHED BY A. C. GOODMAN & CO
1850.

*

ON THK

IMPROVEMENT OF SOCIETY

BY THB

DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE

AN ILLUSTRATION

OP THB

ADVANTAGES WHICH WOULD RESULT FROM A MORE GENERAL DISSEMINATION
OF RATIONAL AND SCIENTIFIC INFORMATION AMONG ALL RANKS

ILLUSTRATED WITH ENGRAVINGS.

BY THOMAS DICK,

AUTHOR OF A VARIETY OF LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC COMM UN1CA TJukJ

IN NICHOLSON'S PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL, THE ANNALI

OF PHILOSOPHY, ETC. ETC.

Knowledge Is power." — Lurd Bacon.

HARTFORD:
PUBLISHED BY A. C. GOODMAN & CO.

1850.

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PREFACE.

THE plan and outlines of the following work were sketched, and a considerable
portion of it composed, about eighteen years ago. It was advertised, as preparing
for the press, in 1823, when the author published the first edition of " The
Christian Philosopher ;" but various other engagements prevented its appear
ance at that period. The Introduction and the first two sections were published
in a respectable quarterly journal in the year 1816 ; but they are now consider
ably modified and enlarged. This circumstance will account for the date ol
some of the illustrative facts to which reference is made in the first part of the
volume, and in several portions of the Appendix.

Had the present work been published at any of the periods now referred to,
the subject it discusses, and some of the illustrations, would have presented a
more novel aspect than they can lay claim to at the present time, when the
diffusion of knowledge has become an object of general attention. The author,
however, is not aware that any work embracing so full an illustration of the
same topics has yet made its ap'pearance; and is, therefore, disposed to indulge
the hope, that, in conjunction with the present movements of society, it may,
in some degree, tend to stimulate those exertions which are now making for the
melioration and mental improvement of mankind. Independently of the general
bearing of the facts and illustrations on the several topics they are intended to
elucidate, the author trusts that not a few fragments of useful knowledge will be
found incorporated in the following pages, calculated to entertain and instruct
the general reader.

In the numerous illustrations brought forward in this volume, it was found
impossible altogether to avoid a recurrence to certain facts which the author
had partially adverted to in some of his former publications, without interrupt
ing the train of thought, and rendering his illustrations partial and incomplete.
But, where the same facts are introduced, they are generally brought forward
to elucidate a different topic. Any statements or descriptions of this kind,
however, which may have the appearance of repetition, eould all be comprised
within the compass of three or four pages.

The general subject of the present work will be prosecuted in another volume,
to be entitled "The Mental Illumination of Mankind, or an inquiry into the
means by which a general diffusion of knowledge may be promoted." Thi*

v PREFACE.

work will embrace — along with a great variety of other topics —an examina
tion of the present system of education, showing its futility and inefficiency, and
illustrating the principles and details of an efficient intellectual system, capable
of universal application ; together with a variety of suggestions in relation to
the physical, moral, and intellectual improvement of society.

To his numerous correspondents who have been inquiring after the work,
" The Scenery of the Heavens Displayed, with the view of illustrating the doctrine
of a Plurality of Worlds" which was announced at page 88 of the " Philosophy
of a Future State," —the author begs respectfully to state, that, if health permit,
he intends to proceed, without delay, to the completion of that work, as soon as
the volume announced above is ready for the press. It will form a volume of
considerable size, and will be illustrated with a great number of engravings,
many of which will be original.

Broughty Ferry, near Dundee,
18th Apil, 1833.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION — Retrospective view of the state of mankind — ignorance of the dark ages —
revival of learning at the Reformation. Present intellectual state of the human race.
Causes which have retarded the progress of the human mind. A more general diffusion
of knowledge desirable. Preludes which indicate the approach of the era of intelligence 11

SECTION I.

INFLUENCE OF KNOWLEDGE IN DISSIPATING SUPERSTITIOUS NOTIONS AND
TAIN FEARS.

Objects and circumstances which ignorance has arrayed with imaginary terrors — eclipses,
comets, aurora borealis, &c. Absurdity of astrology. Belief attached to its doctrines.
Various prevalent superstitious opinions — omens — witches — spectres, &c. Proof of such
notions still prevailing. Superstitions indulged by men of rank and learning. Baneful
tendency of superstition — leads to deeds of cruelty and injustice. How knowledge would
undermine superstition and its usual accompaniments — illustrated at large. Animadversion
on Dr. S. Johnson, &c. - - - - - - - - - -• -17

SECTION IL

ON THE UTILITY OF KNOWLEDGE IN PREVENTING DISEASES AND FATAL
ACCIDENTS.

Accidents which have happened from ignorance of the properties of the different gases, and
the means of preventing them. Disasters which have happened in coal mines. Figure
of Davy's Safety Lamp, with description and remarks. Accidents caused by the stroke
of lightning. Precautions requisite to be attended to during thunder-storm?. Accidents
from ignorance of the principles of mechanics. Reasons of such accidents explained by a
figure. Fatal accidents caused from ignorance of the effects produced by the refraction of
light — illustrated by figures and experiments. Accidents from the clothes of females
catching fire, and the means of prevention. Various diseases propagated from ignorance
of their nature. Pernicious effects of contaminated air. Improper mode of treating
children during infancy, and its fatal effects. Importance of temperance. General
remarks -24

SECTION III.

ON THE INFLUENCE WHICH A DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE WOULD HAVE ON THE
PROGRESS OF SCIENCE.

Science founded on facts. Every person is endowed with faculties for observing facts.
Anecdote of Sir I. Newton. Extraordinary powers of intellect not necessary for making
discoveries in science. Ample field of investigation still remains. Discoveries would

,j CONTENTS.

be nearly in proportion to the number of observers. Various illustrations of these positions.
Geology, its multifarious objects and desiderata. Natural History, how it may bv improved,
and its range extended. Meteorology, imperfection of our knowledge in regard to many
of its objects, — thunder-storms, aurora borealis, meteoric stones, &c. Astronomy, deside
rata in reference to, which remain to he ascertained. Illustration taken from Jupiter,
with four different views of this planet. Venus, mode by which the time of its rotation
may be determined — illustrated by a figure. Comets, fixed stars. — Moon, plan by which
our knowledge of the scenery of this globe may be extended. Discoveries which have
been made in the heavens by accident. Prospects presented when knowledge shall be
more generally diffused. Chymistry, its objects, and the means of its improvement.
Futility of framing hypotheses — importance of observing facts — general remarks and
reflections ..............33

SECTION IV.

ON THE PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH THE PURSUITS OF SCIENCE.

Pleasures of sense and of intellect. The enjoyments of the ignorant and of the man of
intelligence contrasted, and particularly illustrated. Pleasure annexed to the gratification
of the principle of curiosity. Scientific facts illustrative of this subject. — Number of effects
produced by a single principle in nature. Surprising resemblances in operations where
we should least of all have expected them. Grand and sublime objects which science
presents before us. Variety of novel and interesting objects it exhibits. Illustrated from
mechanics, hydrostatics, magnetism, optics, chymistry, &c. Instruments connected with
optics. Figure of the Aerial Telescope. Pleasure in tracing the steps by which dis
coveries have been made, and the experiments by which they are illustrated. Beneficial
tendency of scientific pursuits on the heart, and on social and domestic enjoyment. Mis
cellaneous reflections and remarks ......».-.

SECTION V.

ON THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, AND ITS TENDENCY
TO PROMOTE THE COMFORTS OF GENERAL SOCIETY.

I. A knowledge of science would render mechanics, &c. more skilful in their ?espectivr
employments — illustrated from the arts of dying, calico printing, bleaching, brewing,
tanning, agriculture, &c. Chymistry essentially requisite to surgeons and apothecaries.
Utility of practical Geometry, illustrated by a diagram. Utility of Mechanics. Of Hydro
statics and Hydraulics, illustrated with various figures. Hydrostatical paradox, mode of
conveying water, hydrostatical press, perpendicular pressure of water, and the accidents
it may occasion. Application of these facts to engineering and hydraulic operations.
Disaster occasioned by want of attention to hydrostatic principles. Practical utility of
Pneumatics — anecdote illustrative of. Mode of curing smoky chimneys, illustrated by
figures. Utility of an acquaintance with Optics. Explanation of the nature of a
telescope, and the mode of its construction. Mode of constructing a compound
microscope, with illustrative figures. Burning lenses, Sir D. Brewster's Polyzonal Lens,
reflecting concave mirrors for light-houses, &c., with illustrative figures. Utility of
Electricity and Galvanism. Mode of directing lightning as a mechanical power.
Practical applications of Magnetism, and late discoveries in — Magnetized masks, &c.
Practical utility of Geology. Utility of Natural History. Application of steam — steam
navigation — steam carriages. Carburetted hydrogen gas. Utility of science to day-
labourers, house-keepers, kitchen-maids, &c. Instance illustrative of the advantages
of chymical knowledge - - -.- - . - . - - - -60

II. Scientific knowledge would pave the way for future inventions and improvements in the arts.
Circumstances which led to the invention and subsequent improvement of the telescope,
with a figure of the first telescope. Fraunhofer's telescope — Guinand's experiments on
the composition of flint glass — Description of an achromatic object-glass, with a figure, &c.
H:storical sketches of certain inventions — steam engine — mariner's compass — galvanic

CONTENTS. VU

pem'a'um clocks — watches — air-pump — spinning jennies- -safety lamp, &c.
Few inventions owing to chance. Cautions to be attended to in the construction and use
of the safety lump. Mechanics have a greater chance of becoming inventors than mere
philosopners. Prospects of improvement in future ages - - ... -77
III. T/ie external comforts of mankind promoted by intelligence and improvements in the arts.
Contrast between the past and present aspect of the social state. Wretched accommoda
tions which still exist among the lower classes. Mental improvement would lead to
diligence and economy, to cleanliness in person, clothes, and furniture — to tasteful decora
tions of houses and garden-plots — improvements in foot-paths, narrow lanes, villages, &c. 82

SECTION VI.

ON THE INFLUENCE OF KNOAVLEDGE IN PROMOTING ENLARGED CONCEPTIONS
OF THE CHARACTER AND PERFECTIONS OF THE DEITY.

Grovelling conceptions of the Deity both in heathen and Christian countries. Just con
ceptions of the Divinity acquired from his external manifestations. Ignorance exhibits
distorted views of the Divine character. Attributes of the Deity which science illustrates :
1. The unity of God. 2. Wisdom of the Deity— manifested in the various arrangements
of sublunary nature. Particular illustration. 3. JUenevolence of the Deity — manifested in
the parts of the human frame, and in the surrounding elements — muscles of the eye (illus
trated with figures)— gratification afforded to our different senses. Remedies against
the evils to which we are exposed. Multitudes of animated beings, and the ample
provision made for them. Calculations in relation to the number of certain species of
birds, and the velocity with which they fly. Number of species of plants eaten by
different animals. 4. Science exhibits a view of the multiplicity of conceptions which have
been formed in the Divine mind. Exemplified in the different construction and functions
of the various species of animals — in the numerous parts which enter into the construction
of an animal frame. Lyonet's description of the numerous parts of the cossus caterpillar.
Multiplicity of ideas manifested in the Vegetable kingdom. Varieties in the Mineral
kingdom. Varieties in Microscopical objects — scales of fishes, feathers of birds, wings
of flies, leaves and transverse sections of plants, &c. Numbers and varieties of ani-
maiculse. Immensity of nature. Description of the engravings of microscopic objects.
Variety in the external aspect of nature — in the sun, planets, comets, and on the surface
of the moon. 5. Science expands our conceptions of the power of the Dsity, and of
the magnificence of his empire. Such views of Deity in unison with the dictates of
revelation, — and calculated to produce many beneficial effects on the understandings and
iffoctions of mankind .._.-.... ... 85

SECTION VIL

ON THE BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF KNOWLEDGE ON MORAL PRINCIPLE AND

CONDUCT.

Introductory remarks — knowledge and moral action inseparably connected. Ignorance
one principal cause of immorality and crime. Knowledge requisite for ascertaining the
true principles of moral action. It leads to inquiries into the reasons of moral laws, and
the foundations on which they rest, — to self-examination and self-inspection, — and to a
comprehensive view of the bearings and consequences of moral actions. Miscellaneous
remarks, and objections answered ---______. |(13

SECTION VIII.

ON THE UTILITY OF KNOWLEDGE IN RELATION TO A FUTURE WORLD.

Man destined to an eternal state. Knowledg'e will be carried along with us into that state.
Scientific knowledge has a relation to a future world. Evidences of a future state.
Causes of the indifference which prevails on this subject. Knowledge prepares the mind
for the errjloyments of the future world. Impossibility of enjoying happiness in that
world without knowledge and moral principle. General remarks .... \QQ

VLj CONTENTS.

SECTION IX.

ON THE UTILITY OF GENERAL KNOWLEDGE IN REFERENCE TO THE STUD!
OF DIVINE REVELATION.

Preliminary remarks. Summary of the external evidences ofChristianity. Evidence from
Miracles. Resurrection of Christ. Evidence from Prophecy. Predictions in relation
to Babylon, the Arabs, the Jews, &c. Internal evidences. Dignity and sublimity of
the Scriptures, — exhibit the most rational and sublime views of the Deity, — give full
assurance of a state of immortality,— point out the way in which pardon may be obtained, —
inculcate the purest and most comprehensive system of moraliiy, — explain certain moral
phenomena, — communicate a knowledge of interesting facts and doctrines. Beneficial
Affects which Christianity has produced in the world, — is adapted to every country.
Harmony of Science and Revelation. Christianity of the Bible. Evidences of Revela
tion continually increasing. Reason for giving the preceding summary of these evidences.
General knowledge enables us to understand the meaning and references of the sacred
writings. Figures used in the prophetical writings. Heathen mythology illustrative of
Scripture history. Manners and customs of eastern nations. Utility of ancient geography.
Natural history and science illustrative of Scripture. Evaporation — rivers — ocean —
storms — animated beings — human body — the heavens — plurality of worlds. Advantages
which would resell from an intelligent study of the Scriptures. Folly of infidelity, &c. 113

SECTION X.

MISCELLANEOUS ADVANTAGES OF KNOWLEDGE BRIEFLY STATED.

Knowledge would lead to just estimates of human character and enjoyment — various
remarks on this topic. II. The acquisition of general information would enaMe persons
to profit by their attendance on public instructions. Scientific lectures — instructions from
the pulpit — limited nature of these instructions in consequence of the ignorance of
mankind — prospects presented when knowledge is increased. III. Knowledge would
introduce a spirit of tolerance, and prevent persecution for conscience1 sake. Persecutions
which have prevailed, and still prevail. Absurdity of persecution — general remarks, &c.

IV. Knowledge woidd vanquish the antipathies of nations, and produce harmony among
mankind. Miseries and devastations of war — jealousies and hostilities of nations —
arguments and efforts which enlightened minds would employ for counteracting them.
Advantages which would result from the union of mankind. Practicability of effecting it.

V. A general diffusion of knowledge would promote the union of the. Christian church.
Number of sectaries — slight differences of opinion between them. Evils which have
flowed from sectarianism — promotes infidelity — retards the progress ofChristianity, &c.
Folly of attaching an undue importance to sectarian opinions. Remedies for the divisions
of the church. Liberality and bigotry contrasted. Character of violent party-pariizaris.
Auspicious effects which would flow from Christian union. Present circumstances
favourable to union. Concessions which behooved to be made by all parties, — preparative
measure to union — concluding remark - - - - . . . . -133

SECTION XL

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF CONNECTING SCIENCE WITH RELIGION.

Increase of knowledge, of late years. Tendency to irreligion in certain scientific inquirers,
and the circumstances which have produced it. Religion and science connected —
irrationality and inconsistency of attempting to dissever them. Christian religion over-
looked. Supreme importance of Christianity. Effects of a complete separation of science
and religion. Tendency of our present modes of education. Illustrated from the scenet
exhibited during the French Revolution. Demoralization produced by the principles of the
continental philosophists. Persecuting spirit of French infidels and skeptics. Science
without religion produces few moral effects. Subversion of morality in France, a beacon

CONTENTS.

to guard us from similar dangers. Extract from Rev. D. Young. Nature of the pro
posed connexion between science and religion. Attributes of the Deity displayed in his
works. Authors who have illustrated this subject, with remarks on some of their writings.
Modern system of physico-theology , a desideratum. Newton, Maclaurin, and Robison's
sentiments on this subject. Truths of revelation ought to be recognised in scientific
instructions. Squeamishness of certain philosophers in this respect. Extract from
Dr. Robison. Harmony of Nature and Revelation. Scientific instructions should
produce a moral impression. Prayer and recognition of the Deity in philosophical
associations. Hypocrisy of skeptics. Exemplified in the case of Bvffon. Topics,
connected with religion, which might occasionally be discussed in scientific associations.
Immortality, its importance in a scientific point of view. Skeptical philosophy insufficient
to support the mind in the prospect of dissolution — exemplified in the case of Voltaire,
ttutfbn, Gibbon, Hume, and Diderot Concluding reflections - - - - -

APPENDIX.

Ni» I. Ignorance of the dark ages— scarcity and high price of books - - - -165
JN'V,. II. Superstitious opinions respecting comets and eclipses — Description of a solar
eclipse, and its effects on the inhabitants of Barbary ----.-. 166

No. III. Absurdities of Astrology ..-167

No. IV. Proofs of the belief which 13 still attached to the doctrines of Astrology - - 168
No. V. Illustrations of some of the opinions and practices in relation to witchcraft - 169
History of witchcraft — and the numbers that suffered for this supposed crime - - 17C
No. VI. Proofs that the belief in witchcraft is still prevalent among certain classes of

society --------------- 171

Tales of superstition published by the Jesuits — Anecdote of Alexander Davidson, A. M. 173
No. VII. Circumstances which have occasionally led to the belief of spectres and appari
tions — Indistinct vision — Doses of opium — Drunkenness — Dreams — Fear — Tricks of
im postors — Ventriloquism — Witch of E ndor — Phantasmagoria — G host of a Flea, &c. 1 74- 1 8 1
No. VIII. Explosions of steam-engines — Accidents in America — on the Liverpool Rail
way, &c. with remarks 181-183

No. IX. Circumstances which led to the invention of the Safety Lamp ... 183
No. X. On the utility of the remarks and observations of Mechanics and Manufacturers 184
No. XI. Liberality of Religious Sectaries in America, contrasted with British bigotry 184
No. XII. On the demoralizing effects of Infidel Philosophy in France. Gambling —
Concubinage — Prostitution — Profanation of the Sabbath — Danso-mania — moial reflec
tions — C onsecration of the " Goddess of Reason" — Concluding remarks . - 187-191

OK THK

GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

INTRODUCTION.

lake a restrospective view of the
state of miuikind during the ages that are past,
it presents, on the whole, a melancholy scene
of intellectual darkness. Although in every
age men have possessed all the mental faculties
they now or ever will enjoy, yet those noble
powers seem either to have lain in a great mea
sure dormant, or, when roused into action, to
have been employed chiefly in malignant and
destructive operations. Hence the events
which the page of history records chiefly pre
sent to our view the most revolting scenes of
war, rapine, and devastation, as if the earth had
been created merely to serve as a theatre for
mischief, and its inhabitants for the purpose of
dealing destruction and misery to all around
them. Such, however, are the natural conse
quences of the reign of Ignorance over the
human mind. For the active powers of man
necessarily follow the dictates of his under
standing, and when the intellectual faculties are
not directed to the pursuit and the contempla
tion of noble and benevolent objects, they will
most frequently be employed in devising and
executing schemes subversive of human happi
ness and improvement.

Amidst the darkness which, in ancient times,
so long overspread the world, some rays of in
tellectual light appeared in Palestine, in Egypt,
and in the Greek and Roman empires ; but its
influence on the nations around was extremely
feeble, and, like a few tapers in a dark night,
served little more than to render the surround-
'-ng darkness visible. The light of science
which then shone was, however, doomed to be
speedily extinguished. About the fifth century
of the Christian era, numerous hordes of bar
barians from the northern and the eastern parts
of Europe, and the north-western parts of Asia,
overran the western part of the Roman em
pire, at that time the principal seat of know
ledge ; and, in their progress, overturned and
almost annihilated every monument of science
and art which then existed. Wherever they
marched, their route was marked with devasta

tion and with blood. They made no distinct'izn
between what was sacred and what was pro
fane — what was barbarous and what was re
fined. Amidst the din of war, the burning of
cities, the desolation of provinces, the convul
sion of nations, the ruin of empires, and the
slaughter of millions, the voice of reason and
of religion was scarcely heard ; science was
abandoned ; useful knowledge was set at naught ;
every benevolent feeling and every moral prin
ciple was trampled under foot. The earth
seemed little else than one great field of battle ;
and its inhabitants, instead of cultivating the
peaceful arts and sciences, and walking hand in
hand to a blessed immortality, assumed the
character of demons, and gave vent to the mos<
fiend-like and ferocious passions, till they ap
peared almost on the brink of total extermina
tion.

For nearly the space of a thousand years
posterior to that period, and prior to the Re
formation, a long night of ignorance overspread
the nations of Europe, and the adjacent regions
of Asia, during which the progress of literature
and science, of religion and morality, seems to
have been almost at a stand ; scarcely a vestige
remaining of the efforts of the human mind,
during all that period, worthy of the attention or
the imitation of succeeding ages. The debas
ing superstitions of the Romish church, the
hoarding of relics, the erection of monasteries
and nunneries, the pilgrimages to the tombs of
martyrs and other holy places, the mummeries
which were introduced into the services of reli
gion, the wild and romantic expeditions of cru
saders, the tyranny and ambition of popes and
princes, and the wars and insurrections to which
they gave rise, usurped the place of every ra
tional pursuit, and completely enslaved the
minds of men. So great was the ignorance
which then prevailed, that persons of the most
distinguished rank could neither read nor write.
Even many of the clergy did not understand the
breviary, or book of common prayer, which they
were daily accustomed to recite, and some of

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

them could scarcely read it.* The records of
past transactions were in a great measure lost,
and legendary tales and fabulous histories, to
celebrate exploits which were never performed,
were substituted in place of the authenticated
history of mankind. The learning which then
prevailed, under the name of philosophy and of
scholastic theology, consisted chiefly in vain
disquisitions and reasonings about abstract
truths, and incomprehensible mysteries, and in
attempts to decide questions and points of theo
logy, which lie beyond the reach of the human
mind, and which its limited faculties are unable
to resolve. Sophisms, falsehoods, and bold as
severations were held forth as demonstrations ;
a pompous display of words was substituted in
the place of things ; eloquence consisted in
vague and futile declamations ; and true philo
sophy was los* amidst the mazes of wild and
extravagant theories and metaphysical subtle
ties. The sciences, such as they were, were
all taught in the Latin tongue, and all books in
relation to them were written in that language ;
the knowledge of them was therefore necessarily
confined to the circle of the learned, and it would
have been considered as a degradation of the
subject, to have treated of it in any of the mo
dem languages which then prevailed. The
gates of the temple of knowledge were conse
quently shut against the great body of the peo
ple, and it was never once surmised that they
had any right to explore its treasures. " Dur
ing this period," says Dr. Robertson, " the hu
man mind, neglected, uncultivated, and de
pressed, continued in the most profound igno
rance. Europe, during four centuries, pro
duced few authors who merit to be read, either
on account of the elegance of their composition,
or the justness and novelty of their sentiments.
There are few inventions, useful or ornamental
to society, of which that long period can boast,"
And, if those of the highest ranks, and in the
most eminent stations in society, were so defi
cient in knowledge, the great mass of the people
must have been sunk into a state of ignorance
degrading to human nature.

About the time of the revival of letters, after
the dark ages of monkish superstition and igno
rance, the moral and intellectual state of the
inhabitants of Europe began to experience a

•As an evidence of the extreme ignorance ot
those times, it may be stated, that many charters
granted by persons of the highest rank are pre
served, from which it appears that they could not
subscribe their name. It was usual for persons who
could not write, to make the sign of the cross, in
confirmation of a charter. Several of these remain,
where kings and persons of great eminence affix
signum crucis manu propria pro ig~noratione lltera-
rum, " the siga of the cross made by our own hand,
on account of our ignorance of letters." From this
circumstance is derived the practice of making a x
when signing a deed, in the case of those who can
not subscribe their names. See Robertson's Charles
V. and Appendix, No. L

change auspicious of better times and of a more
enlightened era. The diminution of the Papa!
power and influerce, the spirit of civil and reli
gious liberty which then burst forth, the erec
tion of new seminaries of education, the disco
very of the mariner's compass, the invention of
the art of printing, the labours of Lord Bacon
in pointing out the true method of philosophiz
ing, and the subsequent discoveries of Galileo,
Kepler, Boyle, and Newton, in the physical sci
ences, — gave a new and favourable impulse to
the minds of men, and prepared the way for a
more extensive communication of useful know
ledge to persons of every rank. From this
period knowledge began to be gradually diffused
among most of the European nations ; but its
progress was slow, and its influence was chiefly
confined to the higher circles of society, and to
persons connected with the learned professions,
till after the middle of the eighteenth century.
About this time there began to issue from the
press many popular works on Natural and Civil
History, Geography, Astronomy, and Experi
mental Philosophy, divested of the pedantry ot
former times, and of the technicalities of sci
ence, which, along with periodical works that
were then beginning to extend their influence,
conveyed to the minds of the mechanic and the
artizan various fragments of useful knowledge.
It was not, however, till the era of the French
Revolution, that the stream of knowledge began
to flow with an accelerated progress, and to
shed its influence more extensively on the mid
dling and the lower orders of society. Though
we cannot look back, without feelings of regret,
and even of horror, at the revolting scenes of
anarchy and bloodshed which accompanied that
political convulsion, yet, amidst all its evils, it
was productive of many important and beneficial
results. It tended to undermine that system of
superstition and tyranny by which most of the
European nations had been so long enslaved ;
it ro'.sed millions, from among the mass of the
people, to assert those rights and privileges, to
which they are entitled as rational beings, and
which had been withheld from them by the
strong hand of power ; it stimulated them to in
vestigations into every department connected
with the rights and the happiness of man, and
it excited a spirit of inquiry into every subject
of contemplation which can improve or adorn
the human mind, which, we trust, will never b«
extinguished, till the light of useful knowledge
shall extend its influence over all the inhabit
ants of the earth.

Striking, however, as the contrast is, between
the state of knowledge in the present and in
former ages, much still remains to be accom
plished, till the great body of mankind be sti»
mulated to the prosecution of intellectual ac
quirements. Though a considerable portion of
rational information has of late years been di»

INTRODUCTION.

IS

"eminated among a variety of individuals in
Different classes of society, yet, among the
great majority of the population in every coun
try, a degree of ignorance still prevails, de
grading to the rank of intellectual natures.
With respect to the great mass of the inhabit
ants of the world, it may still be ^aid with pro
priety, that " darkness covers the earth, and
gross darkness the people." The greater part
of the continent of America, the extensive plains
of Africa, the vast regions of Siberia, Tartary,
Thibet, and the Turkish empire — the immense
territories of New Holland, Sumatra, Borneo,
and the Barman empire, the numerous islands
which are scattered throughout the Indian and
the Pacific oceans, with many other extensive
regions inhabited by human beings — stiU lie
within the confines of mental darkness. On the
numerous tribes which people those immense
regions of our globe, neither the light of science
nor of revelation has yet shed its benign influ
ence ; and their minds, debased by superstition,
idolatry, and every malignant passion, and en
slaved by the cunning artifices of priests, and
the tyranny of cruel despots, present a picture
of human nature in its lowest stage of degrada
tion. Even in Europe, where the light of sci
ence has chiefly shone, how narrow is the cir
cle which has been enlightened by its beams!
The lower orders of society on the continent,
and even in Great Britain itself, notwithstand
ing the superior means of improvement they
enjoy, are still miserably deficient in that degree
of knowledge and information which every hu
man being ought to possess ; nor are there many
even in the higher spheres of life who cultivate
science for its own sako, who set a due value
on intellectual acquisitions, or encourage the
prosecution of rational inquiries.

There is, perhaps, no country in the world
where the body of the people are better educated
and more intelligent than in North Britain ; yet
we need not go far, either in the city or in the
country, to be convinced, that the most absurd
and superstitious notions, and the grossest ig
norance respecting many important subjects in
timately connected with human happiness, still
prevail among the great majority of the popula
tion. Of two millions of inhabitants which
constitute the population of the northern part
of our island, there are not, perhaps, 20,000, or
the hundredth part of the whole, whose know
ledge extends to any subject of importance,
beyond the range of their daily avocations.
With respect to the remaining 1,800,000, it
may perhaps be said with propriety, that of the
figure and magnitude of the world they live in
— of the seas and rivers, continents and islands,
•which diversify its surface, and of the various
tribes of men and animals by which it is inha
bited — of the nature and properties of the at
mosphere which surrounds them — of the disco

veries which have been made respecting light,
heat, electricity, and magnetism — of the general
laws which regulate the economy of nature — of
the various combinations and effects of chymi-
cal and mechanical powers — of the motions and
magnitudes of the planetary and the starry orbs
— of the principles of legitimate reasoning — of
just conceptions of the attributes and moral go
vernment of the Supreme Being — of the genuine
principles of moral action — of many other sub
jects interesting to a rational and immortal be
ing — they are almost as entirely ignorant as
the wandering Tartar, or the untutored Indian.

Of eight hundred millions of human beings
which people the globe we inhabit, there are
not perhaps two millions whose minds are truly
enlightened as they ought to be — who prosecute
rational pursuits for their own sake, and from a
pure love of science, independently of the
knowledge requisite for their respective profes
sions and employments. For we must exclude
from the rank of rational inquirers after know
ledge all those who have acquired a smattering
of learning, with no other vifw than to gain a
subsistence, or to appear fas'nicnable and polite.
And, if this rule b,e admitted, I am afraid that
a goodly number^vert of lawyers, physicians,
clergymen, teachers, nay, even some authors,
and professors in universities and academies,
would be struck off from the list of lovers of
science and rational inquirers after truth. Ad
mitting this statement, it will follow, that there
is not one individual out of four hundred of the
human race, that passes his life as a rational
intelligent being, employing his faculties in those
trains of thought and active exercises which are
worthy of an intellectual nature ! For, in so far
as the attention of mankind is absorbed merely
in making provision for animal subsistence, and
in gratifying the' sensual appetites of their na
ture, they can be considered as little superior in
dignity to the lower orders of animated existence.

The late Frederick, king of Prussia, who was
a correct observer of mankind, makes a still
lower estimate of the actual intelligence of the
human species. In a letter to D'Alembert, in
1770, he says, " Let us take any monarchy you
please; — let us suppose that it contains ten
millions of inhabitants ; from these ten millions
let us discount, — first the labourers, the manu
facturers, the artizans, the soldiers, and there
will remain about fifty thousand peisons, men
and women ; from these let us discount twenty-
five thousand for the female sex, the rest will
compose the nobility and gentry, and the re
spectable citizens ; of these, let us examine how
many will be incapable of application, how many
imbecile, how many pusillanimous, how many
dissipated, — and from this calculation it will re
sult, that out of what is called a civilized nation
of nearly ten millions, you will hardly find a
thousand well-informed persons, and even among

14

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

them what Inequality witn regard to genius ! If
eight-tenths of the nation, toiling for their sub
sistence, never read — if another tenth are inca
pable of application, from frivolity, or dissipa
tion, or imbecility, — it results, that the small
share of good sense of which our species is ca
pable, can only reside in a small fraction of a
nation." Such was the estimate made by this
philosophic monarch of the intelligence possessed
by the nations of Europe, sixty years ago; and
although society has considerably advanced in
intellectual acquisitions since that period, the
great body of the people, in every country, is
still shrouded in the mists of folly and ignorance.

Such a picture of the intellectual state of
mankind must, when seriously considered, ex
cite a melancholy train of reflections in the
breast both of the philanthropist and the man of
science. That such a vast assemblage of
beings, furnished with powers capable of inves
tigating the laws of nature, — of determining the
arrangement, the motions, and magnitudes of
distant worlds, — of weighing the masses of the
planets, — of penetrating into the distant regions
of the universe, — of arresting the lightning in its
course, — of exploring the pathless ocean, and
the region of the clouds, — and of rendering the
most stubborn elements of nature subservient
to their designs : that beings, capable of form
ing a sublime intercourse with the Creator him
self, and of endless progression in knowledge
and felicity, should have their minds almost
wholly absorbed in eating and drinking, in child
ish and cruel sports and diversions, and in but
chering one another, seems, at first view, a
tacit reflection on the wisdom of the Creator,
in bestowing on our race such noble powers,
and plainly indicates, that the current of human
intellect has widely deviated from its pristine
course, and that strong and reiterated efforts
are now requisite to restore it to its original
channel. Every lover of science and of man
kind must, therefore, feel interested in endea
vouring to remove those obstructions which
have impeded the progress of useful knowledge,
and to direct the intellectual energies of his
fellow-men to the prosecution of objects worthy
of the high station they hold in the scale of
existence.

Were we to inquire into the external causes
which have retarded the progress of the human
mind, we should, doubtless, find them existing
in the nature of those civil governments which
have most generally prevailed in the world, and
in several of the ecclesiastical establishments
which have been incorporated with them. It
has been a favourite maxim with all tyrants,
that the people must be kept in ignorance ; and
hence \i 3 find, that in the empires of the East,
which are all of a despotical nature, the people
are debarred from the temple of science, and
sunk into a state of the grossest ignorance and

servility. Under such governments, the minrls
of men sink into apathy, — the sparks of genius
are smothered, — the sciences are neglected, —
ignorance is honoured, — and the man of dis
cernment, who dares to vent his opinions, ia
proscribed as an enemy to the state. In the
more enlightened governments on the continent
of Europe, the same effects have followed, in
proportion to the number of those tyrannical
maxims and principles which enter into their
constitution. Hence, we may frequently deter
mine the degree of mental illumination which
prevails among any people, from a considera
tion of the nature of the government under
which they live. For the knowledge of a
people is always in proportion to their liberty,
and where the spirit of liberty is either crushed
or shackled, the energies of the human mind
will never be exerted with vigour, in the acqui
sition or the propagation of literature and sci
ence. Even in the mildest and most enlight
ened governments of modern Europe, the in
struction of the general mass of society form?
no prominent feature in their administration.
Knowledge on general subjects is simply per
mitted to be disseminated among the people ,
its promoters are not sufficiently patronized and
encouraged, — no funds are regularly appropri
ated for this purpose, — and its utility, in many
instances, is even called in question. It is to
be hoped, however, now that the din of war is
in some measure hushed, that the attention of
princes and their ministers will be more parti
cularly directed to this important object: for it
might easily be shown, were it necessary, that
an enlightened population is the most solid ba
sis of a good government, and the greatest se
curity for its permanence, — that it will always
form the strongest bulwark around every throne
where the sceptre is swayed by wisdom and
rectitude. That the establishment of the Popish
religion in any state has a tendency to impede
the progress of knowledge, it would be almost
needless to illustrate. The mummeries which
have been interwoven with its services, the
grovelling and superstitious notions which it has
engendered, the ignorance which prevails among
the population of all those countries over which
its influence extends, the alarms of its priestly
abettors at the idea of free discussion, and of
enlightening the minds of the people, the records
of its Inquisitions, the history of the dirk ages,
when it prevailed in all its rigour, and ihe recent
experience of our own times, show, that it is a
system founded on the darkness and imbecility
of the human intellect, and can flourish only
where the spirit of liberty has fled, and where
reason has lost its ascendency in the minds of
men.*

• Let It be carefully remembered, that in these
remarks it is merely the .system of popery to whtch
the author refers. He is aware that many intiivt

INTRODUCTION.

With regard to th-s internal causes of the ig
norance which so generally prevails, they will
be found in the general depravity of human na
ture ^ in the vicious propensities so prevalent
among all ranks ; in the indulgence of inordi
nate desires after riches and power ; and in the
general disposition of mankind to place their
chief happiness in sensual gratifications, — evils
which the spirit of Christianity only, in con
junction with every rational exertion, is calcu
lated fully to eradicate. And therefore it is in
dispensable, that every attempt to diffuse intel
lectual light over the human race be accompa
nied with the most strenuous exertions to pro
mote the moral renovation of mankind. For
vice and ignorance, especially among the lower
orders, generally go hand in hand ; and experi
ence demonstrates, that indulgence in evil pas
sions, and in unhallowed gratifications, destroys
the relish for mental enjoyments, and is one of
the most powerful obstructions to the vigorous
exercise of the intellectual powers.

That the general diffusion of knowledge
among all ranks is an object much to be desired,
will not, I presume, be called in question by any
one who regards the intellectual powers of man
as the noblest part of his nature, — and who con-
eiders, that on the rational exercise of these
powers his true happiness depends. If ignorance
be one of the chief causes which disturb the
harmonious movements of the machine of so
ciety, by removing the cause we of course pre
vent the effects ; and if knowledge be one of the
mainsprings of virtuous conduct, the more it is
diffused, the more extensively will be brought
into action, on the stage of life, those virtues
which it has a tendency to produce. A few
Ferdinands and Wyndhams and Don Miguels
may still remain, who regard the great mass of
the people merely as subjects of legislation, or
as the tools of tyranny and ambition, and that,
therefore, they must be held in the chains of ig
norance, lest they should aspire to the ranks of
their superiors. But the general current of
public opinion now runs counter to such illiberal
and antiquated notions ; and few persons of re
spectability, at least in this country, would ha
zard their reputation in defending a position so
degrading and untenable. The more learning a
people have, the more virtuous, powerful, and
happy will they become ; and to ignorance aloie
must the contrary effects be imputed. " There
is but one case," says a French writer, "where
ignorance can be desirable ; and that is, when
all is desperate in a state, and when, through
the present evils, others still greater appear be-

duals, distinguished for learning and piety, have
been connected with the Romish church ; and while
he condemns the spirit and tendency of the peculiar
dogmas and practices of that church, he deprecates
every idea of persecution, and every attempt to
deprive its members of those rights and privileges
V> which they are entitled as men and as citizens.
2

hind. Then stupidity is a blessing : knowledge
and foresight are evils. It is then that, shut
ting our eyes against the light, we would hid*
from ourselves the calamities we cannot pre
vent." In every other case, knowledge must
prove an inestimable blessing to men of every
nation and of every rank.

That the period when a general diffusion of
knowledge shall take place is hastening on, ap
pears from the rapid progress which has been
made in almost every department of science
during the last half century; from the numerous
publications on all subjects daily issuing from
the press ; from the rapid increase of theolo
gical, literary, and scientific journals, and the
extensive patronage they enjoy from the nume
rous lectures on chymistry, astronomy, experi
mental philosophy, political economy, and ge
neral science, now delivered in the principal
cities and towns of Europe ; from the adoption
of new and improved plans of public instruc
tion, and the erection of new seminaries of
education in almost every quarter of the civi
lized world ; from the extensive circulation of
books among all classes of the community ;
from the rapid formation of bible and mission
ary societies ; from the increase of literary and
philosophical associations ; from the establish
ment of mechanics' institutions in our principal
towns, and of libraries and reading societies in
almost every village ; from the eager desire now
excited, even among the lower orders of society,
of becoming acquainted with subjects hitherto
known and cultivated only by persons of the
learned professions ; and, above all, from the
spirit of civil and religious liberty now bursting
forth, both in the eastern and the western he
mispheres, notwithstanding the efforts of petty
tyrants to arrest its progress. Amidst the con
vulsions which have lately shaken the surround
ing nations, " many have run to and fro, and
knowledge has been increased ;" the sparks of
liberty have been struck from the collision of
hostile armies and opposing interests : and a
spirit of inquiry has been excited among nu
merous tribes of mankind, which will doubtless-
lead to the most important results. These cir
cumstances, notwithstanding some gloomy ap
pearances in the political horizon, may be con
sidered as so many preludes of a new and hap
pier era about to dawn upon the world ; when
intellectual light shall be diffused among all
ranks, and in every region of the globe ; when
Peace shall extend her empire over the world .
when men of all nations, at present separated
from each other by the effects of ignorance, and
of political jealousies, shall be united by the
bonds of love, of reason, and intelligence, and
conduct themselves as rational and immortal
beings.

In order that such a period may be gradually
ushered in, it ia essentially requisite that a co»

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

fiction of the utility and importance of a general
diffusion of knowledge be impressed upon the
minds of the more intelligent and influential
classes of society, and that every exertion and
every appropriate mean should be used to ac
complish this desirable object. In accordance
with this idea, I shall endeavour, in the follow
ing work,

I. To illustrate the advantages which would
flow from a general diffusion of useful know

ledge among all ranks, — and shall afterward*
follow out the investigation, by

II. An inquiry into the means requisite to
be used in order to accomplish this important
object.*

• As a particular illustration of the means by
which a general diffusion of knowledge might be
effected would render the present work too bulky,
—this department of the subject will be prosecuted
in a separate volume.

GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

PART I.

ON THE ADVANTAGES WHICH WOULD FLOW FROM A GENERAL DIFFUSION OP
KNOWLEDGE.

THAT the intellectual faculties of man have
never been thoroughly directed to the pursuit of
objects worthy of the dignity of rational and
immortal natures — and that the most pernicious
effects have flowed from the perversion of their
mental powers, — are truths which the history
of past ages and our own experience too plainly
demonstrate. That the state of general society
would be greatly meliorated, were the mists of
ignorance dispelled, and the current of human
thought directed into a proper channel, might
appear, were we to take an extensive survey of
the evils which have been produced by igno
rance, and its necessary concomitants, — and of
the opposite effects which would flow from men
tal illumination, in relation to all those subjects
connected with the improvement and the happi
ness of our species. Here, however, a field of
vast extent opens to view, which would require
several volumes fully to describe and illustrate :
I shall, therefore, in the mean time, select, from
the multitude of objects which crowd upon the
view, only a few prominent particulars, — the
elucidation of which shall occupy the following
sections.

SECTION I.

ON THE INFLUENCE WHICH A GENERAL DIF
FUSION OF KNOWLEDGE WOULD HAVE IN
DISSIPATING THOSE SUPERSTITIOUS NO
TIONS AND VAIN FEARS WHICH HAVE SO
LONG ENSLAVED THE MINDS OF MEN.

MY first proposition is, that the diffusion of
knowledge wou'id undermine the fabric of su

perstition, and remove those groundless feara
to which superstitious notions give rise. Igno
rance has not only debarred mankind from
many exquisite and sublime enjoyments, but
has created innumerable unfounded alarms,
which greatly increase the sum of human mi
sery. Man is naturally timid, terrified at those
dangers whose consequences he cannot foresee,
and at those uncommon appearances of nature
whose causes he has never explored. Thus, he
is led, in many instances, to regard with appre
hension and dread those operations of nature
which are the result of regular and invariable
laws. Under the influence of such timid emo
tions, the phenomena of nature, both in the
heavens and on the earth, have been arrayed
with imaginary terrors. In the early ages of
the world, a total eclipse of the sun or of the
moon was regarded with the utmost consterna
tion, as if some dismal catastrophe had been
about to befall the universe. Believing that
the moon in an eclipse was sickening or dying
through the influence of enchanters, the trem
bling spectators had recourse to the ringing of
bells, the sounding of trumpets, the beating of
brazen vessels, and to loud and horrid excla
mations, in order to break the enchantment,
and to drown the muttering of witches, that the
moon might not hear them. In allusion to this
practice, Juvenal, when speaking of a loud
scolding woman, says, that she was able to re
lieve the moon.

"Forbear your drums and trumpets if you please,
Her voice alone the labouring moon can ease."

Nor are such foolish opinions and customs yd
banished from the world. They are said to b«

18

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

•till prevalent in several Mahometan and Pagan
countries.* Comets, too, with their blazing
otils, were long regarded, and still are, by the
mlgar, as harbingers of divine vengeance, pre
saging famines and inundations, or the downfall
of princes and the destruction of empires. i
The Aurora Boreales, or northern lights, have
been frequently gazed at with similar appre
hensions, and whole provinces have been thrown
into consternation by the fantastic coruscations
of those lambent meteors. Some pretend to
see, in these harmless lights, armies mixing in
fierce encounter, and fields streaming with
blood ; others behold states overthrown, earth
quakes, inundations, pestilences, and the most
dreadful calamities. Because some one or other
of these calamities formerly happened soon after
the appearance of a comet, or the blaze of an
aurora, therefore they are considered either as
the causes or the prognostics of such events.

From the same source have arisen those
foolish notions, so fatal to the peace of mankind,
which have been engendered by judicial astro
logy. Under a belief that the characters and
the fates of men are dependent on the various
aspects of the stars and conjunctions of the
planets, the most unfounded apprehensions, as
well as the most delusive hopes, have been ex
cited by the professors of this fallacious science.
Such impositions on the credulity of mankind
are founded on the grossest absurdity, and the
most palpable ignorance of the nature of things ;
for since the aspects and conjunctions of the
celestial bodies have, in every period of dura
tion, been subject to invariable laws, they must
be altogether inadequate to account for the di
versified phenomena of the moral world, and
for that infinite variety we observe in the dispo
sitions and the destinies of men ; and, indeed,
the single consideration of the immense dis
tances of the stars from our globe, is sufficient
to convince any rational mind that their influ
ence can have no effect on a region so remote
from the spaces which they occupy. The pla
netary bodies, indeed, may, in certain cases,
have some degree of physical influence on the
earth, by virtue of their attractive power, but
that influence can never affect the operation of
moral causes, or the qualities of the mind.
Even although it were admitted that the hea
venly bodies have an influence over the desti
nies of the human race, yet we have no data
whatever by which to ascertain the mode of
its operation, or to determine the formula or
rules by which calculations are to be made, in
order to predict the fates of nations, or the in
dividual temperaments and destinies of men ;
and consequently, the principles and rules on
which astrologers proceed in constructing horo-
tcopeq and calculating nativities, are nothing

•See Appendix, No. II.

t Ibid.

else than mere assumptions, and their preten
sions nothing short of criminal impositions upon
the credulity of mankind. With equally the
same reason might we assert, that the earth, in
different positions in its orbit, would have an
influence in producing fools and maniacs in the
nlanet Jupiter, or in exciting wars and insurrec
tions among the inhabitants of Saturn, as to
suppose, with Mr. Varley, the prince of modern
astrologers, that " Saturn passing through the
ascendant, causes dulness and melancholy for a
few weeks," and that " Jupiter, in the third
house, gives safe inland journeys and agreeable
neighbours or kindred."

Notwithstanding the absurdity of the. doc
trines of astrology, this art has been practised
in every period of time. Among the Romans,
the people were so infatuated with it, that the
astrologers, or, as they were then called, the
mathematicians, maintained their ground in
spite of all the edicts of the emperors to expel
them from the capital ; and after they were at
length expelled by a formal decree of the senate,
they found so much protection from the credu
lity of the people, that they still remained in
Rome unmolested. Among the Chaldeans, the
Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the
Arabians, in ancient times, astrology was uni
formly included in the list of the sciences, and
used as one species of divination by which they
attempted to pry into the secrets of futurity
The Brahmins in India, at an early period, in
troduced this art into that country, and, by
means of it, have rendered themselves the ar
biters of good and evil hours, and of the for
tunes of their fellow-men, and have thus raised
themselves to great authority and influence
among the illiterate multitude. They are con«
suited as oracles, and, like all other impostors,
they have taken great care never to sell their
answers without a handsome remuneration. In
almost every country in the world this art is still
practised, and only a short period has elapsed
since the princes and legislators of Europe were
directed in the most important concerns of the
state by the predictions of astrologers. In the
time of Queen Catharine de Medicis, astrology
was so much in vogue, that nothing, however
trifling, was to be done without consulting the
stars. The astrologer Morin, in the seven
teenth century, directed Cardinal Richelieu's
motions in some of his journeys, and Louisa
Maria de Gonzaga, queen of Poland, gave
2000 crowns to carry on an edition of his Astro-
los;ia Gallica ; and in the reigns of Henry the
Third and Henry the Fourth of France, the
predictions of astrologers were the common
theme of the court conversation. Even in the
present day, and in the metropolis of the British
empire, this fallacious art is practised, and its
professors are resorted to for judicial informa
tion, not only by the vulgar, but even by manv

OMENS.

19

in ihe higher spheres of Life. The extensive
annual sale of more than 240,000 copies of
" Moore's Almanac," which abounds with such
predictions, and of similar publications, is a
striking proof of the belief which is still attached
to the doctrines of astrology in our own age and
country, and of the ignorance and credulity from
which such a belief proceeds.* Parhelia, par-
selenae, shooting stars, fiery meteors, luminous
arches, lunar rainbows, and other atmospherical
phenomena, have likewise been considered by
some as ominous of impending calamities.

Such are some of the objects in the heavens,
which ignorance and superstition have arrayed
with imaginary terrors.

On the earth, the objects which have given
rise to groundless fears, are almost innume
rable. The ignesfatui, those harmless meteors
which hover above moist and fenny places in
the night-time, and emit a glimmering light,
have been regarded as malicious spirits, endea
vouring to deceive the bewildered traveller, and
lead him to destruction. The ticking noise
of the little insect called the death-watch — a
screech-owl screaming at the window — a raven
croaking over a house — a dog howling in the
night-time — a hare or a sow crossing the road —
the meeting of a bitch with whelps, or a snake
lying in the road — the falling of salt from a table
— and even the curling of a fibre of tallow in a
burning candle, f have been regarded with ap
prehensions of terror, as prognostics of impend
ing disasters, or of approaching death.

In the Highlands of Scotland, the motions and
appearances of the clouds were, not long ago,
considered as ominous of disastrous events.
On the arming before new-year's day, if a black
cloud appeared in any part of the horizon, it was
thought to prognosticate a plague, a famine, or
.he death of some great man in that part of the
country over which it seemed to hang ; and in
order to ascertain the place threatened by the
omen, the motions of the clouds were often
watched through the whole night. In the same
country, the inhabitants regard certain days as
unlucky, or ominous of bad fortune. That day
of the week on which the 3d of May falls, is
deemed unlucky throughout the whole year. In
the isle of Mull, ploughing, sowing, and reap
ing, are always begun on Tuesday, though the

* That the absurdities of astrology are still In
^ogue among a certain class, appears from the pub-

^ation of such works as the following:— "A Trea-
'se on Zodiacal Physiognomy, illustrated by en
gravings of heads and features, and accompanied
xv tables of the times of the rising of the twelve
signs of the Zodiac, and containing also new astro-
logical explanations of some remarkable portions
of ancient mythological history. By John Varley.
No. I., large 8vo., pp. eo, to be comprised in four
parts. Longman and Co. 1828 !'• A specimen of
some of the fooleries and absurdities gravely treated
of by this sapient author, will be found in Nos. HI.
and I » of the Appendix to this volume.

* Called in Scotland, the dead apeal.

most favourable weather for these purposes be
in this way frequently lost. In Morven, none
will, upon any account, dig peat or turf for fuel
on Friday. The age of the moon is also much
attended to by the vulgar Highlanders ; and an
opinion prevails, that if a house take fire while
the moon is in the decrease, the family will from
that time decline in its circumstances, and sink
into poverty.*

In England, it is reckoned a bad omen to
break a looking-glass, as it is believed the party
to whom it belongs will lose his best friend. In
going a journey, if a sow cross the road, it is
believed the party will meet either with a disap
pointment or a bodily accident before returning
home. It is reckoned unlucky to see first one
magpie, and then another ; and to kill a magpie,
it is believed, will certainly be punished with
some terrible misfortune. If a person meet a
funeral procession, it is considered necessary
always to take off the hat, which keeps all the
evil spirits that attend the body in good humour.
If in eating, a person miss his mouth, and the
victuals fall, it is reckoned very unlucky, and
ominous of approaching sickness. It is also
considered as unlucky to present a ki;..^, scis
sors, razor, or any sharp cutting instrument, to
one's mistress or friend, as they are apt to cut
love and friendship ; and to find a knife or razor,
denotes ill luck or disappointment to the party.

Among the ancient nations, there was hardly
any circumstance or occurrence, however tri
vial, from which they did not draw omens.
This practice appears to have taken its rise in
Egypt, the parent country of almost every su
perstition of pagai.ism; but, from whatever
source it may have derived its origin, it spread
itself over the whole inhabited globe, even
among the most civilized nations, and at this
day it prevails more or less among the vulgar
in every country. Even kings and emperors,
sages and heroes, have been seized with alarm,
at the most trivial circumstances, which they
were taught to consider as ominous of bad for
tune, or of impending danger. Suetonius says
of Augustus, that he believed implicitly in cer
tain omens ; and that, si mane sibi calceus per-
per am, ac sinister pro dextero inducereter, ut di-
rum, " if his shoes were improperly put on in
the morning, especially if the left shoe was put
upon his right foot, he held it for a bad omen."

Thus it appears, that the luminaries of hea
ven, the clouds, and other meteors that float in
the atmosphere, the actions of animals, the
seasons of the year, the days of the week, the
most trivial incidents in human life, and many
other circumstances, have afforded matter of
false alarm to mankind. But this is not all :
Man, ever prone to disturb his own peace, not
withstanding the real evils he is doomed to auf-

• Encyclopedia Britannica, Art. Omen.

90

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

fer, has been ingenious enough to form imagi
nary monsters which have no existence, either
in heaven or on earth, nor the least foundation
in the scenes of external nature. He has not
only drawn false conclusions from the objects
which have a real existence, to increase his
fears ; but has created, in his imagination, an
ideal world, and peopled it with spectres, hob
goblins, fairies, satyrs, imps, wraiths, genii,
brownies, witches, wizards, and other fantas
tical ueings, to whose caprices he believes his
happiness and misery are subjected. An old
wrinkled hag is supposed to have the power of
rendering miserable all around her, who are the
objects of her hatred. In her privy chamber, it
is believed, she can roast and torment the absent,
and inflict incurable disorders both on man and
beast ;* she can transport herself through the
air on a spit or a broomstick ; or, when it serves
her purpose, she can metamorphose herself into
a cat or a hare ; and, by shaking a bridle over a
person asleep, can transform him into a horse ;
and, mounted on this new-created steed, can tra
verse the air on the wings of the wind, and visit
distant countries in the course of a night. A
certain being called a fairy, though supposed to
be at least two or three feet high, is believed to
have the faculty of contracting its body, so as to
pass through the key-hole of a door ; and though
they are a distinct species of beings from man,
they have a strong fancy for children ; and hence,
in the Highlands of Scotland, new-born infants
are watched till the christening is over, lest they
should be stolen or exchanged by those fantastic
existences. The regions of the air have been
peopled with apparitions and terrific phantoms
of different kinds, which stalk abroad at the dead
hour of night, to terrify the lonely traveller. In
ruined castles and old houses, they are said to
announce their appearance by a variety of loud
and dreadful noises ; sometimes rattling in the
old hall like a coach and six. and rumbling up
and down the staircase like the trundling of
bowls or cannon-balls. Especially in lonely
church-yards, in retired caverns, in deep forests
and dells, horrid sounds are said to have been
heard, and monstrous shapes to- have appeared,
by which whole villages have been thrown into
consternation.f

• The reader will find abundance of relations of
this kind in " Satan's invisible world discovered,"
a book which was long read with avidity by the vul
gar in this country, and which has frequently
caused emotions of terror among youthful groups
on winter evenings, while listening to its fearful re-
ations, which could never be eradicated, and has
endered them cowards in the dark, during all the
subsequent periods of their lives.

+ That many of the superstitious opinions and
practices above alluded to, still prevail even within
the limits of the British empire, appears from the
following extract from the " Monthly Magazine"
for July 1813, p. 496.— "In Staffordshire, they burn
a calf in a farm-house alive, to prevent the other
calves from dying. In the same county, a woman

Nor have such absurd notions been confined
to the illiterate vulgar ; men of considerabla
acquirements in literature, from ignorance of
the laws of nature, have fallen into the same
delusions. Formerly, a man who was endowed
with considerable genius and knowledge, was
reckoned a magician. Doctor Bartolo was
seized by the Inquisition at Rome, in the six
teenth century, because he unexpectedly cured
a nobleman of the gout; and the illustrious
Friar Bacon, because he was better acquainted
with experimental philosophy than most persons
of the age in which he lived, was suspected,
even by the learned ecclesiastics, of having
dealings with the devil. Diseases were at
those times imputed to fascination, and hundreds
of poor wretches were dragged to the stake for
being accessary to them. Mercatus, physician
to Philip II. of Spain, relates, that he had seen
a very beautiful woman break a steel mirror to
pieces, and blast some trees, by a single glance
of her eyes ! Josephus relates, that he saw a
certain Jew, named Eleazar, draw the devil out
of an old woman's nostrils, by the application
of Solomon's seal to her nose, in the presence
of Vespasian. Dr. Mynsight is said to have
cured several bewitched persons with a plaster
of assafoatida. How the assafoetida was effica
cious, was much disputed among the learned.
Some thought the devil might consider such an
application as an insult, and ran off in a passion ;
but others very sagely observed, that as devils
were supposed to have eyes and ears, it was
probable they might have noses too. James
VI. who was famed for his polemics and theo
logical acquirements, wrote a treatise in defence
of witchcraft, and persecuted those who opposed

having kept a toad in a pot in her garden, her hus
band killed it, and she reproached him for it, sayiuc,
she intended the next Sunday to have taken the sa
crament, for the purpose of getting some of the
bread to feed him with, and make him thereby a
valuable familiar spirit to her. At Long Ashton, a
young farmer has several times predicted his own
end, from what he calls being tanked over; and his
mother arid father informed a friend of mine, (says
the relater) that they had sent to the While Witch
Doctor, beyond Bridge "Water, by the coachman, for
a charm to cure him, (having paid handsomely fui
it;) but that he had now given him over, as her
spells were more potent than his. If not dead, he is
dying of mere fear, and all the parish of his class
believe it. There is also, in that parish, an old man
who sells gingerbread to the schools, who is always
employed to cure the red water in cows, by means
of charms and verses which he says to them. In
the Marsh, we have water doctors, who get rich ;
at the mines, diviners with rods, who find ores and
water ; and at Weston-super-Mare, they sec lights
before funerals, and are agreed that the people in
that parish always die by threes, i. e. three old,
three young, three men, three women, &c. Such
are a part only of the superstitions of the West in
1813!"

Everj' one who is much conversant with the lower
ranks of society, will find, that such notions are stir
current and believed by a considerable portion of
the population, which is the only apology that can
be made for stating and counteracting such opi
nions.

ABSURDITY OF SUPERSTITION.

las opinions on this subject. The pernicious
effects in mines, occasioned by the explosion of
hydrogen gas, were formerly imputed to the de
mons of the mine. Van Helmont, Bodinus,
Strozza, and Luther, attributed thunder and
meteors to the devil. Socrates believed he was
guided by a demon. Dr.Gudworth, Glanvil,
and others, wrote in defence of witchcraft and
apparitions. But it would be endless to detail
all the foolish opinions which have been imbibed
and propagated even by men who pretended to
genius and learning.

Besides the opinions to which I have now
adverted, and which have a direct tendency to
fill the mind with unnecessary apprehensions,
there is also an immense variety of foolish and
erroneous opinions which passed current for
genuine truths among a great majority of man
kind. That a man has one rib less than a wo
man, — that there is a certain Jew still alive,
who has wandered through the world since the
crucifixion of Christ, — that the coffin of Maho
met is suspended in the air between two load
stones, — that the city of Jerusalem is in the
centre of the world, — that the tenth wave of the
sea is greater and more dangerous than all the
rest, — that all animals on the land have their
corresponding kinds in the sea, — that there is a
white powder which kills without giving a re
port, — that the blood of a goat will dissolve a
diamond, — that all the stars derive their light
from the sun, — that a candle made of human
fat, when lighted, will prevent a person asleep
from awaking, with many other similar un
founded positions, — are regarded as indispu
table truths by thousands, whose adherence to
tradition and authority, and whose indolence
and credulity, prevent them from inquiring, with
a manly independence, into the true state and
nature of things.

Such are a few, and but a very few, of the
superstitious notions and vain fears by which
the great majority of the human race, in every
age and country, has been enslaved. To have
attempted a complete enumeration of such hal
lucinations of the human intellect, would have
been vain, and couid only have produced satiety
and disgust. That such absurd notions should
ever have prevailed, is a most grating and hu
miliating thought, when we consider the noble
faculties with which man is endowed. That
they still prevail, in a great measure, even in our
own country, is a striking proof, that we are,
as yet, but just emerging from the gloom of in
tellectual darkness. The prevalence of such
opinions is to be regretted, not only on account
s>i the groundless alarms they create, but chiefly
on account of the false ideas they inspire with
regard to the nature of the Supreme Ruler of
the universe, and of his arrangements in the go
vernment of the world. While a man, whose
/nind is enlightened with true science, perceives

throughout all nature the most striking evidences
of benevolent design, and rejoices in the benig
nity of the Great Parent of the universe, — while
he perceives nothing in the arrangements of the
Creator, in any department of his works, which
has a direct tendency to produce pain to any in
telligent or sensitive existence, — the supersti
tious man, on the contrary, contemplates the
sky, the air, the waters, and the earth, as filled
with malicious beings, ever ready to haunt him
with terror, or to plot his destruction The one
contemplates the Deity directing the movements
of the material world, by fixed and invariable
laws, which none but himself can counteract or
suspend ; the other views them as continually
liable to be controlled by capricious and malig
nant beings, to gratify the most trivial and un
worthy passions. How very different, of course,
must be their conceptions and feelings respect
ing the attributes and government of the Su
preme Being ! While the one views Him as an
infinitely wise and benevolent Father, whose
paternal care and goodness inspire confidence
and affection ; the other must regard him, in a
certain degree, as a capricious being, and offer
up his adorations under the influence of fear.

Such notions have likewise an evident ten
dency to habituate the mind to false principles
and processes of reasoning, which unfit it for
forming legitimate conclusions in its researches
after truth. They chain down the understand
ing, and sink it into the most abject and sordid
state ; and prevent it from rising to those noble
and enlarged views which revelation and modern
science exhibit, of the order, the extent, and the
economy of the universe. It is lamentable to
reflect, that so many thousands of beings en
dowed with the faculty of reason, who cannot
by any means be persuaded of the motion of the
earth, and the distances and magnitudes of the
celestial bodies, should swallow, without the
least hesitation, opinions ten thousand times
more improbable ; and find no difficulty in be
lieving that an old woman can transform herseh"
into a hare, and wing her way through the air
on a broomstick.

But what is worst of all, such notions almost
invariably lead to the perpetration of deeds of
cruelty and injustice. Of the truth of this po
sition, the history of almost every nation affords
the most ample proof. Many of the barbarities
committed in pagan countries, both in their re
ligious worship and their civil polity, and most
of the cruelties inflicted on the victims of the
Romish inquisition, have flowed from this
source.* Nor are the annals of our own coun-

• In the duchy of Lorraine, 900 females were dell
vered over to the flames, for being witches, by one
inquisitor alone. Under this accusation, it is reck
oned that upwards of thirty thousand women have
perished by the hands of the Inquisition.—"
tim Unmasked," by Puigblanch.

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

try deficient in examples of this kind : The
belief attached to the doctrine of witchcraft, led
our ancestors, little more than a century ago, to
condemn and to burn at the stake hundreds of
unhappy women, accused of crimes of which
they could not possibly have been guilty.* In
New England, about the year 1692, a witchcraft
phrensy rose to such excess as to produce com
motions and calamities more dreadful than the
scourge of war or the destroying pestilence.
There lived in the town of Salem, in that coun
try, two young women, who were subject to
convulsions, accompanied with extraordinary
symptoms. Their father, a minister of the
church, supposing they were bewitched, cast his
suspicions upon an Indian girl, who lived in the
house, whom he compelled, by harsh treatment,
to confess that she was a witch. Other women,
on hearing this, immediately believed that the
convulsions, which proceeded only from the
nature of their sex, were owing to the same
cause. Three citizens, casually named, were
immediately thrown into prison, accused of
witchcraft, hanged, and their bodies left ex
posed to wild beasts and birds of prey. A few
days after, sixteen other persons, together with
a counsellor, who, because he refused to plead
against them, was supposed to share in their
guilt, suffered in the same manner. From
this instant, the imagination of the multitude
was inflamed with these horrid and gloomy
scenes. Children often years of age were put
to death, young girls were stripped naked, and
the marks of witchcraft searched for upon their
bodies with the most indecenf. curiosity ; and
'hose spots of the scurvy which age impresses
upon the bodies of old men, were token for evi
dent signs of infernal power. In default of these,
torments were employed to extort confessions,
dictated by the executioners themselves. For
such fancied crimes, the offspring of supersti
tion alone, they were imprisoned, tortured,
murdered, and their bodies devoured by the
beasts of prey. If the magistrates, tired out
with executions, refused to punish, they were
themselves accused of the crimes they tolerated ;
the very ministers of religion raised false wit
nesses against them, who made them forfeit
with their lives the tardy remorse excited in
them by humanity. Dreams, apparitions, ter
ror, and consternation of every kind, increased
these prodigies of folly and horror. The pri
sons were filled, the gibbets left standing, and

* The Scots appear to have displayed a more than
ordinary zeal against witches, and it is said that
more deranged old women were condemned for this
imaginary crime in Scotland, than in any other coun
try. So late as 1722, a poor woman was burned for
witchcraft, which was among the last executions in
Scotland. A variety of curious particulars in rela
tion to the trials of witches, may be seen in Pit-
cairn's " Criminal Trials, and other proceedings be
fore the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland."-.
Part II. lately published. See also Appendix, No. V.

all the citizens involved in gloomy apprehen
sions. So that superstitious notions, so far from
being innocent and harmless speculations, lead
to the most deplorable results, and therefore
ought to be undermined and eradicated by every
one who wishes to promote the happiness arid
the good order of general society.

Such, then, is the evil we find existing among
mankind — false opinions, which produce vain
fears, which debase the understanding, exhibit
distorted views of the Deity, and lead to deeds
of cruelty and injustice. Let us now consider
the remedy to be applied for its removal.

I have all along taken it for granted, that
ignorance of the laws and economy of nature
is the great source of the absurd opinions to
which I have adverted, — a position which, I
presume, will not be called in question. For
such opinions cannot be deduced from an atten
tive survey of the phenomena of nature, or from
an induction of well-authenticated facts ; and
they are equally repugnant to the dictates of
revelation. Nay, so far are they from having
any foundation in nature or experience, that in
proportion as we advance in our researches
into Nature's economy and laws, in the same
proportion we perceive their futility and ab
surdity. As in most other cases, so in this, a
knowledge of the cause of the evil leads to the
proper remedy. Let us take away the cause,
and the effect of course will be removed. Let
the exercise of the rational faculties be directed
into a proper channel, and the mind furnished
with a few fundamental and incontrovertible
principles of reasoning — let the proper sources
of information be laid open — let striking and
interesting facts be presented to view, and a
taste for rational investigation be encouraged
and promoted — let habits of accurate observa
tion be induced, and the mind directed to draw
proper conclusions from the various objects
which present themselves to view, — and then
we may confidently expect, that superstitious
opinions, with all their usual accompaniments,
will gradually evanish, as the shades of night
before the rising sun.

But here it may be inquired, What kind of
knowledge is it that will produce this effect ?
It is not merely an acquaintance with a number
of dead languages, with Roman and Grecian
antiquities, with the subtleties of metaphysics,
with pagan mythology, with politics or poetry :
these, however important in other point, of
view, will not, in the present case, produce the
desired effect; for we have already seen, 'hat
many who were conversant in such subjects were
not proof against the admission of superstitious
opinions. In order to produce the desired ef
fect, the mind must be directed to the study of
material nature, to contemplate the various
appearances it presents, and to mark the uni
form results of those invariable laws by which

REMEDIES FOR SUPERSTITION.

the universe is governed. In particular, the
attention should be directed to those discoveries
which have been made by philosophers in the
different departments of nature and art, during
ihe last two centuries. For this purpose, the

Divinely great ; they in their powers exult ;
They see the blazing wondei rise anew,
In seeming terror clad, but kindly bent
To work the will of all-sustaining Love."

Thomson's Summer.

Such are the sublime emotions with which a

study of natural history, as recording the van- pergon eniightened wjth the beams of science
ous facts respecting the atmosphere, the waters, contempiates the return of a comet, or any un-
the earth, and animated beings, combined with common celestial appearance. He will wait

the study of natural philosophy and astronomy, the approach of such phenomena with pleasing

is explaining the causes of the phenomena of expectation jn hopes of discovering more of

nature, will have a happy tendency to eradicate

from the mind those false notions, and, at the

same time, will present to view objects of de-

Hghtful contemplation. Let a person be once

thoroughly convinced that Nature is uniform in

her operations, and governed by regular laws,

impressed by an all- wise and benevolent Being,

— he will soon be inspired with confidence, and

will not easily be alarmed at any occasional

phenomena which at first sight might appear as

exceptions to the general rule.

For example, — let persons be taught that

eclipses are occasioned merely by the shadow

of one opaque body falling upon another — that

they are the necessary result of the inclination

of the moon's orbit to that of the earth— that the

times when they tak« place depend on the new

or full moon happening at or near the points of

intersection — and that other planets which have

moons, experience eclipses of a similar nature

—that the comets are regular bodies belonging

to our system, which finish their revolutions,

and appear and disappear in stated periods of

time— that the northern lights, though seldom

saen in southern climes, are frequent in the

the nature and destination of those distant orbs ;
and will be led to form more enlarged ideas of
their omnipotent Creator.

Again, to remove the apprehensions which
arise from the fear of invisible and incorporeal
beings, let persons be instructed in the various
optical illusions to which we are subject, aris
ing from the intervention of fogs, and the indis
tinctness of vision in the night-time, which make
us frequently mistake a bush that is near us for
a large tree at a distance ; and, under the influ-
ence°of which illusions, a timid imagination
will transform the indistinct image of a cow or
a horse into a terrific phantom of a monstrous
size. Let them also be taught, by a selection
of well-authenticated facts, the powerful influ
ence of the imagination in creating ideal forms,
especially when under the dominion of fear —
the effects produced by the workings of con
science, when harassed with guilt — by very
lively dreams, by strong doses of opium, by
drunkenness, hysteric passions, madness, and
other disorders that affect the mind, and by
the cunning artifices of impostors to promote
some sinister or nefarious designs. Let them

regions of the North, and supply the inhabitants likewise be instructed in the nature of upon-

with light in the absence of the sun, and have taneous combustions and detonations, occasioned

probably a relation to the magnetic and electric ^v tne accidental combustion and explosion of

fluids — that the ignesfatui are harmless lights, gaseS) which produce occasional noises and

formed by the ignition of a certain species of lights in church-yards and empty houses. Let

gas produced in the soils above which they
hover— that the notes of the death-watch, so
far from being presages of death, are ascer
tained to be the notes of love, and presages of
hymeneal intercourses among these little in
sects ;* let rational information of this kind be
imparted, and they will soon learn to contem
plate nature with tranquillity and composure

the experiments of optics, and the striking phe
nomena produced by electricity, galvanism,
magnetism, and the different gases, be exhi
bited to their view, together with details of the
results which have been produced by various
mechanical contrivances. In fine, let their at
tention be directed to the foolish, whimsical, and
extravagant notions, attributed to apparitions,

Nay, a more beneficial effect. than evenjhis, and to °their inconsistency with the wise and

benevolent arrangements of the Governor of
the universe.*

That such instructions as those I have now
ith emotions of hinted at would completely produce the intended
effect, may be argued from this consideration,
— tliatthey have uniformly produced this effect on
every mind which has been thus enlightened.
Where is the man to be found, whose mind is
enlightened in the doctrines and discoveries of

will, at the same time, be produced. Those
objects which they formerly beheld with alarm
will now be converted into sources of enjoy
ment, and be contemplated
delight.

" When from the dread immensity of space,
The rushing comet to the sun descends,
With awful train projected o'er the world ;
The enlighten'd few,

Whose god-like miuds philosophy exalts,
The glorious stranger hail. They feel a joy

• This fact was particularly ascertained by Dr.
Oerham.— Philosophical Transactions, No. 291.

•See Appendix, No. VII. for an illustration of some
of the causes which have concurred to propag»M
the belief of apparitions.

24

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

modern science, and who yet remains the slave
of superstitious notions and vain fears ? Of all
ihe philosophers in Europe, is there one who
is alarmed at an eclipse, at a comet, at an ignis
fatuus, or the notes of a death-watch, or who
postpones his experiments on account of what
is called an unlucky day ? Did we ever hear
of a spectre appearing to such a person, drag
ging him from bed at the dead hour of midnight to
wander through the forest trembling with fear ?
No: such beings appear only to the ignorant
and illiterate ; and we never heard of their ap
pearing to any one who did not previously be
lieve in' their existence. But why should phi
losophers be freed from such terrific visions, if
substantial knowledge had not the power of ba
nishing them from the mind ? Why should
supernatural beings feel so shy in conversing
with men of science 1 They would be the fit
test persons to whom they might impart their
secrets, and communicate information respect
ing the invisible world, but it never falls to their
lot to be favoured with such visits. Therefore,
it may be concluded, that the diffusion of useful
knowledge would infallibly dissipate those
groundless fears which have so long disturbed
the happiness particularly of the lower orders of
mankind.*

It forms no objection to what has been now
stated, that the late Dr. Samuel Johnson be
lieved in the existence of ghosts, and in the
tecond sight: for, with all his vast acquirements
in literature, he was ignorant of natural science,
and even attempted to ridicule the study of na
tural philosophy and astronomy — the principal
subjects which have the most powerful tendency
to dissipate such notions, — as may be seen in
No. 24 of his " Rambler ;" where he endea
vours to give force to his ridicule by exhibiting
the oddities of an imaginary pretender to these
sciences. He talks of men of science " lavish
ing their hours in calculating the weight of the
terraqueous globe, or in adjusting systems of
worlds beyond the reach of the telescope ;" and
adds, that " it was the greatest praise of So-

• It would be unfair to infer from any expressions
here used, that the author denies the possibility of
supernatural visions and appearances. We are
assured, _froni the records of Sacred History, that
beings of an order superior to the human ra«s, have
" at sundry times, and in divers manners," made
their appearance to men. But there is the most
marked difference between vulgar apparitions, and
*.he celestial messengers to which the records of Re
velation refer. They appeared, not to old women
and clowns, but to patriarchs, prophets, and apos
tles. They appeared, not to frighten the timid, and
to create unnecessary alarm, but to declare " tidings
of great jny." They appeared, not to reveal such
paltry secrets as the place where a pot of gold or
silver is concealed, or where a lost ring may be
found, but to communicate intelligence worthy of
God to reveal, and of the utmost importance for man
to receive, in these, and many other respects, there
is the most striking contrast between popular
ghosts, and the supernatural communications and
njipearances recorded in Scripture.

crates, that he drew the wits of Greece frutn
the vain pursuit of natural philosophy to moral
inquiries, and turned their thoughts from stars
and tides, and matter and motion, upon the va
rious modes of virtue and relations of life." His
opinions and conduct, therefore, can only be
considered as an additional proof of the pro
priety of the sentiments above expressed.

Nor should it be considered as a thing im
practicable to instruct the great body of mankind
in the subjects to which I have alluded. Every
man possessed of what is called common sense,
is capable of acquiring all the information re
quisite for the purpose in view, even without
infringing on the time allotted for his daily la
bours, provided his attention be once thoroughly
directed to its acquisition, and proper means
used to promote his instruction. It is not in
tended that all men should be made profound
mathematicians and philosophers ; nor is it ne
cessary, in order to eradicate false opinions,
and to enlarge and elevate the mind. A general
view of useful knowledge is all that is necessary
for the great mass of mankind; and would cer
tainly be incomparably preferable to that gross
ignorance, and those grovelling dispositions,
which so generally prevail among the inferior
ranks of society. And, to acquire such a de
gree of rational information, requires only that
a taste for it, and an eager desire for acquiring
it, be excited in the mind. If this wore attained,
I am bold to affirm, that the acquisition of such
information may be made by any person who is
capable of learning a common mechanical em
ployment, and will cost him less (rouble and
expense than are requisite to a schoolboy for
acquiring the elements of the Latin tongue.

To conclude this branch of the subject :—
Since it appears that ignorance produces super
stition, and superstitious notions engender vain
fears and distorted views of the government of
the Almighty, — since all fear is in itself painful,
and, when it conduces not to safety, is painful
without use, — every consideration and every
scheme by which groundless terrors may be re
moved, and just conceptions of the moral attri
butes of the Deity promoted, must diminish the
sum of human misery, and add something to
human happiness. If therefore the acquisition
of useful knowledge respecting the laws and
the economy of the universe would produce this
effect, the more extensively such information is
propagated, the more happiness will be diffused
among mankind.

SECTION II.

ON THE UTILITY OF KNOWLEDGE IN PRE
VENTING DISEASES AND FATAL ACCI
DENTS.

IT is a conclusion which has been deduced
from long experience, " that mankind in thei'

PREVENTION OF DISEASES AND ACCIDENTS.

/ypinions and conduct are apt to run from one
extreme to another." We have already seen,
that, in consequence of false conceptions of the
Deity, and of his arrangements in the economy
of nature, the minds of multitudes have been
alarmed by the most unfounded apprehensions,
and have been " in great fear where no fear
was." On the other hand, from a similar cause,
many have run heedlessly into danger and de
struction, when a slight acquaintance with the
powers of nature, and the laws of their opera
tion, would have pointed out the road to safety.
This leads me to the illustration of another ad
vantage which would be derived from a general
diffusion of knowledge, — namely,

That it would tend to prevent many of those
diseases and fatal accidents which flow from igno
rance of the Izws which govern the operations of
nature.

There are, indeed, several accidents to which
mankind are exposed, which no human wisdom
can foresee or prevent. Being furnished with
faculties of a limited nature, and placed in the
midst of a scene where so many powerful and
complicated causes are in constant operation,
we are sometimes exposed, all on a sudden, to
the action of destructive causes, of which we
were ignorant, or over which we have no con
trol. Even although we could foresee a pesti
lence, a famine, an earthquake, an inundation,
or the eruption of a volcano, we could not alto
gether prevent the calamities which generally
flow from their destructive ravages. But, at the
same time, it may be affirmed with truth, that a
great proportion of the physical evils and acci
dents to which the human race is liable, are the
effects of a culpable ignorance, and might be
effectually prevented, were useful knowledge
more extensively diffused. But it unfortunately
happens, in almost every instance, that the per
sons who are exposed to the accidents to which
I allude, are ignorant of the means requisite for
averting the danger. To illustrate this point, I
shall select a few examples, and shall inter
sperse a few hints and maxims for the consider
ation of those whom it may concern.

The first class of accidents to which I shall
advert, comprises those which have happened
from ignorance of the nature and properties of the
different gases, and of the noxious effects which
some of them produce on the functions of ani
mal life.

We have frequently read in newspapers and
magazines, and some of us have witnessed, such
accidents as the following : — A man descends
into a deep well, which had for some time been
shut up. When he has gone down a consider
able way he suddenly lets go his hold of the
rope or ladder by which he descends, and drops
to the bottom in a state of insensibility, devoid
of utterance, and unable to point out the cause
of his disaster. Another hastily follows him,

to ascortain the cause, and to afford him assist
ance ; but by the time he arrives at the same
depth he shares the same fate. A third person,
after some hesitation, descends with more cau
tious steps. But he soon begins to feel a cer
tain degree of giddiness, and makes haste to
ascend, or is drawn up by assistants. In the
mean time, the unhappy persons at the bottom
of the well are frequently left to remain so long
in a state of suspended animation, that all means
of restoration prove abortive ; and the cause of
the disaster remains a mystery, till some medical
gentleman, or other person of intelligence, be
made acquainted with the circumstances of the
accident. Similar accidents, owing to the same
cause, have happened to persons who have in
cautiously descended into brewers' vats, or who
have entered precipitately into wine cellars and
vaults, which had been long shut up from the
external air, and where the process of fermen
tation was going on : They have been suddenly
struck down, as by a flash of lightning ; and,
in some instances the vital spark has been
completely extinguished. Many instances, too,
could be produced, of workmen, who have in
cautiously laid themselves down to sleep in the
neighbourhood of lirne-kilns where they were
employed, having, in a short time, slept the
sleep of death. The burning of charcoal in
close apartments has also proved fatal to many ;
more especially when they have retired to rest
in such apartments, while the charcoal was
burning, and before the rooms had received a
thorough ventilation.

Numerous are the instances in which acci
dents have happened, in the circumstances now
stated, and which are still frequently recurring ;
all which might have been prevented had the
following facts been generally known and at
tended to : — That there exists a certain species
of air, termed fixed air, or carbonic acid gas,
which instantly extinguishes rlame, and is de
structive to animal life ; that it is found in con
siderable quantities in places which have been
shut up from the external atmosphere, — as in
old wells, pits, caverns, and close vaults ; that
it is copiously produced during the fermentation
of liquoios in brewers' vats, where it hovers above
the surface of the liquor ; in cellars where wine
and malt-liquors are kept ; and by the burning
of lime and charcoal ; and, that being nearly
twice as heavy as common air, it sinks to the
bottom of the place where it is produced. The
following plain hints are therefore all that is
requisite to be attended to, in order to prevent
the recurrence of such disasters. Previous to
entering a well or pit which has been long se
cluded from the external air, let a lighted candle
or taper be sent down ; if it continues to burn
at the bottom there is no danger, for air that will
support flame, without an explosion, will also
support animal life; but, should the taper b*

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

extSiiguished before it reaches the bottom, it
wo.ild be attended with imminent danger to ven
ture down till the foul air be expelled. The
noxious air may be destroyed by throwing down
a quantity of quick lime, and gradually sprin
kling it with water; for as the lime slakes it will
absorb the mephitic air, and a person may
afterwards descend in safety. Where lime is
not at hand, a bush, or such like bulky sub
stance, may be let down and drawn up several
times ; or seme buckets of water may be thrown
into it, till the air be so purified, that a lighted
taper will continue to burn at the bottom. These
precautionary hints will apply to all the other
cases referred to, where this species of gas may
happen to exist. To which I may also add, as
another hint, that in every situation where fixed
air is supposed to exist, it is more dangerous to
sit or to lie down, in such places, than to stand
erect ; for, as this gas is the heaviest of all the
gases, it occupies the lowest place ; and there
fore, a person lying on the ground may be suffo
cated by it, while another standing at his side
would feel no injury, his mouth being raised
above the stratum of the noxious fluid.* — I shall
only remark farther on this head, that several
disorders have been contracted by persons sleep
ing under the branches of trees in the night
time, and in apartments where great quantities
of fruit, or other vegetable matter, are kept, —
from ignorance of the fact, that during the night,
the leaves of trees, and all vegetable matter
perspire a deleterious air, which, when it has
accumulated to a certain degree, may induce a
variety of serious complaints, and sometimes
prove fatal.

The disasters which have happened in coal
mines, and other subterraneous apartments, form
another class of accidents, many of which have
been the effects of ignorance. Of late years
an immense number of men, boys, and horses,
has bcea destroyed by the explosion of inflam
mable air in the coal mines in this country, par
ticularly in the north of England, where the
most affecting and tragical scenes have been
presented to view. On the forenoon of Monday,
25th May, 1812, a dreadful accident took place
at Felling, near Gateshead, in the mine belong
ing to C. T. Branding, Esq. When nearly the
whole of the workmen were below, — the second
set having gone down before the first had come
up, — a double blast of hydrogen gas took place,

* The grotto del Cani, a small cavern in Italy,
about four leagues from Naples, contains a stratum
of carbonic acid gas. It has been a common prac
tice to drive dogs into the cavern, where they suffer
a temporary death, for the entertainment of stran
gers. But a man enters with perfect safety, and feels
no particular inconvenience by standing in it, be
cause his mouth is considerably above the surface
of the stratum of deleterious air; but were he to
lie down he would be instantly suffocated. The
ne precaution may also be useful in walking
UMrough certain caverns in our own country.

and set the mine on fire, forcing up an immense
volume of smoke, which darkened the air to a
considerable distance, and scattered an immense
quantity of small coal from the upcast shaft. In
this calamity ninety-three men and boys pe
rished. The mine was obliged to be closed up
on the following Saturday, in order to extinguish
the fire, which put an end to all hopes of saving
any of the sufferers. On the 6th October, in
the same year, and in the same county, (Dur
ham,) a coal-pit, at Shiney Row, suddenly took
fire, by explosion of the inflammable air ; in
consequence of which seven persons were se
verely scorched. And on the Saturday follow
ing, (October 10th,) the Harrington Mill pit,
distant from the other about two or three hundred
yards, also took fire ; by which four men and
nineteen boys were killed on the spot, and many
people severely wounded and burned, and two
boys were missing. This dreadful catastrophe
was likewise occasioned by the explosion of fire
damp. f The above are only two or three ex
amples of a variety of similar accidents which
have happened, of late years, in the coal dis
tricts in the northern part of our island. That
all such accidents could have been prevented by
means of the knowledge we have hitherto ac
quired, would perhaps be too presumptuous to
affirm ; but that a great proportion of them v, ere
the effects of ignorance on the part of the mi
ners, and might have been prevented by a ge
neral knowledge of the nature and causes of
such explosions, and by taking proper precau
tionary measures, there is every reason to be
lieve. That this is not a mere random asser
tion, will appear from the following extract from
the Monthly Magazine for February 1814, p.
80: — "Mr. Bakewell, in his late lectures at
Leeds, stated the, following circumstance, which
strongly evinces the benefits which arise from
educating the working classes — that, in the coal
districts of Northumberland and Durham, acci
dents are constantly taking place from explo
sions in the mines ; so that not less than six
hundred persons have been destroyed in the last
two years. But, in one of the mines which was
frequently subject to explosion, not an accident
of any consequence had taken place for the last
twelve years ; the proprietors, besi !es other
precautions, having for a considerable time past
educated the children of the miners at their own
expense, and given them proper information re
specting the nature of the danger to be avoided"^

+ See Monthly Magazine, vol. xxxiii. p. sso, and
vol. xxxiv. p. 462.

I This section of the present work was written in
1*16, and the facts referred to in it happened within
three or four years of that date. Since that period
Sir Humphrey Davy's ingenious contrivance, called
the safety lamp, has been invented, by means of
which, we have every reason to believe, many ace:
dents in coal mines have been prevented, and many
lives preserved from destruction. The peculiar pro
perty of this lamp is, that the miner may move about

PREVENTION OF DISEASES AND ACCIDENTS.

27

Were the working miners carefully instructed
in. the nature and composition of the atmos
phere, and its chymical properties, and particu
larly in the nature and composition of the dif
ferent gases, — were such instructions illustrated
by a judicious selection of chymical experi
ments, and were the proper practical hints and
precautions deduced and clearly exhibited, there
cannot be the least doubt that it would be at
tended with numerous beneficial results. When
a person is ignorant of the noxious principles
that may be secretly operating within the sphere
of his labours, he will frequently rush heed
lessly within the limits of danger ; whereas, a
man who is thoroughly acquainted with all the
variety of causes which may possibly be in ac
tion around him, will proceed in every step with
judgment and caution, and, where danger is
apparent, will hasten his retreat to a place of
safety.

The injuries which are produced by the stroke
of lightning form another class of accidents which
are frequently owing to ignorance. It is still to
b.e regretted, that, notwithstanding the disco
veries of modern philosophy, respecting the
electric fluid and the laws of its operation, no
hunderguard has yet been invented, which, in
all situations, whether in the house, in the
street, in the open field, in a carriage, or on
horseback, shall serve as a complete protection
from the ravages of lightning. Till some con
trivance of this kind be effected, it is probable
that the human race will still be occasionally
subjected to accidents from electrical storms.
Such accidents are more numerous and fatal,
even in our temperate climate, than is generally

with it, and even work by its light in the midst of
those explosive mixtures which have so often
proved fatal when entered with a common lamp or
a candle. It transmits its light, and is fed with air,
through a cylinder of copper wire-gauze. The aper
tures in the gauze are about one-twentieth or one-
twenty-fifth of an inch square, and the thickness
ox the wire from one-fortieth to one-sixtieth of an
inch diameter. The parts of the lamp are :— l. The
brass cistern which contains the oil. 2. The rim in
which the wire-gauze cover is fixed, and which is
fastened to the cistern by a moveable screw. 3. An
aperture for supplying oil, fitted with a screw or
cork, and a central aperture for the wick. 4. The
wire-gauze cylinder, which consists of at least 625
apertures to the square inch. 5. The second top,
three-fourths of an inch above the first, surmounted
by a brass or copper plate, to which the ring of sus
pension is fixed. 6. Four or six thick Vertical
wires, joining the cistern below with the top plate,
and serving asprotectin™ pillars round the cage.

When the wire-gauze "safety lamp is lighted and
mtroduoed into an atmosphere gradually mixed
with fire-damp, the first effect of the fire-damp is to
increase the length and size of the flame. When
the inflammable gas forms one-twelfth of the vo
lume of the air, the cylinder becomes filled with a
feeble blue flame, but the flame of the wick appears
burning brightly within the blue flame, and the light
of the wick increases, till the fire damp increases 'co
one-fifth, when it is lost in the flame of the fire
damp, which fills the cylinder with a pretty strong
ligtU. As long as any explosive mixture of gas ex
ists in contact I'ith the lamp, so long will it give its

imagined. From an induction of a variety of
facts of this kind, as stated in the public papers
and other periodical works, in the year 1811,
the author ascertained that more than twenty
persons were killed by lightning, or at the rate
of a thousand persons every fifty years, during
the summer months of that year, within the
limits of our island ; besides the violent shocks
experienced by others, which did not immedi
ately prove fatal, and the damage occasioned to

light, and when it is extinguished, which happens
when the foul air constitutes one-third of the volume
of the atmosphere, the air is no longer proper for
respiration, for though animal life will continue
where flame is extinguished, yet it is always with
suffering.

DAVY'S SAFETY LAMP.

The following are the principal parts of the safety
lamp :— F is the lamp throwing up a brilliant flame.
C is the reservoir, supplied with oil by the tube 31.
E E is a frame of thick wire to protect the wire-
gauze, A A A A, which has a double top G H. The
frame has a ring P attached to it for the convenience
of carrying it. The wire-gauze is well fastened to
the rim B.

Notwithstanding the utility of this invention, such
is the carelessness and apathy of the working mi
ners, that they either neglect to use their safety
lamps, or to attend to the means requisite to keep
them in order,— which carelessness and apathy are
the effects of that gross ignorance into which so
many of them are sunk. Hence \ve find, that sel
dom a year passes in which we do not hear of de
structive explosions happening in our coal mines,
particularly in England.

23

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

sheer, and cattle, and to public and private edi
fices ; and it is worthy of notice, that most of
the individuals who were killed by the lightning
had either taken shelter under trees, or were in
situations adjacent to bells or bell-wires. The
experience of succeeding years proves that a
similar number of disasters of this kind annu
ally take place. It is, however, more than pro
bable, that at least half the number of accidents
arising from the same cause might have been
averted, had the nature of lightning, and the
laws which regulate its movements, been gene
rally known. Seldom a year passes but we are
informed by the public prints of some person or
other having been killed by lightning, when
taking shelter under a large tree, — of whole
families have been struck down when crowding
around a fire-place, during a thunder-storm, —
of one person having been struck when stand
ing beside a bell-wire, and another while stand
ing under a bell connected with the wire, or
under a lustre hanging from the ceiling.

There can be little doubt, that a considerable
number of such accidents would have been pre
vented, had the following facts respecting the
nature of lightning been extensively known : —
That lightning is a fluid of the same nature,
and is directed in its motions by the same laws
which regulate the motions of the electric fluid
in our common electrical machines ; — that it is
attracted and conducted by trees, water, mois
ture, flame, and all kinds of metallic substances ;
—that it is most disposed to strike high and
pointed objects ; and that, therefore, it must be
dangerous to remain connected with or in the
immediate neighbourhood of such objects when
a thunder-cloud is passing near the earth.

Hence the following precautionary maxims
have been deduced, by attending to which the
personal accidents arising from thunder-storms
might be in a great measure prevented. In the
open air, during a storm, rivers, pools, and
every mass of water, even the streamlets aris
ing from a recent shower, should be avoided,
because water being an excellent conductor,
might determine the course of an electrical dis
charge towards a person in contact vith it, or
in its immediate neighbourhood. All high trees
and similar elevated conductors should also be
avoided, as they are in more danger of being
struck than objects on the ground; and, there
fore, a person in contact with them exposes him
self to imminent danger, should the course of
the lightning lie in that direction. But, to take
our station at the distance of thirty or forty
paces from such objects, or, at such a distance
as may prevent us from being injured by the
splinters of wood, should the tree be struck, is
more secure than even in the midst of an open
plain. Persons in a house not provided with
thunder-rods, should avoid sitting near a chim
ney or fire-place, whether there be a fire in the

grate or not. For when there is a fire in th»
grate, the fire contains the following conduc
tors, — flame, smoke, rarefied air, and soot.
Even when there is no fire, the soot with which
the flue is lined is a conductor ; and from the
superior height of the chimney-shaft above
every other part of the building, it is more
liable than any other part of the house to be
struck with lightning. In a house, too, gill
mirrors or picture-frames, lustres or burning
candles, bell-wires, and all metallic substances,
should be carefully avoided, as they afford so
many points of attraction, which might deter
mine the course of an electric discharge. The
safest position is in the middle of the room, if
not near a lustre, a bell, or any thing hanging
from the ceiling; and if we place the chair on
which we sit on a bed or mattress, almost every
possible danger may be avoided.* Such are a
few maxims easy to be recollected and put in
practice, by attending to which, not a few
accidents from electrical explosions might be
averted.

In the next place, various accidents have hap-'
penedfrom ignorance of certain plain mechanical
principles. For example, serious accidents have
sometimes occurred from the want of acquaint
ance with the laws of motion. Persons have
heedlessly jumped out of moving vehicles, and
got their legs and arms sprained or dislocated,
and from one boat to another when both were in
rapid motion, and run the risk of being either
bruised, drenched, or drowned. But had the
effects of compound motion been generally known
and attended to, in all those cases where it oc
curs, it would have prevented many of those
accidents which have happened from persons
rashly jumping out of carriages when in rapid
motion, or attempting to jump from the top of a
moving cylinder, in which cases they are always
precipitated with violence in a direction dif
ferent from what they expected, from the ob
vious effects of a combination of forces. Boats
and carriages have been sometimes overset by
persons rising hastily when they were in danger
of such accidents, — from ignorance of the prin
ciple, that the centre of gravity of the moving
vehicle, by such a practice, is raised so as to
endanger the line of direction being thrown be
yond the base, when the vehicle must, of course,
be overturned ; whereas, had they clapped down
to the bottom, they would have brought down
the line of direction, and consequently the centre
of gravity, farther within the Wse, so as to have
prevented the accident and secured their safety.

• It has been generally thought that the cellar is
the most secure situation during a thunder-storm,
but this is true only in certain cases. AVhen the
lightning proceeds from the clouds, it is unquestion
ably the most secure position ; but in the case of a
returning- stroke, or when the lightning proceeds
from the earth, it is less secure than the higher parts
of the building.

PREVENTION OF DISEASES AND ACCIDENTS.

The r?ason of this will perhaps more plainly
appear from the following explanations : — The
Centre of gravity is that point of a body about
which all its parts are in equilibria, or balance
each other ; and consequently, if this point be
supported, the whole body will be at rest, and
cannot fall. An imaginary line drawn from the
centre of gravity of any body towards the centre
of the earth is called the line of direction. Bo
dies stand with firmness upon their bases, when
this line falls within the base ; but if the line of
direction falls without the base, the body will be
overturned. Thus, the inclining body ABCD,
whose centre of gravity is E, stands firmly on
its base CDKF, because the line of direction
EM falls within the base. But if a weight, as
ABGH, be laid upon the top of the body, the
centre of gravity of the whole body and weight
together is raised up to I ; and then as the line
of direction ED falls without the base at D, the
centre of gravity I is not supported, and the
whole body and weight must tumble down to
gether.

for three hundred years. But were an additional
erection, of any considerable elevation, to be
placed upon its top, it would undoubtedly soon
tumble into ruins.

To a somewhat similar cause, in combination
with heedlessness and ignorance, may be as
cribed many of those accidents which so fre
quently happen at spinning mills and other
pieces of machinery, by which legs and arms
are torn asunder, and the human frame some
times mangled and destroyed.

Fatal accidents have like wise happened from
ignorance of the effects produced by the refraction
of light. It is a well-known optical fact, that
when a ray of light passes from air into water,
and is again refracted, the sine of the angle of
incidence is in proportion to the sine of the angle
of refraction as four to three. From this cir
cumstance it happens, that pools and rivers ap
pear shallower than they really are — their chan
nels, when viewed from their brink, being appa
rently higher than their true position, in the
proportion of three to four ; so that a river eight
feet deep will appear from its bank to be only
six. This fact, may be at any time perceived in
a tub or pail full of water, where the bottom of
the vessel will obviously appear to be raised a
considerable space above its true position, and
its apparent depth consequently diminished. In
consequence of this optical illusion, which is not
generally known, many a traveller as well as
many a schoolboy has lost his life, by supposing
the bottom of a clear river to bo within his
depth, as, when he stands on the bank, the bot
tom will appear one-fourth nearer the surface
than it really is.

This will appear evident from the follow
ing illustrations : — If a ray of light AC passes
obliquely from air into water, instead of continu
ing its course in the direct line CB, it takes the

The tower of Pisa, in Italy, leans sixteen feet
-»ut of the perpendicular, so that strangers are
afraid to pass under it ; but as the plummet or
tine of direction falls within its base or foundation,
J* ;„ ;„ „„ Jo«^.^rr_n: — :/• • *-_!_i_i__ . j:---»ionCH,and approaches the perpendicular

It is in no danger of falling, if its materials keep
together ; and hence it has stood in this state

PP, in such a manner, that the angle of refrac

80

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

tion PCH is less than its angle of incidence
EGA. AE is the sine of the angle of inci
dence, and HP the sine of the angle of refrac
tion ; and the proportion they bear to each other
is as four to three. If a small body, therefore,
were placed at H and viewed from the point A,
ft would appear as if it were raised to the point
B, or one-fourth higher than it really is.

This may be farther illustrated by the follow
ing common experiment. Put a shilling into the
bottom of an empty bason, at C , and walk back
wards till it appear completely hid by the inter
ception of the edge of the bason ; then cause
water to be poured into the bason, and the shil
ling will instantly appear as if placed at the
point D ; for, being now in a denser medium,
it appears raised, or nearer to its surface. Be
fore the water was poured in, the shilling could
not be seen where it was ; now it is seen where
it is not. It is not the" eye that has changed its
place, but the ray of light has taken a new di
rection, in passing from the water to the eye,
and strikes the eye as if it came from the piece
of money. This experiment may be varied as
follows : — Take an empty bason, and, along the
diameter of its bottom, fix marks at a small dis
tance from each other, then take it into a dark
room, and let in a ray of light ; and where this
falls upon the floor, place the bason, so that its
marked diameter may point towards the win
dow, and so that the beam may fall on the mark
most distant from the window. This done, fill
the bason with water, and the beam which be
fore fell upon the most distant mark, will now,
by the refractive power of the water, be turned
out of its straight course, and will fall two or
three or more marks nearer the centre of the
bason.

It is owing to the circumstance now stated,
that an oar partly in and partly out of the water
appears broken ; that objects appear distorted
when seen through a crooked pane of glass ; that
a fish in the water appears much nearer the sur
face than it actually is ; and that a skilful marks
man, in shooting at it, must aim considerably
below the place which it seems to occupy. It
is owins to (lie refractive power of the atmos
phere, that the sun is seen before he rises above
the horizon in the morning, and after he sinks
beneath it in the evening ; that we sometimes

see the moon, on her rising, totally eclipsed,
while the sun is still seen in the opposite part of
the horizon ; and that the stars and planets are
never seen in the places where they really are,
except when they are in the zenith, or point di*
rectly over our head.

Many affecting and fatal accidents have hap
pened, and are frequently recurring, particu
larly to children, and females in the higher ranks
of life, from their clothes catching Jire, most of
which might be prevented, were the two follow
ing simple facts universally known and practi
cally applied, that flame has a tendency to mount
upwards; and that air is essentially requisite for
supporting it. When the clothes of females
take fire, as the fire generally begins at the
lower parts of their dress, so long as they con
tinue in an upright posture the flames naturally
ascend, and meeting with additional fuel as
they rise, become more powerful in proportion ;
whereby the neck, the head, and other vital
parts of the body are liable to be most injured ;
and, by running from one part of the room to
another, or from one apartment to another, as is
most frequently the case, the air, which is the
fuel of fire, gains free access to every part of
their apparel, and feeds the increasing flame.
In such cases, the sufferer should instantly
throw her clothes over her head, and roll or lie
upon them, in order to prevent the ascent of the
flames and the access of fresh air. When this
cannot conveniently be effected, she may still
avoid great agony, and save her life, by throw
ing herself at full length on the floor, and rolling
herself thereon. Though this method may not,
in every case, completely extinguish the flame,
it will to a certainty retard its progress, and pre
vent fatal injury to the vital parts. When as
sistance is at hand, the by-standers should im
mediately wrap a carpet, a hearth-rug, a great
coat, or a blanket, around the head and body of
the sufferer, who should be laid in a recumbent
position, which will prove a certain preventive
from danger. During the year 1813, the author
noted down more than ten instances, recorded
in the public prints, of females who were burned
to death by their clothes catching fire, all of
which might have been prevented, had the sim
ple expedients now stated been resorted to and
promptly applied.

It may be remarked, in the next place, that
many of the diseases to which mankind are sub
ject — particularly fevers, smaL-pox, and other
infectious disorders — might be prevented by the
diffusion of knowledge in relation to their na
ture, their causes, and the means of prevention.
It cannot have been overlooked, in the view of
the intelligent observer, that fevers and other
infectious disorders generally spread with the
greatest facility and make the most dreadful
havoc among the lower orders of society. This
is owing, in part, to the dirty state in which

PREVENTION OF DISEASES AND ACCIDENTS.

31

their houses are kept, every part of which af
fords proper materials for the production and
detention of pestilential effluvia, and their igno
rance of the importance of pure atmospherical
air to animal life, and the consequent necessity
of daily ventilating their apartments. It is also
owing in a great measure te the custom of per
sons crowding into the chambers of those who
are labouring under such infectious diseases,
and thereby not only increasing the strength of
tho infectious virus, but absorbing a portion of
it in their own bodies, to spread its baleful in
fluence in a wider circle. Such a conduct fre
quently proceeds from a want of conviction of
the infectious nature of such disorders, and
from ignorance of the rapid manner in which
they are sometimes communicated from one to
another, as well as from that obstinacy and from
those inveterate prejudices which are always
the accompaniments of ignorance . Though the
cow-pox inoculation has been proved by experi
ence to be an effectual preventive of that loath
some and often fatal disorder, the small-pox, yet
numbers in the lower ranks of life cannot yet be
persuaded to use this simple preventive, and
will rather run the risk of experiencing all its
disagreeable and dangerous effects both on their
own persons and on those of their offspring.
Their obstinate preiudices, in thi> and similar
respects, are increased by their false views and
reasonings respecting the doctrine of the divine
decrees, and the providence of the Almighty.
They imagine, that to induce one species of
disease for the prevention of another is attempt
ing to take the government of the world out of
the hands of the Creator, and that no means of
preventing disorders can be of any avail, if the
Deity has otherwise decreed ; not considering
that the Almighty governs the world he has
created by regular and invariable laws, and ac
complishes his decrees through the intervention
of those secondary causes, both natural and
moral, which are continually operating in the
physical and intellectual world. Were general
knowledge more extensively diffused, and the
rainds of the multitude habituated to just prin
ciples and modes of reasoning, such fallacious
views and opinions would be speedily dissipated,
and consequently those physical evils and disor
ders which they produce would be in a great
measure prevented.

Again, to ignorance we must likewise attri
bute, in a great measure, the pernicious Affects
of contaminated air in dwelling-house*. Pure
air is essentially requisite to the health and
vigour of the animal system as wholesome food
and drink. When contaminated by stagnation,
by breathing, by fk-es or candles, it operates as
a slow poison, and gradually undermines the
human constitution ; yet nothing is less attended
t o in the economy of health by the great majo-
- ity of mankind. Because air is an invisible
3

substance, and makes little impression on the
organs of sense, they seem to act as if it had no
existence. Hence we find, that no attention is
paid by the lower orders of society to the p»o-
per ventilation of their apartments. In somo
cases, the windows of their houses are so fixed
in the walls as to be incapable of being opened ,
and in other cases, where the windows are
moveable, they are seldom opened, except by
accident, for weeks and months together ; and
were it not that a door and a chimney are to be
found in every habitable apartment, the air
would be rendered in many instances absolutely
unfit for respiration. Crowds of tailors, wea
vers, shoemakers, and other mechanics, em
ployed in sedentary occupations, are frequently
pent up in close, arid sometimes damp apart
ments, from morning till evening, without ever
thinking of opening their windows for a single
half hour for the admission of fresh air ; and
consequently, are continually breathing an at
mosphere highly impregnated with the noxious
gas emitted from the lungs, and the effluvia per
spired from their bodies, which js most sensibly
felt by its hot suffocating smell, when a person
from the open air enters into such apartments.
The sallow complexion of such persons plainly
indicates the enervating effects produced by the
air they breathe ; and although its pernicious
effects may not be sensibly felt, it gradually,
preys upon their constitutions, and often pro
duces incurable asthmas, fevers, consumptions,
and other dangerous disorders, which are fre
quently imputed to other causes. Nothing is
more easy than to open the windows of an
apartment, and other apertures that communi
cate with the external air, at meal hours, when
the room is empty, in order to expel the conta
minated air, and admit the pure vital fluid. No
me licine or restorative is cheaper or of more
importance to health and vigour than pure atmos
pherical air ; yet, because it costs nothing, it is
little regarded. Hints and admonitions in re
ference to this point are seldom attended to ;
for ignorance is always proud and obstinate,
and the inconveniences supposed, in certain
cases, to flow from the practice of ventilating
particular apartments are seldom attempted to
be remedied. It is, therefore, presumed, that
were a knowledge of the nature of the atmos
phere, of the ingredients that enter into its conrv-
position, of its indispensable necessity for the
support and invigoration of animal life, of the
circumstances by which it is deteriorated, and
of the baneful effects which are produced by its
contamination, more widely diffused, its use and
importance would be more du\v appreciated, and
the disorders which flow from the circumstances
now stated effectually prevented.*

* The following fact shows, n: an impressive man
ner, the danger arising from the want of a free cir
culation and frequent change '>f air. " In the lyinf

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Mii«:h benefit might also be prevented, were
a knowledge oj the means of restoring suspended
animation, in cases of drowning, strangulation,
&c., generally disseminated. As prompt mea
sures in such cases are absolutely necessary,
many fatal effects have happened from the delay
occasioned by medical assistance having been
at a distance ; which might have been prevented,
had the proper means of resuscitation been
known and immediately resorted to by the per
sons present at such a juncture. Were the na
ture and importance of the function of perspira
tion generally known and attended to, it might
likewise be the means of preventing those dis
eases and disasters which flow from making
sudden transitions from heat to cold, which are
the origin of many fatal disorders among the
labouring classes. If a man is thoroughly con
vinced that more than the one-half of what he
eats and drinks is thrown off by insensible per
spiration, he will at once see the importance of
avoiding every practice and every circumstance
\vhich has a tendency to obstruct the operations
of this important function.

The last example I shall mention, though not
of the least importance, is the fatal effects pro
duced by ignorance of the proper mode of treating
children during the first stages of infancy. It is a
fact deduced from the annual registers of the
dead, that one-half the number of children born,
die under seven years of age. This extraordi
nary mortality is universally imputed, by medi
cal writers, to wrong management during the
first and second years of their 'infancy, and the
practice of giving anodyne aromatic medicines.
Instead of clothing infants in such a manner as
to give free scope for the exercise of all the vital
functions, as soon as they are ushered into the
world, the midvvives and officious matrons fre
quently vie with each other to improve upon na
ture, by attempting to model the head and to
strengthen the limbs by the application of fillets,
rollers, and swaddling-bands, of several yards
in length ; thus loading and binding them with
clothes equal to their own weight, to the mani
fest injury of the motions of their bowels, lungs,
Umbs, and other animal functions. Instead of
covering the head with a thin single cap, and
Keeping the extremities in a moderate degree of

IB hospital of Dublin, two thousand nine hundred
and forty-four infants, put of seven thousand six
hundred and fifty, died in the year 1782, within the
first fortnight from their birth. They almost a!i
expired in convulsions ; many foamed at the mouth ;
their thumbs were drawn into the palms of their
hands ; their jaws were locked ; their faces swelled ;
and they presented, in a greater or less degree,
every appearance of suffocation. This last circum
stance at last produced an inquiry whether the
rooms were not too close and insufficiently venti
lated. The apartments of the hospital were ren
dered more airy ; and the consequence has been,
that the proportion of deaths, according to the re
gisters of succeeding /ears, is diminished from three

warmth, an opposite course is most frequenJN
pursued, which is supposed to be one among ttie
many existing causes of hydrocephalus or watei
in the brain. Instead of allowing the lirst milk
that is secreted, which nature has endowed with
a purgative quality, to stimulate the bowels, il*
is a common practice, immediately on the birth
of a child, to administer a variety of purgative
medicines in close succession, " as if," says a
modern writer, " to prove that it has arrived in
a world of physic and of evils." Instead o[
being exposed to the invigorating effects of pure
air, and kept in a moderate degree of tempera
ture, they are too frequently confined to a hot
contaminated atmosphere, which relaxes their
solids, impedes their respiration, and frequently
induces fatal convulsions.* These are but a few
examples out of many which could be produced
of the improper treatment of children, from
which multitudes of painful complaints and dan
gerous disorders derive their origin. It is
therefore reasonable to believe, that were ge
neral information on such topics extensively dis
seminated, and a more rational mode of nurture
during the first years of infancy adopted, not
only fatal disorders, but many subsequent, dis
eases in life, might either be wholly prevented,
or at least grft;it.ly mitigated.

We have likewise reason to conclude, that a
general dissemination of knowledge, by direct*
ing the mind to intellectual enjoyments, and
lessening the desire for sensual pleasures, would
lead to habits of sobriety and temperance. In
temperance has perhaps been productive of
more diseases, misery, and fatal accidents, than
all, the other causes I have now specified. It
has benumbed the intellectual faculties, debased
the affections, perverted the moral powers, de
graded man below the level of the brutes, and
has carried along with it a train of evils de
structive to the happiness of families, and to the
harmony and order of social life. Wherever
intemperance prevails, a barrier is interposed
to every attempt for raising man from the state
of moral and intellectual degradation into \\hich
he has sunk, and for irradiating his mind with
substantial knowledge. But were the mind in
early life imbued with a relish for knowledge
ard mental enjoyments, it would tend to with
draw it from those degrading associations and
pursuits which lead to gluttony, debauchery,
and clrunker.r.ess, and consequently prevent
those diseases, accidents, and miseries, which
invariably follow in their train. As the human
mind is continually in quest of happiness of one
description or another, so multitudes of the
young and inexperienced have been led to de
vote themselves to the pursuit of sensual plea
sures as their chief and ultimate object, because
they have no conception of enjoyment from any

• See the ^receding note.

PROGRESS OF GENERAL SCIENCE.

other quarter, and are altogether ignorant of the
refined' gratification which flows from intellec
tual pursuits. In the prosecution of knowledge,
the rational faculties are brought into exercise,
and sharpened and invigorated ; and when rea
son begins to hold the ascendancy over the de
sires and affections, there is less danger to be
apprehended that the mind will ever be com
pletely subjected to the control of the sensitive
appetites of our nature.

I might also ha"e stated, that, many physical
evils mi§ht be prevented, were mankind at large
acquainted with the characteristics of poisonous
plants : — the means of detecting mineral poi
sons, and the mode of counteracting their ef
fects ; — the proper mode of extinguishing fires,
and of effecting an escape, in cases of danger,
from that element ; — the precautions requisite to
be attended to in the management of steam-
engines,* &c. &c. But, as a minute acquaint
ance with some of these subjects supposes a
greater degree of knowledge than could reason
ably be expected in the general mass of society,
I shall not further enlarge. The few examples
I have selected will, it is presumed, be sufficient
to prove and illustrate the position stated in the
beginning of this section, " that knowledge
would, in many cases, prevent dangers, diseases,
and fatal accidents." If it be admitted, that
several hundreds of persons are annually de
stroyed by noxious gases, by the explosions of
fire-damp in coal-mines, by the stroke of light
ning, by their clothes catching fire, and other
accidents ; and that several thousands are, dur
ing the same period, carried off by infectious
diseases, and by those diseases which are the
effects of contaminated air, and an improper
mode of treatment during the first stages of in
fancy ; and if a general diffusion of knowledge
respecting the principles and facts adverted to
above would have a tendency to prevent one-half
the number of such physical evils as now hap
pen, it wiii follow, that several hundreds, if not
.thousands, of useful lives might annually be
preserved to the community, and a great pro
portion of human suffering prevented ; and if
so, the cause of humanity, as well as of science,
is deeply interested in the general diffusion of
useful knowledge among persons of every na
tion, and of every rank.

In the conclusion of this topic, it may be re
marked, that the knowledge requisite for the
purpose now specified is of easy acquisition.
It requires no peculiar strength or superiority
of genius, nor long and intricate trains of ab
stract reasoning ; but is capable of being ac
quired by any person possessed of common
sense, when his attention is once thoroughly
directed to its acquisition. As the food of the
body which is the most salutary and nourishing

* See Appendix. No, VOL
5

is the most easily procured, so that kind of
knowledge which is the most beneficial to man
kind at large, is in general the most easily ac
quired. Its acquisition would not in the least
interfere with the performance of their regular
avocations, as it could all be acquired at leisure
hours. It would habituate them to rational
reflections and trains of thought, and gradually
unfold to their view new and interesting objects
of contemplation. It would have a tendency to
prevent them from spending their hours of lei
sure in folly or dissipation, and would form an
agreeable relaxation from the severer duties of
active life.

SECTION III.

ON THE INFLUENCE WHICH A GENERAL DIF
FUSION OF KNOWLEDGE WOULD HAVE ON
THE PROGRESS OF GENERAL SCIENCE.

WE have already seen, that the diffusion of
knowledge among the general mass of society
would eradicate those false and superstitious
opinions which have so long degraded the hu-.
man intellect, would introduce just conceptions
of the attributes of the Deity, and of his opera
tions in the system of nature, and would avert,
or at least greatly mitigate, many of those phy
sical evils to which the human race has been
subjected. Although these were the only ad
vantages to be derived from the general disse
mination of knowledge, they would be sufficient
to warrant every exertion which the friends of
science and of humanity can make to accom
plish such an important object. But these are
only a few of the many beneficial results which
would, doubtless, flow from the progress of ra
tional investigations and scientific pursuits.
Knowledge, in its progress through the general
mass of society, and among the various tribes
of mankind, could not long remain confined
within its present boundaries, but would, in all
probability, enlarge its circumference nearly in
proportion to the extent of its diffusion. The
man of erudition and of science, who now ex
erts his influence and his talents to enlighten the
minds of his fellow-men, would be laying a
foundation for the expansion of his own intellec
tual views, and of those of his successors in the
same pursuits, in future generations. As a
small body of snow, by rolling, gradually accu
mulates to a large mass, so that portion of know
ledge we already possess, in its progress through
the various ranks of mankind, would have its
volume increased, and its present boundaries
extended, so that new scenes of intellectual
rision and enjoyment would be continually
opening to the view. In accordance with these

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

vie-vs, I shall now proceed to illustrate the

That a general diffusion of knowledge would
tend to the rapid advancement of universal act-
ence.

We are placed in the midst of a scene where
a vast multiplicity of objects solicits our atten
tion. Whether we look around on the surface
of the earth, or penetrate into its bowels, or
turn our eyes upwards to the surrounding at
mosphere and the vault of heaven, we perceive
an immense variety of beings, celestial and
terrestrial, animated and inanimated, continu
ally varying their aspects and positions, all dif
fering from each other in certain points of view,
yet connected together by various relations and
resemblances.

Science, in the most general and extensive
sense of the term, consists in a perception of
the resemblances and differences, or the rela
tions which these objects have to one another,
and to us as rational beings. To ascertain the
almost infinite number of relations which sub
sist among the immense variety of objects which
compose the material and intellectual universe,
requires an immense multitude of observations,
comparisons, and deductions to be made by a
vast number of observers placed in various cir
cumstances and positions ; or, in other •*rv^n,
the discovery of an immense number if A-f *.
All science may therefore be con^H?-*^ -v»
founded on fads • and perhaps there wofM bo
few exceptions to the truth of the position, were
we to assert, that the most sublime truths and
deductions, in every science, when stripped of
all their adventitious circumstances, simplified,
and expressed in the plainest and most perspi
cuous terms, maybe reduced to so many facts.
This position might be illustrated, were it ne
cessary, by an induction of particulars from the
various branches of mathematical and physical
science. That " a whole is greater than any
of its parts," — that " the square described on
the hypothenuse of a right-angled triangle is
equal to the sum of the squares described on its
rere*»V| ^des," are facts, the one deduced
frwn ^fwvation or simple intuition, the other
frnro % aeries of comparisons. That the sun is
tb« centre, around which the p/anetary bodies
wMrolve, — that a projectile describes a para
bolic curve, — that the velocities of falling bodies
are in proportion to the spaces run over, — that
fluids press in all directions, — that the pressure
of the atmosphere will support a column of
water to the height of above thirty feet, — that
the elastic spring of the air is equivalent to the
force which compresses it, — that the angle of
incidence of a ray of light is equal to the angle
of reflection, — that the north pole of one mag
net will attract the south pole of another, — that
the air we breathe is a composition of oxygen
ind nitrogen; and a variety of similar truths,—

are/ac<s, deduced either from simple observa
tion and experiment, or from a comparison of a
series of phenomena and experiments .vith eacn
other. Now, every comparison we make be
tween two or more objects or ideas, is an act of
the mind affirming a resemblance or a dis-
greement between the objects compared ; which
affirmation, if deduced from a clear view of the
objects presented to the mind or senses, is tha
declaration of a fact.

If the above sentiments are just, it will fol
low, that every person possessed of an ordinary
share of understanding, and whose organs of
sensation are in a sound state, is capable of ac
quiring all the leading truths of the most useful
sciences, since he enjoys the senses and facul
ties requisite for the observation of facts, and
for comparing them with one another. And if
such a person is capable of receiving into his
mind truths already ascertained, he is also, for
the same reason, qualified for discovering new
truths or facts, provided he be placed in such
circumstances as shall have a tendency to pre
sent the objects of his pursuit in the clearest
point of view ; that he have an opportunity of
surveying them on all sides, and that his atten
tion be firmly riveted on their several aspects
and relations. That one man, therefore, excels
another in these respects, is chiefly owing to
his mind being more particularly directed to the
contemplation of certain objects and relations,
and his mental faculties concentrated upon them
When a person, devoted to scientific investiga
tion, discovers a new fact, it is not, in the ma
jority of instances, because he possesses powers'
of intellect and organs of sensation superior to
the ordinary endowments of humanity, but be
cause he was placed in different circumstances,
and had his attention directed to different ob
jects, and was thus enabled to perceive rela
tions and combinations which had been either
unnoticed by others, or which were placed be
yond the range of their observation. Genius,
then, which is generally attributed to such cha
racters, may be considered as consisting in a
concentration of the rays of intellect upon any
particular object, art, or science, arising from a
lively taste we feei for that particular study. It
may be compared to a burning lens, where the
scattered rays of light are rendered powerful
by being collected into a point.

In so far, then, as we are able to direct the
faculties of the mind — however moderate a de
gree of vigour they may possess — to the fixed
contemplation of scientific objects, in so far may
we expect that new relations will be discovered,
and new truths elicited. Sir Isaac Newton waa
one day asked, " How he had discovered the
true system of the universe?" He replied,
" By continually thinking upon it." He was
frequently heard to declare, that " if he had
done the world any service, it was due to no-

ON THE PROMOTION OF SCIENCE.

thing but industry and patient thought, that he
kept the subject under consideration constantly
before him, and waited till the first dawning
ooened gradually, by little and little, into a full
arid clear light." Had this illustrious philoso
pher been born of barbarous parents in the wilds
of Africa, — had he been placed in circumstances
widely different from those in which he actually
existed, or had not his attention, by some casual
occurrence, been directed to the grand object
which he accomplished, in all probability, his
mind would never have ranged through the ce
lestial regions, nor have discovered the laws of
the planetary motions.

Many important scientific facts require only
a certain combination of circumstances to bring
them to the view of any common observer. To
discover the phases of the planet Venus, the
satellites of Jupiter, and the elliptical figure of
Saturn, after the telescope was invented, re
quired no uncommon powers either of vision or of
intellect in Galileo, who first brought these facts
to view, however superior the faculties he ac
tually possessed. It only required, that he had
a previous knowledge of the existence of these
planetary bodies, that his mind was interested
in the extension of science, and that he foresaw
a probability that new and interesting facts
might be discovered by directing his new in
vented instrument to the starry regions. And
when once he had descried from his observatory
«uch new celestial wonders, every other person
whose organs of vision were not impaired, with
a similar tube, might discover the same objects.
Yet, for want of the qualifications which Galileo
possessed, the telescope might have long re
mained in the hands of thousands before such
discoveries had b?en made ; and it is a fact,
that though the w^scope was in use a consider-,
able time before Galileo made his discoveries,
no person had previously thought of directing it
to the planets ; at any rate, no discoveries had
been made by it in the heavens.

The discovery of new truths in the sciences,
therefore, is not, in most instances, to he as
cribed to the exertions of extraordinary powers
of intellect ; but, in a great majority of cases,
to the peculiar series of events that may occur
in the case of certain individuals, to the various
circumstances and situations in which they may
be placed, to the different aspects in which cer
tain objects may be presented to their view, and
sometimes to certain casual hints or occur
rences which directed their attention to parti
cular objects. A spectacle-maker's boy, by an
accidental experiment, led to the invention of
the telescope ; the remark of a fountain- player,
who observed that water could rise only to thirty-
two feet in the tubes of a forcing engine, led
Galileo to calculate the gravity of the air.
Newton's attention was first directed to a pro-
Wid research into the laws of falling bodies,

by the circumstance of an apple falling upon th«
head, as he was sitting under a tree in his gar
den, which led to the discovery of the grand
principle which unites the great bodies of the
universe. The well-known M*. James Fer
guson, author of several popular treatises on
astronomy and mechanical philosophy, invented
a system of mechanics, and ascertained the
laws of the different mechanical powers, when
only eight years of age, and before he knew
that any treatise had ever been written on that
subject. The accidental circumstance of see
ing his father lift up the roof of his cottage, by
means of a prop and lever, first directed his
mind to these subjects, in which he afterwards
made many useful improvements.

If, then, it be admitted, that an extraordinary
degree of intellectual energy and acumen is not
necessary, in every instance, for making useful
discoveries, — that the concentration of the men
tal faculties on particular objects, and the va
rious circumstances in which individuals may
be placed, have led to the discovery of impor
tant facts, — it will follow, that the exertion of
the ordinary powers of intellect possessed by
the mass of society is sufficient for the purpose
of prosecuting scientific discoveries, and that the
more the number of scientific observers and expe
rimenters is increased among the inferior ranks
of society, the more extensively will interesting
facts and analogies be ascertained, from which
new and important principles of science may be
deduced.

An ample field still remains for the exertion of
all the energies of the human mind. The sci
ences are, as yet, far removed from perfection ;
some of them have but lately commenced their
progress, and some of their elementary prin
ciples still require to be established by future
observations. The objects of nature which
science embraces are almost infinite ; the ex
istence of many of these objects has not yet
been discovered, and much less their multiplied
relations and combinations. The researches of
ages are still requisite, in order thoroughly to
explore the universe, and bring to view its hid
den wonders. In order to bring to light, as
speedily as possible, the undiscovered truths of
science, we must endeavour to increase the
number of those who shall devote themselves,
either wholly or in part, to scientific investiga
tion and research. And, were this object at»
tained, in all probability, the number of useful
truths and facts which would be discovered,
would be nearly in proportion to the number of
those whose attention is directed to such re
searches.

This might be illustrated from the history of
the past progress of science. In those ages,
when only a few solitary individuals, here and
there, directed their attention to such pursuits,
little or no progress was made in the various

36

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

departments of human knowledge ; nay, some
times thev appeared to have taken a reirograde
course. During the dark ages, when the hu
man mind, fettered by papal tyranny and super
stition, and absorbed in sensual gratifications,
seldom made excursions into the regions of sci
ence, no useful discoveries were brought to
light, — science was not only at a stand, but the
knowledge and improvements of preceding ages
were even in danger of being entirely oblite
rated. But no sooner had the human intellect
burst its fetters, and the number of rational in
vestigators begun to increase, — no sooner had
they formed themselves into regular associ
ations for scientific purposes, than Science and
Art were aroused from the slumber of ages,
and began to move forward towards perfection
with accelerated progress. This may easily
be traced by those who have attended to the
history of science during the last 160 years.
About the commencement of this period, the
Academy of Sciences at Paris, and the Royal
Society of London, were established. These
soon gave birth to similar societies in almost
every country in Europe ; and there can be no
doubt, that the advanced state of knowledge in
the present day is chiefly to be attributed to the
investigations and discoveries made by the
members of those associations, to their joint co
operation in the propagation of useful know
ledge, and to the stimulus they afforded to intel
lectual pursuits.

Would we then accelerate the march of sci
ence far beyond the rate of its past and present
progress, — would we wish to extend its range
far beyond its present boundaries, nothing is so
likely to effectuate this end, as an increase of
the number of scientific experimenters and ob
servers. Let a certain portion of rational in
formation be imparted to the great mass of man
kind, — let intellectual acquirements be exhi
bited to them as the noblest objects of pursuit,
and let them be encouraged to form associations,
for the purpose of mutual improvement and sci
entific research. By these means their atten
tion would oe directed to intellectual improve
ment, a taste would be excited for rational in
vestigations, which would stimulate them to
make farther progress ; they would soon feel an
interest in the objects of science ; they would
listen with pleasure to the accounts of disco
veries which are gradually brought to light
throughout the different regions of physical in
vestigation ; and would be stimulated, from a
laudable ambition of distinguishing themselves
as discoverers, as well as from an innate love
to the pursuit of knowledge, to observe those
facts, to make those researches, and to institute

tific investigators now existing, twenty thousand
were employed in surveying the various locali
ties, aspects, and operations of nature, in the
animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, on
the surface of the earth and the ocean, and in
the celestial regions, — hundreds of new fact*
would, in all probability, be brought to light
for one that is now discovered by the present
contracted circle of scientific men ; from which
new ami important conclusions in the arts and
sciences might be deduced.

Nor let it be objected, that the great bulk oi'
mankind, particularly the middling and the
lower ranks of society, are incapable of making
any important discoveries in science. If what
we have already stated be correct, they are
possessed of all the essential requisites, not only
for acquiring the elementary principles of know
ledge, but also for penetrating beyond the circle
which marks the present boundaries of science.
They are all organized in nearly the same man
ner, (a few insulated individuals only excepted,)
and, consequently, have nearly an equal apti
tude for the exercise of conception, judgment,
and ratiocination. They have the same organs
of sensation, and the same powers of intellect,
as persons in the highest ranks of society.
The grand scene of the universe is equally open
to peasants and mechanics, as to princes and
legislators ; and they have the same opportu
nities of making observations on the phenomena
of nature, and the processes of art, — nay, in
many instances, their particular situations, and
modes of life, afford them peculiar advantages
in these respects, which are not enjoyed by per
sons of a superior rank. In short, they have
the same innate curiosity and taste for relishing
such investigations, provided the path of know
ledge be smoothed before them, and their at
tention thoroughly directed to intellectual ac
quisitions.

Nor, again, should it be objected, that an at
tention to such objects, and an exquisite relish
for mental enjoyments, would unfit them for trie
ordinary duties of active life. Every man,
under a well-regulated government, enjoys a
certain portion of leisure from the duties of his
station, which, in too many instances, is wasted
either in listless inaction, or in the pursuits of
folly and dissipation. This leisure is all that is
requisite for the purpose in view. It would
only be requisite that, during its continuance,
the train of their thoughts should be directed
into a channel which would lead them to more
pleasing associations, and more substantial
pleasures, than the general current of human
thought is calculated to produce. That those
who are in the habit of exercising their facultiei

those experiments, that might have a tendency on rational subjects are thereby^rendered moro

to enlarge the circle of human know.__o_.
Were the number of such persons increased but

unfit for the common business of life, it would
be absurd to suppose. He who habitually ex-

thousand-fold, so that for every twenty scien- ercises his judgment on scientific objects, is

ON THE PROMOTION OP SCIENCE.

37

gra>JuJly improving his mental powers, and
must, from this very circumstance, be better
qualified than others for exercising them in his
particular trade or profession. For the habit of
exerting the intellectual faculties in any one
department, must necessarily fit them for vigor
ous exertion on any other object, whether me
chanical, agricultural, social, or domestic, to
which the attention may be directed. The
evils which at present derange the harmony of
society, so far from arising from a vigorous ex
ertion of intellect, are to be ascribed, for the
most part, to an opposite cause. The intellec
tual powers, in the case of the great bulk of
mankind, lie in a great measure dormant, their
energies are not sufficiently exerted in any de
partment of active life ; and when occasionallv
roused from their inactivity, they are too fre
quently exercised in the arts of deception, of
mischief, and of human destruction. To direct
the current of human thought, therefore, into a
different channel, besides its influence on the
progress of science, would be productive of
many happy effects on the social and moral
condition of mankind ; and, as far as my expe
rience goes, with a very few exceptions, I have
found, that those who are addicted to rational
pursuits are the most industrious and respect
able members of civil and Christian society.

The above hints have been thrown out with
the intention of showing, that, as all science is
Bounded on facts, and as every person possessed
of the common organization of human nature is
capable of observing facts, and of comparing
them with one another, — as the discovery of
new truths is owing more to the concentration
of the mental faculties on particular objects, and
to several accidental circumstances, than to the
exertion of extraordinary powers of intellect, —
and as the sciences have generally improved in
proportion to the number of those who have de
voted themselves to their cultivation, — so there
is every reason to conclude, that the diffusion
of general knowledge and of scientific taste,
and consequently, the increase of scientific ob
servers, would ensure the rapid advancement of
the ditferent sciences, by an increase of the
facts in relation to them which would thus be
discovered.

_ I shall now endeavour to illustrate the posi
tions stated above, by a few examples in relation
to two or three of the physical sciences.

Geology. — This science is yet in its infancy ;
and some of its first principles require to be con
firmed and illustrated by an induction of an im
mense number of facts of various descriptions.
It is a branch of knowledge altogether founded
upon facts palpable to the eye of every common
observer. Its object is, to investigate the inter
nal structure of the earth, — the arrangement of
Us component parts,— the chances which its

materials have undergone since its original for
mation, — and the causes which have operated
in the production of these changes. To deter
mine such objects, it is requisite that an im
mense variety of observations be made on the
form, position, and arrangement of mountains,
— on the beds of rivers, — the interior of ca
verns, — the recesses of ravines,— the subterra«
neous apartments of mines, — the fissures and
chasms which abound in Alpine districts, — and
even on the bottom of the ocean, in so far as it
can be explored ; and that a multitude of facts
be collected in relation to the materials and po
sition, the elevation and inflexion, the fraction
and dislocation of the earth's strata — calcareous
petrifactions — metallic veins — decomposed rocks
— mosses — rivers — lakes — sand-banks — sea-
coasts — the products of volcanoes — the com
position of stone, sand, and gravel — the organic
remains of animal and vegetable matter, — in
short, that the whole surface of the terraqueous
globe, and its interior recesses, be contemplated
in every variety of aspect presented to the view
of man. The observations hitherto made in
reference to such multifarious objects have been
chiefly confined to a few regions of the earth,
and the facts which have been ascertained with
any degree of precision, have been collected,
chiefly by a few individuals, within the last fifty
or sixty years. From such partial and limited
researches, general principles have been de
duced, and theories of the earth have been
framed, which could only be warranted by a
thorough examination of every region of tho
globe. Hence one theory of the earth has suc
cessively supplanted another for more than a
century past. The theories of Burnet, Whis-
ton, Woodward, Buffbn, and Whitehurst, have
each had its day and its admirers, but all of
them are now fast sinking into oblivion, and in
the next age will be viewed only as so many
philosophical rhapsodies, and ingenious fcrrions
of the imagination, which have no solid founda
tion in the actual structure of the earth. Even
the foundations of the Huttonian and Wernerian
systems, which have chiefly occupied the atten
tion of geologists during the last thirty years,
are now beginning to be shaken, and new sys
tems are constructing composed of the frag
ments of both. One principal reason of thin
diversity of opinion respecting the true theory
of the earth, undoubtedly is, that all the facts
in relation to the external and internal structure
of our globe have never yet been thoroughly ex
plored. Instead of retiring to the closet, and
attempting to patch up a theory with scattered
and disjointed fragments, our province, in the
mean time, is, to stand in the attitude of sur-
vpvors and observers, to contemplate every as
pect which terrestrial nature presents, to collect
the minutest facts which relate to the object in
view, and then leave to succeeding generation*

33

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

the task of constructing a theory from the ma
terials we thus prepare.

Were we now to suppose, that, instead of one
observer of geological facts that now exists,
thousands were distributed throughout the dif
ferent continents and islands, having their minds
occasionally directed to such investigations ;
that the miners and labourers in coal-pits, iron-
mines, and quarries, not only in Europe, but
throughout Mexico and Peru, in the East and
West Indies, in Canada, in New Holland, in
Southern Africa, in the ranges of the Alps, the
Andes, the Himalayas, and other quarters, ob
served with attention the various phenomena of
nature subject to their inspection, with this ob
ject in view ; that sailors, missionaries, and tra
vellers of every description, contemplated the
different aspects of nature in the regions through
which they passed, and recorded the facts which
came under their observation, for a similar pur
pose ; and could we still farther suppose, that
the great body of mankind in every clime might,
at no distant period, have their minds directed
to similar subjects, there cannot be the least
doubt but an immense multitude of important
facts would soon be accumulated, which would
throw a striking light on the constitution of our
planetary globe, and on the changes and revolu
tions through which it has passed, which would
form a broad basis for the erection of a true
theory of the earth, and tend either to establish
or to overthrow the hypotheses which have hi
therto been framed. Persons in the lower
spheres of life have, in many cases, more fre
quent opportunities of ascertaining facts of the
description to which I allude, than many others
who are placed in an elevated rank. Colliers,
quarriers, miners of every description, and the
inhabitants of Alpine districts, are almost daily
in contact with objects connected with geolo
gical research ; and it is only requisite that their
attention be directed to such inquiries — that the
knowledge of a few elementary terms and prin
ciples be imparted to them — that they be di
rected to classify the facts which fall under their
observation — and that a systematic list of que
ries, such as those published some years ago by
the London " Geological Society," be put into
their hands.*

* The queries to which I refer may be seen in the
"Monthly Magazine" for June 1817, pp. 436—9. A
few years ago, some interesting fossil remains, sup
posed to be the teeth and other bones of the extinct
animal designated by the name of Mammoth, were
almost entirely destroyed through the ignorance of
some labourers in the parish of Horley, who hap
pened to hit upon them when digging gravel. After
--leaving them to pieces with their pick-axes, and
finding it added nothingto their store of knowledge,
"they threw away the fragments among the heaps
of gravel, and the subject was consigned to obli
vion ; and it was only by accident that two entire
'.eeth were found by a gentleman in the neighbour-
nood. The bones supposed to have been either de-
•troyed or lost, are a very large bone, supposed to

Natural History. — It is evident that the ex
tension and improvement of this department ol
knowledge depends almost entirely on obse' Ca
tion. Although a considerable accession has
of late years been made to our knowledge in this
branch of study, yet much still remains to be
accomplished before all the objects it emb.-aceg
be thoroughly explored. Our acquaintance with
the zoology, botany, and mineralogy of New
Holland, Polynesia, Birmah, China, Tartary,
Thibet, Africa, and America, is extremely li
mited ; and even within the limits of Europe,
numerous unexplored regions still lie open to the
future researches of the natural historian. So
numerous are the objects and investigations
which natural history presents, that although its
cultivators were increased ten thousand-fold,
they would find sufficient employment in the
prosecution of new discoveries for many centu
ries to come. Even those minute objects, in the
animal and vegetable kingdoms, which lie be
yond the natural sphere of human vision, and
which the microscope alone can discover, woulq
afford scope for the investigations of thousands
of ingenious inquirers, during an indefinite series
of ages. And it ought never to be forgotten,
that every new object and process we are ena
bled 'o trace in this boundless field of observa
tion, presents to us the Deity in a new aspect,
and enables us to form more enlarged concep
tions of that power and intelligence which pro
duced the immense assemblage of beings with
which we are surrounded.

Independently of the additions that might be
made to our knowledge of animals, vegetables
and minerals, there are several facts in natural
history which miirht be more precisely ascer
tained and explained, were common labourers
and others in the same rank of life inspired with
the spirit of philosophical observation. For the
illustration of this, I shall state only one parti
cular circumstance. It is a fact, which, how
ever inexplicable, must be admitted, that toads
have been found alive in the heart of solid rocks,
and in the trunks of trees, where they have
been supposed to have existed for ages without
any apparent access to nourishment or to air.
Such facts are supported by so numerous and
so respectable authorities, that it would be vain
to call in question their reality ; and they as
sume a more mysterious aspect, from the cir
cumstance, that toads, when placed in the ex
hausted receiver of an air-pumpx like all other
animals, soon lose their existence. That the

have been a thigh-bone ; a huge blade-bone ; and a
tusk of ivory, perfect in its form, described as being
about half a rod in length." Had these labourers
been aware of the interesting nature of such fossils,
they might have been all preserved entire ; and this
circumstance shows how important such occur
rences, and the observations and researches of com
mon labourers, might sometimes prove to the geolo
gist and the general bvudent of nature.

ON THE PROMOTION OF SCIENCE.

load is not the only animal which has been found
in similar instances, appears from a notice in
the Monthly Magazine for April 1817, which
states, that " a large lizard or serpent was found
by some miners, imbedded in a stratum of mi
neral substance, and lived for some time after it
was extricated." As the mineral substance in
which this animal was found was at the bottom
of a deep mine, and connected with the surround
ing strata, we are almost under the necessity of
concluding, that it must have existed in that state
for many years. Now, it is proper to take into
consideration, that such facts have been disco
vered, in the first instance, by labourers, quar-
riers, miners, and others engaged in laborious
occupations, who, with the limited knowledge
they presently possess, are unqualified for at
tending to all the circumstances which require
to be noticed in conducting philosophical re
searches. Were persons of this description
accustomed to examine every uncommon occur
rence of this kind with a philosophic eye ; were
they, in such cases as those to which I have
now referred, to examine, with accuracy, whe
ther chinks or fissures, either horizontal or per
pendicular, existed in the rocks, or were con
nected with the. holes or vacuities of the old
trees, where Dads were found alive ; and were
every other circumstance, which a scientific in
vestigator would take into account, accurately
observed and recorded, such observations might
ultimately lead to some rational explanations of
such unaccountable facts. At any rate, as
those who belong to that class of society to
which I allude, have many opport unties of con
templating the various objects and operations of
the material world, their accumulated observa
tions, when scientifically directed, could not fail
of enlarging our knowledge of facts in several
departments of the history of nature.

Meteorology. — {n this department of physical
science, numerous facts still remain to be ascer
tained, before we can attempt to explain the
causes of various interesting phenomena. We
have hitherto been unable to collect with preci
sion all the facts in relation to the diversified
phenomena of the atmosphere, and are still at
a loss to explain, on known principle*, the causes
-.vhich operate in producing many atmospherical
appearances. We are still in a great measure
ignorant of the aurora boreilix, with respect to
its nature and origin, its distance from the sur
face of the earth, what precise connexion it has
with the magnetic and electric fluids, and why
it has been frequently seen at some periods, and
been invisible at others. We are in a similar
state of ignorance in regard to luminous and
fiery meteors, — as to their different species and
varieties, the velocity and direction of their mo
tions, the.ir influence on other atmospherical phe
nomena, on vegetation, and on the weather, and
the principles in nature which operate in their

production. Although the general cause of
thundfr-storms is in some measure ascertained,
yet we are ignorant of the causes of a variety of
phenomena with which they are sometimes ac>
companied, and of some of the chymical agents
by which they are produced. To determine the
origin of meteoric stones, the particular regions
in which they are produced, the causes of their
extreme velocity, the oblique direction of their
motion, and the agents which concur in their
formation, has hitherto baffled the researches of
the whole philosophical world. Even the nature
of the clouds, their various modifications, their
different electric states, the causes which com
bine to produce their precipitation into rain, the
nature of evaporation, together with an immense
number of facts requisite for laying the founda
tion of a correct theory of the weather, are still
hid in obscurity.

It is obvious, that a thorough knowledge of
atmospherical phenomena cannot be acquired,
before we have ascertained not only the parti
cular facts and appearances connected with the
atmosphere, but all the preceding, concomitant,
and consequent circumstances with which they
are generally accompanied ; and to determine
such particulars requires an immense variety of
observations, both by day and by night, through
all the regions of the earth. Before such facts
be more fully ascertained, our attempts to ac
count for various atmospherical phenomena must
prove unsatisfactory and abortive. Hence, the
causes assigned by philosophers of the last cen
tury for the production of rain, hail, dew, fire
balls, and other meteors, are now considered nu
gatory and erroneous ; and few will be bold
enough to maintain that we have yet arrived at
the knowledge of the true causes. If these
sentiments be admitted, it will follow, that an in
creased number of observers of the scenery of
the atmosphere, in different climates, with a sci
entific object in view, could not fail of increasing
our knowledge both of the phenomena which
take place in the regions of the atmosphere, and
of tae powers of nature which operate in their
production

With respect to the aurorae boreales, some
data might be ascertained for determining their
height above the surface of the earth, which
might lead to a discovery of their true causa,
were a multitude of observers, in different places,
at the same moment, to take the altitude and
bearing of any particular coruscation, particu
larly of the modification of this phenomenon
which assumes the form of a rainbow or lumi
nous arch, which can instantly be done by noting
the series of stars which appear about the mid
dle or sides of the arc at any particular instant.
By this means the parallactic angle might be
found, and the distances of the places of obser
vation, or their difference of latitude, if direct'y
north and south of each other, would form bast

40

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

lines for determining the perpendicular elevation
of iM phenomenon. In reference to luminous
meteors, as they are most frequently seen in The
night-time, men of science and persons of ele
vated rank have seldom opportunities of observ
ing their diversified phenomena, and the circum
stances with which they are preceded and ac
companied. But while persons of this class
are reclining on beds of down, or regaling them
selves at the festive board, hemmed in from the
view of the surrounding skv by the walls and
curtains of their splendid apartments, many in
the lower walks of life are "keeping watch by
night," or travelling from place to place, who
have thus an opportunity of observing every
variety of atmospherical phenomena ; and it is
not unlikely may have seen several species of
luminous and fiery meteors unknown to the sci
entific world. Were persons of this descrip
tion, particularly watchmen, soldiers, sailors,
mail-coach guards, policemen, and such like,
capable of observing such appearances with
scientific interest and accuracy, and of record
ing their observations, various important addi
tions might be made to the facts which compose
the natural history of the atmosphere.

Similar additions mi<jht be made to our know
ledge of thunder-storms, were their phenomena
and concomitant circumstances accurately noted
by a vast, number of persons in different places.
ft mijht, for example, be determined, from a
multitude of observations made with this special
object in view, — at what distance from the earth
a thunder-cloud may explode without danger?
— in what circumstances, and at what elevation
it generally attains its striking distance, and
brings us within the range of its destructive in
fluence ? — what particular effects, hitherto un
observed, are produced by lightning on animal,
vegetable, and mineral substances? — to what
practical purposes its agency might be applied,
— and how its destructive ravages might be
averted or diminished ? The same remarks
will apply to the singular phenomenon of mete
oric stones. These have seldom been observed
at the instant of their descent by men addicted
to philosophical research ; but chiefly by pea
sants, labourers, and mechanics, who, at pre
sent, are generally unqualified for attending to
every circumstance in the preceding and conco
mitant phenomena connected with their descent,
with the discerning eye of a philosopher ; and
therefore, we may still be ignorant of certain
important facts in the history of the fall of these
bodies, which may long prevent us from form
ing any rational theory to explain their causes,
or to determine the regions whence their origin
is derived.

Astronomy. — My next illustration shall be
taken from the science of astronomy. Though
this is among the oldest of 'he sciences, and its
general principles are established with greater

precision than those of almost any other depart-
ment of science, yet many dcsiderat.a requisite
to its perfection, still remain to be ascertained.
The late discovery of several new planets, both
primary and secondary, leads us to conclude,
that other globes of a similar nature, belonging
to our system, may still lie hid in the* distant
spaces of the firmament. The spheroidal figure
of some of the planets — their periods of rota
tion — the nature of the changes which appear to
take place on their surfaces or in their atmos
pheres — the precise nature of the solar spots,
the causes of their changes, and the influence
which those changes produce on our earth or at
mosphere — the parallax of the fixed stars — the
rate of motion of the planetary system in abso
lute space — the gradual formation of nebuise —
the nature of variable stars — the number of co
mets, their periods, the nature of their tails and
atmospheres, and their uses in the system of
nature — with many other interesting particulars
of a similar description, still remain to be ascer
tained. To determine such objects, requires a
multiplicity of long-continued observations in
every region of the heavens ; and it must be
evident, that the more we increase the number
of astronomical observers, the greater chance
we shall have of acquiring a more accurate and
comprehensive knowledge of the bodies which
roll in the distant regions of the universe, and
of the relations they bear to one another, and to
the whole system of nature.

This position might be illustrated by a few
examples. The surface of Jupiter has been
found to be diversified with a variety of spots
and belts : the belts, which are considerably
darker than the general surface of the planet,
are observed to vary in their number, distance,
and position. Sometimes only one or two, and
sometimes seven or eight belts have been ob
served ; sometimes they are quite distinct, and
at other times they seem to run into each other ;
and, in some instances, the whole surface of this
planet has appeared to be covered with small
curved belts that were not continuous across his
disk.

The following figures represent some of the
diversified views which Jupiter sometimes ex*
hibits.

Fig. 1, is copied from Dr. Long, and appears
to be one of the views of this planet taken Ly
the celebrated Cassini. It consists of about
nine different belts. Fig. 2, is copied from
Schroeter, and exhibits a view of Jupiter about
the time of its occultation by the moon, on the
7th of April 1792. Fig. 3, is one of Sir W.
Herschel's views of this planet, as it appeared
on the 28th May 1780, when the whole disk of
Jupiter appeared covered with small curved
belts, or rather lines, that were not continuous
across his disk. Fig. 4, contains a view which
is nt-arly the appearance which Ju«»f«.r exhioits

ON THE PROMOTION OF SCIENCE.

4J

at present, and which is not much different from
iris appearance for several years past. These
appearances may be seen by a good achroma
tic telescope, magnifying from 80 to 150 times.
These views demonstrate, that changes of con
siderable magnitude are occasionally taking
place, either on the surface or in the atmosphere
of this planet, which it would be of some impor
tance to ascertain, in order to our acquiring a
more intimate knowledge of the physical consti
tution of this globe. Now, were a number of
observers, in different places, to mark these ap
pearances, and to delineate the aspect of this
planet during the space of two or three periodi
cal revolutions,* marking the periods of the dif-
feient changes, and noting at the same time the
positions of his satellites — it might be ascer
tained, whether these changes are occasioned
by tides, which are differently affected accord
ing to the position of his moon?, or, by immense
strata of clouds, or other changes that take
place in his atmosphere, or by some great phy
sical revolutions which are occasionally agita
ting the surface of this planet. The observers
of such facts behoovod to be numerous, in order

•The annual or periodical revolution of Jupiter is
completed in about eleven years and ten months.
6

that the deficiencies of one might be supplied by
another, and the general conclusions deduced
from a comparison of all the observations taken
together ; and it would be requisite, that the
places of observation be in different countries,
that the deficiency of observations in one place,
occasioned by a cloudy atmosphere, might be
compensated by those made in the serene sky
of another. Such a series of observations, al
though they should not lead to satisfactory con
clusions in relation to the particulars now stated,
could scarcely fail of throwing some additional
light on the nature and constitution of this
planet.

With respect to the planet Venus, the author
some time ago ascertained from observation,!
that this planet may be distinctly seen in the
day-time, at the time of its superior conjunction
with the sun, when it presents to the earth a
full enlightened hemisphere ; provided its geo
centric latitude, or distance from the sun's
centre at the time be not less than 1° 43/. This
is the only position (except at the time of a
transit, which happens only once or twice in a

+ See Nicholson's Phil. Journal, vol. xxxvi. for
Oct. 1813.— Edin. Phil. Journal, No. v. for July 1820.
-Monthly Mag. Feb. 1814, and August 1820, p. 62.—
Scots Magazine for 1814, p. 84, &c

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE,

nundred years) in which the polar and equato
rial diameters of this planet can be measured,
and their difference, if any, ascertained, so as
to determine whether its fr re, like that of tl
earth and several other pickets, be sphere'
But as this planet may not happen for ;
of years to be in the precise position for s
observation, the attempt to determine the points
now stated, even when the planet happens to be
placed in the requisite circumstances, would, in
all probability, fail, if a number of observers at
the same time, in different places, were not en
gaged in the observation ; on account of the
uncertainty of enjoying a serene sky at one par
ticular place, during the moments when the ob
servation behooved to be made. Whereas, by
a multitude of observations in different places,
the object in view could not fail of being deter
mined. The disputes respecting the period of
rotation of this planet (whether it be 23 hours
20 minutes, or 24 days 8 hours) might also be
settled, were a number of persons to observe its
surface with equatorial telescopes in the day
time ; particularly in those southern climes
wnere the air is serene, and the sky exhibits a
deep azure, where, in all probability, spots
would be discovered, which could be traced in
their motions for successive periods of twelve
hours or more, which would determine to a cer
tainty the point in question.

The following figure and explanation will per
haps tend to show the reason of the dispute
which has arisen in reference to this point. Let
A represent a spot on the surface of Venus.

As this planet is seen, by the naked eye, only
in the morning a little before sun-rise, or in the
evening a short time after sun-set — the motion
of the spot cannot be traced above an hour or
two in succession ; and, consequently, during
that time, its progressive motion is almost im
perceptible. Suppose the observation to have
been made in the evening, after sun-set, the

nex* jservation cannot be made till about th«

?• time, on the following evening, when it is

1 that the spot has moved from A to B.

it is s'ill uncertain whether the spot has only

/ed from A to B, since the last observation,

r has finished a complete revolution, and moved
ihe distance A B as part of another revolution
round the axis of the planet. This point can
only be ascertained by tracing the motion of the
spot without interruption for 10, 12, or 14 hours,
when, if the rotation is performed in 23J hours,
the motion of the spot could be traced without
interruption across the whole disk of the planet.
But such an observation could only be made in
the day-time, in a serene sky, and by means of
equatorial instruments, and by numbers of ob
servers in different places, where the attention is
directed to the same object. But the limits to
which I am confined, in throwing out these cur
sory hints, prevent me from entering into minute
details.

In regard to comets, it is scarcely necessary
to remark, that were the number of those whose
attention is directed to a survey of the heavens
considerably increased, many of those eccentric
bodies, which pass and repass within the orbits
of the planets without being perceived, could not
fail of being detected. AVere multitudes of such
persons engaged in exploring the celestial re
gions, on opposite sides of the globe, those co
mets which pass within the limits of our view,
and which are above our horizon only in the
day-time, and consequently invisible, would be
detected, during the night, by our antipodes in
the opposite regions of the globe. By this
means the number of those bodies belonging to
our system, the diversified phenomena they pre
sent, the form of their trajectories, the periods
of their revolutions, the nature of their tails, and
their ultimate destination, might be more accu
rately determined. With respect to the Jixed
stars, particularly those termed variable stars,
the results of a multitude of observations made
by different persons, might lead us to determine,
whether those changes in brightness which they
undergo, arise from the transits of 'arge planets
revolving around them, and thus furnish direct
evidence of their being the centres of systems
analogous to our own, — or whether they be oc
casioned by large spots which periodically inter
pose between our sight, and then disappear in
the course of their rotation, — or whether the
distance of such stars be changed by their re
volving in a long narrow ellipse, whose trans
verse axis is situated nearly in our line of vi
sion. In the several instances now slated, an
immense variety of successive observations, by
numerous observers at different stations, are re
quisite to accomplish the ends in view ; but the
limits of this section prevent me from entering
into those details requisite for rendering the
hints now suggested perspicuous to those whc

ON THE PROMOTION OF SCIENCE.

nave not devoted their attention to this sub
ject.

The Moon being the nearest celestial body
to the earth, if, might have been expected that
th« variety of scenery on her surface, and even
some parts of her physical constitution, might
have been ascertained and delineated. Yet all'
that has hitiierto been discovered with certainty
in relation to this body is, that her surface is
strikingly diversified with mountains and valleys,
with vast caverns or hollows surrounded with
mountainous ridges, and with several elevated
peaks, which rise, like a sugar loaf, from the
middle of the plains. We have no accurate
delineation of the lunar scenery, as exhibited in
the various stages of the moon's increase and
decrease, except those which have been pub
lished by Hevelius and Schroeter, which have
never been translated into our language, and,
consequently, are very little known. Most of
our English books on astronomy contain nothing
more than a paltry and inaccurate view of the
full moon, which has been copied by one en
graver from another, without any improvements,
ever since the days of Ricciolus, and long before
the telescope was brought to its present state of
i-nprovement. It is not from a telescopic view
of the full moon that any specific deductions
can he made respecting the appearance and
arrangement of her diversified scenery ; but
from long-continued observations of her surface
about the period of the quadratures, and at the
times when she assumes a crescent or a gibbous
phase ; for it is only at such times that the sha
dows of her cavities and mountain-ridges can
be distinctly perceived. As there is none of the
celestial bodies whose constitution and scenery
we have so excellent an opportunity of inspect
ing, had we a sufficient number of astronomical
observers, furnished with good telescopes, the
surface of this globe might be almost as accu
rately delineated as that of the earth, and the
most prominent changes that take place on its
surface plainly detected. In order to bring to
light the minute parts of its scenery, it would
only be requisite to distribute the entire surface
of this luminary among a hundred or a thousand
observers, allotting to each one or more spots as
the particular object of his attention, with the
understanding, that he is to inspect them with
care through every variety of shade they may
exhibit, and during the different stages of the
moon's increase and decrease, and delineate
the different aspects they may present. When
we consider that, by means of a telescope which
magnifies 200 times, an object on the moon that
measures only 600 yards may be perceived as a
visible point, and by one which magnifies 800
times, an object not larger than 150 yards in
diameter may be distinguished — we can scarcely
entertain a doubt, that a number of interesting
discoveries n.ight soon be made on the lunar

surface, were such minute observations as thftse

now suggested to be continued for a series of

years, which might afford sensible and demon-

str evidence o the moon's being a habi-

t" jrld. But bvi'ore attention to such ob"

iome general, and f.he number of astro-

. . observers be increased far beyond what

it is at present, such discoveries can scarcely De

expected.

I shall only remark farther on this head, thai
several discoveries have been made by accident
ally directing a telescope to certain parts of the
heavens. It is well known that Miss Herschell,
while amusing herself in looking at the heavens
through Sir William Herschell's telescope, dis
covered at different times a variety of comets,
which might otherwise have passed unnoticed
by the astronomical world ; and several of the
new planets which have been discovered within
the last 50 or 60 years, were detected when the
discoverers were employed making observations
with a different object in view. The splendid
comet which appeared in our hemisphere in
1811, was first discovered in this country by a
sawyer,* who, with a reflecting telescope of his
own construction, and from his sawpit as an ob
servatory, descried that celestial visitant before
it had been noticed by any other astronomer in
North Britain. The author of this work de
tected this comet a day or two afterwards, be
fore he had been informed of the discovery,
while he was taking a random sweep over the
northern region of the heavens. He had di
rected his telescope to a certain star in the
neighbourhood of Ursa Major, and immediately
afterwards, taking a general sweep upwards and
downwards, and to the east and west, an un
common object appeared in the field of view,
which, after a little inspection, was perceived to
be a comet, and he naturally concluded that he
had made the first discovery, till the newspapers
afterwards informed him that it had been de
tected a day or two before. It was while Sir
W. Herschell was inspecting some small stars
near the foot of Castor, with a different object
in view, that he discovered the planet which
bears his name, and which he at first took for a
comet. It had been seen thirty years before,
but for want of numerous observers to mark its
motions, it had been marked in catalogues as a
fixed star. It was while Mr. Harding of Lili-
enthal, near Bremen, was forming an atlas of
the stars so far as the eighth magnitude, that. '
on the 1st September 1804, he discovered in
the constellation Pisces the planet Juno, one of
the four asteroids situated between the orbits of
Mars and Jupiter.

If, therefore, instead of a few individuals oc
casionally engaged in surveying celestial phe-

• The name of this gentleman Is Mr. Veitch, and
I believe he resides in the neighbourhood of Kelao.

44

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

nomena, and chiefly confined to a small portion
•>f Europe, — were thousands and ten thousands
3f telescopes daily directed to the sky from every
region of the earth, and were distinct portions
of the heavens allotted to distinct classes of ob
servers, as the object of their more immediate
research, every portion of that vast concave,
with the numerous globes which roll within its
wide circumference, as far as human vision as
sisted by art can penetrate, would ere long be
thoroughly explored, and its hidden worlds dis
closed to view. No comet could pass within the
orbit of Jupiter without being detected, — the
undiscovered planets belonging to our system,
if any still remain, would be brought to view, —
the periodica.1 changes on the surfaces and in
the atmospheres of the planets already disco
vered, with all their diversified phenomena,
would be more accurately ascertained and deli
neated, — the path of the solar system in abso
lute space, the velocity of its motion, the dis
tant centre about which it revolves, and the
centre of gravity of the nebula to which it be
longs, might be determined, — the changes arid
revolutions that are taking place among the
fixed stars, — the undiscovered strata of nebulas,
— the old systems that are going into decay, —
the new creations that may be emerging into
existence, and many other sublime objects
which at present lie concealed in the unex
plored regions of space, might be brought within
the range of human contemplation, and astro
nomy, the sublimest of all the sciences, ap
proximate towards perfection.

For making the observations now supposed,
a profound knowledge of the physical and ma
thematical principles of astronomy is not abso
lutely necessary. All the qualifications essen
tially requisite are, — a general knowledge of the
elements of the science, of the celestial pheno
mena which have already been explored, and of
the method of determining the right ascension
and declination of any observed phenomenon, —
qualifications, which every person of common
understanding can easily acquire.

I might next have illustrated the general po
sition laid down in the beginning of this section
from the science of chymistry. This science,
having for its object to ascertain the ingredients
that enter into the composition of bodies, the
nature of those ingredients, the manner in which
they combine, and the properties resulting from
their combination ; or, in other words, an analy
tical examination of the material world, and the
principles which concur to produce its diversi
fied phenomena; it is apparent, at first view,
that an immense number and variety of experi
ments are indispensably requisite for accom
plishing sucn objects; and, consequently, that
Us progress towards perfection cannot be acce-
erated, unless multitudes of experimenters con
cur in observing the phenomena of nature, and

the processes of the arts, in instituting analy
tical experiments, and in prosecuting every in
quiry which has a tendency to promote its im
provement. It is chiefly in consequence of the
increased number of its cultivators that this sci
ence lias risen to the distinguished rank it now
holds among the useful departments of human
knowledge, and that so many brilliant disco
veries have rewarded the investigations of its
votaries. Wrenched from the grasp of empi
rics and alchymists, and no longer confined to
the paltry object of searching for the philoso-
pliers stone, it extends its range over every ob
ject in the material world, and sheds its influ
ence over all the other departments of physical
science ; and as its votaries increase in numbers
and in perseverance, it will doubtless bring to
light scenes and discoveries still more interest
ing and brilliant than those which have hitherto
been disclosed. Illustrations of the same de
scription might also have been taken from op
tics, electricity, magnetism, galvanism, pneuma
tics, and other departments of natural science •,
but having protracted this section to a dispro
portionate length, the instances already stated
will, I presume, be sufficient to prove the truth
of the position, " that a general diffusion of
knowledge would have a powerful influence on the
progress of science."

From the few hints now given, arid from many
others that might have been suggested, had my
limits permitted, it will appear, that much still
remains to be accomplished till any science,
even those which are farthest advanced, arrive
at perfection. The reason is obvious ; the
scene of universal nature has never yet been
thoroughly surveyed, and never will be, till the
eyes and the intellects of millions be fixed in the
contemplation of its multifarious and diversified
objects and relations. Till the universe, in all
its aspects, so far as it lies within the range of
human inspection, be more particularly explored,
clouus and darkness will continue to rest op
many interesting departments of knowledge, and
many of our most specious theories in the sci
ences must be considered as reposing on slendei
and unstable foundations. Prior to the intro
duction of the inductive method of philosophiz
ing, men of science were extremely prone to the
framing of hypotheses, before they had atten
tively surveyed and collected the requisite facts,
and when only a few scattered fragments of
nature were present to their view. Theory was
reared upon theory, and system upon system ;
each of them obtained its admirers and its pe
riod of applause, but, in consequence of modern
researches, they have now passed away like 'a
dream or a vision of the night. The crystal
line spheres with which Ptolemy had enclosed
the heavens are now dashed to pieces ; the vor
tices of Des Cartes have long since ceased their
whirling; the terraqueous globe which Tycta

ON THE PROMOTION OF SCIENCE.

had lixed in the centre of the universe is now set
in rapid motion through the heavens, in com
pany with the planetary orbs ; and the abyss of
water with which Burnet had filled the internal
cavity of the earth is now converted into a mass
denser than the solid rock. The Terra Austra
lia Incognito, which served as a prop to certain
theories, has completely evanished, and is now
transformed into a dreary mass of water and
ice. The subtile ether, which formerly ac
counted for so many phenomena, is now evapo
rated into electricity and heat. Whiston's idea
of the cometary origin of our globe, and Buffbn's
fancy of the earth's being a splinter struck from
the body of the sun, are fast sinking into obli
vion ; and sach will be the fate of every theory,
however specious, which is not founded on the
broad basis of inductive evidence.

Even in the present day, there is still too
great a propensity to generalize, without sub-
•.Tiitdng to the trouble of observing phenomena,
and noting their various modifications and at
tendant circumstances. The human mind is
impatient, and attempts to reach the goal by the
shortest and most rapid course, while observa
tion and experiment are tedious and slow. In
stead of surveying the material world with his
own eyes, and investigating, by observation and
experiment, its principles and laws, the man of
gsnius frequently shuts himself up in his closet,
and from a few scattered fragments of nature,
constructs, in his imagination, a splendid theory,
which makes a noise and a blaze for a little,
tike an unsubstantial meteor, and then evanishes
into air. The system of nature, though di
rected in its general movements by a few simple
laws, is too grand and extensive, and too com
plex in many of its parts, to be grasped by a
few individuals, after a cursory survey ; and,
therefore, to attempt to comprehend its multi
farious revolutions, phenomena and objects
within the range of theories founded on a par
tial view of some of its detached parts, is not
only an evidence of presumption and folly, but
tends to damp our ardour in prosecuting the only
sure path which leads to discovery, and to frus
trate what appears to be one of the designs of
the Creator, namely, to grant to the intelligent
inhabitants of our globe a gradual display of his
stupendous plans in the universe as tlie reward of
their incessant and unwearied contemplation of his
wondrous works.

Wore the period arrived (and of its arrival I
entertain no doubt, from the present movements
of the human mind) when the majority of man
kind shall devote a portion of their time and at
tention to the purposes of science, and to the
con emplation of nature — then the different
tastes of individuals, and the various situations
in which they may be placed, would lead them
to cultivate more particularly the science most
V^ngenial to Uieir minds ; and were distinct

departments of the same science marked out
for distinct classes of individuals, as the more
immediate field of their investigation, on the
principle of the division of labour, every lead
ing principle and fact in relation to that science
would soon be detected and illustrated in all its
practical bearings. Even as matters presently
stand, were the whole literary and scientific
world to form itself into one great republic, and
to allot the several branches of every depart
ment of knowledge to the different classes of
such a community, according to their respective
tastes and pursuits, as the object of their more
particular attention, it might be followed by
many interesting results, and important disco
veries and improvements. But we live in too
early a period in the history of science to expect
a general interest to be taken in such objects ;
we are but just emerging from the gloom of ig
norance and superstition; the great body of
mankind still suffer their faculties to lie in a
state of languor and inactivity, and those who
are more vigorous and alert are too much en
grossed in commercial speculations, in grasping
at power and opulence, and in the indulgence
of sensual gratifications, to think of attending
to the interests of science and the progress of
the human mind. Much, however, might be
accomplished in this respect, with ease and
pleasure, by various classes of society, and
without interfering with their ordinary avoca
tions, were their minds inclined and their at
tention directed to such pursuits.. Sailors, in
crossing the Atlantic, the Pacific, and the In
dian oceans, have frequently excellent opportu
nities of observing the phenomena of the waters,
the atmosphere, and the heavens, peculiar to
the climates through which they pass ; and were
the facts presented to their view observed with
care, classified, and recorded, they might, in
many instances, contribute to the advancement
of science. But thousands of such persons
can sail twice " from Indus to the frozen pole,
as ignorant as their log, and as stubborn as their
compass," without importing one intellectual
acquisition. The observations made during a
single voyage across the Atlantic, by a singi«
observer, M. Humboldt, on the aspect of the
Antarctic region of the heavens — the peculiar
azure of the African sky — the luminous meteors
of the atmosphere — the tides, the currents, and
the different colours of the oce<-:., and other
phenomena which happened to present them
selves to his view — are of more value to the
scientific world than the observations of ten
thousands of other beings who, for a series of
years, have traversed the same regions. Yet
these possessed, on an average, the same sen
tient organs, the same intellectual powers,
though somewhat differently modified and di
rected, the same natural capacities for observa
tion as this distinguished philosopher, which re-

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

quired only an impulse to be given in a certain
direction, in order to accomplish the same ends.
And was Humboldt more burdened and per
plexed, or did he feel less comfortable and happy
than his ignorant and grovelling associates in
the ship that wafted them across the ocean ?
No. He felt emotions of delight and intellec
tual enjoyments to which they were utter
strangers. While they were lolling on their
hammocks, or loitering upon deck, viewing
every object with a "brute unconscious gaze,"
and finding no enjoyment but in a glass of grog,
• — a train of interesting reflections, having a
relation to the past, the present, and the future,
passed through the mind of this philosopher.
He felt those exquisite emotions which arise
from perception of the beautiful and the sub
lime ; he looked forward to the advancement of
natural science as the result of his observations,
and beheld a display of the wisdom and gran
deur of the Almighty in the diversified scenes
through which he passed. Such observations
and mental employments as those to which I
allude, so far from distracting the mind, and un
fitting it for the performance of official duties,
would tend to prevent that languor and ennui
which result from mental inactivity, and would
afford a source of intellectual enjoyment amidst
the uniformity of scene, which is frequently
presented in the midst of the ocean.

From the whole that has been now stated on
this subject, it appears, that in order to make
science advance with accelerated steps, and to
multiply the sources of mental enjoyment, we
have only to set the machinery of the human
mind (at present in a quiescent state) in mo
tion, and to direct its movements to those ob
jects which are congenial to its native dignity
and its high destination. The capacity of the
bulk of mankind for learning mechanical em
ployments, and for contriving and executing
plans of human destruction, proves that they
are competent to make all the researches requi
site for the improvement of science. The same
mental energies now exerted in mechanical la
bour and in the arts of mischief, if properly di
rected, and acting in unison, and accompanied
with a spirit of perseverance, would accomplish
many grand and beneficent effects, in relation
both to the physical and moral world, and would
amply compensate the occasional want of ex
traordinary degrees of mental vigour. Were
only a hundred millions of eyes and of intellects,
(or the tenth part of the population of our
globe) occasionally fixed on all the diversified
aspects, motions and relations of universal na
ture, it could not fail of being followed by the
most noble and interesting results, not only in
relation to science, but to social and moral or
der, and to the general melioration of mankind.
Were this supposition realized, our travellers,
merchants, and mariners, along with the pro

duce of foreign lands, might regularly import,
without the least injury to their commercial in
terests, interesting facts, both physical and mo
ral, scientific observations, chymical experi
ments, and various other fragments of useful
information for rearing the Temple of Science,
and extending the boundaries of human know
ledge.

SECTION IV.

ON HIE PLEASURES AND ENJOYMENTS CON
NECTED W'TH THE PURSUITS OF SCIENCE.

MAN is a compound being : his nature con
sists of two essential parts, body and mine
Each of these parts of the human constitution
has its peculiar uses, and is susceptible of pe
culiar gratifications. The body is furnished
with external senses, which are both the sources
of pleasure and the inlets of knowledge, and
the Creator has furnished the universe with ob
jects fitted for their exercise and gratification.
While these pleasures are directed by the dic
tates of reason, 'ind confined within the limits
prescribed by the Divine law, they are so far
from being unlawful, that in the enjoyment of
them we fulfil one of the purposes for which our
Creator brought us into existence. But the
pursuit of sensitive pleasures is not the ultimate
end of our being ; we enjoy such gratifications
in common with the inferior animals ; and in so
far as we rest in them as our chief good, we
pour contempt on our intellectual nature, and
degrade ourselves nearly to the level of tho
beasts that perish.

Man is endowed with intellectual powers, asj
well as with organs of sensation, — with faculties?
of a higher order, and which admit of more va
ried and sublime gratifications than those which
the senses can produce. By these faculties we
are chiefly distinguished from the lower orders}
of animated existence ; in the proper exercise
and direction of them, we experience the high
est and most refined enjoyments of which our
nature is susceptible, and are gradually pre
pared for the employments of that immortal ex
istence to which we are destined. The corpo
real senses were bestowed chiefly in subser
viency to the powers of intellect, and to supply
materials for thought and contemplation; and
the pleasures peculiar to our intellectual nature,
rise as high above mere sensitive enjoyments,
as the rank of man stands in the scale of ex
istence, above that of the fowls of the air, or
the beasts of the forest. Such pleasures are
pure and refined ; they are congenial to the
character of a rational being ; they arc mora
permanent than mere sensiti\e enjoyments*
they can be enjoyed when worldiv comforts art/

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

47

withdrawn, and when sensual gratifications can
afford no delight; they affurd solace in the
hours of retirement from the bustle of business,
and consolation amidst the calamities and afflic
tions to which humanity is exposed ; and the
more we acquire a relish for such pleasures, the
better shall we be prepared for associating with
intelligences of a higher order in the future
* world.

Before proceeding to the more particular il
lustration of this topic, let us consider the state
and the enjoyments of the man whose mind is
shrouded in ignorance. He grows up to man
hood like a vegetable, or like one of the lower
animals that are fed and nourished for the
slaughter. He exerts his physical powers, be
cause such exertion is necessary for his sub
sistence ; were it otherwise, we should most
frequently find him dozing over the fire, or
basking in the sun, with a gaze as dull and stu
pid as his ox, regardless of every thing but the
gratification of his appetites. He has perhaps
been taught the art of reading, but has never
applied it to the acquisition of knowledge. His
?iews are chiefly confined to the objects imme
diately around him, and to the daily avocations
in which he is employed. His knowledge of
society is circumscribed within the limits of his
parish, and his views of the world in which he
dwells are confined within the range of the
country in which he resides, or of the blue hills
which skirt his horizon. Of the aspects of the
globe in other countries — of the various tribes
with which they are peopled — of the seas and
rivers, continents and islands which diversify
the landscape of the earth — of the numerous
orders of animated beings which people the
ocean, the atmosphere and the land, — of the re
volutions of nations, and the events which have
taken place in the history of the world, he has
almost as little conception as the animals that
range the forest, or bound through the lawns.
In regard to the boundless regions that lie be
yond him in the firmament, and the bodies that
roll there in magnificent grandeur, he has the
most confused and inaccurate ideas ; and he
seldom trounle-s himself with inquiries in relation
to such subjects. Whether the stars be great
or small, whether they be near us or at a dis
tance, or whether they move or stand still, is to
him a matter of trivial importance. If the sun
give him light by day, and the moon by night,
and the clouds distil their watery treasures upon
his parched fields, he is contented, and leaves all
such inquiries and investigations to those who
have little else to engage their attention. He
views the canopy of heaven as merely a ceiling
to our earthly habitation, and the starry orbs as
only so many lumino;is studs or tapers to diver
sify its aspect, and to afford a glimmering light
to the benighted traveller. Of the discoveries
which have been made in the physical sciences
4

in ages past, of the wonders of creation which
they have unfolded to view, of the instruments
which have been invented for exploring the uni
verse, and of the improvements which are now
going forward in every department of science
and art, and the prospects they are opening to
our view, he is almost as entirely ignorant as if
he had been fixed under the frozen pole, or
chained to the surface of a distant planet. He
considers learning as consisting chiefly in the
knowledge of grammar, Greek and Latin ; and
philosophy and astronomy, as the arts of telling
fortunes and predicting the state of the wea
ther ; and experimental chymistry, as allied to
the arts of rnagic and necromancy. He has no
idea of the manner in which the understanding
may be enlightened and expanded, he has no re
lish for intellectual pursuits, and no conception
of the pleasures they afford, and he sets no
value on knowledge but in so far as it may tend
to increase his riches and his sensual gratifica
tions. He has no desire for making improve
ments in his trade or domestic arrangements,
and gives no countenance to those useful in
ventions and public improvements which are
devised by others. He sets himself against
every innovation, whether religious, political,
mechanical, or agricultural, and is determined
to abide by the " good old customs" of his fore
fathers, however irrational and absurd. Were
it dependent upon him, the moral world would
stand still as the material world was supposed to
do in" former times ; all useful inventions and
improvements would cease, existing evils would
never be remedied, ignorance and superstition
would universally prevail, the human mind would
be arrested in its progress to perfection, and man
would never arrive at the true dignity of his in
tellectual nature.

It is evident that such an individual, (and the
world contains thousands and millions of such
characters) can never have his mind elevated
to those sublime objects and contemplations
which enrapture the man of science, nor feel
those pure and exquisite pleasures which culti
vated minds so frequently experience ; nor can
he form those lofty and expansive ideas of the
Deity which the grandeur and magnificence of
his works are calculated to inspire. He is left
as a prey to all those foolish notions and vain
alarms which are engendered by ignorance and
suoerstition ; and he swallows, without the least
hesitation, all the absurdities and childish tales
respecting witches, hobgoblins, spectres and ap
paritions, which have been handed down to him
by his forefathers in former generations. And
while he thus gorges his mind with fooleries and
absurdities, he spurns at the discoveries of sci
ence as impositions on the credulity of mankind,
and contrary to reason and common sense. That
the sun is a million of times larger than the
earth, that light flies from his body at the rav«

48

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

of two hundred \housand miles .in a moment of
time, and that the earth is whirling round its
axis from day to day, with a velocity of a thou
sand miles every hour, are regarded by him as
notions far more improbable and extravagant
than the story of the " Wonderful Lamp," and
all the other tales of the " Arabian Night's En
tertainments." In his hours of leisure from his
daily avocations, his thoughts either run wild
among the most grovelling objects, or sink into
sensuality or inanity, and solitude and retire
ment present no charms to his vacant mind.
While human beings are thus immersed in ig
norance, destitute of rational ideas, and of a
solid substratum of thought, they can never ex
perience those pleasures and enjoyments which
flow from the exercise of the understanding,
and which correspond to the dignity of a rational
and immortal nature.

On the other hand, the man whose mind is
irradiated with the light of substantial science,
has views, and feelings, and exquisite enjoy
ments to which the former is an entire stranger.
In consequence of the numerous and multifa
rious ideas he has acquired, he is introduced,
as it were, into a new world, where he is enter
tained with scenes, objects, and movements, of
which a mind enveloped in ignorance can form
no conception. He can trace back the stream
of time to its commencement ; and, gliding
along its downward course, can survey the most
memorable events which have happened in
every part of its progress from the primeval
ages to the present day — the rise of empires,
the fall of kings, the revolutions of nations, the
battles of warriors, and the important events
which have followed in their train — the progress
of civilization, and of arts and sciences — the
judgments which have been inflicted on wicked
nations — the dawnings of Divine mercy towards
our fallen race — the manifestation of the Son
of God in our nature — the physical changes and
revolutions which have taken place in the con
stitution of our globe — in short, the whole of
the leading events in the chain of Divine dis
pensation from the beginning of the world to
the period in which we live. With his mental
eye he can survey the terraqueous globe in all
its variety of aspects ; contemplate the conti
nents, islands and oceans which compose its
exterior, the numerous rivers by which it is in
dented, the lofty ranges of mountains which di
versify its surface, its winding caverns, its
forests, lakes, sandy deserts, ice-islands, whirl
pools, boiling springs, glaciers, sulphuric moun
tains, bituminous lakes, and the states and em
pires into which it is distributed, the tides and
currents of the ocean, the ice-bergs of the polar
regions, and the verdant scenes of the torrid
7.one. He can climb, in imagination, to the
summit of the flaming volcano, listen to its sub
terraneous bellowings, behold its lava bursting

from its mouth and rolling down its sides like a
flaming river — descend into the subterranean
grotto, survey, from the top of the Andes, the
lightnings flashing and the thunders rolling far
beneath him — stand on the brink of the dashing
cataract and listen to its roarings — contemplate
the ocean rearing its billows in a storm, and tha
hurricane and tornado tearing up forests by
their roots, and tossing them about as stubble.
Sitting at his fireside, during the blasts of win
ter, he can survey the numerous tribes of man
kind scattered over the various climates of the
earth, and entertain himself with views of their
manners, customs, religion, laws, trade, manu
factures, marriage ceremonies, civil and eccle
siastical governments, arts, sciences, cities,
towns and villages, and the animals peculiar to
every region. In his rural walks he can not
only appreciate the beneficence of Nature and
the beauties and harmonies of the vegetable
kingdom, in their exterior aspect, but can also
penetrate into the hidden processes which are
going on in the roots, trunks and leaves of
plants and flowers, and contemplate the nu
merous vessels through which the sap is flowing
from their roots through the trunks and branches,
the millions of pores through which their odori
ferous effluvia exhale, their fine and delicate
texture, their microscopical beauties, their or
ders, genera, and species, and their uses in the
economy of nature.

With the help of his microscope, he can en
ter into a world unknown To the ignorant, and
altogether invisible to the unassisted eye. In
every plant and flower which adorns the field, in
every leaf of the forest, in the seeds, prickles
and down of all vegetables, he perceives beau
ties and harmonies, and exquisi e contrivances,
of which, without this instrument, he could
have formed no conception. In every scale of
a haddock he perceives *a beautiful piece of
net-work, admirably contrived and arranged,
and in the scale of a sole a still more diversified
structure, which no art could imitate, termi
nated with pointed spikes, and formed with ad
mirable regularity. Where nothing but a speck
of mouldiness appears to the naked eye, he be
holds a forest of mushrooms with long stalks,
and with leaves and blossoms distinctly visible.
In the eyes of a common fly, where others can
see only two small protuberances, he perceives
several thousands of beautiful transparent
globes, exquisitely rounded and polished, placed
with the utmost regularity in rows, crossing
each other like a kind of lattice- work, and
forming the most admirable piece of mechanism
which the eye can contemplate. The small
dust that covers the wings of moths and butter
flies he perceives to consist of an infinite multi
tude of feathers of various forms, not much un
like the feathers of birds, and adorned with the
most bright and vivia colours. In an animal so

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

49

small that the naked eye can scarcely distin
guish it as a visible point, he perceives a head,
mouth, eyes, legs, joints, bristles, hair, and
otner animal pans and functions, as nicely
formed and adjusted, and endowed with as much
vivacity, agility and intelligence as the larger
animals. In the tail of a small fish or the foot
of a frog, he can perceive the variegated branch
ings of the veins and arteries, and the blood
circulating through them with amazing velocity.
In a drop of stagnant water he perceives thou
sands of living beings of various shapes and
sizes, beautifully formed, and swimming with
wanton vivacity like fishes ii the midst of the
ocean. In short, by this instrument he perceives
that the whole earth is full of animation, and
that there is not a single tree, plant or flower,
and scarcely a drop of water that is not teeming
with life and peopled with its peculiar inhabi
tants. He thus enters, as it were, into a new
world, invisible to other eyes, where every ob
ject in the animal, vegetable and mineral king
doms, presents a new and interesting aspect,
and unfolds beauties, harmonies, contrasts and
exquisite contrivances, altogether inconceivable
by the ignorant and unreflecting mind.

In the invisible atmosphere which surrounds
him, where other minds discern nothing but an
immense blank, he beholds an assemblage of
wonders, and a striking scene of Divine Wis
dom rfhd Omnipotence. He views this invisible
agent not only as a material but as a compound
substance — compounded of two opposite prin
ciples, the one the source of flame and animal
life, and the other destructive to both, and pro
ducing by their different combinations, the most
diversified and beneficent effects. He per
ceives the atmosphere, as the agent under the
Almighty, which produces the germination and
growth of plants, and all the beauties of the
vegetable creation — which preserves water in a
liquid state — supports fire and flame, and pro
duces animal heat, which sustains the clouds,
and gives buoyancy to the feathered tribes —
which is the cause of winds — the vehicle of
smells — the medium of sounds — the source of
all the pleasures we derive from the harmonies
of music — the cause of that universal light and
splendour which is diffused around us, and of
the advantages we derive from the morning and
evening twilight, [n short, he contemplates it.
as the prime mover in a variety of machines, —
as impelling ships across the ocean, blowing our
furnaces, grinding our corn, raising water from
the deepest pits, extinguishing fires, setting
po.ver-looms in motion, propelling steam-boats
along rivers and canals, raising balloons to the
region of the clouds, and performing a thousand
other beneficent agencies without which our
globe would cease to be a habitable world. All
which views and contemplations have an evi
dent tendency to enlarge the capacity of the

mind, to stimulate its faculties, and to produce
rational enjoyment.

Again, — the man of knowledge, even when
shrouded in darkness, and in solitude, where
other minds could find no enjoyment, can enter
tain himself with the most sublime contempla
tions. He can trace the huge globe on whwh
we stand flying through the depths of space,
carrying along with it its vast population, at tho
rate of sixty thousand miles every hour, and,
by the inclination of its axis, bringing about the
alternate succession of summer and winter,
spring and harvest. By the aid of his telescopo
he can transport himself towards the moon, and
survey the circular plains, the deep caverns, the
conical hills, the lofty peaks, the shadows of the
hills and vales, and the rugged and romantic
mountain scenery which diversify the surface
of this orb of night. By the help of the same
instrument, he can range through the planetary
system, wing his way through the regions of
space along with the swiftest e~bs, and trace
many of the physical aspects anc revolutions
which have a relation to distant worlds. Ho
can transport himself to the planet Saturn, and
behold a stupendous ring 600,000 miles in cir
cumference, revolving in majestic grandeur
every ten hours, around a globe nine hundred
times larger than the earth, while seven moons
larger than ours, along with an innumerable
host of stars, display their radiance, to adorn
the firmament of that magnificent world. He
can wing his flight to the still more distant re
gions of the universe, leaving the sun and all his
planets behind him, till tho^ appear like a
scarcely discernible speck in creation, and con
template thousands and millions of stars and
starry systems, beyond the range of the unas
sisted eye, and wander among suns and worlds
dispersed throughout the boundless dimensions
of space. He can fill up, in his imagination,
those blanks which astronomy has never directly
explored, and conceive thousands of systems
and ten thousands of worlds, beyond all that is
visible by the optic tube, stretching ou' to infinity
on every hand, — new creations inces- roitly start
ing into existence — peopled with intelligences of
various orders, and all under the superinten
dence and government of " the -King Eternal,
Immortal and Invisible," whose power is omni
potent, and the limits of his dominions past find
ing out.

It is evident that a ~aind capable of such ex
cursions and contemplations as I have now sup
posed, must experience enjoyments infinitely su
perior to those of the individual whose soul is
enveloped in intellectual darkness. If substan
tial happiness is chiefly seated in the mind, if it
consists in the vigorous exercise of its faculties,
if it depends on the multiplicity of objects wlrich
lie within the range of its contemplation, if his
augmented by the view of scenes of beauty and

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

sublimity, and displays of infinite intelligence
arui power, if it is connected with tranquillity of
mird, which generally accompanies intellectual
pursuits, and with the subjugation of the plea
sures of sense to the dictates of reason — the en
lightened mind must enjoy gratifications as far
superior to those of the ignorant, as man is su
perior, in station and capacity, to the worms of
the dust.

In order to illustrate this topic a little farther,
I shall select a few facts and deductions in rela
tion to science which demonstrate the interesting
nature and delightful tendency of scientific pur
suits.

Every species of rational information has a
tendency to produce pleasing emotions. There
is a certain gratification in becoming acquainted
with objects and operations of which we were
formerly ignorant, and that, too, altogether inde
pendent of the practical tendency of such know
ledge, of the advantages we may expect to reap
from it, or the sensitive enjoyments with which
it may be accompanied. A taste for knowledge,
a capacity to acquire it, and a pleasure accom
panying its acquisition, form a part of the con
stitution of every mind. The Creator has im
planted in the human mind a principle of curi
osity, and annexed a pleasure to its gratification,
to excite us to investigations of the wonders of
creation he has presented before us, to lead us
to just conceptions of his infinite perfections,
and of the relation in which we stand to him as
the subjects of his government. We all know,
with what a lively interest most persons peruse
novels and romances, where hair-breadth es
capes, mysterious incidents, and tales of wonder
are depicted with all the force and beauty of
language. But the scenes detailed in such wri
tings produce only a momentary enjoyment.
Being retraced as only the fictions of a lively
imagination, they pass away like a dream or a
vision of the night, leaving the understanding
bewildered, and destitute of any solid improve
ment. In order to improve the intellectual facul
ties while we gratify the principle of curiosity,
it is nly requisite, that we direct the attention
to fa<;is instead of fictions ; and when the real
scenes of the universe are presented in an in
teresting aspect, they arc calculated to produce
emotions of wonder and delight even superior to
those excited by the most highly wrought tales
of fiction and romance. The following facts
and considerations will pc.haps tend to corro
borate this, position.

In the first place, the number of effects produced
by a single principle in nature, is calculated to
excite emotions of admiration and delight. From
the simple principle of gravitation, for instance,
proceed all the beauties and sublimities which
arise from the meandering rills, the majestic ri
vers, and the roaring cataracts — it causes the
mountains to rest on a solid basis, and confines

the ocean to its appointed channels — retains tli«
inhabitants of the earth to its surface, and pre
vents them from flying off in wild confusion
through the voids of space — it produces the de
scent of the rains and dews, and the alternate
flux and reflux of the tides — regulates the various
movements of all animals — forms mechanical
powers — gives impulsion to numerous machines
— rolls the moon round the earth, and prevents
her from flying off to the distant regions of space
— extends its influence from the moon to tho
earth, from the earth to the moon, and from the
sun to the remotest planets, preserving surround
ing worlds in their proper courses, and connect
ing the solar system with other worlds and sys
tems in the remote spaces of the universe.
When a stick of sealing wax is rubbed with a
piece of flannel, it attracts feathers or small bits
of paper ; when a long tube of glass, or a cat's
back is rubbed in the dark, they emit flashes of
fire, accompanied with a snapping noise. Now
is it not delightful to a rational mind to know,
that the same principle which causes wax or
amber to attract light substances, and glass
tubes or cylinders to emit sparks of fire, pro
duces the lightnings of heaven, and all the sub
lime phenomena which accompany a violent
thunder-storm, and, in combination with other
agents, produces also the fiery meteor which
sweeps through the sky with its luminous train,
and the beautiful coruscations of the aurora bo-
realis ? There are more than fifty thousand dif
ferent species of plants in the vegetable king
dom, all differing from one another in their size,
structure, flowers, leaves, fruits, mode of propa
gation, internal vessels, medicinal virtues, and
the odours they exhale. Who would imagine
that this immense assemblage of vegetable pro
ductions which adorns the surface of the earth
in every clime, with such a diversity of forms,
fruits and colours, are the result of the combina
tion of four or five simple substances variously
modified by the hand of the Creator? Yet it i?
an undoubted fact, ascertained from chymical
analysis, that all vegetable substances, from the
invisible mushroom which adheres to a spot of
mouldiness, to the cedar of Lebanon and the
Banian-tree, which would cover with its shade
an army of ten thousand men, — are solely com-
posed of the following natural principles,— Ca
loric, Light, Water, Air and Carbon.

Asain, is it not wonderful, that the invisible
atmosphere should compress our bodies every
moment with a weight of more than thirty thou
sand pounds without our feeling it. and the whole
rarth with a weight of 12,043,468,800,000,000,
000 of pounds, or five thousand billions of tons,
that this pressure is essentially necessary to oui
existence, ond that a small quantity of air within
us, which would not weigh above a single ounce,
by its strong elastic force, counteracts
of this tremendous pressure upon our

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

5!

and prevents our being crushed to pieces — that
the same cause prevents our habitations from
falling upon us and crushing us to death, without
which our glass windows would be shattered to
atoms, and our most stately edifices tumbled into
ruins ! — that this atmosphere is at the same time
performing an immense variety of operations in
Naturs and Art — insinuating itself into the pores
and sap-vessels of plants and flowers — produc
ing respiration in all living beings, and support
ing all the processes of life and vegetation
throughout the animal and vegetable creation —
that its pressure produces the process of what is
called suction and cupping — causes snails and pe
riwinkles to adhere to the rocks on which they are
found — gives effect to the adhesion of bodies by
means of mortar and cements — raises water in
our forcing-pumps and fire-engines — supports the
quicksilver in our barometers — prevents the
water of our seas and rivers from boiling and
evaporating into steam — and promotes the ac
tion of our steam-engines while raising water
from deep pits, and while propelling vessels
along seas and rivers !

In the next place, science contributes to the
gratification of the human mind by enabling us
to trace, in many objects and operations, surpris
ing resemblances, where we should least of all
have, expected them. Who could, at first sight,
imagine, that the process of breathing is a spe
cies of combustion, or burning — that the dia
mond is nothing else than carbon in a crystal
lized state, and differs only in a very slight
degree from a piece of charcoal- -that water is
a compound of two invisible airs or gases, and
that one of these ingredients is the principle of
flame ! — that the air which produces suffocation
and death in coal-mines and subterraneous
grottos, is the same substance which gives
briskness to ale, beer, and soda water, and the
acid flavour to many mineral springs — that the
air we breathe is composed of the same ingre
dients and nearly in the same proportions as
nitric acid or aqua fortis, which can dissolve al
most all the metals, and a single draught of
which would instantly destroy the human frame
— that the colour of white is a mixture or com
pound of all the other colours, red, orange, yel
low, green, blue, indigo, and violet, and conse
quently, that the white light of the sun produces
all that diversity of colouring which adorns the
face of nature — that the same principle which
causes our fires to burn, forms acids, produces
the rust of metals, and promotes the growth of
plants by night — that plants breathe and perspire
as well as animals — that carbonic acid gas, or
fixed air, is the product both of vegetation, of
burning, of fermentation and of breathing— that
it remains indestructible by age, and, in all its
diversified combinations, still preserves its iden
tity — that the air which burns in our street-lamps
and illuminates our shops and manufactories, is

the same which causes a balloon to rise above
the clouds, and likewise extinguishes flame when
it is immersed in a body of this gas— that the
leaves of vegetables which rot upon the ground
arid appear to be lost for ever, are converted by
the oxygen of the atmosphere into carbonic acid
gas, and this very same carbon is, in process of
time, absorbed by a new race of vegetables,
which it clothes with a new foliage, and again
renews the face of nature — and that the same
principle which causes the sensation of heat is
the cause of fluidity, expands bodies in every
direction, enters into every operation in nature,
flies from the sun at the rate of 195,000 miles in
a second of time, and, by its powerful influence,
prevents the whole matter of the universe from
being converted into a solid mass !

What, then, can be more delightful, to a being
furnished with such powers as man, than to trace
the secret machinery by which the God of nature
accomplishes his designs in the visible world, and
displays his infinite power and intelligence — to
enter into the hidden springs of Nature's opera
tions, to follow her through all her winding re
cesses, and to perceive, from what simple prin
ciples and causes the most sublime and diver
sified phenomena are produced ! It is with this
view that the Almighty hath set before us his
wondrous works, not to be overlooked, or beheld
with a " brute unconscious gaze," but to be in
vestigated, in order that they may be admired,
and that in such investigations we may enjoy a
sacred pleasure in contemplating the results of
his Wisdom and Intelligence.

In the third place, science contributes to our
enjoyment by the grand and sublime objects she
presents before us. In consequence of the inves
tigations which have been made to determine the
distances and magnitudes of the heavenly bodies,
objects of magnificence and grandeur are now
presented to the view of the enlightened mind of
which former ages could form no conception.
These objects are magnificent in respect of mag
nitude, of motion, of the vast spaces which inter
vene between them, and of the noble purposes for
which they are destined.

What a sublime idea, for example, is presented
to the view by such an object as the planet Jupi
ter, — a globe fourteen hundred times larger than
the world in which we dwell, and whose surface
would contain a population a hundred times more
numerous than all the inhabitants that have ex
isted on our globe since the creation ! And how
is the sublimity of such an idea augmented when
we consider, that this immense body is revolving
round its axis at the rate of twenty-eight thou
sand miles in an hour, and is flying, at the same
time, through the regions of space, twenty-nine
thousand miles every hour, carrying along wilh
it four moons, each of them larger than the earth,
during its whole course round the centre of its
motion ! And if t.hi« olanet, which appears only

52

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

lifeo a luminous speck on the nocturnal sky, pre
sents such an august idea, when its magnitude
and motions are investigated, what an astonish-
in^ idea is presented to the mind when it contem
plates the size and splendour of the sun, — a body
which would contain within its bowels nine hun
dred globes larger than Jupiter, and thirteen hun
dred thousand globes of the bulk of the earth, —
which darts its rays, in a few moments, to the re
motest bounds of the planetary system, producing
light and colour, and life and vegetation through
out surrounding worlds ! And how must cur as
tonishment be still increased, when we consider
the number of such globes which exist through
out the universe ; that within the range of our
telescopes more than eighty millions of globes,
similar to the sun in size and in splendour, are
arranged at immeasurable distances from each
other, diffusing their radiance through the im
mensity of space, and enlivening surrounding
worlds with their benign influence, besides the
innumerable multitudes, which our reason tells
us, must exist beyond all that is visible to the
eyes of mortals !

But the motions, no less than the magnitudes
of such bodies, present ideas of sublimity. That
a globe* as large as the earth should fly through
the celestial regions with a velocity of seventy-
six thousand miles an hour, — that another globef
should move at the rate of one thousand seven
hundred and rifty miles in a minute, and a hun
dred and five thousand miles an hour, — that even
Saturn, with all his assemblage of rings and
moons, should be carried along his course, with
a velocity of twenty-two thousand miles an hour,
— that some of fhc comets, when near the sun,
should fly with the amazing velocity of eight
hundred thousand miles an hour, — that, in all
probability, the sun himself, with all his attend
ing planets, besides their own proper motions,
are carried around some distant centre at the
rate of more than sixty thousand miles every
hour ; and that thousands and millions of sys
tems are moving in the same rapid manner, are
facts so astonishing, and so far exceeding every
thing we behold around us on the surface of the
earth, that the imagination is overpowered and
confounded at the idea of the astonishing forces
which are in operation throughout the universe,
and of the power and energy by which they are
produced ; and every rational being feels a sub
lime pleasure in the contemplation of such ob
jects which is altogether unknown to the ignorant
mind.

The vast and immeasurable spaces which inter
vene between the great bodies of the universe
likewise convey august and sublime conceptions.
Between the earth and the sun there intervenes
a space so vast, that a cannon ball, flying with
«he velocity of five hundred miles an hour, would

The planet Venus

The planet Mercury

not reach that luminary in twenty years ; and a
mail-coach, moving at its utmost speed, would
not arrive at its surface in less than twelve hun
dred years ; and, were it to proceed from the sun
towards the planet Herschel, it would not arrive
at that body after the lapse of twenty-two thou
sand years. And yet the sun, at that immense
distance, exerts his attractive energy, retains
that huge planet in its orbit, and dispenses light
and colour, life and animation over every part of
its surface. But all such spaces, vast as at first
sight they appear, dwindle, as it wore, into a
span, when compared with those immeasurable
spaces which are interposed between its and the
regions of the stars. Between the earth and
the nearest fixed star a space intervenes so vast
and incomprehensible, that a ball flying with the
velocity above mentioned, would not pa.ss through
it in four millions and five hundred thousand
years ; and as there are stars, visible through
telescopes, at least a hundred times farther dis
tant from our globe, it would require such a body
four hundred millions of years, or a period 67,000
times greater than that which has elapsed since
the Mosaic creation, before it could arrive at
those distant regions of immensity.

The grand and noble design* for •uhich the
great bodies, to which I have adverted, are in
tended, suggest, likewise, a variety of interest
ing and sublime reflections. These designs un
doubtedly are, to display the ineffable glories of
the Eternal Mind, — to demonstrate the immen
sity, omnipotence and wisdom of Him who
formed the universe, — and to serve as so many
worlds for the residence of incalculable numbers
of intelligent beings of every order. And, what
an immense variety of interesting objects is pre
sented to the mind when its views are directed
to the numerous orders and gradations of intelli
gences that may people the universe, — the mag
nificent scenes that may be displayed in every
•world, — their moral economy, and the important
transactions that may have taken place in their
history under the arrangements of the Divine
government!

Such are some of the scenes of grandeur
which science unfolds to every enlightened mind.
The contemplation of such objects has an evi
dent tendency to enlarge the capacity of the
soul, — to raise the affections above mean ami
grovelling pursuits, to give man a more impres
sive idea of the dignity of his rational find im
mortal nature, and of the attributes of that Al
mighty Being by whom he is upheld, and to make
him rejoice in the possession of faculties capable
of being exercised on scenes and objects so mag
nificent and sublime.

In the fourth, place, science administers to our
enjoyment by the variety of novel and interesting
objects it exhibits. Almost every department of
natural science presents to the untutored mind an
assemblage of objects, new and strange, which

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

tend to rouse its faculties, and to excite to impor
tant inquiries and interesting reflections. The
science of mechanics presents us with many cu
rious combinations of mechanical powers, which,
from the simplest principles, produce the most
powerful and astonishing effects. " What can
be more strange (says a profound and energetic
writer*) than that an ounce weight should ba
lance hundreds of pounds by the intervention of
a few bars of thin iron ?" And when we consi
der that all the mechanical powers may be re
duced to the lever, the wheel and axle, the pulley,
the inclined plane, the wedge and the screw, how
astonishing are the forces exerted, and the effects
produced, by their various combinations in wheel-
carriages, mills, cranes, thrashing-machines, and
pile-engines ! Hydrostatics teaches us the won
derful fact, that a few pounds of water, without
the aid of any machinery, will, by mere pres
sure, produce an almost irresistible force ; or, in
other words, that any quantity of fluid, however
small, may be made to counterpoise any quan
tity, however large; and hence a very strong
hogshead has been burst to pieces, and the water
scattered about with incredible force, by means
of water conveyed through a very small perpen
dicular tube of great length. On the same prin
ciple, and by the same means, the foundations of
a largo building might be shattered, and the
whole structure overthrown. Magnetism dis
closes to us such singular facts as the following :
— that a small piece of steel, when rubbed by
the loadstone, and nicely poised, will place itself
in a direction nearly north and south, so as to
point nearly towards the poles of the world, —
that the north and south poles of two loadstones
will attract, and two north or two south poles re
pel each other ; and that the power of a magnet
will pass through a thick board, and turn round
a compass-needle, with great velocity, though
placed at a considerable distance.

The science of optics likewise disclose a va
riety of astonishing truths, and is no less replete
with wonders. How wonderful the fact, that
light proceeds from the sun, and other luminous
bodies, with a velocity of 195,000 miles in a mo
ment of time ; that myriads of myriads of rays
are flying off from visible objects towards every
point of the compass, crossing each other in all
directions, and yet accurately depicting the
same images of external objects in thousands of
eves at the same moment, — that the thousands
of millions of rays of light which proceed from
any particular object must be compressed into a
space not more than one-eighth of an inch in di
ameter, before they can enter the pupil of the
eye, and produce vision,— that the images of all
the objects which compose an extensive land
scape are depicted on the bottom of the eye, in
all their colours and relative proportions, within

* Lord Brougham

a space less than half an inch in diameter,— that
the eye can perceive objects distinctly at the dis
tance of six inches, and likewise at the distance
of ten, fifty, or an hundred miles, serving the
purpose both of a microscope and a telescope,
and can be instantaneously adjusted to serve
either as the one or as the other, — and that the
variegated colouring which appears in the sce
nery of nature is not in the objects themselves,
but in the light which falls upon them, without
which all the scenes of creation would wear an
uniform aspect, and one object would be undis-
tinguishable from another !

The instruments which the science of optics
has been the means of constructing, are also ad
mirable in their effects and productive of rati
onal entertainment. How wonderful, that, by
means of an optic lens, an image is depicted in a
dark chamber, on a white table, in which we
may perceive the objects of an extensive land
scape delineated in all their colours, motions and
proportions, and so accurately represented, that
we even distinguish the countenances of indivi
duals at the distance of a mile, — that we can see
objects distinctly when a thick board, or a piece
of metal, is interposed between them and our
eye, — that the images of objects can be made to
hang in the air either upright o' inverted, and
that representations either of the living or of the
dead can be made to start up instantly before the
view of a spectator in a darkened room, — that,
by admitting into a chamber a few rays of white
light from the sun through a prism, all the co
lours of light may be seen beautifully painted on
a piece of paper, — that a single object onay be
multiplied to an indefinite number, and that a
few coloured bits of glass may be made by re
flection to exhibit an infinite diversity of beauti
ful and variegated forms ! How admirable the
effects of the telescope, by which we may see
objects as distinctly at the distance of two or
three miles as if they were placed within a few
yards of us, by which we can penetrate into the
celestial regions, and behold the distant wonders
of the planetary system, and the millions of stars
dispersed through infinite space, as distinctly as
if we were actually transported by a supernatu
ral power several hundreds of millions of miles
into the regions of the firmament ! And how cu
rious the circumstance, that we can, by this in
strument, contemplate such objects in all direc
tions and positions, — that we can view them
either as erect, or as turned upside dovm, — that
we can perceive the spires, houses and windows
of a distant city when our backs are turned di
rectly opposite to it, and our faces in a contrary
direction— the rings of Saturn and the moons of
Jupiter, when we are looking downwards with our
backs turned to these objects,— that we can make
an object on our right hand or our left, appear as
if directly before us, and can cause a terrestrial
landscape to appear above us, as if it were sus*

54

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

pended in the sky.* By the help of the micros
cope \*e can exhibit to a number of spectators at
the same moment, a small animal scarcely distin
guishable by the naked eye, magnified to the size
of ten or fifteen inches in length, and distinguish
not only its limbs, joints, mouth and eyes, but
even the motions of its bowels, and other inter
nal movements ; and in every department of na
ture can contemplate an assemblage of beauties,
delicate contextures, and exquisite contrivances,
which excite the highest admiration, and which
would otherwise have appeared incredible and
incomprehensible to the human mind.

The sciences of electricity and galvanism like
wise display facts both curious and astonishing.
How wonderful the operations of the electric
fluid, which can suddenly contract the muscles
of animals, and give a violent shock to a hundred
or a thousand persons at the same moment —
which moves with such amazing rapidity, that,
in a few seconds of time, it might be made to fly
to the remotest regions of the globe — which
melts iron wire, sets fire to gunpowder and other
inflammable substances, destroys the polarity of

• This is effected by means of the " aerial reflect
ing telescope," lately invented by the author. The
following is a general representation of this teles
cope in profile. -

AB is a tube 01 mahogany about three inches long,
which serves as a socket for holding the speculum ;
CD an arm attached to the tube, about the length of
the focal distance of the mirror, consisting of two
separate pieces C and D. the latter of which slides
under the former, through the brass sockets EF.
To the under part of the socket F is attached a brass
nut wi'.h a female screw, in which the male screw
ab acts by applying the hand to the nob c, which
•erves for adjusting the instrument to distinct vi-

the magnetic needle, and promotes the vegeta
tion of plants and the perspiration of animals —
which can be drawn in vivid sparks from differ
ent parts of the human body, and made to de
scend from the clouds ^in streams of fire ! And
how powerful and astonishing the effects of the
galvanic agency — which makes charcoal burn
with a brilliant white flame, decomposes water
into its elementary parts, and causes platina, the
hardest and heaviest of the metals, to melt as
readily as wax in the flame of a candle — which
produces the most violent convulsions on the
muscular system, causes a hare to move its feet,
and a fowl to clap its wings, with force and
energy, after life is extinct — throws the counte
nance, even of a dead man, into appalling gri
maces and contortions, and excites the most rapid
movements in his hands and limbs, to the horror
and astonishment of all beholders !

The science of chymistry, throughout all its
departments, is no less replete with wonders.
How astonishing are many of the facts which it
discloses, of which the following arc merely spe
cimens ! — That all the productions of nature iii

sion. G is the brass tube which receives the ej-e-
pieces. In looking through this telescope, the right
eye is applied at the point H, the back is directly to
wards the object, and the observer's head is under
stood to be uncovered. When a diagonal eye-piece
is applied, the object may be seen either to the right
or to the left, or at right angles to its true position ;
or, it may be made to appear either upwards, as if
hanging in the air, or downwards, as if below the
surface of the earth. A particular description of
this instrument may be seen in "The Edinburgh
New Philosophical Journal" for July 1826, pp. 41
—52. and in the " London Encyclopedia." Art. Ta-
Itscope.

\\

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

the animal and vegetable kingdoms, are com
posed of a very few simple substances, many of
which are invisible- gases — that water is chiefly
composed of an inflammable principle — that the
acids, such as aquafortis and oil of vitriol, are
formed of different kinds of air — that an invisi
ble fluid, one of the ingredients of the air we
breathe, will cause a rod of iron to burn with
brilliancy, and phosphorus to produce a splen
dour which dazzles the eyes of every beholder
— that the diamond, notwithstanding its value
and brilliancy, is composed of the same materials
as coal — that oxymuriatic acid, or the bleaching
gas, discharges all vegetable colours, and, in the
course of a few minutes, will change a piece of
printed calico into a pure white ; and likewise
burns all the metals, dissolves gold and platina,
and suffocates all animals that breathe it, after
one or two inspirations — that there are metals
much lighter than water, which swim in that
fluid and burn spontaneously with a bright red
light, and when thrown into the mineral acids,
inflame and burn on the surface, and in oxygen
and oxymuriatic acid gas, produce a white flame,
and throw out numerous bright sparks and scin
tillations, — that a certain kind of air, called the
nitrous oxide, when inhaled into the lungs, pro
duces an extraordinary elevation of the animal
spirits, an irresistible propensity to laughter, a
rapid flow of vivid ideas, and a thousand de-
.ightful emotions, without any subsequent feel
ings of debility or exhaustion — and, that it is not
altogether improbable, according to the deduc
tions of some modern chymists, that " oxygen
and hydrogen, with the assistance of the solar
light, are the only elementary substances em
ployed in the constitution of the whole universe ;"
so that Nature, in all her operations, works tho
most infinitely diversified effects, by the slightest
modifications in the means she employs.

Such are only a few specimens of the curious
and interesting subjects which the physical sci
ences present to the reflecting mind. And is it
conceivable that a rational being can make such
objects as those I have now specified the subject
of his frequent study and contemplation, and not
feel pleasures and enjoyments far superior to
those of the mass of mankind, who are either
immersed in sensuality, or enveloped with the
mists of ignorance ? The man who has such
subjects to study and investigate, and such ob
jects to contemplate, can never be destitute of
enjoymeit. If happiness depends on the activity
of the mind, and the range of objects presented
before it, wherever he is placed, — whether at
home or abroad, in the city or in the country, he
can never be at a loss for means of mental grati
fication, and of increasing his stock of intellectual
wealth. He needs not envy the rich and the noble,
on account of the elegance of their mansions and
the splendour of their equipage ; for the magnifi

cence and glories of the universe, and all the
beauties of terrestrial nature lie before him, and
are at all times ready to minister to his enjoy
ment. In investigating the admirable arrange
ments which appear in the economy of creation,
in tracing throughout that economy the perfec
tions of his Creator, and in looking forward to a
nobler state of existence where his views of the
divine empire shall be expanded, he can enjoy a
satisfaction and delight which the wealth of this
world cannot bestow, and which its frowns and
calamities cannot destroy.

Besides the pleasures derived from a contem
plation of the doctrines and the facts of science,
— there is a positive gratification in tracing the,
steps by which the discoveries of science have been
jnade, — the reasonings and demonstrations by
which its doctrines are supported, and the experi
ments by which they are proved and illustrated.
In this point of view, the study of several
branches of mathematical science, however ab
struse they may at first sight appear, will afford
a high degree of gratification to the mind.
When it is announced as a proposition in geo
metry, " that the square described on the hypo-
thenuse, or longest side of a right angled tri
angle, is equal to the sum of the squares de
scribed on the other side,"* — it is pleasing to

* The following figure will convey an idea to the
unlearned reader of the meanirj? of this proposi
tion.

A B C is a riaht angled triangle, having the right
angle at C, and A B is the hypothenuse, or longest
side. By geometrical reasoning it can be- demon
strated, that the square D, described on the longest
side A B, is exactlj '"' to the sum of the squares
E and F, described on tne other two sides.— One of
the uses of this proposition will appear from the
following example. Suppose A C the height of a
wall = 24 feet, B C the width of a trench = 18 feet;
it is required to find the length of a ladder B A which
will reach from the outside of the trench to the top
of the wall. 'Ihe square of 18 is 324 ; the square of
24 is 576, which added together make 900, equal to
the square D ; the square root of which is 30 =a the
length of the ladder. On this principle we cun find

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

perceive, how every step of the demonstration
proceeds with unerring certainty, and leads the
mind to perceive the truth of the conclusion to
which it leads, with as high a degree of demon
strative evidence as that 3 added to 6 make 9,
or that 5 multiplied by 4 make 20. In like
manner, when it is clearly demonstrated by ma
thematical reasoning, that " the three angles of
every triangle, whatever be its size or the incli
nation of its sides, are exactly equal to two right
angles, or 180 degrees," and that " the sides of
a plane triangle are to one another as the sines
of the angles opposite to them," the utility and
importance of these truths may not at first view
be appreciated, however convincing the evi
dence from which the conclusions are deduced.
But when the student comes to know that on
these demonstrated properties of a triangle de
pends the mode of measuring the height of
mountains, and the breadth of rivers, — of deter
mining the circumference of the earth, the dis
tance of the sun and moon, the magnitudes of
the planets, and the dimensions of the solar sys
tem, — it cannot but afford a positive gratification
to perceive the important bearings of such truths,
and that the astronomer, when he announces his
sublime deductions respecting the sizes and dis
tances of the heavenly bodies, does not rest on
vague conceptions, but on observations con
ducted with the nicest accuracy, and on calcu
lations founded on principles susceptible of the
strictest demonstration.

" To follow a demonstration of a grand ma
thematical truth," says a powerful and enlight
ened writer, — " to perceive how clearly and how
inevitably one step succeeds another, and how
the whole steps lead to the conclusion, — to ob
serve how certainly and unerringly the reason
ing goes on from things perfectly self-evident,
and by the smallest addition at each step, every
one being as easily taken after the one before as
the first step of all was, and yet the result being
something, not only far from self-evident, but so
general and strange, that you can hardly believe
it to be true, and are only convinced of it by
going over the whole reasoning, — this operation
of the understanding, to those who so exercise
themselves, always affords the highest delight,"

It is likewise a source of enjoyment to con
template the experiments by which the doctrines
of science are supported, and the reasonings and
deductions founded on experimental investiga
tions. When a person is told that the atmos-
[here presses on every part of the surface of the
earth with a force equal to two thousand one
hundred and sixty pounds on every square foot,
it must surely be gratifying to behold a column
of water supported in a glass tube, open at the
'ower end, — and a square bottle connected with
an air-pump, broken to pieces by the direct pres-

the height of the mountains in the moon, when the
ength 10 their shadows is known.

sure of the atmosphere, — and from a comparison
of the weight of mercury suspended in a tube
with the diameter of its bore, to be able to cal
culate the atmospherical pressure on the body
of a man, or even on the whole earth. When
he is told that one ingredient of atmospheric air
is the principle of flame, is it not curious and
highly interesting to behold a piece of iron burn
ing in this gas, throwing out brilliant sparks of
white flame, and illuminating a large ha.1 with a
dazzling lustre ? — and when he is informed that
fixed air is the heaviest of the gases, and de
structive to flame and animal life, — is it not gra
tifying to perceive this invisible fluid poured from
one vessel to another, and when poured on the
flame of a candle that it instantly extinguishes
it ? Many of the deductions of natural science
are so wonderful, and so unlike every thing we
should have previously conceived, that to the un
tutored mind they appear almost incredible, and
little short of unfounded and extravagant asser
tions. When such a one is told that " any
quantity of liquid, however small, will counter
poise any quantity, however great," — that the
rubbing of a glass cylinder against a cushion
will produce the effect of setting fire to spirits
of wine, or of bursting a bladder of air at the
distance of a hundred feet from the machine —
that the galvanic agency will produce a violent
and uncommon effect upon the nervous and mus
cular system — and that in certain vegetable in-
fusions, myriads of animals of various forms,
may be seen a thousand times less than the
smallest visible point — such assertions are apt
to stagger his belief as improbable and extrava
gant. But when he actually sees in the first
case, a large hogshead that would hold above a
hundred gallons, filled with water, and a long
tube whose bore is not half an inch in diameter,
firmly inserted into its top, and a small quantity
of water scarcely exceeding a quart, poured into
the tube — and then beholds the top rapidly
swelling, and in a few moments, the whole cask
burst to pieces, and the water scattered in every
direction, — or in the second case, when he sees
alcohol suddenly taking fire, and a bladder filled
with oxygen and hydrogen gas, exploding with a
tremendous report, merely by the turning of the
electrical machine at the other end of a long
hall, and the interposition of a wire, — or, when
in the third case, he sees a person drink a glass
of porter which has a wire around it connected
with a galvanic battery, and at a certain stage
of the operation, receive a tremendous concus
sion, which makes him start and roar like a
madman, or, in the last case, when he looks
through a powerful microscope, and perceives
hundreds of mites like so many young pigs,
clambering among rocks of cheese, and thou
sands of fishes in a drop of water — such experi
mental illustrations of the truths of science, can
not fail to prove highly satisfactory, and to atlbrd

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

57

no inconsiderable degree of entertainment and
delight.

The occasional performance of scientific experi
ments, as opportunity offers, and the construction
of philosophical instruments, may also be con
verted into a source of enjoyment. In the one
case, the student of nature may derive gratifica
tion, in being the means of communicating- en
tertainment and instruction to others ; and in the
other, he may whet his ingenuity, and increase
his mental vigour, and be enabled, at a small ex-
pence, to gratify his curiosity in contemplating
the various processes, and the beauties and sub
limities of nature. Many of the instruments of
science, when elegantly constructed, are beyond
the reach of the general mass of mankind, on
Account of their expense ; but a person of mode
rate reflection and ingenuity, during his leisure
hours, can easily construct at an inconsiderable
expense, many of the most useful instruments
which illustrate the facts of science. For ex
ample, a powerful compound microscope, capa
ble of enabling us to perceive the most interest
ing minute objects in the animal, vegetable, and
mineral kingdoms, may be constructed at an ex
pense of little more than a crown, provided the
individual constructs the tubes and other appa
ratus of pasteboard, wood, or other cheap mate
rials ; and the occasional exercise of the mental
powers in such devices, so far from being irk
some or fatiguing, are generally accompanied
with satisfaction and pleasure.

It is true, indeed, that the study of some of
the subjects above mentioned, particularly the
first principles of the mathematics, may, in the
outset, be attended with some difficulties, and to
some minds may wear a dry and uninteresting
aspect. But as the mind proceeds onwards in
its progress, and acquires clearer conceptions of
what at first appeared difficult or obscure—
every difficulty it is enabled to surmount gives a
new relish to the subject of investigation, and
additional vigour to the intellect, to enable it to
vanquish the difficulties which still remain,— till
at length it feels a pleasure and an interest in the
pursuit, which no difficulties, nor even the lapse
of time can ever effectually destroy. " Let any
man," says Lord Brougham, "-pass an evening
in vacant idleness, or even in reading some silly
tale, and compare the state of his mind when he
goes to sleep or gets up next morning, with its
state so-ne other day when he has passed a few
hours in going through the proofs, by facts and
reasonings, of some of the great doctrines in
Natural Science, learning truths wholly new to
him, and satisfying himself by careful examina
tion of the grounds on which known truths rest,
so as to be not only acquainted with the doc
trines themselves, but able to show why he be
lieves them, and to prove before others that they
Are true ; — he will find as great a difference as
can exisi in the same being, — the difference be

tween looking back upon time unprofitai^y
wasted, and time spent in self-improvement; h«
will feel himself in the one case listless and dis
satisfied, in the other, comfortable and happy ;
in the one case, if he do not appear to himself
humbled, at least he will not have earned any
claim to his own respect; in the other case, he
will enjoy a proud consciousness of having by
his own exertions, become a wise, and therefore
a more exalted creature."

The subjects to which I have now adverted,
may be considered not merely in reference t<- ihe
gratification they afford to the understanding,
but likewise in reference to the beneficial infiu-
cnce they would produce on the heart, and on social
and domestic enjoyment.

All the truths relative to the Creator's opera
tions in the universe, when properly contempla
ted, are calculated to produce a powerful and in
teresting impression upon the affections. Is a
person gratified at beholding symmetry and beauty
as displayed in the works of art, — what a high
degree of delightful emotion must be felt in sur
veying the beautiful arrangements of Infinite
Wisdom, in the variety of forms, the nice pro
portions, the exquisite delicacy of texture, and
the diversified hues which adorn the vegetable
kingdom, — in the colours of the morning and
evening clouds of a summer sky, the plumage of
birds, the admirable workmanship on the bodies
of insects, the fine polish of sea-shells, the va
riegated wavings and colouring of jaspers, to
pazes, and emeralds, and particularly in those
specimens of divine mechanism in insects,
plants, and flowers, which the unassisted eye
cannot discern, and which the microscope alone
can unfold to view ! Has he a taste for the swft-
lime ? How nobly is he gratified by an enlight
ened view of the nocturnal heavens, where suns
unnumbered shine, and mighty worlds run their
solemn rounds ! Such contemplations have a
natural tendency, in combination with Christian
principles and motives, to raise the affections to
that Almighty Being who is the uncreated source
of all that is sublime and beautiful in creation, —
to enkindle the fire of devotion, — to excite adora
tion of his infinite excellences, and to produce
profound humility in his presence. Such studies
likewise tend to preserve the mind in calmness
and serenity under the moral dispensations of
Him whose wisdom is displayed in all his ar
rangements, and whose " tender mercies are
over all his works," — and to inspire it with hope
and confidence in relation to the future scenes of
eternity, from a consideration of his power, be
nevolence, and intelligence, as displayed through
out the universe, and of the inexhaustible sources
of felicity he has it in his power to distribute
among numerous orders of beings throughout, an
immortal existence. Contemplating the mime-
roua displays of Divine munificence around ua

58

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

—-ihfe diversified orders of delighted existence
that people the air, the waters, and the earth,
the nice adaptation of their organs and faculties
to their different situations and modes of life, the
ample provision made for their wants and enjoy
ments, and the boundless dimensions of the di
vine empire, where similar instances of benefi
cence are displayed — the heart is disposed to
rest with confidence on Him who made it, con
vinced that his almighty power qualifies him to
make us happy by a variety of means of which
we have no adequate conception, and that his
faithfulness and benevolence dispose him to with
hold no real good " from them that walk up
rightly."

Such studies would likewise tend to heighten
the delights of social enjoyment. There is no
thing more grating to the man of intelligence than
the foolish and trifling conversation which pre
vails in the various intercourses of social life,
even among the middling and the higher circles
of society, and in convivial associations. The
ribaldry and obscenity, the folly and nonsense,
and the laughter of fools which too frequently
distinguish such associations, are a disgrace to
our civilized condition, and to our moral and in
tellectual nature. Without supposing that it will
ever be expedient to lay aside cheerfulness and
rational mirth, the lively smile, or even the loud
laugh, it is surely conceivable, that a more ra
tional and improving turn might be given to gene
ral conversation than what is frequently exem
plified in our social intercourses. And what can
we suppose better calculated to accomplish this
end than the occasional introduction of topics
connected with science and general knowledge,
when all, or the greater part, are qualified so take
a share in the general conversation ? It would
tend to stimulate the mental faculties, to suggest
useful hints, to diffuse general information, to
improve science and art, to excite the ignorant to
increase in knowledge, to present interesting ob
jects of contemplation, to enliven the spirits, and
thus to afford a source of rational enjoyment.
It would also have a tendency to prevent those
shameful excesses, noisy tumults, and scenes of
intemperance which so frequently terminate our
festive entertainments. For want of qualifica
tions for such conversation, cards, dice, childish
questions and amusements, gossiping chit-chat,
and tales of scandal are generally resorted to, in
order to consume the hours allotted to social en
joyment. And how melancholy the reflection,
that rational beings capable of investigating the
laws and phenomena of the universe, and of pro
secuting the most exalted range of thought, and
who are destined to exist in other worlds, through
out an endless duration — should be impelled to
resort to such degrading expedients, to wheel
away the social hours !

Domestic enjoyment might likewise be height
ened and ir, proved by the studies to which we

have adverted. For want of qualifications for
rational conversation, a spirit of listlessness ant'
indifference frequently insinuates itself into the
intercourses of families, and between married
individuals, which sometimes degenerates into
fretfulness and impatience, and even into jars,
contentions, and violent altercations ; in wnich
case there can never exist any high degree of
affection or domestic enjoyment. It is surely
not unreasonable to suppose, that were the minds
of persons in the married state possessed of a
certain portion of knowledge, and endowed with
a relish for rational investigations — not only
would such disagreeable effects be prevented,
but a variety of positive enjoyments would be
introduced. Substantial knowledge, which leads
to the proper exercise of the mental poAvers, has
a tendency to meliorate the temper, and to pre
vent those ebullitions of passion, which are the
results of vulgarity and ignorance. Bv invigo
rating the mind, it prevents it frcm sinking into
peevishness and inanity. It affords subjects for
interesting conversation, and augments affection
by the reciprocal interchanges of sentiment and
feeling, and the mutual communication of in
struction and entertainment. And in cases where
malignant passions are ready to burst forth, ra
tional arguments will have a more powerful influx
ence in arresting their progress, in cultivated
minds, than in those individuals in whose consti
tution animal feeling predominates, and reason
has lost its ascendancy. As an enlightened
mind is generally the seat of noble and liberal
sentiments — in those cases where the parties be
long to different religious sectaries, there is more
probability of harmony and mutual forbearance
being displayed, Avhen persons take an enlarged
view of the scenes of creation, and the revela
tions of the Creator, than can be expected in the
case of those whose faculties are immersed in
the mists of superstition and ignorance.

How delightful an enjoyment is it, after the
bustle of business and the labours of the day are
over, — when a married couple can sit down at
each corner of the fire, and, with mutual relish
and interest, read a volume of history or of po
pular philosophy, and talk of the moral govern
ment of God, th«rarrangcments of his providence,
and the wonders of the universe! Such inter
esting conversations and exercises beget a mutual
esteem, enliven the affections, and produce a
friendship lasting as our existence, and which no
untoward incidents can ever effectually impair.
A Christian pastor, in giving an account of the
last illness of his beloved partner, in a late perio
dical work, when alluding to a book she had read
along with him about two months before her de
cease, says, " I shall never forget the pleasure
with which she studied the illustrations of the
divine perfections in that interesting book. Ris*
ing from the cnntonriplation of the variety, beauty,
immensity, and <srder of the creation, she ex

PLEASURES CONNECTED WITH SCIENCE.

nlted in the assurance of having the Creator for
her father, anticipated with great joy the vision
of him in the next world, and calculated with un
hesitating confidence on the sufficiency of his
boundless nature to engage her most intense in
terest, and to render her unspeakably happy for
ever." It is well known that the late lamented
Princess Charlotte, and her consort Prince Leo
pold, lived together in the greatest harmony and
affection ; and from what her biographers have
stated respecting her education and pursuits, it
appears that the mutual friendship of these illus
trious individuals was heightened and cemented
by the rational conversation in which they in
dulged, and the elevated studies to which they
were devoted. Her course of education em
braced the English, classical, French, German,
and Italian languages ; arithmetic, geography,
astronomy, the first six books of Euclid, algebra,
mechanics, and the principles of optics and per
spective, along with history, the policy of govern
ments, and particularly the principles of the
Christian religion. She was a skilful musician,
had a fine perception of the picturesque in na
ture, and was fond of drawing. She took great
pleasure in strolling on the beach, in marine ex
cursions, in walking in the country, in rural
scenery, ia conversing freely with the rustic in
habitants, and in investigating every object that
seemed worthy of her attention. She was an
enthusiastic admirer of the grand and beautiful
in nature, and the ocean was to her an object of
peculiar interest. After her union with the
prince, as their tastes were similar, they engaged
in the same studies. Gardening, drawing, mu
sic, and rational conversation, diversified their
leisure hours. They took great pleasure in the
culture of flowers — in the classification of them
• — and in the formation, with scientific skill, of a
hortus siccux. But the library, which was fur
nished with the best books in our language, was
their favourite place of resort ; and their chief
daily pleasure, mutual instruction. They were
seldom apart either in their occupations or in
their amusements ; nor were they separated in
their religious duties. " They took sweet coun
sel together, and walked to' the house of God in
company •," and it is also stated,- on good autho
rity, that they had established the worship of
God in their family, which was regularly attended
by every branch of their household. No won
der, then, that they exhibited an auspicious and
a delightful example of private and domestic vir
tue, of conjugal attachment, and of unobtrusive
charity and benevolence. In the higher circles
of society, as well as in the lower, it would be of
immense importance to the interests of domestic
happiness, Chat the taste of the Princess Char
lotte was more closely imitated, and that the
fashionable frivolity and dissipation which so
generally prevail were exchanged for the pursuits
of knowledge, and the delights of rational and

improving conversation. Then those family
feuds, contentions, and separations, and those
prosecutions for matrimonial infidelity which are
now so common, would be less frequently ob
truded on public view, and examples of virtue,
affection, and rational conduct, would be set be*
fore the subordinate ranks of the community,
which might be attended with the most beneficial
and permanent results, not only to the present,
but to future generations.

In short, the possession of a large store -M
intellectual wealth would fortify the soul in the
prospect of every evil to which humanity is
subjected, and would afford consolation and
solace when fortune is diminished, and the
greater portion of external comforts is with
drawn. Under the frowns of adversity, those
worldly losses and calamities which drive un
thinking men to desperation and despair, would
be borne with a becoming magnanimity ; the
mind having within itself the chief resources of
its happiness, and becoming almost independent
of the world around it. For to the individual
whose happiness chiefly depends on intellectual
pleasures, retirement from general society, and
the bustle of the world, is often the state of his
highest enjoyment.

Thus I have endeavoured briefly to illustrate
the enjoyments which a general diffusion of
knowledge would produce — from a considera
tion of the limited conceptions of the untutored
mind contrasted with the ample and diversified
range of view presented to the enlightened un
derstanding — from the delightful tendency of
scientific pursuits, in enabling us to trace, from
a single principle, an immense variety of effects,
and surprising and unexpected resemblances
where we least expected to find them, — from
the grand and sublime objects it presents before
us — from the variety of novel and interesting
scenes which the different departments of phy
sical science unfold — from the exercise of tracing
the steps by which scientific discoveries have
been made — and from the influence of such
studies on the affections and on social and do
mestic enjoyment.

For want of the knowledge to which I have
alluded, it happens that few persons who have
been engaged in commercial or agricultural pur
suits feel much enjoyment, when, in the decline
of life, they reti-e from the active labours in
which they had been previously engaged. Re
tirement and respite from the cares of business
atford them little gratification, and they feel a
vacuity within which nothing around them or
within the range of their conceptions can fill up.
Being destitute of a taste for intellectual pur
suits, and devoiJ of that subsi.. rtum of thought
which is the grouna-vvork of mental activity and
of rational contemplation, they enjoy nothing of
that mental liberty and expansion of soul Which

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

the retreats of solitude afford to the contempla
tive mind ; and, when not engaged in festive
associations, are apt to sink into a species of list-
lessriess and ennui. They stalk about from
one place to another without any definite ob
ject in view — look at every thing around with a
kind of unconscious gaze — are glad to indulge
in trifling talk and gossip with every one they
meet — and, feeling how little enjoyment they de
rive from their own reflections, not unfequently
slide into habits of sensuality and intemperance.
From what we have stated on this topic, it
evidently appears that the pursuits of science
are fitted to yield a positive gratification to every
rational mind. It presents to view, processes,
combinations, metamorphoses, motions, and ob
jects of various descriptions calculated to arrest
the attention and to astonish the mind, far more
than all the romances and tales of wonder that
were ever invented by the human imagination.
When the pleasures arising from such studies
are rendered accessible to all, human happiness
will be nearly on a level, and the different ranks
of mankind will enjoy it nearly in an equal de
gree. As true enjoyment depends chiefly on
the state of the mind, and the train of thought,
that passes through it, it follows, that when a
man prosecutes a rational train of thought,
and finds a pleasure in the contemplation of in
tellectual objects, his happiness is less dependent
on mere sensitive enjoyments, and a smaller
portion of external comforts will be productive
of enjoyment, than in the case of those whose
chief pleasure consists in sensual gratifications.
When intellectual pursuits, therefore, shall oc
cupy the chief attention of mankind, we may in
dulge the hope, that those restless and insatiable
desires which avarice and ambition never cease
to create, will seldom torment the soul, and that
a noble generosity of mind in relation to riches
will distinguish persons of every rank, and be
the means of producing enjoyment wherever its
influence extends.

SECTION V.

ON THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE OF SCIEN
TIFIC KNOWLEDGE, AND ITS TEiNDENCY TO
PROMOTE THE EXTERNAL COMFORTS OF
GENERAL SOCIETY.

IN the preceding section I have considered the
beneficial tendency of knowledge and the plea
sures it affords, chiefly in reference to the un
derstanding and the affections. In the present
section I shall consider it more particularly, in
regard to its practictil effects on the active em
ployments an--1 the externa' comforts of the

middling ?..id lower orders of the community

Eveiy art, being founded on scientific principles,

and directed in its operations by the experi«
mental deductions of philosophy, it follows, that
a knowledge of the principles of science must be
conducive to a skilful practice of the arts, and
must have a tendency to direct the genius of the
artist to carry them to their highest pitch of im
provement. In illustrating this topic, I shall
endeavour to show that an acquaintance with
science would render mechanics, manufacturers,
and labourers more expert and skilful in their
different departments — would pave the way for
future discoveries and improvements — and that
the knowledge and spirit which produced such
improvements would promote the external com
forts of mankind.

I. A knowledge of the principles of science
would render manufacturers, mechanics, and
common labourers of all descriptions more skilful
in their respective professions and employments.
In the arts of dyeing and calico-printing.
every process is conducted on the principles of
chymistry. Not a colour can be imparted but
in consequence of the affinity which subsists
between the cloth and the dye, — or the dye and
the mordant employed as a bond of union be
tween them ; and the colours will be liable to
vary, unless the artist take into account the
changes which take place in them by the absorp
tion of oxygen ; — a knowledge of which and of
the different degrees of oxidizemenl. which the
several dyes undergo, requires a considerable
portion of chymical skill; and such knowledge
is absolutely necessary to epable either the
dyer or the calico printer to produce in all cases
permanent colours of the shade he intends. To
chymistry, too, they must be indebted for the
knowledge they may acquire of the nature of the
articles they use in their several processes —
for the artificial production of their most valua
ble mordants — and for some of their most beau
tiful and brilliant colours. As an evidence of
this, it is sufficient to state, that, to produce
such colours as an olive ground and yellow
figures, a scarlet pattern on a black ground, or a
brown ground with orange figures, formerly
required a period of many weeks ; but by means
of chymical preparations the whole of this work
may now be done in a few days, and patterns
more delicate than ever produced, with a degree
of certainty of which former manufacturers could
have no idea; and all this is effected by dyeing
the cloth a self-colour in the first instance, and
afterwards merely printing the pattern with a
chymical preparation, which discharges a part
of the original dye, and leaves a new colour in
its stead.

The art of bleaching has likewise received so
many important improvements from chymical sci
ence, that no one is now capable of conducting its
processes to advantage who is ignorant of the
scientific principles on whir*' *'ie present prac
tice of that art is founded. Till abo> I *ke close

UTILITY OF CHYMICAL KNOWLEDGE.

of the eighteenth century, the old tedious process
of bleaching continued in practice. But, about
that period the introduction of the oxymuriatic
acid, combined with alkalis, lime and other in
gredients, in bleaching cottons and linens, has
given an entirely new turn to every part of the
process, so that the process which formerly re
quired several months for its completion can
now be accomplished in a few days, and with a
degree of perfection which could not previously
be attained. Even in a few hours, that which
formerly required nearly a whole summer, can
now be effected, and that, too, merely by the
action of an almost invisible fluid. As the
whole process of bleaching, as now practised,
consists almost entirely of chymical agents and
operations, every person employed in this art,
ought to possess a certain portion of chymical
knowledge, otherwise many of its processes
would run the risk of being deranged, and the
texture of the materials undergoing the process
of being either materially injured or completely
destroyed.

The operation of brewing fermented liquors
is likewise a chymical process. The student
of chymistry will learn how the barley in the
first instance is converted into a saccharine
substance by malting ; how the fermentative
process converts the saccharine to a spirituous
substance, and how the latter, by continuing the
process, becomes changed into vinegar. He
will also learn the means of promoting and
encouraging this process, and how to retard and
check it, when it is likely to be carried too far,
so as to be sure of uniformly obtaining satisfac
tory results. In this and in every other process,
it must therefore be of importance to acquire
some knowledge of the principles of natural sub
stances, and of the nature of those changes
which take place in the materials on which we
operate. In the manufacture of soap, it is
reckoned by those intimately acquainted with the
process, that many thousands per annum, now
lost to the community, might be saved, were the
trade carried on upon scientific principles.
When a soap boiler is an accomplished chymist,
he knows how to analyze barilla, kelp, potass,
and other materials, so as to ascertain the pro
portion of alkali in each ; and when these arti
cles are at an exorbitant price, he will have
recourse to various residuums, which he will
decompose by chymical means, and use as sub
stitutes. He will know how to oxydize the
common oils and oil-dregs, so as to give them
consistence, and render them good substitutes
fo«- tallow — and how to apportion his lime so as
to make his alkali perfectly caustic, without
using an unnecessary quantity of that article.
The manufacture of candles might also derive
advantage from chymical science. It is found
that foreign tallows frequently contain a large
portion of acid rendering them inferior to the

English, which, by chymical means may bo
purified at a very small expense, and by the
proper application of chymical agents, other
brown tallows may be rendered beautifully
white, and fit for the best purposes.*

The tanning of hides is now ascertained to
consist in impregnating the animal matter with
that peculiar principle taken from the vegetable
kingdom, called tan, the effect of which is ex
plained entirely on chymical principles. It is
now known that many substances besides oak-
bark, contains tan, and to chymistry we are
indebted for the means of discovering with
accuracy the quantity of tan which the several
astringent vegetables contain. It is supposed
not to be improbable, when the manufacturers
shall have paid proper attention to chymical
science, that the article in question may be pre
pared in chymical laboratories, so as entirely to
supersede the use of oak bark, since the princi
ple of tanning has already been formed artifi
cially by a modern chymist.f — It is also well
known, that to chymical research, the manufac
tures of earthen-ware and porcelain are indebted
for the improved state in which they are now
found. For, the successful management of all
their branches, from the mixture of the materials
which form the body of the ware, to the produc
tion of those brilliant colours with which such
articles are adorned — is dependent on the prin
ciples of chymical science. The celebrated
Wedgewood, to whom this branch of manufac
ture 'is so highly indebted, devoted his whole
attention to the improvement of his art by the
application of his chymical knowledge, of which
few men possessed a larger share ; and he has
been heard to declare, " that nearly all the diver
sified colours applied to his pottery were pro
duced only by the oxides of iron."

There are few persons to whom a knowledge
of chymistry is of more importance than to the
Agriculturist. It will teach him to analyse the
soils on the different parts of his farm, and to
subject to experiment the peat, the marie, the
lime and other manures, in order to ascertain
the advantages to be derived from them, and
the propriety of applying them in particular in
stances. It will teach him when to use lime
hot from the kiln, and when slacked, how to
promote the putrefactive process in his com
posts, and at what period to check it, so as to
prevent the fertilizing particles becoming un-
prolific and of little value. It will also teach
him the difference in the properties of marie,
lime, dung, mud, ashes, alkaline salt, soap-
waste, sea-water and other manures, and, con
sequently, which to prefer in all varieties of
soil. It is said that the celebrated Lavoisier

* For most of the above hints the author Is In
debted to Mr. Parkes.

tSegerin. See Nicolson's Phil. Journal, 4to vol.
i. p. 271.

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

cultivated 240 acres of land in La Vendee, on
chymical principles, in order to set a good ex
ample to the farmers ; and his mode of culture
was attended with so much success, that he ob
tained a third more of crop than was procured
by the us'ial method, and in nine years his an
nual produce was doubled.

I might also have illustrated the practical ad
vantages of chymical science in relation to the
art of extracting metals from their ores, — the con
version of iron into steel, and the metallic ore
into malleable iron — the manufacture of glass,
alum, copperas, blue vitriol, soda, potash, J\loroc-
co-lcather, paper, starch, varnish, and Prussian-
blue — the refining of sugar, saltpetre, gold and
silver — the a.rtihcia.\ formation of ice — the method
of preserving fish, meat, and other articles of
food, and various other processes connected
with the practical departments of life, all of
which arc strictly chymical operations, and can
be improved and brought to perfection chiefly
by the knowledge and application of the doc
trines and facts of chymical science.

With regard to the professions of the physi
cian, surgeon, and apothecary, it is now univer
sally admitted, that an extensive acquaintance
with the principles and facts of chymistry is es
sentially requisite to the successful practice of
these arts. The human body may be considered
as a species of laboratory, in which the various
processes of absorption, secretion, fermenta
tion, composition and decomposition are in
cessantly going forward. Every article of food
and drink we throw into the stomach, every
portion of atmospheric air we receive into the
lungs, every impression we derive from the sur
rounding elements, every motion of the heart
and lungs, and every pulse that vibrates within
us, may be considered as effecting a chymical
change in the vital fluids, and in every part of
the animal system ; the nature of which it is of
the utmost importance to the medical practi
tioner thoroughly to investigate and understand.
For, how can he be supposed to be successful
in his attempts to counteract the disorders to
which the human frame is incident, and to pro
duce a chymical effect on the constitution of his
patient, if he is ignorant either of the processes
which are going on in the system, of the chy-.
mical properties of the substances which he
throws into it, or of the effects which they will
certainly produce ? If he is ignorant of the
chymical affinities that subsist between the va
rious articles of the Materia Medica, he may
often administer preparations which are not
only inefficacious, but even poisonous and de
structive to his patient. When two chymical
substances, each of which might be adminis
tered separately with safety, are combined, they
sometimes produce a substance which is highly
deleterious to the animal system. For example,
although mercury and oxygenized muriatic acid

have both been administered, and either of thero
may be taken separately without injury to the
animal economy, — yet if a medical practitioner,
ignorant of the chymical affinities of such sub
stances, arid of the quality of the compound^
should give both of them in conjunction, the r.iost
dreadful consequences might ensue : since the
product of this mixture, oxygenized muriate of
mercury, is known to be a most corrosive poi
son ; and there can be little doubt that hundreds
of lives have been destroyed, by ignorant pre
tenders to medical science, in consequence of
the injudicious administration of such delete
rious preparations.

But chymistry is not the only science which
is of utility in the arts which minister to the
comfort and pecuniary interests of society.
Geometry, trigonometry, conic sections, and
other branches of mathematical knowledge ; hy
drostatics, hydraulics, mechanics, optics, bota
ny, mineralogy and the other departments of the
physical sciences, may be rendered of essential
service to artisans and mechanics of various de
scriptions. All the sciences are, in some de
gree, connected, and reflect a mutual light upon
one another; and consequently the man who
has the most extensive acquaintance with
science, is best qualified for carrying to per
fection any one department of the useful arts.

Practical Geo?netry is highly useful to almost
every mechanic and artisan, particularly to
mill-wrights, bricklayers, carpenters and ma
sons. It teaches them to form angles of any
assigned number of degrees, to draw parallel
and perpendicular lines, to proportion circumfe
rences to diameters, to divide circular rims into
any number of parts, to estimate the square or
cubical contents of any piece of workmanship,
and to calculate the price they ought to receive
for any work they perform, according to its
solid or superficial dimensions. In forming es
timates of the expense of any proposed under
taking, the carpenter, bricklayer, and architect
must find such knowledge essentially requisite ,
and even the common labourer who undertakes
the formation of roads, the digging of pits, and
the clearing away of rubbish, will find the prin
ciples of arithmetic and geometry of important
service in estimating the rate at which he can
perform such operations. The following geome
trical theorems, besides many others, are capa
ble of a variety of practical applications, in
many departments of the arts. " If, from the
two ends of any diameter of the circle, two lines
be drawn to meet in any one point of the circle
whatever, such lines are perpendicular to each
other," or, in other words, they form a right
angle at the point of contact.* Again, " The

* For example, if from the two ends of the diame
ter A and B, the lines A C, B C be drawn to the point
C, these lines will be perpendicular to each other
and consequently the angle at C will be a right an

PRACTICAL UTILITY OF MECHANICAL PRINCIPLES.

ureas of all circles are in exact proportion to
the squares of their radii, or half diameters."
If, (or example, we draw a circle with a pair of
compasses whose points are stretched 4 inches
asunder, and another with an extent of 8 inches,
the large circle is exactly four times the size or
area of the small one. For the square of 4
is = 16, and the square of 8 is = 64, which is
four times 16. And as the circumferences of
1he circles are in proportion to the radii, it will
follow, that the length of a string which would
go round the curve of the larger circle is ex
actly double the length of one which would go
round the lesser. Mechanics, in recognising
such theorems, will meet with many opportuni
ties of reducing them to practice. — Again, there
is a figure which Geometricians term a parabola,
which is formed every time we pour water for
cibly from the mouth of a tea-kettle, or throw a
stone forward from the hand. One property of
the parabola is, that if a spout of water be di
rected at half a perpendicular from the ground,
or at an angle of elevation of 45 degrees, it will
come to the ground at a greater distance than
if any other direction had been given it, a slight
allowance being made for the resistance of the
air. Hence the man who guides the pipe of a
fire-engine may be directed how to throw the
water to the greatest distance, and he who aims
at a mark, to give the projectile its proper di
rection. — To surveyors, navigators, land-mea
surers, gaugers and engineers a knowledge of
the mathematical sciences is so indispensably
requisite, that without it, such arts cannot be
skilfully exercised.

C

pie. In like manner the lines AD, and B D, A Band
B E, will stand at right angles to each other; and
the same will be the case to whatever point of the
circle such lines are drawn. The practical appli
cation of this principle, in various operations, will,
at once, be obvious to the intelligent mechanic, es
pecially when lie intends the two ends or sides of
iny piece of machinery to stand perpendicular to
each other.

5

The physical sciences are also of the gieatest
utility in almost every department of art. To
masons, architects, ship-builders, carpenters
and every other class employed in combining
materials, raising weights, quarrying stones,
building piers and bridges, splitting rocks, or
pumping water from the bowels of the earth, — a
knowledge of the principles of mechanics and
dynamics is of the first importance. By means
of these sciences the nature of the lever and
other mechanical powers may be learned, and
their forces estimated — the force produced by
any particular combination of these powers cal
culated — and the best mode of applying such
forces to accomplish certain effects, ascertained.
By a combination of the mechanical powers the
.smallest force may be multiplied to an almost in-
definite extent, and with such assistance man hau
been enabled to rear works and to perform ope.
rations which excite astonishment, and which
his own physical strength, assisted by all that
the lower animals could furnish, would have
been altogether inadequate to accomplish. An
acquaintance with the experiments which have
been made to determine the strength of materials,
and the results which have been deduced from
them, is of immense importance to every class
of mechanics employed in engineering and
architectural operations. From such experi
ments, (which have only been lately attended tc
on scientific principles) many useful deductions
might be made respecting the best form of mor
tises, joints, beams, tenons, scarphs, &c. ; the
art of mast making, and the manner of disposing
and combining the strength of different, sub
stances in naval architecture, and in the rear
ing of our buildings. For example, — from the
experiments now alluded to it has been deduced,
that the strength of any piece of material depends
chiefly on ils depth, or on that dimension which
is in the direction of its strain. A bar of timber
of one inch in breadth, and two inches in depth
is four times as strong as a bar of only cvne inch
deep ; and it is twice as strong as a bar two
inches broad and one deep, that is, a joint or
lever is always strongest when laid on its edge.
Hence it follows, that the strougest joist that
can be cut out of a round tree is not the one
which has the greatest quantity of timber in it,
but such that the product of its breadth by the
square of its depth shall be the greatest pos
sible. — Again, from the same experiments it is
found, that a hollow tube is stronger than a solid
rod containing the same quantity of matter. This
property of hollow tubes is also accompan:ed
with greater stiffness ; and the superiority in
strength and stiffness is so much the greater as
the surrounding shell is thinner in proportion to
its diame'.er. Hence we find that the bor.e.s of
men and other animals are formed hollow, which
renders them incomparably stron^r aiid stiffer,
gives more room for the insertion of muscles.

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

and makes them lighter and more agile, than if
they were constructed of solid matter. In like
manner the bones of birds, which are thinner
than those of other animals, and the quills in
their wings, acquire by their thinness the
strength which is necessary, while they are so
light as to give sufficient buoyancy to the ani
mal in its flight through the aerial regions. Our
engineers and carpenters have, of late, begun to
imitate nature in this respect, and now make
their axles and other parts of machinery hollow,
which both saves a portion of materials and ren
ders them stronger than if they were solid.*

The departments of hydrostatics and hydrau
lics, which treat of the pressure and motion of
fluids, and the method of estimating their velo
city and force, require to be thoroughly under
stood by all those who are employed in the
construction of common and forcing-pumps,
water-mills, fountains, fire-engines, hydrostati-
cal presses , and in the formation of canals, wet-
docks, and directing the course of rivers ; other
wise they will constantly be liable to commit
egregious blunders, and can never rise to emi
nence in their respective professions. Such
principles as the following : — that fluids press
equally in all directions, — that they press as
much upwards as downwards, — that water, in
several tubes that communicate with each other,
will stand at the same height, in all of them,
whether they be small or great, perpendicular or
oblique, — that the pressure of fluids is directly
as their perpendicular height, without any regard
to their quantity, — and that the quantities of
water discharged at the same time, by different
apertures, under the same heigth of surface in
the reservoir, are to each other nearly as the
areas of their apertures, — will be found capable
of extensive application to plumbers, engineers,
pump-makers, and all who are employed in
conducting water over hills or vallies, or in
using it as a mechanical power, by a recogni
tion of which they will be enabled to foresee,
with certainty, the results to be exnected from
their plans and operations ; for want of which
knowledge many plausible schemes have been
frustrated, and sums of money expended to no
purpose.

The following figures and explanations will tend
to illustrate some of the principles now stated :
— 1 . Fluids press in proportion to their perpen
dicular heights, and the base of the vessel con
taining them, without regard to the quantity.
Thus, if the vessel ABC, fig. 2, has its base
BC equal to the base FG of the cylindrical ves-
s< i DEFG, fig. l,but is much smaller at the top
A than at the bottom, and of the same height ;
the pressure upon the bottom BC is as great as

* The mechanical reader who wishes particular
information ou this subject is referred to the article
&rf.n<rth of materials in Enty. Brit- 3d edit, which
was written by the late Professor Robison.

the pressure upon the bottom of the vessel DE
FG, when they are filled with water, or any
other liquid, notwithstanding that there will be a
much greater quantity of water in the cylindri
cal than in the conical vessel ; or, in oihf r words,
the bottom BC will sustain a pressure equal to
what it would be if the vessel were as wide at
the top as at the bottom. In like manner, the
bottom of the vessel HIKL, fig. 3, sustains a
pressure only equal to the column whose base if
KL, and height KM, and not as the whoie
quantity of fluid contained in the vessel ; all the
rest of the fluid being supported by the sides.
The demonstration of these positions would oc
cupy too much room, and to many readers would
appear too abstract and uninteresting; but they
will be found satisfactorily demonstrated in most
books which treat of the doctrines of hydros-
tatics.

2. The positions now stated form the founda-

UTILITY OF HYDROSTATICS.

tiori of the hydrostatical paradox, namely, " that
a quantity of fluid, however small, may be made
to counterpoise a quantity, however great."
Thus, if to a wide vessel AB, we attach a tube
CD, communicating with the vessel, and pour

Fig. 4.

water into it, the water will run into the larger
vessel AB, and will stand at the same height C
and G in both. If we affix an inclined tube EF,
likewise communicating with the large vessel,
the water will also stand at E, at the same height
is in the other two ; the perpendicular altitude
»eing the same in all the three tubes, however
imall the one may be in proportion to the other.
This experiment clearly proves that the small co
lumn of water balances and supports the large
column, which it could not do if the lateral pres
sures at bottom were not equal to each other.

Whatever be the inclination of the tube EF, still
the perpendicular altitude will be the same as
that of the other tubes, although the column of
water must be much longer than those in the up
right tubes. Hence it is evident, that a small
quantity of a fluid may, under certain circum
stances, counterbalance any quantity of the same
fluid. Hence also the truth of the principle in
hydrostatics, that " in tubes which have a commu
nication, wlielher they be equator unequal, short or
oblique, the. fluid always rises to the same height."
From these facts it follows, that water cannot be
conveyed by means of a pipe that is laid in a re
servoir to any place that is higher than the reser
voir.

These principles point out the mode of con
veying water across valleys without those expen
sive aqueducts which were erected by the an
cients for this purpose. A pipe, conforming to
the shape of the valley, will answer every pur
pose of an aqueduct. Suppose the spring at A,
fig. 5, and water is wanted on the other side of
the valley to supply the house H, a pipe of lead
or iron laid from the spring -head across the val
ley will convey the water up to the level of (he
spring-head ; and if the house stand a little lower
than the spring-head, a constant stream will pour
into the cisterns and ponds where it is required,
as if the house had stood on the other side of the
valley ; and, consequently, will save the expense
of the arches BB, by which the ancient Romans
conducted water from one hill to another. But,
if the valley be very deep, *he pipes must be
made very strong near its bottom, otherwise they
will be apt to burst ; as the pressure of water
increases in the rapid ratio of 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, &c.
and is always in proportion to its perpendicular
height.

3. Fluids press in all directions, laterally and
upwards, as well as downwards. That fluids
press laterally may be seen by boring a hole in
the side of a cask containing any liquid, when
the liquid will run out in consequence of the
lateral pressure. The upward pressure is not
so obvious, but is clearly proved by the following
experiment, with an instrument generally termed
the hydrostatic bellows :— This machine con

sists of two thick oval boafds. about 13 inches
long and 16 inches broad, united to each other
by leather, so as to open and shut like a pair of
common bellows, but without valves. . Into this
instrument a pipe B, several feet high, is fixed
at D. If we pour water into the pipe at its top
C, it will run into the bellows and separate the
boards a little. If we then lay three weights,
each weighing 100 pounds, upon the upper

66

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Fig. 6.

W

c

Fig. 7.
K

board, and pour more water into the pipe, it
will run into the bellows, and raise up the
board with all the weights upon it. And though
the water in the tube should weigh in all only a
quarter of a pound, yet the pressure of this
small force upon the water below in the bellows
shall support the weights, which are 300 pounds ;
nor will they have weight enough to make them
descend, and conquer the weight of water, by
forcing it out of the mouth of the pipe. The
reason of this will appear from what has been
already stated respecting the pressure of fluids
of equal heights, without any regard to the
quantities. For, if a hole be made in the upper
board, and a tube be put into it, the water will
rise in the tube to the same height that it does*
in the pipe ; and it would rise as high (by sup
plying the pipe) in as many tubes as the board
would contain holes. Hence, if a man stand
upon the upper board, and blow into the bellows
through the pipe, he will raise himself upward
upon the board ; and the smaller the bore of the
pipe is, the easier will he be able to raise him
self. And if he put his finger on the top of the
pipe he may support himself as long as he
pleases.

The uges to which this power may be applied
ttf of great variety and extent ; and the branches

of art dependent upon it appear to be yet in the K
infancy. By the application of this power the
late Mr. Bramah formed what is called the Hy
drostatic Press, by which a prodigious force is
obtained, and by the help of which, hay, straw,
wool, and other light substances, may be forced
into a very small bulk, so as to be taken in
large quantities on board a ship. With a ma
chine, on this principle, of the size of a tea-pot,
standing before him on a table, a man is enabled
to cut through a thick bar of iron as easily as he
could clip a piece of pasteboard with a pair of
sheers. By this machine a pressure of 500 of
600 tons may be brought to bear upon any sub
stances which it is wished to press, to tear up,
to cut in pieces, or to pull asunder.

Upon the same principle, the tun or hogshead
HI, fig. 7, when filled with water, may be
burst, by pressing it with some pounds addi
tional weight of the fluid through the small tube
KL, which may bfi supposed to be from 25 to
30 feet in height. From what has been already
stated, it necessarily follows, that the small
quantity of water which the tube KL, contains,
presses upon the bottom of the tun with as much
force as if a column of water had been added as
wide as the tun itself, and as long as the tube,
which would evidently be an enormous wight,

UTILITY OF HYDROSTATICS.

A few years ago, a friend of mine, when in Ire-
,arid, performed this experiment to convince an
English gentleman, who called in question the
principle, and who laid a bet of fifty pounds that
it would not succeed. A hogshead, above 3 feet
high, and above 2 feet wide, was filled with
water ; a leaden tube, with a narrow bore, be
tween 20 and 30 feet long, was firmly inserted
into the top of the hogshead ; a person, from the
upper window of a house, poured in a decanter
of water into the tube, and, before the decanter
was quite emptied, the hogshead began to swell,
and, in two or three seconds, burst into pieces,
while the water was scattered about with im
mense force.

Hence, we may easily perceive what mischief
may sometimes be done by a very small quantity
of water, when it happens to act according to its
perpendicular height. Suppose, that in any
building, near the foundation, a small quantity
of water, only of the extent of a square yard, has
settled, and suppose it to have completely filled
up the whole vacant space, if a tube of 20 feet
fong were thrust down into the water, and filled
with water from above, a force of more than 5
tons would be applied to that part of the building,
which would blow it up with the same force as
gunpowder.* The same effect may sometimes
be produced by rain falling into long narrow
chinks, that may have inadvertently been left in
building the walls of a house ; which shows the
importance of filling up every crevice and open
ing of a building, and rendering the walls as
close and compact as possible. Hence, like
wise, similar processes in nature, connected
with pools of water in the bowels of the earth,
may occasionally produce the most dreadful
devastations. For, should it happen, that, in
the interior of a mountain, two or three hundred
feet below the surface, a pool of water thirty or
forty square feet in extent, and only an inch or
two in depth, was collected, and a small crevice
or opening of half an inch in breadth were con
tinued from the surface to the water in the
pool ; and were this crevice to be filled with
rain or melted snow, the parts around the layer
of water would sustain a pressure of more than
fix hundred tons, which might shake the moun
tain to its centre, and even rend it with the
greatest violence. In this way, there is every
reason to believe, partial earthquakes have been
produced, and large fragments of mountains
detached from their bases.

The principles now illustrated are capable of
the most extensive application, particularly in all
engineering and hydraulic operations. It is on
the principle of the lateral and upward pressure
of fluids that the water, elevated by the New
River water-works, in the vicinity of London,
*fter having descended from a bason in a vertical

•Seeflg. 8- p. 68.

pipe, and then, after having flowed 1
in a succession of pipes under the pavement, is
raised up again through another pipe, as high as
the fountain in the Temple Garden. It is upon
the same principle that a vessel may be filled
either at the mouth or at the bottom indifferently,
provided that it is done through a pipe, the top
of which is as high as the top of the vessel to be
filled. Hence, likewise, it follows, that when
piers, aqueducts, or other hydraulic works for
the retention of water, are to be constructed, it
becomes necessary to proportion their strength
to the lateral pressure which they are likely to
sustain, which becomes greater in proportion to
the height of the water to be sustained. Walls,
likewise, designed to support terraces, ought tf
be sufficiently strong to resist the lateral pressure
of the earth and rubbish which (hey are to sus
tain, since this pressure will be greater as the
particles of earth, of which the terraces are
composed, are less bound together, and in pro
portion as the terraces are more elevated. The
increase of pressure in proportion to the depth
of any fluid likewise shows the necessity of form
ing the sides of pipes or masonry in which fluids
are to be retained, stronger towards the bottom,
where the pressure is greatest. If they are no
thicker than what is sufficient for resisting the
pressure near the top, they will soon give way by
the superior pressure near the bottom; and if
they are thick enough in every part to resist the
great pressure below, they will be stronger than
necessary in the parts above, and, consequently,
a superfluous expense, that might have been
saved, will be incurred in the additional materials
and labour employed in their construction. The
same principle is applicable to the construction
of flood-gates, dams, and banks of every de
scription, for resisting the force of water. When
the strength and thickness requisite for resisting
the pressure at the greatest depth is once ascer
tained, the walls or banks may be made to taper
upwards, according to a certain ratio founded on
the strength of the materials, and the gradual
decrease of pressure from the bottom upwards ;
or, if one side be made perpendicular, the other
may proceed in a slanting direction towards the
top.

From the principles and experiments now
stated, we may also learn the reason why the
banks of ponds, rivers, and canals blow up, as it
is termed. If water can insinuate itself under
a bank or dam, even although the layer of water
were no thicker than a half-crown piece, the
pressure of the water in me canal or pond will
force it up. In fig. 8, let A represent the section
of a river or canal, and BB a drain running under
one of its banks ; it L evident, that, if the bank
C is not heavier than the column of water BB,,
that part of the bank must inevitably give way.
This effect may be prevented in artificial canal?
by making the sides very tight with clay heavily

68

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

rammed down, or by cutting a trench EF, about
a foot and a-half wide, along the bank of the river
or canal, and a little deeper than the bottom of
the canal; which being filled up with earth or clay

well moistened with water, forms, when dry, a
kind of wall through which the water cannot pe
netrate. By inattention to such circumstances
many disasters have happened, and much ex
pense needlessly incurred; and, therefore, the
scientific principles to which I have now adverted
ought to be known, even by labourers of the
lowest rank employed in operations carried on
for the improvement of the country.

To the want of a recognition of these prin
ciples may be attributed (he failure of the follow
ing scheme, and the disaster with which it was
attended : — After the diiing-bell was invented,
it was considered desirable to devise some means
of remaining for any length of time under wa
ter, and rising at, pleasure without assistance.
" Some years ago, an ingenious individual pro
posed a project, by which this end was to be ac
complished. It consisted in sinking the hull of a
ship made quite water-tight, with the decks and
sides strongly supported by shores, and the only
entry secured by a stout trap-door, in such a
manner, that, by disengaging from within the
weights employed to sink it. it might rise of itself
to the surface. To render the trial more satis
factory and the result more striking, the projec
tor himself made the first essay. It was agreed
that he should sink in twenty fathoms water, and
rise again without assistance at the expiration of
24 hours. Accordingly, making all secure,
fastening down his trap-door, and provided with •
all necessaries, as well as with the means of mak
ing signals to indicate his situation, this unhappy
victim of his own ingenuity entered, and was
sunk. No signal was made, and the time ap
pointed elapsed. An immense concourse of
poople had assembled to witness his rising, but
in vain ; for the vessal was never seen more. The
pressure of the water at so great a depth had, no
doubt, been completely under-estimated, and the
sides of tUt* vessel being at once crushed in, the
unfortunate projector perished before he could

even make the signal concerted to indicate his
distress."*

Many other applications of the principles of
hydrostatics might have been mentioned, but
what has been now stated may serve to exemplify
the practical utility of an acquaintance with such
principles, not only to engineers and superinten-
dants of public works, but tj mechanics and arti
ficers of every descriplion.

The science of Pneumatics, which treats of
the mechanical properties of the atmosphere,
will likewise be found useful to mechanics and
artists of various descriptions, to whom it is, in
many cases, of importance to know something
of the effects of the resistance, the pressure, and
the elasticity of air. The construction of baro
meters, syphons, syringes, and air-pumps, de
pends upon the pressure of the atmosphere, and
likewise water-pumps, fire-engines, and many
other hydraulic machines ; and, consequently,
the constructors of such instruments and en
gines must frequently act at random, if they are
unacquainted with the nature and properties of
the atmosphere, and the agency it exerts in such
mechanical contrivances. f Even the carpenter
and the mason may be directed, in some of their
operations, by an acquaintance with the doc
trines of pneumatics. When two pieces of
wood are to be glued together, they are first
made as even and smooth as possible ; the glue
is then applied to one or both of the surfaces ;
they are then pressed together till the glue has
become thoroughly dry. " The use of the glue is
to fill up every crevice in the pores of the wood,
so as to prevent the admission of any portion of
air between the pieces ; and then the atmos-

* Herschel's " Discourse on the Study of Nal.
Philosophy."

t As an illustration of the importance of being
acquainted with the atmospheric pressure, the fol
lowing anecdote may be here inserted :— A respecta
ble gentleman, of landed property, in one of the
middle counties of Scotland, applied to a friend of
mine, a Lecturer on Chymistry arid Natural Philo
sophy, in order to obtain his advice respecting a
pump-well which he had lately constructed at con
siderable expense. He told him, that, notwithstand
ing every exertion, he could not obtain a drop of
water from the spout, although he was quite sure
there was plenty of water in the well, and atih<,ugK
he had plastered it all armtnd, and Hocked v.p tvtry
crevice. "When my friend inspected the pump, he
suspected that the upper part of the well was air
tight, and, consequently, that the atmospheric pres
sure could not act on the surface of the water in the
well. He immediately ordered a hole to lie bored
adjacent to the pump, when the air rushed in with
considerable force ; and, on pumping, the water flow
ed copiously from the spout. The gentleman was
both overjoyed and astonished ; but It is somewhat
astonishing, that neither he, nor his neighbours, nor
any of the workmen who had been employed in its
construction, should have been able to point out the
cause of the defect ; but, on the other hand, should
have taken the 'very opposite means for remedying
it, namely, by plastering up every crevice, so as to
produce a kind of vacuum within the well. This
and similar facts show how little progress scientific
knowledge has yet made, even among the middle
classes of the community

PRACTICAL UTILITY OF PNEUMATICS.

phere, with a force equal to 15 pounds on every
square inch, presses the pieces firmly together.
A knowledge of this principle will suggest the
propriety of filling up every opening or crevice,
and continuing the pressure for some time, as
the air, wherever it gains admission, has a ten
dency, by its elastic force, to loosen every spe
cies of cement. The same principle might di
rect bricklayers arid masons, in building either
stone or brick- walls, in suggesting the propriety
of filling up every crevice with the most tena
cious cements, so as to prevent the access of
the external air to the interior of the walls.
For there can be no question that the firmness
and stability of our houses and garden-walls de
pend, in part, upon the pressure of the atmos
phere, after the interior crevices are thoroughly
filled up. An extensive knowledge of this
science would likewise direct them to the proper
mode of constructing the flues of chimneys, so
as to prevent that most disagreeable of all cir
cumstances indwelling houses, smoky chimneys.
From ignorance of the effects of heat, of the
experiments that have been made on rarefied
air, and their relation to our common fires, — of
the proper dimensions of funnels, — of the effects
of winds and currents of air, — of the proper
height and width of chimneys, — of the method
of promoting a good draught, and making the
air pass as near the fire as possible, and various
other particulars requisite to be attended to in
the construction of fire-places and their flues ;
many dwelling-houses have been bungled, and
rendered almost uninhabitable. The workmen,
m such operations, without any rational princi
ple to guide them, carry up funnels in the easiest
way they can, according to the practice of" use
and wont," and leave the tenants or proprie
tors of the houses they erect to get rid of their
smoke in the best way their fancy can con
trive. Whereas, were chimneys and their flues
constructed according to the principles of
science, they might be rendered, almost with
certainty, completely efficient for the pur
pose intended.

To all who are acquainted with the nature
and properties of elastic fluids, it must be ob
vious, that the whole mystery of curing smoky
chimneys consists in finding out and removing
the accidental causes which prevent the heated
smoke from being forced up the chimney by the
pressure of the cool or heavier air of the room.
These causes are various ; but that which will
be found most commonly to operate is, the bad
construction of the chimney in the neighbourhood
of the Jim-place. " The great fault," says Count
Rumford, " of all the open fire-places now in
common use is, that they are much too large,
or rather it is the throat of the chimney, or the
lower part of its open canal, in the neighbour
hood of the mantle, and immediately over the
fire, which is too large." The following is a

condensed view of some of the rules given on
this subject, by this ingenious practical philo
sopher, and which are founded on the principles
of science, and on numerous experiments: — 1.
The throat of the chimney should be perpendi
cularly over thejire; as the smoke and hot va
pour which rise from a fire naturally tend up
wards. By the throat of a chimney is meant the
lower extremity of its canal, where it unites
with the upper part of its open fire-place. 2.
The nearer the throat of a chimney is to the
fire the stronger will be its draught, and the less
danger of its smoking ; since smoke rises in con
sequence of its rarefaction by heat, and the heat
is geater nearer the fire than at a greater dis
tance from it. But the draught of a chimney
may be too strong, so as to consume the fuel
too rapidly ; and, therefore, a due medium must
be fixed upon, according to circumstances. 3.
That/owr inches is the proper width to be given
to the throat of a chimney, reckoning across
from the top of the breast of the chimney, or the
inside of the mantle to the back of the chimney ,
and even in large halls, where great fires are
kept up, this width should never be increased
beyond 4j or 5 inches. 4. The width given to
the back of the chimney should be about one-
third of the width of the opening of the fire-place
in front. In a room of a middling size, thirteen
inches is a good size for the width of the back,
and 3 times 13 or 39 inches for the width of the
opening of the fire-place in front. 5. The angle
made by the back of the fire-place and the sides
of it, or covings, should be 135 degrees, which
is the best position they can have for throwing
heat into the room. 6. The back of the chim
ney should always be built perfectly upright. 7.
Where the throat of the chimney has an end,
that is to say, where it enters into the lower
part of the open canal of the chimney, there the
three walls which form the two covings and the
back of the fire-place should all end abruptly,
without any slope, which will render it more
difficult for any wind from above to force its
way through the narrow passage of the throat
of the chimney. The back and covings should
rise 5 or 6 inches higher than the breast of the
chimney. 8. The current of air which, passing
under the mantle, gets into the chimney, should
be made gradually to bend its course upwards,
by which means it will unite quietly with the
ascending current of smoke. This is effected
with the greatest, ease and certainty, merely by
rounding qjf\\\e breast of the chimney, or back
part of the mantle, h.stead of leaving it flat or
full of holes and corners. Fig. 1 shjws the
section of a chimney on the common construc
tion, in which d e is the throat. Fig. 2 shows
a section of the same chimney altered and im
proved, in which d i is the reduced throat, four
inches in the direction of d t, and thirteen ;nchea
in a line parallel to the mantle.

70

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Fig. 1,

Fig. 2.

Masons, bricklayers and others, who are in
terested in this subject, would do well to pro
cure and study Count Rumford's " Essay,"
which was originally sold for two shillings.
His directions have seldom been accurately
attended to in this country by those who have
pretended to improve chimneys on the princi
ples he has laid down, partly from carelessness,
and partly from ignorance of the elements of
science. When the grate is not set in its proper
place, when its sloping iron back is retained, —
when no pains have been taken to make its ends
coincide with the covings of the fire-place, —
when the mantle, instead of having its back
rounded off', is a vertical plane of iron, cutting a
column of smoke which rises beneath it ; and,
above all, when the throat of the chimney, in
stead of four, is made, as we often see, fourteen
inches wide, — not one of the Count's directions
has been attended to, and his principles have as
little to do with the construction of such a chim
ney as with the building of the dykes o<" Hol
land, or the pyramids of Egypt.

A knowledge of the science of Optics, which
explains the nature of vision, and the laws by
which light is refracted and reflected, is essen
tially requisite to the makers of telescopes, mi
croscopes, and all other dioptric and catoptric
instruments, in order to carry them forward to
meir highest pitch of improvement. And yet
how often do we find many of those employed
in the construction and manufacture of such in
struments glaringly deficient in the first princi
pals of optical science? One maker imitates
the instruments of another without discrimina
tion, and while he sometimes imitates the ex
cellencies, he as frequently copies the defects.
Hence the glaring deficiencies in the construc-
•ioft of the eye-pieces of most of our pocket te

lescopes, and the narrow field of view oy wliicu
they are distinguished, which a slight acquaint
ance v/ith the properties of lenses would teach
them to obviate. By a moderate acquaintance
with the principles of this science, any inge
nious mechanic might, at a small expense, be
enabled to construct for himself many of those
optical instruments by which the beauties of the
animal and vegetable kingdoms, and the won
ders of distant worlds have been explored.

Although, in the hands of mathematicians,
the science of optics has assumed somewhat of
a forbidding appearance to the untutored mind,
by the apparently complex and intricate dia
grams by which its doctrines have been illus
trated, yet it requires only the knowledge of a few
simple facts and principles to guide an intelli
gent mechanic in his experiments, arid in the
construction of its instruments. In order to the
construction of a refracting telescope, it is only
requisite to know, that the rays of light, passing
through a convex-glass, paint an image of any
object directly before it, at a certain point be
hind it, called its focus ; and that this image
may be viewed and magnified by another convex-
glass, placed at a certain distance behind it.
Thus, let CD, fig. 1, r-epresent a convex-glass,
whose focal distance CE is 12 inches ; let AB
represent a distant object directly opposite ; the
rays of light passing from this object, and cross
ing each other, will form an image of the object
AB, at EF, in an inverted position. Let GH
represent another convex-glass, whose focal
distance is only one inch. If this glass is placed
at one inch distant from the image EF, or 13
Fig. 1.

APPLICATIONS OF OPTICAL KNOWLEDGE.

71

inches from the glass CD, and the eye applied at
the point S, the object AB will be seen turned
upside down, and magnified in the proportion of

I to 12, or twelve times in length and breadth.
This forms what is called an Astronomical tele
scope ; but, as ever^ thing seen through it ap
pears inverted, it is not adapted for viewing ter
restrial objects. In order to fit it for viewing
land objects, two other eye-glasses, of the same
focal distance, (namely, one inch,) are requi
site ; the second eye-glass IK is placed at 2
inches from GH, or double their focal distance,
and the glass NO at the same distance from IK.*
By this means a second image IM is formed in
an upright position, which is viewed by the eye
at P. through the glass NO, and the object ap
pears magnified in the same proportion as before.
The magnifying power of a telescope of this
construction is found by dividing the focal dis
tance of the object-glass by the focal distance
of the eye-glass. Thus, if the object-glass be
36 inches in focal distance, and the eye-glass

I 1 inch, the magnifying power will be 24 times ;
if the focus of the eye-glass be 2 inches, the

Fig. 2.

G

H

magnifying power will be 18 times, &c.— LM
is the telescope fitted up for use.

A compound microscope might likewise be
easily constructed by any ingenious artizan or
mechanic, by attending to the following illustra
tions and directions. Fig. 2 represents tho
glasses of a compound microscope. AB is thtr
glass next the object; CD is the amplifying
glass for enlarging the field of view; EF is the.
glass next the eye. When a small object, as
GH, is placed below the object-glass AB, at a
little more than its focal distance from it, a mag
nified image of this object is formed by the glass
AB at GH, which is magnified in proportion as
the distance .GG exceeds the distance of AG.
This magnified image of the object is magnified
a second time by the glass EF, to which the eye
is applied at K. This instrument, when fitted
up for use, is represented in fig. 3, where LM
represents a box or pedestal on which it stands,
Fig. 3.

W

•This Is not the best form of a terr^trial eye
piece; but It may serve for the purpose of illustra-
tion. The eye-piece now most generally nsed. con
sists of four lenses, combined on a different prin
ciple.

NO the stage on which the objects are placed,
over the opening i^which is supported by 3 pillars
fixed to the top of the box. P is a tube which is
supported by 3 pillars fixed into the stage. Into
this tube the tube R slides up and down for ad
justing the focus. The small tube u, which carries
the object-glass, is connected with the tube R, and
slides up and down along with it. S is the tube
which contains the two eye-glasses, and which
may be made to slide up and down into the tube
R, for increasing the magnifying power when oc
casion requires. T is a mirror, fixed on the pedes
tal, capable of moving up and down, and to th*

72

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

rigln or left, for throwing light upon the object
placed over the hole i, which may be laid upon a
slip of thin glass. The object-glass AB, fig. 2, is
placed at u, tig. 3. The glass CD is placed oppo
site W, fig. 3, and the eye-glass EF opposite V.
Such are the essential parts of a compound
microscope. Any common mechanic may con
struct one for himself by attending to the follow
ing directions : The object-glass AB, fig. 2,
may be about £, |, or 1 inch focal distance, and
the aperture, or hole which lets in the light from
the object, should not exceed 1-1 Oth of an inch,
otherwise it will cause a glare, which will pro
duce an indistinct image of the object. The
amplifying glass CD may be 2£ inches focal
distance, and 1$ inch in diameter. This glass
is not essentially necessary, but it serves to
enlarge the field of view, and to render it more
distinct near the border. The eye-glass EF
should be about 1 inch focus, and about £ inch in
diameter. With respect to the distances at
which they should be placed from each other,
the glass CD may be placed at about 5 or 6
inches from AB, and the glass EF about 2
inches, or If inch from CD. The object-glass
shoule be a double convex — the eye-glasses may
be plano-convex ; that is, plane on the one side
and convex on the other, with the plane sides
turned next the eye ; but double convexes will
do, if these cannot be procured. The tubes
which contain the glasses may be made of
pasteboard, and the stage, pillars, and box, of
wood. The glasses may be procured for about
4 shillings ; and if the individual fit them into the
tubes, and perform all the other operations re-
q-iisite, the expense of all the other materials
will not exceed other four shillings. Suppose,
now, that the object-glass AB is £ inch focal
distance, and the image GH is formed at the
distance of 6 inches from it, this image will be
larger than the object, nearly in the proportion
of 6 to |, or 12 times. Suppose the glass EF,
considered in connexion with CD, to possess a
magnifying power equal to 5 times, then the
whole magnifying power will be 5 x 12, or 60
times. The object, therefore, will be magnified
60 times in length and in breadth, and, conse
quently, the surface will be magnified 3600
times, which is the square of 60. With such a
microscope, the animalcula3 in water, the circu
lation of the blood in frogs and fishes, the small
feathers which compose the dust on butterflies'
wings, and all the most interesting appearances
of the minute parts of animals and vegetables,
maybe distinctly perceived.

Besides the discoveries in the heavens and in
the minute parts of creation, to which the study
of the science of optics has led, — its principles
we capable of being directed to many important
purposes in *>uman life and society. By means
of large burning mirrors and lenses the rays of
the sun have been condensed, so as to increase

their intensity more than seventeen thousand
times, and to produce a heat more than four
hundred times greater than that of our common
fires, which would serve for the combustion and
fusion of numerous substances, which are infu
sible in the greatest heat oiat can be produced
in our common furnaces. The property of a
convex lens, by which rays proceeding from its
focus are refracted into parallel directions, has
enabled us to throw, from light-houses, a strong
light to great distances at sea. The large
polyzonal, or built up lenses, con! rived by Sir
D. Brevvster, which may be made of any mag
nitude, and the elegant lamp of Lieutenant
Drummond, — the one producing the most intense
light yet known, and the other conveying it
undispersed to great distances, — promise tc
introduce improvements hitherto unthought of,
and to diversify the nocturnal scenery both of
sea and land. For, in the progress of extensive
national improvements, they might be made
subservient, in connexion with curburetted hy
drogen gas, in enlivening and decorating iho
rural scene, in the absence of the sun, and in
guiding the benighted traveller in all his jour-
neyings. For, when we consider the improve
ments, in almost every department of the social
state, which have been lately carried forward, it
is surely not too much to expect, that, in the
course of a century hence, our highways, vil
lages, hamlets, and even some of our moors and
mountains, shall be lighted up witli gas lamps,
connected with mirrors and lenses, analogous to
those which illuminate our cities and towns, and
which direct the mariner, when approaching our
shores. The following figure shows the manner
in which a large lens throws a light to great dis
tances. Let AB, fig. 4, represent one of Sir D.

Fig. 4.
A

Brewster's polyzonal lenses, or any other largo
lens, and GK its focal distance ; if a luminous
body CK, as the flame of a lamp, be placed at
the focal point K, the rays of light, diverging
from CK, after passing through the lens AB,
will proceed in a parallel direction, AE, GH,
BF, and may illuminate objects at very consi
derable distances. AB, fig. 4, represents a

UTILITY OF ELECTRICITY AND GALVANISM.

73

section of the polyzonal lens built of ten different splitting large stones into shivers. This has
pieces. L, fig. 6 exhibits a front view of the been effected in the following manner. Suppose

AB to represent a stone or portion of a rock,
which is intended to be split into a number of
pieces. Into the midst of this stone a long rod
of iron, or conductor CD, is inserted, which ter
minates in a point. When a thunder-cloud, as
EF, passes over the stone, within its striking

same lens. Could such lenses be constructed
of the size of 6, 8, 10 or 12 feet diameter, they
would produce a degree of heat from the solar
rays far surpassing what has hitherto been
effected, and be capable of throwing a brilliant
light to immense distances.

Fig. 6, shows the manner in which a concave
mirror TU reflects the light of a lamp WV,
placed in its focus, to great distances. It is in
this way that the light of the Bell Rock, and
other light-houses, is reflected to more than
thirty or forty miles distant.

Fig. 6.

U

Even the sciences of Electricity and Galva-
n-ifffn. might, in some instances, be rendered sub
servient to the operations of art. By means of
the electrical fluid, models of corn-mills, water-
pumps, and orreries, showing the diurnal motion
of the earth, and the age and phases of the
moon, have been set in motion ; and there can
be no question, that, in the hands of genius, it
might be directed to accomplish much more
important effects. Even the lightning of the
clouds, which is only the electrical fluid acting
on an ample scale, has been guided by the hand
of art, to perform mechanical operations, by

distance of the earth, the lightning from the
cloud strikes the upper part of the pointed con
ductor, and is conducted downwards to the heart
of the stone, which either rends it in different
places, or splits it at once into a multitude of
fragments. This experiment, which appears to
have been first made in Prussia in 1811, was
attended with complete success, during the first
storm that passed over, after the bar of iron was
inserted in the stone.

To braziers, tinsmiths, coppersmiths, and
other workers in metals, a knowledge of Gal"
vwnism might suggest a variety of useful hints,
especially where it is an object of importance to
secure any piece of metallic workmanship from
rust. It is found that when metals are pure
and kept separate from each other, they remain
for a long time untarnished ; but when alloyed,
or placed in contact with other metals, they
soon undergo oxidation. Coins composed of
one metal are found more durable than those
composed of two ; and the copper sheathing of
ships which is fastened with iron nails soon un-

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

corrosion. These effects are now ex
plained on the principles of galvanism. When
two metallic substances of different kinds are
connected by moisture, they form what is called
a galvanic circle ; and, therefore, when one kind
of metal is placed in contact with another, if
either water or the moisture of the atmosphere
adheres to them, a galvanic circle is formed,
and oxidation is produced. On this ground the
late Sir Humphrey Davy suggested the propriety
of fastening the upper sheathing of ships with
copper instead of iron nails. The same princi
ple may be rendered of extensive application,
and may afford many useful hints to every arti-
zan employed in working and combining metals.
A knowledge of magnetism might also, in
many cases, be directed to useful practical
applications. This mysterious power, in con
nexion with its polarity, has already enabled the
miner and surveyor to traverse the remotest
corners of the largest mines, and to trace their
way back in safety through all the windings of
those subterraneous apartments, and has direct
ed the navigator to steer his course with cer
tainty, through the pathless ocean, to his " de
sired haven." Throughout all the regions of
the globe the magnetic power extends its influ
ence ; and it is now found to have an intimate
connexion with heat, electricity, and galvanism.
Of late years, it has been ascertained that iron
with its oxides and alloys are not the only sub
stances susceptible of magnetic influence. The
magnetism of nickel, though inferior to that of
iron, is found to be considerable ; and that of
cobalt and titanium is quite perceptible. Nay,
the recent discoveries of Arago have shown,
" that there is no substance but which, under
proper circumstances, is capable of exhibiting
unequivocal signs of the magnetic virtue." In
consequence of a recent discovery of M. Oer
sted, " we are now enabled to communicate, at
and during pleasure, to a coiled wire, of any
metal indifferently, all the properties of a mag
net — its attraction, repulsion, and polarity, and
that even in a more intense degree than was
previously thought to be possible in the best
natural magnets." This discovery tends to en
large our views of the range of magnetic influ
ence, and to lead us to the conclusion that its
powers may hereafter be applied to purposes of
which at present we can have no conception.
Although the polarity of the magnet has been
of incalculable service to mankind, particularly
in promoting navigation and enlarging our
knowledge of the globe, yet we have no reason
to believe that this is the only practical purpose
to which its powers may be applied, or the only
reason why the Creator has so widely diffused
its influence in the system of nature ; since, in
his diversified operations in the material world,
he so frequently produces a variety of effects
from one and the same cause. It remains with

man to prosecute his observations still more ex
tensively on this subject, and his induscry wiK,
doubtless, be rewarded wfth the discovery of
new relations, laws, and combinations, which
may be susceptible of the most important practi
cal applications in the arts which minister to
the comfort and convenience of mankind. Even
in its present state, the attractive property of
magnetism is capable of being applied as a me
chanical power, in certain pieces of machinery,
although its application in this way has never
yet been attempted on an extensive scale.

The following fact shows how its attractive
power has lately been applied to the prolonga
tion of life, and the warding off of incurable
disease, in the case of a useful class of our
fellow men. " In needle manufactories the work
men are constantly exposed to excessively mi
nute particles of steel which fly from the grind
stones, and mix, though imperceptible to the
eye, as the finest dust in the air, and are inhaled
with their breath. The effect, though imper
ceptible, on a short exposure, yet being constantly
repeated from day to day, produces a consti
tutional irritation, dependent on the tonic pro
perties of the steel, which is sure to terminate in
pulmonary consumption ; insomuch, that persons
employed in this kind of work used scarcely ever
to attain the age of forty years. In vain was it
attempted to purify the air, before its entry into
the lungs, by gauzes or linen guards ; the dust
was too fine and penetrating to be obstructed
by such coarse expedients, till some ingenious
person bethought him of that wonderful power,
which every child that searches for its mother's
needle with a magnet, sees in exercise. Masks
of magnetized steel wire are now constructed
and adapted to the faces of the workmen. By
these the air is not merely strained but searched
in its passage through them, and each obnox
ious atom arrested and removed."*

This interesting fact affords a striking proof
of the useful purposes to which the powers and
properties of natural substances maybe applied,
when the mind is directed to contemplate them
in all their bearings, and to trace them to all
their legitimate consequences. The attractive
power of the magnet, considered not only in its
relation to iron and steel, but to all other sub
stances in which magnet ical virtue is found in a
greater or less degree to reside — might, there
fore, in the hands of an ingenious mechanic, lead
to many interesting experiments, which might
pave the way for the most important practical
results.

The facts connected with the science of Geo
logy may likewise, in many instances, be direct
ed to practical purposes. From the researches
which, of late years, have been made in the in
terior of the earth, geologists are now pretty well

• Herschel's Prclrn. Dis. on Na/. Philos.

STEAM NAVIGATION.

75

acquainted wil.h the position and alternation of
its strata, and with the different fossils which
may be expected to abound in any particular
district. Although these researches were un
dertaken chiefly with a view to ascertain the
changes which have happened in the structure
of our globe, and to support certain theories of
the earth — yet they may frequently be of use to
landed proprietors, to engineers, and to specula
tors in mining operations, so as to direct them in
their investigations, and prevent them from em
barking in schemes that may ultimately blast their
expectations, exhaust their resources, and lead to
irretrievable ruin. The ruinous effects some
times produced by ignorance of this subject
are strikingly illustrated by the following fact : —

" It is not many years since an attempt was
made to establish a colliery at Bexhill, in Sussex.
The appearance of thin seams and sheets of
fossil wood, and wood-coal, with some other in
dications similar to what occur in the neighbour
hood of the great coal beds in the north of Eng
land, having led to the sinking of a shaft, and
the erection of machinery, on a scale of vast ex
tent, — not less than eight thousand pounds are
said to have been laid out on this project, which,
it is almost needless to add, proved completely
abortive, as every geologist would have at once
declared it must, the whole assemblage of geo
logical facts being adverse to the existence of a
regular coal bed in the Hastings' sand; while
this on which Bexhill is situated, is separated
from the coal strata by a series of interposed
beds of such enormous thickness as to render all
idea of penetrating through them absurd. — The
history of mining speculations is full of similar
cases, where a very moderate acquaintance
with the usual order of nature, to say nothing of
theoretical views, would have saved many a
sanguine adventurer from utter ruin."*

The study of the various branches of Natural
History might also be rendered productive of
utility in different departments of the arts. It
is quite evident that a scientific knowledge of
Botany must be highly useful to gardeners and
their labourers, and to all who take an interest
in horticultural and rural operations. Not only
a knowledge of the classification and arrange
ment of plants, but also of their physiological
structure and functions, of their medicinal quali
ties, and of the chymical properties of soils and
the different manures, will be found of conside
rable utility to such individuals. — Zoology and
Comparative Anatomy, which describe the pe
culiar structure and habits of animals, both
foreign and domestic, will convey various por
tions of interesting information to shepherds,
cattle-dealers, and agriculturists of every de
scription. An acquaintance with Mineralogy,
which treats of the solid and inanimate mate-

• Herschel's Discount, &c.

rials of our globe, — the earthy, saline, inflam
mable, and metallic substances of which it 13
composed, must be interesting to lapidaries,
jewellers, iron-founders, and all who are em
ployed in working various metals. To know
the nature of those substances on which they
are operating, the materials with which they ara
united in their native ores, their combination
with phosphorus, sulphur, and carbon, the
changes produced upon them by oxygen and the
different acids, their relations to heat, and the
liquids with which they may come in contact,
and the various compounds into which they may
be formed, will have a direct tendency not only
to increase their stock of general knowledge, but
to render them more skilful and intelligent in
their respective professions. Meteorology, which
treats of the weather and the variable pheno
mena of the atmosphere, will, in many instances,
be found a useful study to mariners, fishermen,
travellers, and farmers, by which they may fre
quently be directed in their movements, and
avoid many inconveniences and dangers. By
carefully attending to the motions of the barome
ter and thermometer, and comparing them with
the electrical state of the atmosphere, the direc
tion of the winds, and the appearances of the
clouds, the farmer may be warned of the con
tinuance of rain or drought, and direct his ope
rations accordingly, so as to protect his produce
from danger.

There is no application of science to the arts
of more importance, and more extensive in its
effects, than that of the employment of Steam
for driving all kinds of machinery, and for pro
pelling vessels along rivers and across the
ocean. " It has armed," says Mr. Jeffrey, " the
feeble hand of man with a power to which no
limits can be assigned — completed the dominion
of mind over the most refractory qualities of
matter, and laid a sure foundation for all those
future miracles of mechanic power, which are
to aid and reward the labours of after genera
tions." The first person who appears to have
entertained the idea of employing steam for pro
pelling vessels, was Mr. J. Hulls, in the year
1736. But it was not till 1807, when Mr. Ful
ton launched, at New- York, the first steam-boat
he had constructed, that navigation by steam
was introduced to general practice, which may
therefore be considered as the epoch of the in
vention. In a few years every river and bay
in the United States became the scene of steam
navigation. In 1822 there were more than 350
steam vessels connected with these States,
some of them of eight and nine hundred tons
burden, and by this time, doubtless, they are
more than doubled. In 1819 an expedition left
Pittsburg, descended the Ohio in steam-boats
for 1100 miles, and then ascending the rapid
Missouri, proceeded to the distance of no less
than two thousand five hundred miles. They

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

have now been introduced into every country in
Europe. On the principal rivers and seas con
nected with the British Isles, and even in the
Scottish lakes, these vessels are sweeping along
in majestic pomp, against wind and tide, diver
sifying the scenery through which they pass,
and transporting travellers and parties of plea
sure to their destination, with a rapidity unex
ampled in former ages. On the Clyde alone
more than fifty or sixty steam vessels are con
stantly plying. The scenery of the Rhine, the
Rhone, the Elbe, the Seine, the Danube, the
"VVolsa, the lakes of Constance and Geneva, and
of many other rivers and inland seas, isnowen-
Jivened by these powerful machines, conveying
goods and passengers in every direction. Even
the Atlantic ocean, an extent of more than three
thousand miles, has been traversed by a steam
boat in twenty days ; and the period, we trust,
is not far distant, when the Red Sea, the Per
sian Gulph, the Bay of Bengal, the Indian
Ocean, the Mediterranean, the Euxine, the
Gulph of Mexico, and even the wide Pacific,
will be traversed by these rapid vehicles, con
veying riches, liberty, religion and intelligence
to the islands of the ocean, and forming a bond
of union among all nations.

The admirable improvements in the construc
tion of steam carriages which are now going for
ward, are no less worthy of attention. The
rapid movements of these machines, which have
been lately introduced on the Liverpool and
Manchester railway, and the security and com
fort with which they are attended, have excited
the astonishment of every beholder. And no
wonder, — since goods and passengers are now
conveyed between these cities, with a velocity
of nearly thirty miles an hour! so that it may
be said, with the strictest propriety, that the
steam engine is the most brilliant present ever
made by philosophy to mankind.

The discovery of carburetted hydrogen gas,
and its application to the purpose of illuminating
our dwelling-houses, streets, and manufactories,
may also be considered in reference to the arts.
Every city, and every town of a moderate size,
is now enlivened with the splendid brilliancy pro
duced from this invisible substance ; pipes for
its conveyance have been laid, of many hundred
miles in extent, and diverging into numerous
ramifications, and thousands of artists are em-
oloyed in conducting its manufacture, and form
ing tubes and other devices for distributing it in
all directions.

Now, since the inventions to which I am
adverting are founded on chymical and mecha
nical principles, and on the discoveries of modern
science, and since many thousands of mechanics
are now employed in constructing the machinery
connected with these inventions, and in con
ducting its operations both by sea and land, it is
of the utmost importance, in order to their being

fully qualified for their respective departments,
that they understand the scientific principles
which enter into the construction of such ma
chines and engines, the peculiar uses of every
part, the manner in which the chymical agents
employed operate, and the effects which, in any
given circumstance, they must necessarily pro
duce. In particular, it is indispensably neces
sary, that engine-men, and others employed for
directing these machines, when in operation,
should be acquainted with every part of their
structure, and the principles on which their
movements depend ; for the comfort and safety
of the public are dependent on the caution and
skill with which they are conducted. How could
any man be qualified for such an office without
some portion of scientific knowledge ? and how
could travellers in such vehicles consider their
lives and property secure, if they were not
guided by men of intelligence and prudence ?
To the want of such caution and skill are
chiefly to be attributed most of the disasters and
fatal accidents, connected with such operations,
which have hitherto taken place.

Besides the agriculturists, manufacturers, me
chanics, and artificers alluded to above, there
are numerous other classes to which similar
remarks will apply. In short, there is scarcely
an individual, however obscure, in any depart
ment of society, but may derive practical benerit
from an acquaintance with science. " The farm-
servant or day labourer," says Lord Brougham,
" whether in his master's employ, or tending the
concerns of his own cottage, must derive great
practical benefit, — must be both a better servant,
and a more thrifty, and, therefore, comfortable
cottager, for knowing something of the nature of
soils and manures, which chymistry teaches, and
something of the habits of animals, and the qua
lities and growth of plants, which he learns
from natural history and chymistry together.
In truth, though a man is neither a mechanic nor
a peasant, but only one having a pot to boil, he
is sure to learn from science lessons which will
enable him to cook his morsel better, save his
fuel, and both vary his dish and improve it.
The art of good and cheap cookery is intimately
connected with the principles of chymical philo
sophy, and has received much, and will yet
receive more, improvement from their applica
tion." — Nay, even the kitchen maid, the laundry
maid, and the mistress of every family, may de
rive many useful hints from the researches of
science. The whole art of cookery is a chymica.
operation, and so are the arts of washing, dres
sing, bleaching, and dyeing. By a knowledge
of the nature and properties of the acids and
other chymical substances, they would learn
how to eradicate stains of ink, grease, &c- from
cotton, linen, woollen, and silks, in the safest
and most effectual manner, and many other pro
cesses of great utility in domestic life. Even

GENERAL UTILITY OF SCIENCE.

77

the art of kindling a fire, and of stirring it when
kindled, depends on philosophical principles.
For example, the stirring of a fire is of use, be
cause it makes a hollow, where the air being
rarefied by the adjacent heat, the surrounding
air rushes into the partial vacuum, and impart
ing its oxygen, gives life to the fire and carries
the flame along with it. On this principle the
following rules are founded. 1. Never stir a
fire when fresh coals are laid on, particularly
when they are very small, because they imme
diately fall into the vacuum, and prevent the
access of the oxygen of the atmosphere, which
is the principle of combustion. 2. Always keep
the bottom bar clear, because it is there chiefly
(hat the air rushes in to nourish the fuel. 3.
Never begin to stir at top, unless when the
bottom is quite clear, and the top only wants
breaking, otherwise the unkindled fuel may be
pressed down in a body to the bottom, and the
access of atmospheric air prevented.

Illustrations, of a similar kind, of the practical
applications of science, might have been given
to an almost indefinite extent ; but the above spe
cimens may suffice as corroborative of the gene
ral position — that scientific knowledge would
render mechanics and manufacturers of all de
scriptions more skilful in the prosecution of their
respective employments.

Some, however, may be disposed to insinuate,
that it is quite enough for philosophers to ascer
tain principles, and to lay down rules founded
upon them, for the direction of the mechanic or
artizan ;— or, that it is only requisite that the
directors and superintendents of chymical pro
cesses and mechanical operations, should be
acquainted with that portion of science which is
necessary for their peculiar departments. But
it is easy to perceive, that a mechanic who
works merely by rules, without knowing the
foundation or reasons of them, is only like a
child who repeats his catechism by rote, without
attaching a single idea to the words he utters, or
like ahorse driving a thrashing machine, without
deviating from the narrow circle to which he is
necessarily confined. When any accident oc
curs, when the circumstances of the case are
somewhat changed, when the same principle on
which he generally proceeds requires to be ap
plied to a new object or mode of operation, he
either blunders his work, or feels himself utterly
at a loss how to proceed. The least deviation
from his accustomed trammels puts him out,
because he has no clear and comprehensive
view of the principles on which his practice
depends. Hence we uniformly find, that a man
of scientific acquirements will easily comprehend
the plan of any new machine or architectural
operation, and be able to execute it, while he
who works only by square and rule, will hesitate
at eviry step, and perceive innumeraole difficul
ties / his way. To confine artists to mere

rules, without a knowledge of the principles on
which they are founded, is to degrade their
intellectual nature, to reduce them to something
like mere machines, to render them less useful
both to themselves and to their employers, and
to prevent the improvement of the liberal and
mechanical arts.

The following instance may be stated as a
specimen of the advantages of chymical know
ledge, and of the practical purposes to which it
may be applied in different regions of the globe.
A young Parisian, of the name of Leger went
on a commercial adventure to Egypt in the year
1822 ; but during some of the convulsions of that
unsettled country, he lost the little property with
which he was intrusted, and was forced to make
a precipitate retreat from Suez to Alexandria.
He remained some time at Alexandria, destitute
and almost hopeless. But the talent of observa
tion, and the social habits characteristic of his
countrymen, came to his aid : in a lucky mo
ment he formed the resolution of retrieving his
fortune by introducing the luxury of ice into the
parched land of the Ptolemies. This common pro
duct of wintry regions is known to be as grateful to
the languid natives of tropical climates as ardent
spirits are to the benumbed inhabitants of the
Polar circle. Having succeeded in effecting a
return to his family, the enterprising Parisian
was enabled by the friendly assistance of Gay
Lussac and Thenard, to adopt the best means
that chyrnistry could devise for the preservation
of ice, both during the voyage, and after its ar
rival in a sultry latitude ; and at length set out
from Paris with his inventions, and arrived safely
at Alexandria, in April 1823. The sovereign
of Egypt, Mahommed AH, was delighted at this
novel addition to oriental luxuries ; and, besides
valuable presents, gave the inventor the exclu
sive right for five years of importing ice into his
dominions. This privilege is estimated to be
worth one million of francs, or nearly 50,000/.
In ancient times the world was enlightened by
the learning of Egypt ; the greatest philosophers
travelled thither, as to the fountain-head of sci
ence ; but the land of Sesostres and Alexander
has now become the prey of the ferocious Mos
lem ; and whatever she enjoys of art, know
ledge or civilization, she is compelled to receive
from the once barbarous regions of the West.*

II. Scientific knowledge will not onlv render
persons more skilful in their respective e7r.p.u;.
ments, but will enable them to make improve*
ments in the arts, and in the physical sciences with
which they are connected.

It has frequently been affirmed that many
useful inventions have been owing to chance,
and that persons ignorant of science have stum
bled upon them without any previous mvestiga-

* • Scots Mechan. Mag. 1826.

78

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

tion. It is not denied, that several inventions
have originated in this way, but they are much
fewer than is generally imagined; and, in al
most every instance, where chance suggested
the first hint of any invention, the future im
provements were directed by the hand of ge
nius and the aids of science. It is said, that the
invention of the telescope was owing to a spec
tacle-maker's boy having accidentally taken up
two convex glasses of different focal distances,
and placed the one near his eye and the other

at a considerable distance, when he perceived,
on looking through them, the spire of a neigh
bouring church turned upside down, and much
larger than its usual size. The father of the
boy, amazed at this singular appearance, be
thought himself of adjusting two glasses on a
board, supporting them in two brass or wooden
circles, which might be removed nearer to, or
farther from each other at pleasure, as in the
following figure, where A represents the object,
B the lens next the object, a the inverted image

formed by it, C the glass next the eye, and D
the sliding board on which it was fixed, for ad
justing the focus. Such appears to have been
the first rude construction of a telescope. But
KO long as the invention remained in this state,
it was of little benefit to society. It was not
before Galileo, a philosopher of Tuscany, heard
of the circumstance, and entered into investiga
tions on the refraction of light, and the proper
ties of lenses, that this noble instrument was
improved and directed to the heavens for the
purpose of making astronomical discoveries ;
and all the subsequent improvements it has re
ceived, have been the result of reasonings, and
experimental investigations, conducted by men
of science. Sir Isaac Newton, inconsequence
of his experiments and discoveries respecting light
and colours, detected the true cause of the im
perfection of the common refracting telescope,
and suggested the substitution of metalline spe
cula instead of lenses, which led him to the in
vention of the reflecting telescope ; and Mr.
Dollond, in consequence of his investigations and
experiments respecting the different degrees of re
fraction and divergency of colour produced by
different kinds of glass, effected the greatest im
provement that had ever been made on the re
fracting telescope, by producing an image free
of the imperfections caused by the blending of
the prismatic colours. And we have reason to
b«lieve, that the further improvement of this tele

scope will chiefly depend on ascertaining the
true chymical composition of flint gla^s for achro
matic purposes, and the proper mode of conduct
ing its manufacture, which may lead to the con
struction of instruments of this kind, on a more
extensive scale than has ever yet been attempted,
and to discoveries in the celestial regions far
beyond those which have hitherto been made.
But such improvements can never be effected,
unless by numerous experimental investigations,
conducted by those whose minds are thoroughly
imbued with the principles of chymical and op •
tical science.*

One of the latest improvements on Achromatic
object-glasses was made by a foreigner of the name
of GvJnand, who was originally a cabinet-maker.
After acquiring a knowledge of the principles of
optics, and of the mode of constructing telescopes,
he applied himself particularly to ascertain the
proper composition of JHnt-gttiss for achromatic
purposes; and, after spending twenty or thirty
years in making experiments— casting one pot of
glass after another, and meeting with frequent
disappointments, — lie at length succeeded in obtain
ing glass for achromatic telescopes, of larger dimen
sions and of a quality superior to what could for
merly be procured. Of this glass was formed the
largest triple achromatic telescope ever constructed,
which was lately erected in the observatory of the
university at Dorpat, under the direction of M
Fraunhofer. This glass is perfectly free from veins,
and has a greater dispersive power than any ob
tained before. The diameter of this object glass is
almost ten inches, and its focal distance 15 feet.
It has four eye-pieces, the lowest magnifying 175
times, and the highest 708 times. Mr. Tulley ot
Islington lately constructed, of similar material*,

ORIGIN OP USEFUL INVENTIONS.

With regard to the invention and improve
ment of the attam-engine — a story has been told
'* that an idle boy being employed to stop and
open a valve, saw that he could save himself the
trouble of attending and watching it, by fixing a
plug upon a part of the machine which came to
the place at the proper times, in consequence of
the general movement." Whether or not this
story has any foundation in truth — certain it is,
that all the most useful improvements in this
engine have been the result of the most elaborate
researches and investigations of scientific truths.
The first distinct notion of the structure and
operation of this powerful machine appears to
have been given by the Marquis of Worcester,
in 1663, in his " Century of Inventions." Its
subsequent improvements by Savary, Blackey,
Newcomen, Beighton and Fitzgerald, were the
results of physical knowledge, of mechanical
skill, and of the most laborious investigations.
Its latest and most important improvements by

manufactured by the same artist, a telescope whose
object-glass is about seven inches diameter, and its
focal length twelve feet, which is now in the pos
session of Dr. Pearson. The piece of flint-glass of
which the concave lens was formed, cost Mr. Tulley
about thirty guineas. Unfortunately for science, the
ingenious artist (Guinand) is now dead, and it is
uncertain whether he has left any particular details
of his process behind him. The possibility, how
ever, of procuring glass for the construction of very
large achromatic telescopes is now put beyond a
doubt.

The unacientinc reader may acquire a general
idea of an achromatic object-glass from the follow,
ing figure,— where A D represents a double unequally
convex lens of crown g-kiss, C B a double concave
of flint glass, and E F another convex lens of crown-
glass. These are placed together in the manner
represented in the figure, and form what is called

an achromatic object-glass, the term achromatic sig
nifying free of colour. Sometimes only two lenses,
a convex of crown, and a concave of flint-glass are
combined for the same purpose. In the case of a
single convex glass, the image formed is blended
with the prismatic colours which come to foci at
different distances from the lens, and consequently
produce a comparatively indistinct image, which
will not admit of a high magnifying power. But the
achromatic lens, forming an image without colour
will bear a larger aperture, and a higher magnifying
power, than a common refractor of the same length,
.-o great is the difference— that an achromatic tele
scope of Dollond, only three feet ten inches in
length, was found to equal, and even excel the
famous aerial telescope of Huygens of 123 feet focal
length, and the gentlemen present at the trial agreed
that " the dwarf was fairly a match for the giant."
1 he principal obstacle to their construction on a
large scale, is, the difficulty of procuring large pieces
of flint-glass free of veins, and of a proper dispersive

6

Mr. James Watt, were owing no less to t
scientific knowledge which adorned his mi
than to his mechanical ingenuity. He was a
man of a truly philosophical mind, eminently
conversant in all branches of natural knowledge,
and the pupil and intimate friend of Dr. Black,
and had attended the lectures of that distin
guished philosopher in the university of Glasgow.
And he often acknowledged " that his first ideas
on this subject were acquired by his attendance
on Dr. Black's chymical lectures, and from the '
consideration of his theory of latent heat, and
the expansibility of steam." We may therefore
rest assured, that all the future improvements
and new applications of this noble invention will
be the result of physical and chymical knowledge
combined with mechanical skill ; and conse
quently, no artizan can ever expect to be instru
mental in bringing the steam-engine to its highest
pitch of improvement, and in directing its ener
gies to all the purposes to which they may be
applied, unless the pursuits of science occupy a
considerable share of his attention.

The first hint of the mariner's compass is
generally supposed to have been owing to chance.
Some persons may have accidentally observed,
that when a small loadstone is suspended in
water on a piece of wood or cork, its ends pointed
towards the south and north. Such experiments
seem to have been applied at first for mere
amusement, and to excite astonishment in the
minds of the ignorant and illiterate. But it was
not till some genius possessed of science and of
reflecting powers seized the hint thus given, that
it was applied to the important purpose of direct
ing the mariner in his course through the path
less ocean. And to science we are indebted
for the manner of determining the declination of
the needle, in all parts of the world, by means
of the azimuth compass, and thus rendering it
an accurate guid« to the navigator in every
region through which he moves. The discovery
of that peculiar principle termed galvanism, was
partly owing to accident. Whilst Galvani, pro
fessor of anatomy at Bologna, was one day em
ployed in dissecting a frog, in a room where
some of his friends were amusing themselves
with electrical experiments, one of them having
happened to draw a spark from the conductor, at
same time that the professor touched one of the
nerves of the animal, its whole body was in
stantly shaken by a violent convulsion. Having
afterwards suspended some frogs from the iron
palisades which surrounded his garden, by
means of metallic hooks fixed in the spines of
their backs, he observed that their muscles con
tracted frequently and involuntarily, as if from a
shock of electricity. Such facts, preseated to
the view of unscientific persons, might hava pro
duced nothing more than a gaze of wonder:
perhaps supernatural powers might have been
resorted to in order to account for the j»hen*.

80

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

mena, and in a short time they might have been
forgotten as a vision of the night. But such
scientific rninds as those of Valli, Volta, Monro,
Bowler, Davy, Humboldt and Wollaston, having
seixed upon these facts, having contemplated
them in every point of view, and instituted ex
periments of every description in relation to
them — most astonishing discoveries in science
have been brought to light — the whole aspect of
chymistry has been changed, and numerous im
provements introduced into the practice of the
useful arts. Alkalis have been decomposed,
new metallic substances discovered, the cause
of the corrosion of metals ascertained, and the
means determined by which it may be effectu
ally prevented.

It is a truth which the whole history of sci
ence fully corroborates, that very few important
discoveries have been made by accident or by
ignorant persons, whose minds were not di
rected to the particular object of research. On
the other hand, we have every reason to believe,
that there are many facts and circumstances
which have passed under the inspection of un
tutored minds, which, had they come within the
range of men of science, would have led to many
useful inventions which are yet hid in the womb
of futurity, and which will reward the industry
of more enlightened generations. The inven
tions to which we have now adverted, and many
others, where chance suggested the first rude
hints, would, in all probability, have lain for ages
in obscurity, without any real utility to mankind,
had not the genius of science seized upon them,
viewed them in all their bearings, and traced
them to all their legitimate consequences and re
sults. Had the telescope, the steam engine,
and the mariner's compass, in their first embryo
state, remained solely in the hands of ignorant
empirics, they might have been reserved merely
as play-things for the purpose of vulgar amuse
ment, or exhibited by cunning impostors to aid
their deceptions, or to produce a belief of their
supernatural powers. But science snatched
them from the hands of the ignorant and the de
signing, and having added the requisite improve
ments, bequeathed them to mankind as the
means of future advancement in the paths of
knowledge, and in the practice of the arts.

It may be laid down as a kind of axiom, to
which few exceptions will occur, that great dis
coveries in science and improvements in art are
never to be expected but as the result of know
ledge combined with unwearied investigation,
This axiom might be illustrated, were it neces
sary, from what we know of the past history of
our most useful inventions. The celebrated M.
Huygens, who first discovered the means of ren
dering clocks exact by applying the pendulum,
and rendering all its vibrations equal by the cy
cloid — was one of the first mathematicians and
astronomers of his age. He had long kept the

object of his pursuit before his mind, he plied
his mechanical ingenuity in adapting tho ma«
chinery of a clock to the maintaining of *he vi
brations of a pendulum, and by his mathemati
cal knowledge investigated the theory of its
motion. By the aid of a new department of
geometrical science, invented by himself, he
showed how to make a pendulum swing in a cy
cloid, and that its vibrations in this curve are all
performed in equal times, whatever be their ex
tent. The ingenious Mr. Robert Hooke, who
was the inventor of spring or pocket watches,
arid of several astronomical instruments fur mak
ing observations both at sea and land — was
eminently distinguished for his philosophical and
mathematical acquirements. From his earliest
years he discovered a genius for mechanics, and
all his other knowledge was brought to bear upon
his numerous inventions and contrivances. —
Otto Guerieke, who invented the Air-pump, was
one of the first mathematicians of his time ; and
the Honourable Robert Boyle, who improved this
valuable instrument, was one of the most illus
trious philosophers of the age and country in
which he lived. — Mr. Ferguson, the inventor of
several orreries, the astronomiaal rotula, the
eclipsarian, the. mechanical paradox, and othe»
astronomical machinery, had, from his earliest
years, devoted the greatest part of his time to
the study of mechanics, and the physical and
mathematical sciences with which it is con
nected, as appears from the numerous populai
works which he published on these subjects
•which are still in extensive circulation. — The
late Mr. Arkwright, the inventor of the spinning
jennies, devoted many years to the study of me
chanics and to the improvement of his inven
tion, till he was perfectly conversant in every
thing that relates to the construction of ma
chinery. This admirable invention, by which a
pound of the finest cotton has been spun by ma
chinery into a yarn extending more than 119
miles, was not the result of chance, but of the
most unwearied study and attention in regard tc>
every circumstance which had a bearing on the
object of his pursuit: and as he nad not ori
ginally received any thing like a regular scien
tific education, his acquirements were the result
of his own application and industry. — " The
new process of refining sugar, by which more
money has been made in a shorter time, and with
less risk and trouble, than was ever perhaps
gained from an invention, was discovered by an
accomplished chymist, E.Howard, brother of
the Duke of Norfolk, and was the fruit of a long
course of experiments, in the progress of which,
known philosophical principles were constantly
applied, and one or two new principles ascer
tained."

There are few inventions of modern times
tl at have been more directly the result of phi
losophical knowledge and experiment, than thr

ORIGIN OF USEFUL INVENTIONS.

8]

lafely-lamp, invented by that accomplished chy-
mist, the late Sir Humphrey Davy. He insti
tuted a series of philosophical experiments, with
the express purpose of constructing, if possible,
a lamp by which the miner might walk through
a body of fire-damp in his subterraneous apart
ments without danger of an explosion; and the
success with which his investigations were at
tended, led to one of the most beautiful and use
ful inventions which distinguish the period in
which we live.* Had this ingenious philosp-
pher been ignorant of the nature and properties of
carburretted hydrogen gas, of the composition of
atmospheric air, of the nature of combustion, and
of the general principles of chymical science,
he could never have hit upon the construction
of this admirable instrument, and the useful mi
ner would still have been left to grapple with his
invisible enemy (the fire-damp) without any
means of escaping from its destructive agency. f

• See Appendix, No. IX.

* It is more than probable, that fatal accidents
have occurred in coal mines where these lamps have
been used, owing to the ignorance and inattention
of some of those artists who have been employed in
forming the wire- gauze, with which they are sur
rounded. A friend of mine, who performed a great
variety of experiments with this instrument, with
every combination of explosive gas, informed me,
that, with a lamp surrounded with wire-gauze, ma
nufactured by an artist in a town in the north of
England, and whn supplied it for the use of the, mi
ners—an explosion uniformly took place when the
instrument was placed in a body of inflammable
gas. He suspected that the apertures in the wire-
gauze were too large, and remonstrated with the
artist on his want of accuracy ; and it was not be
fore he procured gauze with smaller apertures that
his experiments succeeded ; and they were attended
with complete success in every future experiment,
after the gauze was changed. So small was the dif
ference in the contexture of the two pieces of the
gauze, that, to a common eye, it was scarcely per
ceptible. It is found by experiment, that the aper
tures in the gauze should not exceed one twentieth
of an inch square, and that wire from one fortieth
to one sixtieth of an inch diameter, is the most con
venient. Had the artist alluded to, known how to
perform experiments with this instrument, and tried
the effects of his gauze before he sold it for the pur
pose intended, such serious blunders would not
have been committed. Who knows but the defi
ciency in the gauze alluded to might have been the
cause of the destruction of several lives in the pits
where it was used ? for it is a certain fact that acci
dents from explosions are occasionally recurring,
oven in mines where these lamps are generally in
use. Hence the necessity of chymical knowledge
and attention to scientific accuracy in those who are
the manufacturers of instruments of this descrip
tion—on the accurate construction of which the
lives and comforts of a useful body of the commu
nity may depend. I know not whether it be custo
mary to put the safety-lamp into the hands of the
minor, without first trying its efficiency for resisting
thy effects of explosive gases. If it is not, it is a
most glaring and dangerous oversight; and there
can be no question, that to the neglect of this pre
caution are to be attributed many of those explo
sions which have taken place in the mines where
this lamp has been introduced. Besides, such ne
glects have a direct tendency to detract from the
merits of this noble invention, to prevent its univer
sal adoption, and to render uncertain its efficiency
fnr warding off destructive explosions. But from
ttie experiments alluded to above, which were per-

We may farther remark, that the mechanic
whose mind is enlightened with scientific know,
ledge, has a much greater chance of being instru*
mental in improving the arts, than the mere chy-
mist or philosopher. While the mere philoso
pher is demonstrating principles and forming
theories in his closet, and sometimes performing
experiments, only on a small scale, — the work
man, in certain manufactories, has a daily op
portunity of contemplating chymical processes
and mechanical operations on an extensive scale,
and of perceiving numberless modifications and
contrivances, which require to be attended to,
of which the mere scientific speculator can form
but a very faint and inadequate conception.
Being familiar with the most minute details of
every process and operation, he can perceive
redundancies and defects imperceptible to other
observers ; and, if he has an accurate knowledge
of the general principles on which his operations
depend, he must be best qualified for suggesting
and contriving the requisite improvements. As
the mechanic is constantly handling the tools
and materials with which new experiments and
improvements may be made, — observing the ef
fects of certain contrivances, and of deviations
from established practice — and witnessing the
chymical and mechanical actions of bodies on
each other — he has more opportunities of obser
vation in these respects, and, consequently, is
more likely than any other class of society to
strike out a new path which may lead to some
useful invention in the arts, or discovery in the
sciences.* But if his mind is not imbued with
knowledge, he trudges on, like a mill-horse, in
the same beaten track, and may overlook a thou
sand opportunities of performing experiments,
and a thousand circumstances which might
suggest new improvements.

In short, in so far as chance is concerned in
new discoveries and improvements in the arts,
the scientific mechanic has a hundred chances
to one, compared with the ignorant artificer, that,
in the course of his operations, he shall hit upon
a new principle of improvement : his chances
of such results are even superior to those of the
most profound philosophers who never engage in

formed with the greatest care, and with every pos
sible combination of explosive gas, and frequently
exhibited in private, and before large public audi
ences—the efficiency of this lamp for resisting the ef
fects of fire-damp is put beyond the shadow of a
doubt. It is known to be the practice of some mi
ners, occasionally to screw off the top of their lamp,
in order to enjoy the benefit of more light than what
shines through the wire-gauze. Such a practice
ought to be strictly prohibited, and the instrument,
if possible, rendered incapable of being opened at
top— a practice which may probably have been the
occasion of several explosions. If the workmen
in mines were carefully instructed in the general
principles of chymistry, and particularly in the na
ture of combustion, explosions, and the qualities of
the different gases, they would not dare to hazard
such dangerous experiments.

• See Appendix No. X

8<2

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

practical operations, as he is constantly in the
way of perceiving what is useless, defective, or
in any way amiss in the common methods of
procedure. To use a common expression, " he
is in the way of good luck, and if he possesses
the requisite information, he can take the ad
vantage of it when it comes to him." And
should he be so fortunate as to hit on a new in
vention, he will probably enjoy not merely the
honour which is attached to a new discovery, but
also the pecuniary advantages which generally
result from it.

We have, therefore, every reason to hope,
that, were scientific knowledge universally dif
fused among the working classes, every depart
ment of the useful arts would proceed with a
rapid progress to perfection, and new arts and
inventions, hitherto unknown, be introduced on
the theatre of the world, to increase the enjoy
ments of domestic society, and to embellish the
face of nature. No possible limits can be as
signed to the powers of genius, to the resources
of science, to the improvement of machinery, to
the aids to be derived from chymical researches,
and to the skill and industry of mechanics and
labourers when guided by the light which scien
tific discoveries have diffused around them.
Almost every new discovery in nature lays the
foundation of a new art ; and since the recent
discoveries of chymistry lead to the conviction,
that the properties and powers of material sub
stances are only beginning to be discovered — the
resources of art must, in some measure, keep
pace with our knowledge of the powers of na
ture. It is by seizing on these powers, and
employing them in subserviency to his designs,
that man has been enabled to perform operations
which the whole united force of mere animal
strength could never have accomplished. Steam,
galvanism, the atmospheric pressure, oxygen,
hydrogen, and other natural agents, formerly
unnoticed or unknown, have been called into
action by the genius of science ; and, in the
form of steam-boats and carriages, Voltaic bat
teries, gasometers and air-balloons, have gene
rated forces, effected decompositions, diffused
the most brilliant illuminations, and produced a
celerity of motion both on sea and land which
have astonished even the philosophical world,
and which former generations would have been
disposed to ascribe to the agencies of infernal
demons. And who shall dare to set boundaries
to the range of scientific discovery — or to say,
that principles and powers of a still more won
derful and energetic nature, shall not be disco
vered in the system of nature, calculated to
perform achievements still more striking and
magnificent? Much has, of late years, been
performed by the application and combination
of chymical and mechanical powers, but much
more, we may confidently expect, will be
achieved in generations yet to come, when the

physical universe shall be more extensively e»»
plored, and the gates of the temple of knowledge
thrown open to all. Future Watts, Davys ami
Arkwrights will doubtless arise, with minds still
more brilliantly illuminated with the lights of
science, and the splendid inventions of the pre
sent age be far surpassed in the " future miracles
of mechanic power," which will distinguish the
ages which are yet to come. But, in order to
this " wished for consummation," it is indispen
sably requisite that the mass of mankind be
aroused from their slumbers, that knowledge be
universally diffused, and that the light of science
shed its influence on men of everv nation, of
every profession, and of every rank. And if,
through apathy or avarice, or indulgence in sen
sual propensities, we refuse to lend our helping
hand to this object, now that a spirit of inquiry
has gone abroad in the world — society may yeJ
relapse into the darkness which enveloped the
human mind during the middle ages, and the
noble inventions of the past and present a<.re,
like the stately monuments of Grecian and Ro
man art, be lost amidst the mists of ignorance,
or blended with the ruins of empires.

III. The knowledge and mental activity con
nected with the improvement of the arts, would
promote the external comforts of mankind, par
ticularly of the lower orders of society.

Since the period when the arts began to be
improved, and a spirit of inquiry after knowledge
was excited among the middling and lower or
ders, many comforts and conveniencies have
been introduced, and a new lustre appears on the
face of general society. In many places the as
pect of thi country has been entirely changed ;
the low thatched cottage of the farmer has arisen
into a stately mansion, the noisome dunghill
which stood within two yards of his door, has
been thrown into a spacious court at a distance
from his dwelling, and his offices display a neat
ness and elegance which seem to vie with those
of the proprietor of the soil. The gloomy pa
rish church with its narrow aisle and tottering
belfrey, has been transformed into a noble light
some edifice, and adorned with a stately spire
towering above all surrounding objects ; and the
village school, within whose narrow walls a hun
dred little urchins were crowded, like sheep in a
fold, has now expanded into a spacious hall.
Narrow dirty paths have been improved, roads
formed on spacious plans, canals and railways
constructed, streets enlarged, waste lands cul
tivated, marshes drained, and the interior of
houses decorated and rendered more comfortable
and commodious. In districts where nothjng
formerly appeared but a dreary waste, prin%
fields have been established, cotton mills, foun-
deries, and other manufactories erected, villages
reared, and the noise of machinery, the tolling
of bells, the sound of hammers, the buzz of reels,

EXTERNAL COMFORT CONNECTED WIIH SCIENCE.

tnd the hum of human voices and of ceaseless
activity, now diversity the scene where nothing
was formerly heard but the purling stream or the
howlings of the tempest. In certain parts of the
country where the passing of a chariot was a
kind of phenomenon, mails and stage-coaches
crowded with travellers of all descriptions, within
and without, now follow each other in rapid suc
cession, conveying their passengers with unin
terrupted rapidity, and at one-half the expense
formerly incurred. Even on the inland lake,
where scarcely a small skiff was formerly seen,
steam-vessels are now beheld sweeping along in
majestic style, and landing fashionable parties,
heroes, divines, and philosophers, to enliven the
rural hamlet, the heath-clad mountain, and the
romantic glen.

Much, however, is still wanting to complete
the enjoyments of the lower ranks of society.
In the country, many of them live in the most
wretched hovels, open to the wind and rain, with
out a separate apartment to which an individual
may retire for any mental exercise ; in towns, a
whole family is frequently crowded into a single
apartment in a narrow lane, surrounded with
filth and noxious exhalations, and where the light
of day is scarcely visible. In such habitations,
where the kitchen, parlour, and bed-closet are
all comprised in one narrow apartment, it is
next to impossible for a man to improve his mind
by reading or reflection, amidst the gloom of
twilight, the noise of children, and the prepara
tion of victuals, even although he felt an ardent
desire for intellectual enjoyment. Hence the
temptation to which such persons are exposed to
seek enjoyment in wandering through the streets,
in frequenting the ale-house, or in lounging at
the fire-side in mental inactivity. In order that
the labourer may be stimulated to the cultivation
of his mental powers, he must be furnished with
those domestic conveniencies requisite for at
taining this object. He must be paid such wages
as will enable him to procure such conveni
encies, and the means of instruction, otherwise
it is next thing to an insult to exhort him to pro
secute the path of science. The long hours of
labour, and the paltry remuneration which the la
bourer receives in many of our spinning-mills and
other manufactories, so long as such domestic
tlavery and avaricious practices continue, form
an insurmountable barrier to the general diffusion
of knowledge.

But were the minds of the lower orders im
bued with a certain portion of useful science, and
did they possess such a competency as every
numan being ought to enjoy, their knowledge
would lead them to habits of diligence and eco
nomy. In most instances it will be found, that
.gnorance is the fruitful source of indolence,
waste, and extravagance, and that abject poverty
to the result of a want of discrimination and pro
per arrangement in the management of domestic

affairs. Now, the habits of application which
the acquisition of knowledge necessarily pro
duces, would naturally be carried into the va
rious departments of labour peculiar to their sta
tions, and prevent that laziness and inattention
which is too common among the working classes,
and which not unfrequently lead to poverty and
disgrace. Their knowledge of the nature of
heat, combustion, atmospheric air, and combus
tible substances, would lead them to a proper
economy in the use of fuel ; and their acquaint
ance with the truths of chymistry, on which the
art of a rational cookery is founded, would lead
them to an economical practice in the preparation
of victuals, and teach them to extract from every
substance all its nutritious qualities, and to im
part a proper relish to every dish they prepare ;
for want of which knowledge and attention, the
natural substances intended for the sustenance
of man will not go half their length in the hands
of some as they do under the judicious manage
ment of others. Their knowledge of the struc
ture and functions of the animal system, of the
regimen which ought to be attended to in order
to health and vigour, of the causes which produce
obstructed perspiration, of the means by which
pestilential effluvia and infectious diseases are
propagated, and of the disasters to which the hu
man frame is liable in certain situations, would
tend to prevent many of those diseases and fatal
accidents to which ignorance and inattention have
exposed so many of our fellow-men. For want
of attending to such precautions in these re
spects, as knowledge would have suggested,
thousands of families have been plunged into
wretchedness and ruin, which all their future
exertions were inadequate to remove. As the
son of Sirach has well observed, " Better is the
poor being sound and strong in constitution, than
a rich man that is afflicted in his body. Health
and good estate of body are above all gold; there
are no riches above a sound body, and no joy
above the joy of the heart."

As slovenliness and filth are generally the
characteristics of ignorance and vulgarity, so an
attention to cleanliness is one of the distinguishing
features of cultivated minds. Cleanliness is
conducive to health and virtuous activity, but un-
cleanliness is prejudicial to both. Keeping the
body clean is of great importance, since more
than the one half of what we eat and drink is
evacuated by perspiration, and if the skin is not
kept clean the pores are stopped, and perspira
tion consequently prevented, to the great injury
of health. It is highly necessary to the health
and cheerfulness of children; for where it is
neglected, they grow pale, meagre, and squalid,
and subject to several loathsome and trouble
some diseases. Washing the hands, face,
mouth, and feet, and occasionally the whole
body, conduces to health, strength, and ease,
and tends to prevent colds, rheumatism, cramps,

84

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

the palsy, the itch, the tooth-ache, and many
other maladies. Attention to cleanliness of body
would also lead to cleanliness in regard to
clothes, victuals, apartments, beds and furniture.
A knowledge of the nature of the mephitic gases,
of the necessity of pure atmospheric air to health
and vigour, and of the means by which infection
is produced and communicated, would lead per
sons to see the propriety of frequently opening
doors and windows to dissipate corrupted air,
and to admit the refreshing breeze, of sweeping
cobwebs from the corners and ceiling of the
room, and of removing dust, straw, or filth of any
kind which is offensive to the smell, and in which
infection might be deposited. By such attention,
fevers and other malignant disorders might be
prevented, vigour, heallh, and serenity promoted,
and the whole dwelling and its inmates present
an air of cheerfulness and comfort, and become
the seat of domestic felicity.

Again, scientific knowledge would display it
self among the lower orders, in the tasteful de
corations of their houses and garden plots. The
study of botany and horticulture would teach
them to select the most beautiful flowers, shrubs,
and evergreens ; to arrange their plots with
neatness and taste, and to improve their
kitchen-garden to the best advantage, so as to
render it productive for the pleasure and suste
nance of their families. A genius for mecha
nical operations which almost every person may
acquire, would lead them to invent a variety of
decorations, and to devise many contrivances for
the purpose of conveniency, and for keeping
every thing in its proper place and order — which
never enter into the conceptions of rude and
vulgar minds. Were such dispositions and
mental activity generally prevalent, the circum
stances which lead to poverty, beggary, and
drunkenness, would be in a great measure re
moved, and home would always be resorted to as
a place of comfort and enjoyment.

Again the study of science and art would in
cline the lower classes to enter into the spirit of
every new improvement, and to give their assist
ance in carrying it forward. The want of taste
and of mental activity, and the spirit of selfish
ness which at present prevails among the mass
of mankind, prevent the accomplishment of a
variety of schemes which might tend to promote
thf conveniences and comforts of general society.
For example ; many of our villages which might
Otherwise present the appearance of neatness
and comfort, are almost impassable, especially
in the winter season, and during rainy weather,
on account of the badness of roads and the want
of foot-paths. At almost every step you en
counter a pool, a heap of rubbish, or a dunghill,
and in many places feel as if you were walking
in a quagmire. In some villages, otherwise
well planned, the streets present a grotesque
appearance of sandy hillocks and mounds, and

pools of stagnant water scattered in every di*er-
tion, with scarcely the vestige of a pathway to
guide the steps of the passenger. In winter, the
traveller, in passing along, is bespattered with
mire and dirt, arid in summer, he can only drag
heavily on, while his feet at every step sink into
soft and parched sand. Now, such is the apathy
and indifference that prevail among many villa
gers as to improvement in1 these respects, that
although the contribution of a single shilling or
of half a day's labour might, in some instances,
accomplish the requisite improvements, they
will stand aloof from such operations with a
sullen obstinacy, and even glory in being the
means of preventing them. Nay, such is the
selfishness of many individuals, that they will
not remove nuisances even from the front of
their own dwellings, because it might at the
same time promote the convenience of the public
at large. In large towns, likewise, many narrow
lanes are rendered filthy, gloomy, and unwhole
some by the avarice of landlords, and the obsti
nate and boorish manners of their tenants, and
improvements prevented which would tend to
the health and comfort of the inhabitants. But
as knowledge tends to liberalise the mind, to
subdue the principle of selfishness, and to pro
duce a relish for cleanliness and comfort, when
it is more generally diffused, we may expect that
such improvements as those to which I allude
will be carried forward with spirit and alacrity.
There would not be the smallest difficulty in ac
complishing every object of this kind, and every
other improvement conducive to the pleasure
and comfort of the social state, provided the ma
jority of a community were cheerfully to come
forward with their assistance and contributions,
however small, and to act with concord and har
mony. A whole community or nation acting in
unison, and every one contributing according to
his ability, would accomplish wonders in rela
tion to the improvement of towns, villages, and
hamlets, and of every thing that regards the
comfort of civil and domestic society.

In short, were knowledge generally diffused,
and art uniformly directed by the principles of
science, new and interesting plans would be
formed, new improvements set on foot, new
comforts enjoyed, and a new lustre would ap
pear on the face of nature, and on the state of
general society. Numerous conveniences, de
corations, and useful establishments never yet
attempted, would soon be realized. Houses on
neat and commodious plans, in airy situations,
and furnished with every requisite accommoda
tion, would be reared for the use of the peasant
and mechanic; schools on spacious plans for
the promotion of useful knowledge would be
erected in every village and hamlet, and ir every
quarter of a city where they were found expe
dient; asylums would be built for the reception
of the friendless poor, whether young or old ;

ATTRIBUTES OP THE DEITY

manufactories established for supplying employ
ment to every class of labourers and artizans,
and lecture-rooms prepared, furnished with re
quisite apparatus, to which they might resort for
improvement in science. Roads would be cut
In all convenient directions, diversified with rural
decorations, hedge-rows, and shady bowers, —
foot-paths, broad and smooth, would accompany
them in all their windings, and gas-lamps,
erected at every half-mile's distance, would va
riegate the rural scene and cheer the shades of
night. Narrow lanes in cities would be either
widened or their houses demolished ; streets on
broad arid spacious plans would be built, the
smoke of steam-engines consumed, nuisances
removed, and cleanliness and comfort attended
to in every arrangement. Cheerfulness and
activity would everywhere prevail, and the idler,
the vagrant, and the beggar would disappear
from society. All these operations and improve
ments, and hundreds more, could easily be ac
complished, were the minds of the great body of
the community thoroughly enlightened and mora
lized, and every individual, whether rich or poor,
who contributed to bring them into effect, would
participate in the general enjoyment. And what
an interesting picture would be presented to
every benevolent mind, to behold the great body
of mankind raised from a state of moral and
physical degradation to the dignity of their ra
tional natures, and to the enjoyment of the
bounties of their Creator ! — to behold the country
diversified with the neat and cleanly dwellings
of the industrious labourer, — the rural scene,
during the day, adorned with seminaries, manu
factories, asylums, stately edifices, gardens,
fruitful fields and romantic bowers, and, during
night, bespangled in all directions with varie
gated lamps, farming a counterpart, as it were,
to the lights which adorn the canopy of heaven !
Such are only a few specimens of the improve
ments which art, directed by science and mora
lity, could easily accomplish.

SECTION VI.

ON THE INFLUENCE OF KNOWLEDGE IN PRO-
MOTIWO ENLARGED CONCEPTION'S OF THE
CHARACTER AND PERFECTIONS OF THE
DEITV.

ALL the works of God speak of their Author,
in silent but emphatic language, and declare the
glory of his perfections to all the inhabitants of
the earth. But, although " there is no speech
nor language" where the voice of Deity is not
heard, how gross are the conceptions generally
entertained of the character of Him " in whom
we live and move," and by whose superintending
events are directed ! Among the

greater number of pagan nations, the moat al>
surd and grovelling notions are entertained re
specting the Supreme Intelligence, and the
nature of that worship which his perfections de
mand. They have formed the most foolish and
degrading representations of this august Being,
and have i£ changed the glory of the incorruptible
God into an image made like to corruptible
man, and to four-footed beasts and creeping
things." Temples have been erected and filled
with idols the most hideous and obscene ; bulls
and crocodiles, dogs and serpents, goats and
lions have been exhibited to adumbrate the
character of the Ruler of the universe. The
most cruel and unhallowed rites have been per
formed to procure his favour, and human vic
tims sacrificed to appease his indignation. All
such grovelling conceptions and vile abomina
tions have their origin in the darkness which
overspreads the human understanding, and the
depraved passions which ignorance has a ten
dency to produce. Even in those countries
where Revelation sheds its influence, and the
knowledge of the true God is promulgated, how
mean and contracted are the conceptions which
the great bulk of the population entertain of the
attributes of that incomprehensible Being whose
presence pervades the immensity of space, who
" metes out the heavens with a span," and su
perintends the affairs of ten thousand worlds
The views which many have acquired of the
perfections of the Deity, do not rise much higher
than those which we ought to entertain of tho
powers of an archangel, or of one of the sera
phim ; and some have been known, even in our
own country, whose conceptions have been so
abject and grovelling, as to represent to them
selves " the King eternal, immortal, and invisi
ble," under the idea of a " venerable old man.3"
Even the more intelligent class of the commu
nity fall far short of the ideas they ought to form
of the God of heaven, owing to the limited
views they have been accustomed to take of the
displays of his wisdom and benevolence, and
the boundless range of his operations.

We can acquire a knowledge of the Deity
only by the visible effects he has produced, or
the external manifestations he has j^iven of him
self to his creatures ; for the Divine Essence
must remain for ever inscrutable to finite minds.
These manifestations are made in the Revela
tions contained in the Bible, and in the scene of
the material universe around us. The moral
perfections of God, such as his justice, mercy,
and faithfulness, are more particularly deline
ated in his word ; for, of these the system of
nature can afford us only some slight hints and
obscure intimations. His natural attributes,
such as his immensity, omnipotence, wisdom,
and goodness, are chiefly displayed in the works
of creation ; and to this source of information
the inspired writers uniformly direci our atten-

86

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

tion, in order that we may acquire the most
ample and impressive views of the grandeur of
the Divinity, and the magnificence of his ope
rations. " Lift up your eyes on high and behold !
who hath created these orbs ? who bringeth forth
their host by number ? The everlasting God
the Lord, by the greatness of his might, for that
he is strong in power. He measureth the ocean
in the hollow of his hand, he comprehends the
dust of the earth in a measure, he weigheth the
mountains in scales, and hath stretched out the
heavens by his understanding. All nations be
fore him are as the drop of a bucket, and are
counted to him less than nothing, and vanity.
Thine, O Lord, is the greatness, and the glory,
and the majesty, for all that is in heaven and
earth is thine." The pointed interrogatories
proposed to Job,* and the numerous exhorta
tions in reference to this subject, contained in
the book of Psalms and other parts of Scripture,
plainly evince, that the character of God is to
be contemplated through the medium of his visi
ble works. In order to acquire a just and com
prehensive conception of the perfections of
Deity, we must contemplate his character as
displayed both in the system of Revelation and
in the system of nature, otherwise we can ac
quire only a partial and distorted view of the
attributes of Jehovah. The Scriptures alone,
without the medium of his works, cannot con
vey to us the most sublime conceptions of the
magnificence of his empire, and his eternal power
and Godhead; and the works of nature, without
the revelations of his word, leave us in profound
darkness with regard to the most interesting
parts of his character — the plan of his moral
government, and the ultimate destination of man.
Would we, then, acquire the most sublime
and comprehensive views of that invisible Be
ing, vrho created the universe, and by whom all
things are upheld, we must, in the first place,
apply ourselves, with profound humility and
revereace, to the study of the Sacred oracles;
and, in the next place, direct our attention to the
material works of God as illustrative of his
Scriptural character, and of the declarations of
his word. And, since the sacred writers direct
our views to the operations of the Almighty
in the visible universe, in what manner are we
to contemplate these operations ? Are we to
view them in a careless, cursory manner, or
with fixed attention ? Are we to gaze on them
with the vacant stare of a savage, or with the
penetrating eye of a Christian philosopher?
Are we to view them through the mists of igno
rance and vulgar prejudice, or through the light
which science has diffused over the wonders of
creation ? There can be no difficulty to any
•eflecting mind in determining which of these
modes pught to be adopted. The Scriptures

• Job. ch. xxxviii. &c.

declare, that as " the v orks of Jehovah are
great," they must be " souglit out" or thoroughly
investigated, " by all those who have pleasure
therein ;" and a threatening is denounced against
every one who "disregards the works of the
Lord," and "neglects to consider the operations
of his hand."

Such declarations evidently imply, that we
ought to make the visible works of God the sub
ject of our serious study and investigation, and
exercise the rational powers he has given us for
this purpose ; otherwise we cannot expect to
derive from them a true and faithful exhibition of
his character and purposes. For, as the cha
racter of God is impressed upon his works, that
character cannot be distinctly traced unless those
works be viewed in their true light arid actual
relations — not as they may appear to a rude and
inattentive spectator, but as they are actually
found to exist, when thoroughly examined by the
light of science and of revelation. For example,
a person unaccustomed to investigate the system
of nature imagines that the earth is ajixed mass
of land and water in the midst of creation, and
one of the largest bodies in nature, and, conse
quently, that the sun, moon, and stars, and the
whole material universe revolve around it every
twenty-four hours. Such a conception of the
material system might, indeed, convey to the
mind an astonishing idea of the power of the
Deity in causing such an immense number of
orbs to revolve around our world with so prodi
gious a velocity as behoved to take place, were
the earth in reality a quiescent body in the
centre of the universe. But it would give us a
most strange and distorted idea of his intelligence.
While it tended to magnify his omnipotence, it
would, in effect, deprive him of the attribute of
wisdom. For, in the first place, such a concep
tion would represent the Almighty as having de
vised a svstern of means altogether superfluous
and preposterous, in order to accomplish the end
intended ; for it is the characteristic of wisdom
to proportionate the means to the nature of the
design which is to be accomplished. The de
sign, in the case under consideration, is to pro
duce the alternate success-ion of day and night.
This can be effected by giving the earth itself a
rotation round its axis, as is the case in other
globes of much larger dimensions. But accord
ing to the conception to which we are now ad
verting, the whole material creation is considered
as daily revolving around this comparatively
little globe of earth, an idea altogether extrava
gant and absurd, and inconsistent with every
notion we ought to entertain of infinite wisdom.
In the next place, were the earth considered as
at rest, the motions of the planets would present
a series of looped curves without ary marks of
design, a scene of inextricable cui.fusion, and
the whole of the solar system would appear de
void of order and harmonv, and, conseouently,

UNITY OF THE DIVINE BEING.

87

without the marks of wisdom and intelligence.
So that, when the arrangements of nature are
contemplated through the mists of ignorance,
they tend to obscure the glory of the Divinity,
and to convey a distorted idea of his character.
Whereas, when the system of the universe is
contemplated in its true light, all appears ar
ranged with the most admirable harmony, sim
plicity, and order, and every mean proportionate
to the. end it is intended to accomplish. Again,
in so far as we consider the earth as the prin
cipal body, or among the largest bodies of the
universe, in so far do we narrow our conceptions
of the extent and magnificence of creation, and,
consequently, limit our views of the plans and
perfections of the Creator. For our conceptions
of his attributes must, in some measure, corre
spond to the views we have acquired of the am
plitude and grandeur of his empire.

Now, what is it that enables us to investigate
the works of God, and to contemplate the system
of nature in its true light ? It is Science com
bined with observation and experiment. And
what is science considered in a theological point
of view ? It is nothing else than a rational in
quiry into the arrangements and operations of
the Almighty, in order to trace the perfections
therein displayed. And what are the truths
which science has discovered ? They may be
regarded as so many rays of celestial light de
scending from the Great Source of Intelligence
to illuminate the. human mind in the knowledge
of the divine character and government, and to
stimulate it to still more vigorous exertions in
similar investigations, just as the truths of reve
lation are so many emanations from the " Father
of lights," to enlighten the darkness and to
counteract the disorders of the moral world ; and
both these lights must be resorted to to direct
our inquiries, if we wish to attain the clearest
and most comprehensive views of the attributes
of the Divine Mind. Revelation declares, in so
many distinct propositions, the character of God,
and the plans of his moral government. Science
explains and illustrates many of those subjects to
which revelation refers. It removes the veil
from the works of the Creator ; it dispels the
mists which ignorance and superstition have
thrown around them ; it conducts us into the
secret ch ntibers of nature, and discloses to us
many of those hidden springs which produce the
diversified phenomena of the material world ;
it throws a light on those delicate and minute
objects which lie concealed from the vulgar eye,
and brings within the range of our contempla
tion the distant glories of the sky ; it unveils the
laws by which the Almighty directs the move
ments of his vast empire, and exhibits his ope
rations in a thousand aspects of which the un
enlightened mind can form no conception. If,
then, science throws a light on the works and the
ways of God, the acquisition of scientific know

ledge, when properly directed, must hav* a ten
dency to direct our conceptions and to amplify
our views of his adorable attributes, and of his
providential arrangements.

Here it will naturally be inquired, — What are
some of those views of the divine character
which scientific investigation has a tendency to
unfold ? Our limits will not permit a full and ex
plicit answer to this inquiry, the illustration of
which would require a volume of no inconsider
able size, and therefore, we shall attempt no
thing more than the statement of a few general
hints.

1. The phenomena of the material world, as
investigated by science, evince the unity of the
Divine Being. There is such a harmony that
prevails through the whole visible universe, as
plainly shows it to be under the government of
one Intelligence. Amidst the immense compli
cation that surrounds us, we perceive one set of
laws uniformly operating in accordance with
which all things proceed in their regular courses.
The same causes uniformly produce the same
effects in every region of the world, and in every
period of time. " Vegetables spring from the
same seed, germinate by the same means, as
sume the same form, sustain the same qualities,
exist through the same duration, and come to the
same end." Animals, too, of the same species,
are brought into existence in the same manner,
exhibit the same life and vital functions, display
the same active powers and instinct, and hasten
to the same dissolution. Man has one origin,
one general form, the same corporeal structure,
the same vital functions, the same system of in
tellectual faculties, and comes to the same termi
nation. All the elements around him, and every
arrangement in this sublunary sphere, are made,
in one regular manner, subservient to his sensi
tive enjoyment, and are evidently fitted, by one
design, and directed by one agency, to promote
his happiness. The connexion and harmony
which subsist between the animal and vegetable
kingdoms, plainly evince that one and the same
Being is the former of both, and that in his con
trivances with respect to the one, he had in view
the necessities of the other. We know, that dif
ferent sorts of plants, herbs, and flowers, are ap
pointed for food to the several tribes of animals.
That which is hurtful to one species is salutary
to another. One creature climbs the highest
rocks for herbs, another digs in the earth for
roots, and we scarcely know a plant or leaf but
what affords nourishment, and a place of nativity
to some species or other of the insect tribes.
This is the foundation of innumerable relations
and connexions between these two departments
of creation, which show the work to be one, and
the result of the same Power and Intelligence.
In like manner, day and night uniformly return
with the utmost regularity, and by the operation
of the same cause, and with the same regularity

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

and harmony the seasons revolve and appear in
constant succession. The composition of the
atmosphere is the same under every latitude, and
light and heat are diffused by the same law in
every region of the earth. One law causes a
stone to fall to the ground, and by the operation
«f the same law, the moon is retained in her
orbit around the earth, the planets directed in
their revolutions round the sun. arid the whole
universe compacted into one harmonious system.
In short, ail the arrangements and operations of
nature, so far as our knowledge extends, present
to our view a single design, regularly executed
by a single agency. The fair inference, there
fore, is, that every part of the world in which we
dwell, and every department of the solar system,
are under the government of one Intelligence,
which directs every movement throughout the
universal system. And the more extensively
our views of the? universe are enlarged, the
marks of unity in operation and design become
more strikingly apparent. Now, if two or more
intelligences had the government of the universe
in their hands, and if they had equal power and
contrary designs, their purposes would clash,
and they could never become the parents of that
harmony which we clearly perceive throughout
the system of nature. Thus the operations of
the visible world confirm and illustrate the decla
ration of the inspired oracles, that " there is none
other God but one."

2. A scientific investigation of the material
world opens to us innumerable evidences of
Divine Wisdom.

Wherever we turn our eyes in the visible
\7orld around us, and survey with attention the
various processes of nature, we perceive at every
step the most striking marks of intelligence and
design. We perceive the wisdom of the great
Author of nature, in the admirable constitution
of the atmosphere, and the wonderful properties
of the constituent principles of which it is com
posed, — in the motions of light, the inconceiva
ble smallness of its particles, its adaptation to
the eye, and the admirable manner in which
vision is performed, — in the nature of sound, the
laws by which it is propagated, and the various
modifications of which it is susceptible, — in the
process of evaporation, and the rains, dews, and
fertility which are the results of this admirable
part of the economy of nature, — in the utility of
the mountains and valleys with which the eanh
is diversified, and the beautiful colouring which
is spread over the face of nature, — in the morn
ing and evening twilight, and the gradual ap
proaches of light and darkness, — in the vast
expanse of the ocean and its numerous produc
tions,— in the grand, and picturesque, and beau
tiful landscapes with which our globe is adorned,
— in the composition and specific gravity of
viater, and in the peculiar structure and density
ef the solid parts of the earth, — in the expansion

of water in the act of freezing, and the natVlu
and properties of heat arid flame, — in the po t>t
of steam, the properties of the gases, the quali
ties of the magnet, and the agencies of the Ljal-
vanic and electric, fluids, — in the structure of
vegetables, the adaptation of their seeds, roots,
fibres, vessels, and leaves to the purpose of vege
tative life, — the curious processes which are
continually going on in their internal parts, their
delicate contexture and diversified hues, arid
the important purposes they serve in the system
of nature, — in the structure of the various ani
mated beings which traverse the air, the waters,
and the earth. — the provision made for the con
tinuance of the species, their architect ive«facul-
ties, their wonderful instincts, and the injinite
diversity of organization which appears among
them, suited to their various wants and modes of
existence. — in the admirable organization of the
human frame, the numerous bones, muscles,
ligaments, membranes, arteries, and veins which
enter into its construction, the apt disposition of
all its parts, the means contrived for the recep
tion and distribution of nutriment, the effect
which this nutriment produces in bringing the
body to its full growth and expansion, — its self-
restoring power when diseased or wounded, the
provision made against evil accidents and incon
veniences, the variety of muscular movements
of which it is susceptible, the process of respira
tion, the circulation of the blood, the separation
of the chyle, the exquisite structure of the dif
ferent senses, and the nice adaptation of every
organ and movement to the ends it was intended
to subserve. The same wisdom is perceptible
in the position which the sun holds in the solar
system, in order to a due distribution of light and
heat to surrounding worlds ; in the distance at
which the earth is placed from this luminary, —
in the order and harmony of all the celestial mo
tions, and in the wonderful and beautiful scenery,
invisible to the unassisted eye, which the micro
scope displays, both in the animal and vegetable
world. In short, there is not an object within
us or around us, in the mountains or the plains,
in the air, the ocean, or the sky, — among the
animal or the vegetable tribes, when steadily
contemplated in all its aspects and relations, but
displays to the eye of reason and devotion the
consummate intelligence and skill of i's almighty
Author, and calls upon every intelligent agent,
in silent but emphatic language, to praise him
" who made the earth, the sea, the founta:ns of
water, and all that live in them, for whose plea
sure they are and were created."

Let us just select one example out of the
many thousands which might be brought for
ward on this subject. This example shall be
taken from an invisible department of nature.
In consequence of modern scientific discovery,
it has been ascertained that the atmosphere, or
the air we breathe, is compounded of two invi-

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

Bible substances, termed oxygen gas and nitfo-
gen. gas. Oxygen, as formerly stated, is the
principle of vitality and combustion, nitrogen is
destructive both to flame and animal life. Were
we to br-athe oxygen by itself, it would cause
our blood to circulate with greater rapidity, but
it would soon waste and destroy the human
frame by the rapid accumulation of heat. Were
the nitrogen to be extracted from the atmo
sphere, and the oxygen left to exert its native
energies, it would melt the hardest substances
and set the earth on flames. If the oxygen were
extracted and the nitrogen only remained, every
species of fire and flame would be extinguished,
and all the tribes of animated nature instantly
destroyed. The proportion of these two gases
to each other is nearly as one to four. Were
this proportion materially altered, a fluid might
be produced which would cause a burning pain
and instantaneous suffocation. The specific
gravity of these two substances is nearly as 37
to 33, that is, the nitrogen is a small degree
tighter than the oxygen. Were this proportion
reversed, or, in other words, were the oxygen
of the atmosphere a small degree lighter than
the nitrogen, so that the nitrogen might become
a little heavier than common air, — as this gas is
thrown off continually by the breathing of men
and other animals, it would perpetually occupy
the lower regions of the atmosphere, and be
productive of universal pestilence and death.
Again, oxygen gas is separated from the nitro
gen in the lungs ; it is absorbed by the blood,
and gives it its red colour, and is the source of
animal heat throughout the whole system. It
forms the basis of all the acids ; it pervades the
substance of the vegetable tribes, and enables
them to perform their functions, and it forms a
constituent part of the water which fills our
rivers, seas, and oceans. Arid as the atmosphere
is daily liable to be deprived of this fluid b.y
combustion, respiration, and other processes, the
leaves of trees and other vegetables give out a
large portion of it during the day, which, uniting
with the nitrogen gas thrown off by the breathing
of animals, keeps up the equilibrium, and pre-
«erves the salubrity of the air in which we move
and breathe.

These facts demonstrate the infinite know
ledge and the consummate wisdom of the Con-
tiiver of the universe, — in the exquisitely nice
adjustment of every minute circumstance, so as
to preserve the balance of nature and secure the
happiness of his sensitive and intelligent off
spring. What an all-comprehensive intelligence
does it indicate in the Divine Mind, to cause
one single principle in different combinations
to produce so immense a variety of important
effects! What dreadful havoc would be pro
duced throughout the whole of our sublunary
system, if a substance like oxygen gas, which
pervades every part of nature, were not nicely
12

balanced and proportioned. All nature might
soon be thrown into confusion, and all the tribes
of the living world either be reduced to misery,
or swept into the tomb. A material difference
in the proportion of the two airs which compose
the atmosphere, might be productive of the most
dreadful and destructive effects. One of the
most corrosive acids, aquafortis, is composed of
75 parts oxygen and 25 parts nitrogen. Were
this the proportion of these fluids in tha atmo
sphere, every breath we drew would produce the
most excruciating pain, and, after two or three
inspirations, the vital powers would be over
come, and life extinguished. Here then we per
ceive an admirable adjustment of means to ends,
and an evidence of that comprehensive know
ledge which penetrates into the energies of all
substances, and foresees all the consequences
which can follow from the principles and laws
of nature, in every combination and in every
mode of thajr operation. This is only one in
stance out of a thousand which the researches of
science afford us of the admirable economy of
the wisdom of God. From ignorance of such
facts, the bulk of mankind are incapable of ap
preciating the blessings they enjoy, under the
arrangements of infinite wisdom, and unqualified
for rendering a grateful homage to Him " in
whom they live and move, and have their being."
3. The contemplation of nature through the
medium of science, affords innumerable displays
of the benevolence of the Deity. Benevolence,
or goodness, is that perfection of God which
leads him, in all his arrangements, to communi
cate happiness to every order of his creatures.
This attribute, though frequently overlooked is
so extensively displayed throughout the scene
of creation, that we feel at a loss to determine
from what quarter we should select instances
for its illustration. Wherever we find evidences
of wisdom and design, we also find instances of
benevolence ; for all the admirable contrivances
we perceive in the system of nature, have it as
their ultimate end to convey pleasure, in one
shape or another, to sensitive beings. If there
are more than 240 bones in the human body
variously articulated, and more than 440 mus
cles of different forms and contextures, such a
structure is intended to produce a thousand mo
difications of motion in the several members of
which it is composed, and to facilitate every
operation we have occasion to perform. If the
ear is formed with an external porch, a hammer,
an anvil, a tympanum, a stirrup, and a labyrinth,
this apparatus is intended to convey pleasure to
the soul by communicating to it all the modifi
cations of sound. If the eye is composed of three
coats, some of them opaque and some transpa
rent, with three humours of different forms and
refractive powers, and a numerous assemblage
of minute veins, arteries, muscles, nerves, glands,
and lymphatics, it is in order that the images of

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

objects may be accurately depicted on the re
tina, that the ball of the eye may be easily
turned in every direction, and that we may enjoy
all the entertainments of vision.* If an atmo
sphere is thrown around the earth, it is for the
purpose of attempering the rays of the sun, giv
ing a lucid brightness to every part of the hea
vens, producing the morning and evening twi
light, promoting evaporation and the respiration
of animals, and causing the earth to bring forth
abundance of food, by means of the rains and
dews ; all which effects produce happiness in a
thousand different ways to every sentient being.
If this atmosphere presses our bodies with a
weight of thirty thousand pounds, it is in order to
counterpoise the internal pressure of the circu
lating fluids, and to preserve the vessels and
animal functions in due tone and vigour, without
which pressure the elastic fluids in the finer ves
sels would inevitably burst them, and the spark
of life be quickly extinguished. Thousands of
examples of this description, illustrative of divine
benevolence, might be selected from every part
of the material system connected with our world,
all of which would demonstrate that the commu
nication of enjoyment is the great end of all the
contrivances ofinfinite wisdom.

• As an evidence of the care of the Creator to pro
mote our enjoyment, the following instance may be
selected in regard to the?mwcto?oftheeye. Nothing
ran be more manifestly an evidence of contrivance

Fig. 1.

and design, and at the same time of benevolent in
tention, than these muscles, which are admirably
Adapted to move the ball of the eye in every direc
tion, upwards, downwards, to the right nand, to the
left, and in whatever direction we please, so as to
preserve that parallelism of the eye which is neces
sary to distinct vision. In fig. l . is exhibited the eye
ball with its muscles; a, is" the optic nerve; 6, the
rnusculus trochlearis, which turns the pupil down
wards and outwards, and enables the ball of the eye
to roll about at pleasure ; c, is part of the osfrontis,
to which the trochlea or pulley is fixed, through
which d, the tendon of the trochlearis, passes ; e,is
the attolens oculi t >r laising up the globe of the eye ;

There is a striking display of benevolence yj
the gratification afforded to our different senses.
As the eye is constructed of the most delicate
substances, and is one of the most admirable
pieces of mechanism connected with our frame,
so the Creator lias arranged the world in such a
manner as to afford it the most varied and de
lightful gratification. By means of the solar
light, which is exactly adapted to the structure
of this organ, thousands of objects of diversified
beauty and sublimity are presented to the view.
It opens before us the mountains, the vales, the
woods, the lawns, the brooks and rivers, the fer
tile plains and flowery fields, adorned with every
hue, — the expanse of the ocean and the glories
of the firmament. And as the eye would be
dazzled, were a deep red colour or a brilliant
white to be spread over the face of nature, the
divine goodness has clothed the heavens with
blue and the earth with green, the two colours
which are the least fatiguing and the most pleas
ing to the organs of sight, and at the same time
one of these colours is diversified by a thousand
delicate shades which produce a delightful variety
upon the landscape of the world. The ear is cu
riously constructed for the perception of sounds,
which the atmosphere is fitted to convey ; and
what a variety of pleasing sensations are pro-

n, the depressor cculi, for pulling the globe of the
eye down ; /. adductor oculi, for turning the eye
towards the nose ; g; abductor oculi, for moving the
globe of the eye outwards, to the right or left; h,
oUiquus inferior, for drawing the globe of the eye
forwards, inwards, and downwards ; i, part of the
Fig. 2.

superior maxillary bone, to which it is fixed ; k, ttie
eyeball. Fig. 2. represents the same muscles in a
different point of view, where the same letters refer
to the same muscles.

All these opposite and antagonist muscles pre
serve a nice equilibrium, which is effected partly by
their equality of strength, partly by their peculiar
origin, and partly by the natural posture of the body
and the eye, by which means the eye can be turned
instantaneously towards any object, preserved in
perfect steadiness, and prevented'from rolling aboirt
in hideous contortions. This is only one ontofa
hundred instances in relation to the eye, in which
the same benevolent design is displayed.

BENEVOLENCE OF THE DEITY.

91

duced by the objects of external nature intended
to affect this orgar ! The murmurings of the
brooks, tha whispers of the gentle breeze, the
hum of bees, the chirping of birds, the lowing
of the herds, the melody of the feathered song
sters, the roarings of a stormy ocean, the dash-
ings of a mighty cataract, and, above all, the
numerous modulations of the human voice and
the harmonies of music, produce a variety of
delightful emotions which increase the sum of
human enjoyment. To gratify the sense of
smelling, the air is perfumed with a variety of
delicious odours, exhaled from innumerable plants
and flowers. To gratify the feeling, pleasing
sensations of various descriptions are connected
with almost every thing we have occasion to
touch ; and to gratify the sense of taste, the earth
is covered with an admirable profusion of plants,
herbs, roots, and delicious fruits of thousands of
different qualities and flavours, calculated to con
vey an agreeable relish to the inhabitants of
every clime. Now, it is easy to conceive, that
these gratifications were not necessary to our
existence. The purposes of vision, as a mere
animal sensation for the use of self-preservation,
might have been answered, although every trace
of beauty and sublimity had been swept from the
universe, and nothing but a vast assemblage of
dismal and haggard objects had appeared on the
face of nature. The purpose of hearing might
have been effected although every sound had
been grating and discordant, and the voice of me
lody for ever unknown. We might have had
smell without fragrance or perfume ; taste with
out variety of flavour; and feeling, not only
without the least pleasing sensation, but accom
panied with incessant pain. But, in this case,
the system of nature would have afforded no
direct proofs, as it now does, of divine benevo
lence.

The remedies which the Deity has provided
a-gainst the evils L which we are exposed, are
likewise a proof of his benevolence. Medicines
are provided for the cure of the diseases to which
we are liable; heat is furnished to deliver us
from the effects of cold; rest from the fatigues
of :abour ; sleep from the languors of watching ;
artificial light to preserve us from the gloom of
absolute darkness, and shade from me injuries
of scorching heat. Goodness is also displayed
In the power of self-restoration which our bodies
possess, in recovering us from sickness and dis
ease, in healing wounds and bruises, and in
recovering our decayed organs of sensation,
without which power almost every human being
would present a picture of deformity, and a body
full of scars and putrefying sores. The pupil of
the eye is so constructed, that it is capable of con
tracting and dilating by a sort of instinctive power.
By this means the organ of vision defends itself
from the blindness which might ensue from the
admission of too great a quantity of light ; while,

on the other hand, its capacity of expansion, so
as to take in a greater quantity of rays, prevents
us from being in absolute darkness even in the
deepest gloom, without which we could scarcely
take a step with safety during a cloudy night.
Again, in the construction of the human body,
and of the various tribes of animated beings,
hosvever numerous and complicated their organs,
there is no instance can be produced that any
one muscle, nerve, joint, limb, or other part, is
contrived for the purpose of producing pain,
When pain is felt, it is uniformly owing to some
derangement of the corporeal organs, but is never
the necessary result of the original contrivance.
On the other hand, every part of the construc
tion of living beings, every organ and function,
and every contrivance, however delicate and
minute, in so far as its use is known, is found
to contribute to the enjoyment of the individual
to which it belongs, either by facilitating its
movements, by enabling it to ward off dangers,
or in some way or another to produce agreeable
sensations.

In short, the immense multitude of human beings
whicn people the earth, and the ample provision
which is made for their necessities, furnish irre
sistible evidence of divine goodness. It has
been ascertained, that more than sixty thousand
species of animals inhabit the air, the earth, and
the waters, besides many thousands which have
not yet come within the observation of the natu
ralist. On the surface of the earth there is not
a patch of ground or a portion of waler, a single
shrub, tree, or herb, and scarcely a single leaf
in the forest, but what teems with animated be
ings. How many hundreds of millions have
their dwellings in caves, in the clefts of rocks, in
the bark of trees, in ditches, in marshes, in the
forests, the mountains and the valleys ! What
innumerable shoals of fishes inhabit the ocean
and sport in the seas and rivers ! What mil
lions on millions of birds and flying insects, in
endless variety, wing their flight through the
atmosphere above and around "us ! Were we
to suppose that each species, at an average,
contains four hundred millions of individuals,
there would be 24,000,000,000,000, or 24 billions
of living creatures belonging to all the known
species which inhabit the different regions of
the world, besides the multitudes of unknown
species yet undiscovered, — which is thirty thou
sand times the number of all the human beings
that people the globe.* Besides these, there

• As an instance of the immense number of ani
mated beings, the following facts in relation to two
species of birds may be stated. Captain Flinders,
in his voyage to Australasia, saw a compact stream
of stormy petrels, which was from 50 to 80 yards
deep and 300 yards or more broad. This stream for
a full hour and a half continued to pass without in
terruption with nearly the swiftness of the pigeon.
Now, taking the column at 50 yards deep by 300 in
breadth, and that it moved 30 miles an hour, and
allowing nine cubic inches of space to each bird, the

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

are multitudes of animated beings which no man
can number, invisible to the unassisted eye, and
dispersed through every region of the earth, air,
and seas. In a small stagnant pool which in
summer appears covered with a green scum,
there are more microscopic animalcules than
would outnumber all the inhabitants of the earth.
How immense then must be the collective num
ber of these creatures throughout every region
of the earth and atmosphere ! It surpasses all
our conceptions. Now, it is a fact that, from
the elephant to the mite, from the whale to the
oyster, and from the eagle to the gnat, or the
microscopic anirnalcula, no animal can subsist
without nourishment. Every species, too, re
quires a different kind of food. Some live on
grass, some on shrubs, some on flowers, and
some on trees. Some feed only on the roots of
vegetables, some on the stalk, some on the leaves,
some on the fruit, some on the seed, some on
the whole plant; some prefer one species of
grass, some another. Linnceus has remarked,
that the cow eats 276 species of plants and re
jects 218 ; the goat eats 449 and rejects 126 ;
the sheep eats 387 and rejects 141 5 the horso

number would amount to 151 millions and a half.
The migratory pigeon of the United States flies in
still more amazing multitudes. Wilson, in his
"American Ornithology," says, "Of one of these
immense flocks, let us attempt to calculate the
numbers, as seen in passing between Frankfort on
the Kentucky and the Indian territory. If we sup
pose this column to have been one mile in breadth,
and I believe it to have been much more, and that it
moved four hours at the rate of one mile a minute,
the time it continued in passing would make the
whole length 240 miles. Again, supposing that each
square yard of this moving body comprehended three
pigeons, the square yards multiplied by s would
give 2,230,272,000," that is, two thousand two hun
dred and thirty millions and two hundred and se-
renty-two thousand, nearly three times the number
of all the human inhabitants cf the globe, but which
Mr. Wilson reckons to be far below the actual
amount. Were we to estimate the number of ani
mals by the scale here afforded, it would amount to
several hundreds or thousands of times more than
what I have stated in the text. For if a sinirle flock
of pigeons now alluded to in only one district of the
earth, amounts to so prodigious a number, how
many thousand times more must be the amount of
the same species in all the regions of the globe ! In
the above calculations, it is taken for granted that
pigeons fly at the rate of from 30 to 60 miles an hour,
and it is found by actual experiment that this is the
case. In 1830, 1 10 pigeons were brought from Brus
sels to London, and were let fly on the 19th July,
at a quarter before nine A. M. One reached Ant
werp, 1»6 miles distance, at 18 minutes past 2, or in
5 1-2 hours, being at the rate of 34 miles an hour.
Five more reached the same place within eight mi
nutes afterwards, and thirteen others iu the course
of eight hours after leaving London. Another went
from London to Maastricht, 260 miles, in six hours
and a quarter, being at the rate of nearly 42 miles
an hour. The golden eagle sweeps through the at
mosphere at the rate of 40 miles an hour, and it has
'>een computed that the Swift flics, at an average,
500 miles a day, and yet finds time to feed, to clean
Useif, and to collect materials for its nest with ap
parent leisure. Such are the numbers of this species
of animated beings, and such the powers of rapid
motion which the Creator has conferred upon them,
—powers which man, with all his intellectual facul
ties and inventions, has never yet been able to attain.

eats 262 and rejects 212; and the hog, more
nice in its taste than any of these, eats but 72
plants and rejects all the rest. Yet such is the
unbounded munificence of the Creator, that ali
these countless myriads of sentient beings arc
amply provided for and nourished by his bounty!
" The eyes of all these look unto Him, and he
openeth his hand and satisfieth the desire of
every living being." He has so arranged the
world, that every place affords the proper food
for all the Hving creatures with which it abounds.
He lias-furnished them with every organ and ap
paratus of instruments for the gathering, pre
paring, and digesting of their food, and has en
dowed them with admirable sagacity in finding
out and providing their nourishment, and in en
abling them to distinguish between what is
salutary and what is pernicious. In the exercise
of these faculties, and in all their movements,
they appear to experience a happiness suitable
to their nature. The young of all animals in
the exercise of their newly acquired faculties, the
fishes sporting in the waters, the birds skimming
beneath the sky and warbling in the thickets, the
gamesome cattle browsing m the pastures, the
wild deer bounding through the forests, the in
sects gliding through the air and along the
ground, and even the earth-worms wriggling in
the dust, — proclaim, by the vivacity of their
movements and the various tones and gesticula
tions, that the exercise of their powers is con
nected with enjoyment. In this boundless scene
of beneficence, we behold a striking illustration
of the declarations of the inspired writers, that
" the Lord is good to all," — that " the earth is
full of his riches," and that " his tender mercies
are over all his works."

Such are a few evidences of the benevolence
of the Deity as displayed in the arrangements of
the material world. However plain and obvious
they may appear to a reflecting mind, they are
almost entirely overlooked by the bulk of man
kind, owing to their ignorance of the facts of na
tural history and science, and the consequent-
inattention and apathy with which they are ac
customed to view the objects of the visible
creation. Hence they are incapacitated for
appreciating the beneficent character of the
Creator, and the riches of his munificence ; and
incapable of feeling those emotions of admira
tion and gratitude which an enlightened contem
plation of the scene of nature is calculated to
inspire.

4. An enlightened and comprehensive survey
of the universe presents to us a view of the rust
multiplicity of conceptions and the injinite'y divr.~-
sifted ideas which have been formed in the Divim
Mind.

As the conceptions existing in the mind of an
artificer are known by the instruments he con
structs, or the operations he performs, so the
ideas which have existed from eternity in the

VARIETY OF ANIMAL FUNCTIONS,

mind of the Creator are ascertained from the
objects he has created, the events he has pro
duced, and the operations he is incessantly con
ducting. The formation of a single object is an
exhibition of the idea existing in the Creating
Mind, of which it is a copy. The formation of
a second or a third object exactly resembling the
first, would barely exhibit the same ideas a
second or a third time, without disclosing any
thing new concerning the Creator ; and, conse
quently, our com eptions of his intelligence would
not be enlarged, even although thousands and
millions of such objects were presented to our
view, — just as a hundred clocks and watches,
exactly of the same kind, constructed by the
same artist, give us no higher idea of his skill
and ingenuity than the construction of one. But,
every variety in objects and arrangements ex
hibits a new discovery of the plans, contrivances
and intelligence of the Creator.

Now, in the universe we find all things con
structed and arranged on the plan of boundless
and universal variety. In the animal kingdom
there have been actually ascertained, as already
noticed, about sixty thousand different species of
living creatures. There are about 600 species
of mammalia, or animals that suckle their young,
most of which are quadrupeds — 4000 species of
birds, 3000 species of fishes, 700 species of rep-
tiles, and 44,000 species of insects.* Besides
these, there are about 3000 species of shell-Jish,
and perhaps not less than eighty or a hundred
thousand species of animalcules invisible to the
naked eye ; and new species are daily discover
ing, in consequence of the zeal and industry of
the lovers of natural history. As the system of
animated nature has never yet been thoroughly
explored, we might safely reckon the number of
species of animals of all kinds, as amounting to
at least three hundred thousand. We are next
to consider, that the organical structure of each
species consists of an immense multitude of
parts, and that all the species are infinitely diver
sified — differing from each other in their forms,
organs, members, faculties and motions. — They
are of all shapes and sizes, from the microscopic
animalculum, ten thousand times less than a
mite, to the elephant and the whale. — They are
diif^rent in respect of the construction of their
sensitive organs. In regard to the eye, some
have this organ placed in the front, so as to look
directly forward, as in man ; others have it so
placed, as to take in nearly a whole hemisphere,
as in birds, hares and conies ; some have it
fixed, and others, moveable ; some have two
globes or balls, as quadrupeds ; some have four,
as snails, which are fixed in their horns ; some
have eight, set like a locket of diamonds, as
spiders ; some have several hundreds, as flies

• Specimens of all these species are to be seen in
the magnificent collections in the Museum of Na
tural History at Paris.

and beetles, and others above twenty thousand,
as the dragon-fly and several sptcies of butter
flies. In regard to the ear,— some have it large,
erect and open, as in the hare, to hear the least
approach of danger ; in some it is covered to
keep out noxious bodies ; and, in others, as in
the mole, it is lodged deep and backward in the
head, and fenced and guarded from external in
juries. With regard to their dothins, — some
have their bodies covered with hair, as quadru
peds ; some with feathers, as birds ; some with
scales, as fishes ; some with shells, as the tor
toise ; some only with skin ; some with stout and
firm armour, as the rhinoceros ; and others with
prickles, as the hedgehog and porcupine — all
nicely accommodated to the nature of the animal,
and the element in which it lives. These cover
ings, too, are adorned with diversified beauti*>~ ,
as appears in the plumage of birds, the feathers
of the peacock, the scales of the finny tribes, the
hair of quadrupeds, and the variegated polish
and colouring of the tropical shell-fish — beauties
which, in point of symmetry, polish, texture,
variety, and exquisite colouring, mock every at
tempt of human art to copy or to imitate.

In regard to respiration — some breathe through
the mouth by means of lungs, as men and quad«
rupeds ; some by means of gills, as fishes; and
some by organs placed in other parts of their
bodies, as insects. In regard to the circulation
of the blood, some have but one ventricle in the
heart, some two, and others three. In some
animals, the heart throws its blood to the re
motest parts of the system ; in some it throws
it only into the respiratory organs ; in others,
the blood from the respiratory organs is carried
by the veins to another heart, and this second
heart distributes the blood, by the channel of its
arteries, to the several parts. In many insects,
a number of hearts are placed at intervals on the
circulating course, and each renews the impulse
of the former, where the momentum of the
blood fails. In regnrd to the movements of their
bodies, — some are endowed with swift motions,
and others with slow ; some walk on two legs,
as fowls ; some on four, as dogs ; some on eight,
as caterpillars ; some on a hundred, as scolo-
pendrse or millepedes ; some on fifteen hundred
and twenty feet, as one species of sea-star ; and
some on two thousand feet, as a certain species
of echinus.* Some glide along with a sinuous
motion on scales, as snakes and serpents ; some
skim through the air, one species on two wings,
another on four ; and some convey themselves
with speed and safety by the help of their webs,
as spiders ; while others glide with agility through
the waters by means of their tails and fins. — •
But it would require volumes to enumerate and

* See Lyonet's notes to Lessor's Insecto-Theo-
log-y, who also mentions that these Echini have
V1300 horns, similar to those of snails, which they can
put out and draw in at pleasure.

94

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

explain all (he known varieties which distinguish
the different species of animated beings. Besides
the varieties of the species, there are not, per
haps, of all the hundreds of millions which com
pose any one species, two individuals precisely
alike in every point of view in which they may
be contemplated.

As an example of the numerous parts and
functions which enter into the construction of an
animal frame, it may be stated, that, in the hu
man body there are 445 bones, each of them
having forty distinct scopes or intentions ; and
246 muscles, each having ten several intentions ;
so that the system of bones and muscles alone
includes above 14,200 varieties, or different in
tentions and adaptations. But, besides the
bones and muscles, there are hundreds of tendons
and ligaments for the purpose of connecting them
together ; hundreds of nerves ramified over the
whole body to convey sensation to all its parts ;
thousands of arteries to convey the blood to the
remotest extremities, and thousands of veins to
bring it back to the heart ; thousands of lacteal
and lymphatic vessels to absorb nutriment from
the food ; thousands of glands to secrete hu
mours from the blood, and of emunctories to
throw them off from the system — and, besides
many other parts of this variegated system, and
functions with which we are unacquainted, there
are more than sixteen hundred millions of mem
branous cells or vesicles connected with the
lungs, more than two hundred thousand millions
of pores in the skin, through which the perspira
tion is incessantly flowing, and above a thousand
millions of scales, which according to Leeuwen-
hoek, Baker, and others, compose the cuticle or
outward covenng of the body. We have also to
take into the account, the compound organs of
life, the numerous parts of which they consist,
and the diversified functions they perform; such
as the brain, with its infinite number of fibres
and numerous functions ; the heart, with its au
ricles and ventricles ; the stomach, with its
juices and muscular coats ; the .liver, with its
lobes and glands ; the spleen, with its infinity of
cells and membranes; the pancreas, with its
juice and numerous glands ; the kidneys, with
their fine capillary tubes ; the intestines, with all
their turnings and convolutions ; the organs of
sense, with their multifarious connexions ; the
mesentery, the gall-bladder, the ureters, the
pylorus, the duodenum, the blood, the bile, the
lymph, the saliva, the chyle, the hairs, the nails,
and numerous other parts and substances, every
one of which has diversified functions to per
form. We have also to take into consideration
the number of ideas included in the arrangement
And connexion of all these parts, and in the man
ner in which they are compacted into one system
of small dimensions, so as to afford free scope
<br all tho intended functions. If, then, for the
*ake of a rude calculation, we were to suppose,

in addition to the 14,200 adaptations stated
above, that there are 10,000 veins great and
small, 10,000 arteries, 10,000 nerves,* 1000 li
gaments, 4000 lacteals and lymphatics, 100,000
glands, 1,600,000,000 vesicles in the lungs,
1,000,000,000 scales, and 200,000,000,000 of
pores, the amount would be 202,600,149,200 dif
ferent parts and adaptations in the human body ;
and if all the other species were supposed to be
differently organised, and to consist of a simi
lar number of parts, this number multiplied by
300,000, the supposed number of species — the
product would amount to 60,780,044,760,000,000,
or above sixty thousand billions, — the numbei
of distinct ideas, conceptions or contrivances, in
relation to the animal world — a number of which
we can have no precise conception, and which,
to limited minds like ours, seems to approximate
to something like infinity ; but it may tend to
convey a rude idea of the endless multiplicity
of conceptions which pervade the Eternal Mind.
That many other tribes of animated nature
have an organization no less complicated and
diversified than that of man, will appear from
the following statements of M. Lyonet. This
celebrated naturalist wrote a treatise on one
single insect, the cossus caterpillar, which lives
on the leaves of the willow, — in which he has
shown, from the anatomy of that minute animal,
that its structure is almost as complicated as that
of the human body, and many of the parts which
enter into its organization even more numerous.
He has found it necessary to employ twenty
figures to explain the organization of the head,
which contain 228 different muscles. There are
1647 muscles in the body, and 2066 in the in
testinal tube, making in all 3941 muscle^; or
nearly nine times the number of muscles in the
human body. There are 94 principal nerves
which divide into innumerable ramifications.
There are two large tracheal arteries, one at
the right, and the other at the left side of tha
insect, each of them communicating with the air
by means of nine spiracula. Round each spira-
culum the trachea pushes forth a great number
of branches, which are again divided into smaller
ones, and these further subdivided and spread
through the whole body of the caterpillar; they
are naturally of a silver colour, and make a
beautiful appearance. The principal trachael
vessels divide into 1326 different branches. All
this complication of delicate machinery, with
numerous other parts and organs, are com
pressed into a body only about two inches in
length.

* The amazing extent of the ramification of the
veins and nerves may be jurlsed of from this circum
stance, that neither the point of the smallest needle,
nor the infinitely finer lance of a gnat can pierce
any part without drawing blood, and causing an un
easy sensation, consequently without wounding, by
so small a puncture, both a nerve and a vein: and
therefore the number of these vessels here assumed
may be considered as far below the truth.

VARIETY IN THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM.

95

Were we to direct our attention to the vegeta
ble, kingdom, we might contemplate a scene no
less variegated and astonishing than what ap
pears in the animal world. There have already
been discovered more than Jifty-six thousand
species of plants, specimens of all which may be
seen in the Museum of Natural History at
Paris. But we cannot reckon the actual num
ber of species in the earth and seas at less than
four or five hundred thousand. They are of all
sizes, from the invisible forests which are seen
in a piece of mouldiness, by the help of the mi
croscope, to the cocoas of Malabar fifty feet in
circumference, and the banians, whose shoots
0 cover a circumference of five acres of ground.
Each of them is furnished with a complicated
system of vessels for the circulation of its juices,
the secretion of its odours, and other important
functions somewhat analogous to those of ani
mals. Almost every vegetable consists of a
root, trunk, branches, leaves, skin, bark, pith,
sap-vessels, or system of arteries and veins,
glands for perspiration, flowers, petals, stamina,
farina, seed-case, seed, fruit, and various other
parts ; and these are different in their construc
tion and appearance in the different species.
Some plants, as the oak, are distinguished for
their strength and hardness ; others, as the elm
and fir, are tall and slender ; some are tall, like the
cedar of Lebanon, while others never attain to
any considerable height ; some have a rough and
uneven bark, while others are smooth and fine, as
the birch, the maple, and the poplar ; some are so
slight and delicate that the least wind may over
turn them, while others can resist the violence
of the northern blasts ; some acquire their full
growth in a few years, while others grow to a
prodigious height and size, and stand unshaken
amidst the lapse of centuries; some drop their
leaves in autumn, and remain for months like
blighted trunks, while others retain their verdure
amidst the most furious blasts of winter ; some
have leaves scarcely an inch in length or breadth,
while others, as the tallipot of Ceylon, have
leaves so large that one of them, it is said, will
shelter fifteen or twenty men from the rain.

The variety in the vegetable kingdom in re
spect of flowers, is apparent even to the least
attentive observer. Every species is different
from another in the form and hues which it exhi
bits. The carnation differs from the rose, the
rose from the tulip, the tulip from the auricula,
the auricula from the lily, the lily from the nar
cissus, and the rununculus from the daisy. At
the same time each rununculus, daisy, rose or
tulip, has its own particular character and beauty,
something that is peculiar to itself, and in which
it is distinguished from its fellows. In a bed of
rununculuses, or tulips, for example, we shall
scarcely find two individuals that have precisely
the same aspect, or present the same assemblage
of colours. Some flowers are of a stately size,

and seem to reign over their fellows in the same
parterre, others are lowly or creep along the
ground ; some exhibit the most dazzling colours,
others are simple and blush almost unseen : some
perfume the air with exquisite odours, while
others only please the sight with their beautiful
tints. Not only the forms and colours of flowers
but their perfumes, are different. The odour
of southernwood differs from that of thyme, that
of peppermint from balm, and that of the daisy
from the rose, which indicates a variety in their
internal structure, and in the juices that circu
late within them. The leaves of all vegetables,
like the skin of the human body, are diversified
with a multitude of extremely fine vessels, and
an astonishing number of pores. In a kind of
box-tree called Palma Cereres, it has been ob
served that there are above an hundred and se-
venty-two thousand pores on one single side of
the leaf. In short, the whole earth is covered
with vegetable life in such profusion and variety
as astonishes the contemplative mind. Not o/aly
the fertile plains, but the rugged mountains, the
hardest stones, the most barren spots, and even
the caverns of the ocean, are diversified with
plants of various kinds ; and, from the torrid to
the frigid zone, every soil and every climate has
plants and flowers peculiar to itself. To attempt
to estimate their number and variety would be
to attempt to dive into the depths of infinity.
Yet, every diversity in the species, every variety
in the form of the individuals, and even every
difference in the shade and combination of co
lour in flowers of the same species, exhibits a
distinct conception which must have existed in
the Divine Mind before the vegetable kingdom
was created.

Were we to take a survey of the mineral king
dom, we should also behold a striking exhibition
of the " manifold wisdom of God." It is true,
indeed, that we cannot penetrate into the inte
rior recesses of the globe, so as to ascertain the
substances which exist, and the processes which
are going on near its central regions. But,
within a few hundreds of fathoms of its surface,
we find such an astonishing diversity of mineral
substances as clearly shows, that its internal
parts have been constructed on the same plan of
variety as that of the animal and vegetable king
doms. In the classes of eacthy, saline, inflam
mable, and metallic fossils, under which mine
ralogists have ananged the substances of the
mineral kingdom, are contained an immense
number of genera and species. Under the earthy
class of fossils are comprehended diamonds, chry
solites, menilites, garnets, zeolites, corundums,
agates, jaspers, opals, pearl-stones, tripoli, clay
slate, basalt, lava, chalk, limestone, ceylanite,
strontian, barytes, celestine, and various other
substances. The saline class comprehends such
substances as the following, natron or natura4
soda, rock salt, nitre, alum, sal-ammoniac, Ep.

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

soir salt, &c. The class of inflammable sub
stances comprehends sulphur, carbon, bitumen,
coal, amber, cnarcoal, naphtha, petroleum, as
phalt, caoutchouc, mineral tar, &c. The metallic
class comprehends plaiina, gold, silver, mercury,
ooppur, iron, lead, tin, bismuth, zinc, antimony,
cobalt, nickel, manganese, molybdenum, arsenic,
scheele, menachamte, man, silvan chromium,
tungsten, uranium, titanium, tellurium, sodium,
potassium, &c. All these mineral substances
are distinguished by many varieties of species.
There are eiglit genera of earthy fossils. One
of these genera, the flint, contains 34 species,
besides numerous varieties, such as chrysobe-
ryls, topazes, agates, beryls, quartz, emery,
diamond spar, &c. Another genus, the clay,
contains 32 species, such as opal, pitch-stone,
felspar, black chalk, mica, hornblende, &c. and
another, the calc, contains 20 species, as lime
stone, chalk, slate, spar, fluor, marie, boracite,
loam, &c. There are ten species of silver, five
of mercury, seventeen of copper, fourteen of iron,
ten of lead, six of antimony, three ofbismuth, &c.
All the bodies of the mineral kingdom differ from
one another as to figure, transparency, hardness,
lustre, ductility, texture, structure, feel, sound,
smell, taste, gravity, and their magnetical and
electrical properties ; and they exhibit almost
every variety of colour. Some of those sub
stances are soft and pulverable, and serve as a
bed for ihe nourishment of vegetables, as black
earth, chalk, clay, and marl. Some are solid,
as lead and iron ; and some are fluid, as mer
cury, sodium, and potassium. Some are brittle,
as antimony and bismuth, and some are mallea
ble, as silver and tin. Some are subject to the
attraction of the magnet, others are conductors
of the electric fire; some are easily fusible by
heat, others will resist the strongest heat of our
common fires. Some are extremely ductile, as
olatina, the heaviest of the metals, which has
been drawn into wires less than the two thou
sandth part of an inch in diameter, — and gold,
the parts of which are are so fine and expansi
ble, that an ounce of it is sufficient to gild a sil-
?er wire more than 1300 miles long.

In order to acquire the most impressive idea
of the mineral kingdom, we must visit an exten
sive mineralogical museum, where the spectator
will be astonished both at the beauty and the
infinite diversity which the Creator has exhibit
ed in this department of nature. Here it may
be also noticed, that not only the external aspect
of minerals, but also the interior configuration of
many of them, displays innumerable beauties
and varieties. A rough dark-looking pebble,
which to an incurious eye appears only like a
fragment of common rock, when cut asunder and
polished, presents an assemblage of the finest
veins and most brilliant colours. If we go into
a lapidary's shop and take a leisurely survey of
»is jaspers, topazes, cornelians, agates, garnets,

and other stones, we cannot fail to be struck whh
admiration, not only at the exquisite polish and
the delicate wavings which their surfaces pro
sent, but at the variety of design and colouring
exhibited even by individuals of the same spe
cies, the latent beauties and diversities of which
require the assistance of a microscope to dis
cern, and are beyond the efforts of the most ex
quisite pencil fully to imitate.

Not only in the objects which are visible to
the unassisted eye, but also in those which fan
only be perceived by the help of microscopes, is the
characteristic of variety to be seen. In the
scales of fishes, for example, we perceive an in
finite number of diversified specimens of the
most curious workmanship. Some of these are
of a longish form, some round, some triangular,
some square ; in short, of all imaginable variety
of shapes. Some are armed with sharp prickles,
as in the perch and sole ; some have smooth
edges, as in the tench and cod-fish ; and even
in the same fish there is a considerable variety ;
for the scales taken from the belly, the back, the
sides, the head and other parts, are all different
from each other. In the scale of a perch we
perceive one piece of delicate mechanism, in the
scale of a haddock another, and in the scale of
a sole, beauties different from both. We find
some of them ornamented with a prodigious
number of concentric flutings, too near each
other and too fine to be easily enumerated.
These flutings are frequently traversed by others
diverging from the centre of the scale, and pro
ceeding from thence in a straight line to the cir
cumference. On every fish there are many thou
sands of these variegated pieces of mechanism.
The hairs on the bodies of all animals are found,
by the microscope, to be composed of a number
of extremely minute tubes, each of which has a
round bulbous root, by which it imbibes its pro
per nourishment from the adjacent humours, and
these are all different in different animals. Hairs
taken from the head, the eye-brows, the nostrils,
the beard, the hand, and other parts of the body,
are unlike to each other, both in the construc
tion of the roots and the hairs themselves, and
appear as varied as plants of the same genus but
of different species. The parts of which the
feathers of birds are composed, afford a beauti
ful variety of the most exquisite workmanship.
There is scarcely a feather but contains a mil
lion of distinct parts, every one of them regularly
shaped. In a small fibre of a goose-quill, more
than 1200 downy branches or small leaves have
been counted on each side, and each appeared
divided into 16 or 18 small joints. A small part
of the feather of a peacock, one-thirtieth of an
inch in length, appears no less beautiful than the
whole feather does to the naked eye, exhibiting
a multitude of bright shining parts, reflecting first
one colour and then another in the most vivid
manner. The wings of all kind of insects, too.

MISCROSCOPIC ANIMALCULE.

97

jaesent an infinite variety, no less captivating
fo the mind than pleasing to the eye. They
appear strengthened and distended by the finest
bones, and covered with the lightest membranes.
Some of them are adorned with neat and beau
tiful feathers, and many of them provided with
the finest articulations and foldings for the wings,
when they are withdrawn and about to be folded
up in their cases. The thin membranes of the
wings appear beautifully divaricated with thou
sands of little points, like silver studs. The
wings of some flies a.rejilmy, as the dragon-fly;
others have them stuck over with short bristles,
as the flesh-fly ; some have rows of feathers
along their ridges, and borders round their edge,
as in gnats ; some have hairs and others have
hooks placed with the greatest regularity and
order. In the wings of moths and butterflies
there are millions of small feathers of different
shapes, diversified with the greatest variety of
bright and vivid colours, each of them so small
as to be altogether invisible to the naked eye.

The leaves of all plants and flowers when ex
amined by the microscope, are found to be full
of innumerable ramifications that convey the
perspirable juices tn the pores, and to consist of
barenehymous and ligneous fibres, interwoven
in a curious and admirable manner. The
smallest leaf, even one which is little more than
visible to the naked eye, is found to be thus di
varicated, and the vai legations are different in
the leaves of different vegetables. — A transverse
section of a plant not more than one-fourth of an
inch in diameter, displays such beauties and va
rieties, through a powerful microscope, as can
not be conceived without ocular inspection.
The number of pores, of all sizes, amounting to
hundreds of thousands (which appear to be the
vessels of the plant cut asunder,) the beautiful
curves they assume, and the radial and circular
configurations they present, are truly astonish
ing ; and every distinct species of plants exhibits
a different configuration. I have counted in a
small section of a plant, of the size now stated,
5000 radial lines, each containing about 250
pores, great and small, which amount to one mil-
don two hundred and fifty thousand of these va
riegated apertures. — Even the particles of sand
on the sea-shore, and on the banks of rivers,
differ in the size, form, and colour of their grains ;
some being transparent, others opaque, some
having rough and others smooth surfaces ; some
are spherical or oval, and some pyramidal, co
nical or prismatical. Mr. Hook, happening to
view some grains of white sand through his mi
croscope, hit upon one of the grains which was
exactly shaped and wreathed like a shell, though
it was no larger than the point of a pin. " It
resembled the shell of a small water-snail, and
had twelve wreathings, all growing proportiona-
faly one less than the other towards the middle or
centre of the shell, where there was a very small

round white spot." This gives us an idea of
the existence of shell-fish which arc- invisible to
the naked eye, and, consequently, smaller than
a mite.

The variety of forms in which animal life
appears, in those invisible departments of crea
tion which the microscope has enabled us to ex
plore, is truly wonderful and astonishing. Micro
scopic animals are so different from those of the
larger kinds, that scarcely any analogy seems to
exist between them; and one would be almost
tempted to suppose that they lived in conse
quence of laws directly opposite to those which
preserve man and the other larger animals in
existence. When we endeavour to explore this
region of animated nature, we feel as if we were
entering on the confines of a new world, and
surveying a new race of sentient existence. The
number of these creatures exceeds all human
calculation. Many hundreds of species, all dif
fering in their forms, habits, and motions, have
already been detected and described, but we
have reason to believe, that by far the greater
part is unexplored, and perhaps for ever hid from
the view of man. They are of all shapes and
forms : some of them appear like minute atoms,
some like globes and spheroids, some like hand
bells, some like wheels turning on an axis, some
like double-headed monsters, some like cylin
ders, some have a worm-like appearance, some
have horns, some resemble eels, some are like
long hairs, 150 times as long as they are broad,
some like spires and cupolas, some like fishes,
and some like animated vegetables. Some of
them are almost visible to the naked eye, and
some so small that the breadth of a human hair
would cover fifty or a hundred of them, and
others so minute, that millions of millions of them
might be contained within the compass of a
square inch. In every pond and ditch, and
almost in every puddle, in the infusions of pepper,
straw, grass, oats, hay and other vegetables, in
paste and vinegar, and in the water found in
oysters, on almost every plant and flower, and in
the rivers, seas and oceans, these creatures are
found in such numbers and variety as almost
exceed our conception or belief. A class of
these animals, called Mudusas, has been found
so numerous as to discolour the ocean itself.
Captain Scoresby found the number in the olive-
green sea to bo immense. A cubic inch contains
sixty-four, and consequently a cubic mile would
contain 23,888,000,000,0(X),000 ; so that, if on<>
person should count a million in seven days, ii
would have required that 80,000 persons should
have started at the creation of the world to have
completed the enumeration at the present time.
Yet, all the minute animals to which we now
allude are furnished with numerous organs of
life as well as the larger kind, some of their in
ternal movements are distinctly visible, their
motions are evidently voluntary, and some of

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

them appear to be possessed of a considerable
degree of sagacity, and to be fond of each other's
society.*

In short, it may be affirmed without the least
hesitation, that the beauties and varieties which
exist in those regions of creation which are in
visible to the unassisted eye, are far more nu
merous than all that appears to a common ob
server in the visible economy of nature. How
far this scene of creating Power and Intelligence
may extend beyond the range of our microscopic
instruments, it is impossible for mortals to deter
mine; for the finer our glasses are, and the
higher the magnifying powers we apply, the
more numerous and varied are the objects which
they exhibit to our view. And as the largest
telescope is insufficient to convey our views to
the boundaries of the great universe, so we may
justly conclude, that the most powerful micros
cope that has been or ever will be constructed,
will be altogether insufficient to guide our views
to the utmost limits of the descending scale of
creation. But what we already know of these
unexplored and inexplorable regions, gives us an
amazing conception of the intelligence and wis
dom of the Creator, of the immensity of his
nature, and of the infinity of ideas which, during
every portion of past duration, must have been
present before his All-Comprehensive Mind.
What an immense space in the scale of animal
life intervenes between an animalcule which
appears only the sir.e of a visible point, when
magnified 500,000 times, and a whaii, a hun
dred feet long and twenty broad ! The proportion
of bulk between the one of these beings and the
other is nearly as 34,560,000,000,000,000,000
to 1. Yet all the intermediate space is filled
up with animated beings of every form and order !
A similar variety obtains in the vegetable king
dom. It has been calculated, that some plants
which grow on rose leaves, and other shrubs, are
so small that it would require more than a thou
sand of them to equal in bulk a single plant of
moss ; and if we compare a stem of moss, which is

* The following extract from Mr. Baker's descrip
tion of the hair-like animalcule will illustrate some
of these positions. A small quantity of the matter
containing these animalcules having been put into
a jar of water, it so happened, that one part went
down immediately to the bottom, while the other
continued floating on the top. "When things had
remained for some time in this condition, each of
th*»se swarms of animalcules began to grow weary
of its situation, and had a mind to change its quar
ters. Both armies, therefore, set out at the same
time, the one proceeding upwards and the other
downwards ; so that after some time they met in the
middle. A desire of knowing how they would he-
have on this occasion, engaged the observer to
watch them carefully ; and to his surprise, he saw
the army that was marching upwards, open to the
right and left, to make room for those that were
descending. Thus, without confusion or intermix
ture, each held on its way; the anny that was going
up marching in two columns to the top, and the
other proceeding in one column to the bottom, as if
each had been under the direction of wise leaders.

generally not above l-60th of an inch, with some
of the large trees in Guinea and Brazil of twen
ty feet diameter, we shall find the bulk of the
one will exceed that of the other no less than
2,985,984,000,000 times, which multiplied by
1000 will produce 2,985,984,000,000,000, the
number of times, which the large tree exceeds
the rose-leaf plant. Yet this immense interval
is filled up with plants and trees of every form and
size ! With good reason, then, may we adopt
the language of the inspired writers, — " How
manifold are thy works, O Lord ! In wisdom
hast thou made them all. O the depth of the
riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of
God ! Marvellous things doth He which we can
not comprehend."*

* The figures of microscopical objects contained
in the engravings Nos. I. and II., will convey a ruile
idea of some of the objects to which I have now al
luded.

No. I. Fig. i. represents the scale of a si le -fish as
it appears through a pood microscope. ODEF, re
presents that part of the scale which appears on the
outside of the fish, and ABCD, the part which ml-
heres to the skin, being furrowed, that it may hold
the faster. It is terminated by pointed spikes, every
alternate one being longer than the interjacent ones.
Fig. 2, is the scale of a haddock, which appears di
varicated like a piece of net- work. Fie. 3, repre
sents a small portion orfibre of tt\e feather cf a pta-
cock, only l-30th of an inch in extent, as it appears in
the microscope. The small fibres of these feathers
appear, through this instrument, no less beautiful
than the whole feather does to the naked eye. Each
of the sprigs or hairs on each side of the fibre, as CD,
DC, appears to consist of a multitude of bright shin
ing parts which are a congeries of small plates, as
eee, &c. The under sides of each of these plates are
very dark and opaque, reflecting all the rays thrown
upon them like the foil of a looking glass; but their
upper sides seem to consist of a multitude of exceed
ingly thin plated bodies, lying close together, which,
by various positions of the light, reflect first one
colour and then another, in a most vivid and sur
prising manner. Fig. 4, 5, 6, 7, represent some of
the different kinds of feathers which constitute the
dust which adheres to the wings of moths and but
terflies, and which, in the microscope, appear tinced
with a variety of colours. Each of these feathers is
an object so small as to be scarcely perceptible to ;he
naked eye.

Explanation of the figures on No. II.— Fig. 1. re
presents a mite, which has eight legs, with five or
six joints in each, two feelers, a sir.all head in pro
portion to its body, a sharp snout and mouth like
that of a mole, and two little eyes. The body is of an
oval form, with a number of hairs like bristles is
suing from it, and the legs terminate in two hooked
claws. Fig. 2. represents a microscopic animal
which was found in an infusion of ancmony. The
surface of its back is covered with a fine mask in U>e
form of a human face, it has three feet on each side,
and a tail which comes out from under the mask.
Fig. 3, is an animalcula found in the infusion of eld
hay. A, shows the head, with the mouth opened
wide, and its lips furnished with numerous hairs;
B, is its forked tail, D, its intestines, and C, its heart,
which may be seen in regular motion. The circum
ference of the body appears indented like the teeth
of a saw. Fig. 4, shows the Whetl animal or For-
ticclla. It is found in rain-water that has stood some
days in leaden gutters, or in hollows of lead on the
tops of houses. The most remarkable part of this
animalcula is its wheel work, which consists of two
semicircular instruments, round the edges of which
many little fibrillse move themselves very brisVJy
sometimes with a kind of rotation, and sometimes

VARIETY IN THE SYSTEM OF NATURE.

E\en the external aspect of nature, as it ap
pears to a superficial observer, presents a scene
of variety. The ranges of mountains with sum
mits of different heights and shapes, the hills
and plains, the glens and dells, the waving
curves which appear on the face of every land
scape, the dark hues of the forests, the verdure
of the fields, the towering cliffs, the rugged pre
cipices, the rills, the rivers, the cataracts, the
lakes and seas ; the gulphs, the bays and penin
sulas ; the numerous islands of every form and
size which diversify the surface of the ocean,
and the thousands of shades of colouring which
appear on every part of sublunary nature, pre
sent a scene of diversified beauty and sublimity
to the eye of every beholder. — And if we lift
our eyes to the regions of the firmament, we
likewise behold a scene of sublimity and gran
deur mingled "with variety. The sun himself
appears diversified with spots of various shapes
and sizes, some a hundred, some a thousand,
and some ten thousand miles in diameter — indi
cating operations and changes of amazing ex
tent — and almost every new revolution on his
axis presents us with new and varied clusters.
Every planet in the solar system differs from

another in its size, in its spheroidal shape, in its
diurnal rotation, in the aspect of its surface, in
the constitution of its atmosphere, in the num
ber of moons with which it is surrounded, in the
nature of its seasons, in its distance from the
sun, in the eccentricity of its orbit, in the period
of its annual revolution, and in the proportion
it receives of light and heat. Every comet, too,
differs from another in its form and magnitude,
in the extent of its nucleus and tail, in the period
of its revolution, in the swiftness of its motion,
and in the figure of the curve it describes around
the sun ; and " one star differeth from another
star in glory." But could we transport ourselves
to the surfaces of these distant, orbs, and survey
every part of their constitution and arrange
ments, we should, doubtless, behold beauties
and varieties of divine workmanship far more
numerous, and surpassing every thing that, ap
pears in our sublunary system. We have every
reason to believe, from the infinite nature of the
Divinity, and from what we actually behold,
that the mechanism and arrangements of every
world in the universe are all different from each
other ; and we find that this is actually the case,
in so far as our observations extend. The

fn a trembling or vibratory manner. Sometimes the
wheels seem to be entire circles, with teeth like
those of the balance-wheel of a watch : but their
figure varies according to the degree of their pro
trusion, and seems to depend upon the will of the
animal itself; a, is the head and heels ; b, is the heart,
where its systole and diastole are plainly visible, and
the alternate motions of contraction arid dilatation
are performed with great strength and vigour in
about the same time as the pulsation of a man's ar
tery. This animal assumes various shapes, one of
which is represented at fig. 5, and becomes occasion
ally a case for all the other parts of the body.

Fig. 6, represents an insect with net-like arms. It
Is found in cascades where the water runs very
swift. Its body appears curiously turned as on a
lathe, and at the tail are three sharp spines, by
which it raises itself and stands upright in the water ;
but the most curious apparatus Is about its head,
where it is furnished with two instruments, like
fans or nets, which serve to provide its food. These
it frequently spreads out and draws in again, and,
when drawn up, they are folded together with the
utmost nicety and exactness. When this creature
does not employ its nets, it thrusts out a pair of sharp
horns, and puts on a different appearance, as in fig.

7, where it is shown magnified about 400 times. Fig.

8, is the representation of an animalcula found in
the infusion of tlie bark of an oak. Its body is com
posed of several ringlets, that enter one into another,
as the animal contracts itself. At a b, are two lips
lurmshed with moveable hairs ; it pushes out of its
mouth a snout composed of several pieces sheathed
m each other, as at e. A kind of horn, d, is some
times protruded from the breast, composed of furbe
lows, which slide into one another like ''.e drawers
;.f a pocket telescope. Fig. 9, is another animalcula,

tound m the same infusion, called a tortoise, with an
umbilical tail. It stretches out and contracts itself
very easily, sometimes assuming a round figure,
which it retains only for a moment, then opens its
mouth to a surprising width, forming nearly the cir
cumference of a circle. Its motion is very surprising
and singular. Fig. 10, is an animalcula, called great
moittii, which is found in several infusions Its
mouth takes up half the length of its body ; its inside
is filled with darkish spots, and its hinder part ter-
minatol with a singular tail. Fig. n, represents the

jA-oteits, so named on account of its assuming a great
number of different shapes. Its most common shape
bears a resemblance to that of a swan, and it
swims to and fro with great vivacity. When it is
alarmed, it suddenly draws in its long neck, trans
forming itself into the shape represented at m, and,
at other times it puts forth a new head and neck
with a kind of wheel machinery, as at n. Fig. 12,
exhibits a species of animalcula shaped like bells
with long tails, by which they fasten themselves to
the roots of duck weed, in which they were found.
They dwell in colonies, from ten to fift,p»-n in num
ber. Fig. 13, is the globe animal, which appears ex-
actly globular, having no appearance of either head,
tail or fins. It. moves in all directions, forwards or
backwards, up or down, either rolling over and over
like a bowl, spinning horizontally like a top, or glid
ing along smoothly without turning itself at all.
When it pleases, it can turn round, as it were upon
an axis very nimbly without removing out of its
place. It is transparent, except where the circular
black spots are shown ; it sometimes appears as if
dotted with points, and beset with short moveable
hairs or bristles, which are probably the instruments
by which its motions are performed. Fig. 14, shows
a species of animalculae called soles, found in infu
sions of straw and the ears of wheat ; o, is the-
mouth, which is sometimes extended to a great
width, p, is the tail. Fig. 15, represents an anima.
found in an infusion of citron flowers. Its head is
very short, and adorned with two horns like those
of a deer; its body appears to be covered with
scales, and its tail long, and swift in motion. Fig.
16, represents the eels which are found in paste and
stale vinegar. The most remarkable property of
these animals is, that they are viviparous. If one
of them is cut through near the middle, several ova!
bodies of different sizes issue forth, which are young
anguillai, each coiled up in its proper membrane.
An hundred and upwards of the young ones have
been seen to issue from the body of one single eel,
which accounts for their prodigious increase.

It may not be improper to remark, that no en
graving can give an adequate idea of the objects
referred to above, and, therefore, whoever wishes
to inspect nature in all her minute beautiea and
varieties, must have recourse to the microscop*
itself.

iOO

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

moon is the principal orb on whose surface par-
Ji-u.ar observations can be made ; and we find
that us arrangements are materially different
from those of the earth. It has no large rivers,
seas, or oceans, nor clouds such as ours to di
versify its atmosphere. It has mountains and
plains, hills and vales, insulated rocks and ca
irns of every size and shape ; but the form and
arrangement of all these objects are altogether
different from what obtains in our terrestrial
sphere. — While, on our globe, the ranges of
mountains run nearly in a line from east to west,
or from north to south, — on the surface of the
moon they are formed for the most part into cir
cular ridges, enclosing, like ramparts, plains of
all dimensions, from half a mile to forty miles in
diameter. While on earth, the large plains are
nearly level, and diversified merely with gentle
wavings. — in the moon, there are hundreds of
plains of various dimensions sunk, as it were,
nearly two miles below the general level of its sur
face. On this orb we behold insulated moun
tains, more than two miles in elevation, standing
alone, like monuments, in the midst of plains, —
circular basins or caverns, both in the valleys,
and on the summits and declivities of mountains,
and these caverns, again, indented with smaller
ones of a similar form, at the same time, there
are plains far more level and extensive than on
the earth. On the whole, the mountain-scenery
on the lunar surface is far more diversified and
magnificent than on our globe, and differs as
much from terrestrial landscapes as the wastes
and wilds of America from the cultivated plains
of Europe. In short, while on the earth, the
highest mountains are little more than four miles
in heigiu, on some of the planets mountains
have been discovered, which astronomers have
reckoned to be twenty-two miles in elevation.

If then, it is reasonable to believe, that all
the worlds in the universe are different in their
construction and airangements, and peopled
with beings of diversified ranks and orders —
could we survey only a small portion of the uni
versal system — what an amazing scene would
it display of the conceptions of the Divine Mind
and of " the manifold wisdom of God!" Such
views, therefore, of the variety of nature are evi
dently calculated to expand our conceptions of the
divine character, to excite us to admiration and
reverence, to extend o, »• views of the riches of di
vine beneficence, and to enlarge our hopes of the
glories and felicities of that future ' inheritance
which is incorruptible and which fad eth not away.'

5. The contemplation of nature, through the
medium of science, is calculated to expand our
conceptions of the power of the Deity, and of the
magnificence of his empire. The power of God
is manifested by its effects ; and in proportion
as our knowledge of these effects is enlarged,
will oji- conceptions of this attribute of the Divi
nity be expanded. To create a single object

implies an exertion of power which surpasses
finite comprehension ; — how much more the crea
tion and arrangement of such a vast multiplicity
of objects as those to which we have just now
adverted ! For, all that immense variety ol
beings which exists in the animal, vegetable,
and mineral kingdoms, and in the invisible re
gions which the microscope has explored, evin
ces the omnipotence of the Deity, no less than
his wisdom and intelligence. But the magni
tude, as well as the number and variety of the
objects of creation, displays the almighty power
of the Creator. In this point of view, the dis
coveries of modern astronomy tend to aid our
conceptions of the grandeur of this perfection,
and to extend our views of the range of its ope
rations far beyond what former ages could have
imagined. When we take a leisurely survey
of the globe on which we dwell, and consider the
enormous masses of its continents and islands,
the quantity of water in its seas and oceans, the
lofty ranges of mountains which rise from its
surface, the hundreds of majestic rivers which
roll their waters into the ocean, the numerous
orders of animated beings with which it is peo
pled, and the vast quantity of matter enclosed
in its bowels from every part of its circumference
to its centre, amounting to more than two hun
dred and sixty thousand millions of cubical miles
— we cannot but be astonished at the greatness
of that Being who first launched it into existence,
who " measures its waters in the hollow of his
hand, who weighs its mountains in scales, and
its hills in a balance ;" and who has supported
it in its rapid movements, from age to age. But,
how must our conceptions of divine power be
enlarged when we consider, that this earth,
which appears so great to the frail beings which
inhabit it, is only like a small speck in creation,
or like an atom in the immensity of space, when
compared with the myriads of worlds of superior
magnitude which exist within the boundaries of
creation ! When we direct our views to the
planetary system, we behold three or four globes,
which appear only like small studs on the vault
of heaven, yet contain a quantity of matter more
than two thousand four hundred times greater
than that of the earth, besides more than twenty
lesser globes, most of them larger than ouf
world,* and several hundreds of ccmets, of va
rious magnitudes, moving in every direction
through the depths of space. The Sun is a
body of such magnitude as overpowers our fee
ble cor«"«Dtions, and fills us with astonishment.
Within the wide circumference of this luminary
more than a million of worlds as large as ours
could be contained. His body fills a cubical
space equal to 681,472,000,000,000,000 miles,
and his surface more than 40,000,000,000, o?
forty thousand millions of square mLes. At the

* The satelites of Jupiter, Saturn and Hersche),
are all reckoned to be larger than the Earth.

MAGNITUDE OF THE UNIVERSE.

101

ale of sixty miles a-da.y, it would require more
(ban a hundred millions of years to pass over
every square mile on his surface. His attrac
tive energy extends to several thousands of mil
lions of miles from his surface, retaining in their
orbits the most distant planets and comets, and
dispensing light, and heat, and fructifying influ
ence to more than a hundred worlds.* What
an astonishing idea, then, does it give us of the
power of Omnipotence, when we consider, that
the universe is replenished with innumerable
globes of a similar size and splendour! For
every star which the naked eye perceives twink-
img on the vault of heaven, and those more dis
tant orbs which the telescope brings to view
throughout the depths of immensity, are, doubt
less, suns, no less in magnitude than that which
" enlightens our day," and surroanded by a reti
nue, of revolving worlds. Some of them have
been reckoned by astronomers to be even much
larger than our sun. The star Lyra, for exam
ple, is supposed, by Sir W. Herschel, to be
33,275,000 miles in diameter, or thirty-eight
times the diameter of the sun ; and, if so, its
cubical contents will be 36,842,932,671,875,
000,000,000 miles, that is, more than fifty-four
thousand times larger than the sun. The num-
6erofsuch bodies exceeds all calculation. Sir
W. Herschel perceived in that portion of the
milky way which lies near the constellation
Orion, no less than 50,000 stars large enough
to be distinctly numbered, pass before his tele
scope in an hour's time ; besides twice as many
more which could be seen only now and then
by faint glimpses. It has been reckoned that
nearly a hundred millions of stars lie within the
range of our telescopes. And, if we suppose
as we justly may, that each of these suns has a
hundred worlds connected with it, there will be
found ten thousand millions of worlds in that
portion of the universe which comes within the
range of human observation, besides those which
lie concealed from mortal eyes in the unexplored
regions of space, which may * far exceed all
that are visible, as the waters in the caverns of
the ocean exceed in magnitude a single particle
of vapour!

Of such numbers and magnitudes we can form
no adequate conception. The mind is bewil
dered, confounded, and utterly overwhelmed
when it attempts to grasp the magnitude of the
universe, or to form an idea of the omnipotent
«nergy which brought it into existence. The
amplitude of the scale on which the systems of the
universe are constructed tends likewise to ele
vate our conceptions of the grandeur of the
Deity. Between every one of the planetary
bodies there intervenes a space of many mil
lions of miles in extent. Between the sun and

•The planetary system, including the comets
•wn.am more than & hundre.1 bodies dependant on

the nearest star, there is an interval, extending
in every direction, of more than twenty billions
of miles ; and, it is highly probable, that a similar
space surrounds every other system. And, if
we take into consideration the immense forces
that are in operation throughout the universe —
that one globe, a thousand times larger than the
earth, is flying through the regions of immensity
at the rate of thirty thousand miles an hour,
another at the rate of seventy thousand, and
another at a hundred thousand miles an hour,
and that millions of mighty worlds are thus tra
versing the illimitable spaces of the firmament —
can we refrain from exclaiming in the language
of inspiration, " Great and marvellous are thy
works, Lord God Almighty! Who can by
searching find out God ? Who can find out the
Almighty to perfection ? Who can utter the
mighty operations of Jehovah ? Who can show
forth all his praise ?"

Such a scene displays, beyond any other view
we can take of creation, the magnificence and
extent of the divine empire. Those countless
worlds to which we have now adverted, are not
to be considered as scenes of sterility and deso
lation, or as merely diffusing an useless splen
dour over the wilds of immensity, nor are tney
to be viewed as so many splendid toys to amuse
a few astronomers in our diminutive world.
Such an idea would be altogether inconsistent
with every notion we ought to form of the wis
dom and intelligence of the Deity, and with
every arrangement we perceive in the scenes
of nature immediately around us, where we be
hold every portion of matter teeming with in
habitants. These luminous and opaque globes
dispersed throughout the regions of infinite
space, must, therefore, be considered as the
abodes of sensitive and intellectual existence,
where intelligences of various ranks and orders
contemplate the glory, and enjoy the bounty of
their Creator. And what scenes of diversified
grandeur must we suppose those innumerable
worlds to display ! What numerous orders and
gradations of intellectual natures must the uni
verse contain, since so much variety is dis
played in every department of our sublunary
system ! What boundless intelligence is implied
in the superintendence of such vast dominions !
On such subjects the human mind can form no
definite conceptions. The most vigorous ima
gination, in its loftiest flights, drops its wing
and sinks into inanity before the splendours of
the " King eternal, immortal, and invisible, who
dwells in the light unapproachable," when it
attempts to form a picture of the magnificence
of the universe which he has created. But of
this we are certain, that over all this boundless
scene of creation, and over all the ranks of be
ings with which it is replenished, his moral go
vernment extends. Every motion of the material
system, everv movement among the rational

102

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

and sentient beings it contains, and every
thought and perception that passes through the
minds of the unnumbered intelligences which
people all worlds, are intimately known, and for
ever present to his omniscient eye, and all di
rected to accomplish the designs of his universal
providence and the eternal purposes of his will.
" He hath prepared his throne in the heavens, his
kingdom ruleth over all," and " he doth accord
ing to his will among the armies of heaven,'' as
well as " among the inhabitants of the earth."
" The host of heaven worshippeth him, — all his
works, in all places of his dominions, praise him.
His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and of
his government there shall be no end." At the
same moment he is displaying the glory of his
power and intelligence to worlds far beyond the
reach of mortal eyes, — presiding over the coun
cils of nations on earth, and supporting the in
visible animalcula in a drop of water. " In
him" all beings, from the archangel to the
worm, " live and move," and on him they de
pend for all that happiness they now possess,
or ever will enjoy, while eternal ages are roll
ing on.

Such views or the omnipotence of the Deity
and of the grandeur of his empire, are calculated
not only to expand our conceptions of his attri
butes, but to enliven our hopes in relation to
the enjoyments of the future world. For we be
hold a prospect boundless as immensity, in
which the human soul may for ever expatiate,
and contemplate new scenes of glory and feli
city continually bursting on the view, " world
without end."

Such are some of the views of the Deity which
the works of nature, when contemplated through
the medium of science, are calculated to unfold.
They demonstrate the unity of God, his wisdom
and intelligence, — his boundless benevolence, —
the vast multiplicity of ideas which have existed
in his mind from eternity, — his almighty power,
and the magnificence of his empire. These
views are in perfect unison with the declarations
of the sacred oracles ; they illustrate many of
the sublime sentiments of the inspired writers ;
they throw a light on the moral government of
God, arid elevate our conceptions of the extent
of his dominions ; they afford a sensible repre
sentation of the infinity and immensity of the
divine nature, in so far as finite minds are ca
pable of contemplating such perfections ; and,
when considered in connexion with the scriptu
ral character of Deity and the other truths of
revelation, are calculated "to make the man of
God perfect and thoroughly furnished unto every
good work." As the works of God without the
assistance of his word, are insufficient to give us
a complete view of his character and the princi
ples of his moral government, so the bare read
ing of the Scriptures is insufficient to convey to
imr minds those diversified and expansive con

ceptions of the Divinity to which we have ad
verted, unless we comply with the requisitions
of the sacred writers, to "meditate on all his
works, to consider the operations of his hands, to
speak of the glory of his kingdom," and to talk
of his "power" in order that we may be quali
fied " to make known to the sons of men his
mighty operations, and the glorious majesty of
his kingdom."

How very different, then, from the views now
stated, must be the conceptions formed of the
Divinity, by those whose range of thought is
chiefly confined to the objects that lie within a
few miles of their habitation, and how limited
ideas must they entertain of divine perfection !
For the view that any one entertains of the
nature and attributes of God, must, in some de
gree, correspond to the knowledge he has ac
quired of the visible effects of his power, wisdom,
and benevolence ; since it is only by the sensible
manifestations of Deity, either through the me
dium of nature or revelation, that we know any
thing at all about his nature and perfections.
And, therefore, if our views of the manifesta
tions of the Divinity be limited and obscure, such
will likewise be our views of the Divinity him
self. It is owing to the want of attention to such
considerations, that many worthy Christians
are found to entertain very confused and distort
ed ideas of the character of the Deity, of the re
quisitions of his word, and of the arrangement*
of his universal providence. And is it not ao
object much to be desired, that the great body of
mankind should be more fully enlightened in the
knowledge of their Creator? The knowledge
of God lies at the foundation of all religion, and
of all our prospects in reference to the eternal
world, and it must surely be a highly desirable
attainment to acquire as glorious and expansive
an idea of the object of our adoration, as the
finite capacity of our intellects is capable of com
prehending. Such views as we have now ex
hibited of the wisdom, power, and beneficence of
the Deity, and of the magnificence and variety
of his works, were they communicated to the
generality of mankind and duly appreciated,
would not only interest their affections and in
crease their intellectual enjoyment, but would
enable them to understand the meaning and re
ferences of many sublime passages in the volume
of inspiration which they are apt either to over
look or to misinterpret. Such views, likewise,
would naturally inspire them with reverence and
adoration of the Divine Majesty, with gratitude
for his wise and benevolent arrangements, — with
complacency in his administration as the moral
Governor of the world, — with a firm reliance on
his providential care for every thing requisite to
their happiness, and with an earnest desire to
yield a cordial obedience to his righteous laws.
At the same time, they would be qualified to de
clare to others "the glorious honour of *4»

INFLUENCE OF KNOWLEDGE ON MORALS.

103

Majesty, to utter abundantly the memory of his
great goodness, and to speak of all his wonderful

ws*.~\ra "

works.'

SECTION VII.

ON THE BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF KNOW
LEDGE ON MORAL PRINCIPLE AND CON
DUCT.

KNOWLEDGE is valuable chiefly m propor
tion as it is practical and useful. It dispels the
-iarkness which naturally broods over the human
understanding, and dissipates a thousand super
stitious notions and idle terrors by which it has
been frequently held in cruel bondage. It in
vigorates and expands the intellectual faculties,
and directs them to their proper objects. It
elevates the mind in the scale of rational exist
ence, by enlarging its views and refining its
pleasures. It gratifies the desire of the soul
for perpetual activity, and renders its acti
vities subservient to the embellishment of
life and the improvement of society. It un
veils the beauties and sublimities of nature, with
which the heavens and the earth are adorn
ed, and sets before us the " Book of God," in
which we may trace the lineaments of his cha
racter and the ways of his providence. It ag
grandizes our ideas of the omnipotence of Deity,
and unfolds to us the riches of his beneficence,
and the depths of his wisdom and intelligence.
And, in the exercise of our powers on such ob
jects, we experience a thousand delightful emo
tions and enjoyments to which the unenlightened
multitude are entire strangers. All such acti
vities and enjoyments may be reckoned among
the practical advantages of knowledge.

But there is no application of knowledge more
interesting and important than its practical bear
ings on moral principle and action. If it were
not, calculated to produce a beneficial effect oii
the state of morals and the intercourses of gene
ral society, the utility of its general diffusion
might, with some show of reason, be called in
question. But, there cannot be the slightest,
doubt, that an increase of knowledge would be
productive of an increase of moral order, and an
. improvement in moral conduct. For truth, in
thought and sentiment, leads to truth in action.
The man who is in the habit of investigating
truth, and who rejoices in it when ascertained,
cannot be indifferent to its application to conduct.
There must be truth in his actions ; they must
be the expression, the proof, and the effect of
his sentiments and affections, in order that he
may approve of them, and be satisfied that they
are virtuous, or accordant with the relations
which subsist among moral agents. There must
ikewise be a truth or harmony between his ac

tions, so that none of them be incoherent with
the rest. They must all be performed on the
same principles, with the same designs, and by
the same rule. To a man who perceives truth
and loves it, every incongruity and every want
of consistency between sentiment and action,
produces a disagreeable and painful sensation :
and, consequently, he who clearly perceives the
rule of right, and acts in direct opposition to it,
does violence to his nature, and must be subject
ed to feelings and remorses of conscience far
more painful than those of the man whose mind
is shrouded in ignorance. It is true, indeed,
that proficiency in knowledge and in the prac
tice of true morality, do not always proceed with
equal pace. But, it is nevertheless true, that
every action that is truly virtuous is founded on
knowledge, and is the result of scrutiny and
choice directed by truth; otherwise, what is
termed virtue, would be only the effect of ne
cessity, of constraint, or of mechanical habits.
We need not, therefore, fear, that the dominion
of virtue* will be contracted, or her influence
diminished, by an enlargement of the kingdom
of light and knowledge. They are inseparably
connected, their empire is one and the same,
and the true votaries of the one will also be the
true votaries of the other. And, therefore, every
one that sincerely loves mankind and desires
their moral improvement,will diffuse light around
him as extensively as he can, w:*hout the least
fear of its ultimate consequences ; since he
knows for certain, that in all cases whatever,
wisdom excels folly, and light is better than
darkness. The following observations will per
haps tend more particularly to comfirm and elu
cidate these positions.

1. Ignorance is one principal cause of the want
of virtue, and of the immoralities which abound
in the world. Were we to take a survey of the
moral state of the world, as delineated in the
history of nations, or as depicted by modern
voyugers and travellers, we should find abundant
illusti at ion of the truth of this remark. We
.should find, in almost every instance, that igno
rance of the character of the true God, and false
conceptions of the nature of the worship and
service he requires, have led not only to the
most obscene practices and immoral abomina
tions, but to the perpetration of the most horrid
cruelties. We have only to turn our eyes to
Hindostan, toTartary, Dahomy, Benin, Ashan-
tee, and other petty states in Africa ; to New
Zealand, the Marquesas, the Sandwich islands,
and to the Society isles in the Southern Pacific,
prior to their late moral transformation, in order

• By virtue, in this place, and wherever the term
occurs, I understand, conduct regulated by the law
of God, including both the external action and the
principle whence it flows ; in other words, Christian
morality, or that holiness which the Scripture«
enjoin.

104

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

to be convinced of this melancholy truth. The
destruction of new-born infants, — the burning of
aving women upon the dead bodies of their hus
bands, — the drowning of aged parents, — the
offering of human victims in sacrifice, — the tor
turing to death of prisoners taken in battle, — the
murder of infants and the obscene abominations
of the societies of the Arreoy in Otaheite and
other islands, and the dreadful effects of ambi
tion, treachery, and revenge, which so fre
quently accompany such practices, are only a
few specimens of the consequences of ignorance
combined with human depravity. It is likewise
to ignorance chiefly that the vices of the ancient
pagan world are to be attributed. To this cause
the apostle of the Gentiles ascribes the immora
lities of the heathen nations. " The Gentiles,1'
says Paul, " having the understanding darkened
through the ignorance that is in them, have
given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to
work all manner of uncleanness with greedi
ness."* And, in another part of his writings,
he declares, " Because they did not like -to re
tain God in their knowledge, they were given
up to a reprobate mind," or a mind void of
judgment ; and the consequence was, " they
were filled with all unrighteousness, fornication,
wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, envy,
muiJer, deceit, and malignity ;" they were
" backbiters, haters of God, proud, boasters, in
ventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
without understanding, without natural affection,
implacable, and unmerciful."! And, if we turn
our eyes to the scale of society around us, we
shall find that the same cause has produced the
same effects. Among what class do we find
sobriety, temperance, rectitude of conduct, ho
nesty, active beneficence, and abstinence from
the grosser vices most frequently to prevail ? Is
it among ignorant and grovelling minds ? Is it
not among the wise and intelligent, those who
have been properly instructed in their duty, and
in the principles of moral action? And, who
are those that are found most frequently encia^ed
in fighting, brawling, and debauchery, in the
commission of theft and other petty crimes, and
m rioting in low houses of dissipation? Are
they not, for the most part, the rude, the igno
rant, and untutored, — those whose instruction
has been neglected by their parents or guardi
ans, or whose wayward tempers have led them
to turn a deaf ear to the reproofs of wisdom ?
From all the investigations which of lute have
been made into the state of immorality and
crime, it is found, that gross ignorance, and its
necessary concomitant, grovelling affections, are
the general characteristics of those who are en
gaged in criminal pursuits, and most deeply sunk
in vicious indulgence. Now, if it be a fact that
•gnorance is one principal source of immorality

Ephes. iv. 18, 19.

t Rom. i. 28. a1 .

and crime, it appears a natural and necessary
inference, that the general diffusion of know*
ledge would tend to counteract its influence and
operations. For when we remove the cause of
any evil, we, of course, prevent the effects ; and
not only so, but at the same time bring into ope
ration all those virtues which knowledge has a
tendency to produce.

2. Knowledge is requisite for ascertaining the
true principles of moral action, and the duties
we ought to perform. Numerous are the trea
tises which have been written, and various the
opinions which have been entertained, both in
ancient and modern times, respecting the foun
dation of virtue and the rules of human conduct,
And were we to investigate the different theo
ries which have been formed on this subject, to
weigh the arguments which have been brought
forward in support of each hypothesis, and to
balance the various conflicting opinions which
different philosophers have maintained, a con
siderable portion of human life would be wasted
before we arrived at any satisfactory conclu
sions. But if we take the system of revelation
for our guide in the science of morals, we shall
be enabled to arrive, by a short process, at the
most important and satisfactory results. We
skall find, that, after all the theories which have
been proposed, and the systems which have
been reared by ethical philosophers, the Su
preme Lawgiver has comprised the essence of
true morality under two commands, or funda
mental principles, " Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart," and " Thou shalt
love thy neighbour as thyself." On these two
commandments rests the whole duty of man.

Now, although the leading ideas contained in
these commands are simple and obvious to every
one who considers them attentively, yet it re
quires certain habits of reflection and a conside
rable portion of knowledge, to be enabled to
trace these laws or principles to all their legi
timate consequences, and to follow them in all
their ramifications, and in their bearings on hu
man conduct, and on the actions of all moral
intelligences. For, it can easily be shown, that
these laws are so comprehensive as to reach
every possible moral action, to prevent every
moral evil, and to secure the happiness of every
moral agent, — that all the duties inculcated in
the Bible, which we owe to God, to our fellow-
creatures, and to ourselves, are comprehended
in them, and are only so many ramifications of
these general and fundamental principles, — that
they are equally adapted to men on earth and to
angels in heaven, — that their control extends to
the inhabitants of all worlds, — that they form
the basis of the order and happiness of the whole
intelligent system— and that their authority and
influence will extend not only through all the
revolutions of time, but through ah the ages of
eternity. Here, then, we have a subject caicu.

KNOWLEDGE INFLUENTIAL ON MORALS.

105

exercise the highest powers of intelli
gence, and the more we investigate it the more
ehall we admire the comprehensive nature of
that " law which is exceeding broad," and the
more shall we be disposed to comply with its
divine requisitions. But unless we be, in some
measure, acquainted with the first principles of
moral action, and their numerous bearings upon
Ufa and conduct, we cannot expect to make rapid
advances in the path of virtue, or to reach the
sublirner heights of moral improvement.

3. Knowledge, combined with habits of think
ing, would lead to inquiries into the reasons of
those moral laws which the Creator has pro
mulgated, and the foundations on which they
rest. It is an opinion which very generally pre
vails, even among the more respectable portion
of mankind, that the moral laws given forth to
men are the mere dictates of Sovereignty, and
depend solely on the will of the Deity, and, con
sequently, that they might be modified, or even
entirely superseded, were it the pleasure of the
Supreme Legislator to alter them or to suspend
their authority. But this is a most absurd and
dangerous position. It would take away from
tho inherent excellence of virtue, and would re
present the Divine Being as acting on princi
ples similar to those of an Eastern despot. If
such a position were true, it would follow, that
all the immoralities, cruelties, oppressions, wars,
and butcheries that have taken place in the
world, are equally excellent and amiable as
truth, justice, virtue, and benevolence, and that
the character of infernal fiends is just as lovely
and praiseworthy as that of angels and archan
gels, provided the Deity untied that such a change
should take place. Were such a change possible,
it would not only overturn all the notions we are
accustomed to entertain respecting the moral
attributes of God, but might ultimately destroy
our hopes of future enjoyment, and endanger the
happiness of the whole moral universe. But,
there is an inherent, excellence in moral virtue,
and the Deity has willed it to exist, because it is
essential to the happiness and order of the intel
ligent system. It might be shown, that not only
the two fundamental principles of religion and
morality stated above, but all the moral precepts
which flow from them, are founded on the nature
of Gorl, and on the relations which subsist
among intelligent agents, and that, were they
reversed, or their influence suspended, misery
would reign uncontrolled through the universe,
and in the course of ajes the whole moral and
intelligent system would be annihilated.*

Now, if men were accustomed to investigate
the foundations of morality, and the reasons of

• For a full illustration of these positions, and a
variety of topics connected with them, the author
be?s to refer his readers to a work which he lately
published, entitled " The Philosophy nf Rpi)s-ion or
an tUuatratian of the Moral Laws of the Universe "

those moral precepts which are laid befo"o them
as the rule of their conduct, they would perceive
a most powerful motive to universal obedience.
They would plainly see, that all the laws of God
are calculated to uecure the happiness of every
moral agent who yields obedience to them, —
that it is their interest to yield a voluntary sub
mission to these laws, — and that misery both
here and hereafter, is the certain and necessary
consequence of their violation. It is a common
feeling with a considerable portion of mankind,
though seldom expressed in words, that the laws
of heaven are too strict and unbending, — that
they interfere with what they consider their
pleasures and enjoyments, and that if one or
more of them could be a little modified or re
laxed, they would have no objections to attempt
a compliance with the rest. But such feelings
and sentiments are altogether preposterous and
absurd. It would be inconsistent not only with
the rectitude, but with the benevolence of the
Deity, to set aside or to relax a single requisi
tion of that law whi<:h is "perfect" and which,
as it now stands, is calculated to promote the
happiness of all worlds. Were he to do so, and
to permit moral agents to act accordingly, it
would be nothing less than to shut up the path to
happiness, and to open the flood-gates of misery
upon the intelligent universe. Hence we are
told by Him who came to fulfil the law, that,
sooner may "heaven and earth pass away," or
the whole frame of nature be dissolved, than that
" one jot or one tittle can pass from this law."
For, as it is founded on the nature of God, and
on the relations which subsist between Him and
created beings, it must be absolutely perfect and
of eternal obligation ; and, consequently, nothing
could be taken from it, without destroying its
perfection, nor any thing added to it, without
supposing that it was originally imperfect.
Were the bulk of mankind, therefore, capable
of entering into the spirit of such investigations,
and qualified to perceive the true foundations of
moral actions ; were they, for example, clearly
to perceive, that truth is the bond of society, and
the foundation of all delightful intercourse among
intelligent beings in every world, and that, were
the law which enjoins it to be reversed, and ra
tional creatures to act accordingly, all confi
dence would be completely destroyed, — the in
habitants of all worlds thrown into a state of
universal anarchy, and creation transformed
into a chaos, — such views and sentiments could
not fail of producing a powerful and beneficial
influence on the state of morals, and a profound
reverence and respect for that law " which is
holy, just, and good."

4. Knowledge, in combination with habits of
reflection, would lead to self-examination and self"
inspection. The indolent and untutored mind
shuns all exertion of its intellectual faculties, and
all serious reflection on what passes within it,

106

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

or has a relation to moral character and conduct.
It is incapable of investigating its own powers,
of determining the manner in which they should
operate, or of ascertaining the secret springs of
its actions. Yet, without a habit of reflection
and self-examination, we cannot attain a know
ledge of ourselves, and, without self-knowledge,
we cannot apply aright our powers and capaci
ties, correct our failings and defects, or advance
to higher degrees of improvement in knowledge
arid virtue. In order to ascertain our state, our
character, and our duty, such inquiries as the
following must frequently and seriously be the
subject of consideration. What rank do I hold
in the scale of being, and what place do I occupy
in the empire of God ? Am 1 merely a sensi
tive creature, or am I also endowed with moral
and intellectual powers ? In what relations do
I stand to my fellow-creatures, and what duties
do I owe them ? What is my ultimate destina
tion ? Is it merely to pass a few years in eating
and drinking, in motion and rest, like the lower
animals, or am 1 designed for another and a
higher sphere of existence ? In what relation
do I stand to my Creator, and what homage,
submission, and obedience ought I to yield to
him ? What are the talents and capacities
with which I am endowed, and how shall I ap
ply them to the purposes for which they were
given me ? What are the weaknesses and de
ficiencies? to which I am subject, and how are
they to be remedied? What are the vices and
follies to which I am inclined, and by what
means may they be counteracted ? What are
the temptations to which I am exposed, and how
shall they be withstood ? What are the secret
springs of my actions, and by what laws and
motives are they regulated ? What are the
tempers and dispositions which I most frequently
indulge, and are they accordant with the rules
of rectitude and virtue ? What are the preju
dices I am apt to entertain, and by what means
may they be subdued ? What are the affections
and appetites in which I indulge, and are they
regulated by the dictates of reason and the law
of God ? What are my great and governing
views in life ? Are they correspondent to the
will of my Creator, and to the eternal destina
tion that awaits me ? Wherein do I place my
highest happiness ? In the pleasures of sense,
or in the pleasures of intellect and religion, — in
the creature or in the Creator? How have I
hitherto employed my moral powers and capa
cities ? How do I stand affected towards my
brethren of mankind? Do I hate, or envy, or
despise any of them? Do I grudge them pros
perity, wish them evil, or purposely injure and
affront them ? Or do I love them as brethren of
the same family, do them all the good in ray
power, acknowledge their excellencies, and re
joice in their happiness and prosperity ?

Such inquiries and self-examinations, when

seriously conducted, would necessarily lead to
the most beneficial moral results. In leading ua
to a knowledge of our errors and defects, they
would teach us the excellency of Jeumility, the
reasonableness of this virtue, and the foundation
on which it rests, and of course, the folly ot
pride, and of all those haughty and supercilious
tempers which are productive of so much mis
chief and unhappiness, both in the higher and
the lower spheres of life. Pride is uniformly the
offspring of self-ignorance. For, if a man will
but turn his eyes within, and thoroughly scruti
nize himself, so as to perceive his errors and
follies, and the germs of vice which lodge in his
heart, as well as the low rank he holds in the
scale of creation, he would see enough to teach
him humbleness of mind, and to render a proud
disposition odious and detestable, and inconsis
tent with the relations in which he stands to his
Creator, to his fellow-creatures, and to the uni
verse at large. Such mental investigations
would also lead to self-possession, under affronts
and injuries, and amidst the hurry and disorder
of the passions, — to charity, candour, meekness,
and moderation, in regard to the sentiments and
conduct of others, to the exercise of self-denial,
to decorum and consistency of character, to a
wise and steady conduct in life, and to an intel
ligent performance of the offices of piety and the
duties of religion. But how can we ever expect
that an ignorant uncultivated mind, unaccus
tomed to a regular train of rational thought, can
enter, with spirit and intelligence, on the process
of self-examination ? It requires a certain por
tion, at least, of information, and a habit of re
flection, before a man can be qualified to engage
in such an exercise ; and these qualifications
can omy be attained by the exercise which the
mind receives in the acquisition of general know
ledge. — If, then, it be admitted, that self-igno
rance is the original spring of all the follies and
incongruities we behold in the characters of
men, and the cause of all that vanity, censori-
ousness, malignancy, and vice which abound
in the world ; and, if self-knowledge would tend
to counteract such immoral dispositions, we
must endeavour to communicate a certain por
tion of knowledge to mankind, to fit them for the
exercise of self-examination and self-inspection,
before we can expect that the moral world will
be renovated, and " all iniquity, as ashamed,
hide its head, and stop its mouth."

5. Knowledge, by expanding the mind, will
enable it to take a clear and comprehensive view
of the motives, bearings, tendencies, and conse
quences of moral actions. A man possessed of
a truly enlightened mind, must have his mora'
sense, or conscience, much more sensible and
tender, and more judiciously directed, than that
of a person whose understanding is beclouded
with ignorance. When he has 'o choose be
tween good and evil, or between good and bet-

KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO MORAL ACTION.

107

ter, or oetween any two actions he has to per
form, ne is enabled tc bring before his mind
many more arguments, and much higher and
nobler arguments and motives, to determine the
choice he ought to make. When he is about to
perform any particular action, his mental eye is
enabled to pierce into the remote consequences
which may result from it. He can, in some
measure, trace its bearings not only on his
friends and neighbours, and the community to
which he belongs, but also on surrounding na
tions, on the world at large, on future genera
tions, and even on the scenes of a future eter
nity. For an action, whether good or bad, per
formed by an individual in a certain station in
society, may have a powerful moral influence on
tribes and nations far beyond the sphere in
which it was performed, and on millions who
may people the world in the future ages of time.
We know that actions, both of a virtuous and
vicious nature, performed several thousands of
years ago, and in distant places of the world,
have had an influence upon the men of the pre
sent generation, which will redound either to the
honour or the disgrace of the actors, " in that
day when God shall judge the world in righte
ousness, and reward every man according to his
works." We also know, that there are certain
actions which to some minds may appear either
trivial or indifferent, and to other minds bene
ficial, which nevertheless involve a principle
which, if traced to its remoter consequences,
would lead to the destruction of the intelligent
creation. Now, it is the man of knowledge and
of moral perception alone, who can recognise
such actions and principles, and trace them to
all their natural and legitimate results. He
alone can apply, with judgment and accuracy,
the general laws of moral action to every parti
cular circumstance, connect the present with the
future, and clearly discern the mere semblance
of truth and moral rectitude from the reality.

In short, the knowledge of divine revelation,
and a serious study of its doctrines and pre
cepts, must accompany every other species of
information, if we wish to behold mankind re
formed and moralized. It is in the sacred ora
cles alone, that the will of God, the natural cha
racter of man, the remedy of moral evil, the
rules of moral conduct, and the means of moral
improvement, are clearly and fully unfolded.
And the man who either rejects the revelations
of heaven, or refuses to study and investigate
the truths and moral requisitions they contain,
can nevei expect to rise to the sublime heights
of virtue, and to the moral dignity of his nature.
But, were the study of the scriptures uniformly
conjoined with the study of every other branch
of useful knowledge, we should, ere long, behold
a wonderful transformation upon the face of the
moral world. Pride, selfishness, malice, envy,
• mbition, and revenge, would gradually be un

dermined. The spirit of warfare and conten
tion would be subdued ; rioting, drunkenness,
and debauchery, would beheld in abhorrence by
all ranks ; kindness and affection would unite
the whole brotherhood of mankind ; peace, har
mony, and subordination would be displaved in
every department of social life ; " our judjres
would be just, and our exactors righteous ; w&.r *
would be turned into peace to the ends of the
earth, and righteousness and praise spring forth
before all the nations." Were moral principle
thus diffused among the different classes of so
ciety, it could not fail of producing a beneficial
influence on the progress of the arts and sci
ences, and on every thing that might tend to me
liorate the condition of our fellow-creatures, and
to promote the general improvement of mankind.
For, in endeavouring to promote such objects,
we meet with as great a difficulty in the moral
as in the intellectual condition of mankind. The
principles of selfishness, pride, ambition, and
envy, and similar dispositions, create obstacles
in the way of scientific and philanthropic im
provements, tenfold greater than any which arise
from pecuniary resources or physical impedi
ments. But were such principles undermined,
and a spirit of good-will and affection pervading
the mass of society, the machinery of the moral
world would move onward with smoothness and
harmony : and mankind, acting in unison, and
every one cheerfully contributing to the good of
the whole, would accomplish objects, and bene
ficial transformations on the physical and moral
condition of society, far superior to any thing
that has hitherto been realized.

To what has been now stated, with regard to
the influence of knowledge on moral conduct, it
may, perhaps, be objected, that many instances
occur of men of genius and learning indulging in
dissolute and immoral habits, and that the higher
classes of society, who have received a better
education than the lower, are nearly as immoral
in their conduct. In replying to such an objec
tion, we have to consider, in the first place, what
is the nature of the education such persons have
received. Most of the higher classes have re
ceived a grammar-shcool education, and, per
haps, attended a few sessions at an academy or an
university. There cannot, however, be reckoned
above one in ten who pursues his studies with
avidity, and enters into the spirit of the instruc
tions communicated at such seminaries ; as it is
well known to every one acquainted with the
general practice of such students in colleges and
academies, that a goodly number of them spend
their time as much in folly and dissipation, as in
serious study. But, although they had acquired
a competent acquaintance with the different
branches to which their attention was directed,
what is the amount of their acquisitions ? A
knowledge of the Greek and Latin Classics,
and of pagan mythology, in the acquisition of

108

THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

which five years are generally spent at the
grammar-school, and two at the university — and
the elements of logic, ethics and mathematical
philosophy. But such departments of know
ledge, in the way in which they have been generally
taught, have no necessary connexion with reli
gion and moral conduct. On the contrary, by
keeping the principles of Christianity carefully
out of view, and even insinuating objections
against them, some professors of these sciences
have promoted the cause of infidelity, and con
sequently impeded the progress of genuine mo
rality. What aid can be expected to morality
from a mere grammar-school education, when
the acquisition of words and phrases, and the
absurd notions and impure practices connected
with Roman and Grecian idolatry, form the pro
minent objects of attention ; and when, as too
frequently happens, no instructions in Christi
anity are communicated, and not even the forms
of religion attended to in many of those semina
ries ? The mere acquisition of languages is not
the acquisition of useful knowledge : they are,
at best, but the means of knowledge ; and al
though we would not discourage any one, who
has it in his power, from prosecuting such stu
dies, yet it is from other and more important
branches of study that we expect assistance in
the cause of moral improvement.

With regard to men of learning and genius,
we have likewise to inquire into the nature and
tendency of their literary pursuits, before we can
ascertain that they are calculated to prevent the
influence of immoral propensities and passions.
Persons are designated men of learning, who
have made proficiency in the knowledge of the
Greek, Latin, French, German and other lan
guages, — who are skilled in mythology, antiqui
ties, criticism, and metaphysics, or who are pro
found students in geometry, algebra, fluxions,
and other branches of the mathematics. But it
is easy to perceive, that a man may be a pro
found linguist, grammarian, politician, or anti
quarian, and yet not distinguished for virtuous
conduct; for such departments of learning have
no direct bearing upon moral principle or con
duct. On the contrary, when prosecuted exclu
sively, to the neglect of the more substantial parts
of knowledge, and under the influence of certain
opinions and prejudices, they have a tendency
to withdraw the attention from the great objects
of religion, and consequently from the most
powerful motives which excite to moral action. —
We have likewise to inquire, whether such per
sons have made the Christian revelation one
great object of their study and attention, and
whether they are frequently employed in serious
contemplations of the perfections of the Creator,
as displayed in the economy of the universe. If
such studies be altogether overlooked, we need
not wonder that such characters should frequent
ly slide into the paths of infidelity and dissipa

tion ; since they neglect an attention to those
departments of knowledge which alone can guide
them in the paths of rectitude. We may as soon
expect to gather " grapes from thorns or figs
from thistles," as to expect pure morality from
those, however high they may stand in literary
acquirements, who either neglect or oppose the
great truths of religion. — We do not mean, how
ever, to insinuate, that the subjects alluded tc
above are either trivial or unworthy of being
prosecuted. On the contrary, we are fully per
suaded, that there is not a subject which has
ever come under human investigation, when pro
secuted with proper views, and in connexion
with other parts of knowledge, but may be ren
dered subservient, in some way or another, both
to the intellectual and the moral improvement of
man. But, when we speak of diffusing useful
knowledge among the mass of mankind, we do
not so much allude to the capacity of being able
to translate from one language into another, of
knowing the sentiments of the ancient Greeks
and Romans, and the characters and squabbles
of their gods and goddesses, or to the faculty of
distinguishing ancient coins, fragments of vases,
or pieces of armour — as to the facts of history,
science, and revelation, particularly in their
bearing upon the religious views and the moral
conduct of mankind. And, if the attention of
the great body of the people were directed to
such subjects, from proper principles and mo
tives, and were they exhibited to their view in a
lucid and interesting manner, there cannot be the
smallest doubt, that the interests of virtue and of
pure and unde filed religion would be thereby pro
moted to an extent far beyond what has ever yet
been realized.

SECTION VIIL

ON THE UTILITY OF KNOWLEDGE IN RELA
TION TO A FUTURE WORLD.

MAN is a being destined for eternity. The
present world through which he is travelling ia
only a transitory scene, introductory to a future
and an immortal existence. When his corporeal
frame sinks into the grave, and is resolved into
its primitive elements, the intellectual principle
by which it was animated shall pass into another
region, and be happy or miserable, according to
the governing principles by which it was ac
tuated in the present life. The world in which
we now reside may be considered as the great
nursery of our future and eternal existence, as a
state of probation in which we are educating for
an immortal life, and as preparatory to our en
tering on higher scenes of contemplation and
enjoyment. In this point of view, it is of im
portance to consider that our present views and

KNOWLEDGE OF A FUTURE STATE.

109

recollections will be carried along with us into
that future world, that our virtues or vices will
oe as immortal as ourselves, and influence our
future as well as our present happiness, and,
consequently, that every study in which we en
gage, every disposition we now cultivate, and
every action we perform, is to be regarded as
pointing beyond the present to an unseen and
eternal existence.

If, then, we admit that the present state is con
nected with the future, and that the hour of death
is not the termination of our existence, it must
be a matter of the utmost importance, that the
mind of every candidate for immortality be tutor
ed in those departments of knowledge which have
a relation to the future world, and which will
tend to qualify him for engaging in the employ
ments, and for relishing the pleasures and enjoy
ments of that state. The following remarks are
ntended to illustrate this position.

We may remark, in the first place, in general,
that the knowledge acquired in the present state,
whatever be its nature, will be carried along with
us when we wing our flight to the eternal world.
In passing into that world we shall not lose any
•>f the mental faculties we now possess, nor shall
we lose our identity, or consciousness of being
the same persons we now feel ourselves to be ;
otherwise, we behoved to be a different order of
creatures, and consequently could not be the
subjects either of reward or of punishment for
any thing done in the present state. A destruc
tion of our faculties, or a total change of them,
or the loss of consciousness, would be equivalent
io an annihilation of our existence. But, if we
carry into the future state all our moral and in
tellectual powers, we must also, of necessity,
carry along with them all the recollections of the
present life, and all the knowledge, both physical
and moral, which these faculties enabled us to
acquire. We have an exemplification of this
in the parable of our Saviour respecting the rich
man and Lazarus, where Abraham is represent
ed as addressing the former in these words ;
" Son, remember, that thou in thy lifetime re-
ccivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus
evil things ;" evidently implying, that the rich
man retained the power of memory, that he pos
sessed a consciousness that he was the same
thinking being that existed in a former state, and
that he had a perfect recollection of the conduct
he pursued, and the scenes in which he was
placed in this sublunary world. If, then, it be
admitted, that we shall be, substantially, the
same intellectual beings as at present, though
placed in different circumstances, and that the
ideas and moral principles we now acquire will
pass along with us into futurity, and influence
our conduct and happiness in that state, — it can
not be a matter of indifference whether the mind
of an immortal being be left to grope amidst the
mists of ignorance, and to sink into immorality,

or be trained up in the knowledge of every thing
that has a bearing on its eternal destination.
On the contrary, nothing can be of higher value
and importance to every human being, consider
ed as immortal, than to be trained to habits of
reasoning and reflection, and to acquire that
knowledge of his Creator, of himself, of his duty,
and of the relations in which he stands to this
world and to the next, which will qualify him for
the society in which he is hereafter to mingle,
and the part he has to act in a higher scene of
action and enjoyment. For, as gross ignorance
is the source of immoral action, and as immoral
principles and habits unfit the soul for the plea
sures and employments of an immortal state, the
man who is allowed to remain amidst the natural
darkness of his understanding, can have little
hope of happiness in the future world since he
is destitute of those qualifications which are re
quisite in order to his relishing its enjoyments.
Scientific knowledge., as well as that which is
commonly designated theological, is to be con
sidered as having a relation to the future world.
Science, as I have already had occasion to no
tice, is nothing else than an investigation of the
divine perfections and operations as displayed
in the economy of the universe ; and we have
every ground to conclude, both from reason and
from revelation, that such investigations will be
carried forward, on a more enlarged scale, in
the future world, where the intellectual powers,
freed from the obstructions which now impede
their operation, will become more vigorous and
expansive, and a more extensive scene of divine
operation be presented to the view. There are
certain applications of scientific principles, in
deed, which may have a reference solely to the
condition of society in the present life, such as,
in the construction of cranes, diving-bells, speak
ing-trumpets, steam-carriages and fire-engines ;
but the general principles on which such ma
chines are constructed, may be applicable to
thousands of objects and operations in other
worlds with which we are at present unacquaint
ed. The views, however, which science has
opened of the wisdom and benevolence of the
Deity, of the multiplicity of ideas and concep
tions which have existed in his infinite mind, of
his almighty power, and of the boundless range
of his operations — will not be lost when we enter
into the eternal world. They will prepare the
soul for higher scones of contemplation, for ac
quiring more expansive views of divine perfec
tion, and for taking more extensive and sublime
excursions through the boundless empire of Om
nipotence. The same may be affirmed of the
principles of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, conic
sections, and other departments of the mathe
matics, which contain truths that are eternal and
unchangeable, and that are applicable in every
mode of existence, and to the circumstances of
all worlds. Such knowledge may form the ground

110

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

work of all our future improvements in the world
beyond the grave, and give to those who have
acquired it, in conjunction with the cultivation
of moral principle, a superiority over others in
the employments and investigations peculiar to
that higher sphere of existence ; and, conse
quently, a more favourable and advantageous
outset into the new and unknown regions of the
invisible state. To suppose, that the leading
principles of scientific knowledge are of utility
only in the present world, is not only contrary to
every enlightened idea we can form of the future
state, either from reason or revelation, but would
remove some of the strongest motives which
should induce us to engage in the prosecution of
useful knowledge. ]f science is to be considered
as altogether confined in its views and effects,
to the transitory scene of this mortal state, its
attainment becomes a matter of comparatively
trivial importance. To a man hastening to the
verge of life, there could be no strong induce
ment to listen to its deductions or to engage in
its pursuits. But, if the principles of science,
when combined with the truths of revelation, ex
tend to higher objects than the construction of
machinery and the embellishment of human
life, — if they point beyond the present to a future
world, if they tend to expand our views of the
attributes of the Divinity, and of the grandeur
of his kingdom, — and if they prepare the mind
for entering into more ample views and profound
investigations of his plans and operations, in that
state of immortality to which we are destined, —
it must be a matter of importance to every hu
man being, that his mind be imbued with such
knowledge, as introductory to the employments
of that eternal world which lies before him. —
But, we may remark more particularly

In the second place, that the acquisition of ge
neral knowledge, and habits of mental activity,
would induce persons to serious inquiries into the
evidences of a future state. Although there are
few persons, in a Christian country, who deny
the existence of a future world, yet we have too
much reason to believe, that the great majority
of the population in every country are not tho
roughly convinced of this important truth, and
that they pass their lives just as if the present
were the ultimate scene of their destination.
Notwithstanding all the " church-going" which
is so common among us, both among the higher
and the lower classes, and the numerous ser
mons which are preached in relation to this sub
ject, it does not appear, that the one-half of our
population have any fixed and impressive belief
of die reality of an eternal world. If it were
otherwise, it would be more frequently mani
fested in their general temper, conversation and
conduct. But we find the great mass of society
as keenly engaged in the all-engrossing pursuit
*f wealth and honours, as if the enjoyments of
this world were to last for ever. In general

conversation in the social circle, the topic of a
future world, and our relation to it, is studiously
avoided. While a person may talk with the
utmost ease about a projected voyage to Ame
rica, the East Indies, or Van Diemen's Land,
and the geographical peculiarities of these re
gions, and be listened to with pleasure — were he
to talk, in certain respectable companies, of his
departure, to another world, and of the important
realities to which he will be introduced in that
state, — were he even to suggest a hint, that the
scene of our eternal destination ought occa
sionally to form the subject of conversation, —
either a sarcastic sneer or a solemn gloom
would appear on every face, and he would be
regarded as a wild enthusiast or a sanctimo
nious hypocrite. But why should men manifest
such a degree of apathy in regard to this topic,
and even an aversion to the very idea of it, if
they live under solemn impressions of their con
nexion with an immortal existence ? Every ona
who admits the idea of a future world, must also
admit, that it is one of the most interesting and
momentous subjects that can occupy his atten
tion, and that it as far exceeds in importance the
concerns of this life, as the ages of eternity ex
ceed the fleeting periods of time. And, if so,
why should we not appear as eager and inter
ested in conversation on this subject, as we
sometimes are in relation to a voyage to some
distant land ? Yet, among the majority of our
fellow-men, there is scarcely any thing to which
their attention is less directed, and the very idea
of it is almost lost amidst the bustle of business,
the acquisition of wealth, the dissipations of so
ciety, and the vain pageantry of fashionable life.
Among many other causes of the indifference
which prevails on this subject, ignorance and
mental inactivity are none of the least. Im
mersed in sensual gratifications and pursuits,
unacquainted with the pleasures of intellect, and
unaccustomed to rational trains of reflection,
multitudes pass through life without any serious
consideration of the future scene of another
world, resolved, at the hour of dissolution, to
take their chance with' the generations that have
gone before them. But, were men once aroused
to mental activity, and to the exercise of their
reasoning powers on important objects, they
would be qualified for investigating the evi
dences which demonstrate the immortality of
man, which could not fail to impress their minds
with a strong conviction of the dignity of their
intellectual natures, and of their high destina
tion. Those evidences are to be found in the
Christian revelation which has "brought life
and immortality to light,'' and thrown a radiance
on the scenes beyond the grave. But, even inde
pendently of revelation, the evidences which
prove the immortal destiny of man, from the
light of nature, are so strong and powerful, that,
when weighed with seriousness and impartiality,

KNOWLELX3E PREPARATORY TO A FUTURE STATE.

HI

they must appear satisfactory to every candid
and inquiring mind. When we consider the
universal belief of the doctrine of man's immor
tality which has prevailed in all ages and na
tions — when we consider the desire of future ex
istence implanted in the human breast — the noble
intellectual faculties with which man is endowed,
and the strong desire of knowledge which forms a
part of his constitution — the capacity cf making
perpetual progress towards intellectual and moral
perfection — the unlimited range of view which is
opened to the human faculties throughout the
immensity of space and duration — the moral
powers of action with which man is endowed,
and their capacity of perpetual expansion and
activity — the apprehensions and forebodings of
the mind, when under the influence of remorse—
the disordered state of the moral world when con
trasted with the systematic order of the mate
rial — the unequal distribution of rewards and
punishments wher. viewed in connexion with the
justice of God — the absurdity of admitting tha*
the thinking principle in men will ever be annihi
lated — and the blasphemous and absurd conse
quences which would follow, if the idea of a fu
ture state of retribution were rejected ; when
we attend to these and similar considerations,
we perceive an assemblage of arguments, which,
when taken in combination with each other,
carry irresistible evidence to the mind of every
unbiassed inquirer, that man is destined to an
immortal existence — an evidence amounting to
a moral demonstration, and no less satisfactory
than that on which we rest our belief of the ex
istence of the Eternal Mind.* But the greater
part of mankind, in their present untutored state,
are incapable of entering into such inquiries and
investigations. For want of moral and intel
lectual instruction, they may be said to "have
eyes, but see not, ears, but hear not, neither do
they understand," and hence, they pass through
the scenes of mortality, almost unconscious of
their relation to the eternal world, and altoge
ther unprepared forks exercises and enjoyments.
In the next place, the acquisition of knowledge,
in connexion with the cultivation of moral prin
ciples and Christian affections, would tend to pre
pare the mind for the intercourse and employments
of the future world. From divine revelation, we
are assured, that in the future state of happiness,
the righteous shall not only join the company of
"the spirits of just men made perfect," but
shall also be admitted into " the general assem
bly of angels. With these pure and superior
intelligences, and, doubtless too, with the inha
bitants of other worlds, shall the redeemed in
habitants of our globe hold delightful intercourse,

• For a full illustration of these and other evl-
dences of a future state, alon<* with various topics
connected with this subject, the author respectfully
refers his readers to a work which he lately pub
lished, entitled " The Philosophy of a Future State.1'

8

and join in their sublime conversation on the
most exalted subjects. One of the employment*
in which they will be incessantly engaged, will
be, to contemplate the divine works and admi
nistration, and to investigate the wonders of
creating power, wisdom, and goodness, as dis
played throughout the universe. For such are
the representations given in scripture of the ex
ercises of the heavenly world. Its inhabitants
are represented as raising the following song of
praise to their Creator, " Great and marvellous
are thy works, Lord God Almighty ! Just and
true are thy ways, thou King of saints," which
evidently implies, that both the wonders of his
creation, and the plan of his moral government,
are the subjects of their intense study and inves
tigation. And, in another scene exhibited in
the book of Revelation, they are represented in
the sublime adorations they offer to " Him who
liveth for ever and ever," as exclaiming, " Thou
art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour,
and power; for thou hast 'created all things, and
for thy pleasure they are and were created,"
plainly indicating, that the scenes of the mate
rial universe, and the divine perfections as dis
played in them, are the objects of their inces-
sant..contemplation.

Now, in order to our being prepared for such
intercourses and employments, two grand quali
fications are indispensably requisite. In the
first place, the cultivation of moral principle and
conduct, or in other words, the attainment of
that holiness which the scriptures enjoin, " with
out which," we are assured, " no man can see
the Lord," that is0 can hold no delightful inter
course with him through the medium of his works
and providential dispensations. Without this
qualification, we are altogether unfit for being
introduced into the assembly of angels and other
pi re intelligences, and for joining with them in
their holy services and sublime adorations — as
unfit as an ignorant Hotentot, a wild Bosheman,
or the lowest dregs of society, would be to take
a part in an assembly of learned divines, states
men, or philosophers. In order to a delightful
association with any rank of intelligences, there
must exist a certain congeniality of disposition
and sentiment, without which, an intimate in
tercourse would be productive of happiness to
neither party. Persons of proud and revenge
ful dispositions, and addicted to vicious indul
gence, could find no enjoyment in a society
where all is humility and affection, harmony and
love ; nor could pure and holy beings delight in
associating with them, without supposing the
moral laws of the Creator, and the constitution
of the intelligent universe entirely subverted.
Such characters are as opposite to each other,
as light and darkness ; and, therefore, we may
as soon expect to make the East and Wesi
points to meet together, or to slop the planets in
their career, as to form a harmonious union be.

112

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

twoen the ignorant arid vicious, and the en
lightened and virtuous inhabitants of the celes
tial world. In the next place, a knowledge of
the character of God, of his moral dispensa
tions, and of his works of creation, must form a
preparation for the exercises of the heavenly
state ; since these are some of the subjects
which occupy the attention of "the innumer-
ible company of angels and the spirits of just
men made perfect." But how could we be sup
posed to engage in such studies, and to relish
such employments, if we remain altogether un
acquainted with them till our spirits take their
flight from these tabernacles of clay? How
could a man whose mind is continually grovelling
among the meanest and the most trivial objects,
whose soul never rises above the level of his
daily labours, which necessity compels him to
•perform, whose highest gratification is to carouse
•with his fellows, to rattle a set of dice, or to
shuffle a pack of cards, and who is incapable of
/prosecuting a train of rational thought — how
could such a one be supposed qualified for enter
ing, with intelligence and delight, into the sub
lime investigations, and the lofty contemplations
which arrest the attention, and form the chief
exercises " of the saints in light?" There is
an utter incongruity in the idea, that a rude and
ignorant mind could relish the enjoyments of the
heavenly world, unless it be enlightened and
transformed into the image of its Creator; and
we have no warrant from revelation to conclude
that such a transformation will be effected, after
the spirit has taken its flight to the invisible
state.

Bat it is easy to conceive what transporting
pleasures will be felt by an enlightened and
virtuous individual when he is ushered into a
scene where his prospects will be enlarged, his
faculties expanded, and the causes which now
obstruct their energies for ever removed. He
will feel himself in his native element, will re
sume his former investigations on a more en
larged scale, and with more vigour and activity,
and enjoy the prospect of perpetually advancing
•from one degree of kn^viedge and felicity to
another throughout an interminable succession
of existence. Having studied the moral charac
ter of God as displayed in his word, and in the
dispensations of his providence; having ac
quired, after all his researches, only a faint and
imperfect glimpse of his moral attributes ; hav
ing met with >many difficulties and labyrinths in
(ne movements of the divine government which
he was altogether unable to unravel, which pro
duced an ardent longing after a more enlarged
sphere of vision — how gratifying to such a mind
must it be, to contemplate the divine character
in the fulness of its glory, to behold the apparent
uiconsistencies of the divine government recon
ciled, its intricate mazes unravelled, its wisdom
Mid rectitude displayed, and the veil which con

cealed from mortals the reasons of its procedure
for ever withdrawn ! Having taken a cursory
survey of the displays of divine wisdom and
goodness, in the arrangei-^rit of our sublunary
system, and in the construction <if the animal
and vegetable tribes with which it is furnished ;
having directed his views, by the light of sci
ence, to the celestial regions ; having caught a
glimpse of the astonishing operations of almighty
power in the distant spaces of the firmament;
having been overwhelmed with wonder and
amazement at the extent and grandeur of the
divine empire ; having cast many a longing look
towards distant worlds, mingled with many anx
ious inquiries into their nature arid destination
which lie was unable to resolve, and having felt
an ardent desire to learn the history of their
population, and to behold the scene of the uni
verse a little more unfolded — what transporting
joys must be felt by such an individual, when
he shall enter into a world where " he shall
know even as also he is known ;" where the veil
which intercepted his view of the wonders of
creating power shall be removed ; where the
cherubim and the seraphim, who have winged
their flight through regions of immensity im
passable by mortals, shall rehearse the history
of other worlds ; where the sphere of vision will
be enlarged, the faculties invigorated, and the
glories of divine goodness, wisdom and omnipo
tence displayed in all their effulgence ! Having
familiarized such objects to his mind, during
this first stage of his existence, he will enter on
the prosecution of new discoveries of divine
perfection, with a renovated holy ardour, of
which rude and grovelling minds are incapable,
which will fill his soul with extatic rapture —
even "with joy unspeakable and full of glory."
Let us suppose, for the sake of illustration,
two individuals of opposite characters entering
the future world at the same time — the one rude,
ignorant, and vicious, and the other " renewed
in the spirit of his mind," and enlightened with
all the knowledge which science and revelation
can furnish — it is evident, that, although they
were both ushered into the same locality, .their
state and enjoyments would be altogether diffe
rent. The one would sink, as it were, to his
natural level, following the principles, propensi
ties and passions which he previously indulged ;
and, although he were admitted into the society
of pure and enlightened spirits, he would remain
as a cheerless, insulated wretch, without intel
lectual activity, and destitute of enjoyment.
Finding no pleasures suited to his benighted
mind and his grovelling affections, he would be
fain to flee to other regions and to more conge
nial associates, as the owl flies from the vocal
grove and the society of the feathered choir, and
prefers the shades of night to the beams of day.
Like this gloomy bird, which delignts in obscure
retreats and rugged ruins, and has no relish foi

KNOWLEDGE PREPARATORY TO A FUTURE STATE.

113

blooming gardens and flowery meads — the unen-
fightened and unsanctified soul would feel itself
unhappy and imprisoned, as it were, even amidst
triumphant spirits, and the splendours of immor
tal day. Whereas the other, having ardently
longed for such a state, and having previously
undergone the requisite preparation for its en-
>oy merits, feels himself in a region suited to his
taste, mingles with associates congenial to his
disposition, engages in exercises to which he
was formerly accustomed, and in which he de
lighted, beholds a prospect, boundless as the
universe, rising before him, on which his facul
ties may be exercised with everlasting improve
ment and everlasting delight, and, consequently,
experiences a " fulness of joy" which can never
be interrupted, but will be always increasing
" world without end."

Such are the views we must necessarily
adopt respecting the state and enjoyments of
these two characters in the life to come ; and
there is no resisting of the conclusion we have
deduced respecting the ignorant and vicious
individual, without supposing that something,
equivalent to a miracle, will be performed in
his behalf, immediately after his entrance into
the invisible world, to fit him for the employ
ments of a state of happiness. But, for such
an opinion we have no evidence, either from
scripture or from reason. It would be contrary
to every thing we know of the moral government
of God; it would strike at the foundation of all
religion and morality ; it would give encourage
ment to ignorance and vice ; it would render
nugatory all the efforts of a virtuous character
to increase in knowledge and holiness during
the present life, and it would give the ignorant
and the licentious an equal reason for expecting
eternal happiness in the world to come, as the
most profound Christian philosophers, or the
most enlightened and pious divines. Besides,
we are assured by the "Faithful and True
Witness," that, as in the future world, "he
who is righteous shall remain righteous still,"
so " he who is unjust shall remain unjust still,
and he who is filthy shall remain filthy still ;"
which expressions seem evidently to imply, that
no more opportunities will be granted for reform
ing what had been amiss, and recovering the
polluted and unrighteous soul to purity and rec
titude. *

• Whatever opinion we may form as to the doc
trine of Universal Restoration,— it will be admitted,
even by the abettors of that, doctrine, that an unholy
and unenlightened soul is unfit for celestial happi
ness, on its first entrance into the future world, and
thousands or millions of years, or a period equiva
lent to what is included in the phrase, "ages of
ages," may elapse before it is fit for being restored
to the dignity of its nature, and the joys of heaven.
Even on this supposition, (although it were war
ranted by Scripture) the preparation of human be
ings in the present life for a state of future happi
ness, nnust be a matter of the highest importance,
since it prevents the sufferings denoted by " devour-

If, then, it appears, that we shall carry the
knowledge and moral habits we acquire in thil
life along with us into the other world, — and if a
certain portion of rational and religious informa--
tion and moral principle is essentially requisite
to prepare us for the employments and felicities
of that state — by refusing to patronise every
scheme by which a general diffusion of know
ledge may be promoted, we not only allow our
fellow-men to wander amidst the mists of super
stition, and to run heedlessly into numerous dan
gers, both physical and moral, we not only de
prive them of exquisite intellectual enjoyments,
and prevent the improvement of the arts and
sciences, but we deprive them, in a certain de
gree, of the chance of obtaining happiness in a
state of immortality. For as ignorance is the
parent of vice, and as vicious propensities and
indulgences necessarily lead to misery, both
here and hereafter, the man whose mind is left
to grope amidst intellectual darkness, can enjoy
no well-founded hope of felicity in the life to
come, since he is unqualified for the associa
tions, the contemplations, and the employments
of that future existence. As in the material
creation, light was the first substance created
before the chaos was reduced to beauty and
order, so, in the intellectual world, knowledge,
or light in the understanding, is the first thing
which restores the moral system to harmony and
order. It is the commencement of every pro
cess that leads to improvement, comfort, and
moral order in this life, and that prepares us for
the enjoyments of the life to come. But igno
rance is both the emblem and the prelude of
" the blackness of darkness for ever." This is
one of the most powerful considerations which
should induce every philanthropist to exert every
nerve, and to further every scheme which has for
its object to diffuse liberty, knowledge and moral
principle among all the inhabitants of the earth.

SECTION IX.

ON THE UTILITY OF GENERAL KNOWLEDGE
IN RELATION TO THE STUDY OF DIVINE
REVELATION.

OF all the departments of knowledge to which
the human mind can be directed, there is none
of greater importance than that which exhibits
the real character and condition of man as a
moral agent — his relation to the Deity — his eter
nal destiny — the way in which he may be deli
vered from the effects of moral evil — and the
worship and service he owes to his Almighty
Creator. On these and kindred topics, the

ing fire, weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth,"
during the indefinite and lone-continued period at
" ages of ages.'- '

114

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Christian revelation affords the most clear and
satisfactory information, and the details which it
furnishes on these subjects are of the highest
moment, and deeply interesting to every inha
bitant of the globe. But ignorance, leagued
with depravity and folly, has been the cause
that the sacred oracles have so frequently been
treated with indifference and contempt; and
that those who have professed to recognise them
as the intimations of the will of Deity have been
prevented from studying them with intelligence,
and contemplating the facts they exhibit in all
their consequences and relations.

In order to a profitable study of the doctrines,
facts and prophecies contained in the Bible, it
is requisite, in the first place, that a deep and
thorough conviction be produced in the mind,
that they are indeed the revelations of heaven,
addressed to man on earth to direct his views
and conduct as an accountable agent, and a
candidate for immortality. From ignorance of
the evidences on which the truth of Christianity
rests, multitudes of thoughtless mortals have
been induced to reject its authority, and have
glided down the stream of licentious pleasure,
u sporting themselves with their own deceiv-
ings," till they landed in wretchedness and ruin.
The religion of the Bible requires only to be
examined with care, and studied with humility
and reverence, in order to produce a full con
viction of its celestial origin ; and wherever
such dispositions are brought into contact with
a calm and intelligent investigation of the evi
dences of revelation, and of the facts and doc
trines it discloses, the mind will not only discern
its superiority to every other system of religion,
but will perceive the beauty and excellence of
its discoveries, and the absolute necessity of their
being studied and promulgated in order to raise
the human race from that degradation into
which they have been so long immersed, and to
promote the renovation of the moral world.
And, those objections and difficulties which pre
viously perplexed and harassed the inquirer will
gradually evanish, as the mists of the morning
before the orb of day.

The evidences of Christianity have been ge
nerally distributed into the external and the in
ternal. The external may again be divided into
direct or collateral. The direct evidences are
such as arise from the nature, consistency, and
probability of the facts ; and from the simplicity,
uniformity, competency and fidelity of the testi
monies by which they are supported. The col
lateral evidences are those which arise from the
concurrent testimonies of heathen writers, or
others, which corroborate the history of Chris
tianity and establish its leading facts. The
internal evidences arise, either from the con
formity of the announcements of revelation to
the known character of God, from their aptitude
w> the frame and circumstances of man, or from

those convictions impressed upon the mind oj
the agency of the Divine Spirit.

In regard to the external evidences, the fol
lowing propositions can be supported both from
the testimonies of profane writers, the Scrip-
tures of the New Testament, and other ancient
Christian writings ; viz. 1, " That there is sa
tisfactory evidence that many professing to be
original witnesses of the Christian miracles,
passed their lives in labours, dangers, and suf
ferings, voluntarily undergone in attestation of
the accounts which they delivered, and solely in
consequence of their belief of those accounts ;
and that they also submitted, from the same
motives, to new rules of conduct." And, 2,
" That there is not satisfactory evidence, that
persons pretending to be original witnesses of
any other miracles, have acted in the same man
ner, in attestation of the accounts -which they
delivered, and solely in consequence of their be
lief of the truth of these accounts." These pro
positions can be substantiated to the conviction
of every serious and unbiassed inquirer ; they
form the basis of the external evidence of the
Christian religion ; and, when their truth is
clearly discerned, the mind is irresistibly led to
the conclusion, that the doctrines and facts pro
mulgated by the first propagators of Christianity
are true.

The following propositions can also be satis
factorily proved, viz. That the Jewish religion is
of great antiquity, and that Moses was its foun
der — that the books of the Old Testament were
extant long before the Christian era; a Greek
translation of them having been laid up in th&
Alexandrian library in the days of Ptolemy Phi.
ladelphus — that these books are in the main ge
nuine, and the hisiories they contain worthy of
credit — that many material facts which are re
corded in the Old Testament are also mentioned
by very ancient heathen writers — that Christi
anity is not a modern religion, but was professed
by great multitudes nearly 1800 years ago — that
Jesus Christ, the founder of this religion, was
crucified at Jerusalem during the reign of Tibe
rius Caesar — that the first publishers of this re
ligion wrote books containing an account of the
life and doctrines of their master, several of
which bore the names of those books which now
make up the New Testament— that these books
were frequently quoted and referred to by nu
merous writers from the days of the apostles to
the fourth century and downwards — that they are
genuine, or written by the authors whose names
they bear — that the histories they contain are in
the main agreeable to those facts which were
asserted by the first preachers and received by
the first converts to Christianity — that the facts,
whether natural or supernatural, which they
record, are transmitted to us with as great a de
gree of evidence (if not greater) as any histori
cal fact recorded by historians of allowed chac

EVIDENCE OF MIRACLES.

115

pacter and reputation — and that, these books were
wiittcn under a superintendant inspiration.
These and a variety of similar propositions inti
mately connected with them can be fully sub
stantiated ; and the necessary conclusion of the
whole is, that Christianity is a revelation from
God to man, and that its truths are to be believed,
and its precepts practised by all to whom they
are addressed.

Miracles form one part of the external evi
dence by which revealed religion is supported.
If God. in compassion to our benighted and be-
wilderea race, has thought fit to communicate a
revelation of his will, there is no conceivable
mode by which that revelation could be more
powerfully attested, than by empowering the
messengers whom he inspired to work miracles,
as attestations of the truth of the doctrines they
declared. Accordingly we find, that at the in
troduction both of the Jewish and the Christian
dispensations, a series of uncontrolled miracles
was exhibited to those to whom the messengers
of revelation were sent, as evidences that they
toted under the authority of the Creator of the
universe. Under the administration of Moses,
ivho founded the Jewish economy, the waters of
Egypt were turned into blood, darkness covered
all that country for three days, thunders and hail
terrified its inhabitants and destroyed the fruits
of their ground, and all their first-born were slain
by a celestial messenger in one night — the Red
Sea was parted asunder, the tribes of Israel
passed in safety through its waves, while their
enemies " sank as lead in the mighty waters ;"
water was brought from the flinty rock, manna
from heaven was rained down to supply the
wants of two millions of human beings in a
barren wilderness; mount Sinai was made to
tremble to its centre, and was surrounded with
flames and smoke ; Korah, Dathan, and Abi-
ram, with all the thousands that joined their
conspiracy, were by a miraculous earthquake
swallowed up in a moment ; Jordan was divided
when its waters overflowed its banks, and at the
sound of horns the strong walls of Jericho fell
prostrate to the ground. When Jesus Christ
introduced the gospel dispensation, he gave in
controvertible proofs of his divine mission, by
curing diseases of every description merely by
las word, causing the lame to walk, the deaf to
hear, the dumb to speak, and the blind to see ;
raising the dead to life, stilling the tempestuous
waves and the stormy wind ; turning water into
wine, feeding five thousand men in a wilderness
on a few loaves and fishes ; and, particularly, by
his own resurrection from the dead, after he had
been '< crucified and slain." These, as well as
the miracles wrought by Moses, were demon
strative evidences of the agency and interfer
ence of the Most High ; they were completely
beyond the power of mere human agency, and
were altogether different from the tricks of jug

glers and impostors. They were performed in
the open face of day, in the presence of multi
tudes of persons of every description ; they were
level to the comprehension of every man whose
faculties and senses were in a sound state ; and
the conclusion which every unbiassed mind be
hooved to draw from them, was, that " no man
could do such miracles unless God was with
him;" and, consequently, that the truths de
clared by those who were empowered to perform
them, are the revelations of heaven; for it
would be inconsistent with the nature of the Di
vine Being to suppose, that he would interpose
his almighty power to control the laws of natui e,
for the purpose of giving his sanction to false
hood or imposture.

Of the reality of the miraculous events to
which I have alluded, we have as high a degree
of evidence as we have for the reality of any
other fact recorded in the scriptures or in the
history of the world. The single fact of the re
surrection of Christ, a fact so important in the
Christian system, and with which all its other
facts and doctrines are essentially connected,
rests upon a weight of evidence so great that
the rejection of it would be almost equivalent to
the adoption of universal scepticism. This fact
does not rest upon the testimony of an unknown
individual, or even of an unknown multitude,
but on the twelve apostles who had been pre
viously chosen for this purpose, who had accom
panied their Master in all his journeys, who had
been the witnesses of his miracles, sufferings,
and crucifixion, and who affirmed, without the
least hesitation, and in the face of every threat
ening and persecution, that they had seen him
alive at different times, and held intimate con
verse with him after he had risen from the dead.
It rests likewise on the testimony of the seventy
disciples, and on that of the five hundred bre
thren who had seen the Lord after his resurrec
tion. These persons had full opportunity of in
formation as to the fact they asserted; they
could not be deceived, for it was brought within
the evidence of their senses. They saw the
body of the Lord Jesus after he had been cruci
fied and laid in the tomb — not with a passing
glance, but at different times and in divers
places ; they had an opportunity of handling it
to convince them it was no phantom ; they heard
him speak, and entered into intimate conversa
tion with him on the subject of their future mi
nistry. They saw him, not only separately, but
together ; not only by night, but by day , .tot at
a distance, but immediately before them. And
as they could not be deceived themselves, they
could have no motive for deceiving others ; for
they were aware that, by so doing, they exposed
themselves to scorn, persecution, sufferings, and
death itself, without the most distant hope of re-
compense cither in this world or in another-
Their character and conduct were strictly

116

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

watched and scrutinized. Their enemies had
taken every precaution which human wisdom
could devise, to prevent the dead body of their
Master from being removed from the sepulchre,
either by fraud or by violence, and to secure the
public from being deluded by any attempt at
rmposture. And yet, only a few days after he
was buried, and in the very place where he was
crucified, his resurrection was publicly asserted
and proclaimed ; and no attempt was made on
the part of the Jewish rulers to invalidate the
testimony of the apostles, by producing the dead
body of him whom they had crucified — on whose
tomb they had set a seal and a guard of Roman
soldiers. For it is evident, that if his body
could have been found, they would have pro
duced it as the shortest and most decisive con
futation of the story of the resurrection. All
these circumstances being considered, to sup
pose that the apostles either were deceived, or
attempted to deceive the world, would be to ad
mit a miracle as great as that of the resurrec
tion itself. But if the fact of Christ's resurrec
tion be admitted, the truth of the evangelical
history and of the doctrines of Christianity fol
lows as a necessary consequence.

Prophecy forms another branch of the external
evidences of religion. As God alone can per
ceive with certainty the future actions of free
agents, and the remote consequences of those
laws of nature which he himself established —
prophecy, when clearly fulfilled, affords the most
convincing evidence of an intimate and super
natural communion between God and the per
son who uttered the prediction. It is evident,
however, that prophecy was never intended as
an evidence of an original revelation. From
its very nature it is totally unfit for such a pur
pose, because it is impossible, without some
extrinsic proof of its divine origin, to ascertain
whether any prophecy be true or false, till the
period arrive when it ought to be accomplished.
But when it is fulfilled, it affords complete evi
dence, that he who uttered it spake by the spirit
of God, and that the doctrines he taught were
dictated by the same spirit, and, consequently,
true. To us, therefore, who live in an age pos
terior to the fulfilment of many of the ancient
prophecies, and while some of them are actually
accomplishing, the fulfilment of these predic
tions forms a powerful and striking evidence of
the divine authority of the writers both of the
Old and the New Testament.

The first prophecy which was given forth in
the garden of Eden, that " the seed of the woman
should bruise the head of the serpent," and the
predictions of the Jewish prophets respecting the
appearance, the miracles, the sufferings, the
death, resurrection, and subsequent glory of Mes
siah, and the opposition he was to endure from
the people to whom he was sent, were literally
accomplished, when Jesus Christ appeared in

the world ; and the narrations of the evangelists
may be considered as a commentary upon these
ancient prophecies. The deliverance of tiie
Jews from the Babylonish captivity, and its ac
complishment by Cyrus, — the conquest of Egypt
by Nebuchadnezzar, foretold by Jeremiah, — the
succession of the Assyrian, Persian, Grecian,
and Roman monarchies, — the persecution of the
Jews under Antiochus Epiphanes, and the erec
tion of the papal kingdom foretold by Daniel, —
and the destruction of Jerusalem and the dread
ful miseries which should befall its inhabitants,
foretold by Jesus Christ, have all received their
accomplishment, according to the spirit and im
port of the original predictions, and this accom
plishment is embodied in the history of nations.
But there are prophecies which were uttered
several thousands of years ago, of the accom
plishment of which we have sensible evidence at
the present moment, if we look around us and
consider the state of the nations and empires of
the world. For example, it was prophesied
respecting Ishmael, the son of Abraham, " that
he should be a wild man ; that his hand should
be against every man, and every man's hand
against him ; that he should dwell in the pres
ence of all his brethren ; that he should be mul
tiplied exceedingly, beget twelve princes, and
become a great nation." This prediction has
been literally accomplished in the Arabs, the
undoubted descendants of Ishmael, who, for time
immemorial, have been robbers by land and pi
rates by sea ; and though their hands have been
against every man, and every man's iiand
against them, they have always dwelt, and at
this day, still dwell, in " the presence of their
brethren," a free and independent people. The
greatest conquerors in the world have attempted
to subdue them, but their attempts uniformly
failed of success. When they appeared on the
brink of ruin, they were signally and providen
tially delivered. Alexander was preparing an
expedition against them, when he was cut of?
in the flower of his age. Pompey was in the
career of his conquest, when urgent affairs called
him to another quarter. Gallius had penetra
ted far into their country, when a fatal disease
destroyed great numbers of his men, and obliged
him to return. Trajan besieged their capital
city ; but was defeated by thunder, and light
ning, and whirlwinds. Severus besieged the
same city twice, and was twice repelled from
before it. Even the Turks have been unable
to subdue the Arabs, or even to restrain their
depredations ; and they are obliged to pay them
a sort of annual tribute for the safe passage of
the pilgrims who go to Mecca to pay their devo
tions. The curse pronounced upon Ham ; the
father of Canaan, could also be shown to have
been signally accomplished in the case of the
Canaanites, and the Africans, their descendants,
who have been literally " a servant of servant*

INTERNAL EVIDENCES OF REVELATION.

117

to their brethren." They were under the do
minion, first of the Romans, then of the Sara
cens, and now of the Turks. And in what
ignorance, barbarity, slavery, and misery do
most of them remain ? Many thousands of
them are every year bought and sold, like beasts
in the market, and conveyed from one quarter
of the world to do the work of beasts in another.
The present state of Babylon is also a striking
accomplishment of the denunciations of ancient
prophecy. When we consider the vast extent
and magnificence of that ancient city, " the glory
of kingdoms and the beauty of the Chaldee's
excellency," we should have thought it almost
impossible that it should have become " an utter
desolation," that " the wild beasts should cry
in its desolate houses, and dragons in its pleasant
palaces," and that " it should never be inhabited
nor dwelt in from generation to generation," as
the prophet Isaiah had foretold, several hundreds
of years prior to its destruction, and when it was
flourishing in the height of its glory.* Yet we
know for certain, that this once magnificent
metropolis, whose hanging gardens were reck
oned one of the seven wonders of the world, has
become so complete a desolation, that the besom
of destruction has left scarcely a single trace of
its former grandeur ; and it is a subject of dis
pute among travellers, whether the exact site on
which it was built be yet ascertained.

In short, the present state of the Jews, com
pared with ancient predictions, is one of the
most striking and convincing proofs of the literal
fulfilment of Ae Old Testament prophecies. The
following prediction respecting them was uttered
more than 1700 years before the commencement
of the Christian era: " The Lord shall scatter
thee among all people from the one end of the
earth even unto the other. And among those
nations shall thou find no ease, neither shall the
sole of thy foot have rest, but the Lord shall give
thee a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and
sorrow of mind." — " And thou shall become an
astonishment, a proverb, and a by-word among
all the nations whither the Lord shall lead you."f
The whole history of the Jewish nation since the
destruction of Jerusalem, as well as the present
state of that singular people, forms a striking com
mentary upon these ancient predictions, and
shows, that they had been fully and literally ac
complished. The Jews, it is well known, have
been dispersed almost over the whole face of the
globe for more than seventeen hundred years ;
they have been despised and hated by all nations ;
they have suffered the most cruel persecutions;
"their life has hung in doubt before them,
and they have feared day and night," both for
their property and their lives ; they have been
sold in multitudes, like cattle in the market ; they
have been exposed on public theatres, to exhibit

* Isaiah xiii. 19-22.

* Dem. ch. xxviii.

fights, or be devoured by wild beasts. So strong
were popular prejudices and suspicions against
them, that in the year 1348, on suspicion of their
having poisoned the springs and wells, a million
and a half of them were cruelly massacred. In
1492, 500,000 of them were driven out of Spain,
and 150,000 from Portugal, and even at the pre
sent moment they are, in most places, subjected
both to civil incapacities and unchristian severi
ties. Yet, notwithstanding the hatred and con
tempt in which they are held, wherever they
appear, they are most obstinately tenacious ot
the religion of their fathers, although their ances
tors were so prone to apostatize from it ; and
although most of them seem to be utter strangers
to piety, and pour contempt on the moral precepts
of their own law, they are most obstinately at
tached to the ceremonial institutions of it, burden
some and inconvenient as they are. They have
never been amalgamated with any of the nations
among which they awelt ; they remain a distinct
people, notwithstanding their numerous disper
sions; their numbers are not diminished; and,
were they collected into one body, they would foim
a nation as numerous and powerful as in the most
flourishing periods of the Jewish commonwealth.
The existence of the Jews in such circumstances,
as a distinct nation, so contrary to the history of
every other nation, and to the course of human
affairs in similar cases, may justly be considered
as a standing miracle for the truth of divine re
velation. Such a scene in the conduct of the
divine government, cannot be paralleled in the
history of any other people on the face of the
earth ; and their being permitted so long to sur
vive the dissolution of their own state, and to
continue a distinct nation, is doubtless intended
for the accomplishment of another important pre
diction, viz. that " they may return and seek the
Lord their God, and David their king, and fear
the Lord and his goodness in the latter days." In
the present day, we perceive a tendency towards
this wished-for consummation. Within these
last thirty years, a greater number of Jews has
been converted to the profession of the Christian
faith than had happened for a thousand years
before. And when they shall be collected from
all the regions in which they are now scattered,
and brought to the acknowledgment of Jesus
Christ as the true Messiah, and to submission
to his laws, and reinstated either in their own
land or in some other portion of the globe, such
an event will form a sensible demonstration of
the divinity of our religion, level to the compre
hension of all nations, and which all the sneers
and sophisms of sceptics and infidels will never
be able to withstand.

The internal evidences of Christianity are
those which are deduced from the nature of the
facts, doctrines and moral precepts which it ^e-
veals, and from the harmony and consistency of
all its parts. The following is a brief summary

118

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

of the leading views which may be taken of this
subject.

1. The dignity and majesty of the style in
which many portions of the Scriptures are writ
ten, and the sublimity of many of the ideas and
tentiments they contain, are strong presumptions
of their divine original. This is strikingly ex
hibited in all those cases in which the perfections
and operations of the Deity are brought into view,
as in such passages as the following, — " He
hangeth the earth upon nothing ; he bindeih up
the waters in his thick clouds ; he hath compass
ed the waters with bounds, until the day and
night come to an end ; the pillars of heaven
tremble and are astonished at his reproof. He
divideth the sea by his great power ; by his
spirit he hath garnished the heavens. Lo, these
are only parts of his ways, but how little a por
tion is heard of him, and the thunder of his power
who can comprehend ?" — " By the word of the
Lord were the heavens made : he spake and it
was done, he commanded and it stood fast."
" Great is Jehovah and of great power, his great
ness is unsearchable, his understanding is infi
nite ; marvellous things doth he which we can
not comprehend." "The heaven, even the
heaven of heavens cannot contain him ; he hath
prepared his throne in the heavens, and his king
dom ruleth over all. He doth according to his
will in the army of heaven and among the inha
bitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand,
or say unto him, what dost thou ?" " Who hath
measured the ocean in the hollow of his hand,
and meted out heaven with a span, and com
prehended the dust of the earth in a measure,
and weighed the mountains in scales and the
hills in a balance. Who hath directed the
spirit of the Lord, or being his counsellor hath
taught him ? Behold, the nations are as a drop
of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of
the balance. Behold, he taketh up the isles as
a very little thine. All nations before him are
as nothing, and they are counted to him less than
nothing and vanity." These, and many similar
passages to be found in the sacred writings, far
surpass, in dignity of language and sublimity,.of
sentiment, every thing that is to be found in the
writings of the most celebrated poets and philo
sophers of Greece and Rome. If we take the
most animated poems of Homer, Virgil, or Ho
race, and read them in a prose translation, as we
do the Scriptures, they appear flat and jejune,
and their spirit is almost evaporated ; and the
words they put into the mouths of their deities
and the actions they ascribe to them, are fre
quently both ridiculous and absurd, calculated to
fixcite hatred and contempt, instead of adoration
and reverence. But the Scriptures preserve
their sublimity and glory even in the most literal
translation, and such a translation into any lan
guage is always found to be the best; and it has
uniformly happened, that those who have pro

sumed to heighten the expressions by a poetica.
translation or paraphrase, have failed in the at
tempt. It indicates an utter want of true tasie
in any man to despise or undervalue these writ
ings. Were it not that the sacred penmen lay
claim to the inspiration of the Almighty, and,
consequently, set themselves in direct opposition
to pride, lasciviousness, revenge, and every other
unholy principle and passion, the bible, in point
of the beauty and sublimity of its sentiments, and
the variety of interesting information it conveys,
would be prized more highly by every man of
taste than all the other writings either of poets,
philosophers or historians, which have descended
to us from the remotest ages of antiquity.

2. The Christian religion exhibits the most ra
tional, sublime, and consistent views of the Divine
Being. It represents him as self-ex islent and
independent, and as " the high and lofiy One
who inhabited eternity," before the universe
was brought into existence, in whose sight "a
thousand years are as one day, and one day as
a thousand years." It represents him as filling
the immensity of space with his presence, as
having the most intimate knowledge of all crea
tures and events throughout the vast creation, as
the Creator of heaven and earth, as possessed
of uncontrollable power, infinite wisdom and in
telligence, boundless benevolence and mercy,
perfect rectitude and holiness, and inviolable
faithfulness and truth. It represents his provi
dential care as extending to all the creatures he
has formed, and to all their movements, however
numerous or minute ; animating the vegetable
and animal tribes, setting bounds to the raging
billows, " thundering marvellously with his voice,
sending lightnings with rain," having <; his way
in the whirlwind and the storm," making "the
earth to quake at his presence," shining in the
stars, glowing in the sun, and moving with his
hands the mighty worlds which compose the
universe. It represents him as governing the
universe of minds which he has formed, as hav
ing the " hearts" and purposes " of all men in his
hand," and as directing all the mysterious and
wonderful powers of knowledge and moral action
to fulfil his purposes' throughout the whole extent
of his immense and eternal empire. Snch a
being, when properly contemplated, is calculated
to draw forth the love and adoration of all rational
beings; and wherever Christianity lias imparted
a knowledge of these attributes of the divinity,
idolatry and superstition, with all their absurdi
ties, abominations, and horrid cruelties, hava
gradually disappeared.

3. Christianity has given us full assurance of
the immortality of man and of a future state of
punishments and rewards. Nothing can be of
more importance to every human being than to
be assured of his eternal destination. Without
the discoveries of Christiar.ity, we can attain to
no absolute certainty on this momentous sub»ecti

MORAL LAWS OF REVELATION.

119

Ttu greatest philosophers of the heathen world
considered the arguments in favour of man's
immortal destiny as amounting only to a certain
degree of probability, and their minds were con
tinually hanging in doubt and uncertainty, as to
what might befall them at the hour of dissolu
tion. The most powerful arguments in proof
of a future retribution, are founded on the justice,
the benevolence, and the wisdom of the Deity ;
but it is questionable whether we should ever
have acquired clear conceptions of these at
tributes of the Divinity without the aid of the
revelations of the Bible. On this most important
point, however, Christianity dissipates every ob
scurity, dispels every doubt, and sets the doctrine
of " life and immortality" beyond the grave, in
the clearest light, not by metaphysical reasonings,
unintelligible to the bulk of mankind, but by the
positive declarations of him who hath " all power
in heaven and on earth." It gives full assurance to
all who devote themselves to the service of God,
and conform to his will, that " when their earthly
tabernacles are dissolved, they have a building
of God, an house not made with hands, eternal
in the heavens ;" and that " the afflictions " to
which they are now exposed " work out for
them an eternal weight of glory." And, to con
sole them in the prospect of dropping their bo
dies into the grave, they are assured, that the
period is approaching, when their mortal frame
"shall put on immortality," and when "all who
are in their graves shall hear the voice of the
Son of God, and shall come forth, they that
have done good to the resurrection of life, and
they that have done evil to the resurrection of
condemnation."

4. Christianity clearly points out the way by
which pardon of sin may be obtained by the guilty.
Reason discovers that man is guilty, and at the
same time perceives that a sinner de&erves
punishment. Hence, the remorse and the fears
with which the consciences of sinners in every
ftge have been tormented. " Wherewithal shall
I come before the Lord ? Shall I come with
thousands of burnt offerings ? Shall I offer my
first-born for my transgressions, the fruit of my
body for the sin of my soul ?" are the anxious
inquiries of every sinner who feels conscious
that he has violated the laws of Heaven. Hence,
the numerous modes by which Pagan nations
have attempted to appease the wrath of their
deities; hence, their sacrifices, their burnt-of
ferings, their bodily tortures, their human vic
tims, and the rivers of blood which have flowed
in their temples and upon their altars. But
reason could never prove, that by any of these
modes sin could be expiated, and'the Deity ren
dered propitious. Christianity alone unfolds
the plan of redemption, and the way by which
guilty men may obtain forgiveness and accep-
Iance in the sight of him whose laws they have
violated. It declares, " that Christ Jesus died

for our offences, and rose again for our justifi
cation ;" that " God hath set him forth as a
propitiation to declare his righteousness in the
remission of sins," and that, having made so
cosily a sacrifice for the sins of the world, he
will refuse nothing that can contribute to th«
present and everlasting happiness of the believer
in Jesus. " He who spared not his own Son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not
with him also freely give us all things ?" Such de
clarations, when cordially received, are sufficient
to allay all the fears of a guilty conscience, to
inspire the soul with holy love and gratitude,
and to produce " a peace of mind that passeth
all understanding."

5. Christianity inculcates thepurest and most
comprehensive system of morality. Its moral re
quisitions are all comprehended under the two
following rules or principles, " Thou shall love
the Lord thy God with all thy heart," and " thou
shall love thy neighbour as ihyself," which di
verge into numberless ramifications. It could
easily be shown, that these principles are suffi
cient to form the basis of a moral code for the
whole intelligent creation, that they are calculat
ed to unite the creature lo ihe Crealor, and all
rational beings wilh one anolher, wherever they
may exist throughout the boundless empire of
the Almighty ; and that peace, order, and happi
ness would be the invariable and necessary re
sults wherever their influence extended. If the
love of God reigned supreme in every heart,
there would be no superstition or idolatry in the
universe, nor any of the crimes and abominations
with which they have been accompanied in our
world, — no blasphemy or profanation of the
name of Jehovah, — no perjury, hypocrisy, arro
gance, pride, ingratitude, nor murmurings under
the allotments of Divine Providence. And, if
every moral intelligence loved his fellow-creatures
as himself, there would be no rivalships and an
tipathies between nations, and, consequently, no
wars, devastation, nor carnage, — no tyranny,
haughtiness, or oppression among the great, nor
envy, discontent, or insubordination among the
lower classes of society, — no systems of slavery,
nor persecutions on account of religious opinions,
— no murders, thefts, robberies, or assassina
tions, — no treacherous friendships, nor fraud and
deceit in commercial transactions, — no impla
cable resentments among friends and relatives,
and no ingratitude or disobedience among child
ren or servants. On the other hand, meekness,
long suffering, gentleness, humility, lemperance,
fidelity, brotherly kindness, and sacied joy,
would pervade every heart, and transform our
world from a scene of contention and misery to
a moral paradise. The comprehensive nature
of these laws or principles, and their tendency
to produce universal order and happiness among
all intelligences, form, therefore, a strong pre
sumptive argument of their divine original.

120

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Tl,«re are certain Christian precepts, dif
ferent from all that were ever taught by ihe sages
of the Pagan world, and in direct opposition to
their most favourite maxims, which mi^ht be
shown to have the same beneficial tendency.
For example, it is one of the precepts laid down
by the Founder of our religion, " Resist not evil,
but whosoever shall smite thee on the right
cheek, turn to him the other also," &c. ; and in
accordance with this precept he propounds the
following," Love your enemies, do good to them
that hate you, and pray for them who despite-
fully use you and persecute you." And he en
forces it by one of the most sublime and beautiful
motives, " That ye may be the children of your
Father who is in heaven, for he maketh the sun
to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth
rain on the just and on the unjust." Now, these
precepts of morality are not only original, and
peculiar to the Christian system, but they are in
direct opposition to all the virtues generally de
nominated heroic, and which are so much cele
brated by the poets, philosophers, and historians
of antiquity. While the annals of history pro
claim, that the exercise of the heroic virtues
(among which are classed implacability and re
venge,) has banished peace from the world, and
covered the earth with devastation and bloodshed,
it could easily be shown, that, were the virtues
inculcated by our Saviour universally practised,
there would not be an enemy on the face of the
globe, wars would cease to the ends of the earth,
and the whole world would form one vast com
munity offriends and brethren. Whereas, were
the opposite dispositions universal, an uncon
trolled by any counteracting principle, they
would produce a scene of universal contention
and misery throughout the moral universe. —
Another disposition peculiar to the Christian
system, and which is enforced throughout both
the Old and the New Testament, is humility.
So little was this disposition regarded by the
ancient heathen world, that, in the classical lan
guages of Greece and Rome, there is no word to
denote the virtue of humility. It is a quality,
however, which results so naturally out of the re
lation in which man stands to his Maker, and is
so correspondent to the low rank which he holds
in the scale of universal being, that the religion
which so powerfully enjoins it may be said to
have " a sign from heaven" that it proceeds from
God. And, in his intercourses in society, a man
will always find, that there is a far higher degree
of quiet and satisfaction to be enjoyed, by hum
bling himself, than by endeavouring to humble
others ; for every arrogant and haughty spirit
will uniformly smart under the feelings of wound
ed pride, and disappointed ambition.

The Christian virtues to which I have now
adverted, ought not to be considered as the cha
racteristics of a mean and unmanly spirit, or as
contrary to the dignity and energy of the human

character. The apostles and first Christians,
who uniformly practised these virtues, were di*.
tinguished by undaunted fortitude and almosi
unparalleled intrepidity. They advocated their
cause, before princes and rulers, with the utmost
dignity and composure ; they were ready to suf
fer the greatest persecutions, and even the most
excruciating torments, rather than betray the sa
cred cause in which they had embarked ; arid one
of them had the boldness, when brought before
the Roman governor as a prisoner, to arraign
the very vices for which he was notorious, and to
make the profligate judge tremble in his presence.*
So far from these virtues being mean or unmanly,
they are the principal qualities that are justly en
titled to the epithet heroic; for they are the most
difficult to be acquired and sustained, as they run
counter to the general current of human passion
and feeling, and to all the corrupt propensities of
the nature of man. A man may have sufficient
heroism to bombard a town, or to conquer an
army, and yet be altogether unable to regulate
his temper, or subdue his boisterous passions.
But, " he that is slow to anger, is better than the
mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that
taketh a city." In the one case, we strive against
the corrupt affect ions of our nature, in the other,
(as in giving vent to implacability and revenge,)
we give loose reins to our malignant passions.
In the one case, we struggle against the stream,
in order to obtain safety and repose ; in the other,
we allow ourselves to be hurried along with the
current, regardless of the rocks against which wo
may be dashed, or the whirlpools in which we may
be engulfed. In proportion, then, as the Chris*
tian virtues prevail in any community, willquar'
rels and contentions, and every thing destructive
of human enjoyment, be effectually prevented,
and happiness diffused among all ranks of so
ciety.

In short, Christianity, in its moral requisitions,
enjoins every relative and reciprocal duty be
tween parents and children, masters and servants,
husbands and wives, governors and subjects ,
and, not only enforces the practice of justice and
equity in all such relations, but inspires the most
sublime and extensive charity, — a boundless and
disinterested effusion of tenderness for the whole
species, which feels for their distress, and ope
rates for their relief and improvement. It pre
scribes no self-denial, except with regard to sinful
lusts and depraved passions; no mortification,
except of evil affections; it gives full scope to
every feeling that contributes to the real enjoy
ment of life, while it guards, by the most awfu)
sanctions, every duty the observance of which is
necessary for our present and future happiness.
It extends our views beyond the limits of ihe
present state, and shows us, that the future hap
piness of man is connected with his present con-

* Acts xxiv. 25.

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF CHRISTIANITY.

12]

duct, and that every actioo of our lives should
have a reference to that immortal existence to
whicn we are destined. But it never insinuates,
that earth and heaven are opposed to each other,
as to their duties and enjoyments, or that we
must be miserable here, in order to be happy
hereafter. For while it prescribes rules which
have for their ultimate object our happiness in a
future world, the observance of these rules is cal
culated to secure our highest enjoyment even in
the present life ; and every one who has devoted
himself to the practice of genuine Christianity
has uniformly found, that " godliness is profitable
unto all things, having the promise both of the
life that now is, and of that which is to come."
On the characteristics of the moral code of Chris
tianity, then, I should scarcely hesitate to rest
almost the whole of the internal evidence of its
divine original. For laws, which have a tendency
to unite in a bond of affectionate union the whole
intelligent creation, — which, if practised, would
undermine every species of moral evil, and pro
mote peace and happiness over all the earth, and
which are equally calculated to produce true en
joyment in this world, and to prepare us for the
higher felicities of the world to come, — must
have had their origin in the mind of that Al
mighty Being whose omniscient eye perceives all
the effects of every principle of action, and all
the relations which subsist throughout the moral
universe.

6. Christianity explains certain moral phe
nomena, which would otherwise have been inex
plicable, and affords strong consolation under the
evils of life. It throws a light on the origin of
evil, and the disorders both of the physical and
moral world, by informing us, that man has lost
his original happiness and integrity, that the earth
has been defiled by his sin and rebellion, and
that it is no longer the beautiful and magnifi
cent fabric which it appeared during the period
of primeval innocence. On the same ground, it
discovers the reason, why death has been permit
ted to enter our terrestrial system, and the cause
of all those afflictions and calamities to which
mankind are subjected. It presents before us
principles, sufficient to explain most of the ap
parent irregularities and mysterious operations
which appear in the moral government of the Al
mighty, — why storms and tempests, earthquakes
and volcanoes are permitted to produce their rav
ages,— why the wicked so frequently enjoy pros
perity, while the virtuous groan under the pres
sure of adversity,--why tyranny is established
and vice enthroned, while virtue is despised, and
love to truth and righteousness sometimes expo
ses its votary to intolerable calamities. All such
occurrences, under the government of God, are
accounted for on these general principles,--that
Ihey fulfil his counsel, — that they are subservient
to th« accomplishment of some higher designs of
which we are partly ignorant, and that the justice

and equity of his procedure will be fully display
ed and vindicated in the future world, where
" every man will be rewarded according to his
works." And as Christianity explains the cause
of the physical and moral evils which exist in our
world, so it affords strong consolation 10 the minds
of its votaries under the afflictions to which they
are now exposed. For, what is death to that
mind which considers immortality as the career
of its existence ? What are the frowns of for
tune to him who claims an eternal world as his
inheritance ? What is the loss of friends to that
heart which feels that it shall quickly rejoin
them in a more intimate and permanent inter
course than any of which the present life is sus
ceptible ? What are the changes and revolutions
of earthly things to a mind which uniformly an
ticipates a state of unchangeable felicity ? As
earth is but a point in the universe, and time but
a moment in infinite duration, such are the hopes
of the Christian in comparison of every sublunary
misfortune.

7. Revelation communicates to us a know
ledge of facts and doctrines which we could not
otherwise have acquired. It informs, us that
the Deity existed alone innumerable ages before
Time began — that the material universe was
brought into existence, at his command, and by
the exertion of his A/mighty power — and that
the earth, in its present form, had no existence
at a period seven thousand years oeyond the
present. It informs us of the manner in which
this globe was first peopled, of the primeval
state of its first inhabitants, of their fall from the
state of innocence and purity in which they
were at first created, of the increase of wicked
ness which followed the entrance of sin into the
world, of the Deluge which swept away its in
habitants, and of which the most evident traces
are still visible on the surface, and in the bowels
of the earth, — and of the manner in which Noah
and his family were preserved from this uni
versal destruclion, for the re-peopling of the
world. It informs us of the time, manner and
circumstances in which the various languages
which now exist had their origin — a subject
which completely puzzteJ ui< the ancient philoso
phers, which f^sy could never explain, and on
which no other history or tradition could throw
the least degree of hjj".'.. It unfolds to us views
of the state of society in th*» ~.?es that succeeded
the deluge, of the coun'-^s into which mankind
were dispersed, and of the empires wnich they
founded. It records the history of Abraham,
the legislation of Mosf»s, the deliverance of the
tribes of Israel from Egypt, their passage
through the Red-sea, their journeyings through
the deserts of Arabia, under the guidance of the
pillar of cloud and of fire, and their conquest of
the land of Canaan. It informs us of a succes
sion of prophets that were raised up to announce
the coming of Messiah, and to foretel the moat

122

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

remarkable events that were to take place in the
future ages of the world — of the appearance of
Jesus Christ, of the promulgation of his gospel,
and the miraculous effects with which it was
accompanied. All which events, as explained
and illus'rated in the Sacred History, form one
grand series of dispensations which is, in the
highest degree, illustrative of the Power, Wis
dom, Goodness and Rectitude of the Supreme
Being, — and of which no other records can give
us any certain information.

8. The beneficial effects which Christianity has
produced in the world constitute a most power
ful evidence of its divinity. One striking effect
it has produced, is, the superior light it has
thrown on the great objects of religion, and the
knowledge it has communicated respecting its
moral requisitions. Wherever it has been
received, it has completely banished the absurd
systems of polytheism and pagan idolatry, with
all the cruel and obscene rites with which they
were accompanied ; and in their place, has sub-
stituled a system of doctrine and practice, not
only pure and rational, but level to the compre
hension of the lowest class of society. A me
chanic or peasant, instructed in the leading
principles of Revelation, now entertains more
just and consistent notions of God, of his perfec
tions, his laws, and the plan of his universal
providence, than the most renowned philoso
phers of ancient times ever acquired. Chris
tianity has produced an influence even on the
progress of the arts and of rational science ; for
wherever it has been established, they have
uniformly followed in its train ; and the latest
discoveries in philosophy, so far from being
repugnant to its doctrines and facts, are in per
fect consistency with all its revelations, and
tend to illustrate many of its sublime annuncia
tions. With regard to practice — it has intro
duced many virtues which were altogether
unknown in the heathen world. Instead of
sottish idolatry, lasciviousness, unnatural lusts,
pride, ostentation, and ambition, it has intro
duced, among all who submit to its authority,
rational piety, humility, moderation, self-denial,
charity, meekness, patience under affronts and
injuries, resignation to the will of God, brotherly
kindness, and active beneficence. In the first
ages of Christianity, such virtues were eminent
ly conspicuous.—-' See," said the heathen, « how
these Christians love one another." Lactanti-
us, one of the early Apologists, was able to say,
in the face of his antagonists, "Give me a man
who is wrathful, malicious, revengeful, and, with
a few words of God, I will make him calm as a
lamb ; give me one that is a covetous, niggard
ly miser, and I will give you him again liberal,
bountiful, and dealing out of his money hy hand-
fuls; give me one that is fearful of pain and death,
and immediately he shall despise racks and

crosses, and the most dreadful punishments you
can invent."

Its influence on communities and nations is
no less evident, in the changes it has introduced
in the circumstances of domestic life, and the
barbarous practices it has completely abolished.
When it made its way through the Roman em
pire, it abolished the unnatural practice of poly
gamy and concubinage, reduced the number of
divorces, and mitigated the rigour of servitude,
which, among the Romans, was cruel and severn
— masters being often so inhuman as to remove
aged, sick or infirm slaves into an island in the
Tiber, where they suffered them to perish with
out pity or assistance. Polished and polite, as
the Romans have been generally considered, they
indulged in the most barbarous entertainments.
They delighted to behold men combating with
wild beasts and with one another ; and we are in
formed by respectable historians, that the fights
of gladiators sometimes deprived Europe of
twenty thousand lives in one month. Neither
the humanity of Titus, nor the wisdom and vir
tue of Trajan, could abolish these barbarous spec
tacles, till the gentle and humane spirit of the
gospel put a final period to such savage prac
tices, and they can never again be resumed in
any nation where its light is diffused, and its
authority acknowledged. It humanized the bar
barous hordes that overturned the Roman empire,
and softened their ferocious tempers, as soon as
they embraced its principles and yielded to its
influence. It civilized, and raised from moral
and intellectual degration, the wild Irish, and
our forefathers the ancient Britons, who were
classed among the rudest of barbarians till the
time when they were converted to the religion o(
Jesus ; so that the knowledge we now see diffused
around us, the civilization to which we have ad
vanced, the moral order which prevails, the
beauties which adorn our cultivated fields, the
comforts and decorations connected with our
cities and towns, and the present improved
state of the arts and sciences, may all be consi
dered as so many of the beneficial effects which
the Christian religion has produced among us.

In our own times, we have beheld effects no less
powerful and astonishing, in the moral revolution
which Christianity has lately produced in Tahiti,
and the adjacent islands in the Southern ocean.
In this instance, we behold a people who, a few
years ago, .were among the most degraded of the
human race — who were under the influence of the
most cruel superstitions and idolatries — who ador
ed the most despicable idols — who sacrificed on
their altars multitudes of human victims, and
were plunged into all the vices and debauche
ries, and vile abominations which can debase the
character of man — we behold them now trans
formed into civilized and Christian societies—
their minds enlightened in the knowledge of the

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF CHRISTIANITY.

123

tnw God. tneir tempers moulded into the spirit of
the religion of Jesus, — their savage practices
abolished, — industry, peace and moral order
spreading their benign influence on all around,
and multitudes rejoicing in the prospect ofa bless
ed immortality. Where barrenness and desola
tion formerly prevailed, ana where only a few sa
vage huts appeared, open to the wind and rain,
beautiful villages are now arising, furnished with
all the comforts and accommodations of civilized
life. Where pagan altars lately stood, and hu
man victims were cruelly butchered, spacious
temples are now erected for the worship of " the
'3od and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," and
seminaries for the literary and religious instruc
tion of the young. Where sanguinary battles
were fought, amidst the furious yells of savage
combatants, who cruelly massacred every prison
er of war — the voice of rejoicing and of thanks
giving is now heard ascending to Heaven from
the peaceable " dwellings of the righteous," — all
which effects have been produced, within less
than twenty years, by the powerful and benign
agency of the Gospel of peace.*

Even war itself— the most disgraceful and dia
bolical practice in which mankind have indulged,
and which will affix an eternal stigma on the hu
man character-— even war has assumed something
of the spirit of mildness and humanity, compared
with the savage ferocity with which it was con
ducted during the reign of heathenism. Prison
ers are no longer massacred in cold blood ; the
conquered are spared, and their liberty frequent
ly restored ; and, were the principles of Christi
anity recognised, and universally acted upon by
professing Christian nations, the spirit of warfare
would soon be wholly exterminated, and Peace
would extend its benign influence over all the
kingdoms and families of the earth. The cele
brated Montesquieu, in his " Spirit of Laws,"
has observed, " The mildness so frequently re
commended in the gospel is incompatible with
the despotic rage with which an arbitrary tyrant
punishes his subjects and exercises himself in
cruelty. It is the Christian religion which, in
spite of the extent of empire and the influence of
climate, has hindered despotism from being esta
blished in Ethiopia, and has carried into Africa
the manners of Europe. The heir to the throne
of Ethiopia enjoys a principality, and gives to
other subjects an example of love and obedience.
Not far from hence may be seen the Mahometan

(shutting up the children of the king ofSenaar, at
whose death the council sends to murder them in
favour of the prince who ascends the throne." —
" Let us set before our eyes, on the one hand,
the continual massacres of the kings and generals
of the Greeks and Romans, and on the other, the

• Fora particular account of this moral revolution
which has recently taken place in the society and
other islands of the Pacific, the reader Is referred
to "KUis" Polynesian Researches," 2vols. 8vo

destruction of people and c ities by the famous con-
querprs Timur Beg, and Jenghis Kan, who i avag
ed Asia, and we shall perceive, that we owe lo
Christianity in government a certain political lawr
and in war a certain law of nations, which allows
to the conquered the great advantages of liberty,
laws, wealth, and always religion, when the con
queror is not blind to his own interest."

But Christianity has not only abolished many
barbarous practices, it has likewise given birth
to numerous benevolent institutions and establish
ments altogether unknown in Pagan countries.
Let us consider the numerous schools for the in
struction of youth in useful knowledge and in the
principles of religion, which are erected in all
towns and villages in Christian countries, the nu
merous churches and chapels devoted to the wor
ship of God, and to the instruction and comfort of
individuals of every condition, age, and sex, — the
colleges and caademies which have been founded
for imparting knowledge in literature, and in arts
and sciences, — the numerous philanthropic soci
eties which have been formed for the relief of the
aged, the infirm, and the destitute sick, — the edu
cation of the deaf and dumb, — the reformation of
the criminal code, — the improvement of prison
discipline, — the reformation of juvenile offend
ers, — the aiding of the friendless, the orphan, and
the widow, — the literary and moral instruction
of the children of the poor, — the relief of desti
tute imprisoned debtors, — the improvement of
the domestic condition of the labouring classes, —
the promotion of permanent and universal peace,
— the diffusion of the knowledge of the Christian
religion throughout every region of the globe,
and for various other benevolent purposes, all
calculated to alleviate the distresses of suffering
humanity, to extend the blessings of knowledge,
and to communicate enjoyment to all ranks of
mankind ; and we may challenge the enemies of
our religion to point out similar institutions in
any pagan country under heaven that has never
felt the influence of Christianity. And if such
beneficent effects are the native result of the be
nevolent and expansive spirit of Christianity,
they form a strong presumptive evidence, inde
pendently of any other consideration, that it de
rived its origin from that Almighty Being who
is good to all, and whose " tender mercies are
over all his works."

In fine, Christianity is adapted to every coun
try and every clime. Its doctrines and preceptg
are equally calculated to promote the happiness
of princes and subjects, statesmen and philoso
phers, the high and the low, the rich and the
poor. It is completely adapted to the nature
and necessities of man ; its rites are few and
simple, and may be observed in every region of
the globe. It forbids the use of nothing but
what is injurious to health of body or peace of
mind, and it has a tendency to promote a friendly
and affectionate intercourse among men of a..

124

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

rations. And, as it 5s calculated for being uni
versally extended, so its prophets have foretold
that its blessings shall ultimately be enjoyed by
all nations. In the period in which we live, we
behold such predictions more rapidly accomplish
ing than in former times, in consequence of the
spirit of missionary enterprise which now per
vades the religious world. And when it shall
have extended a little farther in its progress, and
shall have brought a few more kingdoms and
islands under its authority, its beneficent effects
will be more clearly discerned, and the eviden
ces of its celestial origin will appear with a
force and power which its most determined ad
versaries will not be able to gainsay or resist.

In proportion as the physical sciences advance,
and the system of nature is explored, will the
harmony between the operations of the Creator
in the material world and the revelations of his
word, become more strikingly apparent. Ever
since philosophy began to throw aside its hypo
thetical assumptions and theoretical reasonings,
and to investigate nature on the broad basis of
induction, its discoveries have been found com
pletely accordant with the Scriptures of truth,
and illustrative of many of the sublime senti
ments they contain. Geology, when in its in
fancy, was eagerly brought forward by a few
sceptical and superficial minds, to subserve the
cause of infidelity. A few pretended facts, of an
insulated nature, were triumphantly exhibited, as
insuperable objections to the truth of the Mosaic
history and chronology. But later and more
accurate researches have completely disproved
the allegations of such sceptical philosophers, and
were they now alive, they would feel ashamed
of their ignorance, and of the fallacious state
ments by which they attempted to impose on the
credulity of mankind. As geology advances in
its investigations, along with its kindred scien
ces, the facts which it is daily disclosing appear
more and more corroborative of the description
given in the Bible of the original formation and
arrangement of our globe, and of the universal
deluge. And, therefore, we have every reason
to conclude, that when science and art shall have
arrived at a still higher point of perfection, and
our terrestrial system shall have been more tho
roughly explored throughout all its departments,
arguments will be derived from philosophy itself
in support of the divinity of our religion, which
will carry irresistible conviction to every mind.

Such is a very brief summary of the internal
evidences of the Christian religion. It is distin
guished by the dignity and sublimity of the style
and sentiments of the writings which contain its
revelations, — it exhibits the most rational and
consistent views of the attributes of the Divine
Being, — it gives us full assurance of a future
state of immortality, — it points out the way by
which pardon of sin and deliverance from moral
erl may be obtained,*— it exhibits the purest and

most comprehensive system of morality, — it ex
plains certain moral phenomena which woixtd
otherwise have been inexplicable, — it affords
strong consolation under the evils of lift;, — it com
municates the knowledge of interesting facts and
doctrines which can be found in no other record.
— it has produced the most beneficial effects on
the state of society wherever it has been receiv
ed, — it is completely adapted to the necessities
of man, and calculated for being universally ex
tended over the world; — to which we might
have added, that it is consistent in all its parts,
when viewed through the medium of enlightened
criticism, and harmonises wiih the principles of
sound reason, and the dictates of an enlightened
conscience. These are characteristics which
will apply to no other system of religion that was
ever proposed to the world ; and if Christianity,
accompanied with such evidences, is not divine
in its original, we rnay boldly affirm that there is
no other religion known among men that can lay
claim to this high prerogative. But we do not
think it possible that the mind of man can receive
a more convincing demonstration of the truth of
Christianity than is set before us in the authen
tic facts on wnich it rests, in its tendency to pro
duce universal happiness, and in the intrinsic
excellence for which it is distinguished. That
man, therefore, by whatever appellation he may
be distinguished, who sets himself in opposition
to the spirit of this religion, and endeavours to
counteract its progress, must be considered as
not only destitute of true taste and of moral ex
cellence, but as an enemy to the happiness of
his species. If the religion of the Bible is dis
carded, we are left completely in the dark with
regard to every thing that is most interesting to
man as an intellectual being, and as a moral
and accountable agent. We should, in this
case, have the most imperfect conceptions of the
attributes of Deity, and should know nothing of
his designs in giving us existence, and placing
us in this part of his empire, — we should remain
in ignorance whether the world had a beginning
or had existed from eternity, or whether we shall
ever have an opportunity of beholding the grand
system of the universe a little more unfolded, —
we should be destitute of any fixed moral laws to
direct us in our social transactions arid inter
courses, — we should be entirely ignorant of the
principles and objects of the moral government ot
the Almighty, — we should be destitute of any
consolation under the afflictions and calamities of
life, — we should hang continually in doubt wheth
er death is to put a final termination to our being,
or convey us to another and an eternal state o/
existence ; and, at length, we should be plunged
into the gulf of universal scepticism, into which
every rejecter of revelation ultimately sinks.

It may not be improper to remark,' that the re
ligion to whose characteristics I have now ad-
verted, is not to be considered as precisely that

EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY INCREASING.

135

foim of Christianity which has been established
in Italy, in Germany, in Russia, or in Britain ;
or as it is professed by Episcopalians, Presbyte
rians, Independents, or any other sectary ; or as
it is expounded in the catechisms, confessions, or
systems of divinity, which have been published
by the different denominations of the Christian
world. In all these cases, its true glory has been
obscured, its beauty defaced, and its purity con
taminated, by passing through the atmosphere of
human folly and corruption ; and opinions and
practices have been incorporated with its leading
principles altogether repugnant to the liberal and
expansive spirit for which it is distinguished. It
is to the Christianity of the Bible alone to which I
refer. It is there alone that it is to be seen in
its native purity, simplicity, and glory ; and he
who neglects to study the Scriptures, unfettered
by the trammels of human systems, will never be
able fully to perceive or to appreciate the true
excellence of that religion, which is " pure and
peaceable, full of mercy and good fruits," and
which breathes " good will towards men." For,
in some of the forms which Christianity has as
sumed in certain countries, it has been so much
blended with human inventions, as to be scarcely
distinguishable from heathenism ; and, conse
quently, in such cases, it has seldom been ac
companied with those, beneficial effects which it
is calculated to produce. And, among almost
all the sectaries in every country, either some of
its distinguishing features have been overlooked,
or its doctrines mixed up with metaphysical dog
mas, or its practical bearings disregarded, or opin
ions respecting its forms and circumstantials set
in competition with its fundamental truths and
moral requisitions. " Nevertheless, the founda
tion of God standeth sure," — and the Divine
fabric of Christianity will remain unshaken and
unimpaired, so long as the Scriptures are preserv
ed uncontaminated and entire.

The evidences to which I have now adverted
are continually increasing rn their clearness and
force. Time, which is gradually undermining
the foundation of error, is enlarging the bulwarks
of truth, and adding to their strength and stabil
ity. Opposition has tended only to clear away
the rubbish which has been thrown around the
Christian fabric, but is has shown its foundations
to be firm and impregnable. The historical evi
dence has been gaining strength ever since the
davs of the apostles, and since the time when
Herbert, Chubb, Tindal, Morgan, and other in
fidel writers attempted to undermine the cause
of -evealed religion. The defences which were
published by Grotius, Stillingfleet,Butler, Leland,
Watson, Paley, and others, have shown, that the
more the arguments for Christianity have been
opposed, sifted, and examined, the more irresisti
ble have they appeared, and the more have they
shone with increasing brightness ; so that no in
fidel has ever attempted to meet them on fair

grounds. — The evidence from prophecy, from its
very nature, is continually progressive ; a«d, in
proportion as Scripture predictions are studied
with judgment and intelligence, and compared
with the history of past ages and the present state
of the nations, will a new light be thrown on the
prophetical writings,which will cause the evidence
of their divinity to shine forth with a brighter,
lustre, and enable every intelligent observer to
read, in passing events and in the revolutions of
empires, the faithfulness of the Almighty in ac
complishing those declarations, which, " at sun
dry times and divers manners, he spake to the
fathers by the prophets.'' — The internal evidence
which has been more overlooked than it ought to
have been, is likewise increasing, and will conti
nue to increase, in proportion as the Scriptures
are perused with judgment and care, as nature is
contemplated with humility and reverence, and
as useful knowledge is diffused over the world.
When the holy principles of our religion shall
have acquired a greater influence over the tem
pers and conduct of its professors ; when the de
liberations of statesmen and tho conduct of states
and empires shall be directed by its maxims and
laws ; when Christianity shall be divested of the
false drapery with which its pretended friends
have attempted to adorn it, and freed from the
corruptions which human folly has incorporated
with its institutions; when all who recognise its
leading doctrines, throwing aside party disputes
and animosities, shall form themselves into one
grand and harmonious association ; when a few
more portions of the heathen world shall have
been brought into subjection to the Prince of
Peace, and when the general happiness result
ing from such events shall be felt and acknow
ledged — then, all who behold such blessed trans
formations will be enabled to read, in characters
that cannot be mistaken, that the Creator of the
universe is the original author of Christianity,
and that the promotion of the best interests of
mankind is the great end of all its revelations.

My intention in giving the preceding summary
of the evidences of Christianity is, to show, that,
without habits of rational thinking and a certain
portion of general information, these evidences
cannot be thoroughly investigated, nor their
weight and importance duly appreciated. For,
how can a mind unaccustomed to reading and re
flection be supposed capable of entering into all
the topics and considerations requisite to be at
tended to in such investigations, — of balancing
arguments, — of comparing prophecies with their
accomplishment in the history of nations, — of
detecting sophisms, or of feel ing the force of rea
sonings, however clear or powerful ? It is des
titute of those fundamental principles and general
ideas on which all moral ratiocinations are

126

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

grounded. On such a mind, the most weighty
arguments and the most cogent reasonings make
no sensible impression. It may be susceptible
of being biassed against religion by the sneers
and sarcasms of jovial companions, and the ri
dicule with which they may treat the truths of
revelation, but it is unqualified either to rebut
such impertinences, or to appreciate the excel
lencies of Christianity, the foundation on which
it rests, and the benignant tendency of its doc
trines and precepls. And if, in the present day,
a man has no acquaintance with the grounds and
reasons of revealed religion, and the evidences
on which its truth and divinity rest, he will not
only be indifferent to the observance of its pre
cepts, and destitute of its supports and consola
tions, but will be constantly liable to be turned
aside to the paths of folly and intemperance, and
to become thv) prey of unthinking fools and scoff
ing infidels. Whereas, when a man can give a
reason of the hope that is in him, his religion be
comes a delightful and a rational service, and he
is enabled to put to silence the scoffs and vain
cavillings of foolish and unreasonable men.

Besides assisting us in investigating the evi
dences of religion — a certain portion of general
information is highly useful, and even necessary
fm enabling us to understand the Sacred writings.
£t is true, indeed, that the leading doctrines of
revelation, respecting the attributes of God, the
mediation of Christ, the way in which salvation
is to be obtained, the grand principles of moral
action, and the duties connected with the several
relations of life, are detailed with such plainness
and perspicuity as to be level to the comprehen
sion of every reflecting mind, however unskilled
in literature or science. But there are certain
portions of Revelation, necessary " to make the
man of God perfect," the study of which requires
the exertion of all our faculties, and the applica
tion of every branch of human knowledge we
can possibly acquire. This arises from the very
nature of the subjects treated of, and from the li
mited faculties of the human mind. To illus
trate this idea is the object of the following re
marks.

1. A considerable portion of Scripture is oc
cupied with prophetical declarations, — in refe
rence to events which have long since taken
place, to those which are now happening, and to
those which will hereafter happen in the future
ages of the world. It contains a series of pre
dictions which embrace the leading outlines of
the history of the world, from its commencement
to its final consummation. Now, in order to trace
the accomplishment of these predictions, and to
perceive clearly the events to which they refer,
a minute acquaintance with ancient and modern
history is indispensably requisite : for it is in
nistory, either sacred or civil, that their accom
plishment is recorded. And, could we, with
one comprehensive glance, lake a survey of all

the leading events which the history of the worVj
records, we should be enabled, when reading the
prophetical writings, to perceive, at every step,
the ideas and purposes of that All-Comprehen
sive Mind that " knoweth the end from the be
ginning," and his faithfulness in accomplishing
the promises, and executing the threatening^ of
his word. — A knowledge of Chronology is also
requisite, in order to ascertain the time in which
predictions were uttered, and the periods to
which they refer — and of Ancient Geography,
to determine the localities of those tribes or na
tions to which the prophecies have a reference,
and their relative positions with regard to each
other. — In particular, it is necessary to be ac
quainted with the Figurative style in which pro
phecy is conveyed, in order to understand the
writings of the ancient prophets. These writ
ings, in common with those of most of the Eas
tern nations, are highly poetical, and abound in
Allegories, Parables and Metaphors. The Al
legory is that mode of speech in which the writ
er or speaker means to convey a different idea
from what the words in their primary signification
bear. Thus, " Break up your fallow-ground,
and sow not among thorns,"* is to be under
stood, not of tillage, but of repentance ; and these
words, " Thy rowers have brought thee into
great waters, the east wind hath broken thee in
the midst of the seas,"f allude, not to the fate
of a ship, but to the fate of a city. — Of all the
figures used by the prophets, the most frequent is
the Metaphor, by which words are transferred
from their plain and primary, to their figurative
and secondary meaning. One of the most co
pious sources of those metaphors to which the
sacred writers resort, is the scenery of Nature.
The Sun, Moon, and Stars, the highest and
most splendid objects in the natural world, figu
ratively represent kings, queens, and princes or
rulers, the highest in the political world, as in
the following passages, " The moon shall be
confounded, and the sun ashamed. "J " I will
cover the heavens, and make the stars thereof
dark ; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the
moon shall not give her light."§ Light and
darkness are used figuratively for joy and sor
row, prosperity and adversity ; as, " We wait
for light, but behold obscurity, for brightness,
but we walk in darkness ;"|| — and likewise for
knowledge and ignorance ; — " The people that
walked in darkness have s«en a great light," &c.
Immoderate rains, hail, floods, torrents, inun
dations, fire and storms, denote judgments and
destruction ; Lebanon remarkable for its height
and its stately cedars, is used as an image of
majesty and strength ; Carmel, which abounded
in vines and olives, as an image of fertility and
beauty ; and bullocks of Bashan, rams, '.ions,

• Jer. iv. 3. * Ezek. xxvii. 28. I Isaiah xxiT
23. § Ezek. xxxii. 7. || Isaiah lix, ».

KNOWLEDGE OF SCRIPTURE HISTORY.

127

eagles, and sea-monsters, as images of cruel and
oppressive conquerors and tyrants. Metaphors
ore likewise borrowed from hislory, from the sce
nery of the temple and its various utensils and
services, and from the ordinary customs and oc
cupations of life — the meaning and application
of which require to be distinctly understood, in
order to perceive the spirit and references of an
cient prophecy. Those who would wish to stu
dy this subject with intelligence, would do well
to consult the works of Lowth, Hurd, Sherlock,
Kennicot, Newcome, and particularly " New
ton's Dissertations on the Prophecies."

2. In studying the historical parts of Scripture —
a knowledge of ancient history, and even of Pa
gan Mythology, tends, in many instances, to
throw light on the narratives of the Sacred wri
ters. We find, from heathen writers, who were
strangers to the Jewish religion, that the most
ancient tradition of all nations, respecting the
early history of the world, is exactly agreeable to
the relation of Moses, though expressed in a
more abstruse, doubtful and imperfect manner.
The description of the origin of the world, in the
ancient Phenician history, translated by Philo
Biblius from Sanchonialhon's collection, and
transmitted to us by Eusebius, is materially the
same, with that which is recorded in the Book of
Genesis, when separated from the fabulous no
tions with which it is blended. The Egyptians,
according to Laertius, acknowledged, " that ori
ginally the world was a confused chaos, from
whence the four elements were separated, and
living creatures made ; and that the world had a
beginning, and consequently would have an end."
Hesiod, the most ancient writer whose works
have reached us, says, that " all things had
their origin from a rude chaos ;" and Ovid, in
the first book of his " Metamorphoses," tells us,
" that before the seas, and the land, and the ca
nopy of heaven existed, there was one appear
ance throughout the whole of nature, which
they called chaos — a rude and indigested mass,
in which earth and air, fire and water were in
discriminately mixed." In short, Thales,
Anaxagoras, Aratus, Virgil and Homer, speak
of the original of all things, comformable to the
account given by Mosesfthough in a different
phraseology ; and we learn from Josephus, Philo,
Tibullus, Clemens Alexandrinus, and Lucian,
that the memory of the six days work was pre
served, not only among the Greeks and Italians,
by honouring the seventh day, but also among
the Celts and Indians, who all measured their
tune by weeks.— Manetho, who wrote the his
tory of the Egyptians, Berosus, who wrote the
Chaldean history, Hicrom, who wrote the his
tory of Phenicia, and Hecatjeus, Hillanicus and
Ephorus, who wrote the history of Greece, all
agree in asserting, " that those who deacended
rom thfl first men, in the first ages of the world,

lived many of them nearly a thousand vears "

9

With regard to the deluge, we find most of the
Greek and Roman writers, Ovid, Lucian, Be
rosus the Chaldean, Abydenus the Assyrian, and
many others referring to that great event, and
detailing the particular circumstances connected
with it, in language nearly similar to that of the
Sacred historian ; such as, the preservation of
Noah, the ark in which he was preserved, the
mountain on which it rested, the dove and the
raven which he is said to have sent out, and the
wickedness of the Antediluvians, as the cause 01
that dismal catastrophe. We find, also, that the
whole mythology of India is full of allusions to
the general deluge, which appears to be the
commencement of their present era ; and that ac
counts of the same event are to be met with in
China and Japan.*

An acquaintance with ancient history is neces
sary for enabling us to fill up the blanks left by
the Sacred historians. From the time of Ezra
and Nehemiah to the birth of Christ, there is an
interval of about four hundred and fifty years, of
the events which happened during which we
have no account, in any part of the inspired writ
ings. A knowledge of the events which happen
ed during this interval is necessary, in order to
complete our views of the scheme of Divine Pro
vidence, and to unfold to us the series of God's
dispensations in relation both to the Jews and
the surrounding nations. During this period,
too, many of the predictions of Daniel and the
other prophets received their accomplishment, —
particularly those which relate to the Medes and
Persians, the Macedonian empire, the times of
Alexander the Great, Ptotemy Philadelphus,
Antiochus Epiphanes, Philip of Macedon, and
the persecutions in the clays of the Maccabees.
In order, therefore, to obtain a clear and compre
hensive view of the ways of Providence during
this interval, such works as Shuckfoni's "Con
nexion of Sacred and Profane History," and
Prideaux's " Connexions of the Old and New
Testament," require to be studied with care, in
many parts of which will be seen a running com
mentary on Daniel's vision of the " Ram and
He-Goat," and of " the things noted in the
Scripture of truth," which have a reference,
among other things, to the kings of Persia, to
Alexander and his successors, and the warlike
expeditions in which they were engaged. For
an elucidation of the general train of events from
the Mosaic creation to the establishment of
Christianity, " Stackhouse's History of the
Bible," in six volumes 8vo, or in three volumes
4to, with the additional notes and dissertations
of Bishop Gleig, will be found an invaluable trea
sure, and will amply repay the reader who gives
it a diligent perusal. f

* See Maurice's "Indian Antiquities " and Bry
ant's System of Mythology."

f In Bishop Gleic's edition of Starkhouse's History,
along and useful dissertation, cnlitlcd, "An

128

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

3. A icnow-.edge of the manners and customs,
climate and seasons, arts and sciences of the
Eastern nations, is essentially requisite, in many
instances, in order to understand the allusions of
the sacred writers, and the meaning of various
portions of Scripture. For example, when an
untutored reader peruses the account given in
the Evangelists of the cure of the paralytic who
was carried by four men on a bed, and who, find
ing it impossible to pass through the throng, as
cended to the top of the house in which Jesus
was, and let him down bed and all, " through
the tiling," into the very room where he was
sitting — he is apt to entertain a very confused
and erroneous idea of the circumstances of the
case, when his attention is directed solely to the
mode of building in this country. But, when he
is informed, that the houses in the country of
Judea were low-built and flat-roofed, and sur
rounded with a parapet breast-high, that there
was a ladder or pair of stairs which led to the
top of the house from the outside, and a trap-door
or hatchway in the middle of the roof — he will
soon acquire a clear idea of the circumstances
stated in this and other parts of the Evangelical
history, and of the ease with which the paralytic
man might be conveyed to the top of the build
ing and let down through the roof. The same
facts likewise illustrate the circumstance of
Peter's going to the top of the house to pray, and
the custom of making proclamations from the
house-tops, to which there are several allusions
in Scripture. — A knowledge of the weather and
seasons of Judea, is frequently of use to illustrate
the force of certain expressions of the sacred wri
ters. It may seem to us nothing extraordinary
that there should be " thunder and rain in har
vest," or in the months of June and July, when
Samuel said, " Is it not wheat harvest to day ?
1 will call unto the Lord, and he shall send thun
der and rain."* But Jerome, who lived in Ju
dea many years, says, it never rained there at
that season ; so that the thunder and rain which
happened at the intercession of Samuel were
truly miraculous, and as such, " the people greatly
feared the Lord and Samuel." — Again, in Luke
xii. 65, it is said, " When ye see the south wind
blow, ye say there will be heat, and it cometh to
pass." In our climate, where the south wind sel
dom blows, this may not be always the case. But
in Syria, Egypt, Judea and the adjacent coun
tries, the effect here mentioned is striking and

ratus to the History of the Bible," has been left out,
without any reason being: assigned for the omission.
Tn other respects the original work appears to be
complete. Bishop Gleig's improvements consist
chiefly in bringing forward the discoveries of modern
science for the purpose of elucidating certain Scrip
tural facts, and repelling the objections of infidels-
arid in vnrious dissertations on some of the leading
doctrines and historical facts of revelation, which
toirn valuable additions to the original work of
•"•vikhouse. See also Home's Introduction, &c.
17.

uniform. When the south wind begins to blow,
the sky becomes dark and heavy, the air grev
and thick, and the whole atmosphere assumes a.
most alarming aspect. The heat produced by
these southern winds has been compared to that
of a huge oven, at the moment of drawing out
the bread, and to that of a flame blown upon the
face of a person standing near the fire that ex
cites it.

Thousands of illustrations of Sacred Scripture
may be derived from such sources; and he who
is unacquainted with them must remain a stran
ger to the beauties of the style of the inspired
writers, and to the precise meaning of many
portions both of the historical and the prophetical
writings. The manners and customs of the East
ern nations have remained nearly the same for
several thousand years ; so that those which are
found existing in the present day are exactly, or
nearly the same, as those which prevailed in the
times when the books of the Old and New Testa
ments were written. Modern oriental travellers,
in their descriptions of the arts, sciences and
manners of the East, have furnished us with a
mass of invaluable materials for the elucidation of
holy writ, and they have proved, in many cases,
unintentionally, better commentators than the
most profound critics and philologists. Many of
their insulated remarks of this kind have lately
been classified and arranged by various writers,
particularly by Harmer, in his " Observations,"
Burder in his " Oriental Customs," Paxton in
his " Illustrations," and Taylor, the late learned
editor of the new editions of Calmet's Dictionary,
in his Fragmenta, appended to ihat work,
which contains an immense number of such
observations, illustrated with a great variety of
engravings.

4. An acquaintance with Ancient Geography,
especially that part of it which relates to the
Eastern countries, would enable a person to pe
ruse many portions of Scripture with much greater
interest and intelligence, than if he were alto
gether ignorant of this branch of knowledge. In
the history of the Old Testament, and in the
Prophetical writings, there are frequent references
and allusions to Mesopotamia, Idumea, Egypt,
Assyria, Chaldea, Arabia, Ethiopia, Lybia
Parthia, Scythia, Persia, and other countries —
to the cities of Jerusalem, Babylon, Nineveh,
Damascus, Tadmor, Tyre, Sidon, &c. — to the
great Sea, or the Mediterranean, the Deqd Sea,
the Sea of Tiberias, the Red Sea — the isles of
Chittim, Cyprus, Crete, Melita — the rivers Jor.
dan, Kishon, Jabbok, Euphrates, Hiddekel, Pi-
son, Ulai, Abana, Pharpar, &c. — Now, a know
ledge of the positions of such places with respect
to the country of Judea, their relative situations
with regard to each other, and of the outlines o<
their history, and of the warlike achievements
and commerce of their inhabitants — is frequent
ly necessary, in order to attain a clear and com

SCIENCE ILLUSTRATIVE OF SCRIPTURE.

129

pre'iionsive view of tne passages in which there
are allusions to such localities. — In reading the
Evangelists, it is highly expedient to know, for
example, the position of Samaria, Galilee, the
lake of Gennesareth, and the river Jordan, with
respect f.o that portion of the Holy Land, denomi
nated Judea — the situations of Bethlehem, Na
zareth, Jericho, Nain, Sychar, Bethsaida, Cana,
Tyre and Sidon, with respect to Jerusalem, and
their respective distances from that rnetroplis —
and the characteristics of the inhabitants of these
places ; for, upon a knowledge of such circum
stances, our perception of the beauty and appro
priateness of our Saviour's discourses, and of the
propriety of his actions, will, in a great measure,
depend. — In reading the history of the journeyings
of the Apostles, it is no less expedient that we
have lying before us maps of Asia Minor, of An
cient Greece, of Palestine, of the Eastern parts
of Africa, and of the islands of the Mediterrane
an, and that we have some acquaintance with
the history and character of the tribes which in
habited these countries in the days of the Apos
tles. Without such knowledge and assistances,
we must, in many instances, read their narratives
without ideas — and shall be unable to appreciate
their labours, the long journeys they undertook,
the fatigues they endured, the dangers to which
they were exposed by sea and land, and the allu
sions made to such circumstances in the Aposto
lic Epistles.*

5. An acquaintance with the facts of Natural
History and Science, and with the general pheno
mena of Nature, would tend to throw a light on
many passages of Scripture, and would enable
persons to perceive a beauty and an emphasis in
certain expressions, which they would otherwise
oe apt to overlook. For example, in the begin
ning of the hundred and thirty-fifth psalm, the
servants of God are exhorted to "praise the name
of Jehovah ;" and in the sequel of the Psalrn va
rious reasons are assigned why we should engage
in this exercise. One of these reasons is, that
" He causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends
of the earth." Many persons who read or who
may sing this portion of sacred poetry, would be
apt to overlook the circumstance now stated as an
argument of very inferior importance. But if
we examine the subject attentively, we shall find,
tnat this physical operation of the Almighty is
not only very wonderful in its nature, but that
upon it most of our comforts, and even our very
existence, depend. Evaporation is a process by
which water and other liquids are converted into
vapour. The matter of heat, combining with
water, renders it specifically lighter, by which

• The student of ancient geography will be assist
ed In his researches by a perusal of Wells' " Set of
Maps of Ancient Geography," twenty-three in num
ber— am! Wells' " Sacred Geography," modernized
by the Editor of Calmet's Dictionary, which is one of
the most accurate and complete works of the kin^t

means it rises and mixes with the atmosphere,
where it remains either invisible, or assumes the
appearance of clouds. In this state it occupies
a space fourteen hundred times greater than in its
ordinary liquid state, and consequently is much
lighter than the atmospheric air into which it
rises. It has been calculated, that, from an acre
of ground, during twelve hours of a summer's
day, more than 1600 gallons of water have been
drawn up into the air in the form of vapour. From
the whole surface of the ocean there arise, every
twelve hours, no less than 30,320,500 ,000,000 or
more than thirty millions of millions of cubic feet
of water, which is more than sufficient to supply
all the rivers that intersect the four quarters of
the globe. This immense body of vapour is form
ed into clouds, which are carried by the winds
over every part of the continents ; and, by a
process with which we are still unacquainted, is
again condensed into rain, snow or dews, which
water and fertilize the earth. Now, if this won
derful and extensive process of nature were to
cease — we might wash our clothes, but centuries
would not dry them, for it is evaporation alone
that produces this effect — there would be no rains
nor dews to fertilize our fields, and the conse
quence would be, the earth would be parched,
and the vegetable productions which afford us
subsistence would wither and decay, — the riv
ers would swell the ocean, and cause it to over
flow a portion of the land, while, at the same time,
their sources would soon be completely exhaust
ed, and their channels dried up. In such a state
of things, the whole system of terrestrial nature
would be deranged, and man, and all the other
tribes of animated nature — deprived of those com
forts which are essential to their existence —
would, in a short time, perish from the earth. So
that it forms a powerful and impressive motive to
excite us to praise the name of Jehovah, when we
call to remembrance, that it is He " who causeth
the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth,"
and thus preserves the harmony of nature, and se
cures to all living creatures the blessings they
now enjoy.

Again, we are informed by Solomon, (Ec-
cles. i. 7.) that " all the rivers run into the sea ;
yet the sea is not full ; unto the place from whence
the rivers come, thither they return again." It
appears, at first sight, somewhat unaccountable,
that the ocean has not long ere now overflown
all its banks, when we consider that so many
majestic streams are incessantly rolling into its
abyss, carrying along with them into its caverns
no less than thirteen thousand six hundred cubi
cal miles of water every year. Solomon partly
solves the difficulty, by informing us, chat, " to
the place whence the rivers come, thither they
return again." But how do they return ? Many
expositors of Scripture attempt to explain this
circumstance, by telling us that the waters of the
ocean percolate through the earth, and in sornt

130

ON THE GENERAL' DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

way wr another, arrive near the tops of mountains,
where springs generally abound. But such a
supposition is not only highly improbable, when
we consider the vast mass of earth and rocks,
several hundreds of miles in thickness, through
which the waters would have to percolate, but
directly contrary to the known laws of nature ;
for nofluid can rise in a tube above the level of it*
source, which in this case it behoved to do. Mo
dern experiments and discoveries, however, have
satisfactorily accounted for this fact, on the prin
ciple of evaporation, to whicji I have just now
adverted. From the surface of the ocean and of
the rivers themselves, there is carried up into
the atmosphere, in the form of vapour, nearly
three times the quantity of water sufficient to re
plenish the sources of all the rivers in the world.
The vapour thus raised is carried by the winds,
in the form of clouds, over every region of the
globe, and falls down in rains to carry on the va
rious processes of nature. One part falls into the
sea, another on the lowlands, and the remaining
part is sufficient to replenish the sources of all
the rivers. So that the assertion of Solomon is
strictly and philosophically correct, that " to the
place whence the rivers come, thither they return
again." They first fall into the ocean ; a por
tion of their waters is then raised by evaporation
into the atmosphere ; this portion of vapour, af
ter traversing the regions of the air, falls down
in rain, mists, and dews, and supplies the nume
rous springs " which run among the hills."

Such illustrations, which might be indefinitely
extended, not only throw alight on the meaning
of the sacred writers, but tend likewise to show
the harmony that subsists between the discove
ries of science and the truths of revelation. As
the Author of Christianity and the Author of the
system of nature is one and the same Being,
there must exist a harmonious correspondence
between truth in the one, and fact in the other ;
and the more they are studied with intelligence,
and in connexion with each other, the more will
their harmony be apparent.

It is a circumstance that has frequently forced
itself upon my attention, that whatever scene of
nature we contemplate, and however brilliant and
unexpected the discoveries which modern science
has brought to light, — however far they have
carried our views into the wonders of the minute
parts of creation, and into the immeasurable re
gions of space, where myriads of suns are light
ed up, — and however much the mind may be
lost in astonishment and wonder, at the magnifi
cent scenes which they disclose, — we shall find
eentiments and expressions in Scripture adequate
to express every emotion of the soul when en
gaged in such contemplations. — Are we contem
plating the expanse of the ocean, and the vast
mass of waters which fill its mighty caverns ? and
do we wish to raise our thoughts in adoration of
the power of that Almighty Being who formed it

by his word ? We are presented by the inspire*
penmen with expressions in which to vent our
emotions. " He holds its waters in the hollow
of his hand ; he taketh up its isles as a very lit
tle thing." " He gathereth the waters of the sea
together as a mass ; he layeth up the depth as in
storehouses." " He dividelh the sea by hi?
power; he hath compassed the waters with
bounds, until the day and night come to ariend."
" Thou coveredst the earth with the deep as
with a garment ; the waters stood above the
mountains:* At thy rebuke they fied ; at tho
voice of thy thunder they hasted away. Thou
hast set a boundary that they may not pass over,
that they turn not again to cover the earth."
"He hath placed the sand for the bounds of the
sea, by a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass
it ; and though the waves thereof toss tnrrn-
selves, yet they cannot prevail; though they
roar, yet can they not pass over it." He hath
said to its rolling billows, " Hitherto shall thou
come, and no farther ; and here shall thy proud
waves be stayed." — Are we spectators of storms
and tempests, especially in the terrific grandeur
they display in southern climes? Our emotions
will be expressed with the greatest emphasis in
the language of inspiration, in which we are
uniformly directed to view the agency of God in
such phenomena. " Clouds and darkness are
round about him : He hath his way in the whirl
wind and the storm, and the clouds are the dust
of his feet." " When he uttereth his voice,
there is a sound of waters in the heavens ; he
causeth the vapours to ascend from I he ends of
the earth ; he maketh lightnings with rain, and
bringeth forth the winds out of his treasuries."
" The God of glory thundereth ; the voice of the
Lord is full of majesty ; the voice of the Lord
divideth the flames of fire ; yea, the Lord brep.k-
eth the cedars of Lebanon." " Who can stand
before his indignation? The mountains qnake
before him, the hills melt, and rocks ate shivered
at his presence."

Again, when we contemplate the immense
number and variety of animated beings which
glide through the waters, move along the earth,
and wing their flight through the air ; together
with the ample provision which is made for
their accommodation and subsistence, — where
can we find language more appropiate to express
our feelings than in these words of the Psalmist ?
" How manifold are thy works, O Lord ! In
wisdom hast thou made them all ; the earth is
full of thy riches ; so is the great and wide sea,
wherein are things creeping innumerable,
both small and great beasts. These all wait
upon thee, that thou mayest give them their meat
in due season. Thou Divest them, — they ga
ther ; thou openest thine hand, — they are filled
with good." — When we survey the .structure oJ

• Referring to the 'XAogt

HARMONY OF SCIENCE AND REVELATION.

131

isfce iMiman frame, and consider the vast number
of hones, muscles, veins, arteries, lacteals, lym
phatics, and other parts, all curiously combined,
and calculated to facilitate every motion of our
bodies, and to produce sensitive enjoyment, —
along with the organs of sense, the process of
respiration, and the circulation of the blood
through the whole frame every four minutes, —
can wo refrain from adopting the expressive
language of the Psalmist ? li I will praise thee,
for I am fearfully and wonderfully made ! mar
vellous are thy works. My substance was not
hid from thee when I was made in secret, and
curiously wrought," — or variegated like needle
work, — " in my mother's womb.* Thine eyes
did see my substance when it was yet imperfect ;
and in thy book all my members were written,
which in continuance were fashioned when as
yet there was none of them. How precious are
thy thoughts (or, thy wonderful contrivances)
concerning me, O God ! How great is the sum
of them ! If I should count them, they are more
in number than the sand." To which may be
added the words of Job, " Thine hands have
made and fashioned me ; thou hast clothed me
with skin and flesh, and hast fenced me with
bones and sinews,' and thy visitation preserveth
my spirit." — When we contemplate the minute
wonders of creation, ar.H are struck with aston
ishment at the inconceivable smallness of certain
animated beings, — how can we more appropri
ately express our feelings than in the language
of Scripture, "He is wonderful in counsel, and
excellent in working ; his wisdom is unsearch
able, his understanding is infinite ; marvellous
things doth he which we cannot comprehend.
There is none like unto thee, O Lord, neither
are there any works like unto thy works. Thou

* In our translation, the beauty and emphasis of
this passage are partly lost. The expression," curi
ously wrought," literally translated, signifies "flow
ered with a needle." The process of the formation
of the human body in the womb is compared to that
in a piece of delicate work wrought with a fine
needie, or fashioned with peculiar art in the loom ;
which, with all its beautiful proportion of figure
and variety of colouring, rises by decrees to perfec
tion under the hand of the artist, from a rude mass
of silk or other materials, and according to a pattern
lying before him. In accordance with this idea, the
Divine Being is here represented as working a

skilfully interwoven and connected with each other,
till It becomes a structure with all the parts, linea
ments, and functions of a man.— no one of which is
to be seen at first, any more than the figures in a
ba.lof silk, before it is fashioned with the needle
The wonders of this workmanship are farther en
hanced from '.he consideration, that, while human
artificers require the clearest light for accomplish-
in? their work, the Divine Artist performs it "in
tecret," within the dark and narrow recess of the
womb. The expression, "How precious are thy
houghti to me," should he rendered, " How precious
are Uiy contrivance* respecting- me," namely, in
reference to the exquisite structure and organala-
tion of the corporeal frame, on which the Psalmist
4 fixed his meditations.

art great, and dost wondrous things ; thcu art
God alone."

When we contemplate the amazing structure
of the heavens — the magnitude of the bodies
which compose the planetary system, and the
numerous orbs which adorn the nocturnal sky-
when we penetrate with the telescope into the
more distant regions of space, and behold ten
thousand times ten thousand more of these bright
luminaries rising to view from every region of the
firmament — when we consider that each of these
twinkling luminaries is a sun, equal or superior
to our own in size and in splendour, and surround
ed with a system of revolving worlds — when we
reflect, that all this vast assemblage of suns and
worlds, forms, in all probability, but a very small
portionof Jehovah's empire, and when our minds
are bewildered and astonished at the incompre
hensible grandeur of the scene — where shall we
find language to express our emotions more ener
getic and appropriate than in such passages as
these ? " Canst thou by searching find out God ?
Canst thou. find out the Almighty to perfection ?
He is glorious in power, his understanding is in
finite, his greatness is unsearchable. The hea
vens declare the glory of Jehovah, and the firma-
nent showeth his handy-work. All nations before
him are as nothing, and they are counted to him
as less than nothing and vanity. He meteth
out the heavens with a span, and compre-
hendeth the dust of the earth in a measure. Be
hold! the heaven and the heaven of heavens
cannot contain him. By the word of the Lord
were the heavens made, and all the host of them
by the spirit of his mouth. He spake, and it
was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.
He doth great things past finding out, and won
ders without number. Great and marvellous
are thy works, Lord God Almighty! Touching
the Alhiighty we cannot find him out ; he is
excellent in power, and his glory is above the
earth and the heavens. Who can utter the
mighty operations of Jehovah ? Who can show
forth all his praise ?"

Are we led, from the discoveries of modern
astronomy, to infer, that numerous worlds besides
our own exist throughout the universe ? This
idea will be found embodied in numerous passa
ges of Scripture, such as the following ; —
" Through faith we understand that the worlds
were framed by the word of God." " In these
last days he hath spoken to us by his Son, whom
he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom
also he made the worlds." " Thou hast made
heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all iheu next,
and thou preserves! them all, and the host of hea
ven worshippeth thee." " He sitteth upon the
circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof
are as grasshoppers. AH the mnabitants of the
earth are reputed as nothing in his sight. The
nations are as the drop of a bucket; and he
doth according to his will in the armies of keaven.

132

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

and among the inhabitants of the earth." " He
hath prepared his throne in the heavens, and his
kingdom ruleth over all." " When I consider
thy heavens — what is man, that thou art mind-
full of him ?" It. would be easy to show, were it
expedient in the present case, that all such ex
pressions and representations, embody in them
the idea of a plurality of worlds, without which
they would appear either inexplicable, or as
a species of bombast, unworthy of the character
of inspired writers. So that, to whatever de
partment of nature we direct our contemplations,
we perceive its correspondence with the senti
ments expressed in the sacred writings, and find
in these writings the most sublime and appropr -
ate language in which to express those emotions
which the diversified scenes of the material world
are calculated to inspire.

We may now ask, if such an assertion can be
made, in truth, with regard to any other writ
ings, ancient or modern, whose sentiments have
not been derived from the sacred oracles ? Can
we find in the writings of all the poets, philoso
phers and orators of Greece and Rome, senti
ments so dignified, appropriate and sublime, in
relation to the objects to which we have alluded ?
Do not such writers frequently misrepresent and
even caricature the system of nature ? Are not
their descriptions of the gods, and the actions
they attribute to them, in many instances, mean,
ridiculous, unworthy of the character of superior
beings, and even in the highest degree immoral
and profane? And, if we turn to the literature
and the sacred books of the Chinese, the Per
sians, the Hindoos or the Japanese, shall we find
any thing superior? And is not the circumstance
to which we have adverted, a strong presumptive
evidence that the Scriptures of the Old and New
Testament were written under the inspiration of
the Almighty ; and consequently, that they are
" profitable for doctrine, for reproof, and for in
struction in righteousness, that the man of God
maybe made perfect, and thoroughly furnished
unto all good works ?"

Such is a brief view of some of the advanta
ges which may be derived from history and gene
ral science in the study of the Scriptures.
There is, indeed, scarcely a branch of useful
knowledge, of whatever description, but may be
rendered in some way or another, subservient to
the elucidation of the sacred oracles, and in ena
bling us to take a wide and comprehensive view
of the facts and doctrines they declare. Were
the great body of mankind, therefore, instructed
in general knowledge, and accustomed to ratio
nal investigations, they would be enabled to study
the Scriptures with much greater interest and
intelligence than they can now be supposed to do.
They would perceive ihe beauty and sublimity
of their language, the dignity and excellence of
the sentiments they contain, the purity of their
loctn^es, and the beneficent tendency of their

moral precepts ; and, by familiarizing their inindt
with the numerous and multifarious facts they ex
hibit, and comparing them with the history ofna
tions, and with passing events, they would gra
dually acquire an enlightened and comprehensive
view of God's superintending providence. The
study of the Scriptmes, in their native simplicity,
with the helps now alluded to, and without inter
mixture of the technical language of theologians,
and of party opinions, would be of vast import
ance in religion. It would convince the unbiass
ed inquirer how little foundation there is in the
Scriptures themselves, for many of those nume
rous disputes about metaphysical dogmas, which
have rent the Christian world into a number of
shreds and patches, and produced jealousy and
animosity, where love and affection should have
appeared predominant. He would soon be ena
bled to perceive, that the system of Revelation
chiefly consists of a series of important facts,
connected with the dispensations of God towards
our race, and interwoven with a variety of practi
cal and interesting truths ; and that the grand
design of the whole is to counteract the effects of
moral evil, to display the true character of Deity,
to promote love to God and man, to inculcate the
practice of every heavenly virtue, and to form
mankind into one harmonious and affectionate
society. He would find none of the technical
terms and phraseology \\hich the schoolmen and
others have introduced into their systems of the
ology ; nor any of those anathemas, which one
sectary has so frequently levelled at another, ap
plied to any one, excepting to those " who love
not our Lord Jesus in sincerity." He would
naturally be led to the conclusion, that what is
not clearly and explicitly stated in the Scriptures,
or but obscurely hinted at, in reference to the
external government of the church or any other
subject, cannot be a matter of primary import
ance, and consequently, ought never to be the
subject of virulent dispute, or the cause of dis
sension or separation among Christians — and
that those things only are to be considered as the
prominent and distinguishing truths of religion
which are the most frequently reiterated, and ex
pressed with such emphasis, and perspicuity, that
" he who runs may read them."

Again, such an intelligent study of the Scrip
tures as would accompany the acquisition of gen
eral knowledge, would have a tendency to pro
mote the union of the Christian church. Ignorance
and distorted views of the truths of revelation
are almost uniformly accompanied with illiberal-
ity and self-conceit ; and where these prevail,
silly prejudices are fostered, and party opinions
tenaciously adhered to, and magnified into undue
importance. But an enlightened mind, — the
farther it advances in the path of knowledge and
in the study of the Sacred Oracles, the more will
it perceive the limited nature of its facuMes, and
the difficulty of deciding on certain myster'ou*

MISCELLANEOUS ADVANTAGES OF KNOWLEDGE.

133

doctrines ; and consequently, the more will it be
disposed to grant to every other mind a liberty of
thought on subordinate religious subjects, and to
make every allowance for those educational pre
judices and other causes which have a tendency
to warp the mind to certain favourite opinions*.
And, when such a disposition more generally pre
vails, and is accompanied with the exercise of
Christian love and moderation- -the spirit of party
will be gradually undermined, and all who recog
nise the grand and essential features of genuine
Christianity will unite in one lovely and harmo
nious society. But, so long as ignorance and
habits of mental inactivity prevail among the
great body of the population, such a happy con
summation cannot be expected.*

In short, were the Sacred writings studied with
reverence and attention, and those departments
of knowledge to which I have alluded brought
forward to assist in their investigation, Infidelity
would soon feel ashamed of its ignorance and
impertinence, and hide its head in retirement and
obscurity. It is owing, in a great measure, to
ignorance of the Scriptures, that so many avow
ed infidels are to be found in society. " They
speak evil of the things which they know not;"
" their mouth speaketh great swelling words " of
vanity againsi truths which they never investi
gated, and which, of course, they do not under
stand. Even some of those who have attempted
to write against revelation are not ashamed to
avow, that they have never either read or studied
the writings it contains. Paine, one of the most
virulent adversaries of Christianity, had the ef
frontery to affirm, that, when he wrote the first
part of his " Age of Reason," he was without a
Bible. "Afterwards," he tells us, in schoolboy
language, " I procured a Bible and a Testament"
Who, but an arrant fool would have made such a
declaration, and thus have proclaimed his own
impertinence and folly ? and who would have lis
tened with patience to such an impudent avowal,
had it been made in relation to any other subject?
For, to attempt to answer a book which one had
not read, is surely the height of presumption and
impudence, and plainly indicates, that the mind
was previously prejudiced against it, and deter
mined to oppose its sentiments. Others have
looked into the Bible, and skimmed over its con
tents, with the express purpose of finding faults
and contradictions. Emerson the mathemati
cian, having imbibed a disrelish for the Scrip
ture,,, endeavoured to satisfy his mind that they
were not divine, by picking out a number of in
sulated passages, which he conceived to be con
tradictions, and set them, one opposite to anoth
er, in two separate columns, and then was bold
fcnough to aver that he had proved the Bible to
be an imposture. Is it any wonder that men

* For a more full illustration of this topic, see Sec-

who presume to act in this manner should never
come to the knowledge of the truth ? What
book in the world would stand such an ordeal ?
There is no treatise on any subject whatever,
which, if treated in this manner, might not be
made to appear a mass of absurdities and con
tradictions. If the Bible is to be read at all, it
must be perused both with reverence and with in
telligence ; and there is no one who enters on the
study of it, in such a state of mind, but will soon
perceive, that it contains " the witness in itself,"
that it is from God, and will feel, that it is " quick
and powerful" in its appeals to the conscience,
and a " searcher of tho thoughts and intents of
the heart." But he who reads it either with
scorn, with negligence, or with prejudice, needs
not wonder if he shall find himself only confirm
ed in his folly and unbelief. "For a scorner
seeketh wisdom, and findeth it not ; but know
ledge is easy unto him that hath understanding.
I have dwelt, at considerable length, on the to
pic of Christianity, because it is a subject of pe
culiar interest and importance to every individual.
If, in systems of education, and in the means by
which mankind at large may be enlightened and
improved, the knowledge of religion be overlook
ed, and its moral requisitions disregarded, more
evil than good may be the result of the dissemi
nation of general and scientific knowledge. We
have a proof of this in the scenes of anarchy,
licentiousness and horror which succeeded the
first French revolution, when revealed religion
was publicly discarded, and atheism, infidelity
and fatalism, accompanied with legalized plun
dering, became "the order of the day." If
knowledge is not consecrated to a moral purpose,
and prosecuted with a reference to that immortal
existence to which we are destined, the utility
of its general diffusion might be justly called in
question. But, when prosecuted in connexion
with the important discoveries of revelation, it
has a tendency to raise man to the highest dig
nity of which his nature is susceptible, and to
prepare him for more exalted pursuits and enjoy
ments in the life to come.

SECTION X.

Miscellaneous Advantages of Knowledge briijly
stated.

In this section, I shall briefly advert to seve
ral advantages which would flow from a general
diffusion of knowledge, not directly included in
those which have already been stated.

I. Minds tutored in knowledge and habits of
reflection, would be led to form just estimates of
human character and enjoyment.

The bulk of mankind are apt to form a false
estimate of the characters of men, from consider

134

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

ing only those adventitious circumstances in
which they are placed, and those external trap
pings with which they are adorned. Wherever
wealth and splendour, and high-sounding titles
have taken up their residence, the multitude fall
down and worship at their shrine. The natural
and acquired endowments of the mind are seldom
appreciated and respected, unless they are cloth
ed with a dazzling exterior. A man of genius,
of virtue and of piety, is riot distinguished from
the common herd of mankind, unless he can af
ford to live in an elegant mansion, to entertain
convivial parties, and to mingle with the fashion
able and polite. The poor and ignorant peasant
looks up with a kind of veneration to mv lord and
my lady, as if they were a species of superior
beings, though, perhaps, with the exception of a
few trifling accomplishments, they are scarcely
raised above the level of the vulgar whom they
despise, in respect to intellectual attainments ;
and they are often far beneath them in those mo
ral accomplishments which constitute the true
glory of man, — being too frequently the slaves of
many foolish caprices and unhallowed passions.
To pay homage to mere titles, rank or riches,
has a tendency to degrade the human mind, and
has been the source of all that vassalage, slavery
and despotism which have prevailed in the world.
On the other hand, the man of rank and fashion
looks down with a species of disdain, and con
siders as unworthy of his notice, the man of ta
lent, or the rational inquirer after truth, if he is
clad in a homely dress, and possessed of only a
small share of wealth ; because, forsooth, he is
unqualified to accompany him to horse-races,
assemblies, masquerades, and other fashionable
entertainments. Many an individual of superla
tive worth and merit has been thus overlooked by
his superiors in rank, and even by the great body
of his fellow-men, and has passed through the
world almost unnoticed and unknown, except by
a few minds congenial to his own. For the beau
ties and excellencies of mind can only be perceiv
ed and appreciated by those whose mental facul
ties have been, in some degree, enlightened
and improved, and who are aualified to estimate
the value of a jewel, although its casket may be
formed of coarse materials, and besmeared with
sand and mud.

The multitude form no less erroneous esti
mates in regard to human happiness. Having
felt little other misery than that which arises
from poverty, want, or excessive labour, they are
apt to imagine, that where riches abound, and the
avenues to every sensitive enjoyment are free
und unobstructed, there misery can scarcly gain
admittance, and the greatest share of human hap
piness must be found ; that where there is wealth
there can be little sorrow, and that those who
glide along in splendour and affluence can scarcely
V acquainted with the cares and anxieties which
.wess so heavily upon the rest of mankind.

Hence the ruling passion, which distingn/shi*
the majority of mankind, to aspire after elevateO
station and rank, and to accumulate riches, al
though it should be at the expense of trampling
under foot every social duty, and every moral
principle, and even at the risk of endangering
life itself. Hence, the idle and the vicious are
led to imagine, that if they can but lay hold of
wealth, whether by fraud, by deceit, or by open
violence, they will be able to administer nutri
ment to those desires which, when gratified, will
complete their happiness.

It is evident, that nothing can be supposed
more effectual for counteracting such fallacious
tendencies of the human mind, than the cultiva
tion of reason, the expanding of the intellectual
faculties, and the habit of applying the princi
ples of knowledge to the diversified phenomena
of human character and conduct. The man
whose mind is accustomed to investigation, and
to take an extensive range through the regions ol
science, and who considers his mental powers as
the chief characteristic by which he is distin
guished in the scale of animal existence, will na
turally be guided in his estimates of human cha
racter, by moral and intellectual considerations.
His eye will easily penetrate through the thin
veil of exterior and adventitious accompaniments,
and appreciate what alone is worthy of regard in
the characters of men, whether they be surround
ed by wealth and splendour, or immersed in po
verty or obscurity. And with respect to human
happiness, a person of this description will easily
enter into such a train of reasoning as the follow
ing, and feel its force : — That, in respect of
wealth, what we cannot reach may very well be
forborne ; that the inequality of happiness on this
account is, for the most part, much less than it
seems ; that the greatness which we admire at
a distance, has much fewer advantages, and
much less splendour, when we are suffered to
approach it ; that the happiness which we ima
gine to be found in high life, is much alloyed
and diminished by a variety of foolish passions
and domestic cares and anxieties, of which we
are generally ignorant ; and that the apparent in
felicity of the lower stations in society is fre«
quently moderated by various moral and domestic
comforts, unknown to many of those who occupy
the highest ranks of social life. There is a cer
tain portion of external enjoyment without which
no man can be happy ; and there is a certain
portion of wealth to procure this enjovment
which every rank of society ought to possess, and
which even the lowest ranks would obtain, were
the movements of the social machine properly
conducted. Bbt, to pursue riches, with all the
violence of passion, as the chief end of our being,
is not only degrading to our intellectual natures,
and tends to block up the avenues to tranquil en •
joyment, but is fraught with toil and an»»etj
and innumerable hazards. " Wealth," says a

PUBLIC INSTRUCTIONS.

135

t*»^in *wra! writer, " is nothing in itself; it is
not ds^rul >ut. when it departs from us ; its value
is founrJ aajy in ihat which it can purchase,
which, if wo suppose it put to its best use by
those that possess it, seems not much to deserve
the desire or envy of a wise man. It is certain,
that with regard to corporeal enjoyment, money
can neither open new avenues to pleasure, nor
block up the passages of anguish. Disease and
infirmity still continue to torture and enfeeble,
perhaps exasperated b/ luxury, or promoted by
softness. With respcci to the mind, it has rare
ly been observed, that wealth contributes much
to quicken the discernment, enlarge the capa
city, or elevate the imagination ; but may, by
hiring flattery, or laying di%ence asleep, confirm
error and harden stupidity."

Such are some of the views and principles by
which an enlightened mind will naturally esti
mate the characters and enjoyments of mankind.
Were the great body of the population in every
country qualified to enter into such reasonings,
and to feel the force of such considerations, it
could not fail of being accompanied with many
beneficial effects. It would temper that foolish
adulation which ignorance and imbecility so fre
quently offer at the shrine of wealth and splen
dour ; and would undermine those envious and
discontented dispositions with which the lower
ranks are apt to view the riches and possessions
of the great. As moral principles and conduct,
associated with intelligence, are the only proper
objects of respect in the human character, it
would lead persons to form a judgment of the
true dignity of man, not by the glitter of affluence,
or the splendour of equipage, but by those moral
and intellectual qualities and endowments, which,
in every station, demands our regard, and which
constitute the real glory of the human character.
It would tend to counteract the principle of Ava
rice, which has produced so many miseries and
mischiefs in society, and to promote that Con
tentment under the allotments of Divine Provi
dence in which consists the chief part of the
happiness of mankind. And while it would
counteract the tendency to foolish and immoral
pursuits, it would direct to those rational pur
suits and enjoyments which are pure and per
manent, and congenial to the high dignity and
destination of man. In short, were the attention
of the higher and influential classes turned away
from hounding and horse-racing, masquerades,
gambling, and such like frivolous amusements,
and directed to the study of useful science, we
might expect to behold them patronising philan-
trophic and scientific characters in their plans
and investigations, and devoting a portion of
their wealth to carry forward those improve
ments by wjiich the comforts of mankind would
be increased, and science and art Carried nearer
to perfection. The twentieth part of that wealth
which is too frequently spent in fashionable follies.

were it devoted to such purposes, would be of in
calculable service to the interests both of hu
manity and of science.

II. The acquisition of general knowledge
would enable persons to profit by their attendance
on public instructions.

In the present day, lectures on popular philoso
phy, astronomy, chemistry, geology, and political
economy are occasionally delivered in the princi
pal cities and towns of Great Britain ; but, out
of a population of thirty or forty thousand, it fre
quently happens, that scarcely thirty or forty in
dividuals can be collected to listen to instructions
on such subjects. This, no doubt, is partly ow
ing to the fee demanded for admission, which is
sometimes beyond the reach of many intelligent
persons in the lower walks of life. But it is
chiefly owing to the want of taste for such branch
es of knowledge — to ignorance of the elements of
general science — and to unacquaintance with the
terms which require to be used in the explanation
of such subjects, arising from the want of intel
lectual instruction in early life. Even of the few
who generally attend such lectures, there is not
perhaps the one half who can enter with intelli
gence into the train of reasoning and illustration
brought forward by the lecturer, or feel much in
terest in the discussions, excepting when their
eyes are dazzled with some flashy experiment.
Hence it follows, that very little knowledge com
paratively can be communicated in this way to
the population at large, owing to the deficiency of
previous instruction, — and that systems of intel
lectual education, more extensive and efficient
than those which have hitherto been in operation,
require to be adopted, before the great body of the
people can be supposed to profit by attendance on
courses of lectures on any department of know
ledge. -

The same remark will apply, with a few mo
difications, to the instructions, delivered by the
teachers of religion. For want of a proper foun
dation being previously laid, in the exercise of
the rational faculty, and the acquisition of gener
al information, comparatively little advantage is
derived from the sermons and expository lectures
delivered by the ministers of the Gospel. Of a
thousand individuals which may compose a wor
shipping assembly where religious instructions
are imparted, there are seldom above two hnndred
(and most frequently much fewer) that can give
any intelligent account of the train of thought
which has been pursued, or the topics which have
been illustrated in the discourses to which they
have professed to listen. This may be owing, in
many instances, if the dry and abstract method by
which certain pr«achers construct their discours
es, and to the want of energy, and the dull and
monotonous manner in which they are delivered.
But, in the majority of instances, it is obviously

136

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWUEDGE.

owing to habits of inattention to subjects of an in
tellectual nature — to an incapacity for following
a train of illustration or reasoning — and to the
want of acquaintance with the meaning of many
terms which theological instructors find it expe
dient to use in the construction of their discours
es — and such deficiencies are to be ascribed to the
mental faculties not having been exercised from
infancy in the pursuit of knowledge and in ration
al investigations.

This deficiency of knowledge and intellectual
culture seems to be virtually acknowledged by the
ministers of religion ; since, in their general dis
courses, they confine themselves, for the most
part, to the elucidation of \\\e first principles of re
ligion. Instead of exhibiting a luminous and
comprehensive view of the whole scenery ofdi-
vine revelation, and illustrating its various parts
from the history of nations, the system of nature,
and the scenes of human life — they generally con
fine their discussions to a few topics connected
with what are termed the fundamental doctrines
of the Gospel. Instead of" going on to perfec
tion," as the Apostle Paul exhorts, by tracing the
elements of Christianity in all their bearings on
moral conduct and Christian contemplation, and
endeavouring to carry forward the mind to the
most enlarged views of the perfections of God and
the " glory of his kingdom" — they feel them
selves under the necessity of recurring again and
again to "the first principles of the doctrine 01
Christ" — feeding their hearers" with milk" in
stead of" strong meat." And the reason assign
ed for waiving the consideration of the more
sublime topics of natural and revealed religion,
and thus limiting the subject of tneir discussions,
is that their hearers are unqualified to follow them
in the arguments and illustrations which behoved
to be brought forward on such subjects — that such
an attempt would be like speaking to the winds
or beating the air, and would infallibly mar their
edification. If this reason be valid, (and that it
is partly so there can be little doubt) it implies,
that some glaring deficiency must exist in the
mental culture of the great body of professing
Christians, and that it ought to be remedied by
every proper mean, in order that they may be
qualified to advance in the knowledge of the at
tributes, the works, and the ways of God, and to
" go on unto perfection."

It is foretold in the sacred oracles, that " men
shall speak of the might of God's terrible acts,"
that " his saints shall speak of the glory of his
kingdom, and talk >,f his power, to make known to
the sons of men his mighty operations and the glo
rious majesty of his kingdom." This prediction
has never yet been fulfilled in reference to the
great body of the Christian chu> ch. For, where
do we find one out of twenty among the hearers
of the Gospel capable of rehearsing the " ter
rible acts" of God, either in his moral or his
physical operations — of tracing the dispensations

of his providence towards nations and communi
ties, in a connected series, from the commence,
ment of time, through the successive periods of
history — and of comparing the desolations of ci
ties and the ruin of empires with the declara
tions of ancient prophecy? Where do we find
one out of a hundred capable of expatiating on
the " power " of Jehovah, and on the most strik
ing displays of this perfection which are exhi
bited throughout the vast creation ? Or where
shall we find those who are qualified to display
the magnificence of that empire which is " es
tablished in the heavens," embracing within its
boundaries thousands of suns and ten thousand?
of worlds — or " to speak," with intelligence, " of
the glory of that kingdom which ruleth over all,"
and thus " to make known to others the mighty
operations" carried on by Jehovah, "and the
glorious majesty of his kingdom?" It is obvious
that no such qualifications yet exist among the
majority of members which compose the visible
church. And yet the predictions to which we
refer must be realized, at some period or another,
in the history of the divine dispensations. And
is it not desirable that they should, in some de
gree, be realized in our own limes ? And, if so,
ought we not to exert all our influence and ener
gies in endeavouring to accomplish so important
and desirable an object ? And, in what manner
are our energies in this respect to be exerted,
but in concerting and executing, without delay,
plans for the universal intellectual instruction of
mankind? For, without the communication oi
knowledge to afar greater extent, and much more
diversified than what has even yet been considered
necessary for ordinary Christians, we can never
expect to behold in the visible church " saints"
endowed with such sublime qualifications as those
to which we have alluded, or the approach of
that auspicious era when " all shall know the
Lord," in the highest sense of the expression,
" from the least even to the greatest."

To obtain a comprehensive, and as far as pos
sible, a complete view of the system of revelation
in all its parts and bearings, and to be. enabled to
comply with all its requirements, is both the duty
and the interest of every man. But, in order
to this attainment, there must be acquired a cer
tain habit of thinking and of meditating. In
vain does a person turn over whole volumes, and
attempt to peruse catechisms, bodies of divinity,
or even the Scriptures themselves, — he can nev< r
comprehend the dependencies, connexions and
bearings of divine truth, and the facts they ex
plain and illustrate, unless he acquire a habit of
arranging ideas, of laying down principles, and
deducing conclusions. But this habit cannot be
acquired without a continued series of instruc
tions, especially in the early part of life, accom
panied with serious attention and profound appli
cation. For want of such pre-requisites the
great body of Christians do not rean half the b*«

CRUELTY AND FOLLY OF PERSECUTION.

13?

nefit they otherwise might from the preaching of
the Gospel ; and " when for the time they ought
to be teachers of others, they have still need that
one teach them again, which be the first princi
ples of the oracles of God." " Hence it is," says
a celebrated preacher, " that the greatest part of
our sermons produce so little fruit, because ser
mons are, at least they ought to be, connected
discourses, in which the principle founds the con
sequence, ana the consequence follows the princi
ple : all which supposes in the hearers a habit of
medilaUon and attention. For the same reason,
we are apt to be offended when any body attempts
to draw us out of the sphere of our prejudices,
and are not. only ignorant, but ignorant from gra
vity, and derive, I know not what glory from our
own stupidity. Hence it is, that a preacher is
seldom or never allowed to sour in his sermons,
to rise into the contemplation of some lofty and
rapturous objects, but must always descend to the
first principles of religion, as if he preached for
the first time, or as if his auditors for the first
time heard. Hence our preachers seem to lead
us into obscure paths, and to lose us in abstract
speculations, when they treat of some of the at
tributes of God, such as his faithfulness, his love
of order, his regard for his intelligent creatures.
It. is owing to this that we are, in some sense,
well acquainted with some truths of religion,
while we remain entirely ignorant of others.
Hence also it is, that some doctrines which are
true in themselves, demonstrated in our Scrip
tures, and essential to religion, become errors,
yea sources of many errors in our mouths, be
cause we consider them only in themselves, and
not in connexion with other doctrines, or in the
proper places to which they belong in the system
of religion."

Were we then, without delay, to set on foot
plans of universal instruction, on a rational prin
ciple — were the young generation to be univer
sally trained up in rational exercises and habits
of reflection, first at Infant Schools, and after
wards at seminaries of a higher order, conducted
on the same intellectual principle, and this sys
tem of tuition continued to the age of manhood,
we should, ere long, behold a wonderful change
in the state of society, in the intelligence of the
Christian people, and in the illustrations of re
ligion which would be introduced into the pulpit.
We should behold thousands of intelligent wor
shippers crowding our religion assemblies,
with minds prepared .jr receiving instruction,
and eagerly listening to arguments and illustra
tions in reference to the most sublime and im
portant subjects. We should behold our preach
ers explaining the first principles of religion with
such clearness and energy, that they should sel
dom need to recur 'o the subject, " soaring in
their sermons," rising into " the contempla
tion of some lofty and rapturous objects"

displaying the majesty and supremacy of God in

18

the operation of his moral government among
the nations, descanting on his glorious ait-ibme*,
exhibiting his wisdom in the arrangements of na
ture and the movements of his providence, illus
trating his omnipotence and grandeur from the
glories of the firmament, and the magnitude of
the universe — directing their hearers to the con
templation of the works of his hand as illustra
tions of the declarations of his word — demon
strating the truth of revelation from its powerful
and beneficient effects — enforcing theholytem
pers and the duties which religion requires from
every rational and scriptural motive — illustrating
the effects of moral evil from the history of na
tions and the miseries in which it has involved
individuals and societies — expatiating on schemes
of philanthropy for the improvement of mankind,
and the conversion of the heathen, and dis
playing the love and mercy of God towards our
race, and the connexions and bearings of the
work of redemption, in its relation to the angelic
tribes and other beings, and in its glorious and
happy consequences on unnumbered multitudes
of mankind, throughout the ages of eternity.
In such a state of Christian society we should
have no dull monotonous preachers, skimming
over the surface of an abstract subject, in a
twenty minutes' sermon, and leaving their hear
ers as dull, and lifeless, and uninformed as they
found them ; but all our public services would be
conducted with life, and energy, and pathos,
and by men of sanctified dispositions and en
lightened understandings, "not given to" idle
ness and " filthy lucre," but having their whole
faculties absorbed in the study of the word, the
ways, and the works of God. And, in order to
expand the minds of the Christian people, and
to prepare them for listening with intelligence to
such instructions, we should have Courses of
Lectures on Natural History, Philosophy, As
tronomy, and General History, attended by thou
sands of anxious inquirers, instead of the tens
which can now be induced to attend on such
means of instruction. For knowledge, when it
is clearly exhibited, and where a previous desire
has been excited for its acquisition, is a source
of enjoyment to the human mind in every stage
of its progress, from the years of infancy to the
latest period of mortal existence.

Hf. Such a diffusion of knowledge as that tc
which we have now adverted, would introduce a
spirit of tolerance and moderation, and prevent
the recurrence of those persecutions for conscience*
sake, which have so much disgraced the world.

It is a striking and most melancholy fact in
the history of man, that the most dreadful suffer
ings and tortures ever felt by human beings, have
been inflicted on account of differences of opin
ion respecting the dogmas and the ceremonies
of religion. Men have been suffered to remain

138

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

villain*!, cheats and robbers, deceitful, profligate
and profane, to invade the territories of their un
offending neighbours, to burn cities and towns,
to lay waste provinces, and slaughter thousands
of their fellow-creatures, and to pass with impu
nity ; while, in numerous instances, the most
pious, upright, and philanthropic characters have
been hurried like criminals to stakes, gibbets,
racks, and flames, merely for holding an opinion
different from their superiors respecting a doc
trine in religion, or the manner in which the Di
vine Being ought to be worshipped. In the
early ages of Christianity, under the emperor
Nero, the Christians were wrapped up in the
skins of wild beasts, and some of them in this
state worried and devoured by dogs ; others were
crucified, and others dressed in shirts made stiff
with wax, fixed to axle trees, and set on fire, and
consumed in the gardens at Rome. Such dread
ful persecutions continued, under the heathen
emperors, with a few intervals, to the time of
Constantine, a period of more than two hundred
and thirty years. It might not be so much to
be wondered at that pagans should persecute the
followers of Christ ; but it was not long before
pretended Christians began to persecute one
another on account of certain shades of differ
ence in their religious opinions. The persecu
tions to which the Walderises and Albigenses
were subjected by the Popish church, and strang
ling and burning of supposed heretics, and the
tortures inflicted on those suspected of favouring
the doctrines of Protestantism by the Spanish
inquisition — a court whose history is written in
flames, and in characters of blood, — exhibit a
series of diabolical cruelties, the recital of which
is enough to make "the ears of everyone to
tingle," and to make him feel as if he were de-

being eligible as teacher of a parochial school, if
he is not connected with the established church >'
and in many other ways attempts to degrade thou
sands of individuals on account of their thinking
and acting according to the dictates of their con
science ? It is true, indeed, that fires, and racks,
and tortures, and gibbets, and thumb-screws are
no longer applied as punishments for differences
of opinion in religion, for the strong hand of the
civil law interposes to prevent them. But were
no such power interposed, the principle which
sanctions such deprivations as those now men
tioned, if carried out to all its legitimate conse
quences, might soon lead to as dreadful persecu
tions as those which have already entailed idelible
disgrace on the race of man.

Such a spirit of intolerance and persecution is
directly opposed to every rational principle, to
every generous and humane feeling, to every pre
cept of Christianity, and to every disposition in
culcated by the religion of Jesus. It is ike height
of absurdity to enforce belief in any doctrine or
tenet, by the application of physical power , for it
never can produce the intended effect ; it may
harden and render persons more obstinate in
their opinions, but it can never convey con
viction to the understanding. And if men had
not acted like fools and idiots, as well as like de
mons, such a force, in such cases, would never
have been applied. And, as such an attempt
is irrational, so it is criminal in the highest de
gree, to aim at producing conviction by the ap
plication of flames, or by the point of the sword ;
being at direct variance both with the precepts
and the practice of the Benevolent Founder of
our holy religion.

We have, therefore, the strongest reason to
conclude, that were the light of science and of

, ,

graded in belonging to a race of intelligences ca- Christianity universally diffused, the hydra of

pable of perpetrating such dreadful enormities.

Even in the British isles such persecutions have
raged, and such cruelties have been perpetrated,
and that, too, in the name of the benevolent reli
gion of Jesus Christ. In our times, the more
appalling and horrific forms which persecution
formerly assumed, have been set aside by the
civil laws of the country, but its spirit still re
mains, and manifests itself in a variety of dif
ferent shapes. What other name can be given
to a power which prevents & numerous and re
spectable body of men from holding certain civil
offices and emoluments, because they do not be
long to an established church, and yet compels
them to contribute to the maintenance of the
ministers of that church, although they do not
recognise them as their religious instructors?
that denies to a dissenter, or his children, the
privilege of being interred in what is called con
secrated ground, and refuses to allow a bell to be
tolled at their funerals ? — that, in Scotland, pre
vents a person, however distinguished for moral
qualifications and intellectual acquirements, from

persecution would never dare, in any shape, to
lift up its heads again in the world. As it was
during the dark ages that it raged in its most
horrific forms, so the light of intelligence would
force it back to the infernal regions whence it
arose, as the wild beasts of the forests betake
themselves to their dens and thickets at the ap
proach of the rising sun. Wherever reason
holds its ascendancy in the mind, and the bene
volence of Christianity is the great principle of
human action, persecution will never be resorted
to, either for extirpating error or enforcing belief
in any opinions. An enlightened mind will at
once perceive, that' in punishing erroneous opin
ions by fines, imprisonment, racks, and flames,
there is no fitness between the punishment and t he
supposed crime. The crime is a mental error,
but penal laws have no internal operation on the
mind, except to exasperate its feelings against
the power that enforces them, and to confirm it
more strongly in the opinions it has embraced.
Errors of judgment, whether religious or politi
cal, can only be overturned by arguments and

CONTENTIONS AMONG MANKIND.

ISO

calm "Basoning, and all the civil and ecclesiasti
cal despots on earth, with all their edicts, and
bulls, and tortures, will never be able to extir
pate (hem in any olher way. For the more that
force is resorted to to compel belief in any sys
tem of opinions, the more will the mind revolt at
such an attempt, and the more will it be con
vinced, that such a system is worthless and un
tenable, since it requires such irrational meas
ures for its support. It can only tend to pro
duce dissimulation, and to increase the number of
hypocrites and deceivers. An enlightened mind
will also perceive, that such conduct is no less
irreligious than it is irrational ; for, where per
secution begins religion ends. Religion pro
claims " peace on earth and good will to men;"
all its doctrines, laws, and ordinances are in
tended to promote the happiness of mankind,
both in " the life that now is and that which is to
come." But actions which tend to injure men
in their persons, liberty, or property, under the
pretence of converting them from error, must be
directly repugnant to the spirit of that religion
which is " pure, and peaceable, gentle, and easy
to be entreated," and to the character of that
Benevolent Being whose " tender mercies are
over all his works." If our religion required for its
establishment in the world, the infliction of civil
pains and penalties on those who oppose it, it
wou'd be unworthy of being supported by any
rational being ; and it is a sure evidence that it
is not the genuine religion of the Bible, but error
and human inventions, under the mask of Chris
tianity, that are intended to be established, when
*uch means are employed for its propagation and
support. It requires very little reflection to
perceive, that religion does not consist in mere
opinions or ceremonial observances, but in the
cultivation and excercise of those heavenly vir
tues and dispositions which tend to cement the
family of mankind in brotherly affection, and to
prepare them for the intercourses and employ
ments of the celestial world ; and if these are
wanting or disregarded, religion becomes a
mere inanity, and it is of little consequence
what opinions men profess to entertain respect-
in" it.

In short, in an enlightened state of society,
men would be disposed to allow the utmost free
dom of thought on every subject, not inconsistent
with the good order of society, and would never
theless hold the most friendly intercourse with
each other. They would clearly discern, that
the best way to reclaim the vicious, and to con-
ve.t the erroneous, is, not to rail and to threat en,
but to be affable and gentle, to bring forward co
gent arguments, and " in meekness to instruct
those who oppose themselves to the truth." They
would see, that many of those opinions and dog
mas, in regard to religion, which have created
heart-burnings and dissensions, are comparavive-
ly of trivial importance, — that the doctrines in

which all Christians agree are much more nume
rous, and of far greater importance, than mose
about which they differ, — that there are suojects
on which the limited faculties of human beings
are unable to form any clear or decisive opin
ions, — that the mind must form its opinions, — in
accordance with the limited or the expansive
range of its intellectual vision, — that where its
mental vie w is narrow and confined, its conclusions
must be somewhat different from those which are
deduced by a mind qualified to take in a more
extensive field of vision, — that the philosopner
whose mind takes in at a grasp the general system
of the world, and the diversified phenomena of the
universe, must have ideas and modes of think
ing materially different from those of the peasant,
whose views are limited chiefly to the confines of
his parish, and the objects immediately around
him, — that there are are few men wilfully erro
neous, and that ignorance and vice are the prin
cipal causes of false and untenable opinions, —
that due allowance ought always to be made for
educational biasses, local prejudices, social in
fluence, and the range of thought to which indi
viduals have been accustomed, — that the exer
cise of love towards God and man is of infinitely
greater importance than mere coincidence in
opinion, and that a complete unanimity of opin
ion on ever)' subject is not to be expected in the
present state, perhaps not even in the future
world. Were such considerations taken into
account, (and they would be all recognised in an
enlightened state of society,) those contentions
and animosities which now rankle in the Chris
tian church, and separate the different sectaries,
would be laid to rest, persecution in every shape
would beheld in universal abhorrence, and peace,
moderation, and candour would distinguish the
friends of religion and all classes of society.

IV. — A universal diffusion of knowledge
would vanquish the antipathies of nations, and
tend to produce union and harmony among man
kind.

" God hath made of one blood all nations of
men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth."
But although they are all the offspring of one
Almighty Being, and descended from one origi
nal human pair, they have hitherto lived, for the
most part, in a state of strife and variance, of
contention and warfare. The history of the
world contains little else than details of the dis
sensions of nations, the feuds of chieftains, " the
tumults of the people," the revolutions of em
pires, and the scenes of devastation and carnage
which have followed in their train. If we go as
far back in our researches as the curliest histori
cal records can carry us, we shall find that wars
have prevailed, almost without intermission, in
every age, in every country, and among every
tribe. No sooner has one series of battles ter-

.40

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

eainafed than preparations have been made for
another: and, in such contests, magnificent ci-
ues have been tumbled into ruins, provinces de
solated, kingdoms rent asunder, and thousands of
thousands of human beings slaughtered wiih all
the ferocity of infernal demons. It is not beyond
the bounds of probability to suppose, that, in
those scenes of warfare, the eighth part of the hu
man race, in every age, has been destroyed, or, a
number of mankind amounting to nearly twenty
thousand millions, which is equal to twenty-five
times the number of inhabitants presently exist
ing in the world. And the leaders in such dia
bolical exploits, so far from repenting of their at-
trocities, have generally been disposed to glory in
their crimes.

Hence the jealousies, the antipathies, and the
hatred which have subsisted, and which still
subsist, between neighbouring nations. The
Turks hate the Greeks, and, as far as in their
power, inflict upon them every species of cruelty
and injustice. The Chinese hate the Europe
ans, cheat them if they can, and pride them
selves in their fancied superiority over all other
nations. The Moors of Africa hate the negroes,
plunder their villages, and reduce them to slave
ry ; the King of Dahomey wages almost conti
nual war with the neighbouring tribes, and adorns
the walls of his palace with the skulls of prison
ers taken in battle. The Algerines and the em
perors of Morocco live in a state of continual
warfare with Christian nations, seize upon their
ships, and reduce their crews to slavery. The
Mrnucaboes, who inhabit the inland part of Ma
lacca, live at variance with all around them, and
never fail to set fire to the ripening grain in every
field that is unprotected and uninclosed. The
Arabians are set against every other nation, and
roam through their deserts, attacking caravans
and travellers of every description. The inha
bitants of one part of New Zealand are almost
in a continual state of enmity against those of
another, and the natives of almost every island
in the Indian and Pacific oceans, if not engaged
in actual contests, are in a state of warlike atti
tude with regard to each other. Even nations
advanced to high degrees of civilization, are
found indulging the meanest and most unreason
able jealousies and antipathies in relation to one
another. The French and the English, whom
nature has separated only by a narrow channel
of the sea, and who are distinguished above all
other nations for their discoveries and improve
ments in the arts, have, for centuries, fostered a
spirit of jealousy and rivalship which has produ
ced political animosities, hatred, wars, and ruin
to the financial and commercial interests of both
nations. During the wars which succeeded the
French revolution, this spirit of hatred and en-
mify rose to such a pitch, that a large portion of
each nation would have, with pleasure, beheld

the other hurled with fury into the infernal re
gions.*

Is there no prospect, then, that such antipa
thies shall ever be extirpated, and harmony re
stored to the distracted nations? Shall the earth
be for ever swept with the besom of destruction 7
Shall war continue its ravages without intermis
sion? Shall hatred still rankle among at( nations,
and Peace never wave its olive branch owr tha
world ? Are we to sit do vn in hopeless despair,
that a union among the nations will » ver be ef
fected, because wars have continued vnce tho
beginning of the world? No, — we have no rea
son to despair of ultimate success, when the mo
ral machinery, calculated to effectuate the ob
ject, shall be set in motion. As ignorance is the
parent of vice, the nurse of pride, avarice, am
bition, and other unhallowed passions, from
which wars derive their origin, so, when the
strongholds of ignorance shall be demolished,
and the light of intelligence shall shed its influ
ence over the world, and the opposite principles
of humility, moderation, and benevolence shal)
pervade the minds of men, the foundations of the
system of warfare will be shaken, and a basis
laid for the establishment of universal peace.
However long the ravages of war have desolated
and convulsed the world, it is announced in the
decree of heaven, that a period shall arrive " when
wars shall cease unto the ends of the earth" And
the era when warriors " shall beat their swords
into ploughshares and their spears into pruning
hooks, and learn the art of war no more," is coe
val with the period foretold in ancient prophecy,
when " the knowledge of the Lord shall cover the
earth, and when all shall know him from the
least to the greatest."

Knowledge has a tendency to unite the hearts
of all who are engaged in its pursuit ; it forms a
bond of union among its votaries more firm and
permanent than that which unites princes and
statesmen ; especially if it is conjoined with
Christian principles and virtuous dispositions
Congeniality of sentiments, and similarity of
pursuits, gradually weaken the force of vulga*
prejudices, and tend to demolish those barriers
which the jealousies of nations have thrown
around each other. True philosophers, whether
English, Swedish, Russian, Swiss, German, or
Italian, maintain an intimate and affectionate
correspondence with each other on every subject
of literature and science, notwithstanding the

• During the wars alluded to, a gentleman, (con
versing with the author on the subject,) who was
uttering the most virulent invectives against the
French, concluded by saying, "After all 1 wish no
great evil to the French, I only wish they icere all
safely landed in heaven," plainly intimating, that he
considered them unworthy to live upon the earth,
and that the sooner they were cut off from it and
sent to the other world, so much the better, whether
their fate should be to dwell in the shades of Tarta
rus or the abodes of Elysium.

ANTIPATHIES OF NATIONS UNDERMINED.

141

antipalhies ol iheir respective nations. During
the late long-continued and destructive warfare
between the French and English, which was
carried on with unprecedented hostility and ran
cour, the naturalists, mathematicians, astrono
mers, and chemists of the two countries, held the
most friendly correspondence in relation to the
subjects connected with their respective depart
ments, m so far as the jealousies of their politi
cal rulers would permit. In the communication
of the French and English philosophers respect
ing the progress of scientific discovery, we find
few traces of nationality, and should scarcely be
able to learn from such communications that their
respective nations were engaged in warfare, un
less when they lament the obstructions which
interrupted their regular correspondence, and
their injurious effects orithe interests of science.
It is a well known fact, that, during the late war,
when political animosities ran so high, the Na
tional Institute of France announced prizes for
the discussion of scientific questions, and invited
the learned in other nations, not even excepting
the English, to engage in the competition; and
one of our countrymen, Sir Humphrey Davy, ac
tually obtained one of the most valuable and dis
tinguished of these honorary awards.

When knowledge is conjoined with a recogni
tion of the Christian precept, " Thou shalt love
thy neighbour as thyself," its possessor will easi
ly be made to enter into such considerations as
the following, and to feel their force: — That all
men, to whatever nation or tribe they belong, are
the children of one Almighty Parent, endowed
with the same corporal organs, the same intellec
tual powers, and the same lineaments of the Di
vine image — that they are subject to the same
animal and intellectual wants, exposed to the same
accidents and calamities, and susceptible of the
same pleasures and enjoyments — that they have
the same capacities for attaining to higher de
grees of knowledge and felicity, and enjoy the
same hopes and prospects of a blessed immortal
ity — that God distributes among them all, thou
sands of benefits, embellishing their habitations
with the same rural beauties, causing the same
sun to enlighten them, the same vital air to make
their lungs play, and the same rains and dews to
irrigate their ground, and ripen their fields to
harvest — that they are all capable of performing
noble achievements, heroic exploits, vast enter
prises; of displaying illustrious virtues, and of
making important discoveries and improvements
—that they are all connected together by nu
merous ties and relations, preparing for each
other the bounties of Nature and the productions
of art, and conveying them by sea and land from
one country to another ; one nation furnishing
tea, another sugar, another wine, another silk,
another cotton, and another distributing its ma
nufactures in both hemispheres of the globe in

•hort, tnat they are all under the moral govern

ment of the same Omnipotent Being, who " hath
made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on
the face of all the earth, who hath determined
the boundaries of their habitations," who carries
them yearly around the centre of light and heat,
and who " gives them rain from heaven and
fruitful seasons, filling their hearts with food and
gladness." How various, then, the ties, how
sacred and indissoluble the bonds, which should
units men of all nations ! Every man, whether he
be a Jew or a Greek, a Barbarian or a Scythian,
a Turk or a Frenchman, a German or a Swede, a
Hottentot or an Indian, an Englishman or a Chi
nese, is to be considered as our kinsman and our
brother, and, as such, ought to be embraced with
benevolence and affection. In whatever region
of the globe he resides, whatever customs or
manners he adopts, and to whatever religious
system he adheres, he is a member of the same
family to which we all belong. And shall we feel
indifferent to our brethren, shall we indulge re
sentment and hostility towards them, because
they are separated from us by a river, by a chan
nel, by an arm of the sea, by a range of moun
tains, or by an arbitrary line drawn by the jea
lousy of despots, or because their government
and policy are different from ours ? Ought we
not, on the contrary, to take a cordial interest in
every thing that concerns them — to rejoice in
their prosperity, to feel compassion on account
of the ravages, desolation, and misery which er
ror andfolly, vice and tyranny may have produced
among them ; and to alleviate, to the utmost of
our power, the misfortunes and oppressions under
which they groan? Reason, as well as Chris
tianity, spurns at that narrow-minded patriotism
which confines its regards to a particular coun
try, and would promote its interests by any
means, although it should prove injurious to every
other nation. Whatever tends to fhe general good
of the whole human family, will ultimately be
found conducive to the prosperity and happiness
of every particular nation and tribe ; while, on
the other hand, a selfish and ungenerous conduct
towards other communities, and an attempt to in
jure or degrade them, will seldom fail to deprive us
of the benefits we wished to secure, and to expose
us to the evils we intended to avert. Such appear
in fact to be the principles of God's moral govern
ment among the nations, and such the sanctions by
which the laws of natural justice are enforced.

Were such sentiments universally recognised
and appreciated, the antipathies of nations would
speedily be vanquished, and union and harmony
prevail among all the kindreds of the earth. And
what a multitude of advantages would ensue—
what a variety of interesting scenes would bo
presented — what an immense number of delight
ful associations would be produced, were such a
union effected among mankind! Were men
over all the globe living in peace and harmony,
every sea would be navigated, every region ex-

142

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

plored, its scenery described, its productions
collected, its botanical peculiarities ascertained,
and its geological structure investigated. The
geography of the globe would be brought to per
fection ; its beauties, harmonies, and sublimities
displayed, and the useful productions of every
clime transported to every country, and culti
vated in every land. Science would, of course,
be improved, and its boundaries enlarged ; new
physical facts would be discovered for confirming
and illustrating its principles, and a broad foun
dation laid for carrying it to perfection. While,
at present, every traveller in quest of scientific
knowledge in foreign lands, is limited in his ex
cursions, and even exposed to imminent danger,
by the rancour of savage tribes and the jealousy
of despotic governments — in such a state of
things, every facility would be given to his
researches, and all the documents of history, and
Ihe treasures of nature and art, laid open to his
inspection. He would be conducted, as a friend
and brother, through every city and rural scene ;
the processes of arts and manufactures,' the
curiosities of nature, and the archives of litera
ture and science, would belaid open to hi? view;
and he would return to his native land loaded
with whatever is curious and useful in nature
and art, and enriched with new accessions to
his treasures of knowledge. The knowledge
and arts of one country would thus be quickly
transported to another; agricultural, manufactur
ing and mechanical improvements would be
gradually introduced into every region ; barren
wastes would be cultivated, forests cut down,
marshes drained, cities founded, temples, schools
and academies erected, modes of rapid commu
nication between distant countries established,
mutual interchanges of affection promoted, and
" the once barren deserts made to rejoice and
blossom as the rose."

We should then behold the inhabitants of
distant countries arriving on our shores — not
with tomahawks, clubs, spears, muskets, and
other hostile weapons, but with the symbols of
peace and the productions of their respective
climes. We should behold the Malayans, the
Chinese, the Cambodians, the Burmese, the
Persians and the Japanese, unfurling their ban
ners on our coasts and rivers, unloading their
cargoes of tea, coffee, pilks, nankeens, em
broideries, carpets, pearls, diamonds, and gold
and silver otnaments and utensils — traversing
our streets and squares in the costume of their
respective countries, gazing at our shops and
edifices, wondering at our manners and customs,
mingling in our assemblies, holding intercourse
with our artists and philosophers, attending our
scientific lectures and experiments, acquiring a
knowledge of our arts and sciences, and return
ing to their native climes to report to their coun
trymen the information they had received, and
Jo introduce amonj; them our discoveries and

improvements. " We should behold the tawn»
Indians of Southern Asia forcing their way
up its mighty rivers in their leathern canoes, tt>
the extremities of the north, and displaying on
the frozen shores of the icy sea, the riches of the
Ganges ; the Laplander covered with warm fur
arriving in southern markets, in his sledge drawn
by rein-deer, and exposing for sale the sable skins
and furs of Siberia ; and the copper-coloured
American Indian traversing the Antilles, arid
conveying from isle to isle his gold and emeralds."
We should occasionally behold numerous cara
vans of Arabians, mounted on thsir dromedaries
and camels, and tribes of Tartars, Bedouins, and
Moors visiting the civilized countries of Europe,
laden with the rarities and riches of their res
pective countries, admiring the splendour of our
cities and public edifices, learning our arts arid
manufactures, acquiring a knowledge of our
literature and sciences, purchasing our commo
dities, procuring specimens of our philosophical
instruments, steam-engines, and mechanical
powers — inviting agriculturists, artists, mechan
ics, teachers, ministers of religion, mathemati
cians and philosophers, to settle among them, for
the purpose of improving i heir system of husband
ry, rearing cities, towns and villages, disseminat
ing useful knowledge, and introducing the arts and
enjoyments of civilized society — at the same
time inviting them to contract marriages with
their sisters and daughters, and thus, by new
alliances, to reunite the branches of the human
family, which, though descended from one com
mon parent, have been so long disunited, — and
which disunion, national prejudices and antipa
thies, as well as climate and complexion, have
tended to perpetuate. And, while we were thus
instrumental hi imparting knowledge and im
provements to olher nations, we ourselvos should
reap innumerable advantages. Our travellers
and navigators, into whatever regions they might
wish to penetrate, would feel secure from every
hostile attack, and would recognise in every one
they met a friend and a brother, ready to relieve
their necessities, to contribute to their comfort,
and to direct them in their mercantile arrange
ments and scientific researches. Our merchants
and manufacturers would find numerous empo
riums for their goods, and new openings for
commercial enterprise, and would import from
other countries new conveniences and comforts
for the use of their countrymen at home.

From such friendly intercourses we should
loarn, more particularly than we have yet done,
the history of olher nations, and the peculiar
circumstances in which thev have existed, par
ticularly of those tribes which have been consi
dered as moving beyond the range of civilizeo
society. All that we at present know of the
history of many foreign nations, consists of a
few insulated sketches and anecdotes, picked
up at random by travellers who passed only a few

UNION IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

143

days or weeks in the countries they describe,
who were beheld with suspicion, and were im
perfectly acquainted with the languages of the
inhabitants. But, from a familiar and confiden
tial intercourse, we should become acquainted
with the whole series of their history, so far as
it is known, which might not only be curious
and interesting in itself, but might throw a light
on the records of other nations, on the facts of
sacred history, and on the general history of the
world. We might thus know something of the
circumstances which attended the early disper
sion of mankind, — the motives which determined
each tribe to choose its separate habitation in an
unknown region, and which induced them to
cross unknown arms of the sea, to traverse moun
tains which presented no path, and rivers which
had not yet received a name, and whose com
mencement and termination were alike un
known. The information which- distant tribes
refuse us, when we approach them like warlike
adventurers or ambitious merchants, would be
freely communicated, when we mingled with
them as friends and benefactors, and especially,
after we had been instrumental in meliorating
their physical and moral condition, and in com
municating to them our improvements.

And, in the name of all that is sacred and be
nevolent, what should hinder such harmonious
and affectionate intercourses between nations
from being universally realized ? Are we not all
brethren of one family ? Have we not all one
Father ? Has not one God created us ? Does not
the same planet support us, and the same atmos
phere surround us 1 Does not the same sun cheer
and enlighten us ? Have we not the same physi
cal organization, the same mental powers, and
'he same immortal destination ? And is it not the
interest of every individual of the human family
that such a friendly intercourse should be esta
blished? Are there any insuperable obstructions,
any impassable barriers, any natural impossibili
ties, that prevent such a union among the na
tions? No, — knowledge, combined with moral
principle and true religion, if universally diffused,
would speedily effectuate this wonderful trans
formation. Enlighten the understandings, direct
the moral powers of man, extend the knowledge
of Christianity through the world, and a broad
foundation will be laid for universal improvement,
and universal friendship among all nations.

But, in order that we may be instrumental in
preparing the way for so desirable an event, our
conduct towards other nations, and particularly
towards uncivilized tribes, must be very different
from what it has generally been in the ages that
are past. We must become, not the plunderers
and destroyers, but the instructors and the bene
factors of mankind. Instead of sending forth the
artillery of war, for the subjugation of distant na
tions, we must uniformly display the banner of
love and the branch af Peace ; instead of despatch-
10

ing crowds of needy adventurers, 5redl witn the
cursed love of gold, to plunder and tckill, like th«
Spaniards in their conquest of Mexico and Peru,
— we must send forth armies of enlightened be-
nefactors, to traverse the benighted nations, to
carry the knowledge of divine truth within the
region of Pagan darkness, to impart to them the
blessings of instruction, and the comforts and
conveniences of civilized life. Instead of landing
on their shores swords and spears and musketry,
— ploughshares, pruning hooks, and every other
agricultural implement, must be plentifully sup
plied to all the inhabitants. Instead of carrying
into slavery their children and relatives, and im-
bittering their lives with cruel treatment, like the
Spaniards and the Portuguese, in reference to the
African negroes, we must, proclaim" liberty to
the captives, and the opening of the prison-doors
to them that are bound." In short, our conduct
must be almost diametrically opposite to that
which political intriguers have generally pursued
towards other states, if we would promote union
among the nations. Our selfishness must be
changed into beneficence, our pride into humility,
our avarice into generosity, and our malignity
into kindness and benevolence. Kindness and
benevolent attentions will sometimes subdue even
the most ferocious animals, and will seldom faii to
soften the breast of the most savage people, and
to win their affections. There is scarcely an in
dividual within the range of the human species,
or even within the range of animated nature, but
is susceptible of the impressions of love ; and if
such principles and affections were to direct the
future intercourses of nations, we might expect,
ere long, to behold the commencement of that
happy era, when " the wilderness and solitary
place shall be glad, when nation shall no longer
lift up sword against nation, when righteousness
and praise shall spring forth before all the na
tions, and when there shall be nothing to hurt
or destroy" among all the families of the earth.

V. — A general diffusion of knowledge would
be one general mean of promoting union in the
Christian Church.

It is a lamentable fact, that throughout the
whole world, there is no system of religion, the
votaries of which are subdivided into so many
sectaries as rriose who profess an adherence to
the Christian faith. Within the limits of Great
Britain, there are perhaps not much fewer than
a hundred different denominations of Christians
belonging to the Protestant church. We have
Calvinists, Arminians. Baxterians, Antinomi-
ans, Arians and Unitarians, Episcopalians,
Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, and Inde
pendents, — Seceders, Brownists, Sandemanians,
Quakers, Moravians, Svvedenborgians, Mille-
narians, Sabbatarians, Universalists, Sublapsa-
rians, Supralapsarians, Diuikers, Kilhamitrn.

144

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

Shakurs, &c. Of some of these there are
several subdivisions. Thus, there are three or
four denominations of Seceders, four or five of
Baptists, three or four of Methodists, and two
or three of Glassites or Sandemanians. Most
of these denominations recognise the leading
truths' of divine revelation, — the natural and
moral attributes of the Deity, — the fall of man,
— the necessity of a Saviour, — the incarnation
of Christ, — the indispensable duty of faith in
him for the remission of sins, — the necessity of
regeneration, and of holiness in principle and
practice, — the obligation of the moral law, — the
doctrine of a resurrection from the dead, and of a
future state of rewards and punishments, — in
short, every thing by which Christianity is dis
tinguished from Mahomedanism, Pagan idola-
tary, and all the other systems of religion that
prevail in the world. Yet, while agreeing in
the leading doctrines of the Christian faith,
they continue in a state of separation from each
other, as if they had no common bond of union,
and, as rival sects, are too frequently in a state
of alienation, and even of open hostility. The
poinls in which they differ are frequently so mi
nute as to be incapable of being accurately de
fined, or rendered palpable to an impartial in
quirer. Where the difference is most apparent,
it consists chiefly in a diversity of opinion res
pecting such questions as the following: —
Whether the election of man to eternal life be
absolute or conditional. — whether Christ died
for the sins of the whole world, or only for a li
mited number, — whether there be a gradation
or an equality among the ministers of the Chris
tian church, — whether every particular society
of Christians has power to regulate its own af
fairs, or ought to be in subjection to higher
courts of judicature, — whether the ordinance of
the Lord's Supper should be received in the pos
ture of sitting or of kneeling, — whether Baptism
should be administered to infants or adults, or be
performed by dipping or sprinkling, &c. Such
are some of the points of dispute, which have
torn the Christian church into a number of
shreds, and produced among the different secta
ries jealousies, recriminations and contentions.
When we consider the number and the impor
tance of the leading facts and doctrines in which
they all agree, it appears somewhat strange and
even absurd, that they should stand aloof from
each other, and even assume a hostile altitude,
on account of such comparatively trivial differ
ences of opinion, especially when they all pro
fess to be promoting the same grand object,
travelling to the same heavenly country, and
expect, ere long, to sit down in harmony in the
mansions above. The grand principles of hu
man action, which it is the chief object of Re
velation to establish, and the precepts of morality
which ought to govern the affections and conduct
»f every Christian, are recognised by all ; and

why then should they separate from each other,
arid remain at variance on account of matters ut'
" doubtful disputation ?"

The evils which flow from such a divided
state of Christian society, are numerous and
much to be deplored. A seciariaji spirit has
burst asunder the bonds of Christian love, and
prevented that harmonious and affectionate in
tercourse among Christians which is one of the
chief enjoyments of social religion. It has in
fused jealousies, fanned the flame of animosity
and discord, set friends, brethren and families at
variance, and shattered even civil communities
into factions and parties. It has kindled con
tentions and heart-burnings, produced envyings,
animosites, and hatred of brethren, burst asun
der ihe strongest ties of natural affection, and
has led professed Christians to violate the
plainest dictates of humanity and of natural jus
tice. It has excited a feverish zeal for the pe
culiarities of a sectary, while the distinguishing
features of Christianity have either been over
looked or trampled under foot. It has wasted
money unnecessarily in erecting separate places
of worship, which might have been devoted to the
promotion of the interests of our common Christi
anity. It has even corrupted our very prayers,
infused into them human passions, and a spirit of
party, and confined them to the narrow limits of
our own sectary, as if the Omnipotent, whom we
profess to adore, were biassed by the same pre
judices as ourselves, and dispensed his favours
according to our contracted views. Could we
fly with the swiftness of an angelic messenger
through the various assemblies convened on the
Christian Sabbath, while they are offering up
their prayers to heaven, what a repulsive and
discordant scene would present itself, when we
beheld the leaders of certain sectaries confining
their petitions to their own votaries, imploring a
special blessing upon themselves, as if they were
the chief favourites of heaven, lamenting the
errors of others, throwing out inuendos against
rival sectaries, taking credit to themselves as
the chief depositories of gospel truth, and thank
ing God for their superior attainments in Chris
tian perfection ! How unlike the noble, bene
volent and expansive spirit which Christianity
inculcates ! — Nay, the intolerance which the di
visions of the Christian church have engendered,
has established Inquisitions for the purpose ot
torturing and burning supposed heretics, — has
banished, imprisoned, plundered, hanged and
committed to the flames, thousands and ten thou
sands, on account of their religious opinions ; and
many eminent characters, illustrious for piety
and virtue, have fallen victims to such unchris
tian barbarities.

In particular, the divisions and contentions of
Christians have been one of the chief causes of
the progress of infidelity. The truth and excel
lence of our religion can only be exhibited to the

EVILS OF SECTARIANISM.

145

world by its effects. And when, instead of love,
union and harmony among its professors, we be
hold bitter envyings, schisms, contentions and
animosities, there appears nothing to allure vi
cious and unthinking minds to examine its evi
dences, and to give it an impartial hearing.
li First agree among yourselves," infidels reply,
" and then we will consider the truth and impor
tance of your opinions." Such a mode of rea
soning and conduct is indeed both absurd and
unfair, when the genuine doclrines and requisi
tions of Christianity are clearly .slated in its ori
ginal records, and which they ought to examine
for themselves ; but it is a circumstance much to
be deplored, that Christians, by their sectarian
animosities, should throw a stumbling-block in
the way of rational investigation into the truths
an;! foundations of religion, and cause thousands
to stumble and fall to their destruction. But, what
is perhaps worst of all, it has greatly retarded, and
still retards, the universal propagation of Chris
tianity through the world. Something has indeed
been effected, of late years, by various sections
of the Christian church, in the different Mis
sionary enterprises which they have conducted,
in their separate capacities ; but it is not too
much to affirm, that, had they acted in combina
tion and in harmony, in jthe missionary cause,
ten times more good would have been effected
than has ever yet been accomplished. Besides,
in our present mode of propagating the Gospel
among the heathen, we are to a certain extent,
sowing the seeds of those unhappy dissensions
which have so long prevailed among ourselves.
And, therefore, till the different religious deno
minations, in this and other Christian lands, be
brought into a more general and harmonious
union, we cannot expect to behold a rapid and
extensive propagation of primitive Christianity
throughout the Pagan world.

Such are some of the evils which a sectarian
spirit has produced in the Christian Church. It
is almost needless to say, that they do not origi
nate in the genius of the Gospel, which is direct
ly opposed to such a spirit, but in the corruption
of human nature, and the perversion of true re
ligion. They have their rise in ignorance, — in
ignorance both of the revelations of the Bible,
considered as one whole, and of those truths of
history, philosophy, and general science, which
have a tendency to liberalize and to enlarge the
capacity of the human mind. This ignorance
naturally leads to self-conceit, and an obstinate
attachment to preconceived opinions and party
prejudices, to attaching an undue importance to
certain subordinate and favourite opinions, and
overlooking the grand^ essentials of the Chris
tian scheme ; and thus prevents the mind from
expanding its views, and taking a luminous and
comprehensive ssuvey of the general bearings
and distinguishing features of the religion of the
Bible. And, if such numerous and serious evils

have followed from the divisions of Christians, it
becomes an important inquiry, whether they har«
ever been productive of advantages sufficient to
counterbalance such pernicious effects. Is an
obscure question, in relation to church-govern
ment, to be set in competition with Christian
union? Is a metaphysical opinion about the
sovereignty of God, and his councils during eter
nity past, to be obstinately maintained, although
the strongest bonds of Christian love should there
by be burst asunder ? Is the rigid adherence to
an opinion respecting dipping or sprinkling in
baptism, or the maintenance of a dogma in refe
rence to the extent of Christ's redemption, under
pretence of bearing a testimony in behalf of
Divine truth, to be considered as sufficient to
counterbalance the numerous evils which have
flowed from a sectarian spirit ? Can we suppose,
that He whose law is love, who hath commanded
us to " keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond
of peace," and who hath declared, again and
again, in the most explicit terms, " By this shall
all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye love
one another:" are we to suppose, that He will
consider the maintenance of such opinions, un
der such pretences, as a warrant for the infringe
ment of the law of charity, or the breach of Chris
tian union, or that he sets a higher value on in
tellectual subtleties and speculative opinions, than
on the practical requisitions of his word, and the
manifestations of Christian temper and conduct ?
To answer these questions in the affirmative,
would be little short of offering an insult to the
King of Zion. Whatever is not so clearly re
vealed in Scripture, that every rational and se
rious inquirer does not plainly perceive it to be
truth or duty, can scarcely be supposed to be ot*
such importance, as to warrant the breach of the
unity of the church. For the inspired writers,
who were the vehicles of a revelation from hea
ven, can never be supposed to have used vague
or ambiguous language in explaining and enfor
cing matters of the first importance.

If we consider the temper and conduct of many
of those "who are sticklers upon phrases, and
zealous about matters of mere form, we shall be
convinced how few beneficial practical effects are
the result of a narrow sectarian spirit. While
they appear fired with a holy zeal lest the purity
of divine ordinances should be tainted by un-
washen hands, you will sometimes find them im
mersed in the grossest sensualities and immorali
ties of conduct. While they are severe stick
lers for what they conceive to be the primitive
form and order of a Christian church, you will
not unfrequently find disorder reigning in their
families, the instruction of their children and
servants neglected, and a sour and boisterous
spirit manifested in all their intercourses with
their domestics. Yea, you will find, in numer
ous instances, that they scrup/e not to practise
frauds in the course of their business, and Uu<

146

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

you can have less dependance on their promises
than on those of the men of the world, who make
no pretences to religion. As an excellent writer
has well observed. " An ardent temperament
copverts the enthusiast into a zealot, who, while
he is laborious in winning proselytes, discharges
common duties very remissly, and is found to be
a more punctilious observer of his creed than of
his word. Or, if his imagination is fertile, he
becomes a visionary, who lives on better terms
with angels and with seraphs, than with his
children, servants, and neighbours ; or, he is one
who, while he reverences the ' thrones, domi
nions, and powers ' of the invisible world, vents
his spleen in railing on all ' dignities and powers
on earth.' "*

What are the remedies then, which may be
applied for healing the unhappy divisions which
have arisen in the Christian church? It is evi
dent, in the first place, that we must discard the
greater part of those human systems of divinity,
and those polemical writings and controversies,
which have fanned the flame of animosity, and
which have so frequently been substituted in the
room of the oracles of God. We must revert to
the Scriptures as the sole standard of every reli
gious opinion, and fix our attention chiefly on
those matters of paramount importance which are
obvious to every attentive reader, and which enter
into the essence of the Christian system. For,
to maintain, that the Scriptures are not suffici
ently clear and explicit in regard to every thing
that has a. bearing on the present comfort and the
everlasting happiness of mankind, is nothing short
of a libel on the character of the sacred writers,
and an indignity offered to Him by whose Spirit
they were inspired. We must also endeavour to
discard the " vain janglings," the sophistical
reasonings, and the metaphysical refinements of
the schools, and the technical terms of polemical
theology, such as trinity, ypostatical union, sacra
ments, &c. and, in our discussions, especially on
mysterious or doubtful subjects, adhere as nearly
as possible to the language of the inspired writ
ers. In particular, more attention ought to be
paid to the manifestation of Christian love, and
the practice of religion, than to a mere coinci
dence of view with regard to certain theological
dogmas. For it is easy to conceive, that a°man
may be animated by holy principles and disposi
tions, although he may have an obscure concep
tion, or may even entertain an erroneous opinion,
of some of the doctrines of religion ; and we know
by experience, that men may contend zealously
for what are considered orthodox doctrines, and
yet be destitute of the spirit ofreli«ion, and tram
ple on its most important practical requirements.
And, were tne spirit of our holy religion thorough
ly to pervade the different sections of the church
—were Christian affection more generally mani-

• Natural Hist, of Enthusiasm, p. 14.

fested among all who bear the Christian jracae,
and the practical injunctions of Christianity uni
formly exemplified in their conduct, we should
soon behold a general coincidence of opinion or,
every thing that can be deemed important in re
ligion, and a mutual candour and forbearance, in
regard to all subordinate opinions, that do not
enter into the essence of religion, and wnich
ought to be left to the private judgment of every
inquirer.

But I entertain little hope that such measures
will be adopted, and an object so desirable accom
plished, while so much ignorance still pervades
the minds of the majority of Christians, and while
the range of their intellectual views is so much
contracted. It is only when the effects of a gene
ral diffusion of knowledge shall be more exten
sively felt, that a more general and cordial union
of the Christian world is to be expected. Light in
the understanding is the source of all reformations,
the detector of all evils and abuses, the correc
tor of all errors and misconceptions, and the
stimulus to every improvement. It dispels the
mists which prevented our distinct vision of the
objects of our contemplation, discovers the stumb
ling-blocks over which we had fallen, points out
the devious ways into which we had wandered,
and presents before us every object in its just
magnitude and proportions. The knowledge to
which I allude consists, in the first place, in a
clear and comprehensive view of the whole system
of divine revelation, in all its connexions and
bearings,-vand, in the next place, in an acquain
tance with all those historical, geographical, and
scientific facts which have a tendency to expand
the capacity of the mind, and to enlarge our con
ceptions of the attributes ofGod,and of the ways of
his providence. Wherever the mind is thorough
ly enlightened in the knowledge of such subjects,
the tendency to bigotry and sectarianism will
quickly be destroyed, and the partition walls
which now separate the different sections of the
church will gradually be undermined ami crumble
into dust. This might be illustrated from the
very nature of the thing. A man whose mind
is shrouded in comparative ignorance, is like a
person who lands on an unknown country in the
dusk of the evening, and forms his opinion of its
scenery and inhabitants from the obscure and
limited view he is obliged to take of them, during
the course of a few hours, — while he whose mind
is enlightened in every department of human and
divine knowledge, is like one who has taken a
minute and comprehensive survey of the same
country, traversed its length and breadth, min
gled with every class of its inhabitants, visited its
cities, towns, arid villages, and studied its arts
and sciences, its laws, customs, and antiquities.
The one can form but a very imperfect and inac
curate conception of the country he has visited,
and could convey only a similar conception tc
others, — the other has acquired a correct idea o

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS OF CHRISTIAN UNION.

147

Jie scene he has surveyed, and can form an accu
rate judgment of the nature, the tendency, and
bearings of the laws, institutions, and political
economy which have been the subject of his inves
tigations. So that the accounts given by these
two visitors, of the same country, behoved to be
materially different. The sectarian bigot is one
who has taken a partial and limited view of one
or two departments of thf> field of revelation, who
fixes his attention on a few of its minute objects,
and who overlooks the sublimity and the grand
bearings of its more magnificent scenery. The
man of knowledge explores it throughout its length
and breadth, fixes his eye upon its distinguishing
features, and brings all the information he has
acquired from other quarters, to assist his concep
tions of the nature, the bearings, and relations of
the multifarious objects presented to his view.
The luminous views ho lias taken of the leading
objects and design of revelation, and the expansive
conceptions he has acquired of the perfections of
Him by whom it was imparted, — will never suf
fer him to believe, that it is agreeable to the will
of God that a Christian society should be rent
asunder in the spirit of animosity, because one
party maintains, for example, that dipping- is the
true mode of performing baptism, and the other,
that it should be ad ministered by sprinkling, while
they both recognise it as a divine ordinance, and
symbolical of spiritual blessings, — or that such
conduct can have a tendency to promote the
glory of God, and the best interests of men. He
can never believe that that incomprehensible Be
ing who inhabiteth eternity, who superintends the
affairs often thousand worlds, and who hath ex
hibited in his word the way to eternal life in the
clearest light — should attach so great a degree of
importance to such questions, that either the one
party or the other should be considered as exclu
sive supporters of divine truth, while they in
fringe the law of Christian love, and forbear " to
keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace."
For, in reference to the example now stated, a
few drops of water are equally ^.symbol or emblem
as the mass of liquid in a mighty river ; — and to
consider the Almighty as beholding with appro
bation such speculations, and their consequent
effects, would be little short of affixing a libel on
his moral character. The man of knowledge is
disposed to view in the same light, almost all the
minute questions and circumstantial opinions,
which have been the cause of separating the
church of Christ into its numerous compartments.
If we attend to facts, we shall find, that, in
ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the man who
is a violent party- partisan, is one whose ideas run
in one narrow track, and who has taken a very
limited and partial survey of the great objects of
religion. He is generally unacquainted with the
range of history, the facts of science, the philo-
gophy of nature, and the physical and moral state
of distant nations. His mind never ranges over

the globe, nor contemplates the remote wonders
of the Creator's empire. His reading is chiefly
confined to the volumes and pamphlets publish
ed by the partisans of his own sect; he can run
over the scriptures and arguments which sup
port his opinions, like a racer in his course, but,
if you break in upon his train of thought, and re
quire him to prove his positions, as he goes
along, he is at a stand, and knows not how to
proceed. While he magnifies, with a microsco
pic eye, the importance of his own peculiar views,
he almost overlooks the grand and distinguishing
truths of the Bible, in which all true Christians
are agreed. On the other hand, there is scarcely
one instance out of a hundred, of men whose
minds are thoroughly imbued with the truths of
science and revelation, being the violent abettors
of sectarian opinions, or indulging in party ani
mosities ; for, knowledge and liberality of senti
ments almost uniformly go hand in hand. Wnile
we ought to recognise and appreciate every por
tion of divine truth, in so far as we perceive its
evidence, — it is, nevertheless, the dictate of an
enlightened understanding, that those truths which
are of the. first importance, demand our first and
chief attention. Every controversy, agitated
among Christians on subjects of inferior import
ance, has a direct tendency to withdraw the at
tention from the great objects which distinguish
the revelations of the Bible; and there cannot be
a more absurd or fatal delusion, than to acquire
correct notions on matters comparatively unim
portant, while we throw into the shade, or but
faintly apprehend, those truths which are essen
tial to religion, and of everlasting moment. Every
enlightened Christian perceives the truth and
importance of this position ; and were it to be
universally acted upon, sectarian divisions and
contentions would soon cease to exist ; for they
have almost uniformly taken place in conse
quence of attaching too great a degree of import
ance to matters of inferior moment.

Were the minds of the members of (he Christian
church, therefore, thoroughly enlightened, and
imbued with the moral principles of the religion
of Jesus, we should soon behold, among all deno
minations, a tendency to union, on the broad ba
sis of recognising the grand essential truths of
Christianity, which formed the principal subjects
of discussion in the sermons of our Saviour and
his apostles — and a spirit of forbearance mani
fested in regard to all opinions on matters of infe
rior importance. Were this period arrived —
and, from the signs of our times, its approach
cannot be very distant — it would be attended
with a train of the most glorious and auspicious
effects. A merging of party differences, and a
consequent union of enlightened Christians,
would dissipate that spirit of trifling in religion
by which so much time has been absorbed in dis
cussing sectarian opinions, to the negleetof the.
great objects of the Christian faith ; for when

148

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

trivial controversies are quashed, the time and
attention they absorbed would be devoted to more
sublime and important investigations. It would
have a powerful influence on the propagation of
Christianity throughout the heathen world ; for
the whole Christian world would then become
one grand Missionary Society, whose operations
would be conducted with rnqre efficiency and
skil1, whose funds would be much more ample,
and whose Missionaries would be better educat
ed than they now are — and those sectarian differ
ences of opinion, which now produce so many
unhappy dissensions, for ever prevented from
disturbing the harmony of converts in distant
lands. It would cherish the principle of Chris
tian love, detach it from every unholy jealousy,
and render it more ardent and expansive in its
philanthropic operations. It would produce a
powerful and beneficial influence upon the men
of the world, and even upon infidels themselves;
it would snatch from them one of their most pow
erful arguments against the religion of the Bible,
and would allure them to the investigation of its
evidences, by the exhibition it gave of its harmo
nious and happy effects. It would have an influ
ence on the minds of the Roman Catholics, in
leading them to an unbiassed inquiry into the
grounds on which the Protestant church is esta
blished. At present, when called upon to ex
amine the doctrines of Protestantism, they retort
Upon us — " You are divided into a hundred dif
ferent sectaries, and are at variance among
yourselves ; show us which of these sects is in
possession of the truth, and we will then examine
your pretensions, and perhaps come over to your
standard." It would have an influence on the
Jewish people, in removing their prejudices
against the religion of Jesus of Nazareth, espe
cially, were it followed, as it likely would be,
with a repeal of all those statutes which have
imposed upon them disabilities, deprived them
of the rights of citizenship, and subjected them to
unchristian severities. In short — in connexion
with the general manifestation of Christian prin
ciple — it would produce a benign influence on
surrounding nations, and on the world .at large.
For a bodv of Christians, in such a country as
ours, formed into one grand association, and act
ing in harmony, must exert a powerful influence
on the councils of the nation ; and our political
intercourses with other states, being conducted
on the basis of Christian principles and laws,
would invite their attention to a religion pro
ductive of so much harmony and so many bene
ficial effects. Peace and unity in the church
would have a tendency to promote peace and
friendship among nations ; the cause of univer
sal education would be promoted, without those
obstructions which now arise from sectarian pre
judices; ana a general diffusion of useful know
ledge would soon be effected throughout every
quarter of the civilized world, till the knowledge

of Jehovah should cover the earth as the water*
cover the channels of the seas.

The disunion of the Christian church is not to
be perpetual. We are t ertain, that a period is
hastening on, when its divisions shall be healed,
when its boundaries shall be enlarged, and when
" the name of Jehnvah shall be one throughout all
the earth." At some period or other, therefore,
in the lapse of time, a movement towards such a
union must commence. It cannot take place be
fore the attention of the religious world is direct
ed to this object. And why should not such a
movement commence at the present moment?
Why should we lose another year, or even ano
ther month, before we attempt to concert mea
sures, in order to bring about a consummation so
devoutly to be wished? The presen' eventful
period is peculiarly auspicious for this purpose ;
when the foundations of tyranny, injustice, and
error are beginning to be shaken ; when know
ledge is making progress among every order of
society ; when reforms in the state, and in every
subordinate department of the community, are
loudly demanded by persons of every character
and of every rank ; when the evils attached to
our ecclesiastical institutions are publicly de
nounced ; when the scriptures are translating
into the languages of every tribe ; and when mis
sionary enterprises are carrying forward in every
quarter of the habitable globe. To attempt a
union of all true Christians, at the present crisis,
would, therefore, be nothing more than falling in
with the spirit of the age, and acting in harmony
with those* multifarious movements, which are
destined to be the means of enlightening and
renovating the human race ; and at no period
since the Reformation could such an attempt
have been made with more sanguine expecta
tions, and greater prospects of success. All eyes
are now turned towards some eventful and aus
picious era, when the light of science shall shine
refulgent, when abuses shall be corrected, evils
remedied, society meliorated, and its various
ranks brought into more harmonious association.
And shall Christians alone remain shut up in
their little homesteads, apart from each other,
stickling about phrases, and contending about
forms, without ever coming forth to salute each
other in the spirit of union, and to give an im
pulse to the moral machinery that is hastening
forward the world's improvement and regenera
tion? Such a surmise cannot be indulged: it
would be a libel on the Christian world, arid a
reproach on the religion of which they profess
themselves the votaries. I trust there are thou
sands in every department of the church, who
are ardently longing to break down the walls of
partition, which separate them from their bre
thren, and anxiously waiting for an opportunity
of expressing their sentiments, and of giving the
right hand of fellowship " to all who lova ow
Lord Jesus in sincerity."

CONNEXION OF SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

149

In any attempts that may be made to promote
this great object, mutual concessions behoved to
bt made hy all parties. One general principle,
that requires to be recognised, is this : — that eve
ry opinion and practice be set aside, which is ac
knowledged on all hands to have no direct founda
tion in scripture, but is a mere human fabrication,
introduced by accident or whim ; such as, the
observance of fast and preparation days pre
vious to the participation of the Lord's Supper,
kneeling in the act of partaking of that ordinance,
repeating the Athanasian Creed in the regular
services of the church, &c. &c. It is a striking
and remarkable fact, that the chief points about
which Christians are divided, are points on
which the volume of inspiration is silent, and
which the presumption and perversity of men
nave attached to the Christian system, and in
terwoven with the truths and ordinances of reli
gion ; and, therefore, were the line of distinction
clearly drawn between mere human opinions and
ceremonials, and the positive dictates of revela
tion, and the one separated from the other, the
way would be prepared for a more intimate and
harmonious union in the church of Christ. As a
preparative measure to such a union, a friendly
intercourse between the different sectaries*
should be solicited and cherished. Enlightened
ministers of different denominations should occa
sionally exchange pulpits, and officiate for each
other in the public exercises of divine worship.
This would tend to show to the world, and to
each other, that there is no unholy jealousy or
hostile animosity subsisting between them, which
their present conduct and attitude too frequently
indicate. It would also be productive of many
conveniences, in the case of a minister being in
disposed, or absent from home, as his place could
frequently be supplied, without the least expense
or inconvenience, by his brethren of other denomi
nations. It would likewise show to the mass of
professing Christians, that the doctrines promul
gated, and the duties enforced, by ministers of
different denominations, are substantially the
same. What a disgrace to the Christian name,
that such a friendly intercourse has never yet
been established ; or, when it occasionally hap
pens, that it should be considered as an extraor
dinary and unlooked-for phenomenon ! What a
strange and unexpected report must be received
by Christian converts in heathen lands, when they
are told, that Christian ministers in this country,
who were instrumental in sending missionaries
10 communicate to them the knowledge of salva
tion, are actuated by so much jealousy, and stand
so much aloof from each other, that even at the

• By sectaries, in this place, and elsewhere, I un
derstand, not only the different denominations of
Dissenters but the Church of England, the Church
of eteoUiuid. and all other national'churches, which
are all no many nectaries, or different compartments
of the universal Christian church.

very time they are planning missionary enterpri
ses, they will refuse their pulpits to each other,
for the purpose of addressing their fellow-men on
subjects connected with their everlasting interests,
and refrain from joining in unison in the ordinan
ces of religion, although many of them expect, ere
long, to join in harmony in the services of the
sanctuary above ! It is to be hoped, that such a
disgrace to the Christian cause will soon be wip
ed away, and its inconsistency clearly perceiv
ed by all who are intelligent and "right-hearted
men."

Such a friendly intercourse and correspon
dence as now suggested, would be far more effi
cient in preparing the way for a cordial union
of Christians, than the deliberations and discus
sions of a thousand doctorsof divinity, delegated
to meet in councils to settle the points in dis
pute between the different sectaries. This object,
I presume, will never be accomplished by theo
logical controversy, or by any attempt to con
vince the respective parties of the futility or
erroneousness of their peculiar opinions ; but, on
the ground of their being brought nearer to each
other, and more firmly united in the mutual ex
ercise of the Christian virtues, and in the bonds
of Christian affection. And, when such a har
monious intercourse shall be fully effected, it
will form a more glorious and auspicious era in
the history of the Christian church, than has
ever occurred since the " good tidings of great
joy" were proclaimed in the plains of Bethlehem,
or since the day of Pentecost, when " the whole
multitude of them that believed were of one heart,
and of one soul, and had all things common."*

SECTION XI.

On the importance of connecting Science with

Religion.

IN several of the preceding sections, I hare
exhibited sketches of the outlines of some of the
branches of science, and of the objects towards
which its investigations are directed. 1 have
all along taken it for granted, that such knowledge
and investigations ought to be combined with
just views of religion, and an attention to its
practical acquirements, and have occasionally
inters persed some remarks on this topic. But
as the subject is of peculiar importance, it may
not be inexpedient to devote a section to its mo/a
particular elucidation.

Of late years, knowledge has increased, among
the middle and lower ranks of society, with
greater rapidity than in any preceding age, and
Mechanics' Institutions, arid other associations,
have been formed, to give an impulse to tho re-

* Sea Appendix, Note XL

150

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

newecl vigour of the human mind, and to gratify
the desires which are now excited for intellectual
pleasures and acquirements. Reason is arous
ing from the slumber of ages, and appears deter
mined to make aggressions on the world of sci
ence, and to employ its faculties on every object
which comes within the range of human inves
tigation. The labourer, the mechanic and arti
san, — no longer confined to trudge in the same
beaten track in their respective professions, and
to the limited range of thought which distinguish
ed their predecessors in former generations —
aspire after a knowledge of the principles on
which their respective arts are founded, and an
acquaintance with those scientific subjects,
which were formerly confined to the cloisters of
colleges and the higher orders of society. Lec
tures have been delivered in most of our towns
and even villages, on the practice of the arts
and the principles of the physical sciences,
which have extended their intellectual views, and
given them a higher idea of the nobleness and
sublimity of the mental faculties with which they
are endowed. This excitement to rational in
quiry has partly arisen from the spirit of the age,
and the political movements which have distin
guished our times; but it has also been produced
by the exertions of men of erudition, in concert
ing plans for the diffusion of knowledge, in giving
a popular form to works of science, and divest
ing it of that air of mystery which it formerly as
sumed. And, should such excitement be pro
perly directed, it cannot fail to raise the lower
ranks of the community from intellectual degra
dation, and to prevent them from indulging in
intemperance, and other sensual vices, which
have so long debased our rational nature. At
no former period has the spirit of science been so
fully awakened, and so generally disseminated.
On every side the boundaries of knowledge have
been extended, the system of nature explored,
the labours of philosophy withdrawn from hypo
thetical speculations to the investigation of facts,
and the liberal and mechanical arts carried to a
pitch of perfeciion, hitherto unattained.

But, amidst all the intellectual movements
around us, it is matter of deep regret, that the
knowledge of true religion, and the practice of
its moral precepts, have not kept pace with the
improvements and the diffusion of science. Not
a few of those who have lately entered on the
prosecution of scientific pursuits, — because their
ideas have not been expanded a little beyond the
limited range of thought to which they were
formerly confined — seem now to regard revealed
n.'ligion as little else than a vulgar superstition,
or, at most, as a matter of inferior moment.
Because their forefathers thought that the earth
was the largest body in nature, and placed in a
quiescent state in the centre of the universe,
and that the stars were merely brilliant spangles
fixed in the concave of the sky, to diversify the

firmament— which notions are now proved to k»
erroneous — therefore they are apt to surmise,
that the religion they professed rested on no bet
ter a foundation. Because their notions of that
religion were blended with erroneous opinions
and foolish superstitions, they would be dispos
ed to throw aside the whole, as unworthy of the
attention of men of enlightened understandings,
whose minds have been emancipated fiom the
shackles of vulgar prejudice and priestly domina
tion. Such irreligious propensities have their
origin, for the most part, in a principle of vanity
and self-conceit, in that spirit of pride congenial
to human nature, which leads the person in
whom it predominates to vaunt himself on his
superiority to vulgar opinions and fears — and,
in the want of discriminating between- what is
of essential importance in religion, and the
false and distorted notions which have been incor
porated with it by the ignorance and perversity
of men.

This tendency to irreligion has likewise been
promoted by the modes in which scientific know
ledge has been generally communicated. In the
greater part of the best elementary treatises on
science, there seldom oeours any distinct refer
ence to the perfections and the agency of that
Omnipotent Being, under whose superintendence
all the processes of nature are conducted. In
stead of directing the young and untutored mind
to rise " from nature up to nature's God" — it is
considered by many, as unphilosophical, when
explaining natural phenomena, to advert to any
but proximate causes, which reason or the senses
con ascertain ; and thus a veil is attempted to
be drawn between the Deity and his visible
operations, so as to conceal the agency of Him
whose laws heaven and earth obey. In the aca
demical prelections on physical science, in most
of our colleges and universities, there appears a
studied anxiety to avoid every reflection that
wears the semblance of religion. From the first
announcement of the properties of matter and the
laws of motion, through all their combinations
in the system of nature, and their applications
to dynamics, hydrostatics, pneumatics, optics,
electricity, and magnetism, the attention of the
student is kept constantly fixed on secondary
causes and physical laws, as if the universe were
a self-existent and independent piece of mecha
nism ; and it is seldom that the least reference
is made to that Almighty Being who brought it
into existence, and whose laws and operations
are the subject of investigation. It is almost
needless to add, that the harmony which subsists
between the works of God, and the revelations
of his word — the mutual light which they reflect
upon each other — the views which they open ol
the plan of the Divine government, — and the
moral effects which the contemplation of nature
ought to produce upon the heart — are never, so
far as we have learned, introduced, in such

POLLY OP OVERLOOKING RELIGION.

seminaries, as subjects which demand particular
attention. Thus the Deity is carefully kept out
of view, and banished, as it were, from his own
creation ; and the susceptible mind of the youth
ful student prevented from feeling those impres
sions of awe and reverence, of love and gratitude,
which the study of the material world, when
properly conducted, is calculated to produce.

The same principles and defects are percepti
ble in the instructions communicated in most of
the Mechanics' Institutions, which have been
lately formed for the improvement of the middle
and lower classes of society. It has been public
ly announced, in the speeches of gentlemen of
science and erudition, who, with a laudable zeal,
took a part in the organization of these institu
tions, — -and the announcement has been re-echo
ed in every similar association, and transcribed
into every literary journal, — that, " Hencefor
ward the discussions of science are to be complete
ly separated from religion.1" I do not mean to
accuse the highly respectable characters alluded
to, as being hostile either to natural or revealed
religion, from the circumstance of their having
made this announcement ; as I presume they
only intended by it to jet rid of those sectarian
disputes about unimportant points in theology,
which have so long disturbed the peace of the
church and of the world. But, when I consider
the use that will be made of it by certain cha
racters and societies, and the bearing it may have
on the mode of communicating scientific know
ledge, I am constrained to pronounce the decla
ration as no less unphilotophical, than it is impi
ous and immoral in its general tendency. It is
unphilotophical ; for science, when properly
considered in relation to its higher and ultimate
objects, is nothing else than an investigation of
the power, wisdom, benevolence, and superin
tending providence of the Almighty, as displayed
in the structure and movements of the universe,
— of the relation in which we stand to this Great
Being, — and of the duties which we owe him.
To overlook such objects, is evidently contrary
to the plainest dictates of reason and philosophy.
Is it possible that an intelligent mind can contem
plate the admirable and astonishing displays of
divine perfection and munificence, throughout
every part of creation, and not be excited to the
exercise of love, and gratitude, and reverential
adoration? Such feelings and emotions lie at
the foundation of all true religion, — and the man
who can walk through the magnificent scene of
the universe, without feeling the least emotion of
reverence and adoration, or of gratitude for the
wise and benevolent arrangements of nature,
may be pronounce^ unworthy of enjoying the
beneficence of his Creator. It was doubtless for
this end. among others, that the Almighty open
ed to our view such a magnificent spectacle as
the universe displays, and bestowed upon us
fitculf ios capable of investigating its structure, —

that we might acquire, from the contemplation
of it, enlarged conceptions of the attributes of hi*
nature, and the arrangements of his providence,
and be excited to " give unto nim the glory due
to his name." And, if we derive such impres
sions from our investigations of the material
system, shall it be considered as inconsistent
with the spirit of true philosophy, to endea
vour to communicate the same impressions to
the minds of those whom we are appointed to
instruct? There can be little doubt, that the
practice of setting aside all references to the cha
racter and perfections of the Deity, in physical
discussions, has tended to foster a spirit of irreli-
gion in youthful minds, and to accelerate their
progress towards the gulf of infidelity and scep
ticism.

Again, philosophy, as well as religion, re
quires that the phenomena of nature be traced
up to their first cause. There are no causes
cognizable by the senses, which will account for
the origin of the universe, and the multifarious
phenomena it exhibits ; and therefore we must
ascend in our investigations to the existence of
an invisible and eternal Cause, altogether impal
pable to the organs of sense, in order to account
for the existence and movements of the material
world. To attempt to account for the harmony
and order, and the nice adaptations which appear
throughout creation, merely from the physical
properties of matter, and the laws of motion, is
to act on the principles of atheism ; and is clearly
repugnant to every dictate of reason, which de
clares, that to every effect we must assign an
adequate cause. And, if in our physical inves
tigations, we are necessarily led to the admission
of a self-existent and eternal Being, the original
source of life and motion, it must be deeply in
teresting to every one of us to acquire as much
information as possible respecting his perfec
tions, and the character of his moral government.
From Him we derived our existence, — »n Him
we depend every moment " for life, and breath,
and all things." Our happiness or misery is in
his hands, and our eternal de-)tiny, whether con
nected with annihilation or with a state of con
scious existence, must be the result of his sove
reign and eternal arrangements. Our comfort in
the present life, and our hopes and prospects in
relation to futurity, are therefore essentially con
nected with the conceptions we form of the at
tributes of Him who made and who governs the
universe ; and, consequently, that philosophy
which either overlooks or discards such views
and considerations, is unworthy of the name,— 13
inconsistent with the plainest deductions of rea
son, and, wherever it is promulgated, must prove
inimical to the best interests of mankind. To
regard science merely in its applications to the
arts of life, and to overlook its deductions in re
ference to the Supreme Disposer of events, is
preposterous and absurd, and unworthy of the

152

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

charactei of the man who assumes to himself the
name of a philosopher ; for, in doing so, he vio
lates the rules which guide him in all his other
researches, and acts inconsistently with the
maxim, that the most interesting and important
objects demand our first and chief attention.

But the evil to which 1 have now adverted, is
not the only one of which we have reason to
complain. While the deductions of natural re
ligion are but slightly adverted to in physical
discussions, and in many instances altogether
overlooked, — the truths of Christianity are virtu
ally set aside ; and it seems to he considered by
some as inconsistent with the dignity of science,
to make the slightest reference to the declara
tions of the sacred oracles. In many of our
grammar schools, academies, and colleges, where
the foolish a.nd immoral rites of pagan mytholo
gy are often detailed, no instructions are impart
ed, to counteract the baneful influence which
heathen maxims and idolatry may produce on
the youthful mind. The superior excellence of
the Christian religion, and the tendency of its
principles and precepts to produce happiness,
both here arid hereafter, are seldom exhibited ;
and in too many instances the recognition of
a Supreme Being, and of our continual depend
ence upon him, and the duty of imploring his
direction and assistance, are set aside, as incon-
bistent with the spirit of the age, and with the
mode of conducting a fashionable education.
The superintendents of mechanics' institutions,
following the prevailing mode, have likewise
agreed to banish from their institutions and dis
cussions, all references to religion, and to the pe
culiarities of the Christian system.

Now, we maintain, that Christianity in every
point of view in which its revelations may be
considered, is a subject of paramount importance.
It is every thing, or it is nothing. It must reign
supreme over every human pursuit, over every
department of science, over every passion and
affection, or be discarded altogether, as to its
authority over man. It will admit of no compro
mises ; for the authority with which it professes
to be invested, is nothing less than the will of the
Eternal, whose sovereign injunctions the inhabi
tants of earth and the hosts of heaven are bound
to obey. If its claims to a divine origin can be
disproved, then it may be set aside as unworthy
of our regard, and ranked along with the other
religions which have prevailed in th? world.
But, if it is admitted to be a revelation from the
Creator of the universe to man on earth, its c aims
are irresistible, it cannot be rejected with impu
nity, and its divine principles and maxims ought
to be interwoven with all our pursuits and asso
ciations.

The importance of Christianity may be evin
ced by such considerations as the following: — It
communicates to us the only certain information
we possess of the character, attributes, and pur

poses of the Creator, to whose laws and i>orai
government we are all amenable. It discloses
to us our state and condition, as depraved crea
tures and violators of his righteous laws, and the
doom which awaits the finally impenitent in the
world to come. It informs us of the only method
by which we may obtain forgiveness of sin, and
complete deliverance from all the miseries and
moral evils to which we are exposed. It incul
cates those divine principles and moral precepts
which are calculated to unite the whole human
race in one harmonious and affectionate society,
and to promote the happiness of every individual,
both in " the life that now is, and in that which is
to corne." It presents before us sources of con
solation, to cheer arid support the mind, amidst
the calamities and afflictions to which we are
subjected in this mortal state. It unfolds to us,
in part, the plan of God's moral government of
the world, and the reasons of certain dispensa
tions and moral phenomena, which would other
wise have remained inexplicable. In sjiort, it
proclaims the doctrine of a resurrection from the
dead, and sets in the clearest light the certainty
of a future state of punishments and rewards, sub
jects in which every individual of the human race
is deeply interested — giving full assurance to all
who comply with its requisitions, that when their
corporeal frames are dissolved, they " shall have
a building of God, an house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens," where they shall inherit
" fulness of joy and pleasures fcr evermore."

These are only some of the important, revela
tions which Christianity unfolds. And, if it bo
a truth which cannot be denied, that we are na
turally ignorant of God, can we be happy without
being acquainted with his moral attributes, pur
poses, and laws? If we be guilty and depraved
— which the whole history of our race clearly de
monstrates — can we feel true enjoyment, if our
guilt is not cancelled, and our depravity not
counteracted? Is it a matter of indifference,
whether we acquire a knowledge of those moral
principles, which will guide us in the path to
wisdom and felicity, or be hurried along by heed
less passions, in the devious ways of vice and
follv ? fs it of no importance, whether we ob
tain information respecting our eternal destiny,
or remain in uncertainty whether death shall
transport us to another world, or finally terminate
our existence ? Can any man, who calls himself
a philosopher, maintain, with any show of rea
son, that it is wiphilosophical, or contrary to the
dictates of an enlightened understanding, that
such subjects should form one great object of out
attention — 'hatlhey should be interwoven with all
our studies and active employments — and that
they should constitute the basis of all those in
structions, which are intended for the melioration
and improvement of mankind ? To maintain
such a position, would he to degrade philosophy
in the eyes of every intelligent inquirer, and t«

EFFECTS OF DISCARDING CHRISTIANITY.

153

render i' unworthy of the patronage of every one
who has a regard to the happiness of his species.
That philosopny which truly deserves the name
will at once admit, that concerns of the highest
moment ought not to be set aside for matters of
inferior consideration ; but that every thing
should be attended to in its proper order, and ac
cording to its relative importance. If such con
siderations have any weight, they prove, beyond
dispute, that there is a glaring deficiency in our
methods of education, where a foundation is not
laid in the truths of Christianity, and where
its authority is overlooked, and its claims disre
garded.

Lf t us consider for a moment what would be
the natural effects of a complete separation be
tween science and religion — between the general
diffusion of knowledge and the great objects ol
the Christian faith. Science might still continue
to prosecute discoveries, to enlarge its bounda
ries, and to apply its principles to the cultivation
of new arts, and to the improvement of those
which have hitherto been practised. Its studies
might give a certain degree of polish to the mind,
might prevent certain characters from running
the rounds of fashionable dissipation, and, in every
gradation in society, might counteract, to a certain
degree, the tendency to indulgence in those mean
and ignoble vices to which the lower ranks in
every age have been addict**}. But, although
the standard of morals would be somewhat raised,
and the exterior of life polished and improved, the
latent principles of moral evil might still remain
rankling in the breast. Pride, ambition, avarice,
and revenge, receiving no counteraction from re
ligious principle, might be secretly harboured and
nourished in the heart, and ready to hurst forth,
on every excitement, in all the diabolical energies
in which they have so frequently appeared amidst
the contests of communities and nations. The
recognition of a Supreme intelligence, to whom
we are accountable, would soon be considered as
unnecessary in scientific investigations, and his
natural perfections overlooked; and, consequent
ly, all the delightful affections of love, gratitude,
admiration, and reverence, which are inspired by
the view of his moral attributes, and the trans
cendent excellence of his nature, would be under
mined and annihilated. There would be no
reliance on the superintending care of an un
erring Providence, ordaining and directing
every event to the most beneficial purposes, and
no consolation derived, amidst the ills of life,
from a view of the rectitude and benevolence of
the Divine government. The present world
would be considered as the only scene of action
and enjoyment; the hope of immortality, which
supports and gladdens the pious mind, would be
exterminated, and every thing beyond the shadow
of death involved in gloom and uncertainty. The
onlf true principles of moral action, which reveal
ed religion inculcates, being overlooked or dis

carded, every one would consider himself AS at
liberty to act according as his humour and pas
sions might dictate ; and, in such a case, a scene
of selfishness, rapacity, and horror, would quickly
ensue, which would sap the foundation of social
order, and banish happiness from the abodes of
men.

Such would be the necessary effects of a com
plete renunciation of revealed religion, and such
a state of things our literary and scientific mode
cf education has a natural tendency to produce,
in wfar as the truths of Christianity are set aside ,
or overlooked, incur plans of instruction. Where
should our youths receive impressions of the De
ity, and of the truth of religion, unless in those
seminaries where they are taught the elements of
general knowledge? Shall they be left to infer,
that religion is a matter of trivial importance,
from tne circumstance, that it is completely over
looked throughout the whole range of their instruc
tions ? 1 may be said, that they have opportuni
ties of revolving Christian instruction elsewhere,
particularly from the ministers of religion; but
will their minds be better prepared for relishing
such instructions, because the religion of the
Bible has been carefully kept out of view in the
other departments of tuition'/ Will they not ra
ther come to such instructions, with their minds
biassed against the truths of revelation ; espe
cially when we consider, that, in almost every in
stance, wlere religion is discarded in the process
of secular instruction, Pagan maxims are intro
duced, and insinuations occasionally thrown out
hostile to ihe interests of genuine Christianity ?
Notwithstanding a'l that I have stated in the pre
ceding pages, respecting the beneficial effects
of a universal diffusion of knowledge, lam fully
persuaded, that, unless it be accompanied with a
diffusion of the spirit of the Christian religion,
and a corresponding practice, it will completely
fail in promoting the best interests of mankind.
If scriptural views of the character of the Dtity —
if the promotion of love to God and to man — if
the cultivation of heavenly tempers and disposi
tions, and the practice of Christian mon'ity, be
entirely overlooked in seminaries devoted to the
instruction of the great body of the community-
such institutions, instead of being a blessing,
would ultimately become a curse to the human
species ; and we should soon behold a vast as
semblage of intelligent demons, furnished with
powers and instruments of mischief superior to
any that have hitherto been wielded, and which
might, ere long, produce anarchy, injustice, and
horror throughout every department of the moral
world.

That these are not mere imaginary forebodings,
might be illustrated from the scenes which were
lately exhibited in a neighbouring nation. The
first revolution in France in 1789, was a revolu
tion not merely in politics and government, but in
religion, in manners, Ln moral principle, and in

154

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

the common feelings of human nature. The way
for «Mch a revolution was prepared by the writ
ings of Voltaire, Mirabeau, Diderot, Helvetius,
D'Alembert, Condorcet, Rousseau, and others
of the same stamp — in which, along with some
useful discussions on the subject of civil and re
ligious liberty, they endeavoured to disseminate
principles subversive both of natural and revealed
religion. Revelation was not only impugned,
but entirely set aside ; the Deity was banished
from the universe, and an imaginary phantom,
under the name of the Goddess of Reason, sub
stituted in his place. Every thing was reduced
to a system of pure materialism; the celestial
spark of intelligence within us was assimilated
to a piece of rude matter, and the fair prospects
of immortality, which Christianity presents,
transformed into the gloom of an eternal night.
Every previous standard of morals was discard
ed; every one was left to act as selfishness,
avarice, and revenge might dictate ; religion of
every description fled from the torch of the pre
vailing philosophy ; and, while " justice and mo
rality" were proclaimed as " the order of the
day," every moral principle, and every human
feeling, were trampled under foot. It is stated,
on good authority, that a little before the revolu
tion, a numerous assembly of French Literati,
being asked, in turn, at one of their meetings, by
their president, " Whether there was any such
thing as moral obligation," answered, in every
instance, that there was not. Soon after that
revolution, the great body of French infidels, who
then ruled the nation, not only denied all the ob
ligations which bind us to truth, justice, and kind
ness, but pitied and despised, as a contemptible
wretch, the man who believed in their existence.
Atheism was publicly preached, and its mon
strous doctrines disseminated among the mass of
the people, an occurrence altogether novel in the
history of man. A professor was even named by
Chaumette, to instruct the children of the state
in the mysteries of Atheism. De la Metherie,
the author of a Philosophical Journal, when dis
cussing the doctrine of crystallization, made the
wild and hideous assertion, u that the highest and
most perfect form of crystallization is that which
is vulgarly called God" In the National Con
vention, Gobet, archbishop of Paris, the rector
Vangirard, and several other priests, abjured the
Christian religion ; and for this abjuration they
received applauses and the fraternal kiss. A priest
from Melun slated, that there is no true religion
but that of nature, and that all ihe mummery with
which they had hitherto been amused, is only
old wives' fables ; and he was heard with loud
applause. The Convention decreed, that " all
the churches and temples of religious worship,
Known to be in Paris, should be instantly shut
jp, and that every person requiring the opening
;f a church or temple should be put under arrest,
as a suspected person, and an enemv to the

state." The carved work of all religious belief
and moral practice was boldly cut down by Car-
not, Robespierre, and their atheistical associates,
and the following inscription was ordered to be
displayed in all the public bury ing-grounds —
"Death is only an eternal sleep ;" so that the dying
need no longer be afraid to step out of existence.
Nature was investigated, by these pretended
philosophers, only with a view to darken the
mind, to prevent mankind from considering any
thing as real but what the hand could grasp or
the corporeal eye perceive, and to subvert the es
tablished order of society.

The consequences of the operation of such
principles were such as might have been expect
ed. They are written in characters of blood,
and in crimes almosWunparaUeled in the history
of nations. A scene of inhumanity, cruelty,
cold-blooded malignity, daring impiety, and in
satiable rapacity, was presented to the world,
which excited in the mind of every virtuous
spectator amazement and horror. Savage atro
cities were perpetrated which would have been
shocking in the most barbarous and unenlighten
ed age ; and, perhaps, at no era has there been
more wretchedness occasioned by licentious
principles and moral degeneracy. The ties of
friendship were cut asunder, the claims of con
sanguinity disregarded, and a cold-blooded self
ishness pervaded the great mass of society.
" The kingdom appeared to be changed into one
great prison; the inhabitants converted into
felons, and the common doom of man commuted
for the violence of the sword, and the bayonet,
and the stroke of the guillotine." Such was the
rapidity with which the work of destruction was
carried on, that, within the short space of ten
years, not less than three millions of human be
ings (one half more than the whole population
of Scotland) are supposed to have perished in
that country alone, chiefly through the influence
of immoral principles, and the seductions of a
false philosophy. The following i? a briet
sketch of some of the scenes to which we allude,
drawn by one who was an eye-witness of the
whole, and an actor in several parts of that hor
rid drama. " There were," says this writer.
" multiplied cases of suicide ; prisons crowded
with innocent persons ; permanent guillotines ;
perjuries of all classes ; parental authority set at
nought ; debauchery encouraged by an allowance
to those called unmarried mothers ; nearly six
thousand divorces in the city of Paris within a
little more than two years ; in a word, whatevei
is most obscene in vice and most dreadful in
ferocity."*

Notwithstanding the incessant, shouts of
" Liberty and Equality," and the boasted illu
minations of philosophy, the most barbarous per
secutions were carried on against those whose

Greeoire.

EFFECTS OF IRRELIGION IN FRANCE.

155

religious opinions differed from the system
adopted by the state. While infidelity was
enthroned in power, it wielded the sword of ven
geance with infernal ferocity against the priests
of the Romish church, who were butchered
wherever found — hunted as wild beasts — fre
quently roasted alive, or drowned in hundreds
togsther, without either accusation or trial. At
Nantz, no less than 360 priests were shot, and
460 drowned. In one night, 58 were shut up in
a barge, and drowned in the Loire. Two hun
dred and ninety-two priests were massacred
during the bloody scenes of the 10th August,
and the 2d September, 1792 ; and 1135 were
guillotined under the government of the Na
tional Convention, from the month of September
1792, till the end of 1795, besides vast numbers,
' hunted by the infidel republicans, like owls and
partridges, who perished in different ways,
throughout the provinces of France.

Such were some of the dismal effects which
flowed from the attempt to banish religion from
science, from government, and from the inter
courses and employments of society. Were
such principles universally to prevail, the world
would soon become one vast theatre of mischief
and of misery — an immense den of thieves and
robbers — a sink of moral pollution — a scene of
impiety, injustice, rapine, and devastation ; a
Golgotha, strewed with carcasses and " dead
men's bones." All confidence and friendship
between intelligent beings would be destroyed ;
the dearest and most venerable relations would
be violated by incestuous pollutions; appetite
would change every man into a swine, and pas
sion into a tiger ; jealousy, distrust, revenge,
murder, war, and rapine would overspread the
earth, and a picture of hell would be presented
wherever the eye roamed over the haunts of men.
During the period when the atrocities to which
we are adverting were perpetrating, the ruffians
who bore rule in France were continually imput
ing to the illumination of philosophy, the ardour
which animated them in the cause of liberty ; and,
it is a truth, that science was enlarging its boun
daries even amidst the horrors with which it was
surrounded. Chemistry was advancing in its
rapid career of discovery, and the celebrated
Lavoisier, one of its most successful cultivators,
was inter-'ipted in the midst of some interesting
experiments, and dragged to the guillotine, where
lie suffered in company with 28 farmers-general,
merely because he was rich. Physical astrono
my, and the higher bianches of the mathematics
were advancing under the investigations of La
Place ; geodetical operations were carrying for
ward, on an extensive scale ; and the physical
sciences, in general, under the hands of nume
rous cultivators, were going on towards perfec
tion. But, while this circumstance shows, that
science may advance in the midst of irreligion —
it proves, at the same time, that, without being

combined with religion, it cannot, of itself, melio
rate the morals of mankind, or counteract the li
centiousness of society. Though it may be con
sidered as a ray of celestial light proceeding from
the original Source of intelligence, yet it will
fail in producing its most beneficial effects, un
less it be combined with " the light of the know
ledge of the glory of God," as it shines in the
word of Divine Revelation. Had such a con
nexion been formed between science and reliaioq,
certain it is, that the bonds which unite the social
system would never have been burst asunder,
nor the foundations of morality overturned by
such a violent explosion as happened at the
French revolution. And, although I am aware,
that a variety of political causes combined to
produce that great convulsion, and the effects
which flowed from it, yet it cannot be denied,
that the principles of atheism, and a false philo
sophy which had thrown off its allegiance to
Christianity, were the chief causes which produc
ed the licentiousness and impiety which charac
terized the rulers and citizens of France, under
"the reign of terror."

It is therefore to be hoped, that those wno now
patronise the intellectual improvement of man
kind, and who wish to promote the best interests
of society, will take warning from the occurren
ces which so lately happened in the French na
tion, during the reign of infidel philosophy and
impiety, and not suffer religicn to be dissevered
from those pursuits which should lead the mind
to the contemplation of a Supreme Intelligence,
and of the glories of an immortal existence. The
moral Governor of the world has set before us
the horrid scenes to which we have alluded, as a
beacon to guard us from similar dangers, that so
ciety might not again be exposed to a ship vreck
so dreadful and appalling. We have, surely, no
reason to repeat the experiment, in order to as
certain the result. It is written in characters
conspicuous to every eye, and legible even to the
least attentive observer, and may serve as a
warning both to the present age, and to every
future generation. Its effects are felt even at
the present moment, in the country where the
experiment was tried, in the irreligion and pro
fligacy which, in its populous cities, still abound,
especially among the middle and higher ranks of
society. Its effects are apparent even in our
own country ; for the sceptical principles and im
moral maxims of the continental philosophy
were imported into Britain, at an early period of
the French Revolution, when the Bible was
discarded by multitudes, as an antiquated impos
ture, and committed to the flames ; and it is,
doubtless, owing in part, to the influence of these
principles, that, in organizing institutions for
the diffusion of knowledge a-nong the lower ranks,
attempts have been made to separate science
from its references to the Creator, and from all
its connexions with revealed religion, it is,

156

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

therefore, (he duty of every man who loves his
species, and who has a regard for the welfare and
prosperity of his country, to use his influence in
endeavouring to establish the literary and scien
tific instruction of the community on the broad
basis of the doctrines of revelation, and of those
moral laws which have been promulgated by the
authority of the Governor of the universe, which
are calculated to secure the moral order, and to
promote the happiness of intelligent agents,
throughout every province of the Divir-e empire.

" When we look at plans of education," (says
an intelligent writer) " matured, or in progress,
which are likely to concentrate the national in
tellect, and form the national taste, and engross
the daily leisure of the peasant or artisan, on
principles of virtual exclusion to every thing spe
cifically Christian, when we see this grievous
and deadly deficiency attaching to schemes of be
nevolence, which are otherwise pure and splen
did, receiving the sanction of public recognition,
countenanced or winked at by the mightiest of
scholars, and most illustrious of statesmen, and
thus put in condition for traversing the land,
from the one end to the other, we do feel alarmed,
in no ordinary degree, at the effects that are
likely to follow it ; and could we influence the
consultations in which the whole originates, would
entreat its projectors to pause and deliberate,
lest they stir the elements of a latent impiety,
instead of dispensing a national blessing. We
dread not the light of science, nor any light of
any kind which emanates from God to -man.
On the contrary, we hail it as a precious acqui
sition, provided it be mingled and seasoned with
that which is revealed, as " the true light which
lighteth 'every man that cometh into the world ;"
but, ir a state of separation from this better light,
and jnattempered by its restoring influence, we
are constrained to dread it, by all the concern we
ever felt for the eternal well-being of our human
kindred."*

To prevent any misconceptions that may arise
respecting our views of the connexion of science
and religion, it may he proper to remark, in the
first place, — that we would consider it prepos
terous in the highest degree, to attempt the in
troduction of sectarian opinions in religion into
the discussions connected with science and phi
losophy. It would be altogether irrelevant to
the objects of scientific associations, to introduce
the subjects of dispute between Calvinists and
Anninians, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, and
Independents ; and we are of opinion, that the
sooner such controversies are banished, even
from theology, and from the Christian world at
large, so much the better ; for they have with
drawn the minds of thousands from the essentials
to the mere circumstantials of religion ; and, in

* Rev. D. Young— Introductory Essay to Sir M.
Hales' Contemplations.

too many instances, have exposed the Christiar
world to the sneers of infidels, and the scoffs of the
profane. — Nor, in the next place, would we con
sider it as either judicious or expedient, to at
tempt to foist in even the essential doctrines of
Christianity, on every occasion, when the sub
ject of discussion did not naturally and directly
lead to their introduction, or to some allusions to
them. Such attempts generally frustrate the end
intended, and are equally displeasing to the man
c f taste, and to the enlightened Christian . — What
we understand by connecting science with reli
gion, will appear in the following observations : —

I. As science has it for one of its highest ob
jects to investigate the works of the Creator,—
an opportunity should be taken, when imparting
scientific instructions, of adverting to the attri
butes of the Deity as displayed in his operations.
The character of the Divine Being, and the per
fections he displays, are, in every point of view,
the most interesting of all human investigations.
The system of nature, in all its parts and process
es, exhibits them to our view, and forces them,
as it were, upon our attention, if we do not wil
fully shut our eyes on the light which emanates
from an invisible Divinity through his visible
operations. The contemplation of this system,
even in its most prominent and obvious appear
ances, has a natural tendency to inspire the most
profound emotions of awe and reverence, of gra
titude and admiration, at the astonishing displays
it exhibits of Omnipotent energy, unsearchable
wisdom, and boundless beneficence. Such stu
dies, when properly directed, are calculated to
make a powerful and interesting impression on
the minds of the young; and it is doing them an
incalculable injury, when their views are never
elevated above proximate causes and physical
laws, to the agency of Him who sits en the
throne of the universe. — " If one train of think
ing," says Paley, "be more desirable than an
other, it is that which regards the phenomena of
nature, with a constant reference to a supreme
intelligent Author. To have made this the rul
ing, the habitual sentiment of our minds, is to
have laid the foundation of every thing which is
religious. The world from henceforth becomes
a temple, and life itself one continued act of ado
ration. The change is no less than this, that
whereas formerly God was seldom in our
thoughts, we can scarcely look upon any thing
without perceiving its relation to him." And is
such a train of thinking to be considered as un-
philosophical ? Is it not, on the contrary, the
perfection of philosophy to ascend to a cause that
will account for every phenomenon — to trace its
incessant agency, and to acknowledge the per
fections it displays? Bishop Watson has well
observed, " We feel the interference of the Deity
everywhere, but we cannot apprehend the nature
of his agency anywhere. A blade of grass can-

PHYSICO-THEOLOGICAL WRITINGS.

157

not spring up, a drop of rain cannot fall, a ray of
Jtght cannot be emitted from the sun, nor a parti
cle of salt be united, with a never-failing sympa
thy to its fellow, without him ; every secondary
cause we discover, is but a new proof of the
necessity we are under of ultimately recurring
to him, as the one primary cause of every thing."
Illustrations of the position for which we are
now contending will be found in such works as
the following : — Ray's " Wisdom of God in the
Creation," — Boyle's " Philosophical and Theo-
losical works,"— Derham's Astro and Physico-
Theolowy,"* — Nieuwenty t's Religious Philoso
pher," — Le Pluche's " Nature Displayed," —
Baxter's " Matho," or the principles of natural
religion deduced from the phenomena of the ma
terial world, — Lessor's Insecto-Theology, or a
demonstration of the Being and Attributes of
God, from the structure and economy of insects,
with notes by Lyonet, — Bonnet's " Contempla
tion of Nature," — Euler's " Letters to a German
Princess," translated by Hunter, — Pierre's
" Studies of Nature," — " Paley's Natural The
ology,'' — Adam's " Lectures on Natural Philoso
phy," — Parkes' " Chemical Catechism," and
several others. The chief ooject of Ray is to
illustrate the wisdom of the Deity in the figure
and construction of the earth, in the structure and
symmetry of the human frame, and in the econo
my of the animal and vegetable tribes. The ob
ject of Derham, in his Astro-Theology, is to dis
play the wisdom and omnipotence of Deity, as
they appear in the structure, arrangement, and
motions of the heavenly bodies ; and his Physico-
Theology, a work of much greater extent, demon
strates the being and attributes of God from the
constitution of the earth and atmosphere, — the
senses — the structure, motions, respiration, food,
and habitations of animals — the body of man —
the economy of insects, reptiles, and fishes, and
the structure of vegetables. Though this excel
lent work is now considered as somewhat anti
quated, yet we have no modern work that can
fully supply its place. Paley's Natural Theolo
gy, however excellent in its kind, does not em
brace the same extensive range of objects. JViifU-
wentyt enters into a minute anatomical investi
gation of the structure of the human body, which
occupies the greater part of his first volume; and
in the two remaining volumes, illustrates the Di
vine perfections from a survey of the atmosphere,
meteors, water, earth, fire, birds, beasts, fishes,
plants, the physical and chemical laws of nature,
the inconceivable smallness of the particles of
matter, and the structure of the starry heavens.

* An edition of Derham's Physico- Theology, in
two vols. Svo. (which is not very generally known)
was published in London in 1793, which contains
additioncd notes illustrative of modern discoveries, a
translation of the Greek and Latin quotations of the
original work, a life of the author, and sixteen cop
perplate engravings, illustrative of many curious
•ubjects in the anima1 and vegetable kingdoms.

The voluminous work of Le Pluche compre
hends interesting descriptions of quadrupeds,
birds, fishes, insects, plants, flowers, gardens,
olive-yards, cornfields, woods, pasture-grounds,
rivers, mountains, seas, fossils, minerals, the at
mosphere, light, colours, vision, the heavenly
bodies, globes, telescopes, microscopes, the his
tory of navigation, systematic physics, &c. — in
terspersed with a variety of beautiful reflections
on the Wisdom and Beneficence of the Deity in
the arrangements of nature. Euler^s Letters
comprehend popular descriptions of the most in
teresting subjects connected with natural philo
sophy and ethics, interspersed with moral reflec
tions, and frequent references to the truths of re
velation. Condorcet, in his French translation
of this work, carefully omitted almost all the pi
ous and moral reflections of this profound and
amiable Philosopher, as inconsistent wiih the in
fidel and atheistical philosophy which then pre
vailed. " The retrenchments," says he " affcct
reflections which relate less to the sciences and
philosophy, than to theology, and frequently even
to the peculiar doctrines of that ecclesiastical
communion in which Euler lived. It is unne
cessary to assign a reason for omissions of this de
scription." These omissions were supplied, and
the passages alluded to restored, by Dr. Hunter,
in his English translation, but they have been
again suppressed in the late edition, published in
Edinburgh, in two volumes, 12mo.*

It is much to be regretted, that we have no
modern Rays, Derhams, Boyles, or Nieuwen-
tyts, to make the light of our recent discoveries
in science bear upon the illustration of the
perfections of the Deity, and the arrangements
of his providence. Since the period when those
Christian philosophers left our world, many of
the sciences which they were instrumental in
promoting, have advanced to a high degree of
perfection, and have thrown additional light on
the wisdom and intelligence of the Divine mind,

• As a specimen of the omissions to which we al
lude, the following passage may. suffice .— " But the
eye which the Creator has formed, is subject to no
one of all the imperfections under which t;he imagi
nary construction of the freethinker labours. In
this we discover the true reason why infinite wisdom
has employed several transparent substances in the
formation of the eye. It is thereby secured against
all thedefects which characterize every work of man.
What a noble subject of contemplation ! How perti
nent that question of the Psalmist ! He who formed
the eye, shall lie not sue ? and He who planted the car,
shall hf, not hear ? The eye alone being a master
piece that far transcends the human understanding,
what an exalted idea must we form of Him who has
bestowed this wonderful gift, and that in the highest
perfection, not on man only, but on the brute crea
tion, nay. on the vilest of insects !" The French
philosopher and statesman seems to feel ashamed of
the least alliance between philosophy and religion,
when he is induced to discard such reflections. He
seems apprehensive, as Dr. Hunter'rcmarks, that a
single drop of water from Scripture would contami
nate the whole mass of philosophy. We would hope
our British philosophers are not yet so deeply tino
turedwith the spirit of infidelity.

158

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

and the economy of the universe. Natural his
tory has widely enlarged its boundaries ; our
views of the range of the planetary system have
been extended ; the distant regions of the starry
firmament have been more minutely explored,
and new objects of magnificence brought within
the reach of our observation. The nature of
light has been more accurately investigated, the
composition of the atmosphere discovered, the
properties of the different, gases ascertained, the
powers of electricity and galvanism detected, and
chemistry — a science completely new-modelled
— has opened up the secret springs of nature's
operations, and thrown a new light on the econo
my of Divine wisdom in the various processes
which are going on in the material system. Is
it not unaccountable, then, that no modern sys
tem of Physico- Theology, embracing the whole
range of modern discoveries, should have pro
ceeded from the pens of some one or other of our
most distinguished philosophers? Does this cir
cumstance seem to indicate, that, since the early
part of the last century, the piety of philosophers
has been declining, f.nd the infidel principles of
the continental school gaining the ascendency?
Infidelity and fatalism very generally go hand in
hand. When (he truths of Revelation are once
discarded, a species of universal scepticism, dif
fering little or nothing from atheism, takes pos
session of the rnind ; and hence we find, that in
the writings of such men as Buffbn, Diderot,
and La Place, there is not the slightest reference
to Final Causes, or to the agency of an All-per
vading Mind that governs the universe.

That the connexion between science and theo
logy, we have been recommending, is not a
vague or enthusiastic idea, appears from the
sentiments which have been expressed on this
subject by the most eminent philosophers.
Throughout the whole of the works of the immor
tal Newton, we perceive a constant attention to
Final causes, or to the great purposes of the
Deity. It was the firm opinion of this philoso
pher, " that, as we are everywhere encountered
in our researches by powers and effects, which
are unaccountable upon any principles of mere
mechanism, or the combinations of matter and
motion, we must for ever resort to a Supreme
power, whose influence extends over all Nature,
and who accomplishes the wisest and most bene
volent ends by the best possible means." Mac-
laurin, the friend of Newton, and the commen
tator on his Principia, expresses the following
sentiments on this subject, in his " Account of
Sir I. Newton's Discoveries." " There is
nothing we meet with more frequently and con
stantly in Nature, than the traces of an all-
governing Deity. And the philosopher who
overlooks these, contenting himself with the
appearances of the material universe only, and
the mechanical laws of motion, neglects what is
most excellent ; and prefers what is imperfect to

what is supremely perfect, finitude to infinity,
what is narrow and weak to what is unlimited
and almighty, and what is perishing to what en«
dures for ever. Such who attend not to so mani
fest indications of supreme wisdom and good
ness, perpetually appearing before them wherever
they turn their views or inquiries, too much re
semble those ancient philosophers who made
Night, Matter, and Chaos, the original of all
things." Similar sentiments were expressed by
the late Professor Robison, one of the most pro
found mathematicians and philosophers of his
age. " So far from banishing the consideration
of final causes from our discussions, it would look
more like philosophy, more like the love of true
wisdom, and it would taste less of an idle curi
osity, were we to multiply our researches in those
departments of nature where final causes are the
chief objects of our attention — the structure and
economy of organized bodies in the animal and
vegetable kingdoms." — " It is not easy to ac
count for it, and perhaps the explanation would
not be very agreeable, why many naturalists so
fastidiously avoid such views of nature as tend
to lead the mind to the thoughts of its Author.
We see them even anxious to weaken every
argument for the appearance of design in the
construction and opet aliens of nature. One
would think, that, an the contrary, such appear-
ances would be most welcome, and that no
thing would be more dreary and comfortless than
the belief that chance or fate rules all the events
of nature." — Elements of Mechanical Philoso
phy, vol. i. pp. 681-2. We know not whether
such sentiments were inculcated from the chair
of Natural Philosophy, which Dr. Robison so
long occupied, by the distinguished philosophei
who has lately deceased.

II. Besides the deductions of natural religion,
to which we have now adverted — in our scienti
fic instructions there ought to be a reference, on
every proper occasion, to the leading truths ol
revelation. There are many scientific inquirers
who would have no objections occasionally to ad
vert to final causes, and the wisdom of the Deity,
who consider it altogether irrelevant, in the dis
cussions of science, to make the slightest refer
ence to the facts and doctrines detailed in the
Sacred Oracles. The expediency, or the im
propriety of such a practice, must depend on the
views we take of the r.ature of the communica
tions which the Scriptures contain. If the Bible
is acknowledged as a revelation from God, its
truths must harmonize with the system of nature,
— they must throw a mutual light on each other, —
and the attributes of the Divinity they respec
tively unfold must be in perfect accordance; and
therefore it can never be irrelevant, when en
gaged in the study of the one, to refer for illustra
tions to the other. On the contrary, to omit do
ing so, from a fastidious compliance with what
has too long been the established practice, would

MORAL TENDENCY OF SCIENCE.

159

be a niece of glaring inconsistency, either in the
tnooiogian on the one hand, or the philosopher
on tne other. We have too much reason to sus
pect, that the squeamishness of certain scientific
characters, in omitting all references to the
Christian system, arises either from a secret
disbelief of its authority, or from a disrelish of
Ihe truths and moral principles it inculcates.

Taking for granted, then, what has never yet
been disproved, that Christianity is a revelation
from heaven, and recollecting, that we live in a
country where this religion is professed, it follows,
as a matter of consistency as well as of duty, that
all our systems of instruction, whether literary or
scientific, whether in colleges, academies, me
chanics' institutions, or initiatory schools, ought
to be founded on the basis of the Christian reve
lation — that, in the instructions delivered in such
seminaries, its leading doctrines should be recog
nised, and that no dispositions or conduct be
encouraged which are inconsistent with its
moral principles.

More particularly, in describing the processes
or phenomena of nature, an opportunity should
frequently be taken of quoting the sublime and
energetic sentiments of the inspired writers, and
of referring to the facts they record, when they
are appropriate, and illustrative of the subject in
hand. This would tend to connect the operations
of nature with the agency of the God of nature ;
and would show to the young, that their instruct
ors felt a veneration for that Book which has
God for its Author, and our present and future
happiness as the great object of its revelations.
Why should the Bible be almost the only book
from which certain modern philosophers never
condescend to borrow a quotation ? They feel
no hesitation — nay, they sometimes appear to
pride themselves in being able to quote from
Plato, Aristotle, and Zeno, or from Ovid, Virgil,
and Lucretius. They would feel ashamed to be
considered as unacquainted with the works of
Bacon, Galileo, Newton, Halley, Huygeris,
Boscovich, Black, Robison, Buffon, or La Place,
and unable to quote an illustrative sentiment
from their writings ; but they seem to feel, as if it
would lessen the dignity of science to borrow
an illustration of a scientific position from
Moses or Isaiah, and to consider it as in nowise
disrespectful to appear ignorant of the contents
of the Sacred Volume. Such were not the sen
timents and feelings of the philosophers to whose
works I lately referred, which abound with
many beautiful and appropriate sentiments from
the inspired writings. Such were not the feel
ings of the celebrated Euler, whose accomplish
ments in science were admired by all the philoso
phers of Europe ; nor were such the feelings of
the late Dr. Robison, who was scarcely his infe
rior. When describing the numerous nebula in
the distant regions of the heavens, he closes his
«marks with the following reflection : — " The
11

human mind is almost overpowered with such a
thought. When the soul is filled with such con
ceptions of the extent of created nature, we can
scarcely avoid exclaiming, « Lord, what then is
man, that thou art mindful of him*1' Under
such impressions, David shrunk into nothing}
and feared that he should be forgotten among so
many great objects of the Divine attention.
His comfort and ground of relief from this de
jecting thought are remarkable. < But,' says he,
' thou hast made man but a little lower than
the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and
honour.' David corrected himself, by calling to
mind how high he stood in the scale of God's
works. He recognised his own divine original,
and his alliance to the Author of all. Now,
cheered and delighted, he cries out, ' Lord, hov«
glorious is thy name !' " — Elements of Me~
chemical Philosophy, vol. i. p. 565.

Again, every proper opportunity should be
taken of illustrating the harmony which subsists
between the system of revelation and the sys
tem of nature — between the declarations of the
inspired writers and the facts which are found to
exist in the material universe. This subject
presents an extensive field of investigation which
has never yet been thoroughly explored, and
which admits of the most extensive and diversi
fied illustrations. The facts of geology — some
of which were formerly set in array against the
records of revelation — are now seen to be corro-
borative of the facts stated in the Mosaic his
tory ;* and in proportion as the system of na
ture is minutely explored, and the physical sci
ences in general approximate to perfection, the
more striking appears the coincidence between
the revelations of the Bible and the revelations
of Nature. And one principal reason why this
coincidence at present does not appear complete,
is, that the Scriptures have never yet been tho
roughly studied in all their references, nor-the
system of the material world thoroughly explored.
The facts of modern science, of which many of
our commentators were ignorant, have seldom
been brought to bear upon the elucidation of the
inspired writings, and the sentiments of the sa
cred writers have seldom been illustrated by an
appeal to the discoveries of science. — The views
which the system of nature exhibits of the plan
and principles of the divine government, the
reasons of the operation of those destructive
agents which frequently exert their energy with
in the bounds of our sublunary system, and the
connexion which subsists between physical and
moral evil, might also form o -c;isional subjects
of investigation i as they are all deeply interest
ing to man considered as a moral agent, and as
the subject of the moral administration of the
Governor of the Universe.

t For illustrations of this position, see Dr. TJro>»
Geology, Parkinson's Organic Remain*, «e.

160

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSJuN OF KNOWLEDGE.

In the next place we hmd it as a matter of
particular importance, that the instructions of
science be conducted in such a manner as to
make a moral impression upon the heart. An
objection has frequently been raised by religious
people against the study of science, from its ten
dency to produce a spirit of intellectual pride ;
and it can scarcely be denied that there is some
ground for the objection, when the pursuits of
general knowledge are entirely separated from
religion. But the objects of science, when pro
perty exhibited, and accompanied with appropriate
reflections, have a very different tendency. When
we consider the numberless multitudes of beings
which exist in the universe, and the immense
variety of processes incessantly going forward
in every department of nature ; when we con
sider the infinite wisdom and intelligence, far
surpassing human comprehension, which they
display ; when we consider the immense magni
tude and extent of the universal system of created
beings, and the probability that man stands near
the lower part of the scale of rational existence,
and is only like an atom in the immensity of
creation, — we perceive the most powerful mo
tives for humility and self-abasernent. When
we consider the benevolent arrangements in the
elements around us, and in the structure and
functions of animated beings, and the provision
made for their subsistence, it has a natural ten
dency to inspire the heart with gratitude and af
fection towards Him from whom all our comforts
flow. And when we reflect on the grandeur of
the Deity as displayed in the magnificence of
his empire, and in his incessant agency through
out all its provinces, should it not inspire us
with reverence and adoration, and with a lively
hope, that a period will arrive when we shall
behold the wonders and glories of his creation
more clearly unfolded? Such sentiments and
emotions, the works of God, when rightly con
templated, are fitted to produce 5 and to overlook
them in our instruction to the young, is to de
prive theln of some of the purest enjoyments,
and some of the greatest advantages, which flow
from scientific knowledge. When their minds
are deeply impressed with such emotions, they
are in some measure prepared for listening with
reverence to the declarations of the inspired
volume, and for perceiving the force and subli
mity of the description it gives of the character
of God.

It would perhaps excite a smile of contempt
in some, who would spurn at the idea of being
ranked in the class of infidels, were I to insinuate,
that our scientific meetings and lectures should
be opened with prayer, and adoration of the Di
vine Being. It might indeed admit of a doubt,
whether it would be expedient to attempt such a
practice in the present state of society. But I
have no hesitation in affirming, that, to acknow
ledge God in all our pursuits, and to pay Him a

tribute of adoration, are dictates of natural M
well as of revealed religion, and that a deist, were
he to act in consistency witli his avowed princi
ples, would engage in daily prayer to the Great
Author of his existence. It is expressly enjoinsd
in the Scriptures, "In all thy ways acknowledge
God, and he shall direct thy steps ;" and it is de
clared to be one of the charactei istics of the wick
ed man, " that God is not in ail his thoughts,"
and that, " through the pride of his countenance
he will not call upon God." If we firmly believe
there is a God, we must also believe that he is
present in all places, and privy to all our thoughts,
that all our circumstances and wants are open to
his Omniscient eye, and that " he is able to do
for us above all that we can ask or think." Al
though we are ignorant of the precise physical
connexion between prayer and the bestowment
of a favour by God, yet we ought to engage in
this duty, because it is accordant with the idea of
a Supreme Being on whom we are every moment
dependent, and has therefore been acknowledged
by the untaught barbarian, as well as by the en
lightened Christian ; because it is positively en
joined ; because there is a connexion established
by the Creator between asking and receiving ;
because it tends to fix our thoughts on the Omni
presence of the Divine Mind, to impress our
hearts with a sense of the blessings of which we
stand in need, and to excite earnest desires after
them; and, because it is one way in which we
may hold a direct intercourse with our Creator.
I would not envy the Christian feelings of that
man who can habitually engage in literary com
positions or scientific discussions, without ac
knowledging his Maker, and imploring his direc
tion and assistance. Religion degenerates into
something approaching to a mere inanity, when
its spirit and principles are not carried into every
department of human life and society, nor its re
quisitions attended to in every secular business in
which we engage. Till the principles of Chris
tianity be made to bear in all their force on every
department of human actions, and especially on
the business of education, we can scarcely ex
pect, that its benign tendency will be generally
appreciated, or that society will reap all the be
nefits which it, is calculated to impart.

There are, however, certain descriptions of
literary characters, who, although they consider
it expedient to pay an occasional compliment to
Christianity, would consider such remarks as
bordering on superstition or fanaticism. When
we talk to them about the Christian revelation
in general terms, they do not choose to say any
thing directly against its excellence or divine au
thority ; but if we descend into particulars, and
expatiate on any of its fundamental doctrines, or
attempt to reduce to practice its holy requisitions,
we are frequently met with a contemptuous sneer,
or a cry of enthusiasm, and sometimes withar
harangue against the follies of Methodism, or of

IMPORTANCE OF RELIGIOUS TRUTHS.

161

Bible and Missionary Societies. We are thus
Jed to infer, with some degree of reason, ihat such
characters have no impressive belief of the Di
vine origin of the Christian system ; and it would
be much more honourable and consistent, at once
to avow their infidelity, than to put on the mask
of dissimulation and hypocrisy. No individual
ought to be subjected to any civil penalties on
account of the opinions he holds, as for these he
is accountable only to his Maker ; nor should
any opinions be attempted to be extirpated by any
other weapons than the strength of reason and
the force of arguments. But, at the same time,
it is requisite, that society should know the lead
ing principles of any one who proposes himself as
a public instructor of his fellow-men, in order
that they may judge wheiher it would be proper
to place their relatives under the instructions of
one, who might either overlook Christianity al
together, or occasionally throw out insinuations
against it. To act the hypocrite, to profess a
decent respect for the Christian religion, while
the principles of infidelity are fixed in the mind,
accompanied with a secret wish to undermine its
foundations, is mean and contemptible, unworthy
of the man who wishes to be designated by the
title of philosopher. Yet such hypocrisy is not
at all uncommon ; it was particularly displayed
by the sceptical philosophers on the continent,
prior to the French revolution, and avowed to
their most intimate associates.

Buffon, the natural historian, who appears to
have been an atheist, was also, according to his
own confession, a consumma'e hypocrite. In a
conversation with M. Herault Sechelles, in 1785,
about four years before his death, and when he
was in the seventy-eighth year of his age, he de
clared, " In my writings I have always spoken of
the creator ; but it is easy to efface that word, and
substitute in its place, the powers of nature,
which consist in the two grand laws of attraction
and repulsion. When the Sorbonne* become
troublesome to me, I never scruple to give them
every satisfaction they require. It is but a
sound, and men are foolish enough to be content
ed with it. Upon this account, if I were ill, and
found my end approaching, I should not hesitate
to receive the sacramen.. Helvetius was my in
timate friend, and has frequently visited me at
Montbart. I have repeatedly advised him to
use similar discretion ; and, had he followed my
advice, he would have been much happier."
" My first work (continued he) appeared at the
same time with IJ Esprit des Lois. Montesquieu
and myself were tormented by the Sorbonne.
The president was violent. ' What have you
to answer for yourself '.?' says he to me, in an angry
tone. ( Nothing at aW,' was my answer, and he
was silenced and perfectly thunderstruck at my
indifference." In perfect accordance with such

• The faculty of Theology at Paris.

a system of hypocrisy, Buffon kept a father con
fessor almost constantly with him, to whom h«
was in the habit of confessing, in the same apart
ment where he had developed the Principles of
Materialism, which, according to his system, was
an abnegation of immortality. He also regularly
attended mass on Sundays, unless prevented by
indisposition, and communicated in the Chapel
of the Glory, every Whitsuntide. Though he
heartily despised his priestly confessor, he flat
tered and cajoled him with pompous promises,
and condescending attentions. " I have seen
this priest (says Sechelles,) in the absence of the
domestics, hand over a towel to the count, set the
dining table before him, and perform such-like
menial services. BufFon rewards these atten
tions with, I thank you my dear child." Such
was the habitual hypocrisy of this philosopher;
and, said he, " it has been observed by me in all
rny writings : I have published the one after the
other in such a manner, that men of vulgar capa
cities should not be able to trace the chain of my
thoughts." His intolerable vanity and pompo
sity, his breach of promises, the grossness of his
conversation, and his numerous amours and in
trigues, were in perfect correspondence with such
principles, and the natural result of them. " His
pleasantries (says Sechelles) were so void of de
licacy, that the females were obliged to quit the
room."* What a scene of moral anarchy would
be introduced, were such principles to be uni
versally inculcated and acted upon in socie
ty! All confidence between man and man
would be shaken, and the foundations of the so
cial system undermined and destroyed. Yet
such was the morality which almost universally
prevailed among the continental philosophers, in
consequence of the sceptical and atheistical prin
ciples they had imbibed. Truth, sincerity, mo
desty, humility, and moral obligation, formed no
part of the code of their morality ; and such, in
all probability, wouW soon be the result in our
own country, were the pursuits of science and phi
losophy to be completely dissevered from reli
gion.

In the last place, there are several topics con
nected with religion, which might occasionally
be made the subjects of discussion in scientific
associations : such, for example, are the eviden
ces and importance of the Christian Revelation —
the physical and moral facts to which it occasion
ally adverts — the attributes of the Divinity — the
general principles of moral action — the laws
which the Creator has promulgated for preserv
ing the order of the intelligent system, and the
foundation on which they rest — the evidences for
the immortality of the soul, and the eternal desti
ny of man. These, and similar topics might, on

• See an account of some particulars in the private
life of Buffon, by M. Sechelles, one of his admirers,
in the Monthly Magazine foi July 1797, supplemen
tary No. vol.3, pp. 49&-501.

102

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

certain occasions, become subjects of investiga
tion, as they can be illustrated without entering on
the arena of theological controversy, or descend
ing within the limits of sectarian opinions. I do
not mean to say, that they should be discussed
according to the method of Forensic disputations,
by opposite parties taking different sides of a
question — a mode of communicating knowledge,
the tendency of which is very questionable — but
that certain positions in reference to them should
be proved and illustrated, in a direct manner, in
the form of essays, lectures, or oral instructions.
The topics now specified, and those which are
intimately related to them, are subjects of the
deepest interest and importance to every indivi
dual of the human race ; and, therefore, no valid
reason can be assigned why such subjects should
not be occasionally elucidated in literary and
scientific seminaries, if it be one object of such
institutions to promote the happiness — and what
is essentially requisite to it — the moral improve
ment of mankind.

For example, is it not in the highest degree
important to every human being, that he should
be convinced of his immortal destiny, and have
his mind impressed with the realities of a future
world — that he should ascertain whether, at death,
he is to be reduced for ever into the same situa
tion as the clods of the valley, or transported to
a more expansive sphere of existence ? Take
away from man the prospect of immortality, and
you throw a veil of darkness and mystery over
all the scenes of creation ; you reduce the moral
world to a scene of confusion, and involve the
ways of Providence in a dark inextricable maze ;
you inwrap the character of the Deity in awful
obscurity, and terminate every prospect of be
coming more fuUy acquainted with the magnifi
cence of the universe ; you reduce man to an
enigma — to the most inexplicable phenomenon
in creation, and annihilai* the strongest motives
to the practice of virtue. But this is not all, you
remove the most powerful motives to the pursuit
of scientific knowledge ; for, in this case, you
confine its beneficial results merely to the promo
tion of the comforts and conveniencies of the pre
sent transitory life ; and the discoveries of the
order and extent of the universe it unfolds, and
the speculations to which they lead, tend only to
bewilder and perplex the mind, when it is cut off
from all hopes of prosecuting its inquiries beyond
the grave, and of beholding the mysterious scenes
of creation more fully displayed. On this
ground, a man who is exhorted to cultivate an
acquaintance with science, might, with some
reason, exclaim, " Of what avail is it, to spend
anxious days and sleepless nights in acquiring
scientific knowledge, when it may be all lost be
fore to-morrow's dawn, or, at the farthest, after
the lapse of a few short years, when my intel-
.ectual faculties shall be annihilated? I qan
acouire but a few scattered fragments of it at

most, although I were to prosecute my research
es as far as the most distinguished geniuses
have ever advanced ; and I must quit the field
of investigation before the ten thousandth part of
it is half explored. Had I a prospect of enlarg
ing my faculties and resuming my researches in
a future state of being, I might engage in them
with some degree of interest and vigour ; but to
one who is uncertain whether his connexion with
the intelligent universe shall be continued for
another day, it appears quite preposterous, and
tends to deprive me of many sensitive gratifica
tions which I find essential to my present enjoy
ment." What is affirmed of happiness, in ge
neral, may be applied to knowledge, one of its
ingredients, that theexpectation of \\spermanency
is indispensably requisite to its perfection. It
is the prospect of science being prosecuted in a
future world and carried to perfection, that con
fers a dignity on its objects, and forms the most
powerful motive to engage in its pursuits ; and,
in this point of view, it may be considered as
forming a part of that training which is requisite
to prepare us for the activities, the contempla
tions, and enjoyments of that higher sphere of
existence. But where no such hopes are indulg
ed, intellectual pursuits are deprived of their
chief excellence and importance, and the best af
fections of the heart of their sublimest objects and
most exalted pleasures ; and the more the powers
of the mind have been exercised and improved,
and the more it feels itself prepared for a series of
rational enjoyments, the more chagrined and dis
appointed must it feel when years roll »way and
it approaches the point where it is to sink into
eternal oblivion. Without the hopes of admis
sion to future sources of enjoyment, at the hour
of dissolution, we may assume an air of compo
sure, because we are unable to resist, or an air
of fortitude from the last efforts of pride ; but,
in point of fact, we can await the extinction of
our being only with a mournful and melancholy
gloom.

This representation has frequently been realiz
ed, in the case of men of cultivated minds, who
had thrown aside the obligations of religion and
the idea of a future world, when they approached
the confines of the tomb,— of which the following
instances may suffice : Voltaire, when approach
ing his dissolution, looked back upon protracted
years with remorse, and forward with dismay.
He wished for annihilation, through the dread of
something worse. He attempted to unburden
his troubled mind by confessing to a priest ; and
he placed his hopes of peace with heaven, iii an
eager conformity to those rituals which he inces
santly treated with contempt. In a previous in
disposition, 'he insisted upon sending for a priest,
contrary to the warmest remonstrances of his
friends and attendants. On recovery, he was
ashamed of his conduct, and ridiculed his own
pusillanimity. This pusillanimity, however

GLOOMY PROSPECTS OF INFIDELITY.

163

returned upon a relapse ; and he had again re
course to the miserable remedy. He acknow
ledged to Dr. Tronchin, his physician, the ago
nies of his mind, and earnestly entreated him to
procure for his perusal a treatise written against
the eternity of future punishment. These facts
were communicated to Dr. Cogan, by a gentle
man highly respected in the philosophical world,
who received them directly from .Dr. Tronchin;
and they concur with many others, in demon
strating the impossibility of enjoying permanent
felicity without the hopes and consolations of
religion. M. Sechelles, to whose narrative I
lately referred, relates, that, in one of his conver
sations with Buffbn, the Count declared, " I
hope to live two or three years longer, to indulge
my habit of working in literary avocations. I
am not afraid of death, and am consoled by the
thought, that my name will never die. I feel
myself fully recompensed for all my labours, by
the respect which Europe has paid to my talents,
and by the flattering letters I have received from
the most exalted personages." Such were the
consolations which this philosopher enjoyed in
the prospect of the extinction of his being. His
name would live when he himself was ror ever
blotted out from that creation which it was the
object of his writings to describe ! But, that
his mind was not altogether reconciled to the
idea of sinking into eternal oblivion, may be in
ferred from another anecdote, related by the
same gentleman. " One evening I read to Buf-
fon the verses of Thomas on the immortality of
the soul. He smiled. 'Par dieu,' says he,
1 religion would be a valuable gift if all this were
true.' " This remark evidently implied, that the
system he had adopted was not calculated to pre
sent so cheerful a prospect of futurity as the
system of Revelation.

Gibbon, the celebrated historian of the Rise
and Fall of the Roman Empire, had his mind
early tinctured with the principles of infidelity ;
and his historical writings are distinguished by
several insidious attacks on Christianity, by un
fair and unmanly sneers at the religion of his
country, and by the loose and disrespectful man
ner in which he mentions many points of morali
ty regarded as important, even on the principles
of natural religion. Such appears to have been
his eagerness in this cause, that he stooped to
the most despicable pun, or to the most awkward
perversion of language, for the pleasure of turn
ing the Scripture into ribaldry, or calling Jesus
an impostor. Yet he appears to have been ac
tuated by the same spirit of hypocrisy which
distinguished Buffon and his philosophical asso
ciates; for, notwithstanding his aversion to
C'iristianity, he would have felt no scruple in
a pting an office in the church, provided it had
.iributed to his pecuniary interests. On the
;casion of his father having been obliged to

mortgage part of his estate, he thus expresses
himself: " I regret that I had not embraced the
lucrative pursuits of the law or of trade, the
chances of civil office or India adventure, or even
the fat slumbers of the church" Such is too
frequently the morality displayed by infidels,
and there is reason to suspect that the church is
not altogether purged of them even in the pre
sent day. That Gibbon's principles were not
sufficient to support his mind in the prospect of
dissolution, appears from many expressions in
the collection of his letters published by Lord
Sheffield, in which are to be traced many in
stances of the high value which he placed upon
existence, and of the regret with which he per
ceived his years to be rapidly passing away.
His letter on the death of Mrs. Posen, bears
every mark of the despondent state of his mind
at the idea, that, " all is now lost, finally, irre
coverably lost!1' He adds, "I will agree with
my lady, that the immortality of the soul is, at
some times, a very comfortable doctrine." The
announcement of his death, in the public prints,
in January 1794, was accompanied with this
remark, " He left this world in gloomy despon
dency, without those hopes and consolations
which cheer the Christian in the prospects of
immortality." — Dr. A. Smith, in the account he
gives of the last illness of Hume, the historian,
seems to triumph in the fortitude which he ma
nifested in the prospect of his dissolution, and he
adduces a playfulness of expression as an evi
dence of it, in his jocular allusion to Charon
and his boat. But, as Dr. Cogan, in his treatise
on the passions, very properly remarks," A mo
ment of vivacity, upon the visit of a friend, will
not conduct us to the recesses of the heart, or
discover its feelings in the hours of solitude."
It is, indeed, altogether unnatural for a man who
set so high a value upon his literary reputation,
and certainly very unsuitable to the momentous
occasion, to indulge in such childish pleasantries,
as Hume is represented to have done, at the
moment when he considered himself as just about
to be launched into non-existence ; and, therefore,
we have some reason to suspect, that his appa
rent tranquillity was partly the effect of vanity
and affectation. He has confessed, says Dr.
Cogan, in the most explicit terms, that his prin
ciples were not calculated to administer consola
tion to a thinking mind. This appears from the
following passage in his treatise on Human
Nature. " I am affrighted and confounded
with that forlorn solitude in which I am placed
by my philosophy. When I look abroad, I fore
see, on every side, dispute, contradiction, and
distraction. When I turn my eye inward, I find
nothing but doubt and ignorance. Where am I,
or what ? From what causes do I derive my
existence, and to what condition shall I return?
I am confounded with these questions, and be-

164

ON THE GENERAL DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.

gin^to fancy myself in the most deplorable condi
tion imaginable, environed with the deepest
darkness."*

Diderot, one of the French philosophists, was
a man of very considerable acquirements in
literature and in the physical sciences. The
first publication by which he attracted public
notice, was a volume written against the Chris
tian religion, entitled Pensees Philosophiques.
Afterwards, in company with Voltaire and
D'Alembert, he conducted the publication of the
Dictionnaire Encyclopedique, the secret object of
which was to sap the foundations of all religion,
while the reader, at the same time, was present
ed with the most, splendid articles on the Belles
Lettres, mathematics, and the different branches
of physical science. Whilst a weak divine, to
whom the theological department of the work
was committed, was supporting, by the best
arguments he could devise, the religion of his
country, Diderot and D'Alembert were overturn
ing those arguments under titles which properly
allowed of no such disquisitions ; and that the
object of these digressions might not pass unno
ticed by any class of readers, care was taken to
refer to them from the articles where the ques
tion was discussed by the divine. Here was an
example of that hypocrisy to which I have alrea
dy adverted, as characteristic of the sect of
infidel philosophers ; and the following anecdote
is illustrative of similar disingenuity, coupled
with almost unparalleled impudence. In the
course of his correspondence with the late Em
press of Russia, Diderot mentioned his own li
brary, as one of the most valuable in Europe,
although it is supposed not to have contained
above a hundred volumes. W-ieri Catharine
wanted to purchase it and make him librarian, he
said, that his constitution could not support the
cold climate of Petersburgh. She offered to let
him keep it during his lifetime at Paris ; and the
library was sold for an immense price. When
her ambassador wanted to see it, after a year or
two's payments, and the visitation could no long
er be put off, he was obliged to run in a hurry,
through all the booksellers' shops in Germany,
to fill his empty shelves with old volumes. It
was customary for Diderot and D'Alembert to
frequent the coffee-houses of Paris, and to enter
with keenness into religious disputes, the former
attacking Christianity, and the latter, under the
mask of piety, defending it, but always yielding
to the arguments of his opponent. This practice
was put a stop to by the police ; and Diderot,
when reproached by the lieutenant for preaching
atheism, replied, " It is true, I am an atheist,
ind I glory in it." But such principles will
not always support the mind, nor did they sup
port the mind of Diderot, when his dissolution
approached. When he perceived that, death

* Treatise on Human Nature, vol i p- 458.

was at no great distance, he desired that a pri«st
might be brought, and the Cure de St. Sulpice
was introduced to him. He saw this ecclesias
tic several times, and was preparing to make a
public recantation of his errors, but Condorcet
and the other adepts now crowded about him,
persuaded him that his case was not dangerous,
and that country air would restore him to health.
For some time he resisted their attempts to
bring him back to atheism, but they secretly hur
ried him to the country, where he died, and a
report was spread that he died suddenly on ris
ing from the table, without remorse, and with
his atheism unshaken.

Such are the native effects of the highest in
tellectual accomplishments, and the most brilliant
acquirements in science, when unaci-ompanied
with the spirit of true religion and of Christian
morality. They cannot improve the moral order
of society ; they cannot procure for their possess
ors substantial enjoyment, even in the present
life, and they are altogether inadequate to sup
port and tranquilli?e the soul in the prospect of
the agonies of dissolving nature. Notwithstand
ing the rational gratifications such persons may
have occasionally enjoyed in philosophical pur
suits, they must be obliged to confess, that they
have acquired no equivalent for those joys which
frequently animate the hearts of the most illite
rate, who are sometimes enabled to look forward
to the king of terrors without dismay, and to de
part in peace with hopes full of immortality, —
when the philosophist is obliged to exclaim, "All
is now lost, finally and irrecoverably lost." Yet
such is the tendency of the principles which are
now in operation in our literary and scientific
seminaries, and such the result to which we must
ultimately look forward, should the principles ol
religion be discarded from the pursuits of know
ledge.

It is therefore to be hoped, that all who have
a sincere regard for the promotion of science, for
the interests of religion, and for the welfare oj
their country, will devote a portion of their atten
tion to this important subject, and set their faces
in opposition to the spirit of that sceptical philo
sophy which has so long debased and demoralized
the continental philosophists. Were all the instruc
tions delivered in our seminaries, from infant
schools, through all the gradations of giammar
and parochial establishments, mechanics' institu
tions, academies, and universities, judiciously
amalgamated with the principles of pure and unde-
filed religion, it would doubtless be accompanied
with a variety of pleasing and beneficial effects. It
would tend to remove the prejudices which a consi
derable portion ofthe religious world s'ill entertain
against the pursuits }f science, — it would lead tr.
correct and rational views of ihe Christian system,
and tend to dissipate those foolish and superstitious
notions which have too frequently been grafted
upon it, — it would promote the interests of genuint

IGNORANCE OF THE DARK AGES.

165

morality among society at large, — it would fit derive their origin, — it would introduce a general
the inferior ranks of the community for taking a spirit of philanthropy, and give efficacy to the
part in the elective franchise and government of means employed for promoting the knowledge of
their country, and the higher ranks for promoting Christianity throughout the world, and would, ere
the enactment of laws congenial to the spirit of long, usher in the period foretold in ancient pro-
true religion, and promotive of the best interests of phecy, when " the knowledge of Jehovah shall
the nation, — it would tend to secure the peace and cover the earth, as the waters cover the channels
tranquillity of nations by undermining the ma- of the deep," and " when righteousness and praise
lignant passions from which wars and contentions shall spring forth before all nations."

APPENDIX.

No. I. — Ignorance of the Dark Ages. Page 12-

THE following facts, chiefly extracted from Dr.
Robertson's history of Charles V.,will show the
low state of literature, and the deplorable igno
rance which characterized the period to which
the text refers. In the ninth century, Herbaud
Comes Palatii, though supreme judge of the em
pire, by virtue of his office, could not subscribe
his name. As late as the fourteenth century,
Du Guesclin, constable of France, the greatest
man in the state, could neither read nor write.
Nor was this ignorance confined to laymen, — the
greater part even of the clergy were not many
degrees superior to them in science. Many dig
nified ecclesiastics could not subscribe the ca
nons of those councils of which they sat as
members. One of the questions appointed by
the canons to be put to persons who were candi
dates for holy orders was this — " Whether they
could read the Gospels and Epistles, and explain
the tenor of them, at least literally?" — Alfred the
Great complained, that from the Humber to the
Thames, there was not a priest who understood
the liturgy in his moiher tongue, or who could
translate the easiest piece of Latin ; and that
from the Thames tu the sea, the ecclesiastics
were still more ignorant. The ignorance of the
clergy is quaintly described by Alanus, an author
of the dark a<jes, in the following words: — " Po-
tius dediti gulas quam glossae ; potius colli^unt
libras quam legunt libros ; libentius in/.uentur
Marihamquaai Marcum ; malunt legere in Sal-
mone quam in Solomone," i. e. They gave them
selves more willingly to the pleasures of gluttony
than to the learning of languages ; they chose
rather to collect money than to read books ; they
looked upon Martha w\\h a more affectionate eye
than upon Mark, and they found more delight "in
reading in Salmon than in Solomon.

One of the causes of the universal ignorance
which prevailed during that period, was the scar
city of hooks, alon<j with their exorbitant price,
and the difficulty of rendering them more com
mon. The Romans wrote their books either on

parchment, or on paper made of the Egyptian pa
pyrus. The latter being the cheapest, was, of
course, the most commonly used. But after the
communication between Europe and Egypt was
broken off, on account of the latter having been
seized upon by the Saracens, the papyrus was no
longer in use in Italy and other European coun
tries. They were obliged, on that account, to
write all their books upon parchment, and as its
price was high, books became extremely rare, and
of great value. We may judge of the scarcity of
the materials for writing them from one circum
stance. There still remain several manuscripts
of the eighth, ninth, and following centuries, writ
ten on parchment, from which some former writ
ing had been erased, in order to substitute anew
composition in its place. In this manner, it is
probable, several works of the ancients perish
ed. A book of Livy, or of Tacitus might be
erased, to make room for the legendary tale of a
saint, or the superstitious prayers of a missal.
Mapy circumstances prove the scarcity of books
during these ages. Private persons seldom pos
sessed any books whatever. Even monasteries of
considerable note had only one missal. Lupus, ab
bot of Ferriers, in a letter to the Pope, A. D. 855,
beseech eshim to send him a copy of Cicero De
Oratore, and Q,uintilian's " Institutions,"" for,"
says he, " although we have part of those books,
there is no complete copy of them in all France."
The price of books became so high, that persons
of a moderate fortune could not afford ;o purchase
them. The Countess of Anjou paid for a copy
of the Homil ies of Haimon, bishop of Alberstadt,
two hundred sheep, five quarters of wheat, and
the same quantity of rye and millet. Even so
/ate as the year 1471, when Louis XI. borrowed
the works of Racis, the Arabian physician, from
the faculty of medicine in Paris, he not only de
posited in pledge a considerable quantity of plate,
but was obliged to procure a nobleman to join
with him as surety in a deed, binding himself un.
der a great forfeiture to restore it. When any
person made a present of a book to a church or
monastery, in which were the only libraries dur-

166

APPENDIX.

ing several ages, it was deemed a donative of
such value, that he offered it on the altar pro re-
medio animassuae, in order to obtain the forgive
ness of his sins. In the eleventh century, the art
of making paper, in the manner now become
universal, was invented ; by means of which, not
only the number of manuscripts increased, but
the study of the sciences was wonderfully facili
tated.

No. II. — Foolish and Superstitious Opinions re
specting Comets and Eclipses. P. 18.

Aristotle held comets to be fiery exhalations,
rising from the lower atmosphere to the upper or
fiery region, condensing during their rapid de
scent, kindling on their near approach to the
Empyreum, and burning until exhausted. .Leo
nard Digges, an Almanack maker of the four
teenth century, affirmed of comets — " That they
signifie corruption of the ayre ; they are signesof
earthquake, of warres,chaunging of kingdomes,
great dearth ofcorne,yea a common deathofman
and beast." — Bodin supposed them spirits,which,
having lived on the earth innumerable ages, and
having at last completed their term of existence,
celebrate their last triumphs, or are recalled to
heaven in the form of shining stars. In the re
cords of former ages, we read of a comet " com
ing out from an opening in the heavens, like to a
dragon with blue feet, and a head covered with
snakes." And we are told, that " in the year
1527, about four in the morning, not only in the
Palatinate of the Rhine, but nearly over all Eu
rope, appeared for an hour and a quarter, a most
horrible comet in this sort. In its length it was of
a bloody colour, inclining to saffron. From the
top of its train appeared a bended arm, in the
hand whereof was a huge sword, in the instant
posture of striking. At the point of the sword
was a star. From the star proceeded dusky rays,
like a hairy tail ; on the side of them other rays
like javelins, or lesser swords, as if imbrued in
blood ; between which appeared human faces of
the colour of blackish clouds, with rough hair and
beards. All these moved with such terrible spark
ling and brightness, that, many spectators swoon
ed with fear." — Rosenburgi " Exampla Come-
tarum."

The comet of 1454, seen at Constantinople,
seemed there to be moving in the firmament, from
west to east, and to present the aspect of a Ham-
ing sword. From its great magnitude, it is said
even to have eclipsed the moon, and created
among the Turks the utmost consternation, as
it was thought to prognosticate nothing less than
a crusade from all the kingdoms of Christendom,
and forbode the certain overthrow of the cre
scent. Only two vears afterwards, when, not
withstanding these direful omens, the Turkish
anns had proved eminently victorious, and were
spreading dismay over all Euroue, Halley's co

met, in 1456, with a long tail turned towards th*
east, created reciprocal and still greater alarms
on the part of the Christians. Pope Calixtus be
lieved it to be at once the sign and instrument ol
divine wrath ; he ordered public prayers to be
offered up, and decreed, that, in every town, the
bells should be tolled at mid-day, to warn the peo
ple to supplicate the mercy and forgiveness of
heaven : " ut omnes de precibus contra Turca-
rum tyrrannidem fundendis admonerentur.
That all people may be admonished to pour out
supplications against the tyranny of the Turks. —
See Milne's Essay on Comets.

Even in modern times, many foolish and pre
posterous opinions have been entertained respect
ing these anomalous bodies. In a late periodi
cal publication, the writer of an article on comets,
when alluding to the comet of 1811, proceeds to
state " some singular changes and circumstan
ces," which its influence occasioned. " The
winter," says he, " was very mild, the spring
was wet, the summer cool, and very little ap
pearance of the sun to ripen the produce of the
earth ; yet the harvest was not deficient, and
some fruits were not only abundant, but delicious-
ly ripe, such as figs, melons, and wall-fruit. Ve
ry few wasps appeared, and the flies became
blind, and disappeared early in the season. No
violent storms of thunder and lightning, and little
or no frost and snow the ensuing winter. Veni
son, which has been supposed to be indebted foi
its flavour to a dry and parched summer, was by
no means deficient in fat or in flavour. Bui
what is very remarkable," continues this sage
observer, " in the metropolis, and about it, was
the number of females who produced twins ; some
had more ; and a shoemaker's wife, in White-
chapel, produced four at one birth, all of whom,"
&c. &c. And all such " sinaular changes and
circumstances," it would appear, according to
the fancy of this sapient Essayist, " were occa
sioned by the influence of the comet which ap
peared in the autumn of 1811 ! !"

The poets, likewise, by their bombastic de
scriptions, have tended to perpetuate supersti
tious feelings. The following is Du Barta's
description of one of these visiters.

"Here, in the night, appears a flaming spire,
There, a fierce dragon, fokieu all on fire ;
Here, with long Woody hairs, a blazing star
Threatens the world with famine, plague, and war;
To princes death, to kingdoms many"crosses;
To all estates inevitable losses ;
To herdsmen rot, to ploughmen hapless seasons;
To sailors storms, to cities civil treasons."

The following extract from " Tully's Letters
from Tripoli" contains a picturesque descrip
tion of a solar eclipse, and the effects it produced
on the inhabitants of Barbary.

" I cannot here omit describing what an extra
ordinary impression an eclipse makes on the un
informed part of the inhabitants of this country

ABSURDITIES OF ASTROLOGY.

167

Of this we had ocular proof during the great
eclipse of the sun, on the 4th of this month,
which was almost total, and occasioned, for
some minutes, a gloomy darkness, resembling
that of midnight. The beginning of the eclipse
was seen at Tripoli, at half past seven in the
morning ; at half past eight, when it waa at the
height, the face of nature was changed from day
to night. The screech-owl, not long retired to
Its rest, re-appeared, and disturbed the morning
with its shrieks. Lizards and serpents were
seen prowling about the terraces ; and flights of
evening birds, here called marabats, and held sa
cred by the Moors, flew about in great numbers,
and increased the darkness. The noisy flitting of
their wings roused the Moor, who had beenstupi-
fied by fear ; and, when one of these heavy birds
(which often drop to the ground by coming in
contact with each other) chanced to fall at his
feet, the African would start aghast, look at it
with horror, and set up a hideous howl. About
eight o'clock, when the lustre of the morning was
completely faded, the common Moors were seen
assembling in clusters in the streets, gazing
wildly at the sun, and conversing very earnestly.
When the eclipse was at its height, they ran
about distracted, in companies, firing volleys of
muskets at the sun, to frighten away the monster
or dragon, as they called it, by which they sup
posed it was being devoured. At that moment,
the Moorish song of death and walliah-woo, or
the howl they make for the dead, not only re-
Bounded from the mountains and valleys of Tri
poli, but was undoubtedly re-echoed throughout
ihe continent of Africa. The women brought
into the streets all the brass pans, kettles, and
iron utensils, they could collect ; and, striking on
them with all their force, and screaming at the
same time, occasioned a horrid noise, that was
heard for miles. Many of these women, owing
to their exertions and fears, fell into fits, or faint
ed. The distress and terror of the Moors did
not in the least abate, till near nine o'clock, when
the sun assured them, by his refulgent beams, that
"11 his dangers were passed.

" During the morning and the day, the atmos
phere was uncommonly clear, even for a Barba-
ry sky, which rendered the effects of this great
eclipse more striking. We learned, from Hadgi
Abderrahman, who paid us a visit when it was
over, that the first ladies in the place had trembled
at the event, and several were seriously ill. The
ladies of his own family, he sak. had suffered
much less at the appearance of th eclipse, from
the circumstance of his being at home with them ;
for, though he considered it would be useless to
enter into a philosophical account of it to them,
yet he assured them that the moon went occa
sionally to see the sun; and when they met, by
their being so close together, the moon always
interrupted more or less of his light. This ac
count, he said, the truth of which they were con

vinced of by his great earnestness, considerably
abated their fears. To the ambassador it was a
serious case, as Lilla Amnani is in a very deli
cate state of health ; but the account he gave her
of the phenomenon entirely pacified her."

The above description presents a melanchoiy
picture of the gross ignorancoeven of the ladie*
of modern Barbary, and of the consequent shal-
lowness of their understandings; since their fa
thers and husbands considered it useless to enter
into a rational account of the phenomenon, and
since they were pleased with such an absurd and
extravagant explanation of it. And, since the
higher ranks, in that country, are so grossly ig
norant of the order of nature, and of the causes
of so common phenomena, in what a state of
mental darkness must the lower classes of soci
ety be placed ! Nor is Barbary the only country
in which such ignorance prevails. Among the
middling and lower ranks, in many European
countries, supposed to be in a moderate state of
civilization, a similar degree of intellectual de
basement will be found to exist. The Croa-
tians, who inhabit a certain district of the Austri
an empire, make the whole of their religion con
sist in the hearing of mass and the observance of
Lent ; and robbery or murder are considered as
more venial crimes, than to eat, during Lent,
with a spoon that has been dipped in broth. The
Morlacchi, who occupy another district of the
same empire, are described by geographers, as
extremely superstitious in their religious opinions,
and as firmly believing in ghosts and witches,
in sorceries and enchantments, and in every
species of supernatural agency, while they are ig
norant of the causes of the most common pheno
mena of nature.

No. III.— Absurdities of Astrology. P. 19, &c.

Mr. Varley's "Zodiacal Physiognomy," re
ferred to in a note, p. 19, pretends to decide, that
the various signs of the zodiac create a great di
versity in the features and complexions of human
beings ; and have, in fact, such influence over
>he destinies of the human race, that the system
may be fairly styled, " the phrenology of the
skies." The following extracts exhibit a few
specimens of the positions maintained by this
profound and erudite writer. " It has been dis
covered," says Mr. Varley, " that each sign con
fers a specific style of countenance, feature, and
complexion, by which appearances, alone, the
sign which was rising at the east, at birth, can,
often without any other help, be ascertained." —
" The fiery trigon, consisting of Aries, Leo, and
Sagittarius, contains the spirited, generous, mag
nanimous, and princely natures. The earthy
trigon, Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn, contain
the careful, sordid, and pernicious qualities ; the
aerial trigon, Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius, con
tain the humane, harmonious, and courteous

168

APPFNDIX.

principles; and the watery (rigon, Cancer,
Scorpio, and Pisces, the cold, prolific, cautious,
and severe qualities." " Sagittarius, the house
of Jupiter, is the only sign under which no per
sons are born having black or dark hair, eyes,
and eye-brows." " I have always uniformly
found," says the author, "those born under Sa
gittarius, to be very fair, with gray eves, and, in
general, of a lively, forgiving-hearted, and free
dispositions." Again, " Five minutes' differ
ence of the time of their birth, renders the mem
bers of the same family red-haired, or black-hatr
ed, blue-eyed or black-eyed, sordid or generous.''
— fl Saturn, at any period of life, passing through
the ascendant, which he does every thirty years,
causes dulness or melancholy, for a few weeks,
to the native, and when Jupiter passes over it,
the party feels cheerful and healthy ; and should
a party of antiquarians, hundreds of years after a
person's death, discover his grave, there must be
some planet or the sun in conjunction, or some
other aspect with- his ascendant." — " Jupiter in
the third house gives safe inland journeys', and
agreeable neighbours or kindred. The moon in
this house will give constant trudging from one
place to another, and is often so posited in the
nativities of postmen and travellers. Jupiter in
the fourth, with Venus, gives fixed or landed pro
perty, and a house ornamented with matters of
taste, or of the fine arts. Jupiter in the fifth,
gives a family of good or clever children, and much
pleasure in life and its amusements. In the
sixth, he signifies good servants and assistants,
good health, and that the native will be fortunate
in small cattle and animals. Jupiter in the se
venth, signifies a good wife or husband, and
agreeable dealings with mankind in making good
bargains," &c. " Children born under Mars have
well formed chins, — under Aquarius, are fair arid
amiable, — under Scorpio, are dark wir.h aijuiline
noses, and greenish or gray eyes." " Lord Byron,
who was born under Scorpio, received enough of
the reflected Taurus principle to prevent his
nose from being aquiline, and to give to his cha
racter a degree of perverseness or eccentricity."
"Persons born under Aries, with Jupiter in the
first house, are likely to succeed and be appreci
ated in England : If he be posited in Taurus, the
native is likely to succeed well in Ireland ; if in
Gemini, in London, of which this sign is the sig-
nificator. Jupiter in Cancer will give him suc
cess in Scotland or Holland, or concerns connect
ed with the water, unless Jupiter should be af
flicted by any malevolent planet, or be in combus
tion by being too near the sun."

By this time the reader will be sufficiently
satiated with the sage doctrines of Mr. John
Varley, in relation to " Zodiacal Physiognomy"
and the Phrenology of the heavens. If he has
a desire to pick up any more of such precious
fragments of wisdom, he will be abundantly gra
tified in perusing the work itself, where, among

other unique and precious relics, he will be pre
sented with an engraving of the Ghost of a Flea.
together with an account of the manner in which
it appeared to Mr. Blake the artist, who drew it,
and of its astrological correspondency arid sig
nification. That such absurdities should be
published by the first bookselling establishment
in London, in the twenty-eighth year of the
nineteenth century, and be purchased by hun
dreds, perhaps by thousands, is a proof, that
strong efforts are still requisite to extirpate the
superstitions of astrology from the minds of many
of our countrymen.

No. IV. — Proofs of the belief which is still attach
ed to the doctrines of Astrology, and of the per
nicious effects it produces. P. ] 9,

That the predictions of astrologers are still
believed by many of our countrymen in the mid
dling ranks of life, appears from the following re
cent occurrences.

On the 2d September, 1829, Joseph Hyatt, a
journeyman printer, was summoned before Sir
Peter Laurie, at the Guildhall, London, charged
with assaulting his wife, Philips, on the preced
ing Saturday. In his defence, Hyatt declared,
that all their unhappiness proceeded from his
wife (a pretty young woman of eighteen years,)
continually haunting the fortune-tellers, and pay
ing attention to their predictions. He produced
a paper he had recently found, written by an as
trologer, to whom his wife had applied. After
laying down the position of the planets on the
third of June, at the moment she applied to him,
the astrologer proceeds, " The querant must not
expect any thing to be very kind to her until late
in this year, say October next. This day will
not prove any thing kind or pleasant. The 28th
day of this month also will not be friendly. July
2d, mind your phunny, and take no journey, and
trust to no relative. The eighth day will not
be unkind I hope. Look to it. The thirteenth
day also promises you pleasure and also profit.
Attend it ; and avoid all dark sallow persons.
(Her husband nearly answered this description.)
From such your disappointments must come.
August 2, 6, 23, avoid them days — may be qua
lified to give you vexation, — avoid them. Sept.
1, 6, will be unkind, but pray avoid 15, 20.
October 4, avoid it, may be vexatious. The 20,
21, 27, 28, 29, 30, will be more kind, pray at
tend to them and make good use of them, they
will not be unkind." The husband said, this
fellow had predicted their separation for three
months ; what other things he had put in her
head he did not know, but he led a miserable
life with her. — Morning Chronicle, Sept. 3d.
1829.

On the same day as above stated, (Sept. 2
1829) Ann Wheeler, a servant girl, was brought
to the Mansion house, charged with having at

WITCHCRAFT.

169

tempted to enter the house of her master, at two
c 'clock in the morning, over the rails. She was
exquisitely dressed, and wore an elegant satin
oonnet, which belonged to her mistress, and put
on her curls and finery, in order to attend a " hop"
in the neighbourhood, and acknowledged that she
had been walking for an hour or two up and down
the streets in conversation with her friend. In
the course of the investigation it was stated, that
there was found in the corner of her box, wrapped
Uj> carefully, a document which might have led to
those unseasonable and unfortunate assignations,
which at last terminated in her being brought to
the watch-house. A paper was handed lo the
Lord Mayor, in which was folded a card, on
which was written the following words, —

" Mrs. Smith, No. 49, Wentworth Street,
Dress Maker."

" Lawful questions resolved."
The paper was an answer to the question,
" What sort of a husband shall I have, and how
soon shall I have him?" It stated, that the
" interrogator should have a nice respectable
tradesman, who should be a most tender husband,
and be tha father of six children, of which she
should be the happy mother ; — thai, certain
planets were visible at their birth, and, in conjunc
tion at the time, a symptom that betokened felicity ,
and that the union should take place as surely as
he or she (the person who wrote the paper) had
the power rf predicting." — Morning Chronicle,
Sept.Sd, 1829.

The above are only specimens of many similar
occurrences which are occasionally recorded in
the daily papers. The pernicious tendency of
astrological predictions on those who are weak
enough to give them credit, is sufficiently appa
rent in the cases now stated ; having in the one
case alienated the affections of a young woman
from her hv? ^nd, and produced contention and
family discora, and in the other, tantalized a
vain young female, and brought her into suspi
cious and disgraceful circumstances, which may
lay the foundation of her ruin, and render her
miserable for life.

No. V. — Illustrations of some of the opinions and
practices of our ancestors in relation to witch
craft. P. 22.

By witchcraft was generally understood, — a
supernatural power, of which persons were sup
posed to obtain the possession, by entering into
a compact with the devil. They gave them
selves up to him, body and soul ; and he engag
ed 'hat ihey shou'd want for nothing, and that he
would avenge them upon all their enemies. As
soon as the bargain was concluded, the devil de
livered to the witcli an imp, or familiar spirit,
to be ready at a call, and to do whatever it was
directed. By the assistance of this imp, and of
the d«vil together, the witch, who was almost
alw<f»« an old woman, was enabled to transport

herself through the air, on a broomstick, or a spit,
to distant places to attend the meetings oi the
witches. At these meetings the devil always
presided. They were enabled also to transform
themselves into various shapes, particularly to
assume the forms of cats arvd hares, in which
they most delighted ; to inflict diseases on whom
soever they thought proper, and to punish their
enemies in a variety of ways. Witchcraft was
universally believed in Europe, till the sixteenth
century, and maintained its ground with tolerable
firmness till the middle of the seventeenth, nay,
in some countries on the continent, till the mid
dle of the eighteenth century. Vast numbers of
reputed witches were convicted and condemned
to be burnt every year. The methods of dis
covering them were various. One was to weigh
the supposed criminal against the church Bible,
which, if she was guilty, would preponderate;
another, by making her attempt to say the Lord's
Prayer, — this no witch was able to repeat en
tirely, but would omit some part, or sentence
thereof. It is remarkable, that all witches did
not hesitate at the same part, — some leaving out
one part, and some another. Teats, through
which the imps sucked, were indubitable marks
of a witch ; these were always raw, and also
insensible, and, if squeezed, sometimes yielded a
drop of blood. A witch could not weep more
than three tears, and that only out of the left eye.
This want of tears was, by the witch-finders,
and, even by some judges, considered as a very
substantial proof of guilt. Swimming a witch
was another kind of popular ordeal generally
practised. For this she vyas stripped naked,
and cross-bound, — the right thumb to the left toe,
and the left thumb to the right toe. Thus pre
pared, she was thrown into a pond or river, in
which, if guilty, she could not sink ; for hav
ing, by her compact with the devil, renounced
the benefit of the water of baptism, that ele
ment, in its turn, renounced her, and refused to
receive her into its bosom. There were two
other ordeals by Jire, by which witches were
discovered ; the first by burning the thatch of the
house of the suspected witch, — the other, by
burning any animal supposed to be bewitched by
her, as a hog or an ox. These, it was held, would
force a witch to confess.

The trial by the stool was another method used
for the detection of witches. It was thus ma
naged : — Having taken the suspected witch, she
was placed in the middle of a room, upon a
stool, or table, cross-legged, or in some other un
easy posture ; to which, if she did i»ot submit, she
was then bound with cords, — there she was
watched, and kept without meat or sleep for
twenty-fo':r hours, (for, they said, that within
that time they should see her imp come and
suck.) A little hole was likewise made in the
door for imps to come in at, and, lest, it should
come in some less discernible shape, they thai

no

APPENDIX.

watcned were taught to be ever and anon sweep
ing tnc room, and, if they saw any spiders or
flies, to kill them, — if they could not kill them,
then they might be sure they were imps. If
witches, under examination or torture, would not
confess, all their apparel was changed, and every
hair of their body shaven off with a sharp razor,
lest they should secret magical charms to prevent
their confessing. It was a maxim, too, in these
proceedings, that witches were most apt to con
fess on Fridays. By such trials as these, and
by the accusations of children, old women, and
fools, were thousands of unhappy women, con
demned for witchcraft, and burned at the stake.

A work, written by M Thoest, was published
a few years ago at Mentz, entitled, "The His
tory of Magic, Demons, Sorcerers," &c. which
contains an affecting narrative of the numbers
that have suffered for the pretended crime of
magic and witchcraft. The cases enumerated
are proved from unequivocal authority. In these
excesses of the magistrates, it appears, that fe
male sorcerers have been the greatest sufferers.
Among other curious articles in the collection, we
learn, that Christopher de Runtzow,a gentleman
of Holstein, whose heated imagination had misled
his understanding, consigned eighteen persons to
theflames at one time, the victims of a merciless
superstition. In a village called Lindheim, con
taining about six hundred inhabitants, not less
than thirty were destroyed by fire, in the narrow
interval between the years 1661 and 1665, mak
ing a twentieth part of the whole population con
sumed in four years. In this inhuman conduct
towards an unhappy class of persons, the author
points out Wurtzburg as having frequently been
subject to well-merited reproach. It appears
from the Ada JWagicaof Naubers, that between
Ihe years 1627 and 1629, one hundred and twen
ty-seven individuals perished in similar instances
of cruelty practised by their brother men. The
principal objects of such nefarious dealings were
old women, or travellers, and frequently poor
children, from nine to ten years of age. Occa
sionally such outrages have been perpetrated on
persons of some consequence, — proficients in
knowledge above the general standard of the
age, or such as had acquired property by their
industry and genius. Among many others in
these shocking details, are the respectable names
of fourteen vicars, two young gentlemen, some
counsellors, the largest or most corpulent man
in Wurtzburg, and his wife, the handsomest
•woman in the city, and a student or scholar en
gaged in the study of foreign languages. Those
innocent sufferers were frequently put to the tor
ture. But what must our feelings and princi
ples incline us to think of an enormity here
Drought to our recollection, in the instance of a
poor girl, Maria Renata, who suffered so late as
jn the year 1749 !

Thn extent of the judicial murders for witch

craft is far greater than most persons, who hav«
not studied the history of demonology, can form
any idea. From the period in which Pope In
nocent VIII. in 1484, issued his bull against
witchcraft, to the middle of the seventeenth cen
tury, if we believe the testimonies of contempo
rary historians, Europe was little better than a
large suburb or outwork of Pandemonium, one
half of the population being either bewitching or
bewitched. Delrio tells us, that five hundred
witches were executed in Geneva, in three
months, about the year 1515. " A thousand"
says Bartholomeus de Spina, " were executed
in one year, in the diocese of Como, and they
went on horning at the rate of a hundred per
annum for some time after. In Lorraine, from
1580 to 1595, Remigius boasts of having burnt
nine hundred. In France, the executions for
the same crime were fifteen hundred and twenty.
In Wurtzburg and Treves, the amount of execu
tions in the course of the century preceding
1628, is reckoned to be 15,700. It has been
calculated that in Germany alone, the number of
victims that perished, from the date of Innocent's
bull to the eighteenth century, considerably ex
ceeds one hundred thousand. The executions
were at first confined to crazed old women, or
unhappy foreigners, but at length the witchcraft
phrenzy rose to such a pitch, and spread so ex
tensively, that the lives of more exalted victims
were threatened. Noblemen and abbots, presi
dents of courts and professors, began to swell the
catalogue, and no man felt secure that he might
not suddenly be compelled, by torture, to bear
witness against his own innocent wife and chil
dren. In the Catholic canton of Glarus, in
Switzerland, it is said, that a witch was burnt,
even so late as the year 1786 ! It is impossible
for any rational and humane mind to peruse such
a list as the above, without shuc* ' .<ng and hor
ror. How dreadful the results to which igno
rance and superstition have led! — and how as
tonishing the consideration, — that judges, law
yers, ministers of religion, nobles, and persons of
all ranks should have given their sanction, with
out the least remorse, to such cruelties and legal
ized murders !

In Pitcairn's " Criminal Trials," referred to
in the text, a variety of curious documents is con
tained, respecting the proceedings of the Justi
ciary Court in Scotland against witchcraft, sorce
ry, and incantation. One of these trials relates
to a gentleman of family, Mr. Hector Monro
of Fowies, who was "indytitand accusit"of
" sorcerie, incantation.nis, or wichecraft." This
trial contains a complete specimen of the super
stition of the age. Mr. Hector, it would appear,
had sent for " Johne M'Connielly-gar and his
wyffes, and Johne Bunes wyffe, in Lylell Alteis,
thre notorious and commoune witches." They
had been sent for to assist in restoring the health
of Robert Monro, a brother of the said Mr.

PREVALENT BELIEF IN DEMONOLOGY.

171

Hector, who entertained them for five days. It
is said in the indictment, that they " poillit the
hair of Robert Monro, his brotheris head, and
plait the naillis of his fingeris and tais," and
" socht be thair develisch meanes to have cureit
him of his sickness ;" but it would appear, that
the weird sisters were by no means successful,
and were compelled to decamp, for " they wald
haif vsitfurth the rest of thair develisch craft was
Tiocht they ferit to tarie with him (Hector Mon
ro) be ressone of his fader, quha wald haif ap-
prehendit thame ; and they declarit to him that
he was owre lang in sending for thame, s\va
that they cald do na guid to the said Robert
Monro." Mr. Hector, however, fell sick him
self, and had recourse to the hags for a cure ;
and as he had an eye to the patrimony of his
father, to which he could not succeed as he was
a younger son, he began some incantations, in
concert with ihe hags, to deprive his elder bro
ther, George Monro, of life, and for this he was
" delatit," also of " slaughter." The indict-
i.ient, which is a most remarkable document, is
too long for insertion. Jonett Grant, Jonett
Clark, and Bessie Roy, nurse to the " Laird of
Boquhave," are the three next ladies who were
called to account for being "fylit" of witchcraft.
The two Jonetta seem to have been in partner
ship ; and if the indictments are to be credited,
they were guilty of no fewer than six " crewal
murthers," by witchcraft, of the " slavchter and
destructionne of saxtene heid of nolt, of raising
the devil, of making men eunuchsby witchcraft,"
&c. For such hardened sinners as the two
Jonetts, no mercy was to be expected, and ac
cordingly they were condemned to be " tane to
the Castle hill of Edinburg, and there werriet
at ane staik, and their body to be burnt to assis."
Bessie Roy, however, came off with flying co
lours, although she was also indicted as " ane
commoune thief," by means of the " enchant
ment and slicht of the diuill." — The following is
the title of a pamphlet republished by Mr. Pit-
cairn, containing a most extraordinary narrative.
"Newes from Scotland, declaring the damnable
life of Doctor Fean, a notable sorcerer, who was
burned at Edinburg in Janurie iast, 1591, which
doctor was register to the deuill, that sundrie
times preached at North Barricke kirk, to a num
ber of notorious witches," &c. The poor wo
man who was most cruelly treated was Euphane
Mackalsann, a notable witch, who appears to
have been so notorious as to be " bound to ane
staik, and brunt to assis, quick to the death."
" This," says Mr. Pitcairn, " was 'he severest
sentence ever pronounced by the court, even in
the most atrocious cases," but poor Euphane
died, nevertheless, with all the heroism and
devotedness of a martyr. See Edin. Lit, Gaz.
July 1829.

To attempt a serious refutation of the doc
trines of witchcraft, would be altogether superflu

ous and even ridiculous. That there ever were
witches, that is, persons endowed with such
powers as are usually ascribed to witches, is
what no rational and enlightened mind can for a
moment admit. The actions imputed to them
are either absurd or impossible. To suppose
an ignorant old woman, or indeed any human
being, capable of transforming herself into a cat
or a hare, is to suppose her capable of counter
acting the laws of nature, which is competent to
none but the Supreme Ruler of the world. We
might almost as soon believe that such a being
is capable of creating the universe. It presents
a most humiliating picture of the imbecility of
the human mind, that such absurdities should
ever have been believed ; and certainly conveys
no very favourable idea of the humanity of our
ancestors, when they inflicted, without remorse,
so many shocking cruelties, especially on the
tender sex, for such fancied crimes. Yet, absurd
as the doctrine of witchcraft certainly is, it is a
lamentable fact, that vast multitudes of our fellow-
men, both in our own country and in other lands,
are still believers in sorcery and witchcraft, of
which an instance or two is stated in the follow-
ing note.

No. VI.— Proofs that the belief in witchcraft is
still prevalent among certain classes of society.

Notwithstanding the degree of information
which prevails in the nineteenth century, it is a
melancholy consideration that superstition, and
a belief in the efficacy of certain incantations,
still prevail to a considerable extent, even in the
most enlightened countries. The following re
cent occurrences will tend to corroborate this
position, and at the same time show the perni
cious consequences which frequently result from
such a belief.

On the 2d September 1829, Laurent Raim-
boult, a farmer in the hamlet of Redoire, Com
mune of Champtre, in France, spent the day in
measuring wheat at the house of Poirier, his
brother-in-law. About eight o'clock in the even
ing, he left to go to his own house, which was
about half a league from Poirier's house. He
carried a bag containing the measure he had
been using, and a box holding his dinner, which
he had not opened ; for he had stated his inten
tion not to eat till he returned home. The
next morning his corpse was found in a meadow,
bordered by a wood, and not very far from his
own house. His body was horribly mutilated,
his clothes stained with blood, and there was a
large wound on the back part of his head. All
the wounds showed that he had been struck by
several persons armed with contusive weapons.
Near him the ground had not been trod upon ; his
bag and the things it contained were carefully
laid by his side : all proved that he had not been
robbed. Poirier, who has always had a good

<

172

APPENDIX.

character in that part of the country, was on very
bad terms with Raimboult, who passed for a sor
cerer. Some time ago, the wife of Poirier had
fallen sick, as well as several of his cattle. Pui-
rier did not doubt for aninstant, that these sick
nesses were the effect of sorcery. He came to
Angers, and consulted a pretended diviner, a
miserable victim of monomania, who gave him
a full water-bottle, and told him to take it home
with him, and put it in the very best place of his
house. " At such an hour,'' said the diviner,
" you should recite such and such prayers before
my water-bottle, and then you will see in the
water it contains, the likeness of him who has
bewitched your wife and your catlle." Poirier
followed these orders precisely; and it is only
too probable that his imagination being pre-oc-
cupie.d with the idea, this wretched man fancied
he saw his brother-in-law in the water-bottle of
the guilty diviner, and thought he was doing a
service to his country in delivering it from a being
whom he regarded as the friend and favourite of
the devil. — Copiedfrom a Paris paper, in Morn
ing Chron. Sept. 23, 1828.

The following occurrence, in another Depart
ment of France, happened nearly about the same
time as the preceding,

" It appears that in the department of Lot
and Garonne, and particularly in some of the
communes of the district of Marmande, the
belief of sorcery is common among the people.
John Sabathe, a peasant, with plenty of money,
living in the vicinity of Clairac, had a sick
daughter: medicine had failed, which is nothing
extraordinary ; but there remained magic, and
Sabathe greatly relied upon it. He applied to
Rose Peres, who enjoyed the reputation of being
a witch. He stated the condition of his daugh
ter; — the witch replied, she would go and visit
her. She went the next morning to Sabathe's
residence, saw the sick girl, and declared she
was bewitched. [Perhaps she was not so far
wrong either, for some witnesses, who were no
doubt very spiteful, gave it as their opinion that
love had entered a little into this affair.] What
ever was the cause of her illness, the witch pro
mised to relieve her, and said, that the thing was
not without a remedy. She told them to light
a great fire, and they would see why afterwards.
Little as we are initiated into the secrets of
magic, we know that odd numbers, especially
the number three, have singular virtues ; there
fore 3 multiplied by 3 must be a number prodi
giously powerful. It was apparently for this
•;ason that the witch required nine large pebble
stones, which she put inlo the fire, and kept there
till they were red hot : she then threw them into
a Kettle full of water, and the mysterious vapour
that arose served to perfume the pntient. that was
yiug over it. But this was only the preamble
of ceremonies much more important. She had
a tab'.e brought to her ; it was covered with a

cloth, ard two lighted candles placed on it ; them
was even an end of wax that had been used in
the church ; a hammer was placed symme.rical-
ly between the two candles, and on one side of the
table the witch laid, with a grave and mysterious
air, the formidable book of magic, so well known
by the name of Little Albert. She still wanted
one thing; it was a plate filled with water, in
which a sum of 400 francs (161. sterling) was to
be deposited. The plate was brought ; — as tc
the sum, we may remark, how difficult magic
must be to practise, and what attention is requi
site to its details. Crown pieces of six francs
were about to be put into the water, when the
witch called out, ' Take care what you are do
ing ; it is crown pieces of Jive francs that are
wanted.' She was instantly obeyed, — the crowns
of five francs are at the bottom of the plate.

" Things being in this state, every body left
the house. The witch remained alone for about
half an hour ; she then re-opened the doors, and
said they might re-enter. She added, that all
had succeeded, but that the malignant spirit that
had appeared had carried away the 400 francs on
withdrawing. The witch's husband then arri
ved ; his wife told him that the assembly was
made. ' It's all well,' said he ; ' but thy sister
is at thy house, and she wants to see you. and we
must go there. They went, accordingly ; Saba
the and his family a little stupified, and the pa
tient in the same slate as before. — These were
the facts which were made known to the Court
by indirect evidence, for these good folks took
care to make no complaint, for fear of the witches.
The Court sentenced her to imprisonment fbi
three years, and a fine of fifty francs. She had
been charged before the Royal Court of A gen for
swindling, under pretence of practising witchcraft.
—Some years ago, the same Court sentenced
to close imprisonment three or four women, living
in the neighbourhood of Villereal, for having put
on the fire and half-burned a pretended witch,
who would not cure them of a disease she had
given them." — GazettedfS Tribunaux, as quoted
in Morn. Chron. Sept. 28,1829.

In both the above cases we perceive an im
plicit belief in the powers of divination and sor
cery, a belief which appears to be general among
the lower ranks of society ; and it would appear
that the profession of witch or sorcerer is pretty
common in the principal towns in France. In the
one instance this belief led tc a most atrocious
murder, and in the other to a dexterous robbery ;
and, in this latter case, it would seem, that, not
withstanding the palpable imposture that was
practised on Sabathe and his family, these sim
ple people still believed in the supernatural pow
ers of the sorceress who had so barefacedly rob
bed them, for " they took care to make no com
plaint, for fear of the witches" — Nearly akin to
sthe notions under consideration, is the following
superstition relating to bees,

PREVALENT BELIEF IN DEMONOLOGY.

173

The practice of informing bees of any death
that takes place in a family, is well known, and
still prevails among the lower orders'in England.
The disastrous consequences to be apprehended
from non-compliance with this strange custom
is, that the bees will dwindle and die. The man
ner of communicating the intelligence to the lit
tle community, with due form and ceremony, is
this — to take the key of the house, and knock
with it three times against the hive, telling the
inmates, at the same time that their master or
mistress, &c. (as the case may be) is dead!
Mr. London says, when in Bedfordshire lately,
we were informed of an old man who sung a
psa'.rn last year in front of some hives which
were not doing well, but which, he said, would
thrive in consequence of that ceremony. — Ma
gazine of Nat. Hist, for 1828.

The Constitutional (January 1828) states,
that under the influence of the Jesuits, and with
the countenance of the authorities, &c. the most
brutifying tales of superstition and fanaticism are
printed and circulated in the provinces of France.
One of the ridiculous narratives to which it al
ludes, details the fate of a blaspheming baker,
who, being infected with the heresies of the Re
volution, had addicted himself to the commission
of every kind of impiety. While his oven one
day was heated, and he was about to put the
bread into it, he vented his usual oaths in the
presence of two neighbours ; when, lo ! the dough
miraculously refused to enter, and the baker was
seized with a cold shivering, of which he died in
two days. In his will he left 600 francs to the
church, confessed his enormities, and besought
the prayers of his friends. — In another, we are
told of the discovery of a miraculous image, which
will be a permanent source of ecclesiastical reve
nue. This image is that of a saint, which has
been for the last two centuries concealed in a
rock. It was discovered by means of a little
white bird perched upon a brilliant crucifix, which
guarded the spot. Since the discovery, the lame
walk, the sick are healed, and the blind recover
their sight, by resorting to the consecrated
ground.

It is not above fifteen or sixteen years ago since
the late Alexander Davidson, A. M., lecturer on
experimental philosophy and chemistry, when in
Ireland, was much annoyed by the superstitious
belief in necromancy and infernal agency which
still prevails among a large portion of the lower
orders in that country. When delivering a
course of lectures in a small town not far from
Londonderry, the rumour of the experiments he
performed spread among the body of the people,
many of whom had listened at the outside of the
hall in which he lectured, to the loud detonations
produced by electrical and other experiments,
particularly the explosions of hydrogen gas. The
great majority of the inhabitants believed he was
an astrologer and necromancer, and considered

it dangerous to have the slightest intercourse
with his family, even in the way of buying and sell
ing. One morning his servant-rnaid was sent
out for bread and groceries for breakfast. After
a considerable time, she returned with a pitiful
countenance and a heavy heart, and declared that
not an article of any description could be obtain
ed. " What," says Mr. D., " is th'ere no tea,
sugar, or bread in the whole village?" " Oyes,"
replied the maid, " there is plenty of every thing
we want, but nobody will sell us an article; they
say we are all witches and wizards and necro
mancers, and iff no canny to tak ony o' your
money." Mr. Davidson and family, in this case,
might have starved, had he not bethought himself
of employing the servant of an acquaintance, who
was one of his auditors, to procure, in her mas
ter's name, the requisite provisions ; and this
plan he was obliged to adopt during the remain
der of his stay in that plane. At another time his
boots required to be repaired; the servant took
them to a shoemaker, and they were received
by one of the female branches of his family ; but
when the shoemaker understood to whom they
belonged, he stormed, and was indignant at their
receiving any thing from such a dangerous indi
vidual. The servant soon after returned to
inquire if the boots were repaired. " Is the astro
loger's boots mendit ?" one of the family vocife
rated. "No,'' was the reply, "they are not
mendit, nor do we intend to mend them, or have
any thing to do with them." The shoemaker's
wife desired the servant to come in, and lifl
the boots herself; " for," said she, " I will not
touch them;" and it appears that both the shoe
maker and his family had been afraid even to put
their fingers upon them, and doubtless imagined
that the very circumstance of their having been
received into the house would operate as an evil
omen. — On the day previous to his leaving that
place, he sent his servant to engage a chaise to
carry them to the next town. The servant told
the landlady of the inn (which was the only one
from which a carriage could be procured) that her
master wished to hire a chaise for to-morrow to

carry them to N . The landlady told her it

could not be granted. " For what reason?" said
the maid. " You know very, wellivhat is the rea
son," said the landlady, in a very emphatical
tone. After the servani returned with this reply,
Mr. Davidson himself went to the inn, when the
following dialogue took place between him and
the Ian 'lady : — " Well, madam, can you give mo a
chaise to-morrow to carry me to Newry ?" " No ;
for our horses are very tired, as they have been
out all day, and they cannot go to-morrow." " O
dear, madam, is that the only reason ? You know
very well / can make them g-o." The landlady,
putting on a grave countenance, replied with em
phasis, " We all know that very well. We know
that you could sink the town, if you chose to do it.
But I shall give you the chaise, to carry you out

174

APPENDIX,

of the place, and make the town rid of you ; butit
is more for fear of you than love io you that I con
sent to grant you my chaise." — Such were the ab
surd and superstitious notions prevalent among
the lower class of the Irish in 1814 or 1815 ; and
these were not the only instances in which they
were manifested, but only specimens of what fre
quently occurred in other parts of that country.

However clearly persons of education and in
telligence may perceive the absurdity and futility
of the superstitious notions and practices to which
I have now referred, — it is a fact, well known to
those who have been conversant among the lower
orders of society, that they still prevail to a very
considerable extent among the untutored ranks,
even of our own country. Nothing but a more
assiduous cultivation of the rational powers, and
a universal diffusion of useful knowledge among
the inferior classes of society, can be expected
thoroughly to undermine and eradicate such opi
nions, and to prevent the baneful and pernicious
consequences to which they lead.

No. VIT. — Circumstances which have occasion
ally led to the belief of Spectres and Appari-
twns. P. 23.

It is certain, that indistinct vision and optical
illusions have, in many instances, been the sour
ces of terror, and have produced a belief of su
pernatural appearances. When we have no
other mode of judging of an unknown object but
by the angle it forms in the eye, its magnitude
will uniformly increase in proportion to its near
ness. If it appears, when at tho distance of
forty or fifty paces, to be only a few feet high, its
height, when within three or four feet of the
eye, will appear to be above forty times greater,
or many fathoms in dimension. An object of
this kind, must naturally excite terror and asto
nishment in the spectator, till he approaches and
recognises it by actual feeling ; for the moment
a man knows an object, the gigantic appearance
it assumed in t'ne eye, instantly diminishes, and
its apparent magnitude is reduced to its real
dimensions. But if, instead of approaching such
an object, the spectator flies from it, he can have
no other idea of it, but from the image which it
formed in the eye; and in this case, he may af
firm with truth, that he saw an object terrible in
its aspect, and enormous in its size. Such illu
sions frequently occur, when persons are walking
through desert and unfrequented tracts of country,
surrounded with a fog, or in the dusk of the
evening, when a solitary tree, a bush, an old
wall, a cairn of stones, a sheep or a cow, may
appear as phantoms of a monstrous size. The
writer of an article in the " Encyclopaedia Bri-
tannica," states, that " he was passing the Frith
cf Forth at dueensferry, one morning which was
extremely foggy. Though the water is only (wo
miles broad The boat did not get within sight of

the southern shore, till it approached very near it
he then saw to his great surprise, a large per
pendicular rock, where he knew the shore was
low and almost flat. As the boat advanced a
little nearer, the rock seemed to split perpendi
cularly into portions, which separated at littlo
distances from one another ; he next saw these
perpendicular divisions move, and upon approach
ing a little nearer, found it was a number of
people standing on the beach, waiting the arrival
of the ferry boat."

Spectres arc frequently occasioned by opium.
Gassendi, the philosopher, found a number of
people going to put a man to death for having
intercourse with the devil, a crime which the
poor wretch readily acknowledged. Gassendi
begged of the people, that they would permit him
first to examine the wizard, before putting him
to death. They did so, and Gassendi, upon ex
amination, found, that the man firmly believed
himself guilty of this impossible crime; he even
offered to Gassendi to introduce him to the devil.
The philosopher agreed, and when midnight
came, the man gave him a pill, which he said it
was necessary to swallow before setting off.
Gassendi took the pill, but gave it to his dog:
The man having swallowed his, fell into a pro
found sleep, during which he seemed much
agitated by dreams ; the dog was affected in a
similar manner. When the man awoke he con
gratulated Gassendi on the favourable reception
he had met with from his sable highness. It
was with difficulty Gassendi convinced him that
the whole was a dream, the effect of soporific
medicines, and that he had never stirred from
one spot during the whole night.

Drunkenness has also the power of creating ap
paritions. Drunkenness seldom or never excites
fear; and, therefore, it may at first sight seem
strange, that persons should imagine they see
ghosts when under the influence of intoxication.
But it is observable, that the ghosts which the
drunkard imagines he sees, he beholds not with
the same terror and alarm, as men that are sober ;
he is not afraid of them ; he has the courage to
converse with them, and even to fight them, if
they give him provocation. Like Burns' " Tarn
o' Shanter," give him " fair play — he cares na'
de'ils a bodle." A man returnina home intoxicat
ed, affirmed, that he had met with the devil ; and
that, after a severe encounter, he had vanquished
him, and brought him to the ground, to which he
had nailed him fast, by driving his staff through
his body. Next morning, the staff was found
stuck with great violence into a heap of turfs !

Dreams may be considered as another source oj
apparitions. While the mind is under the influ
ence of a dream, it considers it as much a reality,
as it does any particular action when awake;
and, therefore, if a person of a weak superstitious
mind should have a very livply dream which in
terests his passions, it ma-' make so deep an im-

CAUSES OF APPARITIONS.

175

ppsssion, that he may be firmly convinced he has
actually seen with his eyes, what has only pass
ed before his imagination ; especially when we
consider, that there are times of slumber when we
are not sensible of being asleep. On this prin
ciple, some have endeavoured to account for the
spectre which is said to have appeared to Brutus.
It is related, that at Philippi, the night before he
gave battle to Augustus Caesar, he saw a fearful
apparition ; it was in the dead of night, when
the whole camp was perfectly quiet, that
Brutus was employed in his tent, in reading by
a lamp that was just expiring; on a sudden he
thought he heard a noise as if somebody entered,
and looking towards the door, he perceived it
open ; a gigantic figure with a frightful aspect,
stood before him, and continued to gaze upon
him with silent severity. At last, Brutus had
courage to speak to it : " Art thou a demon or a
mortal man ? and why comest thou to me ?"
The phantom is said to have replied, " Brutus,
I am thy evil genius, thou shall see me again at
Philippi." "Well then," answered Brutus,
without being discomposed, " we shall meet
again ;" upon which the phantom vanished, and
Brutus, calling to his servants, asked them if
they had seen any thing ; to which replying in
the negative, he again resumed his studies.
This circumstance is related by historians as a
vision, but considering the circumstances, one
may easily judge it to ha"" ^en but a short
dream ; for, sitting in his ten.., Ji «« and trou
bled with the horror of his late' rash act, it was
not hard for him, slumbering in the cold, to dream
of that which most affrighted him ; which fear,
as by degrees it made him wake, so it must have
made the apparition by degrees to vanish ; and
having no assurance that he slept, he could have
no cause to think it a dream, or any thing else
than a vision. Whatever may be said as to
this solution of the case, certain it is, that vivid
dreams in certain states of mind, have been
mistaken for real apparitions, of which various
instances could be adduced, did our limits permit.
Pear is another fertile source of Spectres. As
partial darkness and obscurity are the most com
mon circumstances by which the sight is deceiv
ed, so night is the season in which apparitions
are most frequently said to be seen. The state
of the mind at that time, especially when a person
is alone, prepares it for the admission of such
delusions of the imagination. The fear and cau
tion which night naturally inspires, the opportu
nity it affords for ambuscades, robberies, and as
sassinations, the deprivation of social intercourse,
and the interruption of many pleasing trains of
ideas which objects in the light never fail to pro
duce, are all circumstances of terror, and favour
able to the illusions of a timid imagination; and
therefore, it is by no means strange, that an igno
rant person with a mind uncultivated and unin
formed, and with all the prejudices of the nursery
12

about him, should imagine he sees ghosts in those
places where he believes they hover, especially
at the hour of midnight, when the slightest aid ol
the imagination can transform a cow into a mon
strous phantom, and the reflection of the beams of
the moon from a little water into a ghost with a
winding-sheet ; or a sound which is near, such as
the rustling of the leaves of a tree, the noise of
falling waters, or the screams of animals, when
referred to a great distance, may be magnified
into horrid and unearthly voices ; for, in such
cases, a timid and untutored mind seldom stops to
inquire into the cause of its alarms. The cele
brated historian De Thou, had a very singular
adventure at Saumur, in the year 1598, which
shows the happy effects of a calm inquiry into the
cause of any alarming or extraordinary appear
ance. One night, having retired to rest very
much fatigued, while he was enjoying a sound
sleep, he felt a very extraordinary weight upon
his feet, which, having made him turn suddenly,
fell down and awakened him. At first he ima
gined that it had been only a dream, but hearing
soon after some noise in his chamber, he drew
aside the curtains, and saw, by the help of the
moon, which at that time shone very bright, a
large white figure walking up and down, and at
the same time observed upon a chair some rags,
which he thought belonged to thieves who had
come to rob him. The figure then approaching
his bed, he had the courage to ask it what it was.
" I am (said the figure)the Queen of Heaven."
Had such a figure appeared to any credulous ig
norant man, he would, doubtless, have trembled
with fear, and frightened the whole neighbour
hood with a marvellous description of it. But De
Thou had too much understanding to be so im
posed upon. On hearing the words which drop
ped from the figure, he immediately concluded
that it was some mad woman, got up, called his
servants, anti ordered them to turn her out of
doors ; after which he returned to bed and fell
asleep. Next morning, he found that he had not
been deceived in his conjecture, and that having
forgot to shut his door, this female figure had es
caped from her keepers, and entered his apart
ment. The brave Schomberg, to whom De Thou
related his adventure some days after, confessed
that in such a case he would not have shown so
much courage. The King likewise, who was
informed of it by Schomberg, made the same ac
knowledgment. — See Ency. Brit., Art. Spectre.
The following relation contains a description
of an apparition of a different kind, no less appal
ling. Mr. Schmidt, mathematical teacher at
the school of Pforte, near Naumburg, which had
formerly been a cloister, once happened to awake
suddenly as the morning began to dawn. On
opening his eyes, he beheld with astonishment a
monk standing at the foot of his bed. Looking
at him steadfastly, he appeared to be well-fed;
and his head, far from small, was sunk a little

176

APPENDIX.

between ,1 pair of very broad shoulders. The
chamber was sufficiently secured ; Mr. Schmidt
alone slept in it ; and he was very certain that
no one would attempt to put a trick upon him in
est. He knew also, that no part of his clothes or
any thing else was hanging at his bed's foot.
The figure exactly resembled that of a monk,
clothed in a white surplice, the falling folds of
which were very clearly to be distinguished. Had
an ignorant and timid man beheld this appear
ance, he would probably have covered himself up
with the bed clothes, and firmly maintained that
the ghost of a monk had appeared to him. As
the school had formerly been a cloister, many
monks had been buried both in the church and
church-yard, and it was currently reported among
the vulgar thai the place was haunted. Mr.
Schmidt, however, was neither ignorant nor ti
mid, and he immediately conjectured that his eyes
were deceived, though he could not imagine in
what manner. He raised himself up a iittie in
his bed, but t. e apparition did not move, he only
saw somewhat more of it, and the folds of the
surplice were still more conspicuous. After a
little while he moved towards the right, yet the
apparition remained, and he seemed to have in
part a side view of it ; but as soon as he had
moved his head so far as to have a slight glimpse
of the bed's foot, the apparition retreated back
ward, though still with its face to the bed. Fol
lowing the apparition quickly with his eyes, it re
treated with speed, swelled as it retreated to a
gigantic form, a rustling noise was heard, and

at once the apparition was changed into the

gothic window with white curtains which was
opposite the bed's foot, and about six or seven
feet distance from it. Several times after this
Mr. Schmidt endeavoured when he awoke to see
the same appearance, but to no purpose, the win
dow always looking like a window only. Some
weeks after, however, on awakening, as the day
began to dawn, he again perceived the monk's
apparition at the bed's foot. Being now aware
what occasioned it, he examined it narrowly.
The great arch of the window formed the monk's
shoulders, a smaller arch, in the centre of this,
his head, and the curtains the surplice. The
folds of these appeared much stronger than they
did at the same distance by day-light. Thus the
figure of the monk appeared plainer, nearer, and
smaller, than the window would have done. This
apparition, therefore, like hundreds of others,
was merely an optical deception. The reader
will find a more particular description of it, with
an optical and mathematical explanation of the
phenomenon, in vol. i. of " The Pleasing Pre
ceptor," translated from the German of Gerhard
Ulrich Anthony Vieth.

Another cause of apparitions, and of the belief
in supernatural appearances, is to be found in
the artifices and collusions of impostors, and the
tricks of the waggish. Dr Plot, in his Natural

History of Oxfordshire, relates a marvellous stor
which will illustrate this position. Soon after
the murder of King Charles I., a commission was
appointed to survey the King's house at Wood
stock, with the manor, park, woods, and othev
demesnes belonging to that manor. One Col
lins, under a feigned name, hired himself as
secretary to the commissioners, who, upon the
13th October 1649, met, and took up their resi
dence in the King's own rooms. His majesty B
bed-chamber they made their kitchen, the coun
cil-hall their pantry, and the presence-chamber
was the place where they met for the despatch GJ
business. His majesty's dining-room they made
their wood-yard, and stored ic with the wood of
the famous royal oak from the High Park, which,
that nothing might be left with the name of King
about it, they had dug up by the roots, and split
and bundled up into fagots for their firing.
Things being thus prepared, they sat on the 16th
for the despatch of business ; and, in the midst of
their first debate, there entered a large black dog
(as they thought) which made a dreadful howl
ing, overturned two or three of their chairs, and
then crept under a bed and vanished. This gavo
them the greater surprise, as the doors were kept
constan*' . t so that no real dog could get in

or out. A ne next day their surprise was in
creased, when sitting at dinner in a lower room,
they heard plainly the noise of persons walking
over their heads, though they well knew the
doors were all locked, and there could be nobody
there. Presently after, they heard also all the
wood of the King's oak brought by parcels from
the dining-room, and thrown with great violence
into the presence chamber, as also all the chairs,
stools, tables, and other furniture forcibly hurled
about the room ; their papers, containing the
minutes of their transactions, were torn, and the
ink-glass broken. • When all this noise had
ceased, Giles Sharp, their secretary, proposed to
enter first into these rooms ; and in presence of
the commissioners, from whom he received the
key, he opened the doors, and found the wood
spread about the room, the chairs tossed about
and broken, the papers torn, but not the least
track of any human creature, nor the least reason
to suspect one, as the doors were all fast, and the
keys in the custody of the commissioners. It
was therefore unanimously agreed that the power
that did this mischief must have entered at the
key-hole. The night following, Sharp, the secre
tary, with two of the commissioners' servants,
as they were in bed in the same room, which
room was contiguous to that where the commis
sioners lay, had their beds' feet lifted up so much
higher than their heads, that they expected to
have their necks broken, and then they were let
fall at once with so much violence as shook the
whole nouse, anu more tnan ever terrified the
commissioners. O, the night of the 19th, a
they were all j ..ed in the the same room for

CAUSES OF APPARITIONS.

177

greater safety, and lights burning by them, the
candles in an instant went out with a sulphurous
smell, and that moment many trenchers of wood
were hurled about the room, which next morning
were found to be the same their honours had
eaten out of the day before, which were all remov
ed from the pantry, though not 9 lock was found
opened in the whole house. The next night they
fared still worse ; the candles went out as before,
the curtains of their honours' beds were rattled to
and fro with great violence, they received many
cruel blows and bruises by eight great pewter
dishes, and a number of wooden trenchers being
thrown on their beds, which, being heaved off,
were heard rolling about the room, though in the
morning none of these were to be seen.

The next night the keeper of the king's house
and his dog lay in the commissioners' room, and
then they had no disturbance. But on the night
of the 22d, though the dog lay in the room as be
fore, yet the candles went out, a number of brick
bats fell from the chimney into the room, the
dog howled piteously, their bed-clothes were all
stripped off, and their terror increased. On the
24th they thought all the wood of the king's oak
was violently thrown down by their bed-sides ;
they counted 64 billets that fell, and some hit
and shook the beds in which they lay ; but in the
morning none was found there, nor had the door
been opened where (he billet-wood was kept.
The next night the candles were put out, the
curtains rattled, and a dreadful crack like thun
der was heard ; and one of the servants running in
haste, thinking his master was killed, found
three dozen of trenchers laid smoothly under the
quilt by him. But all this was nothing to what
succeeded afterwards. The 29th, about mid
night, the candles went out, something walked
majestically through the room, and opened and
shut the windows ; great stones were thrown
violently into the room, some of which fell on
the beds, others on the floor ; and at about a
quarter after one, a noise was heard as of forty
cannon discharged together, and again repeated at
about eight minutes interval. This alarmed and
raised all the neighbourhood, who coming into
their honours' room, gathered up the great stones,
fourscore in number, and laid them by in the
corner of a field, where, in Dr. Plot's time, they
were to be seen. This noise, like the discharge
of cannon, was heard over the country for several
miles round. During these noises the commis
sioners and their servants gave one another over
for lost and cried out for help; and Giles Sharp,
snatching up a sword, had well nigh killed one
of their honours, mistaking him for the spirit, as
he came in his shirt from his own room to theirs.
While they were together the noise was continu
ed, and part of the tiling of the house was strip
ped off, and all the windows of an upper room
were taken away with it. On the 30th, at mid
night, something walked into the chamber tread

ing like a bear ; it walked many times about,
then threw the warming-pan violently on the
floor ; at the same time a large quantity of broken
glass, accompanied with great stones and horse
bones, came pouring into the room with uncom
mon force. On the 1st of November the mosi
dreadful scene of all ensued. Candles in every
part of the room were lighted up, and a great fire
made; at midnight, the candles all yet burning, a
noise like the bursting of a cannon was heard in
the room, and the burning billets were tossed
about by it even into their honours' beds, who
called Giles and his companions to their relief,
otherwise the house had been burnt to the ground ;
about an hour after, the candles went out as
usual, the crack as of many cannon was heard,
and many pailfuls of green stinking water were
thrown upon their honours' beds, great stones
were also thrown in as before, the bed-curtains
and bedsteads torn and broken, the windows
shattered, and the whole neighbourhood alarmed
with the most dreadful noises ; nay, the very rab-
bit-stealers, that were abroad that night in the
warren, were so terrified, that they fled for fear,
and left their ferrets behind them. One of their
honours this night spoke, and, in the name of
God, asked what it was, and why it disturbed
them so ? No answer was given to this ; but
the noise ceased for a while, when the spirit
came again; and, as they all agreed, brought
with it seven devils worse than itself. One of the
servants now lighted a large candle, and set it in
the doorway between the two chambers, to see
what passed ; and as he watched it, he plainly
saw a hoof striking the candle and candlestick
into the middle of the room, and afterwards,
making three scrapes over the snuff, scraped it
out. Upon this the same person was so bold as
to draw a sword, but he had scarce got it out
when he felt another invisible hand holding it
too, and pulling it from him, and at length pre
vailing, struck him so violently on the head with
the pummel, that he fell down for dead with the
blow. At this instant was heard another burst
like the discharge of the broadside of a ship of
war, and at the interval of a minute or two be
tween each, no less than 19 such discharges.
These shook the house so violently that they ex
pected every moment it would fall upon their
heads. The neighbours being all alarmed, flock
ed to the house in great numbers, and all joined
in prayer and psalm-singing; during which the
noise continued in the other rooms, and the dis
charge of cannons was heard as from without,
though no visible agent was seen to discharge
them. But what was the most alarming of all,
and put an end to their proceedings effectually,
happened the next day, as they were all at dinner,
when a paper, in which they had signed a mu
tual agreement to reserve a part of the premises
out of the general survey, and afterwards to share
it equally vnong themselves, I which paper they

178

APPENDIX.

nad hid for the present under the earth in a pot
in one corner of the room, and in which an orange
tree grew,) was consumed in a wonderful man
ner by the earth's taking fire with which the pot
was filled, and burning violently with a blue
flame and an intolerable stench, so that they were
all driven out of the house to which they could
never be again prevailed upon to return.

This story has been somewhat abridged from
the Encyclopaedia Brittannica, where it is quoted
from Dr. Plot's history. If I recollect right, it
is embodied in the book entitled " Satan's Invi
sible World Discovered," and the extraordinary
occurrences it relates ascribed to Satanic influ
ence. At the time they happened, they were
viewed as the effects of supernatural powers ;
and even Dr. Plot seems disposed to ascribe
them to this cause. " Though many tricks,"
says the Doctor, "have been often played in
affairs of this kind, many of the things above re
lated are not reconcileable with juggling ; such as
the loud noises beyond the powers of man to
make without such instruments as were not there;
the tearing and breaking the beds ; the throwing
about the fire ; the hoof treading out the candle ;
and the striving for the sword ; and the blow the
man received from the pummel of it." It was at
length ascertained, however, that this wonderful
contrivance was all the invention of the memora
ble Joseph Collins of Oxford, otherwise called
Funny Joe, who, having hired himself as secre
tary under the name of Giles Sharp, by knowing
the private traps belonging to the house, and by
the help of Pulvis Fulminant, and other chemical
preparations, and letting his fellow-servants into
the scheme, carried on the deceit without dis
covery to the very last.

Ventriloquism is another source whence a belief
of apparitions has been induced. By this art, cer
tain persons can so modify their voice as to make
it appear to the audience to proceed from any dis
tance, and in any direction, and by which impos
tors have sometimes accomplished their nefa
rious designs, of which the following are instan
ces.

Louis Brahant, a dexterous ventriloquist,valet-
de-chambre to Francis I., had fallen desperately
in love with a young, h'andsome, and rich heir
ess ; but was rejected by the parents as an un
suitable match for their daughter, on account of
the lowness of his circumstances. The young
jady's father dying, he made a visit to the widow,
who was totally ignorant of his singular talent.
Suddenly, on his first appearance in open day, in
her own house, and in the presence of several per
sons who were with her, she heard herself accost
ed in a voice perfectly resembling that of her dead
nusband,and which seemed to proceed from above,
exclaiming, " Give my daughter in marriage to
Louis Brahant. He is a man of great fortune and
of an excellent character. I now suffer the inex
pressible torments of purgatory for having re

fused her to him. If you obey this admonition
I shall soon be delivered from this place of tor
ment. You will at the same time provide a
worthy husband for your daughter, and procure
everlasting repose to the soul of your poor hus
band.'' The widow could not for a moment
resist this dreadful summons, which had not the
most distant appearance of proceeding from
Louis Brahant, whose countenance exhibited no
visible change, and whose lips were close and
motionless during the delivery of it. According
ly, she consented immediately to receive him for
her son-in-law. — Louis's finances, however,
were in a very low situation, arid the formalities
attending the marriage-contract rendered it ne
cessary for him to exhibit some show of riches,
and not to give the ghost the lie direct. He, ac
cordingly, went to work on a fresh subject, one
Cornu, an old and rich banker at Lyons, who had
accumulated immense wealth by usury and ex
tortion, and was known to be haunted by remorse
of conscience, on account of the manner in which
he had acquired it. Having contracted an inti
mate acquaintance with this man, he, one dav,
while they were sitting together in the usurers
little back parlour, artfully turned the conversa
tion on religious subjects, on demons, and spec
tres, the pains of purgatory, and the torments oi
hell. During an interval of silence between
them, a voice was heard, which, to the astonished
banker, seemed to be that of his deceased father,
complaining, as in the former case, of his dread
ful situation in purgatory, and calling upon him
to deliver him instantly from thence, by putting
into the hands of Louis Brahant, then with him,
a large sum for the redemption of Christians
then in slavery with the Turks ; threatening him,
at the same time, with eternal damnation, if he
did not take this method to expiate, likewise,
his own sins. Louis Branant, of course, af
fected a due degree of astonishment on the occa
sion ; and further promoted the deception by ac
knowledging his having devoted himself to the
prosecution of the charitable design imputed to
him by the ghost. An old usurer is naturally
suspicious. Accordingly, the wary banker made
a second appointment with the ghost's delegate
for the next day : and, to render any design of
imposing upon him utterly abortive, took him
into the open fields, where not a house or a tree,
or even a bush, or a pit were in sight, capable of
screening any supposed confederate. This ex
traordinary caution excited the ventriloquist to
exert all the powers of his art. Wherever the
banker conducted him, at every step, his ear3
were saluted on all sides with the complaints,
and groans, not only of his father, but of all his
deceased relations, imploring him for the love of
God, and in the name of every saint in the calen
der, to have mercy on his own soul and theirs,
by effectually seconding with his purse the inten
tions of his worthy companion. Cornu could no

APPARITIONS CAUSED BY VENTRILOQUISM.

179

tong«r resist the voice of heaven, and, accord-
nigly, carried his guest home with him, and paid
him down ten thousand crowns ; with which the
honest ventriloquist returned to Paris, and mar
ried his mistress. The catastrophe was fatal.
The secret was afterwards blown, and reached
the usurer's ears, who was so much affected by
the loss of his money, and the mortifying raille
ries ofhis neighbours, that he took to his bed and
died.

Another trick of a similar kind was played off
about sixty or seventy years ago, on a whole com
munity, by another French ventriloquist. " M.
St. Gill, the ventriloquist, and his intimate friend,
returning home from a place whither his busi
ness had carried him, sought for shelter from an
approaching thunder-storm in a neighbouring
convent. Finding the whole community in
mourning, he inquired the cause, and was told
that one of the body had died lately, who was the
ornament and delight of the whole society. To
pass away the time, he walked into the church,
attended by some of the religious, who showed
him the tomb of their deceased brother, and spoke
feelingly of the scanty honours they had bestowed
on his memory. Suddenly a voice was heard,
apparently proceeding from the roof of the choir,
lamenting the situation of the defunct in purga
tory, and reproaching the brotherhood with their
lukewarmness and want of zeal on his account.
The friars, as soon as their astonishment gave
them power to speak, consulted together, and
agreed to acquaint the rest of the community
with this singular event, so interesting to the
whole society. M. St. Gill, who wished to car
ry on the joke a little farther, dissuaded them
from taking this step, telling them that they
would be treated by their absent brethren as a
set of fools and visionaries. He recommended
to them, however, the immediately calling the
whole community into the church, where the
ghost of their departed brother might probably
reiterate his complaints. Accordingly, all the
friars, novices, lay-brothers, and even the do
mestics of the convent, were immediately sum
moned and called together, In a short time the
voice from the roof renewed its lamentations and
reproaches, and the whole convent fell on their
faces, and vowed a solemn reparation. As a
first step, they chanted a Deprofundis in a full
choir ; during the intervals of which the ghost
occasionally expressed the comfort he received
from their pious exercises and ejaculations on
his behalf. When all was over, the prior enter
ed into a serious conversation with M. St. Gill ;
and on the strength of what had just passed, sa
gaciously inveighed against the absurd increduli
ty of our modern sceptics and pretended philoso
phers, on the article of ghosts or apparitions.
M. St. Gil! thought it high time to disabuse the
good fathers. This purpose, however, he found
it extremely difficult to effect, till he had prevail

ed upon them to return with him into the church,
and there be witnesses of the manner ir. which
he had conducted this ludicrous deception." Had
not the ventriloquist, in this case, explained tho
cause of the deception, a whole body of men might
have sworn, with a good conscience, that they
had heard the ghost of a departed brother address
them again and again in a supernatural voice.

It is highly probable, that many of those per
sons termed witches and necromancers in ancient
times, who pretended to be invested with super
natural powers, performed their deceptions by
the art of ventriloquism. The term literally
means, speaking from the belly ; and, in accord
ance with this idea, we find that the Pythoness,
or witch of Endor, to whom Saul applied for
advice in his perplexity, is designated in the Sep-
tuagint translation of the Old Testament, "a
woman that speaks from her belly or stomach,"
as most magicians affected to do ; and some au
thors have informed us, that there were women
who had a demon which spake articulately from
the lower part of their stomachs, in a very loud*
though hoarse tone. Umbrae cum sagana reso-
narent triste et acutum. Hor. Sat. viii. lib. i.

Our English translation " familiar spirit," in
Hebrew, signifies " the spirit of Ob or Oboth"
The word Ob in its primitive sense, denotes a
bottle or vessel of leather, wherein liquors were
put ; and it is not unlikely that this name was
given to witches, because, in their fits of enthu
siasm, they swelled in their bellies like a bottle.
The occasion of this swelling is said by some
authors to proceed from a demon's entering into
the sorcerers per partes genitales, and so ascend
ing to the bottom of her stomach, from whence,
at that time, she uttered her predictions ; and
for this reason, the Latins call such persons Ven-
triloqui, and the Greeks Eyyaorpi/ivfloj, that is,
people who speak out of their bellies. Caelius
Rhodiginus (Antiq. lib. 8. c. 10.) says, in refer
ence to such cases, " While I am writing con
cerning ventriloquous persons, there is, in my -»wn
country, a woman of a mean extract, who has an
unclean spirit in her belly, from whence may be
heard a voice, not very strong indeed, but very
articulate and intelligible. Multitudes "f people
have heard this voice, as well as my?e<f, and all
imaginable precaution has been used in examin
ing into the truth of this fact:" — " Q,uandofuturi
avida portentus mens, saepe accersitum ventrilo-
quam, ac exutam amictu, ne quid fraudis occul-
taret, inspectare et audire concupivit." The
author adds, " This demon is called Cincinnatu~
lus, and when the woman calls upon him by his
name, he immediately answers her."— Several
ancient writers have informed us, that in the
times of Paganism, evil spirits had communion
with these ventriloquce per partes secrettores.
Chrysostom says,—" Traditur Pythia foemina
fuisse, qune in Tripodes sedens cxpansa malignum
spiritum per interna immissum, et per genitalw

180

APPENDIX.

partes subeuntem excipiens, furore repleretur,
ipsaque resolutis crinibus baccharetur, ex ore
spumam emittens, et sic furoris verba loqueba-
tur," tStc.

Spectres have also been produced by such opti
cal exhibitions as the phantasmagoria. By means
of this instrument, a spectre can be made appa
rently to start up from a white mist, and to rush
forward towards the spectator with a horrific as
pect. If a thin screen were placed in a dark
room, and the lantern of the phantasmagoria,
with its light properly concealed, the most terri
fic phantoms might be exhibited, which would
confound and appal every one previously unac
quainted with the contrivance, especially if the
exhibition was suddenly made at the dead hour of
night. By means of such exhibitions, combined
with the art of ventriloquism, and the assistance
of a confederate, almost every thing that has been
recorded respecting spectres and apparitions
might be realized.

'> I shall conclude these illustrations of appari
tions, by presenting the reader with a description
of the ghost of a flea, by Mr. Varley, formerly
alluded to, as a specimen of the folly and super
stition that still degrade the present age.

" With respect to the vision of the ghost of the
flea, as seen by Mr. Blake, it agrees in counte
nance with one class of people under Gemini,
which sign is the significator of the flea, whose
brown colour is appropriate to the colour of the
eyes, in some full-toned Gemini persons, and the
neatness, elasticity, and tenseness of the flea, are
significant of the elegant dancing and fencing sign
Gemini. The spirit visited his imagination in
such a figure as he never anticipated in an insect.
As I was anxious to make the most correct inves
tigation in my power of the truth of these visions,
on hearing of this spiritual apparition of a flea, I
asked him if he could draw for me the resem
blance of what he saw. He instantly said, « I see
him now before me.' I therefore gave him paper
and a pencil with which he drew the portrait, of
which a fac-simile is given in this number. I felt
convinced by his mode of proceeding, that he had
a real image before him ; for he left off and be
gan on another part of the paper, to make a se
parate drawing of the mouth of the flea, which
the spirit having opened, he was prevented from
proceeding with the first sketch, till he had closed
it. During the time occupied in completing the
drawing, the flea told him that all fleas were in
habited by the souls of such men as were by na
ture blood-thiruty to excess, and were, therefore,
providentially confined to the size and form of
such insects ; otherwise, were he himself, for in
stance, the size of a horse, he would depopulate
a great part of the country. He added, that, ' if
in attempting to leap from one island to another,
he should fall into the sea, he could swim, and
could not be lost.' This spirit afterwards ap

peared to Blake, arid afforded him a view of bit
whole figure, an engraving of which I snail give
in this work."

N. B. — Blake, who died only two or threa
years ago, was an ingenious artist, who illustrat
ed Blair's Grave, and oiher works, and was so
much of an enthusiast, that he imagined he could
call up from the vasty deep, any spirits or corpo
real forms. Were it not a fact, that a work
entitled " Zodiacal Physiognomy," written by
John Parley, and illustrated with engravings, was
actually published in the year 1828, by Longman
and Co., we should have deemed it almost impos
sible, that amidst the light of the present age, any
man capable of writing a grammatical sentence,
would seriously give such a description as that
quoted above, and attach his belief to such absur
dity and nonsense. But amidst all our boasted
scientific improvements and discoveries, it ap
pears, that the clouds of ignorance and supersti
tion still hang over a large body of our population,
and that the light of the millennial era, if it have
yet dawned, is still far from its meridian splendour.

After what has been now stated respecting the
circumstances which may have led to the popular
belief of spectres and apparitions, it would be al
most needless to spend time in illustrating the
futility of such a belief. There is one strong ob
jection against the probability of apparitions, and
that is, — that they scarcely appear to be intelli
gent creatures, or at least, that they possess so
small a degree of intelligence, that they are un
qualified to act with prudence, or to use the
means requisite to accomplish an end. Ghosts
are said often to appear in order to discover
some crime that had been committed ; but they
never appear to a magistrate, or some person
of authority and intelligence, but to some illite
rate clown, who happens to live near the place
where the crime was committed, to some per
son who has no connexion at all with the af
fair, and who, in general, is the most impropci
person in the world for making the discovery.
Glanville, who wrote in defence of witchcraft and
apparitions, relates, for instance, the following
story : " James Haddock, a farmer, was married
to Elenor Welsh, by whom he had a son. After
the death of Haddock, his wife married one
Davis ; and both agreed to defraud the son by the
former marriage, of a lease bequeathed to him by
his father. Upon this the ghost of Haddock ap
peared to one Francis Taverner, the servant of
Lord Chichester. and desired him to go to Elenor
Welsh, and to inform her that it was the will of
her former husband that their son should enjoy
the lease. Taverner did not at first execute this
commission, but he was continually haunted by
the apparition in the most hideous shapes, which
even threatened to tear him in pieces, till at last
he delivered the message." Now, had this spectre

EXPLOSION OF STEAM-ENGINES.

181

possessed the least common sense, it would have
'appeared first toElenor Welsh, and her husband
Davis, and frightened them into compliance at
once, and not have kept poor Taverner, who had
no concern in the matter, in such constant dis
quietude and alarm.

Another odd circumstance respecting appari
tions, is, that they have nopowerto speak, till they
are addressed. In Glanville's relations, we read
of an old woman, that appeared often to David
Hunter, a neat-herd, at the house of the Bishop
of Down. Whenever she appeared, he found
himself obliged to follow her; and, for three quar
ters of a year, poor David spent the whole of al
most every night in scampering up and down
through the woods after this old woman. How
long this extraordinary employment might have
continued, it is impossible to guess, had not
David's violent fatigue made him one night ex
claim, " Lord bless me! — would I were dead!—
shall I never be delivered from this misery ?" On
which the phantom replied, " Lord bless me too !
—It was happy you spoke first, for till then I
had no power to speak, though I have followed
you so long !" Then she gave him a message to
her two sons, though David told her he remem
bered nothing about her. David, it seems, ne
glected to deliver the message, at which the old
beldam was so much provoked, that she returned
and hit him a hearty blow on the shoulder, which
made him cry out and then speak to her. Now,
if she could not speak till David addressed her,
why might she not have applied this oratorial
medicine, the first time she appeared to him ? It
would have saved both herself and him many a
weary journey, arid certainly David would much
rather have had half a dozen blows from her chop
py fists, than have wanted so many nights' sleep.
To complete the story, it must be added, that
when David's wife found it impossible to keep him
from following the troublesome visiter, she trudged
after him, but was never gratified with a sight of
the enchantress. — See Ency. Brit. Art. Spectre.

What imaginable purpose can be served by
such dumb spectres that cannot speak till they are
addressed,. or by sending apparitions from the
invisible world that appear destitute of common
sense ? It is remarked by Glanville, that ghosts
are generally very eager to be gone; and, indeed,
they are frequently so much so, that like children
and thoughtless fools, they do not stay to tell
Jheir errand. It appears altogether inconsistent
with any rational or scriptural ideas of the over
ruling providence" of the Almighty, to suppose
that such beings would be selected for adminis
tering the affairs of his kingdom, and for main
taining an intercourse between the visible and
invisible worlds. It is also stated to be one pe
culiarity of spectres that they appear only in the
night. But if they are sent to this sublunary
region on affairs of importance, why should they
be afraid of the light of the sun ? In the light

of day their message would be delivered witb as
much ease, and with more chance of success.
As it would excite less fear, it would be listened to
with more calmness and attention; and were
they to exhibit themselves before a number of
intelligent witnesses in the full blaze of day, the
purposes for which they were sent would be more
speedily and securely accomplished. The ce
lestial messengers whose visits are recorded in
Scripture, appeared most frequently during the
light of day, and communicated their messages,
in many instances, to a number of individuals at
once — messages , which were of the utmost im
portance to the individuals addressed, and even
to mankind at large. To give credit, therefore,
to the popular stories respecting ghosts and ap
paritions, embodies in it a reflection on the cha
racter of the All-wise Ruler of the world, and
a libel on the administrations of his moral go
vernment.

No. VIII. — Explosions of Steam-Engines .
Pp. 33, 76.

As steam-engines are now applied to the pur
pose of impelling vessels along seas and rivers,
as well as to many important manufacturing pro
cesses, and are capable of still more extensive
applications, and of higher improvements than
they have yet attained — it is of the utmost im
portance that every circumstance should be care
fully guarded against, which has the remotest
tendency to endanger the bursting of the boiler,
— and that no person be intrusted with the di
rection of such engines who is not distinguished
for prudence and caution, or who is unacquainted
with their construction and the principle of their
operation. For, to ignorance and imprudence
are to be ascribed many of those accidents which
have happened from the bursting of the boilers
of these engines. This remark is strikingly il
lustrated by the following and many other tragical
occurrences : —

In the month of August 1815, the following
melancholy accident happened at Messrs. Nes-
ham and Go's colliery at Newbottle. The pro
prietors had formed a powerful locomotive steam-
engine for the purpose of drawing ten or twelve
coal wagons to the staith at one time : and on the
day it was to be put in motion, a great number
of persons belonging to the colliery collected to
see it; but, unfortunately, just as it was going off,
the boiler of the machine burst. The engine-
man was dashed to pieces, and his mangled re
mains blown 1 14 yards. The top of the boiler,
nine feet square, weighing nineteen hundred
weight, was blown 100 yards, and the two cy
linders 90 yards. A little boy was also thrown to
a great distance. By this accident fifty-seven
persons were killed and wounded, of whom eleven
died on Sunday night ; several remaining dan
gerously ill. The cause of the accident is ac-

1S2

APPENDIX.

counted for as follows: — The engine-man said,
" .4s there are several owners and viewers here, I
will make her (the engine) go in grand style ,•"
and he had scarcely got upon the boiler to loose
the screw of the safety valve, but, beins over
heated, it exploded. — Monthly .Magazine, vol.40,
p. 181.

From what is here stated, it appears, that this
tragical accident was occasioned by a combina
tion of vanity, ignorance, and imprudence in the
person to whom the direction of the engine was
committed. — The following accident which hap
pened to the Washington steam-boat, belonging
to Wheeling, N. America, is attributed to a
somewhat similar cause.

" This boat started from Wheeling on Mon
day, June 10th, 1816, and arrived at Marietta on
Tuesday evening at 7 o'clock, and came safely
to anchor, where she remained till Wednesday
morning. The fires had been kindled and the
boilers sufficiently hot, preparatory to her depar
ture, when the anchor was weighed and the
helm put to larboard, in order to wear her in a
position to start her machinery ; but only having
one of her rudders shipped at the time, its influ
ence was not sufficient to have the desired effect,
and she immediately shot over under the Virgi
nia shore, where it was found expedient to throw
over the kedge at the stern to effect it. This
being accomplished, the crew were then required
to haul it on board, and were nearly all collected
in the quarter for that purpose. At this un
happy fatal moment, the end of the cylinder to
wards the stern exploded, and threw the whole
contents of hot water among them, and spread
death and torture in every direction. The captain,
mate, and several seamen were knocked over
board, but were saved, with the exception of
one man, by boats from the town, and by swim
ming to the shore. The whole town was alarm
ed by the explosion, and all the physicians, with
a number of citizens, went immediately to their
relief. On going on board, a melancholy and
truly horrible scene was presented to view. Six
or eight persons were nearly skinned from head
to foot, and others scalded, making in the whole,
seventeen. In stripping off their clothes the
skin pealed off with them to a considerable depth.
Added to this melancholy sight, the ears of the
pitying spectators were pierced by the screams
and groans of the agonizing sufferers, rendering
the scene horrible beyond description.

"The cause of this melancholy catastrophe
may be accounted for by the cylinder not having
vent through the safety valve, which was firmly
stopped by the weight which hung on the U.-VIT,
having been unfortunately slipped to its extreme,
without its being noticed, and the length of time
occupied in wearing before her machinery could
be set in motion, whereby the force of the steam
would have been expended ; these two causes
united, confined the steam till the strength of the

cylinders could no longer contain it, and gave
way with great violence. Six of the unfortunate
sufferers died on Wednesday night, and one or
two others are not expected to survive." — Loui
siana Gazette and New Orleans Mercantile Ad
vertiser, July 8th, 1816.

Since the above accidents happened, many
others of a similar nature have occurred, which
have ultimately been ascertained to have been
owing either to ignorance, or to carelessness and
inattention, which are the natural results of
ignorance. As steam-boats are now navigat
ing all our Friths and rivers, and even ploughing
the ocean itself; and as steam carriages, are
likely soon to come into general use for the con
veyance of passengers and goods, it is of the
utmost importance to their success, and to the
safety of the public, that every precaution bo
adopted to prevent those explosions, and disar
rangements of the machinery, which might be
attended with fatal effects. But, although science
and art may accomplish all that seems requisite
for the prevention of danger, unless persons
of prudence and intelligence be obtained for the
superintendence and direction of such machines,
the efforts of their projectors to prevent accidents
may prove abortive. And until the tone of in
tellect, among the middling and lower orders, be
somewhat more elevated than it is at present, it
may be difficult to obtain persons for this purpose
of the requisite qualifications.

The following recent accidents from steam
boat explosions, in all probability originated from
causes similar to those to which I have now
alluded.

The boiler of the steam-boat Caledonia, ply
ing on the Mississipi, exploded on the llth
April 1830, killing and wounding about fifteen of
the passengers and seven of the crew, — seven or
eight of whom were blown overboard and lost.
It was expected that some of the wounded would
recover, although badly scalded. The boiler
burst in the side while the boat was under weigh,
and about two hours after being wooded. There
were on board about 400 deck, and sixty cabin
passengers, besides the cr°w, being altogether
about 500 souls. The hull of the boat was un
injured. It is said that the accident arose
from the passengers crowding to one side of the
boat, by which one side of the boiler was expos
ed to the direct action of the fire, and when the
boat righted, a quantity of steam was suddenly
generated greater than the safety valve could
carry off. — The number of persons who have lost
their lives by explosions in America, since tho
commencement of the season(1830,) is not muck
short of one hundred, — sixty in the Helen Macr
gregor, four in the Huntress, nine in the Justice
Marshall, and fourteen in the Caledonia, be
sides those of the latter, who, it was feared
would not recover from ihe injuries they ha*
sustained.

INVENTION OF THE SAFETY LAMP.

283

In these and other instances, it is more than
orobable, that a want of attention to the natural
l&ws of the universe, and to the obvious effects
which an enlightened mind should foresee they
would produce, was the chief cause of the de
struction of so many human beings, and of the
sufferings of those whose lives were preserved.
The same remark may be applied to the cir
cumstances connected with a late fatal accident
which happened on the Liverpool and Manches
ter rail-road.

On Fridav afternoon, February 1, 1833, as
the second-class train, which leaves Liverpool at
three o'clock, was proceeding over Parr Moss, a
little on the other side of Newton, one of the
tubes which passes longitudinally through the
boiler, burst, The consequence was, that a
quantity of water fell into the fire, steam was
generated in abundance, and the engine stopped.
Several of the passengers alighted to see what
was the matter, and they incautiously got upon the
line of rail-way taken by the trains in going to
Liverpool, — the contrary to that on which the dis
abled engine stood. While they were in this
situation, a train of wagons from Bolton, pro
ceeding to Liverpool, came up. The persons
who had alighted did not see the advancing train,
being enveloped in a dense cloud of vapour ; and,
from the same cause, they were by the conduct
or also unseen. They accordingly came upon
them with fearful violence ; several were knocked
down, and the wheels of the train passed over four
of them. Three of the unfortunate party were
killed upon the spot ; their bodies being dread
fully crushed ; the fourth survived, and was taken
forward to the infirmary, but his recovery was
considered hopeless. Two of the three killed
were elderly persons, whose names were un
known ; the third, an interesting young man,
who had formerly been in the employ of the Com
pany as a fireman, and who was married only three
weeks before. The survivor was a boy about
sixteen years of age, who was proceeding from
Belfast to Halifax, where his parents reside. —
The casualty, which was the occasion of
this serious result, was itself but trifling, as the
train went forward to Manchester after a short
delay.

This shocking catastrophe was evidently caus
ed by rashness and imprudence — by not foresee
ing what might probably arise from a certain
combination of circumstances — or, in other
words, by inattention to certain natural laws,
both on the part of those who were connected
with the Liverpool train of wagons, and of those
who conducted the Bolton train. In regard to
the passengers in the Liverpool train, it was
highly improper that they should have left their
seats on the carriage. The accident which befel
the unfortunate Mr. Huskisson, at the opening
of tlie rail-way, should have operated as an im
pressive warning against such a practice. In

the next place, it was most imprudent to venture
upon the other line of rail-way, more especially
when a cloud of steam prevented them from see*
ing what was passing around them. — In regard to
the person who had the command of the Bolton
train, it was incautious and imprudent in the
highest degree, to urge his machinery forward,
when ho beheld a volume of smoke immediately
before him; the least consideration must have
convinced him, that some accident must have
happened, and that the cloud of steam would pre
vent those enveloped in it from perceiving the
approach of his vehicle ; and, therefore, he ought
immediately to have abated his speed, so as to
have acquired a complete command of the en
gine by the time it arrived at the spot where the
steam was floating. Hence the importance — in
conducting steam-engines and other departments
of machinery — of having as superintendents, men
of prudence and of enlightened minds, capable of
foreseeing the probable effects of every combina
tion of circumstances that may happen to occur.
For Ignorance is generally proud, obstinate,
incautious, precipitate in its movements, and
regardless of consequences ; so that, through its
heedlessness and folly, the most splendid inven
tions are often impeded in their progress, and
their value and utility called in question.

The Liverpool and Manchester Rail-way,
and the locomotive powers of th« machinery and
engines which move along it, constitute one ot
the most splendid and useful improvements 01
modern times. From the last half-yearly Re-.
port of '.he Directors, from June 30 to December
31, 1832, it it satisfactorily proved, that this rail
way is completely efficient and applicable to all
the great objects for which it was designed. Dur
ing the period now specified, there were carried
along the rail-way 86,842 tons goods, 39,940 tons
coals, and 182,823 passengers, which is 73,498
fewer than in the corresponding six months of
1831, owing to the prevalence of cholera in Dub
lin, and in the towns of Manchester and Liver
pool. Were this rail-way continued to London,
it is calculated, that the journey from Liverpool
to the Metropolis, a distance of more than 200
miles, might be performed in eight or ten hours.

No. TX. — Circumstances which led to the inven
tion of the Safety Lamp. Pp.27, 81.

This lamp, by means of which hundreds of
lives have been preserved, was invented in the
autumn of 1815. Sir Humphry Davy, the inven
tor, was led to the consideration of this subject,
by an application from Dr. Gray, now Bishop
of Bristol, the chairman of a society established
in 1813, at Bishop- Wearmouth, to consider and
promote the means of preventing accidents by
fire in coal-pits. Being then in Scotland, he
visited the mines on his return southward, and
was supplied with specimens of fire-damp, which,

184

APPENDIX.

on reaching London, he proceeded to examine
and analyze. He soon discovered that the car-
faurretted hydrogen gas, called fire-damp by the
miners, would not explode when mixed with less
than six, or more than fourteen times its volume
of air ; and, further, that the explosive mixture
nould not be fired in tubes of small diameters and
proportionate lengths. Gradually diminishing
these, he arrived at the conclusion, that a tissue
of wire in which the meshes do not exceed a
certain small diameter, which maybe considered
as the ultimate limit of a series of such tubes, is
impervious to the inflamed air ; and that a lamp
covered with such tissue may be used with per
fect safety, even in an explosive mixture, which
takes fire and burns within the cage, securely
cut off from the power of doing harm. Thus,
when the atmosphere is so impure that the flame
of a lamp itself cannot be maintained, the Davy
still supplies light to the miner, and turns his
worst enemy into an obedient servant. This in
vention, the certain source of large profit, he
presented with characteristic liberality to the
public. The words are preserved in which,
when pressed to secure to himself the benefit of
a patent, he declined to do so, in conformity with
the high-minded resolution which he formed,
upon acquiring independent wealth, of never
making his scientific eminence subservient to
gain. " I have enough for all my views and
purposes, more wealth might be troublesome,
and distract my attention from those pursuits
in which I delight. More wealth could not
increase my fame or happiness. It might un
doubtedly enable me to put four horses to my car
riage, but what would it avail me to have it said,
that Sir Humphry drives his carriage and four ?"
Gallery of Portraits.

No. X. — On the Utility of the Remarks and
Observations of Mechanics and Manufac
turers. P. 8] .

That the remarks of experienced artists and la
bourers, may frequently lead to useful discoveries,
maybe illustrated by the following facts: — "A
soap manufacturer remarked that the residuum
of his ley, when exhausted of the alkali for which
he employed it, produced a corrosion of his cop
per boiler for which he could not account. He
put it into the hands of a scientific chemist for
analysis, and the result was the discovery of one
of the most singular and important chemical ele
ments, iodine. The properties of this, being
studied, were found to occur most appositely in
illustration and support of a variety of new, curi
ous, and instructive views, then gaining ground in
chemistry, and thus exercised a marked influence
over the whole body of that science. Curiosity
was excited ; the origin of the new substance was
'raced to tho sea-plants from whose ashes the
orincipal ingredient of soap is obtained, and ulti

mately to the sea-water itself. It was thence
hunted through nature, discovered in salt mine*
and springs, and pursued into all bodies which
have a marine origin; among the rest, into
sponge. A medical practitioner then called to
mind a reputed remedy for the cure of one of the
most grievous and unsightly disorders to which
the human species is subject — the goitre — which
infests the inhabitants of mountainous districts to
an extent which in this favoured land we have
happily no experience of, and which was said to
have been originally cured by the ashes of burnt
sponge. Led by this indication, he tried the ef
fect of iodine on that complaint, and the result
established the extraordinary fact, that this sin
gular substance, taken as a medicine, acts with
the utmost promptitude and energy on goitre, dis
sipating the largest and most inveterate in a short
time, and acting (of course with occasional fail
ures, like all other medicines) as a specific or
natural antagonist, against that odious deformity.
It is thus that any accession to our knowledge of
nature is sure, sooner or later, to make itself felt
in some practical application, and that a benefit
conferred on science, by the casual observation
or shrewd remark of even an unscientific or illite
rate person, infallibly repays itself with interest,
though often in a way that could never have beeu
at first contemplated."*

Iodine was accidentally discovered (as above
stated) in 1812, by M. De Courtois, a manufac
turer of saltpetre at Paris, and derived its first
illustrations from M. Clement and M. Desor-
mes. Its name literally signifies a violet colour. Its
specific gravity is about 4. It becomes a violet-
coloured gas at a temperature below that, of boiling
water; it combines with the metals, with phos
phorus and sulphur, with the alkalis and metallic
oxides, and forms a detonating compound with
ammonia. Dr. Coindet of Geneva first recom
mended the use of it, in the form of tincture, for
the cure of goitres. Some readers may perhaps
require to be informed that thg goitre is a large
fleshy excrescence that grows from the throat,
and sometimes increases to an enormous size.
The inhabitants of certain parts of Switzerland,
especially those in the republic of Valais, are
particularly subject to this shocking deformity.

No. XI. — Liberality of Religious Sectaries in
America, contrasted with British bigotry.
P. 149.

The following sketches are taken from Stuart's
" Three Years in North America." When a(
Avon, a village in the north-west part of the State
of New York, Mr. Stuart went to attend a church
about a mile distant, of which he gives the follow
ing description. — " The horses and carriages wcr«
tied up in great sheds near the church-doors, dur

• Herschel's Prelim. Discourse to Nat. Phil.

LIBERALITY OP SECTARIES IN AMERICA.

183

Ing the time of service. The day was hot, and
the precentor, as usual, in the centre of the front
gallery, opposite to the minister, officiated, not
only without a gown, but without a coat upon his
back. There was some sort of instrumental
music — hautboys and bassoons, I think, against
which there are no prejudices in this country.
The clergyman, a very unaffected, sincere-look
ing person, delivered a plain sensible discourse,
in which he introduced the names of Dr. Erskine
and Dr. Chalmers, which sounded strange to us,
considering where we were, on the western side
of the Atlantic, not very far from the falls of Ni
agara. At the close of his sermon, he addressed
his hearers in some such terms as these, — ' My
friends, the sacrament of the Lord's supper is to
be dispensed here this evening. This is a free
church, open to all — Presbyterians, Methodists,
Baptists, and all other denominations of Chris
tians. This is according to our belief. All are in
vited ; the risk is theirs.' Such liberality is, we
find on inquiry, not unusual among the clergymen
and congregations of different sects, with the ex
ception in general of Unitarians. I observe an
example recorded in Hosack's Life of Clinton ;
and as it relates to the great Father of the United
States, and is of unquestionable authority, I think
it of sufficient interest for insertion. ' While the
American army, under the command of Wash
ington, lay encamped in the vicinity of Morris-
town, New-Jersey, it occurred that the service of
the communion (then observed semi-annually
only) was to be administered to the Presbyterian
church in that village. In a morning of the pre
vious week, the General, after his accustomed
inspection of the camp, visited the house of the
Rev. Dr. Jones, then pastor of that church, and,
after the usual preliminaries, thus accosted him :
— ' Doctor, I understand that the Lord's supper
is to be celebrated with you next Sunday. I would
learn, if it accords with the canons of your church
to admit communicants of another denomination.'
The Doctor rejoined, ' Most certainly. Ours is
not the Presbyterian table, General, but the
Lord's table, and we hence give the Lord's invi
tation to all his followers, of whatever name.'
The General replied, ' I am glad of it ; that is as
it ought to be, but as I was not quite sure of the
fact, I thought I would ascertain it from yourself,
as I propose to join with you on that occasion.
Though a member of the church of England, I
have no exclusive partialities.' The Doctor re
assured him of a cordial welcome, and the Gene
ral was found seated with the communicants the
next Sabbath,

" During my residence in the United States,
subsequent to this period, I was frequently wit
ness to the good understanding which generally
prevails among clergymen professing different
opinions on church forms and doctrinal points,
in this country ; and I occasionally observed
notices in I he newspapers to the same purport.

The two following I have preserved :— • Tho
corner-stone of a new Baptist church was laid at
Savannah in Georgia, and the ceremonial ser
vices were performed by clergymen of the Metho
dist, German, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Episcopal,
and Baptist churches.' ' The sacrament of the
Lord's supper was administered in the Rev. Mr.
Post's church (Presbyterian church at Washing
ton) and, as usual, all members of other churches
in regular standing were invited to unite with
the members of that church, in testifying their
faith in, and love to, their Lord and Saviour.
The invited guests assembled around the table;
and it so happened that Mr. Grundy, a senator
from Tennessee, and two Cherokee Indians, were
seated side by side.' Nothing is more astound
ing in the stage-coach intercourse with the peo
ple of this country, as well as in the bar-rooms
where travellers meet, than the freedom and
apparent sincerity of their remarks, and the per
fect feeling of equality with which the conversa
tion is maintained, especially on religious
matters. I have heard the most opposite creeds
maintained, without any thing like acrimonious
discussion or sarcastic remark, by persons in the
same stage, professing themselves undisguisedly,
Calvinists, Episcopalians, Methodists, and
Unitarians," &c.

If such are the liberal views entertained in
America on religious subjects, and if such dispo
sitions are more congenial to the spirit of the
Christian system, than the fiery and uuhallowed
zeal and unholy jealousies which many religion
ists display — why are they not more frequently
manifested in our own country ? For, the differ
ence of localities and customs cannot alter the
nature and obligation of moral principles and
actions. What a striking contrast to the scenes
now exhibited are such facts as the following; —
" The Rev. J. T. Campbell, rector of Tilston,
in the diocese of Chester, has been suspended
from his clerical function, for twelve months,
with a sequestration of his benefice, for that time,
for preaching in a methodist meeting-house in
Nantwich, and in other similar places within
the diocese." " The Rev. Dr. Rice, curate of
St. Lukes, London, who made himself conspicu
ous the other day, at Mr. Wakely's dinner, and
who, in consequence of the liberal sentiments he
then expressed on the subject of Church Reform,
has fallen under the censure of his diocesan."
Both these notices appeared in most of the
newspapers in January 1833, and were never
contradicted ! If such conduct in the rulers of
the church were warranted by the doctrines or
precepts of the New Testament, Christianity
would be unworthy of any man's attention or
support. If the principles and persecuting
spirit involved in such decisions, were coun
tenanced and supported by the laws of the state,
we should soon be subjected to al1 the burnings,
hangings, mannings, tortures, a:.d horrid cruel*

APPENDIX.

tics, wnich distinguished the dark ages of Pope-

S, ana the oroceedings of the Star Chamber,
ow .ong will it be ere professed Christians
display a Christian spirit! and what is the utility
of Christianity to the world, unless candour,
forbearance, love, meekness, and other Christian
virtues, be the characteristics of its professed
votaries ! We dare any person to bring forward
a single instance of a man's being converted to
the faith of our holy religion, by the display of
unhallowed zeal, furious bigotry, sectarian con
tentions, or the manifestation of a domineering
and persecuting spirit. But, thousands of in
stances could he produced of such dispositions
being the means of recruiting the ranks of infi
delity and licentiousness. The following state
ment, sent to the Editor of the Liverpool Mercu
ry, Feb. 14th, 1833, displays the liberality of
certain British clergymen, in the thirty-third
year of the nineteenth century. " I have been
recently called on by death to part with one of

my children. I waited upon the Rev.

of church (where I buried a child a short

time ago,) to arrange with him about its inter
ment near the other. 'But, to what place of
worship do you go ?' inquired most seriously the
Reverend divine. < The Me(hodists,Sir, of the
New Connexion,' I replied. ' As you do not
attend my church, I cannot, therefore, bury your
child. — Where was your child baptized ?' was
his second inquiry. ' At the church of which I
am a member,' I answered. ' How can you
think,' exclaimed the liberal and pious, but indig
nant minister, ' that I shall bury your child,
which has been baptized by a Dissenter ? Take
your child to be buried where it was baptized.' —
1 But, Sir, we have no burial-ground connected
with our chapel.' « No matter ; the church
wardens of my church have determined not to
bury any that do not belong to the church. Go,'

eaid the minister, ' to , and arrange with

him.' — So saying, he turned his back and left me.
R. Emery."

The Duke of Newcastle — so notorious^/br do
ing what he pleases with his own — has the follow
ing clause introduced into certain leases in the
neighbourhood of Nottingham : — " That in none
of the houses to be built, shall be held prayer-meet
ings, or any conventicles for the diffusion of senti
ments contrary to the doctrines of the Church of
England." A fine specimen, truly, of Chris
tian liberality in the nineteenth century ! If his
Grace the Duke of Newcastle attended to his
prayers zsfrequently and fervently as the Liturgy
enjoins, he would be disposed to display a little
more candour in reference to the (: prayer-meet
ings" of his dissenting brethren. With regard
to the leading doctrines of the Church of England,
there are few dissenters disposed to find much
fault with them. But what will his Grace say
of the indolence and avaricious conduct of many
•f the ministers of that church, which have been

the cause of the rapid increase of Dissenleri 1
The Vicar of Pevensey in Sussex (as appears
from a petition of the parishioners, dated Februa
ry 1, 1833) derives an income from the parish of
about 12001. a-year, and yet has never once per
formed divine service, since his induction, about
seventeen years ago. He has another living at
Guestling, about fifteen miles distant, from which
he derives a revenue of 4001. per annum. Whe
ther he does duty there is not known ; but it is
not absurd to suppose, that a parson who will not
so much as read prayers for 12001. is not very
likely to preach for 4001. — R. Hodgson, Dean
of Carlisle, is also Vicar of Burg-on-Sands, Rec
tor of St. Georges in Hanover Square, Vicar of
Hellington, and yet at none of these places is he
found officiating. The tithes received by the
Dean and Chapter for Heshet, amount to 1000/.
or 1500/. a-year ; they pay the curate that does
the duty 18/. 5*., or at the rate of one shilling
a-day — the wages of a bricklayer's labourer. In
Wetheral and Warwick, the Dean and Chapter
draw about 1000Z. a-year for tithes, and 1000/.
a-year from the church lands, and they pay the
working minister the sum of 501. a-year. The
tithes of the parish of St. Cuthberts and St. Ma
ry amount to about 15001. a-year ; and the two
curates, who do the duty, receive each the sura
of 21. 13s. 4d. a-year ! ! Three brothers of the
name of Goodenough, monopolize thirteen pieces
of church preferment. One of them is Prebend
of Carlisle, Westminister and York, Vicar of
Wath All-Saints on Dearn, chaplain of Adwick,
and chaplain of Brarnpton Bierlow. Those pre
ferments produce, of course, several thousands,
for which the incumbents perform absolutely no
thing. And yet, one of the persons above allud
ed to, had lately the effrontery to come to Carl
isle and preach up " the Church is in danger,"
because these shocking enormities are now ex
posed to public reprobation. See Times news
paper for March 7, 8, 1833. It would be no
great breach of charity to suppose, that it is such
doctrines and practices as those now stated, that
the Duke of Newcastle is determined to support
with such a degree of persecuting zeal — and that
pure Christianity, detached from its connexions
with the state, is the object of his hatred and con
tempt.

As a corroboration of Mr. Stuart's statements
respecting the liberality of Religious Sectaries
in America, the following extract of a letter,
dated 18th February 1833, which the author
received from the Rev. Dr. S , a learned
and pious Presbyterian minister in the State of
New York, may be here inserted —

" I deeply regret to hear that so much of the
spirit of sectarianism prevails among the differ
ent religious denominations of your country.
We, too, have enough of it ; but it is here mani
festly on the decline. You may possibly tnink it
an unreasonable stretch cf liberality when I teB

EFFECTS OF INFIDEL PHILOSOPHY.

187

you, that within a few weeks, I suffered an
Episcopaliat to preach in my pulpit, and to use
his own forms of prayer. Bi't such is the state
of feeling in my congregation, that, though such
a thing had never before occurred among them,
yet it met with their universal and unqualified
approbation. On the other hand, I expect, in
the course of a week or two, to preach a charity
sermon here in one of our Episcopal churches,
and to perform the whole service in my own way.
This, it must be confessed, is a little uncommon
even in this country ; but every thing indicates,
that such expressions of good will, even between
Presbyterians and Episcopalians, will soon be
come frequent. Independents and Presbyte
rians here occupy nearly the same ground. They
are indeed distinct denominations, but are repre
sented in each other's public bodies." The au
thor has perused an excellent sermon of the cler
gyman now alluded to, which was preached in
an Independent church when introducing an In-
dependent minister to his charge immediately after
ordination, which shows that we have still much
to learn from our transatlantic brethren, in relation
to a friendly and affectionate intercourse with
Christians of different denominations.

No. XII. — On the Demoralizing Effects of Infi
del Philosophy. P. 1 53—1 56.

With the view of corroborating and illustrating
more fully the statements made in the pages re
ferred to, the following facts may be stated in re
lation to the moral character of the inhabitants of
France, particularly those of Paris.

In the first place, the vice of gambling pre
vails in the capital of France to an extent un
known in almost any other country. The Pa-
lais Royale is the grand focus of this species of in
iquity, which is the fertile source of licentious
ness, and of almost every crime. Mr. J. Scott,
who visited Paris in 1814, thus describes this
sink of moral pollution. " The Palais Royale
presents the most characteristic feature of Paris ;
it is dissolute, gay, wretched, elegant, paltry,
busy, and idle — it suggests recollections of atro
city, and supplies sights of fascination — it dis
plays virtue and vice living on easy terms, and
in immediate neighbourhood of each other. Ex
citements, indulgences, and privations— art and
vulgarity — science and ignorance— artful con
spiracies and careless debaucheries — all mingle
here, forming an atmosphere of various exhala
tions, a whirl of the most lively images — a sti
mulating melange of what is most heating, in
toxicating, and subduing." Sir W. Scott, who
visited Paris in 1815, gives the following de
scription of this infamous establishment. " The
Pa/ais Royale, in whose saloons and porticoes
vice has established a public and open school for
gambling and licentiousness, should be levelled
to the ground with all its accursed brothels and

gambling houses — rendezvouses the more seduc
tive to youth, as being free from some cf those
dangers which would alarm timidity in places of
avowedly scandalous resort. In the Satton den
Etrangers, the most celebrated haunt of this
Dom-Daniel, which I had the curiosity to visit,
the scene was decent and silent to a degree of
solemnity. An immense hall was filled with
gamesters and spectators. Those who kept the
bank, and managed the affairs of the establish
ment, were distinguished by the green shades
which they wore to preserve their eyes ; by their
silent and grave demeanour, and by the paleness
of their countenances, exhausted by their con
stant vigils. There was no distinction of per
sons, nor any passport required for entrance,
save that of a decent exterior; and, on the long
tables, which were covered with gold, an artisan
was at liberty to hazard his week's wages, or a
noble his whole estate. Youth and age were
equally welcome, and anyone who chose to play
within the limits of a trifling sum, had only to
accuse his own weakness, if he was drawn into
deeper or more dangerous hazard. Every thing
appeared to be conducted with perfect fairness.
The only advantage possessed by the bank
(which is however, enormous) is the extent of
the funds, by which it is enabled to sustain any
reverse of fortune; whereas, most of the indi
viduals who play against the bank, are in cir
cumstances to be ruined by the first succession
of ill luck ; so that, ultimately, the small ventures
merge in the stock of the principal adventurers,
as rivers run into the sea. The profits of the
establishment must, indeed, be very large, to
support its expenses. Besides a variety of at
tendants, who distribute refreshments to the
players gratis, there is an elegant entertainment,
with expensive wines, regularly prepared, about
three o'clock in the morning, for those who
choose to partake of it. With such temptations
around him, and where the hazarding an insigni
ficant sum seems at first venial or innocent, it is
no wonder that thousands feel themselves gradu
ally involved in the vortex, whose verge is so lit
tle distinguishable, until they are swallowed up,
with their time, talents, fortune, and frequently
also both body and soul.

" This is vice with her fairest vizard; but the
same unhallowed precinct contains many a se
cret celiyor the most \ideous and unheard of de
baucheries ; many an open rendezvous of infamyj
and many a den of usury and treason ; the whole
mixed with a Vanity Fair of shops for jewels,
trinkets, and baubles; that bashfulness may not
need a decent pretext for adventuring into the
haunts of infamy. It was here that the preach
ers of revolution found, amidst gamblers, despe
radoes, and prostitutes, ready auditors of their
doctrines, and active hands to labour in their
vineyard. It was here that the plots of the
Buonapartists were adjusted ; and from hence

.88

APPENDIX.

the seduced soldiers, inflamed with many a bum
per to the health of the exile of Elba, under the
mystic names of Jean de VEpee, and Corporal
Violet, were dismissed to spread the news of his
approaching return. In short, from this central
pit of Acheron, in which are openly assembled
and mingled those characters and occupations
which, in all other capitals, are driven to shroud
themselves in separate and retired recesses ; from
this focus of vice and treason have flowed forth
those waters of bitterness of which France has
drunk so deeply."

The slate of marriage in this country since the
revolution is likewise the fertile source of im
morality and crime. Marriage is little else than
a state of legal concubinage, a mere temporary
connexion, from which the parties can loose them
selves when they please ; and women are a
species of mercantile commodity. Illicit con
nexions and illegitimate children, especially in
Paris, are numerous beyond what is known in
any ofher country. The following statement of
the affairs of the French capital, for the year
ending 22d September 1803, given by the Pre
fect of Police to the Grand Judge, presents a
most revolting idea of the state of public morals :
— During this year 490 men and 167 women
committed suicide ; 81 men and 69 women were
murdered, of whom 55 men and 52 women were
foreigners ; 644 divorces ; 155 murderers exe
cuted ; 1210 persons condemned to the galleys,
&c. ; 1626 persons to hard labour, and 64 mark
ed with hot irons ; 12, 076 public women were
registered ; large sums were levied from these
wretched creatures, who were made to pay from

5 to 10 guineas each monthly, according to their
rank, beauty, or fash ion ; 1552 kept mistresses
were noted down by the police, and 380 brothels
licensed by the Prefect. Among the criminals
executed were 7 fathers for poisoning their
children ; 10 husbands for murdering their wives;

6 wives that had murdered their husbands ; and
15 children who had poisoned or otherwise de
stroyed their parents.

The glaring profanation of the Sabbath is an
other striking characteristic of the people of
France, especially as displayed in the capital.
Entering Paris on the Sabbath, a Briton is
shocked at beholding all that reverence and so
lemnity with which that sacred day is generally
kept in Christian countries, not only set aside,
but ridiculed and contemned, and a whole people
apparently lost to every impression of religion.
The shops are all alive, the gaming-houses fill
ed, the theatres crowded, the streets deafened
with ballad-singers and mountebanks; persons
of all ages, from the hoary grandsire to the child
Df four or five years, engaged in balls, routs, and
ilancings, — the house of God alone deserted, and
ihe voice of religion alone unheard and despised.
The Sabbath was the day appointed for cele
brating the return of Buonaparte from Elba in

1815. In the grand square there were stationed
two theatres of dancers and rope-dancers: two
theatres of amusing physical experiments ; six
bands for dancing ; a theatre of singers ; a display
of fire-works ; a circus where Francone's troops
were to exhibit ; and above all, that most delec
table sport called Matts de Cocagne. The Matts
de Cocagne consists of two long poles, near the
tops of which are suspended various articles of
cookery, such as roast beef, fowls, ducks, &c.
The poles are soaped and rendered slippery
at the bottom ; and the sport consists in the lu
dicrous failures of those who climb to reach the
eatables. Two Matts de Cocagne were also
erected in the square Marjury ; as also four bands
for dancing, a theatre of rope-dancers ; a theatre
of amusing experiments ; a theatre of singers,
&c. ; and fire- works. These amusements were
to commence at 2 o'clock, P. M. and to last till
night. Along the avenue of the Champ de Ely-
sees, there were erected 36 fountains of wine, 12
tables for the distribution of eatables, such as
pies, fowls, sausages, &c. The distribution of
the wine and eatables took place at three o'clock.
At nine o'clock there was a grand fire-work at
the Place de Concorde. Immediately after
wards a detonating balloon ascended from the
Champ de Elysees. The detonation took place
when the balloon was at the height of 500 toises,
or above 3000 feet. In the evening all the the
atres were opened gratis, and all the public edi
fices were illuminated. Such was the mode in
which the Parisians worshipped the " goddess o{
Reason " on the day appointed for the Christian
Sabbath.

That such profanation of the Sabbath is still
continued, and that it is not confined to the city
of Paris, but abounds in most of the provincial
towns of France, appears from the following ex
tract of a letter inserted in the EevangelicaJ
Magazine for January 1833, from a gentleman
who recently resided in different parts of that
country : — " Could every pious reader of this
letter be awakened, on the morning of that sacred
day, as I have been, by the clang of the anvil,
and, on his entrance into the streets and markets,
observe business prosecuted or suspended accord
ing to the tastes of the tradesmen ; could be
mark the workmen on seasons of religious festi
val, erecting the triumphal arch on the Sabbath
mornin?, and removing it on the Sabbath even
ing ; and notice the labourers, at their option,
toiling all day at the public works ; could he see
the card-party in the hotel, and the nine-pins
before every public house, and the promenaders
swarming in all the suburbs ; could he be com
pelled to witness, on one Sunday, a grand re
view of a garrison ; and on another be disturbed
by the music of a company of strolling players *
and could he find, amidst all this profanation, as
I have found, no temple to which to retreat, save
the barren cliff or ihe ocean-cave, surely he

MANIA FOR DANCING IN PARIS.

189

would feel and proclaim the truth, ' This people
is destroyed for lack of knowledge.' " The same
gentleman shows, that this profanation is chiefly
occasioned by " the destitution of Scriptual in
formation which exists in France," which the
following facts, among many others that came
under his own observation, tend to illustrate.

"On the road to M on a market-day, I

stopped about a dozen persons, some poor, others
of the better classes, and showing them the New
Testament, begged them to inform me if they
possessed it. With a single exception, they all

replied in the negative. In the town of M

I entered, with the same inquiry, many of the
most respectable shops. Only one individual
among thoir occupiers was the owner of a New
Testament. One gentleman, who, during a
week, dined with me at my inn, and who avow
ed himself a deist and a materialist, said that he
had not seen a Testament for many years. In
deed, I doubted whether he had ever read it ; for,
on my presenting one to him, he asked if it con
tained an account of the creation. A journey
man bookbinder, having expressed a wish to
obtain this precious book, remarked, on receiving
it, in perfect ignorance of its divine authority,
that he dared to say it was ' a very fine work.1
A student in a university, about 20 years of age,
told me, that although he had seen the Vulgate
(Latin) version of the New Testament, he had
never met with it in a French translation. A
young woman, who professed to have a Bible,
produced instead of it a Catholic Abridgment of
the Scriptures, garbled in many important por
tions, and interlarded with the comments of the
Fathers."

Such facts afford a striking evidence of the
hostility of the Roman Catholic clergy in
France to the circulation of the Scriptures, and
the enlightening of the minds of the community
in the knowledge of Divine truths ; and therefore
it is no wonder that Infidelity, Materialism, and
immoral ity, should very generally prevail. " Even
among the Protestants," says the same writer,
" a large number of their ministers are worldly
men, frequenting, as a pious lady assured me,
' the chase, the dance, and the billiard 'table.1
As to the public worship of God, the case is
equally deplorable. In two large towns, and a
population of 25,000, 1 found no Protestant sanc
tuary. In a third town, containing about 7000
inhabitants, there was an English Episcopal
chapel for the British residents, but no French
Protestant service. At a fourth, in which there
was a Protestant church, the minister, who sup
plied four other places, preached one Sabbath in
five, weeks."

The mania for dancing, which pervades all
classes and all ages, is another characteristic of
the peoole of Paris, of which some idea may be
formed irom the following extract from a French
public Journal, dated August 2, 1804 : » The

danso-mania of both sexes seems rather to in
crease than decrease with the warm weather.
Sixty balls were advertised for last Sunday ; and
for to-morrow sixty-nine are announced. Any
person walking in the Elysian fields, or on the
Boulevards, may be convinced that these temples
of pleasure are not without worshippers. Besides
these, in our own walks last Sunday, we counted
no less than twenty-two gardens not advertised,
where there was fiddling and dancing. Indeed,
this pleasure is tempting, because it is very cheap.
For a bottle of beer, which costs 6 sous (3d.,)
and 2 sous (Id.,) to the fiddler, a husband and
wife, with their children, may amuse themselves
from three o'clock in the afternoon till eleven
o'clock at night. As this exercise both diverts
the mind and strengthens the body, and as Sun
day is the only day of the week which the most
numerous classes of people can dispose of, with
out injury to themselves or the state, government
encourages, as much as possible, ihese innocent
amusements on that day. In the garden of Chau-
mievre, on the Boulevard Neuf, we observed, in
the same quadrilles, last Sunday, four genera
tions, the great grandsire dancing with his great-
great granddaughter, and the great-grandmamma
dancing with her great-great-grandson. It was
a satisfaction impossible to be expressed, to see
persons of so many different ages, all enjoying the
same pleasures for the present, not remembering
past misfortunes, nor apprehending future ones.
The grave seemed equally distant from the girl
often years old, and from her great-grandmamma
of seventy years, and from the boy that had not
seen three lustres, as from the great grandsire
reaching nearly fourscore years. In another
quadrille, were four lovers dancing with their
mistresses. There, again, nothing was observed
but an emulation who should enjoy the present
moment. Not an idea of the past, or of time
to come, clouded their thoughts ; in a few words,
they were perfectly happy. Let those torment
ed by avarice or ambilion frequent those places
on a Sunday, and they will be cured of their vile
passions, if they are not incurable."*

Such are a few sketches of the moral state
and character of the people of Paris, which, there
is every reason to believe, are, with a few mo
difications, applicable to the inhabitants of most
of the other large towns in France. Among the
great mass of the population »f that country,
there appears to be no distinct f cognition of the
moral attributes of the Deity, /" the obligation
of the Divine law, or of a future and eternal state
of existence. Whirled about incessantly in the
vortex of vanity and dissipation, the Creator is
lost sight of, moral responsibility disregarded,
and present sensual gratifications pursued with

• Several of the above sketches are extracted from
the " Glasgow Geography," a work which contain!
an immense mass of historical, geographical, and
miscellaneous information

190

APPENDIX.

the utmost eagerness, regardless whether death
shall prove the precursor to permanent happiness
or misery, or to a state of " eternal sleep." Never,
perhaps, in a Pagan country, was the Epicu
rean philosophy so systematically reduced to prac
tice as in the country of Voltaire, Buffbn,,Mi-
rabeau, Condorcet, Helvetius, and Diderot. It
tannot be difficult to trace the present demorali
sation of BVance to the sceptical and atheistical
principles disseminated by such writers, which
were adopted in all their extent, and acted upon
by the leaders of the first Revolution. Soon
after that event, education was altogether pro
scribed. During the space of five years, from
1791 to 1796, the public instruction of the young
was totally set aside, and, of course, they were
.eft to remain entirely ignorant of the facts and
doctrines of religion, and of the duties they owe
to God and to man. It is easy, therefore, to con
ceive what must be the intellectual, the moral,
and religious condition of those who were born a
little before this period, and who now form a con
siderable portion of the population arrived at the
years of manhood. A gentleman at Paris hap
pened to possess a domestic of sense and general
intelligence above his station. His master, upon
some occasion, used to him the expression, " It
is doing as we would be done by," — the Christian
maxim. The young man looked rather surpris
ed: " Yes," (replied the gentleman) " I say, it
is the doctrine of the Christian religion, which
teaches us not only to do as we would be done
oy, but also to return g'ood for evil." " Jt may be
so Sir," (replied he) " but I had the misfortune
to be born during the heat of the revolution, when
it would have been death to have spoken on the
subject of religion ; and so soon as I was fifteen
years old, I was put into the hands of the drill-
serjeant, whose first lesson to me was, that as a
French soldier, I was to fear neither God nor
devil." It is to be hoped, that the rising genera
tion in France is now somewhat improved in
intelligence and morality beyond that which
sprung up during the demoralizing scenes of
the first revolution ; but, in spite of all the coun
teracting efforts that can now be used, another
generation, at least, must pass away, before the
immoral effects produced by infidel philosophy,
and the principles which prevailed during the
i( reign of terror," can be nearly obliterated.

I shall conclude these sketches with the follow
ing account of the consecration of the " Goddess
of Reason," — one of the most profane and pre
sumptuous mockeries of every thing that is ra
tional or sacred, to be found in the history of
mankind.

" The section of the Sans Culottes, declared at
the bar of the Convention, November 10, 1793,
that they would no longer have priests among
hem, and that they required the total suppression
»fall salaries paid to the ministers of religious
worship , The petition was followed by a nume

rous procession, which filed off in the hall, ac
companied by national music. Surrounded by
them, appeared a young woman* of the finest
figure, arrayed in the robes of liberty, and seated
in a chair, ornamented with leaves and festoons.
She was placed opposite the President j ana
Chaumette, one of the members, said, ' Fanaticism
has abandoned the place of truth ; squint eyed,
it could not bear the brilliant light. The people
of Paris have taken possession of the iemple,
which they have regenerated ; the Gothic arches
which, till this day resounded with/ies, now echo
with the accents of truth ; you see we have not
taken for our festivals inanimate idols, it is a
cheftfceuvre of nature whom we have arrayed in
the habit of liberty ; its sacred form has inflamed
alt hearts. The public has but one cry, " No
more altars, no more priests, no other God but
the God of nature." We, their magistrates, we
accompany them from the temple of truth to the
temple of the laws, to celebrate a new liberty, and
to request that the cidevant church of Notre Dame
be changed into a temple consecrated to reason and
truth.' This proposal, being converted into a
motion, was immediately decreed ; and the Con
vention afterwards decided, that the citizens of
Paris, on this day, continued to deserve well of
their country. The Goddess then seated herself
by the side of the President, who gave her a.fra-
ternalkiss. The secretaries presented themselves
lo share the same favour ; every one was eagej
to kiss the new divinity, whom so many saluta
tions did not in the least disconcert. During the
ceremony, the orphans of the country, pupils of
Bourdon (one of the members) sang a hymn to
reason, composed by citizen Moline. The na
tional music played Gosset's hymn to liberty.
The Convention then mixed with the people, to
celebrate the feast of reason in her new temple. A
grand festival was accordingly held in the church
of Notre Dame, in honour of this deity. In the
middle of the church was erected amount, and on
it a very plain temple, the facade of which bore
the following inscription — ' a la Philosophic.'
The busts of the most celebrated philosophers
were placed before the gate of this temple. The
torch of truth was in the summit of the mount,
upon the altar of Reason, spreading light. The
Convention and all the constituted authorities
assisted at the ceremony. Two rows of young
girls, dressed in white, each wearing a crown of
oak leaves, crossed before the altar of reason, at
the sound of republican music ; each of the girls
inclined before the torch, and ascended the sum
mit of the mount. Liberty then came out of the
temple of philosophy, towards a throne made of
turf, to receive the homage of the republicans o»
both sexes, who sang a hymn in her praise, ex
tending their arms at the same time towards her.

• Madame Desmoulines, who was afterwards gvO
Mined.

CONSECRATION OF A FEMALE DEITY

291

Liberty ascended afterwards, to return to the
temple, and, in re-entering it, she turned about,
casting a look of benevolence upon her friends;
when she got in, every one expressed with enthu
siasm the sensations which the Goddess excited
in them by songs of joy ; and they swore, never,
never to cease to be faithful to her."

Such were the festivities and ceremonies which
were prescribed for the installation of this new
divinity, and such the shameless folly and daring
impiety with which they were accompanied!
Such is the Religion of what has been presump
tuously celled Philosophy, when it has shaken off
its allegiance to tne Christian Revelation — a reli
gion as inconsistent with the dictates of reason
and the common sense of mankind, as it is with
the religion of the Bible. Never, in any age,
was Philosophy so shamefully degraded, and ex
posed to the contempt of every rational mind, as
when it thus stooped to such absurd foolery and
Heaven-daring profanity. Besides the impiety

13

of the whole of this procedure, — which is almogt
without a parallel in the annals of the world-
there was an imbecility and a siUinfss in it, alto
gether incompatible with those sublime ideas of
creation and Providence, which true philosophy,
when properly directed, has a tendency to inspire.
And how inconsistently ,as well as inhumanely, did
these worshippers of "liberty," "reason," and
"truth," conduct themselves to the representative
of their goddess, when, soon after, they doomed the
lady, whom they had kissed and adored in the
"temple of truth," to expire under the stroke of the
guillotine! Such occurrences appear evidently
intended by the moral Governor of the world, to
admonish us of the danger of separating science
from its connexions with revealed religion, and
to show us to what dreadful lengths, in impiety
and crime, even men of talent will proceed, when
the truths of Revelation are set aside, and the
principles and moral laws of Christianity arc
trampled under foot.

THE

PHILOSOPHY

OF A

FUTURE STATE

BY THOMAS DICK,

AUTHOR OF A VARIETY OF LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC COMMUNICATIOOT

IN NICHOLSON'S PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL, THE ANNALS

OF PHILOSOPHY, ETC. ETO.

HARTFORD:

PUBLISHED BY A. C. GOODMAN & CO.
1850.

TO
THOMAS CHALMERS, D.D.

PROFESSOR OP MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF
ST. ANDREWS.

SIR,

In dedicating to you this volume, which has for its object to exhibit a popu
tar view of the Philosophy of a Future State, as deduced from the light of
science and revelation, — a consideration of a far higher nature than the formal
and customary honour of addressing a man of literary and scientific attainments,
induced me to shelter it under your patronage.

In the several vocations in which Divine Providence has called you to offi
ciate, you have proved yourself the warm and disinterested patron of all that
is benevolent and good— of every thing that concerns the present and eterna.
welfare of mankind : and your praises have been re-echoed from one corner
of the land to another, as the champion of the Christian religion, — the doctrines
of which, your voice and your pen have done so much to illustrate.

Your writings furnish ample testimony to the world of your earnest, active,
and unwearied solicitude for the moral and religious improvement of mankind
—a solicitude which is not abated by any minor differences of opinion in those
with whom you co-operate, where the great object is, to diffuse knowledge and
happiness over the face of the earth.

Your kind indulgence to me, on the slight acquaintance I have of you per
sonally, and your approbation of some of my labours, in endeavouring to
connect Science and Religion, induce me to hope, that, if the views taken of
the present subject in any measure correspond with your own, you will coun
tenance my humble attempts to dispel the prejudices which many well-meaning
Christians may entertain, as to the beneficial tendency of exhibiting the sciences
of a. present, as applicable to the circumstances and relations of a. future world.

That you may long be spared as the advocate of vital Christianity — as a
blessing and ornament to your country — and as a zealous instructor of those
who are destined to promote its best interests ; and that you may enjoy, with
out interruption, the pleasures arising from a consciousness of the esteem and
approbation of the wise and the pious, is the sincere prayer of,

SIR,
Your much obliged,

and humble Servant,

THOMAS DICK,

Brmighty Ferry, near Dundee,
Dec. 28, 1827.

PREFACE.

THE reasonings and illustrations contained in the following pages are intended
to direct the intelligent Christian in some of those trains of thought which he
ought to prosecute, when looking forward to the scene of his future destination.
The Author was induced to engage in the discussion of this subject, from a
consideration, that many vague and erroneous conceptions are still entertained
among Christians in regard to the nature of heavenly felicity, and the employ-
ments°of the future world. In elucidating the train of thought which is here
prosecuted, he has brought forward, without hesitation, the discoveries ot
modern science, particularly tnose which relate to the scenery of the heavens;
convinced, that all the manifestations of himself which the Creator has per
mitted us to contemplate, are intended to throw light on the plan of his moral
government in relation both to our present and our future destiny. He has
carefully avoided every thing that might appear like vague or extravagant con
jecture ; and he trusts that the opinions he has broached, and the conclusions
he has deduced, will generally be found accordant with the analogies of Nature
arid the dictates of Revelation. He is aware, that he has many prejudices to
encounter, arising from the vague and indefinite manner in which such sub
jects have been hitherto treated, and from the want of those expansive views
of the Divine operations which the professors of Christianity should endeavour
to attain ; but he feels confident that those who are best qualified to appreciate
his sentiments, will treat with candour an attempt to elucidate a subject hitherto
overlooked, and in which every individual in the human race is deeply in
terested.

It was originally intended to publish what is contained in Parts II. and III.
without any dissertation on the evidences of a future state as deduced from the
light of nature — taking the immortality of man for granted on the authority of
Revelation. But, on second thought, it was judged expedient, for the sake of
general readers, to exhibit a condensed view of those arguments which even
the light of reason can produce in favour of the immortality of man. In this
department of the volume, the Author has brought forward several arguments
which he is not aware have been taken notice of by ethical writers, when
treating on this subject. He has endeavoured to illustrate these and the other
arguments here adduced, in minute detail, and in a popular manner, so as to
be level to the comprehension of every reader; and he trusts, that the force oi
the whole combined, will be found to amount to as high a degree of moral
demonstration as can be expected in relation to objects which are not cogni
zable by the eye of sense.

vi PREFACE.

The greater portion of what is contained in Part III. having been written
above eight years ago, several apparent repetitions of facts alluded to in the
preceding Parts may perhaps be noticed by the critical reader ; but, in genera)
it will be found, that where the same facts are repeated, they are either exhib
ited in a new aspect, or brought forward to elucidate another subject.

The practical reflections and remarks imbodied in the last Part of this work,
will not, the Author is persuaded, be considered by any of his readers, as either
unnecessary, or unappropriate to the subjects treated of in the preceding parts
of this volume. It is of the utmost importance that every individual be con
vinced, that he cannot be supposed a candidate for a blessed immortality, unless
the train of his affections, and the general tenor of his conduct, in some meas
ure correspond to the tempers and dispositions, and the moral purity which
rrevail in the heavenly state.

The favourable reception which the public have given to the volumes he has
formerly published, induces the Author to indulge the hope, that the present
volume may not be altogether unworthy of their attention. That it may tend
to convince the skeptical of the reality of an immortal existence — to expand
the believer's conceptions of the attributes of the Divinity, and the glory ol
" that inheritance which is reserved in heaven" for the faithful — and to excite
in the mind of every reader an ardent desire to cultivate those dispositions and
virtues which will prepare him for the enjoyment of celestial bliss — is the
Author's most sincere and ardent wish, as it was the great object he had in
view when engaged in its composition.

CONTENTS,

INTRODUCTION.

Importance of tho question which relates to the reality of a Future World — folly
of the indifference which prevails in relation to tins point - - "- 11

PART I.

CHAPTER I.
PROOFS OP A FUTURE STATE FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE. S3

SECTION I.

On tho universal belief which the doctrine of Immortality has obtained in all
ages 13

SECTION II.
On the desire of Future Existence implanted in the human mind ... 17

SECTION III.

On the Intellectual Faculties of man, and the strong desire of knowledge im
planted in the human mind .-20

SECTION IV.
On the perpetual progress of the mind towards Perfection- • 24

CONTENTS.

SECTION \.

On the unlimited Ran^e of View which is opened to the human faculties through
<>ut the immensity ol space and duration ------- 25

SECTION VI.
On the Moral Powers of man • ,..„.. 29

SECTION VII.

On the apprehensions and forebodings of the mind when under the influence of
Remorse ...-.---...--33

SECTION VIII.

On the disordered state of the Moral "World, when contrasted with the regular and
systematic oraer of the Material -------- 36

SECTION IX.
On the equal distribution of Rewards and Punishments in the present state - - 40

SECTION X.

Z)n the absurdity of supposing that the Thinking Principle in man will ever be
annihilated ------------ 44

SECTION XI.

On the gloomy considerations and absurd consequences involved in the Denial of
a Future State 46

CHAPTER II.

PROOFS OF A FUTURE STATE FROM DIVINE REVELATION. 53

Practical influence which the doctrine of a Future State ought to have upon our
AiTections and Conduct -.--.....-57

CONTENTS. 1X

PART II.

ON THE CONNEXION OP SCIENCE WITH A FUTURE STATE. GO

Object of Scientific Investigation ......... f|

Objects on which the faculties of celestial intelligences will be employed . 62
Extent of the general conflagration -----....53

Sciences which will be prosecuted in a future state ..... gg

Arithmetic, its objects — utility of numbers and their combinations — illustrations

from Scripture - ........... gg

Mathematical sciences, their utility — angels recognise the principles of these sci
ences — the Creator has laid the foundation of these sciences in his works - 70
Astronomy, its objects — presents an immense field of contemplation - - 71
Natural Philosophy, — its objects and discoveries ------ 74

Anatomy and Physiology, their objects — wonders of the human frame — resur
rection-body, &c. -----..-.. 76

History — contains a record of the ways of Providence — our ignorance of many

important facts in history — history of angels and other intelligences 77

PART III.

ON THE AIDS WHICH THE DISCOVERIES OF SCIENCE AFFORD
FOR ENABLING US TO FORM A CONCEPTION OF THE PERPET
UAL IMPROVEMENT OF THE CELESTIAL INHABITANTS IN
KNOWLEDGE AND FELICITY 84

Vague and distorted Conceptions in regard to the Employments of Heaven • 84

PART IV.

ON THE MORAL QUALIFICATIONS REQUISITE TO THE ENJOYMENT
OF THE FELICITY 09 THE FUTURE WORLD. 109

Sxamples of Depravity — Buonaparte ....... -121

Lord Bvron . . . - . ....... 122

Example from Cochrane's Travels ........122

Misery resulting from the association of malignant characters - - 122, 123
General conclusion - - ........ 124

CONTENTS

APPENDIX.

Mr. Shepherd's Letter to Lord Byron ^ • - - 125

His lordship's reply — his last sentiments in reference to religion and
eternity - ...... J25

Buonaparte's opinion of the morality of the New Testament, £c. • 137

THE

PHILOSOPHY

OF A

FUTURE STATE

PART I.

PROOFS OP A FUTURE STATE.

INTRODUCTION.

THE SKetches contained in Parts II. and III.
of this work, being chiefly intended to illustrate
the connexion of science with the scenes of a
future world, and the aids which its discoveries
afford, for enabling us to form some conception
of the perpetual improvement of its inhabitants
in knowledge and felicity — I shall endeavour, in
this First Part, to exhibit a condensed view of
some of those evidences which prove the immor
tality of the soul, and the eternal destination of
man.

This is an inquiry far more interesting and
important, to every individual of mankind, than
any other which comes within the range of the
human mind. Next to the being of a God, the
doctrine of the immortality of man lies at the
foundation of all religion, and of all the animat
ing prospects which can cheer us in this land of
our pilgrimage. Remove from the mind the be
lief of a future existence, and the hope of im-
moitality, and religion becomes a shadow, life a
dream, and the approach of death a scene of
darkness and despair. Upon this short question,
' ( Is man immortal, or is he not ?" depends all
lhat is valuable in science, in morals, and in the
ology, and all that is most interesting to man
as a social being, and as a rational and account
able intelligence. If he is destined to an eternal
existence, an immense importance must attach
to all his present affections, actions, and pur
suits ; and it must be a matter of infinite moment,
that they be directed in such a channel, as will
tend to carry him forward, in safety, to the feli
cities of a future world. But if his whole ex
istence be circumscribed within the circle of a

few fleeting years, man appears an enigma, an
inexplicable phenomenon in the universe, human
life a mystery, the world a scene of confusion»
virtue a mere phantom, the Creator a capricious
being, and his plans and arrangements an inex
tricable maze.

There is too much reason to believe, that the
indifference to religion which so generally pre
vails, especially among those who are raised a
little above the vulgar throng, and the unhallowed
propensities and vicious practices to which it
gives rise — are owing, in a considerable degree,
to the want of a full conviction of the reality of
a future existence, or to some doubts which hover
about the mind, in relation to this important
point. There is no man, however insensible to
the obligations of religion, that can fully satisfy
his own mind, or the minds of others, that the
idea of a future world is a mere chimera. On
the contrary, the possibility, and even the pro
bability, of the truth of man's eternal destiny,
will, at certain seasons, force themselves upon
the minds evfti of the most careless and profane.
Yet, it is amazing to consider, with what ease and
indifference multitudes of this description can
glide down the stream of time, under the awful
uncertainty whether it will land them in tho
shades of annihilation, the realms of bliss, or the
regions of endless wo.—" Between us and these
three periods or states," says a celebrated French
writer, " no barrier is interposed but life, the
most brittle thing in all nature ; and the happi
ness of heaven being certainly not designed for
those who doubt whether they have an immortal
part to enjoy it, such persons have nothing left,

12

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

but the miserable chance of annihilation, or of
hell. There is not any reflection which can have
more reality than this, as there is none which
has greater terror. Let us set the bravest face
on our condition, and play the heroes as artfully
as we can, yet see here the issue which attends
the goodliest life upon earth ! It is in vain for
men to turn aside their thoughts from this eterni
ty which awaits them, as if they were able to
destroy it, by denying it a place intheir imagina
tion. It subsists in spite of them / it advances
unobserved ; and death, which is to draw the
curtain from it, will, in a short time, infallibly
reduce them to the dreadful necessity of being
forever nothing, or forever miserable."

To treat a subject so interesting and moment-
jus, with levity or indifference ; to exert all the
energies of the soul in the pursuit of objects,
which a few years, at most, will snatch forever
from their embrace; and never to spend one
serious hour in reflecting on what may possibly
succeed the present scene of existence, ot. in
endeavoring to find some light, to clear up the
doubts that may hang over this important in
quiry, and to treat with derision and scorn those
who would direct them in this serious investiga
tion, is not only foolish and preposterous, but
the height of infatuation and of madness. It is
contrary to every principle on which reasonable
men act, in relation to the affairs of the present
world. To retain the profits of a lucrative busi
ness, or to prevent the loss of fortune, or of honor,
a man will sometimes strain every nerve, stretch
every faculty, deprive himself of sleep, submit
to numerous privations, encounter the raging
elements, and brave the dangers of the ocean.
Nay, he will often be overwhelmed with despond
ency at the slightest inconveniences, and will
pass whole weeks and months in sullenness and
chagrin, for an imaginary affront, or for the
loss of a few pounds, while, at the same time,
he remains perfectly indifferent, and without the
least emotion, in regard to the unknown scenes
of the eternal world, and the danger of endless
axisery to which he is exposed. Such a conduct,
and such dispositions, which are too frequently
realized in the case of thousands who occasion
ally mingle in our religious assemblies, are
obviously inconsistent with the dictates of pru
dence and of common sense, and with every thing
that ought to characterize a rational and an
accountable creature.

When we look back into the inexplorable abyss
of that eternity which is already past ; when we

look forward to the immeasurable extent, and
the unfathomable depth of eternity to come ;
when we behold Time, and all its circling years,
appearing only like a point on the surface of that
vast and boundless ocean ; when we consider
the immense spaces of the universe with which
we are surrounded, and the innumerable worlds
which lie dispersed in every direction throughout
the immeasurable tracts of ci cation ; when we
consider that our existence, as thinking beings,
may run parallel with interminable ages ; and
that, in the revolutions of eternity, we may exist
in regions of space immeasurably distant from
our present habitation, associate with other or
ders of intelligent beings, and pass through new
scenes and changes in distant worlds : and, when
we consider that our relation to time may be
dissolved, and our connexion with eternity com-
mence, within the space of a few months or years,
or even before the sun shall have described
another circuit around the earth — no inquiry can
appear so momentous and interesting, as that
which leads t<? *he determination of our future
and eternal destiny, and of those realities which
await us beyond the tomb. To remain insensi
ble to the importance of such an inquiry, and
unaffected at the prospect of the result to which
it may lead ; while we are feelingly alive to all
the paltry concerns and little ills of life, would
argue the most unaccountable stupidity, incon
sistency and infatuation.

The man whose heart pants after substantial
knowledge and felicity, whose affections centre
on the Author of his existence, and who delights
to contemplate his character and perfections,
will enter, with pleasure, on every investigation
which has a tendency to throw a light on the
scene of his future destination. He will weigh,
with impartiality, every consideration, and will
seize, with delight, upon every argument by
which a full conviction of his immortal destiny
may be indelibly riveted upon his mind ; and he
will endeavor to cheer his soul amidst the sor
rows of mortality, with the consideration that
"when the earthly house of his tabernacle is
dissolved, he has a building of God, an house
not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

In illustrating the evidences of a future state,
I shall, in the first place, state some of those
proofs which reason, or the light of nature, fur-
nishes, of man's eternal destination; and sec
ondly, those which are derived from the system
of revelation.

CHAPTER I.

PROOFS OF A FUTURE STATE FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

THE evidences of a future state which the light
of reason affords, though not so clear and de
cisive as those which are derived from divine
revelation, are worthy of the serious considera
tion of every one in whose mind the least doubt
remains on this important subject. The con
viction they are calculated to produce, when
attentively weighed, is sufficient to leave every
one without excuse who trifles with the concerns
of his future destiny, and overlooks his relation
to the eternal world. Though the Deity is in
visible to mortal eyes, yet his existence and per
fections are clearly demonstrated by his visible
operations, and he has not left himself without a
witness to his beneficence, in any age, " in his
giving rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons,
and filling our hearts with food and gladness."
In like manner, though the realities of a future
world are not presented directly to the eye of
sense, yet the faculties with which man is en
dowed, when properly exercised on all the phy
sical and moral scenes which the universe dis
plays, are sufficient to evince the high degree of
probability, if not absolute certainty, that his
duration and his sphere of action are not con
fined to the narrow limits of the present world,
but have a relation to a future and an immortal
existence. — In illustrating this topic, I shall
waive the consideration of several of those meta
physical arguments which have been adduced by
philosophers and divines, founded on the imma
teriality of the human soul, and confine myself
chiefly to those popular considerations, which
are level to every capacity, and, perhaps, more
convincing than the subtle and refined disquisi
tions of metaphysical minds.

SECTION I.

ON THE UNIVERSAL BELIEF WHICH THE
DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY HAS OBTAINED
IN ALL AGES.

It forms a presumptive proof of the immor
tality of man, that this doctrine has obtained
universal belief among all nations, and in every
period of time.

That the thinking principle in man is of an
immortal nature, was believed by the ancient
Egyptians, the Persians, the Phenicians, the
Scythians, the Celts, the Druids, the Assyrians,
—by the wisest and the most celebrated charac
ters among the Greeks and Romans, and by al

most every other ancient nation and tribe who*
records have reached our times. The notions,
indeed, which many of them entertained of the
scenes of futurity were very obscure and imper
fect ; but they all embraced the idea, that death
is not the destruction of the rational soul, but
only its introduction to a new and unknown state
of existence. The ancient Scythians believed
that death was only a change of habitation ; and
the Magian sect, which prevailed in Babylonia,
Media, Assyria, and Persia, admitted the doc
trine of eternal rewards and punishments. The
doctrines taught by the second Zoroaster, who
lived in the time of Darius, were, " that there
is one Supreme Being, independent and self-ex
istent from all eternity ; that under him there are
two angels, one the angel of light, who is the
author of all good ; and the other the angel of
darkness, who is the author of all evil : that they
are in a perpetual struggle with each other ; that
where the angel of light prevails, there good
reigns; and that where the angel of darkness
prevails, there evil takes place; that this strug
gle shall continue to the end of the world : that
then there shall be a general resurrection and a
day of judgment, wherein all shall receive a just
retribution, according to their works. After
which, the angel of darkness and his disciples
shall go into a world of their own, where they
shall suffer, in everlasting darkness, the punish
ment of their evil deeds ; and the angel of light
and his disciples shall also go into a world of
their own, where they shall receive, in everlast
ing light, the reward due to their good deeds ;
that after this they shall remain separated for
ever, and light and darkness be no more mixed
to all eternity."* The remains of this sect,
which are scattered over Persia and India, still
hold the same doctrines, without any variation,
even at this day.

It is well known, that Plato, Socrates, and other
Greek philosophers, held the doctrine of the
soul's immortality. In his admirable dialogue,
entitled, " The Phaedon," Plato represents So
crates, a little before his death, encompassed with
a circle of philosophers, and discoursing with
them on the arguments which prove the eternal
destiny of man. " When the dead," says he,
" are arrived at the rendezvous of departed souls,
whither their angel conducts them, they are all
judged. Those who have passed their lives in a
manner neither entirely criminal, nor absolutely

• Rollins' Ancient History, vol. li.

14

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

innocent, are sent into a place where they suffer
pains proportioned to their faults, till, being
purged and cleansed of their guilt, and after
wards restored to liberty, they receive the reward
of the good actions they have done in the body.
Those who are judged to be incurable, on ac
count of the greatness of their crimes, the fatal
destiny that passes judgment upon them, hurls
them into Tartarus, from whence they never de
part. Those who are found guilty of crimes,
great indeed, but worthy of pardon, who have
committed violences, in the transports of rage,
against their father or mother, or have killed
aome one in a like emotion, and afterwards re
pented — suffer the same punishment with the last,
out lor a time only, till by prayers and supplica
tions, they have obtained pardon from those they
have injured. But those who have passed through
life with peculiar sanctity of manners, are re
ceived on high into a pure region, where they
live without their bodies to all eternity, in a
series of joys and delights which cannot be de
scribed." From such considerations, Socrates
concludes, " if the soul be immortal, it requires
to be cultivated with attention, not only for what
we call the time of life, but for that which is to
follow, I mean eternity ; and the least neglect in
this point may be attended with endless conse
quences. If death were the final dissolufion of
being, the wicked would be great gainers by it,
by being delivered at once from their bodies, their
souls, and their vices ; but as the soul is immor
tal, it has no other means of being freed from its
evils, nor any safety for it, but in becoming very
good and very wise ; for it carries nothing with
it, but its good or bad deeds, its virtues and vices,
which are commonly the consequences of the
education it has received, and the causes of eter
nal happiness or misery." Having held such
discourses with his friends, he kept silent for
some time, and then drank off the whole of the
poisonous draught which had been put into his
hand, with amazing tranquillity, and an inex
pressible serenity of aspect, as one who was
about to exchange a short and wretched life, for
a blessed and eternal existence.

The descriptions and allusions, contained in
the writings of the ancient poets, are a convin
cing proof, that the notion of the soul's immortal
ity was a universal opinion in the times in which
they wrote, and among the nations to whom their
writings were addressed. Homer's account of
the descent of Ulysses into hell, and his descrip
tion of Minos in the shades below, distributing
justice to the dead assembled in troops around
his tribunal, and pronouncing irrevocable judg
ments, which decide their everlasting fate, de
monstrate, that they entertained the belief, that
virtues are rewarded, and that crimes are pun
ished, in another state of existence. The poems
of Ovid and Virgil contain a variety of descrip
tions, in which the same opinions are involved.

Their notions of future punishment are set fort!
in the descriptions they give, of Ixion, who wa»
fastened to a wheel, and whirled about continu
ally with a swift and rapid motion — of Tantalus,
who, for the loathsome banquet he made for the
gods, was set in water up to the chin, with apples
hanging to his very lips, yet had no power either
to stoop to the one to quench his raging thirst, or
to reach to the other to satisfy his craving appetite
— of the fifty daughters of Danaus, who, for the
barbarous massacre of their husbands in one
night, were condemned in hell to fill a oarrel full
of holes with water, which ran out again as fast
as it was filled — of Sisyphus, who, for his rob
beries, was set to roll a great stone up a steep
hill, which, when it was just at the top, suddenly
fell down again, and so renewed his labour — and
of Tityus, who was adjudged to have a vulture
to feed upon his liver and entrails, which still
grew and increased as they were devoured. —
Their notions of future happiness are imbodied
in the descriptions they have given of the Hes
perian gardens, and the Elysian fields, where the
souls of the virtuous rest secure from every dan--
ger, and enjoy perpetual and uninterrupted bliss.
And as the nations of antiquity recognised
the doctrine of a future state of existence, so
there is scarcely a nation or tribe of mankind,
presently existing, however barbarous and untu
tored, in which the same opinion does not pre
vail. The natives of the Society Isles believe,
that after death, there is not only a state of con
scious existence, but degrees of eminence and
felicity, according as men have been more or
less pleasing to iheEatova, or Deity, while Upon
earth. The chiefs of the Friendly Islands be
lieve in the immortality of their soul, which, at
death, they say is immediately conveyed in a
fast-sailing canoe, to a distant country, called
Doobludha, which they describe as resembling
the Mahometan paradise, — that those who are
conveyed thither are no more subject to death,
but feast on all the favourite productions of thei.1
native soil, with which this blissful abode is
plentifully furnished. The New Zealandera
believe, that the third day after the interment of
a man, the heart separates itself from the corpse,
and that this separation is announced by a ge
neral breeze of wind, which gives warning of
its approach, by an inferior divinity that hovers
over the grave, and who carries it to the clouds.
They believe that the soul of the man whose
flesh is devoured by the enemy, is doomed to a
perpetual fire, while the soul of the man whose
body has been rescued from those that killed
him, and the souls of all who die a natural death,
ascend to the habitations of the gods. The in
habitants of the Pelew Islands, according to the
account of Captain Wilson, although they have
few religious rites and ceremonies, believe in
one Supreme Being, and in a future state of
rewards and punishments. In the religion of

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

the Kaimuc Tartars, the doctrine of a future
slate holds a conspicuous place. They believe
t.'iat hell is situated in the middle region, be
tween heaven and earth, and their devils are re
presented with all sorts of frightful forms, of a
black and hideous aspect, with the heads of goats,
lions, and unicorns. Their holy lamas, who
have obtained a victory over all their passions,
are supposed to pass immediately into heaven,
where they enjoy perfect rest, and exercise
themselves in divine service. The Samoiedians
of Northern Tartary believe, that there is one
Supreme Being, that he is our all-merciful and
common Parent, and that he will reward with a
happy state hereafter, those who live virtuously
in this world. The JBirmans believe in the
transmigration of souls, after which, they main
tain, that the radically bad will be sentenced to
lasting punishment, while the good will enjoy
eternal happiness on a mountain called Meru.

The various tribes which inhabit the continent
of Africa, in so far as we arc acquainted with
their religious opinions, appear to recognise the
doctrine of a future state. " I was lately dis
coursing on this subject," says Mr. Addison, in
one of his Spectators, " with a learned person,
who has been very much conversant among the
inhabitants of the most western parts of Africa.
Upon his conversing with several in that coun
try, he tells me, that their notions of heaven or
of a future state of happiness, is this — that every
thing we there wish for will immediately present
itself to us. We find, say they, that our souls
are of such a naiure that they require variety,
and are not capable of being always delighted
with the same objects. The Supreme Being,
therefore, in compliance with this state of hap
piness which he has implanted in the soul of
man, will raise up, from time to time, say they,
every gratification which it is in the human na
ture to be pleased with. If we wish to be in
groves or bowers, among running streams or falls
of v/ater, we shall immediately find ourselves in
the midst of such a scene as we desire. If we
would be entertained with music, and the melody
of sounds, the concert arises upon our wish, and
the whole region about us is filled with harmony.
In short, every desire will be followed by frui
tion; and whatever a man's inclination directs
him to, will be present with him." — The Ne
groes, and other inhabitants of the interior of
Africa, according to the account of Mr. Park,
believe in one Supreme Ruler, and expect here
after to enter into a state of misery or felicity.
The Gallas of Abyssinia, though they reject
the doctrine of future punishment, admit the
reality of a future state. The Mandingoes, the
Jaloffs, the Feloops, the Foulahs, the Moors, and
all the other tribes who have embraced the Ma
hometan faith, recognise the doctrine of the
immortality of the soul, and of future rewards in
«, celestial paradise. The natives of Dahomv
14

entertain the same belief; and hence, it is a
common practice with the sovereign of that
country, to send an account to his forefathers of
any remarkable event, by delivering a message
to whoever may happen to be near him at tho
time, and then ordering his head to be chopped
off immediately, that he may serve as a courier,
to convey intelligence to the world of spirits.*

The Persians are said to leave one part of theii
graves open, from a belief that the dead will be
reanimated, and visited by angels, who will ap
point them to their appropriate abodes in a future
state. From a similar belief, thousands of Hin
doo widows annually sacrifice themselves on the
funeral piles of their deceased husbands, in the
hope of enjoying with them the felicities of eter
nal life. — The Japanese believe, that the souls
of men and beasts are alike immortal ; that a
just distribution of rewards and punishments
takes place after death ; that there are different
degrees of happiness, as well as of punishment,
and that the souls of the wicked transmigrate,
after death, into the bodies of animals, and at
last, in case of amendment, are translated back
again into the human form."}" From a conviction
of the reJity of a future world, the Wahabee
Arabs regard it as impious to mourn for the
dead, who, they say, are enjoying felicity with
Mahomet in paradise ; and the Javanese make
several feasts, on the decease of their friends and
relations, to commemorate their entrance into a
world ot' bliss. — The North American Indians
believe that, beyond the most distant mountains
of their country, there is a wide river; beyond
that river a great country ; on the other side of
that country, a world of water ; in that water
are a thousand islands, full of irees and streams
of water, and that a thousand buffaloes, and ten
thousand deer, graze on the hills, or ruminate in
ths valleys. When they die, they are persuaded
that the Great Spirit will conduct them to this
land of souls.

Thus it appears, that not only the philosophers
of antiquity, and the most civilized nations pre
sently existing on the globe, have recognised
the doctrine of the immortality of man, but that
even the most savage and untutored tribes fortify
their minds in the prospect of death, with the
hope of a happiness commensurate to their de
sires, in the regions beyond the grave.

" E'en the poor Indian whose untutor'd mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind,
Whose soul proud science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk or milky way —
Yet simple nature to his hope has given
Behind the cloud-topt hill an humbler heaven ,•
Some safer world in depth of woods embraced,
Some happier island in the watery waste,
"Where slaves once more their native land behold,
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold,—
And thinks, admitted to yon equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company. "—Pop*.

• M'Leod's Voyage to Africa, 1830, p. M,
t Thunberg's Travels.

16

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

Among the numerous and diversified tribes
that are scattered over the different regions of
the earth, that agree in scarcely any other senti
ment or article of religious belief, we here find
the most perfect harmony, in their recognition of
a Supreme Intelligence, and in their belief that
the soul survives the dissolution of its mortal
frame. And, as Cicero long since observed,
" In every thing the consent of all nations is to
be accounted the law of nature, and to resist it,
is to resist the voice of God." For we can
scarcely suppose, in consistency with the divine
perfections, that an error, on a subject of so
vast importance to mankind, should obtain the
universal belief of all nations and ages, and that
God himself would suffer a world of rational
beings, throughout every generation, to be car
ried away by a delusion, and to be tantalized by
a hope which has no foundation in nature, and
which is contrary to the plan of his moral govern
ment. It is true, indeed, that several of the
opinions to which I have now adverted, and
many others which prevail among the uncivilized
tribes of mankind, in regard to the condition of
disembodied spirits, and the nature of future
happiness, are very erroneous and imperfect;
hut they all recognise this grand and important
truth, that death is not the destruction of the
rational soul, and that man is destined to an im
mortal existence. Their erroneous conceptions
in respect to the rewards and punishments of
the future world may be easily accounted for,
from a consideration of the imperfect concep
tions they have formed of the Divine Being,
and of the principles of his moral government ;
from their ignorance of those leading principles
and moral laws, by which the Almighty regulates
the intelligent universe ; from the false ideas they
have been led to entertain respecting the nature
of substantial happiness ; from the cruel and
absurd practices connected with the system of
pagan superstition; from the intellectual dark
ness which has brooded over the human race
ever since the fall of man ; and from the univer
sal prevalence of those depraved dispositions
and affections, which characterize the untutored
tribes on whom the light of revelation has never
shone.

To whatever cause this universal belief of a
future existence is to be traced — whether to a
universal tradition derived from the first parents
of the human race : to an innate sentiment ori-
(finally impressed on the soul of man ; to a divine
revelation disseminated and handed down from
one generation to another, or to the deductions of
human reason — it forms a strong presumption,
and a powerful argument, in favour of the posi
tion we are now endeavouring to support. If it
is to be traced back to the original progenitors of
mankind, it must be regarded as one of those
truths which were recognised by man in a state
of innocence, when his affections were pure, and

his understanding fortified against delusion and
error. If it be a sentiment which was origmaih
impressed on the human soul by the hand of its
Creator, we do violence to the law of our nature,
when we disregard its intimations, or attempt to
resist the force of its evidence. If it ought to be
considered as originally derived from Revelation,
then it is corroborative of the truth of ihe Sacred
Records, in which " life and immortality" ar«
clearly exhibited. And, if it be regarded as like
wise one of the deductions of natural reason, we
are left without excuse, if we attempt to obscure
its evidence, or to overlook the important conse
quences which it involves. — As the consent of all
nations has been generally considered as a pow
erful argument for the existence of a Deity, so
the universal belief of mankind in the doctrine of
a future state ought to be viewed as a strong pre
sumption that it is founded upon truth. The
human mind is so constituted, that, when left to
its native unbiassed energies, it necessarily in
fers the existence of a Supreme Intelligence, from
the existence of matter, and the economy of the
material world ; and, from the nature of the hu
man faculties, and the moral attributes of God,
it is almost as infallibly led to conclude, that a
future existence is necessary, in order to gratify
the boundless desires of the human soul, and to
vindicate the wisdom and rectitude of the moral
Governor of the world. These two grand truths,
which constitute the foundation of all religion,
and of every thing that is interesting to man as
an intelligent agent, are interwoven with the the
ological creed of all nations ; and, in almost every
instance, where the one is called in question, the
other is undermined or denied : so that the doc
trine of the immortality of man may be consi
dered as resting on the same foundation as the
existence of a Supreme Intelligence.

It must indeed be admitted, that individuals
have appeared in every age, who have endeavour
ed to call in question, or to deny, this fundamen-
tal truth. But this circumstance forms no valid
objection to the force of the argument to which I
have now adverted. For the number of such
persons has been extremely small, when compar
ed with the mass of mankind ; and their opinions
on this subject have generally originated either
from wilful ignorance ; from an affectation of sin
gularity and of appearing superior to vulgar fears ;
or from indulging in a course of wickedness and
impiety, which has led them to wish, and if pos
sible to believe, that there are neither punish
ments nor rewards beyond the grave. If it ap
pear strange and unnatural that any man should
wish his soul to be mortal, Hierocles assigns the
true reason of it : "A wicked man," says he
" is afraid of his judge, and therefore wishes his
soul and body may perish together by death,
rather than it should appear before the tribunal
of God." If a number of fools should think fit
to put out their own eyes, to prevent them from

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

17

%eHng the effects of light, as Democritus, the
undent philosopher, was said to have done, it
would form no argument to prove that all the rest
of the world was blind. And, if a few sceptics
and profligates endeavour to blind the eyes of
their understanding by sophistry and licentious
ness, it cannot prevent the light of reason, which
unveils the realities of a future world, from shin
ing on the rest of mankind, nor constitute the
slightest argument to prove the fallacy of the
doctrine they deny.

SECTION II.

ON THE DESIRE OF FUTURE EXISTENCE IM
PLANTED IN THE HUMAN MIND.

Those strong and restless desires after future
existence and enjoyment, which are implanted
in the soul of man, are a strong presumptive
proof that he is possessed of an immortal na
ture.

There is no human being who feels full satis
faction in his present enjoyments. The mind
is for ever on the wing in the pursuit of new ac
quirements, of new objects, and, if possible, of
higher degrees of felicity, than the present mo
ment can afford. However exquisite any par
ticular enjoyment may sometimes be found, it
soon begins to lose its relish, and to pall tho in
tellectual appetite. Hence the voracious desire,
apparent among all ranks, for variety of amuse
ments, both of a sensitive, and of an intellectual
nature. Hence the keen desire for novelty, for
tales of wonder, for beautiful and splendid exhi
bitions, and for intelligence respecting the pas
sing occurrences of the day. Hence the eager
ness with which the daily newspapers are read
by all ranks who have it in their power to procure
them. However novel or interesting the events
which are detailed to-day, an appetite for fresh
intelligence is excited before to-morrow. Amidst
the numerous objects which are daily soliciting
attention, amidst the variety of intelligence which
newsmongers have carefully selected for the grati
fication of every taste, and amidst the fictitious
scenes depicted by the novelist and the poet —
" the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear
with hearing." Hence, too, the insatiable de
sires of the miser in accumulating riches, and
the unremitting career of ambition, in its pur
suit of honours and of fame. And hence the
unlour with which the philosopher prosecutes
one discovery after another, without ever ar
riving at a resting-point, or sitting down con
tented with his present attainments. When
Archimedes had discovered the mode of deter
mining the relative quantities of gold and silver
m Hiero's crown, did he rest satisfied with this
a«w acquirement ? No. The ecstacy he felt

at the discovery, when he leaped from the bath,
and ran naked through the streets of Syracuse,
crying, " I have found it, I have found it"—sooB
subsided into indifference, and his mind pushed
forward in quest of new discoveries. When
Newton ascertained the law of universal gravi
tation, and Franklin discovered the identity of
lightning and the electric fluid, and felt the trans
ports which such discoveries must have excited,
did they slacken their pace in the road of scien
tific discovery, or sit down contented with their
past researches ? No. One discovery gave a
stimulus to the pursuit of another, and their ca
reer of improvement only terminated with their
lives. After Alexander had led his victorious
armies over Persia, Babylonia, Syria, Egypt,
and India, and had conquered the greater part of
the known world, did he sit down in peace, and
enjoy the fruit of his conquests ? No. His de
sires after new projects, and new expeditions,
remained insatiable ; his ambition rose even to
madness ; and when the philosopher Anaxarchus
told him, there was an infinite number of worlds,
he wept at the thought that his conquests were
confined to one.

These restless and unbounded desires are to be
found agitating the breasts of men of all nations,
of all ranks and conditions in life, if we ascend
the thrones of princes, if we enter the palaces of
the great, if we walk through the mansions of
courtiers and statesmen, if we pry into the abodes
of poverty and indigence, if we mingle with poets
or philosophers, with manufacturers, merchants,
mechanics, peasants, or beggars ; if we survey
the busy, bustling scene of a large city, the se
questered village, or the cot which stands in the
lonely desert — we shall find, in every situation,
and among every class, beings animated with
desires of happiness, which no present enjoy
ment can gratify, and which no object within tho
limits of time can fully satiate. Whether we
choose to indulge in ignorance, or to prosecute
the path of knowledge ; to loiter in indolence, or
to exert our active powers with unremitting ener
gy ; to mingle with social beings, or to flee to the
haunts of solitude, — we feel a vacuum in the
mind, which nothing around us can fill up; a
longing after new objects and enjoyments, which
nothing earthly can fully satisfy. Regardless
of the past, and unsatisfied with the present, the
soul of man feasts itself on the hope of enjoy
ments which it has never yet possessed

" Hope springs eternal in the human breast;
Man never is, but always to be blest.
The soul uneasy, and confined from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come. '

That the desire of immortality is common,
and natural to all men, appears from a variety of
act ions, which can scarcely be accounted for on
any other principle, and which prove that tha
mind feels conscious of its immortal destiny
Why, otherwise, should men be anxious about

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

their reputation, and solicitous to secure their
names from oblivion, and to perpetuate their
fame, after they have descended into the grave ?
To accomplish such objects, and to gratify such
desires, poets, orators, and historians, have been
flattered and rewarded to celebrate their actions ;
monuments of marble and of brass have been
erected to represent their persons, and inscrip
tions engraved in the solid rock, to convey to
future generations a record of the exploits they
had achieved. Lofty columns, triumphal arches,
towering pyramids, magnificent temples, palaces,
and mausoleums have been reared, to eternize
their fame, and to make them live, as it were,
in the eyes of their successors, through all the
future ages of time. But, if the soul be destined
to destruction at the hour of death, why should
man be anxious about what shaU happen, or
what shall not happen hereafter, when he is re
duced to a mere non-entity, and banished for
ever from the universe of God ? He can have no
interest in any events that may befall the living
world when he is cancelled from the face of crea
tion, and when the spark of intelligence he pos
sessed is quenched in everlasting night. If any
man be fully convinced that the grave puts a
final period to his existence, the only consistent
action he can perform, when he finds his earthly
wishes and expectations frustrated, is to rush
into the arms of death, and rid himself at once
of all the evils connected with his being. But
we find the great majority of mankind, notwith
standing the numerous ills to which they are sub
jected, still clinging with eagerness to their
mortal existence, and looking forward, with a
certain degree of hope, to a termination of their
Borrows.

— " They rather choose to bear those ills they have
Than fly to others that they know not of."

There is, I presume, no individual in a sound
state of mind, who can entirely throw aside all
concern about his posthumous reputation, and
about the events that may happen in the world
after his decease. And if so, it clearly demon
strates, not only that he does not wish, but that
ne does not even suppose that his existence will
oe for ever extinguished at death. The idea of
the shame of being exposed naked after their
death, produced such a powerful effect upon the
minds of the Milesian virgins, that it deterred
them from putting an end to their lives, after all
other arguments had been tried in vain.* The
desire of existence — and of existence, too, which
has no termination, appears to be the foundation

• "I beseech men for God's sake, (says Halo,) that
If at any time there arise in them a desire or a wish
that others should speak well of their death ; then
at that time they would seriously consider, whether
those motions are not from some spirit to continue
;v spirit, after it leaves its earthly habitation, rather
man from an earthly spirit, a vapour which cannot
act, or imagine, or desire, or fear things beyond
ita continuance."

•of all our desires, and of all the plans we form
in life. Annihilation cannot be an object of
desire to any rational being. We desire some
thing that is real, something that is connected
with happiness or enjoymmt, but non-existence
has no object nor concern whatever belonging t<j
it. When a wicked man, under a consciousness
of guilt, indulges a wish for annihilation after
death, it is not because non-existence is in
itself an object of desire, but he would choose it
as the least of two evils : lie would rather be
blotted out of creation, than suffer the punish
ment due to his sins in the eternal world.

It may also be remarked, that the desire of
immortality, however vigorous it may be in or
dinary minds, becomes still more glowing and
ardent in proportion as the intellect is cultivated
and expanded, and in proportion as the soul
rises to higher and higher degrees of virtue and
moral excellence. It forms a powerful stimulus
to the performance of actions which are noble,
generous, public-spirited, benevolent, and hu
mane, and which have a tendency to promote the
intellectual improvement, and the happiness of
future generations. Hence the most illustrious
characters of the heathen world, the poets, the
orators, the moralists and philosophers of anti
quity, had their minds fired with the idea of im
mortality, and many of them were enabled to
brave death without dismay, under the conviction
that it was the messenger which was to waft their
spirits to the realms of endless bliss. When
Demosthenes had fled for shelter to an asylum
from the resentment of Antipater, who had sent
Archias to bring him by force, and when Archias
promised upon his honour that he should not lose
his life, if he would voluntarily make his personal
appearance : — " God forbid," said he, " that after
I have heard Xenocrates and Plato discourse so
divinely on the immortality of the soul, I should
prefer a life of infamy and disgrace to an ho
nourable death." Even those who were not
fully convinced of the doctrine of immortality,
amidst all their doubts and perplexities on this
point, earnestly wished that it might prove truet
and few, if any of them, absolutely denied it.
Hence, too, the noble and disinterested actions
which Christian heroes have performed, under
the influence of unseen and everlasting things.
They have faced dangers and persecutions in
every shape ; they have endured " cruel mock-
ings, scourgings, bonds, and imprisonments;"
they have triumphed under the torments of the
rack, and amidst the raging flames; they have
surmounted every obstacle in their benevolent
exertions to communicate blessings to their fel
low-men; they have braved the fury of the raging
elements, traversed sea and lana, and pushed
their way to distant barbarous climes, in order to
point out to their benighted inhaouants the path
that leads to eternal life. Nor ao they think it
*oo dear to sacrifice their lives in s>uch service?,

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

since " they desire a better country," and feel
assured that death will introduce them to " an
exceeding great and an eternal weight of glory."
Since, then, it appears that the desire of im
mortality is common to mankind, that the soul is
incessantly looking forward to the enjoyment of
some future good, and that this desire has been
the spring of actions the most beneficent, and
heroic, on what principle is it to be accounted
for?

'Whence springs this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality ? x
Or, whence this secret dread, and inward horror,
Of falling into nought 1— Why shrinks the soul
Back, on herself, and startles at destruction 2"

Wheneo proceeds the want we feel amidst the
variely of objects which surround us ? Whence
arises" the disgust that so quickly succeeds every
enjoyment? Wherefore can we never cease
from wishing for something more exquisite than
we have ever yet possessed ? No satisfactory
answer can be given to such questions, if our
duration be circumscribed within the limits of
time •, and if we shall be blotted out of creation
when our earthly tabernacles are laid in the
dust. The desires to which t now refer appear
to be an essential part of the human constitution,
and, consequently, were implanted in our nature
by the hand of our Creator;— and, therefore,
we must suppose, either that the desire of im
mortality will be gratified, or that the Creator
takes delight in tantalizing his creatures with
hopes and expectations which will end in eternal
disappointment. To admit the latter supposi
tion, would be inconsistent with every rational
idea we can form of the moral attributes of the
Divinity. It would be inconsistent with his
veracity; for to encourage hopes and desires
which are never intended to be gratified, is the
characteristic of a deceiver, and therefore con
trary to every conception we can form cf the
conduct of " a God of truth." It would be in
consistent with his rectitude; for every such de
ception implies an act of injustice towards the
individual who is thus tantalized. It would be
inconsistent with his wisdom ; for it would imply
that he has no other means of governing the in
telligent creation, than those which have a ten
dency to produce fallacious hopes and fears in
the minds of his rational offspring. It would
be inconsistent with his benevolence; for as " the
desire accomplished is sweet to the soul," so
disappointed hopes uniformly tend to produce
misery. Yet the benevolence of the Deity, in
every other point of view, is most strikingly dis
played in all his arrangements in the material
universe, and towards every species of sensitive
existence.

Whzc has been now stated in relation to desire
and hope, will equally apply to those fears and
apprehensions, which frequently arise in the
Blind in reference to the punishments of a future

world. A Being possessed of perfect
lence cannot be supposed to harass his intelligent
creatures, and to render their lives bitter with
alarming apprehensions, for which there .it not
the slightest foundation. But, if there is no
state either of punishment or reward beyond the
grave, those desires of immortal duration, which
seem at first view to elevate man above the
other inhabitants of this globe, actually place
him below the level of the beasts, which bound
through the forests and lawns, and find their
chief enjoyment in browsing on the grass. They
are alive to present enjoyment, but appear to
have no anticipations of the future; they feel
present pain, but there is no reason to believe
that they are ever tormented with fears or fore
bodings of future punishment. They are con
tented with the organs with which Nature has
furnished them ; they appear fully satisfied with
ranging the fields and feasting on the herbage ;
their desires need no restraint, and their wishes
are completely gratified ; and. what pleased them
yesterday will likewis* give them pleasure to
morrow, without being harassed with insatiable
desires after novelty and variety. They live di
vested of those innumerable cares and anxieties
which harass and perplex the children of men,
and they never wish to go beyond the boundary
which nature prescribes. " The ingenious bee
constructs commodious cells, but never dreams
of rearing triumphal arches or obelisks to deco
rate her waxen city." Through ignorance of
the future, they pass from life to death, with
as much indifference as from watching to sleep,
or from labour to repose. But man. amidst all
the enjoyments and prospects which surround
him, feels uneasy and unsatisfied, because he
pants after happiness infinite in duration. His
hopes and desires overstep the bounds of time
and of every period we can affix to duration,
and move onward through a boundless eternity.
And if he is to be for ever cut off from exist
ence when his body drops into the grave, how
dismal the continued apprehension of an ever
lasting period being put to all his enjoyments
after a prospect of immortality has been opened
to his view !

How, then, shall we account for these anoma
lies ? How shall we reconcile these apparent
inconsistencies ? In what light shall we exhibit
the conduct of the Creator, so as to render it
consistent with itself? There is but one con
clusion we can form, in consistency with the
moral attributes of God, which will completely
unravel the mystery of man being animated with
unbounded desires, and yet confined to a short
and limited duration in the present world, and
that is, — that this world is not the place of our
final destination, but introductory to a more glo
rious and permanent state of existence, where
the desires of virtuous minds will be completely
gratified, and their hopes fully realized. I do

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

not «ee how any other conclusion can be drawn,
witnput denying both the moral character, and
even the very existence of the Deity.

SECTION III.

)N THE INTELLECTUAL FACULTIES OF MAN,
AND THE STRONG DESIRE OF KNOWLEDGE
WHICH IS IMPLANTED IN THE HUMAN
MIND.

The principle of curiosity, or the strong desire
of knowledge which is implanted in the mind of
man, and the noble intellectual faculties for ac
quiring it with which he is endowed, are evi
dences and proofs of his immortal destination.

Though this argument may be considered, by
some, as only a branch of the preceding, it may
not be inexpedient, for the sake of impression,
to consider it separately, as it will admit of rea
sonings and illustrations distinct from those
which have now been brought forward.

The desire of knowledge is natural to every
rational being, and appears to be a fundamental
part of the constitution of the human mind. It is
perceptible even in the first stage of its pro
gress, and has a powerful influence over the
movements and the enjoyments of the young.
Present to a child a beautiful landscape, as ex
hibited through an optical machine, and it will
be highly delighted with the exhibition. Present
a second and a third of a different description,
in succession, and its delight will be increased ;
it will anxiously desire exhibitions of new and
varied objects, and its curiosity will never be
satisfied but with a constant succession of scenes
and objects which tend to widen the circle of its
knowledge, and enlarge the capacity of its mind.
Hence the keen desires of the young for shows,
spectacles, processions and public exhibitions of
every description, and the delight which they feel
in making excursions from one scene to another.
Hence the delight with which travellers traverse
the Alpine scenes of nature, cross seas and
oceans, descend into the gloomy subterraneous
cavern, or climb to the summit of the flaming
volcano, notwithstanding the fatigues and perils
to which they are exposed.

" For such the bounteous providence of Heaven
In every breast implanting the desire
Of objects new and strange, to urge us on
With unremitted labour to pursue
Those sacred stores that wait the ripening soul,

In Truth's exhaustless bosom.

— — — — — — — For this the daring youth

Breaks from his weeping mother's anxious arms,
In foreign climes to rove ; the pensive sage
Heedless of sleep, or midnight's harmful damp,
Hangs o'er the sickly taper ; and untired
The virgin follows with enchanted step
The maz.es of some wild and wondrous tale,
From morn to eve." Akenside-

*f the desire of knowledge appears, in many

instances, to be less ardent in after life, it M
owing in a great measure to the methods of our
education, and the false principles on which we
attempt to convey instruction to the youthful
mind. Our initiatory instructions, hitherto, pre
sent the young with little more lhan the key of
knowledge, instead of knowledge itself. We lead
them to the threshold of the temple of science
without attempting to unfold its treasures. We
deem it sufficient that they be taught to pro
nounce, like a number of puppets, a multitude
of sounds and terms to which they attach no dis
tinct conceptions, while we decline to communi
cate clear and well-defined ideas. We load their
memories with technical phrases and propositions
which they do not understand, while the objects
of substantial science are carefully concealed
both from the eye of sense and from the eyes of
their understandings. Instead of leading them
by gentle steps, in the first stage of their pro
gress, over the grand, and beautiful, and varie
gated scenery of Nature and Revelation, where
almost every object is calculated to arrest their
attention, and to excite admiration, — we con
found them with an unintelligible jargon of
grammar rules, of metaphysical subtleties, and
of dead languages, associated with stripes, con
finement, and painful recollections, which fre
quently produce a disgust at every thing which
has acquired the name of learning, before they
are made acquainted with that in which true
knowledge consists. Yet, notwithstanding the
injudicious methods by which we attempt t'o
train the youthful intellect, it is impossible to
eradicate the desire of knowledge from tho
human mind. When substantial knowledge ig
presented to the mind, in a judicious and al
luring manner, it will not only be relished, but
prosecuted with ardour, by every one whose
faculties are not altogether immersed in the
mire of sensuality. Let a man, however ig
norant and untutored, be made acquainted with
some of the interesting details of Geography,
with the wonders of the ocean, and the nume
rous rivers continually rolling into its abyss.
with the lofty ranges of mountains which stretch
along the continents, and project their sum
mits beyond the clouds, with the volcanoes,
the tornadoes, the water-spouts, and the sui>-
lime and beautiful landscapes which diversify
the different climates of the earth; with the
numerous tribes of animated beings which peo
ple its surface, and the manners and customs
of its human inhabitants — he will feel an eager
desire to know every thing else that appertains
to this subject, and will prosecute his inqui
ries with avidity, in so far as his means and
opportunities permit. Acquaint him with some
of the most striking facts in ancient and mo
dern history, and he will feel a desire to know
every thing of importance that has occurred in
the annals of the world since the commence-

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

tnent of time. Unfold to him some of the dis
coveries which have been made in relation to
the constitution of the atmosphere, the electric,
magnetic, and galvanic fluids, and the chymi-
cal changes and operations that are constantly
going on in the animal, vegetable, and mineral
kingdoms, and his curiosity will be strongly
excited to penetrate still farther into the mys
teries of nature. Direct his views to the con
cave of the firmament, and tell him of the vast
magnitude of the sun, and the planetary globes,
the amazing velocity with which they run their
destined rounds, and of the immense number and
distances of the stars — and he will eagerly pant
after more minute information respecting the
great bodies of the universe, and feel delighted
at hearing of new discoveries being made in the
unexplored regions of creation.

I never knew an instance in which knowledge
of this description was communicated in a ra
tional, distinct, and alluring manner, where it was
not received with a certain degree of pleasure,
and with an ardent desire to make further inves
tigations into the wonders of creating wisdom
and power. Such appears to be the original con
stitution of the human rnind, that it is necessa
rily gratified with every thing that gives scope
to the exercise of its faculties, and which has a
tendency to extend the range of their action. It
is true, indeed, that, in some men, the desire of
knowledge appears to be blunted and almost an
nihilated, so that they appear to be little superior
in their views to the lower orders of sensitive ex
istence. But this happens only in those cases
where the intellectual faculties are benumbed
and stupified bv indolence and sensuality. Such
persons do all they can to counteract the original
propensities of their nature ; and yet even in the
worst cases of this kind that can occur, the ori
ginal desire is never altogether extirpated, so
long as the senses are qualified to perform their
functions. For the most brutish man is never
found entirely divested of the principle of curi
osity, when any striking or extraordinary object
is presented to his view. On such an occasion,
the original principles of his constitution will be
roused into action, and he will feel a certain de
gree of wonder and delight in common with other
rational minds.

And, as man has a natural desire after know
ledge, and a delight in it — so, he is furnished
with noble faculties and vast capacities of intellect
for enabling him to acquire, and to treasure it
up. He is furnished with senses calculated to
convey ideas of the forms, qualities, and relations
of the various objects which surround him. His
sense of vision, in particular, appears to take in
a wider range of objects, than that of any other
sensitive being. While some of the low'er ani
mals have their vision circumscribed within a
circio of a few yards or inches in diameter, the
eye of man can survey, at one glance, an exten

sive landscape, and penetrate even to the regions
of distant worlds. To this sense we are indebted
for our knowledge of the sublimest objects which
can occupy the mind, and for the ideas we have
acquired of the boundless range of creation.
And, while it is fitted to trace the motions of
mighty worlds, which roll at the distance of a
thousand millions of miles, it is also so con
structed, as to enable him, with the assistance
of art, to survey the myriads of living beings
which people a drop of water. All his other
senses are likewise calculated to extend the range
of his knowledge, to enable him to communicate
his ideas to others, and to facilitate the mutual
interchanges of thought and sentiment between
rational minds of a similar construction with his
own.

His understanding is capable of taking in a
vast variety of sentiments and ideas in relation
to the immense multiplicity of objects which are
perceived by his external senses. Hence the
various sciences he has cultivated, the sublime
discoveries he has made, and the noble inven
tions he has brought to light. By the powers of
his understanding, he has surveyed the terraque
ous globe, in all its varieties of land and water,
continents, islands and oceans ; determined its
magnitude, its weight, its figure and motions ;
explored its interior recesses, descended into the
bottom of its seas, arranged and classified the
infinite variety of vegetables, minerals, and ani
mals which it contains, analysed the invisible
atmosphere with which it is surrounded, and de
termined the elementary principles of which it is
composed, discovered the nature of thunder, and
arrested the rapid lightnings in their course, as
certained the laws by which the planets are di
rected in their courses, weighed the masses of
distant worlds, determined their size and dis
tances, and explored regions of the universe invi
sible to the unassisted eye, whose distance exceeds
all human calculation and comprehension. The
sublime sciences of Geometry, Trigonometry,
Conic Sections, Fluxions, Algebra, and other
branches of Mathematics, evince the acuteness
and perspicacity of his intellect ; and their ap
plication to the purposes of Navigation and
Geography, and to the determination of the laws
of the celestial motions, the periods of their re
volutions, their eclipses, and the distances at
which they are placed from our sublunary man
sion, demonstrate the vigour and comprehension
of those reasoning faculties with which he is en
dowed.

By means of the instruments and contrivances
which his inventive faculty has enabled him to
form and construct, he can transport ponderous
masses across the ocean, determine the exact
position in which he is at any time placed upon
its surface, direct his course along pathless de
serts and through the billows of the mighty deep ;
— transform a portion of steam into a mechanical

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

power for impelling waggons along roads, and
•hrge vessels with great velocity against wind and
tide ; and can even transport himself through the
yielding air beyond the region of the clouds. He
can explore the invisible worlds which are con
tained in a putrid lake, and bring to view their
numerous and diversified inhabitants ; and the
next moment he can penetrate to regions of the
universe immeasurably distant, and contemplate
the mountains and the vales, the rocks and the
plains which diversify the scenery of distant sur
rounding worlds. He can extract an invisible
substance from a piece of coal, by which he can
produce, almost in a moment, the most splendid
illumination throughout every part of a large Tind
populous city, — he can detach the element of
fire from the invisible air, and cause the hardest
stones, and the heaviest metals to melt like wax
under its powerful agency ; and he can direct the
lightnings of heaven to accomplish his purposes,
in splitting immense stones into a multitude of
fragments. He can cause a splendid city, adorn
ed with lofty columns, palaces, and temples, to
arise, in a spot where nothing was formerly be
held but a vast desert or a putrid marsh ; and can
make " the wilderness and the solitary place to
be glad, and the desert to bud and blossom as
the rose." He can communicate his thoughts
and sentiments in a few hours, to ten hundred
thousands of his fellow-men ; in a' few weeks, to
the whole civilized world ; and, after his decease,
he can diffuse important instructions among
mankind, throughout succeeding generations. —
In short, he can look back, and trace the most me
morable events which have happened in the world
since time began ; he can survey the present as
pect of the moral world among all nations ; — he
can penetrate beyond the limits of all that is
visible in the immense canopy of heaven, and
range amidst the infinity of unknown systems
and worlds dispersed throughout the boundless
regions of creation, and he can overleap the
bounds of time, and expatiate amidst future
scenes of beauty and sublimity, which " eye
hath not seen," throughout the countless ages of
eternity.

What an immense multitude of ideas, in rela
tion to such subjects, must the mind of such a
person as Lord Bacon have contained ! whose
mental eye surveyed the whole circle of human
science, and who pointed out the path by which
every branch of knowledge may be carried towards
perfection ! How sublime and diversified must
have been the range of thought pursued by the
immortal Newton I whose capacious intellect
seemed to grasp the vast system of universal na
ture, who weighed the ponderous masses of the
planetary globes, and unfolded the laws by which
their diversified phenomena are produced, and
their motions directed !

" H», while on this dim spot, where mortals toll,
Closed In dust,— from Motion's simple laws

Could trace the secret hand of Providence,

Wide-working through this universal frame.

— AH intellectual eye, our solar round

First gazing through, he, by the blei .ded power

Of Gravitation and Projection, saw

The whole in silent harmony revolve.

— Then breaking hence, he took his ardent flight

Through the blue infinite, and every star

Which the clear concave of a winter's night

Pours on the eye, or astronomic tube, —

at his approach

Blazed into suns, the living centre each
Of an harmonious system."

Such minds as those of Socrates, Plato, Archi
medes, Locke, Boyle, La Place, and similar il
lustrious characters, likewise demonstrate the
vast capacity of the human intellect, the exten
sive range of thought it is capable of prosecut
ing, and the immense number of ideas it is
capable of acquiring. And every man, whose
faculties are in a sound state, is endowed with
similar powers of thought, and is capable of be
ing trained to similar degrees of intellectual ex
cellence.

And as man is endued with capacious intel
lectual powers for the acquisition of knowledge,
so he is furnished with a noble faculty by which
he is enabled to retain, and to treasure up in his
intellect the knowledge he acquires. He is en
dowed with the faculty of memory, by which the
mind retains the ideas of past objects and percep
tions, accompanied with a persuasion, that the
objects or things remembered were formerly real
and present. Without with faculty we could
never advance a single step in the path of men
tal improvement. If the information we ori
ginally derive through the medium of the senses
were to vanish the moment the objects are re
moved from our immediate perception, we
should be left as devoid of knowledge as if we
had never existed. But, by the power of memo
ry, we can treasure up, as in a storehouse, the
greater part, if not the whole of the ideas, no
tions, reasonings, and perceptions which we
formerly acquired, and render them subservient
to our future progress in intellectual attainments.
And it is probable, that even a human spirit^ in
the vigorous exercise of the faculties with which
it is now furnished, may go forward, through an
interminable duration, making continual acces
sions to its stores of knowledge, without losing
one leading idea, or portion of information which
it had previously acquired.

The power of memory in retaining past im
pressions, and its susceptibility of improvement,
are vastly greater than is generally imagined.
In many individuals, both in ancient and in
modern times, it has been found in such a state
of perfection, as to excite astonishment, and al
most to transcend belief. It is reported of Sene
ca, that he could repeat two thousand verses at
once, in their order, and then begin at the end
and rehearse them backwards, without missing a
single syllable. Cyrus is said to have been able
to call everv individual of his numerous army by

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

23

is own name. Cyneas, who was sent by
Pyrrhus to the Senate at Rome, on an expedi
tion, the very next day after his arrival, both
knew and also saluted by their names, all the
Senate, and the whole order of the gentlemen in
Rome. Mithridates, who governed twenty-
three nations, all of different languages, could
converse with every one of them in their own
language.* An ancient author mentions one
Oritus, a Corsican boy, to whom he dictated a
great number of words both sense and nonsense,
and finding he could rehearse a considerable
number without missing one, and in the same
order in which he dictated them, increased them
to the number of forty thousand, and found, to
his astonishment, that he could repeat them all
from beginning to end, or from the end back
wards to the beginning, in the order in which
they were dictated.

In modern times, there have likewise been
many instances of extraordinary powers of re
tention. Dr. Wallis, in a paper in the Philoso
phical Transactions, informs us that he extracted
the cube root of the number three, even to thirty
places of decimals, by the help of his memory
alone. Maglia Bethi, an Italian, had read all
the books that were published in his life time,
and most of those which were published be
fore, and could not only give an account of
what was contained in each author, but could
likewise, from memory, quote the chapter, sec
tion, and page of any book he had read, and
repeat the author's own words, in reference to
any particular topic. A gentleman, in order to
try his memory, lent him a long manuscript he
was about to publish, and after it had been re
turned, called upon him soon afterwards, pre
tending he had lost it, and desired him to write
as much of it as he could remember; when,
to his surprise, he wrote it over accurately
word for word, the same as in the manuscript
he had lent him. M. Euler, a late celebrated
mathematician and philosopher, who died in
1783, having lost his sight by too intense ap
plication to study, afterwards composed his "Ele
ments of Algebra," and a work " On the ine
qualities of the planetary motions," that required
immense and complicated calculations, which he
performed by his memory alone, to the admira
tion and astonishment even of the philosophic
world. His memory seemed to retain every
idea that was conveyed to it, either from reading
or from meditation, and his powers of reasoning
and of discrimination were equally acute and
capacious. He was also an excellent classical
scholar, and could repeat the ^Eneid of Virgil
from the beginning to the end, and indicate the
first and last line of every page of the edition he
used.j I have conversed with an individual,

•Senec. Controvers. Lib- 1. Pliny's Nat. Hist. &c.
* Encyclopedia Britan. Art. Euler.

who was born blind, and who could repeat the
whole of the Old and New Testaments from be
ginning to end ; and not only so, but could repeat
any particular chapter or verse that might be
proposed to him, the moment after it was speci
fied.

Thus it appears that man is not only possessed
of an ardent desire after knowledge, but is en
dued with the most penetrating and capacious
powers of intellect, both for acquiring and for
treasuring it up in his mind — powers which ap
pear susceptible of indefinite improvement in
this world ; and the legitimate inference that may
be drawn from this, is, that they will continue to
be exerted with uninterrupted activity, through
out an unceasing duration. And, is it possible
to suppose, in consistency with the moral attri
butes of the Deity, that the exercise of such
powers is intended to be confined within the nar
row limits of time, and to the contracted sphera
of the terraqueous globe ?

-"Say, can a soul possess'd

Of such extensive, deep, tremendous powers
Enlarging still, be but a finer breath
Of spirits dancing through their tubes a while,
And then for ever lost in vacant air?"

Such a conclusion never can be admitted while
we recognise the divinity as possessed of bound
less goodness and unerring wisdom. It is the
province of goodness to gratify those pure and
ardent desires which it has implanted in the soul ;
and it is the part of wisdom to proportionate
means to ends. But if the whole existence
of human beings had been intended to be con
fined to a mere point in duration, is it rational
to suppose, that Infinite Wisdom would have en
dowed the human soul with powers and capaci
ties so marvellous and sublime, and made so many
great preparations and arrangements for promot
ing its physical and moral perfection ? To acqui
esce in sucl, a. supposition, would be to degrade
the divine wisJomand intelligence below the level
of the wisdom of man, and to impute imperfec
tion and folly M Him who is " the only wise
God." For, in the conduct of human beings,
we uniformly rega.-d it as an evidence of folly,
when they construct a complicated and an extra
vagant machine, which either accomplishes no
end, or no end worthy of the expense and labour
bestowed on its construction. And, therefore,
if we would not ascribe imbecility or want of
design to the aaorable Creator of the universe,
we must admit, that he has not formed the soul
of man for this terrestrial scene alone, but has
destined it to a state of progressive improve
ment, and of endless duration.

This conclusion will appear still more evident,
if we consider the endless round of business and
care, and the numerous hardships to which the
bulk of mankind are subjected in the present
state, which prevent the full and vigorous ex«p»

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

cise of the intellectual powers on those objects
which are congenial to the ardent desires, and
the noble faculties of the human soul. The
greater part of mankind, in the present circum
stances of their terrestrial existence, have their
time and attention almost wholly absorbed in
counteracting the evils incident, to their present
condition, and in making provision for the wants
of their animal natures ; and, consequently, the
full gratification of the appetite for knowledge,
is an absolute impossibility, amidst the pursuits
and the turmoils connected with the present scene
of things. If we likewise consider the difficulty
of directing the mind in the pursuit of substan
tial knowledge, and the numerous obstructions
which occur in our researches after truth, amidst
the contradictory opinions, the jarring interests,
and the wayward passions of men, — if we con
sider the imperfections of our senses, and the
fallacies to which they are exposed — the preju
dices and the passions which seduce us into er
ror — how readily we embrace a glittering phan
tom for a substantial truth — and how soon our
spirits faint under the pressure of intense appli
cation to mental pursuits, — we shall be convinc
ed, that, in this sublunary sphere, there is no
scope for the full exercise of the intellectual
powers, and that the present world must be only
a preparatory scene to a higher state of exist
ence. Besides, even in those cases where every
requisite for the acquisition of knowledge is pos
sessed — where leisure, wealth, education, books,
instruments, and all the assistances derived from
learned associations, are conjoined with the most
splendid intellectual endowments, how feeble are
the efforts of the most penetrating and energetic
mind, and how narrow the boundary within which
its views are confined ! The brightest genius,
standing on the highest eminence to which sci
ence can transport him, contemplates a bound
less prospect of objects and events, the knowledge
of which he can ne\er hope to attain, while he
is chained down to the limits of this terrestrial
ball. His mental eye beholds an unbounded and
diversified scene of objects, operations, relations,
changes, and revolutions, beyond the limits of
all that is visible to the eye of sense : he catches
an occasional glimpse of objects and of scenes
which were previously involved in obscurity, he
strains his mental sight, stretches forward with
eagerness to grasp at new discoveries, descries
some openings which direct his view into the re
gions of infinity and eternity — is still restless and
dhsatisfied — perceives all his knowledge to be
mere shreds and patches, or like a few dim tapers
amidst the surrounding gloom — is convinced that
his present faculties are too weak and limited,
and that he must be raised to a sublimer station,
before he can fully grasp the magnificent objects
which lie hid in the unexplored regions of im
mensity. All his present views and prospects
are confined within a circle of a few miles, and

all beyond, in the universal system, which ejfr
tends through the immeasurable tracts of infinite
space, is darkness and uncertainty.

Can it, then, be supposed, that a soul furnish
ed with such noble powers and capacities, capa
ble of traversing the realm of creation, of opening
new prospects into the unbounded regions of
truth that lie before it, and of appreciating the
perfections of the Sovereign of the universe — a
soul fired with ardent desires after knowledge,
panting after new discoveries of truth and of the
grandeur of the Divinity, unsatisfied with all its
past attainments, and contemplating a boundless
unexplored prospect before it — should be cast off
from existence, and sink into eternal annihila
tion, at the moment when its capacities were
just beginning to expand, when its desires were
most ardent, and when the scenes of immensity
and eternity were just opening to its view 1 If
such a supposition could be admitted, man would
be the most inexplicable phenomenon in the uni
verse ; his existence an unfathomable mystery ;
and there could be no conceivable mode of recon
ciling his condition and destination with the wis
dom, the rectitude, and the benevolence of his
Creator.*

SECTION IV.

ON THE PERPETUAL PROGRESS OF THE MIND
TOWARDS PERFECTION.

As a supplement to the preceding argument,
it may be stated, that the soul of man appears la
be capable of making a perpetual progress towards
intellectual and moral perfection, and of enjoying
felicity in every stage of its career, without Hit
possibility of ever arriving at a boundary to its
excursions. In the present state we perceive no
limits to the excursions of the intellect, but
those which arise from its connexion with an
unwieldy corporal frame, which is chained down,
as it were, to a mere point, in the immensi
ty of creation. Up to the latest period of its
connexion with time, it is capable of acquiring
new accessions of knowledge, higher attain
ments in virtue, and more ardent desires after

• Such considerations, as those which I have now
adduced, seem to have made a powerful impression
upon the minds of the philosophers of antiquity.
"When I consider," says Cicero, "the wonderful
activity of the mind, so great a memory of what is
past, and such a rapacity of penetrating into the
future ; when I behold such a number of arts and
sciences, and such a multitude of discoveries thence
arising ; I believe, and am firmly persuaded, that a
nature which contains so many things within itself
cannot be mortal." Cicero de Senectvte. Cap. 21
And if this argument appeared strong even in Cice
ro's time, it has received a vast accession of strength
from the numerous arts, sciences, inventions, and
discoveries, which are peculiar to the age in which
we live.

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

jnorai perfection ; and the infinity of the Creator,
and the immensity of that universe over which he
presides, present a field in which it may for ever
expatiate, and an assemblage of objects on which
its powers may be incessantly exercised, with
out the most distant prospect of ever arriving at
a boundary to interrupt its intellectual career.

As I cannot illustrate this topic in more beau
tiful and forcible language than has been already
done by a celebrated Essayist, I shall take the
liberty of quoting his words. — " How can it en
ter into the thoughts of man," says this elegant
writer, " that the soul, which is capable of such
immense perfections, and of receiving new im
provements to all eternity, shall fall away into
nothing almost as soon as it is created ? Are
such abilities made for no purpose? A brute
arrives at a point of perfection which he can
never pass. In a few years he has all the en
dowments he is capable of; and weve he to live
ten thousand more, would be the same thing he
is at present. Were a human soul thus at a
stand in her accomplishments, were her faculties
to be full blown, and incapable of further enlarge
ments, I could imagine it might fall aw\v insen
sibly, and drop at once into a state of annihila
tion. But can we believe a thinking being, that
is in a perpetual progress of improvements, and
travelling on from perfection to perfection, after
having just looked abroad into the works of the
Creator, and made a few discoveries of his infi
nite goodness, wisdom and power, must perish in
her first setting out, and in the very beginning of
her inquiries ?

" A man, considered in his present state,
seems only sent into the world to propagate his
kind. He provides himself with a successor,
and immediately quits his post to make room for
him : —

Heir urges on his predecessor heir,

Like wave impelling wave.

He does not seem born to enjoy life, but to deli
ver it down to others. This is not surprising to
consider in animals, which are formed for our
use, and can finish their business in a short life.
The silk-worm, after having spun her task, lays
her eggs and dies. But a man can never have
taken in his full measure of knowledge, has riot
time to subdue his passions, esablish his soul in
virtue, and come up to the perfection of his na
ture, before he is hurried off the stage. Would
an infinitely wise Being make such glorious crea
tures for so mean a purpose ? Can he delight
in the production of such abortive intelligences,
such short-lived reasonable beings ? Would he
give us talents that are not to be exerted ? capa
cities that are never to be gratified ? How can
we find that wisdom, which shines through all his
works in the formation of man, without looking
on this world as a nursery for the next ? and be-
Jieving that the several generations of rational
creatures, which rise up and disappear in such

quick successions, are only to receive their first
rudiments of existence here, and afterv-ards to
be transplanted into a more friendly climate,
where they may spread and flourish to all eternity 1

" There is not, in my opinion, a more plets
ing and triumphant consideration in religion than
this, of the perpetual progress which the soul
makes towards the perfection of its nature, with
out ever arriving at a period in it. To look upon
the soul as going on from strength to strength;
to consider that she is to shine for ever with new
accessions of glorv, and brighten to all eternity,
that she will be stilf adding virtue to virtue, and
knowledge to knowledge, carries in it something
wonderfully agreeable to that ambition which is
natural to the mind of man. Nay, it must be a
prospect pleasing to God himself to see his crea
tion for ever beautifying in his eyes, and drawing
nearer to him by greater degrees of resemblance.

" Methinks this single consideration of the
progress of a finite spirit to perfection will be
sufficient to extinguish all envy in inferior na
tures, and all contempt in superior. That che
rubim, which now appears as a god to a human
soul, knows very well that the period will come
about in eternity, when the human soul shall be
as perfect as he himself now is : nay, when she
shall look down upon that degree of perfection as
much as she now falls short of it. It is true the
higher nature still advances, and by that means
preserves his distance and superiority in the scale
of being ; but he knows how high soever the sta
tion is, of which he stands possessed at present,
the inferior nature will at length mount up to it,
and shine forth in the same degree of glory.

" With what astonishment and veneration
may we look into our own souls, where there are
such hidden stores of virtue and knowledge, such
inexhausted sources of perfection ? We know
not yet what we shall be, nor will it ever enter
into the heart of man to conceive the glory that
will be always in reserve for him. The soul
considered with its Creator, is like one of those
mathematical lines that may draw nearer to an
other for all eternity without a possibility of
touching it : and can there be a thought so trans
porting, as to consider ourselves in these per
petual approaches to Him who is not cnly the
standard of perfection but of happiness!"*

SECTION V.

ON THE UNLIMITED RANGE OF VIEW WHICH
IS OPENED TO THE HUMAN FACULTIES
THROUGHOUT THE IMMENSITY OF SPACE
AND OF DURATION.

The unlimited range of view which is opened
to the human imagination throughout the immeo-

• Spectator, vol. 2.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

sitj of space and of duration, and the knowledge
we are capable of acquiring respecting the dis
tant regions of the universe, are strong presump
tions and evidences of the eternal destination of
man.

If the universe consisted solely of the globe on
which we dwell, with its appendages, and were
the spaces with which it is surrounded nothing
more than an immense void, it would not appear
surprising were the existence of man to terminate
in the tomb. After having traversed this earthly
ball for eighty or a hundred years, and surveyed
all the varieties on its surface ; after having ex
perienced many of the physical and moral evils
connected with its present constitution, and felt
that " all is vanity and vexation of spirit," and
that no higher prospect, and no further scope for
the exercise of his faculties were presented to
view ; he would be ready to exc aim with Job,
" I loathe it, I would not live alway ; let me
alone, for my days are vanity : my soul chooseth
strangling and death, rather than my- Ufe."
To run the same tiresome round of giddy plea
sures, and to gaze perpetually on the same un
varied objects, from one century to another,
without the hope of future enjoyment, would af
ford no gratification commensurate with the de
sires and capacities of the human mind. Its
powers would languish, its energies would be
destroyed, its progress to perfection would be for
ever interrupted, and it would roam in vain
amidst the surrounding void in quest of objects
to stimulate its activity.

But, beyond the precincts of this earthly scene,
ie a wide and unbounded prospect lies before us ;"
and the increasing light of modern science has
enabled us to penetrate into its distant regions,
and to contemplate some of its sublime arid
glorious objects. Within the limits of the solar
system of which our world forms a part, there
have been discovered twenty-nine planetary bo
dies, which contain a mass of matter more than
two thousand five hundred times greater than the
earth, besides the numerous comets, which are
traversing the plenetary regions in all directions,
and the immense globe of the sun, which is like
a universe in itself, and which is five hundred
times larger than the earth and all the planets
and comets taken together. These bodies differ
from each other in their magnitude, distances
and motions, and in the scenery with which their
surfaces are diversified ; and some of them are
encircled with objects the most splendid and su
blime. They appear to be furnished with every
thing requisite for the accommodation of intel
lectual beings, — are capable of containing a
population many thousands of times greater than
that of our world, and are doubtless replenished
witn myriads of rational inhabitants. Within
the limits of this system the soul of man would
find full scope for the exertion of all its powers,
capacities and activities, during a series of ages.

Our views of the universe, however, are not
confined to the system with whicn we are more
immediately connected. Every star which twin
kles in the canopy of heaven, is, on good grounds,
concluded to be a sun, and the centre of a mag
nificent system similar to our own ; and perhaps
surrounded with worlds more spacious and splen
did than any of the planetary globes which we
are permitted to contemplate. Nearly a thou
sand of these systems are visible to every ob
server, when he directs his eye, in a clear winter's
night, to the vault of heaven. Beyond all that is
visible to the unassisted eye, a common telescope
enables us to discern several thousands more.
With higher degrees of magnifying power, ten
thousands more, which lie scattered at immea
surable distances beyond the former, may still be
described. With the best instruments which art
has hitherto constructed, many millions have
been detected in the different regions of the sky
— leaving us no room to doubt, that hundreds of
millions more, which no human eye will ever dis
cern in the present state, are dispersed through
out the illimitable tracts of creation. So that no
limits appear to the scene of Creating Power, arid
to that vast empire over which the moral govern
ment of the Almighty extends. Amidst this
boundless scene of Divine Wisdom and Omnipo
tence, it is evident, that the soul might expatiate
in the full exercise of its energies, during ages
numerous as the drops of the ocean, without
ever arriving at a boundary to interrupt its ex
cursions.

Now, it ought to be carefully remarked, in the
first place, that God endowed the mind of man
with those faculties by which he has been ena
bled to compute the bulk of the earth, to deter
mine the size and distances of the planets, and to
make all the other discoveries to which I now
allude. In the course of his providence he led
the human mind into that train of thought, and
paved the way for those inventions by means of
which the grandeur and extent of his operations
in the distant regions of space have been opened
to our view. It, therefore, appears to have been
his will and intention, that the glories of his em
pire, in the remote spaces of creation, should be,
in some measure, unveiled to the inhabitants of
our world.

Again, when the soul has once got a glimpse
of the magnificence and immensity of creation,
it feels the most ardent desire to have the veil,
which now interposes between us and the re
mote regions of the universe, withdrawn, and
to contemplate at a nearer distance the splen
dours of those worlds whose suns we behold
twinkling from afar. A thousand conjectures
and inquiries are suggested to the mind, in re
lation to the systems and worlds which are dis
persed through the immensity of space. Ar«»
all those vast globes peopled with inhabitants?
Are they connected together, under the govw»»-

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

raent of God, as parts of one vast moral sys
tem? Are their inhabitants pure moral intel
ligences, or are they exposed to the inroads of
physical and moral evil? What are the gra
dations of rank or of intellect which exist among
them? What correspondence do they carry on
with other provinces of the Divine empire ?
What discoveries have they made of the per
fections of Deity, of the plan of his government,
and of the extent of his dominions? With what
species of corporeal vehicles do they hold a
correspondence with the material world ? With
what organs of perception, and with what pow
ers of intellect are they furnished? What fa
culties and organs different from those of man
do they possess, and by what laws are their
social intercourses regulated? Do benignity
and love for ever beam from their countenances,
and does ecstatic joy perpetually enrapture their
hearts? What capacities for rapid movement
do they possess ? Are they confined within the
limits of a single globe like ours, or can they
fly from one world to another, on the wings of
a seraph? What magnificent landscapes adorn
the places of their residence ? What celestial
glories are hung out for their contemplation in
the canopy of heaven ? What visible displays
of the presence and agency of their Creator are
presented to their view ? By what means are
they carried Toward in their progress towards in
tellectual and moral perfection? What sciences
do they cultivate, — what objects engage their
chief attention — in what solemn and sublime
forms of worship and adoration do they join ?
What changes or revolutions have taken place
among them ? What transactions does their
history record ? What scenes of glory or of ter
ror have been displayed towards any particular
system or province of this immense empire? Are
sin, disease, and death altogether unknown, and
do their inhabitants bask for ever in the regions
of immortality ? What knowledge do they pos
sess of the character and condition of the inha
bitants of our globe, and of the system of which
it forms a part? What variety of sensitive and
intellectual beings is to be found in the different
systems of the universe ? What diversity of ex
ternal scenery, superior to all that the eye of man
has seen or his imagination can conceive, is dis
played throughout the numerous worlds which
compose this vast empire ? What systems ex
ist, and what scenes of creating power are dis
played in that boundless region which lies beyond
the limits of human vision ? At what period in
duration did this mighty fabric of the universe
first arise into existence? What successive
creations have taken place since the first material
world was launched into existence by the Omnipo
tent Creator ? What new worlds and beings are
still emerging into existence from the voids of
•pace ? Is this mighty expanse of creation to
endure for ever —and to receive new accessions

to its population and grandeur, while eternity
rolls on ? What are the grand and ultimate do
signs to be accomplished by this immense assem
blage of material and intellectual beings, and is
man never to behold this wondrous scene a littie
more unfolded ?

Inquiries o. 'his description, to which no satis
factory answers can be expected in the present
state, might be multiplied to an indefinite extent.
The soul of man is astonished, overwhelmed,
and bewildered at the immensity of the scene
which is opened before it, — and at once per
ceives, that, in order to acquire a comprehensive
knowledge of the character and attributes of the
Divinity — to penetrate into the depths of his
plans and operations — and to contemplate the fulV
glory of his empire, — ages numerous as the stars
of heaven are requisite, and that, if no future ex
istence awaits it beyond the grave, its ardent
desires after progressive improvement and feli
city, and its hopes of becoming more fully ac
quainted with the universe and its Author, must
end in eternal disappointment.

Again, the mind of man is not only animated
with ardent desires after a more full disclosure
of the wonders of this boundless scene, but is
endowed with capacities for acquiring an indefi
nite extent of knowledge respecting the distant re
gions of the universe and the perfections of its
Author. Those who have taken the most exten
sive excursions through the field of science, still
find, that they are capable of receiving an addi
tion to all the knowledge they have hitherto ac
quired on every subject, and of prosecuting in
quiries beyond the range of the visible system,
provided the means of investigation were placed
within their reach. Were a human soul trans
ported to a distant world, for example, to die
regions of the planet Saturn, — were it permitted
to contemplate at leisure the sublime movements
of its rings, and the various phenomena of its
moons ; the variety of landscapes which diversify
its surface, and the celestial scenery which its
firmament displays, — were it to mingle with its
inhabitants, to learn the laws by which their so
cial intercourse is directed, the sciences which
they cultivate, the worship in which they engage,
and the leading transactions and events which
their history records — it would find no more dif
ficulty in acquiring and treasuring up such infor
mation, than it now does in acquiring, from die
narrative of a traveller, a knowledge of the cus
toms and manners of an unknown tribe of man
kind, and of the nature of the geographical terri
tory it possesses. Were angelic messengers
from a thousand worlds, to be despatched, at
successive intervals, to our globe, to describe the
natural and moral scenery, and to narrate the
train of Divine dispensations peculiar to each
world-1— there would be ample room in the human
mind for treasuring up such intelligence, not
withstanding all the stores of science which it

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

may have previously acquired. Such informa
tion would neither annihilate the knowledge we
had formerly attained, nor prevent our further
progress in intellectual acquisitions. On the
contrary, it would enlarge the capacity of the
mind, invigorate its faculties, and add a new
stimulus to its powers and energies. On the
basis of such information, the soul could trace
new aspects, and new displays of Divine wisdom,
intelligence, and rectitude, and acquire more
comprehensive views of the character of God —
just as it does, in the mean time, from a contem
plation of those objects and dispensations which
lie within its grasp. To such researches, inves
tigations, and intellectual progressions, no boun
dary can be assigned, if the soul be destined to
survive the dissolution of its mortal frame. It
only requires to be placed in a situation where
its powers will be permitted to expatiate at large,
and where the physical and moral obstructions
which impede their exercise shall be completely
removed.

It may be farther remarked, on the ground of
what has been now stated, that all the knowledge
which can be attained in the present state, is hut
as a drop to the ocean, when compared with
" the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" that
may be acquired in the eternal world. The pro
portion between the one and the other may bear
a certain analogy to the bulk of the terraqueous
globe, when compared with the immensity of the
worlds and systems which compose the universe.
If an infinite variety of designs, of objects, and
of scenery, exist in the distant provinces of cre
ation, as we have reason to believe, from the
variety which abounds in our terrestrial system,
— if every world be peopled with inhabitants of
a different species from those of another, if its
physical constitution and external scenery be
peculiar to itself, if the dispensations of theCre-
tor towards its inhabitants be such as have not
been displayed to any other world, if " the ma
nifold wisdom of God," in the arrangement of
its destinies, be displayed in a manner in which
it has never been displayed to any other class of
intelligences; — and, in short, if every province
of creation exhibit a peculiar manifestation of the
Deity — we may conclude, that all the knowledge
of God, of his works and dispensations, which
can be attained in the present life, is but as the
faint glimmering of a taper when contrasted with
the effulgence of the meridian sun. Those who
have made the most extensive and profound in
vestigations into the wonders of nature, are the
most deeply convinced of their own ignorance,
and of the boundless fields of knowledge which
remain unexplored. Sir Isaac Newton had em
ployed the greater part of his life in some of the
sublimest investigations which can engage the
attention of the human mind, — and yet he de
clared, a Hi tie before his death, " I do not know
•vhat I may appear to the world, but to myself I

seem to have been only like a boy playing on U»
sea shore, and diverting myself in now and then
finding a pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary,
while the great ocean of truth lay all undiscover
ed before me." And is it reasonable to believe,
that after a glimpse of the boundless treasures
of divine science has flashed upon the mind, it
is to pass only a few months or years in anxious
desire and suspense, and then be extinguished
for ever ?

It may be farther observed, in connexion with
the preceding remarks — that the creation of such
a vast universe must have been chiefly intended to
display the perfections of the Deity , and to afford
gratification and felicity to the intellectual beings
he has formed. The Creator stands in no need
of innumerable assemblages of worlds and of
inferior ranks of intelligences, in order to secure
or to augment his felicity. Innumerable ages
before the universe was created, he existed alone,
independent of every other being, and infinitely
happy in the contemplation of his own eternal
excellences. No other reason, therefore, can be
assigned for the production of the universe, but
the gratification of his rational offspring, and that
he might give a display of the infinite glories of
his nature to innumerable orders of intelligent
creatures. Ten thousand times ten thousand
suns, distributed throughout the regions of im
mensity, with all their splendid apparatus of
planets, comets, moons, and rings, can afford no
spectacle of novelty to expand and entertain the
Eternal Mind ; since they all existed, in their
prototypes, in the plans and conceptions of the
Deity, during the countless ages of a past eter
nity. Nor did he produce these works for the
improvement and information of no being. This
amazing structure of the universe, then, with all
the sensitive and intellectual enjoyments connect
ed with it, must have been chiefly designed for
the instruction and entertainment of subordinate
intelligences, and to serve as a magnificent the
atre on which the energies of divine power and
wisdom, and the emanations of divine benevo
lence might be illustriously displayed. And can
we suppose that the material universe will exist,
while intelligent minds, for whose improvement
it was reared, are suffered to sink into annihi
lation ?

Again, it cannot be admitted, in consistency with
the attributes of God, that he will finally disap
point the rational hopes and desires of the human
soul, which he himself has implanted and cherished,
If he had no ultimate design of gratifying ration
al beings with a more extensive display of the
immensity and grandeur of his works, it is no'-
conceivable, that he would have permitted them
to make those discoveries they have already
brought to light respecting the extent and the
glory of his empire. Such discoveries could not
have been made without his permission and di
rection, or without those faculties and mean*

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

which he himself had imparted. And, there
fore, in permitting the inhabitants of our world
to take a distant glimpse of the boundless scene
of his operations, he must have intended to ex
cite those ardent desires which will be gratified
in a future world, and to commence those trains
of thought which will be prosecuted with increas
ing ardour, through eternity, till we shall be able
to perceive and comprehend the contrivance and
skill, the riches of divine munificence, the vast
designs, and the miracles of power and intelli
gence which are displayed throughout every part
of the universal system. — To suppose that the
Creator would unfold a partial and imperfect view
of the wonders of creation, and enkindle a ra
tional longing and desire, merely for the purpose
of mocking and tantalizing our expectations, would
be to represent the moral character of the Deity
as below the level of that of a depraved mortal.
It would argue a species of deceit, of envy, and
of malignity, which is altogether repugnant to
the character of a Being of infinite benevolence.
As his goodness was the principal motive which
induced him to bring us into existence, his con
duct must be infinitely removed from every thing
that approaches to envy, malignity, or a desire
to mock or disappoint the rational hopes of his
creatures. His general character, as displayed
in all his works, leads us to conclude, that, in so
far from tantalizing the rational beings he has
formed, he is both able and willing " to do to and
for them exceeding abundantly above all that they
can ask or think." If he had intended merely
to confine our desires to sensitive enjoyments and
to the present life, the habitation of man would
have required no more contrivance nor decoration
than what are requisite for the lion's den and the
retreats of the tiger, and no farther display of
the grandeur of his empire would have been un
folded to view.

Since, therefore, it appears, that the universe
is replenished with innumerable systems, and is
vast, and unlimited in its extent — since God en
dued the mind of man with those faculties by
which he has explored a portion of its distant
regions — since the soul feels an ardent desire to
obtain a more full disclosure of its grandeur and
magnificence — since it is endued with faculties
capable of receiving an indefinite increase of
knowledge on this subject — since all the know
ledge it can acquire in the present state, re
specting the operations and the government of
God, is as nothing when compared with the
prospects which eternity may unfold— since the
universe and its material glories are chiefly in
tended for the gratification of intelligent minds
—and since it is obviously inconsistent with the
moral character of the Deity, to cherish desires
*nu expectations which he will finally frustrate
and disappoint — the conclusion appears to be un
avoidable, that man is destined to an immortal
itMtence. During the progress of that existence,

his faculties will arrive at their full expansion,
and there will be ample scope for their exercise
on myriads of objects and events which are just
now veiled in darkness and mystery. He will
be enabled to penetrate more fully into the plans
and operations of the divinity — to perceiv-e new
aspects of the Eternal Mind, new evolutions of
infinite wisdom and design, new displays of om
nipotence, goodness, and intelligence — and to
acquire a more minute and comprehensive view
of all the attributes of the Deity, and of the con
nexions, relations, and dependencies, of that vast
physical and moral system over which his go
vernment extends.

SECTION VI.

ON THE MORAL POWERS OF MAIT.

The moral powers with which man is endued
form a strong presumptive proof of his immortal
destiny.

Man is formed for action, as well as for con
templation. For this purpose there are inter
woven in his constitution, powers, principles,
instincts, feelings, and affections, which have a
reference to his improvement in virtue, and which
excite him to promote the happiness of others.
These powers and active principles, like the in
tellectual, are susceptible of vast improvement,
by attention, by exercise, by trials and difficul
ties, and by an expansion of the intellectual
views. Such are filial and fraternal affection,
fortitude, temperance, justice, gratitude, genero
sity, love of friends and country, philanthropy,
and general benevolence. Degenerate as our
world has always been, many striking examples
of such virtues have been displayed both in an
cient and modern times, which demonstrate the
vigour, expansion, and sublimity of the moral
powers of man.

When we behold men animated by noble sen
timents, exhibiting sublime virtues, and perform
ing illustrious actions, — displaying generosity
and beneficence in seasons of calamity, and tran
quillity and fortitude in the midst of difficulties
and dangers — desiring riches only for the sake
of distributing them — estimating places of pow
er and honour, only for the sake of suppressing
vice, rewarding virtue, and promoting the pros
perity of their country — enduring poverty and
distress with a noble heroism — suffering inju
ries and affronts with patience and serenity—
stifling* resen «ient when they have it in their
power to inflict vengeance — displaying kindness
and generosity towards enemies and slanderers
— vanquishing irascible passions and licentious
desires in the midst of the strongest tempta
tions — submitting to pain and disgrace in order
to promote the prosperity of friends and rela-

30

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

tives — and sacrificing repose, honour, wealth,
and even life itself, for the good of their coun
try, or for promoting the best interests of the
human race, — we perceive in such examples
features of the human mind, which mark its dig
nity and grandeur, and indicate its destination
to a higher scene of action and enjoyment.

Even in the annals of the Pagan world, we
find many examples of such illustrious virtues.
There we read of Regulus exposing himself to
the most cruel torments, and to death itself,
rather than suffer his veracity to be impeach
ed, or his fidelity to his country to be called in
question — of Phocion, who exposed himself to
the fury of an enraged assembly, by inveighing
against the vices, and endeavouring to promote
the best interests of his countrymen, and gave
it as his last command to his son, when he was
going to execution, " that he should forget how
ill the Athenians had treated his father" — of
Cyrus, who was possessed of wisdom, modera
tion, courage, magnanimity, and noble senti
ments, and who employed them all to promote
the happines of his people — of Scipio, in whose
actions the virtues of generosity and liberality,
goodness, gentleness, justice, magnanimity, and
chastity, shone with distinguished lustre — and
of Damon and Pythias, who were knit together
in the bonds of a friendship which all the ter
rors of an ignominious death could not, dis
solve. But of all the characters of the heathen
world, illustrious for virtue, Aristiden appears to
stand in the foremost rank. An extraordinary
greatness of soul, (says Rollin) made him supe
rior to every passion. Interest, pleasure, ambi
tion, resentment, jealousy, were extinguished in
him by the love of virtue and his country. The
merit of others, instead of offending him, be
came his own by the approbation he gave it.
He rendered the government of the Athenians
amiable to their allies, by his mildness, good
ness, humanity, and justice. The disinterest
edness he showed in the management of the
public treasure, and the love of poverty which
he carried almost to an excess, are virtues so
far superior to the practice of our age, that they
scarce seem credible to us. His conduct and
principles were always uniform, steadfast in the
pursuit of whatever he thought just, and inca
pable of the least falsehood, or shadow of flat
tery, disguise, or fraud, even in jest. He had
s-ich a control over his passions, that he uni-
G<rmly sacrificed his private interest, and his
private resentments, to the good of the public.
Themistodes was one of the principal actors who
procured his banishment from Athens; — but,
after being recalled, he assisted him on every
occasion with his advice and credit, joyfully
taking pains to promote the glory of his great
est enemy, through the motive of advancing the
nublic good. And when afterwards the dis
grace of Themistocles gave him a proper op

portunity for revenge, instead of resenting tne
ill treatment he had received from him, he con
stantly refused to join with his enemies, being
as far from secretly rejoicing over the misfor
tune of his adversary as he had been before
from being afflicted at his good success. Such
virtues reflect a dignity and grandeur on every
mind in which they reside, which appear in
compatible with the idea, that it is destined to
retire for ever from the scene of action at the
hour of death.

But the noblest examples of exalted virtue arc
to be found among those who have enlisted them
selves in the cause of Christianity. The Apos
tle Paul was an illustrious example of every thing
that is noble, heroic, generous, and benevolent in
human conduct. His soul was inspired with a
holy ardour in promoting the best interests of man
kind. To accomplish this object, he parted with
friends and relatives, relinquished his native
country, and every thing that was dear to him
either as a Jew or as a Roman citizen, and ex
posed himself to persecutions and dangers of every
description. During the prosecution of his benevo
lent career, he was " in journeyings often, in perils
of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by his own
countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils
in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils
in the sea, in perils among false brethren : in
weariness and painfulness, in watchings often,
in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in stripes
above measure, in cold and nakedness." Yet
none of these things moved him, nor did he count
his life dear to him, provided he might finish hig
course with joy, and be instrumental in accom
plishing the present and eternal happiness of his
fellow-men. In every period of the Christian
era, similar characters have arisen to demonstrate
the power of virtue and to bless mankind. Oui
own age and country have produced numerous
philanthropic characters, who have shone as lights
in the moral world, and have acted as benefactors
to the human race. The names of Alfred, Penn,
Bernard, Raikes, Neilde, Clarkson, Sharpe,
Buxton, Wilberforce, Yenning, and many others,
are familiar to every one who is in the least ac
quainted with the annals of benevolence. The
exertions which some of these individuals have
made in the cause of liberty, in promoting the
education of the young, in alleviating the dis
tresses of the poor, in ameliorating the condition
of the prisoner, and in counteracting the abomina
ble traffic in slaves, will be felt as blessings con
ferred on mankind throughout succeeding gene
rations, and will, doubtless, be held in everlasting
remembrance.

But among all the philanthropic characters of
the past or present age, the labours of the late
Mr. HOWARD, stand pre-eminent. This illustri
ous man, from a principle of pure benevolence,
devoted the greater part of his life to active bone
ficence, and to the alleviation of human wretch-

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

in every country where he travelled , —
diving into the depth of dungeons, and exposing
himself to the infected atmospheres of hospitals
and jails, in order to meliorate the condition of
the unfortunate, and to allay the sufferings of the
mournful prisoner. In prosecuting this labour of
love, he travelled three times through France,
four times through Germany, five times through
Holland, twice through Italy, once through Spain
and Portugal, and also through Denmark, Swe
den, Russia. Po.and, and part of the Turkish
empire, surveying the haunts of misery, and dis
tributing benefits to mankind wherever he ap
peared.

"From realm to realm with cross or crescent

crown'd,

Where'er mankind and misery are found,
O'er burning sands, deep waves, or wilds of snow.
Mild Hmoard journeying seeks the house of woe.
Down many a winding step to dungeons dank,
Where anguish wails aloud and fetters clank,
To caves bestrewed with many a mouldering tone,
And cells whose echoes only learn to groan,
Where no kind bars a whispering friend disclose.
No sun-beam enters, and no 7.ephyr blows ;
—He treads, inemulous of fame or wealth,
Profuse of toil and prodigal of health :
Leads stern-ey'd Justice to the dark domains,
If not to sever to relax the chains,
Gives to her babes the self-devoted wife,
To her fond husband liberty and life.
—Onward he moves ! disease and death retire ;
And murmuring demons hate him and admire."

Darwin.

Such characters afford powerful demonstra
tions of the sublimity of virtue, of the activity of
the human mind, and of its capacity for contri
buting to the happiness of fellow intelligences to
an unlimited extent. We have also, in our own
times, a class of men who have parted from their
friends and native land, and have gone to the
" uttermost ends of the earth," to distant barba
rous climes, exposing themselves to the frosts of
Labrador and Greenland, to the scorching heats
of Africa, and to the hostile attacks of savage
tribes, in order to publish the salvation of God,
and to promote the happiness of men of all lan
guages and climates. Some of these have felt
their minds inspired with such a noble ardour in
the cause of universal benevolence, that nothing
but insurmountable physical obstructions prevent
ed them from making rhe tour of the world, and
imparting benefits to men of all nations, kindreds,
and tongues.

Can we then imagine, that such active powers
as those to which I have now alluded — powers
which qualify their possessors for diffusing hap
piness to an indefinite extent among surround
ing intelligences— will be for ever extinguished
by the stroke of death ? and that, after a few fee
ble efforts during the present transitory scene,
they will never again exert their energies through
all eternity ? This will appear in the highest de
gree improbable, if we consider, 1. The limited
sphere of action to which the generality of man
kind are confined in the present state. Most men
15

are confined to laborious employments, and have
their attention almost entirely absorbed in provi
ding for their families, and in anxious solicitude
for their animal subsistence and success in life,
so that they find no scope for their moral powers
beyond the circle of the family mansion, and of
their own immediate neighbourhood. 2. The pe
riod within which the most energetic powers can
be exerted is extremely limited. It is not before
man has arrived near the meridian of life that
his moral powers begin to be fully expanded, —
and it frequently happens, in the case of ardent
benevolent characters, that, at the moment when
their philanthropic schemes were matured, and
they had just commenced their career of benefi
cence, death interposes, and puts a period to all
their labours and designs. 3. In the present
state of the world, numerous physical obstruc
tions interpose to prevent the exertion of the
moral powers, even in the most ardent philan
thropic minds. The want of wealth and influ
ence ; the diseases and infirmities of an enfeebled
corporeal frame ; the impediments thrown in the
way by malice and envy, and the political ar
rangements of states ; the difficulty of penetrating
into every region of the globe where human be
ings reside, and many other obstructions, pre
vent the full exercise of that moral energy which
resides in benevolent and heroic minds, and con
fine its operations within a narrow span. But
can we ever suppose, in consistency with Divine
Wisdom and Benevolence, that God has implan
ted in tne human constitution benevolent active
powers, which are never to be fully expanded,
and tiiat those godlike characters that have oc
casionally appeared on the theatre of our world,
are never to re-appear on the field of action, to
expatiate, in the full exercise of their moral pow
ers, in the ample career of immortality ? To
admit such a supposition would be in effect to
call in question his Wisdom and Intelligence.
It is the part of Wisdom to proportionate means
to ends, and to adapt the faculties of any being
to the scene in which it is to operate. But
here, we behold a system of powers which can
never can be brought into full operation in the
present state ; and, therefore, if death is to put
a final termination to the activity of man, the
mighty powers and energies with which he is
endowed have been bestowed in vain, — and we
are led to conceive of the Divine Being as de
ficient in Wisdom and Intelligence in his govern
ment of the intellectual beings he has formed.

This will, perhaps, appear still more obvi
ous, if we attend to the following considerations.
— Throughout the universe we perceive traces
of a system of universal benevolence. This re
distinctly perceptible in relation to our own globe,
in the revolution of day and night ; in the consti
tution of the atmosphere ; in the beautiful and
sublime scenes presented to the eye in every
country ; in the agencies of light and heat, and

32

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

of the electrical and galvanic fluids ; in the splen
dour of the sun, and the glories of the midnight
sky; in the organization of the body of man, and
the different senses with which he is endowed ;
in the general adaptation of the mineral and ve
getable kingdoms, and of every element around
us, to the wants of man and other sensitive be
ings ; and in the abundant supply of food and drink
which is annually distributed to every rank of
animated existence. We perceive traces of the
same benevolent agency in the arrangements
connected with distant worlds — in the rotation
of the planetary globes around their axes, in the
assemblages of rings and moons with which they
are environed, and in the diversified apparatus
by which light and heat are distributed in due
proportion to the several bodies which compose
the solar system. And, in other systems, in the
distant regions of space, we perceive that it is
one great end of the Creator, to diffase light and
splendour throughout all the provinces of his im
mense empire, in order to unveil his glorious
works to the eyes of unnumbered intelligences.
But, although a system of benevolence is abun
dantly manifest in the mechanical fabric of the
universe, yet it does not appear that happiness
can be fully enjoyed without the benevolent agency
of intelligent beings. We have abundant proofs
of this position in the world in which we dwell.
For although the goodness of the Creator is dis
played throughout all its regions, yet the greater
part of the human race is in a state of comparative
misery, not owing to any deficiency in the Divine
bounty, but to the selfishness, ambition, and
malevolence of men. With the blessings which
Heaven provides from year to year, the whole
population of our globe, and a thousand millions
more, would be amply supplied, and happiness
extensively diffused, were benevolence a promi
nent and universal trait in the character of man
kind. Even in those places where only a few
energetic and benevolent individuals bestir them
selves in the cause of general philanthropy, a
wonderful change is rapidly produced in the
condition of society. Disease, and misery, and
want, fly away at their approach, — the poor are
supplied, the wretched relieved, the prisoner re
leased, the orphan provided for, and the widow's
heart made to sing for joy.

Now, we have every reason to conclude, that
moral action extends over the whole empire of
God — that benevolence exerts its noblest ener
gies among the inhabitants of distant worlds —
and that it is chiefly through the medium of re
ciprocal kindness and affection that ecstatic joy
pervades the hearts of celestial intelligences.
For we cannot conceive happiness to exist in any
region of space, or among any class of intellec
tual beings, where love to the Creator, and to one
another, is not a prominent and permanent affec
tion.

U is, therefore, reasonable to believe that those

virtuous benevolent characters which have ap
peared in our world, have been only in the aoto**
training for a short period, preparatory to their
being transported to a nobler scene of action, and
that their moral powers, which could not be
brought into full exercise in this terrestrial
sphere, were intended to qualify them for ming
ling with more exalted intelligences, and co-ope
rating with them in carrying forward that vast
system of universal benevolerx e, to which all the
arrangements of the Creator evidenlly tend.

Whether then, it may be asked, does it appear
most consistent with the moral powers of man,
and with the wisdom and goodness of God, to
suppose that such illustrious characters as Penn,
G. Sharp, Clarkson, Venning, Howard, and the
apostle Paul, are now for ever banished from
creation, or that they are expatiating in a higher
scene of action and enjoyment, where all their
benevolent energies find ample scope, and where
every blossom of virtue is fully expanded ? If
there is a God, and if wisdom, benevolence, and
rectitude, form an essential part of his character,
we cannot doubt for a moment that such charac
ters are still in existence, and shall re-appear on
a more splendid theatre of action in the future
scenes of eternity.

I shall conclude my illustrations of the pre
ceding arguments with the following extract from
a judicious and elegant writer : —

" In tracing the nature and destination of any
being, we form the surest judgment from his
powers of action, and the scope and limits of
these compared with his state or that field in
which they are exercised. If this being passes
through different states or fields of action, and
we find a succession of powers adapted to the
different periods of his progress, we conclude,
that he was destined for those successive states,
and reckon his nature progressive. If, besides
the immediate set of powers which fit him for
action in his present state, we observe another
set which appear superfluous if he were to be
confined to it, and which point to another or
higher one, we naturally conclude that he is not
designed to remain in his present slate, but to
advance to that for which those supernumerary
powers are adapted. Thus, we argue, that the
insect, which has wings forming or formed, am*
all the apparatus proper for flight, is not destined
always to creep on the ground, or to continue in
the torpid state of adhering to a wall, but is
designed in its season to take its flight in air.
Without this farther destination, the admirable
mechanism of wings and the other apparatus,
would be useless and absurd.

" The same kind of reasoning may be applied
to man, while he lives only a sort of vegetative
life in the womb. He is furnished even there
with a beautiful apparatus of organs, eyes, ears,
and other delicate senses, which derive iourtoi*«

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

went indeed, but are in a manner folded up, and
have no proper exercise or use in their present
confinement. Let us suppose some intelligent
spectator, who never had any connexion with
man, nor the least acquaintance with human af
fairs, to see this odd phenomenon, a creature
formed after such a manner, and placed in a si
tuation apparently unsuitable to such various
machinery, must he not be strangely puzzled
about the use of his complicated structure, and
reckon such a profusion of art and admirable
workmanship lost on the subject : or reason by
way of anticipation, that a creature endued with
such various yet unexerted capacities, was des
tined for a more enlarged sphere of action, in
which those latent capacities shall have full play ?
The vast variety and yet beautiful symmetry and
proportions of the several parts and organs with
which the creature is endued, and their apt co
hesion with and dependence on the curious re
ceptacle of their life and nourishment, would
forbid his concluding the whole to be the birth of
chance, or the bungling effort of an unskilful ar
tist ; at least, would make him demur a while at
so harsh a sentence. But if, while he is in this
state of uncertainty, we suppose him to see the
babe, after a few successful struggles, throwing
off his fetters, breaking loose from his little dark
prison, and emerging into open day, then unfold
ing his recluse and dormant powers, breathing
in air, gazing at light, admiring colours, sounds,
and all the fair variety of nature ; immediately his
doubts clear up, the propriety and excellence of
the workmanship dawn upon him with full lustre,
and the whole mystery of the first period is un
ravelled by the opening of this new scene. Though
in this second period the creature lives chiefly a
kind of animal life, that is, of sense and appetite,
yet by various trials and observations he gains
experience, and by the gradual evolution of the
powers of the imagination he ripens apace for
an higher life, for exercising the arts of design
and imitation, and of those in which strength or
dexterity are more requisite, than acuteness or
reach of judgment. In the succeeding rational
or intellectual period, his understanding, which
formerly crept in a lower, mounts into an higher
sphere, canvasses the natures, judges of the re
lations of things, forms schemes, deduces con
sequences from what is past, and from present as
well as past collects future events . By this suc
cession of states, and of correspondent culture,
he grows up at length into a moral, a social, and
a political creature. This is the last period at
which we perceive him to arrive in this his mor
tal career. Each period is introductory to the
next succeeding one ; each life is a field of ex
ercise and improvement for the next higher one ;
the life of the fcetus for that of the infant, the
life of the infant for that of ihe child, and all the
lower for the highest and best.
" But is this the last period of nature's pro

gression ? Is this the utmost extent of her plot,
where she winc.s up the drama, and dismisses the
actor into eternal oblivion ? Or does he appear
to be invested with supernumerary powers, which
have not full exercise and scope even in the last
scene, and reach not that maturity or perfection
of which they are capable, and therefore point
to some higher scene, where he is to sustain an
other and more important character, than he has
yet sustained ? If any such there are, may we
not conclude from analogy, or in the same way
of anticipation as before, that he is destined for
that after part, and is «to be produced upon a
more august and solemn stage, where his sub-
limer powers shall have proportioned action, and
his nature attain its completion."*

In illustrating the preceding arguments, I have
shown that man is possessed of desires which
cannot be fully gratified, and of moral and intel
lectual powers which cannot be fully exercised in
the present world, and consequently, we have the
same reason to conclude, that he is destined to a
higher scene of existence, as we would have,
from beholding the rudiments of eyes and ears in
the embryo in the womb, that it is destined to
burst its confinement, and to enter into a world,
where sounds, and light, and colours will afford
ample scope for the exercise of these organs.

SECTION VII.

ON THE APPREHENSIONS AND FOREBODINGS
OF THE MIND, WHEN UNDER THE INFLU
ENCE OF REMORSE.

The apprehensions of the mind, and its fear
ful forebodings of futurity, when under the in
fluence of remorse, may be considered as inti
mations of a state of retribution in another
world.

As the boundless desires of the human mind,
the vast comprehension of its intellectual facul
ties, and the virtuous exercise of its moral pow
ers, are indications of a future state of more
enlarged enjoyment, so, those horrors of con
science which frequently torment the minds of
the wicked, may be considered as the forebod
ings of future misery and wo. For it appears
as reasonable to believe, that atrocious deeds
will meet with deserved opprobrium and punish
ment in a future state, as that virtuous actions
will be approved of and rewarded ; and, conse
quently, we find, th?.t all nations who have be
lieved in a future state of happiness for the
righteous, have also admitted that there are fu
ture punishments in reserve for the workers of
iniquity. Every man has interwoven in his con
stitution a moral sense which secretly condemn*

• Pordyce.

THE PHILOSCPHY OF A FUTURE STATE,

him when he has committed an atrocious action,
ovfn when the perpetration of the crime is un
known to his fellow-men, and when he is placed
in circumstances which raise him above the fear
of human punishment. There have been nume
rous individuals, both in the higher and lower
ranks of life, who, without any external cause, or
apprehension of punishment from men, have been
seized with inward terrors, and have writhed
under the agonies of an accusing conscience,
which neither the charms of music, nor all the
other delights of the sons of men, had the least
power to assuage. Of the truth of this position,
the annals of history furnish us with many im
pressive examples. The following may suffice
as specimens : —

While Belshazzar was carousing at an impious
banquet with his wives and concubines and a
thousand of his nobles, the appearance of the
fingers of a man's hand, and of the writing on
an opposite wall, threw him into such consterna
tion, that his thoughts terrified him, the girdles
of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one
against another. His terror, in such circum
stances, cannot be supposed to have proceeded
from a fear of man ; for he was surrounded by
his guards and his princes, and all the delights of
music, and of a splendid entertainment. Nor
did it arise from the sentence of condemnation
written on the wall ; for he was then ignorant
both of the writing and of its meaning. But he
was conscious of the wickedness of which he
had been guilty, and of the sacrilegious impiety
in which he was then indulging, and, therefore,
the extraordinary appearance on the wall, was
considered as an awful foreboding of punishment
from that almighty and invisible Being whom he
had offended. — Tiberius, one of the Roman em
perors, was a gloomy, treacherous, and cruel
tyrant. The lives of his people became the sport
of his savage disposition. Barely to take them
away was not sufficient, if their death was not
tormenting and atrocious. He ordered, on one
occasion, a general massacre of all who were
detained in prison, on account of the conspiracy
of Sejanus his minister, and heaps of carcasses
were piled up in the public places. His private
vices and debaucheries were also incessant, and
revolting to every principle of decency and vir
tue. Yet this tyrant, while acting in the pleni
tude of his power, and imagining himself beyond
the control of every law, had his mind tortured
with dreadful apprehensions. We are informed
by Tacitus, that in a letter to the Senate, he
opened the inward wounds of his breast, with
such words of despair as might have moved pity
in those who were under the continual fear of his
tyranny.* Neither the splendour of his situation

•Tiberium non fortuna, non solltudines protege-
bant, quin tormenta pectoris suasque pcenas ipse
fdteretur, &c.— Tacitui-

as an emperor, nor the solitary retreats to which
he retired, could shield him from the accusation*
of his conscience, but he himself was forced to
confess the mental agonies he endured as a pu
nishment for his crimes. — Antiochus Epiphanet
was another tyrant remarkable for his cruelty and
impiety. He laid siege to the city of Jerusalem,
exercised the most horrid cruelties upon its inha
bitants, slaughtered forty thousand of them in
three days, and polluted, in the most impious
manner, the temple, and the worship of the God
of Israel. Some time afterwards, when he was
breathing out curses against the Jews for having
restored their ancient worship, and threatening to
destroy the whole nation, and to make Jerusalem
the common place of sepulture to all the .Jews,
he was seized with a grievous torment in his in
ward parts, and excessive pangs of the colic,
accompanied with such terrors as no remedies
could assuage. " Worms crawled from every
part of him ; his flesh fell away piece-meal, and
the stench was so great that it became intoler
able to the whole army; and he thus finished an
impious life, by a miserable death."f During
this disorder, says Polybius, he was troubled
with a perpetual delirium, imagining that spec
tres stood continually before him, reproaching
him with his crimes. — Similar relations are given
by historians, of Herod who slaughtered the in
fants at Bethlehem, of Galerius Maximiarms the
author of the tenth persecution against the
Christians, of the infamous Philip II. of Spain,
and of many others whqse names stand conspi
cuous on the rolls of impiety and crime.

It is related of Charles IX. of France, who
ordered the horrible Bartholomew massacre, and
assisted in his bloody tragedy, that, ever afier,
he had a fierceness in his looks, and a colour in
his cheeks, which he never had before ; — that Le
slept little and never sound ; and waked frequent
ly in great agonies, requiring soft music to com
pose him to rest ; and at length died of a linger
ing disorder, after having undergone the most
exquisite torments both of body and mind.
D'Aubigne informs us that Henry IV. frequent
ly told, among his most intimate friends, that
eight days after the massacre of St. Bartholo
mew, he saw a vast number of ravens perch and
croak on the pavilion of the Louvre ; that the
same night Charles IX. after he had been two
hours in bed, started up, roused his grooms of the
chamber, and sent them out to listen to a great
noise of groans in the air, and among others,
some furious and threatening voices, the whole
resembling what was heard on the night of the
massacre ; that all these various cries were so
striking, so remarkable, and so articulate, that
Charles believing that the enemies of the Mont-
morencies and of their partisans had surprised
and attacked them, sent a detachment of hw

t Rollin's An. Hist

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

35

guards to preven f this new massacre. It is
scarcely riecessar ' to add, that the intelligence
brought from Paris proved these apprehensions
to be groundless, and that the noises heard, must
have been the fanciful creations of the guilty con
science of the king, countenanced by the vivid
remembrance of those around him of the horrors
of St. Bartholomew's day.

King Richard III. after he had murdered his
innocent royal nephews, was so tormented in
conscience, as Sir Thomas More reports from
the gentlemen of his bed chamber, that he had
no peace or quiet in himself, but always carried
it as if some imminent danger was near him.
His eyes were always whirling about on this
side, and on that side ; he wore a shirt of mail,
and was always laying his hand upon his dagger,
looking as furiously as if he was ready to strike.
He had no quiet in his mind by day, nor could
take any rest by night, but, molested with terri
fying dreams, would start out of his bed, and run
like a distracted man about the chamber.*

This state of mind, in reference to another
case, is admirably described, in the following
lines of Dryden.

" Amidst your train this unseen judge will wait,
Examine how you came by all your state ;
Upbraid your impious pomp, and in your ear
Will halloo, rebel! traitor! murderer!
Your ill-got power, wan looks, and care shall bring,
Known but by discontent to be a King.
Of crowds afraid, yet anxious when alone,
You'll sit and brood your sorrows on a throne."

Bessus the Paeonian being reproached with
ill nature for pulling down a nest of young spar
rows and killing them, answered, that he had
reason so to do, " Because these little birds ne
ver ceased falsely to accuse him of the mur
der of his father." This parricide had been till
then concealed and unknown ; but the revenging
fury of conscience caused it to be discovered
by himself, who was justly to suffer for it. That
notorious sceptic and semi-atheist, Mr. Hobbes,
author of the " Leviathan," had been the means
of poisoning many young gentlemen and others,
with his wicked principles, as the Earl of Ro
chester confessed, with extreme compunction, on
his death-bed. It was remarked, by those who
narrowly observed his conduct, that " though in
a humour of bravado he would speak strange
and unbecoming things of God ; yet in his stu
dy, in the dark, and in his retired thoughts,
he trembled before him." He could not endure
to be left alone in an empty house. He could
not, even in h;s old age, bear any discourse of
death, acd seemed to cast off all thoughts of it.
He could not bear to sleep in the dark ^and" if his
candle happened to go out in the night, he would
awake in terror and amazement, — a plain indica
tion, that he was unable to bear the dismal re
flections of his dark and desolate mind, and knew

• Stows Annals p. 460.

not how to extinguish, nor how to bear the 'igftt
of « the candle of the Lord" within him. He is
said to have left the world, with great Reluctance
under terrible apprehensions of a dark and un
known futurity.

" Conscience, the torturer of the soul, unseen
Does fiercely brandish a sharp scourge within.
Severe decrees may keep our tongues in awe
But to our thoughts what edict can give law "
Even you yourself to your own breast shall tell
Your crimes, and your own conscience be your heU.

Many similar examples of the power of con
science in awakening terrible apprehensions of
futurity, could be brought forward from the re
cords of history both ancient and modern ; — and
there can be no question, that, at the present
moment, there are thousands of gay spirits im
mersed in fashionable dissipation, and professing
to disregard the realities of a future world, who,
if they would lay open their inmost thoughts,
would confess, that the secret dread of a future
retribution is a spectre which frequently haunts
them while running the rounds of forbidden plea
sure, and embitters their most exquisite enjoy
ments.

Now, how are we to account for such terrors
of conscience, and awful forebodings of futurity,
if there be no existence beyond the grave ? espe
cially when we consider, that many of those who
have been thus tormented have occupied stations
of rank and power, which raised them above the
fear of punishment from man? If they got their
schemes accomplished, their passions gratified,
and their persons and possessions secured from
temporal danger, why did they feel compunction
or alarm in the prospect of futurity ? for every
mental disquietude of this description implies a
dread of something future. They had no great
reason to be afraid even of the Almighty himself,
if his vengeance do not extend beyond the pre
sent world. They beheld the physical and moral
world moving onward according to certain fixed
and immutable laws. They beheld no miracles
of vengeance — no Almighty arm visibly hurling
the thunderbolts of heaven against the workers
of iniquity. They saw that one event happened
to all, to the righteous as well as to the wicked,
and that death was an evil to which they behoved
sooner or later to submit. They encountered
hostile armies with fortitude, and beheld all tho
dread apparatus of war without dismay. Yet
in their secret retirements, in their fortified re
treats, where no eye but the eye of God was
upon them, and when no hostile incursion was
apprehended, they trembled at a shadow, and felt
a thousand disquietudes from the reproaches of
an inward monitor which they could not escape.
These things appear altogether inexplicable if
there be no retribution beyond the grave.

We are, therefore, irresistibly led to the con
clusion, that the voice of conscience, in such
cases, is the voice of God declaring his abhor-

86

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

rence of wicked deeds and the punishment, which
they deserve, and that his providence presides
over the actions of moral agents, and gives inti
mations of the future destiny of those haughty
spirits who obstinately persist in their trespasses.
And, consequently, as the peace and serenity of
virtuous minds are preludes of nobler enjoyments
in a future life, so those terrors which now assail
the wicked may be considered as the beginnings
of that misery and anguish which will be con
summated in the world to come, in the case of
those who add final impenitence to all their other
crimes.

SECTION VIII.

ON THE DISORDERED STATE OF THE MORAL
WORLD, WHEN CONTRASTED WITH THE
REGULAR AND SYSTEMATICAL ORDER OF
THE MATERIAL.

The disordered state of the moral world, con
trasted with the regular and systematical order
of the material, affords a strong presumption of
another state in which the moral evils which
now exist will be corrected.

When we take a general survey of the great
fabric of the universe, or comemplate more mi
nutely any of its subordinate arrangements, the
marks of beauty, order and harmony, are stri
kingly apparent. Every thing appears in its pro
per place, movinjj onward in majestic order, and
accomplishing the end for which it was intended.
In the planetary system, the law of gravitation
is found to operate exactly in proportion to the
square of the distance, and the squares of the pe
riodic limes of the planets' revolutions round
the sun are exactly proportionate to the cubes of
their distances. Every body in this system fin
ishes its respective revolution in exactly the same
period of time, so as not to deviate a single mi
nute in the course of a century. The annual re
volution of the planet Jupiter was ascertained two
centuries ago, to be accomplished in 4330 days,
14 hours, 27 minutes, and 11 seconds, and his
rotation round his axis in 9 hours, 56 minutes,
and these revolutions are still found to be per
formed in exactly the same times. The earth
performs its diurnal revolution, from one century
to another, bringing about the alternate succes
sion of day and night, in exactly the same period of
23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds. Through
out the whole of this system, there is none of the
bodies of which it is composed that stops in its
motion, or deviates from the path prescribed.
No one interrupts another in its course, nor in
terferes to prevent the beneficial influences of
attractive power, or, of light, and heat. Were
it otherwise — were the earth to stop in its di
urnal revolution, and delay to usher in the dawn

at its appointed time, or were the planets to
dash one against another, and to run lawlessly
through the sky, the system of Nature would run
into confusion, its inhabitants would be thrown in
to a state of anarchy, and deprived of all their en
joyments. But, in consequence of the order
which now prevails, the whole presents to the eye
of intelligence an admirable display of beauty
and harmony, and of infinite wisdom and desigii.
In like manner, if we attend to the arrange
ments of our sublunary system — to the revolu
tions of the seasons, the course of the tides, the
motions of the rivers, the process of evapora
tion, the periodical changes of the winds, and
the physical economy of the animal and vegeta
ble tribes — the same systematic order and har
mony may be perceived. — In the construction
and movements of the human frame, there is a
striking display of systematic order and beauty.
Hundreds of muscles of different forms, hundreds
of bones variously articulated, thousands of lac
teal and lymphatic vessels, and thousands of
veins and arteries all act in unison every mo
ment, in order to produce life and enjoyment,
Every organ of sense is admirably fitted to re
ceive impressions from its corresponding objects.
The eye is adapted to receive the impression of
light, and light is adapted to the peculiar con
struction of the eye ; the ear is adapted to sound,
and the constitution of the air and its various
undulations are fitted to make an impression on
the tympanum of the ear. Even in the con
struction of the meanest insect we perceive a
series of adaptations, and a system of organiza
tion no less regular and admirable than those of
man ; — and as much care appears to be bestow
ed in bending a claw, articulating a joint, or
clasping the filaments of a feather, to answer its
intended purpose, as if it were the only object on
which the Creator was employed. — And it is
worthy of remark, that our views of the harmony
and order of the material world become more
admirable and satisfactory, in proportion as oui
knowledge of its arrangements is enlarged and
extended. Whether we explore, with the tele
scope, the bodies whirh are dispersed through
the boundless regions of space, or pry, by the
help of the microscope, into the minutest parts
of nature, we perceive traces of order, and oi ex
quisite mechanism and design which excite ad
miration and wonder in every contemplative
mind. Before the invention of the microscope,
we might naturally have concluded, that all be
yond the limits of natural vision was a scene of
confusion, a chaotic mass of atoms without life.
form, or order ; but we now clearly perceive,
that every thing is regular and systematic, thai
even the dust on a butterfly's wing, every dis
tinct particle of which is invisible to the naked
eye, consists of regularly organized feathers —
that in the eye of a small insect, ten thousand
nicely polished globules are beautifully arranged

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

37

HJ a transparent net-work within the compass of
one-twentieth of an inch — and that myriads of
living beings exist, invisible to the unassisted
sight, with bodies as curiously organised, and
as nicely adapted to their situations as the bodies
of men and of the larger animals. So that the
whole frame of the material world presents a
scene of infinite wisdom and intelligence, and a
display of systematic order, beauty, and propor
tion. Every thing bears the marks of benevo
lent design, and is calculated to produce happi
ness in sentient beings.

On the other hand, when we take a survey of
the moral world in all the periods of its history,
we perceive throughout almost every part of its
extent, an inextricable maze, and a scene of
clashing and confusion, which are directly op
posed to the harmony and order which pervade
the material system. When we take a retro
spective view of the moral state of mankind,
during the ages that are past, what do we behold,
but a revolting scene of perfidy, avarice, injus
tice, and revenge, — of wars, rapine, devastation,
and bloodshed ; nation rising against nation, one
empire dashing against another, tyrants exercis
ing the most horrid cruelties, superstition and
idolatry immolating millions of victims, and a
set of desperate villains, termed heroes, prowling
over the world, turning fruitful fields into a wil
derness, burning towns and villages, plundering
palaces and temples, drenching the earth with
human gore, and erecting thrones on the ruins
of nations ? Here we behold an Alexander, with
his numerous armies, driving the ploughshare of
destruction through surrounding nations, levelling
cities with the dust, and massacring their inof
fensive inhabitants in order to gratify a mad
ambition, and to be eulogised as a hero, — there
we behold a Xerxes, fired with pride and with
the lust of dominion, leading forward an army of
three millions of infatuated wretches to be
slaughtered by the victorious and indignant
Greeks. Here we behold an Ataric, with his
barbarous hordes, ravaging the southern coun
tries of Europe, overturning the most splendid
monuments of art, pillaging the metropolis of
the Roman empire, and deluging its streets and
houses with the blood of the slain, — there we
behold a Tamerlane overrunning Persia, India,
and other regions of Asia, cai ry ing slaughter and'
devastation in his train, and displaying his spor
tive cruelty, by pounding three or four thousand
people at a time in large mortars, and building
their bodies with bricks and mortar into a wall.
On the one hand, we behold six millions of
Crusadtrs marching in wild confusion through
the eastern parts of Europe, devouring every
tiling before them, like an army of locusts,
breathing destruction to Jews and infidels, and
massacring the inhabitants of Western Asia
with infernal fury. On the other hand, we be-
ftold the immense forces ofJenghiz Kan ravag

ing the kingdoms of Eastern Asia, to an extent
of 15 millions* of square miles, beheading
100,000 prisoners at once, convulsing the world
with terror, and utterly exterminating from the
earth fourteen millions of human beings. At
one period, we behold the ambition and jealousy
of Marius and Sylla embroiling the Romans in
all the horrors of a civil war, deluging the city
of Rome for five days with the blood of her citi
zens, transfixing the heads of her senators with
poles, and dragging their bodies to the Forum to
be devoured by dogs. At another, we behold a
Nero trampling on the laws of nature and socie
ty, plunging into the most abominable debauche
ries, practising cruelties which fill the mind with
horror, murdering his wife Octavia, and his
mother Agrippina, insulting Heaven and man
kind by offering up thanksgivings to the gods on
the perpetration of these crimes, and setting
fire to Rome, that he might amuse himself with
the universal terror and despair which that ca
lamity inspired. At one epoch, we behold the
Goths and Vandals rushing like an overflowing
torrent, from east to west, and from north to
south, sweeping before them every vestige of
civilization and art, butchering all within their
reach without distinction of age or sex, and
marking their path with rapine, desolation, and
carnage. At another, we behold the emissaries
of the Romish See slaughtering, without dis
tinction or mercy, the mild and pious Albigen-
ses, and transforming their peaceful abodes into
a scene of universal consternation and horror,
while the inquisition is torturing thousands of
devoted victims, men of piety and virtue, and
committing their bodies to the flames.

At one period of the worliJ,f almost the whole
earth appeared to be little else than one great
field of battle, in which the human race seemed
to be threatened with utter extermination. Tho
Vandals, Huns, Sarmatians, Alans, and Suevi,
were ravaging Gaul, Spain, Germany, and other
parts of the Roman empire; the Goths were
plundering Rome, arid laying waste the cities of
Italy ; the Saxons and Angles were overrunning
Britain and overturning the government of the
RomanSi, The armies of Justinian and of the
Huns and Vandals were desolating Africa, and
butchering mankind by millions. The whole
forces of Scythia were rushing with irresistible
impulse on the Roman empire, desolating the
countries, and almost exterminating the inhabi
tants wherever they came. , The Persian armies
were pillaging Hierapolis, Aleppo, and the sur
rounding cities, and reducing them to ashes ; and
were laying waste all Asia, from the Tigris to
the Bosphorus. The Arabians under Mahomet

• " The conquests of Jenghiz Kan," says Millot,
"were supposed to extend above eighteen hundred
leajrues from east to west, and a thousand from
south to north-"— Modern History, vol. 1.

t About the fifth, sixth and seventh centuries of thg
Christian era.

S3

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

and his successors were extending their conquests
over Syria, Palestine, Persia, and India, on the
east, and over Egypt, Barbary, Spain, and the
islands of the Mediterranean, on the west ; cut
ting in pieces with their swords all the enemies
of Islamism. In Europe, every kingdom was
shattered to its centre ; in the Mahommedan em
pire in Asia, the Caliphs, Sultans, and Emirs
were waging continual wars ; — new sovereignties
were daily rising, and daily destroyed ; and Af
rica was rapidly depopulating, and verging to
wards desolation and barbarism.

Amidst this universal clashing of nations,
when the whole earth became one theatre of
bloody revolutions, — scenes of horror were dis
played, over which historians wished to draw a
veil, lest they should transmit an example of
inhumanity to succeeding ages — the most fertile
and populous provinces were converted into
deserts, overspread with the scattered ruins of
villages and cities — every thing was wasted and
destroyed with hostile cruelty — famine raged to
such a degree that the living were constrained to
feed on the dead bodies of their fellow-citizens —
prisoners were tortured with the most exquisite
cruelty, and the more illustrious they were, the
more barbarously were they insulted — cities were
ieft without a living inhabitant — public buildings
which resisted the violence of the flames were
levelled with the ground — every art and science
was abandoned — the Roman empire was shatter
ed to its centre and its power annihilated — ava
rice, perfidy, hatred, treachery, arid malevolence
reigned triumphant ; and virtue, benevolence, and
every moral principle were trampled under foot.

Such scenes of carnage and desolation have
been displayed to a certain extent and almost
without intermission, during the whole period of
this world's history. For the page of the histo
rian, whether ancient or modern, presents to our
view little more than revolting details of ambi
tious conquerors carrying ruin and devastation
in their train, of proud despots trampling on the
rights of mankind, of cities turned into ruinous
heaps, of countries desolated, of massacres per
petrated with infernal cruelty, of nations dashing
one against another, of empires wasted and de
stroyed, of political and religious dissensions,
and of the general progress of injustice, immo
rality, and crime. Compared with the details on
these subjects, all the other facts which have oc
curred in the history of mankind are considered
by the historian as mere interludes in the great
drama of the world, and almost unworthy of
being recorded.

Were we to take a survey of the moral world
as it now stands, a similar prospect, on the whole,
would be presented to our view. Though the
shades of depravity with which it is overspread
are not so thick and dark, nor its commotions so
numerous and violent as in ancient times, yet
the aspect of every nation under heaven presents

to our view, features which are directly opposite
to every thing we should expect to contemplate
in a world of systematic order, harmony, and
love. If we cast our eyes towards Asia we shall
find the greater part of five hundred millions of
human beings involved in political commotions,
immersed in vice, ignorance, and idolatry, and
groaning under the lash of tyrannical despots.
In Persia, the cruelty and tyranny of its rulers
have transformed many of its most fertile pro
vinces into scenes of desolation. In Turkey,
the avarice and fiend-like cruelty of the Grand
Seignior and his Bashaws have drenched the
shores of Greece with the blood of thousands,
turned Palestine into a wilderness, and rendered
Syria, Armenia, and Kurdistan scenes of injus
tice and rapine. In China and Japan a spirit
of pride and jealousy prevents the harmonious
intercourse of other branches of the human fa
mily, and infuses a cold-blooded selfishness into
the breasts of their inhabitants, and a contempt
of surrounding nations. Throughout Tartary,
Arabia, and Siberia, numerous hostile tribes are
incessantly prowling among deserts and forests
in quest of plunder, so that travellers are in con
tinual danger of being either robbed, or murder
ed, or dragged into captivity. — If we turn our
eyes upon Africa, we behold human nature sunk
into a state of the deepest degradation — the states
of Barbary in incessant hostile commotions, and
plundering neighbouring nations both by sea and
land — the petty tyrants of Dahorny, Benin, As-
hantee, Congo, and Angola, waging incessant
wars with neighbouring tribes, masssacring
their prisoners in cold blood, arid decorating their
palaces with their skulls — while other degraded
hordes, in conjunction with civilized nations, are
carrying oa a traffic in man-stealing and slavery,
which has stained the human character with
crimes at which humanity shudders. — II" we turn
our eyes towards Amtrica, we ^liall find that war
and hostile incursions are the principal employ
ments of their native tribes, and that the malig
nity of infernal demons, is displayed in the tor
tures they inflict upon the prisoners taken in
battle, while anarchy, intolerance, and political
commotions, still agitate a great proportion of
its more civilized inhabitants.— If we take a sur
vey of the Eastern Archipelago, and of the isl
ands which are scattered over the Pacific Ocean,
we shall behold immense groups of human beings,
instead of living in harmony and affection, dis
playing the most ferocious dispositions towards
each other, hurling stones, spears and darts on
every stranger who attempts to land upon their
coasts; offering up human sacrifices to their in
fernal deities, and feasting with delight on the
flesh and blood of their enemies.

If we direct our attention towards Europe, the
most tranquil and civilized portion of the globe —
even here we shall behold numerous symptoms of
anarchy and moral disorder. During

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

39

the last thirty years, almost every nation in this
quarter of the world has been convulsed to its
centre, and become the scene of hostile commo
tions, of revolutions, and of garments rolled in
blood. We have beheld France thrown from a
state of aristocratical tyranny and priestly do
mination into a state of popular anarchy and
confusion — her ancient institutions razed to the
ground, her princes and nobles banished from
her territories, and her most celebrated philoso
phers, in company with the vilest miscreants,
perishing under the stroke of the guillotine.
We have beheld a Buonaparte riding in triumph
through the nations over heaps of slain, scat
tering " firebrands, arrows, and death," and
producing universal commotion wherever he
appeared; overturning governments, "changing
times," undermining the thrones of emperors,
and setting up kings at his pleasure. We have
beheld his successors again attempting to en
twine the chains of tyranny around the necks
of their subjects, and to hurl back the moral
world into the darkness which overspread the
nations during the reign of Papal superstition.
We have beheld Poland torn in pieces by the
insatiable fangs of Russia, Austria, and Prus
sia, her fields drenched with blood, her patriots
slaughtered, and her name blotted out from the
list of nations. We have beheld Moscow
enveloped in flames, its houses, churches, and
palaces tumbled into ruins, the blackened car
cases of its inhabitants blended with the frag
ments, and the road to Smolensko covered with
the shattered remains of carriages, muskets,
breast-plates, helmets, and garments strewed in
every direction, and thousands of the dying and
the dead heaped one upon another in horrible
confusion, and swimming in blood. We have
beheld the demon of war raging at Borodino,
Austerlitz, the Tyrol, Wilna, Smolensko, Tra
falgar, Camperdown, Eylau, Jena, La Vendee,
Cadiz, Warsaw, Friedland, Talavera, Sebas-
lian, Lutzen, Leipsic, and Waterloo, demo
lishing cities, desolating provinces, and blending
the carcasses of horses and cattle with the
mangled remains of millions of human beings.
We have beheld Spain and Portugal thrown into
anarchy and commotion, and become the scenes
of bloody revolutions — Turkey waging war with
religion and liberty — Greece overrun with blood
thirsty Mahometans, and her shores and islands
the theatre of the most sanguinary contests.

And what do we just now behold when we
cast our eyes on surrounding nations 1 Russia
pushing forward her numerous armies into the
confines of Persia for the purpose of depredation
and slaughter, — the Grand Seignior ruling his
subjects with a rod of iron, and decorating the
gates of his palace with hundreds of the heads
and ears of his enemies,* while his Janizaries are

• In a communication from Odessa, dated August
1, 1941, it was stated, that the five hundred heads and

fomenting incessant insurrections, — the Greeks
engaged in a contest for liberty, surroundea
with blood-thirsty antagonists, and slaughtered
without mercy, — Portugal the scene of intestine
broils and revolutions, — Spain under the control
of a silly priest-ridden tyrant, to gratify whose
lust of absolute power, thousands of human
beings have been sacrificed, and hundreds of
eminent patriots exiled from their native land, —
the Inquisition torturing its unhappy victims, —
the Romish church thundering its anathemas
against all who are opposed to its interests, —
the various sectaries of Protestants engaged in
mutual recriminations and contentions, — and the
princes and sovereigns on the Continent almost
all combined to oppose the progress of liberty,
and to prevent the improvement of the human
mind.

If we come nearer home, and take a view of
the every-day scenes which meet our eye, what
do we behold ? A mixed scene of bustling and
confusion, in which vice and malevolence are
most conspicuous, and most frequently triumph
ant. When we contemplate the present aspect
of society, and consider the prominent disposi
tions and principles which actuate the majority
of mankind, — the boundless avaricious desires
which prevail, and the base and deceitful means
by which they are frequently gratified — the
unnatural contentions which arise between hus
bands and wives, fathers and children, brothers
and sisters — the jealousies which subsist betv/een
those of the same profession or employment —
the bitterness and malice with which law-suits
are commenced and prosecuted — the malevolence
and caballing which attend electioneering con
tests — the brawlings, fightings, and altercations,
which so frequently occur in our streets, ale
houses, and taverns — and the thefts, robberies,
and murders, which are daily committed, — when
we contemplate the haughtiness and oppression
of the great and powerful, and the insubordina
tion of the lower ranks of society — when we see
widows and orphans suffering injustice ; the
virtuous persecuted and oppressed ; meritorious
characters pining in poverty and indigence ;
fools, profligates, and tyrants, rioting in wealth
and abundance ; generous actions unrewarded ;
crimes unpunished ; and the vilest of men raised
to stations of dignity and honour — we cannot but
admit, that the moral world presents a scene of
discord arid disorder, which mar both the sensi
tive and intellectual enjoyments of mankind.

Such, then, are the moral aspects of our world,
and the disorders which have prevailed during

twelve hundred ears of the Greeks, sent Ly the Cap
tain Pac.ha to Constantinople, after the taking of
Ipsara, were exposed on the Rate of the seraglio,
on the 20th of July, with the following inscription:
" God has blessed the arms of the Mussulmans, and
the detestable rebels of Ipsara are extirpated from
the face of the world," &c. It was added, "AH
friendly powers have congratulated the Sublime
Porte on this victory."

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

every period of its history. They evidently
present a striking contrast to the beauty and
harmony which pervade the general constitution
of the material system — to the majestic move
ments of the planetary orbs, the regular succes
sion of day and night, and the vicissitudes of
the seasons ; the changes of the moon, the
ebbing and flowing of the sea ; the admirable
functions of the human system ; and the harmo
nious adaptations of light and heat, air and
water, and the various objects in the mineral and
vegetable kingdoms to the wants and the comfort
of animated beings. And can we, for a moment,
suppose that this scene of moral disorder and
anarchy was the ultimate end for which the
material system was created ? Can we suppose
that the earth is every moment impelled in its
annual and diurnal course by the hand of Omni
potence—that it presents new beauties every
opening spring — brings forth the treasures of
autumn, and displays so many sublime and vari
egated landscapes — that the sun diffuses his
light over all its regions, that the moon cheers
the shades of night, and the stars adorn the ca
nopy of the sky, from one generation to another
— merely that a set of robbers and desperadoes,
and the murderers of nations, might prowl over
the world for the purpose of depredation and
slaughter, that tyrants might gratify their mad
ambition, that vice might triumph, that virtue
might be disgraced, that the laws of moral order
might be trampled under foot, and that the suc
cessive generations of mankind might mingle in
this bustling and discordant scene for a few
years, and then sink for ever into the shades of
annihilation ? Yet such a conclusion we are
obliged to admit, if there is no future state in
which the present disorders of the moral world
will be corrected, and the plan of the divine go
vernment more fully developed. And if this con
clusion be admitted, how shall we be able to
perceive or to vindicate the wisdom of the Cre
ator in his moral administration? We account
it folly in a human being when he constructs a
machine, either for no purpose at all, or for no
good purpose, or for the promotion of mischief.
And how can we avoid ascribing the same im
perfection to the Deity, if the present state of
the moral world be the ultimate end of all his
physical arrangements ? But his wisdom is
most strikingly displayed in the adaptations and
arrangements which relate to the material sys
tem, — and a Being possessed of boundless intel
ligence must necessarily be supposed to act in
consistency with himself. He cannot display
wisdom in the material system, and folly in those
arrangements %vhich pertain to the world of mind.
To suppose the contrary, would be to divest him
of his moral attributes, and even to call in ques
tion his very existence.

We are therefore necessarily led to conclude,
that the present state of the moral worW is only

a small part of the great plan of God's moral go
vernrnent — the commencement of a series of
dispensations to be completed in a future scene
of existence, in which his wisdom, as well as all
his other attributes, will be fully displayed before
the eyes of his intelligent offspring. If this con
clusion be admitted, it is easy to conceive, how
the moral disorders which now exist may be rec
tified in a future world, and the intelligent uni
verse restored to harmony and happiness, and
how those moral dispensations which now appear
dark and mysterious, will appear illustrative of
divine wisdom and intelligence, when contem
plated as parts of one grand system, which is to
run parallel in duration with eternity itself. But,
if this be rejected, the moral world presents to
our view an inextricable maze, a chaos, a scene
of interminable confusion, and no prospect ap
pears of its being ever restored to harmony and
order. The conduct of the Deity appears
shrouded in impenetrable darkness ; and there
is no resisting of the conclusion, that imperfec
tion and folly are the characteristics of the Al
mighty — a conclusion from which the mind
shrinks back with horror, and which can never
be admitted by any rational being who recognises
a supreme intelligence presiding over the affairs
of the universe.

SECTION IX.

ON THE UNEQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF RE
WARDS AND PUNISHMENTS IN THE PRE
SENT STATE.

The unequal distribution of rewards and pu
nishments in the present state, viewed in con
nexion with the justice and other attributes cf
the Deity, forms another powerful argument in
support of the doctrine of a future state.

It is admitted, to a certain extent, that "vir
tue is its own reward, and vice its own punish
ment." The natural tendency of virtue, or an
obedience to the laws of God, is to produce hap
piness ; and were it universally practised, it
would produce the greatest degree of happiness
of which human nature in the present state is
susceptible. In like manner, the natural ten
dency of vice is to produce misery : and were its
prevalence universal and uncontrolled, the world
would be transformed into a society of demons,
and every species of happiness banished from
the abodes of men. By connecting happiness
with the observance of his laws, and misery with
the violation of them, the Governor of the world,
in the general course of his providence, gives a
display of the rectitude of his character, and the
impartiality of his allotments towards the sub
jects of his government.

But, although these positions hold true, in th*»
general course of human affairs, there ire innu«

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

merable cases in which the justice of God, and
the impartiality of his procedure, would be liable
to be impeached, if this world were the only
scep« of rewards and punishments. We behold
a poor starving wretch, whom hunger has im
pelled to break open a house, in order to satisfy
his craving appetite, or to relieve the wants of a
helpless family, dragged with ignominy to the
scaffold, to suffer death for his offence. We be
hold, at the same time, the very tyrant by whose
order the sentence was executed, who has plun
dered provinces, and murdered millions of human
beings, who has wounded the peace of a thousand
families, and produced universal consternation
and despair wherever he appeared — regaling
himself in the midst of his favourites, in perfect
security from human punishments. Instead of
being loaded with fetters, and dragged to a dun
geon, to await in hopeless agony the punishment
of his crimes, he dwells amidst all the luxuries
and splendours of a palace ; his favour is courted
by surrounding attendants ; his praises are chant
ed by orators and poets ; the story of his exploits
is engraved in brass and marble ; and historians
stand ready to transmit his fame to future gene
rations. How does the equity of the divine go
vernment appear, in such cases, in permitting an
undue punishment to be inflicted on the least of
fender, and in loading the greatest miscreant
with unmerited enjoyments ?

Again, in almost every period of the world,
we behold men of piety and virtue who have
suffered the most unjust and cruel treatment from
the hands of haughty tyrants and blood-thirsty
persecutors. It would require volumes to de
scribe the instruments of cruelty which have
been invented by these fiend-like monsters, and
the excruciating torments which have been en
dured by the victims of their tyranny, while
justice seemed to slumber, and the perpetrators
were permitted to exult in their crimes. The
Waldenses, who lived retired from the rest of
the world, among the bleak recesses of the Alps,
were a people distinguished for piety, industry,
and the practice of every moral virtue. Their
incessant labour subdued the barren soil, and
prepared it both for grain and pasture. In the
course of two hundred and fifty years they in
creased to the number of eighteen thousand, oc
cupying thirty villages, besides hamlets, the
workmanship of their own hands. Regular
priests they had none, nor any disputes about
religion ; neither had they occasion for courts of
justice ; for brotherly love did not suffer them to
go to law. They worshipped God according to
the dictates of their conscience and the rules of
his word, practised the precepts of his law, and
enjoyed the sweets of mutual affection and love.
Yet this peaceable and interesting people be
came the victims of the most cruel and bloody
persecution. In the year 1540, the parliament
of Provence condemned nineteen of them to be

burned for heresy, their trees to be rooted up,
and their houses to be razed to the ground.
Afterwards a violent persecution commenced
against the whole of this interesting people, and
an army of banditti was sent to carry the hellish
purpose into effect. The soldiers began with
massacring the old men, women, and children,
all having fled who were able to fly ; and then
proceeded to burn their houses, barns, corn, and
whatever else appertained to them. In the town
of Cabriere sixty men and thirty women, who
had surrendered upon promise of life, were but
chered each of them without mercy. Some
women, who had taken refuge in a church, were
dragged out and burnt alive. Twenty-two vil
lages were reduced to ashes ; and that populous
and flourishing district was again turned into a
cheerless desert. Yet, after all these atrocities
had been committed, the proud pampered priests,
at whose instigation this prosecution was com
menced, were permitted to live in splendour, to
exult over the victims of their cruelty, to revel
in palaces, and to indulge in the most shameful
debaucheries. — If the present be the only state
of punishments and rewards, how shall we vin
dicate the rectitude of the Almighty, in such
dispensations ?

In the reign of Louis XIV. and by the orders
of that despot, the Protestants of France were
treated with the most wanton and diabolical cru
elty. Their houses were rifled, their wives and
daughters ravished before their eyes, and their
bodies forced to endure all the torments that in
genious malice could contrive. His dragoons
who were employed in this infamous expedi
tion, pulled them by the hair of their heads,
plucked the nails of their fingers and toes, prick
ed their naked bodies with pins, smoked them in
their chimneys with wisps of wet straw, threw
them into fires and held them till they were al
most burnt, slung them into wells of water, dip
ped them into ponds, took hold of them with red
hot pincers, cut and slashed them with knives,
and beat and tormented them to death in a most
unmerciful and cruel manner. Some were hanged
on the gallows, and others were broken upon
wheels, and their mangled bodies were either left
unburied, or cast into lakes and dunghills, with
every mark of indignation and contempt. Ma-
reschal Montrevel acted a conspicuous part in
these barbarous executions. He burnt five hun
dred men, women, and children, who were as
sembled together in a mill to pray and sing
psalms; he cut the throats of four hundred of the
new converts at Montpelier, and drowned their
wives and children in the river, near Aignes
Mortes. Yet the haughty tyrant by whose or
ders these barbarous deeds were committed,
along with his mareschals and grandees, who as
sisted in the execution — instead of suffering the
visitations of retributive justice, continued, for
thirty years after this period, to riot in all the

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

splendours of absolute royalty, entering into so-
,emn treaties, and breaking them when he plea
sed, and arrogating to himself divine honours ;
ana his historians, instead of branding his me
mory with infamy, have procured for him the
appellation of Louis THE GREAT.

A thousand examples of this description might
be collected from the records even of modern
history, were it necessary for the illustration of
this topic. The horrible cruelties which were
committed on the Protestant inhabitants in the
Netherlands by the agents of Charles V. and
Philip II. of Spain, where more than a hundred
thousand persons of respectable characters were
butchered without mercy by the Dukes of Alva
and Parma, for their adherence to the religion
of the Reformers, — the dreadful massacres which
took place, on St. Bartholomew's day, in Paris
and throughout every province of France — the
persecutions of the Protestants in England, du
ring the reign of Q,ueen Mary, when the fires
of Smithfield were kindled to consume the bodies
of the most pious and venerable men — the Irish
massacre in the reign of Charles I. when more
than 40,000 inoffensive individuals were slaugh
tered without distinction of age, sex, or condi
tion, and with every circumstance of ferocious
cruelty — the persecutions endured by the Scot
tish Presbyterians, when they were driven from
their dwellings, and hunted like wild beasts by
the blood-thirsty Claverhouse and his savage
dragoons — the many thousands of worthy men
who have fallen victims to the flames, and the
cruel tortures inflicted by the Inquisitors of
Spain, while their haughty persecutors were per
mitted to riot on the spoils of nations — the fiend-
like cruelties of the Mogul emperors in their
bloody wars — the devastations and atrocities com
mitted by the Persian despots — the massacre of
the Gardiotes by Ali Pacha, and of the inhabi
tants of Scio by the ferocious Turks — are only
a few instances out of many thousands, which
the annals of history record of human beings suf
fering the most unjust and cruel treatment, while
their tyrannical persecutors were permitted to
prosecute their diabolical career without suffer
ing the punishment due to their crimes. When
the mind takes a deliberate review of all the re
volting details connected with such facts, it is
naturally led to exclaim, " Wherefore do the
wicked live, become old, yea are mighty in-power?
Is there no reward for the righteous ? Is there no
punishment for the workers of iniquity? Is there
no God that judgeth in the earth?" And, in
deed, were there no retributions beyond the limits
of the present life, we should be necessarily
obliged to admit one or other of the following con
clusions, — either that no Moral Governor of the
worid exists, or, that justice and judgment are
not the foundation of his throne.

When we take a survey of the moral world
wound us, aa it exists in the present dayj the

same conclusion forces itself upon the mind.
When we behold, on the one hand, the virtuous
and upright votary of religion struggling with
poverty and misery, treated with scorn and con
tempt, persecuted on account of his integrity and
piety, despoiled of his earthly enjoyments, or
condemned to an ignominious death ; and on th«
other, the profligate and oppressor, the insolent
despiser of God and religion, passing his days
in affluence and luxurious ease, prosecuting with
impunity his unhallowed courses, and robbing the
widow and the fatherless of their dearest com
forts — when we behold hypocrisy successful in
all its schemes, and honesty and rectitude over
looked and neglected — the destroyers of our spe
cies loaded with wealth and honours, while the
benefactors of mankind are pining in obscurity
and indigence — knaves and fools exalted to posts
of dignity and honour, and men of uprightness
and intelligence treated with scorn, and doomed
to an inglorious obscurity — criminals of the deep
est dye escaping with impunity, and generous
actions meeting with a base reward — when we
see young men of virtue and intelligence cut off
in early life, when they were just beginning to
bless mankind with their philanthropic labours,
and tyrants and oppressors continuing the pests
of society, and prolonging their lives to old age
in the midst of their folly and wickedness — hu
man beings torn from their friends and their na
tive home, consigned to perpetual slavery, and
reduced below the level of the beasts, while their
oppressors set at defiance the laws of God and
man, revel in luxurious abundance, and prosper
in their crimes ; — when we behold one nation
and tribe irradiated with intellectual light, ano
ther immersed in thick darkness ; one enjoying
the blessings of civilization and liberty, another
groaning under the lash of despotism, and doomed
to slavery and bondage, — when we contemplate
such facts throughout every department of the
moral world, can we suppose, for a moment, that
the Divine administration is bounded by the visi
ble scene of things, that the real characters of
men shall never be brought to light, that vice is
to remain in eternal concealment and impunity,
and that the noblest virtues are never to receive
their just " recompence of reward ?" To admit
such conclusions would be in effect to deny the
wisdom, goodness, and rectitude of flie Ruler of
the world, or to suppose, that his ail-wise and
benevolent designs may be defeated by the folly
and wickedness of human beings. But such con
clusions are so palpably and extravagantly ab
surd, that the only other alternative, the reality
of a future state of existence, maybe pronounced
to have the force of a moral demonstration. So
that, had we no other argument to produce in
support of the doctrine of a future state of retri
bution, this alone would be sufficient to carry
conviction to every mind that recognises the ex
istence of a Supreme Intelligence, and entertains

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

just views of the attributes which must neces
sarily be displayed in his moral administra
tion.

When this conclusion is once admitted, it
removes the perplexities, and solves all the
difficulties which naturally arise in the mind,
when it contemplates the present disordered state
of the moral world, and the apparently capricious
manner in which punishments and rewards are
dispensed. Realizing this important truth, we
need not be surprised at the unequal distribution
of the Divine favours among the various nations
and tribes of mankind ; since they are all placed
on the first stage of their existence, and eternity
is rich in resources, to compensate for all the
defects and inequalities of fortune which now
exist. We need not be overwhelmed with an
guish when we behold the pious and philanthro
pic youth cut down at the commencement at his
virtuous career, since those buds of virtue which
began to unfold themselves with so much beauty
in the present life, will be fully expanded and
bring forth nobler fruits of righteousness in that
life which will never end. We need not wonder
when we behold tyrants and profligates triumph
ing, and the excellent ones of the earth trampled
under foot, since the future world will present a
scene of equitable administration, in which the
sorrows of the upright will be turned into joy,
the triumphs of the wicked into confusion and
shame, and every one rewarded according to his
works. We need not harass our minds with
perplexing doubts, respecting the wisdom and
equity of the dispensations of Providence ; since
the moral government of God extends beyond
the limits of this world, and all its dark and in
tricate mazes will be fully unravelled in the light
of eternity.

-" The. great eternal scheme

Involving all, and in a perfect whole
Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads,
To Reason's eye will then clear up apace.

— Then shall we see the cause

Why unassuming "Worth in secret liv'd,

And died neglected : why the good man's share

In life was gall and bitterness of soul ;

Why the lone widow and her orphans pin'd

In starving solitude, while Luxury,

In palaces, lay straining her low thought,

To form unreal wants ; why heaven-born Truth

And Moderation fair, wore the red marks

Of Superstition's scourge ; why licens'd Pain,

That cruel spoiler, that imbosom'd foe,

Imbitter'd all our bliss.— Ye good distrest !

Ye noble Few! who here unbending stand

Beneath life's pressure, yet bear up awhile,

And what your bounded view, which only saw

A little part, deemed evil, is no more :

The storms of Wintry time will quickly pass.

And one unbounded Spring encircle all.—

Thompson's Winter.

Thus it appears, that, although God, in the
general course of his providence, has connected
nappiness with the observance of his laws, and
misery with the violation of them, in order to
display the rectitude of his nature, and his ha
tred of moral evil ; vet he has, at the same time,

in numerous instances, permitted vice to tri
umph, and virtue to be persecuted and oppress
ed, to convince us, that his government of hu
man beings is not bounded by the limits of time,
but extends into the eternal world, where the
system of his moral administration will be com
pleted, his wisdom and rectitude justified, and
the mysterious ways of his Providence com
pletely unravelled.

This argument might have been farther illus
trated from a consideration of those moral pe».
ceptions implanted in the human constitution,
and which may be considered as having the
force of moral laws proceeding from the Gover
nor of the universe. The difference between
right and wrong, virtue and vice, is founded upon
the nature" of things, and is perceptible by every
intelligent agent whose moral feelings are not al
together blunted by vicious indulgences. Were
a man to affirm that there is no difference be
tween justice and injustice, love and hatred,
truth and falsehood ; that it is equally the same
whether we be faithful to a friend or betray him
to his enemies, whether servants act with fide
lity to their masters or rob them of their pro
perty, whether rulers oppress iheir subjects or
promote their interests, and whether parents
nourish their children with tenderness, or smo
ther them in their cradles — he would at once
be denounced as a fool and a madman, and his
sed out of society. The difference between such
actions is eternal and unchangeable, and every
moral agent is endued with a faculty which en
ables him to perceive it. We can choose to
perform the one class of actions and to refrain
from the other ; we can comply with the voice
of conscience which deters us from the one,
and excites us to the other, or we can resist
its dictates, and we can judge whether our ac
tions deserve reward or punishment. Now,
if God has endued us with such moral percep
tions and capacities, is it reasonable to suppose,
that it is equally indifferent to him whether we
obey or disobey the laws he has prescribed?
Can we ever suppose, that He who governs the
universe is an unconcerned spectator of the good
or evil actions that happen throughout his do
minions 1 or that he has left man to act, with
impunity, according to his inclinations, whether
they be right or wrong ? If auch suppositions
cannot be admitted, it follows that man is ac
countable for his actions, and that it must be an
essential part of the Divine government to bring
every action into judgment, and to punish or re
ward his creatures according to their works.
And if it appear, in point of fact, that such retri
butions are not fully awarded in the present
state, nor a visible distinction made between the
righteous and the violators of his law, we must
necessarily admit the conclusion, that the full
and equitable distribution of punishments and
rewards is reserved to a future world, when a

44

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

risible and everlasting distinction will be made,
and the whole intelligent creation clearly dis
cern between him that served God and him that
served him not.

SECTION X.

Olf THE ABSURDITY OF SUPPOSING THAT
THE THINKING PRINCIPLE IN MAN WILL
EVER BE ANNIHILATED.

It is highly unreasonable, if not absurd, to
suppose that the thinking principle in man will
ever be annihilated.

In so far as our knowledge of the universe
extends, there does riot appear a single instance
of annihilation throughout the material system.
There is no reason to believe, that, throughout
all the worlds which are dispersed through the
immensity of space, a single atom has ever yet
been, or ever will be annihilated. From a va
riety of observations, it appears highly probable,
that the work of creation is still going forward
in the distant regions of the universe, and that
the Creator is replenishing the voids of space
with new worlds and new orders of intelligent
beings; and it is reasonable to believe, from
the incessant agency of Divine Omnipotence,
that new systems will be continually emerging
into existence while eternal ages are rolling on.
But no instance has yet occurred of any sys
tem or portion of matter either in heaven or
earth having been reduced to annihilation.
Changes are indeed incessantly taking place,
in countless variety, throughout every depart
ment of nature. The spots of the sun, the
belts of Jupiter, the surface of the moon, the
rings of Saturn, and several portions of the
starry heavens, are frequently changing or vary
ing their aspects. On the earth, mountains are
crumbling down, the caverns of the ocean filling
up, islands are emerging from the bottom of the
sea, and again sinking into the abyss ; the
ocean is frequently shifting its boundaries, and
trees, plants, and wavinf grain now adorn
many tracts which were once overwhelmed with
the foaming billows. Earthquakes have pro
duced frequent devastations, volcanoes have
overwhelmed fruitful fields with torrents of burn
ing lava, and even the solid strata within the
bowels of the earth have been bent and dis
rupted by the operation of some tremendous
power. The invisible atmosphere is likewise
the scene of perpetual changes and revolutions,
by the mixture and decomposition of gases, the
respiration of animals, the process of evapora
tion, the action of winds, and the agencies of
'•ght, heat, and the electric and magnetic fluids.
The vegetable kingdom is either progressively
advancing to maturity or falling into decay.

Between the plants and the seeds of vegeta'6.«»
there is not the most distant similarity. A
small seed, only one-tenth of an inch in diame
ter, after rotting for a while in the earth, shoots
forth a stem ten thousand times greater in size
than the germ from which it sprung, the branches
of which afford an ample shelter for the fowls of
heaven. The tribes of animated nature are
likewise in a state of progressive change, either
from infancy to maturity and old age, or from
one state of existence to another. The cater
pillar is first an egg, next, a crawling worm,
then a nymph or chrysalis, and afterwards a
butterfly adorned with the most gaudy colours.
The may-bug beetle burrows in the earth where
it drops its egg, from which its young creeps
out in the shape of a maggot, which cast its
skin every year, and, in the fourth year, it
bursts from the earth, unfolds its wings, and
sails in rapture " through the soft air." The
animal and vegetable tribes are blended, by a
variety of wonderful and incessant changes.
Animal productions afford food and nourish
ment to the vegetable tribes, and the various
parts of animals are compounded of matter de
rived from the vegetable kingdom. The wool
of the sheep, the horns of the cow, the teeth of
the lion, the feathers of the peacock, and the
skin of the deer — nay, even our hands and feet,
our eyes and ears, with which we handle and
walk, see and hear, and the crimson fluid that
circulates in our veins — are derived from plants
and herbs which once grew in the fields, which
demonstrate the literal truth of the ancient say
ing, " All flesh is grass."

Still, however, amidst these various and un
ceasing changes and transformations, no exam
ple of annihilation has yet occurred to the eye
of the most penetrating observer. When a
piece of coal undergoes the process of combus
tion, its previous form disappears, and its com
ponent parts are dissolved, but the elementary
particles of which it was composed still remain
in existence. Part of it is changed into caloric,
part into gas, and part into tar, smoke, and
ashes, which are soon formed into other combi
nations. When vegetables die, or are decom
posed by heat or cold, they are resolved into
their primitive elements, caloric, light, hydrogen,
oxygen, and carbon, — which immediately enter
into new combinations, and assist in carrying
forward the designs of Providence in other de
partments of nature. But such incessant,
changes, so far from militating against the idea
of the future existence of man, are, in reality,
presumptive proofs of his immortal destination.
For, if amidst the perpetual transformations;
changes, and revolutions that are going forward
throughout universal nature in all its depart
ments, no particle of matter is ever lost, or re
duced to nothing, it is in the highest degree
improbable, that the thinking principle in man

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

will be destroyed, by the change which takes
piace at the moment of his dissolution. That
change, however great and interesting to the in
dividual, may be not more wonderful, nor more
mysterious than the changes which take place in
the different states of existence to which a ca
terpillar is destined. This animal, as already
stated, is first an egg, and how different does its
form appear when it comes forth a crawling
worm? After living some time in the cater
pillar state, it begins to languish, and apparently
dies ; it is incased in a tomb, and appears devoid
of life and enjoyment. After a certain period it
acquires new life and vigour, burst its confine
ment, appears in a more glorious form, mounts
upward on expanded wings, and traverses the
regions of the air. And, is it not reasonable,
from analogy, to believe, that man, in his pre
sent state, is only the rudiments of what he
shall be hereafter in a more expansive sphere of
existence? and that, when the body is dissolved
in death, the soul takes its ethereal flight into a
cek?stial region, puts on immortality, and be
comes " all eye, all ear, all ethereal and divine
feeling?"

Since, then, it appears that annihilation forms
no part of the plan of the Creator in the material
world, is it reasonable to suppose, that a system
of annihilation is in incessant operation in the
world of mind? that God is every day creating
thousands of minds, endued with the most capa
cious powers, and, at the same time, reducing to
eternal destruction thousands of those which he
had formerly created ? Shall the material uni
verse exist amidst all its variety of changes, and
shall that noble creature, for whose sake the uni
verse was created, be cut off for ever in the infancy
of its being, and doomed to eternal forgetful-
ness ? Is it consistent with the common dic
tates of reason to admit, that matter shall have a
longer duration than mind, which gives motion
and beauty to every material scene ? Shall the
noble structures of St. Paul and St. Peter sur
vive the ravages of time, and display their beau
tiful proportions to successive generations, while
Wren and Angelo, the architects that planned
them, are reduced to the condition of the clods of
the valley ? Shall the " Novum Organum " of
Bacon, and the "Optics" and "Principia" of
Newton, descend to future ages, to unfold their
sublime conceptions, while the illustrious minds
which gave birth to these productions, are en
veloped in the darkness of eternal night? There
appears a palpable absurdity and inconsistency
in admitting such conclusions. We might al
most as soon believe that the universe would
continue in its present harmony and order, were
its Creator ceasing to exist. " Suppose that the
Deity, through all the lapse of past ages, has
supported the universe by such miracles of power
and wisdom as have already been displayed —
merely that he might please himself with letting

it fall to pieces, and enjoy the spectacle of the
fabric lying in ruins " — would such a design be
worthy of infinite Wisdom, or conformable to
the ideas we ought to entertain of a Being eter
nal and immutable in his nature, and possessed
of boundless perfection? But suppose, farther,
that he will annihilate that rational nature for
whose sake he created the universe, while the
material fabric was still permitted to remain in
existence, would it not appear still more incom
patible with the attributes of a Being of unboun
ded goodness and intelligence? To blot out
from existence the rational part of his creation,
and to cherish desolation and a heap of rubbish,
is such an act of inconsistency, that the mind
shrinks back with horror at the thought of attri
buting it to the All-Wise and Benevolent Cre
ator.

We are, therefore, necessarily led to tho fol
lowing conclusion : " That, when the human
body is dissolved, the immaterial principle by
which it was animated, continues to think and
act, either in a state of separation from all body,
or in some material vehicle to which it is inti
mately united, and which goes off with it at
death ; or else, that it is preserved fay the Father
of spirits for the purpose of animating a body in
some future state." The soul contains no prin
ciple of disolution within itself, since it is an
immaterial uncompounded substance ; and, there
fore, although the material creation were to be
dissolved and to fall into ruins, its energies might
still remain unimpaired, and its faculties " flou
rish in immortal youth,

" Unhurt, amidst the war of elements,

The wrecks of matter and the crush of worlds."

And the Creator is under no necessity to annihi
late the soul for want of power to support its
faculties, for want of objects on which to exer
cise them, or for want of space to contain the
innumerable intelligences that are incessantly
emerging into existence ; for the range of im
mensity is the theatre of his Omnipotence, and
that powerful Energy, which has already brought
millior.s of systems into existence, can as easily
replenish the universe with ten thousand millions
more. If room were wanted for new creations,
ten thousand additional worlds could be compri
sed within the limits of the solar system, while
a void space of more than a hundred and eighty
thousand miles would still intervene between the
orbits of the respective globes ; and the immea
surable spaces which intervene between our
planetary system and the nearest stars, would af
ford an ample range for the revolutions of mil
lions of worlds. And, therefore, although every
soul, on quitting its mortal frame, were clothed
with a new material vehicle, there is ample
scope in the spaces of the universe, and in the
omnipotent energies of the Creator, for the full
exercise of all its powers, and for every enjov-

46

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

ment requisite to its happiness. So that in
every point of view in which we can contemplate
the soul of man and the perfections of its Crea
tor, it appears not only improbable, but even
absurd in the highest degree, to suppose that the
spark of intelligence in man will ever be extin
guished.

SECTION XI.

ON THE GLOOMY CONSIDERATIONS AND AB
SURD CONSEQUENCES INVOLVED IN THE
DENIAL OF A FUTURE STATE.

The denial of the doctrine of a future state in
volves in it an immense variety of gloomy con
siderations and absurd consequences.

If the doctrine of a future existence be set
aside, man appears an enigma, a rude abortion,
and a monster in nature, his structure is inex
plicable, and the end for which he was created
on unfathomable mystery ; the moral world is a
scene of confusion, the ways of Providence a
dark impenetrable maze, the universe a vast,
mysterious, and inexplicable system, and the De
ity a Being whose perfections and purposes can
never be traced nor unfolded.

Let us suppose, for a few moments, that there
is no state of existence beyond the grave, and
consequently, that the supposed discoveries of
Revelation are a mere delusion ; and consider
some of the gloomy prospects and absurd conse
quences to which such a supposition necessarily
loads. I shall suppose myself standing in an at
titude of serious contemplation, and of anxious
inquiry respecting the various scenes and objects
which surround me, and the events that pass un
der my review : —

I first of all look into myself, and inquire,
whence I came? whither I am going? who pro
duced me ? of what my body is composed ? what
is the nature of my senses ? of the thinking
principle I feel within me ? and for what purpose
was I ushered into being? I perceive in my body
a wonderful mechanism which I cannot compre
hend : I find by experience, that my will exerci
ses a sovereign power over my muscular system,
so that my hands, feet, arms, and limbs, are dis
posed to obey every impulse, and, at the signal
of a wish, to transport my body from one place
to another. 1 find my thinking principle inti
mately connected with my corporeal frame, and
both acting reciprocally on each other ; but I can
not fathom the manner in which these operations
are effected. I feel ardent desires after enjoy
ments in which I never shall participate, and ca
pacities for knowledge and improvement which I
never can attain. I feel restless and uneasy,
even amidst the beauties of nature, and the plea-
Bures of the senses. I ask whence proceeds the

want I feel amidst all my enjoyments ? Where
fore can I never cease from wishing for something
in addition to what I now possess ? Whence
arises the disgust that so quickly succeeds every
sensitive enjoyment, and the want I feel even in
the midst of abundance? I ask why I was call
ed into existence at this point of duration, rather
than at any other period of that incomprehensible
eternity which is past, or of that which is yet to
corne ? why, amidst the vast, spaces with which
I am encompassed, and the innumerable globen
which surround me, I was chained down to this
obscure corner of creation from which I feel un
able to transport myself? why I was ushered
into life in Britain, and not in Papua or New
Zealand ? and why I was formed to walk erect
and not prone, as the inferior animals? To all
such inquiries I can find no satisfactory answers,
— the whole train of circumstances connected
with my existence appears involved in impene
trable darkness and mystery. Of one thing
only I am fully assured, that my body shall, ere
long, be dissolved and mingle with the dust, and
my intellectual faculties, desires, and capacities
for knowledge be for ever annihilated in the tomb.
I shall then be reduced to nothing, and be as
though I never had been, while myriads of be
ings, like myself, shall start into existence, and
perish in like manner, in perpetual succession
throughout an eternity to come.

I look backward through ages past — I behold
every thing wrapped in obscurity, and perceive
no traces of a beginning to the vast system
around me, — I stretch forward towards futurity,
and perceive no prospect of an end. All things
appear to continue as they were from generation
to generation, invariably subjected to the same
movements, revolutions, and changes, without
any distinct marks which indicate either a be
ginning or an end. — I look around on the scene
of terrestrial nature — I perceive many beauties
in the verdant landscape, and many objects the
mechanism of which is extremely delicate and
admirable — I inhale the balmy zephyrs, am
charmed with the music of the groves, the splen
dour of the sun, and the variegated colouring
spread over the face of creation. But. I behold
other scenes, which inspire melancholy and ter
ror. The tempest, the hurricane and the tor
nado ; the sirocco, the samiel and other poisonous
winds of the desert ; the appalling thunder
cloud, the forked lightnings, the earthquake
shaking kingdoms, and the volcano pouring fiery
streams around its base, which desolate villages
and cities in their course. — I behold in ono
place a confused assemblage of the ruins of na
ture in the form of snow-capped mountains,
precipices, chasms and caverns ; in another,
extensive marshes and immense deserts of bar
ren sand; and, in another, a large proportion of
the globe a scene of sterile desolation, and
bound in the fetters of eternal ice. I know not

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

4?

what opinian to form of a world where so many
beauties are blended with so much deformity,
and so many pleasures mingled with so many
sorrows and scenes of terror, — or what ideas to
entertain of Him who formed it. But I need
give myself no trouble in inquiring into such
subjects ; for my time on earth is short and un
certain, and when I sink into the arms of death,
I shall have no more connexion with the uni
verse.

I take a retrospective view of the moral world
in past ages, in so far as authentic history serves
as a guide, and perceive little else but anarchy,
desolation and carnage — the strong oppressing
the weak, the powerful and wealthy trampling
under foot the poor and indigent — plunderers,
robbers, and murderers, ravaging kingdoms, and
drenching the earth with human gore. I behold
the virtuous and innocent persecuted, robbed and
massacred, while bloody tyrants and oppressors
roll in their splendid chariots, and revel amidst
the luxuries of a palace. In such scenes I per
ceive nothing like regularity or order, nor any
traces of justice or equity in the several allot
ments of mankind ; for since their whole exist
ence terminates in the grave, the virtuous sufferer
can never be rewarded, nor the unrighteous
despot suffer the punishment due to his crimes.
The great mass of human beings appear to be
the sport of circumstances, the victims of op
pression, and the dupes of knavery and ambi
tion, and the moral world at large an assemblage
of discordant elements tossed about like dust
before the whirlwind. I hear virtue applauded,
and vice denounced as odious and hateful. But
what is virtue? A shadow, a phantom, an
empty name ! Why should I follow after virtue
if she interrupts my pleasures, and why should
I forsake vice if she points out the path to pre
sent enjoyment ? It is my wisdom to enjoy life
during the short period it continues; and if
riches be conducive to my enjoyment of happi
ness, why should I fear to procure them either
by deceit, perjury, or rapine ? If sensual in
dulgence contribute to my pleasure, why should
I refrain from drunkenness and debauchery, or
iny other action that suits my convenience or
gratifies my passions, since present enjoyments
are all I can calculate upon, and no retributions
await me beyond the grave.

I feel myself subjected to a variety of suffer
ings, disappointments and sorrows — to poverty
and reproach, loss of friends, corporeal pains and
mental anguish. I am frequently tortured by the
recollection of the past, the feeling of the present,
and the dread of approaching sufferings. But
I see no object to be attained, no end to be ac-
complislied by my subjection to such afflictions :
I suffer merely for the purpose of feeling pain,
wasting my body and hastening its dissolution :
I am sick only to languish under the burden of a
feeble emaciated frame — perplexed and downcast
16

only to sink into deeper perplexities and sorrows ,
oppressed with cares and difficulties only to enter
on a new scene of danger and suffering. No
drop of comfort mingles itself with the bitter cup
of sorrow : no affliction is sweetened and allevi
ated by the prospect of a better world ; for the
gloomy mansions of the grave bound my views
and terminate all rny hopes and fears. How,
then, can I be easy under my sufferings ? how
can I be cordially resigned to the destiny which
appointed them ? or how can I trace the benevo
lence of a superior Being in permitting me thus
to be pained and tormented for no end ? I will
endeavour to bear them with resolute despera
tion, merely because I am borne down by neces
sity to pain and affliction, and cannot possibly
avoid them.

I lift my eyes to the regions above, and con
template the splendours of the starry frame.
What an immensity of suns, and systems and
worlds burst upon my view, when I apply the
telescope to the spaces of the firmament ! How
incalculable their number ! how immeasurable
their distance ! how immense their magnitude !
how glorious their splendour ! how sublime their
movements ! When I attempt to grasp this stu
pendous scene, my imagination is bewildered,
and my faculties overpowered with wonder and
amazement. I gaze, I ponder ; I feel a longing
desire to know something farther respecting the
nature and destination of these distant orbs ; but
my vision is bounded to a general glimpse, my
powers are limited, and when 1 would fly away
to those distant regions, I find myself chained
down, by an overpowering force, to the diminu
tive ball on which I dwell. Wherefore, then,
were the heavens so beautifully adorned, and so
much magnificence displayed in their structure,
and why were they ever presented to my view ;
since I am never to become farther acquainted
with the scenes they unfold? Perhaps this is
the last glance I shall take of the mighty con
cave, before my eyes have closed in enC^ss light.
" Wherefore was light given to him that is in
misery, — to a man whose way is hid, and whom
God hath hedged in ?" Had I been enclosed in
a gloomy dungeon my situation had been toler
able, but here I stand as in a splendid palace,
without comfort and without hope, expecting
death every moment to terminate my prospects ;
and when it arrives, the glories of the heavens
to me will be annihilated for ever.

I behold science enlarging its boundaries, and
the arts advancing towards perfection ; I see nu
merous institutions organizing, and hear lectures
on philosophy delivered for the improvement of
mankind, and I am invited to take a part in those
arrangements which are calculated to produce a
general diffusion of knowledge among all ranks.
But of what use is knowledge to beings who are
soon to lose all consciousness of existence ? It
requires many weary steps and sleepless nights

48

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

to cilmb the steep ascent of science ; and when
we have arrived at the highest point which mor
tals have ever reached, we descry still loftier
regions which we never can approach, — our foot
ing fails, and down we sink into irretrievable
ruin. If our progress in science here were in
troductory to a future scene of knowledge and
enjoyment, it would be worthy of being prose
cuted by every rational intelligence ; but to beings
who are uncertain whether they shall exist in the
universe for another day, it is not only superflu
ous, but unfriendly to their present enjoyments.
For, the less knowledge they acquire of the
beauties and sublimities of nature, and the more
brutish, ignorant and sottish they become, the
less they will feel at the moment when they are
about to be launched into non-existence. Let
Uie mass vof mankind, then, indulge themselves
tn whatever frivolous amusements they may
choose ; do not interrupt their sensual pleasures,
by vainly attempting to engage them in intellec
tual pursuits ; let them eat and drink. aYid revel
and debauch, for to-morrow they die. All that
is requisite, is, to entwine the chains of despo
tism around their necks, to prevent them from
aspiring after the enjoyments of their superiors.
In short, I endeavour to form some conceptions
of the attributes of that great unknown Cause
which produced all things around me. But my
thoughts become bewildered amidst a maze of
unaccountable operations, of apparent contradic
tions and inconsistencies. I evidently perceive
that the Creator of the universe is possessed of
boundless power, but I see no good reason to
conclude that he exercises unerring wisdom, un
bounded goodness and impartial justice. I per
ceive, indeed, some traces of wisdom, in the
construction of my body and its several organs
of sensation ; and of goodness, in the smiling
day, the flowery landscape, and the fertile plains ;
but I know not how to reconcile these with some
other parts of his operations. How can I attri
bute the perfection of wisdom to one who has
implanted in my constitution desires which will
never be gratified, and furnished me with moral
and intellectual faculties which will never be fully
exercised, and who has permitted the moral world
in every age to exhibit a scene of disorder? I
perceive no evidences of his benevolence in sub
jecting me to a variety of sorrows and sufferings
which accomplish no end but the production of
pain ; in tantalizing me with hopes, and alarming
me with fears of futurity which are never to be
realized, and in throwing a veil of mystery over
all his purposes and operations. Nor can I trace
any thing like impartial justice in the bestow-
ment of his favours, for disappointments and
sorrows are equally the lot of the righteous and
the wicked, and frequently it happens that the
innocent are punished and disgraced, while vil
lains and debauchees are permitted to glory in
Iheir crimes. All that I can plainly perceive, is,

the operation of uncontrollable power, directed
by no principle but caprice, and accomplishing
nothing that can inspire ardent affection, or se
cure the permanent happiness of rational beings

Such are some of the gloomy reflections of a
hopeless mortal whose prospect is bounded by
the grave ; and such are some of the horrible con
sequences which the denial of a future state ne
cessarily involves. It throws a veil of darkness
over ths scenes of creation, and wraps in impe
netrable mystery the purposes for which man was
created, — it exhibits the moral world as a chaotic
mass of discordant elements, accomplishing no
end, and controlled by no intelligent agency, — it
represents mankind as connected with each other
merely by time and place, as formed merely for
sensual enjoyment, and destined to perish with
the brutes, — it subverts the foundations of moral
action, removes the strongest motives to the prac
tice of virtue, and opens the flood-gates of every
vice, — it removes the anchor of hope from the
anxious mind, and destroys evey principle that
has a tendency to support us in the midst of suf
ferings, — it throws a damp on every effort to raise
mankind to the dignity of their moral and intel
lectual natures, and is calculated to obstruct the
progress of useful science, — it prevents the mind
from investigating and admiring the beauties of
creation, and involves in a deeper gloom the ruins
of nature which are scattered over the globe,
— it terminates every prospect of becoming more
fully acquainted with the glories of the firma
ment, and every hope of beholding the plans of
Providence completely unfolded, — it involves the
character of the Deity in awful obscurity, it de
prives Him of the attributes of infinite wisdom,
benevolence and rectitude, and leaves him little
more than boundless omnipotence, acting at ran
dom, and controlled by no beneficent agency. In
short, it obliterates every motive to the perform
ance of noble and generous actions, damps the
finest feelings and affections of humanity, leads to
universal scepticism, cuts off* the prospect of
every thing which tends to cheer the traveller in
his pilgrimage through life, and presents to his
view nothing but an immense blank, overspread
with'the blackness of darkness for ever.

Such being the blasphemous and absurd con
sequences which flow from the denial of the
doctrine of a future state of retribution — the
man who obstinately maintains such a position,
must be considered as unworthy not only of tho
name of a philosopher, but of that of a rational
being, and as one who would believe againsl
demonstration, and swallow any absurdity, how
ever extravagant, which quadrates with his
grovelling appetites and passions. Mathema
ticians frequently demonstrate a truth by show- \
ing that its contrary is impossible, or involves
an absurdity. Thus, Euclid demonstrates the
truth of the fourth proposition of the first book
of his Elements, bv showing that its contrar?

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

49

implies this obvious absurdity — " that two
sUaight lines may enclose a space." This
•node of proving the truth of a proposition is
considered by every geometrician, as equally
tonclusive and satisfactory, as the direct method
of demonstration ; because the contrary of every
falsehood must be truth, and the contrary of
every truth, falsehood. And if this mode of
demonstration is conclusive in mathematics, it
o»ight to be considered as equally conclusive in
moral and theological reasoning. If, for exam
ple, the denial of a future existence involves in
it the idea that God is not a Being possessed of
impartial justice, and of perfect wisdom and
goodness — notwithstanding the striking displays
of the two last-mentioned attributes in the sys
tem of nature — we must, I presume, either ad
mit the doctrine of the immortality of man, or
deny that a Supreme Intelligence presides over
the affairs of the universe. For, a Being di
vested of these attributes, is not entitled to the
name of Deity, nor calculated to inspire intelli-
|ent minds with adoration and love ; but it is
reduced to something like uncontrollable fate, or
mere physical force, impelling the movements
of universal nature without a plan, without dis
crimination, and without intelligence. On the
same principle (the reductio ad absurdum,) we
demonstrate the earth's annual revolution round
the sun. The motions of the planets, as viewed
from the earth, present an inexplicable maze
contrary to every thing we should expect in a
well arranged and orderly system. These bo
dies appear sometimes to move backwards,
sometimes forwards, sometimes to remain sta
tionary, and to describe looped curves, so ano
malous or confused, that we cannot suppose an
Infinite Intelligence the contriver of a system of
such inextricable confusion. Hence the astro
nomer concludes, on good grounds, that the earth
is a moving body ; and no one thoroughly ac
quainted with the subject ever calls it in ques
tion : for when our globe is considered as revolv
ing round the centre of the system in concert
•with the other planetary orbs, all the apparent
irregularities in their motions are completely ac
counted for, and the whole system appears re
duced to a beautiful and harmonious order, in
accordance with every idea we ought to form of
the wisdom and intelligence of its author.

In the same way, the admission of the doc
trine of a future state accounts for the apparent
irregularities of the moral world, and affords a
key for a solution of all the difficulties that may
arise in the mind respecting the equity of the
Divine administration in the present state. In
opposition to the desponding reflections and
gloomy views of the sceptic, it inspires the vir
tuous mind with a lively hope, and throws a
glorious radiance over the scenes of creation,
and ovtr every part of the government of the
Almighty, It exhibits the Self-existent and

Eternal Mind as an object of ineffable sublimity}
grandeur, and loveliness, invested with unerring
wisdom, impartial justice, and boundless bene
volence, presiding over an endless train of intel
ligent minds formed after his image, governing
them with just and equitable laws, controlling
all things by an almighty and unerring hand,
and rendering all his dispensations ultimately
conducive to the happiness of the moral uni
verse. It presents before us an unbounded
scene, in which we may hope to contemplate the
scheme of Providence in all its objects and
bearings, where the glories of the divine per
fections will be illustriously displayed, where
the powers of the human mind will be perpe
tually expanding, and new objects of sublimity
and beauty incessantly rising to the view, in
boundless perspective, world without end. It
dispels the clouds that hang over the present and
future destiny of man, and fully accounts for
those longing looks into futurity which accom
pany us at every turn, and those capacious
powers of intellect, which cannot be fully ex
erted in the present life. It presents the most
powerful motives to a life of virtue, to the per
formance of beneficent and heroic actions, to
the prosecution of substantial science, and to the
diffusion of useful knowledge among all ranks
of mankind. It affords the strongest consola
tion and support, amidst the trials of life, and
explains the reasons of those sufferings to which
we are here exposed, as being incentives to the
exercise of virtue, and as " working out for us a
far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory."
It affords us ground to hope that the veil which
now intercepts our view of the distant regions
of creation, will be withdrawn, and that the
amazing structure of the universe, in all its sub
lime proportions and beautiful arrangements,
will be more clearly unfolded to our view. It
dispels the terrors which naturally surround the
messenger of death, and throws a radiance over
the mansions of the tomb. It cheers the gloomy
vale of death, and transforms it into a passage
which leads to a world of perfection and happi
ness, where moral evil shall be for ever abolished,
where intellectual light shall beam with efful
gence on the enraptured spvit, and where celes
tial virtue, now so frequently persecuted and
contemned, shall be enthroned in undisturbed
and eternal empire.

Since, then, it appears, that the denial of a
future state involves in it so many difficulties,
absurd consequences and blasphemous assump
tions, and the admission of this doctrine throws
a light over the darkness that broods over the
moral world, presents a clue to unravel the
mazes of the divine dispensations, and solves
every difficulty in relation to the present condi
tion of the human race— the pretended philoso
pher who rejects this important truth must be
considered as acting in direct opposition to ihose

50

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

principles of reasoning which he uniformly
admits in his physical and mathematical inves
tigations, and as determined to resist the force
of every evidence which can be adduced in proof
of his immortal destination.

Thus I have endeavored, in the preceding
pages, to prove and illustrate the immortality of
man, from a consideration of the universal be
lief which this doctrine has obtained among all
nations — the desire of immortality implanted in
the human breast — the strong desire of know
ledge, and the capacious intellectual powers with
which man is furnished — the capacity of making
perpetual progress towards intellectual and moral
perfection — the unlimited range of view which is
opened to the human mind throughout the im
mensity of space and duration — the moral powers
of action with which man is endued — the fore
bodings and apprehensions of the mind when
ander the influence of remorse — the disordered
state of the moral world when contrasted with
the systematical order of the material — the une
qual distribution of rewards and punishments,
viewed in connection with the justice of God —
the absurdity of admitting that the thinking prin
ciple in man will be annihilated — and the blas
phemous and absurd consequences which would
follow if the idea of a future state of retribution
were rejected.

Perhaps there are some of these arguments,
taken singly, that would be insufficient fully to
establish the truth of man's eternal destiny ; but
when taken in combination with each other,
they carry irresistible evidence to the mind of
every unbiassed inquirer. They all reflect a
mutual lustre on each other ; they hang together
in perfect harmony ; they are fully consistent
with the most amiable and sublime conceptions
we can form of the Deity ; they are congenial
to the sentiments entertained by the wisest and
best of men in every age ; they are connected
with all the improvements and discoveries in the
moral and physical worlds ; and, like the radii
of a circle, they *\\ converge to the same point,
and lead directly tc the same conclusion. It
appears next to impossible, that such a mutual
harmony, consistency, wid dependence, could
exist among a series of propositions that had no
foundation in truth; and, thtrefore, they ought
to be considered, when taken conjunctly, as
having all the force of a moral demonstration.
They rest on the same principles arid process of
reasoning from which we deduce the V;ng of a
God ; and I see no way of eluding their force,
but by erasing from the mind every idea of a
•Supreme Intelligence. Hence, it has generally,
I might say, uniformly been found, that all na
tions that have acknowledged the existence of a
Divine Being, have likewise recognised the idea

of a future state of retribution. These two
fundamental propositions are so intimately con
nected, and the latter is so essentially dependent
on the former, that they must stand or fall
together. And, consequently, we find, that the
man who obstinately rejects the doctrine of &
future state, either avows himself a down-right
atheist, or acts precisely in ths same way as a
person would do, who believes that a Supreme
Moral Governor has no existence.

But even the principles of atheism itself,
though frequently embraced by vicious charac
ters to allay their fears, are not sufficient to re
move all apprehensions in regard to a future ex
istence. For, if the universe be the production
merely of an eternal succession of causes and
effects, produced by blind necessity impelling the
atoms of matter through the voids of immensity
— what should hinder, that amidst the infinite
combinations arising from perpetual mjotion, men
should be created, destroyed, and again ushered
into existence, with the same faculties, remi
niscences, perceptions and relations as in their
former state of existence? And, although thou
sands or millions of years should intervene be
tween such transformations, yet such periods
might appear as short and imperceptible as the
duration which passes while our faculties are
absorbed in a sound repose. The idea of infi
nity, immensity, and an endless succession of
changes, renders such a supposition not alto
gether impossible. But what a dreadful futurity
might not the mind be left to picture to itself in
such a case ? If the movements of the universe
were the productions of chance, directed by no
intelligent agency, we should incessantly be
haunted with the most dreadful anticipations.
We should see the images of death, annihilation,
and reproduction advancing before us in the
most terrific forms, and should find it impossible
to determine on what foundation the hopes and
the destiny of intelligences reposed. We should
be uncertain whether mankind were doomed to
perish irrecoverably, or, by the operation of some
unknown cause, or accident, to be reproduced, al
some future period in duration, and devoted to
endless torments. The comparative order and
tranquillity which now subsist, or have subsisted
for ages past, could afford us no ground of hope
that such consequences would not take place :
for all the revolutions of time to which we can
look back, are but as a moment in the midst of
infinite duration, and the whole earth but a point
in the immensity of space. So that, during the
lapse of infinite ages, changes, revolutions and
transformations might be effected, which mighf
overwhelm all the intelligent being's that eve.
existed, in eternal misery. Hence it ap^ars,
that even atheism itself, with all its mass of con
tradictions and absurdities, cannot entirely shel
ter its abettors from the terrors of an unknown
futurity.

PROOFS FROM THE LIGHT OF NATURE.

51

I shall only remark farther, on this part of
my subject, — that, although the arguments now
adduced in support of the immortality of man
,vere less powerful than they really are, they
ought to make a deep impression on the mind
of every reflecting person, and determine the
line of conduct which he ought to pursue. If
they were only probable — if they possessed no
greater degree of weight than simply to over
balance the opposite arguments, still, it would be
every man's interest to act on the supposition,
that a future world has a real existence. For,
in the ordinary affairs of human life, and even in
the sciences, our opinions and conduct are gene
rally determined by a series of probabilities, arid
a concurrence of reasons, which supply the want
of more conclusive evidence on subjects which
are not susceptible of strict demonstration. A
merchant, when he purchases a certain commo
dity, has no demonstrative evidence that the sale
of it shall ultimately turn to his advantage ; but,
from a consideration of its price and quality, of
the circumstances of trade, and of his immedi
ate prospects, he determines on the purchase ;
and, bv acting on the ground of similar proba
bilities, he conducts his affairs, so as to issue in
his prosperity and success. A philosopher has
no demonstrative arguments to support the one-
half of the opinions he has formed, in relation
to the phenomena of human society, and of the
material world. His deductions respecting the
causes of the winds, of thunder and lightning, of
volcanic eruptions, of the nature of light, sound,
electricity, galvanism, and other operations in
the system of nature, are grounded on that spe
cies of reasoning which is termed analogical,
and which, at best, amounts to nothing more
than a high degree of probability. Notwith
standing, he feels no hesitation in prosecuting
his experiments and researches, under the gui
dance of such reasoning, confident that it will ul
timately lead him to the innermost recesses of the
temple of truth ; for we know, that the most
splendid discoveries of modern times, have ori
ginated from inquiries and observations, con
ducted on the ground of analogical reasoning. In
like manner, in the important subject under con
sideration, we ought to be determined in our
views and conduct, even by probabilities, although
the arguments adduced should leave the question
at issue in some measure undetermined. For,
if an eternal world has a real existence, we not
only embrace an erroi 1,. rejecting this idea, but,
by acting in conformity with our erroneous con
ceptions, run the risk of exposing ourselves to
the most, dreadful and appalling consequences.
Whereas, if there be no future state, the belief
of it, accompanied with a corresponding conduct,
can produce no bad effect either upon our own
minds or those of others. On the contrary, it
would prove a pleasing illusion during our pas-
•agc, through a world of physical and motal

evil, and would revive the downcast spirit, when
overwhelmed with the disappointments and sor
rows which are unavoidable in our present con
dition. So that, even in this case, we might
adopt the sentiment of an ancient philosopher,*
and say — " If I am wrong in believing that the
souls of men are immortal, I please myself in
my mistake ; nor while I live will I ever choose
that this opinion, with which I am so much de
lighted, should be wrested from me. But if, at
death, I am to be annihilated, as some minute
philosophers suppose, I am not afraid lest those
wise men, when extinct too, should laugh at my
error."

But, if the arguments we have brought for
ward, amount, not only to bare probability, but to
moral certainty, or, at least, to something nearly
approximating to moral demonstration — if the
opposite opinion involves a train of absurdities,
if it throws a dismal gloom over the destiny of
man, and over the scenes of the universe, and if
it robs the Almighty of the most glorious and
distinguishing attributes of his nature — no words
are sufficient to express the folly and inconsisten
cy of the man, by whatever title he may be
distinguished, who is determined to resist con
viction, and who resolutely acts, as if the idea of
a future world were a mere chimera. To pass
through life with indifference and unconcern, to
overlook the solemn scenes of the invisible world,
and to brave the terrors of the Almighty, which
may be displayed in that state — in the face of such
powerful arguments as even reason can produce
— is not only contrary to every prudential princi
ple of conduct, but the height of infatuation and
madness. Such persons must be left to be arou
sed to consideration, by the awful conviction
which will flash upon their minds, when they are
transported to that eternal state which they now
disregard, and find themselves placed at the bar
of an almighty and impartial Judge.

Among the considerations which have been
adduced to prove the immortality of man, I have
taken no notice of an argument, which is almost
exclusively dwelt upon by some writers, namfly,
that which is founded on the immateriality of the
human soul. I have declined entering upon any
illustration of this topic, — 1. Because the proof
of the soul's immateriality involves a variety
of abstract metaphysical discussions, and re
quires replies to various objections which have
been raised against it, which would tend only to
perplex readers endowed with plain common
sense. 2. Because the doctrine of the immate
riality of the thinking principle, however clear
ly it may be proved, can add nothing to the weight
of the considerations already brought forward ;
nor, when considered by itself, can it afford any
conclusive argument in favour of the soul's im
mortality. It simply leads us to this conclusion,

• Cicero.

5*

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

— that, since the soul is an uncompounded sub
stance, it cannot perish by a decomposition of
its parts ; and consequently, may exist , in a se
parate state, in the full exercise of its powers, af
ter its corporeal tenement is dissolved. But its
immortality cannot necessarily be inferred from
its natural capacity of existing in a state of se
paration from the body ; for that being who crea
ted it may, if he pleases, reduce it to annihilation,
since all the works of God, whether material or
immaterial, depend wholly on that power by which
they were originally brought into existence. Its
immortality depends solely on the will of its Cre
ator, without whose sustaining energy the whole
creation would sink into its original nothing. If
it could be proved that God will employ his
power to annihilate the soul, in vain should we at
tempt to demonstrate that it is naturally immor
tal. But whether God wills that the soul should
be destroyed at death, is a very different quest ion
from that which relates to its nature as an imma
terial substance. The whole train of argument
illustrated in the preceding pages, affords, I pre
sume, satisfactory evidence that the Creator will
never annihilate the human soul, but has destined
it to remain in the vigorous exercise of its noble
faculties to all eternity.

Hence it follows, that it is a matter of trivial
importance, when considering the arguments
which prove our immortal destiny, whether we
view the soul as a material, or as an immaterial
substance. Suppose I were to yield to the scep
tic, for a moment, the position, " that the soul
is a material substance, and cannot exist but in
connexion with a material frame," what would
he gain by the concession? It would not sub
tract a single atom from the weight of evidence
which has already been brought forward to prove
the immortality of man. For, if we can prove
that God has willed the immortality of the soul
and, consequently, has determined to interpose
his almighty power, in order to support its fa
culties throughout an eternal existence, in vain
•hall he have proved that it is not immortal in
& naiurt. He who created the human soul and

endued it with so many noble faculties, can coo
tinue its existence, through an unlimited esteni
of duration, in a thousand modes incomprehen
sible to us. If a material system of organic.v
powers be necessary for the exercise of its en
ergies, he can either clothe it with a fine ethe
real vehicle, at the moment its present tenement
is dissolved, or connect it, in another region of
the universe, witli a corporeal frame of more ex
quisite workmanship, analogous to that which
it now animates. For any thing we know to
the contrary, there may be some fine material
system, with which it is essentially connectedj
and which goes off with it at death, and serves
as a medium through which it may hold a direct
communication with the visible universe. Even
although its consciousness of existence were to
be suspended for thousands of years, its Creator
can afterwards invest it with a new organical
frame, suited to the expansive sphere of action
to which it is destined ; and the intervening pe
riod of its repose may be made to appear no
longer than the lapse of a few moments. In
short, if God has sustained the material universe
hitherto, and will, in all probability, continue it
for ever in existence, so that not a single atom
now existing, shall at any future period be anni
hilated — the same Power and Intelligence can,
with equal ease, support the thinking principle
in man, whatever may be its nature or substance,
and however varied the transformations through
which it may pass. If the Creator is both able
and willing to perpetuate the existence of the
rational spirit through an endless duration, and
if his wisdom, benevolence and rectitude require
that this object should be accomplished, all diffi
culties arising from its nature or the mode of its
subsistence, must at once evanish. The pre
ceding' arguments in support of a future state,
are, therefore, equally conclusive, whether we
consider the soul as a pure immaterial substance,
or as only a peculiar modification of matter ; so
that the sceptic who adopts the absurd idea of the
materiality of mind, cannot, even on this ground
invalidate the truth of man's eternal destination.

CHAPTER II.

PROOFS OF A FUTURE STATE FROM DIVINE REVELATION.

THE evidences of a future state, which w»
have endeavoured, in the preceding pages, to in
vestigate on the principles of human reason, are
amply confirmed and illustrated in the Revela
tion contained in the Sacred Scriptures. It is
one. of the distinguishing characteristics of that
revelation, that, in every important point, it
harmonizes with the deductions of sound reason,
and the principles of common sense. This was
naturally to be presumed ; since God is the au
thor both of the reasoning faculty, and of the
declarations contained in the volume of inspi
ration ; and this consideration forms a strong
presumptive argument in support of the divine
authority of the Scriptures, and should excite us
to receive, with cordial veneration and esteem,
a revelation which confirms the law of nature,
and is congenial to the sentiments of the wisest
and the best of mankind in all ages. If any
serious inquirer, .who had entertained doubts
on this subject, has been led to a conviction
of the reality of his immortal destiny, by such
arguments as the preceding, he will naturally re
sort to the Sacred Records for more full informa
tion on this important point ; and I should have
no fear of any one remaining long an enemy of
Revelation, when once a powerful conviction of
a future state has been deeply impressed on his
mind. If a man is fully convinced that he is
standing every moment on the verge of an eter
nal state, he cannot but feel anxious to acquire
the most correct information that can be obtained
respecting that world which is to constitute his
everlasting abode ; and if he is altogether care
less and insensible in this respect, it is quite
clear, that he has no thorough conviction of the
realities of a life to come.

The Christian Revelation has " brought life
and immortality to light," not so much on ac
count of the express assurance it gives of the
reality of a future world, but chiefly, as it clear
ly exhibits the nature and the employments of
that state, its endless duration, the ground on
which we can expect happiness in it, and the
dispositions and virtues which qualify us for
relishing its exercises and enjoying its felicities ;
and particularly, as it opens to our view the glo
rious scene of a " resurrection from the dead,"
and the re-union of soul and body in the man
sions of bliss.

In illustrating this topic, it would be quite un
necessary to enter into any lengthened details.
When the divine authority of the Scriptures
is recognised, a single proposition or assertion,
when it is clear and express, is sufficient to de
termine the reality of any fact, or the truth of
any doctrine ; and therefore, 1 shall do little
more than bring forward a few passages bearing
on the point under consideration, and inter
sperse some occasional remarks. As some have
called in question the position, " that the doc
trine of a future state was known to the Jews,"
I shall, in the first place, bring forward a few pas
sages and considerations to show that the doctrine
of immortality was recognised under the Jewish
as well as under the Christian dispensations.

As the belief of a future state lies at the very
foundation of religion, it is impossible to suppose,
that a people whom the Almighty had chosen to
be his worshippers, and the depositories of his
revealed will, should have remained ignorant of
this interesting and fundamental truth, and have
had their views confined solely to the fleeting
scenes of the present world. " Faith," says
Paul, in his Epistle to the Hebrews, " is the
confident expectation of things hoped for, and
the conviction of things not seen."* It includes
a belief in the existence of God, and of the re
wards of a life to come ; for, says the same
apostle, " He that cometh to God must believe
that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them
that diligently seek him." Having stated these
principles, he proceeds to show, that the ancient
patriarchs were animated in all their services by
their conviction of the realities of a future and
invisible world. With respect to Abraham he
informs us, that " he expected a city which had
foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
He obtained no such city in the earthly Canaan;
and therefore we must necessarily suppose, that
his views were directed to mansions of perpetui
ty beyond the confines of the present world.
With respect to Moses, he says, that under all
his persecutions and afflictions, " he endured as
seeing Him who is invisible ; for he had a re
spect to the recompense of reward." That it-
ward did not consist in temporal grandeur, other
wise, he might have enjoyed it in much more

* Doddridge's Translation of Heb. «i. 1

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

splendour and security in Egypt, as the son of
Pharaoh's daughter ; nor did it consist in the
possession of Canaan, for he was not permitted
to enter into that goodly land. It must, there
fore, have been the celestial inheritance to which
the eye of his faith looked forward, as the object
of his joyful anticipation. With regard to all
the other patriarchs whose names &tand high on
the records of the Old-Teslament Church, he
declares, that " they confessed that they were
strangers and pilgrims on earth," that " they de
clared plainly that they sought a better country,
that is, an heavenly ;" and that those who " were
tortured" to induce them to renounce their re
ligion, endured their sufferings with invincible
fortitude, " not accepting deliverance" when it
was offered them, " that they might obtain a bet
ter resurrection."

In accordance with these declarations, the
prophets, in many parts of their writings, speak
decisively of their expectations of a future life,
and of the consolation the prospect of it afforded
them, under their sufferings. " As for me,"
says the Psalmist, " I shall behold thy face in
righteousness ; I shall be satisfied when I awake
with thy likeness." " My flesh shall rest in
hope ; for thou wilt not leave my soul in the
grave. Thou wilt show me the path of life : in
thy presence is fulness of joy ; at thy right hand
are pleasures for evermore." "Yea, though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil ; for thou art with me. Surely
goodness and mercy will follow me all the days
of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the
Lord for ever." " God will redeem rny soul
from the grave ; for he will receive me/' " Whom
have I in heaven but thee ? and there is none
upon earth that I desire besides thee. Thou
wilt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward
receive me to glory. My flesh and my heart
shall fail; but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion for ever," Nothing can be more
clear and express than such declarations. If the
psalmist had no belief in a future state, and no
hop's of enjoying its felicities, after the termi
nation of his earthly pilgrimage, his language is
absolutely without meaning. What rational in
terpretation can be given to the expressions of
" dwelling in the house of God for ever," after
his days on earth are numbered — of " Jehovah
being his everlasting portion," after his heart had
ceased to beat — and of his being " redeemed from
the grave," and put in possession of " fulness of
joy," and " everlasting pleasures,"— if his views
were confined to the narrow limits of time, and
the boundaries of the earthly Canaan ? Such
expressions would be a species of bombast and
hyperbole altogether inconsistent with the dig
nity and veracity of an inspired writer.

Job, that illustrious example of patience under
affliction, consoled his spirit in the midst of ad
versity by the hopes he entertained of a blessed

immortality. " I know," says he, " that my
Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the
latter day upon the earth : and, after I awake;
though this body shall be destroyed, yet out of
my flesh shall I see God." In various other pas
sages of the prophets, not only a future state,
but a resurrection from the grave and the solem
nities of the day of judgment are plainly inti
mated. " The dead men shall live, together
with my dead body shall they rise. Awake and
sing, y& that dwell in dust ; for thy dew is as the
dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the
dead." " Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth,
and walk in the ways of thy heart, arid in the
sight of thine eyes : but know thou, that for all
these things God will bring thee into judgment."
" For God shall bring every work into judgment,
with every secret thing, whether it be good, or
whether it be evil." " Many of them that, sleep
in the dust of the earth shall awake, some. to
everlasting life, and some to shame and ever
lasting contempt. And they that be wise shall
shine as the brightness of the firmament ; and
they that turn many to righteousness as the stars
for ever and ever."

One reason, among others, why the doctrine
of a future state is not frequently adverted to,
and treated in detail, in the writings of the Old
Testament, undoubtedly is, that it was a truth
so well understood, so generally recognised, and
so essential to the very idea of religion, that it
would have been superfluous to have dwelt upon
it in detail, or to have brought it forward as a
new discovery. This doctrine is implied in the
phraseology of the Old Testament, in many cases
where there is no direct reference to a future
world, as in such passages as the following: " I
am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham,
the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob :" Ex-
od. iii. 6. Our Saviour has taught us to consi
der this and similar passages as embodying the
doctrine of a future life. " For God is not the
God of the dead, but of the living." If the holy
patriarchs whose names are here commemo
rated with so much honour, were reduced to the
condition of the clods of the valley, and if their
intellectual part were not in existence, Jehovah
would never own the high relation of a God to
those whom he has finally abandoned, and suf
fered to sink into non-existence. Consequently,
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were living and in
telligent beings, in another state, when this de
claration was made to Moses at the burning bush.
The phrase, " He was gathered to his people,"
implies a similar sentiment. In Gen. xxv. it is
said, " Abraham gave up the ghost, and was
gathered to his people." This expression is not
to be viewed as importing that he was buried
with his fathers ; for the fathers of Abraham were
buried several hundreds of miles from the cave
of Machpelah, in which Abraham's mortal re
mains were deposited, — some of them in the

PROOFS FROM DIVINE REVELATION.

55

•and of Chaldea, and some of them in the country
of Mesopotamia, which lay at a considerable
distance from the land of Canaan. The true
meaning must therefore be, that he was " ga
thered" to the assembly of the righteous, to the
blessed society of those congenial spirits, emi
nent for their piety, who had passed before him
into the invisible world. Hence, says the Psal
mist, " Gather not my soul with sinners." —
Hence, says Job, when describing the miseries
of the wicked, " The rich man shall lie down"
in the grave, "but he shall not be gathered;1"
and the prophet, when personating the Messiah,
declares, " Though Israel be not gathered, yet
shall I be glorious in the eyes of Jehovah."

These remarks may suffice to show, .that the
doctrine of a future state was known, and gene
rally recognised, by the venerable patriarchs and
other illustrious characters that flourished under
the Jewish dispensation.

That this doctrine is exhibited in the clearest
Ught in the Christian Revelation, has never been
disputed, by any class of religionists, nor even
by infidels themselves. In this revelation, how
ever, the doctrine of immortality is not attempted
to be proved by any laboured arguments or su
pernatural evidences, nor is it brought forward
as a new discovery. It is evidently taken for
granted, and incidentally interwoven through all
the discourses of our Saviour and his apos
tles, as a truth which lies at the foundation of
religion, and which never ought for a moment
to be called in question. In elucidating this to
pic, it will be quite sufficient simply to quote a
few passages from the New-Testament writers.

Paul, when looking forward to the dissolution
of his mortal frame, declares, in his own name,
and in the name of all Christians — " Our light
affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh
out for us a far more exceeding and eternal
weight of glory ; while we aim not at things
which are visible, but at those which are invisi
ble ; for the things which are visible are tempo
rary, but those which are invisible are eternal.
For we know, that, if this earthly house of our
tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of
God, an house not made with hands, eternal in
the heavens." When the time of his departure
from the body was at hand, he declared, " I have
fought the good fight, I have finished my course,
I have kept the faith : henceforth there is laid up
for me a crown of righteousness, which the right
eous Judge shall give me at that day ; and not to
me only, but to all them that love his appearing"
The apostle Peter declares, that believers " are
regenerated to the lively hope of an inheritance
incorruptible, undefiled, and thatfadeth not away,
reserved in heaven for them." " When the chief
Shepherd shall appear, we shall receive a crown
of glory, which Tadeth not away." Our Saviour
declares, in reference to his servants, " I give
onto them eternal life, and they shall never per

ish." '•' In my Father's house arc many man
sions : if it were not so I would have told you.
I go to prepare a place for you. And I will come
again, and receive you to myself, that where I
am there you may be also." And again, " Many
shall come from the east and the west, and shall
sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,
in the kingdom of heaven." " Then shall the
righteous shine forth as the sur> in the kingdom
of their Father."

While these and similar passages clearly de
monstrate the certainty of an eternal world, and
the future happiness of the righteous — the apos
tles and evangelists are equally explicit in as
serting the future misery of the wicked. " The
unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God,"
but " shall go away into everlasting punishment."
" The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven,
with his mighty angels, in flaming fire , taking ven
geance on them them that know not God, and who
obey not the Gospel : who shall be punished with
everlasting destruction from the presence of the
Lord, and from the glory of his power." " At
the end of the world, the angels shall come forth
and sever the wicked from among the just, and
shall cast them into a furnace of fire, where shcl»
be weeping and gnashing of teeth." " The fear
ful and unbelieving, and murderers, and whore
mongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars,
shall have their part in the lake which burneth
with fire and brimstone. There shall in nowise
enter into the heavenly Jerusalem any thing that
defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination,
or maketh a lie."

The way by which happiness in the future world
may be obtained is also clearly exhibited. " Etci
nal life is the gift of God, through Jesus Christ
our Lord." " For God so loved the world, that
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish but have ever
lasting life." " This is the record, that God
hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in
his son." " The God of all grace hath called
us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus." — The
dispositions of those on whom this happiness will
be conferred, and the train of action which pre
pares us for the enjoyment of eternal bliss, are
likewise distinctly described. " Whatsoever a
man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that
soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap cor
ruption , but he that soweth to the spirit, shall cf
the spirit reap life everlasting." " To them who,
by patient continuance in well-doing, seek for
glory, honour, and immortality, God will recom
pense eternal life." " The pure in heart shall
see God." " He that doeth the will of God abi-
deth for ever." " Him that overcometh will I
make a piUar in the temple of my God, and he
shall go no more out." " Blessed are they that
do his commandments, that they may have a right
to the tree of life, and may enter through the gate*
into the city."

56

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

The nature of the heavenly felicity, and the
employments of the future world, are likewise in
cidentally s'ated and illustrated. The founda
tion of happiness in that state is declared to con
sist in perfect freedom from moral impurity, and
in the attainment of moral perfection. " No one
who worketh abomination can enter the gates of
he New Jerusalem." " Christ Jesus gave him
self for the church, that he might, sanctify and
cleanse it, and that he might present it to himself
a glorious church, holy, and without blemish."
The honour which awaits the faithful, in the hea
venly world, is designated il a crown of righteous
ness." The inheritance to which they are desti
ned is declared to be "undefiled" with moral
pollution ; and it is " an inheritance among them
that are sanctified." " When Christ, who is our
life, shall appear," says the Apostle John, " we
shall be like him," adorned with all the beauties
of holiness which he displayed on earth as our
pattern and exemplar. The employments of that
world are represented as consisting in adoration
of the Creator of the universe, in the celebration
of his praises, in the contemplation of his works,
and in those active services, flowing from the
purest love, which have a tendency to promote the
harmony and felicity of the intelligent creation.
" I beheld," said John, when a vision of the
future world was presented to his view, " and, lo,
a great multitude, which no man could number,
of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and
tongues, stood before the throne, clothed in white
robes, crying with a loud voice, Salvation to our
God that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the
Lamb. Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and
thanksgiving, and honour, and power, be ascribed
to our God forever and ever." That the con
templation of the works of God is one leading
part of the exercises of the heavenly inhabitants,
appears, from the scene presented to the same
apostle, in another vision, where the same celes
tial choir are represented as falling down before
Him that sat on the throne, and saying, " Thou
art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour,
and power ; for thou hast created all things, and
for thy pleasure they are, and were created."
Such sublime adorations and ascriptions of praise,
are the natural results of their profound investi
gations of the wonderful works of God. In
accordance with the exercises of these holy intel
ligences, another chorus of the celestial inhabi
tants is exhibited as singing (he song of Moses,
ihe servant of God, and the song of the Lamb,
saying, " Great and marvellous are thy works,
Lord God Almighty, just and true are thy ways,
Jiou King of saints."

The resurrection of the body to an immortal
life, is also declared, in the plainest and most
decisive language. This is one of the peculiar
discoveries of Revelation ; for, although the
ancient sages of the heathen world generally
admitted the immortality of the soul, they seem

never to have formed the most distant conception,
that the bodies of men, after putrefying in the
grave, would ever be reanimated ; and honce,
when Paul declared this doctrine to the Atnenian
philosophers, he was pronounced to be a babbler.
This sublime and consoling truth, however, is
put beyond all doubt by our Saviour and his
apostles. — " The hour is coming," says Jesus,
" when all that are in the graves shall hear the
voice of the Son of God, and shall come forth;
they that have done good, to the resurrection of
life ; and they that have done evil, to the resur
rection of condemnation." " I am the resurrec
tion and the life : he thatbelieveth in me, though
he were dead, yet shall he live." " Why should
it be thought a thing incredible that God should
raise the dead ?" " We look for the Saviour,
who shall change our vile bodv, that it may be
fashioned like unto his glorious body, according
to the energy by which he is able even to sub-
due all things to himself." « We shall all be
changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an
eye, at the last trump ; for the trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed." — The nature of this
change, and the qualities of the resurrection-
body, are likewise particularly described by Paul
in the fifteenth chapter of the first epistle to the
Corinthians. " It is sown," or committed to
the grave " in corruption ; it is raised in incor-
ruption" — liable no more to decay, disease and
death, but immortal as its Creator. " It is raised
in Power," — endued with strength and vigour
incapable of being weakened or exhausted, and
fitted to accompany the mind in its most vigor
ous activities. — "It is raised in glory" — destined
to flourish in immortal youth and beauty, and
arrayed in a splendour similar to that which
appeared on the body of Christ when " his face
did shine as the sun, and his raiment became
white and glittering." — " It is raised a spiritual
body" — refined to the highest pitch of which
matter is susceptible, capable of the most vi
gorous exertions and of the swiftest movements,
endued with organs of perception of a more ex
quisite and sublime nature than those with which
it is now furnished, and fitted to act as a suitable
vehicle for the soul in all its celestial services
and sublime investigations.

Such is a brief summary of the disclosures
which the Christian Revelation has made
respecting the eternal destiny of mankind — a
subject of infinite importance to every rational
being — a subject of ineffable sublimity and
grandeur, which throws into the shade the most
important transactions, and the most splendid
pageantry of this sublunary scene — a subject
which should be interwoven with all our plans,
pursuits and social intercourses, and which
ought never for a moment to be banished from
our thoughts. — I shall, therefore, conclude this
department of my subject with a remark or :wc

PROOFS FROM DIVINE REVELATION.

57

OS THE PRACTICAL INFLUENCE WHICH THB
DOCTRINE OF A FUTURE STATE OUGHT TO
HAVE UPON OUR AFFECTIONS AND CON-
UTTCT.

When we look around us on tne busy scene of
numan life, and especially when we contemplate
the bustle and pageantry which appear in a
populous city, we can scarcely help concluding,
that the great majority of human beings that
pass in review before us, are acting as if the
present world were their everlasting abode, and
as if they had no relation to an invisible state of
existence. To indulge in sensual gratifications,
to acquire power, wealth and fame, to gratify
vanity, ambition and pride, to arnuse themselves
with pictures of fancy, with fantastic exhibitions,
theatrical scenes and vain shows,and to endeavour
to banish every thought of death and eternity
from the mind, appear to be in their view the
great and ultimate ends of existence. This is
the case, not merely of those who openly avow
themselves " men of the world," and call in
question the reality of a future existence ; but
also of thousands who regularly frequent our
worshipping assemblies, and profess their belief
in the realities of an eternal state. They listen
to the doctrines of eternal life, and of future
punishment, without attempting to question
either their reality or their importance, but as
soon as they retire from " the place of the
holy," and mingle in the social circle, and the
bustle of business, every impression of invisible
realities evanishes from their minds, as if it had
been merely a dream or a vision of the night.
To cultivate the intellectual faculties, to aspire
after moral excellence, to devote the active
powers to the glory of the Creator, and the bene
fit of mankind ; to live as strangers and pilgrims
upon earth, to consider the glories of this world
as a transient scene that will soon pass away,
and to keep the eye constantly fixed on the reali
ties of an immortal life — are characteristics of
only a comparatively small number of indivi
duals scattered amidst the swarming population
around us> who are frequently regarded by their
fellows as a mean-spirited and ignoble race of
beings. Though death is making daily havoc
around them, though their friends and relatives
are, year after year, dropping into the grave,
though poets and orators, princes and philoso
phers, statesmen and stage-players, are continu
ally disappearing from the living world ; though
sickness and disease are raging around and lay
ing their victims of every age prostrate in the
dust, and though they frequently walk over
Ihe solemn recesses of the burying ground, and
tread upon the ashes of "the mighty man, and
the man of war, the judge and the ancient, the
cunning artificer, and the eloquent orator," — yet
they prosecute the path of dissipation and vanity
with as much keenness and resolution, as if
8

every thing around them were unchangeaoie, apd
as if their present enjoyments were to last
for ever.

If this representation be founded on fact, we
may assuredly conclude, that the great bulk of
mankind have no fixed belief of the reality of a
future world, and that more than the one half of
those who profess an attachment to religion, are
as little influenced in their general conduct by
this solemn consideration, as if it were a matter
of mere fancy, or of" doubtful disputation." Il
is somewhat strange, and even paradoxical, that,
amidst the never-ceasing changes which are
taking place among the living beings around us,
men should so seldom look beyond the grave to
which they are all advancing, and so seldom
make inquiries into the certainty and the nature
of that state into which the tide of time has car
ried all the former generations of mankind. If
a young man were made fully assured that, at
the end of two years, he should obtain the sove
reignty of a fertile island in the Indian ocean,
where he should enjoy every earthly pleasure his
heart could desire, — his soul would naturally
bound at the prospect, he would search his maps
to ascertain the precise position of his future
residence, he would make inquiries respecting it
at those travellers who had either visited the
spot or passed near its confines ; he would pe
ruse with avidity the descriptions which geogra
phers have given of its natural scenery, its soil
and climate, its productions and inhabitants; and,
before his departure, he would be careful to pro
vide every thing that might be requisite for his
future enjoyment. If a person, when setting out
on a journey which he was obliged to under
take, were informed that his road lay through a
dangerous territory, where he should be exposed,
on the one hand, to the risk of falling headlong
into unfathomable gulfs, and, on the other, to the
attacks of merciless savages, — he would walk
with caution, he would look around him at every
step, and he would welcome with gratitude any
friendlv guide that would direct his steps to the
place of his destination. But, in relation to a fu
ture and invisible world, there exist, in the minds
of the bulk of mankind, a most unaccountable
apathy and indifference ; and net only an indif
ference, but, in many instances, a determined
resolution not to listen to any thing that may be
said respecting it. To broach the subject of im
mortality, in certain convivial circles, would be
considered as approaching to an insult ; and the
person who had the hardihood to do so, wouid
be regarded as a rude, sanctimonious intruder
How unaccountably foolish and preposterous is
such a conduct ! especially when we consider,
that those very persons who seem to be entirely
regardless whether they shall sink into the gulf
of annihilation, or into the regions of endlesg
perdition, will pass whole days and nights ic
chagrin and despair for the loss of some employ-

58

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

mo*rt, for a slight iffront, or for some imaginary
reflection on their reputation and honour !

Were it necessary to bring forward additional
proofs that the greater part of mankind have no
belief in a future state, or, which amounts near
ly to the same thing, that it has no influence
whatever on the general tenor of their thoughts
and actions — the prominent features of their con
duct afford abundant evidence of this melancholy
truth. Would a man, who firmly believes that
he is destined to an everlasting state, pass
fifty or sixty years of his life without spending
one serious thought about that unknown futu
rity into which he is soon to enter, or making
the least inquiry respecting its nature and em
ployments ? Would he toil from morning to
night, with incessant care, to lay up a few fleet
ing treasures, and never spend a single hour in
considering what preparations are requisite for
an endless existence ? Would he spurn at that
book which has unveiled the glories and the
terrors of eternity, and " brought life and immor
tality to light?" Would he sneer at the person
who is inquiring the way to a blessed immortality,
and count him as an enemy when he wished to
direct his attention to the concerns of an unseen
world? Can that man be supposed to believe
that a crown of glory awaits him in the heavens,
whose whole soul is absorbed in the pursuits of
ambition, and who tramples on every principle
of truth and justice, in order to gain possession
of a post of opulence and honour? Can those
parents believe that in heaven there is " a trea
sure that fadeth not," while they teach their
children to conclude, that the acquisition of a
fortune, and the favor of the great, are the grand
objects to which they should aspire ? Can that
old hoary-headed votary of pleasure consider
himself as standing on the verge of an eternal
world, who still indulges himself in all the fashion
able follies and frivolities of the age, and never
casts an eye beyond the precincts of the grave ?
Can that hard-hearted worldling, who shuts his
ears at the cry of the poor and needy, and who
grasps his treasures with eagerness even amidst
the agonies of dissolution — believe that " a re
compense of reward" awaits the benevolent " at
the resurrection of the just?" Can that man
be impressed with the solemnities of the eternal
world, who, the moment after he has committed
the remains of a relative to the grave, violates
every humane ?.nd friendly feeling, and for the
sake of a few paltry pounds or shillings, deprives
the widow and the orphan of every earthly en
joyment? Can that courtly sycophant, who is
continually hunting after places and pensions,
fawning upon his superiors, and whose whole
<fife is a continued course of treachery, adulation
and falsehood — believe that "all liars shall have
their portion ir the lake that btirneth with fire
and brimstone ?" Can that thoughtless de-
uauchee believe that future punishment awaits the

workers of iniquity, who runs from one scene of
dissipation to another, who wastes his time in
folly and extravagance, and whose life is but one
continued crime ? Or can we even suppose
that that clergyman, who is unremittingly aspi
ring after preferment, who is mercilessly fleecing
his flock, yet neglecting their instruction, and
engaged in incessant litigations about some pal
try tythes, seriously believes, that the treasures
of this world are unworthy to be compared with
that " exceeding great and eternal weight of glory
which is about to be revealed in the life to come ?'*'
Such conduct plainly indicates, whatever pro
fessions certain descriptions of these charac
ters may make, that the solemn realities of the
eternal world have no more practical influence
on their minds than if they regarded them as
unsubstantial phantoms, or as idle dreams.

The doctrine of a future state is not a mere
speculative proposition, to serve as a subject of
metaphysical investigation, or to be admitted
merely to complete a system of philosophical or
theological belief. It is a truth of the highest
practical importance, which ought to be inter
woven with the whole train of our thoughts anu
actions. Yet how many are there, even of
those who bear the Christian name, who are
incessantly engaged in boisterous disputes re
specting the nature of faith, who have never felt
the influence of that faith which is ': the confi
dent expectation of things hoped for, and the
conviction of things which are not seen," and
which realizes to the mind, as if actually present,
the glories of the invisible world! If we really
believe the doctrine of immortality, it will mani
fest itself in our thoughts, affections and pur
suits. It will lead us to form a just estimate oj
the value of all earthly enjoyments. For, in the
light of eternity, all the secular pursuits in which
men now engage, appear but as vanity, and all
the dazzling objects which fascinate their eyes,
as fleeting shadows. A realizing view of an
eternal state dissipates the illusion which the
eye of sense throws over the pageantry and
the splendours of this world, and teaches us
that all is transitory and fading, and that our
most exquisite earthly enjoyments will ere long
be snatched from our embrace. For, not a sin
gle mark of our sublunary honours, not a single
farthing of our boasted treasures, not a single
trace of our splendid possessions, nor a single
line of the beauty of our persons, can be carried
along with us to the regions beyond the grave.
It will stimulate us to set our affections on things
above, and to indulge in heavenly contemplations
" Where our treasure is, there will our hearts
be also." Rising superior to the delights of
sense, and to the narrow boundaries of time, we
will expatiate at large in those boundless re
gions which eye hath not seen, and contem
plate, in the light of reason and of revelation,
those scenes of felicity and grandeur, which wiL

PROOFS FROM DIVINE REVELATION.

59

burst upon the disembodied spirit, when it has
dropped its earthly tabernacle in the dust. Like
Seneca, when he contemplated, in imagination,
Ihe magnitude and beauty of the orbs of heaven,
we will look down, with a noble indifference, on
the earth as a scarcely distinguishable atom, and
say, " Is it to this little spot that the great designs
and vast desires of men are confined ? Is it for
this there is such disturbance of nations, so
much carnage, and so maov ruinous wars ? O
folly of deceived men! to imagine great king
doms in the compass of an atom, to raise ar
mies to divide a point of earth with their swords !
It is just as if the ants should divide their mole
hills into provinces, and conceive a field to be
several kingdoms, and fiercely contend to enlarge
their borders, and celebrate a triumph in gain
ing a foot of earth, as a new province to their
empire." In the light of heaven all sublunary
glories fade away, and the mind is refined and
ennobled, when, with the eye of faith, it pene
trates within the veil, and describes the splen
dours of the heaves of heavens.

Again, if we believe the doctrine of immor
tality, we will be careful to avoid those sins
which would expose us to misery in the future
world, and to cultivate those dispositions and
virtues which will prepare us for the enjoyment
of. eternal felicity. Between virtue and vice,
sin and holiness, there is an essential and eter
nal distinction ; and this distinction will be fully
and visibly displayed in the eternal world. He
whose life is a continued scene of vicious in
dulgence, and who has devoted himself to " work
all manner of uncleanness with greediness,''
becomes, by such habits, if a vessel of wrath
fitted for destruction?' and, from the very con
stitution of things, there is no possibility of
escaping misery in the future state, if his exist
ence be prolonged. Whereas, he who is de
voted to the practice of holiness, who loves his
Creator with supreme affection, and his neigh
bour as himself, who adds to his faith " virtue,
knowledge, temperance, patience, brotherly-
kindness, and charity," is, by such graces, ren
dered fit for everlasting communion with the
Father of spirits, and for delightful association
with all the holy intelligences that people his
immense empire. Again, the belief of a future

world should excite us to the exercise of con-
tentment, and reconcile our minds to whatever
privations or afflictions Providence may allot to us
in the present world. " For the sufferings of
the present time are not worthy to be compared
with the glory which is to be revealed." If we
believe that the whole train of circumstances
connected with our present lot, is arranged by
Infinite Wisdom and Benevolence, every thing
that befalls us here must have a certain bearing
on the future world, and have a tendency to
prepare us for engaging in its exercises and for
relishing its enjoyments. In short, if we recog
nise the idea of an immortal life, we will endea
vour to acquire clear and comprehensive views
of its nature, its pleasures, and its employments.
We will not rest satisfied with vague and con
fused conceptions of celestial bliss ; but will en
deavour to form as precise and definite ideas on
this subject as the circumstances of our sublu
nary station will permit. We will search the
Oracles of Divine Revelation, and the discove
ries of science, and endeavour to deduce from
both the sublimest conceptions we can form of the
glories of that " inheritance which is incorrupti
ble, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, which
is reserved in heaven for the faithful."

In a word, if our minds are as deeply im
pressed with this subject as its importance de
mands, we shall experience feelings similar to
those which affected the mind of Hyeronvmus
when he contemplated the dissolution of tho
world, and the solemnities of the last judgment.
— " Whether I eat or drink, or in whatever
other action or employment I am engaged, that
solemn voice always seems to sound in my ears,
'Arise ye dead and come to judgment !' — As
often as I think of the day of judgment, my
heart quakes, and my whole frame trembles. If
I am to indulge in any of the pleasures of the
present life, I am resolved to do it in such a way,
that the solemn realities of the future judgment
may never be banished from my recollection."*

• Slve comedam, sive bibani, sive aliquid aliud
faciam, semper vox ilia in auribus meus sonars
videtur: Surgite Mortui, et venite a.d judicium.
Quotius diem judicii cogito, totus corde et corpore
contremisro. Si qua enim praesentis vita, est la^
titise, ita agenda est, ut nunquam amarituJo futuri
judicii recedat a memoria,

PART II.

ON THE CONNEXION OF SCIENCE WITH A FUTURE STATE.

A GREAT outcry has frequently been made,
by many of those who wish to be considered
as pious persons, about the vanity of human
science. Certain divines in their writings, and
various descriptions of preachers in their pulpit
declamations, not unfrequently attempt to em
bellish their discourses, and to magnify the truths
of Scripture, by contrasting them with what
they are pleased to call " the perishing treasures
of scientific knowledge." " T e knowledge we
derive from the Scriptures," say they, " is able
to make us wise unto salvation; all other know
ledge is but comparative folly. The knowledge
of Christ and him crucified will endure forever ;
but all human knowledge is transitory, and will
perish for ever when this world comes to an end.
Men weary themselves with diving into human
science, while all that results to them is vanity
and vexation of spirit. Men may become the
greatest philosophers, and have their understand
ings replenished with every kind of human
knowledge, and yet perish for ever. What have
we to do with the planets and the stars, and
whether they be peopled with inhabitants ? Our
ousiness is to attend to the salvation of our
souls."

Now, although some of the above, and simi
lar assertions, when properly modified and ex
plained, may be admitted as true, the greater
part of them, along with hundreds of similar
expressions, are either ambiguous or false. But,
although they were all admitted as strictly true,
what, effect can the frequent reiteration of such
comparisons and contrasts have on the mass of
the people to whom they are addressed, who are
already too much disinclined to the pursuit of
general knowledge — but to make them imagine,
that it is useless, and in some cases dangerous,
to prosecute any other kind of knowledge than
what is derived directly from the Scriptures?
And what is the knowledge which the great
majority of those who attend the public services
of religion have acquired of the contents of the
sacred oracles? It is too often, I fear, exceed
ingly vague, confused and superficial; owing, in
a great measure, to the want of those habits oi
mental exertion, which a moderate prosecution
of useful science would have induced.

Such declamations as those to which I have
MOW adverted, obviously proceed from a very
•imited sphb, ^ of information and a contracted

range of thought. It is rather a melancholy re
flection, that any persons, particularly preachem
of the gospel, should endeavour to apologize for
their own ignorance by endeavouring to under
value what they acknowledge they never have ac
quired, and therefore, cannot be supposed to un
derstand and appreciate. For, although several
well-informed and judicious ministers of religion,
have been led, from the influence of custom, and
from copying the expressions of others, to use a
phraseology which has a tendency to detract from
the utility of scientific knowledge, yet it is ge
nerally the most ignorant, those whose reading
and observation have been confined within the
narrowest range, who are most forward in their
bold and vague declamations on this topic. We
never find, in any part of the Sacred Records,
such comparisons and contrasts as those to which
I allude. The inspired writers never attempt to
set the word of God in opposition to his works,
nor attempt to deter men from the study of the
wonders of his creation, on the ground that it is
of less importance than the study of his word.
On the contrary, they take every proper oppor
tunity of directing the attention to the mechan
ism and order, the magnificence and grandeur of
the visible world; and their devotional feelings
are kindled into rapture by such contemplations.
When the Psalmist had finished his survey of
the different departments of nature, as described
in the civ. Psalm, he broke out into the following
devotional strains : " How manifold are thy
works, O Lord ! in wisdom hast thou made them
all : the earth is full of thy riches, so is the great
and wide sea. The glory* of the Lord shall
endure for ever, the Lord shall rejoice in all his
works. I will sing unto the Lord as long as I
live ; I will sing praises to my God while I have
my being." For the visible works of God dis
play the same essential attributes of Deity, and
of his superintending providence, as the revela
tions of his word ; and it is one great design of
that word to direct men to a rational and devout
contemplation of these works in which his glory
is so magnificently displayed. And, therefore,
to attempt to magnify the word of God by degra
ding his works, or to set the one in oppositioi)
to the other, is to attempt to set the Deity in op-

• That is, the display of the Divine perfections in
the material world, as the connexion of the passage
plainly intimates.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

61

position to himself, and to prevent mankind from
offering a certain portion of that tribute of adora
tion and thanksgiving which is due to his name.

It is true, indeed, that the mere philosopher
has frequently been disposed to contemplate the
nniverse as if it were a self-acting and indepen
dent machine. He has sometimes walked through
the magnificent scenes of creation, and investi
gated the laws which govern the motions of the
celestial orbs, and the agencies which produce
the various phenomena of our sublunary system,
without offering up that tribute of thanksgiving
and praise which i? due to the great First Cause,
or feeling those emotions of adoration and reve
rence which such studies have a tendency to in
spire. But it is no less true, that the mere theo
logian has, likewise, not unfrequently, walked
through the field of revelation, studied its doc
trines, and facts and moral requisitions, written
volumes in support of its heavenly origin, and
defended its truths against the cavils of adversa
ries, without feeling that supreme love to God and
affection towards his neighbour which it is the
great object of the Scriptures to produce, and dis
playing a disposition and conduct directly repug
nant to its holy precepts. An argument founded
on the impiety of certain pretended philosophers,
to dissuade us from the study of the material
world, would, therefore, be equally powerful to
deter us from the study of divine revelation, when
we consider that many who profess to receive its
doctrines live in open defiance of its most sacred
requisitions. In both cases, such examples merely
show, that man is a frail inconsistent being, and
too frequently disposed to overlook his Creator,
and to wander from the source of happiness.

In a work entitled, " The Christian Philoso
pher" I have endeavoured to illustrate this
subject at considerable length, and to show, that
the investigation of the works of creation, under
the guidance of true science, has a tendency to
expand our conceptions of the power, wisdom,
benevolence, and superintending providence of
God, — and that the various sciences and the
inventions of art may be rendered subservient in
promoting the objects of true religion, and diffus
ing its influence among the nations. — At present,
I shall confine my views, in the few following
remarks, to the illustration of the following posi
tion — " That science has a relation to a future
state."

It is a very vague, and, in many points of
view, a fake assertion, which has so frequently
been reiterated — that, what is generally termed
human knowledge, or the sciences, have no con
nexion with an immortal existence, and that they
will be of no utility whatever when this world
comes to an end. — Truth, of every description, is,
from its very nature, eternal and unchangeable ;
and. consequently, it cannot be supposed a pre
posterous opinion, that the established principles
of several of our sciences will be the basis of

reasoning and of action in a future state as
well as in the present. That a whole is greater
than any of its parts ; that the three angles 01
a triangle are equal to two right angles "; that
the sides of a plain triangle are to one ano
ther, as the sides of the angles opposite to
them : these and many similar propositions are
equally true in heaven as on earth, and may
probably be as useful truths there as in our pre
sent abode.

OBJECT OF SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATION.

In order to avoid misconception, and a confu
sion of thought on (his subject, it may not be
improper, in the first place, to define and illus
trate what is meant by the term Science.

Science, in its most general acceptation,
denotes knowledge of every description ; in a
more restricted sense, it denotes that species of
knowledge which is acquired chiefly by the exer
cise of the human faculties; and in a still more
restricted sense, it denotes that systematic
species of knowledge which consists of rule and
order, — such as geometry, arithmetic, algebra,
natural philosophy, geography, astronomy, chy-
mistry, mineralogy and botany. — In the observa
tions which follow, the term may be taken in any
one of these senses ; but particularly in the last,
which is the most common and appropriate
meaning. By means of scientific investigation,
the powers of the human mind have been won
derfully strengthened and expanded, and our
knowledge of the operations of the Creator
extensively enlarged. Science has enabled us
to transport ourselves from one continent to
another, to steer our course through the pathless
ocean, and to survey all the variety of scenery
which the terraqueous globe displays; it has
taught us to mount upwards to the region of the
clouds, and to penetrate into the bowels of the
earth, to explore the changes which the earth has
undergone since the period of its creation. It
has laid open to our view the nature and consti
tution of the atmosphere, the principles of which
it is composed, and its agency in supporting fire
and flame, and vegetable and animal life. On
the principles which science has established, we
have been enabled to ascertain the distances of
many of the heavenly bodies, to compute their
magnitudes, and to determine the periods of their
revolutions ; and by means of the instruments it
has invented, we have been enabled to take a
nearer survey of distant worlds — to contemplate
new wonders of creating power in regions of the
sky which lie far beyond the utmost stretch of the
unassisted eye, — and to explore those invisible
regions, where myriads of living beings are con
centrated within the compass of a visible point.
— In consequence of such discoveries, we nave
been enabled to acquire more clear and ample
conceptions of the amazing energies of omnipo-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

tence, of the inscrutable depths of infinite
wisdom, of the overruling providence of the
Almighty, of the benevolent care he exercises
over all his creatures, and of the unlimited extent
of those dominions over which he eternally pre
sides.

The faculties by which man has been enabled
to make the discoveries to which I have alluded,
were implanted in his constitution by the hand
of his Creator; and the objects on which these
faculties are exercised, are the works of the
Creator, which, the more minutely they are
investigated, the more strikingly do they display
the glory of his character and perfections. Con
sequently, it must have been the intention of the
Creator that man should employ the powers he
has given him in scientific researches ; other
wise, he would neither have endowed him with
such noble faculties, nor have opened to his
view so large a portion of his empire. Scientific
investigations, therefore, are to be considered as
nothing less than inquiries into the plans and
operations of the Eternal, in order to unfold the
attributes of his nature, his providential proce
dure in the government of his creatures, and the
laws by which he directs the movements of uni
versal nature. It is true, indeed, that every one
who calls himself a philosopher may not keep
this end in view in the prosecution of scientific
acquirements. He may perhaps be actuated
merely by a principle of curiosity, by a love of
worldly gain, or by a desire to acquire reputation
among the learned by the discoveries he may
bring to light, just in the same way as some theo
logians are actuated in prosecuting the study of
the Christian system. But the discoveries
which have been made by such persons, are,
notwithstanding, real developements of the plans
of the Deity, and open to a devout mind a more
expansive view of the power, wisdom, and be
nevolence of Him who is " wonderful in council,
and excellent in working." It is our own fault
if we do not derive useful instruction from the
investigations and discoveries of philosophy; it
is owing to our want of intelligence to discrimi
nate between the experiments of men, and the
operations of God, and to the want of that reve
rence, humility, and devotion, which ought to
accompany us in all our studies and contem
plations of nature. Science, therefore, from
whatever motives it may be prosecuted, is,
in effect, and in reality, an inquiry after God:
it is the study of angels and other superior
intelligences ; and we cannot suppose there is
a holy bein£ throughout the universe that is not
employed, in one mode or another, in scien
tific research and investigation; unless we can
suppose that there are moral intelligences who
are insensible to the displays of the divine glo
ry, and altogether indifferent, whether or not
they make progress in the knowledge of their
Creator.

OBJECTS ON WHICH THE FACULTIES Of
CELESTIAL INTELLIGENCES WILL BE EM
PLOYED.

Let us now consider the objects on which tria
faculties of celestial intelligences will be employed
in the way of scientific investigation.

The grand scene of universal nature — that
august theatre on which the Almighty displays,
to countless myriads, his glorious perfections —
will remain substantially the same as it is at
present, after all the changes in reference to our
globe shall have taken place ; and the clear and
expansive view of its economy, its movements,
and its peculiar glories, which will then be laid
open to their inspection, will exercise the faculties,
and form a considerable portion of the felicity of
renovated moral agents.

That the general system of nature will remain
materially the same, when the present fabric of
our globe is dissolved, may be argued, 1. From
the immense number and magnitude of the bo
dies of which it is composed. In every direction
to which we can turn our eyes, the universe ap
pears to be replenished with countless orbs of
light, diffusing their splendours from regions im
measurably distant. Nearly one hundred mil
lions of these globes are visible through telescopes
of the greatest magnifying power ; and it is more
than probable, that beyond the reach of the finest
glasses that art has ever constructed, thousands of
millions exist in the unexplored regions of im
mensity, which the eye of man, while he remains
in this lower world, will never be able to descry.
All these luminous globes, too, are bodies of im
mense magnitude ; compared with any one of
which, the whole earth dwindles into an incon
siderable ball. It is probable that the smallest of
them is at least one hundred thousand times
larger than the globe on which we live. — 2. All
these bodies are. immensely distant from the earth.
Although we could wing our course with a swift
ness equal to ten thousand miles a-day, it would
require more than five millions of years before
we could reach the nearest star ; and the more
distant of these orbs are placed in regions so im
mensely distant, that the imagination is oewil-
dered and overpowered when it attempts to grasp
the immeasurable extent which intervenes be
tween us and them. This circumstance proves,
that these bodies are of an immense size and
splendour, since they are visible at such dis
tances ; and consequently demonstrates, (hat each
of them is destined, in its respective sphere, to
accomplish some noble purpose, worthy of the
plans of a Being of infinite wisdom and good
ness. — 3. The whole of this vast assemblage of
suns and worlds has no immediate connexion with
the present constitution and arrangement of oui
globe. There are no celestial bodies that have
any immediate connexion with the earth,, or di
rect influence upon it, except the sun, the moon,

EXTENT OF THE GENERAL CONFLAGRATION

63

and several of the planets ; and therefore, those
more distant orbs, to which I allude, cannot be
supposed to be involved in the physical evils
which the fall of man has introduced into our
world; or to have the least connexion with any
future change or catastrophe that may befall the
terraqueous globe. Though this globe, and " all
that it inherits," were dissolved ; yea, although the
sun himself and his surrounding planets were set
in a blaze, and blotted for ever out of creation ;
the innumerable and vast bodies which replenish
the distant regions of the universe, would still
exist, and continue to illuminate the voids of
creation with undiminished splendour.

EXTENT OF THE GENERAL CONFLAGRATION.

From the considerations now stated, it is evi
dent, that the changes which are predicted to
take place at the general conflagration, will not
extend beyond, the environs of our globe, or at
farthest, beyond the limits of the solar system.
There is, indeed, no reason to conclude, that
they will extend beyond the terraqueous globe it
self and -its surrounding atmosphere ; for since
all the revelations of Scripture have a peculiar
reference to the inhabitants of this globe, the
predicted changes which are to take place in its
physical constitution, at the close of the present
economy of Providence, must be considered as
limited to the same sphere. As the world was
formerly destroyed by a deluge of waters, in
consequence of the depravity of man, so its de
struction by fire will take place, for the same
reason, in order that it may be purified from all
the effects of the curse which was originally pro
nounced upon the ground for man's sake, and
restored to its former order and beauty. But
there is not the smallest reason to conclude,
either from Scripture or the general constitution
of the universe, that this destruction will extend
beyond that part of the frame of nature which
was subjected to the curse, and is physically
connected with the sin of man ; and consequently,
will be entirely confined to certain changes which
will be effected throughout the continents, islands,
and oceans, and in the higher and lower regions
of the atmosphere.

This appears to be the sense in which tne
most judicious expositors of Scripture interpret
those passages which have a particular reference
to this event. Dr. Guyse, in his "Paraphrase
on the New Testament," interprets 2 Peter iii.
7, 12, precisely in this sense : « When that final
decisive day of the Lord Jesus shall come,— the
aerial heavens, being all in a flame, shall be de
stroyed, and the constituent principles of the
atmosphere, together with the earth and all things
in it, shall be melted down by an intense dissolv
ing heat into a confused chaos, like that out of
which they were originally formed." And in a
note on this paraphrase he remarks. "By the
17

heavens is meant here the aerial heavens. For
the heavens and the earth ar« here spoken of
in opposition to those of the old world, which
could mean nothing more than the earth and its
former atmosphere, the state of which underwent
a great alteration by the flood." — " By the /ica-
vens and the earth, in such passages as these,"
says the learned Dr. Mede, " is to be understood,
that part of nature which was subjected to the
curse, or that is inhabited by Christ's enemies,
and includes in it the earth, water, and air, but
not the heavenly bodies, which are not only at a
vast distance from it, but it is little more than a
point, if compared to them for magnitude." —
Dr. Dwight, when .adverting to this subject, ex
presses the same sentiment: " The phrase hea
vens and earth (says he) in Jewish phraseology
denoted the universe. In the present case,
however, (2 Peter iii. 10, 12, 13.) the words
appear to be used with a meaning less extended,
where it is declared, that that which is intended
by both terms, shall be consumed, dissolved, and
pass away. This astonishing event, we are
taught, shall take place at the final judgment ;
and we have no hint in the Scriptures, that the
judgment will involve any other beings besides
angels and men."

From the preceding considerations, it is obvi
ous, that when the inspired writers use such
expressions as these, — " The stars shall fall from
heaven," "the powers of heaven shall be shaken,"
and, " the heaven departed as a scroll," they are
to be understood not in a literal, but in a figura
tive sense, as denoting changes, convulsions, and
revolutions in the moral world. And when, in
reference to the dissolution of our globe and its
appendages, it is said, that " the heavens shall
pass away with a mighty noise," the aerial heaven,
or the surrounding atmosphere is to be understood.
How this appendage to our world may be dis
solved, or pass away with a mighty noise, it is not
difficult to conceive, now that we have become
acquainted with the nature and energies of its
constituent parts. One essential part of the at
mosphere contains the principle of flame ; and if
this principle were not counteracted by its con
nexion with another ingredient, or were it let
loose to exert its energies without control, instantly
one immense flame would envelope the terraque
ous globe, which would set on fire the founda
tions of the mountains, wrap the ocean in a
blaze, and dissolve, not only coals, wood, and
other combustibles, but (he hardest substances in
nature. It is more than probable, that when the
last catastrophe of our globe arrives, the oxygen
and nitrogen, or the two constituent principles ol
the atmosphere, will be separated by the inter
position of Almighty power. And the moment
this separation takes place, it is easy to conceive,
that a tremendous concussion will ensue, and the
most dreadful explosions will resound throughout
the whole of the expanse which surrounds the

64

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

£>io'j«i which will stun the assembled world, and
shake the earth to its foundations. For, if, in
chymical experiments conducted on a small scale,
the separation of two gases, or their coming
in contact with the principle of flame, is fre
quently accompanied with a loud and destructive
explosion, — it is impossible to form an adequate
idea of the loud and tremendous explosions which
would ensue were the whole atmosphere at once
dissolved., and its elementary principles separated
from each other and left to exert their native en
ergies. A sound as if creation had burst asun-
jer, and accompanied the next moment with a
universal blaze, extending over sea and land,
would present a scene of sublimity and terror,
which would more than realize all the striking
descriptions given in Scripture of this solemn
scene.

Again, when in reference to this tremendous
event, it is said, that " the earth and the heaven
fled away," (Rev. xx. 11.) we are not to imagine,
that the distant bodies of the universe shall be
either annihilated, or removed from the spaces
they formerly occupied ; but that all sublunary
nature shall be thrown into confusion and disor
der, and that the celestial orb?, during this univer
sal uproar of the elements, will be eclipsed from
the view, and appear as if they had fled away.
The appearance of the heavens whirling with a
confused and rapid motion, at this period, would
be produced, were the Almighty (as will proba
bly be the case) suddenly to put a stop to the
diurnal rotation of the earth, or to increase the
rate of its motion; in which case, the celestial
luminaries would appear either to stop in their
courses, or to be thrown into rapid and irregular
agitations. And the appearance of the heavens
in reality receding from the view, would be pro
duced, were the earth to leave its present station
among the planets, and to be impelled with a
rapid motion towards the distant parts of the
solar system, or beyond its boundaries ; in which
case, the sun would appear to fly off with a rapid
motion to a distant part of space, till he had di
minished to the size of a twinkling star, and
the moon and the nearest planets would, in a
short time, entirely disappear. — Whether these
suppositions exactly correspond with the arrange
ments which Divine Wisdom has made in refer
ence to the general conflagration, I do not take
upon me positively to determine. But I have
stated them in order to show, that all the descrip
tions contained in Scripture, of the dissolution of
our globe, and of the circumstances connected
with it, can be easily accounted for, and may be
fully realized, without supposing any change to
take place in the universe beyond the limits of
the earth and its atmosphere.

To suppose, as some have done, that the whole
fabric of creation will be shattered to pieces,
that the stars will literally fall from their orbs,
and the material universe be blotted out of exis

tence, is a sentiment so absurd and extravagant
and so contrary to tho general tenor of Scripture,
and the character of God, that it is astonishing il
should ever have been entertained by any man,
calling himself a divine or a Christian preacher.*
I have already had occasion to remark, that there
is no example of annihilation, or entire destruc
tion of material substances, to be found in the
universe, and that it is to the last degree improba
ble, that any one particle of matter which now
exists will ever be completely destroyed, how
ever numerous the changes that may take place
in the universe, j We have no reason to believe,
that even those changes to which our world is
destined, at the general conflagration, will issue
in its entire destruction. The materials of which
the earth and its atmosphere are composed will
still continue to exist after its present structure
is deranged, and will, in all probability, be em
ployed in the arrangement of a new system, puri
fied from the physical evils which now exist, and
which may continue to flourish as a monument
of divine power and wisdom, throughout an in
definite lapse of ages.

In accordance with these sentiments, we find
the inspired writers asserting the stability and
perpetuity of the material universe. In a pas
sage formerly alluded to, the Psalmist, after
having contemplated the scenes of the material
creation, declares, in reference to these visi
ble manifestations of the divine perfections, —
" The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever, the
Lord shall rejoice in all his works." And the
Apostle Peter, when describing the dissolution of
the elementary parts of our globe, intimates, at
the same time, the continued existence of the
visible fabric of nature. " We look," says he,
"for new heavens and a new earth, wherein
dwelleth righteousness." The same truth is in
cidentally declared in many other portions oi
Scripture. In the prophecies respecting tho
Messiah and the duration of his kingdom, it is
declared, that " His name shall endure for ever,
his name shall be continued as long aft the sun.

• As a specimen of the vague and absurd declama
tions on this subject, which have been published both
from the pulpit and the press, the following extract
from a modern and elegantly printed volume of
sermons may suffice.— "The blast of the seventh
trumpet thundering with terrific clangour through
the sky, and echoing from world to world, shall fill
the universe, and time shall be no more ! The six
trumpets have already sounded : when the seventh
shall blow, a total change shall take place throughout
the creation ; the vast globe which we now inhabit
shall dissolve, and minsle with yon beauteous azure
firmament, with sun, and moon, and all the immense
luminaries flaming there, in one undistinguished
ruin; all shall vanish away like a fleeting vapour,
a visionary phantom of the night, and -not a sing/e
trace of them be found ! Even the last enemy, Death,
shall be destroyed, and time itself shall benomore!1'
&c. &c. When such bombastic rant is thunlered in
the ears of Christian people, it is no wonder that
their ideas on this subject become extremely incor
rect, and even extravagantly absurd.

+ See Sect. x. page 44.

PERPETUITY OF THE MATERIAL UNIVERSE.

\

His seed shall endure for ever, and his throne as
the sun before me;" which expressions evidently
imply that the sun will not be blotted out of cre
ation, but continue to hold a station in the uni
verse as long as the Redeemer and his subjects
exist. It is aiso stated, in reference to the same
elustrious personage, " His seed will I make to
endure for ever, and his throne as the days of
heaven," which intimates, that the heavens will
endure as long as the government of Immanuel.
In reference to the stability and perpetuity of
the celestial luminaries, it is declared, that
" Jehovah hath preparedhis THRONE in the hea
vens." And when the Psalmist calls upon all
the beings in the universe to celebrate the praises
of the Creator, he says, in reference to the orbs
of heaven, " Praise ye him, sun and moon, praise
him all ye stars of light— Let them praise the
name of the Lord ; for he commanded, and they
were created. He hath also established them for
ever and ever; he hath made a decree which
shall not pass ;* which expressions evidently im
ply, that, whatever changes may happen in par
ticular systems, the great body of the celestial
orbs, which constitute some of the grandest
scenes of the universe, will remain stable and
permanent as the throne of the Eternal. — But,
not to multiply quotations, — ttye following de
claration of Jehovah by the prophet Jeremiah
is quite decisive on this point. " Thus saith
the Lord, who giveth the sun for a light by day,
and the ordinances of the moon and of the
stars for a light by night : The Lord of Hosts
is his name. If these ordinances depart from
before me, saith the Lord, then the seed of
Israel also shall cease from being a nation before
me for ever,"f which words plainly imply, that
if these luminaries continue in existence, the
accomplishment of the divine promise is se
cured to all the spiritual seed of Israel ; but should
they be blotted out of creation, or depart from
before Jehovah, the happiness of the " ran
somed of the Lord," and their relation to him
as the source of their felicity, would be ter
minated for ever. And have not these lumina
ries continued in their stations, since the pre
diction was announced, during a period of more
than two thousand years ? And do they not still
shine with undiminished lustre ? Yes, and they
will still continue to display the glory of their
Creator while countless ages are rolling on.
Hence it is declared, with respect to the " saints
of the Most High," « They that be teachers of
wisdom shall shine as the brightness of the firma
ment, and they that turn many to righteousness,
as the stars for ever and ever."

In short, when we consider the boundless ex
tent of the starry firmament, the scenes of gran
deur it displays, the new luminaries, which, in

• See Psalm Ixxii. 17. Ixxxix. 36, &c. ciii. 19.
cxlviii. 3—7.

* Jeremiah xxxi. 35, 36.

the course of ages, appear to be gradually aug
menting its splendour, and the countless myriads
of exalted intelligences which doubtless/ people its
expansive regions — when we consider that it con
stitutes the principal portion of the empire of the
Eternal, the most astonishing scene of his opera
tions, and the rhost striking display of his om
nipotence and wisdom, — it would be one of the
most extravagant notions that can possibly be en
tertained,, and inconsistent with every rational
and Scriptural idea we can form of the good-
ness and intelligence of the Deity, to suppose,
that these vast dominions of his, in which his per
fections shine with a splendour so ineffable, will
ever bo suffered to fall to pieces, or to sink into
non-existence. With almost equal reason might
we suppose, that the Creator himself would cease
to exist, and infinite space be left as a bound
less blank without matter and intelligence.

If the considerations now adduced be admitted
to have any force, and if the position I have en
deavoured to establish, cannot be overthrown,
either on Scriptural or rational grounds — many
of our sermons and poems which profess to give
a description of the scenes of the " Last day,"
must be considered as containing a species of
bombast which has a tendency to bewilder the
mind, and to produce distorted views of the per
fections of the Creator, and of the wise arrange
ments he has established in the system of the
universe. A celebrated poet, when expatiating
on this subject, in order to give effect to his de
scriptions, breaks out into the following extrava
gant exclamations, when alluding to the starry
firmament :

" How far from east to west ? The lab'ring eye
Can scarce the distant azure bounds descry —
So vast, this world's a grain ; yet myriads grace
With golden pomp the throng'd etherial sp<;ce.
How great, how firm, how sacred all appears !
How worthy an iir.mortal round of years !
Yet aU must drop, as autumn's sickliest grain^
And earth and firmament be sought in vain.
Time shall be slain, all nature be destroyed,
Nor leave an atom in the mighty void.
One universal ruin spreads abroad,
Nothing is safe beneath the throne of God."

Again,

"The flakes aspire, and make the heavens their prey
The sun, the moon, the stars, all melt away;
All, all is lost, no monument, no sign,
Where once so proudly blaz'd the gay machine." &C.

If such descriptions were to be literally rea^
ized, a resurrection from the dead woula be an o6»
solute impossibility — the universe would be re
duced to an immense blank — and the visible
glories of the Creator, by which alone his per
fections are recognised by finite intelligences,
would be eclipsed in the darkness of eternal
night. Poetical scraps of this description, are,
however, frequently reiterated by flaming orators,
in order to give effect to their turgid declama
tions, while they have no other tendency thai-.

66

THE PHILOSOPHY OP A FUTURE STATE.

-r

to iead their hearers into a maze of error and ex
travagancy, to prevent them from thinking sober-
beriy and rationally on the scenes predicted in
Scripture, and to excite the sneer of philosophical
infidels.

The only passage of Scripture which, at first
view, seems to militate against the position I
have endeavoured to establish, is that contained
in Psalm cii. 25, 26. " Of old hast thou laid the
foundation of the earth ; and the heavens are the
work of thy hands : they shall perish, but thou
shall endure ; yea, all of them shall wax old like
a garment ; as a vesture shalt thou change them,
and they shall be changed : but thou art the same,"
&c. Some commentators, as Mr. Pierce and
others, suppose, that by <( the earth and hea
vens," in this passage, are to be understood, go
vernments, or civil and ecclesiastical states, as
these words, in their figurative sense, sometimes
denote. But this does not appear to be the sense
in which they are here used. Taken in their
literal sense, they may refer to the same objects
and events alluded to by the Apostle Peter, in
his Second Epistle, chap. iii. 7, 10. formerly ex
plained ; namely, to the dissolution of the earth
and the aerial heavens, at the close of time. But,
supposing that the words were taken in their
most extensive sense, as denoting the whole fa
bric of the material universe, it would not in the
least invalidate the proposition I am now sup
porting. The main design of the passage is to
assert the eternity and immutability of God, in
opposition to the mutable nature of created be
ings. All material things are liable to change ;
but change does not imply destruction or annihila
tion. When it is said, " the righteous perish and
no man layeth it to heart;" and "they that
are far from God shall perish,1' it is not to be un
derstood, tKat either the one or the other shall
be blotted out of existence. So, when it is said
that the heavens and the earth shall perish, a
change or revolution is implied, but not an en
tire destruction. It is farther said, " As a ves
ture they shall be folded up," &c. This appears
to be spoken in allusion to the custom which ob
tains in the Eastern nations, among the grandees,
of frequently changing their garments as a mark
of respect ; and seems to import, the ease and ce
lerity with which the Divine Being can accom
plish important changes in the universe. He can
accomplish the revolutions of worlds and of sys
tems with an ease similar to that of a prince
changing bis apparel, or laying aside his vest
ments. But his changing any particular system
from its original state, implies only his opening a
new scene, and varying the course of his dispen
sations in relation to a certain order of his crea
tures. Nor does the passage under consideration
lead us to conclude, that the changes alluded to
shall all take place throughout the whole universe
at the same period but they may be considered as
happening at different periods throughout the

lapse of infinite duration, according to the df»
signs which his wisdom has determined to accom
plish.

That all material objects are subject to decom
position and changes, we have abundance of
evidence in every department of nature. With
respect to the earth on which we tread, we per
ceive the soil in the higher grounds gradually
washed down by the action.of winds and rains,
and carried by the rivers to the bed of the ocean,
Banks are accumulating at the mouths of rivers,
and reefs in the midst of the seas, which are the
terror of mariners and obstructions to navigation.
In every pit and quarry, and on the face of every
crag and broken precipice, we perceive the marks
of disorder, and the effects of former changes
and convulsions of nature ; while around the
bases of volcanic mountains, we behold cities
buried under a mass of solid lava, orchards arid
vineyards laid waste, and fertile fields transform
ed into a scene of barrenness and desolation.
Observation likewise demonstrates, that even the
luminaries of heaven are not exempted from re
volutions and changes. The law of gravitation,
which extends its influence through all the celes
tial orbs, has a tendency, in the course of ages,
to draw together all the spacious globes in thn
universe, and to condense them into one solid
mass; and, were it not for the counteracting and
sustaining hand of God, this effect, at some dis
tant period in duration, would inevitably take
place, and creation be reduced to one vast and
frightful ruin. Many of the stars are ascertained
to be subjected to periodical changes, varying
their lustre, and appearing and disappearing at
certain intervals ; while others, which formerly
shone with superior brilliancy, have gradually
disappeared, and their place in the heavens is
no longer to be found. Other stars, unknown to
the ancients and to preceding observers, ha.ve
made their appearance in modern times ; and
various nebulous spots, in the distant regions of
space, appear to be increasing both in lustre and
extent. These, and many other similar facts,
indicate changes and revolutions as great, and
even much greater than those which are predicted
to befall the earth when its atmosphere shall be
dissolved, its1*' elements melt with fervent heat,"
and a new world rise out of its ruins. It is pro
bable, that, in the lapse of infinite duration, all
the systems which now exist, some at one period
and some at another, will undergo changes and
transformations which will astonish the intelli
gent creation, and open new and sublimer scenes
of divine operation to an admiring universe.
But such changes will be altogether different
from annihilation or utter destruction — altogether
different from the ideas embodied in the language
of poets, when they tell us that •' not one atom
shall be left in the mighty void," and chat " earth
and firmament will be sought in vain." Those
stars which appeared, the one in 1572, and the

PERMANENCY OF THE UNIVERSE.

67

other in 1604, which shone with a brightness
superior to Venus, and afterwards disappeared,
we have no reason to believe, are blotted out of
creation. They may either have been changed,
from flaming suns, to opaque globes like the pla
nets, and may still be existing in the same region
of space ; or they may have been carried forward
with a rapid motion, to a region of the universe
altogether beyond the utmost limits of our vision,
or some other transformation, beyond the reach
of human conception, may have been effected.
For the annihilation of matter appears to form
no part of the plan of the Creator's arrange
ments ; at least, we have no proof of it, in any
one instance, and the very idea of it seems to
imply an inconsistency, which is repugnant to
what we already know of the divine character
and operations.

Such changes, then, so far from diminishing
the visible glory of the universe, will present to
the view of the intelligent creation a greater va
riety of sublime scenery than if all things " con
tinued as they were from the beginning of the
creation," and will exhibit the attributes of the
Almighty in all their varied aspects and diver
sified modes of operation. While they demon
strate the mutable nature of created beings, and
the immutability of the Creator, they will en
liven the scenes of the universe, and excite the
admiration and praises of countless multitudes of
enraptured intelligences.

From the considerations now stated, it will
(allow, that the various relations which now sub
sist among the great bodies which compose the
universe, will not be materially altered by any
changes or revolutions which may take place
in our terrestrial sphere: nor will the general
aspect of creation be sensibly altered by any
changes that may occasionally happen among the
celestial luminaries. Whatever may be the na
ture of such changes, or however important they
may be to the inhabitants of the systems in
which they happen, they bear no sensible propor
tion to the whole fabric of the universe. Though
stars have, at different periods, disappeared from
the visible concave of the firmament, and have,
doubtless, undergone amazing revolutions, yet
the general appearance of the heavens in all
ages has been nearly the same, and will probably
continue so for an indefinite lapse of ages yet to
corne. Although our earth were just now trans
ported to a point of space a hundred thousand
millions of miles beyond the sphere we presently
occupy, the general aspect and the relative po
sitions of the starry orbs, and the figures of the
different constellations, would appear, on the
whole, the same as they now do when we lift our
eyes to the nocturnal sky. The constellations
of Orion and Charks's Wain, for example, would
present the same shape, the same number of
•tars, and the same relations to neighbouring
constellations, when viewed from a region

1,000,000,000,000,000* of miles distant from
the earth, as they now do from the sphere in
which we are p laced. f— Extension, magnitude,
relative position, attraction, gravitation, central
forces, rectilineal and circular motions, and other
properties and relations of matter, will still sub
sist in the universe, after we are transported

to another state and to a different region ; and,

consequently the sciences founded on the various
combinations of these properties and of the laws
which govern them, will be cultivated by intel
ligent beings, and carried forward to that mea
sure of perfection which they cannot attain in
the present state ; unless we suppose, what is
evidently absurd and contrary to Scripture, that
our knowledge will be more limited in the future,
than in the present world.

For example, the laws which direct the motions
of falling bodies, the appearances produced by
bodies in the heavens moving with different de
grees of velocity, the apparent motions of the
sun and of the starry heavens, and the general
principles of geography and astronomy, on the
planet Jupiter, or any other similar globe, with
the exception of a few local modifications, are
materially the same as on the surface of the
earth ; — which is evident from the consideration
of his spheroidal figure, his diurnal and annual
motions, and from the consideration that gravita
tion is regulated by the same general laws on that
body, and on similar globes, as on the surface of
the earth or the moon. — The laws of vision, and
the nature and properties oflight and colours, are
essentially the same throughout all that portion
of the universe which lies within the sphere of
our observation ; and we have no reason to be
lieve, that the general laws of the universe will
be unhinged for the sake of man, or on account
of any changes that happen in his present abode,
or in reference to his future destination. For, to
use the words of a late eminent Scottish philoso
pher, " The light by which the fixed stars are
seen, is the same with that by which we behold
the sun and his attending planets. It moves
with the same velocity, as we observe by compa
ring the aberrations of the fixed stars with the
eclipses of Jupiter's satellites. It is refracted
and reflected by the same laws. It consists of

• That is, a thousand billions ,• a billion being equal
to ten hundred thousand millions.

tThis will appear quite evident to any one who
considers the immense distance of the stars from
the earth and from one another. We know, by ex
perience, that a change of place equal to 190 millions
of miles, or the diameter of the earth's annual orbit,
produces no sensible difference in the appearance of
the starry heavens, and it is certain that if this dis
tance were multiplied by ten hundred thousand, the
case would be nearly the same. The nearest star
is, at least, 20 billions of miles distant, and remoter
stars several thousands of billions ; and therefore,
the relative positions of bodies so widely dispersed
from each other, would not be sensibly altered by a
change of place equal in extent to a thousand bil
lions of miles.

68

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

the same colours. No opinion therefore, can be
formed of the solar light which must not also be
adopted with respect to the light of the fixed
stars. The medium of vision must be acted on
in the same manner by both, whether we sup
pose it the undulations of an ether, or the emis
sion of matter from the luminous body." — From
these facts we may conclude, that the general and
fundamental principles of the science of Optics
are recognised and acted upon in the remotest re
gions which the telescope has explored, and from
a portion of that knowledge which is possessed
by the intelligences which occupy those distant
provinces of the Creator's empire — always, how
ever, making proper allowances for those local
varieties and modifications, which must produce
an infinite diversity of scenery throughout the
universe, although the same general laws operate
throughout the whole.

What has been now stated in reference to light,
gravitation, and other affections of matter, might
be extended to various other properties, and to
the sciences which have been founded upon them ;
such as, the pressure and motions of fluids, the
properties of gaseous bodies, the phenomena of
electricity and magnetism, and aU those affinities,
decompositions and changes, which are the ob
jects of chymical research. For, in a material
fabric, in whatever portion of space it may be
placed, there must, from the very nature of things,
be a diversity of objects for the investigation of
the naturalist, the chymist, and the philosopher,
in which the wisdom and goodness of the Deity
will always be displayed. Every system of mat
ter, wherever existing in infinite »-p%ce, has a
determinate size and figure ; it is composed of an
infinite number of atoms, variously modified and
arranged ; it has certain diversities of surface
and internal arrangement ; it is susceptible of
certain motions ; it stands in certain relations to
surrounding bodies, and it is destined to accom
plish some wise designs corresponding to the
eternal plan of the infinite Creator. There is
no portion of organized matter now existing, or
which may hereafter exist, but which must be
considered in these and similar points of view.
Now the object of every rational intelligence,
whether designated by the appellations of philo
sopher, astronomer or chymist, when contemplat
ing any material system, is, or ought to be, to
trace the various properties and arrangements
which exist in that system, in order to perceive
the intelligence, wisdom and benevolence that
appear in its construction, and thus to acquire a
more correct and comprehensive view of the plans
and perfections of his Creator. But such con
templations necessarily suppose, the cultivation
of those sciences which will enable him to make
Buch investigations with spirit and effect, with
out which he would be unable to trace either the
qualities and relations of material objects, or to
oerceive the admirable designs of the all-wise

Creator in the works which his almighty powe?
has produced.

SCIENCES WHICH WILL BE CULTIVATED IIS
A FUTURE STATE.

In order to illustrate this subject a little far
ther, I shall offer a few brief remarks on some
of those sciences which will be recognised and
prosecuted in a future world.

ARITHMETIC.

Arithmetic, or the knowledge of numbers, and
their various powers and combinations, is a sci
ence which must be understood in a greater or less
degree by all intelligent beings wherever exist
ing ; without some knowledge of which, no ex
tensive progress could be made in the study of-
the works of God, and in forming just concep
tions of the immense number and variety of be
ings which exist within the limits of his empire.
By the application of the science of numbers
the bulk of the earth has been ascertained ; the
distances and magnitudes of many of the hea
venly bodies have been computed ; the propor
tion which one part of the universe bears to
another has been determined ; the inconceivable
minuteness of the particles of efrluvia, of ani
malcule, and of the atoms of light, has been
brought within the limits of our contemplation ;
and we have been enabled to form some faint
conceptions of the amazing velocities with which
the celestial orbs are carried forward in their
courses. The universe presents to our view an
assemblage of objects, relations, and movements
calculated to draw forth into exercise all the
knowledge of numbers we can possibly acquire.
We are presented with magnitudes so stupend
ous, and with spaces and distances so vast, that
the mind is obliged to summon up all its powers
of calculation, and all its knowledge of propor
tions, progressions and equations, and to add one
known magnitude to another, in a long mental
process, before it can approximate to any thing
like a well-defined idea of such sublime and ex
pansive objects ; and, after all its mental efforts,
computations and comparisons, it is frequently
under the necessity of resting satisfied with ideas
which are vague, inaccurate, and obscure. With
regard to the multiplicity and variety of the ob
jects which creation contains, our present know
ledge of the powers of numbers is altogether
inadequate to convey to the mind any thing ap
proaching to a distinct and comprehensive con
ception. The number of systems in the heavens
which lie within the range of our telescopes, is
reckoned to be at least a hundred millions (100,-
000,000.) In the regions of infinite space, be
yond the boundaries of all these, it is not im
probable, that ten thousand times ten ih

ARITHMETIC.

69

po
Ev

millions of other systems are running their am
ple rounds. With each of these systems, it is
probable, that at least a hundred worlds are con
nected.* Every one of these worlds and systems,
we have reason to believe, differs from another,
in its size, splendour and internal arrangements,
in the peculiar beauties and sublimities with
which it is adorned, and in the organization and
capacities of the beings with which it is fur
nished. The immense multitude of rational be
ings and other existences with which creation is
replenished, is an idea which completely over
powers the human faculties, and is beyond the
er of our arithmetical notation to express.
ven the multiplicity of objects in one world or
system, is beyond our distinct conception. How
very feeble and imperfect conceptions have we
attained of the immensity of radiations of light
incessantly emitted from the sun and falling upon
our globe, and of the innumerable crossings and
recrossings of these rays from every object around,
in order to produce vision to every beholder ! of
the incalculable myriads of invisible animalculae
which swim in the waters and fly in the air, and

! pervade every department of nature ; of the par
ticles of vapour which float in the atmosphere,
and of the drops of water contained in the ca
verns of the ocean ! of the many millions of in
dividuals belonging to every species of vegetables,
of which 50,000 different species have already
been discovered, and of the number of trees,
shrubs, flowers and plants of every description
which have flourished since the creation ! of the
countless myriads of the lower animals, and of
the human species, which have been brought into
existence since the commencement of time, and
of those which are yet to appear in regular suc
cession till time shall be no more ! of the im
mense variety of movements, adjustments and
adaptations connected with the structure of an
animal body, of which fourteen thousand maybe
reckoned as belonging to the system of bones and
muscles comprised in the human frame, besides
a distinct variety of as numerous adaptations in
each of the 60,000 different specios of animals
which are already known to exist ! of the count
less globules contained in the eyes of the nume
rous tribes of beetles, flies, butterflies and other
insects of which 27,000 have been counted in a
single eye ! And, if the multiplicity of objects
in one world overwhelms our powers of concep
tion and computation, how much more the num
ber and variety of beings and operations con
nected with the economy of millions of worlds !
No finite intelligence, without a profound know-

) ledge of numbers in all their various combina
tions, can form even a rude conception of the
diversified scenes of the universe ; and yet, with-

• With the solar system to which we belon" there
are connected more than a hundred globes of diffe
rent sizes, if we take into account the planets both
yrimary and secondary, and likewise the comets

out some faint conception at least, of such ob
jects, the perfections of the Creator and the
glories of his kingdom cannot be appreciated.

It is evident, therefore, that superior intelli
gences, such as angels, and redeemed men in a
future state, must have their attention directed
to the science of numbers, unless we suppose,
what is contrary to Scripture, that their know
ledge and capacities of intellect will be mere
limited than ours are in the present state. They
may not stand in need of the aids of any thing
similar to slates, pencils or numerical characters
to direct them in their computations, or to give
permanency to the results of their arithmetical
processes. The various steps of their calcula
tions may be carried forward with inconceivable
rapidity, by a mental process which will lead
to unerring certainty ; but the same general prin
ciples on which we proceed in our notations
and calculations, must, from the nature of things,
be recognised in all their numerical processes
and sublime investigations.

The Scriptures occasionally give us some in
timations of objects and scenes calculated to
exercise the numerical powers of the heavenly
inhabitants. When Daniel beheld the vision
of the " Ancient of Days" sitting on his throne,
a numerous retinue of glorious beings appeared
in his train to augment the grandeur of the
scene. " Thousand thousands ministered unto
him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood
before him." We are told in the sixty-eighth
Psalm, that "the chariots of God are twenty
thousand, even many thousands of angels?" and
in the Epistle to the Hebrews, we read of " an
innumerable company of angels." The apostle-
John, when narrating his visions of the celestial
world, tells us, that he " beheld and heard the
voice of many angels round about the throne,
and the number of them was ten times ten thou
sand, and thousands of thousands." And again,
" After this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude
which no man could number, of all nations and
kindreds, and people, and tongues — and all the
angels stood round about the throne, and fell on
their faces and worshipped God." These ex
pressions are the strongest which the inspired
writers make use of in order to express a count
less multitude of objects ; and they lead us to
conclude, that, in the heavenly world, vast as
semblages of intelligent beings will be occasion
ally presented to the view ; and consequently, a
countless variety of scenes, objects and circum
stances connected with their persons, stations
and employments. And, therefore, if celestial
beings were not familiarized with numerical
calculations and proportions, such scenes, instead
of being contemplated with intelligence and ra
tional admiration, would confound the intellect,
and produce an effect similar to that which is felt
by a savage when he beholds, for the first time,
some of the splendid scenes of civilized life.

70

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

It is owing, in a great measure, to ignorance
of the powers of numbers, and the mode of ap
plying them, that we find it impossible to convey
any distinct ideas of the velocities, distances,
and magnitudes of the heavenly bodies to the
illiterate ranks of mankind. We are told by
travellers, that there are some untutored tribes
whose knowledge of numbers is so limited, that
they cannot count beyond a hundred, and that
there are others whose notation is limited to
twenty, or the number of fingers and toes on their
hands and feet. While such ignorance of num
bers exists, it is quite evident, that such persons
are entirely unqualified for surveying, with an
eye of intelligence, the grand and diversified ope
rations of the Creator, and for appreciating their
number and magnificence. Even the most cul
tivated minds, from an imperfect knowledge of
this subject, find it difficult to form distinct con
ceptions of the plans of the Creator, and of the
various relations which subsist in the universe.
After familiarizing our minds to the classification
and arrangement of numbers, we can form a to
lerable notion of a thousand, or even of a hun
dred thousand; but it is questionable, whether
we have any distinct and well-defined idea of a
million, or ten hundred thousand. And if our
conceptions of such a number be imperfect, how
exceedingly vague must be our ideas of a thou
sand millions, of billions, trillions, and quartil-
Kons, when used to express the number or dis
tances of the heavenly bodies ? — It is evident,
then, that beings of a superior order, or in a
higher state of existence, must have a more pro
found and comprehensive knowledge of numbers
than man : in consequence of which they are
enabled to survey the universe with more intelli
gence, and to form more distinct and ample con
ceptions of the designs and operations of infinite
wisdom and omnipotence.

MATHEMATICS.

Mathematics, including geometry, trigonome
try, conic sections, and other branches, is another
department of science which will be recognised
by superior beings in a future state. It is the
science of Quantity, and treats of magnitude, or
local extension, as lines, surfaces, solids, &c.
The demonstrated truths of this science are
eternal and unchangeable, and are applicable to
the circumstances of all worlds, wherever they
may exist, and in every period of duration, so
long as the material -fabric of the universe re
mains. Guided by the truths which this science
unfolds and demonstrates we have been enabled
to determine the figure and dimensions of the
earth, to direct our course from one continent to
another across the pathless deep, to ascertain the
distance and magnitude of the sun and planets,
and the laws which the Almighty has ordained
for preserving their order and directing them in

their movements ; and have been led to form
more correct ideas of the immense distances and
the vast extent of the starry heavens. It was
owing to his profound knowledge of the truths of
this science that the illustrious Sir Isaac Newton
determined the properties and the composition of
light, the causes of the alternate movements of
the ocean, and the mechanism of the planetary
system ; and expanded our views of the grandeur
of the universe and the perfections of its Al
mighty Contriver.

Some of the truths of this science may appear,
to a superficial thinker, as extremely trivial, and
almost unworthy of regard. The properties of
a triangle, such as, " that the square of the hy
potenuse of a right-angled triangle, is equal to
the squares of the other two sides" — " that the
three angles of a triangle are equal to two right
angles" — and, " that the sides of a plane trian
gle are to one another as the sines of the angles
opposite to them" — may appear to some minda
as more curious than useful, and scarcely deserv
ing the least attention. Yet these truths, when
applied to the relations of the universe, and
traced to all their legitimate consequences, have
led to the most important and sublime results.
On the ground of such truths we have ascertained,
that the moon is 240,000 miles (iistant from the
earth, that the sun is thirteen hundred thousand
times larger than our globe, that the planet Her-
schel is removed to the distance of eighteen hun
dred millions of miles, and that the nearest star
is at least two hundred thousand times farther
from us than the sun. When the length of any
one side of a triangle is known, however large
that triangle may be, and the quantity of its an
gles determined, the length of the other sides can
easily be found : we know the extent of the
earth's diameter : we can ascertain under what
angle that diameter appears at the moon, and
from these data we can, by an easy calculation,
detei<mine the length of any of the other two
sides of this triangle, which gives the distance of
the moon.

We have every reason to conclude, that an
gels and other superior intelligences proceed on
the same general principles in estimating the
distances and magnitudes of the great bodies of
the universe. They may not, indeed, require to
resort to the same tedious calculations, nor to
the same instruments and geometrical schemes
which we are obliged to use. Without such
aids, they may arrive at the proper results with
unerring precision, and their compulations may
be performed almost in the twinkling of an eye ;
and while we are obliged to confine our calcula
tions to lines and triangles of only a few thou
sands or millions of miles in extent, they may be
enabled to form triangles of inconceivable extent,
on base lines of several thousands of trillions of
miles in length. We are informed, in the book
of Daniel, that " the angel Gabriel, being coiu«

ASTRONOMY.

71

manded to fly swiftly from the celestial regions,
reached the prophet about the time of the even
ing sacrifice." This fact implies, not only that
angelic beings are endued with powers of rapid
motion, but that they are intimately acquainted
with the directions, distances, and positions of
the bodies which compose the material universe.
This heavenly messenger, having been previous
ly stationed far beyond the limits of our planeta
ry system, had to shape his course in that direc
tion, to discriminate the orbit of the earth from
the orbits of the other planets, and the particular
part of its orbit in which it was then moving ;
and having arrived at the confines of our atmos
phere, he required to discriminate the particular
region in which Daniel resided, and to direct his
flight to the house in which he was offering up
his devotions. Now, since angels are neither
omniscient nor omnipresent, as they are limited
beings, possessed of rational faculties, and as it
's probable are invested with bodies, or fine ma
terial vehicles,* — they must be guided in such
excursions by their reasoning powers, and the
faculty of rapid motion with which they are en
dued. Such excursions imply the recognition of
certain mathematical principles, and I have al
ready had occasion to notice, that these princi
ples are applicable throughout every part of the
universe, and must be recognised, more or less,
by all intelligent beings.

The Creator himself has laid the foundation
of the mathematical sciences. His works con
sist of globes and spheroids of all different dimen
sions, and of immense concentric rings revolving
with a rapid motion. These globes are carried
round different centres, some of them in circles,
Borne in ellipses, and others in long eccentric
curves. Being impelled in their courses by dif
ferent degrees of velocity, their real motions can
not be traced, nor the beautiful simplicity and
narmony of the different systems made apparent,
without the application of mathematical investi
gations. To an observer untutored in this sci
ence, many of the celestial motions would ap
pear to display inextricable confusion, and lead
him to conclude, that the Framer of the universe
was deficient in wisdom and intelligent design. —
The principles of mathematics are also exhibited
in the numerous and diversified figures into
which diamonds, crystals, salts, and other bodies,
are formed ; in the hexagonal cells of bees, wasps
and hornets, in the polygons and parallel lines
which enter into the construction of a spider's
web, and in many other objects in nature. — Now,
since God has exhibited the elements of this sci
ence before us in his works ; since he has endued
us with rational faculties to appreciate and ap
ply these elements to useful investigations; and
since his wisdom and intelligence, and the beau-

• The Author will afterwards have an opportunity
of illustrating this position, in Part III. of this work.

ty and order of hi? works, cannot be fully under
stood without such investigations, — it is evident,
that he must have intended, that men should b«.
occasionally exercised in such studies ; in order
to perceive the depths of his wisdom, and the ad
mirable simplicity and harmony of his diversified
operations.. And as the applications of this sci
ence are extremely limited in the present world,
its more extensive applications, like those of
many other branches of knowledge, must be con
sidered as reserved for the life to come. — To
suppose, therefore, that such studies will be aban
doned, and such knowledge obliterated in a fu
ture state, would be to suppose, that the works
of God will not be contemplated in that state,
and that redeemed men in the heavenly worlc
will lose a part of their rational faculties, and re
main inferior in their acquirements to the inhabi
tants of the earth, even in their present imper
fect and degraded condition.

ASTRONOMY.

Astronomy is another science which will oc
cupy the attention of pure intelligences in tho
future world. The object of this science is, to
determine the distances and magnitudes of the
heavenly bodies, the form of the orbits they de
scribe, the laws by which their motions are
directed, and the nature and destination of the
various luminous and opaque globes of which
the universe appears to be composed. It is the
most noble and sublime of all the sciences, and
presents to our vie%v the most astonishing and
magnificent objects, — whether we consider their
immense magnitude, the splendour of their ap
pearance, the vast spaces which surround them,
the magnificent apparatus with which some of
them are encompassed, the rapidity of their mo
tions, or the display they afford of the omnipotent
energy and intelligence of the Creator. In con
sequence of the cultivation of this science, our
views of the extent of creation, and of the sub
lime scenery it unfolds, are expanded far beyond
what former ages could have conceived. From
the discoveries of astronomy it appears, that our
earth is but as a point in the immensity of the
universe — that there are worlds a thousand times
larger, enlightened by the same sun which
" rules our day" — that the sun himself is an
immense luminous world, whose circumference
would inclose more than twelve hundred thou
sand globes as large as ours — that the earth and
its inhabitants are carried forward through the
regions of space, at the rate of a thousand miles
every minute — that motions exist in the great
bodies of the universe, the force and rapidity of
which astonish and overpower the imagination —
and that beyond the sphere of the sun and planets,
creation is replenished with millions of luminoug
globes, scattered over immense regions to which
the human mind can assign no boundaries.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

These objects present an immense field for the
contemplation of every class of moral intelli
gences, and a bright mirror in which they will
behold the reflection of the divine attributes.
Of this vast universe, how small a portion has
yet been unveiled to our view ! With respect
to the bodies which compose our planetary sys
tem, we know only a few general facts and rela
tions. In regard to the fixed stars, we have
acquired little more than a few rude conceptions
of their immense distance and magnitudes. In
relation to the comets, we only know that they
move in long eccentric orbits, that they are im
pelled in their courses with immense velocity,
and appear and disappear in uncertain periods
of time. Of the numerous systems into which
the stars are arranged, of the motions peculiar
to each system, of the relations which these mo
tions have to the whole universe as one vast
machine, of the nature and arrangement of the
numerous nebulas which are scattered through
out the distant regions of space ; of the worlds
xvhich are connected with the starry orbs ; of
the various orders of beings which people them ;
of the changes and revolutions which are taking
place in different parts of the universe, of the
new creations which are starting into existence,
of the number of opaque globes which may exist
in every region of space, of the distance to which
the material world extends, and of the various
dispensations of the Almighty towards the di
versified orders of intelligences which people his
vast empire — we remain in almost profound ig
norance, and must continue in this ignorance, so
long as we are chained down to this obscure
corner of creation. — There will, therefore, be
ample scope in the future world for further re
searches into this subject, and for enlarging our
knowledge of those glorious scenes which are at
present so far removed beyond the limits of
natural vision, and the sphere of human investi
gation.

The heavens constitute the principal part of the
divine empire — compared with which our earth is
but as an atom, and " all nations are as nothing,
and are accounted to Jehovah as less than no
thing and vanity." Vast, as this world may
appear to the frail beings that inhabit it, it pro
bably ranks among the smallest globes in the
universe ; but although it were twenty thousand
times more spacious than it is, it would be only
as a grain of sand when compared with the
immensity of creation, and all the events that
have passed over its inhabitants as only a few of
those ephemeral transactions which crowd the
annals of eternity. It is throughout the bound
less regions of the firmament that God is chiefly
seen, and his glory contemplated by unnumbered
intelligences. It is there that the moral gran
deur of his dispensations, and the magnificence
of his works are displayed in all their variety
and lustre to countless orders of his rational off

spring, over which he will continue eternally to
preside. Hence the numerous allusions to *' the
heavens," by the inspired writers, when the
majesty of God and the glory of his dominions
are intended to be illustrated. " All the gods of
the nations are idols ; but Jehovah made the hea
tens." " The Lord hath prepared his throne in
the heavens, and his kingdom ruleth over all.''
" By his Spirit he hath garnished the heavens."
" The heavens declare the glory of Jehovah."
" When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy
fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast
ordained — what is man, that thou art mindful
of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest
him?" "The heavens, even the heaven of
heavens, cannot contain thee." " By the word
of Jehovah were the heavens made, and all the
host of them by the spirit of his mouth." " The
heavens shall declare his righteousness." " Our
God is in the heavens, he hath done whatso
ever he hath pleased." " The heavens shall de
clare thy wonders, O Lord ."' " I lift up mine
eyes to thee, O thou that dwellestin the heavens."
" Thus saith God the Lord, he that created the
heavens and stretched them out." " The hea
vens for height are unsearchable." " As the
heaven is high above the earth, so great is his
mercy toward them that fear him." He is
l'~ the God of heaven, — he rideth on the heaven
of heavens which he founded of old : heaven is
his throne, and the earth his footstool." — When
the folly of idolaters is exposed, when the coming
of Messiah is announced, and when motives are
presented to invigorate the faith and hope of the
saints, Jehovah is represented as that omnipo
tent Being who " meteth out the heavens with a
span, who spreadeth them out as a curtain, and
bringeth forth their hosts by the greatness of his
might." " Thus saith God the Lord, he that
created the heavens and stretched them out — I
will give thee for a covenant of the people, for a
light of the Gentiles."* " Thus saith the Lord
that created the heavens — I said not to the seed
of Jacob, seek ye me in vain," &c.| These,
and hundreds of similar passages, evidently im
ply, that we ought to contemplate the attributes
of God chiefly in relation to the display which is
given of them in the firmament of his power —
that the heavens are by far the most extensive
portion of his dominions — and that the power
and intelligence displayed in the formation and
arrangement of the hosts of heaven, lay a sure
foundation for the hope and joy, and the future
prospects of the people of God.

In order to form just conceptions of the beauty
and grandeur of the heavens, and of the intelli
gence of Him who arranged their numerous hosts
some of the fundamental facts and principles ot
astronomy require to be understood and recog
nised. The order of the bodies which compose

Isa. xliv 5 6

tea. xlv. 18, 19.

ASTRONOMY.

73

ehe solar system, or other systems which exist in
the universe — the form of their orbits, their pro
portional distances and periods of revolution —
their magnitudes, rotations, velocities, and the
various phenomena which are observed on their
surfaces — the arrangement and positions of the
different clusters of stars — of the stellar and plan
etary nebula, of double, triple, and variable stars,
and many other general factSj require to be known
before the mind can receive farther information
respecting the structure of the universe. It
may be* also necessary, even in a higher state
of existence, to be acquainted with those contri
vances or artificial helps by which very distant
objects may be brought near to view. We know
by experience, in our present state, that by
means of telecsopes, millions of stars, which
the unassisted eye cannot discern, are brought
within the sphere of our observation, and
numerous other splendid objects, which, with
out the aid of these instruments, would have
been altogether concealed from our view. The
organs of vision, indeed, of the redeemed in
habitants of our globe, after the resurrection,
there is every reason to believe, will be capable
of taking in a much more extensive range of
view than at present. They may be endowed
with qualities which will enable them to pene
trate into the depths of space far beyond the
reach of our most powerful telescopes, and to
perceive with distinctness, objects at the dis
tance of many billions of miles. Still, however,
they may require artificial aids to their natural
organs, in order to enable them to contemplate
objects at still greater distances. And although
Buci" helps, to natural vision, analogous to our
telescopes, may be conceived as incomparably
superior to ours, yet the same general principles
must be recognised in their construction. For,
as has been already noticed, the light which
emanates from the most distant stars consists of
the same colours, and is refracted and reflected
by the same laws, as the light which is emitted
from the sun, and which illuminates our terres
trial abode ; and, consequently, must operate on
the organs of sentient beings, in those remote
regions, in a manner similar to its effects on the
eyes of man.

It is highly probable, that, in the future world,
a considerable portion of our knowledge respect
ing the distant provinces of the divine empire,
will be communicated by superior beings who
have visited the different systems dispersed
through the universe, and have acquired infor-
tion respecting their history, and their physical
and moral scenery. We learn from Scripture,
that there are intelligences who can wing their
way, in a short period of time, from one world to
another. Such beings, in the course of a thou
sand centuries, must have made many extensive
tours through the regions of creation, and ac
quired a comprehensive knowledge of the most

striking scenes which the universe displays.
And, since they have occasionally ming.ed in
the society of men, and communicated intelli
gence from heaven to earth, it is reasonable to
believe, that they will have more frequent inter
course with redeemed men in a future state, and
communicate the discoveries they have made
respecting the economy and grandeur of God's
universal empire. But, at the same time, it
ought carefully to be observed, that such com
munications would neither be fully understood
nor appreciated, unless the mind had a previous
acquaintance with the leading facts, and the
grand outlines of astronomical science. To en
ter into the spirit of those sublime details which
angels or archangels might communicate respect
ing other systems and worlds, the mind must be
prepared by a knowledge of those principles
which have already been ascertained, and of
those discoveries which have already been made
in relation to the system of the universe. Sup
pose a group of the native tribes of New Hol
land or Van Diemen's Land, were assembled
for the purpose of listening to a detail of the
principal discoveries which modern astronomers
have made in the heavens — it would be impossi
ble to convey to their minds a clear conception
even of the prominent and leading facts of this
science, from the want of those general ideas
which are previously necessary in order to the
right understanding of such communications.
Such would be the case of men in a future state,
in regard to the communications of angelic mes
sengers from distant worlds, were their minds not
imbued with a certain portion of astronomical
knowledge. They might stare, and wonder at
some of the facts detailed ; but their ideas would
be vague and confused, and they would be unable
to form clear and comprehensive conceptions of
the various circumstances connected with the
scenes described, in all their bearings, aspects,
and relations, and of the indications they afford
of exquisite skill and intelligent design.

As the objects which astronomy explores are
unlimited in their range, they will afford an inex
haustible subject of study and contemplation to
superior beings, and to mankind when placed in
a higher sphere of existence. Astronomical sci
ence, as having for its object to investigate and
explore the facts and relations peculiar to all the
great bodies in the universe, can never be ex
hausted; unless we suppose that finite minds
will be able, at some future period in duration,
to survey and to comprehend all the plans and
operations of the infinite Creator. But this is
evidently impossible ; for " who can by searching
find out God ? Who can find out the Almighty
to perfection ?" After millions of centuries have
run their rounds, new scenes of grandeur will be
still bursting on the astonished mind, new regions
of creation, and new displays of divine power
and wisdom will still remain to be explored ,

74

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

arsd, consequently, the science of astronomy will
never arrive at absolute perfection, but will be
in a progressive course of improvement through
all the revol itions of eternity. In the prosecu
tion of such investigations, and in the contem
plation of such objects as this science presents,
the grand aim of celestial intelligences will be,
to increase in the knowledge and the love of God ;
and, in proportion as their views of the glories of
his empire are enlarged, in a similar proportion
will their conceptions of his boundless attributes
be expanded, and their praises and adorations
ascend in sublimer strains to Him who sits upon
the throne of the universe, who alone is " worthy
to receive glory, honour, and power," from every
order of his creatures.

Since then, it appears, that astronomy is con
versant about objects the most wonderful and
sublime — since these objects tend to amplify our
conceptions of the divine attributes — since a
clear and distinct knowledge of these objects
cannot be attained without the acquisition of a
certain portion of astronomical science — since
the heavens constitute the principal part of God's
universal empire — since our present views of the
magnificence of this empire are so obscure and
circumscribed — since even the information that
may be communicated on this subject, by other in
telligences, could not be fully understood without
some acqnaintance with the principles of this
science — and since the boundless scenes it un
folds present an inexhaustible subject of contem
plation, and afford motives to stimulate all holy
beings to incessant adoration — it would be ab
surd to suppose that renovated men, in a supe
rior state of existence, will remain in ignorance
of this subject, or that the study of it will ever
be discontinued while eternity endures.

NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

Natural Philosophy is another subject which
will doubtless engage the attention of regenera
ted men in a future state.

The objects of this science is to describe the
phenomena of the material world, to explain
their causes, to investigate the laws by which
the Almighty directs the operations of nature,
and to trace the exquisite skill and benevolent
design which are displayed in the economy of
the universe. It embraces investigations into
the several powers and properties, qualities and
attributes, motions and appearances, causes and
effects, of all the bodies with which we are sur
rounded, and which are obvious to our senses, —
such as light, heat, colours, air, water, sounds,
echoes ; the electrical and magnetical fluids ;
hail, rain, snow, dew, thifnder, lightning, the
rainbow, parhelia, winds, luminous and fiery
meteors, the Aurora Borealis, and similar ob
jects in the system of nature.

From the discoveries of uxperimental philoso

phers, we have been made acquainted with 8
variety of striking facts and agencies in the sys
tem of the universe, which display the amazing
energies of the Creator, and which tend to ex
cite our admiration of the depths of his wisdom
and intelligence. We learn that the light emit
ted from the sun and other luminous bodies
moves with a velocity equal to 200,000 miles in
a second of time — that every ray of white light
is composed of all the colours in nature, blend
ed in certain proportions — that the immense
variety of shades of colours which adorns the
different landscapes of the earth, is not in the
objects themselves, but in the light that falls
upon them — and that thousands of millions of
rays are incessantly flying off from all visible
objects, crossing and recrossing each other in an
infinity of directions, and yet conveying to every
eye that is open to receive them, a distinct pic
ture of the objects whence they proceed. We
learn that the atmosphere which surrounds us
presses our bodies with a weight equal to thirty
thousand pounds, that it contains the principles
of fire and flame — that, in one combination, it
would raise our animal spirits to the highest
pitch of ecstacy, and in another, cause our im
mediate destruction — that is capable of being
compressed into 40,000 times less space than it
naturally occupies — and that the production of
sound, the lives of animals, and the growth of
vegetables, depend upon its various and unceas
ing agencies. We learn that a certain fluid
pervades all nature, which is capable of giving a
shock to the animal frame, which shock may be
communicated in an instant to a thousand indi
viduals — that this fluid moves with inconceiva
ble rapidity — that it can be drawn from the
clouds in the form of a stream of fire — that it
melts iron wire, increases the evaporation of
fluids, destroys the polarity of the magnetic needle
and occasionally displays its energies among the
clouds in the form of fire-balls, lambent flames,
and forked lightnings. We learn that the bodies
of birds, fishes, quadrupeds, and insects, in rela
tion to their eyes, feet, wings, fins, and other
members, are formed with admirable skill, so as
to be exactly adapted to their various necessities
and modes of existence, and that they consist of
an infinite number of contrivances and adapta
tions in order to accomplish the purpose intend
ed — and that the beaver, the bee, the ant, and
other insects, construct their habitations, and
perform their operations with all the skill and
precision of the nicest mathematical science.
The bee, in particular, works, as if it knew the
highest branches of mathematics, which required
the genius of Newton to discover. — In short, the
whole of nature presents a scene of wonders
which, when seriously contemplated, is calcu
lated to expand the intellectual powers, to refine
the affections, and to excite admiration of &e
attributes of God, and the plan of his providence.

NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

Natural Philosophy may, therefore, be consi
dered as a branch both of the religion of nature,
and of the religion of revelation. It removes,
in part, the veil which is spread over the mys
terious operations of nature, and discloses to
our view the wonders which lie concealed from
the sottisn multitude, " who regard not the works
of the Lord, nor consider the operations of his
hands." It enables us to perceive th°. footsteps of
the Almighty both in his majestic movements
and in his most minute designs ; for there is not
a step we can take in the temple of nature, under
the guidance of an enlightened philosophy, in
which we do not behold traces of inscrutable
wisdom and design, arid of a benevolence which
extends its kind regards to every rank of sensi
tive and intelligent existence. It shows us the
beauty and goodness of the divine administra
tion ; and demonstrates, that the communication
of happiness is the final cause of all the admi
rable arrangements which pervade the material
system. It teaches us, that the several opera
tions of nature are carried on by means uncon
trollable by human power, and far transcending
finite skill to plan or to execute. It discovers
those laws by which the sovereign of the universe
governs his vast dominions, and maintains them
in undecaying beauty and splendour, throughout
all ages. It thus enables us to consecrate the
universe into one grand temple, and, from the
contemplation of every object it presents, to ele
vate our minds, and to raise our voices in grate
ful praises to Him " who created all things, and
for whose pleasure they are and were created."
In the future world there will be abundant scope
for the prosecution of this subject to an indefi
nite extent. With respect to the state of sepa
rate spirits, after their departure from this world,
(he employments in which they engage, and the
connection in which they stand to the material
system, we can form no distinct conception, and
must remain in ignorance till the period arrive
when we shall be actually ushered into that mys
terious scene of existence. But, we are assured,
that, after the r-asurrection, a material world will
be prepared for the habitation of the just, in
which their connection with the visible universe
will doubtless, be far more extensive than it is
at present ; and wherever a material system ex
ists, it affords scope for physical investigations,
and for the application of the principles of Na
tural Philosophy. This new world will be pre
pared and arranged by divine wisdom ; and
consequently, will exhibit scenes of beauty and
grandeur, oi exquisite contrivance and benevo
lent design. For, if the world we now inhabit,
amidst all the deformities and physical derange
ments which sin has introduced, displays so
many beautiful arrangements and marks of in
telligence and skill, much more may we conclude,
that the world in which "righteousness shall
dwell," will abound in every thing that can charm

the eye, the ear, or the imagination, and illus
trate the manifold wisdom of God ; and of course
will present a boundless field for the most sub
lime investigations of science. This world, in
many of its arrangements, will doubtless present
a variety of objects and scenes altogether diffe
rent from those we now behold, even although the
same physical laws which govern our terrestrial
system should still continue in operation. The
inflection, refraction and reflection of light will
be directed by the same general laws, and will
produce effects analogous to those we now per
ceive in the scene around us ; but the mediums
through which it passes, and the various objects
by which it is refracted and reflected, and many
other modifications to which it may be subjected,
may produce a variety of astonishing effects,
surpassing every thing we now behold, and ex
hibit scenes of beauty and magnificence of whicn,
we can, at present, form no distinct conception.
The science of optics, in unfolding to us the na
ture of light, and the various properties of prisms,
mirrors, and lenses, has enabled us to exhibit a
variety of beautiful and surprising effects, and
to perceive traces of infinite intelligence in rela
tion to this element, beyond what former ages
could have believed. And, therefore, we have
reason to conclude, that, in the hand of Omni
potence, when arranging other worlds, the ele
ment of light is capable of being modified in a
thousand forms of which we are now ignorant,
so as to produce the most glorious and transport
ing effects. There will probably be no such
phenomena as thunder, lightning, and fiery me
teors in the world to which I allude, but the
electrical fluid, which is the principal agent in
producing these appearances, and which pervades
every part of naturev may operate in that world
in a different manner, and, instead of producing
effects that are terrific and appalling, may be an
agent for creating scenes which will inspire tho
soul with admiration and delight. Some of the
mechanical, pneumatical, and hydrostatical prin
ciples which enter into the construction of mills,
wheel-carriages, forcing pumps, and steam-en
gines, may not be applied to the same purposes
in the future world ; but they may be applicable
to a variety of other unknown purposes corres
ponding to the nature of that world, and the cha
racter and employments of its inhabitants.

In such cases as those now alluded to, and in
thousands of others, there will be ample scope
for the application of all the principles of natural
science ; and thousands of facts and principles, to
us unknown, will doubtless be brought to light by
the superior sagacity of the heavenly inhabitants.
To maintain the contrary, would be, in effect,
to suppose, that the inhabitants of heaven are en
dowed with powers of intellect inferior to those
of the inhabitants of the earth, — that their know
ledge is less extensive than ours, — that they make
no progress in moral and intellectual attairruents.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

— and that they have no desire to explore " the
works of the Lord, and to consider the operations
of his hands."

What has been now stated in relation to Natu
ral Philosophy, will equally apply to the science
.of Chymistry. This science has for its object to
ascertain the first principles of all bodies, their
various properties and combinations, their mode
of operation, and the effects they produce in the
economy of nature. Its discoveries have not only
unfolded many of the admirable processes which
are going forward in the animal, vegetable, and
mineral kingdoms, but have opened to our view
many striking displays of the wisdom and good
ness of God, in producing, by the most simple
means, the most astonishing and benevolent ef
fects. The principles of this science must, there
fore, be applicable, wherever matter exists, under
whatever shape or modification it may present
itself; and as all the worlds throughout the uni
verse are composed of matter compounded into
various forms, they must afford an ample range
for the investigations and researches of chymical
science.

ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY.

Anatomy and Physiology are subjects vvhicn we
may reasonably conclude, will occasionally occupy
the attention of the inhabitants of heaven. The
object of these sciences is, to investigate the ge
neral structure and economy of the animal frame,
and especially the parts and functions of the hu
man body. The system of organization connected
with the human frame is the most admirable
piece of mechanism which the mind can contem
plate — whether we consider the immense num
ber and variety of its parts — the numerous func
tions they perform — the rapid movements which
are incessantly going forward throughout every
part of this system — the amazing force exerted
by the heart and muscles — the processes of diges
tion and respiration — the system of veins and
arteries — the articulation of the bones — the struc
ture and course of the lymphatics — the ramifica
tions of the nerves — the circulation of the blood
— the wonderful changes, dissolutions and com
binations continually going on — the chymical ap
paratus adapted for effecting these purposes —
the organs of sense by which an intercourse is
maintained with the external world — or, the har
monious correspondence of all its parts and
functions with the agencies of the surrounding
elements. From the researches of physiologists
we learn, that there are in the human body, two
hundred and forty-five bones variously articu
lated, each of them having above forty distinct
scopes or intentions ; and four hundred and forty-
six muscles of various figures and magnitudes,
connected with the bones, for producing the nu
merous movements of the animal frame — that
more than a hundred of these muscles are em
ployed every time we breathe — that there are

thousands of veins and arteries distributer]
throughout every part of this wonderful system
— that the whole mass of blood rushes with im
mense velocity, through these vessels, and through
the heart, fourteen times every hour — that respi
ration is nothing else than a species of combus
tion, in which the oxygen of the atmosphere is
absorbed by the blood, and diffuses heat and vi
gour throughout the system — that the lungs are
composed of an infinite number of membranous
cells or vesicles variously figured, and full of air,
communicating on all sides with one another, and
that their number amounts to at least 1,700,000,-
000 — that there are above three hundred thou
sand millions of pores in the glands of the skin
which covers the body of a middle-sized man,
through which the sweat and insensible perspi
ration are continually issuing — that thousands of
lacteal and lymphatic tubes are absorbing and
conveying nutriment to the blood — that the heart,
in the centre of the system, is exerting an im
mense muscular force, and giving ninety-six
thousand strokes every twenty-four hours ; — and
that all this complicated system of mechanism,
and hundreds of other functions of which we are
ignorant, must be in constant action, in order to
preserve us in existence, and secure our enjoy
ment.

This subject frequently engaged the attention
of the pious Psalmist. With an eye of intelli
gence and devotion, he surveyed the curious or
ganization of the human frame, from the rude
embryo in the womb to the full developernent of
all its functions ; — and, struck with the wisdom
and goodness displayed in its formation, he raised
his thoughts to God in grateful adoration. "I
will praise ihee," he exclaims, " for I am fear
fully and wonderfully made ; marvellous are thy
works ! How precious are thy wonderful contri
vances in relation to me, O God ! How great
is the sum of them! If I should count them, they
are more in number than the sand." This body,
however, wonderful as its structure is, is liable
to decay, and must soon be dissolved in the grave.
But we are assured that a period is approaching,
when, " all that are in their graves shall hear the
voice of the Son of God, and shall come forth ;"
when this mortal frame " shall put on immortal'
ity," and when that which was sown in corrup
tion "shall be raised in glory." If the human
body, even in its present state of degradation, ex
cited the pious admiration of the Psalmist, much
more will it appear worthy of our highest admi
ration, when it emerges from darkness and cor
ruption to participate in the glories of an im-
mortal life. Its faculties will then be invigorated,
its tendency to dissolution destroyed, every prin»
ciple of disease annihilated, and every thing that
is loathsome and deformed for ever prevented.
Being " fashioned like unto Christ's glorious
body," its beauty will be exquisite, its symmetry
perfect, its aspect bright and refulgent, and hs

HISTORY.

77

motions vigorous and nimble. Its sensitive organs
will be refined and improved, and the sphere of
their operation extended. Its auditory organs
will be tuned to receive the most delightful sen
sations from the harmonies of celestial music,
and its visual powers rendered capable of per
ceiving the minutest, objects, and penetrating into
tne most distant regions. New senses and facul
ties of perception, and new powers of motion,
fitted to transport it with rapidity from one por
tion of space to another, will, in all probability,
be superadded to the powers with which it is
now invested. And, surely, the contrivances and
adaptations which must enter into the structure
of such an organical frame, cannot be less curi
ous and exquisite, nor display less wisdom and
intelligence than those which we now perceive
in our mortal bodies. On the contrary, we must
necessarily suppose thousands of the most deli
cate contrivances and compensations, different
from every thing we can now conceive, to be es
sentially requisite in the construction of an or
ganized body intended for perpetual activity, and
destined to an IMMORTAL duration. — To inves
tigate and to contemplate the contrivances of
divine wisdom, by which the elements of disease
and death are for ever prevented from entering
into this renovated frame, and by which it will
be preserved in undecaying youth and vigour
throughout the lapse of innumerable ages, we
must necessarily conclude, will form a part of
the studies of renovated man in the future world ;
— nor can we help thinking, that the knowledge
of the wonders of the human frame we now
acquire, may be a preparatory qualification, for
enabling us to form an enlightened and com
prehensive conception of the powers, qualities,
and peculiar organization, of the bodies of the
saints after the period of the resurrection.

HISTORY.

Another branch of study in which the saints
in heaven will engage, is History. History
contains a record of past facts and events ; and
makes us acquainted with transactions which
happened hundreds or thousands of years before
we were brought into existence. When viewed
in its proper light, it may be considered as no
thing else than a detail of the operations of
Divine Providence in relation to the moral in
telligences of this world. It illustrates the cha
racter of the human race, and the deep and
universal depravity in which they are involved ;
and displays the rectitude of the character of
God, and the equity of his moral administra
tion.

History, therefore, will form a prominent ob
ject of study among the celestial inhabitants, as
furnishing those materials which will illustrate
the ways of Providence and display the wisdom
ind righteousness of Jehovah in his government

of the world. At present we can contemplate
only a few scattered fragments of the history of
mankind. Of the history of some nations we
are altogether ignorant ; and of the history of
others we have only a few unconnected details,
blended with fabulous narrations and extrava
gant fictions. Of no nation whatever have we
an entire history composed of authentic mate
rials ; and consequently, we perceive only some
broken and detached links in the chain of the
divine dispensations, and are unable to survey
the whole of God's procedure towards our race,
in one unbroken series, from the creation to the
present time. We know nothing decisively re
specting the period during which man remained
in a state of innocence, nor of the particular
transactions and events that happened previous
to his fall. And how little do we know of the
state of mankind, of the events which befell
them, and of the civil and religious arrangements
which existed, during the period of sixteen
hundred years which intervened between the
creation and the deluge, though the world was
then more fertile and populous than it has ever
since been ? How little do we know of the
state of mankind immediately previous to the
flood, of the scenes of consternation and terror
which must have been displayed over all the
earth, when the fountains of the great deep were
broken up, and the cataracts of heaven opened,
and of the dreadful concussion of the elements of
nature, when the solid strata of the earth were
rent asunder, when the foundations of the moun
tains were overturned, and the whole surface of
the globe transformed into one boundless ocean?
How little do we know of the circumstances
which attended the gradual rise of idolatry, and
of the origin of the great empires into which the
world has been divided ? How little do we know
even of the history of I he Jewish nation, posterior
to the period of the Babylonish captivity?
Whither were the ten tribes of Israel scattered
among the nations, what events have befallen
them, and in what countries are they now to be
found ? Of the history of all the nations in the
world (the Jews only excepted) from the time of
the deluge to the days of Hezekiah, a period of
nearly two thousand years, we remain in pro
found ignorance. And yet, during that long
period, God had not forsaken the earth ; his dis
pensations towards his rational offspring were
still going forward, empires were rising and de
clining, one generation passing away, and another
generation coming, and thousands of millions of
mankind ushered into the eternal world. — Those
chasms in the history of mankind, which hide
from our view the greater portidh of God's moral
dispensations, will, doubtless, be filled up in the
eternal state, so that we shall be enabled to take
a full and comprehensive view of the whole of the
divine procedure, in all its connections and
bearings towards every nation upon earth

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

But the history of man is not the only topic in
this department of knowledge, that will occupy
the attention of the inhabitants of heaven. The
history of angels — of their faculties, intercourses,
and employments — of their modes of communi
cation with each other — of their different embas
sies to distant worlds — of the transactions which
have taken place in their society — and of the
revolutions through which they may have passed
— the history of apostate angels — the cause of
their fall and the circumstances with which it
was attended — the plans they have been pursuing
since that period, and the means by which
they have endeavoured to accomplish their in
fernal devices — will doubtless form a portion of
the history of divine dispensations, which " the
saints in light" will be permitted to contemplate.
Over this part of the divine economy a veil of
darkness is spread, which, we have reason to
believe, will be withdrawn, when that which is
perfect is come, and, " when we shall know even
as also we are known." — It is also probable, that
the leading facts in relation to the history ofbther
worlds will be disclosed to their view. The his
tory of the different planets in the solar system,
and of those which are connected with other
systems in the universe — the periods of their
creation, the character of their inhabitants, the
changes through which they have passed, the pe
culiar dispensations of Providence towards them,
and many other particulars, may be gradually
laid open to the " redeemed from among men,"
for enlarging their views of the divine govern
ment. By meuns of such communications they
will acquire a clearer and more distinct con
ception of the moral character and attributes of
God, of the rectitude of his administrations, and
of " his manifold wisdom1' in the various modes
by which he governs the different provinces of
his vast empire. Under the impressions which
such views will produce, they will rejoice in the
divine government, and join with rapture in the
song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song
of the Lamb, saying, " Great and marvellous
are thy works, Lord God Almighty! Just and
true are thy ways, than King of saints .'"

Thus I have briefly stated, in the preceding
pages, some of those branches of science which
will be recognised by the righteous in a future
state. Several other departments of scientific
knowledge might have been specified ; but my
intention simply was, to present to the view of
the reader, a few specimens as illustrations of rny
general position, " that science must be consi
dered as having a relation to a future world." If
it be admitted that any one science will be cul
tivated in heaven, it will follow, that the greater
part if not the whole, of those sciences which
Vring to light the treasures of useful knowledge,
will likewise be prosecuted by superior intelli-
Cences. For all the useful sciences have an inti

mate connexion with each other; so that an ac>
quaintarice with one department of knowledge u
essentially requisite to a clear and comprehen
sive view of another. Astronomy supposes a
knowledge of arithmetic, geometry, trigonome
try, conic sections, and other parts of mathema
tics : experimental philosophy supposes a previous
acquaintance with natural history and physiology,
and is intimately connected with chymisfry, mi
neralogy and botany ; and anatomy and physiology
suppose a knowledge of the leading principles
of hydrostatics, pneumatics, and optics. The
principles of one science run into another, and
reflect a mutual lustre on each other, so that all
the sciences, when properly conducted, asd
viewed in their true light, have but one object in
view, namely, to ascertain the facts existing in
the universe, their connexions and relations, the
laws by which they are governed, and the illus
trations they afford of the power, wisdom and
benevolence of the Creator.

In order to elucidate this topic a little farther,
the following brief remarks may be stated. — It is
admitted, by every believer in Revelation,* that,
at the close of the present arrangements respect
ing our world, " All that are in their graves shall
be raised to life i" and that, however different
the constitution of these new-modelled bodies
may be from their present state of organization,
they will still be material vehicles, furnished with
organs of sensation as the medium of perception
to the immaterial spirit. In what manner the
disembodied spirit views material objects and re
lations, and applies the knowledge of them which
it acquired while united to an organical structure,
we can have no conception whatever, till we be
actually ushered into the separate state ; and
therefore, the observations already made, or
which may yet be thrown out on this subject, are
not intended to apply to the intermediate state
of the spirits of good men. That state, what
ever may be the modus of perception and enjoy
ment in it, is a state of imperfection, and, in
some respects, an unnatural state, if we suppose
that the spirit is not connected with any material
vehicle. — Now, if it be admitted, that the spirits
of the just, at the general resurrection, are to be
reunited to material crganical structures, it must
also be admitted, that those structures must have
some material substratum on which to rest, or,
in other words, a material world or habitation in
which they may reside. This last position is
also as evident, from the declarations of Scrip
ture, as the first. For, while we are informed
that the elementary parts of our globe shall be
dissolved, we are at the same time assured, that
" new heavens and a new earth" shall be pre
pared, (< wherein the righteous shall dwell;"—
that is, a world purified from physical and moral

• The followers of Baron Swedenberg only e»-
cepted.

X.UUALITY OF HEAVEN.

evil, and fitted to the tenovated faculties of the
redeemed, will be prepared in some part of the
universe, for the residence of the just.

In reference to the locality, and the circum
stances of our future destination, there appear to be
only four or five suppositions that can be formed.
Either, 1. The world we now inhabit will be
new-modelled, after the general conflagration,
and furnished as a proper place of residence for
its renovated .inhabitants ; — or, 2. Some of the
globes now existing in other regions of space, to
which the holy inhabitants of our world will be
transported, may be allotted as the more perma
nent habitation of the just; — or, 3. Some new
globe or world will be immediately created,
adapted to the circumstances of redeemed men,
and adorned with scenery fitted to call forth into
exercise their renovated powers ; — or, 4. The
redeemed inhabitants of heaven may be permit
ted to transport themselves from one region or
world to another, and be furnished with faculties
and vehicles for this purpose ; — or, 5. After re
maining for a certain lapse of ages in that parti
cular world to which they shall be introduced
immediately after the resurrection, they may be
transported to another region of the universe, to
contemplate a new scene of creating power and
intelligence, and afterwards pass, at distant in
tervals, through a successive series of transporta
tions, in order to obtain more ample prospects of
the riches and glory of God's universal kingdom.

In all these cases, whatever supposition we
may adopt as most probable, the general laws
which now govern the universe, and the general
relations of the great bodies in the universe to
each other will remain, on the whole, unchanged ;
unless we adopt the unreasonable and extrava
gant supposition, that the whole frame of Jeho
vah's empire will be unhinged and overturned,
for the sake of our world, which, when compared
with the whole system of nature, is but an un-
distinguishable atom amidst the immensity of
God's works. With equal reason might we sup
pose, that the conduct of the inhabitants of a
planet which revolves around the star Siriuy, or
the catastrophe which may have befallen the
planets Ceres, Pallas, Juno, and Vesta, must
necessarily involve in them the destruction' of
the terraqueous globe.

Let us suppose, for a moment, that the globe
we now inhabit, with its surrounding atmosphere,
shall be cleared from the physical evils which
now exist, and undergo a new arrangement to
render it fit for being the abode of holy intelli
gences in a future state. On this supposition,
would not the general relation of things in the
universe remain materially the same as at pre
sent? The wide expanse of the firmament, and
all the orbs it contains, would present the same
general arrangement and relation to each other
which they now do. Supposing this new-mo
delled world to bo of a spherical or spheroidal

figure— which appears to be the general from of
all the great bodies in the universe with which
we are acquainted — there would then exist cer
tain properties and relations between circles cut
ting each other at right angles, or in any other
direction ; or, in other words, between an equa
tor and poles, parallels and meridians, &c. as ai
present. The direction of its motion, the incli
nation of its axis, the component parts of its
surface and atmosphere, and other circumstances,
might be changed, which would produce an
immense variety of phenomena, different from
^hat now takes place ; but the same general
principles of geography, astronomy, arithmetic,
geometry, chymistry and mechanics, which apply
to all the various relations of material object*
wherever existing, would also be applicable in
the present case ; and, consequently, such sci
ences would be recognised and cultivated, and
the principles on which they are built, reasoned
and acted upon, though in a more perfect man
ner than at present, in this new world and new
order of things. Such sciences, therefore, aa
flow from the natural and necessary relations of
material objects, and which tend to direct us in
our conceptions of the wisdom and power of the
great Architect of nature, must be known and
cultivated in a future world, where rational spirits
are united to an organical structure, and related
to a material system ; and consequently, if tha
elementary and fundamental principles of such
sciences be not acquired now, they will remain
to be acquired hereafter.

The remarks now stated, with a few modifica
tions, will apply to any of the other suppositions
which may be made in reference to the place and
circumstances of our future destination. — Even
although the relations of external objects and
their various properties, in the future world, were
altogether different from those which obtain in
the present state of things, still, it would bo
useful and highly gratifying to the mind, to be
enabled to compare the one with the other, and
to perceive how the divine wisdom is displayed
in every mode and variety of existence. No
possible mode of material existence, however,
can be conceived to exist, to which some of the
elementary principles of scientific knowledge do
not apply.

There are, indeed, several arts and science*
which more immediately respect the preseiu
world, and our relations in it, which cannot bj
supposed to be subjects of investigation in a fu
ture state of happy existence. The study of
languages — which forms a prominent object of
attention with many of those who declaim on the
vanity of human science — the study of medicina
as a practical art; the study of civil and muni
cipal law ; the study of political economy, he.
raldry and fortification , the arts of war, farriery,
falconry, hunting and fishing; the arts of thfl
manufacturer, clothier, dyer, &c. — in short, aU

80

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

those arts and sciences which have their founda
tion in the moral depravity of our nature, will, of
course, pass away, as exercises which were pe
culiar to the deranged state of our terrestrial
habitation, and the degraded condition of its
inhabitants ; and which, therefore, can have no
place in a scene of moral perfection. But the
principles of the mathematics, and the axioms
on which they are built, the truths of natural
philosophy, astronomy, geography, mechanics,
and similar sciences, will be recognised, and
form the basis of reasoning and of action, so
long as we are sentient beings, and have a rela
tion to the material system of the universe. Ma
ny truths, indeed, which now require much study,
and long and intricate trains of reasoning before
they can be acquired, may be perceived by sim
ple intuition, or, at least, be more easily and
rapidly apprehended than at present. If a genius
like that of Sir Isaac Newton, could perceive at
a glance, the truth of Euclid's propositions in
geometry, without attending to every part of the
process requisite for ordinary minds, we may
reasonably conclude, that, in a world where the
physical and moral obstructions to intellectual
energy are removed, every science, and every
relation subsisting among corporeal and intellec
tual beings, will be more clearly, rapidly, and
comprehensively perceived and understood.

Many striking instances have occasionly oc
curred, of the capacity and vigour of the human
mind, even amidst the obscurities, and the ob
structions to mental activity which exist in the
present state of things. The illustrious Pascal,
no less celebrated for his piety than for his intel
lectual acquirements, when under the age of
twelve years, and while immersed in the study
of languages, without books, and without an in
structor, discovered and demonstrated most of
the propositions in the first book of Euclid, be
fore he knew that such a book was in exist
ence — to the astonishment of every mathemati
cian ; so that, at that early age, he was an in-
/entor of geometrical science. He afterwards
k-nade some experiments and discoveries on the
nature of sound, and on the weight of the air,
and demonstrated the pressure of the atmos
phere : and, at the age of sixteen, composed a
treatise on Conic Sections, which in the judg
ment of men of the greatest abilities, was viewed
as an astonishing effort of the human mind. At
nineteen years of age, he invented an arithme
tical machine by which calculations are made,
not only without the help of a pen, but even with
out a person's knowing a single rule in arithme
tic; and by the age of twenty-four, he had
acquired a proficiency in almost every branch
of human knowledge, when his mind became
entirely absorbed in the exercises of religion. —
The celebrated Grotius, at the age of thirteen,
only a year after his arrival at the university of
Leyden, maintained public theses in mathe

matics, philosophy and law, with universal ap
plause. At the age of fourteen, he ventured to
form literary plans which required an amazing
extent of knowledge ; and he executed them in
such perfection, that the literary world was struck
with astonishment. At this eatly aj:c he pub-'
lished an edition of Martianus Cupella, and
acquitted himself of the task in a manner which
would have done honour to the greatest scholars
of the age. At the age of seventeen he entered
on the profession of an advocate, and pleaded
his first cause at Delf, with the greatest reputa
tion, having previously made an extraordinary
progress in the knowledge of the sciences. —
The Admirable Crichton, who received his edu
cation at Perth and St. Andrews, by the time
he had reached his twentieth year, was master of
ten languages, and had gone through the whole
circle of the sciences as they were then under
stood. At Paris he one day engaged in a dis
putation, which lasted nine hours, in the presence
of three thousand auditors, against four doctors of
the church and fifty masters, on every subject
they could propose, and having silenced all his an
tagonists, he came off amidst the loudest acclama
tions, though he had spent no time in previous
preparation for the contest. — Gassendi, a cele
brated philosopher of France, at the age of four,
declaimed little sermons of his own composi
tion ; at the age of seven, spent whole ni»hts iii
observing the motions of the heavenly bodies, of
which he acquired a considerable knowledge
at sixteen, he was appointed professor of rhe
toric at Digne, and at the age of nineteen, he
was elected professor of philosophy in the uni
versity of Aix. His vast knowledge of philosophy
and mathematics was ornamented by a sincere
attachment to the Christian religion, and a life
formed upon its principles and precepts. — Jere
miah Horrox, a name celebrated in the annals
of astronomy, before he attained the age of
seventeen, had acquired, solely by his own indus
try, and the help of a few Latin authors, a most
extensive and accurate knowledge of astronomy,
and of the branches of mathematical learning
connected with it. He composed astronomical
tables for himself, and corrected the errors of the
most celebrated astronomers of his time. He
calculated a transit of the planet, Venus across
the sun's disk, and was the first of mortals who
beheld this singular phenomenon, which is now
considered of so much importance in astronomi
cal science. Sir Isaac Newton, the fame of
whose genius has extended over the whole ci
vilized world, made his great discoveries in geo
metry and fluxions, and laid the foundation of his
two celebrated works, his " Principia" and " Op
tics," by the time he was twenty-four years of age;
and yet these works contain so many abstract
profound and sublime truths, that only the first rat*'
mathematicians are qualified to understand and
appreciate them. In learning mathematics, h«

GENERAL REMARKS.

did not study tho geometry of Euclid, who seem
ed to him too p.ain and simple, and unworthy of
taking up his time. He understood him almost
before he read him ; and a cast of his eye upon
the contents of his theorems, was sufficient to
make him master of their demonstrations. —
Amidst all the sublime investigations of phy
sical and mathematical science in which he en
gaged, and amidst the variety of books he had
constantly before him, the Bible was that which
he studied with the greatest application ; and
his meekness and modesty were no less admira
ble than the variety and extent of his intellectual
acquirements. — /. Philip Barrutier, who died
at Halle in 1740, in the twentieth year of his
age, was endowed with extraordinary powers of
memory and comprehension of mind. At the
age of five, he understood the Greek, Latin,
German and French languages ; at the age of
nine he could translate any part of the Hebrew
Scriptures into Latin, and could repeat the
whole Hebrew Psalter ; and before he had com
pleted his tenth year, he drew up a Hebrew lexi
con of uncommon and difficult words, to which he
added many curious critical remarks. In his
thirteenth year he published, in two volumes oc
tavo, a'translation from the Hebrew of Rabbi
Benjamin's " Travels in Europe, Asia and Af
rica," with historical and critical notes and dis
sertations ; the whole of which he completed in
four months. In the midst of these studies, he
prosecuted philosophical and mathematical pur
suits, and in his fomteenth year invented a me
thod of discovering tho longitude at sea, which ex
hibited the strongest marks of superior abilities.
In one winter he read twenty great folios, with
all the attention of a vast comprehensive mind.
Such rapid progress in intellectual acquire
ments strikingly evinces the vigour and compre-
nension of the human faculties ; and if such
varied and extensive acquisitions in knowledge
can be attained, even amidst the frailties and
physical impediments of this mortal state, it is
easy to conceive, with what energy and rapidity
the most sublime investigations may be prosecu
ted in the future world, when the spirit is con
nected with an incorruptible body, fitted to ac
company it in all its movements ; and when every
moral obstruction which now impedes its activity
shall be completely removed. The flights of the
loftiest genius that ever appeared on earth, when
compared with the rapid movements and com
prehensive views of the heavenly inhabitants,
may be no more than as the flutterings of a mi
croscopic insect, to the sublime flights of the
soaring eagle. When endowed with new and
vigorous senses, and full scope is afforded for ex
erting all the energies of their renovated facul
ties, they may be enabled to trace out the hidden
springs of nature's operations, to pursue the courses
of the heavenly bodies, in their most distant and
rapid career, and to survey the whole chain of mor

al dispensations in reference not only to the human
race, but to the inhabitants of numerous worlds

I shall conclude this part of my subject with
an observation or two, which may tend to illus
trate and corroborate the preceding remarks.

In the first place, it may be remarked, that
our knowledge in the future world, will not be
diminished, but increased to an indefinite extent.
This is expressly declared in the Sacred Records.
" Now we see through a glass darkly, but then
face to face. Now we know in part, but then
shall we know, even as also we are known," 1
Cor. xiii. 12. This passage intimates, not only
that our knowledge in a future state shall be
enlarged, but that it shall be increased to an
extent to which we can, at present, affix no limits.
And if our intellectual views shall be immensely
expanded in the realms of light, we may rest as
sured that all those branches of useful science
which assist us in exploring the operations of the
Almighty, will not only be cultivated, but carried
to their highest pitch of perfection. For the
faculties we now possess will not only remain
in action, but will be strengthened and invigora
ted ; and the range of objects on which they will
be employed will be indefinitely extended. To
suppose otherwise, would be to suppose man to
be deprived of his intellectual powers, and of
the faculty of reasoning, as soon as he entered
the confines of the eternal world.* When we
enter that world we carry with us the moral and
intellectual faculties, of which we are now con
scious, and, along with them, all those ideas and
all that knowledge which we acquired in the
present state. To imagine that our present fa
culties will be essentially changed, and the ideas
we have hitherto acquired totally lost, would be
nearly the same as to suppose that, on entering
the invisible state, men will be transformed into
a new order of beings, or be altogether annihi
lated. And, if our present knowledge shall not
be destroved at death, it must form the ground
work ot all the luiure improvements we may
make, and of all the discoveries that may be un
folded to our view in the eternal state.

Again, the superior intellectual views which
some individuals shall possess beyond others,
will constitute the principal distinction between
redeemed men in the heavenly state. The prin
cipal preparation for heaven will consist in re
newed dispositions of mind — in the full exercise

• An old Welch minister, while one day pursuing
his studies, his wife being in the room, was suddenly
interrupted by her asking him a question,which has
not always been so satisfactorily answered—" John
Evans, do you think we shall be known to each other
in heaven ?" Without hesitation he replied,—" To be
sure we shall,— do you think we shall be greater fools
there, than we are here."— If the reader keep in mind
that our knowledge in heaven will be increased, and
not diminished ; or, in other words, that we shall
not be "greater fools there than we are here." he
will be at no loss to appreciate all that I have hither
to stated on this subject.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

d ,ove to God, and love to aii suoordinate holy
intelligences, and in all the diversified ramifica
tions of action into which these grand principles
necessarily diverge. When arrived at that happy
world the saints will feel themselves to be all
equal, — as they were once " children of disobe
dience even as others," as they were all redeemed
" by the precious blood of Christ," as they were
renewed by the influence of the Spirit of grace,
— as they stand in the relation of brethren in
Christ, and " sons and daughters of the Lord
God Almighty," as they are the companions of
angels, and kings and priests to the God and
Father of all. Without the exercise of holy dis
positions, heaven could not exist, although its
inhabitants had reached the highest pitch of in
tellectual improvement ; — and all who shall ulti
mately be admitted into that happy state, will
feel that they are eternally indebted for the pri
vileges and the felicity they enjoy, to " Him that
sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb who was
slain, and redeemed them to God by his blood."
But, notwithstanding, there will be a consider
able difference, at least in the first instance, in
regard to the expansion of their intellectual views.
In this point of view, it is impossible to suppose
that they can be all equal. Suppose a Negro
slave, who had been recently converted to Chris
tianity, and a profound Christian philosopher, to
enter the eternal world at the same time, is it
reasonable to believe, that there would be no dif
ference in the amplitude of their intellectual
views? They would both feel themselves deli
vered from sin and sorrow, they would he filled
with admiration and wonder at the new scenes
which opened to their view, and would be in
spired with the most lively emotions of humility
and reverence ; but if each of them carried along
with him that portion of knowledge which he
acquired in the present life, there behoved to be
a considerable difference in the comprehension
of their views and the range of their intellectual
faculties; unless we suppose that a change
amounting to a miracle was effected in the mind
of the Negro, whose mental views were pre
viously circumscribed within the narrowest
limits. And, to suppose such a miracle wrought
in every individual case, would not only be con
trary to every thing we know of the general plan
of the divine procedure, but would destroy
almost every motive that should now induce us
to make progress " in the knowledge of our Lord
and Saviour Jesus Christ," and in our views of
the works and dispensations of the Almighty.
In the course of ages, indeed, the Negro may
equal the philosopher in the extent of his intel
lectual acquisitions ; but, in the first instance,
both Scripture* and reason declare, that a dif
ference must exist, unless the laws which govern
the intellectual world be entirely subverted. Can

8eeDan.xii.3. i Cor. xv. 41, 42. Matt. xxv. 14, &c-

we suppose, for a moment, that an ignorant pro*
fligate, who has been brought to repentance,
and to " the knowledge of the truth," only a fei*
hours before his entrance into the world of spi
rits, shall, at the moment he has arrived in the
world of bliss, acquire those enlarged concep
tions of divine truth, which an Owen, a Watts,
a Doddridge, or a Dwight, attained at the same
stage of their existence ? or that a Hottentot,
who had been brought to the knowledge of Chris
tianity only during the last month of his life,
shall enter into heaven with the expansive views
of a Newton or a Boyle? Such a supposition
would involve a reflection on the wisdom of the
divine administration, and would lead us to con
clude, that all the labour bestowed by the illus
trious characters now alluded to, in order to im
prove in the knowledge of divine subjects, was
quite unnecessary, and even somewhat approach
ing to egregious trifling.

Not only will the views of the saints in heaven
be different in point of expansion and extent, but
their love to God, and the virtues and graces
which flow from this principle, will be diminished
or increased, or, at least, somewhat modified by
the narrowness or expansion of their intellectual
views. If it be admitted, that the more we
know of God the more ardently shall we love
him, — it will follow, that, in proportion as we
acquire a comprehensive and enlightened view
of the operations of God in the works of creation,
in the scheme of providence, and in the plan of
redemption, in a similar proportion will our love
and adoration of his excellencies be ardent and
expansive. In this point of view, "the saints
in light" will make improvement in holiness
throughout all the ages of eternity, though, at
every stage of their existence, they will enjoy
pure and unmingled bliss. Every science they cul
tivate, and every stage to which they advance in
intellectual improvement, will enable them to dis
cover new glories in the divine character, which
will raise their affections to God still higher,
and render their conformity to his moral image
more complete.

It has frequently been a subject of discussion
among theologians, " Whether there shall be
degrees of glory in heaven." This question
may be easily settled, if there be any weight in
the remarks and considerations now stated. In
so far as there is a difference in the vigour and
expansion of the intellectual powers, and in the
amplitude of objects they are enabled to embrace,
in so far may there be said to be " degrees of
glory :" and a superiorly, in this respect, may be
considered as the natural reward which accom
panies the diligent improvement of our time and
faculties upon earth, though such a distinction can
never be supposed to produce any disposition
approaching to envy, as so frequently happens in
the present state. On the contrary, it may be
supposed to produce a holy emulation to improve

OBJECTION OBVIATED.

every faculty, to cultivate every branch of celes
tial science, and to increase in the knowledge of
God. In corroboration of these views, we are
told in Scripture, that the reward bestowed on
(hose servants to whom talents were intrusted,
was in proportion to the improvement they had
made ; and that, at the close of time, the saints
will present an appearance analogous to that of
the spangled firmament; for "as one star dif-
fereth from another star in glory, so also is the
resurrection from the dead." And the reason of
this difference is intimated by the prophet Da
niel, " They that excel in wisdom shall shine as
the brightness of the firmament ; and they that
turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever
and ever."

If the remarks row stated have any solid foun
dation, it will follow, that what is generally term
ed human science, ought not to be indiscriminately
considered as having a relation merely to the
present world. Such an idea would tend to
damp our ardour in the prosecution of scientific
knowledge, and immensely to lessen its value.
He who prosecutes science as a subject of specu
lation merely in reference to the contracted span
of human life, acts from very mean and narrow
views, and may be considered, in some points of
view, as little superior to the avaricious man
•vhose mind is completely absorbed in the acqui
sition of the perishing treasures of this world.
The Christian philosopher, who traces the per
fections and the agency of God in every object
of his investigation, ought to consider his present
pursuits as the commencement of a course of
improvement which will have no termination —
as introductory to the employments and the
pleasures of a higher state of existence — and as
affording him a more advantageous outset into
that better world than happens to those who are
destitute of his enlarged views. For the more
we know at present of the wonders of infinite
power, wisdom, and goodness, in the material
works of the Almighty, it is obvious, that the
better prepared we shall be for more enlarged
contemplations of them at a future period, and
the greater pleasure shall we feel in beholding
those objects and operations, which are now hid
in obscurity, unveiled to view.

In throwing out the preceding reflections, I
am far from pretend ing to determine the particu
lar arrangements which the Almighty has form
ed in relation to our future destination, or the
particular circumstances which may exist in
other worlds. These things lie altogether be
yond the range of our investigation, and must,
therefore, remain inscrutable in our present state.
But there are certain general principles or re
lations which necessarily flow from the nature of
things, which must be considered as included
within any particular arrangements which may
be formed; and, it is such general principles

only to which I refer.— Nor should it be consi
dered as presumption, to endeavour to ascertain
these general principles or necessary relations ot
things. The Creator evidently intended we
should know them ; since he has exhibited such
an immense variety of his works before us, and
has bestowed upon us faculties adequate to ex
plore their magnitude and arrangement, to in
vestigate the laws which direct their motions,
and to perceive their connection and dependency,
and some of the grand designs for which they
were intended.

To every thing that has just now been stated
in relation to the prosecution of science in the
celestial world, I am aware it will be objected
by some, that such knowledge, if it be requisite
in a future state, will be acquired by immediate
intuition, or communicated in a direct maner by
the Creator himself.— For such an assumption,
however, though frequently reiterated, there is
no foundation in any passage of Scripture when
rationally interpreted ; and it is repugnant to the
clearest dictates of reason. It is contrary to eve
ry regular mode with which we are acquainted,
by which rational beings are conducted to know
ledge and happiness ; it would imply a continued
miracle — it would supersede the use of the intel
lectual faculty — and it would ultimately detract
from the felicity of intelligent agents. For,
a great part of the happiness of finite intelli
gences arise from the gradual evolution of truth,
in consequence of the exercise of their rational
powers. Were all our knowledge in a future
state to be acquired by immediate intuition, or
by direct supernatural communications from the
Deity, our rational faculties would, in many
respects, be bestowed in vain. It appears to be
one of the main designs for which these faculties
were bestowed, that we might be directed in the
prosecution of knowledge, and led to deduce,
from the scenes of the visible universe, those
conclusions which will gradually expand our views
of the plans and perfections of its Almighty Au
thor. Adam, when in a state of innocence,
(and his condition in that state, as a moral agent
was precisely similar to the state of good men
in a future world, except his liability to fall)
was not acquainted, in the first instance, with
every object in the world in which he was
placed, and their various relations to each other.
He could not know, for example, the peculiar
scenery of nature which existed on the side of
the globe opposite to that on which he was
placed. He must have exercised his senses, his
locomotive faculties, and his reasoning powers,
and made observations and experimental re
searches of various kinds, before he became
thoroughly acquainted with the structure, the
order and beauty of his terrestrial habitation. —
For to suppose man, in any state, a mere pas
sive subject of intellectual and external jmpres-

64

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

sion s, would be, to reduce him to something like
a mere machine ; and would imply a subversion
of all the established laws which regulate the
operations of matter and intellect throughout the
Universe.

We know, likewise, that truth is gradually
developed even to superior intelligences. The
manifold wisdom of God in reference to the
church, and the plans of his grace in relation to
the Gentile world, were, in some measure, veiled
to the angels, till the facts of the death and re
surrection of Christ, and the preaching and mir
acles of the Apostles were exhibited to their
view ;* and hence they are represented as " de
siring to look into," or prying with avidity into
the mysteries of redemption ; which evidently
implies, the active exertion of their powers of
reason and intelligence, and their gradual ad
vancement in the knowledge of the purposes and
plans of the Almighty. And, if beings far su
perior to man in intellectual capacity, acquire
their knowledge in a gradual manner, by reflec-

•Ephes. Hi. 5— 11.

tion on the divine dispensations, and the e.xer-
cise of their mental powers, it is unreasonable
to suppose, that man, even in a higher sphere of
existence, will acquire all his knowledge at once,
or without the exertion of those intellectual en
ergies with which ho is endowed.

In short, were the saints in heaven to acquire
all their knowledge as soon as they entered on
that scene of happiness, we must suppose them
endowed with capacities, not only superior to the
most exalted seraphim, but even approximating
to the infinite comprehension of the Deity him
self. For the range of investigation presented
to intelligent beings is boundless, extending to all
the objects and moral dispensations of God,
throughout the immensity of his empire. And
could we suppose finite minds capable of em
bracing the whole of this range of objects at one
comprehensive grasp, their mental energy would
soon be destroyed, and their felicity terminate ; '
for they could look forward to no farther expan
sion of their views, nor to a succession of a new
range of objects and operations through all the
future ages of eternity.

PART III.

ON THE AIDS WHICH THE DISCOVERIES OF SCIENCE AFFORD, FOR ENABLING US TO FORM
A CONCEPTION OF THE PERPETUAL IMPROVEMENT OF THE CELESTIAL INHABITANTS IN
KNOWLEDGE AND FELICITY.

ON the subject of a future world, and the exer
cises and enjoyments of its inhabitants, many
foolish and inaccurate conceptions have prevail
ed, even in the Christian world. We are as
sured, that the foundation of the felicity to be
enjoyed in that world, rests on the absence of
every evil, and the attainment of moral perfec
tion — that the principle of depravity must be
destroyed, and the affections purified and refined,
before we can enjoy " the inheritance of the
saints in light." These are principles which
are clearly exhibited in the Scriptures, which are
accordant to the dictates of sound reason, and
which are generally recognised by the various
sections of the religious world. But the greater
part of Christians rest contented with the most
vague and incorrect ideas of the felicity of heaven,
and talk and write about it in so loose and figu
rative a manner, as can convey no rational nor
definite conception of the sublime contemplations
and employments of celestial intelligences. In
stead of eliciting, from the metaphorical language
of Scripture, the ideas intended to be conveyed,
they endeavour to expand and ramify the figures
employed by the sacred writers still farther,
leaping metaphor upon metaphor, and epithet
upon epithet, and blending a number of discord
ant ideas, till the image or picture presented to

the mind assumes the semblance of a splendid
chaotic mass, or of a dazzling but undefined me
teor. The term Glory, and its kindred epithets,
have been reiterated a thousand times in descrip
tions of the heavenly state ; — the redeemed have
been represented as assembled in one vast crowd
above the visible concave of the sky, adorned
with " starry crowns," drinking at " crystal
fountains," and making " the vault of heaven
ring" with their loud acclamations. The Re
deemer himself has been exhibited as suspended
like a statue in the heavens above this immense
crowd, crowned with diadems, and encircled
with a refulgent splendour, while the assembly
of the heavenly inhabitants were incessantly gaz
ing on this object, like a crowd of spectators
gazing at the motion of an air balloon, or of a
splendid meteor. Such representations are re
pugnant to the ideas intended to be conveyed by
the metaphorical language of Inspiration, when
stripped of its drapery. They can convey noth
ing but a meagre and distorted conception of the
employments of the celestial state, and tend only
to bewilder the imagination, and to "darken
counsel by words without knowledge."

Hence it has happened, that certain infidel scof
fers have been led to conclude, that the Christian
Heaven is not an object to be desired ; and have

WORK OF REDEMPTION.

85

frequently declaied, that "they could feel no
pleasure in being suspended for ever in an ethe
real region, and perpetually singing psalms and
hymns to the Eternal " — an idea of heaven which
is too frequently conveyed, by the vague and
distorted descriptions which have been given of
the exercises and entertainments of the future
world.

There is an intimate connection between the
word and the works of God : they reflect a mutual
lustre on each other ; and the discoveries made
in the latter, are calculated to expand our con
ceptions and to direct our views, of the revela
tions contained in the former. Without taking
into account the sublime manifestations of the
Deity, exhibited in his visible creation, our ideas
of celestial bliss must be very vague and confu
sed, and our hopes of full and perpetual enjoyment
in the future state, extremely feeble and languid.
From the very constitution of the human mind,
it appears, that in order to enjoy uninterrupted
happiness,- without satiety or disgust, it is requi
site that new objects and new trains of thought
be continually opening to view. A perpetual re
currence of the same objects and perceptions,
however sublime in themselves, and however in
teresting and delightful they may have been felt
at one period, cannot afford uninterrupted grati
fication to minds endowed with capacious powers,
and capable of ranging through the depths of
immensity. But all the objects in this sublunary
world and its environs, and all the events record
ed in sacred and profane history, are not suffi
cient to occupy the expansive minds of renovated
intelligences for a million of ages, much less
throughout an endless duration of existence. A
series of objects and of moral dispensations,
more extensive than those immediately connect
ed with the globe we inhabit, must, therefore,
be supposed to engage the attention of "the
spirits of just men made perfect," during the re
volutions of eternal ages ; in order that their fa
culties may be gratified and expanded — that new
views of the divine character may bo unfolded —
and that in the contemplation of his perfections,
they may enjoy a perpetuity of bliss.

It has been, indeed, asserted by some, that
" the mysteries of redemption will be sufficient
to afford scope for the delightful investigation of
the saints to all eternity." It is readily admitted,
that contemplations of the divine perfections, as
displayed in human redemption, and of the stu
pendous facts which relate to that economy, will
blend themselves with all the other exercises of
redeemed intelligences. While their intellectual
faculties are taking the most extensive range
through the dominions of Him who sits upon the
throne of universal nature, they will never forget
that love " which brought them from darkness to
light," and from the depths of misery to the
uplendours of eternal day. Their grateful and
Tiumphant praises will ascend to the Father of

glory, and to the Lamb who was slain, for ever
and ever. But, at the same time, the range o»
objects comprised within the scheme of redemp
tion, in its reference to human beings, cannot be
supposed, without the aid of other objects of con
templation, to afford full and uninterrupted scopa
to (he faculties of the saints in heaven, through
out an unlimited duration. — This will appear, if
we endeavour to analyze some of the objects
presented to our view in the economy of re
demption.

In the first place, it may be noticed, that a '
veil of mystery surrounds several parts of the
plan of redemption. " God manifested in the
flesh," the intimate union of the eternal self-
existent Deity with '• the man Christ Jesus," —
is a mystery impenetrable to finite minds. But
the eternity, the omnipresence, and the om
niscience of the Deity, are equally mysterious ;
for they are equally incomprehensible, and must
for ever remain incomprehensible to all limited
intelligences. It is equally incomprehensible,
that a sensitive being should exist, furnished with
all the organs and functions requisite for animal
life, and yet of a size ten thousand times less
than a mite. These are facts which must be
admitted on the evidence of sense and of reason,
but they lie altogether beyond the sphere of our
comprehension. — Now, an object which involves
a mystery cannot be supposed to exercise and
entertain the mind through eternity, considered
simply as incomprehensible, without being asso
ciated with other objects which lie within the
range of finite comprehension ; otherwise, re
flections on the eternity and omnipresence of
God, considered purely as abstractions of the
mind, might gratify the intellectual faculties, in
the future world, in as high a degree as anj
thing that is mysterious in the scheme of re
demption. But it is quite evident, that perpe
tual reflection on infinite space and eternal dura
tion, abstractly considered, cannot produce a
very high degree of mental enjoyment, unless
when considered in their relation to objects more
definite and comprehensible. Such contempla
tions, however, will, doubtless, be mingled with
all the other views and investigations of the saints
in the heavenly world. In proportion as they
advance through myriads of ages in the course v*
unlimited duration, and in proportion to the en
larged views they will acquire, of the distances
and magnitudes of the numerous bodies which
diversify the regions of the universe, their ideas
of infinite space, and of eternal duration, will be
greatly expanded. For we can acquire ideas of
the extent of space, only by comparing the dis
tances and bulks of material objects with one
another,— and of duration by the trains of thoug'u,
derived1 from sensible objects, which pass through
our minds, and, from the periodical revolution*
of material objects around us. — The same things
may be affirmed in relation to all that is mysto-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

rious in the economy of human redemption ; and,
if what has been now said be admitted, it will
follow that such mysteries, considered merely as
incomprehensible realities, could not afford a
rapturous train of thought to entertain the mind
throughout the ages of eternity. It is definite
and tangible objects, and not abstract mysteries,
that constitute the proper subject of contempla
tion to a rational mind. Fur although we were
to ponder on what is incomprehensible, such as
the eternity of God, for millions of years, we
should be as far from comprehending it, or acqui
ring any new ideas respecting it, at the end of
such a period, as at the present moment.

In the next place, redemption may be consi
dered in reference to the important/acte connect
ed with it, in which point of view, chiefly, it be
comes a tangible object for the exercise of the
moral and intellectual powers of man .These
facts relate either to the " man Christ Jesus, the
Mediator between God and man," or to the
saints whose redemption he procured. The
general facts which relate to Christ, while he
sojourned in our world, are recorded in ihe New
Testament by the Evangelists. These compre
hend his miraculous conception, and the circum
stances which attended his birlh ; his private
residence in Nazareth; his journies as a public
teacher through the land of Judea ; his miracles,
sufferings, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension
to heaven. There is doubtless a variety of inter
esting facts, besides those recorded in the Gos
pels, with which it would be highly gratifying to
become acquainted : such as, the manner in which
he spent his life, from the period of the first dawn-
ings of reason, to the time of his commencing his
public administrations — the various trains of
thought that passed through his mind — the men
tal and corporeal exercises in which he engaged
— the social intercourses in which he mingled —
the topics of conversation he suggested — the
amusements (if any) in which he indulged — the
pious exercises and sublime contemplations in
which he engaged, when retired from the haunts
and the society of men ; — and particularly those
grand and important transactions in which he
has been employed, since that moment when
a cloud interposed between his glo -jfied body,
and the eyes of his disciples, aftei his ascent
from Mount Olivet — What regions of the mate
rial universe he passed through in his triumphant
ascent — what intelligence of his achievements he
conveyed to other worlds — what portion of the
immensity of space, or what globe or material
fabric is the scene of his more immediate resi-
dence-^-what are the external splendours and pe
culiarities of that glorious world — what inter
course he has with the spirits of just men made
perfect; with Enoch and Elijah, who are already
furnished with bodies, and with other orders of
celestial intelligences— what scenes and move
ments will take place in that world, when ho is

about to return to our terrestrial sphere, to sum
mon all the tribes of men to the general judg»
ment? The facts in relation to these, and simi
lar circumstances, still remain to be disclosed,
and the future details which may be given oi
such interesting particulars, cannot fail to be
highly gratifying to every one of the " redeemed
from among men." But still, it must be admit
ted, that although the details respecting each of
the facts to which I allude, were to occupy the
period of a thousand years, the subject would
soon be exhausted, if other events and circum
stances, and another train of divine dispensations
were not at the same time presented to view;
and the future periods of eternal duration would
be destitute of that variety and novelty of pros
pect which are requisite to secure perpetual en
joyment.

The other class of facts relates to the redeem
ed themselves, and comprehends those diversified
circumstances in the course of providence, by
means of which they were brought to the know
ledge of salvation, and conducted through the
scenes of mortality to the enjoyment of endless
felicity. These will, no doubt, afford topics of
interesting discourse, to diversify and enliven
the exercises of the saints in heaven. But the
remark now made in reference to the other facts
alluded to above, is equally applicable here.
The series of divine dispensations towards every
individual, though different in a few subordin
ate particulars, partakes of the same character,
and wears the same general aspect. But although
the dispensations of Providence towards every
one of the redeemed were as different from ano
ther as it is possible to conceive, ar.d although a
hundred years were devoted to the details fur
nished by every saint, eternity would not be ex
hausted by such themes alone.

Again, it, has been frequently asserted, that
the saints in heaven will enjoy perpetual rapture
in continually ga/ing on the glorified humanity
of Christ Jesus. The descriptions sometimes
given of this circumstance, convey the idea of a
vast concourse of spectators gazing upon a re
splendent figure placed upon an eminence in the
midst of them, — which, surely, must convey a very
imperfect and distorted idea of the sublime employ
ments of the saints in light. The august splen
dours of the " man Christ Jesus," the exalted
station he holds in the upper world, the occasion
al intercourse which all his saints will hold with
him, the lectures on the plans and operations ot
Deity with which he may entertain them — the
splendid scenes to which he may guide them
— and many other circumstances — will excite
the most rapturous admiration of Him who is
" the brightness of the Father's glory." — But,
since the glorified body of Christ is a material
substance, and, consequently, limited to a certain
portion of space, it cannot be supposed to be a..
all times within the view of every inhabitant et

STARRY SYSTEMS.

87

Heaven ; and although it were, the material splen
dours of that body, however august and asto
nishing, cannot be supposed to afford new and
varied gratification, throughout an endless suc
cession of duration. He will be chiefly recogni
sed as the Head of the redeemed family of man,
" in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom
and knowledge," who will gradually reveal the
secret counsels of God, and direct his saints to
those displays of divine glory which will enligh
ten and entertain their mental powers. This
seems to be intimated in such representations as
the following, — " The Lamb that is in the midst
of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead
them to living fountains of water." By direct
ing their attention to those objects in which
they may behold the most august displays of
divine perfection, and teaching them in what
points of view they ought to be contemplated, and
what conclusions they ought to deduce from them,
" he will feed" the minds of his people with divine
knowledge, and " lead them" to those sublime
and transporting trains of thought, which will fill
them with "joy unspeakable and full of glory."
Thus it appears, that neither the mysteries,
nor the leading facts connected with the plan of
redemption, when considered merely in relation
to human beings — can be supposed to be the prin
cipal subjects of contemplation in the heavenly
state, nor sufficient to produce those diversified
gratifications which are requisite to insure per
petual enjoyment to the expanded intellects of re
deemed men in the future world — though such
contemplations will undoubtedly be intermingled
with all the other intellectual surveys of the saints
in glory.

I now proceed to the principal object in view,
namely, to inquire, what other objects will em
ploy the attention of good men in the world to
come, and what light the material works of God,
which have been unfolded to our view, tend to
throw upon this subject.

The foundation of the happiness of heavenly
intelligences being laid in the destruction of every
principle of moral evil, — in the enjoyment of
moral perfection — and in the removal of every
physical impediment to the exercise of their in
tellectual powers— they will be fitted for the most
profound investigations, and for the most enlarged
contemplations. And one of their chief employ
ments, of course, will be, to investigate, con
template, and admire the glory of the divine
perfections. Hence it is declared in Scripture
as one of the privileges of the saints in light,
that " they shall see God as he is" — that " they
shall see his face"— and that " they shall behold
his glory,"— which expressions, and others of
similar import, plainly intimate, that they shall
enjoy a clearer vision of the divine glory than in
the present state. But how is this vision to be
obtained ? The Deity, being a spiritual uncom-

pounded substance, having no visible form, nor
sensible quantities, " inhabiting eternity," and
filling immensity with his presence — his essen
tial glory cannot form an object for the direct
contemplation of any finite intelligence. His
glory, or, in other words, the grandeur of his
perfections, can be traced only in the external
manifestation which he gives of himself in the
material creation which his power has brought
into existence — in the various orders of intelli
gences with which he has peopled it — and in his
moral dispensations towards all worlds and be
ings which now exist, or may hereafter exist,
throughout his boundless empire.

It is in this point of view, that our knowledge
of the material universe assists our conceptions
of the scenes of a future state, and throws a re
fulgence of light on the employments, and the
uninterrupted pleasures of the redeemed in hea
ven. By the discoveries of modern science, in
the distant regions of space, we are fully assured,
that the attributes of the Deity have not been
exercised solely in the construction of our sub
lunary sphere, and of the aerial heavens with
which it is encompassed, nor his providential
regards confined to the transactions of the frail
beings that dwell upon its surface, but extend to the
remotest spaces of the universe. We know, that
far beyond the limits of our terrestrial abode, the
Almighty has displayed his omnipotence in fram
ing worlds which, in magnitude, and in splendour
of accompaniments, far surpass this globe on
which we dwell. The eleven planetary bodies
which, in common with the earth, revolve about
the sun, contain a mass of matter two thousand
five hundred times greater, and an extent of sur
face sufficient to support an assemblage of inha
bitants three hundred times more numerous than
in the world which we inhabit. The divine wis
dom is also displayed in reference to these vast
globes, — in directing their motions, so as to pro
duce a diversity of seasons, and a regular succes
sion of day and night — in surrounding some of
them with moons, and with luminous rings of a
magnificent size, to adorn their nocturnal hea
vens, and to reflect a mild radiance in the absence
of the sun — in encompassing them with atmos
pheres, and diversifying their surface with
mountains and plains. These and other arrange
ments, which indicate special contrivance and
design, show, that those bodies are destined by
the Creator to be the abodes of intellectual be
ings, who partake of his bounty, and offer to him
a tribute of adoration and praise.

Although no other objects were presented to
our view, except those to which I now allude,
and which are contained within the limits of our
system, yet even here — within this small pro
vince of the kingdom of Jehovah— a grand and
diversified scene is displayed for the future con
templation of heavenly intelligences. But it is
a fact which cannot be disputed, that the sun and

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

all his attendant planets form but a small speck
in ine map of the universe. How great soever
this earth, with its vast continents and mighty
oceans, may appear to our eye, — how stupendous
soever the great globe of Jupiter, which would
contain within its bowels a thousand wor.-ss as
large as ours — and overwhelming as the con
ception is, that the sun is more than a thousand
times larger than both, — yet, were they this mo
ment detached from their spheres, and blotted out
of existence, there are worlds within the range of
the Almighty's empire where such an awful ca-
tasirophe would be altogether unknown. Nay,
were the whole cubical space occupied by the
solar system — a space 3,600,000,000 miles in
diameter — to be formed into a solid globe, con
taining 24,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
cubical miles, and overspread with a brilliancy
superior to that of the sun. to continue during
the space of a thousand years in this splendid
state, and then to be extinguished and annihi
lated — there are beings, who reside in .spaces
within the range of our telescopes, to whom its
creation and destruction would be equally un
known : and to an eye which could take in the
whole compass of nature, it might be altogether
unheeded, or, at most, be regarded as the appear
ance and disappearance of a lucid point in an
obscure corner of the universe — just as the de
tachment of a drop of water from the ocean, or
a grain of sand from the sea shore is unheeded
by a common observer.

At immeasurable distances from our earth and
system immense assemblages of shining orbs dis
play their radiance. The amazing extent of that
space which intervenes between our habitation
and these resplendent globes, proves their im
mense magnitude, and that they shine not with
borrowed but with native splendour. From what
we know of the wisdom and intelligence of the
divine Being, we may safely conclude, that he
has created nothing in vain ; and consequently,
that these enormous globes of light were not dis
persed through the universe, merely as so many
splendid tapers to illuminate the voids of infinite
space. To admit, for a moment, such a suppo
sition, would be inconsistent with the marks of
intelligence and design which are displayed in
all the other scenes of nature which lie within
the sphere of our investigation. It would repre
sent the Almighty as amusing himself with
splendid toys, — an idea altogether incompatible
with the adorable Majesty of heaven, and which
would tend to lessen our reverence of his cha
racter, as the only wise God. — If every part of
nature in our sublunary system is destined to
some particular use in reference to sentient be
ings — if even the muddy waters of a stagnant
pool are replenished with myriads of inhabitants,
should we for a moment doubt, that so many
thousands of magnificent globes have a relation
to the accommodation and happiness of intel

ligent beings ; since in every part of the material
system which lies open to our minute inspection,
it appears, that matter exists solely for the pur
pose of sentient and intelligent creatures. As
the Creator is consistent in all his plans and ope
rations, it is beyond dispute, that those great globes
which are suspended throughout the vast spaces
of the universe are destined to some noble purposes
worthy of the infinite power, wisdom, and intelli
gence, which produced them. And what may
these purposes be ? Since most of these bodies
are of a size equal, if not superior, to our sun, and
shine by their own native light, we are led bv ana
logy to conclude, that they are destined to subserve
a similar purpose in the system of nature — to pour
a flood of radiance on surrounding worlds, and
to regulate their motions by their attractive in
fluence. So that each of these luminaries may
be considered, not merely as a world, but as the
centre of thirty, sixty, or a hundred worlds,
among which they distribute light, and heat, and
comfort.*

If, now, we attend to (he vast number of those
stupendous globes, we shall perceive what an ex
tensive field of sublime investigation lies open to
all the holy intelligences that exist in creation.
When we lift our eyes to the nocturnal sky, we
behold several hundreds of these majestic orbs,
arranged in a kind of magnificent confusion,
glimmering from afar on this obscure corner of
the universe. But the number of stars, visible
to the vulgar eye, is extremely small, compared
with the number which has been descried by
means of optical instruments. In a small por
tion of the sky, not larger than the apparent
breadth of the moon, a greater number of stars
has been discovered than the naked eye can dis
cern throughout the whole vault of heaven. In
proportion as the magnifying powers of the tele
scope are increased, in a similar proportion do
the stars increase upon our view. They seem
ranged behind one another in boundless perspec
tive, as far as the assisted eye can reach, leaving
us no room to doubt, that, were the powers of
our telescopes increased a thousand times more
than they now are, millions beyond millions, in
addition to what we now behold, would start up
before the astonished sight. Sir William Her-
schel informs us, that, when viewing a certain
portion of the Milky Way, in the course of seven
minutes, more than fifty thousand stars

•The Author will have an opportunity of illus
trating this subject, in minute detail, in a work en
titled, The scenery of the Jieavcns displayed, with
the view of proving and illustrating the doctrine of
a plurality r,f worlds ;" in which the positions here
assumed will he shown to have the force of a moral
demonstration, on the same general principles by
which we prove .the being of a God, and the immor
tality of man. In this work, all the known facts in
relation to descriptive astronomy, and the structure
of the heavens, will be particularly detailed, and ac
companied with original remarks ar.d moral and
religious reflections, so as to form a comprehensive
compeml of popular astronomy

DIVERSITY OF SCENERY IN THE HEAVENS.

across the field of his telescope, — and it has been
calculated, that within the range of such an in
strument, applied to all the different portions of
the firmament, more than eighty millions of stars
would be rendered visible.

Here, then, within the limits of that circle
which human vision has explored, the mind per
ceives, not merely eighty millions of worlds, but,
at least thirty times that number ; for every star,
considered as a sun, may be conceived to be
.surrounded by at least thi-'v planetary globes ;*
so that the visible system of the universe rnay be
stated, at the lowest computation, as compre
hending within its vast circumference, 2,400,-
000,000 of worlds ! This celestial scene pre
sents an idea so august and overwhelming, that
the mind is confounded, and shrinks back at the
attempt of forming any definite conception of a
multitude and a magnitude so far beyond the
limits of its ordinary excursions. If we can
form no adequate idea of the magnitude, the va
riety, and economy of one world, how can we
form a just conception of thousands ? If a sin
gle million of objects of any description presents
an image too vast and complex to be taken in at
one grasp, how shall we ever attempt to compre
hend an object so vast as two thousand four hun
dred millions of worlds ! None but that Eter
nal Mind which counts the number of the stars,
which called them from nothing into existence,
and arranged them in the respective stations
they occupy, and whose eyes run to and fro
through the unlimited extent of creation — can
form a clear and comprehensive conception of
the number, the order, and the economy of this
vast portion of the system of nature.

But here, even the very feebleness and obscu
rity of our conceptions tend to throw a radiance
on the subject we are attempting to illustrate.
The magnitude and incomprehensibility of the
object, show us, how many diversified views of
the divine glory remain to be displayed ; what
an infinite variety of sublime scenes may be af
forded for the mind to expatiate upon ; and what
rapturous trains of thought, ever various, and
ever new, may succeed each other without in
terruption, throughout an unlimited duration.

Let us now endeavour to analyze some of the
objects presented to our mental sight, in this
vast assemblage of systems and worlds, which
lie within the sphere of human vision.

The first idea that suggests itself, is, that they
are all material structures— in the formation of
which, infinite wisdom and goodness have been
emplojed; and consequently, they must exhibit

* The solar system consists of eleven primary and
eighteen secondary planets ; in all twenty-nine
besides more than a hundred comets; and it is pro
bable that several planetary bodies exist within the
limits of our system which have not yet been disco
vered. Other systems may probalily contain a more
numerous retinue of worlds, and perhaps ofc larger
size than those belonging to the system «f the sun.

scenes of sublimity and of exquisite contrivance
worthy of the contemplation of every rational
being. If this earth, which is an abode of apos
tate men, and a scene of moral depravity, and
which, here and there, has the appearance of
being the ruins of a former world — presents the
variegated prospect of lofty mountains, romantic
dells, and fertile plains ; meandering rivers,
transparent lakes, and spacious oceans ; ver
dant landscapes, adorned with fruits and flowers,
and a rich variety of the finest colours, and a
thousand other beauties and sublimities that
are strewed over the face of nature — how grand
and magnificent a scenery may we suppose,
must be presented to the view, in those worlds
where moral evil has never entered to derange
the harmony of the Creator's works — where love
to the Supreme, and to one another, fires the
bosoms of all their inhabitants, and produces a
rapturous exultation, and an incessant adoration
of the Source of happiness ! In such worlds,
we may justly conceive, that the sensitive en
joyments, and the objects of beauty and gran
deur which are displayed to their view, as far
exceed the scenery and enjoyments of this world,
as their moral and intellectual qualities excel
those of the sons of men.

In the next place, it is highly reasonable to be
lieve, that an infinite diversity of scenery exists
throughout all the worlds which compose the
universe ; that no one of all the millions of sys
tems to which I have now adverted, exactly re
sembles another in its construction, motions,
order, and decorations. There appear, indeed,
to be certain laws and phenomena which are
.common to all the systems which exist within
the limits of human vision. It is highly proba
ble that the laws of gravitation extend their
influence through every region of space occupied
by material substances ; and, it is beyond a
doubt, that the phenomena of vision, and the
laws by which light is reflected and refracted,
exist in the remotest regions which the telescope
has explored. For the light which radiates from
the most distant stars (as formerly stated) is
found to be of the same nature, to move with the
same velocity, to be refracted by the same laws,
and to exhibit the same colours as the light which
proceeds from the sun, and is reflected from sur
rounding objects. The medium of vision must,
therefore, be acted upon, and the organs of sight
perform their functions, in those distant regions,
in the same manner as takes place in the system
of which we form a part, or, at least, in a man
ner somewhat analogous to it. And this cir
cumstance shows, that the Creator evidently
^tended we should form some faint ideas, al
least, of the general procedure of nature in dis
tant worlds, in order to direct our conceptions of
the sublime scenery of the universe, even while
we remain in this obscure corner of creation.
But, although the visible systems of the universe

90

THE PnrLOSOPHY OF A Fb 1 UHE STATE.

appear to be connected by certain general prin-
cioles and laws which operate throughout the
whole, yet the indefinite modifications which
these laws may receive in each particular system,
may produce an almost infinite diversity of phe
nomena in different worlds, so that no one de
partment of the material universe may resemble
another. Nor is it difficult to conceive how
such a diversity of scenery may be produced.
With regard to the terraqueous globe, — were its
axis to be shifted, so as to point to a different
quarter of the heavens, or were the angle which
it forms with the ecliptic to be greater or less
than it now is, the general appearance of the
firmament would be changed, the apparent mo
tions of the sun and stars, the days and nights,
the seasons of the year, and an immense variety
of phenomena in the earth and heavens would
assume a very different aspect from what they
now wear. Were the component parts of the
atmosphere materially altered, were its refrac
tive power much increased, or were a greater
portion of caloric or of electricity introduced into
its constitution, the objects which diversify the
landscape of the earth, and the luminaries of
heaven, would assume such a variety of new and
uncommon appearances, as would warrant the
application of the Scripture expression, " a new
heaven and a new earth." It is, therefore, easy
to conceive, that, when infinite power and wis
dom are exerted for this purpose, every globe in
the universe, with its appendages, may be con
structed and arranged in such a manner as to
present a variety of beauties and sublimities pe
culiar to itself.

That the Creator has actually produced this
effect, is rendered in the highest degree proba
ble, from the infinite variety presented to our
view in those departments of nature which lie
open to our particular investigation. In the ani
mal kingdom we find more than a hundred thou
sand different species of living creatures, and
about the same variety in the productions of ve
getable nature ; the mineral kingdom presents to
us an immense variety of earths, stones, rocks,
metals, fossils, gems, and precious stories, which
are strewed in rich profusion along the surface,
and throughout the interior parts of the globe.
Of the individuals which compose every distinct
species of animated beings, there is no one
which bears an exact resemblance to another.
Although the eight hundred millions of men that
now people the globe, and all the other millions
that have existed since the world began, were to
he compared, no two individuals would be found
to present exactly the same aspect in every point
of view in which they might be contemplated.
In like manner, no two horses, cows, dogs, lions,
elephants, or other terrestrial animals will be
Sound bearing a perfect resemblance. The same
observation will apply to the scenery of lakes,
-•'virs, grottos, and mountains, and to all the di

versified landscapes which tho surface of fho
earth and waters presents to the traveller, anu
the student of nature.

If, from the earth, we direct our views to the
other bodies which compose our planetary sys
tem, we shall find a similar diversity, so far as our
observations extend. From the surface of one of
the planets, the sun will appear seven times larger,
and from the surface of another, three hundred
and sixty times smaller than he does to us. One
of those bodies is destitute of a moon ; but from
its ruddy aspect, either its surface or its atmo
sphere appears to be endowed with a phospho
rescent qua'.ity, to supply it with light in the
absence of the sun. Another is surrounded by
four resplendent moons, much larger than ours •
a third is supplied with six, and a fourth, with
seven moons, and two magnificent rings to re
flect the light of the sun, and diversify the scene
ry of its sky. One of these globes revolves
round its axis in ten, and another in twenty-three
hours and a half. One of them revolves round
the sun in eighty-eight, another in two hundred
and twenty-four days ; a third in twelve years,
a fourth in thirty, and a fifth in eighty-two years.
From all which, and many other circumstances
that have been observed, an admirable variety of
phenomena is produced, of which each planetary
globe has its own peculiarity. Even our moon,
which is among the smallest of the celestial bo
dies, which is the nearest to us, and which accom
panies the earth during its revolution round the
sun, exhibits a curious variety of aspect, different
from what is found on the terraqueous globe.
The altitude of its mountains, the depths of its
vales, the conical form of its insulated rocks,
the circular ridges of hills which encompass its
plains, and the celestial phenomena which are
displayed in its firmament — present a scenery
which though in some points resembling oar own,
is yet remarkably different, on the whole, from
the general aspect of nature in our terrestrial
habitation.

If, therefore, the Author of nature act on the
same general principles, in other systems, as he
has done in ours — which there is every reason
to believe, when we consider his infinite wisdom
and intelligence — we may rest assured, that ev
ery one of the two thousand four hundred mil
lions of worlds which are comprehended within
the range of human vision, has a magnificence
and glory peculiar to itself, by which it is dis
tinguished from all the surrounding provinces of
Jehovah's empire. In this view, we may con
sider the language of the Apostle Paul as ex
pressing not only an apparent, but a real fact.
" There is one glory of the sun, and another
glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars .
"/or one star differeth from another star in glory."
To suppose that the Almighty has exhausted his
omnipotent energies, and exhibited all the mani
festations of nis glory which his perfections can

FACULTIES Of &UPERIOR BEINGS.

9J

oroduce, in one system, or even in one million of
Hystems, would be to set limits to the resources
of his wisdom and intelligence which are in
finite and incomprehensible. Hence we find
the sacred writers, when contemplating the nu
merous objects which creation exhibits, breaking
out into such exclamations as these, " How
manifold, O Jehovah, are thy works ' In wis
dom hast thou made them all."

In the next place, — Besides the magnificence
and variety of the material structures which
exist throughout the universe, the organized and
intelligent beings with which they are peopled,
present a vast field of delightful contemplation.
On this general topic, the following ideas may
be taken into consideration : —

1. The gradations of intellect or the various
orders of intelligences which may people the
universal system. That there is a vast diver
sity in the scale of intellectual existence, may be
proved by considerations similar to those which
I have already stated. Among sentient beings,
in this world, we find a regular gradation of
intellect, from the muscle, through all the orders
of the aquatic and insect tribes, till we arrive
at the dog, the monkey, the beaver and the ele
phant, and last of all, to man, who stands at the
top of the intellectual scale, as the lord of this lower
world. We perceive, too, in the individuals
which compose the human species, a wonderful
diversity in their powers and capacities of intel
lect, arising partly from their original constitu
tion of mind, partly from the conformation of their
corporeal organs, and partly from the degree of
cultivation they have received. But it would be
highly unreasonable to admit, that the most ac
complished genius that ever adorned our race,
was placed at the summit of intellectual perfec
tion. On the other hand, we have reason to
believe, that man, with all his noble powers,
stands nearly at the bottom of the scale of the
intelligent creation. For a being much inferior
to man, in the powers of abstraction, conception,
and reasoning, could scarcely be denominated
a rational creature, or supposed capable of be
ing qualified for the high destination to which
man is appointed. As to the number of species
which diversify the ranks of superior intellectual
natures, and the degrees of perfection which dis
tinguish their different orders, we have no data,
afforded by the contemplation of the visible uni
verse, sufficient to enable us to form a definite
conception. The intellectual faculties, even of
finite beings, may be carried to so high a pitch
of perfection, as to baffle all our conceptions and
powers of description. — The following descrip
tion in the words of a celebrated Swiss natu
ralist, may perhaps convey some faint idea of the
powera of some of the highest order of intelli
gences : —

•• To convey one's self from one o»ace to ano

ther with a swiftness equal or superior to that of
light ; to preserve one's self by the mere force
of nature, and without the assistance of any other
created being ; to be absolutely exempted from
every kind of change ; to be endowed with the
most exquisite and extensive senses; to have
distinct perceptions of all the attributes of matter,
and of all its modifications ; to discover effects
in their causes ; to raise one's self by a most
rapid flight to the most general principles ; to
see in the twinkling of an eye these princi
ples ; — to have at the same time, without confu
sion, an almost infinite number of ideas ; to see
the past as distinctly as the present, and to pene
trate into the remotest futurity ; to be able to
exercise all these faculties without weariness:
these are the various outlines from which we may
draw a portrait of the perfections of superior
natures." *

A being possessed of faculties such as these,
is raised as far above the limited powers of man,
as man is raised above the insect tribes. The
Scriptures assure us, that beings, approximating,
in their powers arid perfections, to those now
stated, actually exist, and perform important of
fices under the government of the Almighty.
The perfections of the angelic tribes, as repre
sented in Scripture, are incomparably superior
to those of men. They are represented as pos
sessed of powers capable of enabling them to
wing their flight with amazing rapidity from world
to world. For the angel Gabriel, being com
manded to fly swiftly, while the prophet Daniel
was engaged in supplication, approached to him,
before he had mado an end of presenting his re
quests. During the few minutes employed in
uttering his prayer, this angelic messenger de
scended from the celestial regions to the country
of Babylonia. This was a rapidity of motion
surpassing the comprehension of the most vigor
ous imagination, and far exceeding even the ama
zing velocity of light. — They have power over
the objects of inanimate nature; for one of them
" rolled away the stone from the door of the se
pulchre," at the time of Christ's resurrection.
They are intimately acquainted with the springs
of life, and the avenues by which they may be
interrupted ; for an angel slew, in one night,
185,000 of the Assyrian army. — They are per
fectly acquainted with all the relations which
subsist among mankind, and can distinguish the
age and character of every individual throughout
all the families of the earth. For one of these
powerful beings recognised all the first-born in the
land of Egypt, distinguished the Egyptians from

* This writer, in addition to these, states the follow
ing properties :— " To be invested with a power capa
ble of displacing the heavenly bodies, or of changing
the course of nature, and to be possessed of a power
and skill capable of organizing matter, of forming a
plant, an animal, a world."— But I can scarcely think
that such perfections are competent to any being
hut the Supreme.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

the children of Israel, and exerted his powers in
their destruction. And as they are " minister
ing spirits to the heirs of salvation," they must
have a clear perception of the persons and cha
racters of those who are the objects of the Divine
favour, and to whom they are occasionally sent
on embassies of mercy. — They are endowed with
great physical powers and energies ; hence they
are said " to excel in strength:" and the phrase,
"asZron^angel," and "a?rag-%angel," which are
sometimes applied to them, are expressive of the
same perfection. Hence they are represented,
in the book of the Revelation, as " holding the
four winds of heaven," as executing the judg
ments of God upon the proud despisers of his go
vernment, as " throwing mountains into the sea,"
and binding the prince of darkness with chains,
and " casting him into the bottomless pit."

They are endowed with unfading arid im
mortal youth, and experience no decay in the
vigour of their powers. For the angels who
appeared to Mary at the tomb of our Saviour,
appeared as young men, though they were then
more than four thousand years old. During the
long succession of ages that had passed since
their creation, their vigour and animation had
suffered no diminution, nor decay, — they are
possessed of vast powers of intelligence. Hence
they are exhibited in the book of Revelation,
as being "full of eyes," that is, endowed with
" all sense, all intellect, all consciousness ; turn
ing their attention every way ; beholding at once
all things within the reach of their understand
ings i and discerning them with the utmost clear
ness of conception." The various other quali
ties now stated, necessarily suppose a vast com
prehension of intellect ; and the place of their
residence, and the offices in which they have
been employed, have afforded full scope to their
superior powers. They dwell in a world where
truth reigns triumphant, where moral evil has
never entered, where substantial knowledge ir
radiates the mind of every inhabitant, where the
mysteries which involve the character of the
Eternal are continually disclosing, and where
the plans of his providence are rapidly unfolded.
They have ranged through the innumerable re
gions of the heavens, and visited distant worlds,
for thousands of years ; they have beheld the un
ceasing variety, and the endless multitude of
the works of creation and providence, and are,
doubtless, enabled to compare systems of worlds,
with more accuracy and comprehension than
we are capable of surveying villages, cities and
provinces. Thus, their original powers and
capacities have been expanded, and their vigour
and activity strengthened; and, consequently,
in the progress of duration, their acquisitions of
wisdom and knowledge must indefinitely sur
pass every thing that the mind of man can con
ceive. — We have likewise certain intimations,
that, among these celestial beings, there are

gradations of nature and of qffice ; since there
are among them, "seraphim and cherubim,
archangels, thrones, dominions, principalities
and powers," which designations are evidently
expressive of their respective endowments, of tho
stations they occupy, and of the employments for
which they are qualified.

Hence it appears, that although we know but
little in the mean time of the nature of that diver
sity of intellect which prevails among the higher
orders of created beings — the intimations given
in the sacred volume, and the general analogy
of nature, lead us to form the most exalted ideas
of that amazing progression and variety which
reign throughout the intellectual universe.

2. Not only is there a gradation of inteUect
among superior beings, but it is highly probable,
that a similar gradation or variety obtains, in
the form, the organization, and tho movements
of their corporeal vehicles.

The human form, especially in the vigour of
youth, is the most beautiful and symmetrical of
all the forms of organized beings with which we
are acquainted ; and, in these respects, may
probably bear some analogy to the organical
structures of other intelligences. But, in other
worlds, there may exist an indefinite variety, as
to the general form of the body or vehicle with
which their inhabitants are invested, the size,
the number, and quality of their organs, tho
functions they perform, the splendour and beauty
of their aspect, and particularly, in the number
and perfection of their senses. Though there
are more than a hundred thousand species of
sensitive beings, which traverse the earth, the
waters, and the air, yet they all exhibit a mark
ed difference in their corporeal forms and organ
ization. Quadrupeds exhibit a very different
structure from fishes, and birds from reptiles ;
and every distinct species of quadrupeds, birds,
fishes, and insects, differs from another in its
conformation and functions. It is highly proba
ble, that a similar variety exists, in regard to
the corporeal vehicles of superior intelligences —
accommodated to the regions in which they re
spectively reside, the functions they have to per
form, and the employments in which they are
engaged ; and this we find to be actually the
case, so far as our information extends. When
any of the angelic tribes were sent on embas
sies to our world, we find, that, though they
generally appeared in a shape somewhat re
sembling a beautiful human form, yet, in every
instance, there appeared a marked difference
between them and human beings. The angel
who appeared at the tomb of our Saviour, 'ex
hibited a bright and resplendent form : " His
countenance was like the brightness of light
ning, and his raiment as white as snow," glit
tering with an extraordinary lustre beyond what
mortal eyes could bear. The angel who deliver
ed Peter from the prison to which he had becft

SENSE?? OF SUPERIOR BEINGS.

confined by the tyranny of Herod, was arrayed in
such splendour, that a glorious light shone
through the whole apartment where the apostle
was bound, dark and gloomy as it was. That
these beings have organs of speech, capable of
forming articulate sounds and of joining in mu
sical strains, appears form the words they utter
ed on these and other occasions, and from the
song they sung in the plains of Bethlehem, when
they announced the birth of the Saviour. They
appear to possess the property of rendering
themselves invisible at pleasure ; for the angel
that appeared to Zacharias in the sanctuary of
the temple, was invisible to the surrounding mul
titudes without, both at the time of his entrance
into, and his exit from the '< holy place."*

In particular, there is every reason to con
clude, that there is a wonderful variety in the
number and acuteness of their organs of sensa
tion. We find a considerable variety, in these
respects, among the sensitive beings which in
habit our globe. Some animals appear to have
only one sense, as the muscle, and the zoophytes ;
many have but two senses ; some have three ;
and man, the most perfect animal, has only Jive.
These senses, too, in different species, differ
very considerably, in point of vigour and acute-
ness. The dog has a keener scent, the stag a

* To what is stated in this paragraph respecting
angels, it will doubtless be objected, " that these
intelligences are pure spirits, and assume corporeal
forms only on particular occasions." This is an
opinion almost universally prevalent; but it is a
fnere assumption, destitute of any rational or scrip
tural argument to substantiate its truth. There is
no passage in Scripture, with which I am acquaint
ed, that makes such an assertion. The passage in
Psalm civ. 4, " Who maketh his angels spirits, and
his ministers a flaming fire," has frequently been
quoted for this purpose ; but it has no reference to
any opinion that may be formed on this point ; as
the passage should be rendered, " Who maketh the
winds luVmessengers, and a flaming fire his minis
ters." Even although the passage were taken as
it stands in our translation, and considered as re
ferring to the angels, it would not prove, that they
are pure immaterial substances; for, while they
are designated spirits, which is equally applica
ble to men as well as to angels— they are also
said to be "a flaming fire," which is a material sub
stance. This passage seems to have no particular
reference to either opinion ; but, if considered as
expressing the attributes of angels, its meaning
plainly is,— that they are endowed with wonderful
activity — that they move with the swiftness of the
winds, and operate with the force and energy of
flaming fire ;— or, in other words, that He, in whose
service they are, and who directs their movements,
employs them " with the strength of winds, and
the rapidity of lightnings."

In every instance in which ansels have been sent
on embassies to mankind, they have displayed sen
sible qualities. They exhibited a definite form some
what analogous to that of man, and colour and
splendour, which were perceptible by the organs of
vision— they emitted sounds which struck the organ
of hearing— they produced the harmonies of music,
imd sung sublime sentiments whir.h were uttered in
articulate wcrds, that were distinctly heard and re
cognized by the persons to whom they were sent,
Luke ii. U.— and they exerted their power over the
sense of feeling ; for the angel who appeared to
Peter in the prison, " smote him on the side, and
raised him up." In these instances, angels mani-

quicker perception of sounds, and the eag'o and
the lynx more acute visual organs than mankind.
The same diversity is observable in the form
and the number of sensitive organs. In man,
the ear is short and erect, and scarcely suscepti
ble of motion; in the horse and the ass, it is long
and flexible ; and in the mole, it consists simply
of a hole which perforates the skull. In man
there are two eyes ; in the scorpion and spider,
eight ; and in a fly, more than Jive thousand.

That superior beings, connected with other
worlds, have additional senses to those which
we possess, is highly probable, especially when
we consider the general analogy of nature, and
the gradations which e?:ist among organized be
ings in our world. It forms no reason why we
should deny that such senses exist, because we
can form no distinct conceptions of any senses
besides those which we possess. If we had been
deprived of the senses of sight and hearing, and
left to derive all our information merely through
the medium of feeling, tasting and smelling, we
could have had no more conception of articulate
language, of musical harmony and melody, of
the beauties of the earth, and of the glories of
the sky, than a muscle, a vegetable, or a stone.
To limit the number of senses which intelligent
organized beings may possess to the five which

fested themselves to men, through the medium of
three principal senses by which we recognize the
properties of material objects; and why, then,
should "we consider them as purely immaterial sub
stances, having no connection with the visible uni
verse 1 We have no knowledge of angels but from
revelation ; and all the descriptions it gives of these
beings leads us to conclude, that they are connected
with the world of matter, as well as with the world
of mind, and are furnished with organical vehicles,
composed of some refined material substance suita
ble to their nature and employments

When Christ shall appear the second time, we are
told that he is to come, not only in the glory of his
Father, but also in " the glory of his holy angels,"
who will minister to him and increase the splen
dour of his appearance. Now, the glory which the
angels will display, must be visible, and, consequent
ly, material; otherwise it could not be contemplated
by the assembled inhabitants of our world, and could
present no glory or lustre to their view. An assem
blage of purely spiritual beings, however numerous
and however exalted in point of intelligence, would
be a mere inanity, in a scene intended to exhibit a
visible display of the divine supremacy and gran
deur. — The vehicles or bodies of angels are doubtless
of a much finer mould than the bodies of men ; but,
although they were at all times invisible through
such organs of vision as we possess, it would form
no proof that they were destitute of such corporeal
frames. The air we breathe is a material substance,
yet it is invisible; and there are substances whose

irity is more than ten times greater than that of
tiie air of our atmosphere. Hydrogen gas is more
than twelves times lighter than common atmo
spheric air. If, therefore, an organized body were
formed of a material substance similar to air, or to
hydrogen gas, it would in general be invisible ; but,
in certain circumstances, might reflect the rays of
light, and become visible, as certain of the lighter
gaseous bodies are found to do. This is, in some
measure, exemplified in the case of animalcute,
whose bodies are imperceptible to the naked eye,
and yet, are regularly organized material safe-
stances, endowed Vith all the functions requisite to
life, motion, and enjoyment.

94

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

have been bestowed upon man, would be to set
bounds to the infinite wisdom and skill of the
Creator, who, in all his works, has displayed an
endless variety in the manner of accomplishing
his designs. While, in the terrestrial sphere in
which we move, our views are limited to the
external aspects of plants and animals — organ
ized beings, in other spheres, may have the
faculty of penetrating into their internal (and to
us, invisible) movements — of tracing an animal
from its embryo-state, through all its gradations
and evolutions, till it arrive at maturity — of per
ceiving, at a glance, and, as it were, through a
transparent medium, the interior structure of an
animal, the complicated movements of its cu
rious machinery, the minute and diversified
ramifications of its vessels, and the mode in
which its several functions are performed — of
discerning the fine and delicate machinery which
enters into the construction, and produces the
various motions of a microscopic animalculum,
and the curious vessels, and the circulation of
juices which exist in the body of a plant — of
tracing the secret processes which are going on
in the mineral kingdom, and the operation of
chymical affinities among the minute particles
of matter, which produce the diversified pheno
mena of the universe. And, in fine, those senses
which the inhabitants of other worlds enjoy in
common with us, may be possessed by them in
a state of greater acuteness and perfection.
While our visual organs can perceive objects
distinctly, only within the limits of a few yards
or miles around us, their organs may be so mo
dified and adjusted, as to enable them to perceive
objects with the same distinctness, at the dis
tance of a hundred miles — or even to descry the
scenery of distant worlds. If our powers of
vision had been confined within the range to
which a worm or a mite is circumscribed, we
could have formed no conception of the ampli
tude of our present range of view ; and it is by
no means improbable, that organized beings ex
ist, whose extent of vision as far exceeds ours,
as ours exceeds that of the smallest insect, and
that they may be able to perceive the diversified
landscapes which exist in other worlds, and the
movements of their inhabitants, as distinctly as
we perceive the objects on the opposite side of
a river, or of a narrow arm of the sea.

After Stephen had delivered his defence be
fore the Sanhedrim, we are told " he looked up
steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory r*
God, and Jesus standing at the right band uf
God ; and said, Behold I see the heavens open
ed, and the Son of man standing on the right
hand of God." Some have supposed that the
eyes of Stephen, on this occasion were so modi
fied or strengthened, that he was enabled to pe
netrate into that particular region where the glo
rified body of Christ more immediately resides.
But whether his opinion be tenable or not, cer

tain it is, that angels arc endowed with senses
or faculties which enable them to take a minute
survey of the solar system, and of the greater
part of our globe, even when at a vast distance
from our terrestrial sphere ; otherwise, they cc'.ld
not distinguish the particular position of our
earth in its annual course round the sun, in their
descent from more distant regions, nor direct
their course to that particular country, city, or
village, whither they are sent on any special
embassy.

What has been now said in reference to the
organs of vision, is equally applicable to the
organs of hearing, and to several of the other
senses ; and since faculties or senses, such as
those I have now supposed, would tend to un
veil more extensively the wonderful operations
of the Almighty, and to excite incessant admi
ration of his wisdom and beneficence, it is rea
sonable to believe that he has bestowed them on
various orders of his creatures for this purpose
— and that man may be endowed with similar
senses, when he arrives at moral perfection, .;nd
is placed in a higher sphere of existence.

Besides the topics to which I have now ad
verted, namely, the gradation of intellect, and
the diversity of corporeal organization — a still
more ample and interesting field of contempla
tion will be opened in the HISTORY of the nu
merous worlds dispersed throughout the universe,
— including the grand and delightful, or the aw
ful and disastrous events which have taken place
in the several regions of intellectual existence.

The particulars under this head which may
be supposed to gratify the enlightened curiosity
of holy intelligences, are such as the following:
— the different periods in duration at which the
various habitable globes emerged from nothing
into existence — the changes and previous ar
rangements through which they passed before
they were replenished with inhabitants — the dis
tinguishing characteristic features of every spe
cies of intellectual beings — their modes of exis
tence, of improvement, and of social intercourse
— the solemn forms of worship and adoration
that prevail among them — the laws of social, and
of moral order peculiar to each province of the
divine empire* — the progress they have made.

•There are certain general laws which are com-
mon to all the orders of intellectual beings through
out the universe The IAVO principles which form
the basis of our moral law are of this nature :—
" Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine
heart, and with all thine understanding," and "thou
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." "For we can
not suppose the Deity, in consistency with the sanc
tity and rectitude of his nature, tn reverse these laws.
in relation to any class of intelligences, or to ex
empt them from an obligation to 'obey them; and.
therefore, they may be considered as the two grand
moral principles which direct the affections and
conduct of all holy beings throughout the immen
sity of God's empire, and which unite them to on*
another, and to their common Creator. But, in sub
ordination to these principles or laws, there may
be a variety of special moral Jaws, adapted to tlv*

MORAL HISTORY OF OTHER WORLDS.

95

in knowledge, and the discoveries they have
brought to light, respecting the works and the
ways of God — the peculiar manifestations of
himself which the Divine Being may have made
to them, " at sundry times and in divers man
ners" — the ' most remarkable civil and moral
events which have happened since the period of
their creation — the visible emblems of the Divine
Presence and glory which are displayed before
them — the information they have obtained respect
ing the transactions and the moral government of
other worZds— the various stages of improvement
through which they are appointed to pass — the
different regions of the universe to which they
may be transported, and the final destination to
which they are appointed.

In particular, the facts connected with their
moral history , in so far as they may be unfolded,
will form an interesting subject of discourse and
of contemplation. It is highly probable, when
we consider the general benignity of the Divine
Nature, and the numerous evidences of it which
appear throughout the whole kingdom of anima
ted nature — that the inhabitants of the greatest
portion of the universal system, have retained
the moral rectitude in which they were created,
and are, consequently, in a state of perfect hap
piness. But, since we know, from painful expe
rience, that one world has swerved from its allegi
ance to the Creator, and been plunged into the
depths of physical and moral evil, it is not at all
improbable, that the inhabitants of several other
worlds have been permitted to fall into a similar
calamity, — for this purpose among others — that
the importance of moral order might be demon
strated, that the awful consequences of a violation
of the eternal laws of heaven might be clearly
manifested, and that a field might be laid open
for the display of the rectitude and mercy of God as
the moral Governor of the universe. In reference
to such cases (if any exist.) the points of inquiry
would naturally be — What is the ultimate desti
nation of those beings who, in other regions of
creation, have acted the part of rebellious man ?
Has their Creator interposed for their deliver
ance in a manner analogous to that in which he
has accomplished the redemption of mankind?
If so, wherein do such schemes of mercy dif
fer, and wherein do they agree with the plan of
salvation by Jesus Christ? What scenes of
moral evil have been displayed, and how have the

peculiar economy, circumstances, and relations,
which exist in each distinct world. As we have
eertain special laws, in our moral code, such as the
fifth and seventh precepts of the Decalogue, which
In all probability, do not apply to the inhabitants
of some other worlds, so they may have various
specific regulations or laws, which cannot apply
to us in our present state. The reader will find
i particular illustration of the two fundamental
laws to which I have now adverted, and of their
application to the inhnbitants of all worlds in a
work which I lately published, entitled, " The Phi
losophy of Religion ; or, an Illustration of the Mo
ral Laws of the Universe."

19

moral disorders in those worlds been over
and counteracted by the providential dispen
sations of the Almighty ? Here, a thousand
questions would crowd upon the mind, a variety
of emotions of opposite kinds would be excited,
and a most interesting field of investigation would
be laid open to the contemplation of the redeemed
inhabitants of such a world as ours. And, it is
easy to conceive, with what kindred emotions and
sympathetic feelings, and with what transporting
gratulations, the renovated inhabitants of such
worlds, would recognise each other, should they
ever be brought into contact, and permitted to
mingle their ascriptions of praise to the Creator
and Redeemer of worlds.

Even in those worlds where the inhabitants
have retained their primeval innocence, there
may be an almost infinite variety in the divine dis
pensations, both in amoral, and intellectual point
of view. — As finite intelligences, from their very
nature, are progressive beings, and, therefore,
cannot be supposed to acquire all the treasures of
wisdom and knowledge, and to comprehend all
the multifarious displays of divine perfection,
during the first stages of their existence — there
may be an admirable diversity of modes, corres
ponding to their peculiar circumstances and stages
of improvement, by which the Creator may gra
dually unfold to them the glorv of his nature, and
enable them to take a more extensive survey of
the magnitude and order of his dominions. Some
may be only emerging from the first principles
of science, like Adam soon after his creation, and
may iiave arrived but a few degrees beyond the
sphere of knowledge which bounds the view of
man ; others may have arrived at a point where they
can take a more expansive survey of the order,
economy, and relations of material and intellec
tual existences, — while others after having con
templated, for ages, a wide extent of creation,
in one district of the empire of God, may be
transported to a new and a distant province of
the universe, to contemplate the perfections of
Deity in another point of view, and to investigate
and admire a new scene of wonders. — If every
individual of the human race, from his birth to
his death, passes through a train of providences
peculiar to himself, it appears at least highly
probable, reasoning from the analogies to which
we have already adverted, and from the variety
that every where appears in the natural and moral
world, that the divine dispensations towards
every distinct class of intelligent beings, have
some striking peculiarities, which do not exactly
coincide with those of any other.

That some portion, at least, of the natural and
moral history of other worlds will be laid open
to the inspection of redeemed men in the future
world, may be argued from this consideration, —
that such views will tend to unfold the moral cAo-
racter of the Deity, and to display more fully his
intelligence, wisdom, and rectitude, in the diver-

96

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

sified modes of his administration, as the Gover
nor of the universe. We have reason to believe
that the material creation exists solely for ihe
sake of sentient and intelligent beings ; and that
it has been arranged into distinct departments,
and peopled with various ranks of intellectual
natures, chief" for the purpose of giving a dis
play of the nval attributes of God, an*d of de
monstrating t.iC indispensable necessity and the
eternal obligation of the moral laws he has enact
ed, in order to secure the happiness of the whole
intelligent system. And, if so, we may reason
ably conclude, that a certain portion of the divine
dispensations towards other classes of the intel
ligent creation, will ultimately be displayed to
our view. — This position may likewise be argued
from the fact that other intelligences have been
made acquainted with the affairs of our world,
and the tenor of the dispensations of God towards
our race. The angelic tribes have been frequently
sent on embassages to our terrestrial sphere. On
such occasions they have indicated an intimate
acquaintance with the most interesting transac
tions which have taken place among us ; and we
are informed, that they still "desire to pry into"
ihe scheme of redemption, and " to learn" from
the divine dispensations towards the church " tho
manifold wisdom of God."* Some notices of
ihe history, the employments, and the destination,
of these celestial beings have likewise been con
veyed to us. We know that they hold an eleva
ted station in the kingdom of Providence ; that
they are possessed of great power and wisdom,
of wonderful activity, of superior intellectual
faculties, and of consummate holiness and recti
tude of nature ; that they are employed on cer
tain occasions as ambassadors from God to man,
in executing his judgments upon the wicked, and
ministering to the heirs of salvation ; and that a
certain number of them fell from the high station
in which they were originally placed, and plunged
themselves into a state of sin and perdition. We
have therefore reason to believe, that, it is one part
of the plan of the government of God, to disclose the
history of one species of intellectual beings to an
other, in such portions, and at such seasons, as
may seem most proper to Infinite Wisdom, and
best suited to the state and character, and the
gradual improvement of his intelligent offspring.
In conformity to what has been now advanced,
we find the saints in heaven represented as utter
ing a song of praise to God!, in consequence of the
survey they had taken of his moral administra
tion, and of the admiration it excited. " They
sing the song of Moses, and the song of the
Lamb, saying, Just and true are thy ways, thou
King of saints" And, in proportion as the dis
pensations of Providence towards other worlds
are unfolded, in the same proportion will their
views of Jehovah's " eternal righteousness" be
expanded, and a new note of admiration and

* See Ephes. ill. 10. 1 Peter i. 12.

rapture added to their song of praise. — The
knowledge of the saints in heaven is represent
ed as being very accurate and comprehensive-
Hence it is declared, that, in lhat siate of per
fection, " they shall know, even as also they are
known." This expression certainly denotes a ve
ry high degree of knowledge respecting the works
and the ways of God ; and, therefore, most com
mentators explain it as consisting in such an
intuitive and comprehensive knowledge " ab
shall bear some fair resemblance to that of the
Divine Being, which penetrates to the very cen
tre of every object, and sees through the soul,
and all things, as at one single glance ;" or, at
least, that " their knowledge of heavenly objects
shall be as certain, immediate and familiar, as
any of their immediate friends and acquaintances
now have of them."* And, if such interpreta
tions be admitted, this knowledge must include
a minute and comprehensive view of the dispen
sations of the Creator towards other worlds, and
other orders of moral and intelligent agents.

In regard to the manner in which information
respecting the structure, the inhabitants, and the
history of other worlds may be communicated,
our limited knowledge affords no certain data on
which to ground a definite opinion. We may,
however, reasonably suppose, that an intercourse
and correspondence will be occasionally opened
up, by means of celestial beings endowed with
faculties of rapid motion, who may communicate
particular details of the intelligence they acquire
in the regions they are accustomed to visit.
Such correspondence has already partially taken
place in our world, by means of those beings
termed, in Scripture, " the angels," or " the
messengers of Jehovah ;" and, it is highly proba
ble, had man continued in his state of original
integrity, that such angelic embassies would
have been much more frequent than they have
ever been, and we might have been made ac
quainted, in this way, with some outlines of the
physical and moral scenery of other worlds, par
ticularly of those which belong to our own sys
tem — of which we must now be contented to
remain in ignorance ; and must have recourse to
the aids of reason, and science, and observation,
in order to trace some very general outlines of
their physical economy. This is, doubtless, one
deplorable effect, among others, of the apostacyof
man — that intelligences endowed with moral per
fection can no longer hold familiar intercourse
with the race of Adam, but in so far as they are
employed by their Creator in communicating oc
casional messages, which have a respect merely
to their moral renovation.f — We may likewise,

* See Doddridge's and Guyse's paraphrase on I
Cor. xiii. 12.

t It is probable that the celestial beings who have
occasionally held a communication with our race,
are not all of the same species, or inhabit the same
regions : since they are distinguished in Scripture
by different names, as Seraphim, Cherubim/Thronea,
Dominions, Angels, Archangels, &c.

MORAL HISTORY OF OTHER WORLDS.

with some degree of probability, suppose, that
every distinct order of holy intelligences, after
having resided for a certain number of ages, in
one region of the universe, may be conveyed to
a».".ther province of creation, to investigate the
ne'v scenes of wisdom and omnipotence there
unfolded, — and so on, in a continued series of
transportations, throughout the ages of eternity.
We know that man is destined to undergo such
a change of locality ; and although sin has mado
•he passage from one world to another, assume a
gloomy and alarming aspe.it, it may nevertheless
be an example, (though in a different manner)
of those removals whi<jh take place with respect
»o other beings, from one province of creation to
another. Nor have we any reason to believe,
that the locality in which we sHll be placed,
after the general resurrection, will form our per
manent and everlasting abode ; otherwise, we
should be eternally chained down, aJ «ve are at
present to a small corner of creation.

In regard to the redeemed inhabitants of our
world, there is every reason to believe, that the
Redeemer himself, he, " in whom dwell all the
treasures of wisdom and knowledge," will be
one grand medium through which information
will be communicated respecting the distant glo
ries of Jehovah's empire. This seems to be
directly intimated, though in metaphorical lan
guage, in the following passage from the book of
Revelation : " The Lamb who is in the midst of
the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them
to fountains of living water." Knowledge is
the food of the mind ; and in this sense the term
is frequently applied in the Scriptures : — " I will
give them pastors (saith God) after mine own
heart, who shall feed them with knowledge and
understanding." " Feed the church of God,"
says the apostle Peter ; that is, instruct them in
the knowledge of the truths of religion. There
fore, by imparting to his saints a knowledge of
the plans and operations of God, and informa
tion respecting the magnificence of his works in
the regions around, " the Lamb in the midst of
the throne will feed them" by gratifying their in
tellectual powers, and their desires after know
ledge ; and the noble and transporting trains of
thought which such discoveries will inspire, (and
which may be aptly compared to the effect pro
duced by " fountains of living water" on a parch
ed traveller,) will arrest all the faculties of their
souls, and fill them " with joy unspeakable and
full of glory."

Perhaps, it may not be beyond the bounds of
probability to suppose, that, at certain seasons,
during a grand convocation of the redeemed with
Jesus their exalted head president among them
— that glorious personage may impart to them
knowledge of the most exalted kind, direct their
views to some bright manifestations of Deity, and
deliver most interesting lectures on the works and
the ways of God. This would be quite accord

ant with his office as the " Mediator between
God and man," and to his character as the
" Messenger of Jehovah," and the " Revealer"
of the divine dispensations.

Pointing to some distant world, (which, even
to the acute visual organs of heavenly beings,
may appear only as a small lucid speck in their
sky,) we may suppose him giving such a descant
as the following : — " That world presents a very
differen* aspect from what yours once did, owing,
chiefly to the moral purity and perfection of its
inhabitants. There, the most grand and varie
gated objects adorn their celestial canopy ; and
the scenes around their habitations are inter
mingled with every thing that is beautiful to the
eye, and gratifying to the senses and the imagi
nation. Neither scorching heats, nor piercing
colds, nor raging storms, ever disturb the tran
quillity of those happy mansions. The fine
etherial fluid which they breathe produces a per
petual flow of pleasing emotions, and sharpens
and invigorates their intellectual powers for
every investigation. The peculiar refractive and
reflective powers possessed by the atmospheric
fluid which surrounds them, produce a variety of
grand and beautiful effects, sometimes exhibiting
aerial landscapes, and scenes emblematical of
moral harmony and perfection, — sometimes a
magnificent display of the riches and most va
riegated colouring, and sometimes reflecting the
images of the celestial orbs in various aspects
and degrees of magnitude. Their vegetable
kingdom is enriched with a variety of produc
tions unknown in your former world, diversified
with thousands of different forms, shades, co
lours, and perfumes, which shed a delicious fra
grance all around. The inferior sentient beings
are likewise different, and exhibit such ingeni
ous, mild, and affectionate dispositions, as con
tribute, in no inconsiderable degree, to the
pleasure and entertainment of the more intelli
gent order of the inhabitants. The organs of
vision of these intelligences are so acute, that
they are enabled to perceive, as through a trans
parent medium, the various chymical and mecha
nical processes that are incessantly going on in
the numberless ramifications of the vegetable
tribes, and in the more curious and complicated
structure of animal bodies ; for the Creator has or
dained, as one part of their mental enjoyments,
that they shall be furnished with the means of
tracing the mode of his operations, and the de
signs they are intended to accomplish in the dif
ferent departments of nature.

" They are likewise extensively acquainted
with moral science — with the moral relations of
intelligent beings to their Creator, and to one
another, and with the outlines of the history of
several other worlds ; for the leading facts in the
history of your world, respecting the fall of man,
its dismal consequences, and your subsequent
redemption and renovation, have been coramy

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

nicated to thenit for the purpose of enlarging
their views of God's moral dispensations, and
illustrating the rectitude and benevolence of his
government. — In their intercourses and associ
ations, no discordant voice is ever heard, no
symptom of disaffection ever appears, no boister
ous passions ever disturb their tranquillity; but
all is harmony and order, peace and love. Their
progress in the knowledge of God, and of his
works, is rapid and sure, for they see clearly the
first principles of all reasoning and science ; and,
without once making a false step, or deducing an
erroneous conclusion, they trace them with rapi
dity and certainty, to all their legitimate conse
quences. Their acquaintance with natural and
moral facts is extensive and minute. For the
most sacred regard is attached to truth, which
was never once violated in that happy society ;
and, therefore, every discovery, every new doc
trine and fact which is brought to light by any
individual, is regarded by all others as an esta
blished truth which is never called in question,
and which serves to direct and facilitate all their
other researches. Unlike the exaggerations and
falsehoods which were once propagated by lying
travellers and sceptical philosophers, in your
former world, which tended to bewilder the anx
ious inquirer, and to obscure the radiance of
truth ; in yonder world truth is regarded as a
most sacred and invaluable treasure, as the basis
of the happiness of the moral universe, and the
foundation on which rests the throne of the eter
nal; and, therefore, being never violated by any
individual, every testimony and assertion is re
ceived with unhesitating confidence. By a rapid
mode of communication which has been esta
blished, their intercourses with each other are
frequent and delightful, and the discoveries which
are made of the operations of infinite wisdom and
benevolence, are quickly circulated through all
the intelligent ranks of that abode of felicity and
love. Beings from other worlds occasionally visit
them, and convey interesting intelligence, and
affectionate congratulations from the regions
whence they came ; and a glorious symbol of
the divine Majesty was lately displayed in their
firmament, from which was announced, in ma
jestic but mild and transporting language — the
approbation of their Creator, and his purpose of
translating them, as a reward of their obedience,
to another region of his empire, to behold new
displays of his beneficence and power.

" This is a specimen of the moral order and
happiness which prevail among the greater part
of those worlds which shine from afar in yonder
firmament, but which are distinguished by a va
riety of peculiar circumstances, which shall be
unfolded on another occasion."

Directing their view to another distant orb,
which appears like a dim ruddy speck in an ob
scure quarter of the firmament, he may thus
•wrocoed :— " That, too, is a world on a different

scale, and in a different condition. It is a thoii
sand times larger than the globe you once in
habited, and was originally arrayed with all that
magnificence and beauty which characterize the
works of the Creator. During a considerable
period its inhabitants retained their allegiance
to their Maker, and their affection for each other.
But certain individuals, whom a principle of
pride and ambition had led to desire stations of
pre-eminence, having dared to violate some of
the fundamental laws of their Creator, — the
moral turpitude which this disposition and con
duct produced, gradually spread from one rank
to another, till the whole mass of its inhabitants
was completely contaminated, and plunged into
a gulph of misery. To such a dreadful length
has this depravity proceeded, that even the ex
ternal aspect of that world, which was once fair
as Eden, has assumed the appearance of a
gloomy waste, and a barren wilderness. The
rivers have been turned out of their course, by
these infatuated beings, that they might overflow
and change into a marsh the once fertile plains.
The earth has been dug into immense pits and
chasms, and the vegetable tribes have been torn
from their roots and stripped of their verdure, in
order to deface the primeval beauty of creation.
By these, and other horrible devastations, the
ethereal fluid in which they breathed, which
formerly diffused a delightful fragrance, has now
become the receptacle of noisome exhalations,
which nauseate and irritate every species of
sensitive existence. Its brilliancy has thereby
become obscured, so that their sun appears
lowering through its dense vapours, like a dusky
ball; and their nocturnal sky, which once pre
sented a splendid assemblage of shining orbs, is
now covered with blackness, and darkness, and
tempest, through which no celestial orb ever
transmits the least glimmering ray. For the
almighty Contriver of all worlds has so arranged,
proportioned, and adjusted every circumstance
in the constitution of nature, that the smallest
derangement, by malevolent beings, of the order
he has established, is always productive of dis
astrous effects.

" Instead of being animated with love to their
Creator, and to one another, which is the first
duty of all intelligent creatures, they hate their
Maker, and curse him on account of the exist
ence he has given them; and they hate each
other, with a perfect hatred. There exists
among them no peace, justice, sympathy, friend
ship, or confidence. Every one beholds and re
cognises another with the countenance of a fiend,
and is ever intent upon annoying him to the ut
most of his power. And, were it not that their
bodies are constructed on an immortal principle;
so that no power less than infinite can completely
destroy them, — their ferocious passions would,
long ere now, have effected the utter extermina
tion of every individual in that populous bet

x:

MORAL HISTORY OF OTHER WORLDS.

miserable world. Their bodies, which were
once fair and glorious, are now covered with
every mark of vileness and deformity, They
have no delight in contemplating the glories of
their Creator's workmanship, for they have de
faced every beauty which creation displayed,
when it came fresh and fair from the hand of its
Maker; and the intelligence and wisdom they
formerly possessed, are now obliterated, and
changed into ignorance and folly.

" At the commencement of this affecting
scene of depravity, a messenger was despatched
by their Almighty Sovereign to warn them of
their danger, and to urge them to reformation ;
but, as they had not then felt the full effects of
that wretchedness into which they were plung
ing — after a few temporary pangs of remorse,
' they returned every one to his evil ways.'
Holy intelligences, from other worlds, have oc
casionally been sent, to contemplate the gloomy
aspect, and the sad desolations of this wretched
world ; in order that they might bring back in
telligence to the worlds with which they are
more immediately connected, of the dismal ef
fects produced by the violation of those eternal
laws of rectitude whish the Governor of the uni
verse has ordained. The Creator has, for many
ages, permitted those physical and moral disor
ders to exist — not because he delights in the
misery of any of his creatures, but because he
has a regard to the ultimate happiness of the
whole intelligent, system. He leaves them, in
the mean time, ' to eat of the fruit of their own
ways,' that they may feel the full effects of their
apostacy and wickedness. He has permitted
them to proceed thus far in their rebellion and
depravity, in order that surrounding worlds may
be fully apprised of the dismal effects that must
inevitably ensue on every infringement of moral
order. This desolated world and its wretched
inhabitants are doomed to remain in their pre
sent deplorable state, for ages yet to come, till
an extensive and indelible impression be made
on the inhabitants of every province of God's
empire, of their eternal obligation to conform to
those laws and principles of moral order which
his infinite wisdom has established for the regu
lation of the intelligent universe ; and also, that
those miserable beings themselves may be
aroused to consideration, led to humble them
selves in his presence, and made to feel some
emotions of contrition for their impiety and in
gratitude. When these ends are accomplished,
a bright effulgence shall suddenly illume the
darkness of their night, their atmosphere shall
be cleared of its vapours, and the glorious orbs
of heaven shall once more burst upon their view ;
the astonished inhabitants shall lift up their eyes
•vith amazement at the wondrous and unlooked-
for spectacle, and a divine messenger, arrayed
in splendid majesty, shall proclaim, ' Peace
from heaven — Good-will from Jehovah to this

guilty world.' In both hemispheres of this globe,
shall the joyful message be proclaimed. This
sudden and unexpected announcement will arrest
the attention of every inhabitant, and rekindle
in his breast those sparks of gratitude, which
had been so long extinguished. To prove the
sincerity of this annunciation, the ' Power of the
Highest' will be interposed to purify the atmos
phere, to restore the desolations which had been
produced, and to renew the face of nature. A
series of moral instructions will commence, and
be carried on with vigour, till all be fully con
vinced of the folly and impiety of their conduct.
Order will be gradually re-established; affec
tionate intercourses will commence; an indelible
impression of their ingratitude and wickedness,
and of the justice and benevolence of God, will
be for ever fixed in their minds, which will secure
them, at all future periods, from a similar apos
tacy ; and peace, truth, and happiness shall finally
reign triumphant."

On such topics as these, may we suppose out
Redeemer, in the character of Mediator, occa
sionally to expatiate, with irresistible eloquence,
when presiding in the assemblies of his redeemed ;
and the emotions produced by such communica
tions, will doubtless excite them to join in unison
in celebrating the divine character and adminis
tration, in such strains as these: — "Halleluia!
the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. True and
righteous are his judgments. Salvation, and
glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our
God. Thou art worthy to receive glory, honour,
and power ; for thou hast created all things, and
for thy pleasure they are and were created."*

Thus I have endeavoured to show, that even
that portion of the universe which lies within

* I hope none of my readers will consider the
supposition of the Redeemer occasionally deliver
ing lectures on divine subjects to an assembly of his
saints, as either improbable, extravagant, or roman
tic. Since writing the above, I find, that the pious
and philosophic Dr. I. Watts entertained a similar
opinion. In his sermon, " On the happiness of sepa
rate spirits," when describing the employments of
the upper world, he thus expresses his sentiments
on this topic; — "Perhaps you will suppose there is
no such service as hearing sermons, that there is no
attendance upon the word of God there. But are
we sure there are no such entertainments? Are
there no lectures of divine wisdom and grace given
to the younger spirits there, by spirits of a more ex
alted station ? Or, may not our Lord Jesus Christ
himself be the everlasting Teacher of his church?
May he not at solemn seasons summon all heaven
to hear him publish some new and surprising dis
coveries which have never yet been made known
to the ages of nature or of grace, and are reserved
to entertain the attention, and to exalt the pleasure
of spirits advanced to glory ? Must we learn all by
the mere contemplation of Christ's person ? Does
he never make use of speech to the instruction and
joy of saints above.— Or, it may be, that our blessed
Lord (even as he is man) has some noble and un
known way of communicating a long discourse, CT
a long train of ideas and discoveries to millions of
blessed spirits at once, without the formalities 01
voice and language, and at some peculiar seasons he
may thus instruct and delight his samts in heaven."

too

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE

the reach of our assisted vision, comprehends
within its capacious sphere, at least two thou
sand four hundred millions of worlds — that each
of these worlds, being constructed by infinite
wisdom, must exhibit, even in its external as
pect, a scene worthy of the contemplation of
every rational being — that it is highly probable,
from ascertained facts, from analogy, and from
revelation, that each of these worlds has a pe
culiarity of scenery, and of appendages, which
distinguish it from every other — that there is a
gradation of intellect, and beings of different
orders among the inhabitants of these worlds —
that it is probable their corporeal forms and
their organs of sensation are likewise wonder
fully diversified — and that the natural and moral
history of each presents scenes and transactions
different from those which are found in any other
world. So that when the mind endeavours to
grasp the immense number of worlds, here pre
sented to our mental view, and considers the
variety of aspect in which each of them rejquires
to be contemplated — there appears, to such
limited intellects as ours, no prospect of a ter
mination to the survey of a scene so extensive
and overwhelming ; but, on the contrary, a ra
tional presumption, that one scene of glory will
be followed by another, in perpetual succession,
while ages roll away.

If it would require, even to beings endowed
with mental powers superior to those of man, se
veral hundred of years, to survey the diversified
landscapes which our globe displays, to investi
gate the numerous chymical processes going on in
the animal, the vegetabloi and the mineral king
doms, throughout the surface of the earth, the
recesses of the ocean, and the subterraneous re
gions, and to trace the history of every tribe of
its inhabitants during a period of six thousand
years, — if it would require thousands of years
to explore the plantery system, which pre
sents a field of inquiry two thousand times more
extensive — how many hundreds of thousands of
millions of years would be requisite to study
and investigate the visible universe in all that
variety of aspect to which I have now ad
verted ! — To explore the diversified structure
and arrangements of the bodies which com
pose the solar system, and the moral events which
have taken place among its inhabitants, would
require a long series of ages. The system of
bodies connected with the planet Saturn, would,
of itself, require several hundreds of years of
study and research, in order to acquire a. general
view of its physical, moral, and intellectual as
pects and relations. Here we have presented
to view, — 1. A globe of vast dimensions capable
of containing a population of sentient and intelli
gent beings more than a hundred times greater
than that of the earth. 2. Two immense rings,
ihe one of them containing, on both its sides an
area of eight thousand millions of square miles,

and the other an area of twenty thousand miUitmt
of miles, and sufficient to contain a population,
one hundred and forty times larger that of our
globe, although they were as thinly peopled a»
the earth is at present. 3. Seven satellites, 01
moons, each of which is undoubtedly as large as
the globe on which we live, and some of them, pro
bably, of much greater dimensions. The mag
nificent and astonishing scenery displayed in
this planet, so very different from any thing that
is beheld in our terrestrial sphere — the stupen
dous luminous arches which stretch across its
firmament, like pillars of cloud by day and pil
lars of fire by night — the diversified shadows they
occasionally cast on the surrounding landscape
— the appearance and disappearance of its moons,
their eclipses, and diversified aspects in respect
to each other, and to the inhabitants of the
planet itself, — the novel scene.-, which would ap
pear in the animal, vegetable, and mineral king
doms — the customs, manners, and employments
of the inhabitants — the series of events which
have happened among them and the tenor of the
divine dispensations in relation to their past
history and their future destination — these, and a
thousand other particulars, of which we can
form no distinct conception — could not fail to af
ford a sublime and delightful gratification to a ra
tional intelligence for a series of ages.

" It is probable, too, that even within the
boundaries of our solar system, important phy
sical and moral revolutions have happened since
its creation, besides those which have agitated
the world in which we dwell. On the surface
of the planet Jupiter, changes are occasionally
taking place, visible at the remote distance at
which we are placed. The diversity of appear
ance that has been observed in the substances
termed its belts, in whatever they may consist,
or from whatever cause this diversity may ori
ginate, — indicates change as great, as if the
whole mass of clouds which overhang Europe,
and the northern parts of Asia and America,
were to be completely swept away, and suspen
ded in dense strata over the Pacific and the In
dian oceans, — or as if the waters of the Atlantic
ocean were to overflow the continent of Ame
rica, and leave its deepest caverns exposed to
view. — There were lately discovered, between
the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, four small planeta
ry bodies ; and, on grounds which are highly prob
able, astronomers have concluded, that they once
formed a larger body which moved in the same
region, and which had burst asunder by some
immense eruptive force proceeding from its cen
tral parts. This probable circumstance, toge
ther with a variety of singular phenomena exhi
bited by these planets, naturally lead us to con
clude, that some important moral revolutions
had taken place, in relation to the beings with
which it was peopled ; and suggest tc the mind
a variety of sublime and interesting reflections

IMMENSITY OF OBJECTS IN CREATION.

101

which may hereafter be disclosed. — The planet
Mars, in several respects, bears a striking re
semblance to our earth. Its rotation round its
axis is accomplished in nearly the same time as
the earth, namely, in 24 hours and 40 minutes.
The inclination of its axis to the plane of its
orbit is 28 decrees and 42 minutes, that of the
earth being 23 degrees 28 minutes. Conse
quently, it experiences a diversity of seasons, and
different lengths of days and nights, as we do in
our sublunary sphere. Hence Sir William
Herschel informs us, that he observed a lumi
nous zone about the poles of this planet, which
is subject to periodical changes, and is of opi
nion, that this phenomenon is produced by the
reflection of the sun's light upon its polar re
gions, and that the variation in the magnitude
and appearance of this zone is owing to the
melting of these masses of polar ice. Its at
mosphere is likewise found to be very dense and
obscure ; which is the cause of that ruddy
appearance which this orb uniformly exhibits.
These circumstances indicate a striking simi
larity, in its physical constitution, to that of the
earth. Whether the moral state of its inhabi
tants bears any resemblance to the present con
dition of mankind, is a question which naturally
suggests itself, and which may possibly be solved
in the future state to which we are destined.
Frost and snow, the accumulation and melting
of vast masses of polar ice, long nights, and
wintry storms, scenes of darkness and desolation,
stormy clouds, and a dense hazy Atmosphere
surcharged with wintry exhalations, do not ap
pear to be the characteristics of a world where
perfect happiness is enjoyed. The Sun which
is the centre of our system, and which enlight
ens surrounding worlds with his beams, is five
hundred times larger than all the planets and
moons taken together. And, since we perceive
frequent changes taking place in his surface and
luminous atmosphere, there is doubtless a variety
of astonishing processes and transformations go
ing on, both in the exterior and interior parts
of this immense luminary, on a scale of magni
tude and grandeur, which it would be highly
gratifying to behold and investigate, and which
would raise to the highest pitch, our conceptions
of the magnificence and glory of Him " who
dwells in light unapproachable."

If, then, the planetary system, which occu
pies no larger a portion of space than one of the
smallest stars that twinkle in our sky, would
afford such a vast multiplicity of objects for the
contemplation of intelligent "beings, during a
lapse of ages, — what an immense assemblage of
august objects and astonishing events is present
ed before us in the physical arangements, and
the moral history of the myriads of systems and
worlds to which I have alluded, and what an im
mense duration would be requisite for finite
cuiuds to survey the wondrous scene ! This

consideration suggests an idea of duration, which
to limited intellects such as ours, seems to ap
proximate to the idea of eternity itself. Even
although it could be shown, that creation extend
ed no farther than the utmost bounds which the
ingenuity of man has enabled him to penetrate,
— still, the vast assemblage of glorious objects
contained within the range of our assisted vi
sion, shows what an infinite variety of mental
gratification the Creator may bestow on his in
telligent offspring ; and we are assured, that
" no good thing will he withhold from them that
walk uprightly."

But, would it be reasonable to admit, that the
dominions of the universal Sovereign terminate
at the boundaries of human vision? Can we
believe, that puny man, who occupies so diminu
tive a speck among the works of God, has pe
netrated to the utmost limits of the empire of Him
who fills the immensity of space with his presence?
As soon might we suppose, that a snail could
penetrate to the utmost extremity of the ocean,
and, with one glance, survey its deepest caverns •
or, that a microscopic animalcula, which is con
fined to a drop of water, in the crevice of a small
stone, could explore at one comprehensive view,
the regions of Europe, Asia, Africa, and America.
Shall we consider the visible system of nature, —
magnificent and extensive as it is, — a palace suf
ficient for the habitation of the Deity ? No : this
would be, to circumscribe the Almighty within
the limits of our imperfect vision, and within
the sphere of our comprehension. " Behold, the
heavens, and the heaven of heavens, cannot con
tain him !" This declaration implies, that, be
yond all that the inhabitants rf this world can
explore in the visible firmament, there is a
" heaven of heavens" — a region which contains
unnumbered firmaments, as gloru us and extensive
as that which we behold, — throughout the vast
extent of which, the Deity is eternally and essen
tially present. With regard to all that is visible
by the unassisted eye, or by the telescope, in
the vault of heaven, we may say with the poet : —

" Vast concave ! ample dome ! wast thou design'd
A meet apartment for the Deity?
Not so : that thought alone thy state impairs,
Thy lofty sinks, and shallows thy profound,
And straitens thy diffusive; dwarfs the whole,
And makes an universe an orrery."

Beyond the wide circumference of that sphere
which terminates the view of mortals, a boundless
region exists, which no human eye can penetrate,
and which no finite intelligence can explore. To
suppose that the infinitely extended region which
surrounds all that is visible in creation, is a mere
void, would be as unreasonable, as to have affirm
ed, prior to the invention of the telescope, that
no stars existed beyond those ,\vhich are visible
to the naked eye. When we consider the limited
faculties of man, and the infinite attributes of the
Eternal Mind, we have the highest reason to

102

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

conclude, that it is but a very small portion of
the works of God which has been disclosed to
our view. " Could you soar beyond the moon,
(says a well-known writer) and pass through all
the planetary choir ; could you wing your way
to the highest apparent star, and take your stand
on one of those loftiest pinnacles of heaven, you
would there see other skies expanded, another
sun distributing his beams by day, other stars
that gild the alternate night, and other, perhaps
nobler systems established in unknown profusion
through the boundless dimensions of space. Nor
would the dominion of the universal Sovereign
terminate there. Even at the end of this vast
tour, vou would find yourself advanced no farther
than the suburbs of creation, — arrived only at the
frontiers of the great Jehovah's kingdom."

It is highly probable, that, were all the two
thousand four hundred millions of worlds to which
we have adverted, with all the eighty millions of
suns around which they revolve, to be suddenly
extinguished and annihilated, it would not cause
so great a blank in creation, to an eye that could
take in the whole immensity of nature, as the
extinction of the pleiades, or seven stars, would
cause in our visible firmament. The range of
material existence may, indeed, have certain
limits assigned to it; but such limits can be per
ceived only by that Eye which beholds, at one
glance, the whole of infinite space. To the
view of every finite mind, it must always appear
boundless and incomprehensible. Were it pos
sible that we could ever arrive at the outskirts of
creation, after having surveyed all that exists in
the material universe, we might be said, in some
measure, to comprehend the Creator himself;
having perceived the utmost limits to which his
power and intelligence have been extended. For,
although we admit, that the perfections of the
Creator are infinite ; yet we have no tangible
measure of these perfections, but what appears
in the immense variety and extent of material
and intellectual existence. And we may hence
conclude, that the highest order of created intel
lects, after spending myriads of ages in their re
search, will never come to a period in their inves
tigations of the works and the ways of God.

Even although we could conceive certain li
mits to the material universe, and that, after the
lapse of millions of ages, a holy intelligence had
finished his excursions, and made the tour of the
universal system which now exists, — yet. who
can set bounds to the active energies of the Eter
nal Mind, or say, that, new systems of creation,
different from all that have hitherto been con
structed, shall not be perpetually emerging into
existence ? By the time a finite being had ex
plored every object which now exists, and ac
quired a knowledge of all the moral and physical
revolutions which have happened among the
worlds which, at present, diversify the voids of
space — a new region of infinite space might be

replenished with new orders of material and in
tellectual existence: and, were he to return to
the point from which he at first set out, after
numerous ages had elapsed, he would, doubt
less, behold new changes and revolutions in
many provinces of the Creator's dominions-
new heavens and new earths — and new species
of sentient and intellectual beings, different from
all those he at first contemplated.

That such is the plan of the Creator's opera
tions, is not a mere conjecture or surmise, but is
warranted from observations which have been
made on the phenomena of the celestial bodies.
New stars have, at different periods, appeared
in the heavens ; which are plain indications of
the continued exertion of creating power. Some
planets have burst asunder into different frag
ments, and stars which had shone for ages have
disappeared, and their existence, in their former
state, cannot now be traced.* Such facts evi
dently show, that some important revolutions
have taken place in relation to the bodies which
have thus been withdrawn from our view. Hav
ing forages run theirdestined course, either theii
constitution has undergone an essential change,
or they have been removed to another region of
immensity, to subserve other purposes in the
magnificent arrangements of the Sovereign In
telligence. The observations made by Sir Wil
liam Herschel on the nebulous appearances in
the heavens, and on the changes and modifica
tions which they undergo, lead to the conclusion,
that new systems are gradually forming in the
distant regions of the universe. And, if the crea
ting energy of the Omnipotent is at present in
constant operation, and has been so for ages past,
who shall dare to affirm, that it shall ever cease
its exertion through all the ages of eternity?

Here, then, we have presented to our contem
plation, an assemblage of material and intellectual
existence, to which the human rnind can affix no
boundaries, — which is continually increasing,
and still an infinity of space remaining for per
petual accessions, during the lapse of endless
ages, — an assemblage of beings, which, in point
of number, of magnitude, and of extent, seems
to correspond with a boundless duration. So
that, we have no reason to doubt, that " the
saints in light" will be perpetually acquiring new
discoveries of the divine glory, new prospects
info the immensity of God's operations, new
views of the rectitude and grandeur of his moral
government, new accessions to their felicity, and
new and transporting trains of thought, without
the least interruption, as long as eternity endures.

•Stars which are marked in ancient catalogues,
are not now to be found, and others are now visible
which were not known to the ancients. Some have
gradually increased in brilliancy. Some that were
formerly variable, now shine with a steady lustre,
while others have been constantly diminisning in
brightness.

THRONE OF GOD.

THRONE OF GOD.

There is just one idea more that may he sug
gested, in addition to the several views exhibited
above, in order to raise to a higher pitch of
sublimity, our views of the grandeur of the Di
vine Being, and of the magnificence of his works
The Scriptures frequently refer to a particulai
place, circumstance, or manifestation, termed the
throne of God; as in the following passages: —
" Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my foot
stool." " The Lord hath prepared his throne in
the heaysnit" "A glorious high throne, from
the beginning, is the place of thy sanctuary."
" Therefore are they before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple."
" Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power,
be unto Him that sits upon the throne." — These,
and similar expressions and representations, must
oe considered, either as merely metaphorical, or
at jferring to some particular region of the uni
verse, where the Divine glory is reflected, in
some peculiarly magnificent manner, from mate
rial objects ; and where the manifestations of the
Divine character are most illustriously displayed.
If there be a reference to the splendour and mag
nitude of a particular portion of creation, there
is an astronomical idea, which may help us to
form somo conception of this " glorious high
hrone," which is the peculiar residence of the
Sternal. It is now considered by astronomers,
as highly probable, if not certain, — from late ob
servations, from the nature of gravitation, and
other circumstances, that all the systems of the
universe revolve round one common centre,—
and that this centre may bear as great a propor
tion, in point of magnitude, to the universal
assemblage of systems as the sun does to his
surrounding planets. And, since our sun is five
hundred times larger than the earth, and all the
other planets and their satellites taken together,
— on the same scale, such a central body would
be five hundred times larger than all the systems
and worlds in the universe. Here, then, may be
a vast universe of itself — an example of material
creation, exceeding all the rest in magnitude and
splendour, and in which are blended the glories
of every other system. If this is in reality the
case, it may, with the most emphatic propriety,
be termed, THE THRONE OF GOD.

This is the most sublime and magnificent idea
that can possibly enter into the mind of man
We feel oppressed and overwhelmed in endea
vouring to form even a faint representation of it.
But, however much it may overpower our feeble
conceptions, we ought not to revolt at the idea
of so glorious an exvension of the works of God ;
since nothing less magnificent seems suitable to
a being of infinite perfections. — This grand cen
tral body may be considered as the Capital of the
universe. Prom this glorious centre, embassies
may be occasionally despatched to all surrounding

worlds, in every region of space. Here, too,
deputations from all the different provinces of
creation, may occasionally assemble, and the in
habitants of different worlds mingle with each
other, and learn the grand outlines of tnose physi
cal operations and moral transactions, which
have taken place in their respective spheres.
Here, may be exhibited to the view of unnum
bered multitudes, objects of sublimity and glory,
which are no where else to be found within the
wide extent of creation. Here, intelligences of
the highest order, who have attained the most
sublime heights of knowledge and virtue, may
form the principal part of the population of this
magnificent region. Here, the glorified body of
the Redeemer may have tak'en its principal sta
tion, as " the head of all principalities and pow
ers :" and here likewise, Enoch and Elijah may
reside, in the mean time, in order to learn the
history of the magnificent plans and operations
of Deity, that they may be enabled to commu
nicate intelligence respecting them to their breth
ren of the race of Adam, when they shall again
mingle with them in the world allotted for their
abode, after the general resurrection. Here, the
GRANDEUR of the Deity, the glory of his physi
cal and moral perfections, and the immensity of
his empire, may strike the mind with more bright
effulgence, and excite more elavated emotions of
admiration and rapture, than in any other pro
vince of universal nature. In fine, this vast and
splendid central universe may constitute that au
gust mansion referred to in Scripture, under the
the designation of the THIRD HEAVENS — THE

THRONE OF THE ETERNAL the HEAVEN OP

HEAVENS — THE HIGH AND HOLY PLACE

and THE LIGHT THAT IS INACCESSIBLE AND
FULL OF GLORY.*

• "Within the limits of the last 150 years, it has been
found, that the principal fixed stars have a certain
apparent motion, which is nearly uniform and regu
lar, and is quite perceptible in the course of thirty
or forty years. The star Arcturus, for example, has
been observed to move three minutes and three se
conds in the course of seventy-eight years. Most
of the stars have moved toward the south. The
stars in the northern quarter of the heavens seem
to widen their relative positions, while those in the
southern appear to contract their distances. These
motions seem evidently to indicate, that the earth,
and all the other bodies of the solar system, are mov
ing in a direction from the stars, in the southern
part of the sky, toward those in the northern. Dr.
Herschel thinks, that a comparison of the changes
now alluded to, indicates a motion of our sun with
his attending planets towards the constellation Her
cules. This progressive movement which our sys
tem makes in absolute space is justly supposed to be
a portion of that curve, which the sun describes
around the centre of that nebula to which he belongs ;
and, that all the other stars belonging to the same
nebula, describe similar curves. And since the uni
verse appears to be composed of thousands of ««-
bulce, or starry systems, detached from each other,
it is reasonable to conclude, that all the starry ays-
terns of the universe revolve round one common
centre, whose bulk and attractive influence are pro-
portionable to the size and the number of the bod let
which perform their revolutions around it. W»
know, that the law of gravitation extends its influ«

104

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

Perhaps some whose minds are not accustom
ed 10 such bold excursions through the regions
of material existence, may be apt to consider the
grand idea which has now been suggested, and
many of the preceding details as too improbable
and extravagant to claim our serious attention.
In reply to such an insinuation, let it be consi
dered, in the first place, that nothing has been sta
ted but what corresponds to the whole analogy
of nature, and to several sublime intimations
contained in the system of divine Revelation.
It is a fact, which, in the present day, cannot be
denied by any one acquainted with the subject,
that the material universe, as far as our eye and
our glasses can carry us, consists of a count
less multitude of vast bodies, which completely
baffle our feeble powers in attempting to form any
adequate conception of them. This amazing
fact, placed within the evidence of our senses,
shows us, that it is impossible for the human
mind to form too extravagant ideas of the uni
verse, or to conceive its structure to be more glo
rious and magnificent than it really is.f

Again, nothing short of such sublime and
magnificent conceptions seems at all suitable to
the idea of a Being of infinite perfection and of
eternal duration. If we admit, that the divine Be-

ence from the sun to the planet Herschel, at the
distance of eighteen hundred millions of miles, and
to the remotest parts of the orbits of the comets,
which stretch far beyond this limit ; and there is the
strongest reason to believe, that it forms a connect
ing bond between all the bodies of the universe,
however distant from each other. This being ad
mitted, — the motion of the different systems now
alluded to, and the immensity of the central body,
from which motion of every kind originates, to pro
duce the order and harmony of the universe,— ap
pear to be necessary, in order to preserve the balance
of the universal system, and to prevent the numer
ous globes in the universe from gradually approach
ing each other, in the course of ages, and becoming
one universal wreck.— We are mechanically con
nected with the most distant stars visible through
our telescopes, by means of light, which radiates
from those distant luminaries, mingles with the solar
rays, penetrates our atmosphere, and effects our op
tic nerves with the sensation of colours, similar to
those produced by the rays of the sun. And we have
equal reason to conclude, that we are likewise me
chanically connected with these bodies by the law
of gravitation. So that the idea thrown out above,
however grand and overwhelming to our feeble
powers, is not a mere conjecture, but is founded on
observation, and on the general analogies of the
universe.

*In descending to the minute parts of nature, we
obtain ocular demonstration of facts which overpower
our faculties, and which would be altogether incredi
ble, were they not placed within the evidence of the
senses. In a drop of water, in which certain vege
table substances have been infused, millions of liv
ing creatures have been seen, and, in some instances
where the animalcule are transparent, their eyes,
and the peristaltic motion of their bowels have
been perceived. The minuteness of the blood-vessel,
and other parts of the structure of such creatures, is
as wonderful, and as incomprehensible, on the one
hand, as the magnitude and immensity of the uni
verse are on the other,— demonstrating, that, in the
works of the Creator, there is an infinity on either
hand, which limited intellects will never be able fully
to comprehend.

ing is infinite, pervading the immensity of space
with his presence, why should we be reluctant
to admit the idea, that his almighty energy w
exerted throughoutthe boundless regions of space*1
for it is just such a conclusion as the notion of an
infinite intelligence should naturally lead us to
deduce. Whether does it appear to correspond
more with the notion of an infinite Being, to
believe, that his creative power has been con
fined to this small globe of earth, and a few spark
ling studs fixed in the canopy of the sky, or to
admit, on the ground of observation and analogy,
that he has launched into existence millions of
worlds — that all the millions of systems within
the reach of our vision, are but as a particle of
vapour to the ocean, when compared with the
myriads \\hich exist in the unexplored regions
of immensity — that the whole of this vast assem
blage of suns and worlds revolves around the
grand centre of the universe — and that this centre
where the throne of God is placed, is superior to
all the other provinces of creation in magnitude,
beauty, and magnificence ? Who would dare to
prove that such conceptions are erroneous, or
impossible, or unworthy of that Being who sits
on the throne of the universe ? To attempt
such a, proof would be nothing less than to set
bounds to Omnipotence — to prescribe limits to
the operations of him " whose ways are past find
ing oOt.'

" Can man conceive leyond what God can do ?

Nothing but quite impossible is hard.

He summons into being with like ease

A whole creation, and a. single grain.

Speaks he the word ? a thousand worlds are born !

A thousand worlds? There's space for millions

more ;

And in what space can his great Fiat fail ?
Condemn me not, cold critic ! but indulge
The warm imagination ; why condemn ?
Why not indulge such thoughts as swell our hearts
With fuller admiration of that Power
Which gives our hearts with such high thoughts to

swell ?

Why not indulge in his augmented praise?
Darts not his glory a still brighter ray,
The less is left to chaos, and the realms
Of hideous night ?"

These views and reasonings are fully corrobo*
rated by the sublime descriptions of Deity con«
tained in the Holy Scriptures. — " Canst thou by
searching find out God ? canst thou find out the
Almighty to perfection ?" " He is the high and
lofty One who inhabiteth eternity " — "He is glo
rious in power" — "He dwells in light unap
proachable and full of glory" — "Great is our
Lord and of great power, his grealness is un
searchable ; his understanding is infinite " — " Can
any thing be too hard for Jehovah ? " The ev
erlasting God the Lord, the Creator of the ends
of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary, there
is no searching of his understanding " — " He do-
eth great things, past finding out, and wonders
without number." " He meteth out the heaven*
with a span, and comprehendeth the dust of th*

GRANDEUR OF THE DEITY.

105

<>arth in a measure." " By the word of the Lord
were the heavens made, and all the host of them
ay the Spirit of his mouth." " He spake, and
-'twas dona ; — He commanded, and it stood fast."
"He stretched forth the heavens alone, and
bringeth forth their hosts by number." " Lo
these are parts of his ways, but how little a por
tion is heard of him ; and the thunder of his power
who can understand ? Behold the heaven, and
the heaven of heavens cannot contain him!"
" The heavens declare the glory of God, and
the firmament showeth forth his handy-work."
" Thine, O Lord ! is the greatness, and the glory,
and the majesty, for all in heaven and earth, is
thjne , and thou art exalted above all." " Behold
the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the
Lord's." u Jehovah hath prepared hit throne in
the heavens, and his kingdom ruleth over all." " I
will speak of the glorious honour of thy majesty,
and of thy wondrous works" " Blessed be thy
glorious name who art exalted above all blessing
and praise." " Thou, even thou, artLord alone ;
thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens,
with all their host, thou preservest them all, and
the host of heaven worshippeth thee." " Who
can utter the mighty acts of the Lord ? who can
show forth all his praise ?" " Touching the Al
mighty, we cannot find him out." "He is ex
cellent in power, and his glory is above the earth
and heavens."

Such sublime descriptions of the Divine Being,
which are interspersed throughout various parts
of Revelation, lead us to form the most august
conceptions of his creative energy, and plainly
indicate, that it is impossible for the highest
created intellect to form a more magnificent idea
of his designs and operations than what in re
ality exists.

In short, though some of the preceding views
may not precisely correspond to the facts which
shall ultimately be found to exist in the universe,
« — they ought, nevertheless, to be entertained and
rendered familiar to the mind, since they open
a sublime and interesting train of thinking ; and
since they cannot go beyond the magnificence
of Jehovah's kingdom, nor be very different from
what actually exists in the universe. They form
a kind of sensible substratum of thought for the
mind to fix upon, when it attempts to frame the
loftiest conceptions of the object of our adora
tion. — It may be laid down as a principle which
ou«ht never to be overlooked in Theology, — that,
our conceptions of the grandeur of God are pre
cisely, or, at least, nearly commensurate with our
conceptions of the grandeur and extent of his ope
rations throughout the universe. We all admit,
that the Deity is infinite, both in respect of space
and of duration. But, an infinity of empty space,
and an infinity of duration, abstractly considered,
convey no precise or tangible ideas to the mind,
to guide it in forming distinct conceptions of
thtf Deity or of any oilier beings. It is only

when the immensity of space is considered as
diversified with an immense variety and multipli
city of objects, and when eternal duration is con
templated as connected with a constant succes
sion of glorious scenes and transactions, that
the soul of man can expand its views and ele
vate its conceptions of the incomprehensible Je
hovah.

If these sentiments be admitted, it will follow,
that the man whose ideas are confined within
limits of a few hundred miles, or even within
the range of the globe we inhabit, must have
his views of Deity confined within nearly the
same sphere. For we have no sensible mea
sures of the attributes of God, but those which
are derived from the number and extent of his
actual operations. When we attempt to think
of Him, without the assistance of his visible
works, our thoughts instantly run into confusion,
and sink into inanity. And, since we find, that
the material works of God are so " great above
all measure," so widely extended, and so mag
nificent in the scale of their operation, it is of
the utmost importance, in a religious point of
view, that the mind accustom itself to range at
large through the wide extent of creation — to
trace, by analogy, from what is known, the pro
bable magnitude, arrangement, and grandeur of
what is removed beyond the limits of our vi
sion — to add magnitude to magnitude, system to
system, and motion to motion, till our thoughts
are overwhelmed with the mighty idea. And,
though we may occasionally frattne some erro
neous or inadequate notions, when forming
our conceptions of certain subordinate particu
lars, yet, we need not fear, that in point of num
ber, magnitude, and variety, our conceptions can
ever go beyond the realities which exist within
the range of universal nature, unless we suppose,
that " man can conceive beyond what God can
do." Such trains of thought will tend to expand
and elevate the mind, and give it a sublime
turn of thinking ; and will naturally produce
an ardent desire of beholding a brighter display
of the magnificence of the Creator in the eterna1
world.

From what has been now detailed respect
ing the numerous and august objects that may
be presented to the contemplation of celestial
intelligences, we may conclude, that the chief
subjects of study in the heavenly world will be
History and Philosophy. Under the department
of history, may be comprehended all the details
which will be exhibited to them respecting the
origin, progress, and consummation of the re
demption of man, and the information they may
receive respecting the natural and moral scenery,
and the prominent providential occurrences and
arrangements of other worlds.

As it is evident, that matter exists chiefly for
the sake of sensitive and intelligent beings, so,

106

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

it is highly probable, if not demonstratively cer
tain, that the peopling of worlds with rational
creatures is intended chiefly to display the moral
character of the Creator in his providential dis
pensations, and in the whole series of his moral
administration towards the numerous worlds and
orders of creatures which exist throughout
his dominions. All his other perfections, par
ticularly his power and intelligence, appear to
be exerted in subserviency to this grand object,
and to the distribution of happiness through
out the universe. In so far, then, as the facts
respecting his moral government, in other
worlds, are made known to the redeemed in
heaven, in so far will their views of his moral
attributes, and of the principles of his adminis
tration in the universe, be enlarged and expand
ed. In the disclosures which, in the course of
ages, may be made on this subject, displays of
the eternal righteousness of Jehovah, of his retri
butive justice, of his " tender mercy," and of his
boundless benevolence, may be exhibited, which
will astonish and enrapture the mind more highly
than even the magnificence and grandeur of his
physical operations, and fill it with admiration
of the amiable and adorable excellencies of the
Sovereign Ruler of the universe. It" we account
it a pleasant study to investigate the habits and
economy of some of the insect tribes ; — if we
should reckon it highly gratifying to learn the
history of all the events which have befallen
every nation and tribe of mankind since the
world began, particularly those which relate to
our first parents in paradise, and after their ex
pulsion from it, — to the antediluvians, to the ten
tribes of Israel, to the Christians in the first cen
turies, to the Waldenses, to the Assyrians, Baby-
l(/nians and American Indians, — how delightful
and gratifying must it be, to learn the history of
angels, principalities and powers, and to become
acquainted with the leading transactions which
have occurred among beings of a higher order
and of different species, dispersed among ten
thousands of worlds ! Great and marvellous as
the history of our world, and of human redemp
tion appears, it may be far surpassed by the
events which eternity will unfold. " The day
is coming," (to use the words of a celebrated
modern writer *) when the whole of this wond
rous history shall be looked back upon by the
eye of remembrance, and be regarded as one
incident in the extended annals of creation, and
with all the illustration, and all the glory it has
thrown on the character of the Deity, will it be
seen as a single step in the evolution of his de
signs ; and a.s long as the time may appear, from
the first act of our redemption to its final accom
plishment, and close and exclusive as we may
think the attentions of God upon it, it will be
"bund that it has left him him room enough for

•Dr. Chalmers.

all his concerns, and that on the high scale of
eternity, it is but one of those passing and ephe
meral transactions, which crowd the history of a
never-ending administration."

Under the department of Philosophy may oe
included all those magnificent displays whicn will
be exhibited of the extent, the magnitude, the
motions, the mechanism, the scenery, the inha
bitants, and the general constitution of other sys
tems, and the general arrangement and order of
the universal system comprehended under the
government of the Almighty. On these topics,
with all their subordinate and infinitely diversified
ramifications, the minds of redeemed intelligences
from this world will find ample scope for the ex
ercise of all their powers, and will derive from
their investigations of them perpetual and unin
terrupted enjoyment, throughout an endless ex
istence.

That the subjects of contemplation now stated,
will, in reality, form the chief employments of
renovated men and other intellectual beings, in a
future state, may also be proved from the repre
sentations given in the word of God of the pre
sent exercises of these intelligences. In the
book of Revelation, the angels, under the figure
of " living creatures full of eyes," and the " el
ders," or representatives of the church of the
redeemed, are represented as falling down before
the throne of the Eternal, saying, " Thou art
worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, honour, ana
power, for thou hast created all things, and for
thy pleasure they are and were created." Here,
the material works of God are represented as the
foundation or reason of the thanksgiving and ado
rations of the heavenly host ; and the language
evidently implies, that these works are the sub
ject of their contemplation — that they have beheld
a bright display of divine perfection in their struc
ture and arrangement — that they are enraptured
with the pnlarged views of the divine glory
which these works exhibit — and that their hearts,
full of gratitude and admiration, are ever ready to
burst forth in ascriptions of" glory, honour, and
power to him" who called the vast assemblage
of created beings into existence. — In another
scene, exhibited in the same book, the saints who
had come out of great tribulation, and had gotten
the victory over all enemies, are represented
with the harps of God in their hands, celebrating
the divine praises in this triumphant song,
" Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord
God Almighty — just and true are thy ways, thou
King of saints." — The first part of this song
may be considered as the result of their contem
plations of the magnificent fabric of the universe,
and the or"">notent energies which its move
ments display ; and the last part of it as the re
sult of their study and investigation of the moral
government of God in his providential arrange
ments towards men and angels, and towards all
the worlds whc 3e moral economy may be opened

FUTURE MISERY OF THE WICKED.

107

to their view. For the words of the song plainly
imply, that they have acquired such an expansive
view of the works of God as constrains them to
declare, that they are " great and marvellous ;"
and that they have attained such an intimate
knowledge of the divine dispensations towards
the intelligent universe, a senables them to per
ceive that all the ways of the King of heaven
are " righteous and true."

From the preecding details we may also learn,
what will form one constituent part of the misery
of the wicked in the future world. As one part
of the happiness of the righteous will consist in
u seeing God as he is," that is, in beholding the
divine glory as displayed in the physical and
moral economy of the universe, — so, it will, in
all probability, form one bitter ingredient in the
future lot of the unrighteous, that they shall be
deprived of the transporting view of the Cre
ator's glory, as displayed in the magnificent ar
rangements he has made in the system of nature.
Confined to one dreary corner of the universe,
surrounded by a dense atmosphere, or a congeries
of sable clouds, they will be cut off from all in
tercourse with the regions of moral perfection,
and prevented from contemplating the sub
lime scenery of the Creator's empire. This
idea is corroborated by the declarations of Scrip
ture, where they are represented " as banished
from the new Jerusalem," " thrust out into outer
darkness," and reserved for " the blackness ot
darkness for ages of ages." And, nothing can
be more tormenting to minds endowed with ca
pacious powers, than the thought of being for ever
deprived of the opportunity of exercising them
on the glorious objects which they know to exist,
but which they can never contemplate, and about
which they never expect to hear any transporting
information.

If it be one end of future punishment to make
wicked men sensible of their folly and ingratitude,
and of the mercy and favours they have abused,
it is probable, that, in that future world or region
to which they shall be confined, every thing
will be so arranged, as to bring to their recollec
tion, the comforts they had abused, and the divine
goodness they had despised, and to make them
feel sensations opposite to those which were pro
duced by the benevolent arrangements which ex
ist in the present state.— For example, in the
present economy of nature, every one of our
senses, every part of our bodily structure, every
movement of which our animal frame is suscep
tible, and the influence which the sun, the at
mosphere, and other parts of nature, produce on
our structure and feelings, have a direct tendency
to communicate pleasing sensations. But, in
that world, every agency of this kind may be re
versed, as to the effect it may produce upon per
cipient beings. Our sense of touch is at present
accompanied with a thousand modification? of

feelings which are accompanied with pleasure ;
but there, every thing that comes in contract with
the organs of feeling may produce the most pain
ful sensations. Here, the variety of colours which
adorn the face of nature, delights the eye and
the imagination, — there, the most gloomv and
haggard objects may at all times produce a dismal
and alarming aspect over every part of the sur
rounding scene. Here, the most enchanting music
frequently cheers, and enraptures the human
heart, there, nothing is heard but the dismal
sounds " weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of
teeth." Ungrateful for the manifold blessings
they received in this world from the bountiful
Giver of all good, the inhabitants of that dreary
region will behold their sin in their punishment,
in being deprived of every thing which can ad
minister to their sensitive enjoyment.

With regard to their moral state, similar effects
will be produced. Here, they hated the society
of the righteous, and loved to mingle with evil
doers in their follies and their crimes ; there they
will be for ever banished from the company of the
wise and the benevolent., and will feel the bitter
effects of being perpetually chained to the so
ciety of those malignant associates who will be
their everlasting tormentors. Here they delighted
to give full scope to their depraved appetites and
passions, there, they will feel the bitter and hor
rible effects of the full operation of such lusts and
passions, when unrestrained by the dictates of
reason, and the authority of the divine law. If,
to these sources of sorrow and bitter deprivations,
be added the consideration, that, in such minds,
the principles of malice, envy, hatred, revenge, and
every other element of evil, which pervaded their
souls while in this life, will rage without control,
we may form such a conception of future misery
as will warrant all the metaphorical descrip
tions of it which are given in Divine Revela*
tion, without supposing any farther interposi
tion of the Deity, in the direct infliction of
punishment. While he leaves them simply to
" eat of the fruit of their own ways, and to be
Jilled with their own devices,1' their punishment
must be dreadful, and far surpassing every spe
cies of misery connected with the present state
of the moral world.

On the other hand, a consideration of the infi
nitely diversified sources of bliss to which our at
tention has been directed, has a powerful ten
dency to impress the minds of the saints with
a lively perception of the unbounded nature ol
divine benignity, and of " the love of God
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." It is chiefly
in connection with such expansive views of the
attributes and the government of the Daily, that
the love of God towards the redeemed appears
"boundless," and "passing comprehension;"
for it introduces them into a scene which is not
only commensurate with infinite duration, but is
boundless in its prospects of knowledge, of fali-

108

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

city, and of glory. And, therefore, amidst all
the other employments of the heavenly state,
they will never forget their obligation to that
unmerited grace and mercy which rescued their
souls from destruction, but will mingle with all

their sublime investigations, ascriptions of

" blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, to
Him that sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb,
for ever and ever."

The substance of what has been detailed in
this department of my subject may be now
briefly stated in the following summary :

The redeemed in heaven will enjoy perpetual
and uninterrupted felicity — the foundation of this
felicity will be laid in their complete freedom
from sin, and their attainment of moral perfec
tion — their renovated faculties will be employ
ed in contemplating the divine glory — the di
vine glory consists in the manifestation of the
divine perfections — the sensible display of these
perfections will be given, (and can only be given)
in the works of creation, in the intelligences
which people the material world, their orders,
gradations, history, and present state — in the
variety of scenery which the abodes of intelli
gence exhibit — in the economy and moral order
which prevail among them, — and in the various
dispensations of Divine Providence in reference
to all worlds and orders of beings.

With regard to the happiness of heaven, the
Scriptures convey to us, in general propositions,
certain intimations of its nature, qualities, and
objects, and of the qualifications which are requi
site in order to its enjoyment. The discoveries
which science has made in the visible creation
form so many illustrations of the scriptural decla
rations on this subject; and it is undoubtedly our
duty to direct our trains of thought, and to expand
our conceptions of the felicities of the future
world, by every illustrative circumstance which
can be traced in the scene of nature which the
Almighty has presented to our view. For the
word and the works of God must always har
monize, and reflect a mutual lustre on each other.
What we find to be actually existing within the
visible scene of the universe, can never contra
dict any of the statements of Revelation ; but,
on the contrary, must tend to elucidate some one
or other of its interesting communications. And
since we find, in our survey of the system of
nature, an assemblage of astonishing objects
which tend to raise our conceptions of the Su
preme Being, and of the sublime and diversified
nature of future felicity, — it becomes us to prose
cute those trains of thought which the analo
gies of Nature and of Revelation suggest, in
order to enlarge the capacities of our minds, to
exalt our ideas of celestial bliss, and to prepare
us for more expansive and sublime contempla
tions, in that world where the physical and mo-
•al obstructions which now impede our progress,

and obscure our intellectual Tiews, shall De cora«
pletely and for ever removed.

From the whole of what we have stated on
this department of our subject, we may learn
the value of the human soul, and the importance
which ought to be attached to our immorta.
destination. What a shadow does human life
appear when contrasted with the scenes of
futurity! What a small point in duration do
the revolutions of time present when compared
with a boundless eternity! What a limited
scene does this world, with all its glories, ex
hibit, when set in competition with the extent,
and the splendours of that empire which
stretches out into immensity, and shall endure
for ever! And is man to be transported to
other regions of the universe, to mingle with
the inhabitants of other worlds, and to exist
throughout an endless duration ? What a noble
principle does the human mind appear, when
we consider it as qualified to prosecute so many
diversifiednrains of thought, to engage in so
sublime investigations, to attain the summit of
moral perfection, and to expatiate at large,
through the unlimited dominions of the Almighty,
while eternal ages are rolling on! How import
ant, then, ought every thing to be considered
which is connected with the scene of our eternal
destination ! If these truths be admitted, reason
and common sense declare, that a more inte
resting and momentous subject cannot possibly
occupy the mind of man. It is so profoundly
interesting, and connected with so many awful
and glorious consequences, that we must be
utterly dead to every noble and refined feeling,
if we be altogether indifferent about it.

If there were only a bare probability for the
opinion, that man is immortal, and that the scenes
to which I have alluded might possibly be real
ized, it ought to stimulate the most anxious in
quiries, and awaken all the powers and energies
of our souls. For it is both our duty and our
highest interest to obtain light and satisfaction,
on a point on which our present comfort and
our ultimate happiness must depend. But, if
the light of nature, and the dictates of revela
tion both conspire to demonstrate the eternal
destiny of mankind, nothing can exceed the folly
and the infatuation of those who trifle with
their everlasting interests, and even try ever}
scheme, and prosecute every trivial object, thai
may have a tendency to turn aside their thought*
from this important subject. Yet, how often do
we find, in the conduct of the various classes of
mankind, the merest trifles set in competition
with the scenes of happiness or of misery that
lie beyond the grave. The grovelling pleasures
derived from hounding and horse-racing, balls,
masquerades, and theatrical amusements ; the
acquisition of a few paltry pounds or shillings,
the rattling of dice, or the shuffling of a pack of

QUALIFICATIONS FOR HEAVEN.

106

»rd«, will absorb the minds of thousands who
profess to be rational beings, while they refuse
to spend (me serious hour in reflecting on the
fate of their inrmortal spirits, when their bodies
shall have dropped into the tomb. Nay, such
is the indifference, and even antipathy with
which this subject is treated by certain classes
of society, that it is considered as unfashionable,
and in certain cases, would be regarded as a
species of insult, to introduce, in conversation,
a sentiment or a reflection on the eternal destiny
of man. " The carelessness which they betray
in a matter which involves their existence,
their eternity, their all, (says an energetic
French writer) awakes my indignation, rather
than my pity. It is astonishing. It is horrify
ing. It is monstrous. I speak not this from
the pious zeal of a blind devotion. On the con
trary, I affirm, that self-love, that self-interest,
that the simplest light of reason, should inspire
these sentiments ; and, in fact, for this we need
but the perceptions of ordinary men. — It requires
but little elevation of soul to discover* that here
there is no substantial delight ; that our plea
sures are but vanity, that the ills of life are
innumerable ; and that, after all, death, which
threatens us every moment, must, in a few years,
perhaps in a few days, place us in the eternal con
dition of happiness, or misery, or nothingness."
It is, therefore, the imperative duty of every
man who makes any pretensions to prudence and
rationality, to endeavour to have his mind im
pressed with a conviction of the reality of a
future and invisible world, to consider its import
ance, and to contemplate, in the light of reason
and of revelation, the grand and solemn scenes
which it displays. While the least doubt

hovers upon his mind in relation to this subject,
he should give himself no rest till it be dispelled.
He should explore every avenue where light and
information may be obtained ; he should prose
cute his researches with the same earnestness
and avidity as the miser digs for hidden trea
sures ; and above all things, he should study,
with deep attention and humility, the revelation
contained in the Holy Scriptures, with earnest
prayer to God for light and direction. And if
such inquiries be conducted with reverence, with
a devotional and contrite spirit, and with perse
verance, every doubt and difficulty that may have
formerly brooded over his mind will gradually
evanish, as the shades of night before the orient
sun. " If thou criest after knowledge, and lift-
est up thy voice for understanding; if thou seek-
est her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid
treasures — then shall thou understand the fear of
the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. For
the Lord giveth wisdom, out of his rnouth cometh
"knowledge and understanding. In all thy ways
acknowledge him, and he shall t'Vect thy paths.
Then shall thy light break forth in obscurity, and
thy darkness shall be as the noon-day."

In fine, if we are thoroughly convinced of our
relation to an eternal world, it will be our con
stant endeavour to cultivate those heavenly dis
positions and virtues, and to prosecute that
course of action which will prepare us for the
enjoyments of the heavenly state. " For with
out holiness no man can see the Lord : and we
are assured that " no unclean thing can enter the
gates of the New Jerusalem," and that neither
" thieves, nor extortioners, nor the covetous,
nor the effeminate, nor drunkards, nor revilers,
nor idolaters shall inherit the Kingdom of God."

PART IV.

ON THE MORAL QUALIFICATIONS REQUISITE TO THE ENJOYMENTS OF THE FELICITY OF
THE FUTURE WORLD.

THERE is scarcely an individual who admits
the 'doctrine of the immortality of man, who
does not indulge a certain degree of hope, that
he shall be admitted into a happier world, when
his spirit wings its way from this earthly scene.
Even the man of the world, the profligate and
the debauchee, notwithstanding their conscious
ness of guilt, and of the opposition of their affec
tions to the Divine Law, and the duties of the
Christian life, are frequently found buoying
themselves up, in the midst of their unhallo'weo!
courses, with the vain expectation, that an All-
Merciful Creator will not suffer them ultimately
to sink into perdition, but will pity their weak
ness and follies, and receive them, when they die,
into the joys of heaven. Such hopes arise from
ignorance of the divine character, and of that in

which true happiness consists, and from fallaci
ous views of the exercises of a future state and tho
nature of its enjoyments. For, in order to enjoy
happiness in any slate, or in any region of the uni
verse, the mind must be imbued with a relish for
the society, the conlemplalions, and the employ
ments peculiar to that region or state, and feel
an ardent desire to participate in its enjoyments.
What pleasure wo'ild a miser whose mind is
wholly absorbed in the acquisition of riches, feel
in a world where neither gold nor silver, nor any
other object of avarice is to be found ? What
entertainment would a man whose chief en
joyment consists in hounding, horse-racing,
routes, and masquerades, derive in a scene
where such amusements are for ever abolished?
Could it be supposed that those who now find

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

their highest intellectual pleasures in Novels
and Romances, and in listening to tales of scan
dal, would experience any high degree of en
joyment in a world where there is nothing but
substantial realities, and where the inhabitants
are united in bonds of the purest affection? — or,
that those whose minds never rise beyond the
pleasures of gambling, card-playing, and gossip-
ping chit-chat, would feel any relish for the re
fined enjoyments, the sublime contemplations,
and the enraptured praises of the heavenly in
habitants ? All the arrangements of the celes
tial state, behoved to be changed and overturned,
and angels, archangels, and redeemed men,
banished from its abodes, before such characters
could find entertainments agreeable to their
former habits and desires. Although they were
admitted into the mansions of bliss, they would
be miserably disappointed ; and would feel them
selves in a situation similar to that of a rude
savage or a Russian boor, were he to be intro
duced into an assembly of princes and nobles.
They would perceive nothing congenial to their
former pursuits ; they would feel an inward reluc
tance to the pure and holy exercises of the place,
and they would anxiously desire to fly away to
regions and to companions more adapted to
their grovelling views and affections. For, it is
the decree of Heaven — a decree founded on the
moral laws which govern the intelligent universe,
and which, like the law of the Medes and Per
sians, cannot be changed. — that " IVithout holi
ness no man can see the Lord,"" and that " no im
pure person that worketh abomination, ormaketh.
a lie, can enter within the gates of the Heavenly
Jerusalem. "

The foundation of felicity in the future state,
is substantially the same as that which forms the
basis of happiness in the present world. However
elevated the station in which an individual may
be placed, however much wealth he may possess,
and however splendid his rank and equipage, he
can enjoy no substantial felicity, while he remains
the slave of grovelling appetites and affections,
and while pride and envy, ambition and revenge,
exercise a sovereign control over his mind.
While destitute of supreme love to God, and be
nevolent affections towards man, and of the
Christian virtues which flow from these funda
mental principles of moral action, the mind must
remain a stranger to true happiness, and to all
those expansive views, and delightful feelings,
which raise the soul above the pleasures of sense,
and the trivial vexations and disappointments of
the present life.

These positions could be demonstrated, were
it necessary, by numerous facts connected with
the moral scenery of human society. Whence
proceeds that ennui, which is felt in the fashion
able world, in the absence of balls, parties, ope
ras, and theatrical entertainments? Whence
arise those domestic broils, those family feuds

and contentions, which are so common in th»
higher, as well as in the lower ranks of life, anc
which embitter every enjoyment ? Whence does
it happen, that, in order to obtain gratification,
and to render existence tolerable,, so many thou •
sands of rational beings condescend to indulga
in the most childish, foolish, and brutal diver
sions ? Even in the most polished circles of
society, many who pride themselves on their su
periority to the vulgar throng, are found deriving
their chief gratification, not only in scattering des
truction among the brutal and the feathered tribea
but in mingling among the motley rabble ofacock-
pit, and in witnessing a couple of boxers encoun
tering like furious fiends, and covering each other
with wounds and gore. Whence arise the torments
that are felt from wounded pride and disappointed
ambition ? and how does it happen that social
parties cannot enjoy themselves for a couple of
hours, without resorting to cards and dice, gam
bling and gossipping, and the circulation of tales
of scandal ? How is it to be accounted for, that
suicide is so frequently committed by persons in
the higher circles, who are surrounded with
luxuries and splendour; and that murmuring,
discontentment, and ingratitude, mark the dispo
sitions and conduct of the lower ranks of society ?
All these effects proceed from the absence of
Christian principles and dispositions, and from
the narrow range of objects to which the intel
lectual powers are confined. The man who is
actuated by Christian views and affections, looks
down with indifference and contempt, on the de
grading pursuits to which I have alluded : his soul
aspires after objects more congenial to his ra
tional and immortal nature ; and in the pursuit
of these, and the exercise of the virtues which
religion inculcates, he enjoys a refined pleasure
which the smiles of the world cannot produce,
and which its frowns cannot destroy.

As in the present life there are certain mental
endowments necessary for securing substantial
happiness, so, there are certain moral qualifica
tions indispensably requisite in order to prepare us
for relishing the entertainments and the employ
ments of the life to come. The foundation of fu
ture felicity must be laid in " repenlance towards
God, and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ."
We must be convinced of our sin and depravity
as descendants' of the first Adam, of the demerit
of our offences, of the spotless purity and eternal
rectitude of that Being whom \ye have offended,
and of the danger to which we are exposed as
the violators of his law. We must receive, with
humility and gratitude, the salvation exhibited
in the Gospel, and " behold," with the eye of
faith, " the Lamb of God who laketh away the
sins of the world." We must depend on the aid
of the Spirit of God to enable us to counteract
the evil propensities of our nature, to renew our
souls after the divine image, and to inspire luj
with ardent desires to abound all in those " fruit*

LOVE TO GOD.

Ill

of righteousness which are to the praise and glory
of God." We must " add to our faith, fortitude
and resolution, and to fortitude knowledge, and to
knowledge, temperance, and to temperance, pa
tience, and to patience, godliness, and to godli
ness, brotherly kindness and charity. For, if
these things be in us and abound, they will per
mit us to be neither barren nor unfruitful in the
knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ ; — and so an
entrance shall be abundantly administered unto
us into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and
Saviour."*

The foundation of Religion being thus laid in
the exercise of such Christian graces, the follow
ing dispositions and virtues, among many others,
will be cherished and cultivated, and will form
substantial qualifications for enabling us to par
ticipate in " the inheritance of the saints in light."
1. Supreme love to God, the original source
of happiness. This is the first duty of every
rational creature, and the most sublime affection
that can pervade the human mind. It glows in
the breasts of angels and archangels, of cheru-
him and seraphim, yea, there is not an inhabitant
of any world in the universe who has retained
his primitive integrity, in whose heart it does
not reign triumphant. It unites all holy intelli
gences to their Creator and to one another; and
consequently, it must qualify us for holding a de
lightful intercourse with such beings, wherever
th«y exist, and in whatever region of the universe
our future residence may be appointed. It enli
vens the adorations of the angelic tribes, when
they exclaim, " Thou art worthy, O Lord, to re
ceive glory, and honour, and thanksgiving, and
power." It animates them in all their celestial
services ; it inspires them with a noble ardour
in executing the commands of their Sovereign,
and it qualifies its possessor, to whatever world
be may belong, for co-operating with them, in
carrying forward that scheme of universal be-
Devolence, towards the accomplishment of which
all the arrangements of the Creator ultimately
tend.

This holy affection is congenial to every view
we can take of the character and operations of
the Deity, and its obligation is deduced from the
clearest principles of Reason, as well as from the
dictates of Revelation. It is founded on every
attribute of the Divinity, and on every part of
his physical and moral administration. His om
nipotence is every moment exerted in supporting
the frame of the universe, in bringing about the
alternate succession of day and night, summer
and winter, seed-time and harvest, and in direct
ing the operation of the elements of nature, in
such a way as to contribute to the happiness of
man. His wisdom and intelligence are display
ed in proportionating and arranging every object
in the system of nature, in such a manner, that

• 2 Peter 1. 5, 6, 7, 8, 11 noddridge's Translation
20

every thing is preserved in order and harmonj
and in organizing the bodies of men and othet
creatures, so as to prevent pain, and to produce
a combination of pleasurable sensations. His
goodness extends over all his works, and is dis
played towards every rank of sensitive and in
telligent existence. It appears in the splendours
of the sun, in the radiance of the moon, in the
glories of the starry firmament, in the beautiful
assemblage of colours which diversify the face of
Nature, in the plants and flowers, which adorn
the fields, in the gentle zephyrs, in the rains and
dews that fertilize the soil, in the provision made
for the sustenance of the innumerable beings that
inhabit the air, the waters, and the earth, and
" in filling the hearts of men with food and glad
ness." His mercy and forbearance are exer
cised towards all men, even to the most profligate
and abandoned, in supporting them in existence
and loading them with his benefits, even when
they are engaged in acts of rebellion against him.
For he comrnandeth his sun to arise on the evil
as well as on the good, and sendeth rain both on
the just and on the unjust. He displays his long-
suffering, for many years, towards the thought
less prodigal, and the violators of his law, to
demonstrate, that " he desires not that any should
perish, but that all should come to repentance."
A Being possessed of such attributes, and in
cessantly displaying such beneficence through-
out creation, demands the highest affection and
veneration of all his intelligent offspring; so
that it is the dictate of enlightened reason as
well as of revelation, " Thou shall love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all
thy soul, and with all thy strength." For, it is
from him as the original source of felicity, that
all our sensitive and intellectual enjoyments pro
ceed, and on him we depend for all the blessings
that shall accompany us in every future stage of
our existence. Love to God, is therefore, the
most reasonable and amiable affection that can
glow in the human heart, and the spring of every
virtuous action, and of every pleasing and rap
turous emotion. If we are possessed of this di
vine principle, we shall delight in his worship,
and bow with reverence at his footstool ; we shall
feel complacency in his character and adminis
tration ; we shall contemplate with admiration,
the incomprehensible knowledge, the omnipotent
power, and the boundless beneficence displayed
in the mighty movements of creation and pro
vidence ,• we shall feel the most lively emotions
of gratitude for the numerous blessings he be
stows ; we shall be resigned to his will und*"-
every providential arrangement, and we shaft
long for that happy world where the glories of his
nature, and the " kindness of his love" shall be
more illustriously displayed. But the man who
is destitute of this amiable affection, is incapaDie
of those sublime and rapturous emotions which
animate the minds of celestial intelligences, ami

112

THE PHILOSOPHY UP A FUTURE STATE.

altogetner unqualified for mingling in their soci
ety. He is a rebel against the divine govern
ment, a nuisance in the universe of God, the
slave of grovelling appetites and passions, and
consequently, unfit for participating in the exer
cises and enjoyments of the saints in glory.

2. Love to mankind is another affection which
is indispensably requisite to qualify us for parti
cipating in the joys of heaven. This distinguish
ing characteristic of the saints naturally and ne
cessarily flows from love to the Supreme Being.
"For (says the apostle John) everyone that
loveth him who begat, loveth them also who are
begotten of him. If God loved us we ought also
to love one another. If a man say, I love God,
and hatethhis brother, he is a liar ; for he who
loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how
can he love God whom he hath not seen." As
the spring flows from the fountain and partakes
of its qualities, and as the shadow always ac
companies the substance, and is produced by it,
BO love to man uniformly accompanies the love
of God, and is produced by the powerful influ
ence which this governing principle exerts over
the mind.

This affection is accordant with the dictates
of reason, and congenial to the best feelings of
the human heart. When we consider that our
fellow-rnen derived their origin from the same
almighty Being who brought us into existence —
that they are endowed with the same physical
functions as ourselves, and the same moral
and intellectual powers, — that they relish the
same pleasures and enjoyments, possess the same
feelings, and are subjected to the same wants
and afflictions — that they are involved in the
same general depravity, and liable to the same
temptations and disasters — that they are jour
neying along with us to the tomb, and that our
dust must soon mingle with theirs — when we
consider the numerous relations in which we
stand to our brethren around us, and to all the
inhabitants of the globe — our dependence upon
all ranks and descriptions of men, and upon al
most every nation under heaven for our sen
sitive and intellectual enjoyments, — and that
thousands of them are traversing sea and land,
and exposing themselves to innumerable dan
gers, in order to supply us with the comforts and
the luxuries of life — when we consider, that they
are all destined to an immortal existence, and
shall survive the dissolution of this globe, and
bear a part in the solemn scenes which shall
open to view when time shall be no more — in
sh^t, when we consider, that the Great Father
of all, without respect of persons, makes the
same vital air to give play to their lungs, the
same water to cleanse and refresh them, the
same rains and dews to fructify their fields, the
same sun to enlighten their day, and the same
moon to cheer the darkness of their night — we
must be convinced, that love to our brethren of

mankind is the law of the Creator, »nd the most
rational and amiable affection that can animate
the human heart in relation to subordinate intel
ligences. He who is destitute of (his affection
is a pest in society, a rebel and a nuisance in
the kingdom of God, and, of course, unqualified
for the enjoyment of celestial bliss. "For he
who hateth his brother, is a murderer ; and we
know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding
in him."*

But, our love is not to be confined to our
brethren of the race of Adam. It must take a
loftier flight, and comprehend within its expan
sive grasp, all the holy intelligences in the uni
verse, in so far as their nature and qualities have
been made known to us. We must love the an
gelic tribes. They are beings who stand near
the summit of the scale of intellectual exis
tence ; they are endowed with faculties superior
to man ; they dwell in the glorious presence
of God, and are employed as his ministers in
superintending the affairs of his government.
They .are possessed of wonderful activity, in
vested with powers of rapid motion, and flou
rish in immortal youth. They are adorned with
consummate holiness and rectitude, and with pe
culiar loveliness of character. Pride and vanity,
envy and malice, wrath and revenge, never ran
kle in their breasts. They never indulge in im
piety, never insult the Redeemer, nor bring a
railing accusation against their brethren. They
glow with an intense and immortal flame of love
to their Creator ; they are incessantly employed
in acts of benevolence ; they occasionally descend
to our world on embassies of mercy, and are
ministering spirits to the heirs of salvation. On
all these accounts they demand our esteem, our
approbation, and our affectionate regard. And,
although they are at present placed beyond the
reach of our beneficence, and we have no oppor
tunity of expressing our benevolent, wishes, yet
we may afterwards be joined to their society,
and co-operate with them in their labours of love.

The indispensable necessity of love to man
kind, and to every class of holy intelligences, as
a preparation for heaven, will appear, when we
consider, that we shall mingle in their society,
and hold intimate fellowship with them in the
eternal world. For the inhabitants of our world
who are admitted into heaven, are represented
in Scripture, as joining " the general assembly
and church of the first-born, the spirits of just
men made perfect and the innumerable company
of angels ;" and hence they are exhibited, in the
book of Revelation, as joining with one heart
and one mind in contemplating the divine opera
tions, and in celebrating the praises of their com
mon Lord. In the society of that blessed world,
love pervades every bosom, it reigns for ever
triumphant; and therefore, every exercise and

• 1 John iii. 15.

HUMILITY.

113

filtercouse is conducted with affection, harmony,
and peace. Among the other evils which shall
oe banished from the New Jerusalem, it is de
clared in the book of Revelation, that " there
shall be no more crying" or, as the words should
be rendered, " there shall be no more clamour,
broils, or contentions" arising from the operation
of malignant principles. No jarring affection is
ever felt, no malevolent wish is ever uttered, and
no discordant voice is ever heard, among all the
myriads of those exalted intelligences. Kind
ness and benignity expansive, benevolence, con
descension and humility, are the characteristics
of all the inhabitants of heaven. Without these
qualities the celestial world would become a scene
of eternal confusion, and happiness would be
banished from its abodes. If, therefore, we would
be qualified to associate with those glorious be
ings and to participate in their enjoyments, we
must cultivate the same virtues, and be animated
by similar dispositions, otherwise, we could ex
perience no delight in the society of angels,
and of " the spirits of the just made perfect."
Were an individual whose heart is full of ran
cour and envy, who delights in broils and conten
tions, and in the exercise of revenge, to be ad
mitted into that society, he would find no asso
ciates actuated by congenial feelings, he would
disturb the harmony of the celestial choir, and
would be instantly expelled, with every mark of
indignation and horror, from those blessed
abodes. "For what fellowship hath righteous
ness with unrighteousness ? what communion
hath light with darkness ? and what concord
hath Christ with Belial?" By a law which
pervades the whole moral universe wherever it
extends, which can never be rescinded, and
which, like the law of gravitation in the materi
al world, connects all the individuals of which it
is composed in one harmonious system ; such
characters must, of necessity, be for ever exclu~
ded from the mansions of the blessed. On the
other hand, the man whose heart glows with love
to his Creator, and with expansive affection to
mankind, and towards all holy beings, is secured
of eternal happiness, as the necessary result of
the possession of such divine principles ; and
must enjoy felicity, while such principles re
main in exercise, during all the future periods of
his existence, and in every region of the universe
to which he may be transported.

3. Humility is another essential qualification
for enjoying the felicity of the future world.
There is nothing that appears more prominent
in the character of the bulk of mankind, than
pride, which displays itself in a thousand differ
ent modes in the intercourses of society. It is
uniformly accompanied with haughtiness of de
meanour, self-conceit, obstinacy, arrogance, and
a whole train of malignant passions and affec
tions. It is the pest of general society, the
source of domestic broils and contentions, and

the greatest curse that can fall on a Christian
church, when it insinuates itself into the minds
of those who " love to have the pre-eminence."
It is a source of torment to its possessor, and tc
all around him ; and of all the malignant pas»
sions which rankle in the human breast, it is the
most inconsistent with the present character and
condition of man. It is peculiar to falle* and
depraved intelligences, for it is certain, from the
very constitution of the moral system, that no
emotions of pride or haughtiness are ever felt in
the breasts of angels, or any other holy beings ;
because such affections are incompatible with
the principle of love to God and to our fellow-
creatures.

In opposition to this principle, which predo
minates in the minds of fallen man, and apostate
angels, — humility is a distinguishing character
istic of the sons of God, whether on earth or in
heaven. Hence, we are told that " God re-
sisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the hum
ble" — that even <c a proud look is an abomina
tion in his sight," while he beholds with com
placency " the humble and the contrite spirit."
Hence, we are exhorted " to clothe ourselves
with humility ;" and " to forbear one another
in all lowliness and meekness of mind, and to
esteem others better than ourselves." Humility
consists in a just sense of our character and con
dition, both as depending beings and as apos
tate creatures, accompanied with a correspon
dent train of dispositions and affections. Howe
ver much this disposition has been disrelished by
Hume and other infidels, who consider it as both
vicious and contemptible, — when viewed in its
true light, it appears congenial to the best feel
ings of our nature, and to the plainest deductions
of reason. — When we consider our condition as
creatures, dependent every moment on a Supe
rior Being " for life, and breath, and all things,**
when we reflect on the cunon« r>r<nni7.ation of
our corporeal frame, the thousauus o. . ra.c, arte
ries, muscles, bones, lacteals, and lymphatics,
which are interwoven through its constitution;
the incessant pulsation of the heart in the centre
of the system and the numerous other functions
and movements over which we have no control,
— when we reflect on oar character as guilty and
depraved creatures, in the presence of Him
" who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity ;"
and on the numerous diseases, pains, sorrows,
and physical evils from the war of the elements,
'•« which we are subjected, — when we consider,
that, ere long, our bodies must crumble into dust,
and become the prey of noisome reptiles; —
when we reflect on the low station in which we
are placed in the scale of intelligent existence —
that we are only like so many atoms, or micro
scopic, animalculce when contrasted with the in
numerable myriads of bright intelligences that
people the empire of God — and that the globe
on which we dwell is but as "the drop of a

114

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

bucket," when compared with the millions of
more resplendent worlds that roll through the
vast spaces of creation ; — and, in short, when
we consider the grandeur of that Omnipotent
Being whose presence pervades every region of
immensity, and in whose sight " all the inhabit
ants of the world, are as grasshoppers, and are
courilfed to him as less than nothing and vanity,"
there is no disposition that appears more con
formable to the character and condition of man,
than "lowliness of mind," and none more un
reasonable and inconsistent with the rank and
circumstances in which he is placed, than pride,
haughtiness and arrogance.

This amiable disposition forms a peculiar trait
in the character of angels and other pure intelli
gences. It is poor, puny, sinful man, alone, who
dares to be proud and arrogant. It is that re
bellious worm of the dust alone, (if we except
the angels of darkness,) chat looks down with
supercilious contempt on his fellow-creatures,
and attempts to exalt himself above the throne of
God. No such affections are ever felt in the
breast of superior beings who have kept their first
estate. In proportion to the enlarged capacity
of their minds ; in proportion to the expansive
views they have acquired of the dominions of
Jehovah, in proportion to the elevated concep
tions they have attained of the character and at
tributes of their Creator, in a similar proportion
are their minds inspired with humility, reverence
and lowly adoration. Having taken an extensive
survey °r 'lie operations of Omnipotence, having
wm- tneir way to numerous worlds, and be-
• xjia scenes of wisdom and benevolence, which
the eye of man hath not yet seen, nor his imagi
nation conceived, and having contemplated dis
plays of intelligence and power, which are beyond
the reach even of their own superior faculties to
comprehend — they see themselves as finite and
imperfect creatures, and even as it were fools,*
in the presence of Him whose glory is ineffable
and whose ways are past finding out. — Hence,
they are represented as "covering their faces
with their wings," in the presence of their So
vereign ;f and, in the Book of Revelation, they
are exhibited as " casting their crowns before the
throne, and saying thou art worthy, O Lord, to
receive glory, and honour, and power. "J What
a striking contrast does such a scene present to
the haughty airs, and the arrogant conduct of the
proud beings that dwell on this terrestrial ball,
who are at the same time immersed in ignorance
and folly, immorality and crime !

In their intercourses with the inhabitants of
our world, and the offices they perform as minis
tering spirits to the heirs of salvation, the same

* In the book of Job, Eliphaz, when describing the
fterfections of the Almighty, declares, that " the
aeavens are not clean in his si<?ht," and that even
..s angels he chargeth with/oWy." Job iv. is xv.15.

- Isaiah vi. 2. I Rev. iv. 10, H

humble and condescending demeanor is displayed.
One of the highest order of these celestial mes
sengers — " Gabriel, who stands in the presence
of God," — winged his flight from his heavenly
mansion to our wretched world, and, directing
his course to one of the most despicable villages
of Galilee, entered into the hovel of a poor vir
gin, and delivered a message of joy, with the
most affectionate and condescending gratulations.
Another of these benevolent beings entered the
dungeon in which Peter was bound with chains,
knocked off his fetters, addressed him in the lan
guage of kindness, and delivered him from the
hands of his furious persecutors. When Pau}
was tossing in a storm, on the billows of the
Adriatic, a forlorn exile from his native land, and
a poor despised prisoner, on whom the grandees
of this world looked down with contempt, — an
other of these angelic beings, " stood by him,"
during the darkness of the night and the war of
the elements, and consoled his mind wilh the as
surance of the divine favour and protection.
Lazarus was a poor despised individual, in ab
ject poverty and distress, and dependent on cha
rity for his subsistence. He lay at the gate of a
rich man, without friends or attendants, desiring
to be fed with the crumbs that fell from his table.
His body was covered with boils and ulcers,
which were exposed without covering to the open
air; for the " dogs came and licked his sores."
What nobleman or grandee would have conde-t
scended to make a companion of a fellow-crea
ture in such loathsome and abject circumstances ?
Who, even of the common people, would have
received such a person into their houses, or de
sired his friendship ? Who would have accounted
it an honour, when he died, to attend his funeral ?
Celestial beings, however, view the circum
stances, and the characters of men in a very dif
ferent light, from that in which they appear to
" the children of pride." Poor and despised as
Lazarus was, a choir of angels descended from
their mansions of glory, attended him on his
dying couch, and wafted his disembodied spirit
to the realms of bliss.

Since, then, it appears, that angelic beings,
notwithstanding their exalted stations, and the
superior glories of their character, are " clothed
with humility," — it must form a distinguishing
trait in our moral characters, if we expect to bo
admitted into their society in the world to come
For how could we enter into harmonious fellow
ship with these pure intelligences, if we were
actuated with dispositions diametrically opposite
to theirs, and what happiness would result from
such an association, were it possible to be effect
ed? A proud man, were he admitted into hea
ven, could feel no permanent enjoyment. The
external glory of the place might dazzle his eyes
for a little, but he would feel no relish for tlie so
ciety and the employments of lhat world. The
peculiar honour conferred on patriarchs, pro-

FOLLY OF PRIDE.

115

ohets, and apostles, and the noble army of mar-
yrs, and the exalted stations of the cherubim and
serajtfiim, would excite his envy and ambition,
and, ere long, he would attempt to sow the seeds
of discord, and to introduce anarchy and confu
sion among the hosts of heaven. So that the
passion of pride, when cherished in the soul as
-he governing principle of action, is utterly in
compatible with our admission into the regions
of harmony and love.

Let me ask the man in whose heart pride and
haughtiness predominate, if he really imagines
that he can be a candidate for a glorious and im
mortal existence ? Does he not at once perceive
the inconsistency of such a thought with the dic
tates of reason, and the nature of future felicity ?
— Of what has he any reason to be proud ? Is
he proud of his birth ? of his ancestors ? of his
wealth? of his ttation? of his beauty? of his
personal accomplishments ? of his gallantry ? of
his debaucheries? of his military prowess? or of
the thousands of human beings he has slain in
battle ? Is he proud of his skill in music, in
dancing, in fencing, in fox-hunting, and in gam
bling? of his knowledge in languages, in lite
rature, in arts and sciences? Or is he proud
that h" is subjected to the asthma, the gra
vel, the mopsy, and the gout, that his fune
ral will be attended by a train of mourners,
and that a monument of marble will be erect
ed to his memory, when his carcass is putre
fying with the reptiles of the dust ? Suppose
he were admitted into the celestial mansions- -
which of all these topics would he choose for the
theme of his conversation, and the ground of his
boasting? Would he attempt to entertain the
cherubim and the seraphim, by telling them how
many rude chieftains he was descended from,
how many ancient families he was connected
with, and how many acres of land he possessed
as a patrimony in that wrutched world which is
soon to be wrapt in flames ? Would he tell them
of his expertntfss as a marksman, of his dexte
rity as a horse-racer, of his adroitness as a boxer,
of his skill in manoeuvring an army, of the vil
lages he had burned, of the towns he had pil
laged, or of the thousands he had butchered in
storming a city? — He would be overwhelmed
with shouts of indignation, and instantly hissed
from their abodes. — Would he boast of his skill
in languages and antiquities, or of his knowledge
in arts and sciences? What a poor ignoramus,
(if I may use the expression) would he appear
in the presence of Gabriel, the angel of God,
who has so frequently winged his way, in a few
hours, from heaven to earth, and surveyed the
regions of unnumbered worlds ! Would a poor
worm of the earth, whose view is confined within
& few miles around it, boast of its knowledge in
.he presence of beings endowed with such capa
cious powers, and who have ranged over so vast
i portion of the universe of God ? And, if he

has nothing else to boast of, why is he proud *
What a pitiful figure he would make among the
intelligent and adoring hosts of heaven ? While
such a disposition, therefore, predominates in the
mind, its possessor can enjoy no substantial feli
city either in this life or in the life to come,.

On the other hand, the man, who, like his Re
deemer, is " meek and lowly in heart," has "the
witness in himself," that he has obtained the ap
probation of his God, that he is assimilated to
angelic beings in his temper and affections, that
he has the principle of eternal life implanted in
his soul, and that he is in some measure qualified
for joining in the exercises, and enjoying the
felicity of the heavenly state. " For thus saith
the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity,
whose name is holy; I dwell in the high and
holy place, — with him also that is of a contrite
and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the hum
ble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones."

4. Active Beneficence, with all its accompany
ing virtues, is another characteristic of the man
who is training for the heavenly inheritance.
Wherever the principle of love to God and man,
and the grace of humility are in exercise, they
will uniformly lead the individual who is under
their influence to " abound in the fruits of right
eousness, and to use every active endeavour to
promote the comfort and happiness of mankind.
He will endeavour, as far as his power and influ
ence extend, to relieve the wants of the poor,
the fatherless and the widow, to soothe the dis
consolate, to comfort the afflicted, to shelter the '
houseless and benighted traveller, to instruct the
ignorant, and to meliorate the moral and physical
condition of every rank of society. He will pa
tronize every scheme which has for its object to
remove the evils which exist in the social stale —
to increase the comforts of mankind — to improve
the soil— to facilitate human labour — to clear away
nuisances from the habitations of men — to pro
mote order, cleanliness, and domestic enjoyment
— to train the minds of the young to knowledge
and virtue — to introduce improvement in the me
chanical arts, and to diffuse useful science among
all ranks. Above all things he will endeavour,
in so far as his station and opportunities permit,
to promote the spiritual improvement and the
eternal happiness of mankind, and will study to
render all his other exertions subservient to the
attainment of this most interesting and momen
tous object. In contributing to the accomplish
ment of this end, he will give his countenance
and support to every institution, and to every ra
tional scheme which is calculated to promote the
knowledge of the scriptures of truth, throughout
our own country, and in other lands, and to make
known "the salvation of God" over all the
earth. — In such benevolent exertions he will per
severe, even in the face of every species of op
position, obloquy, and reproach, through the whole
course of his existence in this world, tiU death

116

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.
a nob'er sphere of action and

transport him to
enjoyment.

The necessity of acquiring habits of active
beneficence, in order tc our preparation for the
felicity of the future world, will appear, if we
consider, that heaven is a social state, and that
a considerable portion of its happiness will con
sist in the mutual interchange of benevolent af-
fec^ns and beneficent actions. There will,
indeed, be no poor and distressed objects to be
relieved and comforted, no sorrows to be allevi
ated, and no physical nor moral evils to be coun
teracted ; for, in the New Jerusalem " there
shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor cry
ing, neither shall there be any more pain, for
the former things shall have passed away, and
God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes."
But its inhabitants will be for ever employed in
acts of beneficence towards each other, corres
ponding to their dignified stations, and the cir
cumstances in which they are placed. This is
evident from the very nature of Love, which
pervades the hearts of the whole of that " mul
titude which no man can number." Love can
be manifested only by its effects, or by those ex
ternal acts of kindness and benignity which tend
to communicate happiness to others ; and, there
can be no doubt, that, in a thousand ways in
comprehensible .to us, the inhabitants of the
upper world will be the means of diffusing ec
static delight through the bosoms of surrounding
intelligences, which will form a pait of that joy
which is " unspeakable and full of glory." The
sympathetic feelings they will express for each
other, both in respect to their former and their pre
sent condition, the interest they will take in listen
ing to each other's history, the scenes of felicity
to which they will conduct each other, the noble
and enrapturing subjects of conversation with
which they will entertain one another, the ob-

intelligences, as his ministers in accomplishing
his designs, and for communicating enjoyment
to each other. With respect to the angels, we
are informed by Paul, that " they are all minis
tering spirits, sent forth to minister to them who
shall be heirs of salvation." Hence we learn
from sacred history, that they delivered Peter
from the fury of Herod and the Jewish rulers, —
Daniel from the ravenous lions — Lot from the
destruction of Sodom, and Jacob from the hands
of Esau; that they strengthened and refreshed
Elijah in the wilderness, comforted Daniel when
covered with sackcloth and ashes, directed Jo
seph and Mary in their journey to Egypt, and
Cornelius to Peter, to receive the knowledge of
salvation ; that they communicated " good ti
dings of great joy" to Zacharias the father of
John the Baptist, to the Virgin Mary, and to
the shepherds in the plains of Bethlehem, and
consoled the hearts of the disconsolate disciples,
by proclaiming the resurrection of their Lord
and Master ;— and we have reason to conclude,
that such ministrations are appointed to be con
tinued throughout all the periods of time.

It is not improbable that the spirits of just
men made perfect are likewise occasionally
employed in similar services. When the vision
of the New Jerusalem was exhibited to John
by a celestial messenger, he " fell down to wor
ship before the feet of ihe messenger, who show
ed him these things." But the messenger for
bade him, saying, — " See thou do it not ; for/
am thy fellow- servant, and of thy brethren the
prophets, and of them that keep (or are interested
in) the sayings of this book." These words
would naturally lead us to conclude, that this
messenger was a departed saint, since he desi"-
nates himself a brother, a propliet, arid a fellow-
servant. Perhaps it was the spirit of Moses, of
David, of Isaiah, of Jeremiah, or of Daniel, wb/»

jects of beauty and sublimity to which they will would account it an honour to be employ

direct each other's attention, the lectures on di
vine subjects, which the more capacious and
exalted spirits among them may deliver to their
younger brethren of " the church of the first
born," and the intelligence from distant worlds
which the seraphim may communicate, on re
turning from their embassies of love to other
regions — may form a part of those beneficent
services, into which every inhabitant of that
world will engage with peculiar pleasure. To
communicate happiness in every possible mode,
to make surrounding associates exult with joy,
and to stimulate them to celebrate the praises
of the " Giver of all Good," will be their un-
seasing desire and their everlasting delight.

We have every reason to believe, that a vast
system of universal Berevolence is going on
throughout the universe of God, and that it is
the grand object of his rjoral government to dis
tribute happiness among unnumbered worlds.
In prosecuting this object, he employs created

ed

such a service by their exalted Lord. But
whether or not such a supposition may be admit
ted, certain it is, that the saints will hereafter
be employed in active beneficent services, ir
concert with other holy beings, so long as thei-
existence endures. For they are constituted
" Kings and Priests to the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ," and are " workers to
gether with God," in carrying forward the plans
of his government.

Since, then, it appears, that the inhabitants
of heaven are incessantly employed in acts ot
beneficence, the habit of beneficence which is
acquired in this world, along with its ac
companying virtues, may be considered as
a preparation and a qualification for that
more extensive s »here of moral action into
which the saints shall be introduced, when they
wing their way from this earthly call to the
regions above. And, consequently, those who
never engage in " works of faith and labours of

SOCIETY OF HEAVEN.

117

love," and who are governed by a principle of
idfiskneis in the general tenor of their conduct,
must be considered as unqualified for taking a
part in the benevolent employments of the celes
tial world.*

Let us now consider for a little, the happiness
which must flow from an association with intel
ligent beings animated with the sublime prin
ciples and holy dispositions to which I have now
adverted.

In the present world, one of the principal
sources of misery, arises from the malevolent
dispositions, and immoral conduct of its inhabi
tants. Pride, ambition, malignant passions,
falsehood, deceit, envy, and revenge, which ex
ercise a sovereign sway over the hearts of the
majority of mankind — have produced more mi
sery and devastation among the human race,
than the hurricane and the tempest, the earth
quake and the volcano, and all the other concus
sions of the elements of nature. The lust of
ambition has covered kingdoms with sackcloth
and ashes, levelled cities with the ground, turned
villages into heaps of smoking ruins, transformed
fertile fields into a wilderness, polluted the earth
with human gore, slaughtered thousands and
millions of human beings, and filled the once
cheerful abodes of domestic life, with the sounds
of weeping, lamentation, and woe. Injustice
and violence have robbed society of its rights
and privileges, and the widow and fatherless of
their dearest enjoyments. Superstition and re
venge have immolated their millions of victims,
banished peace from the world, and subverted
the order of society. The violation of truth in
contracts, affirmations, and promises, has in
volved nations in destruction, undermined the
foundations of public prosperity, blasted the
good name and the comfort of families, perplexed
and agitated the minds of thousands and millions,
and thrown contempt on the revelations of hea
ven, and the discoveries of science. Malice,
envy, hatred, and similar affections, have stirred
up strifes and contentions, which have invaded
the peace of individuals, families, and societies,
and imbittered all their enjoyments. It is
scarcely too much to affirm, that more than nine-
tenths of all the evils, perplexities, and sorrows,
which are the lot of suffering humanity, are
owing to the wide and extensive operation of
such diabolical principles and passions.

What a happiness, then, must it be, to mingle
in a society where such malignant affections

* This subject might have been illustrated at
greater length ; but as the author has already had
occasion to enter into a minute discussion of the
yrinciples of moral action, and their relation to the
inhabitants of all worlds, in his work on " The Phi
losophy of Religion,"— he refers his readers to that
tieatise, for a more ample elucidation of the several
topics, to which he has briefly adverted in the pre
ceding pages— particularly to Chap. I. throughout,
Chap. II. Section 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, and the General Con-
etufiona.

shall never more shed their baleful influence,
and where love, peace, and harmony, mutual
esteem, brotherly-kindness and charity, are for
ever triumphant! To depart from a world
where selfishness and malignity, strife and dis
sensions, wars and devastations so generally
prevail, and to enter upon a scene of enjoyment
where the smiles of benevolence beam from the
countenances of unnumbered glorious intelli
gences, must raise in the soul the most erratic
rapture, and be the ground-work of all those
other " pleasures which are at God's right hand
for evermore." — Even in this world, amidst the
physical evils which now exist, what a scene of
felicity would be produced, were all the illus
trious philanthropic characters now living, or
which have adorned our race in the ages that are
past, to be collected into one society, and to as
sociate exclusively, without annoyance from
" the world that lieth in wickedness !" Let us
suppose a vast society composed of such cha-
ract rs as Moses, Elijah, Jeremiah, Daniel,
Paul, James and John, the Evangelists, men
who accounted it their highest honour to glorify
God and to promote the salvation of mankind, —
such philanthropists as Howard, Clarkson, Ven-
ning, and Sharpe, who displayed the most be
nignant affections, and spent their mortal exist
ence in unwearied efforts to meliorate the con
dition of the prisoner, and relieve the distresses
of the wretched in every land-rto deliver the
captive from his oppressors — to unloose the
shackles of slavery — to pour light and vital air
into the noisome dungeon, and to diffuse bless
ings among mankind wherever they were found ;
— such profound philosophers as Locke, Newton,
and Boyle, whose capacious intellects seemed to
embrace the worlds both of matter and of mind,
and who joined to their mental accomplishments,
modesty, humility, equanimity of temper, and
general benevolence ; — such amiable divines as
Watts, Doddridge, Bates, Hervey, Edwards,
Lardner, and Dwight, whose hearts burned with
zeal to promote the glory of their Divine Mas
ter, and to advance the present and everlasting
interest of their fellowmen. To associate per
petually with such characters, even with the im
perfections and infirmities which cleaved to them
in this sublunary region, would form something
approaching to a paradise on earth.

But, let us suppose such characters divested
of every moral and mental imperfection, endowed
with every holy principle and virtue that can
adorn a created intelligence, and with capacious
intellectual powers in vigorous and incessant
exercise, dwelling in a world where every natu
ral evil is removed, where scenes of glorv meet
the eye at every step, and where boundless pros
pects stretch before the view of the enraotured
mind. Let us further suppose, intefligences in
vested with faculties far more energetic and
sublime— who have ranged through the imrnen-

118

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

eity of creation, who have mingled with the in-
nabitants of ten thousand worlds, who have
learned the history of the divine dispensations
in relation to them all, and who are inspired
with every amiable and benignant feeling, and
with humility, love and condescension ; — let us
suppose ambassadors of this description, from
numerous worlds, occasionally joining this celes
tial society, and " rehearsing the mighty acts
of Jehovah," as displayed in the regions from
•whence they came. — let us suppose, " the man
Christ Jesus" president among them, in the ef
fulgence of his glory, and unfulding his peerless
excellences to every eye, — let us suppose these
glorious beings engaged in conversations, con
templations, investigations, thanksgivings, adora
tions, and beneficent services, corresponding to
the magnificence of the region in which they
reside, and to the dignity of their natures — and
we have a faint picture of the social enjoyments
of the celestial world. This is the society of
heaven, the general assembly of the church tri
umphant, for which we must now be inspired
with a divine relish and for which we must now
be prepared in the temper and disposition of our
minds, if we expect to be hereafter admitted into
that " house not made with hands which is eter
nal in the heavens."

O blessed and glorious society ! where no con
tentions ever arise, where no malignant spirit
interrupts the universal harmony, where no male
volent affection is ever displayed, where no pro
vocation disturbs the serenity of the mind, where
not one revengeful thought aaises against the most
depraved inhabitant of the universe, where a
single falsehood is never uttered, where folly,
impertinence and error never intrude, where no
frown sits lowering on the countenance, and no
cloud ever intercepts the sunshine of benevo
lence ! — where "Holiness to the Lord" is in
scribed on every heart, where every member is
knit to another by the indissoluble bonds of af
fection and esteem, where a friendship is com
menced which shall never be dissolved, where
love glows in every bosom, and benignity beams
from every countenance, where moral excellence
is displayed in its most sublime, and diversified,
and transporting forms, where " a multitude
which no man can number, from all nations, and
kindreds, and people, and tongues," join in uni
son with angels and archangels, principalities
and powers, in swelling the song of salvation to
Him that sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb
that was slain, for ever and ever ! — ye glorious
hosts of heaven, who minister to the heirs of
salvation on earth ! Ye redeemed inhabitants
from our world, " who came out of great tribu
lation, and are now before the throne of God,
and serve him day and night in his temple !" we
long to join your blessed society. You dwell
amidst scenes of magnificence and the splendours
of eternal day ; — you are for ever secure from

sin and sorrow, and every evil annoyance ;—
your joys are uninterrupted, ever increasing, ana
ever new ; — your prospects are boundless as the
universe, arid your duration permanent as the
throne of the Eternal ! — We dwell " in houses ol
clay whose foundation is in the dust :" we so
journ in " a land of pits and snares," and within
" the region of the shadow of death:" we walk
amidst scenes of sorrow and suffering, surrounded
by " the tents of strife," and exposed to the
malice of " lying lips and deceitful tongues !"
From our earthly prison, to which we are now
chained as " prisoners ofhope," we lift up our
eyes to your happy mansions, with longing
desires, and exclaim, " O that we had the wings
of a seraph, that we might fly away to your
blissful seats and be at rest !" We long to join
" the general assembly and church of the first
born, which are written in heaven — the spirits of
just men made perfect — the innumerable com
pany of angels — Jesus the Mediator of the new
covenant, and God the Judge of all." .

May the Father of all mercies,who hath begot
ten us to the lively hope of an incorruptible inhe
ritance, grant that we may persevere in the Chris-*
tian course,be kept from falling, be " guarded by
his almighty power, through faith unto salvation,"
and that in due time, an entrance may be abun
dantly administeied to us into the everlasting
kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."
To whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

From the subject to which our attention ha9
now been directed, we may learn, what will con
stitute one bitter ingredient in the punishment
that awaits the wicked in the future world. As the
principle of love, which pervades the minds of the
inhabitants of heaven, with the diversified rami
fications into which it diverges, forms the ground
work of all the other enjoyments of the celestial
world, — so the principle of malignity which pre
dominates in the hearts of the wicked, will be
the source of the greater part of that misery they
are doomed to suffer in the eternal stale. — " We
cannot form a more dreadful picture of future
punishment than by conceiving the principles of
falsehood, deceit, and malignity, and the passions
of pride, hatred, malice, and revenge, raging with
uncontrolled and perpetual violence. We need
represent to ourselves nothing more horrible in
the place of punishment, than by supposing the
Almighty simply permitting wicked men to give
full scope to their malevolent dispositions ; leav
ing them ' to eat of the fruit of their own ways,
and to be filled with their own devices.' The ef
fects produced by the uncontrolled operation of
such principles and passions, would be such as
may be filly represented by the emblems of the
worm that never dies, of ' devouring fire,' and of
their necessary concomitants, ' weeping and
wailing and gnashing of teeth.'"*

* Philosophy of Religion, pp. 55. 53.

EXAMPLES OP MALIGNITY.

119

In order to illustrate this sentiment, and to im
press it more deeply upon the mind of the reader,
I shall select two or three facts in relation to cer
tain characters whose names stand conspicuous
in the annals of history.

Every reader of history is acquainted with the
character and actions of Antiochus Epiphanes,
whose name stands so high on the rolls of impi
ety and crime. Having besieged the city of
Jerusalem, he took it by storm, and, during the
three days it was abandoned to the fury of the
soldiers, he caused forty thousand* men to be in
humanly butchered : he exercised every species
of cruelty upon the citizens, and unmercifully put
to death all those who fell into his hands, and
whom he considered as his enemies. He de
spatched Appollonius at the head of 22,000 men,
with orders to plunder all the cities of Judea, to
murder all the men, and sell the women and
children for slaves. He accordingly came with
his army, and to outward appearance, with a
peaceable intention ; neither was he suspected by
the Jews, as he was superintendent of the tribute
in Palestine. He kept himself inactive till the
next Sabbath, when they were all in a profound
quiet, and then, on a sudden, began the work of
slaughter. He sent a portion of his men to the
temple and synagogues, with orders to cut to
pieces all who were found in these places of
resort ; whilst the rest going through the streets of
the city, massacred all who came in their way.
He next ordered the city to be plundered and
set on fire, pulled down all their stately buildings,
anc' carried away captive ten thousand of those
who had escaped the slaughter. Not yet satisfied
with the blood of the Jews, Antiochus resolved
either totally to abolish their religion, or to de
stroy their whole race. He issued a decree that
all nations within his dominions should forsake
their old religion and gods, and worship those of
the king, under the most severe penalties. He
dedicated the temple at Jerusalem to Jupiter
Olympus, and set up his own statue on the altar
of burnt-offering ; and all who refused to come
and worship this idol were either massacred or
put to some cruel tortures, till they either complied
or expired under the hands of the executioners.
He put to death Eleazar, one of the most illustri
ous of the Jews, a venerable old man, ninety years
of age, and a doctor of the law, " whose life had
been one continued series of spotless innocence,"
and his execution was accompanied with the most
cruel torments. He seized the seven brothers
commonly called the Maccabees, along with their
mother, and caused them to be scourged in a
most inhuman manner, in order to compel them
to swallow swine's flesh, which their law forbade,
e.tul when they refused, he was so exasperated that
he ordered brazen pans and cauldrons to be
heated '., and, when they were red, he caused the

• Rollln states the number at 80,000.

tongue of the eldest to be cut off— had the skin
torn from his head, and the extremities of his
hands and feet cut off, before his mother and
his brethren. After being mutilated, he was
brought close to the fire, and fried in the pan.
The second brother was then taken, and, after
the hair of his head, with the skin, was torn away,
he was tortured in the same manner as his elder
brother ; and in like manner were the other five
brethren put to death, — the last of whom, who was
the youngest, he caused to be tortured more
grievously than the rest. Last of all the mother
also suffered death. \

Hearing, some time afterwards, that, the Jews
had revolted, he assembled all his troops, which
formed a mighty army, and determind to destroy
the whole Jewish nation, and to settle other peo
ple in their country. He commanded Lysias, one
of his generals, to extirpate them root and branch,
so as not to leave one Hebrew in the country.
When in Persia advice was brought him of tho
defeat of Lysias, and that the Jews had retaken
the temple, thrown down the altars and idols
which he had set up, and re-established their
ancient worship. At this news his fury rose to
madness. In the violence of his rage, he set out
with all possible expedition, like an infernal fiend,
venting nothing but menaces on his march, and
breathing only final ruin and destruction to every
inhabitant of Judea, and to all that appertained
to them. He commanded his coachman to drive
with the utmost speed, that no time might be
lost for fully satiating his vengeance, threatening
at the same time, with horrid imprecations, to
make Jerusalem the burying place of the whole
Jewish nation, and not to leave one single inha
bitant within its confines. But the Almighty,
against whose providence he was raging, inter
posed, and stopped him in his wild career. " He
was seized," says Rollin, " with incredible pains
in his bowels, and the most excessive pangs of
the colic." Still, his pride and fury were not
abated : he suffered himself to be hurried away
by the wild transport of his rage, and breathing
nothing but vengeance against the land of Judea
and its inhabitants, he gave orders to proceed
with still greater celerity in his journey. But as
his horses were running forward impetuously,
he fell from his chariot, and bruised every part of
his body in so dreadful a manner, that he suffered
inexpressible torments ; and soon after finished
an impious life by a miserable death.

The Turks, in their wars with neighbouring
states, both in former and present times, have
been proverbial for the malevolence they have
displayed, and the cruelties they have exercised
towards their enemies. The following is only
one instance out of a thousand which might be
produced, of the desperate length 10 which human
beings will proceed in treachery and in the in-

t The details of these shocking cruelties may be
seen in Rollin's Ancient History, voL 7,

120

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE,

flietion of torment, when under the influence of
a principle of malignity.

In the war with Turkey and the states of Ve
nice, about the year 1571, the Venetians were
besieged by the Turks in the city of Famagosta
in the island of Cyprus. Through famine and
want of ammunition, the Venetian garrison was
compelled to enter upon terms of capitulation.
A treaty was accordingly set on foot, and hos
tages exchanged. The following terms were
agreed to by both parties : — That the officers and
soldiers should march out with all the honours of
war, drums beating, colours flying, five pieces of
cannon, all their baggage, and be conveyed in
safety to Candia, under an escort of three Turk
ish gallies; and that the inhabitants should re
main in the free use of their religion, untouched
in their property, and in full possession of their
freedom. Next day Bragadino, the Venetian
commander, went to pay his compliments to
Mustapha, the Turkish general, attended by
some of his chief officers. At first they met
with a civil reception, Mustapha ordering a seat
to be placed for Bragadino on his own right hand.

They soon entered into discourse about the
prisoners, and Mustapha taxing Bragadino with
some violences committed by the garrison during
the suspension granted for settling a capitulation,
Bragadino, with a generous disdain, denied the
charge. Upon which Mustapha, rising up in a
fury, ordered him to be bound hand and foot, and
the others to be massacred before his face, with
out regard to hospitality, their bravery, the
treaty subsisting, or their being unarmed.

Bragadino was reserved for a more cruel
treatment : after being insulted with the most
vilifying and opprobrious language ; after under
going the most excrutiating tortures ; after having
his ears, nose, and lips slit, his neck was stretch
ed upon a block, and trampled upon by the das
tardly Mustapha, who asked him where was
now that Christ whom he worshipped, and why
he did not deliver him out of his hands ? At the
same time the soldiers on board the fleet were
despoiled of every thing, and lashed to the oars.
This day's work being finished, Mustapha enter
ed the city, where he gave immediate orders,
that Tiepolo, a person of high rank and authority,
should be hanged upon a gibbet. A few days
after, before Bragadino had recovered from the
wounds he had received, he was carried in deri
sion to all the breaches made in the walls, loaded
with buckets filled with earth and mortar, and
ordered to kiss the ground as often as he passed by
Mustapha , a spectacle that raised pangs of pity
in the callous hearts of the meanest Turkish sol
diers, but could not move compassion in the obdu
rate breast of Mustapha. Afterwards, the brave
Rcagadino was cooped up in a cage, and igno-
miniously hung to a sail-yard in one of the
gallies, where his intrepid soldiers were chained
to the oars. This sight rendered them almost

furious : they exclaimed against the baseness,
the treachery of Mustapha; they called aloud fo
revenge, and desired to be set at liberty, that the]
might, even without arms, rescue their bravo
general, and inflict the deserved punishment
uoon their mean, dastardly, and cowardly foes.
Their request was answered with cruel lashes
Bragadino was taken down, conducted to the
market-place, amidst the din of trumpets, drums,
and other warlike instruments, where he was
Jlayed alive, and a period put to his glorious life.
His skin was hung, by way of trophy, to the sail-
yard of a galley sent round all the coasts to insult
the Venetians. His head, with those of Andrea
Bragadino, his brother, Lodovico Martinenga,
and the brave Gtuirino, were sent as presents to
Selim the Turkish Emperor.*

Could an infernal fiend have devised more ex
cruciating tortures, or have acted with greater
baseness and malignity than this treacherous
and cruel monster ? What a horrible thing would
it be to be subjected to the caprice and under
the control of such a proud and vindictive spi
rit every day, only for a year, much more for
hundreds and thousands of years ! A group of
such spirits giving vent to their malevolent pas
sions without control, are sufficient to produce
a degree of misery among surrounding intelli
gences, surpassing every thing that the human
mind, in the present state, can possibly conceive.

When the Norman barons and chevaliers,
under William the Conqueror, had obtained
possession of England, they displayed the most
cruel and malignant dispositions towards the
native inhabitants. They afflicted and ha
rassed them in every state, forcing them to work
at the building of their castles; and when the
castles were finished, they placed on them a
garrison of wicked and diabolical men. They
seized all whom they thought to possess any
thing — men and women — by day and night ; they
carried them off; imprisoned them ; and, to ob
tain from them gold or silver, inflicted on them
tortures such as no martyrs ever underwent. t|
Some they suspended by their feet, with their
heads hanging in smoke ; others were hung by
the thumb, with fire under their feet. They
pressed the heads of some by a leathern thong, so
as to break the bones, and crush the brain ;
others were thrown into ditches full of snakes,
toads, and other reptiles ; others were put in
the chambre ft crucit. This was the name given
in the Norman tongue to a sort of chest, short,
strait, and shallow, lined with sharp stones, into
which the sufferer was crammed to the disloca
tion of his limbs. — In most of the castles was a
horrible and frightful engine used for putting to
the torture. This was a bundle of chains sc
heavy that two or three men could hardly lift
them. The unfortunate person upon whonr

• See " Modern Universal History," voL 27, pp^
405, 406.

EXAMPLES OF MALIGNITY.

they were laid, was kept on his feet by an iron
collar fixed in a post, and could neither sit, nor
lie, nor sleep. They made many thousands die
of hunger. They laid tribute upon tribute on
the towns and villages. When the towns
people had no longer any thing to give, they
plundered and burned the town. You might
have travelled a whole day without finding one
soul in the towns, or in the country one culti
vated field. The poor died of hunger, and they
who had formerly possessed something, now
begged their bread fron* door to door. Never
were more griefs and woes poured upon any
(and; — nay the Pagans in their invasions cau
sed fewer than the men of whom I now speak.
They spared neither the church-yards, nor the
churches ; they took all that could be taken, and
then set fire to the church. To till the ground
had been as vain as to till the sand on (he sea
shore.*

What scenes of wretchedness do such proud
and malignant demons produce even in the pre
sent world ! Can such spirits be supposed quali
fied for joining the general assembly and church
of the first-born, and for taking a part in the be
neficent operations of heaven ? If they exist at
all in a future world, they must exist in misery ;
and so long as such diabolical passions continue
to rage, they must produce " lamentation and
wo" among all the associates with which they
are surrounded. — Even within the confines of
mortality, the man who is under the despotic
sway of pride, ambition, and similar malevolent
passions, imbitters every enjoyment he might
otherwise possess, produces pain in the minds
of others, and experiences in his own soul pangs
similar in kind to those which are felt in the
place of punishment. I shall illustrate this po
sition by the spirit and temper displayed by two
illustrious individuals who have lately departed
to the invisible state ; — the one renowned in the
political, the other in the literary world.

The first character to which I allude is that
of Napoleon Buonaparte. This extraordinary
man, who for nearly twenty years dazzled the
whole Eastern hemisphere, like a blazing me
teor, appears to have been actuated by the most
extravagant and restless ambition. Though
he exercised many cruelties in the midst of his
career, as at Jaffa and other places, yet delight in
deeds of atrocity formed no part of his ruling
passion, and were only occasionally resorted to,
in order to accomplish his ambitious projects.
The agitated state of mind into which he was
thrown by his love of conquest, and the daring
enterprises in which he embarked, is strikingly
depicted by M. Segur, in his " History of Na
poleon's Expedition to Russia.1' When at
Vitepsk, on his way to Moscow, M. Segur
says — " He at first hardly appeared bold enough

• Thierry's " History of the Norman Conquest,"
I vols. 1825.

to confess to himself a project of such great te
merity — [the marching against Moscow.] But
by degrees he assumed courage to look it in the
face. He then began to deliberate, and the state
of great irresolution which tormented his mind,
affected his whole frame. He was observed to
wander about his apartments, as if pursued by
some dangerous temptation : nothing could rivel
his attention ; he every moment began, quit'fd,
and resumed his labour ; he walked about with
out any object ; inquired the hour, and looked at
his watch ; — completely absorbed, he stopped,
hummed a tune with an absent air, and again
began walking about. In the rnidst of his per
plexity, he occasionally addressed the persons
whom he met with such half sentences as ' Well
— What shall we do ! — Shall we stay where we
are, or advance? — How is it possible to stop
short in the midst of so glorious a career?' He
did not wait for their reply, but still kept wan
dering about, as if he was looking for something,
or somebody, to terminate his indecision. — At
length, quite overwhelmed with the weight of
such an important consideration, and oppressed
with so great an uncertainty, he would throw
himself on one of the beds which he had caused
to be laid on the floor of his apartments. His
frame, exhausted by the heat and the struggles
of his mind, could only bear a covering of the
slightest texture. It was in that state that he
passed a portion of his day at Vitepsk."

The same restless agitations seemed to have
accompanied him at every step in this daring
expedition. " At Borodino," says the same
writer, " his anxiety was so great as to prevent
him from sleeping. He kept calling incessantly
to know the hour, inquiring if any noise was
heard, and sending persons to ascertain if the
enemy was still before him, — Tranquillized fora
few moments, anxiety of an opposite description
again seized him. He became frightened at the
destitute state of the soldiers, &c. He sent for
Bessieres, that one of his marshals in whom he
had the greatest confidence : — he called him
back several times, and repeated his pressing
questions, &c. Dreading that his orders had
not been obeyed, he got up once more, and
questioned the grenadiers on guard at the en
trance of his tent, if they had received their pro
visions. Satisfied with the answer, he went in,
and soon fell into a doze. Shortly after he called
once more. His aid-de-camp found him now
supporting his head with both his hands ; ha
seemed, by what was overheard, to be meditat
ing on the vanities of glory. — ' What is war .<
A trade of barbarians, the whole art of which
consists in leing the strongest on a given point.
He then complained of the fickleness of fortune,
which he now began to experience. He again
tried to take some rest. But the marches he nad
just made with the army, the fatigues of the pre
ceding days and nignts, so many cares, and nis

122

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

intense and anxious expectations, had worn him
out. An irritating fever, a dry cough, and ex
cessive thirst consumed him. During the re
mainder of the night he made vain attempts to
quench the burning thirst that consumed him."

What man that ever enjoyed the pleasures of
tranquillity, would envy such a state of mind as
that which has now been described, although the
individual were surrounded with every earthly
glory ? Such mad ambition as that which raged
in the breast of this singular personage, must be
a perpetual torment to its possessor, in whatever
region of the universe he exists, and must pro
duce baleful effects on every one within the
sphere of its influence. — The coolness with
which such characters calculate on the destruc
tion of human life, and the miseries which their
lawless passions produce on their fellow-crea
tures, appears in the following extract.

" He asked Rapp, if he thought we should
gain the victory ? ' No doubt,' was the reply,
' but it will be sanguinary.' ' I know it,' re
sumed Napoleon, ' but I have 80,000 men ; I
shall lose 20,000 ; I shall enter Moscow w ith
60,000 ; the stragglers will then rejoin us, and
afterwards the battalions on the march ; and we
shall be stronger than we were before the bat
tle.' '»

The other personage to whom I alluded is
Lord Byron.

The following sketches of his character are
taken from " Recollections of the life of Lord
Byron, from the year 1808 to the year 1818.
Taken from authentic documents, &c. by R. C.
Dallas, Esq."

14 He reduced his palate," says Mr. Dallas,
11 to a diet the most simple and abstemious — but
the passions of his heart were too mighty ; nor
did it ever enter his mind to overcome them. Re
sentment, anger, and hatred, held full sway over
him ; and his greatest gratification at that time,
was in overcharging his pen with gall, which
flowed in every direction, against individuals,
his country, the world, the universe, creation,
and the Creator. — Misanthropy, disgust of life,
leading to skepticism and impiety, prevailed in
his heart, and imbittered his existence. Unac
customed to female society, he at once dreaded
and abhorred it. As for domestic happiness he
had no idea of it. ' A large family,' he said,
' appeared like opposite ingredients, mixed per
force in the same salad, and I never relished the
Composition.' He was so completely disgusted
with his relations, especially the female part of
them, that he completely avoided them. ' I con
sider,1 said he, ' collaterial ties as the work of
prejudice, and not the bond of the heart, which
must choose for itself unshackled.' — In corre
spondence with suchdispositions and sentiments,
" he talked of his relation to the Earl of Carlisle
with indignation." Having received from him
a frigid letter, " he determined to lash his rela

tion with all the gall he could throw into satire.*
— He declaimed against the ties of consan
guinity, and abjured even the society of his
sister, from which he entirely withdrew him
self, until after the publication of " Cliilde Ha
rold," when at length he yielded to my persua
sions, and made advances to a fiiendly corre
spondence."

Here we have a picture of an individual, in
whom " resentment, anger, and hatred," reign
ed without control : who could vent his rage
even against the Creator, and the universe he
had formed, who hated his fellow-creatures, and
even his own existence ; who spurned at the
ties of relationship, and " abjured even the so
ciety of his sister." What horrible mischiefs
and miseries would a character of this descrip
tion produce, were such malevolent passions to
rage with unbounded violence, without being
checked by those restraints, which human laws
impose in the present state !

I shall state only another example of this
description, taken from Captain Cochrane's
" Travels in Russia." — On arriving at the
Prussian frontiers, says the captain, " My
passport demanded, myself interrogated by a
set of whiskered ruffians, obliged to move from
one guard to another, the object of sarcasm and
official tyranny, I wanted no inducement, fa
tigued as I was, to proceed on my journey, but
even this was not permitted me. A large public
room, full of military rubbish, and two long
benches serving as chairs, to an equally long
table, were the place and furniture allotted me.
I asked the landlord fur supper; he laughed at
me ; and to my demand of a bed, grinningly
pointed to the floor, and refused me even a por
tion of the straw which had been brought in for
the soldiers. Of all the demons that ever existed,
or have been imagined in human shape, I thought
the landlord of the inn the blackest. The figure
of Gil Peres occurred to me, but it sunk in tha
comparison with the wretch then before me for
ill nature, malignity, and personal hideousness.
His face half covered with a black beard, and
large bristly whiskers, his stature below the
common, his head sunk between his shoulders
to make room for the protuberance of his back ;
his eyes buried in the ragged locks of his lank
grisly hair; — added to this a club foot, and a
voice which, on every attempt to speak, was
like the shrieking of a screech-owl, — and you
have some faint idea of this mockery of a
man." — Here, we have presented to view a
human being, who, in the malignity of his mind,
and in the conformation of his body, bears a cer
tain resemblance to those wretched beings in
whose ore" «•*-<? benevolence never glows, and in
whose dwellings nothing is seen but the most
haggard and deformed objects, and nothing heard
but horrid imprecations, and the sounds of wo.

Let us now suppose, for a moment, a vas*

EXAMPLES OF DEPRAVITY.

133

assemblage of beings of the description to which
I have adverted, collected in a dark and dreary
region. Let us suppose many thousands of
millions of such characters as Nero, who set
fire to Rome, that he might amuse himself with
the wailings and lamentations which this cala
mity inspired, and insulted Heaven by offering
thanksgivings to the gods, after murdering his
wife and his mother, — Tiberius who delighted
in torturing his subjects, and massacring them
in the most tormenting and cruel manner, — Co-
ligula, celebrated in the annals of folly, cruelty,
and impiety, who murdered many of his subjects
with his own hand, and caused thousands who
were guilty of no crimes to be cruelly butchered,
—Antiochus Epiphanes, who butchered forty
thousand of the inhabitants of Jerusalem in cold
blood, and rushed forward, like an infernal de
mon, with the intention of destroying every in
habitant of Judea, — Hamilcar, who threw all
the prisoners that came into his hand, to be de
voured by wild beasts, — Atdrubal, who put out
the eyes of all the Roman captives he had
taken during two years, cut off their noses,
fingers, legs, and arms, tore their skin to pieces
with iron rakes and harrows, and threw them
headlong from the top of his battlements, —
Jenghiz Khan, who caused seventy chiefs to be
thrown into as many caldrons of boiling water,
and took pleasure in beholding his army behead
ing a hundred thousand prisoners at once, — Ta
merlane, who displayed his sportive cruelty in
pounding three or four thousand people in large
mortars, or building them among bricks and
mortar into a wall, — Mustapha, who treache
rously murdered the Venetian officers, after hav
ing entered into a treaty with them, and who
beheld with delight the noble-minded Bragadino,
whom he had cruelly tortured, flayed alive, —
Buonaparte, whose mad ambition sacrificed so
many millions of human beings, and Lord By
ron,* in whose breast " resentment, anger, and
hatred," raged with violence, and who made his
gall flow out " against individuals, his country,
the world, the universe, creation, and the Crea
tor ;" — let us suppose such characters associated
together in a world where no pleasing objects
meet the eye, or cheer the heart and imagination ;
and let us likewise suppose, that the malignant
principles and boisterous passions which reigned
in their minds during the present state, still con
tinue to rage with uncontrolled and perpetual

• The Author trusts, that none of his readers will
for a moment suppose, that, in bringm? forward
the above-mentioned characters as examples of ma
lignity, he presumes to decide on their eternal des
tiny. His object merely is to show, that such ma
lignant principles and passions as they displayed in
the general tenor of their conduct, if resolutely
persisted in, necessarily led to misery. With regard
to Buonaparte and Lord Byron, he is disposed to
indulge a hope, that their malevolent dispositions
were in some measure counteracted, before they
passed into the eternal world. The grounds of his
hope, on this point, are stated in the Appendix.

violence against all surrounding associates; it
is evident, that, in such a case, a scene of misery
would be produced, beyond the power of the
human mind either to conceive or to describe.
If so dreadful effects have been produced, by
such diabolical passions, even in the present
world, where Providence " sets restraining
bounds to the wrath of man," and where be
nignant dispositions are blended with the evil
principles which so generally prevail, what
must be the effects where pure malignity, with
out any mixture of benevolent feelings, reigns
universally, is perpetually tormenting its objects,
is ever increasing in its fury, and is never con
trolled by physical obstructions or by moral con
siderations ! This is the society of hell : this
is the essence of future misery : this is " the
worm that never dies, and the fire that is never
quenched ;" and the natural effects produced by
it is universal anguish and despair, — " weeping,
and wailing, and gnashing of teeth." — If such
be the end of the ungodly, and the malignant
despiser of God's law, and the riches of his
mercy as manifested in Christ Jesus, — how
careful should we be to counteract every evil
propensity and passion, and how fervently ought
we to join in the prayer of the Psalmist, and
in the resolution of Jacob: " Gather not my
soul with sinners, nor my life with bloody men."
" O my soul, corne not thou into their secret;
unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou
united !"

Let none imagine, because I have selected
some of the more atrocious characters recorded
in history, as illustrations of the effects of de
pravity — that only such are " vessels of wrath,
fitted for destruction." The principle of malevo
lence is substantially the same in every heart
where it is predominant, however much it may
be varnished over by hypocrisy, dissimulation,
and the various forms of politeness which pre
vail in the world ; and it requires only a certain
stimulus to excite it to action, and full scope to
exert its energies, in order to produce the most
horrible and extensive effects. Several of tho
atrocioas characters to which I have alluded,
appeared, in the commencement of their career,
to be possessed of a certain portion of benevo
lence, and of other amiable qualities. Nero, in the
beginning of his reign, showed several marks O;
the greatest kindness and condescension, affa
bility, complaisance, and popularity. When he
was desired to sign his name to a list of male
factors that were to he executed, he exclaimed,
" Would to Heaven I could not write !" —
Caligula began his reign with every promising
appearance of becoming the real father of his
people. Tiberius at first concealed his thoughts
under the mask of an impenetrable dissimulation.
He governed with moderation, and even appear
ed to excel in modesty. But afterwards, whe»
these individuals became intoxicated with power,

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

and bad thrown aside all considerations of mo
rality and decorum, the latent principles of
-rialignity burst forth in all their violence, till
they became a scourge and an execration to
mankind. So will it happen with those who now
harbour malicious and vindictive passions, under
a cloak of dissimulation and fashionable polite
ness, when they enter the invisible world under
the dominion of such affections. When the re
straints of society, of common decorum, and of
human laws, are completely removed ; when they
have lost all hopes of the divine mercy ; when
they find themselves surrounded by none but ma
lignant associates, and when they feel the effects
of their infernal malice and revenge — those pas
sions, which sometimes lay dormant in this life,
will be roused into action, and rage with ungo
vernable fury against every one around, against
themselves, " against the universe, and against
the Creator."

Nor let it be imagined, that God will interpose
at the hour of death, and, by an exertion of his
power and benevolence, destroy the principles of
sin, and prepare such characters for the joys of
heaven. Such an interference, in every indivi
dual case, would imply a continued miracle, and
would be inconsistent with the established order
of the divine government; as it would supersede
the use of all those instructions, admonitions,
and moral preparations which God hath appoint
ed for rendering his people " meet for the inherit
ance of the saints in light;" and would prevent
the moral renovation of the world, which is now
gradually effecting by the exertions of those who
are " renewed in the spirit of their minds." It
is true, indeed, that the mercy of God is infinite,
and that so long as there is life, there is hope ; —
so that the most abandoned sinner has no reason
to despair, while he remains within the confines

of the present state. But as for those who ptjn
from time into eternity, evidently under the
power of revengeful and depraved passions, we
have but slender grounds on which to hope that
they shall ever afterwards be prepared for the
felicity of heaven.

From the whole of what I have stated in this
department of my subject, it is evident, that there
are two different states in the future world ; or,
in other words, a heavenand a hell ; a state of
happiness, and a state of misery. If human
beings are to exist at all in another region of
creation, and throughout an unlimited duration,
it is necessary that there be a separation effect
ed, on the ground of their leading dispositions
and characters. The nature of things, the moral
constitution of the universe, and the happiness
of the intelligent creation, as well as the decree
of the Creator, require, that such an arrangement
should take place. For it is altogether incom
patible with the laws of moral order, that pride,
hatred, malignity, and revenge, should dwell in
the same abode with humility, benevolence,
friendship, and love ; or, that beings, actuated by
principles and affections diametrically opposite
to each other, could engage with harmony in the
same employments, and relish the same pleasures.
Were such an incongruous association permitted,
the moral universe would soon become a scene
of universal anarchy, and happiness be banished
from all worlds. So that the two states of im
mortality revealed in Scripture, are equally ac
cordant with the dictates of reason, and with the
declaration of our Saviour, who has solemnly
assured us, that " the wicked shall depart into
everlasting punishment, and the righteous into
life eternal."

APPENDIX.

THE following fads and documents, in rela
tion to Lord Byron, lead us to indulge the hope,
that, prior to his dissolution, he was actuated by
sentiments and dispositions, different from those
which are stated at page 122.

The lady of Mr. John Shepherd of Frome,
having died some time ago, leaving amongst
her papers, a prayer which her husband believ
ed to have been composed on behalf of the noble
poet, Mr. Shepherd addressed it to his Lord
ship, which called forth the reply which is here
subjoined.

Frome, Somerset, Nov. 21s«, 1821.
To the Right Honourable Lord Byron, Pisa.

MY LORD, — More than two years since, a
lovely and beloved wife was taken from me, by
lingering disease, after a very short union. She
possessed unvarying gentleness and fortitude,
and a piety so retiring, as rarely to disclose
itself in words, but so influential, as to produce
uniform benevolence of conduct. In the last
hour of life, after a farewell look on a lately born
and only infant, for whom she had evinced in
expressible affection, her last whispers were,
t( God's happiness ! God's happiness !" Since
the second anniversary of her decease, I have
read some papers which no one had seen during
her life, and which contained her most secret
thoughts. I am induced to communicate to your
Lordship a passage from these papers, which,
there is no doubt, refers to yourself; as I have
more than once heard the writer mention your
agility on the rocks at Hastings :—

" O my God, I take encouragement from the
assurance of thy word, to pray to Thee in behalf
of one for whom I have lately been much in
terested. May the person to whom I allude,
(and who is now, we fear, as much distinguished
for his neglect of Thee, as for the transcendent
talents Thou hast bestowed on him) be awaken
ed to a sense of his own danger, and led to seek
that peace of mind in a proper sense of religion,
which he has found this world's enjoyments
unable to procure. Do thou grant that his fu
ture example may be productive of far more ex
tensive benefit, than his past conduct and writings
have been of evil ; and may the Sun of Righte
ousness, which, we trust, will, at some future
period, arise upon him, be bright in proportion
to the darkness of those clouds which guilt has
raised, and soothing in proportion to the keen
ness of that agony which the punishment of his
rices has inflicted on him ! May the hope, that

the sincerity of my own efforts for the attainment
of holiness, and the approval of my own love to
the great Author of religion, will render this
prayer, and every other for the welfare of man
kind, more efficacious — cheer me in the path of
duty ; but let me not forget, that, while we are
permitted to animate ourselves to exertion, by
every innocent motive, these are but the lesser
streams which may serve to increase the current,
but which, deprived of the grand fountain of good,
(a deep conviction of inborn sin, and firm belief
in the efficacy of Christ's death, for the salvation
of those who trust in him, and really seek to
serve him) would soon dry up, and leave us as
barren of every virtue as before. — Hastings,
July 3lst, 1814."

There is nothing, my Lord, in this extract,
which, in a literary sense, can at all interest
you ; but it may, perhaps, appear to you worthy
of reflection, how deep and expansive a concern
for the happiness of others, a Christian faith can
awaken in the midst of youth and prosperity. —
Here is nothing poetical and splendid, as in the
expostulatory homage of M. Delamartine ; but
here is the sublime, my Lord ; for this interces
sion was offered on your account, to the supreme
Source of happiness. It sprang from a faith
more confirmed than that of the French poet,
and from a charity, which, in combination with
faith, showed its power unimpaired amidst the
languors and pains of approaching dissolution.
I will hope, that a prayer, which, I am sure, was
deeply sincere, may not be always unavailing.

It would add nothing, my Lord, to the fame
with which your genius has surrounded you, for
an unknown and obscure individual to express
his admiration of it. I had rather be numbered
with those who wish and pray, that " wisdom
from. above," and " peace," and "joy," may
enter such a mind.

THE ANSWER.

Pisa, Dec. 8th, 1821.

SIR, — I have received your letter. I need
not say that the extract which it contains has
affected rne, because it would imply a want ol
all feeling to have read it with indifference.
Though I am not quite sure that it was intended
by the writer for me, yet the date, the place
where it was written, with some other circum
stances, which you mention, render the allusion
probable. But, for whomsoever it was meant, I
have read it with all the pleasure which can arise

THE PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE.

from so melancholy a topic. I say, pleasure,
oecause your brief and simple picture of the life
and demeanor of the excellent person whom I
trust that you will again meet, cannot be con
templated without the admiration due to her
virtues, and her pure and unpretending piety.
Her last moments were particularly striking ;
and I do not know, that in the course of reading
the story of mankind, and still less in my obser
vations upon the existing portion, I ever met with
any thing so unostentatiously beautiful. Indis
putably, the firm believers in the gospel have a
great advantage over all others — for this simple
reason, that if true, they will have their reward
hereafter; and if there be no hereafter, they can
be but with the infidel in his eternal sleep, hav
ing had the assistance of an exalted hope through
life, without subsequent disappointment, since
(at the worst of them) '•' out of nothing, nothing
can arise," not even sorrow. But a man's
creed does not depend upon himself', who can
say, I will believe this, that, or the other? and
least of all that which he least can comprehend ?
I have, however, observed, that those who have
begun with extreme faith, have in the end greatly
narrowed it, as Chillingworth, Clark, (who ended
as an Arian,) and some others; while on the
other hand, nothing is more common, than for
the early skeptic to end in a firm belief, like
Maupertius and Henry Kirke White. But
my business is to acknowledge your letter, and
not to make a dissertation. I am obliged to you
for your good wishes, and more obliged by the
extract from the papers of the beloved object
whose qualities you have so well described in a
few words. I can assure you, that all the fame
which ever cheated humanity into higher notions
of its own importance, would never weigh on my
mind against the pure and pious interest which
a virtuous being may be pleased to take in my
welfare. In this point of view, I would not ex
change the prayer of the deceased in my behalf,
for the united glory of Homer, Csesar, and Na
poleon, could such be accumulated upon a living
head. Do me the justice to suppose, that " video
meliora proboque," however the " deteriora se-
quor" may have been applied to my conduct. I
have the honour to be your obliged and obedient
servant, BYRON.

P. S. I do not know that I am addressing a
clergyman ; but I presume that you will not be
affronted by the mistake (if it is one) on the ad
dress of this letter. One who has so well ex
plained, and deeply felt, the doctrines of religion,
will excuse the error which led me to believe
him its minister.

This letter, every one will admit, exhibits
Lord Byron in a much more amiable point of
view than the traits of his character sketched by
Mr. Dallas, prior to the year 1818. The fol

lowing account of his deathbed sentiments t
extracted from " Last days of Lord Byron."

A very few days before his Lordship's death,
Mr. Parry relates : — " It was seven o'clock in
the evening when I saw him, and then I took a
chair at his request, and sat down by his bed
side, and remained till ten o'clock. He sat up in
his bed, and was then calm and collected. He
talked with me on a variety of subjects, con
nected with himself and his family. He spake
of death also with great composure, and though
he did i.ot believe his end was so very near,
there was something about him so serious and so
firm, so resigned and composed, so different from
any thi-.g I had ever before seen in him, that my
mind misgave, and at times foreboded his speedy
dissolution. ' Parry,' he said, when I first went
to him, ' I have much wished to see you to
day. I have had most strange feelings, but my
head is now better. I have no gloomy thoughts,
and no idea but I shall recover. I am perfectly
collected — I am s^re I am in my senses— but a
melancholy will creep over me at times.' The
mention of the subject brought the melancholy
topics back, and a few exclamations showed
what o-- jpied Lord Byron's mind when he was
left in silence and solitude. 'My wife! my
Ada ! my country ! the situation of this place —
my removal impossible, and perhaps death — all
combine to make me sad. I am convinced of"
the happiness of domestic life. No man on
earth respects a virtuous woman more than I do ;
and the prospect of retirement in England, with
my wife and Ada, gives me an idea of happi
ness I have never experienced before. Retire
ment will be every thing to me, for heretofore to
me life has been like the ocean in a storm. You
have no conception of the unaccountable thoughts
which come into my mind when the fever attacks
me. — Eternity and space are before me, but on
this subject, thank God, I am happy and at ease.
The thought of living eternally, of again reviv
ing, is a great pleasure. Christianity is the
purest and most liberal religion in the world,
but the numerous teachers who are continually
worrying mankind with their denunciations and
their doctrines, are the greatest enemies of re
ligion. I have read with more attention than half
of them the Book of Christianity, and I admire
the liberal and truly charitable principles which
Christ has laid down. There are questions
connected with this subject which none but Al-
mightv God can solve. Time and space who
can conceive ? None but God — on him I rely.' "

Who knows but the prayer of the amiable
young lady, inserted above, was the mean of
leading his Lordship to indulge such sentiments,
and of ultimately securing his eternal happiness !
" The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous
man availeth much." This consideration should
not only excite us to offer up intercessions in
behalf of particular individuals, but also to use

APPENDIX.

127

every prudent and delicate mean — by conversa
tion, epistolary correspondence, or otherwise, to
rouse the attention of those, especially in the
higher circles of life, who appear unconcerned
about " the things which relate to their everlast
ing peace."

The following lines, written by Lord Byron,
are said to have been found in his Bible : —

" Within this awful volume lies
The mystery of mysteries.
Oh ! happiest they of human race,
I'o whom our God has given grac:;,
To hear, to read, to fear, to pray,
To lift the latch, and force the way ;
But better had they ne'er been born,
Who read to doubt, or read to scorn."

With regard to Buonaparte, we have nothing
so satisfactory as in the case of Byron, that
might lead us to conclude that his moral and re
ligious sentiments were changed for the better.
In his solitude at St. Helena, however, it ap
pears that the subject of religion occasionally oc
cupied his auction. The following anecdote,

extracted from I,a Casas' Journal, will show the
opinion which he entertained of the morality of
the New Testament : —

In a conversation on the subject of religion,
which he had with his friends at St. Helena, he
saiu, among many other things, " ' How is it
possible that conviction can find its way to our
hearts, when we hear the absurd language, and
witness the acts of iniquity of the greatest num
ber of those whose business it is to preach to
us ? I am surrounded with priests who preach
incessantly that their reign is not of this world,
and yet they lay hands upon every thing they
can get. The Pope is the head of that religion
from heaven, and he thinks only of this world,'
&c. The Emperor ended the conversation by
desiring my son to bring him the New Testa
ment, and taking it from the beginning, he read
as far as the conclusion of the speech of Jesus on
the mountain. He expressed himself struck with
tne highest admiration at the purity, the sublimity,
the beauty of the morality it contained, and we all
experienced the same feeling."

I

THE

PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION;

AN ILLUSTRATION

or THB

MORAL LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE.

BY THOMAS DICK,

MTTHQR OF A VARIETY OF LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC COMMUNICATH
Z* NICHOLSONS PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL, THE ANNALS
OF PHILOSOPHY, ETC. ETC.

"Knowledge Is power."— Lord Bacon,
"Love is the fulfilling of the law."- Pavt

HARTFORD:

PUBLISHED BY A. C. GOODMAN & CO
1850.

PREFACE.

To delineate the mora. bearings of the Christian Revelation, — to display the
reasonableness and the excellence of its precepts, and the physical and rationa
grounds on which they rest, — and to exhibit a few prominent features in the
moral aspect of the world, — were some of the principal objects which the author
had in view in the composition of the following work. He is not aware that a
similar train of thought has been prosecuted, to the same extent, by any preceding
writer; and is therefore disposed to indulge the hope that it may prove both
entertaining and instructive to the general reader, and to the intelligent Christian.

It may not be improper to remind the reader that the author's object simpiy is,
to illustrate the topics he has selected as the subject of this volume. As he has
taken his fundamental principles from the system of revelation, he was under no
necessity, as most ethical writers are, to enter into any laboured metaphysical
discussions on the foundation of morality, and the motives from which moral
actions should proceed. — The truth of revelation is, of course, taken for granted ;
and all who acknowledge its divine authority, will readily admit the principles
which form the basis of the system here illustrated. But, although it formed no
particular part of the author's plan to illustrate the evidences of the Christian
revelation, he trusts that the view which is here given of the benignant tendency
of its moral requisitions, will form a powerful presumptive argument in support
of its celestial origin.

The Christian reader may also bg reminded, that it is only the philosophy 01
religion which the author has attempted to illustrate. It formed no part of his
plan to enter into any particular discussion on the doctrines of revelation, or on
those topics which have so frequently been the subject of controversy in the
Christian church. It is not to support the tenets of Calvinism, Arminianism,
Baxterianism, Arianism, or any other isni which distinguishes the various
denominations of the religious world, that these illustrations are presented to
public view ; but to elucidate an object which it appears to be the grand design
of revelation to accomplish, and in the promotion of which every section of the
Christian church is equally interested, and to which they would do well to
" take heed."— In his illustration of this subject, the author has kept his eye
solely on the two revelations which the Almighty has given to mankind, —
THE SYSTEM op NATURE, and the SACRED RECORDS just as they stand, — without
any regard to the theories of philosophers, the opinions of commentators, or
the systems of theologians. He is disposed to view the revelations of the
Bible rather as a series of important facts, from which moral instructions are to
be deduced, than as a system of metaphysical opinions for the exercise of the
intellect.

PREFACE.

On the leading topics which have divided the Christian world, the author has j
formed his own opinion, and has adopted those which he has judged, on the i
whole, to be most correct ; but it is of no importance to the reader what thes
opinions are, or of what system of speculative theology he is inclined, on th
whole, to support. He sets very little value upon purely speculative opinions
except in so far as they tend to promote the grand moral objects of Christianity
and while he assumes the unalienable right of thinking for himself on the subjec
of religion, he is disposed to allow the same privilege to others. He believes
on the authority of Scripture, that " God is the Creator of heaven and earth ;"—
that " he is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his works ;" — that " he i
good to all, and that his tender mercies are over all his works ;" — that " he s
loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believet,
on him might not perish, but have everlasting life ;" — that " Christ died for ou
sins, that he was buried, and that he rose again from the dead according to th
Scriptures;" — that " he is the propitiation lor our sins, and that he ever live
to make intercession ;" — together with all the other facts and doctrines wit
which these are essentially connected. But he views the recognition of suci
doctrines and facts not as the end of religion, but only as the means l»y whici
the great moral objects of Christianity are to be promoted and accomplished.

In illustrating the moral state of the world, the author is sorry that he wa
obliged to compress his details within so narrow tints. Few readers, however
will appreciate tne labour and research he was unuer the necessity of bestowing
in order to select and arrange the facts which he has detailed. He ha
occasionally had to condense a long history or narrative, and even a whole
volume, into the compass of two or three pages; and to search through rhor
than twenty volumes, in order to find materials to fill a couple of pages. Wit]
the same degree of research, (excepting the mechanical labour of transcription,'
he might have filled several volumes with similar illustrations ; and he
convinced that a work of this description, judiciously executed, would prove
highly instructive, as well as entertaining, not only to the Christian world, bu
to readers of every description.

Various topics connected with the philosophy of religion still r*oa«m to be
illustrated. These shall form the subject of discussion in a future **)iume
should the present work be received with general approbation.

PERTH, January, 1826.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION.

Objects of human knowledge - -

CHAPTER I.

ON THE MORAL RELATIONS OP INTELLIGENT BEINGS TO
THEIR CREATOR ......... 15

SECTION L

On the primary or most general idea of Morality ..... 15

«

SECTION II.
On the fundamental principles of Morality ...... jg

SECTION III.
On the Omnipotence of God -----

SECTION IV.
On the Wisdom and Goodness of God -

SECTION V.
On the Mercy and Patience of God

Ym CONTENTS.

SECTION VI.
On the Rectitude of the Divine Character ---... . . 34

SECTION VII.
Modes in which Love to God is displayed - - 38

CHAPTER II.

SECOND PRINCIPLE OF MORAL ACTION — LOVE TO ALL SUB.
ORD1NATE INTELLIGENCES - . 4/

%

SECTION L

The natural equality of mankind considered as the basis of love to our neighbour 44

SECTION IL

The connexions and relations which subsist among mankind considered as estab
lishing the basis of love to our neighbour ---_-_,. 49

SECTION III.

The ultimate destination of mankind considered as a basis for love to our neigh
bour, and as a motive to its exercise -- - - - . . -52

SECTION IV. *

Love to God and our neighbour enforced and illustrated, from a consideration of
the miserable effects which would ensue were these principles reversed, and
were rational beings to act accordingly ---.--- - 5ft

SECTION V.

Effects which would flow from the full operation of the principle of Love to God and
Ionian 58

SECTION VI.
Universality of the principles of Love to God and to fellow intelligences - -65

SECTION VII.
The preceding views corroborated by Divine Revelation - - 70

CONTENTS.

SECTION VIII.

On the practical operation of Love, and the vanous modes in which it should be dis
played towards mankind .... 74

CHAPTER III.

ON THE MORAL LAW, AND THE RATIONAL GROUNDS ON WHICH
ITS PRECEPTS ARE FOUNDED - - 84

The first commandment ---------- -85

The second commandment ------- .-88

The third commandment 92

The fourth commandment • - - - 93

The fifth commandment 97

The sixth commandment -------.-.99

The seventh commandment -------... 101

The eighth commandment - - - - - - - - - -104

The ninth commandment 106

The tenth commandment 112

General conclusions and remarks founded on the preceding illustrations - - 115

CHAPTER IV.

A BRIEF SURVEY OF THE MORAL STATE OF THE WORLD ; OR,
AN EXAMINATION OF THE GENERAL TRAIN OF HUMAN AC
TIONS, IN REFERENCE TO ITS CONFORMITY WITH THE PRIN
CIPLES AND LAWS NOW ILLUSTRATED 122

SECTION I.

State of Morals in the Ancient World 123

Warlike dispositions of mankind --- ..... 125
Atrocities connected with war 129

SECTION II.

State of Morals in Modern Times 133

Moral state of savage nations - - - - - - - - -133

Warlike attitude of savage nations ......... 140

Inhumanity of uncivilized tribes to unfortunate travellers - ... 141
Malevolent dispositions, as displayed in disfiguring the body .... 146

Malevolence as it appears in the religion of savage tribes .... 148

SECTION III.
Moral State of Civilized Nations .... .... 149

CONTENTS.

SECTION IV.

Moral state of the professing Christian World - - 164

Moral state of the Protestant Church, and of the dispositions generally manifested
among Christians in our own country -----".._ 173

General reflections - - -- - - - - - - -179

Means by which the practice of Christian morality might be promoted - - 181
Conclusions from the general principles illustrated in this volume - 182

PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

INTRODUCTION.

THE objects of human knowledge may be re
duced to two classes — the relations of matter and
the relations of mind ; or, in other words, the ma-
lerial and the intellectual universe. Of these two
departments of science, the intellectual universe
is, in many respects, the most interesting and im
portant. For, in so far as our knowledge and re
searches extend, it appears highly probable, if not
absolutely certain, that the material universe ex
ists solely for the sake of sentient and intelligent
oeings — in order to afford a sensible manifestation
of the attributes of the great First Cause, and to
rferve as a vehicle of thought and a medium of
enjoyment to subordinate intelligences. So in
timately related, however, are these two objects
of human investigation, that a knowledge of the
one cannot be obtained but through the medium
of the other. The operations of mind cannot be
carried on without the intervention of extern"'
objects ; for if the material universe had never
existed, we could never have prosecuted a train
of thought ;* and the beauties and sublimities of
external nature can be perceived only by thinking
beings, without the existence of which, the ma
terial universe would remain like a mighty blank,
and might be said to have been created in vain.
Hence it appears, that, previous to our inquiries

• The whole train of ideas which passes through
our minds on any subject may be considered as the
images of external objects variously modified and
combined. These images we receive through the
medium of our senses, by which we hold a com
munication with the material world. All our ideas
of God, and of the objects of religion, are derived
from the same source. The illustrations of the
attributes of the Deity, and of his moral adminis
tration, contained in Scripture, are derived from
the external scenes of creation, and from the re
lations of human society; consequently, had the
material world never existed, we could have form
ed no conceptions of the divine perfections similar
to those which we now entertain, nor have prosecu
ted a train of thought on any other subject; for the
material universe is the basis of all the knowledge
we have hitherto acquired, or can acquire, respect ing
oursels-es, our Creator or other intelligences. Any
person who is disposed to call in question this posi
tion must be prepared to point out, distinctly and spe
cifically, those ideas or trains of thought which are
not derived through the medium of the external
e«nses, and from the objec's on which they are
exercised.

into the nature and relations of mimd, it is neces
sary, in the first placejto study the phenomena of
the material world, and the external actions of all
those percipient beings with which it is peopled ;
for the knowledge of the facts we acquire in rela
tion to these objects must form the ground-work
of all our investigations.

We are surrounded, on every hand, with
minds of various descriptions, which evince the
faculties of which they are possessed, by the va
rious senses and active powers with which they
are furnished. These minds are of various gra
dations, in point of intellectual capacity and
acumen, from man downwards through all the
animated tribes which traverse the regions of
earth, air, and sea. We have the strongest rea
son to believe, that the distant regions of the
material world are also replenished with intel-
*cctual beings, of various orders, in which there
may be a gradation upwards, in the scale of
intellect above that of a man, as diversified as
that which we perceive in the descending scale,
from man downwards to the immaterial princi
ple which animates a muscle, a snail, or a mi
croscopic animalcula. When we consider the
variety of original forms and of intellectual ca
pacities which abounds in our terrestrial system,
and that there is an infinite gap in the scale of
being between the human mind and the Supreme
Intelligence, it appears quite conformable to the
magnificent harmony of the universe, and to the
. wisdom and benevolence of its Almighty Author,
to suppose, that there are beings within the
range of his dominions as far superior to man in
the comprehension and extent of mental and cor
poreal powers, as man is, in these respects, su
perior to the most despicable insect ; and that
these beings, in point of number, may exceed all
human calculation and comprehension. This
idea is corroborated by severa' intimations con
tained in the records of reve/ation, where we
have presented to our view a class of intelligences
endowed with physical energies, powers of rapid
motion, and a grasp of intellect, incomparably su
perior to those which are possessed by any of the
beings which belong to our sublunary system.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

To contemplate the various orders of intelli
gences which people the material universe, and
the relations which subsist among them — the ar
rangements of the different worlds to which they
respectively belong — the corporeal vehicles by
which they hold a correspondence with the ma-
'erial system — the relation in which they stand to
ather worlds and beings, from which they are
separated by the voids of space — and the excur
sions they occasionally make to different regions
of that vast empire of which they furm a part —
io trace the superior intellectual faculties and the
sensitive organs with which they are endowed —
the profound investigations they have made into
the economy of the universe — the trains of thought
which they pursue, and the magnificent objects
on which their faculties are employed — the emo
tions with which they view the scenes and trans
actions of such a world as ours — the means by
which they have been carried forward in the
career of moral and intellectual improvement —
the history of their transactions since the period at
which they were brought into existence— the pe
culiar dispensations of the Creator, and the re
volutions that may have taken place among them
— the progressions they have made from one
stage of improvement to another — the views they
have acquired of the perfections and the plans of
their Almighty Sovereign — the transporting emo
tions of delight which pervade all their faculties
— and the sublime adorations they offer up to the
Fountain of all their felicity — would constitute a
source of the most exquisite gratification to every
holy, intelligent, and inquiring mind. But, since
we are at present confined to a small corner of
the universe of God, and surrounded by immea
surable voids of space, which intervene between
our habitation and the celestial worlds, through
which no human power can enable us to pene
trate, we must remain ignorant of the nature
and economy of those intellectual beings, till our
souls take their flight from these " tabernacles of
clay," to join their kindred spirits in the invisible
world. While we remain in our sublunary man
sion, our investigations into the world of mind
must, therefore, of necessity, be. confined to the
nature and attributes of the Uncreated Spirit, and
to the faculties of our own minds and those of the
sensitive beings with which we are surrounded.
These faculties, as they constitute the instru
ments by which all our knowledge, both human
and divine, is acquired, have employed the at
tention of philosophers in every age, and have
been the theme of many subtle and ingenuous
speculations; and they, doubtless, form an in
teresting subject of investigation to the student
of intellectual science.

But, of all the views we can take of the world
of mind, the moral relations of intelligent beings,
and the laws founded on these relations, are topics
by far the most interesting and important. This
subject may be treated in a more definite and

tangible manner than the theories which have
been formed respecting the nature and operations
of the intellectual powers. Illustrations level to
every capacity, and which come home to every
one's bosom, may be derived both from reason
and experience, from the annals of history, and
the records of revelation. It is not involved in
the same difficulties and obscuiity which have
perplexed the philosophy of the intellect ; and
there are certain principles which may be traced
in relation to this subject, which apply to all the
rational intelligences that God has formed, how-
ever diversified in respect of the regions of the
universe which they occupy, and in the extent
of their intellectual powers. Above all, thig
subject is more intimately connected with the
present and future happiness of man than any
other which comes within the range of human
investigation ; and therefore, forms a prominent
and legitimate branch of what may be termed
" The Philosophy of Religion."

That ihe moral relations of intelligent minds,
and the temper and conduct corresponding with
these relations, are essentially connected with
the happiness of every rational agent, might be
made to appear from a variety of cases, in which
the reversing of certain moral laws or principles
would inevitably lead to disorder and misery.
I shall content myself with stating the following
illustration : — We dwell in an obscure corner of
God's empire,- but the light of modern science
has shown us, that worlds, a thousand times larger
than ours, and adorned with more refulgent splen
dours, exist within the range of that system of
\vn,ch we form a part. It has also unfolded to
our view other systems dispersed throughout, the
voids of space, at immeasurable distances, and
in such vast profusion, that our minds are unable
to grasp their number and their magnitude. Rea
son and revelation lead us to conclude, that all
these worlds and systems are adorned with dis
plays ofdivine wisdom, and peopled with myriads
of rational inhabitants. The human mind, after
it has received notices of such stupendous scenes,
naturally longs for a nearer and more intimate in
spection of the grandeur and economy of those
distant provinces of the Creator's empire ; and
is apt to imagine, that it would never weary, bul
would feel unmingled enjoyment, while it winged
its flight from one magnificent scene of creation
to another. But although an inhabitant of ouj
world were divested of the quality of gravitation
endowed with powers of rapid motion adequate
to carry him along " to the suburbs of creation,'
and permitted by his Creator to survey all tha
wonders of the universe, if a principle of lova
and kindly affection towards fellow-intelligences
did not animate his mind, if rage and revenge
pride and ambition, hatred and envy, were inces
santly rankling in his breast, he could feel na
transporting emotions, nor taste the sweets of
true enjoyment. The vast universe, through

INTRODUCTION.

13

which he roamed, would be transformed into a
spacious hell ; its beauties and sublimities could
not. prevent misery from taking possession of his
sou'i \ and, at every stage of his excursion, he
could not fail to meet with the indications of his
Creator's frown. For there appears, from rea
son and experience, as well as from the dictates
of revelation, an absolute impossibility of en
joying happiness so long as malevolent affections
retain their ascendancy in the heart of a moral
intelligence, in whatever region of universal na
ture his residence may be found.

Hence we may learn, that the highest attain
ments in science to which any one can arrive,
though they may expand the range of his intel
lectual views, will not ensure to their possessor
substantial and unmingled enjoyment, while his
heart is devoid of benevolent affections, and while
he is subjected to the influence of degrading and
immoral passions. If it be possible that any one
now exists in the literary world, who has devoted
his life to the sublimest investigations of science,
and has taken the most extensive views of the
arrangements of the material world, and yet
who remains doubtful as to the existence of a
Supreme Intelligence, and of an eternal state of
destination; who is elated with pride at the
splendour of his scientific acquirements; who
treats his equals with a spirit of arrogance ; who
looks down with a haughty and sullen scowl on
the inferior ranks of his fellow-men ; who is
haughty, overbearing, and revengeful in his ge
neral deportment, and who is altogether indiffe
rent as to the moral principles he displays, — I
would envy neither his happiness nor his intel
lectual attainments. He can enjoy none of those
delightful emotions which flow from the exercise
of Christian benevolence, nor any of those con
solations which the good man feels amidst the
various ills of life ; and, beyond the short span of
mortal existence, he can look forward to no
brighter displays of the grandeur of the material
and intellectual universe, but to an eternal depri
vation of his powers of intelligence in the shades
of annihilation.

It must, therefore, be a matter deeply interest
ing to every intelligent agent, to acquire correct
notions of the fundamental principles of moral
action, and to form those habits which will fit
him for the enjoyment of true felicity, to what
ever region of the universe he may afterwards be
transported. — In the illustration of this subject,
f. shall pursue a train of thought which I am
not aware has been prosecuted by any previous
writers on the subject of morality, and shall en
deavour to confirm and illustrate the views which
may be exhibited, by an appeal to the discoveries
of revelation.

We have an abundance of ponderous volumes
on the subject of moral philosophy ; but the dif
ferent theories which have been proposed and
discussed, and the metaphysical mode in which

the subject has been generally treated, have sel
dom led to any beneficial practical results. To
attempt to treat the subject of morals without a
reference to divine revelation, as most of our ce
lebrated moral writers have done, seems to be
little short of egregious trifling. It cannot serve
the purpose of an experiment, to ascertain how
far the unassisted faculties of man can go in ac
quiring a knowledge of the foundation and the
rules of moral action; for the prominent princi
ples of Christian morality are so interwoven into
the opinions, intercourses, and practices of mo
dern civilized society, and so familiar to the mind
of every man who has been educated in a Chris
tian land, that it is impossible to eradicate the
idea of them from the mind, when it attempts to
trace the duly of man solely on the principles of
reason. When the true principles of morality
are once communicated through the medium of
revelation, reason can demonstrate their utility,
and their conformity to the character of God, to
the order of the universe, and to the relations
which subsist among intelligent agents. But we
are by no means in a situation to determine whe
ther they could ever have been discovered by the
investigations and efforts of the unassisted powers
of the human mind. The only persons who could
fairly try such an experiment were the Greeks
and Romans, and other ivilized nations, in an
cient times, to whom the light of revelation was
not imparted. And what was the result of all
their researches on this most important of all
subjects ? What were trie t -irtical effects of all
the fine-spun theories and suutie speculations
which originated in the schools of ancient philo
sophy, under the tuition of Plato and Socraies,
of Aristotle and Zeno ? The result is recorded
in the annals of history, and in the writings of
the apostles. " They became vain in their ima
ginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
They were filled with all unrighteonsness, forni
cation, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness-
envy, murder, deceit, malignity ; they were back
biters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, invent
ors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without
natural affection, implacable, and unmerciful."
Their general conduct was characterized by
pride, lasciviousness, and revenge ; they indulged
in the commission of unnatural crimes ; they
were actuated by restless ambition, and they
gloried in covering the earth with devastation
and carnage.

It is true, indeed, that some of the sects of
philosophers propounded several maxims and
moral precepts, the propriety of which cannot
be questioned; but none of rf.em could agree
respecting either the foundation of virtue, or the
ultimate object toward which it should be di
rected, or that in which the chief happiness ol
man consists ; and bence it happened, that the
precepts delivered by the teachers of philosophy
had little influence on their own conduct, and

II

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

far less on that of the unthinking multitude.
Where do we find, in any of the philosophical
schools of Greece and Rome, a recommendation
of such precepts as these, " Love your enemies ;
do good to them who hate you ; and pray for
them who despitefully use you and persecute
you ?" In opposition to such divine injunctions,
we can trace, in the maxims and conduct of the
ancient sages, a principle of pride insinuating
itself into the train of their most virtuous ac
tions. It has been reckoned by some a wise and
a witty answer which one of the philosophers
returned to his friend, who had advised him to
revenge an injury he had suffered ; " What,
(says he) if an ass kicks me, must I needs kick
him again?" Some may be disposed to consi
der such a reply as indicating a manly spirit,
and true greatness of soul ; but it carries in it a
proud and supercilious contempt of human na
ture, and a haughtiness of mind, which are alto
gether inconsistent with the mild and benevolent
precepts of Him, who, in the midst of his severest
sufferings from men, exclaimed, " Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they do."

It appears somewhat preposterous to waste
our time, and the energies of our minds, in la-
ooured metaphysical disquisitions, to ascertain
the foundations of virtue, and the motives from
which it is to be pursued ; whether it consists
in utility, in the Jitness of things, or in the regu
lations of states and political associations, and
whether it is to be prosecuted from a principle
of self-love or of benevolence, when every useful
question that can be started on this subject may
be immediately solved by a direct application to
the revejations of heaven, and an infallible rule
derived for the direction of our conduct in all
the circumstances and relations in which we
may be placed. Even although the moral philo
sopher were to reject the Bible,, as a revelation
from God, it would form no reason why its an
nunciations should be altogether overlooked or
rejected. As an impartial investigator of the
history of man, of the moral constitution of the
human mind, and of the circumstances of our
present condition, he is bound to take into view

every fact and every circumstance which may
have a bearing on the important question which
he undertakes to decide. Now, it is & fact,
that such a book as the Bible actually exists — •
that, amidst the wreck of thousands of volumes
which the stream of time has carried into obli
vion, it has survived for several thousands of
years — that its announcements have directed
the opinions and the conduct of myriads of man
kind — that many of the most illustrious charac
ters that have adorned our race have submitted
to its dictates, and governed their tempers and
their actions by its moral precepts — that those
who have been governed by its maxims have
been distinguished by uprightness of conduct,
and been most earnest and successful in promot
ing the happiness of mankind — that this book
declares, that a moral revulsion has taken place
in the constitution of man since he was placed
upon this globe — and that the whole train of its
moral precepts proceeds on the ground of his
being considered as a depraved intelligence.
These are facts which even the infidel philoso
pher must admit; and, instead of throwing them
into the shade, or keeping them entirely out of
view, he is bound, as an unbiassed inquirer, to
take them all into account in his researches into
the moral economy of the human race. In par
ticular, he is bound to inquire into the probability
of the alleged fact of the depravity of man, and
to consider, whether the general train of human
actions, the leading facts of history in reference
to all ages and nations, and the destructive effects
of several operations in the system of nature,
have not a tendency to corroborate this important
point. For the fact, that man is a fallen intelli
gence, must materially modify every system of
ethics that takes it into account. Should this
fact be entirely overlooked, and yet ultimately be
found to rest on a solid foundation, then, all the
speculations and theories of those moralists whc
profess to be gi taed solely by the dictates of
unassisted reas-ow, iwy p'-ove to be nothing more
than the reverios cf a va«i imagination, and tc
be built on " tlw Ws^ss &»J)<-KS :~f a vision."

CHAPTER I.

ON THE MORAL RELATIONS OP INTELLIGENT BEINGS TO THEIR CREATOR.

SECTION I.

OH THE PRIMARY OR MOST GENERAL IDEA
OF MORALITY.

I CONCEIVE, that the first or most general
idea of morality is, ORDER,— or, that harmo
nious disposition and arrangement of intelligent
beings, which is founded on the nature of things,
and which tends to produce the greatest sum of
happiness.

Physical Order, or the order of the material
universe, is that by which every part is made to
harmonize to the other part, and all individually
to the whole collectively. Thus, the adaptation
of light to the eye, and of the eye to light ; the
adaptation of the structure of the ear and of
the lungs to the constitution of the atmosphere,
and its various undulations ; the adaptation of
the waters, the vegetable productions of the
field, the minerals in the bowels of the earth, the
colours produced by the solar rays, and all the
other parts and agencies of external nature, to
the wants and the happiness of sentient beings ;
the adaptation of day and night to the labour and
rest appointed for man ; and the regularity of the
motions of the planetary bodies in their circuits
round the sun — constitute the physical order, or
harmony of the visible world ; and it is this
which constitutes its principal beauty, and which
evinces the wisdom of its Almighty Author.

Moral Order is the harmony of intelligent
beings in respect to one another, and to their
Creator, and is founded upon those relations in
which they respectively stand to each other.—
Thus, reverence, adoration, and gratitude, from
creatures, correspond or harmonize with the idea
of a self-existent, omnipotent, and benevolent
Being, on whom they depend, and from whom
they derive every enjoyment, — and love, and
good will, and a desire to promote each other's
happiness, harmonize with the idea of intelli
gences of the same species mingling together in
social intercourses. For, it will at once be ad
mitted, that affections directly opposite to these,
and universally prevalent, would tend to destroy
the moral harmony of the intelligent universe,
and to introduce anarchy and confusion, and
consequently misery, among all the rational inha
bitants of the material world.

The following brief illustration, by way of
contrast, may, perhaps, have a tendency more
particularly to impress the mind with the idea

of order intended to be conveyed in the above
stated definitions.

Suppose the principle which unites the plane
tary globes in one harmonious system, to be
dissolved, and the planets to run lawlessly through
the sky — suppose the planet Jupiter to forsake
his orbit, and in his course to the distant regions
of space, to impinge against the planet Saturn,
and to convulse the solid crust of that globe from
its surface to its centre, to disarrange the order
of its satellites, to shatter its rings into pieces,
and to carry the fragments of them along with
him in his lawless career, — suppose the sun to
attract his nearest planets to his surface with a
force that would shake them to their centres,
and dissolve their present constitution, — suppose
the moon to fly from her orbit, and rush towards
the planet Venus, — the earth to be divested of
its atmosphere, the foundations of its mountains
to be overturned, and to be hurled into the plains,
and into the ocean ; its seas and rivers to for
sake their ancient channels, and to overflow the
land, and its human inhabitants swept promis
cuously along with the inferior animals into
dens and caves, and crevices of the earth, and
into the bottom of the ocean : — in such a scene,
we should have presented to our view a specimen
of physical confusion and disorder ; and it would
form an impressive emblem of the state of rational
beings, whose moral order is completely sub
verted.

Again, suppose the rational inhabitants of our
globe to be universally set against each other, in
order to accomplish their misery and destruction
— suppose the child rising in opposition to his
parents, the wife plotting the destruction of her
husband, the brother insnaring his sister, and
decoying her to ruin, — teachers of all descrip
tions inculcating the arts of deception, of revenge,
and of destruction, and representing every prin
ciple and fact as contrary to what it really is —
falsehoods of every description industriously
forged and circulated as facts through every rank
of society — rulers setting themselves in opposi
tion to the populace, and plotting their destruc
tion, while they are at the same time actuated
by a principle of pride, of envy, and malice
against each other — tlie populace setting^ them
selves in opposition to their rulers, exterminating
them from the earth, subverting every principls
of law and order, gratifying, without control,
every principle 'of revenge, avarice, lascivious
ness and sensual indulgence, and enjoying

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

diabolical satisfaction in contemplating the
scenes of misery they have created : — in short,
every one beholding in his neighbour the male
volence of a fiend armed with instruments of
destruction, and devising schemes to secure his
misery and ruin. Suppose the lower animals,
impelled by revenge, to rise up in indignation
against man, and to swell the horrors of this ge
neral anarchy — suppose the superior orders of
intelligences to mingle in this scene of confusion,
to exert their high physical and intellectual
powers in adding fuel to these malevolent prin
ciples and operations, and in attempting to drag
other intelligences of a still higher order from
their seats of bliss — suppose all these intelli
gences actuated by an implacable hatred of their
Creator, combined to deface the beauties of the
material creation, and then to engage in a war
of universal extermination throughout the whole
intelligent system in every region of the universe :
such a state of things, if it could exist in the
universe, would form a perfect contrast to moral
order; it would present a scene in which exist
ence could not be desirable to any intelligent
mind, and in which happiness could not possibly
be enjoyed by any rational being, but by Him
who is eternally happy independently of his
creatures. Moral order, then, is completely op
posed to such a state of things as has now been
represented ; it consists in every being holding
its proper station in the universe, acting accord
ing to the nature of that station, and using its
powers and faculties for the purposes for which
they were originally intended ; and the grand
object intended to be accomplished by this order,
is, the happiness of the whole, — without which
misery would reign uncontrolled throughout all
the ranks of intelligent existence.

This state of the moral world is most fre
quently designated in scripture by the term holi
ness. Of the ideas included under this term,
and several of its kindred epithets, very vague
and imperfect conceptions are frequently enter
tained. Its leading or generic idea, from what
has been now stated, will evidently appear to be,
a conformity to order, founded on the relations of
intelligent beings to each other ; or, in other
words, it consists in a complete conformity to
the law of God, (which is founded on those re
lations) including both the action and the prin
ciple from which it flows. In reference to cre
ated beings, holiness may, therefore, be defined
to be a conformity to the moral order of the uni
verse, — and, in relation to the Creator, it is that
perfection of his nature, which leads him to pro
mote the moral order and happiness of intelligent
beings, and to counteract every thing which stands
in opposition to this object.

That the leading ideas and definitions now
slated are correct, will, perhaps, more distinctly
appear in the course of the following discussions
and illustrations ; but should any one be disposed

to call in question the statements now given in
reference to the primary idea of morality, hig
difference of opinion on this point will not mate*
rially affect the leading train of sentiment prose
cuted in the further elucidation of this subject.

SECTION II.

ON THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF MO
RALITY.

The leading idea of morality or holiness, as
now stated, resolves itself into the two following
principles — love to God the Creator, and love to
fellow intelligences. These are the two grand
springs on which the whole moral machine of
the universe depends. All the diversified ac
tions by which happiness is diffused among in
telligent agents, are only so many ramifications
of these two simple and sublime principles,
which connect all holy beings throughout the
wide empire of God, i» one harmonious union.
This we are not left to infer merely from the na
ture of thinga, but have the authority of the
supreme Legislator, as our warrant for placing
these principles as the foundation of all moral
virtue among every class of moral agents. For
thus saith our Saviour, " THOU SHALT LOVE

THE LORD THY GOD WITH ALL THY HEART,
AND WITH ALL THY MIND, AND WITH ALL

THY STRENGTH. This is the first and great
commandment. The second is like unto it :

THOU SHALT LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR AS THY
SELF. On these two principles hang all the law
and the prophets."

These principles, now that they are commu-
nicaled, and sanctioned by divine authority, ap
pear quite accordant to the dictates of enlighten
ed reason, and calculated to promote the happi
ness of the intelligent creation ; yet we never
find that the moral systems of pagan philosophers,
in any country, were built on this foundation, or
that they assumed them as indispensable axioms
to guide them in their speculations on the sub
ject of ethics.

In elucidating this topic, I shall endeavour to
show the reasonableness and the utility of these
principles of moral action, from a consideration
of the nature of God, and the relations in which
intelligent beings stand to him as the source of
their existence and felicity — from the nature of
subordinate intelligences, and the relations in
which they stand to one another — from the mi
sery which must inevitably follow, where such
principles are violated or reversed — from the
happiness that would necessarily flow from then
full operation — and, lastly, that they apply to the
circumstances of all created intelligences wher»
ever existing, throughout the boundless universe
— I have used the plural term principles, to ex-

OMNIPOTENCE OF GOD.

press the foundation of moral action, because
our Saviour has arranged them under two dis
tinct heads, in the passage just now quoted ;
but strictly speaking, there is but one principle,
namely, Love, which divides itself, as it were,
into two great streams, one directing its course
towards the supreme Source of all felicity, and
the other towards all the subordinate intelligences
He has created.

first Principle — LOVE TO GOD.

Love, considered in reference to the Supreme
Being, may be viewed as dividing itself into a
variety of streams or kindred emotions, all flow
ing from one source. The most prominent of
these emotions are the following — Admiration,
which consists in a delightful emotion, arising
from a contemplation of the wonderful works of
God, and of the wisdom and goodness which they
unfold — Reverence, which is nearly allied to ad
miration, is a solemn emotion, mingled with awe
and delight, excited in the mind, when it contem
plates the perfections, and the grand operations
of the Eternal Mind — Gratitude, which consists
in affection to the Supreme Being, on account
of the various benefits he has conferred upon us
— Humility, which consists in a just sense of our
own character and condition, especially when we
compare ourselves with the purity and perfection
of the divine character. To these emotions
may be added Complacency and delight in the
character and operations of God — Adoration
of his excellencies, and an unlimited Dependence
upon him in reference to our present concerns,
and to our future destination. I have stated
these different modifications of tHfe first princi
ple of morality, because, in the following illus
trations, they may all occasionally be taken into
account, when an allusion is made to the affec
tions, which the character and operations of the
divine Being have a tendency to excite.

Love is that noble affection which is excited by
amiable objects ; and therefore, in order to its
being rational, permanent, and delightful, it
must be founded on the perception of certain
amiable qualities or attributes connected wilh its
object. In order to demonstrate the reasonable
ness of this affection in reference to God, it is
only requisite to consider his character and per
fections, and the relation in which he stands to
us as the Author of our existence and enjoy
ments. But, as a comprehensive view of this
subject would require volumes for its illustration,
I shall confine myself to the illustration of only
two or three lineaments of the divine character.

SECTION III.

ON THE OMNIPOTENCE OF GOD.

We naturally venerate and admire a character
In which physical energy is combined with high
22

intellectual powers, when these powers arc uni
formly exerted in the counteraction of vice and
misery, and in the promotion of happiness. On
this ground, the Omnipotence of God is calcula
ted to affect the mind with that particular modi
fication of love, which is designated by the term
Reverence. Were it possible that any human
being could construct a machine, by means of
which, in combination with his own physical
powers, he could transport himself and his trea
sures from one region of the globe to another,
at the rate of 200 miles in an hour, and were he,
at the same time, to devote his treasures, and his
moral and intellectual energies to the improve
ment and melioration of the various tribes of
mankind in every clime through which he pass
ed, such an object could not fail of exciting in
our minds a sentiment of admiration and reve
rence. Were one of the highest orders of cre
ated intelligences to descend from his celestial
mansion, and to display himself to our view in
all the bright radiance of his native heaven —
were he to take his station over the regions of
Thibet or Hindostan, and, after having excited
the attention of a wondering populace, were he to
detach the huge masses of the Himalaya moun
tains from their foundations, and toss them into
the depths of the Indian Ocean, and, in the
course of a few hours, transform the barren
wastes of that dreary region into a scene of
beauty and luxuriant vegetation, and cause
splendid cities to arise, where formerly nothing
was presented to the view hut a bleak and fright
ful wilderness — at such a display of physical
power, combined with benevolent design, wo
could not withhold a feeling of awe, and a senti
ment of reverence, almost approaching to reli
gious adoration.

If, then, the contemplation of physical and
mental energies, with which even created beings
may possibly be invested, would excite our ad
miration and reverence, what powerful emotions
of this description must the energies of the Un
created Mind be calculated to produce, when
they are contemplated by the eye of enlightened
reason, and in the light of divine revelation!
When this huge globe on which we dwell existed
in the state of a shapeless and unformed mass ;
when land, and water, and air, were blended in
wild confusion, and chaos and darkness extended
their dominion over all its gloomy regions, at
His command " light sprung out, of darkness,
and order out of confusion ;" the mountains
reared their projecting summits, the valleys were
depressed, the caverns of the ocean were hol
lowed out, and the waters retired to the places
which He had appointed for them. The fields
were clothed with luxuriant verdure ; Eden ap
peared in all its beaut) the inferior tribes of
animated existence took possession of the nir,
the waters, and the earth, and man was fo. mod
in the image of his Maker, to complete Uiis

18

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

wondrous scene. At this period, too, the earth
received such a powerful impulse from the hand
of its Creator, as has carried it along through the
voids of space, with all its furniture and inha
bitants, in the most rapid career, for six thousand
years ; having already moved through a space
of 3,480,000,000,000 miles, and will still conti
nue its unremitting course for thousands of years
to come, till the " mystery of Providence be
finished."

Would we be struck with admiration and as
tonishment, at beholding a superior created in
telligence tossing a mountain into the sea 1
What strong emotions of reverence and awe,
then, ought to pervade our minds, when we be
hold the Almighty every moment producing
effects infinitely more powerful and astonishing!
What would be our astonishment, were we to
behold, from a distance, a globe as large as the
earth tossed from the hand of Omnipotence, and
flying at the rate of a thousand miles every
minute ! Yet this is nothing more than what is
every day produced by the unceasing energies
of that Power which first called us into exist
ence. That impulse which was first given to
the earth at its creation is still continued, by
which it is carried round every day from west to
east, along with its vast population, and at the
same time impelled forward through the regions
of space at the rate of sixty-eight thousand miles
in an hour. Nor is this among the most wonder
ful effects of divine power : it is only one compa
ratively small specimen of that omnipotent energy
which resides in the Eternal Mind. When we
lift our eyes towards the sky, we behold bodies a
thousand times larger than this world of ours,
impelled with similar velocities through the
mighty expanse of the universe. We behold the
planetary globes wheeling their rapid courses
around the sun, with unremitting velocity — the
comets returning from their long excursions in
the distant regions of space, and flying towards
the centre of our system with a velocity of hun
dreds of thousands of miles an hour — the sun him
self impelled toward some distant region of space,
and carrying along with him all his attendant
planets — and, in a word, we have the strongest
reason to conc'ude, that all the vast systems of
the universe, rv'hich are more numerous than
language can express, are in rapid and incessant
motion around the throne of the Eternal, carry
ing forward tl grand designs of infinite wisdom
which thev are destined to accomplish.*

It must, however, be admitted, that the "~uni-
festation of power, or great physic? Jiiergy,
abstractly considered, is not of ifr . calculated
to produce that emotion oe c-verence which
flows from love, unless ie being in whom it
resides exerts it for fh«, purposes of benevolence.
A superior being, cnuowed with great physical

• Sfid a more comprehensive Illustration of this
subject in " The Christian Philosopher," pp. 8—29.

and intellectual energies, which were exerted
solely for the purpose of destruction, could in
spire no feelings but those of dread and alarm :
and were it possible to conceive an omnipotent
being divested of the attribute of benevolence,
or possessed of a capricious character, he would
form the most terrible object which the human
mind could contemplate. But the attribute of
infinite power, when conjoined with infinite wis
dom and goodness, conveys an idea the most glo
rious and transporting. Every display of divine
power to which I have now alluded, has the
communication of happiness for its object. The
motion of the earth around its axis every twenty-
four hours, is intended to distribute light and
darkness, in regular proportions, to all the inha
bitants of the earth, and to correspond to the
labour and rest appointed for man. It produces
a variety which is highly gratifying to the ra
tional mind ; for, while our fellow-men on the
opposite side of the globe are enjoying the
splendours of the noonday sun, the shades of
night, which at that time envelope our hemi
sphere, are the means of disclosing to our view
the magnificent glories of the starry frame.
Were this motion to cease, this world and all
its inhabitants would be thrown into a state of
confusion and misery. While the inhabitants
of one hemisphere enjoyed the splendours of
perpetual day, the glories of the nocturnal hea
vens would be for ever veiled from their view,
and the inhabitants of the other hemisphere
would be enveloped in the shades of eternal
night. While the one class was suffering under
the scorching effects of excessive heat, the other
would be frozen to death amidst the rigours of
insufferable cold — vegetable nature, in both cases,
would languish, and the animal tribes would be
gradually extinguished.

The same benevolent intention may be per
ceived in that exertion of power by which the
earth is carried forward in its annual course
around the sun. From this motion we derive all
the pleasures we enjoy from the vicissitude of
the seasons ; without which the variety cf nature
that appears in the beauties of spring, the luxuri
ance of summer, the fruits of autumn, and the
repose of winter, would be completely destroyed.
And, it is worthy of notice, that all this variety
is enjoyed every moment by some one tribe or
other of the human family ; for while it is sum
mer in one region, it is winter in another : and
while one class of our fellow-men is contemplat
ing the opening beauties of spring, another is
gathering in the fruits of harvest. The same
benevolent designs, we have every reason to be
lieve, are displayed in those more magnificent ex
ertions of divine power which appear among all
the rolling worlds on high ; for, in so far as our
observations extend, all the arrangements of the
planetary globes appear calculated to promote the
happiness of sentient and intellectual being*.

OMNIPOTENCE OF GOD.

19

While, therefore, we contemplate the opera
tions of divine power, either in the earth or in
the heavens, we perceive every thing which is
calculated to inspire us with love, admiration,
and reverence. When we lie down on our pil
lows in the evening, how pleasing it is to reflect,
that the power of our Almighty Father will be
exerted in carrying us round in safety several
ihousands of mhes, during our repose in sleep,
in order that our eyes may be again cheered with
the morning light? When, amid the gloom and
storms of winter, we look forward to the reviving
scenes of spring, we know that we must be car
ried forward more than a hundred millions of
miles, before we can enjov the pleasures of that
delightful season ; and when spring arrives, we
must be carried through the voids of space a
hundred millions of miles farther, before we can
reap the fruits of summer and harvest. How de
lightful, then, is the thought, that the omnipotent
energy of our heavenly Father is incessantly
exerted in producing such a wonderful effect,
accompanied by such a variety of beneficent
changes, all contributing to our enjoyment!*

What is the reason, then, why we feel so little
admiration and reverence at the beneficent ope
rations of divine power ? If we should be struck
with veneration and wonder at beholding a su
perior created intelligence tossing a range of
mountains into the sea, why do we behold, with
so much apathy, effects ten thousand times more
energetic and astonishing ? One general reason,
among others, undoubtedly is, that the moral
constitution of man ha? suffered a melancholy
derangement; in consequence of which, the train
of his thoughts and affections has been turned
out of its original channel. The Scriptures are
clear and explicit on this point ; they declare, in
the most positive terms, that " the carnal mind
is enmity against God," and that, in consequence
of this depraved principle, the wicked " walk in
the vanity of their minds, being alienated from
the life of God. They say to the Almighty, De
part from us, for we desire not the knowledge of
thy ways. God is not in all their thoughts, and
through pride of their countenances they will not
call upon God."— Another reason is, that the
almighty Agent who produces so stupendous ef
fects remains invisible to mortal eyes. Were a
celestial intelligence to appear in a splendid and
definite form, and to produce such effects as I

• In this, and other places of this work, the truth
of the annual and diurnal motions of the earth is
taken for granted, because I conceive it is suscepti
ble of the clearest demonstration— (See " Chris
tian Philosopher " PP. 23, 33, 147, 149.) But,
should the truth of this position be called in ques
tion or denied, it will not materially affect the pro
priety of such moral reflections as are here stated •
for, in this case, a similar, or even a much greater
display of omnipotence must be admitted in refer
ence to the motions of the heavenly bodies in
bringing about the succession of day and night and
the changes of the seasons.

have supposed, the connexion between the agent
and the effects produced, would forcibly strike
the senses and the imagination. But he who sits
on the throne of the universe, and conducts all
its movements, is a being " who dwells in light
unapproachable, whom no man hath seen, or«m
see.' ' He can be contemplated only through the
sensible manifestations he gives of his perfections;
and, were the train of our thoughts properly di
rected, we would perceive him operating in every
object and in every movement. We would hear
his voice in the wind and the thunder, in the
earthquake, the storm, and the tempest ; we
would see him in the beauties and sublimities of
sublunary nature, in tbe splendours of the sun,
and the glories of the nocturnal sky ; and, in
whatever situation we might be placed, we would
feel ourselves surrounded with the omnipotent
energies of an ever-present Deity.

The contemplation of God as an omnipotent
being, is calculated to inspire the mind with love
and confidence in the prospect of futurity. The
promises addressed to us by a wise and benevo-
ient being can excite in us trust and dependence,
only in so far as we are convinced of his ability
to secure their fulfilment. If almighty power
were not an attribute of the Eternal Mind, or
were we unable to trace its operations in visible
existing facts, then all the promises and delinea
tions of revelation, in reference to unseen and
eternal objects, might prove to be nothing more
than imaginary scenes, that could never be real
ized. But the good man, who perceives omnipo
tent energy in incessant operation throughout all
the scenes of the universe which surround him,
feels the most perfect security in looking forward
to the scene of his future destination, and to
those changes and revolutions which shall suc
ceed the period of his present existence. He
knows that, in a few years at most, that immor
tal principle which now animates his frame, will
take its flight from its earthly mansion to a world
unknown. To what regions it will direct its
course ; what scenes and prospects will be un
folded to its view ; what intercourse it may have
with the spirits of departed men, or with other
intelligences ; in what state it shall pass its ex
istence till the consummation of the present plan
of Providence — whether it shall remain as a
naked spirit entirely disconnected with the visi
ble universe, or be clothed with some etherial
vehicle, to enable it to hold a correspondence
with other regions of the material creation— he
is at present unable to determine. He knows
that his body, too, shall disappear from the living
world, and be reduced to corruption and ashes.
In what manner the essential particles of this
body shall be preserved distinct from those of all
other human bodies, after they have been tossed
about by the winds, and blended with the other
elements of nature ; by what means th*»y shal]
be reunited into a more glorious form; and hov»

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

the separate spirit shall be enabled to recognize
its renovated and long-lost partner at the resur
rection of the just — he can form no conception.

He knows, that the globe on which he now
resides is doomed to be dissolved amidst devour
ing flames, when " the elements shall melt with
fervent, heat, and the earth, and the works that
are therein, shall be burnt up" — that the ashes
of all the myriads of the race of Adam shall issue
from the caverns of the ocean, and from the
charnel houses, in every region of the land — that
they shall be moulded into new organical struc
tures, united with their kindred spirits, and be
convened in one grand assembly before God, the
Judge of all. He knows, that " new heavens and
a new earth" will be arranged for the residence
of the " redeemed from among men ;" but in
what region of the universe this abode may be
prepared, what scenes it will unfold, and by what
means the innumerable company of the righteous
shall be transported from amidst the ruins of this
globe to that celestial habitation — he is at pre
sent at a loss to form even a conjecture. He
knows, that after these solemn changes have
been effected, ages numerous as the drops of the
ocean will roll over him — that worlds numerous
as the stars of heaven will still run their destined
rounds — that other systems may undergo impor
tant chang-es and revolutions — that new systems
of creation may be gradually emerging into ex
istence, and that scenes of magnificence and
glory, different from all that ever preceded them,
may incessantly rise to view, throughout the
lapse of unceasing duration. But, in the pros
pect of all these solemn and important events, he
beholds — in that almighty energy which wheels
our globe around from day to day, and impels it
in its annual course, and which 'directs, at the
same time, the movements of all the hosts of
heaven — the exertion of a benevolent power,
which is calculated to inspire him with love and
confidence, and which is able to secure his hap
piness amidst the revolutions of worlds, and
amidst all the scenes through which he may
pass during an immortal existence. Under this
impression, he can adopt the affectionate and
triumphant language of the psalmist — " Whom
have I in heaven but thee, and there is none
upon earth that I desire beside thee ! My heart
and my flesh shall fail, but God is the strength of
my heart, and my portion for ever"

Thus it appears, that the omnipotence of God
is one of those attributes of his nature which is
particularly calculated to fill the mind with sen
timents of love and confidence, admiration and
reverence. And, if such emotions be at all excited
in the mind, they must rise to the highest pitch
of elevation to which we can carry them ; for
there is no other object or being that possesses
the same perfection, or can claim the same de
gree of affection and love. If we love God at
all, it must be " with all our heart, with all our

understanding, and wifH all our strength." Th»
considerations to which 1 have now adverted,
have been too seldom taken into view in moral
and religious discussions on this topic. The
omnipotence of the Deity is seldom exhibited as
a ground and an excitement of veneration and
love, and yet it stands, as it were, on the fore
front of the divine character, giving beauty and
efficiency to all his other perfections: without
which wisdom, benevolence, faithfulness, mercy,
and patience, would degenerate into empty
names, and form no solid foundation for the ex
ercise of confidence and hope. Arid, therefore,
it is the duty of every Christian to endeavour,
by every proper means, to enlarge his concep
tions of the operations of omnipotence, and to
familiarize his mind to contemplations of the
magnitude, motions, grandeur, and immensity
of God's works, in order that his love to God
may be elevated and expanded, and his faith
and hope strengthened and invigorated. To thih
attribute of Jehovah the inspired writers uni
formly direct our views, as a source of joy and
confidence, "Praise ye the Lord, — praise him,
ye servants of the Lord ; for I know that Jeho
vah is great, and that our Lord is above all
gods. Whatever the Lord pleased, that Hid
he, in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and
all deep places. Great is the Lord, and greatly
to be praised ; his greatness is unsearchable. I
will speak of the glorious honour of thy majesty,
and of thy wondrous works. I will speak of the
might of thy terrible acts, and will declare thy
greatness ; to make known to the sons of men thy
mighty operations, and the glorious majesty of
thy kingdom. Happy is he who hath the God
of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord
his God, who made heaven arid earth, the sea,
and all that in them is, who keepeth truth for
ever."

SECTION IV.

ON THE WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD.

Another feature in the divine character, which
is calculated to excite our most ardent affection,
is, the Wisdom and Goodness of God. These
two attributes may be considered under one head,
since they are always inseparable in their ope
ration. Goodness proposes the end, namely, the
happiness of the sensitive and intelligent crea
tion ; and IVisdom selects the most proper meant
for its accomplishment.

Wherever genius appears combined with be
nevolent intentions and beneficent operations,
we cannot withhold a certain portion of affection
and regard.

When we behold a man like Howard, devo
ting his wealth, his knowledge, his ititellectua

WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD.

21

and active powers, to alleviate the sorrows, and
to promote the happiness of his fellow-men —
when we behold him in retirement at his native
mansion, a universal blessing to his neighbours
around him, furnishing employment, for the poor,
erecting schools for the instruction of their chil
dren, watching over the morals of his neighbour
hood, visiting the abodes of affliction, acting the
part of a physician to their bodies, imparting
spiritual instruction to theii souls, promoting the
knowledge and practice of rtligion, and extend
ing his benevolent regards to persons of all re-
Ugious persuasions — when we behold him leaving
his native country and the friends of his youth,
on a tour of benevolence over all Europe and
the East ; hazarding his health and his life in
the service of humanity, diving into the depths
of dungeons, plunging into the infected atmos
pheres of hospitals arid jails, visiting the lonely
and squalid prisoner, entering the wretched
hovels of sorrow and affliction, administering
consolation and relief, and surveying the di
mensions of misery and distress among men of
all nations, for the purpose of devising schemes
for the relief of the distresses of suffering hu
manity, and for promoting the comforts of man
kind — when such a character appears on the
stage of life, there is no class of the human race,
whose powers are not completely vitiated, but
must feel towards it strong emotions of esteem
and affectionate regard.

But what are all the wise and beneficent de
signs of a fellow-mortal, when compared with
the numerous and diversified streams of benevo
lence which are incessantly flowing from the un
created source of felicity ! They are but as a
drop to the ocean, or as an atom when compared
with the immensity of the universe. On him
all beings depend, from the archangel to the
worm ; from Him they derive their comforts ; to
Him they are indebted for all their powers«and
faculties ; and on him their eternal felicity de
pends. Were we to prosecute this subject to
any extent, it would lead us into a field on which
volumes might be written, and yet the greater
part of the displays of divine beneficence would
remain unrecorded. I shall therefore confine
myself to the selection of only a few instances
of the wisdom. and goodness of God.

Wherever we turn our eyes in the world
around us, we behold innumerable instances of
our Creator's beneficence. In order that the eye
and the imagination may be gratified and charm
ed, he has spread over the surface of our ter
restrial habitation an assemblage of the richest
colours, which beautify and adorn the landscape
of the earth, and present to our view a pictu
resque and diversified scenery, which is highly
gratifying to the principle of novelty implanted
in the human mind. On all sides we behold
a rich variety of beauty and magnificence. Here,
spread the wide plains and fertile fields, adorned

with fruits and verdure ; there, the hills rise in
gentle slopes, and the mountains rear their snowy
tops to the clouds, distilling from their sides the
brooks and rivers, which enliven and fertilize
the plains through which they flow. Here, the
lake stretches into a smooth expanse in the bo
som of the mountains ; there, the rivers mean
der through the forests and the flowery fields,
diversifying the rural scene, and distributing
health and fertility in their train. Here, we be
hold the rugged cliffs and the stately port of the
forest ; there, we are charmed with the verdure
of the meadow, the enamel of flowers, the azure
of the sky, and the gay colouring of the morn
ing and evening clouds. In order that this scene
of beauty and magnificence might be rendered
visible, He formed the element of light, without
which the expanse of the universe would be a
boundless desert, and its beauties for ever veiled
from our sight. It opens to our view the moun
tains, the hills, the vales, the woods, the lawns,
the flocks and herds, the wonders of the mighty
deep, and the radiant orbs of heaven. It paints
a thousand different hues on the objects around
us, and promotes a cheerful and extensive inter
course among all the inhabitants of the globe.

Again, in order to gratify the sense of hearing,
He formed the atmosphere, and endowed it with
an undulating quality, that it might waft to our
ears the pleasures of sound, and all the charms
of music. The murmuring of the brooks, the
whispers of the gentle breeze, the soothing sound
of the rivulet, the noise of the waterfall, the hum
of bees, the buzz of insects, the chirping of birds,
the soft notes of the nightingale, and the melody
of thousands of the feaihered songsters, which
fill the groves with their warblings, produce a
pleasant variety of delightful emotions; — the nu
merous modulations of the human voice, the ar
ticulate sounds peculiar to the human species,
by which the interchanges of thought and affec
tion are promoted, the soft notes of the piano
forte, the solemn sounds of the organ — and even
the roaring of the stormy ocean, the dashings of
the mighty cataract, and the rolling thunders
which elevate the soul to sentiments of sublimity
and awe — are all productive of a mingled variety
of pleasures ; and demonstrate that the distribu
tion of happiness is one grand end of the opera
tions of our bountiful Creator.

To gratify Hie sense of smelling, he has per
fumed the air with a variety of delicious odours,
which are incessantly exhaled from a thousand
plants and flowers. Countless millions of these
odoriferous particles, which elude the penetrating
power of the finest microscope to discover, are
continually wafted about by the air, and floating
around us, impervious to the sight, the hearing,
and the touch, but calculated to convey pleasure
to the soul, through the medium of the olfactory
nerves, and to enable us to " banquet on the in-
visible dainties of nature."

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

To gratify the sense of feeling, he has con
nected pleasure with the contact of almost every
thing we have occasion to touch, and has ren
dered it subservient for warning us of whatever
/nay be disagreeable or dangerous. Had a male
volent being constructed the body of man, and
formed tlie arrangements of external nature, he
might have rendered the contact of every object
of touch as acutely painful as when we clasp a
prickly shrub, or thrust our fingers against the
point of a needle.

To gratify the sense of taste, and to nourish
our bodies, he has furnished us with a rich va
riety of aliments, distributed not with a niggardly
and a sparing hand, but with a luxuriant pro
fusion, suited to the tastes of every sentient
Deing, and to the circumstances of the inhabit
ants of every clime. He has not confined his
bounty merely to the relief of our necessities, by
confining us to the use of a few tasteless herbs
and roots, but has covered the surface of the earth
with an admirable profusion of plants, herbs,
grains, and delicious fruits of a thousand differ
ent qualities and tastes, which contribute to the
sensitive enjoyment and comfort of man. In
almost every region of the earth, corn is to be
found in the valleys surrounded by the snowy
mountains of the North, as well as in the verdant
plains of the Torrid Zone. In warm regions,
cool and delicious fruits are provided for the re
freshment of the inhabitants, and the trees are
covered with luxuriant foliage to screen them
from the intensity of the solar heat !* Every
season presents us with a variety of fruits pecu
liar to itself, distributed by the munificent hand
of the " Giver of all good." The month of June
presents us with cabbages, cauliflowers, and
cherries ; July, with gooseberries, raspberries,
peaches, and apricots ; August and September
scatter before us, in luxuriant abundance, plums,
figs, apples, pears, turnips, carrots, cresses, po
tatoes, and, above all, wheat, oats, rye, and bar
ley, which constitute the " staff of bread" for the
support of man and beast ; and although we are
indebted chiefly to the summer and autumn for
these rich presents, yet, by the assistance of

* The manner in which the Creator has contrived
a supply for the thirst of imn, in sultry places, is
worthy of admiration.— He has placed amidst the
burning sands of Africa, a plant, whose leaf, twisted
round like a cruet, is always tilled with a large glass
full of fresh water ; the gullet of this cruet is shut
by the extremity of the leaf itself so as to prevent
the water from evaporating. He has planted in some
other districts of the same country, a great tree,
called by the negroes boa, the trunk of which, of a
prodigious bulk, is naturally hollowed like a cistern.
In the rainy season, it receives its fill of water, which
continues fresh and cool in the greatest heats, by
means of the tufted foliage which crowns its sum
mit. In some of the parched, rocky islands in the
"West Indies, there is found a tree called the water
lianne, so full of sap, that if you cut a single branch
of it, as much water is immediately discharged as a
man can drink at a draught, and it is perfectly pure
and limpid. See Pierre's " Studies of Nature."

human art, we can preserve and enjoy the Create;
part during winter and spring. The soil which
produces these dainties has never yet lost its fer
tility, though it has brought forth the harvests of
six thousand years, but still repay* our labour
with its annual treasures ; — and, were selfish
man animated with the same liberal and generous
views as his munificent Creator, every individual
of the human family would be plentifully supplied
with a share of these rich and delicious bounties
of nature.

In fine, the happiness of man appears to be
the object of the divine care, every returning
season, every moment, by day and by night. By
day, He cheers us with the enlivening beams of
the sun, which unfolds to us the beauty and the
verdure of the fields ; and lest the constant
efflux of his light and heat should enfeeble our
bodies, and wither the tender herbs, he com
mands the clouds to interpose as so many mag
nificent screens, to ward off the intensity of the
solar rays. When the earth is drained of its
moisture, and parched with heat, he bids the
clouds condense their watery treasures, and fly
from other regions on the wings of the wind, to
pour their waters upon the fields, not in over
whelming and destructive torrents, but in small
drops and gentle showers, to refresh the thirsty
soil, and revive the vegetable tribes. He has-
spread under our feet a carpet of lovely green
richer than all the productions of the Persiai
loom, and has thrown around our habitation ar
azure canopy, which directs our view to the dis
tant regions of infinite space. — By night, he
draws a veil of darkness over the mountains and
the plains, that we may be enabled to penetrate
to the regions of distant worlds, and behold the
moon walking in brightness, the aspects of the
planetary globes, the long trains of comets, and
the innumerable host of stars. At this season,
too, all nature is still, that we may enjoy in quiet
the refreshments of sleep, to invigorate our men
tal and corporeal powers. " As a mother stills
every little noise, that her infant be not dis
turbed ; as she draws the curtain around its
bed, and shuts out the light from its tender eyes •
so God draws the curtains of darkness around
us, so he makes all things to be hushed and still,
that his large family may sleep in peace." — In
a word, if we look around us to the forests which
cover the mountains, or if we look downward?
to the quarries and mines in the bowels of the
earth, we behold abundance of materials for
constructing our habitations, for embellishing
the abodes of civilized life, and for carrying
forward improvements in the arts and sciences.
And, if we consider the surrounding atmosphere,
we shall find it to contain the principle of life,
and the element of foe, by means of which our
winter evenings are cheered and illumina^d in
the absence of the sun. — Contemplating ail these
benign agencies as flowing from the care and

WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD.

benevolence of our Almighty Parent, the pious
mind may adopt the beautiful language of the
poet, though in a sense somewhat different from
what he intended :

For me kind Nature wakes her genial power,
Suckles each herb, and spreads out every flower 5
Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew
The juice nectareous, and the balmy dew ;
For me the mine a thousand treasures brings;
For me health gushes from a thousand springs ;
Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me, rise j
My footstool earth, my canopy the skies." Pope,

Viewing the various scenes and harmonies
of nature, in relation to man, and to the gratifi
cation of his different senses, we may also say,
in the language of Akenside, in his ooem "On
the Pleasures of Imagination," that

Not a breeze

Flies o'er the 'meadow, not a cloud imbibes
The setting sun's effulgence ; not a strain
From all the tenants of the warbling shade
Ascends, but whence his bosom can partake
Fresh pleasure and delight.
The rolling waves, the sun's unw earled course,
The elements and seasons, all declare
For what the Eternal Maker has ordain'd
The powers of man -. we feel within ourselves
His energy divine : He tells the heart
He meant, He made us to behold and love
What He beholds and loves, the general orb
Of life and being: to be great like Him,
Beneficent and active."

Let us now consider, for a few moments, the
wisdom which is displayed in the harmonious
adjustment of the organs of sense to the scenes
of external nature. All the scenes of beauty,
grandeur, and benignity, which surround us, in
the earth and heavens, would remain as one
mighty blank, unproductive of enjoyment, unless
our bodies were " fearfully and wonderfully"
framed, and endowed wilh organs fitted for ena-
61ing us to hold a correspondence with the ma
terial world. Ten thousands of vessels, tubes,
bones, muscles, ligaments, membranes, motions,
contrivances, and adaptations, beyond the reach
of the human understanding fully to investigate
or to comprehend, must be arranged, and act in
harmonious concert, before any one sense be
longing to man can perceive and enjoy its objects.
Before the eye can behold a landscape, and be
charmed with its beauties, it was requisite that
three humours should be formed, of different
sizes, different densities, and different refractive
powers — three coats, or delicate membranes,
with some parts opaque, and some transparent,
some black, and some white, some of them formed
of radial, and some with circular fibres, com
posed of threads finer than those of the spider's
web. The crystalline humour required to be
composed of two thousand very thin spherical
lamina, or scales, lying one upon another, every
one of these scales made up of one single fibre,
or finest thread, wound in a most stupendous
manner, this way, and that way, so as to run se
veral courses, and to meet in as many centres.
This curious and delicate piece of organization

required to be compressed into the size of a ball
of only half an inch in diameter, and a socket
composed of a number of small bones, to be hol
lowed out and exactly fitted for its reception. A
bed of loose fat for this ball to rest upon, a lid
or curtain to secure it from danger, a variety of
muscles to enable it to move upwards and down
wards, to the right and to the left, and a nume
rous assemblage of minute veins, arteries, nerves,
lymphatics, glands, and other delicate pieces of
animal machinery, of which we have no distinct
conception, were still requisite to complete this
admirable organ. Even in this state it would be
of no use for the purpose of vision, unless it
were connected with the brain by the optic nerve,
through the medium of which the impressions of
visible objects are conveyed to the soul. Still,
in addition to all these contrivances, a wonderful
machinery requires to be in action, and an ad
mirable effect produced, before a landscape can
be contemplated. Ten thousand millions of rays,
compounded of a thousand different shades of
colour, must fly off in every direction from the
objects which compose the surrounding scene,
and be compressed into the space of one-eighth
of an inch, in order to enter the eye, and must
paint every object in its true colour, form, and
proportion, on a space not exceeding half an inch
in diameter. Were any one of the parts which
compose this complicated machine either want
ing or deranged ; were it changed into a different
form, or placed in a different position ; were even
a single muscle to lose its capacity of acting, we
might be for ever deprived of all the enchanting
prospects of the earth and heavens, and enveloped
in the darkness of eternal night. Such is the
skill and intelligence requisite for accomplishing,
even in a single organ, the purpsoes of divine
benevolence.

Again, before we could enjoy the harmony of
sounds, the charms of music, and the pleasures
of conversation, an instrument, no less wonderful
than the eye required to be constructed. In the
ear, which is the organ of hearing, it was requi
site, that there should be an outward porch for
collecting the vibrations of the air, constructed,
not of fleshy substances, which might fall down
upon the orifice, or absorb the sounds, nor of
solid bones, which would occasion pain and in
convenience when we repose ourselves — but com
posed of a cartilaginous substance, covered with
a smooth membrane, -endowed with elasticity,
and bent into a variety of circular folds, or hol
lows, for the reflection of sound. It was farther
requisite, that there should be a tube, or passage,
composed partly of cartilage, and partly of bone,
lined with a skin or membrane, and moistened
with a glutinous matter, to form a communication
with the internal machinery of this organ, where
the principal wonders of hearing are performed.
This machinery consists, first, of lhetympanumt

24

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

or drum of the ear, which consists of a dry, thin,
and round membrane, stretched upon a bony ring,
so as actually to resemble the instrument we call
a drum. Under this membrane is a small nerve,
or string, stretched tight, for the purpose of
stretching or relaxing the drum, and increasing
or diminishing its vibrations, so as to render it
capable of reflecting every possible tone. Be
hind it is a cavity, hewn out of the temporal bone,
the hardest one in the body, in which there si-ems
to be an echo, by which the sound is reflected
with the utmost precision. This cavity contains
four very small, but remarkable bones, denomi
nated the hammer, the anvil, the orbicular bone,
and the stirrup, all connected together, and ne
cessary for contributing to the extension and vi
bration of the tympanum. In this cavity are also
formed various windings or cavities filled with
air ; and, in order that the air may be renewed,
there is an opening which communicates with
the back part of the mouth, called the Eustachian
tube.

The next apparatus belonging to this curious
machine, is the labyrinth, which is composed
of three parts, the vestibule or porch, three semi
circular canals, and the cochlea. This last is a
canal, which takes a spiral course, like the shell
of a snail, and is divided by a very thin lamina,
or septum of cords, which keeps decreasing
from the base to the top. The air acting on
either side of these diminutive cords, produces
a motion, nearly in the same manner as the
sound of one musical instrument excites a tre
mulous motion in the cords of another. All
these tubes, and winding canals, may be consi
dered as so many sounding galleries, for aug
menting the smallest tremours, and conveying
their impressions to the auditory nerves, which
conduct them to the brain. Besides the seve
ral parts now mentioned, a number of arteries,
veins, lymphatics, glands, and a variety of other
contrivances, which the human mind can neither
trace nor comprehend, are connected with the
mechanism of this admirable organ.

All this curious and complicated apparatus,
however, would have been of no avail lor the
purpose of hearing, had not the atmosphere been
formed, and its particles endowed with a tremu
lous motion. But, this medium being prepared,
a sounding body communicates an undulatory
motion to the air, as a stone thrown into a pond
produces circular waves in the water ; the air,
thus put in motion, shakes the drum of the ear;
the tremours, thus excited, produce vibrations
in the air within the drum ; this air shakes the
handle of the hammer ; the hammer strikes the
anvil, with which it. is articulated ; the anvil
transmits the motion to the stirrup, to which
its longer leg is fastened ; the stirrup transmits
the motion it has received to the nerves ; and
the nerves, vibrating like the strings of a violin,

or lyre, and the motion being still further aug
mented in the labyrinth, — the soul, in a man
ner altogether incomprehensible to us, receives
an impression proportioned to the weakness or
intensity of the vibration produced by the sound
ing body. Such is the exquisite and complicated
machinery which required to be constructed,
and preserved in action every moment, before
we could enjoy the benefits of sound, and the
pleasures of articulate conversation.

Again, before we could enjoy the pleasures of
feeling, an extensive system of organization re
quired to be arranged. A system of nerves,
originating in the brain and spinal marrow, and
distributed, in numberless minute ramifications,
through the heart, lungs, bowels, blood-vessels,
hands, feet, and every other part of the body,
was requisite to be interwoven through the
whole constitution of the animal frame, before
this sense, which is the foundation of all the other
sensations, and the source of so many pleasures,
could be produced. Wherever there are nerves,
there are also sensations ; and wherever any
particular part of the body requires to exert a
peculiar feeling, there the nerves are arranged
and distributed in a peculiar manner, to produce
the intended effect. And how nicely is every
thing arranged and attempered, in this respect,
to contribute to our comfort! If the points of
the fingers require to be endowed with a more
delicate sensation than several other parts, they
are furnished with a corresponding number of
nervous ramifications; if the heel require to be
more callous, the nerves are more sparingly dis
tributed. If feelings were equally distributed
over the whole body, and as acutely sensible as in
the membranes of the eye, our very clothes would
become galling and insupportable, and we should
be exposed to continual pain ; and if every part
were as insensible as the callus of the heel,
the body would be benumbed, the pleasures we
derive from this sense would be destroyed, and
the other organs of sensation could not perform
their functions in the manner in which they now
operate. So that in this, as well as in all the
other sensitive organs, infinite wisdom is admi
rably displayed in executing the designs of
benevolence.

In order that, we intent derive enjoyment from
the various aliments and delicious fruits which
the earth produces, a peculiar organization, dif
ferent from all the other senses, was requisite to
be devised. Before we could relish the peculiar
flavour of the pear, the apple, the peach, the
plumb, or the grape, the tongue, the principal
organ of taste, required to be formed, and its
surface covered with an infinite number of ner
vous papillae, curiously divaricated over its sur
face, to receive and convey to the soul the
impressions of every flavour. These nerves
required to be guarded with a firm arid proper

WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD.

tegument or covering, to defend them from dan
ger, and enable them to perform their functions
so long as life continues ; and at the same time,
to be perforated in such a manner, with a multi
tude of pores, in the papillary eminences, as to
give a free admission to every variety of taste.
It was likewise necessary, that these papillary
nerves should be distributed in the greatest
number, in those parts of the organ to which
the objects of taste are most frequently applied ;
and hence we find, that they are more numerous
on the upper than on the lower parts of the tongue;
and, therefore, when we apply highly-flavoured
substances to the under part, we are not so sen
sible of the taste, till we remove them to the
upper surface. A variety of veins, arteries,
glands, tendons, and other parts with which we
are unacquainted, are also connected with this
useful organ. When we consider how frequently
these delicate organs are used, during a length
of years, it is matter of admiration how well
they wear. While our clothes Wear out in the
course of a year or two, while the hairs of our
heads turn gray, and are nipped asunder at the
roots, and while age shrivels the most beautiful
skin, these delicate nervous papillae last longer
lhan instruments of iron or steel ; for the sense
of taste is generally the last that decays. For
the bestowment of this sense, therefore, and the
pleasures it conveys, we have abundant reason
to admire and adore the wisdom and goodness of
our Almighty Creator.

Finally, that we might be regard with the
scent of flowers, and the aromatic perfumes of
spring and summer, and that none of the plea
sures of nature might be lost, the organ of swell
ing was constructed to catch the invisible odo
riferous effluvia which are continually wafted
through the air. For this purpose it was requi
site that bones, nerves, muscles, arteries, veins,
cartilages, and membranes, peculiarly adapted
to produce this effect, should be arranged, and
placed in a certain part of the body. As the
bones of the head are too hard for this purpose,
the nerves of smelling required to have a bone
of a peculiar texture, of a spongy nature, full of
'little holes, like a sieve, through which they
might transmit their slender threads or branches
to the papillous membrane which lines the cavi
ties of the bone and the top of the nostrils. The
noslrils required to be cartilaginous and not
fleshy, in order to be kept open, and to be fur
nished with appropriate muscles to dilate or con
tract them as the occasion might require. It was
likewise requisite, that they should be wide at
the bottom, to collect a large quantity of effluvia,
and narrow at the top, where the olfactory nerves
are condensed, that the effluvia might act with
the greatest vigour, and convey the sensation to
the brain. By means of these and numerous
other contrivances, connected with this organ, we
are enabled to distinguish the qualities of our

food, and to regale ourselves on those invisi
ble effluvia which are incessantly flying off from
the vegetable tribes, and wafted in every direc
tion through the atmosphere.

Of all the senses with which we are furnished,
the sense of smelling is that which we are apt to
consider as of the least importance ; and some
have even been ready to imagine, that our en
joyments would scarcely have been diminished,
although its organs had never existed. But, ft
is presumptuous in man to hazard such an opi
nion in reference to any of the beneficent designs
of the Creator. We know not what relation the
minutest operations, within us or around us,
mny bear to the whole economy of nature, or
what disastrous effects might be produced, were
a single pin of the machinery of our bodies
broken or destroyed. The exhalations which
are, at this moment, rising from a putrid marsh
in the centre of New Holland, and hovering
in an invisible form, over that desolate region,
may be forming those identical clouds which,
the next month, shall water our fields and gar
dens, and draw forth from the flowers their aro
matic perfumes. The sense of smelling may
be essentially requisite to the perfection of
several of the other senses ; as we know that
the sense of feeling is inseperably connectea
with the senses of seeing, hearing, and tasting.
Let us consider, for a moment, some of the
agencies whieh require to be exerted when this
sense is exercised and gratified. Before we
could derive pleasure from the fragrance of a
flower, it was requisite that a system of the
finest tubes, filaments, and membranes should
be organized, endowed with powers of absorp
tion and perspiration, furnished with hundreds
of vessels for conveying the sap through all its
parts, and perforated with thousands of pores
to give passage to myriads of odoriferous par
ticles, secreted from the internal juices. It
was also requisite that the atmosphere should
be formed, for the purpose of affording nourish
ment to the plant, and for conveying its odo
riferous effluvia to the olfactory nerves. The
rains, the dews, the principle of heat, the re
volution of the seasons, the succession of day
and night, the principle of evaporation, the
agitation of the air by winds, and the solar
light, — all combine their influence and their
agencies in producing the grateful sensation we
feel from the smell of a rose. So that the sense
of smelling is not only connected with the agen
cy of all the terrestrial elements around us, but
bears a relation to the vast globe of the sun him
self; for an energy exerted at the distance of
ninety-five millions of miles, and a motion of
200,000 miles every second, in the particles of
light, are necessary to its existence ; and conse
quently, it forms one of the subordinate ends for
which that luminary was created : — and, being
related to the sun, it may bear a certain re/atio*

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

to similar agencies which that central globe is
producing among the inhabitants of surrounding
worlds.

Thus it appears, that the various senses of
man, as well as -the external objects which con
tribute to their gratification, are the results of
infinite wisdom and goodness, and calculated
to promote the happiness of sensitive and intel
ligent beings.

But, before any one of these senses could per
form its functions, it required to be united with
a most wonderful system of organization. The
heart required to be endowed with an immense
degree of muscular power, and to be set in ac
tion in the centre of this complicated system —
hundreds of arteries required to be bored, and
ramified, and arranged, to convey the blood to its
remotest extremities, and hundreds of veins to
bring it back again to its reservoir — thousands
of lacteal and lymphatic tubes to absorb nutri
ment from the food, and convey it to the circu
lating fluid — thousands of glands to secrete hu
mours that are noxious or redundant from the
mass of blood, and emunctories to throw them
oft' from the system — hundreds of muscles fot
moving the different members of the body, and
for conveying the whole corporeal frame from
place to place — hundreds of fine cords infinitely
ramified over the whole body, to convey sensa
tion to all its parts ; and thousands of millions of
perforations to be made in the skin, through
which the insensible perspiration might conti
nually flow. To support this fine and delicate
system of vessels, hundreds of bones of diver
sified forms, and different sizes, and connected
together by various modes of articulation, re
quired to be constructed and arranged, and nice
ly adapted to their peculiar functions ; and hun
dreds of tendons and ligaments, to connect these
bones with the muscles, and with every other
part of the animal frame. This machine re
quired to be preserved in constant action, whether
we be sleeping or waking, sitting or standing, in
motion or at rest. The heart required to give
ninety-six thousand strokes every twenty-four
hours, to send ofTstreams of the vital fluid through
hundreds of tubes, and to impel the whole mass
of blood through every part of the body every
four minutes. The lungs required to be in con
stant play, expanding and contracting their thou
sand vesicles, at least twenty times every mi
nute, to imbibe the oxygen of the atmosphere,
and to transmit its enlivening influence to the
circulating fluids — the stomach to be dissolving
the food, and preparing it for the nourishment of
the body — the liver and kidneys to be drawing
off their secretions — the lacteals to be extracting
nutritious particles, to be conveyed, by the ab
sorbent vessels, into the mass of blood — -and the
perspiration, which might otherwise c,og the
wheels of the whole machine, to be thrown off
incessantly through millions of pores. All this

curious and delicate machinery, constructed of
the most flabby substances, required to be put ID
motion, and to be preserved in action every mo
ment, before we could contemplate the beauties
of a landscape, be delighted with the sounds of
music, or inhale the fragrance of a rose.

It is worthy of notice, that, in the construc
tion and arrangement of these numerous and
complicated parts and functions, there is not a
single instance, that any physiologist can pro
duce, in which pain is the object of the contri
vance. Of all the thousands of adaptations
which infinite Wisdom has contrived, there is not
one but what has for its object the communication
of pleasure to the sentient being in which it is
found. If a number of small muscles are con
nected with the eye, it is for the purpose of
rendering that organ susceptible of a quick and
easy motion in every direction, to meet every
exigence. If the arteries are furnished with nu
merous valves, opening only in one direction, it
is intended to prevent the blood from returning
by a wrong course, and endangering the whole
structure of the animal machine. If a joint is
formed to move only in one direction, as the
joints of the fingers, it is intended to prevent
those inconveniences which would inevitably
have been felt, had it been capable of moving in
every direction. If another kind of joint is con
structed so as to move in every direction, it is
intended to enable us to perform, with facility,
those movements and operations which would
otherwise have been either impossible, or have
been attended with the greatest inconvenience
and pain. There are certain parts connected
with the human frame, whose precise use can
not be accurately determined, but this is owing
to our limited knowledge of the various functions
which are requisite to be performed in this com
plicated machine. In no instance whatever can
it be shown, that the infliction of pain is the ob
ject of any one part or function of whose use we
are uncertain ; — and it is conformable to the dic
tates of the soundest reason to conclude, that,
since every part, whose use we can ascertain, is
adapted to communicate pleasure, every other
part, throughout every branch of the animal sys
tem, is calculated to produce a similar effect.

It is true, indeed, that pain is frequently felt
in the different members which compose our
corporeal system ; but this is not owing to its
original construction, but to the derangement
which its parts receive, either from internal dis
ease or from external violence : and such conse
quences are the effects either of the folly of man,
in exposing his body to danger, or in using its
members for improper purposes, — or of the
physical changes which have happened in the
system of nature since man was created. — 01
of those depraved and immoral passions which
so frequently agitate and convulse his corporea*
frame.

WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD.

Let us now endeavour, if we can, to sum up a
few of the blessings which we enjoy from these
wise arrangements of our beneficent Creator.
In our bodies there are reckoned 245 bones, each
of them having forty distinct scopes or intentions,
and 446 muscles for the purpose of motion, each
having at least ten several intentions. All these
are ready every moment to perform their func
tions; and every breath we draw, whether we
be in motion or at rest, asleep or awake, a hun
dred muscles at least are in constant action. In
the act of breathing, we respire at least twenty
times every minute ; the heart exerts its muscu
lar force in propelling the blood into the arteries
sixty times every minute ; the stomach and ab
dominal muscles are every moment in action,
and the curious little bones of the ear are ever
ready to convey sensations of the softest whisper
to the brain. So that, without an hyperbole, or
the least extravagance of expression, it may
truly and literally be said, that we enjoy a thou
sand blessings every minute, and, consequently,
sixty thousand every hour, and one million four
hundred and forty thousand every day. For, if
any one of these numerous functions were to
stop, or to be interrupted, pain, and even death
itself might be induced. Let us ask the man
who is gasping for breath, under an incurable
asthma, or him who is smarting under the pain
of a toothache, or him who has wounded a nerve,
an artery, or a vein, or him who has dislocated
his shoulder-blade, if he would riot consider it as
a peculiar blessing to have the functions of na
ture restored to their original action ? And if
one member out of joint, or one function out of
order, produces so much pain and uneasiness,
how grateful ought we to feel for the thousands
of blessings we enjoy every moment, while the
wheels of the animal machine are moving on
with smoothness and harmony ! If we consider
the number of years during which these blessings
have been continued, — if we consider the mer
cies received in childhood, which have been long
overlooked or forgotten, — if we count the many
nights which we have passed in sound repose,
and the many days we have enjoyed without
bodily pain, — if we reflect on the numerous ob
jects of sublimity and beauty with which our
eyes have been delighted, the numerous sounds
which have charmed our ears and cheered our
hearts, and the numerous gratifications which
our other senses have received ; if we consider
how often food has been provided and adminis
tered for the nourishment of our bodies, and
from how many visible and invisible dangers we
have been delivered — and, if we view all these
countless blessings as proceeding every moment
from Him, " whose hands have made and fash
ioned us," and who " breathed into our nostrils
the breath of life," can we forbear to recognise
our Almighty Benefactor as worthy of our su
preme affection and our most lively gratitude ?

" For me, when I forget the darling theme,—
Be my tongue mute, my fancy paint no more,
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to heat."

Under an impression of the diversified agencies
of Divine Wisdom which are incessantly contri
buting to our enjoyment, and of the vast profu
sion of our Creator's beneficence which we be
hold around us, and experience every passing
hour, can we forbear exclaiming with the enrap
tured poet : —

" When all thy mercies, O my God!

My rising soul surveys,
Transported with the view, I'm lost

In wonder, love, and praise.
Through every period of my life

Tl.y goodness I'll proclaim ;
And, after death, in distant worlds,

Renew the glorious theme.
Through all eternity to Thee

A joyful song I'll rai
or, oh ! eternity 's too sh
To utter all thy praise."

If, then, the construction of our bodies, and
the terrestrial scene in which we are placed, pre
sent so many striking displays of wisdom and
benevolence, what an astonishing and transport
ing scene of divine benignity would burst upon
the view, were we permitted to explore those
more extensive provinces of the empire of Omni
potence, where physical and moral evil have
never shed their baleful influence to interrupt
the happiness of intellectual natures! Could
we soar beyond the regions of the planetary
system; could we penetrate into that immensity
of worlds and beings which are scattered in
magnificent profusion through the boundless
fields of ether ; could we draw aside the veil
which now conceals the grandeur and beauty of
their physical economy and arrangements ; could
we behold their inhabitants arrayed in robes of
beauty, with ecstatic joy beaming from their
countenances, basking perpetually in the regions
of bliss, united to one another by indissoluble
bands of love and affection, without the least
apprehension of evil, or of an interruption to
their enjoyments ; and looking forward with con
fidence to an interminable succession of delighted
existence; could we retrace the history of their
Creator's dispensations towards them since the
first moment of their existence, and the peculiar
displays of divine glory and benignity, that may
occasionally be exhibited to their view, — it is
more than probable, that all the displays of wi§-
dom and benevolence which we now behold, nu
merous as they are, would be thrown completely
into the shade, and that this world would appear
only as a Lazar-house, when compared with the
bright and transporting scenes of the celestial
worlds. This we are infallibly led to conclude,
in regard to a certain class of intelligences in
the future state, by the express declarations of
Scripture. For thus it is written, " Eye hath
not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into
the heart of man, the things whreh God hath

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

prepared for them that love him." And if re
novated men shall experience such superior en-
•o) mcnts in the eternal world, there can be no
doubt that all those intelligences, in every region,
who have retained their primitive integrity, are
at this moment in the possession of similar
transporting enjoyments. It must, therefore,
have an additional tendency to elevate our affec
tions to the Supreme Intelligence, when we
view Him not only communicating happiness to
the 'Various tribes of beings which people our
globe, but also distributing streams of felicity in
boundless profusion, among the inhabitants of
unnumbered worlds

1 shall now conclude my illustrations of this
topic, by exhibiting a few instances of the wis
dom and goodness of God as delineated in the
Sacred Scriptures.

" The Lord is good to all, and his tender mer
cies are over all his works He stretched forth
the heavens, and laid the foundation of the earth,
and foimeth the spirit of man within him. He
planted the ear, and formed the eye ; and he
breathed into our nostrils the breath of life. In
his hand is the soul of every living thing, and the
breath of all mankind. "With him is wisdom and
strength, and his understanding is infinite. He
is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.
He hath established the world by his wisdom,
and stretched out the heavens by his understand
ing. O the depth of the riches both of the wis
dom and the knowledge of God! how unsearcha
ble are his operations, and his ways past finding
out ! He causeth the vapours to ascend from
the ends of the earth ; he bindeth up the wa
ters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not
rent under them. He hath compassed the wa
ters with hounds, until the clay and night come
to an end. He visiteth the earth and water-
eth it , he greatly enricheth it with rivers ; he
prepareth corn for its inhabitants ; he water-
eth the ridges thereof abundantly ; he settleth
the furrows thereof; he maketh it soft with
showers ; he blesseth the springing thereof; he
crowneth the year with his goodness, and his
paths drop fatness. The pastures are clothed
with flocks ; the valleys are covered over with
corn, and the little hills are encircled with joy.*

" He sendeth the springs into the valleys
which run among the hills ; they give drink to
every beast of the field. Beside these springs
the fowls of heaven have their habitation, which
sing among the branches. He causeth the grass
*o grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of
man ; and wine that maketh glad the heart of
man, and oil that maketh his face to shine, and
bread that strengtheneth his heart. He planted
the tall trees and the cedars of Lebanon, where

* In this, and several other quotations from the
Scriptures, the literal rendering from the Hebrew is
substituted in place of the common translation, and
the supplements arc frequently omitted.

the birds make their nests, and the storks ihcir
dwellings. The high hills are a refuge for the
wild goats, and the rocks for the conies. He
appointed the moon for seasons, and the sun to
enlighten the world ; he makes darkness a cur
tain for the night, till the sun arise, when man
goeth forth to his work and to his labour till the
evening. How manifold are thy works, O Lord i
In wisdom hast ihou made them all ; the earth is
full of thy riches ; so is the great arid wide sea,
wherein are things creeping innumerable, both
small and great beasts. These all wait upon thee,
that thou mayest give them their meat in due
season. Thou givest them — they gather ; thou
openest thine hand — they are filled with good.
Thou hidest thy face — they are troubled ; thou
sendest forth thy spirit — they are created ; and
thou renewest the face of the earth. The glory
of the Lord shall endure for ever ; Jehovah shall
rejoice in all his works. He is Lord of heaven
and earth ; he giveth to all, life, and breath, and
all things ; he hath made of one blood all nations
of men, to dwell on all the face of the earth ; and
hath determined the times before appointed, and
the bounds of their habitation. For in him we
live, and move, and have our being. I will sing
unto Jehovah as long as I live ; I will sing prai
ses to my God, while I have my being ; I will
utter abundantly the memory of his great good
ness, and speak of all his wondrous works."

The inspired writers rise tostill higher strains
when they celebrate the Divine Goodness in re
ference to our eternal salvation.

" Praise ye Jehovah, for Jehovah is good ; he
remembered us in our low estate; for his mercy
endureth for ever. I will praise thee, O Lord,
my God, with all my heart, and I will glorify thy
name for evermore ; for great is thy mercy toward
me, and thou hast delivered my soul from the
lowest hell. God so loved the world, that he
gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever be-
lieveth on him should not perish, but have ever
lasting life. He sent an angel fr»rn the celestial
glory to announce his birth : and a multitude of
the heavenly host to proclaim, Glory lo God in
the highest, peace on earth, arid good will to
men. He spared not his own Son, but delivered
him up for us all — and shall he not with him also
freely give us all things ? Blessed be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath
blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
things in Christ ; in whom we have redemption
through h.s blood, the forgiveness of sins, ac
cording to the riches of his grace. — Bless the
Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless
his holy name ; whoforgiveth all thine iniquities,
who healeth all thy diseases ; who redeemeth thy
life from destruction, and crowneth thee with lov
ing kindness and tender mercies. As the heaven
is high above the earth, so great is his mercy
toward them that fear him. The mercy of Je
hovah is from everlasting to everlasting, upon

MERCY AND PATIENCE OF GOD.

them that fear him ; and his righteousness unto
children's children. Many, O Lord, my God, are
thy wonderful works, which thou hast done, and
thy thought? to us ward ; they cannot be reckoned
up in order unto thee; if I would declare and
speak of them, they are more than can be num
bered. — I will praise thee, for I am fearfully and
wonderfully made : marvellous are thy works.
How precious are thy thoughts (or designs)
towards me, O God ! how great is the sum of
them ! If I should count them, they are more
in number than the sand."

Thus it appears, that both the system of na
ture, and the system of revelation, concur in
exhibiting the wisdom and benevolence of the
Deity as calculated to excite the highest degree
of ardent affection in the minds of the whole in
telligent creation. If an atom of gratitude is
due to an earthly benefactor, it is impossible to
set bounds to that affection and gratitude which
ought incessantly to rise in our hearts towards
the Creator of the universe, who is the " Father
of mercies, and the God of all consolation."
And, therefore, we need not wonder, that " holy
men of old," whose minds were overpowered
with this sacred emotion, broke out into language
which would be deemed extravagant, by the frigid
moralists of the present, age. Under a sense of
the unbounded love and goodness of God, the
psalmist felt his heart elated, and formed these
pious resolutions : " Seven times a day will I
praise thee, O Lord ! At midnight will I rise to
give thanks to thee, because of thy righteous
precepts, I will rejoice in the way of thy pre
cepts, as much as in all riches. The law of thy
mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold
and silver. Oh, how I love thy law! it is my
meditation all the day. I will speak of thy tes
timonies before kings, and will not be ashamed
of thy commandments. Whom have I in heaven
but thee 1 and there is none upon earth that I
desire beside thee. As the hart panteth after
the brooks of water, so panteth my soul after
thee, O God !" Under similar emotions, the
Apostle Paul exclaims, "I am persuaded that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principal
ities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things
to come, shall be ab.e to separate us from the
'ove of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

SECTION V.

ON THE MEBCY AND PATIENCE OF GOD.

Another feature in the divine character, which
is peculiarly calculated to excite admiration, af
fection, and gratitude, is the mercy and patience
of God.

Mercy has its source in the divine goodness,
and may be considered as a particular modifica

tion of the benevolence of the Deity. Goodness
is the genus, mercy the species. The goodnesi
of God extends to all the creatures he has formed,
of whatever description or character, — to the
fowls of the air, the fishes of the sea, the micro
scopic animalcula, and the most wicked class of
human beings, as well as to angels, archangels,
and other superior intelligences. Mercy can
have a reference only to those who have sinned
against their Maker, and rendered themselves
unworthy of his favours. It consists in the be-
stowment of blessings upon those who have for
feited every claim to them, and have rendered
themselves obnoxious to punishment. It cannot
be exercised toward " the angels who have kept
their first estate," or towards any other class of
holy intelligences, because they do not stand in
need of its exercise. — The patience or forbear
ance of God, is that attribute of his nature which
consists in his bearing long with sinners, and
refraining from inflicting deserved punishment,
notwithstanding their impenitence, and long-
continued provocations.

These attributes are seldom displayed, in our
world, by one man, or class of men, towards
another. Instead of clemency, mercy, and for
bearance, we find in the character of mankind,
as delineated in the page of history, the princi
ple of revenge operating more powerfully than
almost any other disposition ; and, therefore,
when any striking instance of mercy and long-
suffering is exhibited in human conduct, we are
disposed to wonder at it, and to admire it as an
extraordinary moral phenomenon. When we be
hold a personage who is possessed of every de
gree of moral and physical power for crushing his
enemies — yet remaining calm and tranquil, and
forbearing to execute deserved punishment, not
withstanding repeated insults and injuries, we
are led to admire such qualities, as indicating a
certain degree of greatness and benevolence of
mind. On this principle, we admire the for
bearance of David, the anointed king of Israel,
towards Saul, his bitterest enemy, when he had
an opportunity of slaying him at the cave of En-
gedi ; and afterwards, when he was sleeping in
a trench at Hachila; — and at the clemency
which he exercised tawards Shitnei, who had
cursed and insulted him, and treated him most
reproachfully. On the same principle, we ad
mire the conduct of Sir Walter Raleigh, a man
of known courage and honour, towards a certain
rash, hot-headed youth. Being very injuriously
treated by this impertinent mortal, who next pro
ceeded to challenge him, and, on his refusal, spit
on him, and that too in public ; — the knight ta
king out his handkerchief, with great calmness,
made him only this reply : " Young man, if 1
could as easily wipe your blood from my con
science, as I can this injury from my face, I
•would this moment take away your life."

In order to exhibit the mercy and long-suf-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

fering of the Deity in their true light, let us con
sider, for a moment, some of the leading features
in the conduct and the character of mankind. —
Whether we go back to the remote ages of an
tiquity, or review the present moral state of the
inhabitants of our globe, we shall find the fol
lowing, among other similar traits, in the charac
ter of the great mass of this world's population ;
— An utter forgetfulness of God, and the preva
lence of abo7ninable idolatries. Though an invi
sible and omnipotent energy may be clearly per
ceived in that majestic machinery by which the
vault of heaven appears to be whirled round our
globe from day today ; and though every return
ing season proclaims the exuberant goodness of
that Being who arranged our terrestrial habita
tion, — yet, of the great majority of human beings
that have hitherto existed, or now exist, it may
with truth be said, that " God is not in all their
thoughts, and the fear of God is not before their
eyes." Arid how grovelling have been the con
ceptions of those who have professed to offer
their adorations to a superior Intelligence ! They
have changed the glory of the incorruptible God
into an image made like to corruptible man, and
have invested with the attributes of divinity a
3lock of marble, the stock of a tree, a stupid ox,
and a crawling reptile : to which they have paid
hat worship and homage which were due to the
Almighty Maker of heaven and earth. — Blas
phemy and impiety is another characteristic of
tie majority of our species. How many have
tiere been of our wretched race in all ages, and
how many are there in the present age, who
' set their mouths against the heavens in their
blasphemous talk," and " dare defy the Omnipo-
tsnt to arms!" They say to God, "Depart
from us, for we desire not the knowledge of thy
ways : What is the Almighty, that we should
serve him ? and what profit should we have, if
we pray unto him ?" While his hand is making
their pulse to beat, and their lungs to play, and
vhile he is distributing to them corn, and wine,
and fruits in rich abundance, they are blasphe
ming his venerable Majesty, and prostituting
these very blessings for the purpose of pouring
dishonour on his name.

The diabolical passions which men have dis
played towards one another, is another striking
trait in their character. War has been their
employment and their delight in every age.
Thousands of rational beings of the same spe
cies have set themselves in array against thou
sands, and have levelled at each other spears, and
arrows, and darts, and musquetry, and cannon,
and every other instrument of destruction, till
legs and arms, and skulls, and brains, were min
gled with the dust — till the earth was drenched
with human gore — till cities, and towns, and
villages, were tumbled into ruins, or given, up as
a prey to the devouring flames — and till the
bounties of Providence, which God had provi

ded for man and beast, were destroyed, and
trampled down as the mire of the streets. And,
what adds to the enormity of such dreadful pas
sions, they have often had the effrontery to im
plore the assistance of the God of mercy in this
work of horror and destruction. When, to al.
these abominable dispositions and practices, we
add, the the numerous other acts of atrocity,
that are daily committed in every quarter of the
world, — the oppression and injustice which the
poor, the widow, and the fatherless have suffered
from the overwhelming hand of power ; the per
secutions which tyranny has inflicted on the se
lect few, who have raised their voices against
such abominations ; the falsehood, and treachery,
and perjury, which are rampant in every land ,
the lewd and unnatural crimes that are daily
committed ; the thefts, and murders, and assas
sinations, that are incessantly perpetrating in
some one region of the world or another ; the
haughty pride and arrogance which so many of
the puny sons of men assume ; the murmurings
and complainings at the dispensations of Provi
dence, and the base ingratitude with which the
majority of mankind receive the bounties of
heaven ; — and when we consider, for how many
thousands of years these abominable dispositions
have been displayed, we have reason to wonder
that condign punishment is not speedily executed,
and that the Almighty does not interpose his
omnipotence, to shatter this globe to atoms, and
to bury its inhabitants in the gulf of everlasting
oblivion.

Yet, notwithstanding these depraved and un
grateful dispositions ; notwithstanding that this
spacious world, which was erected for a temple
to the Deity, has been turned into a temple of
idols, its seas and rivers stained, and its fields
drenched with the blood of millions of human
beings, and its cities transformed into a sink of
moral pollution ; in spite of all these innumerable
and aggravated provocations, the God of heaven
still exercises his mercy, long-suffering, and for
bearance. He impels the earth in its annual and
diurnal course, to bring about the interchanges
of day and night, and the vicissitudes of the
seasons ; he makes his sun to arise on the world,
to cheer the nations with his light and heat ; he
sends his rains, to refresh the fields, both of
" the just, and of the unjust ;" he causes the
trees, the herbs, and the flowers, to bud arid blos
som every returning spring ; he ripens the fields in
harvest ; he crowns the year with his bounty, and
encircles the little hills with rejoicing. Instead
of " sending forth his mighty winds," in inces
sant storms and hurricanes, to tear up wh?le
forests by their roots, and to lay waste the pro
ductions of the soil, he fans the groves and the
lawns with gentle breezes, and odoriferous gales.
Instead of opening the cataracts of heaven, and
dashing down overwhelming torrents, to deluge
the plains, and frustrate the hopes of man, he

MERCY AND GOODNESS OF SOD.

refreshes the parched ground with gentle show
ers, as if they proceeded from a watering-pot.
Instead of confining our sensitive enjoyments to
bread and water, as if we were the tenants of a
jail, he has strewed our gardens and fields with
every variety of luxuriant delicacies, to gratify
every appetite. Instead of directing the light
nings to set on fire the mountains, and to level
our cities to the ground, and the thunders to roll
incessantly around us, he commands this terrific
meteor to visit us only at distant intervals, and
in its gentler operations, just to remind us what
tremendous instruments of destruction he is ca
pable of wielding, and that we ought to " be still
and know that He is God," and that " he has
punished us less thin our iniquities deserve."
O that man would praise the Lord for his mer
cy, and for his long-suffering towards the chil
dren of men !

This character of God is peculiar to himself,
and cannot be supposed to belong, unless in a
very inferior degree, to any created intelligence.
Were the meekest man that ever appeared on the
theatre of our world — or were even one of the
highest intelligences in heaven to be invested
with a portion of the attribute of omniscience ;
could he penetrate, at one glance, over all that
hemisphere of our globe on which the sun shines,
and, at the next glance, survey the other hemi
sphere which is enveloped in darkness ; could his
eye pierce into the secret chambers of every habi
tation of human beings, in every city, and town,
and village, and especially into those haunts where
crimes are veiled by the shades of night from
every human eye ; could he behold at one glance
all the abominations that are hourly perpetrating
in every region of the world — the pagan wor
shippers in Thibet and Hindostan, performing
their cruel and execrable rites — the wheels of
Juggernaut crushing to death its wretched devo
tees — the human victims which are tortured and
sacrificed, to gratify the ferocity of some bar
barous chief — the savage hordes of New Zea
land, feasting on the flesh of their fellow-men,
whom they have cruelly butchered, and drinking
their blood out of human skulls — the Indians of
America, tearing with pincers the flesh of their
prisoners, and enjoying a diabolical pleasure in
beholding their torments — the haughty inquisi
tors of Spain insulting their devoted victims,
in the name of the merciful Saviour, and prepar
ing tortures, and stakes, and flames for their de
struction — the assassin plunging his dagger into
'

vious man devising schemes for the ruin and
destruction of his neighbour — the mutinous
crew, in the midst of the ocean, rising up against
their superiors, slashing them with their sabres,
and plunging their bodies into the deep — the
gamester ruining a whole family by a throw of
the dice — the skeptic sporting with the most
sacred truths — the atheist attempting to defy the
Omnipotent — the prostitute wallowing in the
mire of uncleanness — the drunkard blaspheming
the God of heaven in his midnight revels — nu
merous tribes of human beings, in every quarter
of the globe, dashing out each other's brains in
mutual combat — hypocritical professors of reli
gion, harbouring malice and revenge against their
brethren — and thousands of other iniquitous
scenes which are daily presented before the pure
eyes of Omniscience ; could he behold all the
abominable acts of this description which are
perpetrated on the surface of our globe, in
the course of a single day, and were the elements
under his control, for executing condign punish
ment on transgressors, — it is more than probable,
that, before another day dawned upon the world,
the great globe we inhabit would be shattered to
its centre, and enveloped in devouring flames.
For no finite intelligence could refrain his in
dignation for a length of years, or could pene
trate into all the reasons, why "sentence against
an evil work should not be speedily executed ;"
why the murderer should not be arrested by death
before his hand is lifted up to strike ; why thi>
tyrant should not be cut off before his victims
are secured ; and why the slave should be doom
ed to drag out so many long years under the rod
of a relentless master. But God beholds all
these actions in all their bearings and relations
to the plan of his government, and in all their
eternal consequences ; and beholding them, he
" keeps silence," and refrains from executing
immediate and deserved punishment.

This part of the divine character, when seri
ously considered, is calculated to excite strong
emotions of admiration and wonder : and these
emotions must be raised to their highest pitch,
when we consider the many instruments of ven
geance which are every moment wielded by the
hand of the Almighty. If forbearance were
owing to impotence, or a want of means for the
infliction of retributive justice, our admiration
would cease. But all the elements of nature are
under the immediate control of the Governor of
the universe ; and, in a thousand modes incom-

his neighbour's bosom — the midnight robber en- prehensible by us, He could make them tho in-

tering into the abode of honest industry, stran- struments of his vengeance to ehastist a guilty

glingits inmates, and carrying off their treasures world. "For in his hand is the soui of every

— the kidnapper tearing the poor African from living thing, and the breath of all mankind." Let

his wife and children, and native land — the un- us consider, for a little, some of those agents

feeling planter and overseer lashing his degraded which lie within the sphere of our knowledge in

slaves — tyrants and persecutors dragging " the the system of nature.

excellent ones of the earth" to prisons, to dun- Of all the elements of nature, there is none

geons, and to gibbets — the malevolent and en- more delightful and beautiful in its effects thaj

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

ligld. " Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant
thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun." It
diffuses a thousand shades of colouring over the
hills, the vales, the rivers, and the boundless deep,
and opens to our view the glorious host of hea
ven. Yet this delightful visitant, by a slight
modification, from the hand of Omnipolence, is
capable of being transformed into the most de
structive element in nature. Light flies from the
sun at the rate of 200,000 miles in a second of
time ; and it is owing to its particles being al
most infinitely small, that we feel no inconveni
ence from their rapid velocity. But, were the
Creator to condense several millions of these
particles into one, or impel them with a still
greater velocity, the solid crust of our globe
would be perforated and shattered in every point
by this celestial artillery, and its inhabitants
would soon be battered to atoms.

Again, the atmosphere which surrounds us,
and in which we live and breathe ; which con
tains the principles of Jife ; which fans u£ with
its gentle gales, and wafts to our ears the har
monies of music — is capable of being converted
into an instrument of terror and destruction. It
is composed chiefly of two different ingredients ;
one of these is the principle of flame, — and if
the other ingredient were extracted from the at
mosphere, and this principle left to exert its na
tive energy without control, instantly the forests
would be in a blaze 5 the hardest metals, and the
most solid rocks, would melt like wax; the wa
ters of the ocean would add fuel to the raging
element; and, in a few minutes, the whole ex
panse of our glebe would be enveloped in one
devouring flame.

Again, the globe on which we reside is whirl
ing round its axis every twenty-four hours, and
is carried round the sun with a still greater ve
locity. Should that Almighty arm which first
impelled it, in its career, cause these motions
suddenly to cease, mountains would be tumbled
into the sea, forests torn up by their roots, cities
overthrown and demolished, all nature would be
thrown into confusion, and terror and destruction
would overwhelm the inhabitants of the world.
Not only the stopping of the earth's motions,
but even a new direction given to its axis of ro
tation, would be productive of the most fatal
effects. The earth's axis at present is directed
to certain points of the heavens, from which it
never deviates, but in a very small degree ; but
were the hand of Omnipotence to bend it so as
to make it point in a different direction, the ocean
would abandon its present bed, and overflow the
land ; and a second universal deluge would over
whelm all the monuments of human grandeur,
and sweep the earth's inhabitants into a watery
grave.

Again, not only the. elements which immedi
ately surround us, but even celestial bodies which
arfl just now invisible to our sight, and removed

to the distance of a thousand rniilions of miles
might be employed as ministers of vengeance.
There are at least a hundred comets connected
with the solar system, which are moving in all
directions, and crossing the orbits of the earth,
and the other planets. Were the orbit of one of
these bodies, in its approach to the sun, to be
bent in a direction to that of the earth, the mos*.
alarming phenomena wotun DC exhibited in the
heavens. A ruddy globe, larger in appearance
than the moon, would first announce terror to the
inhabitants of the earth — every day this terrific
object would increase in size, till it appeared to
fill the celestial hemisphere with its tremendous
disk; — the light of the sun would be eclipsed —
the stars would disappear — the ocean would be
thrown into violent agitation, and toss its billows
to the clouds — the earth would " reel to and fro,
like a drunkard" — and universal alarm and con
fusion would seize upon all the tribes of the liv
ing world. At length, this tremendous orb would
approach with accelerated velocity, and, striking
the earth with a crash, as if heaven and earth
had burst asunder, would shiver the globe into
fragments, and for ever exterminate the race of
man.

It will at once be admitted, oy every one who
acknowledges the incessant agency of a Supreme
Being in the movements of the universe, that any
one, or all of these effects combined, are within
the compass of Omnipotence ; and not only so,
but they might all be accomplished with terrific
energy in the course of a few moments. If puny
man, by his mechanical dexterity, can suddenly
stop a stupendous machine which he has put in
motion — if he can impel red-hot balls at the rate
of 500 miles an hour — if he can extract the oxy
gen from a small portion of the atmosphere, and
cause it to set on fire the hardest metallic sub
stances — we cannot doubt for a moment, that,
with infinitely greater ease, the Almighty could
stop the earth in its career, separate the compo
nent parts of the atmosphere, set on fire the
foundations of the mountains, or impel the blaz
ing comet towards the earth, to crush it to atoms.
That God has been a constant specifier of tho
wickedness of man for four thousand years ; that
he has, during all that period, wielded in his
hands so many terrific miniiteps of vengeance ;
and that he has hitherto refrained from executing
deserved punishment on the workers of iniquity
— is, therefore, a striking evidence that his mercy
is infinite, and that he is " long-suffering and
slow to anger, not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance."

Il would, however, be a most unwarrantable
conclusion, from this circumstance, to imagine
that God beholds with indifference the scenes of
iniquity that are hourly presented before him. In
order to show that he is not an unconcerned spec
tator of the ways of men, and that, the instru
ments of punishment are always in his hand, he

MERCY AND PATIENCE OF GOD

sometimes " cometh out of his place, to punish
the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity,"
and displays the holiness of his nature, by " ter
rible things in righteousness." In such visita
tions, " his way is in the whirlwind and the
storm ; clouds and darkness are round about him ;
a fire goeth before him, and burneth up his ene
mies round about ; the stormy winds are his
messengers, and flames of fire his ministers ; the
clouds pour out their waters ; the sky sends forth
a sound ; the voice of his thunder is in the hea
vens ; his lightnings enlighten the world ; the
earth quakes and the people tremble." The hur
ricane, which tears up whole forests by the roots,
and tosses them abo.it as stubble, which levels
the loftiest spires with the ground, and dashes the
stateliest ships against each other, till they are
broken into shivers, and plunged into the deep ;
the lightnings, which fill the atmosphere with
their blaze, which shatter the strongest buildings,
and strike whole herds of cattle into a lifeless
group; the pestilence, " which walketh in dark
ness," and cuts off thousands of its victims in a
day ; the volcano, belching forth rivers of fire,
causing surrounding cities to tremble, and send
ing forth its bellowings over a circuit of a thou
sand miles ;— these, and many other agents which
are in operation in the system of nature, are ex
perimental proofs of the dreadful energy of those
ministers of destruction, which are constantly
under the superintendence of the A'mighty, and
of his occasionally using them for the purpose of
chastising the nations for their iniquities.

In particular, the earthquake is one of the most
terrible and destructive instruments of vengeance.
In the year 1755, the shock of an earthquake was
felt at Lisbon, which levelled to the ground more
than half of that populous city, and buried fifty
Ihousand of its inhabitants in the ruins. The
shock extended its influence over an extent of
four millions of square miles ; and therefore, it
is easy to conceive, that, had a little greater im
pulse been given to the physical agents which
produced this terrible effect, the solid globe on
which we stand might have been convulsed to its
centre, and all its inhabitants crushed to death,
amidst the universal ruin.

We have also an experimental proof, that
there are physical principles in the constitution
of our globe, sufficient to give it a shock through
out every part of its solid mass, and that such a
shock, at one period, it actually received. When
the wickedness of man became great upon the
earth, " when every imagination of the thoughts
of his heart was only evil continually," the
fountains of the great deep were broken up, the
cataracts of heaven were opened, and the whole
solid crust of our globe received such a shock as
rent the mountains asunder, and hurled them
into the p'.airis ; the effects cf which are stil!
visible, in every Alpine district, and in the sub
terraneous caverns of the earth. Of all the
23

millions of the race of Adam that then existed,
only eight individuals, after having been tosseo
for seven months on the tremendous billows of a
boundless ocean, survived, to tell to their poste
rity the tidings of this universal wreck. The
dreadful scenes of horror and consternation
which must have been presented at this awfui
crisis ; the stupendous forces which must have
been in operation in the atmosphere above, and
in the foundations of the earth beneath, and the
tremendous clash of elemental war which must
have ensued, throughout every region of earth,
air, and sea, — it is beyond the power of the
human imagination to depict, in all their terrific
grandeur. But we have every reason to con
clude, that the bottom of the ocean was lifted up
to the level of the loftiest mountains, that disrup
tions of the mountains and of the densest rocks en
sued, that dreadful explosions resounded through
out the whole expanse of nature, and that the
mighty waters hurled their billows with resist
less fury in every direction, rolling immense
rocks and forests from one continent to another,
and whirling the wrecks of different regions to
the opposite extremities of the globe.

Were it at any time the intention of the
Almighty to inflict deserved punishment on a
particular district, or class of men, without de
ranging the whole structure of our globe, we hav«
also an experimental proof how easily this could
be effected, even without infringing the esta
blished laws of nature. He has only to condense
the powerful energies of the electrical fluid in a
large cloud, and lo despatc-h it on the wings of
the wind, to discharge its thunderbolts on any
particular city, or mountain, or plain, — and the
work of destruction is instantly accomplished.
A striking instance of this kind happened, in
the year 1772, in the island of Java, in the East
Indies. On the llth of August, at the dead
hour of night, a bright cloud was observed cover
ing a mountain in the district of Cheribon, and
at the same moment several reports were heard,
like those of a cannon. The people who dwelt
on the upper parts of the mountain not being able
to fly with sufficient swiftness, a great part of
the cloud, about nine miles in circumference,
detached itself under them, and was seen at a
distance, rising and falling like the waves of the
sea, and emitting globes of fire so luminous, that
the night became as clear as day. The effects
of this dreadful explosion were astonishing.
Every thing was destroyed for twenty miles
around. The houses were demolished ; the
plantations were buried in the earth ; vast num
bers of goats, sheep, and horses, and 1500 head
of cattle were destroyed ; and above two thou
sand human beings were in a moment plunged
into the gulf of eternity.* " Witi. God is terri-

* In this, and the other illustrations of this subject
stated above, I consider the Divine Being as the
grand agent in directing the operations of th» ele

54

THE PHILOSOPHY OF H^LIGION.

t»Ie majesty. Who can stand before his indig
nation ? who can abide in the fierceness of his
anger? The mountains quake before him ; the
hills melt, and the earth is burned at his pre
sence." — " Let all the earth fear the Lord; let
all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of
him."

Thus it appears, that God is not an unconcern
ed .spectator of the ways of men — that he has
every moment at his command the most de
structive elements of nature — and that we have
abundant proofs that these destructive elements
have been occasionally used, for inflicting con
dign punishment on the workers of iniquity.
Notwithstanding these resources of vengeance,
we find, by experience, that his mercy is exer
cised, from year to year, and from century to cen
tury, towards a world, the majority of whose
inhabitants are daily trampling under foot his sa
cred institutions, and his holy laws. The in
stances which occur, of the devastations of the
hurricane, the thunder, the volcano, the earth
quake, and the pestilence, are comparatively few,
and seem intended chiefly to arouse the attention
of thoughtless arid ungrateful man ; to prevent
him from running to the extreme of wickedness ;
and to convince him that the Most High ruleth
in the kingdoms of men," and that " verily
there is a God who judgeth in the earth." Hence
we may perceive the striking emphasis of the
language of the inspired writers : " The Lord
is slow to anger ," and yet " great inpower."

This display of the exercise of perfect self-
command in the Divine Mind, is, therefore,
calculated, as well as his wisdom and goodness,
to inspire us with emotions of reverence, admi
ration, and love. " The Lord is merciful and

ments, but without infringing those general laws
which are found to operate with undeviating con
stancy in the system of the universe. To explore
the'manner in which these general laws are directed
to produce certain specific effects, in reference to
particular regions and tribes of mankind, must ob
viously be beyond the limits of our faculties ; unless
we could enter into all the designs of the Eternal
Mind, when he gave birth to the universe, and ar
ranged its elementary parts ; and unless we could
take a comprehensive view of the remotest tenden
cies of the elements of nature, and the times and
circumstances in which they shall produce a specific
and extraordinary effect. All these tendencies and
circumstances were before the mind of the Eternal
Jehovah, when he established the plan of his moral
government ; and, therefore, whatever events may
occur in the physical system, must be considered as
the accomplishment of his moral purposes, in refer
ence to the moral agents he has created. It would
be presumptuous in so limited a being as man, to
determine, in every case, what is the precise moral
reason of the extraordinarv Destructive effects of
physical agents. We can only say, in general, that
they are connected with the sin and depravity of
man. But, at that solemn day, when the reasons of
the divine dispensations shall be laid open, it will
perhaps be frund, that such uncommon and alarm
ing effects were the punishmeut of aggravated
transgressions, the peculiar malignity and tendency
of which were removed, in a great measure, beyond
Ihe sphere of general observation,

gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy
As the heaven is high above the earth, so grea
is his mercy toward them that fear him. Bless
the Lord, O my soul, and forget riot all hii

benefits.'

SECTION VI.

OF THE RECTITUDE OF THE DIVINE
CHARACTER.

Another perfection in the character of God,
which is calculated to inspire confidence and af
fection, is his Justice, or, the Rectitude of his
nature.

The rectitude of the Divine Being, in its most
extensive sense, consists in doing that which, in
all cases, is right, upon the whole ; or, in other
words, that which will have the greatest ten
dency to promote the order and happiness of his
universal empire. It. includes under it, the
idea of distributive justice, which consists in re
warding the good, and punishing the bad, ac
cording to equitable laws, calculated to produce
harmony and happiness throughout the whole
intelligent system. This perfection of the Deity
may be considered as a branch of his general
benevolence, which appears to be the source of
all his moral attributes, and the spring of all
his actions. The display of his natural and
moral perfections, and the general happiness of
the intelligences which exist throughout his im
mense and eternal empire, appear to be the great
objects in view, in his moral government of the
universe : and, in order to secure these objects,
it is requisite that justice be impartially admi
nistered, according to the eternal rules of recti
tude, and that ~l every one be rewarded according
to his works."

That this attribute is possessed by the Divine
Being, in the highest degree, appears from the
following considerations. He exists, and has
always existed, completely independent of all his
creatures ; he is in the actual possession of
boundless felicity, which no other being can in
terrupt ; and is consequently liable to no evil,
nor diminution of enjoyment. He is omnipotent ,
and therefore can accomplish whatever he plea
ses, and can effectually prevent whatever might
detract from his happiness, or disturb the order
of his government. He has, therefore, nothing
to fear from any other being, and can desire
nothing from his creatures to increase his feli
city. Consequently, no possible motive or temp
tation can exist, to induce him to inflict an act of
injustice on any of the intellectual beings he has
formed. Injustice, among men, proceeds either
from want of intelligence to discriminate be
tween what is right and wrong ; from want of
power to bring their purposes into effect; fn>m

JUSTICE OF GOD.

35

the fear of some evil or disadvantage which may
arise from the impartial distribution of justice;
from the idea of some imaginary good of which
they might be deprived ; from some mental de
fect incident to the present state of humanity ;
from some prejudice against the individuals to
wards whom justice ought to be administered ;
or from the indulgence of some cruel and de
praved dispositions. But none of these causes
or motives can exist in the mind of the All-per
fect and infinite Creator. His comprehensive
eye takes in, at one glance, all the circumstances,
even the most minute, on which a righteous de
cision depends ; he is no " respecter of per
sons ;" he can indulge no malevolent disposi
tions ; he can expect no accession of enjoyment
from an act of injustice ; he has nothing to fear
from the execution of his decisions ; his power is
all-sufficient to bring them into full effect, at the
time, and in the manner, which is most condu
cive to the happiness of the universe ; and his be
nevolence, which is displayed throughout all his
works, effectually prevents him from withholding
good, or inflicting evil, beyond the desert of the
subjects of his government.

This character of the Deity is amply exhibit
ed and confirmed in the declarations of Sacred
Scripture, where it is asserted, that " He is a
God of truth, and without iniquity ; just and
right is he." " Thou art just," says Nehemiah,
liin all that is brought upon us ; for thou hast
done right, but we have done wickedly." " Shall
mortal man be more just than God? Surely God
will not do wickedly, neither will the Almighty
pervert judgment. Wilt thou condemn Him
that is most just? Is it fit to say to a king,
Thou art wicked ; or to princes, Ye are ungod
ly ? How much less to him who accepteth not
the persons of princes, nor regardeth the rich
more than the poor?" — " The righteous Lord
loveth righteousness; he shall judge the world in
righteousness; he shall minister judgment to the
people in uprightness. Justice and judgment
are the foundation of his throne. The Lord our
God is righteous in all his works which he
doth." " I am the Lord who exercise judgment
and righteousness in the earth." " God is not
unrighteous to forget your work and labour of
>ove which ye have showed towards his name. —
Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God
Almighty ; just and true are thy ways, thou King
of saints." The equitable laws which he has pro
mulgated to his creatures ; the justice he re
quires to be exercised by one man to another ;
his promises of reward, and his threatenings of
punishment; and the impressive judgments
which he has executed on individuals, on nations,
and on the world at large, all bear testimony to
the existence of perfect rectitude in the divine
character.

But, although Scripture and Reason combine
in attesting the immutable justice of God, we are

unable, in many instances, to trace the display
of this perfection in his dispensations towards the
inhabitants of our world. This is owing, in part,
to the false maxims by which we form a judgment
of his procedure ; to the limited views we are
obliged to take of the objects of his government;
to the want of a comprehensive knowledge of the
whole plan of his dispensations, and the ends to
be effected by them ; to the limited views we
have acquired of the whole range of his univer
sal dominions ; and to our ignorance of the rela
tions which may subsist between our world and
the inhabitants of other provinces of the divine
Empire. We behold many of " the excellent of
the earth," pining in the abodes of poverty, and
almost unnoticed by their fellow-men ; while we
behold the wicked elevated to stations of power,
and encircled with riches and splendour. From
a false estimate of true enjoyment, we are apt
to imagine, that misery surrounds the one, and
"that happiness encircles the other; and that
there is an apparent act of injustice in these dif
ferent allotments ; whereas, God may have placed
the one in the midst of worldly prosperity as a
punishment for his sins, and the other in obscu
rity, as a stimulus to the exercise of virtue. We
behold a man of piety and benevolence falling
before the dagger of an assassin, who escapes
with impunity : we are startled at the dispensa
tion, and confounded at the mystery of provi
dence, and are apt to exclaim, " Is there not a
God that judgeth in the earth ?" But, we are ig
norant of the relation which such an event bears
to the general plan of the divine government—
of the links in the chain of events which preced
ed it, and of those which shall follow in its train.
We are ignorant of the relation it bears to par
ticular families and societies, or to the nation at
large in which it happened, and even to all the
nations ol the earth. An event apparently trivial,
or mysterious, or, according to our views, un
just, may, for aught we know, form an essential
link in that chain of events which extends from
the commencement of time to its consummation,
which runs through a thousand worlds, and
stretches into the depths of eternity. We all
know, that some of the most appalling scenes of
terror and destruction have often proceeded from
an apparently trivial accident, and that events of
the greatest importance have originated from
causes so inconsiderable as to be almost over
looked. The British and Foreign Bible Socie
ty, which now engages the attention of the whole
mass of the Christian world, and whose be
neficent effects will soon extend to the remotest
corners of the world, derived its origin from a
casual conversation between a few obscure indi
viduals, on the subject of distributing the Scrip
tures. And the apparently trivial circumstance,
of observing that a certain mineral substance,
when left free to move itself, uniformly pointo
towards the north, has been the means, not onln

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

of the knowledge we have acquired of the differ
ent regions of our globe, but of imparting to
miUions of mankind incalculable blessings, which
will descend to their posterity to the latest gene
rations.

Hence it appears, that, in our present circum
stances, we are altogether incompetent to form a
correct judgment of what is just or unjust in the
present dispensations of the Almighty, unless we
could survey, with the eye of a seraph, the
ample plan of the divine government, — the whole
chain of God's dispensations towards our race, —
the numerous worlds and beings over which his
moral government extends, — the relation which
the events now passing among us bear to other
moral intelligences, either as subjects of con
templation, as warnings of the danger of apos-
tacy from God, or as motives to universal
subjection and obedience, — and the connexions,
bearings, and dependencies of the whole of that
moral system which embraces unnumbered
worlds, and constitutes one grand and boundless
empire, under the government of the Creator. —
Even then, with the eye and the mind of a finite
intelligence, we should occasionally meet with
events which would surpass our comprehension,
and be altogether inexplicable, on the grounds of
the knowledge we had previously acquired, and
should still be constrained to exclaim, " O the
depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the
knowledge of God ! How unsearchable are his
judgments, and his ways past finding out !"

But although " clouds and darkness" at pre
sent hang over the ways of the Almighty, so
that we cannot, in every instance, perceive the
rectitude of his procedure, we may rest satisfied
that " justice and judgment are for ever the
foundation of his throne ;" and we are assured,
by the Sacred Oracles, that a period is approach
ing, when the mystery of Providence will be un
folded, and when all its dark and perplexing
events, in reference to this world, will be ex
plained to the full conviction of all its assembled
inhabitants. For " God hath appointed a day
in which he will judge the world ire righteousness
by that man whom he hath ordained ; whereof he
hath given assurance unto all men, in that he
hath raised him from the dead." Then " the
secrets of all hearts" shall be disclosed, and
every man rewarded " according to his works ;"
for, " God shall bring every work into judgment,
with every secret thing, whether it be good, or
whether it be evil." Then it will be clearly
perceived, that " verily there is a reward for the
righteous, and that there is a God that judgeth in
the earth." Then the rectitude of Jehovah, in
every part of his moral administration, will
shine forth in all its lustre ; a visible and ever
lasting distinction will be made between the
righteous and the wicked, and the whole intelli
gent creation will plainly discern between " him
that served God, and him that served him not."

In the mean time, God has not left I ' xself
without a witness to the impartiality of l-u jus
tice in his allotments towards men, in that h* has
invariably connected ryisery with the violation of
his laws, and happiness with the observance of
them. However different the allotments of
mankind may be, in regard to wealth, honour, or
station, it holds invariably true, that " the? is
no peace," or substantial happiness, " to .he
wicked;" and that "the man is blesstd who
fears the Lord, and delights in his command
ments."* Place a man on the highest pinnacle
of earthly grandeur, and let him indulge in
schemes of ambition, avarice, pride, revenge,
cruelty, and other violations of the divine law,
and he may as soon attempt to stop the sun in
his course, as to expect substantial enjoyment
while he continues in the indulgence of such ma
levolent passions. Place another in the most
obscure abode of human life, and let him exercise
piety, benevolence, humility, and every other
Christian temper ; and he will enjoy a peace, an
equanimity, and a portion of happiness, which
the wicked can never possess, and which the
wealth of the world can neither give nor take
away. Hence it is, that we behold so many in
stances of disgust at life, and of self-destruction,
among those who are elevated to stations of pow
er, and surrounded with every kind of sensitive
enjoyment. — This consideration, of itself, should
silence every murmur that is apt to arise at the
dispensations of God's providence, and convince
us that " he is righteous in all his ways, and
holy in all his works."

On the whole, then, it appears, that thejustice
of God has a tendency to inspire us with confi
dence, and love, and joy, no less than his mercy
and benevolence. \Vere it not for this perfection
of the divine character, omnipotence might be
come a most terrific and tremendous attribute of
the Deity. We should have no motive but that
of fear to stimulate us to obedience ; we should
feel no security against danger, and distress, and
the perpetual recurrence of spectacles of ven
geance, and, in the course of ages, the spacious
universe might be transformed into an immense
region of" lamentation, and mourning, and wo."
Were it not for this perfection, the benevolence
of the Deity would degenerate into weakness and
imbecility. Wicked men, and other depraved
intelligences, presuming on freedom from impu
nity, and their diabolical passions acquiring
strength and vigour, by long exercise, would carry
misery and destruction in their train, wherever
they exerted their energies ; and would interrupt,
and ultimately destroy the harmony and felicity
of the intelligent universe. But, while we re
cognize the rectitude of the divine character as
an immutable attribute of Deity, we can »ook
forward with confidence through all the revolu-

•Psal. cxiL 1.

DUTY OF LOVE TO GOD.

*fon* of time, and to all those eternal scenes
which shall succeed the demolition of the pre-
stnt system of things, fully assurod, that God
is the universal Protector of his unnumbered off
spring — that his power will never be interposed
to inflict an act of injustice — that no intelligent
being will ever suffer a punishment beyond his
desert — and that no happiness which his bene
volence has devised, and his word has promised,
will ever be withheld from those " who put their
trust in his name, and hearken to the voice of his
commandments."

Thus I have endeavoured to show, that love to
God, which is the first principle of the moral
law, is founded upon the natural and moral per
fections of the Deity — that the attributes of omni
potence, wisdom, goodness, mercy, forbearance,
and justice, are calculated to excite this noble
affection to the highest degree in the minds of
all holy intelligences. I might also have illus
trated this subject from considerations drawn
from the infinity, the eternity, the immutability,
the holiness, and veracity of God. But the
illustrations already stated, will, I presume,
be sufficient to demonstrate, that this affection,
in conjunction with all its kindred emotions,
ought to occupy the highest place in the human
heart, and in the minds of all created intelli
gences.

It may, perhaps, be insinuated by some, that
the preceding illustrations have been carried to
a greater length than the nature of the subject re
quired — and it is readily admitted, that the mere
logical argument did not require so extended
illustrations. Every person who knows the
meaning of the terms made use of, will at once
admit, that, since God is a Being possessed of
almighty power, infinite wisdom, boundless
benevolence, mercy, forbearance, and perfect
rectitude — he ought to be loved affectionately and
supremely. But such general and metaphysical
reasoning, though perfectly conclusive and in
controvertible, possesses but a slender influence
over the mind, in exciting it to the cultivation of
holy affections. For the sake of impression, it is
essentially requisite, that the various manifesta
tions of divine perfection should be presented
to the view, in order that the mind may have a
tangible train of thought before it, to stimulate
its activities, and its religious emotions. Ge
neral views and reasonings on any subject, and
especially on the subject of religion, produce a
very slight impression on the majority of man
kind. It is not owing so much to the want of
conviction of the truth of certain important pro
positions in religion, that divine truths take so
slender a hold of the mind, as to the want of
those definite and impressive conceptions which
can be acquired only by a minute and attentive
survey of the works and the dispensations of
God. And, in this point of view, the preceding
illustrations, had the limited natuie of the present

work permitted, might have been prosecuted to a
much greater extent.

I might also have illustrated this subject from
a consideration of ike relations in which God
stands to us, and to all his creatures. He is
our Creator, and we are the workmanship of his
hands. He formed our bodies, and he sustains
our spirits. His physical energy is felt by us
every moment, in making our hearts to beat, and
our lungs to play, and in impelling the crimson
fluid which circulates in our bodies, through a
thousand different tubes. To him we are in
debted for life, and all its comforts ; and for all
the powers, capacities, and privileges, which
dignify our nature, and exalt us above the lower
ranks of existence. He is our Preserver and
bountiful Benefactor, who " sustains our souls
in life," who supports the course of nature, in
its diversified movements, and '"' daily loads us
with his benefits." To his superintending pro
vidence we are indebted for the food we eat, the
water we drink, the clothes we wear, the air we
breathe, the light which cheers us, the splendours
of the sun, the milder radiance of the moot), the
magnificence of the starry sky, the rains and
dews which fertilize the soil ; the earth, with
its riches and abundance ; the trees, plants, and
waving grain, which enrich our fields ; the
flowers which deck the meadows, the beautiful
and magnificent colouring which is spread over
the terrestrial landscape, the succession of day
and night, and the vicissitude of the seasons.
In short, to him we are indebted for all the ob
jects and movements around us, which render
our abode on earth convenient, desirable, and
productive of enjoyment.

He is our Fatfter, and we are his children.
He watches over us with a tender care ; and,
" as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord
pitieth them that fear him." This tender and
indissoluble relation binds us to him by the
strongest ties, and is calculated to excite the
most ardent filial affection and gratitude. He
is our Sovereign and Lawgiver, and we are his
subjects ; and all his laws are framed on the
principles of eternal and immutable rectitude,
and are calculated to promote the harmony and
happiness of the whole intelligent creation. He
is our Master, \r.d we are his servants, and " his
commandments are not grievous." He is our
Friend in adversity, our Protector in danger
and in distress ; our Instructor, who has impart
ed to us knowledge and understanding ; and our
Redeemer, who " spared not his own Son, but
delivered him up for us all," that we might be
rescued from the gulf of depravity and ruin, and
exalted to a state of consummate felicity. In
fine, he is that being who is the inexhaustible
fountain of light, of life, and of joy to ail beings-
en whom depend all our future prospects in this
world, and all the transporting scenes to which
we look forward in an interminable state </

S3

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

existence. — All these, and many other relations,
in which we stand to the God of heaven, de
monstrate, that supreme love to this beneficent
Being, is the first and highest duty of every ra
tional creature ; and they present the most
powerful motives to stimulate us to its exercise.
But, to illustrate these topics, in minute detail,
would be inconsistent with the limited plan of
the present work ; and it is the less necessary,
as several of them have already been brought
into view, in the course of the preceding illus
trations.

SECTION VII.

MOPES IN WHICH LOVE TO GOD IS DIS
PLAYED.

I shall now offer a remark or two on the na
ture of this sublime affection, and the manner in
which it ought to be manifested. Love to God
is not a single and solitary affection in the hu
man breast, which evaporates in a few transient
and undefined emotions ; but is the spring of
every holy activity, and is intimately connected
with every virtuous emotion, with every pious
sentiment, with every religious requirement,
with every sensitive enjoyment, with our pre
sent comforts, and our future and eternal pros
pects.

It includes in it, complacency, or delight in the
character and administration of God. Viewing
him as a self-existent and eternal Being, — fill
ing immensity with his presence, launching in
numerable worlds into existence, upholding them
all by the " word of his power," and superin
tending the minutest concerns of all his offspring,
from the loftiest seraph, through all the inferior
gradations of existence, to the smallest animal-
cula, — the mind feels the most delightful emo
tions, in regarding the happiness of the universe
as perfectly secure under his physical and moral
administration. Contemplating his bounty to
angels and to men, to the birds of the air, the
fishes of the sea, and the numerous tribes which
traverse the surface of the land, — his mercy to
wards our fallen race, — his long-suffering and
forbearance towards wicked nations and indivi
duals, — his faithfulness in the accomplishment
of his promises and threatenings, — and the un
erring rectitude of his dispensations towards all
his creatures, — the mind feels supreme appro
bation and complacency in his attributes, pur
poses, and administrations; beholding in his cha
racter an excellence and amiableness, a moral
dignity and grandeur which is not to be found in
any created intelligence. Even in reference to
those acts of his government which appear
dreadful and appalling — in the volcano, the earth
quake, the thunders, the hurricane, the tempest,

and the doom of the impenitent, its approbatiC-f
and complacency are not withheld, convincec
that perfect rectitude is the rule of his procedure,
and that his righteousness will one day be
brought to light before an assembled world.

Love to God includes admiration of hi* won
derful works. The man whose affections are
directed to the Supreme Intelligence is not an
indifferent spectator of the manifestations of
Deity. He beholds the magnificent canopy of
heaven daily moving around him in silent gran
deur; his eye penetrates beyond the apparent
aspects of the twinkling luminaries which adorn
it, and surveys the hand of the Almighty wheel
ing stupendous globes through the immeasura
ble regions of space, and extending his operations
throughout unnumbered systems, dispersed over
the boundless expanse of the universe. He be
holds the great globe on which he is placed, im
pelled by the same omnipotent arm, prosecuting
its course through the depths of space, and cir
cling around the sun, to bring about the revolu
tions of the seasons. He contemplates the vasl
ranges of mountains that stretch around it — the
mass of waters in the mighty ocean, and its nu
merous tribes of animated beings — the " dry
land," with all its furniture and inhabitants —
the vast caverns, chasms, and shattered strata
which appear in its interior recesses — and the
atmosphere with which it is surrounded, with
the clouds, the lightnings, and the tempests
which diversify its aspect. He traces the foot
steps of the Almighty in his moral administra
tion — in the deluge which swept away the in
habitants of the antediluvian world — in the
burning of Sodom, the dividing of the Red sea,
the thunders and lightnings of Sinai — the mani
festation of the Son of God in human flesh; his
sufferings, death, resurrection, and triumphant
ascension — in the propagation of the gospel it
the face of every opposition, in the rise and fall
of empires, the dethronement of kings, the bat
tles of warriors, and the convulsions of nations.
And, while he contemplates such objects and
operations, his admiration is excited by the in
comprehensible knowledge displayed in the con
trivance of the universe, the boundless benevo
lence which extends over all these works, and
the omnipotent power by which all the mighty
movements of Creation and Providence are ef
fected. And, while he admires, he is filled
with strong emotions of reverence of the glorious
perfections of that Being, whose mighty hand
conducts those stupendous movements, and he
feels the fuil force of the impressive exhortation
of the psalmist, " Let all the earth fear the
Lord ; let all the inhabitants of the world stand
in awe of him : for he spake, and it was done ;.
he commanded, and it stood fast." Even the
abstract conceptions we have of the immensity
of the Divine Being, by wnich he is present it
every part of infinite space — the eternity of hig

HUMILITY AND RESIGNATION.

39

duration, and the range of his omniscience winch
embraces an intimate knowledge of the thoughts,
the purposes, and the actions of all creatures ;
are calculated to overpower the mind with emo
tions of veneration and awe, blended with feel
ings of affVnion and delight at the recollection of
the relation in which we stand to this glorious
Intelligence.

Again, Love to God includes Humility and
self-abasement in the divine presence. There
is no disposition which appears more incom
patible with supreme affection for the Creator
than pride, haughtiness, and arrogance. "God
resisteth the proud." Even " a proud look" is
declared to be an " abomination" in his sight.
And, if the indulgence of pride be inconsistent
with the love of God, humility must be regarded
as one of its essential and distinguishing accom
paniments. When a man who loves God re
flects on his condition and character — lhat he is a
creature who derived his existence from a supe
rior Being, to whom he is indebted for all his
powers and faculties, and by whose power and
mercy he is every moment preserved in ex
istence ; when he considers his station in the
universe — that he is only like an atom in the im
mensity of creation, when compared with the
innumerable beings which people its wide do
mains — that he stands near the lowest part of
the scale of intelligent existence, and that " all
the inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers"
before Him who sits on the throne of the heavens ;
when he recollects that he has apostatized from
the God who made him, that he is guilty of
innumerable violations of his righteous laws, and
stands condemned at the bar of Him " who is of
purer eyes than to behold iniquity ;" when he
contemplates the circumstances in which he is
now placed in consequence of his transgressions
—the pains, diseases, poverty, bereavements,
and reproaches, to which he is subjected ; the
storms, and tempests, and elemental war to
which he is exposed ; the degradation which
awaits his body at the hour of dissolution and in
the mansions of the tomb ; and the ignorance,
the errors, and follies into which he has fallen ; —
when he considers that " lowliness of mind" is a
characteristic of the most exalted of created in
telligences, who "veil their faces" in the divine
presence, and cheerfully extend their benevolent
regards to the meanest human being who is an
" heir of salvation ;" and, above all, when he re
flects on the ineffable grandeur of that Being
before whom " all nations are as the drop of a
bucket," he is convinced that pride is the most
unreasonable principle that can exist in the hu
man breast, and that the most profound humility
ought for ever to characterize his thoughts and
actions, both in the presence of God, and before
the eyes of men. On such a character only will
'; the High and Lofty One who inhabits eternity,"
KKJk with complacency, and in such a heart alone

can the love of God !>e expected to reside in
all its generous and noble exercises. Such a dis
position, mingling with all the othct benevolent
affections, will render them sweet and delightful :
it will render us amiable in the eyes of our fel
low-men; it will secure us against all the
wretched effects and boisterous passions which
flow from haughtiness and pride ; it will mitigate
the sorrows, the perplexities, and anxieties to
which we are subjected in our earthly pilgrim
age ; it will enable us to preserve our minds
tranquil and serene amidst the provocations, the
affronts, and the contentions to which we are ex
posed in our intercourses with general society,
and will prepare us for associating with the in
habitants of that happier world, where seraphic
love, profound reverence of the Divine Majesty,
and profound humility, mingle with all their in
tercourses and employments.

Resignation to the providential dispensations
of the Almighty is another manifestation and ac
companiment of love to God. To be habitually
discontented, and to murmur and repine under
the allotments of his providence, must obviously
appear to be inconsistent with sincere and ardent
affection for the Supreme Disposer of events. —
Resignation to the will of God is the duty of
every intelligent creature towards the Creator ;
and in proportion to the degree in which this
principle exists, will be the happiness of the in
tellectual being that exercises it. Angels are
perfectly happy, because they are perfectly sub
missive to the will of their Creator — being fully
contented with the station allotted them in the
universe, and completely resigned to all the fu
ture services and allotments which Infinite Wis
dom has ordained. Wherever pure affection
towards God actuates the mind among the in
habitants of our world, it produces a disposition
similar in kind, though inferior in degree, to
that which animates the breasts of the cherubim
and the seraphim in the regions of bliss.

He, who is actuated by this noble principle,
regards every providential event as the appoint
ment of his Father in heaven. The devouring
flames may consume his habitation to ashes, and
scatter his treasures to " the four winds of hea
ven ;" the ship in which his wealth is embarked
may be dashed against the rocks, and sink " as
lead in the mighty waters ;" his friends may for
sake him in the season of his deepest anxiety and
distress ; the wife of his bosom, whom he ten
derly loved, maybe snatched from his embrace by
the cold hand of death ; his children, dearer to
him than his own soul, may fall victims, one
after another, to some pestilential disease, and
be for ever removed from his sight to the " land
of deep forgetfulness ;" his familiar friend in
whom he trusted may " lift up his heel against
him," and load him with unmerited reproaches,
his own body may be chastened with sore pain
and loathsome disease ; a fall from a home may

40

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

break the bones of his leg, and render him lame
for life ; a random blow may bruise his eye-balls,
and deprive him of all the entertainments of
vision ; he may be stretched for many long years
on the bed of languishing ; his country may
either be ravaged and laid waste by destroying
armies, or rains and inundations may sweep
away the produce of his fields. But under all
such calamities, he bows with submission to the
will of Him " who rules in the whirlwind and
directs the storm ;" not because he has fortified
his mind with a stoical apathy and indifference
towards the evils of life ; not because he is inca
pable of feeling the evils he is doomed to suffer ;
for he may feel them in the acutest degree, even
while he exercises full resignation ; but he is re
signed, because he feels assured that they are the
appointment of his Almighty Friend — that they
are parts of the plan of unerring wisdom — that
they are intimately connected with the whole
chain of providence that runs through his pre
sent existence — that they are intended, in the
scheme of infinite benevolence, to promote his
happiness in a way which his limited faculties
are unable at present to comprehend — and that
they have a bearing on the scenes and enjoy
ments of the eternal world. And therefore, under
the pressure of his most painful feelings, he is
enabled to adopt the triumphant language of the
prophet, " Although the fig-tree shall not blos
som, neither fruit be in the vine; the labour of
the olive fail, and the fields yield no meat ; the
flock be cut off from the fold, and there bo no
herd in the stall ; yet will I rejoice in the Lord,
I will be glad in the God of my salvation." While
others murmur and rage, and toss themselves
like a wild bull in a net, and curse the supposed
authors of their calamities, he is enabled to
" possess his soul in patience," convinced of the
rectitude of the divine dispensations; and thus dis
plays a nobleness of mind, and a heroism which
is " above all Greek, above all Roman fame."
Again, Love to God comprehends Gratitude
for the benefits he bestows. Gratitude is that
particular modification of love which flows out
towards God, considered as the Author and Be-
slower of all felicity: it is love excited by kind
ness communicated from benevolent motives. It
is one of the most natural and obvious manifes
tations of that general principle which I have been
hitherto illustrating; for ingratitude is altogether
inconsistent with love to a benefactor. In order
to kindle this amiable affection into a lively
flame, the person in whose bosom it glows en
deavours to take a minute and expansive survey
of the " loving-kindness of God," and of the
countless variety of benefits he is continually re
ceiving. He feels grateful to God for his existence,
for the powers and capacities with which he is en
dowed, for the rank which he holds in the scale of
terrestrial existence ; in being raised above the
clods of the valley, and furnished with faculties

superior to the beasts of the forest and the fowa
of heaven. He feels grateful that he was brought
into existence in a Christian land, and in civil
ized society; that the "glad tidings of salva
tion" have reached his ears ; that " God so
loved the world, that He gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth on him might not
perish, but have everlasting life," and that every
enjoyment requisite for his present and future
happiness is secured through this plan of divine
benevolence. But he does not rest satisfied
with vague and general views of these important
benefits ; he contemplates the degradation into
which sin had plunged him, the greatness of the
misery from which the love of God has delivered
him, the moral perfection of his nature to which
he is now training, the serenity of mind he ex
periences in the practice of the divine precepts,
the security he feels for his present and future
safety under the protection of Omnipotence, the
" strong consolation" under the evils of life
which the promises of God lead him to expect,
the victory over death of which he is secured
" through Christ Jesus his Lord," the resXir-
rection of his body at the close of time, the " new
heavens and the new earth" to which he is de
stined at the dissolution of this sublunary system,
the alliance into which he is brought to the an
gelic tribes and other pure intelligences, his moral
capacity for associating with every holy being in
the universe, and the endless succession of trans
porting scences which will burst upon his view
through the ages of eternity. While contempla
ting these high privileges, in all their bearings
and varied ramifications, emotions of affection
arid gratitude arise in his breast which can only
be expressed in the language of elevated devotion.

" 0 How shall words with equal warmth

The gratitude declare
That glows within my ravish'd heart !
But Thou canst read it there."

" Bless the Lord, O my soul! and all that is
within me bless his holy name. Give lhanks to
the Lord, and forget not all his benefits; who
forgiveth all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy
diseases; who redeemeth thy life from destruc
tion, and crowneth thee with loving-kindness
and tender mercies."

Nor does he feel less grateful to God for his
kindness as displayed in the material world, and
in the ordinary course of his providence. He
feels grateful for these scenes of sublimity and
beauty with which the visible universe is adorn
ed — for the sun when he ascends the vault of
heaven, and diffuses his radiance over the moun
tains and the vales — for the moon, when she
" walks in brightness" through the heavenc,
and cheers the shades of night — for the planets,
while they run their ample rounds, and evince,
by their magnitude and motions, the eternal
omnipotence of their Maker — for the innumera-

SUBLIMITY OF THE PRINCIPLE OF LOVE.

41

Me host of stars, which unite their splendours to
adorn the canopy of the sky, and display the
riches, and grandeur, and boundless extent of
God's universal kingdom— for the light, which
darts with unconceivable rapidity from the celes
tial luminaries, and diffuses a thousand shades
of colour on the terrestrial landscape — for the
surrounding atmosphere, which supports the ele
ment of fire, conveys the clouds over every re
gion, and sustains and invigorates the functions
of animal life— for the variety of beautiful and
majestic scenery which diversifies our terrestrial
system— for the towering cliffs, the lofty moun
tains, and the expansive vales — for the mean
dering river, gliding through the fields, and dif
fusing health and fertility wherever it flows— for
the riches which abound in the gardens, the
forests, and the fields, and the mineral treasures
contained in the bowels of the mountains — for
the harmony of musical sounds, the mellifluous
notes of the nightingale and the lark, and the
melodious warblings which resound from the
vales, the mountains, and the groves — for the
flowers which enamel the meadows, the trees,
the shrubs, and the waving grain which adorn
the earth with picturesque beauty — for the ani
mated beings which contribute to our comfort,
the bee which collects for us honey from every
opening flower, the sheep which yields its fleeces
for our clothing, and thousands of other creatures
which contribute to supply us with food, rai
ment, furniture, and innumerable enjoyments.
In all these, and similar objects, he perceives
ample reasons for elevating his soul in lively
gratitude to his bountiful Benefactor.

When he turns his eyes upon himself, and
considers the wonderful machinery which gives
life and motion to his frame, he perceives the
strongest reason for the exercise of incessant
admiration and gratitude. He feels grateful for
every joint of his fingers, and for every me ve-
rnent of his wrist, by which he is enabled with
the utmost ease to perform a countless variety
of manual operations essential to his comfort —
for the hundreds of bones which support his
animal system, with their various articulations,
and the hundreds of muscles and tendons which
are interwoven with every part of the machine,
which enable it to perform without the least
obstruction, a thousand varied movements sub
servient to his health, convenience, and plea
sure. 'He cannot walk through his apartment,
nor lift his eyes to the heavens, nor move a joint
•»f his finger, nor draw a single breath, without
perceiving an evidence of the wisdom and in
telligence of his Almighty Maker. He per
ceives, that if only one joint were wanting, or
one muscle out of action, or one movement out of
a thousand interrupted, he would instantly be
subjected to a thousand painful sensations which
would throw a gloom on every earthly enjoyment.
But especially, when he reflects on the wonders

of vision — the thousands of millions of rays that
are every moment darting from the objects
around him, crossing each other in an infinity
of directions, and yet conveying to every eye a
distinct perception of their colours, motions, and
diversified aspects ; when he reflects on the
facility with which he can turn his eye in every
direction, upwards and downwards, to the right
hand and to the left, and in a moment take in the
landscape of the earth and the heavens " at a
small inlet which a grain might close ;" when
he considers the numerous and complicated
movements continually going on within him —
the heart, like a powerful engine in perpetual
motion, impelling, with prodigious force, streams
of blood through a thousand different tubes — the
numerous lacteal and lymphatic vessels absorb
ing nutriment from the food, and conveying it
through every part of this wonderful machine,
when he considers that these incessant motions
are, as it were, the immediate hand of the
Divinity within him, over which he can exer
cise no control, and which are all intended to
preserve his existence and minister to his enjoy
ment, — he cannot forbear exclaiming, in the
language of grateful admiration, " How pre
cious are thy wonderful contrivances concern
ing me, O God ! how great is the sum of them !
If I should count them, they are more in num
ber than the sand. I will praise thee, for I am
fearfully and wonderfully made !"

He does not overlook such instances of " the
loving-kindness of God," because, to some, they
may appear minute and trivial. He does not
contrast them with what are reckoned spiritual
and more important blessings; nor attempt to
institute comparisons between the beneficent
operations of Omnipotence, in order to throw a
certain portion of them into the shade. He con
siders all the operations of God from the plan
of redemption for guilty men, and the mission of
his Son into our world, to the minutest muscle
that moves the joint of a finger, or the ray of
light that darts from a flower of the field, as
parts of one vast system of boundless benevo
lence, as essentially connected together as the
links of a chain ; and, in regard to himself, he
views all the variety of blessings now alluded
to, as one undivided stream of unbounded bene
ficence, commencing with the first moment of
his existence, running through all the scenes and
circumstances of his terrestrial existence, and
expanding into the unfathomable ocean of eter
nity. In the whole series of contrivances and
events which relate to his present and future
existence, both in what we consider the mi
nutest and the most magnificent works of the
Deity, he perceives the stamp of infinite per
fection, and a connexion of plan and of opera
tion, which excludes all attempts at comparisons
and contrasts. Under such impressions, ann
with such views of the concatenation of evert

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION

t»art of the scheme of divine benevolence, he is
'ed to contemplate the kindness of God at every
step, and in every object, arid is ever ready to
exclaim, " What shall I render to the Lord for
all his benefits toward me?:'

In fine, supreme love to God includes in its
exercise, a delight in the public and private ex
ercises of his worship, a constant endeavour to
yield a willing and unreserved obedience to all
the institutions he has appointed, and to all the
laws he has issued forth for counteracting the
depravity of our natures, and for raising us to a
state of moral perfection; an active and enlight
ened zeal for the honour of his name, and for
promoting those institutions which have a ten
dency to advance his kingdom in the earth ; a
sincere and disinterested affection to all our fel
low-men, and particularly to every class of holy
intelligences ; a cordial approbation of all his
plans and movements in creation and provi
dence ; and devout aspirations after that higher
state of existence, where the glories of his na
ture and " the kindness of his love" shall be
more clearly unfolded, and where love shall glow
\n one uninterrupted and perpetual emotion.

Thus, it appears that love to God consists in
complacency in his character and administration,
i\nd is inseparably connected with admiration of
K's wonderful works, with humility, resignation,
aivi gratitude.

1 cannot conclude my remarks on this topic
without adverting, for a little, to the nobleness
and sublimity of this first and fundamental
spring of all moral action. From what has been
already stated, it appears that love to God is
the mos,'. reasonable and amiable affection that
can aninvite ihe human mind ; for that Being
who is the object of it is the sum of all perfec
tion, the standard of all moral and physical
excellence, and the source of all the felicity
enjoyed by e rery rank of existence throughout
the boundless universe. It is also the most sub
lime and expandve affection that can pervade the
mind of any created intelligence. It excites the
most rapturous emotions when we contemplate
the harmonies, the beauties, and the sublimities
of the universe ; for it recognizes them as the dis
plays of boundless wisdom and boundless good
ness ; as the production of that Almighty Being
who stands in ihe relation of our Father and our
Friend ', and leads us to conclude, that that power
and intelligence which ^ave birth to all that is
grand and beautiful in heaven and on earth, will
be for ever exercised in com "ibuting to our eternal
enjoyment. Without such a recognition, crea
tion appears only like an immense desert, and is
apt to fill the mind with apprehension and terror ;
for it can feel no pleasurable emotions in con
templating the operations of a Being for whom
It entertains no affectionate regard. But, in
our solitary walks in the fields and the gardens,
amidst the emanations of divine munificence ;

in our journeys through the fertile plains ; in ow
excursions through the Alpine scenes of nature ;
in our investigations into the structure of the
animal and vegetable tribes ; and in our contem
plations on the wonders of the starry sky — love
throws a radiance on all these objects, and ex
cites an interest which cannot be appreciated
by that mind which has never felt the force of
this sacred emotion.

It renders us superior to the ills of life, while,
under its influence, we bow, in cordial submis
sion, to the divine dispensations, as the result
of perfect wisdom, rectitude, and benevolence.
It enables us to recognize the hand of a Divine
Benefactor in every enjoyment, and the rod of
an affectionate Father, in every trial and afflic
tion to which we are subjected. It raises the
soul above the carking cares and degrading pur
suits of the world, and enables it to look down
with heroic indifference on all those trivial inci
dents and fancied insults which irritate, and in
flame, and torment " the children of pride." It
preserves the mind in calm serenity amidst the
raging of the tempest, the rolling thunders, the
whirlwind, and the hurricane, the eruptions of
the volcano, and the convulsions of the earth-
quke ; while it recognizes the Ruler of the storm,
who presides amidst the crash of warring ele
ments, as its omnipotent Protector and its
eternal refuge.* It enables the man in whose
bosom it resides, to contemplate with composure
the downfall of kings and the revolutions of na
tions, to anticipate the hour of his dissolution
without dismay, and to look forward with forti
tude to the ruins of dissolving nature, when "the
elements shall melt with fervent heat," and the
earth, with all its magnificence, shall be wrapt in
flames ; confident that, under " the shadow of
the wings of the Almighty," he shall remain in
perfect security, amidst " the wreck of matter
and the crush of worlds."

This divine principle assimilates us to angels,
and to every other class of holy intelligences.
It renders us qualified for associating with these
superior intellectual natures — for entering into
their vast and comprehensive views — for con
versing with them OP the sublime topics which
occupy their attention — for bearing a part in
their extensive schemes of universal benevo-

• The celebrated Kircher, in his relation of the
dreadful earthquake in Calabria, in 1638, which
overthrew the city of Euphemia, of which, he was
a spectator, expresses his feelings on that occasion
in the following words :— " The universal ruin
around me, the crash of falling houses, the totter
ing of towers, and the groans of the dying, all con
tributed to raise terror and despair. On every side
of me, I saw nothing but a scene of ruin and danger
threatening wherever I should fly. I commended
myself to God, as my last great refuge. At that
hour, 0 how vain was every sublunary happiness .
wealth, honour, empire, wisdom, all mere uselesfc
sounds, and as empty as the bubbles of the deep
Just standing on the threshold of eternity, nothing
but God was my pleasure ; and the nearer I ap
proached, I only loved him the more."

SUBLIMITY OF THE PRINCIPLE OF LOVE.

lence — and for contributing, along with them, to
the order and prosperity of God's everlasting
kingdom. It secures to us the friendship and
affection of all the virtuous inhabitants of the
universe, and renders us fit for affectionate in
tercourse with . them, wherever we may after
wards exist, throughout the boundless expanse of
creation. Should we ever be permitted, during
the lapse of eternal duration, to wing our flight
from world to world, in order to enlarge our
views of God's unbounded empire, the exercise
of this holy affection would secure to us a friendly
reception and an affectionate intercourse among
all the pure intelligences within the range of his
moral administration : for, as this principle is
founded on the nature of God, who is eternal
and unchangeable, it must pervade the minds of
the inhabitants of all worlds that have retained
their primitive integrity. It is this divine affec
tion which excites the rapturous flame that
glows in the breasts of the angelic tribes, which
enlivens the songs and the adorations of the
cheruoim and the seraphim, which inspires
them with a noble ardour in executing the com
mands of their Creator, and which animates
them in their flight from the celestial regions to
this obscure corner of creation, when they min
ister to the heirs of salvation. It was this noble
principle which impelled the angel Gabriel in
his rapid flight through the celestial spaces,
when he descended to announce to Daniel the
answer to his supplications, and to Zacharias and
Mary the birth of the Saviour; which animated
the angels who unbarred the prison doors to
Peter, and gave assurance to Paul of the divine
protection, while he was tossing on the tem
pestuous billows of the Adriatic sea ; and which
fanned the flame of devotion in the heavenly host,
when they sung, in the plains of Bethlehem,
" Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth,
and good will towards men."

In fine, this sublime affection assimilates us to
God, who is benevolence itself, who supremely
loves his own character, and who is incessantly
displaying his benevolence, in all its infinitely
diversified effects, throughout the intelligent uni
verse. It assimilates us to Jesus the Son of
the Highest, who is " the brightness of the Fa
ther's glory ,and the express image of his person,"
and who is for ever actuated with fervent zeal
for the honour of God, and for the happiness of
man. It constitutes the foundation of all felicity ;
it opens the gates to perpetual enjoyment ; it
secures its possessor of eternal happiness, as its
natural and necessary result, and prepares him
for mingling in the employments of the " innu
merable company of angels and the spirits of
just men made perfect:" for all the transporting
scenes of glory, and all the avenues to felicity,
whjoh will be opened to the immortal spirit,
while ages, numerous as the sand, are rolling on,

while mighty worlds are emerging out of no
thing, and innumerable orders of beings are
starting into existence, may be considered as so
many infinitely diversified streams flowing from
supreme affection to the blessed God, as the
spring of every rapturous enjoyment. Possessed
of this divine principle, we secure the most ho
nourable connexions, become benefactors to the
intelligent universe, participators of the enjoy
ments of seraphic natures, agents for carrying
forward the plans of Infinite Benevolence, and
" workers together with God," in accomplishing
his eternal designs. Without it, we became
nuisances in the kingdom of God, rebels against
his government, pests to fellow intelligences,
destitute of the noblest of all affections, deprived
of substantial enjoyment in the present world,
and exposed to misery, without interruption, in
the world to come.

If such be the native effects of supreme love to
God, and if this principle lie at the foundation
of all genuine morality, how foolish and pre
posterous is it for Christian moralists to wander
through the dark labyrinths of Greek and Romar
literature, and the intricate mazes of modern
skeptical philosophy, in search of any other prin
ciples of moral action ? It is like groping for the
light of the sun in the windings of a subterraneous
grotto, and preferring the glimmering of a tape'
to the full blaze of the orb of day. It is, to fo--
sake " the fountain of living waters, and to
hew out to themselves broken and empty cisterns,
that can hold no water."

In order to invigorate and expand this affec
tion in the mind, it. is requisite that we take a
comprehensive view of all the manifestations of
that Being towards whom it is directed, as exhi
bited in the history of his operations recorded in
the volume of inspiration ; in the details of his
moral government among the nations, both in
ancient and in modern times, which may be col
lected from the writings of historians, voyagers,
travellers, and missionaries ; in the economy of
the inferior tribes of animated beings ; in the
diversified scenery of nature around us in our
terrestrial system ; and in the sublime move
ments that are going forward, among distant
worlds, in the firmament of his power ', for, the
more we know of the manifestations of the
Creator, the more acquaintance shall we have of
the Creator himself; and, in proportion as our
knowledge of his character is enlarged, in a
similar proportion will our love be ardent and
expansive. Such extensive views and contem
plations are indispensably requisite, in order to
a full recognition of the divine injunction
" Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart, and with all thy strength, and with all thing
understanding," This is the first and the great
commandment.

CHAPTER II.

SECOND PRINCIPLE OF MORAL ACTION— LOVE TO ALL SUBORDINATE INTELLIGENCES.

IN the commencement of the last chapter, I
had occasion to remark that, strictly speaking,
the fundamental principle or affection which
gives birth to all the ramifications of moral
action, is but one, namely, Love. This noble
affection may be considered as dividing itself
into two great streams, one directing its course
towards the Creator, as the supreme source of
all felicity, and the other expanding itself to
wards all the intellectual beings which he has
formed.

Having, in the preceding pages, endeavoured
to illustrate the foundation and the reasonable
ness of the principle of love to God, from a con
sideration of his perfections, character, and re
lations, and having described some of those
kindred affections by which its existence in the
minds of moral agents is manifested, — I shall
now endeavour to exhibit the foundation, and
the reasonableness, of that modification of love
which is directed towards created intelligences,
and which may be termed the second principle of
moral action — THOU SHALT LOVE THY NEIGH
BOUR AS THYSELF. Taking it for granted that
this is the fundamental law prescribed by the
Creator for regulating the conduct of intelligent
beings towards each other — because the Supreme
Lawgiver has proclaimed it as such in the reve
lation which he has given us of his will — I shall
endeavour to exhibit the reasonableness and the
beauty of this amiable principle — from the na
ture of man, and the relations in which all the
individuals of the human race stand to each
other — from the happiness which would flow
from the uniform operation of this principle — and
from the misery which would inevitably ensue
were it completely eradicated from the minds of
moral agents.

Before proceeding to the illustration of these
particulars, it may be proper to remark, that by
" our neighbour1' is to be understood men of every
nation and of evert/ clime, whether they avow
liemselues as our friends or our enemies, and
whatever may be their language, their religion,
their rank, or station. The inhabitants of New
Zealand, of Patagonia, of New Holland, of
UieLadrones, of Kamtschatka, or of Greenland,
are our neighbours, in the sense intended in the
divine injunction above quoted, as well as those
who reside in our own nation and in our more
immediate neighbourhood. For with all these,
and other tribes of mankind, we may happen to

have intercourses, either directly or indirectly,
and towards them all we ought to exercise an
affection analogous to that which every man
exercises towards himself. This we are deci
sively taught by our Saviour in the parable oi
the good Samaritan, in which it is clearly shown,
that under the designation of neighbour, we are
to include even our bitterest enemies. His apos
tles avowed the same sentiment, and taught,
that in the bonds of Christian love, no distinc
tion should exist between " Jews and Greeks,
Barbarians, Scythians, bond, or free." For
they are all members of the great family of God,
and recognized as children by the universal
parent.

SECTION I.

THE NATURAL EQUALITY OP MANKIND CON
SIDERED AS THE BASIS OF LOVE TO OUR
NEIGHBOUR.

I SHALL now exhibit a few considerations
founded on the Natural Equality of Mankind, in
order to evince the reasonableness and the ne
cessity of the operation of the principle of love
towards all our fellow-men.

In the first place, Men, of whatever rank, kin
dred, or tribe, are the offspring of the great
Parent of the universe. They were all created
by the same Almighty Being, and to him they
are indebted for all the members and functions ot
their animal frames, and for those powers, ca
pacities, and endowments, which render them
superior to the clods of the valley and to the
beasts of the forest. They derived their origin
too, as to their bodies, from the same physical prin
ciples and from the same earthly parent. " Of the
dust of the ground" the body of the first man was
formed ; and from Adam, the primogenitor of the
human race, have descended all the generations
of men which now exist, or will hereafter exisi
till the close of time. This is equally true of the
prince and of his subjects ; of the monarch ar
rayed in purple, and seated on a throne, and ol
the beggar, who is clothed in rags, and embraces
a dunghill; of the proud nobleman, who boasts
of a long line of illustrious ancestors, and of the
obscure peasant, whose progenitors were uniio-
r;ced and unknown. All derived their origin from

EQUALITY OF MANKIND.

45

the dust, and all return to the dust again. This
consideration, on which it is unnecessary to
dwell, shows the reasonableness of union and af
fection among men, on the same grounds from
which we conclude that brothers and sisters be
longing to the same family ought to manifest a
friendly affection for each other.

Secondly, Men of all nations and ranks are
equal in respect to the mechanism of their bodies
and the mental faculties with which they are en
dowed. Whether their bodies be rudely covered
with the skins of beasts, or adorned with the
splendours of royalty ; whether they be exposed
naked to the scorching heats and piercing colds,
or arrayed in robes of silk and crimson — in their
construction arid symmetry they equally bear the
impress of infinite wisdom and omnipotence.
The body of the meanest peasant, who earns his
scanty subsistence from day to day by the sweat
of his brow, is equally admirable, in the motions
of its fingers, the structure of its limbs, and the
connexion and uses of its several functions, as
the body of the mightiest and the proudest baron
who looks down upon him^with contempt. The
organs of vision comprise as many coats and
humours, muscular fibres, and lymphatic ducts,
and form as delicate pictures upon the retina —
the bones are equally numerous, and as accurate
ly articulated — the muscles perform their func
tions with as great precision and facility — the
lymphatic and absorbent vessels are as numerous
and incessant in their operations — and the heart
impels the blood through a thousand veins and ar
teries with as great a degree of rapidity and of
purity in the corporeal frame of a poor African
slave, who is daily smarting under the lash of an
unfeeling -planter, as in the body of the Emperor
ofChina, who sways his sceptre over half the in
habitants of the globe. All the external trappings
which fascinate the vulgar eye, and by which the
various ranks of mankind are distinguished, are
merely adventitious, and have no necessary con
nexion with the intrinsic dignity of man. They
are part of the consequences of the depravity of
our species : in most instances they are the re
sults of vanity, folly, pride, and frivolity ; and
they constitute no essential distinction between
man and man ; for a few paltry guineas would
suffice to deck the son of a peasant with all the
ornaments of a peer.

Men are also nearly on a level in respect to
the mental faculties which they possess. Every
man, however low his station in the present
world, is endowed with a spiritual principle which
he received by " the inspiration of the Al
mighty," which is superior to all the mechanism
and modifications of matter, and by which he is
allied to beings of a superior order. The facul
ties of consciousness, perception, memory, con
ception, imagination, judgment, reasoning, and
moral feeling, are common to men of all casts
and nations. The power of recollecting the past,

and of anticipating the future — of deducing con
clusions from premises previously demonstrated
— of representing to the mind objects and scenes
which have long ceased to exist ; of forming in
the imagination new combinations of the objects
of sense ; of perceiving the qualities of moral ac
tions, and distinguishing between right and
wrong ; of recognizing a supreme intelligent
Agent in the movements of the universe, and of
making perpetual advances in knowledge and fe
licity ; faculties which distinguish man from all
the other tribes which people the earth, air, or
sea ; are possessed by the dwarfish Laplander and
the untutored peasant, as well as by the ruler of
kingdoms, the enlightened statesman, and the
man of science. It is true, indeed, that there is
a mighty difference among men in the direction
of these faculties, in the objects towards which
they are directed, in the cultivation they have
received, and in the degree of perfection to which
they have attained. There are innumerable gra
dations in the improvement and the energies ol
intellect, from the narrow range of thought pos
sessed by a Greenlander or an Esquimaux, to
the sublime and expansive views of a Bacon, or
a Newton. But, this difference depends more
on the physical and moral circumstances in
which they are placed than on any intrinsic dif
ference in the faculties themselves. Place the
son of a boor or of a Laplander in circumstances
favourable to the developement of his mental
powers, and afford him the requisite means for
directing and increasing their activity, and he
will display powers of intelligence equal to those
which are found in the highest ranks of civilized
life. A sound understanding, a correct, judg
ment, vigour of mind, control over the irascible
passions, and other mental endowments, though
destitute of polish, will as frequently be found
in the lower walks of life as jn the elevated ranks
of opulence and power.

The philosopher, however, as well as the man
of rank, is apt to look down with a contemptuous
sneer on the narrow conceptions of the hus
bandman, the mechanic, and the peasant ; and is
disposed to treat them as if they were an inferior
species of intelligent beings. He does not al
ways consider that the profound and the subtle
speculations, which are dignified with the title of
philosophy, are frequently of less importance to
the progress of the human mind, and to the en
joyment of substantial comfort, than the deduc
tions of common sense and the dictates of a
sound though plain understanding : that they
torment him with feelings, doubts, and perplexi
ties, which sometimes shake the whole fabric ol
his knowledge, and lead him into labyrinths, out
of which he can scarcely extricate his way;
while the man of plain understanding, guided by
a few certain and important points of truth, pro
secutes the path of virtue with safety and success.
For it may be considered as an established

48

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

maxim, that the most interesting and salutary
trutns connected with the happiness of man are
neither numerous nor difficult to be acquired,
and are level to the comprehension of men of
every nation and of every rank. But however
grovelling may be the affections, and however
limited the intellectual views, of the untutored
ranks of society, they are capable of being trained
to the knowledge and the practice of every thing
which regards their present comfort and their
future happiness ; and to devise and execute the
means by which this object maybe accomplish
ed, is one way among many others bv which our
iove to mankind should be displayed and demon
strated. We have no reason to complain of the
want of mental energy, or of the ignorance and
folly of the lower orders of mankind, and to
despise them on this account, while we sit still
in criminal apathy, and refuse to apply those
means which are requisite to raise them from
their state of moral and intellectual degradation.
Thirdly, Mankind are on an equality, in re
spect of that moral depravity with which they are
all infected. From whatever cause it may be
conceived to have originated, the fact is certain,
that a moral disease has spread itself through all
the branches of the human family, in whatever
station, or in whatever regions of the globe they
may be placed. Whether we look back on the
" generations of old," or survey the moral state
of the nations in modern times ; whether we turn
our eyes to the abodes of savage or of civilized
/ife ; whether we contemplate the characters of
the higher orders of society, or the practices
which abound among the inferior ranks of social
life ; the stamp of depravity, in one shape or
another, appears impressed upon the general
conduct of mankind. In the case of nations,
this depravity has manifested itself in those wars,
dissensions, devastations, and contentions for
territory and power, which have in all ages con
vulsed the human race and disturbed the peace
of the world. Among lesser societies, families,
and individuals, it is displayed in the operation
of the principles of pride, ambition, tyranny,
persecution, revenge, malice, envy, falsehood,
deceit, covetousness, anger, and other malignant
passions, which have infested all ranks and con
ditions of men. This depravity infects the
higher ranks of mankind equally with the lower,
though among the former it is sometimes var
nished over with a fairer exterior ; and therefore,
there is no rank or order of men that have any
valid reason on this ground for despising their
Tallow-creatures, or withholding from them the
exercise of love and affection. For " there is
none righteous, no, not one : for all have sinned,
and come short of the glory of God." And in
this point of view, love ought to exercise its be
neficent energies, in endeavouring to counteract
the stream of human corruption, and in dissemi-
aating those divine principles which are calcir

lated to raise mankind to the moral dignity of
their nature.

Fourthly, Mankind possess substantially *>
same pleasures and enjoyments. It is a trite
saying, but it is nevertheless a true and important
one, that happiness does not. depend upon the
rank arid stations we occupy in life, nor upon the
quantity of wealth or riches we possess. The
pleasures which flow from the movements of the
system of nature, and from . the beauties which
adorn the heavens and the earth, are commor
and open to all the inhabitants of the globe. The
rising sun, the smiling day, the flowery land
scape, the purling streams, the lofty mountains,
the fertile vales, tb.3 verdure of the meadows, the
ruddy hues of the evening clouds, the rainbow
adorned with all the colours of light, the corusca
tions of the northern lights, ths music of the
groves, the songs of the nightingale and the lark,
the breath of spring, the fruits of harvest, the
azure sky, the blazing comet, the planets in their
courses, the moon walking in brightness, and the
radiant host of stars, convey to the mind thou
sands of delightful images and sensations, which
charm the cottager and the mechanic no less
than the sons of opulence and fame. The plea
sures of the senses, of eating and drinking, of
affectionate friendship, of social arid domestic
intercourse, of a cheerful contented mind, of fer
vent piety towards God, and of the hope of im
mortality beyond the grave, may be enjoyed by
men of every colour, and rank, and condition in
life ; by the inhabitants of the cottage, as well as
by the potentate who sways his sceptre over
kingdoms. Nor does it materially detract from
these enjoyments in the case of the peasant,
that his body is frequemly hung with rags, that
he subsists on the coarsest fare, and reposes
under the thatch of a miserable hut. For habit
is the great leveller of mankind ; it reconciles
us to innumerable inconveniences and privations,
and blunts the edge of the keenest pleasures.
The owner of a princely mansion frequently
loathes the most delicious dainties on his table,
and walks through his magnificent apartments,
surrounded with paintings and decorations, with
as much apathy and indifference as if he were
in an Indian wigwam or a clay-built cottage.
So that, in the pleasures of sense, of affection,
and sentiment, there is no essential distinction
between the high and the low, the rich and the
poor. Bui should it be insinuated that the poor
and the ignoble have fewer enjoyments than the
rich, then it will follow, that towards them in a
particular manner our benevolent affections ought
to he directed, in order that they may enjoy a
competent portion of those physical and intellec
tual pleasures which the Creator has provided foi
all his creatures.

Fifthly, Men in every condition and in every
clime have the same wants, and are exposed to
the same disasters and afflictions. Hunger and

EdUALITY OF MANKIND.

thirst, cold and heat, motion and rest, are com
mon to all orders and conditions of men ; and in
order to supply and alleviate such wants, the aid
of* our fellow-men is indispensably requisite, to
enable us to obtain food, raiment, light, warmth,
comfortable accommodation, and shelter from the
blasts of the tempest. We all stand in need of
comfort, and advice in the hour of difficulty and
danger ; we all long for the love, and friendship,
and good offices of those around us ; and we all
thirst for an increase of knowledge, happiness,
and joy. And those wants and desires can be
supplied and gratified only by the kindly inter
course and affection of kindred spirits.

All are exposed to the same sorrows and af
flictions. Disappointments, anxiety, disgrace,
accidents, pain, sickness, disease, loss of health,
fortune, and honour, bereavement of children,
friends, and relatives, are equally the lot of the
prince and the peasant. The prince in the cradle
is a being as weak and feeble, as dependent on
his nurse, has as many wants to be supplied, is
liable to as many diseases and accidents, and
requires as many exertions to learn to lisp, to
speak, and to walk, as the new-born babe of his
meanest subject. Nay, the rich and the power
ful are frequently exposed to miseries and vexa
tions from fancied insults, affronts, and provoca
tions, from frustrated hopes, from pride, vanity,
and ill-humour, from abortive projects and dis
concerted plans, to which the poor are generally
strangers. If we enter into one of the abodes of
poverty, where one of the victims of disease is
reclining, we may behold a poor emaciated mor
tal, with haggard looks and a heaving breast,
reposing on a pillow of straw, surrounded by
ragged children and an affectionate wife, all
eager to sooth his sorrows and alleviate his dis
tress. If we pass through a crowd of domestics
and courtly attendants into the mansion of opu
lence, where disease or the harbinger of death
has seized one of its victims, we may also behold
a wretch, pale, blotched, and distorted, agonizing
under the pain of the asthma, the gravel, or the
gout, and trembling under the apprehensions of
the solemnity of a future judgment, without one
sincere friend to afford him a drop of consola
tion. Neither the splendour of his apartment,
nor the costly crimson with which his couch is
hung, nor the attentions of his physicians, nor
the number of his attendants, can prevent the
bitter taste of nauseous medicines, the intolera
ble pains, the misgivings of heart, and the pangs
of conscience which he feels in common with
the meanest wretch who is expiring on a duns-
bill.

Lastly, All ranks come to the same termina
tion of their mortal existence. " Dust thou art,
and unto dust thou shall return," is a decree
wnich has gone forth against every inhabitant of
our globe, of whatever kindred, rank, or nation.
The tombs of mighty princes, of intrepid gene-

rals, of illustrious statesmen, ma) be adorned
with lofty columns, with sculptured marble, and
flattering inscriptions ; but within these var
nished monuments their bodies present putrid
carcasses, as loathsome, and as much the prey of
worms and corruption, as the corpse of their
meanest vassal. Their eyes are equally impe
netrable to the light of day, their ears are equally
deaf to the charms of music, and their tongues
are equally silent in this land of deep forgetful-
ness. This consideration of itself fully demon
strates, if any demonstration be necessary, the
natural equality of mankind, and that there is
no essential difference between the noble and the
ignoble, the emperor, and the slave. And since
mankind are all equally liable to afflictions and
distresses, and are all journeying to the tomb,
nothing can be more reasonable than the exercise
of love, with all its kindred affections, towards
every class of our fellow-men, in order to alle
viate their sorrows, and to cheer them on their
passage through this region of mortality.

Thus it appears, that there is a natural equal
ity subsisting among mankind, in respect of their
origin, their corporeal organization, their intel
lectual powers, their moral depravity, their
wants, their afflictions, their pleasures, and en
joyments, and the state to which they are reduc
ed after they have finished the career of their
mortal existence. The illustration of such cir
cumstances would be quite unnecessary, were it
not that a certain proportion of mankind, under
the influence of pride and other malignant pas
sions, are still disposed to look down on certain
classes of their fellow-mortals as if they were a
species of beings of an inferior order in the scale
of existence. To the propriety of the senti
ments now stated, the sacred Scriptures bear
ample testimony. " The rich and the poor meet
together ; the Lord is the maker of them all."*
" Did not he that made me in the womb Ipake
my servant, and did he not fashion us alike ?"f
" God hath made of one blood all nations of men
for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath
determined the times before appointed, and the
bounds of their habitation."!

Since, therefore, it appears, that mankind are
equal in every thing that is essential to the hu
man character, this equality lays abroad founda
tion for the exercise of universal love towards
men of all nations, tribes, conditions, and ranks.
It must obviously appear contrary to every prin
ciple of reason, repugnant to every amiable feel
ing, and inconsistent with the general happiness
of the species, that intelligent beings, who are all
children of the same Almighty Parent, members
of the same great family, and linked together by
so many fraternal ties, "should " bite and devour
one another," engage in hostile enterprises
against each other, look ckown with scorn and

• Prov. xxii. 2. t Job xxxi. 15. I Acts rvll. 28.

48

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

contempt on each other, or even behold with in
difference the condition of the meanest member
of the family to which they belong. On the other
hand, it is consistent with the dictates of enlight
ened reason, congenial to the best feelings of hu
man nature, and indispensably requisite to the
promotion of universal happiness, that such be
ings should be united in the bonds of affection
and harmony, that they should sympathize with
the distressed, delight in beholding the happi
ness of all, "rejoice with them that do rejoice,
and weep with them that weep ;" — that every one,
whether he be near or far off, whether he be rich
or poor, whether he be learned or unlearned,
whether he belong to this or the other civil or
religious society, whether his colour be black or
white, whether he be blind, or deaf, or lame,
whether he be an inhabitant of Greenland, Ice
land, Barbary, Germany, France, or Spain,
whatever may be his language, manners, or cus
toms, should be recognized, wherever he may be
found, as a friend and brother ; and a cordial in
terest felt in every thing that concerns his welfare
and comfort. Such a recognition of man as man,
is a duty which necessarily flows from the na
tural equality of mankind, and is congenial to the
conduct of the Universal Parent towards all his
human offspring. For, in his love to his numerous
family, and without respect of persons, he makes
the same vital air to give play to their lungs, the
same sun to cheer and enlighten them, and the
same rains and dews to refresh their fields, and
to ripen the fruits of harvest.

Let it not, however, be inferred, from what
has been now stated, that we mean to sap the
foundations of that subordination of ranks which
exists in this world. This gradation in society
is the appointment of God, and necessarily flows
from the circumstances and relations in which
man is placed in this first stage of his existence ;
and^ were it completely overthrown, society
would be plunged into a scene of anarchy and
confusion ; and the greater part of the individuals
which compose it, would become a lawless ban
ditti. Whether or not there exists a subordina
tion of office and rank among superior intelligen
ces of the same species, or among the inhabitants
of other globes, we are unable at present to de-
i.ermine ; but in the actual condition of society
in the world in which we dwell, a state of com
plete independence, and a perfect equality of
wealth, station, and rank, are impossible, so long
as there exists a diversity in the capacities,
tempers, and pursuits of men. On the diversity
of rank, and the relations which subsist between
the different classes of society, as parents and
children, masters and servants, princes and sub
jects, is founded a great proportion of those
moral laws which God hath promulgated in his
word, for regulating the inclinations and the con
duct of mankind.
Diversity of fortune and station appears abso

lutely inevitable in a world where moral evil ex
ists, and where its inhabitants are exposed to
dangers, difficulties, and distress. Whether the
inhabitants of a world, where moral perfection
reigns triumphant, can exist in a state of perfect
felicity, and move forward in progressive im
provement, without a subordination of rank, it is
not, for us to determine. But in such a world as
ours, it is a wise and gracious appointment of
the Creator, and is attended with many and im
portant advantages. Were there no diversity of
wealth and station, we should be deprived of
many of the comforts, conveniences, and assis
tances which we now enjoy. Every one would
be obliged to provide for himself food, drink,
clothing, furniture, shelter, medicines, and re
creations; and in the season of sickness, danger,
and distress, he would have few or none to alle
viate his affliction, and contribute to his com
fort. But, in consequence ofthe diversity which
now exists, an opportunity is afforded of em
ploying 'he several capacities and endowments
of mankind in those lines of active exertion, for
which they are respectively fitted, and of render
ing them subservient for the improvement and
happiness of general society. One exercises thd
trade of a weaver, another that of a baker ; ono
is a shoemaker, another a tailor; one is an archi
tect, another a farmer ; one is a teacher of sci
ence or religion ; others have their minds enter
tained and improved by his instructions. One is
appointed a ruler over a city, another over a
kingdom ; one is employed in writing for the
amusement and instruction of mankind, another
is employed in printing and publishing his writ
ings. By this arrangement, the powers and ca
pacities in which individuals excel, are gradually
carried to the highest degree of attainable per
fection ; and the exertions of a single individual
are rendered subservient to the ease, the conve
nience, and the mental improvement of thou
sands.

It is not to the diversity of rank and station,
that the evils which exist among the various
classes of society are to be attributed ; but to the
influence of a spirit of pride, on the one hand,
and a spirit of insubordination on the other — to
the want of a disposition to discharge the duties
peculiar to each station, and to the deficiency of
those kindly affections which ought to be mani
fested towards every human being, by men in all
the ranks and departments of life. If love, in all
its benevolent ramifications, were to pervade the
various ranks of social life, kings would never
oppress their subjects, nor masters act unjustly
towards their servants ; nor would subjects and
servants refuse to submit to just laws, and equi
table regulations. All would act their parts with
harmony and delight in this great moral machine,
and every station and rank would contribute, in
its sphere, to the prosperity and happiness of
another. For the poor cannot do without the

RELATIONS OF MANKIND.

49

t ten, nor the rich without the poor ; the prince
without his subjects, nor subjects without wise
and enlightened rulers, and equitable laws. All
are linked together by innumerable ties ; and the
recognition of these ties, and the practice of the
reciprocal duties which arise out of them, form
the source of individual happiness, an4 the bonds
of social enjovment

SECTION II.

THE CONNEXIONS AN1> RELATIONS WHICH
SUBSIST AMONG MANKIND CONSIDERED AS
ESTABLISHING THE BASIS OF LOVE TO
OUR NEIGHBOUR.

THE relations which subsist among mankind
lay a foundation for the exercise of the benevo
lent affections, and for the various duties of social
life ; and these relations are far more numerous
and extensive than the generality of mankind are
disposed to admit. The relations of parents and
children, of husbands and wives, of brethren and
sisters, of masters and servants, of rulers and
subjects, of teachers and scholars, of buyers and
sellers, &c. are recognized by all as involving an
obligation to the exercise of certain correspond
ing duties and affections. The moment we con
template the relation of a parent and a child, we
at once perceive the obligation of love on the part
of the parent, and of reverence and obedience on
the part of the child ; and, in every other relation,
a corresponding duty is involved, resulting from
the nature of that relation, and founded on the
principle of love. But as these relations, and
their corresponding duties and affections have
been frequently illustrated, I shall advert to a va
riety of circumstances, generally overlooked,
which demonstrate the universal connexion of hu
man beings with each other, and the reasonable
ness of the exercise of love towards all man
kind.

Wherever we turn our eyes towards the great
family of mankind — whether we look around on the
land of our nativity, or to distant continents, and
(he oceans which surround them, we behold thou
sands of human beings toiling for our ease, our
convenience, our pleasure, and improvement. —
Here, we behold the ploughman turning up the
furrows of the soil, and the sower casting in the
seed which is to produce the fruits of harvest: —
there, we behold the reaper cutting down the corn
which is to serve for our nourishment. On the
one hand, we behold the cow-herd tending his
cattle, which are to afford us milk, butter, and
cheese ; on the other, we behold the shepherd
tending his flocks, whose wool is to provide us
with warm and comfortable clothing. One is
preparing leather from the hides of oxen, another
n shaping it into shoes and boots. One is spin-
24

ning flax and cotton into yarn, ancthtr is weav
ing it into linen and muslin, to cover and adorn
us. One is dressing the vine, whose juice is to
cheer and refresh us ; another is treading the
wine-press, and preparing the wine for our use.
Here, we behold the blacksmith toiling and
sweating at the anvil, preparing tongs, and
shovels, and grates, for our apartments ; there,
we behold the carpenter, with his hammer, and
plane, and saw, fitting up beds, and tables, and
chairs, for our ease and accommodation. Here,
one is preparing our food, and another our cloth
ing ; there, one is preparing our drink, and
another our medicines. In one chamber, the
student of nature and of science is preparing, at
the midnight lamp, those compositions which are
to convey entertainment and instruction to the
minds of the public ; in another, the herald of
salvation is meditating on those divine subjects,
which he is about to proclaim for the illumination
and comfort of assembled multitudes. In short,
to whatever department of human society we di
rect our attention, and to whatever quarter we
turn our eyes, in the busy scene around us, we
behold thousands of our fellow-men exerting their
corporeal and intellectual powers in those em
ployments which will ultimately contribute either
to our ease, our entertainment, our security, our
accommodation, our subsistence, or our moral
and intellectual improvement.

But our connexions with human beings are
not confined to our immediate neighbourhood, nor
even to the nation in which we reside. There
is scarcely a region of the globe towards which
we can direct our view, in which we do not be
hold innumerable links which connect us with the
great family of mankind. Let us turn our eyes
to the West India islands, and we shall behold
the poor African slave toiling under the scorch
ing heat of a tropical sun, and smarting under
the cruel lash of an unfeeling overseer, in order
to provide for us sugar, molasses, and rice, to
mingle with our dainties, and to regale our appe
tites. If we direct our view to the enpire of
China, on the opposite side of the globe, twelve
thousand miles distant from the former region,
we shall behold thousands and tens of thousands
of our brethren of the human family busily em
ployed in planting the tea tree, in plucking its
leaves, in exposing them to the steam of boiling
water, in spreading them out to dry, in assorting
them into different parcels, in packing and ship
ping them off for distant shores, that we, at a
distance of nine thousand miles, may enjoy a de
licious beverage for our morning and evening
meais.* If we turn our eves on India and Persia,

• For a portion of this beverage we are indebted
even to some of the monkey tribe. As the tea shrub
often grows on the rucjred banks of steep mountains,
access to which is dangerous, and sometimes irn
practicable, the Chinese, in order to come at th»
leaves, make use of a singular stratagem. These

50

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

we *na!l find multitudes of men, women, and
children assiduously employed in cultivating the
mulberry plant, in hatching and rearing silk
worms, in winding and twisting the delicate
threads which proceed from these insects, and
preparing them for the loom, in order that our
ladies may be adorned with this finest production
of nature and art. Let us pass in imagination
to the frozen regions of Siberia and Kamtschatka,
to the inhospitable shores of Onalaska and the
Aleutian isles, and we shall behold numbers of
weather-beaten wretches exposed to innumerable
dangers by sea arid land, traversing snowy moun
tains, forests, inarches, and deserts, suffering
frequent shipwrecks on the coasts of unknown
islands inhabited by savage tribes, and exposed,
night and day, to the chilling frosts of the polar
region, and the attacks of ravenous wolves, in
order to collect the skins of otters, and furs of va
rious descriptions, to adorn the dress of our fe
male friends, and to shelter them from the
winter's cold. Let us pass to the forests ofNor-
way, Sweden, Canada, and Jamaica, and hun
dreds of hardv, weather-beaten peasants, exposed
to many accidents and privations, will be seen
cuttingdown the tall firs, larches, and mahogany,
sawing them into planks and logs, and conveying
them in floats along rapid rivers towards the sea,
to be shipped for our country, for the purposo of
being formed into floors and roofs for our build-
in<*s, and into elegant furniture to decorate our

b ' o

apartments.

Not only in distant islands and continents,
but even in the midst of the vast ocean, multi
tudes of our brethren are toiling for our pleasure,
convenience, and comfort. See yonder vessel
in the Southern Atlantic ocean, which has just
weathered the storms on the southern capo of
Africa, and narrowly escaped the dangers of
shipwreck on a rocky shore. For several weeks
the hardy mariners have been beating against
the wind in the midst of thunders, lightnings,
and tempests, with mountainous waves con
tinually breaking over them, darkness surround
ing them for many sleepless nights, and the dread
of impending destruction filling them with trem
bling and horror. And why have they been ex
posed to danger so dreadful and appalling ? That
they might convey to our shores, from China
arid Hindostan, scores of tea, coffee, sugar, por
celain, silks, carpets, and precious stones, to
supply luxuries to our tables, and ornaments to
our dress. See yonder vessel, too, which is
tossing in the midst of the Northern ocean,
passing between shoals and icebergs, and liable
every moment to be crushed to pieces between
mountains of ice. Her mariners have long been

steep places are generally frequented by great num
bers of monkeys, which, being irritated and provok
ed, to avenge themselves, tear off the branches, and
shower them down upon those who have insulted
them The Chinese immediately collect these bra nch-
MUd strip off their leaves.-Ewci/. Brit. Art. Tea.

exposed to the rigours of an arctic sky, and nave
narrowly escaped being plunged into the deep
by the stroke of an enormous whale, in order
that we might be supplied with seal-skins, whale
bone, and oil for our lamps.

Even in the bowels of the ocean thousands of
poor wretches, on the coasts of Califonia, Ceylon,
Persia, and China, are diving amidst its waves,
remaining whole half hours, at sixty feet below
the surface of its waters, exposed to the danger
of being devoured by sharks and other monsters
of the deep, in order to collect pearls for orna
ments to the ladies of Europe, Asia, Africa, and
America. — In short, wherever we turn our eyes
on the surface of the mighty deep, we contem
plate a busy scene of human beings ploughing
the ocean in every direction, snd toiling, in the
midst of dangers, storms, and tempests, in order
to promote the accommodation of their fellow-
mortals, who dwell on opposite regions of the
globe. On the one hand, we behold thousands
of hardy Russians, Swedes, and Norwegians,
steering their vessels along the Baltic and the
German sea, to convey to our shores copper,
timber, pitch, skins, hemp, and tallow ; on the
other, we behold the Americans ploughing the
waves of the Atlantic, with stores of mahogany,
sugar, rice, flour, tobacco, rum, and brandy.
Along the vast Pacific ocean, the Spanish gal
leons are conveying to Europe, gold, silver,
pearls, precious stones, and all the other riches
of Peru. Even from the southern icy ocean,
where nature appears bound in the fetters of
eternal ice, the adventurous mariner is convey
ing to our shores furs of various kinds, with the
products of seals and whales. And, in return
for the supply we receive from foreign regions,
our British sailors are traversing every sea and
ocean, and distributing to the inhabitants of
every clime the productions of our arts, sciences,
and manufactures.

Even in the subterraneous apartments of the
globe, as well as upon its surface, many thou
sands of human beings are labouring, in confined
and gloomy regions, to promote our comforts and
enjoyments. The copper mines in Sweden are
situated at more than a thousand feet below the
surface of the ground, and contain a vast num
ber of subterraneous apartments, branching in
all directions. In these dreary abodes, twelve
hundred wretched beings are doomed to pass
their existence, deprived of the cheerful light of
day — toiling, almost naked, in the midst of hot.
and sulphureous vapours, and under severe task
masters, in order that we may be supplied with
the best species of copper, for forming our ket
tles, cauldrons, and copper-plate engravings.
The salt mines of Hungary and Poland, the gold
and silver mines of Potosi and Peru, and hun
dreds of similar subterraneous mansions, in
various parts of the earth, present to our view
numerous groups of our fellow-men, all engaged

RELATIONS OF MANKIND.

51

hi similar toils and 1 abours, in order that we may
enjoy the riches, the elegancies, and the con
veniences of life. In our own country, how
manv thousands of our brethren are labouring
in the dark recesses of the earth, far beneath its
surface, exposed to the suffocation of the choke-
damp and the explosions of the Jire-damp, in
procuring for us that invaluable fossil, which
warms and cheers our winter apartments, which
oooks our victuals, and enables us to carry on
the various processes of our arts and manufac
tories !

Thus it appears, that we are connected with
our fellow-men, in every quarter of the world,
J»y thousands of ties ; — that millions of human be
ings, whom we have never seen, nor never will
see on this side the grave, are labouring to pro
mote our interests, without whose exertions we
should be deprived of the greatest proportion of
our accomodations and enjoyments. While we
are sitting in our comfortable apartments, feast
ing on the bounties of Providence, thousands,
and ten thousands of our brethren of mankind, in
different regions of the globe, are assiduously
labouring to procure for us supplies for some
future entertainment. One is sowing the seed,
another gathering in the fruits of harvest ; one is
providing fuel, and another furs and flannel, to
guard us from the winter's cold ; one is convey
ing home the luxuries and necessaries of life,
another is bringing intelligence from our friends
in distant lands ; one is carrying grain to the
mill, another is grinding it, and another is con
veying it along the road to our habitations ; one
is in search of medicines to assuage our pains,
and another is in search of consolation to sooth
our wounded spirits. In the midst of these ne
ver-ceasing exertions, some are crossing deep
and dangerous rivers, some are traversing a vast
howling wilderness ; some are wandering amidst
swampy moors, and trackless heaths ; some are
parched with thirst in sandy deserts ; some are
shivering and benumbed amidst the blasts of
winter; some are toiling along steep and dan
gerous roads, and others are tossing in the midst
of the ocean, buffeted by the winds and raging
billows.

And, since we are connect sd with our fellow-
creatures by so many links, ij it not reasonable,
is it not congenial to the nature of man, that we
should be connected with them by the ties of
sympathy and benevolent affections ? It is true,
indeed, that the various classes of mankind in
every country, who are toiling for our ease and
gratification, seldom or never think of us in the
midst of their difficulties and labours. Perhaps
they have no other end in view than to earn their
daily subsistence, and provide food and clothing
for their families ; perhaps they are actuated by
the most selfish motives, and by principles of
vanity and avarice; and some of them, perhaps,
«nder the influence of that depravity which is

common to the species, may be secretly cursing
and reproaching us as individuals, or as a nation.
But, from whatever motives their labours and
exertions proceed, it is a fact which cannot be
denied, and which thev cannot prevent, that we
actually enjoy the benefit of them ; and, that, with
out them, we should be deprived of the greater
part of those comforts and enjoyments which
render existence desirable, and which cheer us
in our pilgrimage to the grave.

We have, therefore, in almost every artificial
object that surrounds us, and in every enjoyment
we possess from day to day, so many sensible
emblems of our connexion with every branch of
the great family of mankind. When we sit down
to a dish of tea, we are reminded of the crowded
and busy population of China, where this plant is
produced, and of the poor African slave, through
whose sorrows and toils the sugar we mix with
it is prepared. And shall we not feel a kindly
affection for those whose labours procure us such
a refreshing beverage ? And should not our love
prompt us to every active exertion by which their
miseries may be alleviated, and their intellectual
and religious improvement promoted ? When
we look at the pearls which adorn us, we are re
minded of the poor wretch who has plunged to
the bottom of the deep, and scrambled among
projecting rocks, to the danger of his life, in or
der to procure them. When we look at a cop
per-plate engraving, we are reminded of the dark
and cheerless recesses of the copper mines,
where hundreds are employed in digging for this
useful metal. When we enjoy the comfort of a
cheerful fire, we are reminded of the gloomy sub
terraneous regions to which so many of our coun
trymen are confined, and the toils and dangers to
which they are exposed, before our coals can be
dragged from the bowels of the earth. And while
we feel delighted with the diversified enjoyment
which flows from the labour and industry of every
class of mankind, is it reasonable that we should
look with indifference on any one of them ? Is
it not accordant with the dictates of enlightened
reason, and with every thing that we consider as
amiable in the nature of man, that we should
embrace them all in the arms of kindness and
brotherly affection, and that our active powers,
so far as our influence extends, should be em-,
ployed in endeavouring to promote their present
and everlasting happiness? At present, they
seldom think about the benefits they are procur
ing for us and others by their useful labours ; but
•were their circumstances meliorated, were their
miseries relieved, were their minds expanded by
instruction, were their moral powers cultivated
and improved, were they to behold the various
branches of the human family for whom they are
labouring, exerting every nerve to promote their
moral improvement and domestic enjoyment, it
would produce many pleasing emotions in their
breasts, in the midst of all their toilsome Uh

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

hours, to reflect that their exertions are the
means of distributing numerous comforts and
conveniences among men of different nations,
ranks, kindreds, and languages. Their minds
would take a more extensive range among the
various tribes of mankind with which they are
connected, as intelligences of the same species ;
they would learn to trace the remotest conse
quences of every branch of labour, and of every
mechanical operation in which they are engaged,
and they would thus feel themselves more inti
mately related to every individual of the great
family to which they belong.

That it is the intention of the Creator that an
extensive and affectionate intercourse should be
carried on between the remotest tribes of man
kind, appears even from the physical constitu
tion and arrangement of our globe. The surface
of the earth is every where indented with rivers
of various dimensions, winding in every direc
tion through the continents and the larger
islands, and some of them running a course of
several thousands of miles. In the eastern con
tinent, above four hundred rivers of large di
mensions are rolling from the mountains towards
the sea ; and in the western continent, more
than one hundred and forty majestic streams are
to be found, connecting the highest and the re
motest parts of the land with the ocean, besides
thousands of streams of smaller dimensions.
The water of the sea is formed of such a con
sistency, or specific gravity, that it is capable of
supporting large floating edifices ; while, at the
same time, its parts are so yielding as to permit
such vehicles to move with rapidity along its
surface, through its waves and billows. In vir
tue of this arrangement, the ocean, instead of
standing as an everlasting barrier between the
nations, has become a medium for the most
speedy intercourse between distant lands. The
atmosphere which surrounds the globe, contri
butes likewise by its agency to promote the same
important end. By the impulsion of its differ
ent masses in various directions, our ships are
wafied with considerable velocity along ihe sur
face of rivers, seas, and oceans, to the remotest
extremities of the globe. By means of these ar
rangements which the Creator has established,
the treasures of the mountains, and of the inland
parts of the continents and islands, are conveyed
towards the sea, and transported from one island
and continent to another ; and thus the various
tribes of mankind have an opportunity of visiting
each other, of cultivating an affectionate inter
course, and of contributing to their mutual en
joyment. And as it is probable that there exist
in nature certain powers or principles not yet
discovered, the agency of which may be applied
to the propelling of machines and vehicles over
land and water, and through the regions of the
atmosphere, with a velocity much superior to
what has hitherto been effected ; — it appears

evident, that the Creator, in forming such prin
ciples, and in permitting man to discover their
nature and energies, intended that they should
be applied for promoting a rapid and endearing
intercourse among all the branches of thai
large family which he has placed upon the globe.
And I have no doubt, that in the future ages of
the world, by means of improvements in art
and science, such intercourse will be carried on
in the spirit of benevolence, to an extent and
with a rapidity of which we cannot at present
form any adequate conception.

It appears, then to be one great design of the
Creator, in connecting mankind by so many
links, and in rendering them dependent upon
each other, though placed in opposite regions oJ'
the globe, to lay a broad foundation for the exer
cise of the benevolent affections between men of
all nations, and ultimately to unite the whole hu
man race in one harmonious and affectionate so
ciety. And it is obviously the duty of every
human being to cultivate those dispositions, and
to prosecute that train of action which have a
tendency to accomplish the plans of the Univer
sal Parent, and to promote the happiness of his
intelligent offspring. In so doing, he contributes
to his own individual happiness, and at the same
time to that of all the moral intelligences in hea
ven and earth with which he is connected.

SECTION III.

THE ULTIMATE DESTINATION OF MANKIND
CONSIDERED AS A BASIS FOR LOVE TO OCR
NEIGHBOUR, AND AS A MOTIVE TO IT3
EXERCISE.

THE present world is not the ultimate desti
nation of mankind. It is only a passing scene
through which they are. now travelling to that im
mortal existence which will have no termination.
Man is at present in the infancy of his being ;
his faculties ate only beginning to expand, his
moral powers are feeble and depraved, his intel
lectual views are circumscribed within a narrow
range, and all the relations in which he stands
demonstrate that the present scene is connected
with the future, and is introductory to a higher
sphere of action and enjoyment. " We know,"
says the Apostle Paul, (i that if this earthly
house of our tabernacle were dissolved, we have
a building of God, an house not made with
hands, eternal in the heavens." And our Sa
viour declares, that " the hour is coming, in
which all that are in their graves shall hear his
voice, and shall come forth," and that " our
vile bodies shall be changed, and fashioned like
unto his glorious body," and shall enter into the
enjoyment of a new world, " which is incorrup
tible, undefiled, and which fadeth not away."

RELATIONS OF MANKIND.

Tlw capacity of making perpetual advances
in knowledge and moral improvement in a fu
ture stale of existence, is that in which the true
dignity of man consists; and in this capacity,
and the high destination with which it is con
nected, there is no difference between the higU
and the low, the slave who is chained to a
galley, and the sovereign at whose nod the na
tions tremble. They are equally destined to im
mortality, and will exist in a future world, when
time and all the arrangements of the present
state shaul come to a close. If man were only
the creature of a day, whose prospects are
bounded by this terrestrial scene, and whose
hopes terminate in the tomb, it might appear a
matter of comparatively little importance whether
or not our benevolent regards were extended to
our fellow-men, except in so far as our self-in
terest and avarice were concerned. The happi
ness of a fellow-creature might then be consider
ed as a matter of indifference, and his dissolu
tion, at death, a circumstance as trivial as the
falling of a leaf in autumn, or the sinking of a
stone to the bottom of the ocean. Even in this
case, however, it would still be conducive to hu
man happiness during the short and uncertain
span of our existence, that all the branches of
the human family were cemented together in
union and affection. But when we reflect that
all the intelligent beings around us, with whom
we more immediately associate, and all those in
distant lands with whom we are connected by
the ties of one common nature, and on whom we
depend for many of our comforts, are destined
along with ourselves to an eternal world, in
another region of the Creator's empire ; and
that the affections we now cultivate, and the
conduct we pursue in reference to our brethren,
have an intimate relation to that immortal ex
istence ; — this consideration stamps an import
ance on the exercise, of brotherly affection which
is beyond the power of human language to ex
press. It shows us, that the dispositions which
we now indulge, and the manner in which we
treat the meanest of our fellow-creatures, may
be recognised and attended with the most im
portant effects a thousand millions of years
hence, and may run parallel in their conse
quences even with eternity itself.

We may, perhaps, view it as a matter of tri
vial moment in what manner we now conduct
ourselves towards a servant or a slave ; whether
we render his life miserable by hard labour,
cruel insults, and contemptuous treatment, or
study to promote his comfort and domestic enjoy
ment ; whether we neglect to instruct him in the
knowledge of his duty to his God and to his fel
low men, or labour to promote his moral anJ re
ligious improvement. We may view with in
difference or contempt the person and the family
of a poor pious neighbour, who has earned a
•canty subsistence by the sweat of his brow, and

may behold his body laid in the grave with as
much apathy as we behold the carcass of a dog
thrown into a pond. But could we follow the
pious man beyond the precincts of the tomb, into
that immortal scene which has burst upon his
disencumbered spirit ; could we trace the gradual
expansion of his faculties towards objects which
lie beyond the grasp of mortals, and the perfec
tion of his moral powers ; could we behold his
mouldered frame starting up to new life at " the
resurrection of the just," and arrayed in new
splendour and beauty ; could we contemplate him
placed in a station of dignity and honour among
the sons of God," in that glorious residence to
which he is destined ; his intellectual powers ex
panding, grasping the most sublime objects, and
pushing forward in the career of perpetual im
provement, without the least stain of moral im
perfection : — would we now treat such a one with
malevolence, or even with indifference or ne
glect ? And were we placed by his side in such
a dignified station, what would our feelings be
when we recollected the apathy, the indifference,
and even the contempt with which he was treated
in this sublunary scene ? On the other hand,
could we follow the poor wretched slave to the
future world, and contemplate the degradation
and misery to which he is there reduced in con
sequence of our malevolence and neglect, what
emotions of horror and indignation should we
not feel at the recollection of that pride and dis
affection which led us to act so basely towards
a fellow-immortal, whom it was in our power to
have trained to wisdom, to excellence, and to a
happy immortality ? When, therefore, we be
hold individuals withholding their benevolent re
gard from their brethren of mankind, and treat
ing them with haughtiness and contempt, we
must conclude that such persons overlook the
true dignity of man, and secretly disbelieve the
reality of an immortal state of existence, whatever
professions they may make to the contrary. For
the consideration of the eternal destiny of man
kind reflects a dignity on the meanest human be
ing, and attaches an importance to all our affec
tions and actions in relation to him, unspeakably
greater than if his existence were circumscribed
within the narrow limits of time, and throws
completely into the shade all the degrading cir
cumstances with which he is now surrounded.

When we consider our brethren of the human
family in the light of immortal intelligences, and
look forward to the scenes of the eternal world,
a crowd of interesting reflections naturally arises
in the mind. A wide and unbounded prosnect
opens before us. Amidst new creations and \he
revolutions of systems and worlds, new displays
of the Creator's power and providence burst upon
the view. We behold ourse'ves placed on a
theatre of action and enjoyment, and passing
through " scenes and changes" which bear no
resemblance to the transactions and events ot

54

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

'.his sublunary world. We behold ourselves
mingling with beings of a superior order, culti
vating nobler affections, and engaged in more
sublime employments than those which now oc
cupy our attention. We behold ourselves asso
ciated with men of all nations and kindreds, and
with those who lived in the remotest periods of
time. Millions of years roll on after millions, our
capacities and powers of intellect are still ex
panding, and new scenes of beauty and magnifi
cence are perpetually bursting on the astonished
mind, without any prospect of a termination. —
Amidst those eternal scenes, we shall doubtless
enter into the most intimate connexions with per
sons whom we have never seen, from whom we
are now separated by continents and oceans, with
those whose bodies are now mouldering in the dust,
with those who have not yet entered on the stage
of existence, and with those svith whom we now
refuse to associate on account of their rank, and
.station, and religious opinions. That man, into
whose dwelling we would not at present deign
to enter, and with whom we would abhor to min
gle in the public services of religion, may then be
one of our chief companions in the regions of
bliss, in directing and expanding our views of the
glory and magnificence of God. The man whom
we now hate and despise, and whose offers of as
sistance we would treat with disdain, may in
that happier world be a principal agent in opening
to our view new sources of contemplation and
delight. That servant whom we now treat as a
being of inferior species, at whom we frown and
scold with feelings of proud superiority, may be
our instructor and director, and every way our
superior, in that region where earthly distinctions
are unknown. That humble instructor whom
we now despise, and whose sentiments we treat
with contempt, may, in that world ofintelligence
and love, be our teacher and our guide to direct
our views of the attributes of the Deity, of the
arrangements of his providence, and of the glories
of his empire. There the prince may yield prece
dence to his subjects, the master to the slave,
and the peer to the humblest peasant. For no
pre-eminence of birth, fortune, or learning, no
excellence but that which is founded on holiness
and virtue, on moral and intellectual endow
ments, will have any place in the arrange
ments of that world where human distinctions are
for ever abolished and unknown. And shall we
now refuse to acknowledge those who are to be
our friends and companions in that future world ?
Is it not agreeable to the dictates of reason and
to the voice of God that we should regard them
with complacency and affection, whatever be the
garb they now wear, whatever be their colour or
features, and in whatever island or continent
ihey may now reside?

It must, indeed, be admitted, that all the inha
bitants of oui world will not be exalted to dignity
and happiness in the future state. A great pro

portion of them, in their present state of depravi
ty and degradation, are altogether unqualified fo?
participating in the exercises and enjoyments of
celestial intelligences. Whole nations arc stiFi
overspread with intellectual darkness, ignorant
of their eternal destination, and immersed in im
moralities and vile abominations. And, even in
those countries where the light of revelation has
dispelled the gloom of heathenism, a vast mass of
human beings are to be founa> " having their un
derstandings darkened, alienated from the life ct
God," and sunk into the mire of every moral pol
lution. Still, we have no reason, on this ac
count, to overlook their native dignity, and their
high destination. Every human being we see
around us, however low in rank, or degraded by
vice, is endowed with an immortal nature, and is
capable of being raised to the dignity of an inhabit
ant of heaven; and there is not a single indivi
dual to whom we can point, either in our own
country or in other lands, in relation to whom we
are authorized to affirm, that he will not be a
participator in immortal bliss. And, therefore,
every man with whom we associate, and whom
we recognize in the circle of society around us,
ought to be viewed as one with whom we may as
sociate in the world to come. And as to those
who appear to be partially enlightened and reno
vated in their minds, we ought not to withhold
our affection and complacency on account of their
ignorance, their contracted views, or erroneous
opinions. We should view them, not as they ara
in their present state of infancy and weakness,
but as they will be when arrived at maturity and
manhood ; not as they appear in the first weak
essays of their intellectual powers, and in the
lowest step of their existence, but as they will ap
pear in their career of improvement after a lapse
of millions of ages. Carrying forward our views
to those eternal scenes, and accompanying our
brethren of the human family through all the gra
dations of their existence in future worlds, we
behold their faculties in progressive expansion,
their minds approximating nearer to the source
of eternal wisdom, their views of the empire of
Omnipotence continually enlarging, their know
ledge of the plan of redemption, and its numerous
bearings, for ever increasing ; their love and af
fection to God and to fellow intelligences waxing
into a more ardent flame ; every evil propensity
corrected, every imperfection removed, every
blossom of virtue fully expanded, and " joy un
speakable and full of glory" pervading every
faculty of their souls. And can we behold intel
ligent minds, capable of so high and dignified at
tainments, and the companions of our future
destiny, with indifference or contempt? Is there
not here a broad foundation laid for the most ex
pansive emanations of love towards every mem
ber of the great family of mankind, however
much he may be obscured, and sullied by folly
and sin in this first stage of his existence ?

EFFECTS OF MALEVOLENCE.

55

In the mean time, while the greater part of
mankind are immersed in ignorance and vice,
while the image of their Maker is defaced, and
their immortal powers prostituted to the vilest
passions, the most noble and honourable opera
tion in which love can be engaged, is to devise
and execute schemes by which our degraded
brethren may be raised to intellectual and moral
excellence: to train up young immortals in re
ligion and virtue ; to diffuse the principles of
useful knowledge among all ranks ; to counteract
the diabolical spirit of war and contention ; to
abolish slavery in every shape ; to meliorate the
social and domestic condition of the lower orders
of society; to publish the revelation of God in
every language, and to send forth the messen
gers of salvation to every land, to instruct men of
all nations and kindreds and tongues in the
knowledge of the true God, and of the path which
leads to a blessed immortality. Thus shall we
be enabled to manifest our Jove towards all our
brethren of the human family ; thus shall we con
tribute to render them worthy of our highest af
fection, and to prepare them for the exalted
exercises and employments of the life to come.

SECTION IV.

LOVE TO GOD AND OUR NEIGHBOUR ENFORCED
AND ILLUSTRATED, FROM A CONSIDERA
TION OF THE MISERABLE EFFECTS WHICH
WOULD ENSUE WERE THESE PRINCIPLES
REVERSED, AND WERE RATIONAL BEINGS
TO ACT ACCORDINGLV.

THE two leading principles which I have en
deavoured to illustrate, in the preceding pages,
form the basis of the moral order of the intelli
gent universe. Consequently, were these prin
ciples reversed, and were moral agents to act
accordingly, the moral world would soon be trans
formed into a scene of the most dismal anarchy
and confusion. Every action would be dictated
by feelings of pure malevolence, and misery in
every shape would be the great object which hu
man beings would exert their powers to accom
plish. Could we suppose for a moment, that so
ciety could subsist for any length of time under
the unrestrained operation of such a principle, the
following, among many thousands of similar ef
fects, would be the natural and necessary results.

Every individual would exhibit, in every
action, the character of a fiend ; and every fami
ly would display a miniature picture of hell. —
Between the husband and wife there would be
nothing but incessant brawling, dissension, and
execration. Whatever was ardently desired by
the one would be as resolutely and obstinately
opposed by the other ; and the fury and resentment
excited by unsatisfied desires, and disappointed

hopes, would destroy eve«-y vestige of peace and
tranquillity, and stimulate a host of infernal pas
sions to rage without control. Their children
would be actuated by the same diabolical tempers.
The son would take an infernal pleasure in curs
ing, insulting, and reproaching " the father that
begat him," and in trampling with scorn and in
dignation on the mother who gave him birth. —
Brothers and sisters would live under the con
tinual influence of malice and envy, " hateful, and
hating one another." Whatever actions tended
to irritate, to torment, and to enrage the passions
of each other, and to frustrate their desires and
expectations, would be performed with a grin of
infernal delight. Mutual scuffles and execrations
would ensue. One would have his eye-ball bruis
ed, or knocked out of its socket, another would
have his teeth driven out of his jaws ; one would
have his hair torn from its roots, another his
skull fractured with repeated blows ; the legs of
one would be full of bruises and putrifying
sores, and the face of another all over covered
with blotches and scars, most hideous to behold ;
and, in the progress of contention, the hand of a
brother would plunge his dagger into a brother's
heart. In larger societies, fraud, falsehood, de
ceit, seduction, quarrels, oppression, plunder, ra
pine, murder, and assassination, would be the
common occurrences of every day and every hour.
The seller would uniformly endeavour to cheat
the buyer, and the buyer would endeavour, by every
kind of fraud, or open force, to deprive the sel
ler of the value of his commodities. Poison would
be sold for medicine, and deleterious mixtures and
poisonous drugs would be mixed up with the com
mon articles of food, that the venders might enjoy
the diabolical pleasure of hearing of the pains,
the agonies, and the dying groans of the victims
of their villany. The debauchee would triumph
in the number of victims he had rendered wretch
ed and forlorn by his wiles and depraved pas
sions ; the strong would oppress the weak, anc?
rejoice in depriving them of every comfort, and
the powerful would exult in trampling under their
feet the persons and the property of fhe poor, and
in beholding the extent of the miseries they had
created.

In the common intercourse of life, every one
would be maltreated, insulted, and reproached,
as he walked along the street ; the lip would be
shot out with a diabolical grin at every passen
ger, which would be returned with the frown and
the scowl of a demon. Every passenger that
met another on the highway would be encoun
tered with blows, execrations, and reproaches ;
and he who met his neighbour unawares in the
recesses of a forest, would receive a dagger in
his breast before he was aware of his danger.
Words would be exchanged between man and
man that would cut each other's hearts "like the
piercings of a sword," and horrible contentions,
accompanied with rage and fury, and wound*

56

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

and bruises would be presented to the view in
every city, and village, and rural scene. When
one had finished a house to shelter him from the
storm, a number of desperadoes, in horrid com
bination, would overturn the mansion, and crush
him among the ruins. When one had planted
vines and fruit-frees, others would seize the op
portunity, when they were beginning to bud and
blossom, to tear them up by the roots; persons
who sowed the seed in spring could have no con
fidence that they would ever reap the fruits in
autumn ; and no one could have the least secu
rity that the wealih and property he possessed
to-day would be his to-morrow. No one could
feel secure for a single hour, that his life was
not in danger from the sword of the murderer or
the assassin ; every man would live in continual
fear and alarm ; no pleasing prospects nor hopes
of future enjoyment would ever calm the tumul
tuous passions, or cheer the distracted mind ; all
confidence between man and man would be com
pletely destroyed ; falsehood in every shape
would walk triumphant; the rnirid would be dis
tracted amidst its ignorance of the scenes and
events that were happening around it ; for no in
telligence could be believed, and no one could
certainly know the reality of any object or event,
unless he beheld it with his own eyes. Schools,
seminaries of learning, universities, and acade
mies would have no existence, and no one could
gain an acquaintance with any principle or fact
in the universe around him, except in so far as
he had made the investigation by means of his
own senses arid powers. Tormented by tumul
tuous passions raging within, in continual alarm
from desperadoes, plunderers, and assassins rag
ing around, looking back on the past with horri
ble recollections, and contemplating the future
with terror and dismay, the mind would feel it
self fixed in a scene of misery and wretchedness,
which no words could describe nor pencil deli
neate.

If we could suppose a number of such beings
leagued together for the purpose of carrying the
schemes of malevolence more completely into
effect, one of their employments would be to set
fire to houses and villages, in order that they
might enjoy the infernal pleasure of seeing their
fellow-creatures deprived of every shelter, and
of beholding men, women, and children roasting
in the flames. Another employment would be
to poison the springs of water, that they might
behold one after another, from the sucking child
to the hoary head, seized with excruciating pains,
and sinking into the agonies of death. Another
gratification of malevolence would be to dam up
the rivers in their rapid course, that they might
overflow the circumjacent plains, in order that
they might feast their eyes on the scenes of de-
vas'tation and ruin that would ihus be created,
and on thp terror and destruction of the wretched
The conflagration of a city, with

all its accompaniments, the crash of falling
houses, and of palaces tumbling into ruin; the
terror and confusion of its inhabitants, the wail-
ings of women and children, arid the groans of
the burning victims, would be a feast to the eyea
and music to the ears of such malignant beings,
as they once were to Nero, when, from the top
of a high tower, he beheld Rome wrapt in the
flames which he himself had kindled, and sung
on his lyre the destruction of Troy. Even in
the midst of the ocean such revolting scenes
would be frequently realized. When t\vo ships
descried each other, a diabolical onset would
ensue. To set on flames the respective vessels,
to sink them in the deep, or to cause them to
burst with a horrid explosion, would be the ob
ject of both the crews ; that they might feast
their malevolence on the spectacle of wounds
and carnage, of drowning wretches covered with
blood and scars, fighting with the billows, and
scrambling for safety among the shattered frag
ments of the wreck.

Were it possible that discoveries in art and
science could be made by intelligences actuated
by such malignant passions, they would be all
applied to subserve the purposes of malevolence.
The force of gunpowder would be employed to
blow ships and houses to atoms, to shake popu
lous cities to their foundations, and to create
among their inhabitants universal horror and
alarm ; the force of steam would be employed in
producing destructive explosions, and in propel
ling the instruments of death and devastation
among a surrounding populace. Air balloons
would be employed for enabling them to carry
their malignant schemes, in relation to distant
tribes, more speedily into effect ; for hurli'ig
down upon towns and villages stones, and bullets,
and darts; and for enabling them to escape in
safety when they had finished the work of de
struction. The discovery of the nature of light
ning, and its identity to the electrical fluid, in
stead of being applied for the protection of per
sons and of buildings from the stroke of that ter
rific meteor, would be destined to the purpose of
devastation and destruction. The electricity of
the atmosphere and the lightnings from the
clouds would be conducted and directed so as to
set on fire stacks of corn, to shatter lofty build
ings, and lay groups of men and cattle prostrate
with the dust. Every mechanical power, and
all the combinations of physical forces which art
can produce, would be applied to the framing of
engines for torture, devastation, and ma&sacre ;
and on the front of every new invention would
be displayed, as if engraved in legible characters

—TERROR, MISERY, AND DESTRUCTION.

Could we suppose for a moment such beings
occasionally combining together on a large sc&le,
for the purpose of more extensively glutting their
malevolence, their conduct towards each other ru
nations, and the contests in which they would be

EFFECTS OF MALEVOLENCE.

57

engaged in this capacity, would he tremendous
and horriMe beyond the power of description.
Every malevolent affection would be brought into
action ; every infernal passion would be raised
to its' highest pitch of fury; every one, stimu
lated by his associates, would breathe nothing
but revenge, execrations, slaughter, and utter
extermination against opposing armies; every
engine of human destruction which ingenuity
could invent would be brought into the scene of
action ; the yell of demons would accompany the
fierce and sanguinary onset ; and a scene of
horror would ensue beyond the power of imagi
nation to conceive, which would n-ot terminate
till the one class of combatants had exterminated
the other ; till they had trampled down and de
stroyed the fruits of their ground, and turned
their land into a wilderness ; till they had burned
their villages to ashes, and tumbled their cities
into a heap of ruins ; till they had drenched their
fields with blood, and strewed them with skulls,
and limbs, and the mangled carcasses of thou
sands and ten thousands of men, women, and
children, thrown together in horrible confusion.
But it is needless to dwell on such scenes ; since
the history of all nations — since even the history
of modern Europe presents us with spectacles of
horror, scarcely inferior to those I have now de
scribed, and with moral agents who bear too
striking a resemblance to those whose actions are
completely subversive of the second command
ment of the law, " Thou shalt love thy neighbour
as thyself."

Such, then, would be some of the dreadful
effects which would flow from a subversion of
the second principle of the moral law, if we could
suppose that organical intelligences, not endowed
with immortal bodies, could exist for any length
of time amidst such scenes of depravity and
wretchedness. But it is more than probable
that such a state of society could not long sub
sist in such a world as we now inhabit, and
among rational beings, whose corporeal organi
zation is constructed after the model of the hu
man frame. The whole mass of society in every
land would soon be transformed into one bound
less scene of anarchy and confusion ; every one
would flee from his neighbour as from an infernal
fiend ; a war of universal extermination would
commence ; nothing would be beheld over all the
regions of the globe but spectacles of rapine,
devastation, and destruction ; and nothing would
be heard among all the eight hundred millions of
its inhabitants but the voice of execration, and
the yells of lamentation, and mourning, and wo,
till at length every beauty which now adorns the
face ol nature would be effaced, every fertile field
transformed info a desert, every human habita
tion overturned, and every inhabitant of the earth
sunk into oblivion.* This is one of the most

• Whether sur,h scenes as some of them now de
scribed may be realize* in the future state of pu-

terrible representations we can form of the hor
rors of the future state of punishment, where ma
levolent passions rage without control ; and the
considerations now stated demonstrate, that the
man who is actuated by a principle of hostility
towards his neighbour, is training and preparing
himself for becoming an inhabitant of that mise
rable and dreary region, " where the worm dieth
not, and the fire" of malevolence and revenge
" is never quenched." We are thus instructed,
that if there be a future state at all, it must,
from the very nature and constitution of things,
be a state of misery and horror to every man
whose mind is under the unrestrained dominion
of depraved affections and malignant passions ;
so that there is no possibility, in such a case, of
escaping the " wrath to come," unless the moral
constitution of the intelligent universe were en
tirely subverted.

If, then, it appears that such dismal conse
quences would flow from the subversion of this
principle or law, it is obvious that the law itself
must be " holy, just, and good," and calculated
to promote the perfection and happiness of all
created intelligences, among whom it is found
in full operation. And in a world such as ours,
where this law is partially violated, the conse
quent misery which is suffered will be nearly in
proportion to the extent to which this violation
is carried, and to the number of individuals who
are actuated by a principle of opposition to its
requirements.

In like manner, it might be shown, that the
most dismal effects would "be produced, were the
first principle of the moral law reversed, and the
malevolence of intelligent beings directed towards
their Creator. In this case, instead of assem
bled multitudes joining in solemn adorations of
the divine character and perfections, the God of
heaven would be blasphemed, and his name ab
horred in every land. Instead of reverence and
profound humility in the presence of Jehovah, a
spirit of pride and independence, and an impa
tience of control, would pervade every mind.
Instead of thanksgivings for the bounties of his
providence, the basest ingratitude would be mani
fested, and the most marked contempt of all his
favours. Instead of cordial submission to his
wise arrangements, nothing but murmurings and
repinings would be heard, and the most pre
sumptuous decisions uttered against all the dis-

nishment, or whether the principles of the moral law
will be entirely subverted among the miserable be
ings who are subjected to that punishment, it be
comes not us positively to determine. But we can
scarcely conceive a more horrible idea thun that of
intelligent beings acting uniformly from principles
of pure malevolence, and at the same tune endowed
with immortal bodies, capable of sensations similar
to those we now feel. In this case, every accumu
lated wound received from malignant associates
would be an additional source of pain and miserr
which would continually increase, wi^cu. »uj
prospect of relief from the stiOKo vi death.

58

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

pensatious of his providence. Instead of com
placency and delight in his character and opera
tions, insults and reproaches would burst forth
at every display of his wisdom, justice, and
omnipotence. Instead of admiration of the
beauty and grandeur of his wonderful works in
heaven and earth, feelings of contempt and
disdain would be mingled with all their surveys
of the operatior.J of nature. His omnipotence
would be disregarded, his benevolence called in
question or despised, and his wisdom and intelli
gence arraigned. Like Alphonso, king of Cas
tile, they would not hesitate to affirm, "If we
had been of God's privy council when he made
the world, we would have advised him better."
Under the influence of such diabolical disposi
tions, the harmony of the visible creation would
be attempted to be deranged, and its beauties
defaced, in so far as their limited powers would
be able to effect. The fields would be stripped
of their verdure ; the forests would be torn up
by the roots, and strewed in shapeless masses
along the plains ; the vegetable beauties which
now diversify the rural landscape would be effa
ced ; the rivers would be turned out of their
courses to overflow the adjacent plains, and to
transform them into stagnant marshes and
standing pools ; the air would be impregnated
with pestilential vapours; and the grand, and
beautiful, and picturesque scenes of nature would
be stripped of their glory, leaving nothing but
naked rocks and barren deserts, covered with
the wrecks of nature, to mark the operations of
malevolence.

Such would be the dispositions and the conduct
of intelligent beings were the first principle of the
moral law reversed, and their actions regulated
by a principle of malevolence : and such, in a
greater or less degree, are the dispositions of
every man in whose heart the love of God has
never taken up its residence. Revolting as the
scenes now supposed must appear to every mind
possessed of moral feeling, they must be admit
ted to be the necessary results of malignant pas
sions raging without control. And if there be
any region of creation in which pure malevolence
actuates its inhabitants, we must suppose the
restraining influence of the Almighty interposed,
to preserve their malignant operations within
those bounds which are consistent with the plans
of his moral government and the general happi
ness of the intelligent universe. That princi
ples and practices have existed among mankind,
which, if left to operate without restraint, would
produce all the effects now supposed, appears
from the description which the apostle Paul
gives of the character of the Gentile world, and
even of that portion of it which had been brought
into a civilized state. He declares that " they
did not like to retain God in their knowledge,
but changed the glory of the incorruptible God
into an image made like to corruptible man, and

to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping
things," that they were "filled with all un
righteousness, fornication, wickedness, cove-
teousness, maliciousness ;" that they were " full
of envy, murder, deceit, malignity, backbiters,
haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, in
ventors of evil things, disobedient to parents }
without understanding, without natural affection^
implacable, unmerciful. Who, knowing tho
judgment of God, that they who commit such
things are worthy of death, not only do the same,
but have pleasure in them that do them."
Were practices and passions of this description,
which are all directly opposed to the principle of
benevolence, to operate without control, the
universe would soon be transformed into a bound
less scene of devastation and sterility, of misery
and horror, of lamentation and wo.

Turning our eyes from such revolting scenes,
I shall now direct the attention of my readers to
a more pleasing picture, and endeavour to de
lineate some of the happy effects which would
naturally result from a complete conformity in
thought and action to the principles of the divine
law.

SECTION V.

EFFECTS WHICH WOULD FLOW FKOM THE
FULL OPERATION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF
LOVE TO GOD AND TO MAN.

WERE this divine principle in full operation
among the intelligences that people our globe,
this world would be transformed into a paradise,
the moral desert would he changed into a fruitful
field, and " blossom as the rose," and Eden
would again appear in all its beauty and delight.
Fraud, deceit, and artifice, with all their con
comitant train of evils, would no longer walk
rampant in every land. Prosecutions, lawsuits,
and all the innumerable vexatious litigations
which now disturb the peace of society, would
cease from among men. Every debt would ba
punctually paid ; every commodity sold at its
just value ; every article of merchandise exhibit
ed in its true character ; every promise faithfully
performed ; every dispute amicably adjusted ;
every man's character held in estimation ; every
rogue and cheat banished from society; and
every jail, bridewell, and house of correction,
would either be swept away, or transformed into
the abodes of honesty, industry, and peace. In
justice and oppression would no longer walk
triumphant through the world, while the poor,
the widow, and the fatherless were groaning un
der the iron rod of those who had deprived them
of every comfort. No longer would the captive
be chained to a dungeon, and doomed to count,
in sorrow and solitude, the many long days and
years he has been banished from the light of daj

EFFECTS OF BENEVOLENCE.

and the society ofhis dearest friends. No longer
should we see a hard-hearted creditor doom a
poor unfortunate man, for the sake of a few
shillings or pounds, to rot in a jail, while his fa
mily, deprived of his industry, were pining away
in wretchedness and want. No longer should
we hear the harsh creaking of iron doors, pon
derous bolts, and the clanking of the chains of
criminals ; nor the sighs and groans of the poor
slave, fainting under the iash, and the reproaches
of a cruel master. The bands of the oppressed
would be loosed, the captives would be set at
liberty, the iron fetters would be burst asunder,
and a universal jubilee proclaimed throughout
every land. The haunts of riot and debauchery
would be forsaken, and their inmates hissed from
the abodes of men. The victims of seduction
would no longer crowd our streets at the dead
hour of night, to entice the " simple ones" into
the paths of vice and destruction ; but purity,
righteousness, and peace would " run down our
streets like a river," distributing safety, happi
ness, and repose.

The tongue of the slanderer and the whisper
ings of the backbiter would no longer be heard in
their malicious attempts to sow the seeds of
discord and contention among brethren. False
hood in all its ramifications, with the numerous
train of evils it now produces, would be banished
from the intercourses of society ; nor would
treachery prove the ruin of families and societies,
and interrupt the harmony of the commercial
and the moral world. No longer should we hear
of the embezzling of property by unfaithful ser
vants, nor the blasted hopes, the cruel disap
pointments, and the ruin of credit and of reputa
tion now produced by the votaries of falsehood.
"The lips of truth would be established for ever,"
and the liar and deceiver would be hissed to the
shades of hell. Our property would remain
sacred and secure from the thief and the mid
night robber, and our persons from the attacks of
the murderer and the assassin. We should no
longer hesitate to prosecute our journeys by day
or by night for fear of the foot-pad or the high
wayman, but should recognize every passenger
as a friend and protector. Plunder and devasta
tion would cease from the earth; "violence
would no more be heard in our land ; nor wast
ing nor destruction in all our borders." Exe
crations and malicious insults would never
harrow up the feelings of our fellow-men, nor
would a single instance of revenge be heard of
among all the inhabitants of the earth.

Pride, which now stalks about with stately
steps and lofty looks, surveying surrounding in
telligences with feelings of contempt, would be
for ever banished from the world. Ambition
would no longer wade through slaughter to a
throne, nor trample on the rights of an injured
people. Wars would cease to the ends of the
earth, and the instruments of human destruction

would be beaten into ploughshares and pruning,
hooks. That scourge which has drenched the
earth with human gore — which has convulsed
every nation under heaven — which has produced
tenfold more misery than all the destructive ele
ments of nature, and which has swept from
existence so many millions of mankind — would
be regarded as the eternal disgrace of the human
character, and the most shocking display of de
pravity in the annals of our race. No longer
should we hear " the sound of the trumpet and
the alarm of war," the confused noise of " the
horseman and the bowman," and of the mighty
armies encamping around " the city of the inno
cent," to hurl against its walls the instruments
of destruction. No longer should we behold the
fires blazing on the mountain tops, to spread the
alarm of invading armies : nor the city, which
was once full of inhabitants, " sitting solitary,"
without a voice being heard within its dwellings
but the sighs of the disconsolate and the groans
of the dying. Human wolves thirsting for the
blood of nations, would cease to prowl among
men. Nation would not lift up sword against
nation, neither would they learn war any more.
The instruments of cruelly, the stake, the rack,
the knout, and the lash, would no longer lacerate
and torture the wretched culprit; cannons, and
guns, and swords, and darts would be forged no
more ; but the influence of reason and affection
would preserve order and harmony throughout
every department of society. The traveller,
when landing on distant shores, and on the is
lands of the ocean, would no longer be assailed
with stones, spears, arrows, and other instru
ments of death, and be obliged to flee from the
haunts of his own species, to take refuge in the
lion's den, or on the bosom of the deep ; but
would be welcomed as a friend and a messenger
of peace. The animosities which now prevail
among religious bodies would cease ; the nick
names by which the different sects of religionists
have been distinguished, would be erased from
the vocabulary of every language ; Christians
would feel ashamed of those jealousies and evil
surmisings which they have so long manifested
towards each other, and an affectionate and har
monious intercourse would be established among
all the churches of the saints.

These, and a thousand other evils, which now
render this world a vast wilderness of perturba
tion, wretchedness, and sorrow, would be com
pletely eradicated, were the principle of holy love
in incessant operation ; and in their place a
scene of loveliness and moral beauty would burst
upon the view, which would diffuse joy and
ecstatic delight through every bosom.

Every family would become a mansion rf
peace and love — a temple consecrated to the
God of heaven, from which the incense of prayer,
and praise, and pious aspirations, would daily
ascend in sweet memorial to the throne above.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Domestic broils and contentions would cease ;
brothers and sisters would be cemented in the
closest bonds of holy affection ; the law of kind
ness would swell their hearts and dwell upon
their tongues; serenity and joy, and a desire to
please, would appear on every countenance ; a
mutual exchange of sentiment and generous
affections would circulate joy from father to son,
and from children to parents ; and all the mem
bers of the family circle, animated by the same
benevolent spirit, would " dwell together in
unity." To communicate useful knowledge, to
train each other to piety and virtue, to point out
the different spheres in which benevolence should
act, to assist in every kindly office, to sooth each
other in distress, and to direct each other in the
path to an endless life, would be the unceasing
desire and endeavour of every inmate of the
family mansion. From every such mansion, the
radiations of love would fly from family to family,
from one hamle^and village to another, from one
town and city to another, from one nation to
another, and from one continent to another,'till
all the families of the earth were converted into
" the dwellings of the God of Jacob."

In larger communities the principle of love
would effectuate a mighty change. That spirit
of jealousy and selfishness, of avarice and mono
poly, which now produces so many jarrings, con
tentions, and collisions of interests among town
councils, corporations, and other smaller asso
ciations, would cease to operate. Every one
would see and feel, that the prosperity of the
whole is also the prosperity of every portion of
the general community. Boisterous disputa
tions, sneers, hisses, reproaches, and angry pas
sions, would be banished from the deliberations
of every society ; and candour, good-will, and
kindly affections would animate the minds of all
its members. Righteous laws would be enacted,
and distributive justice equitably administered.
Every nation would form one great and harmoni
ous family ; all its members being linkeJ together
by the ties of kindness and reciprocal affection.
Its magistrates would become " nursing fathers"
to the whole body of the people, to promote their
peace, their domestic comfort, their knowledge,
and their general improvement ; and throughout
all ranks of the community nothing would ap
pear but submission, obedience, reverence, and
respect.

The mutual intercourse of nations would be
established on the principles of friendship and
affection, and on the basis of immutable justice
and eternal truth. Raised above petty jealousies,
secure from the alarms of war, and viewing each
other as branches of the same great family, and
as children of the same Almighty Parent, —
every nation and empire would feel an interest
In promoting the prosperity of another, and would
rejoice in beholding its happiness and improve
ment. Commerce would be free and unshackled,

and the productions of nature and of art wouki
quickly be transported into every nation from
every clinie. Travellers and navigators would
visit foreign shores without danger or alarm from
insidious or hostile tribes, and would land on
the most obscure island of the ocean, fully as
sured of protection and comfort, and the wel
come of friendship and affection. Every vessel
that ploughed the deep would become a floating
temple, from which incense and a pure offering
would daily ascend to the Ruler of the skies,
and its mariners would join, with one heart and
one mind, in imploring upon each other the bless
ing and protection of the God of heaven. The
beams of love and affection would gladden every
land, and add a new lustre to (he natural beauties
of its landscape. The inhabitants of China and
Japan would be hailed as benefactors when they
arrived on our coasts with their cargoes of tea,
sugar, silk, and porcelain ; and the natives of
France and Great Britain, when they transport
ed their manufactures to these distant empires,
would be welcomed as friends, and conducted,
without the least jealousy or suspicion, through
all their cities and rural scenes, to survey the
beauties of nature and art with which those
countries are adorned. The natives of Papua
and New-Zealand would land on our shores
without spears, or darts, or other hostile wea
pons, and be recognized as friends and brethren ;
and our countrymen, when traversing the dif
ferent regions of the globe, would always meet
with a cordial reception when landing on their
coasts. For national jealousies and antipathies
would cease ; and instead of selfish and revenge
ful passions, reason would be cultivated, and
its powers expanded ; the smile of benevolence
and the hand of benefice nee would gladden the
inhabitants of every clime, and "righteousness
and praise would spring forth before all the
nations."

Under the benignant influence of the spirit of
love, useful intelligence of every description
would be rapidly and extensively communicated;
the sciences would be improved, and carried
forward to perfection ; the jealousies which
now exist among scientific men would cease to
operate, and every fact on which science is
built would be impartially investigated, and ex
hibited in its true aspect ; the arts would flourish,
and be carried to the highest pitch of improve
ment ; no secrets in arts or trades would be lock
ed up in the breast of the discoverer ; but every
useful hint would at once be communicated to
the public ; every invention would uniformly be
applied to the promotion of a benevolent ob
ject, and the arts of destruction would cease to
be cultivated, and be held in universal detesta
tion. Under the hand of art, the habifations-oi
men would be beautified and adorned, to cor
respond with the purity and improvement of
their moral feelings, and a new lustre would

EFFECTS OF BENEVOLENCE.

61

b« thrown ovt- the face of nature. Towns and
villages woulc* be built on spacious plans, divest
ed of all that gloom and filth which now disgrace
the abodes of millions of human beings, and
which form an emblem of their physical and
moral wretchedness ; and the landscape of every
tountrv would present a scene of grandeur, fertil
ity, and picturesque beauty, Those immense
treasures which have been so long expended in
the arts of war and devastation would be em
ployed in turning immense deserts into fruitful
fields, in beautifying the aspect of rural nature,
in planting orchards and vineyards, in forming
spacious roads, in establishing seminaries of
instruction, in erecting comfortable habitations
for the lower orders of society, and promoting
their domestic enjoyment. What an immense
variety of objects of this description would be
accomplished within the limits of Great Britain
by means of a thousand millions of pounds, which
we all know have been lately expended within
the space of twenty-four years, in carrying for
ward the work of destruction !

Under the influence of the reign of love, the
instruction of all ranks, in every department of
useful knowledge, would be rapidly promoted ;
ignorance and error, with all their attendant
evils, would soon evanish from the minds even
of the lowest orders of society ; seminaries would
be erected and established on a liberal basis, for
instructing every class of mankind in all those
branches of science which tend to expand the
capacity of the human mind, and to extend the
range of its contemplations ; the hours of active
labour would be abridged, in order that they
might have leisure for the cultivation of their
understanding and the exercise of their moral
powers. To add to their stock of knowledge,
and to increase the sum of happiness around
them, would be considered as interesting and as
delightful as it now is to the sons of Mammon
to " add house to house, and field to field," and
to riot on the gains of avarice. Societies would
be formed for mutual improvement in knowledge
and virtue ; lectures delivered on every interest
ing and useful subject ; experiments performed to
illustrate the order and mechanism of nature ;
and instruments of every description procured
for exhibiting the wisdom and omnipotence of
the Creator and the glories of the universe. The
revelation of heaven would be studied with in
telligence in all its aspects and bearings, and
every passion, affection, and active exertion
would be directed by its moral requisitions.
The human mind, thus trained and carried for
ward in wisdom and holiness, would shed a
moral radiance around it, and be gradually pre
pared for entering on a higher scene of contem
plation and enjoyment;

Among all ranks of men, a spirit of selfishness
and 'avarice would be extinguished, and in its
stead a spirit of noble generosity and benefi

cence would pervade the whole mass of tociety.
That divine maxim inculcated by our Saviour,
" It is more blessed to give than to receive,'1 would
be engraven on every heart, and appear in every
action. This sublime principle forms a promi
nent irait in the character of God, and in all his
arrangements towards his creatures ; and it ani
mates the minds of superior intelligences in their
associations with each other, and in their occa
sional intercourses with the inhabitants of our
world. In imitation of these glorious beings, the
human race would consider it as the grand end
of their existence, not merely to acquire wealth,
knowledge, or power, but to employ themselves
in the unceasing diffusion of beneficence to all
around. To communicate happiness through
out all the ranks of their fellow-men with whom
they mingle, to sooth the disconsolate and the
desponding, to relieve the distressed, to instruct
the ignorant, to expand the intellect, to animate
and direct the benevolent affections, to increase
the enjoyments of the lower orders of the com
munity, to direct the opening minds of the young,
to lead them by gentle steps into the paths of
wisdom and holiness, and to* promote every
scheme which has a relation to the public good,
would form the constant aim of all conditions of
men from the highest to the lowest. Every house
would be open to the weary and benighted travel
ler, every heart would welcome him to the re
freshments and repose it afforded, every coun
tenance would beam benignity, every comfort
would be afforded, every wish anticipated, and
every stranger thus entertained would " bless
the mansion," and implore the benediction of
heaven on all its inmates. The houseless child
of want would no longer wander amidst scenes
of plenty, tattered and forlorn, pinched with po
verty, exposed to the piercing blasts, and obliged
to repose under the open canopy of heaven, for
want of more comfortable shelter ; the poor
would soon cease out of the land, every one
would be active and industrious, and every one
would enjoy a comfortable portion of the boun
ties of Providence. And what a happy world
would it be were kindness and affection the cha
racteristic of all its inhabitants! The face of
nature would wear a more cheering aspect, " the
desert would rejoice and blossom as the rose,"
the flowers would look more gay, the " little hills"
would be encircled with joy, the light of heaven
would appear more glorious and transporting, a
thousand delightful emotions would spring up in
the mind amidst every rural scene, and every so
cial intercourse would be a source of unmingled
bliss. Paradise would be restored, heaven would
descend to earth, and an emblem would be pre
sented of the joys of the blessed above.

O blissful and auspicious era ! When wilt
thou arrive to still the restless agitation of ma
lignant passions, to promote peace on earth and
good will among men ? When will the benevo-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

lence of angels and archangels descend to dwell
with- man upon earth, to expel selfishness from
the human breast, to hush every disordered affec
tion, and to restore tranquillity and order among
the bewildered race of Adam ? When will the
spirit of love, in all its' beneficent energies, de
scend from the Father of light to arrest the con
vulsions of nations, to heal the wounds of suffer
ing humanity, to transform fields of slaughter into
regions of tranquillity, to soften the ferocious
tempers of '* the people who delight in war," to
unite in one holy and harmonious society men of
every language and of every tribe? Not till
Christianity shall have shed its benign influ
ence on every land; not till " the knowledge of
the Lord shall cover the earth," and the can
nons, and swords, and spears, and battle-axes
of the warrior shall be broken to shivers, and
forged into ploughshares and pruning-hooks.
" Then shall the wolf dwell with the lamb, and
the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the
calf, and the young lion, and the fading toge
ther, and a little child chall lead them." " Then
judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, and
righteousness in the fruitful field. And the work
of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of
righteousness, quietness and assurance for ever.
And all people shall dwell in peaceable habitations,
and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting-places."
In fine, under the reign of love, most of the
evils, both physical and moral, under which men
are now doomed to suffer, would be either greatly
mitigated or completely abolished. It is scarcely
too much to affirm, that nine-tenths of all the
evils that affect humanity are the result of the
malice and unkindness of mankind towards each
other. If all the sorrow and wretchedness pro
duced by fraud, falsehood, avarice, extortion,
injustice, oppression, perjury, seduction, trea
chery, litigations, slander, pride, ambition, re
venge, robbery, murder, plunder, and devasta
tion, were extirpated, little would remain besides
the incidental evils which occasionally flow from
the elements of nature. And even these would
be greatly mitigated by the benevolent operations
of art, directed by the discoveries of science. By
clearing the surface of the globe of immense
forests, by draining stagnant marshes, and by
the universal cultivation and improvement of the
soil, the seasons would be meliorated, and
storms and tempests would be deprived of their
wonted violence and fury ; and the partial phy
sical evils which still remained would be almost
annihilated to the sufferer, by the sympathy,
and tendemess, and the kind and fostering hand
of universal benevolence. Where virtue, tem
perance, serenity of mind, and social joy reigned
triumphant, and where none of the ghastly phan
toms of skepticism and superstition haunted the
mind, disease would seldom invade the human
frame ; the span of mortal existence would be
extended ; death would become calm and tran

quil, and every one would " come to his grave,
like as a shock of corn cometh in his season.**
In short, under the influence of the emanation?
of love, malignity would be transformed into be
nevolence, vice into virtue, oppression into jus
tice, cruelty into sympathy and tenderness, sel
fishness into beneficence, contention into unity
and friendship,fraud info honesty, avarice into ge
nerosity, pride into humility, wretchedness into
comfort, sorrow into joy, war into peace, and this
spacious globe, now the receptacle of misery and
vice, would be transformed into the temple of
concord, happiness, and peace.

Such are some of the beneficial effects which
would be experienced in the social state of the
human race, were a principle of benevolence to
pervade the minds of mankind. The immense
mass of moral evils, under which the earth now
groans, would be removed ; the moral aspect of
society, in every nation, would assume a new
lustre of loveliness and excellence; and nature
herself would be arrayed in new robes of grace
fulness and beauty. For it would be easy to
show, were it at all necessary, that every parti
cular now stated, and a thousand similar effects,
would be the natural and necessary results of love,
when it becomes the mainspring of human actions

I shall now shortly trace some of the effects of
love, considered as directed more immediately
towards God.

Supreme love to God would excite compla
cency in his character and perfections ; and piety,
in all its fervent and delightful emotions, would
naturally flow upwards to the fountain of all
purity. His glorious character would be vene
rated, and his name revered over all the earth ;
trophies would be erected to his honour, and tem
ples consecrated to his worship in every land.
Crowds of worshippers, beaming benignity and
devotion, would be held in every region, con
verging towards the " dwelling-place" of the
Most High, and encouraging one another in such
language as this : " Come ye and let us go up
to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the
God of Jacob, and he will teach us of his ways,
and We will walk in his paths." With enlight
ened views of the attributes of Jehovah, with
glowing affections, and with profound reverence,
would they join in the sublime exercises of the
sanctuary, and listen to the intimations of his
will. All voices would be tuned to melodious
strains, and the solemn organ, and those instru
ments of music which are now devoted to the
gratification of the sons of fashionable folly and
dissipation, would harmonize in exciting devo
tional affections, and in swelling the song of sal
vation " to Him who sits upon the throne, and tc
the Lamb who hath redeemed us to God by his
blood." Every landscape, in every point of
view, would present a noble edifice devoted to the
worship of the God of heaven, adorned with every
majestic decoration suitable to its sanctity, and

EFFECTS OF BENEVOLENCE.

C3

rearing its spacious dome above all the surround
ing habitations of men. Its gates " would be
open continually ; '.hey would not be shut day nor
night," that men might have access at all sea
sons to bring " incense and a pure offering" to
the shrine of Jehovah. The whole earth would
soon be converted into one universal temple, sa
cred to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, from which, thanksgiving, and the voice
of melody, and the holy aspirations of gratitude
and love, would ascend to heaven without inter
mission, and in every direction, from the regions
of the nortK to the regions of the south, and
" from the rising of the sun to the going down
of the same." Solemn seasons would be ap
pointed, and spacious plains consecrated for the
assembling of ten thousands of " the sons of
God." not for carnage and devastation, as when
the warrior " mustereth the armies to the battle,"
but " to rehearse the mighty acts of the Lord,"
to exchange sentiments and feelings of affec
tionate regard, and to swell the song of triumph
over sin and misery, with the harmony of human
voices and musical instruments, in one loud
chorus to the skies. Then the name of Jehovah
would be One throughout all the earth. "All
his works would praise him, and his saints would
bless him. They would abundantly utter the
memory of his great goodness, they would speak
of the glorious honour of his majesty, and sing
of his righteousness."

Among all ranks of men cordial submission to
the will of God, and contentment under the
arrangements of his providence would be uni
formly manifested. Every one would consider
the situation in which Providence had placed
him as the best possible for promoting his present
improvement and his future felicity, viewing it
as the allotment of infinite wisdom and benevo
lence. In adversity he would sustain his afflic
tions with patience, and derive from them " the
peaceable fruits of righteousness." In prosperity
he would acknowledge God as the source of all
his enjoyments, and devote the wealth and influ
ence he possessed to the promotion of religion,
and the best interests of his fellow-men. By
day, and by night, and at every returning sea
son, the overflowings of gratitude, in every
heart, would burst forth in songs of thanksgiving
to the Giver of all good. Every comfort would
be recognized as " coming down from the Fa
ther of lights," and every pleasing sensation
produced by the scenery of nature, as the result
of his wisdom and beneficence. His wonderful
works, which are now overlooked, or gazed at
with apathy by nine-tenths of the inhabitants of
the globe,would be contemplated with enlightened
understandings, and with emotions of reverence,
admiration, and delight. The majestic move
ments of the planetary orbs, the glories of the
starry sky, the light beaming from a thousand
aims through the immeasurable voids of space, the

mighty ocean with all its wondeis, the numerous
rivers rolling into its abyss, the lofty ranges of
mountains which encircle the earth, the treasures
of the fields, the riches of the mines, the beau
ties which adorn the hills and plains, the won
ders of the atmosphere, the admirable structure
and economy of the numerous tribes of animated
beings, — these, and thousands of other objects,
considered as manifestations of the attributes of
Deity, would supply topics of conversation in
every social circle, on which every heart would
dwell with increasing delight. " They would
speak of the glory of his kingdom, and talk of
his power, to make known to the sons of men
his mighty acts, and the glorious majesty of his
kingdom." The work of human redemption, in
its origin and progress, in its connexions and
bearings, in the lustre it reflects on the perfec
tions of the Deity, in its relation to the angelic
tribes, and in its glorious and happy conse
quences on thousands of millions of human be
ings throughout an eternal round of existence —
the person of the Redeemer, his amiable cha
racter, his grace and condescension, and the
glories of his exalted state — the joys of departed
saints, the general resurrection, with all its
solemn and transporting scenes, the new hea
vens and the new earth, and the boundless scene
of grandeur and felicity which will open to the
view when death shall be swallowed up in vic
tory, and all things subjected to the moral order
of the universe, would afford subjects of sublime
contemplation, and themes for social converse,
on which enlightened and renovated minds
would expatiate with ever-growing improve
ment and ever-growing pleasures.

The providential dispensations of God to
wards the human race, would form another
subject of investigation, which would be prose
cuted with feelings of astonishment, admiration,
and reverence. The history of all nations
would be carefully perused — not for the purpose
of admiring the exploits of mighty conquerors
and barbarous heroes, and feasting the imagina
tion on spectacles of human slaughter and devas
tation — but for exciting abhorrence of those de
praved passions which had drenched the eartk
with blood — for drawing forth the tear of pity over
the graves of slaughtered nations — far stimu
lating the exercise of those holy affections which
restored peace and tranquillity to the world — for
acquiring a display of the rectitude of the moral
character of God, and the equity of his admi
nistration among the nations — for tracing the
accomplishment of divine predictions — for illus
trating the long-suffering and forbearance of
God, and for exciting admiration of that inscru
table wisdom by which the whole train of events
was conducted, so as to set restraining bounds
to the wrath of man, and to make it subservient
to the introduction of the reign of happiness and
peace. In all the revolutions of past ages, and

64

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

in all the events that daily passed in review
before them, they would uniformly recognize the
agency and the purposes of that Almighty Being
" who doth according to his will in the armies of
heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth,"
and who is carrying forward all the plans of his
government to a glorious consummation.

Eveiv useful invention, every new instrument
for investigating the operations of nature, every
new discovery in the earth, or in the heavens,
every exploration of an unknown region of the
globe, every branch of commerce and manufac
ture, every new mode of facilitating labour and
improving the productions of the soil ; every
improvement in the ease and rapidity of travel
ling, and of conveying intelligence from one re
gion to another, and every art and science,
would be consecrated, in some form or other, to
Jhe service of God, and to the accomplishment
of the objects of general benevolence. One
grand diffusive principle, manifesting itself in
numberless ramifications, would pervade the
whole mass of society ; and one grand aim, the
honour and glory of the Creator, and the uni
versal diffusion of happiness in every direction,
and among every rank of sentient and intelligent
beings, would be the unceasing endeavour of
men of all nations, and kindreds, and languages.
The whole mass of this world's inhabitants
would appear like one vast celestial army march
ing forward in harmony to the regions of bliss,
every one, in his appointed order, passing in
peace and tranquillity through the gates of death,
to join the general assembly above, and to aug
ment and enliven the congregation of the
heavens.

On such a world the God of heaven would
look down with complacency, and his providen
tial care would be exercised in averting those
physical evils which now increase the moral
wretchedness of mankind. His eye would be
continually upon them for good, and his ear
would be ever open to their requests. Then
that glorious scene presented to the view of the
apostle John, would be fully realized, — " Be
hold the tabernacle of God is with men, and he
will dwell with them ; and they shall be his peo
ple, and God himself shall be with them, and be
their God. And God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes, and there shall be no more
curse, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall
there be any more pain ; for the former things
have passed away." To such a world celestial
messengers would rejoice to wing their down
ward flight, on messages of love. Their visits,
which have been "few, and far between," and
which have been long interrupted by the malevo
lence of men, would be again resumed ; and
those " morning stars" that shouted for joy
when this fair creation arose into existence,
would be filled with unutterable delight when
they beheld moral order restored, and the smiles

of universal love irradiating the inhabitants of
our globe, and would shout even with more
ecstatic joy than they did before, " Glory to God
in the highest, peace on earth, and good will
among men !"

Alas ! such a picture as that which we have
now faintly sketched, has never yet been realized
in the moral aspect of the inhabitants of this
world. To the eye of an angelic intelligence,
while he hovers over our globe in his flight
through the planetary regions, nothing appears
but a vast cloud of moral darkness and depravity,
with here and there only a few faint radiations
of truth and love emerging from the general
gloom. He beholds throughout the whole extent
of Africa, from the shores of Barbary and EgypV.
to the Cape of Good Hope — throughout the vast
regions of Asia and its numerous islands, and
throughout four-fifths of the continent of America,
little else than one wide scene of moral desola
tion, where idolatry and superstition, tyranny
and ambition, treachery and cruelty, war and
dissension, reign triumphant among almost every
tribe; and where scarcely a ray of divine light
and divine love gilds the horizon, from the ono
end of these extensive regions to the other.
Even in Europe, where the light of science and
of revelation is converged to a focus, what an
immense cloud of moral darkness still appears en
veloping its population ? The fields of Waterloo,
of Leipsic, of Borodina, and of Smolensko,
where so many thousands of human beings
were sacrificed to the demon of war — the vales
of Switzerland and Hungary, the plains of
France and Italy, the anarchy and commotions
of Spain and Portugal, and the ensanguined
shores of Turkey and Greece, where massacres
have been perpetrated with the rage and fury of
infernal demons, bear witness to the melancholy
fact, that hatred and malignity still hold the as
cendency over the nations of Europe, and over
all the efforts of benevolence and love.

But, we trust, that the period is fast approach
ing, when the breath of a new spirit shall
pervade the inhabitants of every clime, and when
holy love shall unite all the tribes of mankind in
one harmonious society. When the messen
gers of the Prince of Peace " shall run to and
fro" from the north to the south, and from the
rising to the setting sun: when the sound of the
gospel-trumpet shall re-echo throughout every
land ; when the light of divine revelation shall
diffuse its radiance on the benighted nations;
when its sublime doctrines and moral requisi
tions shall be fully understood and recognized in
all their practical bearings, and when the energy
ofihat Almighty spirit which reduced to light
and order the dark and shapeless chaos, shal:
be exerted on the depraved and benighted minds
of the mass of this world's population — then the
death-like slumber whicl has seized upon the
race of Adam shall be broken ; ihe dead ib

UNIVERSALITY OF THE PRINCIPLE OF LOVE.

trcsoasses and sins shall awake to new life and
activity ; this bedlam of the universe will be restor
ed to reason and intellectual freedom, and to the
society of angelic messengers, and the face of the
moral creation will be renewed after the image
of its maker. Then wars shall cease to the
ends of the earth, and anarchy and dissension
shall convulse the nations no more ; violence
will no more be heard in any land, u liberty will
be proclaimed to the captives, and the opening of
the prison-doors to them that are bound." The
spirit of malevolence will be vanquished, its
power will be broken, and its operations demo
lished. The order and beauty of the celestial
system will be restored. " Holiness to the
Lord" will be inscribed on all the implements
and employments of mankind. Kindness and
compassion will form the amiable characteristic
of every rank of social life. Love will spread
her benignanWvings over the globe, and reign
uncontrolled in the hearts of all its inhabitants.
For thus saith the voice of Him who sits on the
throne of the universe, " Behold I make all
things new — I create new heavens and a new
earth, and the former shall not be remembered,
nor come into mind. Be ye glad, and rejoice
for ever in that which I create ; for behold, I
create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a
joy, and the voice of weeping shall be no more
heard in her, nor the voice of crying."

SECTION VI.

UNIVERSALITY OF THE PRINCIPLES OF LOVE
TO GOD, AND TO FELLOW-INTELLIGENCES.

THE grand principles of morality tc which I
have now adverted, are not to be viewe« ' as con
fined merely to the inhabitants of our gl be, but
as extending to all intellectual beings. They
form the basis of the moral laws, which govern
all intelligences throughout the vast universe, in
whatever world or region of infinite space they
may have their physical residence ; and they
constitute the bond which unites to the supreme
intelligence, and to one another, all holy beings,
wherever existing in the wide empire of Omnipo
tence. This will at once appear, if we reflect
for a moment, on what has been stated in the
preceding sections. We have seen, that, if
those laws or principles were reversed, and were
the moral agents of our world to act accordingly,
nothing would ensue, but anarchy, %vretchedness,
horror, and devastation, and ultimately a com
plete extermination of the race of mankind. And
by parity of reason, it will follow, that were the
name principles to operate in any other world,
however different the capacities, relations, and
physical circumstances of its inhabitants might
be. similar disastrous effects would be the inevi-
25

table result ; and were they to pervade all world*,
disorder and misery would reign uncontrolled
throughout the whole intelligent system.

When the Creator brought any particular
world into existence, and peopled it with inhabit
ants, we must suppose, that the laws to which I
am now adverting, were either formally address-
ed to them by some external revelation, or so
powerfully impressed upon their moral constitu
tion, as to become the main-spring of all their
actions, so long as they might retain the original
principles implanted in their minds by the Author
of their existence. Any other supposition would
be fraught with the most absurd and horrible
consequences. It would be subversive of every
idea we are led to form of the character of the
Divine Being, inconsistent with the perfect bene
volence and rectitude of his nature, and incom
patible with the relations in which rational be
ings stand to Him and to one another, and with
the harmony and happiness of the universe, to
suppose, that any creatures now exist, or ever
can exist, to whom such commands as these
would be given, — " Thou shall hate thy Creator,
who is the source of thine existence ;" and
" Thou shall hate all thy fellow-intelligences with
whom thou mayst associate." And if the mind
would recoil with horror, at the idea of such
laws issuing forth from the throne of the Eternal
to any class of moral agents, it must necessarily
be admitted, lhat the opposite principles or laws,
to which I allude, are promulgated to all intelli
gences, and are obligalory on every inhabitant
of all the worlds which lie between the range o
Jehovah's empire. The natural scenery with
which the inhabitants of other worlds are sur
rounded, the organization of their corporeal
frames, the intellectual capacities with which
they are endowed, the stated employments in
which they engage, and the relations in which
they stand to each other, may be ver) different
from those which obtain in our terrestrial sphere ,
but the grand principles to which I refer, must
necessarily pervade every faculty of their minds,
every active exertion, and every relation that
subsists among them, by whatever character it
may be dislinguished, if ihey be found existing
in a state of happiness.

The moral code of laws in other worlds may
be somewhat differently modified from ours, ac
cording vv, .lie circumstances in which the inha
bitants of each respective world are placed, and
the relations which obtain among them ; but the
same general principles will run through every
ramification of their moral precepts, and appear in
the minutes actions they perform,as the sap which
proceeds from the trunk of a tree diffuses itself
among the minutest and the most distant branch
es. The seventh commandment of our moral code
can have no place in a world where the inhabit
ants " neither marry nor are given in marriage }"
w/iere the succession of intelligent beings is uot

66

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

carried on by any process analogous to human
generation, where death is unknown, and where
rational agents have a fixed and permanent abode.
The fifth precept of our law cannot be recognized
in a world where the relations of parents and
children, princes and subjects, superiors and in
feriors, have no existence. And in those worlds
where the bounties of Divine Providence are
equally enjoyed by all, or where external comforts
are not necessary for the happiness of the indi
vidual, as in our world, or where the slightest
temptation to interfere with the property of
another does not exist, there will be no necessity
for a distinct moral regulation corresponding to
the eighth commandment of our moral code. —
But in every world where happiness exists, and
where the inhabitants have retained their original
integrity, love to God, and "love to all subordinate
intelligences with which they are connected, will
animate every heart, regulate every desire, and
run through every action. And in those worlds
(if any such exist besides our own) where these
principles are counteracted, or not recognized as
the foundation of moral action, misery and disor
der, in a greater or less degree, must be the in
evitable consequence.

The greater part, however, of the precepts
comprised in the moral law given to man, must
be considered as obligatory upon all the rational
inhabitants of the universe. The first command
ment, which forbids the recognition of any object
of adoration, or of supreme affection, besides the
eternal Jehovah — the second, which forbids the
representation of this incomprehensible Being by
any visible or material objects — the third, which
enjoins reverence of the name or attributes of
God — and the spirit of the fourth, which enjoins
a certain portion of duration to be set apart for
solemn acts of worship and adoration, are appli
cable to all the moral agents that Jehovah has
created. The sixth commandment, which forbids
malice, revenge, and injurious actions of every
description — the ninth, which forbids falsehood,
and inculcates truth, which is the basis of the
moral universe — and the tenth, which forbids
envy, and every unhallowed desire to deprive our
neighbour of any portion of his happiness — are
also binding upon every class of moral intelligen
ces, wherever existing, throughout the unlimited
empire of God. For, if we suppose any one of
these precepts to be reversed, and moral agents
to act on the principle of this subversion, their
moral order and harmony would be interrupted,
and consequently, their happiness destroyed. —
For example, let the law, which inculcates
truth, be supposed to be universally violated
among any class of rational beings, and instantly
all improvement in wisdom and knowledge would
cease ; nothing could be depended upon as fact
but what was obvious to the senses of every in
dividual ; social compacts would be dissolved ; a
mutual repulsion would ensue, and every social

affection and enjoyment would be unhinged and
destroyed.

By overlooking considerations of this kind, the
celebrated Dr. Chalmers, in his " Discourses on
the Christian Revelation viewed in connexion
with Modern Astronomy," deprived himself of
an important argument to prove that Christianity
is not confined to this sublunary region. For, as
it is the great object of the Christian Revelation
to bring into full effect, in all their practical
bearings, the principles 1 have been endeavour
ing to illustrate, and as these principles must be
interwoven with the moral code of all worlds — it
follows, that the spirit and essence of our religion
must be common to all the holy inhabitants of
the universe.

From what has been now stated respecting
the universality of the principle of love, the fol
lowing conclusions may be deduced : —

1. That the man in whose heart this principle
is predominant, and whose actions are directed
by its influence, is qualified for associating with
the pure intelligences of all worlds. Were we
transported to the surface of the planet Jupiter,
and had we access to mingle with its vast popu
lation ; or were we conveyed to one of the pla
nets which revolve around the star Sirius — if the
inhabitants of these globes have retained the
primeval purity of their natures, and if the prin
ciple of love reigned supreme in our hearts, we
should be assured of a welcome reception from
those distant intelligences, and be qualified to
mingle with them in their adorations of our com
mon Creator, and in all their affectionate and
harmonious intercourses. We should only have
to learn the mode by which they communicate to
each other their ideas and emotions. Love
would form the basis of every union, and amal
gamate us with every department of their socie
ty. With pleasure, and with the most endearing
affection, would they point out to us the peculiar
glories of the world they inhabit, and rehearse
the history of the Creator's dispensations in that
portion of his empire ; and with equal pleasure
should we listen to the instructions which flow
from the lips of Benevolence, and survey those
transporting objects and arrangements which de
corate a world where love pervades the breasts
of all its inhabitants. To visit a distant world,
although it were in our power, where the inha
bitants were of an opposite description, conic
afford no gratification to an intelligent and bene
volent mind, but would overwhelm it with anguish
and dismay. What enjoyment would the capa
cious mind of a pure intelligence from the regions
of the constellation Orion, derive from visiting a
world inhabited by such beings as the inhabitants
of Nootka Sound, New Guinea, or New Zealand,
where the moral and intellectual principle is
completely debased, and where the beauties of
Nature are defaced with interminable forests and
marshes, and the haunts of beasts of prey ? lie

UNIVERSALITY OF THE PRINCIPLE OF LOVE.

67

would be filled with disappointment and horror —
He might <lrop a tear of pity over the wretched
inhabitants ; but he would soon wing his flight
back to a more delectable region. A similar dis
appointment would be felt, were an inhabitant of
our world, in whose mind hatred and cruelty,
avarice and ambition, reigned without control —
to be conveyed to a world of happiness and love.
The novel scenes of beauty and grandeur, which
would burst upon his sight, might captivate his
senses for a little : but he would feel no enjoy
ment in the exercise of virtuous affections and
rapturous adorations, to which he was never ac
customed ; he would find no objects on which to
gratify his cruel and ambitious desires, and he
would be glad to escape from the abodes of af
fection and bliss, to the depraved society from
whence he came. Hence we may learn, that,
however expansive views we may have acquired
of the range of the Creator's operations, and of
the immensity of worlds which are diffused
through boundless space, and however ardent de
sires we may indulge of visiting the distant re
gions of creation, we never can indulge a rational
hope of enjoying such a privilege, were it possi
ble, unless love to God and to man become the
predominant disposition of our minds. For, al
though we were invested by the Almighty with
corporeal vehicles, capable of transporting us
from one region of creation to another, with the
most rapid motion, we could enjoy no solid sa
tisfaction, while we remained unqualified for
relishing the exercises, and mingling in the asso
ciations of holy intelligences. In every happy
world on which we alighted, we should feel our
selves in a situation similar to that of a rude and
ignorant boor, were he conveyed to a palace, and
introduced into an assembly of courtiers and
princes.

2. Another conclusion deducible from this
subject is, that by virtue of this grand and go
verning principle, man is connected with the
highest order of intelligences, and with the inha
bitants of the most distant worlds ; and his
happiness perpetually secured. When we
take a view of the universe by the light of mo
dern science, our minds are overpowered and
confounded at the idea of its vast and unlimited
range. When we consider that it would require
several millions of years fora cannon ball, flying
at the rate of five hundred miles an hour, to
reach the nearest stars — when we consider that
there are stars visible to the naked eye, at least
fifty times farther distant than these — when we
consider that there arc stars visible by the tele
scope a thousand times farther distant than any
of the former — and when we consider that all the
suns and worlds which lie within this unfathom
able range are, in all probability, only as a
grain of sand to the whole earth, when com
pared with the immensity of systems which lie
t-eyond them in the ua explored abyss of infinite

space, — we are lost in the immensity of creation,
and can set no bounds to the empire of the
Almighty Sovereign. When we look forward to
that eternal state to which we are destined —
when we consider that after thousands of mil
lions of centuries have run their rounds, eteiiiity
will be no nearer to a termination, and that ages,
numerous as the drops of the ocean, will still roll
on in interminable succession, — we behold a
lapse of duration, and a succession of events
stretching out before us, which correspond with
the immeasurable spaces of the universe, and
the number and magnitude of the worlds with
which it is stored. When we view ourselves as
thus connected with the immensity of creation
on the one hand, and with infinite duration on
the other ; and when we reflect on the numerous
changes that have happened, both in the physical
and moral aspect of our globe, within the period
of six thousand years, we cannot but conclude
that we are destined to pass through new scenes
and changes in that eternity which lies before us,
of which at present we can form no conception.
After remaining for thousands of millions of
years in that world which will be prepared for
the righteous at the general resurrection, we
may be transported to another system as far dis
tant from that abode as wo now are from the
most distant stars visible to our sight, in order to
contemplate new displays of the attributes of
God, in another province of his empire. We
may afterwards be conveyed to an unoccupied
region of immensity, where new creations, dis
playing new objects of glory and magnificence,
are starting into existence. We may after
wards be invested with the wings of a seraph,
and be enabled to wing our way, in company with
angels, from world to world, and to visit the most
distant regions of that immense universe over
which Omnipotence presides. In short, the
imagination can set no limits to its excursions,
when it attempts to survey the revolutions ana
changes that may take place, and the new
scenes of glory which may burst upon the view,
throughout the lapse of duration which will have
no end.

Now, in whatever relation man may stand to
any portion of the universal system, throughout
every future period of his existence, and during
all the revolutions of eternity, love will unite him
to all other holy beings with whom he may as
sociate, however distant their abode from the
spot he now occupies, however different its
scenery and arrangements, and however superior
they may be in point of corporeal organization
and intellectual capacity. For no intelligence,
in any region of the universe, in whom the princi
ple of love predominates, can ever be supposed
to disdain to associate with another, of whatever
rank or order, who is actuated by a similar affec
tion ; otherwise his love would degenerate into
malevolence. This principle will unite him to

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

angels and archangels, to cherubim and sera
phim, to thrones, dominions, principalities, and
powers, from whose discourses he will learn the
history of the divine dispensations, the wonders
of Almighty power, and the " manifold wisdom
of God." So long as it reigns uncontrolled in
his heart, it will secure his happiness in all
places, and in every period of his existence, by
a law established by the Almighty, and founded
on his perfections; a law which binds together
the whole intelligent system, and forms the basis
of the felicity of the moral universe. So that
his future blessedness is for ever secure, beyond
the reach of danger, and rests upon a foundation
stable and permanent as the throne of tho
Eternal.

3. From what has been now stated, we may
learn that there is but one religion throughout the
universe, however vast its magnitude and bound
less its extension. In this world, numerous
systems of religion prevail, and thousands of
different opinions in relation to its ceremonies
and objects; but experience has demonstrated,
that all of them, except one, are insufficient to
guide rational beings to substantial felicity.
And of this one system, how many foolish and
inaccurate, and even contradictory opinions,
have been formed, through the ignorance and
perversity of the human mind ! Though all its
parts have a direct reference to the actions of
intelligent agents, and to the cultivation of
benevolent affections, yet it has been represented,
even by its professed abetters, as a congeries of
metaphysical dogmas and speculative opinions ;
and in this point of view it has been the source
of perpetual wrangling and contentions. Though
it is calculated to expand the understanding, to
warm the heart, and to elevate the soul to God,
yet it has been reduced, by the cunning artifice
of man, to a mass of mere quibbles and unmean
ing ceremonies. And though it breathes nothing
but peace and good-will to man, it has been
employed as an engine of persecution and of
human destruction. It is only in proportion as
our religion approximates to the character of the
religion which is common to all holy beings,
that it is worthy of our veneration and our ardent
pursuit. Anu therefore, in order to determine
the truth and importance of any particular sys
tem of religious opinions, the best test we can
apply to k is, to ascertain what bearings it has
upon the grand principles to which we have been
adverting. " Do all the sentiments and tenets
which it strenuously supports, like the lines from
the circumference to the centre of a circle, con
verge towards the promotion of love in all its
practical ramifications ? Are the opinions we
now so fiercely maintain of such a nature, that
we shall probably recognize them as important
practical principles a million of years hence, in
the regions of distant worlds?" If such a test
were applied to hundreds of opinions which have

agitated the religious world, and obstructed tin
operations of the benevolent affections, thej
would be driven away from the Christian sys
tem as chaff before the whirlwind ; and Chris
tians would feel ashamed of the importance they
attached to their " mint, and anise, and cum-
min," while they neglected the weightier matters
of the law, "judgment, mercy, and the love ot
God." How many false and foolish opinions
shall we leave behind us in this region of dark
ness and contention, when we enter within
the confines of the eternal state ? How sublime,
how lovely, and how beautifying will religion
appear in that world, where it will be contem
plated in its native simplicity, and stripped 01
all the foreign and adventitious circumstances
which now obscure its brightness and glorv ! I
need scarcely say, that the one religion 10 which
I allude is Christianity, considered, not so much
in the scheme of mediation which it unfolds,
which may have a relation solely to man viewed
in his character as a sinner, but in the leading
dispositions and virtues it inculcates, and in the
great objects which all its doctrines, facts, and
supernatural communications have a tendency
to accomplish. In these points of view, it must
be considered as imbodying principles and laws
which pervade the religious systems of all worlds.
Finally, Love is a principle in the moral and
intelligent system which bears a striking analogy
to the principle of attraction in the material
world. Each of them unites, in its respective
sphere, all the beings which compose it in one
grand and harmonious system ; and both of them
combined give birth to all the moral and physical
phenomena which diversify the intellectual and
the material universe. By the principle of at
traction, the inhabitants of the earth, along with
their habitations, are retained to its surface, and
prevented from flying off in wild confusion
through the voids of space. By the same power
the mountains rest on a solid basis, the rivers
flow from the mountains to the plains, and tho
ocean is confined within its appointed channels.
It produces the various phenomena which arise
from the meandering rill, the majestic river, and
the roaring cataract. It produces the descent
of rain and dew, and the alternate flux and reflux
of the tides. It prevents the waters of the great
deep from covering the mountain-tops, and
mingling in confusion with the clouds of heaven.
It binds together the infinity of atoms which con
stitute the globe on which we tread ; it regulates
the various movements of men and other anima
ted beings ; it forms mechanical powers, and
gives impulsion to numerous machines and en
gines. It rolls the moon in regular succession
around the earth, and prevents her from running
lawlessly through the sky. It extends its influ
ence from the sun to the remotest planets, con«
ducting revolving worlds, with ali their satellite*,
in their ample circuits, and prese: ving them atf

ANALOGY OF LOVE TO ATTRACTION.

in one harmonious system. It connects the
earth and the planetary globes with other sys
tems in the distant regions of space ; and carries
the sun, with all his attendant orbs, around the
centre of that nebula to which it belongs, and
all the systems and nebulae of the universe
around the throne of God.

In like manner, love unites all holy intelli
gences, wherever dispersed through the ampli
tudes of creation, in one amiable and harmonious
system. It unites man to God, and God to man.
It unites the renovated inhabitants of our globe
to angels and archangels, and qualifies them for
entering into the closest bonds of friendship and
affection with superior intelligences that people
the regions of distant worlds. It produces an
expansive and harmonious spirit, and an ardent
desire to diffuse happiness among all surround
ing beings. It gives birth to those sublime emo
tions which flow out towards the Creator in the
various forms qf adoration, complacency, hope,
confidence, humility, joy, submission, and re
verence ; and it is the spring of all those vir-
luous dispositions which flow out towards our
fellow-creatures in the form of mercy, compas
sion, sincerity, candour, sympathy, kindness,
long-suffering, gentleness, meekness, charity,
generosity, justice, and active beneficence. It
impels its possessor to run to the assistance of
the distressed, to support the weak, to console
the desponding, to comfort the dying, to diffuse
the rays of heavenly light over the benighted
mind, and to rejoice in the prosperity of ail
around. It is " the bond of perfection" which
unites the members of an affectionate family, and
preserves the union of the faithful in all the
churches of the saints. It unites man to man by
the closest ties, however different in language,
customs, colour, and complexion, and however
far removed from each other in point of place.
. It enables the Greenlander, the Icelander, the
African, the inhabitant of Hindostan, and the in
habitant of the British Isles, in whose hearts it
resides, to recognize each other as " the sons of
God," and as "brethren in Christ Jesus." It
sends forth the imagination over every quarter of
the globe, carrying benevolent wishes, fervent
prayers, and intercessions for men of all kindreds
and ranks ; and employs every active endeavour
to promote the present enjoyment and the eter
nal felicity of the family of mankind. It in
spires the soul with emotions of delight, when
it becomes the instrument of communicating
happiness to all within the sphere of its influ
ence. It unites the host of seraphim and che
rubim in one vast and harmonious association ;
so that no jarring affection is ever felt, and no
discordant voice is ever heard, among the thou
sands and ten thousands of these exalted intelli
gences. It preserves every member of the holy
and intelligent system in the rank and orbit pre-
•criboi by Infini e Wisdom, and leads them all to

rejoice in accomplishing the plans of their
volent Creator. Around him, as the sun of the
moral system — the centre of light, and love, and
joy — they all revolve in their appointed order;
cheered by the emanation of his love, enlightened
by his beams, and reflecting a radiance upon all
the beings with which they are surrounded.
Though one orb differs from another in motion,
in magnitude, and in glory, yet no one interferes
with another to impede its progress, or to inter
cept the emanations of light and joy from the
Uncreated Source and Centre of all enjoyment.

Were the principle of attraction which binds
together the atoms of our giobe, and connects the
planetary orbs with the sun, to be completely dis
solved, the earth would be shattered to its centre ;
the waters of the ocean would fly upwards, and
be dispersed through the highest regions of the
atmosphere ; rocks and mountains would be de
tached from their bases, and raised aloft above
the clouds ; forests would be torn up from their
roots, and tossed about in confusion through the
sky ; the moon would forsake her ancient course ;
the planets would run lawlessly through the im
mensity of space, and mighty worlds would be
seen dashing against each other, till they were
shattered to pieces, and their fragments tossed
about in disorder throughout surrounding sys
tems. Effects equally disastrous to the intelli
gent system would be produced, were the influ
ence of love, in all its varied emanations, to be
completely suspended or annihilated. War would
be proclaimed in heaven, and myriads of angels
hurled from their seats of bliss. The rapturous
songs and adorations of seraphs would be changed
into the bowlings and execrations of demons.
The population of the universe would be trans
formed into one vast assemblage of fiends ; its
regions of beauty and fertility would become one
wide scene of desolation and horror, and the voice
of lamentation and misery would be heard re
sounding throughout all worlds. On earth king
doms would be shaken and convulsed ; govern
ments overturned ; societies dissolved ; families
dispersed ; the bonds of friendship burst asun
der ; husbands torn from their wives, and parents
from their children ; the intercourse of nations
suspended ; the pursuits of science and religion
abandoned ; every rank and relation overturned,
end virtue banished from the abodes of men.
Deserting all social beings, and forsaken by all,
man would become a solitary monster, wandering
without plan or object, an enemy to himself and
to his species. Anarchy and disorder would
reign triumphant over the whole race of human
beings, and the bowlings of wretchedness and
despair would re-echo from every land.

Such a scene of moral desolation selfishnes*
and malignity have a natural tendency to create ;
and surh a scene they have actually created in
our world, in so far as their influence has extended.
The power of attraction has never been com.

70

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

pletely suspended in relation to our globe, nor
has the moral Governor of the universe suffered
the principle of love to be entirely eradicated
from the minds of its inhabitants. But, as when
the law of gravitation is counteracted in case of
earthquakes and volcanoes, the most destructive
und desolating convulsions ensue, — so it happens
in the moral world, when the law of benevolence
is trampled under foot. " Nation rises against
nation, and kingdom against kingdom ;" hostile
armies encounter like tigers rushing on their
prey ; " firebrands, arrows, and death" are scat
tered in every direction ; a confused noise of
chariots, and horsemen, and of engines of de
struction, is wafled on every breeze ; garments
are rolled in blood, and whole plains drenched
with human gore, and covered with the carcasses
of the slain. But wherever love diffuses its
powerful and benign influence, there harmony,
happiness, and peace are enjoyed by every rank
of sensitive and intellectual existence. In every
world where it reigns supreme, the intellectual
faculty is irradiated, the affections are purified
and expanded, transporting joys are felt, and,
like the planetary orbs and their train of satel
lites, all shine with a steady lustre, and move on
ward in harmonious order, around the Supreme
Source of intelligence, and the Eternal Centre
of all felicity.

SECTION VII.

THE PRECEDING VIEWS CORROBORATED BY
DIVINE REVELATION.

IN the preceding sections I have endeavoured
to illustrate the two grand principles of the Mo
ral Law, and to demonstrate their reasonableness,
and the necessity of their universal operation, in
order to the promotion of the happiness of the
intelligent system. I have proceeded all along
on the ground of revelation, as well as of reason,
and the nature of things. But since these im
portant principles form the basis of the system
of religion, and of all the practical conclusions
I may afterwards deduce in the remaining part
of this work, it may be expedient to advert a
little more explicitly to the declarations of Scrip
ture on this subject. And here I propose very
briefly to show, that it is the great end of Divine
Revelation to illustrate these principles in all
their various bearings, and to bring them into
practical operation.

This position is expressly stated by our Sa
viour himself, in his reply to the scribe, who pro
posed the question, " Which is the great com
mandment in the law?" " Thou shall love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, ana with all thy mind." This is the first
and great commandment. And the second is

like unto it ; Thou shall love thy neighbour AS
thyself. ON THESE TWO COMMANDMENTS HANG

ALL THE LAW AND THE PROPHETS." Tllia

declaration evidently implies, that it is the design
of the whole of the Old Testament Revelation, to
illustrate and enforce these laws, and to produce
all those holy tempers which are comprised in the
love of God, and of our neighbour. This ap
pears to be the grand object of all the histonca
facts, religious institutions, devotional exercises,
moral maxims, prophecies, exhortations, pro
mises, and threatenirigs, which it records. The
history of the formation of the universe, and of
the beautiful arrangement of our globe, as de
tailed in the Book of Genesis, is calculated to
display the wisdom and goodness of the Creator,
and to draw forth our affections towards Him
who is the Author of our enjoyments, and who
pronounced every thing he had made to be " very
good." The history of the wickedness of tho
anlediluvian world, of ihe dreadful effects it pro
duced in ihe slate of society, and of the awful
catastrophe by which its inhabitants were swept
from existence, and buried in the waters of tho
deluge, is calculated to illustrate, in the most
striking manner, the guilt and ihe danger of
withdrawing the affections from God, and of in
dulging a principle of malevolence towards man.
The history of the crimes of Sodom, and of the
fate of its wretched inhabitants ; the destruction
of Pharaoh and his armies at the Red Sea ; the
history of the idolatrous practices of ihe Israel-
iles, of iheir murmurings in the wilderness, and
of the punishments inflicted for their rebellion 5
the fate of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, and of
the worshippers of Baal : The destruction of ihe
nations of Canaan ; the judgments which pur
sued the Jewish nalion, during the whole period
of their history, on account of their defection
from God, and the calamities which befell them
at the period of the Babylonish captivity — toge
ther with all the other facts connected with the
history of that people and of the surrounding na
tions, are intended to exhibit the dismal conse
quences, and the moral wretchedness which in
evitably follow, when the affections of mankind
are withdrawn from the God of Heaven, and left
to grovel in the mire of depravity and vice.

The instilutions of ihe Jewish Church were
appointed for promoling the knowledge and the
love of God, and for exciting an abhorrence of
every thing which is contrary to the rectitude
and purity of his nature. Among the tribes that
inhabited the land of Canaan, prior to the en
trance of the Israelites, and among all the sur
rounding natioes, the worship of false gods, the
grossest superstitions, and the most abominable
vices universally prevailed. It was one great
end of the laws and ceremonies enjoined upon
Israel, to excite the highest degree of abhorrence
at every thing which was connected with idola«
try, to portray its wickedness and folly, to rivet

ILLUSTRATIONS FROM SCRIPTURE.

71

the affections of the people to the worship of the
true God, to preserve them uncontaminated from
the malignant disposition, and the vile prac
tices of the neighbouring nations, and to instruct
them in the nature and attributes of the Deity ;
thac they might be " a peculiar people to Jeho
vah, separated from all the people that were on
the face of the earth." Hence, the following in
timation and injunction are placed on the front
of the moral code of laws delivered to that nation)
" Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord
Thou shall have no other gods before me." To
promote harmony and affection between man and
man ; to enforce the exercise of justice and equity
in all their dealings ; to inculcate chastity and
purity of affection, kindness to strangers, com
passion, tenderness, and sympathy ; obedience
to parents, charitable dispositions towards the
poor and needy, and tenderness and mercy to
wards the inferior animals, were the great ob
jects of the various laws and regulations com
prised in their moral and political code.

The devotional port ions of the Old Testament,
particularly those contained in the book of
Psalms, have the same general tendency. The
descriptions of the work of creation and provi
dence, the adorations of the majesty of the God
of Israel, the celebration of the divine character
and excellences, and the ascriptions of thanks
giving and praise for the mercy, long-suffering,
and goodness of God, with which these divine
compositions abound, are calculated to raise the
affections to Jehovah as the source of every
blessing, and to inspire the soul with love, admi
ration, and reverence. In many of these sublime
odes, particularly in the 119th Psalm, the mind
of the Psalmist is absorbed in meditation on the
excellency of the divine precepts, and the happi
ness which the observance of them is calculated
to convey to the soul. " O how I love thy law !"
eays David ; " it is my meditation all the day.
The law of thy mouth is better unto me than
thousands of of gold and silver. I have rejoiced
in thy testimonies as much as in all riches."
The moral maxims contained in the writings of
Solomon are likewise intended to draw forth the
desires after God, to counteract the influence of
the depraved passions of the human heart, and
to promote the exercise of candour, sincerity, jus
tice, and benevolence among mankind. The ex
hortations, remonstrances, and denunciations of
the prophets, were also intended to recall the af
fections of the people of Israel to the God from
whom they had revolted, to show the unreason
ableness of their conduct in " forsaking the foun
tain" of their happiness ; to display the purity,
the excellence, and the eternal obligation of the
divine precepts, and to warn them of the inevita
ble misery and ruin which will overtake the work
ers of iniquity. In short, all the promises and
threatenings of the word of God, all the consider
ations addressed to the hopes and the fears of

men, all the providential dispensations of God,
all the manifestations of the divine character and
perfections, and all the descriptions of the glories
of heaven, and of the terrors of hell, have a ten
dency to illustrate the indispensable obligation
of love to God, and love to all mankind, in order
to secure our present comfort and eternal felicity.
And, as it was the main design of the Old
Testament economy to illustrate and enforce the
principle of love to God and to man, so it is, in
a particular manner, the great object of the
Christian Revelation, to exhibit the law of love
in all its bearings and practical applications. In
one of the first sermons delivered by our Saviour,
and the longest one recorded in the Evangelical
History, the Sermon on the Mount, the main
design is to explain and enforce these principles,
in relation both to God and to man, and tc sweep
away all the false glosses which Ignorance and
Prejudice had mingled with their interpretations
of the Divine Law. In one part of this dis
course, our Lord declares, that we may as soon
expect to see " heaven and earth pass away," or
the whole frame of the universe dissolved, as
that "one jot or one tittle shall pass from the
law." For, as it is a law founded on the nature
of God, it must be of eternal obligation, and can
never be abrogated with regard to any class of
rational beings, in consistency with the perfec
tions of the divine nature. As it is a law abso
lutely perfect, comprehending within its range
every disposition and affection, and every duty
which is requisite for promoting the order and
happiness of intelligent agents, nothing can be
taken from it without destroying its peifection;
and nothing can be added to it without supposing
that it was originally imperfect. And as it was
intended to preserve the harmony and to secure
the felicity of the intellectual beings that people
the earth and the heavens, the fabric of universal
nature must be destroyed, before this law can be
set aside or cancelled. For we have already
seen, (Sect. IV.) that, were it reversed, the
whole intelligent system would be transformed
into a scene of confusion, misery, and horror.
For the purpose of affording an immense theatre,
on which the operations of this law might be
displayed, the earth with all its furniture and
decorations, and the heavens, with all their
hosts, were called into existence ; and, therefore,
were it either cancelled or reversed, neither the
glory of the Creator would be displayed, nor the
happiness of his intelligent creation secured.
The mighty expanse of the universe, enclosing
so many spacious worlds, would become one
boundless moral desert, in which no " fruits of
righteousness" would appear, nor any trace of
the beauty and benevolence of the Eternal Mind.
— In the same discourse, our Saviour enforces
the duty of love towards even our most bitter
enemies and most furious persecutors. " Ye
have heard that it hath been said^^hou t-halt

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But
I say unto you, Love your enemies ; bless them
that curse you ; do good to them that hate you ;
and pray for them that despitefully use you, and
persecute you ; that you may be the children of
your Father who is in heaven; for he maketh
his sun to arise on the evil and on the good, and
sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."
This ij one of the most sublime exercises of the
principle of love, in reference to our fellow-men ;
and it is enforced from the most sublime motive
and consideration — the conduct of Benevolence
itself towards a race of rebellious and ungrateful
creatures.

All the other instructions of this Divine Tea
cher — his parables, exhortations, admonilions,
warnings, end consolatory addresses, though re
ferring to particular cases and circumstances —
had the same general object in view. When his
disciples would have called for fire from heaven,
to consume the Samaritans, he kindly, but with
energy and decision, reminded them, that a prin
ciple of malignity was imbodied in their unhal
lowed desires, which is directly opposed to the
law of love. " Ye know not what manner of
spirit ye are of; for the Son of man is not come
to destroy men's lives, but to save them." Among
his last instructions to his followers, when he
was about to depart from the scene of his earthly
pilgrimage, love was the grand theme on which
he repeatedly expatiated. " A new command
ment give I unto you, that ye love one another ;
ES I have loved you, that ye also love one ano
ther. By this shall all men know that ye are
my disciples, if ye have love one to another."
" These things I command you, that ye love one
another."

And, as the promotion of the spirit of love was
the great object of his instructions, so his whole
»ife was an uninterrupted exemplification of the
purest benevolence, both towards friends and to
wards enemies. Never did that holy affection
which unites the angelic tribes, and diffuses joy
among the poor inhabitants of all worlds, appear
within the confines of our world, so amiable, so
disinterested, and so ardent, as during the period
of the public ministry of Jesus, and particularly
towards the close of hi<= earthly career. In the
immediate prospect of sufferings, dreadful be
yond our conceptions, his love to mankind was
" strong as death," which the many waters of af
fliction which surrounded him were unable to
quench. His whole soul seemed to be absorbed
in affection towards his disconsolate disciples, and
in a desire to cheer and animate their drooping
spirits. His last addresses, as recorded by the
Evangelist John, breathe a spirit of tenderness
and compassion, and of Divine benignity, of which
we have no parallel in the annals of our race."

To display his kindness and condescension,
and to teach his disciples to peform with cheer-
'ulnessthe humblest offices of friendship, he rose

from supper ; he laid aside his garments ; h»
took a towel ; he girded himself ; he poured wa
fer into a bason ; he began to wash the disci
ples' feet; anJ he wiped them with the towel
wherewith he was girded. He then addressed
them in such language as this : — " Let not your
heart be troubled ; in my Father's house are
many mansions ; I go to prepare a place for you.
And, if I go and prepare a place for you, I will
come again and receive you to myself; that
where I am there ye may be also. I will not
leave you comfortless ; I will pray the Father,
and he shall give you another comforter, even
the Spirit of truth, which shall abide with you
forever. Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name,
I will do it. Peace I leave with you ; my peace
I give unto you; not as the world giveth, give
I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, nei
ther let it be afraid." In his last prayer, which
accompanied these benedictions, the same ardent
flow of affection burst from his benevolent heart —
" Holy Father ! keep, through thine own name,
those whom thou hast given me, that they may
be one as we are." But his love was not con
fined to the select few with whom he was sur
rounded at this interesting hour. His mental
eye surveyed the various tribes which people this
department of creation — it pierced through all
the succeding generations of mankind — and he
embraced in his expansive affections the whole
race of the faithful till the close of time.
" Neither pray I for these alone ; but for them
also who shall believe on me through their word ;
that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in
me, and I in thee ; that they also may be one in
us." Even towards his bitlerest enemies his
benevolent emotions flowed out, in earnest sup
plications for their forgiveness. Neither " the
floods of ungodly men," which compassed him,
nor the torrents of abuse which were poured
upon him while he was nailing to the cross, could
overpower that heavenly flame which burned in
his holv breast. In the midst of all the mocke
ries, insults, and indignities which he endured,
when he was made " a spectacle to angels and
to men," his affectionate desires ascended, with
the srnoke of the evening sacrifice, to the throne
of God, in behalf of his murderers — " Father,
forgive them ; for they know not what they do."
O, what a striking contrast is here presented, to
those scenes of pride, malignity, and revenge,
which have so long disgraced the race of Adam,
and spread lamentation, and mourning, and ter
ror, among families, societies, and nations !
What a happy world would this become, were it
peopled with such amiable characters, and were
all who profess to be followers of Jesus, instead of
contending about "questions which gender strife,"
to vie with each other in imitating his mild and
benevolent spirit ! Then Christianity would ap
pear in its native lustre, and receive the homage
due to its divine character : and the name of J«v

ILLUSTRATIONS FROM SCRIPTURE.

73

novah would soon be proclaimed throughout all
the earth, and the joys of his salvation felt in
every clime.

Again, it is one great end of the death of Christ
t.o destroy the principle of malignity in the hu
man heart, and to promote the operation of the
law of love. "While we were enemies, (says
the Apostle Paul,) we were reconciled to God
by the death of his Son." " We are sanctified
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ
once for all." " He lored us, and washed us
from our sins in his own blood." " They who
were enemies in their mind, and by wicked works,
he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death,
to present them holy and unblameable, and unre-
provable in his sight." Love to his heavenly
Father, and love to mankind, impelled him to
" humble himself, and to become obedient to
death, even the death of the cross." And, in
order that this divine principle might be kept
alive, and form a bond of union among all his fol
lowers, he appointed an ordinance, consisting of
gensible signs, in commemoration of his death,
to be observed in all ages as a memorial of his
love, and to remind his friends of the indispen-
sibie obligation under which they are laid to love
one another. To promote the same benevolent
design, he arose from the dead, ascended to
heaven, sent down the Spirit of Holiness to abide
in the Church, and now presides in the celestial
world as " a Prince and a Saviour, to give re
pentance and the remission of sins."

And, as the instructions and the example of
Jesus Christ were calculated to exhibit the prin
ciple of love in all its interesting aspects, and to
promote its practical influence, so the preaching
and the writings of hjs Apostles had the same
important object in view, as the ultimate scope
of all their ministrations. The one half of every
epistle to the Christian churches is occupied in
delineating the practical bearings of this holy af
fection. Like the lines which proceed from the
r.entre to the circumference of a circle, the va-
i lous radiations of Christian affection are traced
from love, as the grand central point, and exhi
bited in all their benign influence on individuals,
families, churches, and the diversified relations
which subsist in civil and Christian society.
" Above all things," says the Apostle, " put on
love, which is the bond of perfection. Though
we speak with the tongues of men and angels, and
have not love, we are become as sounding brass,
or a tinkling cymbal. And though we under
stand all mysteries, and all knowledge, and be
stow all our goods to feed the poor, and have not
fove, itprofiteth nothing. Love suffereth long,
and is kind ; love envieth not, vaunteth not itself,
doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her
own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil.
Prophecies shall fail, languages- shall cease,
earthly knowledge shall vanish away, but love
foileth," " Love worketh no ill to his

neighbour ; therefore, love is the fulfilling of die
law. All the law is comprehended in this say
ing, namely, Thou shall love thy neighbour as
thyself. The works of the flesh," or those which
flow from a principle of malignity, " are these :
fornication, uncleanness, idolatry, hatred, vari
ance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, envy-
ings, murders, revellings, and such like. But
the fruit of the spirit, is love, joy, peace, long-suf
fering, gentleness, goodness, fidelity, meekness,
and temperance." " Let love be without dis
simulation, and walk in love as Christ also hath
loved us. Be kindly affectioned one toward
another with brotherly love, in honour preferring
one another. Distributing to the necessity of
saints ; given to hospitality. Bless them that per
secute you ? bless, and curse not. Rejoice with
them that do rejoice, and weep with them that
weep. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ
also loved the church ; children, obey your parents
in the Lord; fathers, provoke not your children
to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and
admonition of the Lo d. Servants, be obedient to
your masters, with good will doing service as to
the Lord, and not unto men ; and ye masters, do
the same thing unto them, forbearing threatening,
knowing that your master also is in heaven."
" Put on, as the elect of God, holy and beloved,
bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind,
meekness, long-suffering ; forbearing one another
in love, and forgiving one another, if any man
have a quarrel against any ; even as Christ for
gave you, so also do ye."

Such is the general scope of the instructions
which the apostles delivered, in all their com
munications to the Christian churches, whether
composed of Jews or Gentiles. And, had it not
been for the strong prejudices of the Jews, and
the erroneous conceptions of the Gentiles, which
the apostles had to combat, it is probable, >hat
the whole of their epistles would have been soiely
occupied in delineating the practical effects of
love to God, and to our brethren of mankind,
and its glorious consequences in the future
world. And, as it was the great aim of the
apostles themselves, in their writings and per
sonal administrations, to illustrate the numerous
bearings of Christian love, so they gave solemn
charges to their successors in the work of the
ministry, to make all their instructions subser
vient to the promotion of the same important ob
ject. Almost the whole of the epistles addressed
to Timothy and Titus, which relate to the du
ties and the objects of the Christian ministry, has
a reference, not to the discussion of metaphysical
questions in theology, which " are unprofitable
and vain," but to the illustration and the inculcat
ing of those practical duties which flow from the
spirit of love, and to the counteracting of those
proud, malignant, and speculative dispositions
which are opposed to the meekness and benignity
of the gospel of peace.

74

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

I might also have shown, by numerous quota
tions, that, in the general epistles of Peter,
James, and John, the same grand object to which
I have been adverting is steadily and uniformly
kept in view. The first epistle of John is almost
exclusively devoted to the illustration of the love
of God and of man ; and on this theme, in which
his soul appears to be almost entirely absorbed,
he expatiates Widi peculiar energy and delight :
" We know that we have passed from death to
life, because we love the brethren. He that
loveth not his brother abideth in death. Who
soever hateth his brother is a murderer ; and ye
know that no murderer hath (the principle of)
eternal life abiding in him. Behold, what man
ner of love the Father hath bestowed on us, that
we should be called the sons of God ! Beloved,
let us love one another ; for love is of God : and
every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth
God. He that loveth not knoweth not God ;
for God is love. No man hath seen God at any
time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in
us, and his love is perfected in us. If any man
say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a
liar ; for he that loveth not his brother, whom he
hath seen, how can he love God, whom he hath
not seen ?" It is recorded, by some ancient au
thors, that when this apostle was grown old, and
unable to preach, he used to be led to the church
at Ephesus, and only to say these words to the
people, Little children, love one another." Such
was the importance which this venerable apostle
attached to love, as the grand and governing prin
ciple in the Christian system.

Finally, The procedure of the last judgment
will be conducted on evidence, deduced from the
manifestations of love. At that solemn period,
when the present economy of Divine Providence
shall come, to a termination ; when the elements
shall melt with fervent heat, and the great globe
on which we tread shall be wrapt in flames;
when the archangel shall descend, and sound
an alarm with " the trump of God;" when the
graves shall open, an 1 give forth their dead; and
when aii the generations of men, " both small
and great," shall stand before the throne ofGod ;
the eternal destiny of all the millions of mankind
will be unalterably determined, on the ground of
the manifestations which have been given of the
existence and the operation of the principle of
love, and of the affections and conduct to which
it is opposed. " When the Son of man shall
corne in his glory, and all the holy angels with
him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his
glory. And before him shall be assembled all
nations. Then shall he say to them on his right
hand, Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. For I was an hungered, and ye gave
me meat ; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink ;
I was a stranger, and ye took me in ; naked, and
ve clothed me ; I was shk, and ye visited me ;

I was in prison, and ye came unto me." And,
though ye had no opportunity of performing these
offices to me in person, yet, " inasmuch as ye
did it to one of the least of these my brethren,
ye did it unto me." " Then shall he also say to
them on the left hand, Depart from rne, ye curs
ed ; for I was an hungered, and ye gave me no
meat ; I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink;
I was a stranger and ye took me not in ; naked,
and ye clothed me not; sick, and in prison, and
ye visited me not. Verily, I say untoyou, inas
much as ye did it not to one of the least of these,
ye did it not to me. And these shall go away
into everlasting punishment, but the righteous
into life eternal." For every one shall be re
warded according to his works. — Such is the
importance which will be attached to the influ
ence of this holy affection over the human mind,
at that " day of dread, decision, and despair ;"
for it is quite obvious, that every action here
specified in relation to the righteous, is an effect
of the love of God and of man presiding in the
heart , and, therefore, if we shall ultimately be
found destitute of this holy principle, we cannot
expect the reward of the faithful, nor " have
boldness in the day of judgment."

Thus it appears that it is the great end of alj
the historical facts, the religious institutions, tha
devotional writings, the moral maxims, the in
structions of the prophets, the warnings, exhor
tations, promises, and threatenings, comprised
in the Jewish revelation, to illustrate and enforce
the law of love in its references both to God and
to man — that it is explained and illustrated in the
various instructions delivered by our blessed
Saviour, and enforced by his example — that itg
numerous bearings and modifications are display
ed in the writings of all the apostles, and in
their instructions to Christian teachers — and, that
its existence in the heart, and its operation in
active life, will form the decisive test of our cha
racter at the final judgment.

SECTION VIII.

ON THE PRACTICAL OPERATION OF LOVE, AND
THE VARIOUS MODES IN WHICH IT SHOULD
BE DISPLAYED TOWARDS MANKIND.

WE have already seen, that love is a most
noble and expansive affection. It is not like a
blazing meteor which dazzles the eye for a few
moments, and then vanishes from the sight. It
does not consist merely in a few transient emo
tions, and fruitless wishes for the good of others.
It does not waste its energies in eloquent ha
rangues on the beauty of virtue, in theorizing spe
culations on the principles of morals, in framing
Quixotic schemes of philanthropy, or in weep
ing over tales of fictitious wo. It is a substantial
and an ever active principle ; its energies are ex
erted for the purpose of communicating happiness

PRACTICAL OPERATIONS OF BENEVOLENCE.

75

lo every rank of sensitive and intellectual beings ;
a 'id the moral world, as it actually exists, is the
grand theatre of its operations. I have already
endeavoured to illustrate some of the modifica
tions of this affection, in its relation to God ;* and,
in the preceding sections of this chapter, have
occasionally adverted to some of its benignant
effects in reference to man. It may, however,
be expedient, in this place, to enter a little more
explicitly into the practical operations of benevo
lence, and the various modes by which its influ
ence may be manifested in relation to our bre
thren of mankind.

The grand object which love proposes to ac
complish is the communication ofhappiness. And,
in order to stimulate and direct us in its opera
tions, the character and agency of God are set
before us as our examplar. There is not a more
amiable, attractive, nor comprehensive idea of
the Divine Being any where to be found than that
which is exhibited by the Apostle John, in three
words — GOD is LOVE. He is the eternal, un
created Source of felicity, from which flow all
those streams of joy which gladden the hearts of
angels and archangels, cherubim and seraphim ;
and whatever portion of happiness, sensitive or
intellectual, is enjoyed by man on earth, and by
all the subordinate tribes of animated nature, is
derived from the same inexhaustible fountain.
For the purpose of communicating happiness, he
called the material universe into existence, to
serve as an immense theatre, on which his bene
volence might be displayed to countless orders
of sensitive and intelligent creatures ; and all
the perfections of his nature may be considered as
so many agents employed for the execution of
this noble design. Impelled, as it were, by this
essential and characteristic affection of the Di
vine Mind, all the attributes of Deity are inces
santly operating throughout the immensity of
creation in the view of the inhabitants ofall worlds.
His Omnipotence is employed in supporting the
worlds already created, and in bringing new
systems, and new orders of beings into exist
ence ; and his Wisdom, in devising, select
ing, and arranging those means which are requi
site for accomplishing the plans of benevolence.
Towards those wretched beings who have abused
his goodness, and wandered from happiness, his
Mercy is proclaimed ; and his Patience and for
bearance are long exercised, in order to lead
them to repentance, and to the paths of felicity.
His Justice, conjoined with his power, is exer
cised for the purpose of restraining the efforts of
malevolence, for preventing the inroads of anar
chy arid confusion, ana for preserving the order
and happiness of the intelligent creation. In this
view, all the judgments, however dreadful and
appalling, which have been inflicted on the work
ers of iniquity in every age, have had a tendency

* See p%ges 4G— FI

to accomplish the purposes of benevolence, in
reference to the universal system. For, the ge
neral good of God's universal empire, considtrr.d
as one whole, must be viewed as the great end
which benevolence is accomplishing, and the
partial exclusions from happiness, which now
happen in the case of certain classes of moral
agents, must be regarded as necessary arrange
ments subservient to this important end. His
infinite Knowledge, extending to all events, past,
present, and to come ; and his Omniscient eye,
piercing into the secret purposes of every heart,
surveying the various tribes of men, and the cir
cumstances of all the worlds which float in the
immensity of space, and comprehending the re
motest consequences of all actions throughout
infinite duration, enable Him, in every instance,
to form those arrangements by which the objects
of benevolence may be accomplished on the most
extensive scale, and by which the everlasting
happiness of the holy and intelligent system may
be most effectually secured.

For the purpose of displaying his love to the
moral intelligences of our world, he has given
us a revelation of his character and will ; he has
exhibited his law as a law of love ; he has pro
mised the agency of his holy Spirit, to produce
in us those dispositions which his law requires ;
and he has given the most affecting display of
his love, in the mission of his Son into the
world. " In this," says the Apostle John, " was
manifested the love of God towards us ; because
that God sent his only-begotten Son into the
world, that we might live though him. Herein
is love; not that we loved God, but that he lov
ed us, and sent his Son to be a propitiation for
our sins. Beloved, ifGod so loved us, how ought
we to love one another ?"

Now, we are commanded in the Sacred Scrip
tures to be imitators of God in his benevolent
operations, and especially in those cases in
which love requires to surmount every obstacle,
and to exert all its powers in opposition to ha
tred, enmity, and ingratitude. " Be ye perfect,"
says our Saviour, " as your Father who is in
heaven is perfect. Love your enemies ; bless
them who curse you ; do good to them who hate
you ; and pray for them who despitefully use you
and persecute you. That you may be the chil
dren of your Father who is in heaven : for he
maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the
good ; and sendeth rain on the just ana on the
unjust." So that his enemies subsist on his
bounty, and are cheered and refreshed hy his pro
vidential care. In like manner, the operation o.
love on the part of man may be consideredas '.he
whole energy of an intelligent, mind, directing
its faculties of perception, judgment, reasoning,
and imagination, along with its physical pow
ers, to the production of happiness both among
friends and enemies, so far as its influence can
extend. In the prosecution of this noble end, man

70

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

becomes " a worker together with God," a subor
dinate agent in carrying forward those plans of In
finite Benevolence which will issue in the ultimate
happiness of the moral universe. And as the
Almighty, in his benevolent operations, preserves
the harmony of the universe by certain laws of
order which he has established, as is apparent
in the arrangement of the planetary system, and
in the physical and moral economy of our ter
restrial sphere ; so it is the duty of man, in all
the movements to which love impels him, to imi
tate his Creator in this respect, and to employ the
intellectual faculties with which he is endued, for
regulating the exercise of the benevolent prin
ciple, for adapting and proportioning means
to ends, and for discriminating between rational
and enthusiastic schemes of exertion ; so that
order may facilitate his movements, and that the
greatest sum of happiness may result from his
active endeavours.

We may now attend more particularly to the
practical operations of love, and the objects to
wards which it should be directed.

The principal objects towards which our be
nevolence should be directed are, intelligent be
ings ; and in the sphere of action to which we
are at present confined, man is the chief object
whom we have it in our power to benefit by our
benevolent exertions. Our benevolent affections,
indeed, ought to expand towards all the holy
intelligences of which we have any intimation ;
and, in another stage of our existence, we may
have an opportunity of mingling with other or
ders of intellectual beings, and of co-operating
with them in diffusing happiness throughout the
universe ; but while we continue in this sublu
nary region, the improvement and happiness of
our fellow-men is the chief object to which our
exertions must necessarily be confined ; and when
we view the present state of the moral world in
all nations and climates, we behold a field of ex
ertion sufficiently ample to employ all the ener
gies of benevolence that have ever yet been dis
played, or perhaps ever will be displayed during
the existing economy of our world.

Man may be considered in two points of view :
as possessed of a body, which is susceptible of
agreeable or disagreeable sensations and feel
ings ; and, as endued with a inind, or spiritual
principle which is capable of perpetual im
provement in knowledge and virtue, and which
is destined an endless existence. In both these
respects, love will exert its powers in meliorat
ing the condition and promoting the enjoyments
of mankind. In regard to his corporeal system,
man ' has various wants, which require to be
supplied, and he is subjected to various tuffer-
ings which require to be soothed and allevi
ated. He stands in need of food, raiment, shel
ter from the blasts of the tempests, comfort
able lodging and accommodation, light to cheer
and enable him to prosecute his employments,

pure atmospheric air to invigorate his anima*
system, and water to cleanse and refresh him.
He is exposed to corporeal weakness and to
mental imbecility; to pain, sickness, and dis
ease ; to the loss of sight, of hearing, and of
bodily feelings ; to the decrepitude of old age
and to all those lingering disorders which termi
nate in dissolution. He is also exposed to the
afflictions occasioned by the loss of friends and
relatives ; to dejection of mind, to remorse of
conscience, to doubt, despondency, and despair ,
and to a long train of anxieties, vexations, per
plexities, and troubles of various, kinds. Now,
in reference to the wants of mankind, love, when
genuine and ardent, will endeavour to supply
them wherever a deficiency is known to exist ,
and in reference to their calamities and sorrows,
it will use its utmost exertions to relieve and
assuage them, in as far its powers and influ
ence can extend. In this respect, every one,
however low his situation in life, however li«
mited the range of his knowledge, and how
ever contracted the sphere of his influence may
be, has it in his power, in a greater or less de
gree, to communicate blessings to his brethren
of mankind. He can visit the sick bed of an
afflicted neighbour ; he can supply a cup of cold
water to cool his parched tongue ; he can wipe
the sweat from his forehead ; he can smooth his
pillow ; he can turn him round on his bed of
languishing, that he may enjoy a more comfort
able repose; and he can cheer him with tho^e
expressions of tenderness and affection, which
have a tendency above all other acts of kindness
to sooth and revive the downcast spirit. He
can assist his neighbour by his strength, or by
his skill, by his counsel and advice, and by tak
ing a lively interest in his concerns ; he can
promote his joy by rejoicing in his prosperity and
success, by assisting him in his employment, by
rescuing him from danger, t\y forgiving the in
juries he may have received, by acknowledging
the worth of the skill, virtues, and endowments
of which he is possessed, and by listening with
patience and complacency to his sentiments,
complaints, or grievances. He can even pro
mote the happiness of his neighbour in ^negative
way, by not injuring him in his character or re
putation ; by not standing in the way of his pros
perity or advancement ; by not thwarting him
in his schemes and enterprises ; by not inter
rupting him in his innocent amusements ; and
by refraining from every thing that would tend
unnecessarily to injure hirn in his trade or pro-
fession. Such friendly attentions to promote
the comfort of his fellow-men, every one has it
in his power to bestow : and upon such appa
rently trivial actions the happiness of mankind
in general more immediately depends, than on
many of those legislative arrangements which
arrest the attention of a whole empire. For,
were they universally performed, the greater par*

PRACTICAL OPERATIONS OF BENEVOLENCE.

77

•f ihe miseries which afflict humanity would
disappear from the world.

But, in cases where a high degree of intel
lectual talent, of wealth, and of influence is pos
sessed, love is enabled to take a wider range in
its beneficent operations, by endeavouring to
counteract public evils, and to promote rational
schemes of general philanthropy. When we
take a survey of the condition of the great mass
of the lower orders of society, we find them la
bouring under many physical evils and inconve
niences, which have a tendency to injure their
health and their comfort, and to obstruct their
moral and intellectual improvement. In their
orivate habitations, we find multitudes of them
residing in places where they are almost depriv
ed of light and of pure air, and surrounded with
noxious effluvia, putrid smells, and every thing
that is insalubrious and offensive to the senses.
We find wnole families packed into a narrow
apartment of twelve feet square, in a narrow lane,
where the rays of the sun never penetrate, where
the refreshing breeze is seldom felt, and where
the beauties of nature are never beheld. In
public manufactories we find hundreds of men,
women, and children, with pale faces and ema
ciated looks, breathing a polluted atmosphere
half-poisoned with deleterious fumes, steam,
smoke, or noxious gases. In large cities, we
find numbers of children, through the careless
ness and unprincipled disposition of their pa
rents, left to wallow in filth and wretchedness,
without even rags to cover their nakedness, and
encouraged in the haibits of pilfering, and of every
other vice which can debase their minds and
render them pests to society ; and we behold
others doomed to the degrading employment of
chimney-sweeping, deprived of the attentions
which flow from the tender affection of parents,
and subjected to the harsh treatment of unfeel
ing masters. We behold multitudes of human
beings torn from their families and their native
land, cooped up in an infernal floating dun
geon, carried to a foreign land, sold like cattle
to an avaricious planter, and held in the chains
of perpetual slavery. In reference to all these
aod similar evils which exist in human society,
love will exert its energies, either to alleviate or
to remove them. It will induce one individual
to investigate their causes, to point out the pro
per means of remedy, and to publish to the world
the result of his deliberations a'nd researches.
It will induce another to apply the discoveries
of natural science and the inventions of art to
the purpose of improving the physical condition
of mankind. It wiM induce a third individual,
in conjunction with others, to form rational plans
of melioration, and to organize societies to carry
them into effect; and it will impel others to
come forward with their wealth and influence to
provide the means for carrying forward on the
most extensive scale the plans of general bene

ficence. In short, the whole machinery of natuie
and art, of mind and matter, of religion and litera*
ture, of science and legislation, would be set in
motion to promote the external enjoyments of
mankind, were love a predominant principle in
human society. Cottages on commodious and
healthy plans would be reared for the industri
ous poor; streets would be formed and gardens
allotted them for their pleasure and accommo
dation ; public manufactories would be arranged
and regulated in such a manner as to contribute
to health, to comfort, and to rational improve
ment ;* the children of the poor would be fed
and clothed, and trained up to habits of industry
and virtue ; employment would be provided for
all classes of labourers and mechanics, and sub
sistence furnished when employment could not
be procured ; idleness would be universally dis
couraged, and honourable industry would be re
warded in such a manner as to afford not only the
comforts, but even many of the luxuries of life ;
slavery in every shape, with all its injustice and
cruelties, would be abolished, and rational liberty
would be proclaimed among all ranks and in
every clime.

Thus the man in whose heart love presides,
takes a lively and sincere interest in every thing
that has a tendency to promote the external com
fort and welfare of his neighbour. He is com
passionate and merciful, gentle and indulgent,
kind and tender-hearted, generous and humane ;
he feels for the sorrows of suffering humanity,
and his wealth and activity are directed to re
lieve the distresses of the poor and the afflicted,
to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to pro
tect the widow and the. orphan, to encourage
honest industry, to meliorate the condition of the
useful mechanic, and to increase and extend his
comforts and enjoyments. Of such a one it may
be said, in the language of Job, " He is eyes to
the blind, feet to the lame, and a father to the poor.
When the ear hears him, then it blesses him,
and when the eyes sees him, it gives witness to
him ; because he delivers the poor that cries,
and the fatherless, and him that hath none to help

•Some may be disposed to insinuate, that such at
tempts would be altogether visionary, and could ne
ver be realized. But I would ask such persons,
Have such schemes ever been attempted to be realiz
ed on an extensive scale ? Has the promotion of the
health and comfort, of the industrious poor ever be
come aparticular object of attcntiwilo the legislature,
to men of rank and influence, and to the whole class
of opulent manufacturers ? Is it not a fact, that
while the acquisition of wealth is made the main ob
ject of attention, the melioration of the condition of
the industrious labourer and mechanic is either alto
gether overlooked, or viewed as a very subordinate
object of attention ? He is generally left to shift for
himself the best way he can, and left to breathe in an
impure atmosphere without any particular sacrifice
being made to remedy the evil. I venture to affirm,
that were the comfort of the lower orders of society
made as particular an object of attention as is the
acquisition of wealth, every obstacle to its accom
plishment would soon be removed.

7ft

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

him. The blessing of him that was ready to
perish comes upon him, and he causes the widow's
heart to sing for joy."

But the activities of benevolence are not confin
ed to the communication of sensitive enjoyments.
Man is a rational and immortal, as well as a
sensitive being; and the operations of genuine
love will have for their ultimate object the pro
motion of his best interests as a moral and intellec
tual agent, and as an heir of immortality.

When we consider man as an intellectual be
ing, standing in various important relations to
his God and to his fellow-creatures, we behold
numerous evils which require to be remedied, as
well as in the circumstances of his physical con
dition. Though the human mind is capable of
vast expansion, of acquiring an immense number
of sublime and interesting ideas, and of enjoying
the purest pleasure in contemplating the objects
which lie within its range, yet it is a melancholy
fact, that in all ages, mental darkness has en
veloped the great majority of our race ; and that
the grossest ignorance of the most important
truths, accompanied with the most degrading af
fections, still prevails among the greater part of
the population of every region of the globe. We
need not go to the frozen climes of Lapland and
Labrador, to the filthy huts-of the Greenlander
and the Esquimaux, to the rude savages of
Nootka Sound, to the degraded tribes of New-
Holland and Van Dieman's Land, to the wild
and wretched Boshemen and Caffres, or to the
swarthy sons of Central Africa, in order to be
convinced of this lamentable truth. We need
only to look around us among the various ranks of
our own population, and we shall not fail to see
ignorance, in all its diversified forms, exerting its
malign influence over the minds of men, accom
panied with superstition, enthusiasm, bigotry,
intolerance, and every grovelling affection that
can debase the human mind. Multitudes of the
young, both in the city and in the country, are
suffered to shoot up from infancy to manhood, as
if they were mere animal existences, ignorant of
the character and operations of God, of the duties
they owe to their Creator and to one another, and
of the eternal state of existence to which they
are destined. Even in many of those places
where instruction is attempted to be communi
cated, what a pitiful pictare is exhibited of the re
sults of education, and of the folly which attaches
itself to the character of man! The pronuncia
tion of a number of unmeaning words, the recit
ing of passages which the young cannot under
stand, the repetition of a few propositions in re
gion to which no ideas are attached, and the
casting of a few accounts, are considered as suf-
*icient to lead them forward in the path of know-
edge and virtue ; and are substituted in the place
of those definite and luminous instructions which
are requisite to expand the opening intellect, to
Convey distinct ideas to the mind, to unfold the

scenes of creation and providence, to display the
character of God, and to train up the youthfui
mind to glory and immortality.

Now, in reference to the ignorance which pre
vails in the world, love to man, as an intellectual
being, will excite to active endeavours in order
to counteract its influence. It will prove an ex
citement to the erection of seminaries of instruc
tion wherever they are deficient ; it will patronize
every scheme and every exertion by which know,
ledge may be increased ; and will diffuse mental
illumination as far as the sphere of its influence
extends. It will not rest satisfied with the form
of instruction, without the substance ; with the
elements of language, without the elements of
thought •, with the key of knowledge, without
knowledge itself; but will devise rational plans
for conveying substantial information to the minds
of the young, so as to win their affections, arrest
their attention, and carry them forward with
pleasure in the paths of improvement. It will
not offer them stones and ashes instead of bread,
but will spread before them an intellectual feast,
and " feed them with knowledge and understand
ing." It will not confine its attention merely to
the instruction of the young, but will endeavour,
by writing, by conversation, by lectures, by lend
ing and circulating books, by establishing public
libraries, and by organizing rational and scientific
institutions, to diffuse the rays ofintellectual light
among men of all ages, ranks, and professions ;
and will never cease its exertions till ignorance,
with all its degrading accompaniments, be ba
nished from society, and till the light of truth illu
minate the inhabitants of every land. In a word,
it will endeavour to render every branch of
knowledge subservient to the illustration of the
character and the revelation of God, and to the
preparing of mankind for the employments of
that nobler state of existence to which they are
destined.

Again, as man is possessed of an immortal na
ture, and in his present state of sin and degrada
tion is exposed to misery in the future world, so it
is one of the highest offices of love to endeavour
to promote the eternal salvation of mankind. For
the accomplishment of this important object, all
its activities are concentrated, and all its other
labours are rendered subservient. To improve
the physical condition of man as a sensitive be
ing, and to enlarge his knowledge as an intellec
tual, while we overlook his eternal interests,
is to neglect one of the most important duties of
Christian philanthropy. The sensitive enjoy
ments of man are conducive to his happiness so
long as they continue ; and " knowledge is plea
sant to the soul." But what are all the acquisi
tions and enjoyments of time, when compared
with the concerns of eternity ! and what will they
avail, if their possessor be found unqualified for
the employments of an endless life! If the soul
of man be an immortal principle, and if the leas*.

PROGRESS OF BENEVOLENCE,

danger exists of its being deprived, though igno
rance and guilt, of happiness in the future world,
no words can express the importance which
ought to be attached to this "labour of love."
" What will it profit a man if he shall gain the
whole world, and lose his own soul ? or what shall
a man give in exchange for his soul ?'' And there
fore, the man ip whose breast true benevolence
resides, will consider the eternal happiness of his
fellow-immortals as the grand and ultimate ob
ject which o'jght always to be kept in view,
and will exert all his faculties, powers, and influ
ence, in order to it" accomplishment. He will
not rest satisfied witH prayers and wishes for the
salvation of men ; he will not wait for any ex
traordinary afflatus of the Divine Spirit; but
will prosecute with judgment and perseverance
that course of active duty, which has a tendency
to pioduce the desired effect. So far as the
circle of his influence extends, he will endeavour
to instruct the ignorant, to arouse the careless,
to reclaim the dissipated, to convince the skeptic,
to train up the young in the knowledge of God
and in the paths of virtue, and to encourage and
animate every one who is inquiring the way to
eternal life. He will exhibit religion in its most
amiable, and attractive, and sublime aspects ;
and will endeavour to fix the attention on the
lovely tempers, and the beneficial effects which
the observance of its precepts has a tendency to
produce. He will not make it his chief object to
convert men to the belief of certain metaphysical
dogmas in religion, nor to gain them over to em
brace the peculiarities of a party ; but to produce in
their minds a cordial acquiescence in the plan of
salvation which the Gospel exhibits, a reverence
of the divine character and perfections, a desire
to cultivate holy tempers, and a fixed determina
tion to walkin the paths of God's commandments.
Such a character will give every due encou
ragement by his advice and by his wealth to
Christian churches, and to faithful and intelli
gent ministers of religion. He will patronize
every rational scheme which has for its object to
propagate the Gospel of peace umong all nations.
He will encourage the translation of the Scriptures
into the languages of all kindreds and tribes ; he
will give countenance to societies formed for cir
culating the Bible in foreign lands ; and he will
assist in sending forth intelligent and philanthro
pic missionaries to barbarous and unenlightened
tribes, for the purpose of diffusing the blessings
of knowledge, civilization, and religion ; and he
will rejoice to co-operate in such benevolent
schemes with all who sincerely wish to promote
the best interests of their fellow men, by what
ever name they are distinguished, and to what
ever section of the Christian church they may
belong.

In short, love, when genuine and ardent, will
set itself in opposition to every species of bigotry
and intolerance, and to all those oetty jealousies

and bitter animosities which have so long dis
tracted the Christian church, which have thrown
an odium on its character, and prevented the
harmonious intercourse of the followers of Jeaus.
It will make every sacrifice consistent with the
great objects of Christianity, and will use every
appropriate mean to heal the unhappy divisions
which exist in the religious world, and to pro
mote an affectionate union of" all who love our
Lord Jesus in sincerity;" in order that the
church of Christ may form one compact harmo
nious body, in opposition to atheists, skeptics,
and the men of the world, and in order that
every plan and effort to diffuse the knowledge
and influence of the Christian religion may be
carried more speedily and more extensively into
effect.

With regard to all the other branches of Chris-
tian morality, and to all the virtues which can
adorn the human character, in every station and
relation in life, they will be found to flow from
the exercise of the principle I have now been
illustrating, as naturally as the sap flows from
the trunk of the remotest ramifications of a tree,
or as the gas which now illuminates our streets
and churches flows from the main gasometer,
through hundreds of pipes, to all the different
burners. Sincerity and veracity in our words
and actions, honesty and fair dealing in trade
and commerce, fidelity to compacts and engage
ments, a regard to public liberty, an equitable
administration of justice, condescension and
kindness to inferiors, reverence and respect to
superiors, submission to just laws and regula
tions, friendship, and a cordial interchange of
friendly sentiments and affections ; courtesy, ci
vility, affability, harmony, and good neigbour-
hood ; modesty, chastity, and discretion ; for
giveness of injuries, hospitality to strangers,
humanity to servants and dependants, compassion
to the distressed ; parental, filial, and fraternal
affection, sympathy, generosity, temperance,
and fortitude, together with all the other social
virtues which unite man to man, will as naturally
flow from the fountain of love, when it exists
in the human breast, as water flows from a
reservoir, through all the pipes which distribute
it to the inhabitants of a large city. For he
who withholds the exercise of such virtues, or
acts in direct opposition to them, can never be
supposed to be sincerely attached to his fellow-
creatures, or to consult their happiness ; and
the meaning of language must be inverted be
fore we can apply to him the epithet benevolent ;
and the order of the moral system deranged,
before we can expect happiness to flow from such
a conduct.

The cardinal virtues have been arranged by
some moralists under the heads of Prudence
Temperance, Fortitude, and Justice. Prudenct
consists in judging what is best, in the choic*

86

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

both of ends and means, particularly in reference
to our own interests, and to the good or evil which
may result from our choice. Temperance is that
virtue which moderates and restrains the sensual
appetites, ffotitude is that calm and steady
habit of the mind which either enables us bravely
to encounter the prospect of ill, or renders us
serene and invincible under its immediate pres
sure. Justice is that virtue which impels us to
give to every person what is his due. Now,
it could easily be shown, that love is the impel
ling principle which excites to the exercise of
all these virtues. It will lead us to pay a due
regard to our own comfort and interest, but not
so as to interfere with ihe interests or to obstruct
the happiness of others. It will teach us to pre
serve the dominion of the soul over sense and
passion, and to restrain the influence of the sen
sual appetites, from considerations drawn from
our own happiness, and from the good of others.
For, aa intemperance kindles the fire of resent
ment and the flames of lust, excites to boisterous
words and to lawless actions, wastes the sub
stance and reduces families to wretchedness
and ruin, it must be directly opposed to the prin
ciple of benevolence. It will inspire us with a
generous and heroic indifference to the preca
rious possessions of this mortal scene, and will
excite to activily and perseverance in promoting
human happiness, in the face of every difficulty
and obstruction, and in spite of obstinacy and
ingratitude, and of all the sneers and reproaches
that may be thrown out upon us on account of
the singularity of our conduct. And as Justice
is nothing else than the measure of benevolence,
it will uniformly direct us to give to every one
his due, and restrain us from withholding
from our neighbour any thing to which he is en
titled by equity or by law. And in cases where
the division of property is concerned , it will in
many instances be induced to relinquish its
right when only a few paltry pounds or shillings
are at stake, rather than run the risk of dissolv
ing the bonds of affection and friendship.

The duties of morality have by other mora
lists, particularly by the moderns, been arranged
into the duties we owe to God, as piety, rever
ence, and confidence; the duties we owe toother
men, as fidelity, loyalty, humanity, and justice;
and the duties we owe to ourselves, as chastity,
sobriety, and temperance. From what has been
already stated, both in this and in several of
the preceding sections, it will obviously ap
pear, that all these classes of duties necessarily
flow from the operation of that primary, diffusive,
and ever active principle, which resides origin
ally in the Eternal Mind, and which pervades
the minds of all holy intelligences.

Finally, The man who is animated by the noble
principle of benevolence, will endeavour to dis
charge with fidelity every social and relative
duty, and will feel an interest in the domestic

comfort and the moral and religious Improve
ment of all around him. He will display the
activities of this holy affection more immediately
in the family in which he resides, as a friend, a
father, a husband, a son, or a brother ; perform
ing with punctuality all the duties which such
relations include ; promoting unity, harmony,
affection, and a reciprocal interchange of all
those offices of kindness, which tend to secure
mutual confidence, pleasure, and improvement.
From the family, his affections will be diffused
to the neighbourhood around, in al! the forms of
kindness, compassion, faithfulness, forgiveness,
charity, generosity, humanity, and justice. He
will contemplate every member of society as a
kinsman and a brother ; he will feel a fraternal
attachment; he will delight in his success and
prosperity, and will endeavour to encourage the
social virtues, and to multiply the sources ol
enjoyment wherever his influence extends. From
the circle of his immediate neighbourhood, his
affections will extend over all the nation to
which he belongs. Its prosperity and advance
ment in arts, sciences, and legislation, its peace
and tranquillity, and the wisdom and rectitude
of its rulers, will be the object of his fervent
prayers to the God of heaven. To watch over
its interests, to promote the improvement of its
constitution and its laws, to expose the intrigues
of bribery and corruption, to resist the efforts of
tyranny and ambition, and to defeat every en
croachment on its rights and liberties, in a manly
and Christian manner, he will consider as a
duty which he owes to his fellow-subjects, to his
rulers, and to succeeding generations. It will
be his chief aim, not so much to prevent men
from becoming thieves, and robbers, and mur
derers, as to make them pious, virtuous, and
useful members of the general community ; that
every one may live " a quiet and peaceable life,
in all godliness and honesty."

Nor will his benevolence be confined within
the limits of a narrow-minded and selfish patriot
ism : — his affections will expand to surrounding
nations, and embrace the interests of every peo
ple, and will excite him to co-operate in every
scheme by which civilization and science, liberty
and Christianity, may be promoted among all the
tribes and kindreds of the earth. He will occa
sionally transport himself in imagination to dis
tant climes, and to the islands scattered over the
face of the ocean, — and the joy or sorrow which
is felt in the hut of the Greenlander, in the In
dian wigwam, or among the tents of tho Tartars,
will find access to his feeling heart. An in
undation, an earthquake, the eruption of a vol
cano, a destroying pestilence, or the horrors ol
war, happening in Persia, China, or Japan, will
not be viewed with apathy or indifference, be
cause those countries are placed thousands of
miles beyond the boundaries of his own ; but he
will sympathise in the sorrows of those distant

MORAL SYSTEMS.

81

sufferers, as well as in the calamities which befall
nis brethren in his native land. Nor will- his af
fections be confined to the men of the present
age, but will stretch forward to embrace the
sons and daughters of future times, who are des
tined to appear on the theatre of this world, in
successive generations, till time shall be no
longer. The plans which he now forms, the
ground-works of the improvements which he is
now establishing, and the diversified operations of
oenevolence in which he is now engaged, will
have, for their ultimate object, the diffusion of the
light of science and of religion, and the communi
cation of happiness, in various forms, to unnum
bered multitudes of the human race, after his
spirit shall have taken its flight beyond the
bounds of this terrestrial sphere. Nor will the cur
rent of his love towards fellow-intelligences be
bounded by the limits of time, and the range of
this sublunary system, but will run forward into
those interminable ages, which shall succeed the
dissolution of our globe, and will rise upward to
the inhabitants of those glorious worlds which
roll in the distant regions of creation. Contem
plating the diversified scenes in which he may
hereafter be placed, and the various orders of
intellectual beings with which he may mingle,
his soul will be transported at the prospect of en
tering upon a more extensive field for the range
of his benevolent affections, and of being quali
fied to receive and to communicate happiness on a
more enlarged scale, in company with other holy
intelligences, — where the field of benevolence
will be continually expanding, and the most ex
quisite delight springing up in his bosom, and
ever increasing, as eternal ages are rolling on.

Thus, it appears, that Benevolence is an ex
pansive and an ever active principle, diffus
ing happiness in its train wherever it extends.
Were an extensive moral machinery to be set in
action by this powerful principle, it is impossible
to describe what a variety of blessings would soon
be distributed among mankind, and what a mighty
change would be effected in the social state of
human brings, and on the whole aspect of the
moral world. And from what has been already
stated, it is evident, that, although intellectual
talent, wealth, and influence, have most in their
power, as the prime directors of the moral ma
chine, — yet there is no individual in whom this
principle resides, however limited his faculties,
and his sphere of action, but has it in his power
co communicate happiness to his fellow creatures,
and to become at least a subordinate agent in pro
moting the plans of universal benevolence.

From what has been stated above, and in se
veral of the preceding parts of this work, we
may learn, that, in order to acquire a knowledge
of our duty, and of the motives which should
stimulate us to its performance, there is no need
to engage in the study of voluminous systems of
26

ethical science, or to perplex the mind with la
boured disquisitions on the principles of morals.
The general path of duty is plain to every one
who is inclined to walk in it ; and whoever wishes
to be assisted and directed in his progress to
wards moral perfection, will find, in the Pro
verbs of Solomon, the sermons of Jesus Christ,
and the practical parts of the apostolic epistles,
maxims, and precepts, and motives inculcated,
infinitely superior in regard both to their author
ity and their excellence, to those of all other
systems of moral philosophy, whether in ancient
or in modern times. This seems to be partly
admitted even by moral philosophers themselves.
The celebrated Dr. Reid, in his " Essays on
the Active Powers of Man," after a variety of
learned and abstract discussions on active power,
and the principles of human action, when
treating on the theory of morals, says, " This
is an intricate subject, and there have been
various theories and much controversy about it
in ancient and in modern times. But it has little
connexion with the knowledge of our duty, and
those who differ most in the theory of our moral
powers, agree in the practical rules of morals
which they dictate. As a man may be a good
judge of colours, and of the other visible quali
ties of objects, without any knowledge of the
anatomy of the eye, and of the theory of vision;
so a man may have a very clear and compre
hensive knowledge of what is right and of what
is wrong in human conduct, who never studied
the structure of our moral powers. A good ear
in music may be much improved by attention
and practice in that art ; but very little by study
ing the anatomy of the ear, and the theory of
sound. In order to acquire a good eye, or a
good ear, in the arts that require them, the the
ory of vision, and the theory of sound, are by no
means necessary, and indeed of very little use.
Of as little necessity or use is what we call the
theory of morals, in order to improve our moral
judgment." — REID, " On the Active Powers,"
Essay v. chap. 2.

To a man who is familiar with the Scriptures,
and whose mind has acquired a relish for the
simplicity and excellence of the Christian code
of morals, how cold, and frigid, and uninteresting,
do the laboured disquisitions of our most cele
brated ethical writers appear! There is little
to be found in such writings to kindle the fire of
holy love, and to inspire the soul with a noble
ardour, in carrying forward the plan of divine
benevolence. What powerful stimulus to ex
alted virtue can be expected from abstract dis
cussions on active power, on liberty and necessity,
on theories of moral action, on the reason and fit
ness of things, on self-love, on public and private
interest, on the law of honour, and the like ; and
of how little practical utility are the results ot
such disquisitions ; since every principle of ac
tion, every motive, and every duty conducive tc

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

the happiness of the intelligent system, is laid
down in the Scriptures, with a plainness and per
spicuity, which render them level to the meanest
understanding ? And what shall we say of those
moralists who teach us, that " modesty, humility,
and forgiveness of injuries," belong to the class
of vices ;* and, by consequence, that pride,
imprudence, and revenge, are to be ranked
among the virtues ! Such virtue, alas! has too
long prevailed in our degenerate world ; but were
it universally to prevail, it would transform crea
tion into a chaos, and banish happiness from the
universe. What beneficial practical effects have
ever yet been produced by all the systems of ethics
which have hitherto been published to the world ?
Let us look back on the nations of antiquity, on
the schools of Plato, Socrates, Epicurus, and
Zeno ; let us survey the conduct of our modern
skeptical philosophers, and the practices of our
youths who attend courses of ethical lectures in
our universities and academies, and say, whether
the general depravity of human nature has been
counteracted, and a spirit of universal benevo
lence has been cherished and promoted by such
instructions. I venture to affirm, that we are
far more indebted to our Saviour's sermon on
the mount, and to the practical writings of the
apostle Paul, for that portion of morality which
has given a polish to the manners of modern
socieiy, than to all the systems of ethics, detached
from Christianity, which have ever been published
by the philosophers either of Greece or Rome,
or of the British empire : arid that it is only
by following out the instructions of these divine
teachers that we can expect to see the world
regenerated, and vice and iniquity banished from
our streets.

In throwing out the preceding hints, I have
confined my attention chiefly to the intelligent
creation. But it is evident, that where a prin
ciple of genuine love actuates the mind, it will
extend its benevolent regards even to the lower
orders of animated existence. Towards them
the Creator has displayed his benevolence, as
well as towards man. He has framed their bo
dies in as curious and admirable a manner, as
the bodies of mankind. He has bestowed upon
them organs of sensation exactly adapted to the
situations they occupy, and to their various modes
of subsistence. He has formed them with in
stincts which enable them to construct their habi
tations, to select their food, to protect themselves
from danger, and to choose the fittest places for
bringing forth their young. He has provided,
in the different departments of nature, all that
variety of food which is requisite to supply the
wants of the whole of that immense assemblage
of living beings which traverse the air, the waters,
and the earth. " These all wait upon Him,
and he giveth them their meat indue season."

* This sentiment is taught by Mr. Hume, and his
followers.

Their sportive motions, their varied movement^
and the delight with which they seem to exer
cise their faculties, testify, that they are the
objects of the beneficence of their Almighty
though unknown Maker. So that God noL only
takes care of men, but of the fishes of Hie sea,
the creeping insects, and the fowls of heaven,
for "a sparrow cannot fall to the ground" with
out his providential permission.

This benevolent care of the Creator, which
extends to the lowest order of his creatures, in
structs us, that our benevolence also should be
displayed towards the inferior ranks of sensitive
existence — that we should not only abstain from
vexing, and torturing, and unnecessarily depriv
ing them of existence ; but should endeavour to
promote their comfort and enjoyment. It was
the object of several of the laws delivered to the
Jews, to inculcate compassion and humanity
towards their domestic animals : and Solomon
lays it down as a moral maxim, that " the right
eous man regardeth the life of his beast." Be
nevolence will display itself, in the shape of
tenderness and humanity towards every crea
ture that is endowed with feeling and sensation ;
but it cannot be supposed to have a powerful
influence over that man who can wantonly tor
ture a poor fly, lash a feeble old horse, wound a
bird or a hare for mere sport, twirl a cockchaffer
on a crooked pin, or even intentionally trample
under foot a snail or a worm, that is doing him
no injury. The benevolent man rejoices in the
happiness of all creation around him ; and, were
this disposition universally prevalent, not only
should we see cock-fighting, dog-fighting, bull-
baiting, and other cruel and degrading sports
for ever abolished, but should form a more de
lightful intercourse with many of the lower ani
mals than we have ever yet enjoyed. — The
Arabians never beat their horses ; they never
cut their tails; they treat them gently; they
speak to them, and seem to hold a discourse ;
they use them as friends ; they never attempt
to increase their speed by the whip, nor spur
them but in cases of great necessity. They never
fix them to a stake in the fields, but suffer them
to pasture at large around their habitations ; and
they come running the moment they hear the
sound of their master's voice. In consequence
of such treatment, these animals become docile
and tractable in the highest degree. They re
sort at night to their tents, and lie down in the
midst of the children, without ever hurting then)
in the slightest degree. The little boys and girl?
are often seen upon the body or the neck of the
mare, while the beasts continue inoffensive and
harmless, permitling them to play with and
caress them without injury. — Several species
of birds have a natural attachment to the habita
tions of man ; but his malevolence orevents
them from entering into any intimate and friendly
association ; for they seem to be fully aware of

BENEVOLENCE TOWARDS ANIMALS.

83

his guns, and snares, and other arts of destruc
tion, which make them shy, even in cases of ne
cessity, of trusting themselves to his generosity
and protection. How many amusing and in
structive associations might be formed with this
class of animals, if the kindness and benevolence
of man were to secure their confidence ! Even
the beasts of the forest, the elephant, the lion,
and the tiger,* have had their ferocious disposi
tions softened by kindness and attention, and
have become the protectors and the friends of
man.

Although the lower animals seem to be inca
pable of making improvements when left to them
selves, yet experience has proved, that, under
the tuition of man, they are capable of making
considerable advancement in knowledge, and in
the exercise of the benevolent affections. Kind
ness and affection will frequently soften the most
savage and obdurate dispositions among "man
kind ; and it is not improbable, that a judicious
and universal display of friendly attentions to
wards those animals which occasionally associ
ate with man, would go far to counteract their
malevolent propensities, and to promote their
harmony and affection. I never was more delight
ed with an exhibition of animals than on a late
occasion, when I beheld &cat, a bird, and a motive
living in the same cage, in the most cordial har
mony and peace — a fact which demonstrates that
the strongest antipathies of the animal tribes may
be overcome by the care and attention of man.
And as such an experiment could not have
been attempted with success, except wlien these
animals were very young, it shows us the im
mense importance of an early attention to the
training of our youth in habits of kindness and
affection towards each other, and of humanity
towards every sensitive being ; and that it ought
to be the great care of parents, nurses, and ser
vants, to counteract \hejirst appearance of ma
levolent dispositions in very early life, however
trivial the circumstances in which such disposi
tions are manifested.

The famous Baron Trenck, when confined in
his dungeon in Magdeburg, had so tamed a
mouse, that it would play round him, and, eat
round him, and eat from his mouth. When he
whistled, it would come and jump upon his
shoulder. After his cruel keepers had given
orders that he should be deprived of its society,
and had actually taken it away blindfolded, it
found its way back again to the door of his dun
geon, waited the hour of visitation, when the door
would be opened, and immediately testified its
joy, by its antic leaping between his legs. This
mouse was afterwards carried off, and put into a

• An experiment was lately exhibited, by the
keeper of the animals in the Tower of London,
which demonstrates, that even the tiger is capable
of being tamed, and rendered susceptible of friendly
feelings towards man.

cage, where it pined, refused all sustenance, and,
in a few days, was found dead. " In this small
animal," says the Baron, " I discovered proofs
of intelligence too great to easily gain belief.
Were I to write them, such philosphers as sup
pose man alone endowed with the power of
thought, allowing nothing but what they call in
stinct in animals, would proclaim me a fabulous
writer, and my opinions heterodox to what they
suppose sound philosophy." — A nobleman of
France, a Count Lauzun, was condemned to a
rigid imprisonment. Cut off from all human
society, and allowed no means of diverting his
solitude, he made a companion of a spider, who
had spun her web in the corner of his cell. He
at length familiarized her so far, that she would
come upon his hand, and eat from it a portion of
his food which he gave her. The jailer, totally
devoid of feeling, thoughr. this too great an in
dulgence for the unfortunate prisoner, and crush
ed the spider to death.

Many such instances could be brought forward
to illustrate the affection of the inferior tribes,
and their capability of improvement. But al
though they were entirely destitute of mental
qualities and affections, as they are sensitive be
ings, susceptible of pleasure and pain, the truly
benevolent man will never intentionally inflict
upon them unnecessary pain, and far less will
he ever enjoy a savage delight, like some mon
sters inhuman shape, in beholding them writhing
under the agonies occasioned by barbarous treat
ment. He will feel a joy in their comfort, and
will endeavour to counteract their malignant
propensities, and to train them up in those ha
bits by which they may be rendered useful to
man, and pleasing to ach other. Were such a
kind and humane disposition towards the lower
animals generally to prevail, we might ulti
mately expect the literal accomplishment of
those predictions recorded in ancient prophecy :
— " In that day will I make a covenant for them
with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls
of heaven, and with the creeping things of the
ground ; and I will break the bow and the sword,
and the battle out of the earth, and will make
them to lie down safely." " I will cause the
evil beasts to cease out of the land, and they
shall dwell safely in the wilderness, and sleep
in the woods." " The wolf shall dwell with
the lamb : the cow and the bear shall feed in
one pasture, and their young ones shall lie down
together; the sucking child shall play on the
hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put
his hand on the adder's den. They shall not
hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith
the Lord."

The remarks which have been stated in this
section, in reference to the practical influence
of the principle of benevolence, are intended
merely as a few insulated hints in regard to some
of the modes in which it may be made to ope-

84

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

-ate. To illustiate its operation in detail, and
to trace its progress in all its diversified bear
ings and ramifications, would be, to write a Body
of Practical Morality, which would fill several
volumes — a work which is still a desideratum in
Christian literature. I cannot conclude this
chapter more appropriately than with the fol
lowing excellent passage, extracted from Dr.
Dwight's " System of Theology."

" The divine law is wholly included in two
precepts : Thou shall love the Lard thy God
with all thy heart ; and thy neighbour as thyself.
These are so short, as to be necessarily included
in a very short sentence ; so intelligible, as to be
understood by every moral being who is capable
of comprehending the meaning of the words God
and neighbour ; so easily remembered as to ren
der it impossible for them to escape from our
memory, unless by wanton, criminal negligence
of ours ; and so easily applicable to every case of
moral action, as not to be mistaken unless through
indisposition to obey. At the same time, obedi
ence to them is rendered perfectly obvious and per
fectly easy to every mind which is not indisposed
to obey them. The very disposition itself,
if sincere and entire, is either entire obedience,

or the unfailing means of that external condoo>
by which the obedience is in some cases com
pleted. The disposition to obey is also confined
to a single affection of the heart, easily distin
guished from all other affections, viz. love. I^ove,
saith St. Paul, is the fulfilling of the law. The
humblest and most ignorant moral creatures,
therefore, are in this manner efficaciously pre
served from mistaking their duty.

" In the mean time, these two precepts, not
withstanding their brevity, are so comprehensive
as to include every possible action. The arch
angel is not raised above their control, nor can
any action of his exceed that bound which they
prescribe. The child who has passed the verge
of moral agency, is not placed beneath their re
gulation : and whatever virtue he may exercise,
is no other than a fulfilling of their requisitions.
All the duties which we immediately owe to
God, to our fellow-creatures, and to ourselves,
are, by these precepts, alike comprehended and
required. In a word, endlessly varied as moral
action may be, it exists in no form or instance
in which he who perfectly obeys these precepU
will not have done his duty, and will not finr
himself justified and accepted by God.'1

CHAPTER III.

ON THE MORAL LAW AND THE RATIONAL GROUNDS ON WHICH ITS PRECEPTS ARE

FORMED.

Iw the preceding chapters, I have endeavoured
to illustrate the foundation of love to God, from
a consideration of his attributes, and the rela
tions in which he stands to his creatures. I
have also illustrated the rational grounds of love
to our neighbour, from a consideration of the
natural equality of mankind, of the various rela
tions in which they stand to one another, and of
their eternal destination. The dismal conse
quences which would result from a total subver
sion of these laws, the beneficial effects which
would flow from their universal operation, their
application to the inhabitants of other worlds,
the declarations of Scripture on this subject,
and the various modes in which benevolence
should display its activities, have also been the
subject of consideration.

The two principles now illustrated, may be
considered as two branches proceeding from the
same trunk, and spreading into different ramifi
cations. The first four commandments of the
moral law may be viewed as flowing from the
principle of love to God, and the remaining
fix as ramifications of the principle of benevo-
cnce, or love to man. In the following brief

illustrations, I shall endeavour to show the
reasonableness of these moral laws in relation to
man, from a consideration of the misery which
would necessarily result from their universa.
violation, and of the happiness which would
flow from universal obedience to their requi
sitions.

These laws were published in the most solemn
manner, to the assembled tribes of Israel in the
wilderness of Horeb. While Mount Sinai was
shaking to its centre, and smoking like a furnace ;
while flames of fire were ascending from its
summit, and thick darkness surrounding its
base ; while thunders were rolling in clouds
above, and lightnings flashing amidst the sur
rounding gloom ; and while the earth was quak
ing all around, and the voice of a trumpet waxing
louder and louder, — in the midst of this solemn
and terrific scene, God spake the commandments
with an audible articulate voice, in the hear
ing of the trembling multitude assembled round
the mountain. A combination of objects and
events more awful and impressive, the human
mind can scarcely conceive; compared with
which, the pretended pomp of Pagan deities,

MORAL LAW.

85

Mid Jupiter shaking Olympus with his imperial
rod, are lame, ridiculous, and profane ; and ne
ver, perhaps, since the commencement of time,
was such a striking scene presented to the view
of any of the inhabitants of this world. The
most solemn preparations, were made for this
divine manifestation ; the people of Israel were
commanded to purify themselves from every
mental and corporeal pollution, and strictly en
joined to keep within the boundaries marked out
for them, and not to rush within the limits as
signed to these awful symbols of the Deity. An
assemblage of celestial beings, from another
region of creation, was present on this occasion,
to perform important services, to swell the gran
deur of the scene, and to be witness of the impres
sive transactions of that solemn day.* Mos^s
was appointed as a temporary mediator between
God and the people, to explain to them in nv'Jder
terms the words of the law, and the further inti
mations of the divine will. Yet so terrible were
the symbols of the present Deity, that even
Moses was appalled, and said, " I exceedingly
fear and quake." In order that the impressive
words which were uttered on that day might not
be forgotten in future generations, they were
written on tables of stone with the finger of God.
They were not simply drawn on a plane, like
the strokes of writing upon paper, but the cha
racters were engraved, or cut out of the solid
Btone, so that they could not be erased. They
were not written on paper or parchment, or even
on wood, but on stone, which is a much more
durable material. " The tables were written
upon both their sides, on the one side, and on
the other were they written ; and the tables
were the work of God, and the writing was the
writing of God, graven upon the tables."f This
was intended to prevent the possibility of any
thing being added to the law, or taken from it.
The tables were two in number, the one contain
ing the precepts which inculcate love to God,
and the other containing those which enjoin the
love of our neighbour. These laws, thus en
graven on the most durable materials, were de
posited in the most sacred part of the tabernacle,
in the ark of the covenant under the mercy-seat.
All the striking circumstances, now mentioned,
were evidently intended to proclaim the Majesty
and Grandeur of the Supreme Legislator — the
exceJiency and perfection of his law — that it is
the eternal and unalterable rule of rectitude —

• Stephen says, that the Jews " received the law
y the disposition of angels." Grotius observes,
on this passage, that the Greek preposition (eis)
here signifies amidst, and that (diatagas agelon,)
denotes troops of angels ranged in military order ;
and that there is a reference to Deut. xxxiii. 2.
" The Lord came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir
unto them ; he shined forth from Mount Paran,
and he came with ten thousands of his holy ones •
trom his right hand went a fiery law for them."

* Exod. xxxii. 45.

that it is of perpetual obligation on all the inha
bitants of the earth— that it is the rule of actioa
to angels and archangels, and to all other moral
intelligences, as well as to the human race-
arid that the most dreadful consequences must
ensue on all those who persist in violating its
righteous precepts.

The proclamation of this law was prefaced
by these words, " I am Jehovah thy God,"
which contain a ground and reason for our obe
dience. They evidently imply, that he is the
Self-existent and Eternal Being who brought
thsvast universe into existence, who " garnished
the heavens, and laid the foundations of the
earth," and peopled all worlds with their inha
bitants — that he has sovereign authority to
prescribe a rule of action to his creatures— that
he knows best what laws are requisite to pre
serve the order of his vast empire, and to secure
the happiness of the intelligent creation — that
he is the former of our bodies, the Father of
our spirits, and the director of all the movements
of nature and providence, from whose unceasing
agency every joy proceeds — and that all his re
gulations and arrangements are calculated to
promote the present and everlasting felicity of
all rational agents that submit to his authority. —
That these laws are not mere acts of Divine
Sovereignty, but founded on the nature of things,
and are calculated to preserve the harmony and
order of the intelligent universe, will appear
from the following illustrations and remarks.

THE FIRST COMMANDMENT.

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

All the commandments, except the fourth
and fifth, are expressed in a negative form : But
it is obvious, that every negative command in
cludes a requisition of the duty which is opposed
to the sin forbidden ; and those which are positive
include a prohibition of the conduct which is
opposed to the duty required. This first com
mandment, therefore, though expressed in the
negative form, must be considered as including
a positive injunction to love God with all our
hearts, to offer a tribute of supreme adoration
to his perfections, and to exercise the graces of
hope, gratitude, submission, and reverence.
Having already considered the precept in this
point of view, (pp. 85—95) it is only necessary,
in this place, to attend for a little, to the negative
form of I he command. The prohibition contained
in this precept must be considered as extending
not only to Polytheism, and the various objects
of worship which have prevailed in the heathen
world, but to every thing which is the object of
our supreme affection and regard.

It is a dictate of enlightened and unprejudiced
reason, that the Being to whom we are indebted
for our existence, on whom we every moment

86

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

depend, who directs the movements of the system
of nature, who daily loads us with his benefits,
and on whom our hopes of eternal felicity en
tirely depend — should be coniemplated with the
most ardent affection and gratitude, regarded as
the most excellent and venerable of all beings,
and recognised as the Supreme Legislator, whose
laws we are bound, by every tie of gratitude, to
obey. Wherever such sentiments and affections
pervade the mind, they constitute the first prin
ciples of piety, the source of all holy obedience,
and the foundation of all true happiness. Were
they universally felt, and acted upon by human
beings, the Most High God, would be adored in
every land, his image would be impressed on
every heart, his righteous law would never be
violated, grovelling desires and affections would
be eradicated, and our world would be transform
ed into an abode of felicity, where joys similar
to those of angels would succeed to scenes of
wretchedness and wo.

On the other hand, where the unity and the
attributes of the divine Being are not recognised,
and where other objects are substituted in his
place, the foundations of religion, and of moral
order are completely subverted, and a door open
ed for the introduction of every absurdity, im
morality, and vile abomination, that can de
grade a rational intelligence. The command
under consideration is placed on the front of the
divine law as the foundation of all the other pre
cepts; and, therefore, wherever it is violated, or
not recognised, a regular obedience to the other
subordinate injunctions of religion is not, in the
nature of things, to be expected. Were its
violation, in our world, complete and universal,
it is impossible to say what would be the mise
rable condition of human beings in their social
capacity. To its general violation, may be
traced all the evils under which humanity has
groaned in every age, and all the depraved pas
sions, and shocking immoralities which now
disfigure the aspect of the moral world.

There is nothing that appears more prominent
in the history and the character of almost every
nation under heaven, than an infringement of this
first and fundamental law of the Creator. A
rational and enlightened mind, on the first con
sideration of this subject, would be apt to sur
mise, that such a law is almost superfluous and
unnecessary. There is such an immense dis
proportion between a block of marble, or a crawl
ing reptile, and that Being who supports the
system of universal nature, that it appears, at
first view, next to impossible, that a reasonable
being should ever become so stupid and degraded,
as to substitute the one for the other, and to offer
his adorations to an object completely devoid of
life, power, and intelligence. Yet experience
teaches us, that there is no disposition to which
the human mind is more prone than "to depart
from the living God," and to multiply objects of

idolatrous worship. This will appear, if we take
bu t the slightest glance of the objects of adoration
which have prevailed, and which still prevail in
the pagan world.

At one period of the world, with the single ex
ception of the small nation of the Jews, idolatry
overspread the face of the whole earth. And how
numerous and degrading were the objects which
the blinded nations adored! We arc informed,
by Hesiod, Varro, and other ancient authors,
that no less than thirty thousand subordinate di
vinities were comprised within that system of
idolatry which prevailed among the Greeks and
Romans. They had both celestial and terres
trial deities. They assigned peculiar gods to
the fountains, the rivers, the hills, the mountains,
the lawns, the groves, the sea, and even to hell
itself. To cities, fields, houses, edifices, fami
lies, gates, nuptial chambers, marriages, births,
deaths, sepulchres, trees, and gardens, they also
appropriated distinct and peculiar deities.
Their principal celestial deities were Jupiter,
Mars, Mercury, Apollo, Bacchus, Venus, Juno,
and Minerva — their terrestrial, Saturn, Ceres,
Diana, Neptune, Cybele, Proserpine, and Pluto.
Their chief idol was Jupiter, whom they called
the father of gods and men ; and under his au
thority, Neptune had the jurisdiction of the sea,
Juno, of the air, Cybele, of the earth, and Pluto,
of the realms below. Instead of worshipping the
living and immortal God, they deified a host of
dead men, called heroes, distinguished for nothing
so much, as for murder, adultery, sodomy, rapine,
cruelty, drunkenness, and all kinds of debauchery.
To such contemptible divinities, splendid temples
were erected,* adorations addressed, costly offer
ings presented, and rites and ceremonies perform
ed, subversive of every principle of decency and
morality, and degrading to the reason and the
character of man. — A system of idolatry of a
similar kind, though under a different form, pre
vailed among the Egyptians. The meanest and
the most contemptible objects — sheep, cats, bulls,
dogs, cows, storks, apes, vultures, and other
birds of prey ; wolves, and several sorts of oxen,
were exalted as objects of adoration. " If you
go into Egypt," says Lucian, " you will see
Jupiter with the face of a ram, Mercury as a
fine dog, Pan, is become a goat; another god is
Ibis, another the crocodile, and another the ape.
There, many shaven priests gravely tell us, that
the gods being afraid of the rebellion of the giants,
assumed these shapes." Each city and district
in Egypt entertained a peculiar devotion for

* The temple of Diana at Ephesus, has been al
ways admired as one of the noblest pieces of archi
lecture that the world ever produced. It was 425
feet long, 200 feet broad, and supported by 127 co
lumns of marble 60 feet high ; 27 of which were
beautifully carved. Diodorus Siculus mentions,
that the rich pres.ents made to the temple of ApoUc1
at Delphos, amounted to one million three hundred
and thirty three thousand pounds.

MORAL LAW

3t

fcome animai or other, as the object of its adora
tion. The city of Lentopolis worshipped a lion ;
the city of Mendez, a goat ; Memphis, the Apis ;
and the people at the lake Myris, adored the
crocodile. These animals were maintained, in
01 near their temples, with delicate meats ;
were bathed, anointed, perfumed, had beds pre
pared for them ; and when any of them happen
ed to die, sumptuous funerals were prepared in
honour of the god. Of all these animals, the
bull, Apis, was held in the greatest veneration.
Honours of an extraordinary kind were conferred
on him while he lived, and his death gave rise
to a general mourning.

Such was the abominable idolatry that prevail
ed even among the most enlightened nations of
antiquity. They changed the glory of the incor
ruptible God into " the similitude of an ox that
eateth grass," and into images made like to cor
ruptible man and to birds, and to four-footed
beasts, and creeping things. And if the Egyp
tians, the Greeks, and the Romans, who are
distinguished from the rest of the world for their
improvements in literature, science, and the
arts, had so far renounced their allegiance to the
God of heaven, we may rest assured that the
surrounding nations were sunk still farther into
the pollutions of idolatry and of mental debase
ment. The Phenicians, the Syrians, the Ca-
naanites, the Chaldeans and Babylonians, the
Arabians, the Scythians, the Ethiopians, and
the Carthaginians, the ancient Gauls, Germans,
and Britons, were, if possible, more deeply de
based ; and mingled with their idolatrous rites,
many cruel, obscene, and vile abominations —
Such is still the moral and religious debasement,
even in modern times, of the greater part of the
nations which dwell upon the earth. Even the
Hindoos, theBirmans, the Chinese, the Persians,
and the Japanese, though ranked among the most
polished nations of the heathen world, are sunk
into the grossest ignorance of the true God, and
are found perpetrating, in their religious worship,
deeds revolting to humanity, and stained with
horrid cruelty and injustice.

The moral effects which were produced by a
departure from this fundamental law of the Crea
tor, were such as correspond with the abomina
tions of that religious system which was adopt
ed. Man is an imitative being ; and he gene
rally imitates the actions of those whom he
conceives to be placed in a superior rank and
station. When, therefore, the gods were intro
duced to his view, as swollen with pride, mad
with rage, fired with revenge, inflamed with lust,
engaged in wars, battles, and contests, delight
ing in scenes of blood and rapine, in hatred and
mutual contentions, and in all kinds of riot and
debauchery, it was natural to suppose that such
passions and crimes would be imitated by their
Winded votaries. Accordingly we find, that
sucn vices universally prevailed, even among the

politest nations of antiquity; and some of their
sacred rites, solemnized in honour of their gods,
were so bestial and shocking, as to excite horror
in every mind possessed of the least sense of de
cency and virtue. They gloried in the desolation
and destruction of neighbouring nations. To
conquer, and oppress, and enslave their fellow-
men, and to aggrandize themselves by slaughter
and rapine, was the great object of their ambi
tion. The law of kindness and of universal
benevolence was trampled under foot, and even
the common dictates of humanity, equity, and
justice, were set at defiance. But this was not
all — Idolatry soon began to instigate its votaries
to the perpetration of the most revolting and un
natural cruelties. Dreadful tortures were in
flicted on their bodies, to appease their offended
deities ; human victims, in vast numbers, were
sacrificed, and even their infants and little chil
dren were thrown into the flames, as an offering
to the idol which they adored.

The Mexicans were accustomed to treat them
selves with the most inhuman austerities, think
ing that the diabolical rage of their deities
would be appeased by human blood. " It makes
one shudder," says Clavigero, " to read the aus
terities which they practised upon themselves,
either in atonement for their transgressions, or
in preparation for their festivals. They mangled
their flesh as if it had been insensible, and let
their blood run in such profusion, as if it had
been a superfluous fluid in the body. They
pierced themselves with the sharpest spines of
the aloe, and bored several parts of their bodies,
particularly their ears, lips, tongues, and the fat
of their arms and legs." The priests of Baal,
we are told, in the book of Kings, " cut them
selves with knives and lancets, till the blood
gushed out upon them." When the Carthagi
nians were vanquished by Agathocles, king of
Sicily, they conceived that their god, Jupiter La-
tialis was displeased with their conduct. In
order to appease him, and propitiate his favour,
they sacrificed to him, at once, two hundred sons
of the first noblemen of their state. On the al
tars of Mexico, twenty thousand human beings
are said to have been sacrificed every year; and
fifty thousand were annually offered up in the va
rious parts of that empire, accompanied with cir
cumstances of such dreadful cruelty and horror,
as makes us shudder at the recital. In Hindos-
tan, even at the present day, several thousands
of women are annually burned on the funeral
piles of their deceased husbands, as victims to
the religion they profess; besides multitudes of
other human victims, which are crushed to death
under the wheels of that infernal engine which
supports the idol Juggernaut. Were the one
hundredth part cf the ah./minations which have
been perpetrated under the system of idolatry,
in those countries where it has prevailed, to be
fully detailed, it would exhibit a picture of de-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

pravity and of infernal agency, at which the hu
man mind would shrink back with horror ; and
would form a striking commentary on the
divine declaration, that " the dark places of
the eanh are full of the habitations of horrid
cruelly."

It appears, then, that a violation of the first
precept of the moral law is the greatest crime of
which a rational creature can be guilty ; for it is
the source of all the other crimes which have en
tailed wretchedness on mankind, and strewed the
earth with devastation and carnage. It is a
comprehensive summary of wickedness ; which
includes pride, falsehood, blasphemy, malignity,
rebellion, hatred of moral excellence, and the
basest ingratitude towards Him from whom we
derived our being, and on whom we depend for
all our enjoyments. It is a crime which, above
all others, has a tendency to degrade the charac
ter of man ; for where it abounds, the human
mind is sunk into the lowest state, both of moral
and of intellectual debasement. What a pitiful
and humiliating sight is it, and what emotions
of astonishment must it excite in the mind of an
archangel, to behold a rational and immortal in
telligence cutting down an oak in the forest, burn
ing part of it in the fire, baking bread, and roast
ing flesh upon its embers, and forming the residue
of it into an idol, filling down and worshipping it,
and saying, "Deliver me, for thou art my God !"*
And when we behold the same degraded mortal
sacrificing the children of his own bowels before
this stump of a tree, can we retrain from exclaim
ing, in the language of the prophet, " Be asto
nished, O ye heavens, at this ; and be ye horri
bly afraid !" Were idolatry to become universal
in the world, there is no crime, no species of
cruelty, no moral abomination within the com
pass of the human heart to devise, but would
soon be perpetrated without a blush, in the open
face of day. Had not God, in his mercy, com
municated a revelation of his will, in order to
counteract the influence of Pagan theology, —
instead of cultivating the powers of our minds,
and expanding our conception of the Almighty,
by a contemplation of his word and works, we
might, at this moment, have been sunk into the
lowest depths of moral degradation, been prostrat
ing ourselves, in adoration, before a stupid ox or
a block of marble, and sacrificing our sons and
daughters to an infernal Moloch. It is one of
the glories of Revelation, and a strong proof of its
divine origin, that all its promises and threaten-
ings, its admonitions and reproofs, its doctrines,
its laws and ordinances, are directly opposed to
every idolatrous practice ; and that there is not a
single instance in which the least countenance is
given to any of the abominations of the Pagan
^vorld.

In the present age, and in the country in which

• See Isaiah *lv. 9—21.

we reside, we are in little danger of relapsing
into the practices to which I have now adverted.
But idolatry is not confined to the adoration of
Pagan divinities: it has it seat in every heart
where God is banished from the thoughts, and
where pride, ambition, and avarice occupy the
highest place. " Covelousness" or an inordinate
love of wealth, is declared by the Apostle Paul to
be " idolatry ;" and such mental idolatry, though
more refined than that of the heathen world, is
almost equally abhorrent to the Divine Being, and
equally subversive of the grand principles of
Christian morality. If the acquisition of wealth
and riches be the constant and supreme aim of
any individual, Mammon is the god whom he
regularly worships, and the God of heaven is de
throned from his seat in the affections. Such
moral effects as the following are the natural
results of this species of idolatry : It steels the
heart against every benevolent and generous
emotion ; it shuts the ears to the cries of the
poor and needy ; it engenders cheating, falsehood,
and deceit ; it prevents the man in whom it pre
dominates from exerting his active powers, and
from contributing of his wealth to promote the
happiness of mankind ; it chains down his noble
faculties to the objects of time and sense ; it leads
him to love and to serve himself more than the
Creator ; it wraps him up in selfishness, and an
indifference to the concerns of all other beings ;
it destroys the principles of equity and justice ; it
blunts the feelings of humanity and compassion ;
and prevents him from attending to the salvation
of his soul, and from looking at those things which
are unseen and eternal. And in every other case
where a similar principle holds the supreme
seat in the affections, similar effects will be pro
duced.

THE SECOND COMMANDMENT.

Thou shall not make unto thee any graven imaget
nor any likeness oj" any thing that is in heaven
above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in
the waters under the earth : thou shall not bow
down thyself to them, nor serve them.

Thejirst commandment, which I have illustrat
ed above, respects the object of our worship ; for
bidding us to substitute anv other being in the
room of God, or to offer it that homage which is
due to the eternal Jehovah. This second com
mandment respects the manner in which he is to
be worshipped. And in regard to the manner in
which the Divine Being is to be contemplated
and adored, it is expressly declared, that no im
age nor representation of this incomprehensible
Being is at any time, or on any account, to be
formed. This command, like the former, might
at first sight appear to be unnecessary, if the
almost universal practice of mankind had not
taught us that there is no disposition which the

IMAGE WORSHIP.

human mind is more apt to indulge, than to en
deavour to bring the invisible Divinity within
the range of our senses, and to contemplate him
as such a one as ourse.ves. The necessity of
this injunction, its reasonableness, and the folly
and absurdity of the practice against which it is
directed, will appear from the following consider
ations.

The Divine Being fills the immensity of space
with his presence, and to his essence we can set
no bounds. He inhabited eternity, before the
earth or the heavens were brought into existence,
rejoicing in the contemplation of his own excel
lences, and in the future effects of his power and
benevolence. He is a spiritual uncompounded
substance, and consequently invisible to mortal
eyes, and impalpable to every other organ of
sensation. His omnipotence neither man nor
angel can scan, nor can they explore the depths
of his wisdom and intelligence. When universal
silence and solitude reigned throughout the in
finite void — when not a sound was heard nor an
object seen within the immeasurable extent of
boundless space — at his command, worlds, nume
rous as the sand, started into being. Thousands
of suns diffused their splendours through the re
gions of immensity ; the ponderous masses of
the planetary globes were launched into existence,
and impelled in their rapid courses through the
sky ; their surfaces were adorned with resplen
dent beauties, and replenished with myriads of
delighted inhabitants. The seraphim and the
cherubim began to chant their hymns of praise,
and " shouted for joy" when they beheld new
worlds emerging from the voids of space. Life,
motion, activity, beauty, grandeur, splendid illu
mination, and rapturous joy, among unnumbered
intelligences, burst upon the view, where a little
before nothing appeared but one immense, dark,
and cheerless void. And ever since duration
began to be measured, either in heaven or on
earth, by the revolutions of celestial orbs, the
same omnipotent energy has been incessantly
exerted in directing the movements of all worlds
and systems, and in upholding them in their
vast career. Of a being invested with attributes
so glorious and incomprehensible, with power
so astonishing in its effects, with goodness so
boundless, and with wisdom so unsearchable,
what image or representation can possibly be
formed which will not tend to contract our con
ceptions, and to debase the character of the infi
nite and eternal Mind ! " To whom will ye
liken ne, or shall I be equal, saith the HOLT
ONE."

When a person of dignity and of respectability
of character is caricatured, and associated with
objects and circumstances that are mean, ridicu
lous, and grotesque, it has a tendency to degrade
his character, and to lessen our veneration. For
the respect we entertain for any individual is
founded on the view we take of him in all the

aspects in which he may be contemplated. For
a similar reason, every attempt to represent the
Divine Majesty by sensible images, must have a
tendency to narrow our conceptions of his glory,
to debase his character, and to lessen our reve
rence and esteem. What possible similitude
can there be between that mighty being, who by
his word lighted up the sun, and diffused ten
thousands of such immense luminaries through
the regions of creation, whose hand wields the
planets, and rolls them through the tracts of
immensity ; between him who " meteth out the
heavens with a span, and holds the ocean in the
hollow of his hand," and the most resplendent
image that was ever formed by human hands !
Even the sun himself, with all his immensity of
splendour, although our minds were expanded to
comprehend his vast magnificence, would form
but a poor and pitiful image of Him, whose
breath has kindled ten thousand times ten thou
sand suns. How much less can a block of mar
ble or a stupid ox adumbrate the glories of the
King eternal, immortal, and invisible ! It will
doubtless redound to the eternal disgrace of the
human character, in every region of the universe
where it is known, that ever such an impious
attempt was made by the inhabitants of our de
generate world, as to compare the glory of the
incorruptible God to an image made like to cor
ruptible man. Wherever such attempts have
been made, there we behold human nature in its
lowest state of debasement ; the intellectual
faculties darkened, bewildered, and degraded ;
the moral powers perverted and depraved ; gro
velling affections predominating over the dictates
of reason, and diabolical passions raging without
control. Hence, too, the debasing tendency of
all those attempts which have been made to
introduce into the Christian church, pictures and
images, to represent " The invisible things of
God," and the sufferings of the Redeemer. For,
wherever such practices prevail, the minds of
men will generally be found to entertain the
grossest conceptions of the Divine Being, and of
the solemn realities of religion.

But the principal reason why any representa
tion of God is expressly forbidden in this com
mandment, is, that whenever such a practice
commences, it infallibly ends in adoring the
image itself, instead of the object it was intended
to represent. Or, in other words, the breach of
this commandment necessarily and uniformly
leads to a breach of the first. Notwithstanding
the shock which the human mind appears to have
received by the fall, it is altogether inconceivable,
that any tribe of mankind should have been so
debased and brutalized, as, in the first instance^
to mistake a crocodile, or the stump of a tree,
however beautifully carved, for the Creator of
he.iven and earth. Such objects appear to have
been first used as symbols or representations of
the Deity, in order to assist the mind in forming

90

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

a conception of his invisible attributes. But as
they had a direct tendency to debase the mind,
and to obscure the glory of the Divinity, in pro
cess of time they began to be regarded by the
ignorsnt multitude as the very gods themselves,
which they were at first intended to represent ;
and that tribute of adoration was paid to the
symbol itself, which was originally intended to
be given to the invisible God, through this sensi
ble medium. And, when we contemplate kings
and princes, poets and philosophers, heroes and
sages, " young men and virgins, old men and
children," whole provinces, nations, and conti
nents, prostrating themselves before the shrine of
such despicable and abominable idols, and the
idea of the true God almost banished from the
world, we have reason to feel ashamed, and to
be deeply humbled, that we belong to a race of
intelligences that have thus so grossly prostituted
their rational and moral powers.

The only natural image or representation of
God which is set before us for our contemplation,
is, the boundless universe which his hands have
formed ; and his moral image is displayed in the
laws which he has published, in the movements
of his providence, and in the face of Jesus Christ
his Son, who is " the image of the invisible God,
and the brightness of his glory." All these exhi
bitions of the Divine Majesty, we are command
ed to study, to contemplate, and admire ; and it
is essentially requisite in order to our acquiring
correct and comprehensive views of the object of
our adoration, that no one of these displays of the
Divinity should be overlooked, or thrown into
the shade. There are some Christians, who
imagine, they may acquire a competent know
ledge of the character of God, although they
should never spend a single moment in contem
plating his perfections as displayed in his visible
works. Tn regard to such, I hesitate not to af
firm, that they are, to a certain extent, idolaters,
and remain wilful idolaters, contented with the
most inadequate and grovelling conceptions of
the Deity, so long as they refuse to contemplate,
with fixed attention, and with intelligence, the
operations of his hands. If a man's ideas never
extend beyond the bounds of his visible horizon,
or beyond the limits of the country in which he
resides, and if, at the same time, he has over
looked the most striking displays of divine wis
dom and goodness within these bounds — his con
ceptions of the Divine Being himself, will nearly
correspond with the conceptions he forms of his
works. If his views be even confined within the
limits of the globe on which he dwells, his con
ceptions of God will still be grovelling, distorted,
and imperfect. And, therefore, the idea which
such an individual forms to himself of God, may
be inferior to that which is due to one of the
higher orders of created intelligences. And, if
•o, he has only an image of a creature in his
wind, instead of a comprehensive conception of

the Groat Creator. We have too much reason
to believe, that there are multitudes in the reli
gious world, who pass for enlightened Christians,
whose ideas of the Supreme Ruler of the uni
verse do not rise beyond the conceptions we
ought to form of the powers and capacities of
Gabriel the archangel, or of one of the highest
order of the seraphim.

We can never expect, from the very nature of
things, to be able to explore the depths of Jeho
vah's essence, or to comprehend the whole range
of his dominions and government. But, a large
portion of his operations lies open to our inspec
tion ; and it is from an enlightened contempla
tion of what is presented to our view in the visi
ble universe, that we are to form our conceptions
of the grandeur of the Eternal Mind. For, it
may be admitted as an axiom, both in natural
and revealed theology, that our conceptions of
God will nearly correspond with the conceptions
we acquire of the nature and extent of his opera
tions. In the universe around us, we perceive
an image of his infinity, in so far as a finite
and material existence can adumbrate the attri
butes of an Infinite and Invisible Existence.
When we lift our eyes towards the midnight sky,
we behold a thousand suns diffusing their splen
dours from regions of space immeasurably dis
tant. When we apply a telescope to any
portion of this vast concave, we perceive thou
sands more which the unasisted eye cannot
discern. When we increase the magnifying
powers of the instrument, we descry numerous
orbs of light, stretching still farther into the un
fathomable depths of space ; so that there appear
no limits to the scene of creating power. When
the eye of reason penetrates beyond all that is
visible through the most powerful telescopes, it
contemplates a boundless region teeming with
other resplendent suns and systems, whose num
ber and magnificence overwhelm the imagina
tion ; so that no limit can be set to the excursions
of the intellect when it wings its flight over the
wide empire of Jehovah. Over all this vast
assemblage of material splendour, over its move
ments, and over all the diversified ranks of intel
ligence it supports, God eternally and unchange
ably presides. He is an Infinite Being ; — and
in this immense universe which he has opened
to our view, he has given us an image of his
infinity, which corresponds with the perfections
which the inspired writers ascribe to him — and
without a contemplation of which, the mind must
have a very unworthy and circumscribed idea of
the attributes of the Eternal Mind. Even in
many of the objects which surround us in this
lower world, we perceive an image of the infinity
of the Creator — particularly in those living
worlds which are contained in a few drops of
water, some of the inhabitants of which are
several hundreds of thousands of times smaHer
than the least grain of sand.— To the contempla-

IMAGE WORSHIP.

91

tion of such objects we are directed by God
himself, in order to acquire an impressive view
of his character and operations. " Lift up your
eyes on high, and behold who hath created these
orbs, that bringeth out their host by number: he
calleth them all by names, by the greatness of
his might, for that he is strong in power." —
And, the prophets, when reasoning against idol
atry, present us with a train of thought similar
lo that to which I have now adverted. They
describe the Almighty as "sitting on the circle
of the heavens, and the inhabitants of the earth
as grasshoppers in his sight." They represent
him as " measuring the waters in the hollow of
his hand, weighing the mountains in scales, and
meting out the heavens with a span — before whom
all nations are as the drop of a bucket, and are
counted to him less than nothing and vanity."

It is strange, indeed, that the duty of contem
plating the image of God as impressed upon his
works, should be so much overlooked by the
great body of the Christian world, notwithstand
ing the obvious reasonableness of this duty, and
the pointed injunctions in relation to it which
are reiterated in every department of the word of
God. It is still more strange, that the instruc
tions of many religious teachers have a tendency
to dissuade Christians from engaging in this duty,
by the foolish contrasts they attempt to draw be
tween the word and the works of God ; so that
the great mass of Christians are left to remain
half idolaters for want of those expansive concep
tions of God which a knowledge of his works is
calculated to produce.

It is also most unaccountable, on every prin
ciple of reason, and of Revelation, that the wil
ful neglect of this duty should never be account
ed either as a sin, or as a want of that respect
which is due to the Majesty of heaven. We
have known persons rebuked,,and even excluded
from a Christian Church, foi holding a metaphy
sical sentiment different from their brethren re
specting the divine plans and decrees ; but we
never heard of an individual being either re
proved or admonished by a Christian society,
for neglecting to contemplate tho character of
God as displayed in his works, although he had
lived fifty years amidst the magnificence of
creation, and had acquired little more knowledge
of his Creator, from this source, than the ox
which browses on the grass. Yet, to this neglect
is to be imputed a great proportion of those gro
velling conceptions, superstitious notions, and
distorted views of the doctrines of religion which
still disgrace the Christian world. This fact is
still more unaccountable, when we consider that
a knowledge of the abstrusities and technicali
ties of science is not requisite in order to the
performance of this duty. It requires only the
eye of sense, of reason, and of devotion to be di
rected to the scene of divine operation within us,
and around us, and to be occasionally fixed on the

object we contemplate, in order to appreciate
the perfections and the glory of the ever present
Deity. Although there were no other striking
objects around us, the single fact of the apparent
revolution of the celestial concave, with all its
magnificent orbs, around the earth every twenty-
four hours, is sufficient to overpower the mind of
every rational observer with admiration and
wonder, if his attention were seriously directed
to it only for a single hour. The ideas of ma
jesty, of grandeur, and of omnipotent energy
which this single circumstance is calculated to
inspire, are such as irresistibly to lead the mind
to the contemplation of a Being whose perfections
are incomprehensible, and whose ways are past
finding out. Yet, I believe, it may be affirmed
with truth, that more than one half of the Chris
tian world are ignorant that such a fact exists ;*
such is the indifference and the apathy with which
many religionists view the wonderful works of
God.

It was chiefly owing to such criminal inatten
tion to the displays of the Divine Character in
the works of creation, that the inhabitants of the
Pagan world plunged themselves into all the
absurdities and abominations of idolatry. " For
the invisible things of God, even his eternal power
and godhead, are clearly seen in the things that
are made," if men would but open their eyes,
and exercise their powers of intelligence. " The
heavens declare the glory of Jehovah ," they de
clare it to all the inhabitants of the earth.
" There is no speech nor language where their
voice is not heard : their line is gone out through
all the earth, and their words to the end of the
world."

" In reason's ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice ;
Forever singing, as they shine,
' The hand that made us is divine.1 "

But the Heathen world did not listen to the in
structions thus conveyed, nor did they apply
their understandings, as they ought to have done,
to trace the invisible things of God, from the visi
ble displays of his character and perfections, in
the universe around them. " They became vain
in their imaginations, and their foolish hearts
were darkened ; and professing themselves to be
wise, they became fools." While " the harp
and the viol, the tabret, the pipe, and the wine
were in their feasts, they regarded not the works
of the Lord, nor considered the operations of his
hands." "Wherefore they were given up by God
to indulge" in vile affections, and " to worship
and serve the creature rather than the Creator,
who is blessed for ever." And, even under the

• Here I refer simply to the apparent motion of
the heavens— leaving every one to form his own
opinion as to the other alternative— the motion of the
earth. In either case the mind is overpowered with
ideas of grandeur and of Almighty power. See this
topic more particularly illustrated in " Christ. Philo
sopher,"

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Christian dispensation, we have too much reason
to fear, that effects somewhat analogous to these
have been produced, and a species of mental idol
atry practised by thousands who have professed
the religion of Jesus; owing to their inattention
to the visible operations of Jehovah, and to their
not connecting them with the displays of his
character and agency as exhibited in the revela
tions of his wore.

THE THIRD COMMANDMENT.

Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God

The name of any person is that which distin
guishes him from other individuals. Whatever
word is employed to distinguish any object,
whether animate or inanimate, is its name. In
like manner, the Name of God is that by which
he is distinguished from all other beings. It in
cludes those terms which express his nature and
character, as Jehovah — those titles by which his
relation to his creation is designated, as " The
Creator of the ends of the earth, — The Father of
mercies, — The God of salvation," &c. — the at
tributes of which he is possessed, as his Eternity,
Omnipotence, Holiness, Justice, &c. — the works
which he has exhibited in heaven and on earth —
the movements of his Providence, and the Reve
lations of his word. By every one of these, the
character of God is distinguished from that of
all other beings in the universe. In relation to
this name or character of the Divine Being, it is
solemnly commanded that " we are not to take it
in vain," — that is, we are not to use any of the
titles or designations of the Divine Majesty, for
trifling, vain, or evil purposes ; nor are we to
treat any displays of his character with levity,
profaneness, or irreverence.

We violate this command, when we use the
name of God, in common discourse, in alight and
irreverent manner, when we interlard our con
versations with unnecessary oaths and assevera
tions in which this name is introduced ; when we
swear to what we know to be false, or when we
multiply oaths in reference to vain and trifling
concerns ; when we imprecate curses and dam
nation on our fellow-creatures ; when we ap
proach God in prayer, without those feelings of
reverence and awe, which his perfections de
mand ; when we swear by any object in heaven
or in earth, or by the false deities of the heathen
world ; when we treat his wonderful works with
indifference or contempt ; when we endeavour to
caricature, and misrepresent them, or attempt to
throw a veil over their glory ; when we insinuate
that his most glorious and magnificient works
were made for no end, or for no end worthy of
that infinite wisdom and intelligence by which
they were contrived ; when we overlook or deny
the Divine Agency, which is displayed in the
operations of nature ; when we murmur and re

pine at his moral dispensations, or treat the
mighty movements of his providence, whether
in ancient or in modern times, with a spirit of
levity, with ridicule, or with contempt ; when we
treat the revelations of the Bible with indifference
or with scorn ; when we make the declarations of
that book, which unfolds to us the sublime and
adorable character of Jehovah, the subject of mer
riment and jest; when we endeavour to throw
upon them contempt and ridicule, with the view
of undermining their divine authority ; and when
we sneer at the public and private worship of God,
and at the ordinances which he hath appointed.
— In all these and many other ways, the name of
God is profaned, his character reproached, and
that reverence of the Divine Being, which is the
foundation of all religion and moral order, under
mined and subverted.

When the name or the titles by which a fellow-
mortal is distinguished, are made the subject of
banter and ridicule in every company, when they
are brought forward for the purpose of giving an
edge to a sarcastic sneer ; and when his employ
ments and the works he has constructed are con
temned, and associated with every thing that is
mean and degrading ; it is an evidence of the low
estimation in which he is held by the individual
who does so, and has a tendency to debase his
character in the eyes of others. On the same
principle, the profanation of the name of God, has
an evident tendency to lessen our admiration of
the Majesty of Heaven, and to banish from tho
mind every sentiment of veneration and reve
rence. The man who can deliberately violate
this command, from day to day, — thus offering a
continual insult to his Maker — proclaims to all
around, that he has no emotions of reverence and
affection towards that Almighty Being, whoso
power upholds the fabric of heaven and earth, and
who dispenses life and death to whomsoever ho
pleases. " He Siretcheth out his hand against
God, and strengthened himself against the A1-"
mighty." He proclaims to every reflecting mind,
that pride, enmity, rebellion, and irreverence,
are deeply seated in his heart, and that " the fear
of God," and the solemnities of a future judg
ment " are not before his eyes."

Were the violation of this law to become uni
versal among men — the name of God, among all
ranks, ages, and conditions of life, would be as
sociated, not only with every (rifling discourse
and altercation, but with every species of ribald
ry and obscenity. The lisping babe would be
taught to insult that Mighty Being, from whom
it so lately derived its existence ; and the man of
hoary hairs, even in the agonies of death, would
pass into the eternal state, imprecating the ven
geance of his Maker. All reverence for Jehovah
would, of course, be banished from society ; no
temples would be erected to his honour ; no silen.
adorations of the heart would ascend to his throne ;
no vows would be paid ; no forms of worship ap-

INSTITUTION OF THE SABBATH.

pointed ; no tribute of thanksgiving and gratitude
would be offered to his name, — but the voice of
profanity and of execration, among high and low,
rich and poor, the young and the old, in every
social intercourse, and in every transaction,
would resound tnroughout all lands. No motives
to excite to moral action, would be derived from
the authority and the omnipresence of God, and
from a consideration of his future retributions ;
for his character would be reproached, and his
authority trampled under foot by all people.
" They would set their mouths against the hea
vens in their blasphemous talk," and they would
say, " How doth God know, and is there know
ledge in the Most High?" " What is the Al
mighty that we should serve him, and what profit
shall we have, if we pray unto him?" " The
Lord doth not see, neither doth the God of Jacob
regard us." His wonderful works would either
be overlooked, or treated with contempt, or as
cribed to the blind operation of chance or of fate.
They would be represented as accomplishing no
end, as displaying no wisdom, and as controlled
by no intelligent agency. Their apparent irre
gularities and defects would be magnified, and
expatiated upon with diabolical delight; while
the glorious evidences they exhibit of infinite
wisdom and beneficence would be thrown com
pletely into the shade. The dispensations of his
providence would be viewed as an inextricable
maze, without order or design, directed by chance,
and by the ever-varying caprice of human beings.
His venerable word would universally become
the subject of merriment and laughter, — a topic
for the exercise of ribaldry and ridicule, and a
theme for enlivening the unhallowed song of the
drunkard. The most solemn scenes which it dis
plays, and its most joyful and alarming declara
tions, would be equally treated with levity and
contempt. — Such are some of the impious prac
tices, and horrible effects which would follow, if
the name of Jehovah were universally profaned.
The very name of religion would be blotted out
from the earth, its forms abolished, its sanctions
disregarded, its laws violated, virtue and piety
annihilated, the flood-gates of every evil burst
open, and moral order entirely subverted.

On the other hand, universal reverence of the
name and character of God would lead to the
practice of all the duties of piety and morality.
The Most High would be recognised with senti
ments of veneration at all times; and the silent
adorations of the heart would flow out towards
him in all places ; in the house, and in the street,
in the bosom of the forest, and in the fertile plain,
in the city, and in the wilderness, under the
shades of night, and amidst the splendours of day.
in every place, temples would be erected for his
worship, hallelujahs of praise would ascend, and
" incense and a pure offering" be presented to
bis name. With reverence and godly fear, with
•xpansive views of his magnificence and glory,

with emotions of affection and of awe would his
worshippers approach him in prayer, in praise, in
contemplation, and in all the services of his sanc
tuary. The whole earth would be consecrated
as one grand temple, from which a grateful ho
mage would ascend from the hearts and from the
lips of millions of devout worshippers, in all
places, from the rising to the setting sun. In
the domestic circle, in the social club, in the
convivial meeting, in the streets, in " the high
places of the city," in the public walks, in the
councils of the nations, and in every other inter
course of human beings, the name of God would
never be mentioned nor his character alluded to,
but with feelings of profound and reverential awe.
His works would be contemplated with admira
tion, with reverence, and with gratitude, as pro
claiming the glory of his kingdom, the depths of
his wisdom, and the extent of his power. His
mighty movements among the nations would be
regarded with submission and reverence, as ac
complishing the eternal purposes of his will, and
his holy word would be perused by all classes of
men with affection ami delight, as the oracle
which proclaims the glories of his nature and the
excellence of his laws, the blessings of his salva
tion, and the path which conducts to eternal feli
city in the life to come. Such are some of the
delightful effects which would follow, were a sen
timent of profound reverence to pervade the
whole mass of human beings ; — and correspond
ing sentiments of love and affection for each other,
would be the necessary and unceasing accom
paniments of respect and veneration for their
common Parent.

THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT.

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Six days shall thou labour, and do all thy
work ; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the
Lord thy God," &c.

This commandment obviously enjoins the
setting apart of one day in seven, as a day of rest
from worldly labour, and as a portion of lime to
be devoted to the devotional exercises of religion,
and particularly to the public worship of God.
It was given forth, not merely to display the
Sovereignty of the Lawgiver ; but to promote
both the sensitive and the intellectual enjoyment
of man. "The Sabbath," says our Saviour,
" wiis made ./or man. and not man for the Sab
bath."

It was made for man, in the first place, as a
day of rest. In this point of view, it is a most
wise and merciful appointment, especially when
we consider the present condition of mankind, as
doomed to labour, and toil, and to the endurance
of many sorrows. When we reflect on the ty
rannical dispositions which prevail among Man
kind, on the powerful influence of avarice over
the human mind, and on the almost total absence

94

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

of benevolence and compassion towards suffering
humanity, wherever such disposiiions predomi
nate, we cannot but admire the wisdom and be
nevolence of the Creator, in the appointment of
a weekly jubilee for the rest and refreshment of
labourers spent with toil. On this day, the mas
ter has an opportunity of divesting his mind of
worldly cares and anxieties, the servant of ob
taining liberty and respite from his toilsome em
ployments; and labourers of every class, of en
joying repose in the bosom of their families.
Such, however, are the avaricious dispositions,
and the contracted views of a great proportion of
mankind, that they are apt to regard the institu
tion of the Sabbath as an obstruction to the ad
vancement of their worldly interests. They will
calculate how much labour has been lost by the
rest of one day in seven, and how much wealth
might have been gained, had the Sabbath not in
tervened to interrupt their employments. But
all such selfish calculations, even in a worldly
point of view, proceed on the principle* of a
narrow and short-sighted policy. \Ve know by
experience, that, on the six days out of seven
appointed for labour, all the operations requisite
for the cultivation of the fields, and for the manu
facture of every useful article for the comfort of
mankind, can be performed with ease, and with
out the least injury to any class of men. And
what more could be accomplished, although the
Sabbath \vere converted into a day of labour ?
Were this violation of the divine command to
become universal, it might be shown that, instead
of producing an increase of wealth, it would in
fallibly produce an increase of toil and misery
in relation to the great mass of mankind, without
any corresponding pecuniary compensation. The
labouring class at present receive little more wa
ges than is barely sufficient to procure the neces
saries of life. If their physical strength would
permit them to work eighteen hours a day, in
stead of twelve, it is beyond a doubt, that, in a
very short time, the work of eighteen hours would
be demanded by their employers for the price of
twelve — particularly in all cases where a suffi
cient number of labourers can be easily obtained.
In like manner, were the Sabbaih to be used as a
day of labour, the wages of seven days would
soon be reduced to what is now given for the la
bour of six. In the first instance, indeed, before
such a change was thoroughly effected, the la
bouring part of the community would acquire a
seventh part more wages every week than they
did before; and men unaccustomed to reflection,
and who never look beyond a present temporary
advantage, would imagine that they had acquired
a new resource for increasing their worldly gain.
But, in a very short time, when the affairs of the
social state were brought, to a certain equilibri
um, they would be miserably undeceived ; and
the abolition of the Sabbath, instead of bringing
»long with it an increase of wealth, would carry

in its train an increase oflabour, — a continued se«
ries of toilsome and unremitting exertions, whicu.
would waste their animal powers, cut short the
years of their mortal existences, " make their
lives bitter with hard bondage,'' and deprive them
of some of the sweetest enjoyments which they
now possess.

And as the sabbath was appointed for the rest
of man, so it was also intended as a season of
repose for the inferior animals which labour for
our profit. " The seventh day is the Sabbath of
the Lord thy God ; in it thou shah not do any
work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy
man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle,
nor the stranger that is within thy gates." This
injunction exhibits the compassionate care and
tenderness of the Creator in a very amiable and
impressive point of view. It shows us, that the
enjoyments of the lowest ranks of sensitive exis
tence are not beneath his notice and regard. As
he knew what degree of relaxation was necessary
for the comfort of the labouring animals, and as
he foresaw that the avarice and cruelty of man
would endeavour to deprive them of their due re
pose, so he has secured to them, by a law which
is to continue in force so long as the earth en
dures, the rest of one day in seven in common
with their proprietors and superiors. And this
privilege they will undoubtedly enjoy hereafter,
in a mc^e eminent degree lhan they have yet
done, w!.en man himself shall be induced to pay
a more cordial and unreserved obedience to this
divine precept, — when " he shall call the Sab
bath a delight, and the holy of the Lord honour
able."

Again, the Sabbath was appointed for man. as a
season for pious recollection, and religious contem
plation. " Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it
holy." Amidst the numerous cares and laborious
employments of human life, it is impossible to
fix the mind, for any length of time, on the divine
glory, as displayed in the works of creation, on
the important facts and doctrines of revealed reli
gion, and on the grand realities of the life to come.
And, therefore, if the labouring classes enjoyed no
regular season of repose for serious reflection,
and religious instruction, the objects of religion
would soon be entirly neglected, and the impres
sion of a future world evanish from the mind.
But in the wise arrangements of the beneficent
Creator, an opportunity is afforded to all ranks of
men for cultivating their moral and intellectual
powers, and for directing them to the study and
contemplation of the most glorious and interesting
objects. As the Sabbath was originally institut
ed as a sacred memorial of the finishing of the
work of creation, so it is obvious that the con
templation of the fabric of the universe, and of
the perfections of its Almighty Author therein
displayed, ought to form one part of the exercises
of this holy day ; and, consequently, that illustra
tions of this subject ought to be frequently brought

INSTITUTION OF THE SABBATH.

95

before the view of the mind in those discourses
which are delivered in the assemblies of the
««aints. Since the references to this subject,
throughout the whole of divine revelation, are so
frequent and so explicit, it is evident, that the
Creator intended that this amazing work of his
ahould be contemplated with admiration, and
make a deep and reverential impression upon
every mind. To call to remembrance a period
when there was no terraqueous globe, no sun,
nor moon, nor planets, nor starry firmament, when
darkness and inanity reigned throughout the infi
nite void — to listen to the voice of God resound
ing through the regions of boundless space, " LET
THERE BE LIGHT; and light was" — to behold
ten thousands of spacious suns instantly lighted
up at his command — to trace the mighty masses
of the planetary worlds projected from the hand of
Omnipotence, and running their ample circuits
with a rapidity which overwhelms our concep
tions — to contemplate the globe on which we
stand emerging from darkness and confusion to
light and order ; adorned with diversified scenes
of beauty and of sublimity, with mountains, and
plains, with rivers, and seas, and oceans ; and
with every variety of shade and colour ; cheered
with the melody of the feathered songsters, and
with the voice of man, the image of his Maker,
where a little before eternal silence had prevailed,
— to reflect on the Almighty energy, the bound
less intelligence, and the overflowing beneficence
displayed in this amazing scene — has a tendency
to elevate and expand the faculties of the human
mind, and to excite emotions of reverence and
adoration of the omnipotent Creator. This is a
work which the eternal Jehovah evidently intend
ed to be held in everlasting remembrance, by man
on earth, and by all the inhabitants of the heaven
ly regions. It is the mirror of the Deity, and
the natural image of the invisible God ; and it
forms the groundwork of all those moral dis
pensations towards his intelligent offspring,
which will run parallel with eternity itself. And,
therefore, to overlook this subject in the exercises
of the Sabbath, is to throw a veil over the glories
of the Deity, to disregard the admonitions of his
word, and to contemn one of the most magnifi
cent and astonishing displays of Divine perfec
tion. "By the word of Jehovah were the hea
vens made, and all the host of them, by the breath
of his mouth. He gathereth the waters of the
sea together as an heap, he layeth up the depth
in storehouses. Let all the earth fear the Lord ;
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe
of him. For he spake, and it was done, he com
manded, and it stood fast."

This is a command which never was abrogat
ed, and which never can be abrogated in relation
to any intelligent beings, so long as the Creator
exists, and so long as the universe remains as a
memorial of his power and intelligence. Those
sacred songs which are recorded in scripture for

directing the train of our devotional exercises,
are full of this subject, and contain specimens of
elevated sentiments, of sublime devotion, incom
parably superior to what is to be found in any
other record, whether ancient or modern.* But
man, whose unhallowed hand pollutes and de
grades every portion of revelation which he at
tempts to improve, has either endeavoured to
set aside the literal and sublime references of
these divine compositions, or to substitute in
their place the vague and extravagant fancies
of weak and injudicious minds, for directing
the devotional exercises of Christian churches. t
As the book of God is the only correct standard
of religious worship, so our devotional exercises
both in public and in private, ought to be chiefly,
if not solely, directed by the examples of devo
tion contained in the inspired writings, which
are calculated to regulate and enliven the pious
exercises of men of every age and of every clime.
But, the celebration of the work of creation is
not the only, nor the principal exercise to which
we are called on the Christian sabbath. Had
man continued in primeval innocence, this would
probably have constituted his chief employment.
But he is now called to celebrate, in conjunction
with this exercise, a most glorious deliverance
from sin and misery, effected by the Redeemei
of mankind. And, for this reason, the Sabbath
has been changed from the seventh to the first
day of the week, in memorial of the resurrection
of Christ, when he was " declared to be the Son

• See particularly Psalms 8, 18, 19, 29. 33, 65, 68,
68,74, 89, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 100, 104, 107, 111, 135, 136,
139, 145, 146, 147, 148, &C. &C.

* I here allude to several collections of Hymns
which have been introduced into the public worship
ofChristian societies— many of which, containanum-
ber of vague and injudicious sentiments, and extrava
gant fancies, while they entirely omit many of those
subjects on which the inspired writers delight to ex
patiate. This position could easly be illustrated by
abundance of examples, were it expedient in this
place. I am firmly of opinion, that the praises of the
Christian church ought to be celebrated In Scripture-
language- that selections for this purpose should
be made from the book of Psalms, the Prophets, and
the New Testament writers, which shall embody
every sentiment expressed in the original, without
gloss or comment, and be as nearly as possible in
the very words of Scripture. This has been partly
effected in many of the Psalms contained in metrical
version, used in the Scottish Church, in which sim
plicity, and sublimity, and a strict adherence to the
original; are beautifully exemplified. In this case
there would be no need for a separate hymn-book
for Baptists, Methodists, Independents, Presbyteri
ans.and Episcopalians;: But, when a poet takes an
insulated passage of Scripture, and spins out a doz
en stanzas about it, he nuy interweave, arid most
frequently does, as many fancies of his own as he
pleases. Were the ideas contained in certain hymn?
to be painted on canvass, they would represent, ei
ther a congeries of clouds and mists, or a group Of dis
torted and unnatural objects. And why should such
vague fancies, and injudicious representations, be
imposed on a Christian assembly 1 What a disgrace
is thrown upon Christianity, when the different sects
of Christians cannot cordially join together in the
same, songs of thanksgiving and praise to their com
mon Father and Lord1

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

of God with power." In this deliverance, as
in the first creation, a variety of the grandest
and most interesting objects is presented to our
view : — The Son of God manifested in the flesh
— the moral image of the invisible Creator em-
oodied in a human form, displaying every hea
venly disposition, and every divine virtue, per
forming a series of the most astonishing and bene
ficent miracles, giving sight to the blind, and
hearing to the deaf, making the lame man leap
as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb to sing, re
storing the infuriated maniac to the exercise of
reason, commanding diseases to fly at the signal
of a touch, recalling departed spirits from the in
visible world, raising the dead to life, and, on
every occasion, imparting heavenly instructions
to attending multitudes. We behoid this illus
trious personage suspended on the cross, encom
passed with the waters of affliction, and with
the agonies of death ; the veil of the temple rent
in twain, from the top to the bottom — ihe rocks
of mount Calvary rent asunder — the sun covered
with blackness — darkness surrounding the whole
land of Judea — the graves opening — the dead
arising, and the Prince of Life consigned to the
mansions of the tomb. On the third morning
after this solemn scene, " a great earthquake"
having shaken the sepulchre of the Saviour, we
behold him bursting the prison-doors of the tomb,
and awakening to a new life, which shall never
end — we behold celestial messengers, in resplen
dent forms, descending from the ethereal regions
to announce to his disconsolate disciples, that
he who was dead " is alive, and lives for ever
more;" we behold him, at length, bestowing his
last benediction on his faithful followers, rising
above the confines of this earthly ball, winging his
way on a resplendent cloud, attended by myriads
of angels, through distant regions which " eye hath
not seen ;'' and entering " into heaven itself, there
to appear in the presence of God for us." In
the redemption achieved by this glorious person,
we are directed to look back on that scene of
misery in which sin has involved the human
race, and to those " regions of sorrow and dole
ful shades," from which his mercy has delivered
us ; and to look forward to a complete deliverance
from moral evil, to a resurrection from the grave,
to a general assembly of the whole race of Adam
— to the destruction and renovation of this vast
globe on which we dwell, and to the enjoyment of
uninterrupted felicity, in brighter regions, while
countless ages roll away. — Such are some of the
sublime and interesting objects which we are
called upon to contemplate and to celebrate on
the day appointed for the Christian sabbath — ob
jects which have a tendency to inspire the mind
with sacred joy, and with an anticipation of no
ble employments in the life to come.

Again, the Sabbath was appointed as a stated
season far llie public worship of God. As man
kind are connected by innumerable tics, as they

are subject to the same wants and infirmities, arc
exposed to the same sorrows and afflictions, and
stand in need of the same blessings from God,— •
it is highly reasonable and becoming, that they
should frequently meet together, to offer up in
unison their thanksgiving and praise to their com
mon Benefactor, and to supplicate the throne oi
his mercy. These exercises are connected with
a variety of interesting and important associa
tions. In the public assemblies where religious
worship is performed, " the rich and the poor
meet together." Within the same walls, those
who would never have met in any other circum
stances, are placed exactly in the same situation
before Him in whose presence all earthly dis
tinctions evanish, and who is the Lord, and " the
Maker of them all." Here, pride and haughti
ness are abased ; all are placed on the same
level as sinners before Him " who is of purer
eyes than to behold iniquity ; the loftiness of man
is humbled, the poor are raised from the dust, and
the Lord alone is exalted in the courts of his holi
ness. Here, cleanliness and decency of apparel
are to be seen, and human nature appears, both
in its physical and its moral grandeur.* Here,
civility of deportment, and kindly affections are
generally displayed. Here, we feel ourselves in
the immediate presence of Him before whom all
nations are as the drop of a bucket ; we feel our
guilty and dependant character, and stand, as
suppliants, for mercy to pardon, and for grace to
help us in the time of need. Here, knowledge
of the most important kind is communicated to
assembled multitudes, almost " without money
and without price." Here, the poorest beggar,
the youth, and the man of hoary hairs, may learn
the character of the true God, and of Jesus
Christ whom he hath sent — the way to eternal
happiness — the sources of consolation under the
afflictions of life — and the duties they owe to
their Creator, and to all mankind. In a word,
here the sinner, in the midst of his unhallowed
courses, is aroused to consideration ; and here
the saint is animated and encouraged in his
Christian journey, and enjoys a foretaste of the
blessedness of heaven, and an earnest of the de
lightful intercourses and employments of " the
saints in light."

Let us now suppose, for a moment, that the
Sabbath, and its exercises, were universally abo
lished from the civilized world. What would be
the consequences ? The knowledge of the true
God, which the institution of the Sabbath, more
than any other mean, has tended to perpetuate,
would soon be lost, his worship abandoned, and
relioion and moral principle buried in the dust.
In Pagan countries, where the Sabbath is un-

• What a striking contrast, even in a physical
point of view, is presented between a modern a*
sembly of Christian worshippers, and the hideous
and filthy group of human beings that are to be seen
in the kraal of a Hottentot, or in the cave of a r«€ w
Hollander.

RELATIONS OF MANKIND.

known, the true God is never adored, the soul of
man is debased, and prostrates itself before the
sun and moon, and even before demons, mon
sters, insects, reptiles, and blocks of wood and
stone. In France, where the Sabbath was for
a season abolished, an .Tipious phantom, called
the GrCcMess of Reason, was substituted in the
room of the Omnipotent and Eternal God ; the
Bible was held up to ridicule, and committed to
the flames ; man was degraded to the level of
the brutes ; his mind was assimilated to a piece
of clay, and the cheering prospects of immortali
ty were transformed into the shades of an eternal
night. Atheism, Scepticism, and Fatalism, al
most universally prevailed ; the laws of morality
were trampled under foot ; and anarchy, plots,
assassinations, massacres, and legalized plunder,
became " the order of the day." — With the loss
of the knowledge of God, all impressions of the
Divine presence, and all sense of accountable-
ness for human actions, would be destroyed. The
restraints of religion, and the prospect of a future
judgment, would no longer deter from the com
mission of crimes ; and nothing but the dread
of the dungeon, the gibbet, or the rack, would
restrain mankind from the constant perpetration
of cruelty, injustice, and deeds of violence. No
social prayers, from assembled multitudes, would
be offered up to the Father of mercies ; no voice
of thanksgiving and praise would ascend to the
Ruler of the skies ; the work of creation, as
displaying the perfections of the Deity, would
cease to be admired and commemorated ; and
the movements of Providence, and the glories of
redemption, would be overlooked and disregard
ed. The pursuit of the objects of time and sense,
which can be enjoyed only for a few fleeting
years, would absorb every faculty of the soul ;
and the realities of the eternal world would
either be forgotten, or regarded as idle dreams.
In short, were the Sabbath abolished, or, were
the law which enforces its observance to be re
versed, man would be doomed to spend his mor
tal existence in an unbroken series of incessant
labour and toil ; his mental powers would lan
guish, and his bodily strength would be speedily
wasted. Habits of cleanliness, civility of deport
ment, and decency of apparel, would be disre
garded ; and the persons, and the habitations of
the labouring classes, would soon resemble the
filthiness and the wretched objects which are
seen in the kraal of a Hottentot. Their minds
would neither be cheered with the prospect of sea
sons of stated repose in this world, nor with the
hope of eternal rest and joy in the world to come.

THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT.

" Honour thy Father and thy Mother."
The four preceding commandments, whose
Importance I have endeavoured to illustrate, were
written on a septral? tablet from those that follow,
27

and have been generally considered as enjoin
ing the practice of piety, or those duties winch
more immediately respect God as their object.
But they also include the duties we owe to owr-
selves ; for in yielding obedience to these require
ments, we promote our best interests in this
world, and are gradually prepared for participa
ting in the enjoyments of the world to come.
These laws are binding upon angels and arch
angels, and upon every class of intelligent beings,
in whatever quarter of the universe their local
residence may be found, as well as upon the in
habitants of the earth. The fourth command
ment, indeed, in so far as regards the particular
portion of time to be set apart for the worship of
God, may possibly be peculiar to the inhabitants
of our world. Even although the inhabitants of
such a world as the planet Jupiter were com
manded to set apart every seventh natural day
for the stated public worship of God, the propor
tion of absolute time allotted for this purpose,
would not be the same as ours ; for the natural
day in that world is equal to only ten hours of
our time. But the spirit of this precept, or, the
principle on which it is founded, must be common
to all worlds . For we can conceive of no class
of intelligent creatures, on whom it is not obli
gatory to devote a certain portion of time for the
social worship and adoration of their Creator,
and for commemorating the displays of his
Power and Benevolence; and all holy intelli
gences will cheerfully join in such exercises, and
will consider it as a most ennobling and delight
ful privilege, to engage at stated seasons, along
with their fellow-worshippers, in admiring and
extolling the Uncreated Source of their enjoy
ments. But the stated seasons appointed by the
Creator for such solemn acts of worship, the
manner and circumstances in which they shall
be performed, and the number of worshippers that
may assemble on such occasions, may be diffe
rent in different worlds, according to the situa
tions in which they are placed.

The fifth commandment, to which I am now to
advert, is one of those moral regulations which
may possibly be peculiar to the relations which
exist in our world ; at least, it cannot be suppo
sed to apply to the inhabitants of any world
where the relations of parents and children, of
superiors and inferiors, are altogether unknown.
But, in the circumstances in which man is plac
ed, it is a law indispensably requisite for pre
serving the order and happiness of the social
system. — It requires the exercise of those dis
positions, and the performance of those duties,
which are incumbent upon mankind, in the va
rious relations in which they stand to each other.
It, consequently, includes within its spirit and
references, the duties which children owe to their
parents, and parents to their children ; the duties
of husbands and wives, of masters and servants,
of teachers and scholars, of brothers and sis-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

*,erg, c-t the young and the old, and of governors
and their subjects ; together with all those dis
positions of reverence, submission, affection,
gratitude, and respect, with which the perfor
mance of these duties ought to be accompanied.
It must also be considered as forbidding every
tiling that is opposed to these dispositions, and
to the obedience required ; as contumacy, re
bellion, and want of respect, on the part of chil
dren towards their parents ; disobedience of ser
vants to the reasonable commands of their mas
ters ; and every principle of disaffection and of
insubordination among the various ranks of so
ciety. That all this is included within the range
of this precept, might be proved from the princi
ples on which our Saviour explains the sixth and
seventh commandments, in his Sermon on the
Mount, and from the illustrations of these duties
which are given in the Apostolic epistles, and
in other parts of Scripture.

As it forms no part of my plan, to enter into
any particular explanations of the duties required
in the Decalogue, which have frequently been
expounded by many respectable writers, in works
particularly appropriated to this object, — I shall
simply illustrate, in a few words, the reasonable
ness of this, and the following precepts, from a
consideration of the effects which would follow,
were these laws either universally observed, or
aniversally violated.

Were this law to be reversed, or universally
violated, it is impossible to form an adequate
conception of the dreadful scene of anarchy and
confusion which would immediately ensue.
Every social tie would be torn asunder, every
relation inverted, every principle of subordina
tion destroyed, every government overturned,
every rank and order of mankind annihilated,
and the whole assembly of human beings con
verted into a discordant mass cf lawless bandit
ti. Every family would present a scene of riot,
confusion, insubordination, contention, hatred,
tumult, and incessant execration. Instead of
love, peace, unity, and obedience, the son would
rise in rebellion against his father, and the father
would insult and trample under foot his son. To
use the words of our Saviour, " The brother
would deliver up the brother to death, and the
father the child ; and the children would rise up
against their parents, and cause them to be put
to death ; the daughter would be set at variance
against her mother, and the daughter-in-law
against her mother-in-law ; and a man's foes
would be they of his own household." Children
would be unprovided with proper food, clothing,
and instruction, and left to wander, houseless
and forlorn, as vagabonds on the face of the earth ;
and parents, abandoned by their children, in sick
ness, poverty, and old age, would sink into the
grave in wretchedness and despair. The young,
instead of " rising up before the hoary head, and
honouring the face of the old man," would treat

the aged and infirm with every mark of scorn,
derision, and contempt ; and would feel a diabo
lical delight in vexing, thwarting, and overpower
ing their superiors in age and station. No in
structions could be communicated by teachers and
guardians to the rising generation ; for riot, in
solence, insult, derision, and contempt, would
frustrate every effort to communicate knowledge
to a youthful group. No building nor other work
of art could be commenced with the certain pros
pect of being ever finished ; for its progress would
depend upon the whims and humours of the
workmen employed, who, of course, would re
joice in endeavouring to frustrate the plans and
wishes of their employers. No regular govern
ment nor subordination in a large community,
could possibly exist ; for the great mass of socie
ty would endeavour to protect every delinquent,
and would form themselves into a league to pre
vent the execution of the laws. These effects
would inevitably follow, even although the re
quisition contained in this precept, were to be
viewed as confined solely to the reverence and
obedience which children owe to their parents.
For, were this obedience withdrawn, and an op
posite disposition and conduct uniformly mani
fested, the young would carry the same disposi
tions which they displayed towards their parents,
into all the other scenes and relations of life, and
fill the world with anarchy and confusion. But
it would be needless to expatiate on this topic, as
it appears obvious to the least reflecting mind,
that a universal violation of this law would quite
unhinge the whole fabric of society, and would
soon put an end to the harmonious intercourse of
human beings.

On the other hand, a constant and universal
obedience to this precept would produce such
effects on the deformed aspect of our world as
would transform it into a paradise of moral
beauty, of happiness and love. Every family
would exhibit a picture of peace and concord, of
harmony and affection. No harsh and bitter
language, no strifes, nor jars, nor contentions
would ever interrupt the delightful flow of recip
rocal affection between parents and children. No
longer should we behold the little perverse mem
bers of the domestic circle, indulging their sulky
humours, and endeavouring to thwart the wishes
of their superiors, nor the infuriated parent
stamping and raging at the obstinacy of his
children ; nor should we hear the grating sounds
of discord, and insubordination which now so
frequently issue from the family mansion. Every
parental command would be cheerfully and
promptly obeyed. Reverence and filial affec
tion would glow in every youthful breast towards
the father that begat him, and towards the mother
that gave him birth. Their persons, and their
characters would be regarded with veneration
and respect, and their admonitions submitted tr.
without a murmur or complaint. To gladden

LAW IN RELATION TO MURDER.

99

the hearts of their parents, to run at the least
signal of their will, to sha-e in their benignant
smile or approbation, and to avoid every species
of conduct "that would produce the least uneasi
ness or pain — would be the unceasing aim of all
the youthful members of the family circle. In
sickness, they would smooth their pillows, and
alleviate their sorrows, watch like guardian
angels around their bed, drop the tear of affec
tion, and pour (he balm of consolation into their
wounded spirits. In the decline of life, they
would minister with tenderness to their support
and enjoyment, guide their feeble steps, sympa
thize with them in their infirmities, cheer and
animate their dejected spirits, and render their
passage to the tomb smooth and comfortable.
And how delighted would every parent feel
amidst such displays of tenderness and affection !
There is perhaps nothing in the whole range of
human enjoyment that creates a higher and more
unmingled gratification to parents, than the duti
ful and affectionate conduct of their offspring. It
sweetens all the bitter ingredients of human life,
and ;idds a relish to all its other comforts and en
joyments. It imparts a continual satisfaction
and serenity to the parental breast ; it smooths
th 3 wrinkles of age ; it cheers the spirits under
th« infirmities of declining nature, and makes the
dj ing bed of old age comfortable and easy. And
thfl joy and satisfaction thus felt by parents would
be reflected into the bosom of their children ;
which would produce a union of interests, a cor
diality of affection, and a peace and tranquillity
of mind in every member of the family, which no
adverse occurrence in future life could ever effec
tually destroy.

From the family circle the emanations of filial
piety would spread and diffuse themselves through
all the other departments of society. The same
spirit of love and dutiful respect which united
and endeared parents to children, and children
to parents, would unite one family to another,
one village to another, one city to another, one
province to another, one kingdom and empire to
another, till all the tribes of the human race were
united in kindness and affection, as one great
and harmonious family. Every dutiful child
would become a faithful and obedient servant, a
docile scholar, and a loyal and submissive sub
ject, when placed in those relations ; and would
prove a blessing and an ornament to every so
ciety of which he was a member. -And every
dutiful and affectionate parent, when placed in
the station of a king, or a subordinate ruler, would
display a parental affection towards every mem
ber of the community over which he was appoint
ed. Hence it might easily be shown, that an un
interrupted and universal observance of this sin
gle precept, viewed in all its connexions and
bearings, would completely regenerate the world
—and that the peace, the harmony, and the pros
perity of all the nations of the earth, will ulti

mately depend on the spirit of filia. piety being
infused into every family. " Honour thy father
an;l thy mother," says the Apostle, " which is
the first commandment with promise ; that it may
be well with thee, and that thou mayest live long
upon the eaith" These words, which are fre
quently repeated in Scripture, are not empty
sounds ; nor ought they to be deprived, even
unde- the Christian dispensation, of their obvious
and literal meaning. Filial piety has a natural
tendency to produce health, long life, and pros
perity ; and could we trace the whole of the secret
history of Providence in reference to this precept,
we should, doubtless, find this position abundantly
exemplified. At any rate, were it universally
practised, it would carry along with it a train of
blessings which would convert the tumults and
convulsions of nations into peace and tranquillity,
and transform the moral wilderness of this world
into a scene of verdure, beauty, and loveliness,
which would enrapture the mind of every moral
intelligence; and among its other benefits,
" length of days, and long life and peace," would
undoubtedly " be added" to the other enjoyments
of mankind.

THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT.

"Thou shalt not kill."

This precept forbids the taking away of the
life of sensitive or intelligen* existence. The
command is absolute, without the least excep
tion, as it stands in the Deca'ogue; and it is
universal, extending to every rational and moral
agent. It implies that, as every sensitive and
every intelligent being derived its existence
from the omnipotent Creator of heaven and earth,
no one has a right to deprive it of that existence,
except that Being by whom it was bestowed.
And, whatever exceptions to the universality of
this law may be admitted, they can be admitted
only on the authority of the Lawgiver himself,
who is the Original Fountain of existence to all
his creatures. The principal exceptions to this
law are the following: — 1. The man who has
violently taken away the life of another is com
manded, by the authority of God, to be put to
death. " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man
shall his blood be shed." This is the dictate of
reason as well as of revelation ; for no human
power can reca/l the departed spirit or re-animate
the lifeless corpse, and no adequate compensation
can ever be given for such a crime.* 2. The
life of the lower animals is permitted by the same

• Notwithstanding the considerations here stated,
the Author is doubtful whether the Creator has con
ceded to man the right of taking away the life of
another, even in case of murder. If the passage here
quoted ought to be considered as a prediction rather
than a law, as is most probable, it will afford no war
rant for the destruction of human life ; and there is
no other injunction of this kind which has any rela
tion to the New Testament dispensation.

100

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

authority to be taken away when these animals are
necessary for our food, or when they endanger our
existence. This permission was first granted, im
mediately after the flood, to Noah arid his descen
dants. v« God said to Noah and his sons ; every
thing that moveth shall be meat for you ; even
as the green herb have I given you all things."
Without such a positive grant from the Creator,
man could have had no more right to take away
the life of an ox or a sheep, than he has to imbrue
his hands in the blood, or to feast on the flesh of
his fellow-men. To takt the life of any sensitive
being, and to feed on its flesh, appears incompa
tible with a state of innocence ; and, therefore, no
such grant was given to Adam in paradise ; nor
does it appear that the Antedeluvians, notwith
standing their enormous crimes, ever feasted on
the flesh of animals. It appears to have been a
grant suited only to the degraded state of man
after the deluge ; and, it is probable, that as he
advances in the scale of moral perfection, in the
future ages of the world, the use of animal food
will be gradually laid aside, and he will return
again to the productions of the vegetable kingdom,
as the original food of man, and as that which is
best suited to the rank of rational and moral
intelligence. And, perhaps, it may have an in
fluence, in combination with other favourable
circumstances, in promoting health and longevity.
— But, although the inferior animals are, in the
mean time, su' jected to our use, no permission
is granted to t eat them with harshness or cruelty,
or to kill them for the sake of sport and amuse
ment. And, therefore, the man who wantonly
takes away the lives of birds, hares, fishes, and
other animals, for the mere gratification of a
taste for hunting or fishing, can scarcely be ex
culpated from the charge of a breach of this com
mandment.

The above are the principal exceptions which
the Creator has made in reference to the law
under consideration. And it may not be impro
per to remark, that, besides the direct act of
murder, every thing that leads to it, or that has
a tendency to endanger life, is to be considered
as forbidden in this commandment. All un-
kindness and harsh treatment exercised towards
servants, dependants, and brute animals, by
which life may be shortened or rendered intole
rable — all furious and revengeful passions, which
may lead to acts of violence— all quarrelling,
fighting, and boxing, either for bets, or for the
gratification of hatred or revenge — all wishes for
the death of others, and all contrivances either
direct or indirect to compass the destruction of
our neighbour — all criminal negligence by which
our own life or the life of others may be endan
gered or destroyed — and all those actions by
which murder may be committed as a probable
effect, as the burning of inhabited houses, and
the throwing of the instruments of death into the
midst of a crowd— are to be regarded as involv

ing the principle of murder, as well as the direct
acts of suicide, duelling, and assassination ; and,
consequently, as violations of that law which
extends to the secret purposes of the heart, as
well as to the external actions. Even unreason
able anger, malice, and scurrility are declared
by our Saviour to be a species of murder : " Who
soever is angry with his brother without a cause,
shall be in danger of the judgment, and whoso
ever shall say to his brother, Raca" that is, ihou
worthless empty fellow, " shall be in danger of
the council."* Life is desirable only as it is
connected with enjoyment, and, therefore, when
a man treats his brother with such a degree of
hatred and scurrility, as to render his existence
either unpleasant or intolerable, he ought to be
ranked among the class of murderers. For the
apostle John declares, without the least limita
tion, that " whosoever hateth his brother is a
murderer, and he that loveth not his brother
abideth in death." And, if this criterion be ad-
milted, a train of murderers will be found exist
ing in society far more numerous than is gene
rally supposed.

It would be needless to attempt an illustration
of the consequences which would ensue, were
the breach of this law to become universal. It
is obvious, on the slightest reflection, that were
this to happen, human society would soon cease
to exist. That prophecy which was given forth
respecting Ishmael would then receive a most
terrible and extensive accomplishment, in the
case of every human agent : " His hand shall be
against every man, and every man's hand against
him." Every man would assume the character
of an infernal fiend ; every lethal weapon would
be prepared and furnished for slaughter ; every
peaceful pursuit and employment nould be in
stantly abandoned ; the voice of wailing and the
yells of fury and despair, would be heard in every
family, in every village, in every city, in every
field, in every kingdom, and in every clime.
Every house, every street, every valley, every fo
rest, every river, every mountain, and every con
tinent would be strewed with fearful devastation,
and with the mangled carcasses of the slain. The
work of destruction would go on with dreadful
rapidity, till the whole race of man were extir
pated from the earth, leaving this vast globe a
scene of solitude and desolation, an immense
sepulchre, and a spectacle of horror to all supe
rior intelligences. — And, let it be remembered,
that such a picture, horrible and revolting as it
is, is nothing more than what would be the no-

• Math. v. 22. Christ, in this passage, refers to a
court among the Jews, composed of twenty-three
men, wherein capital sentences might be passed
on which a malefactor might he strangled or be
headed : this was called the Judgment. But the
Sanhedrim, or Council, was the supreme Jewish
court, consisting of seventy-two; in which the
highest crimes were tried, which they, and the?
alone, punished with stoning, which was conskwr-
ed a more terrible death than the former.

LAW OF MARRIAGE.

101

tarerf result of the principle of hatred, were it left
to its native energies, and were :t not controlled,
in the course of providence, by Him who sets
restraining bounds to the wrath of man.

In order to counteract the tendencies of this
baleful principle, it is of the utmost importance
that youth be trained up in habits of kindness,
tenderness, and compassion, both towards human
beings, and towards the inferior animals ; that
an abhorrence should be excited in their minds
of quarrelling, fighting, and all mischievous
tricks and actions ; that they be restrained
from the indulgence of malicious and resentful
passions ; that every indication of a cruel and
unfeeling disposition be carefully counteracted ;
and that every tendency of the heart towards the
benevolent affections, and every principle of ac
tive beneficence be cultivated and cherished
with the most sedulous care and attention. For,
in youth, the foundation has generally been laid
of those malevolent principles and passions
which have led to robbery, assassination, and
deeds of violence, — which have filled the earth
with blood and carnage : and which have dis
played their diabolical energy in so dreadful a
manner amidst the contests of communities and
nations.

Were the disposition to indulge hatred, which
leads to every species of murder, completely
counteracted, the greatest proportion of those
evils which now afflict our world, would cease to
exist. Human sacrifices would no longer bleed
upon Pagan altars ; the American Indians would
no longer torture to death their prisoners taken
in war, nor the New Zealanders feast upon the
flesh and the blood of their enemies. The widows
of Hindostan would no longer be urged to burn
themselves alive on the corpses of their deceased
husbands; norwould the mothers ofChina imbrue
their hands in the blood of their infant offspring.
The practice of Duelling would forever cease,
and would be universally execrated as an outrage
OH common sense, and on every generous and
humane feeling, und as the silly attempt of a
puny mortal to gratify wounded pride or disap
pointed ambition, at the expense of the life of
his fellow-creature. Despotism would throw
aside its iron sceptre, and the nations would be
ruled with the law of love; and plots, conspira
cies, treasons, and massacres would be attempt
ed no more. The fires of the Inquisition would
cease to be kindled, the supposed heretic would
no longer be consigned to the horrors of a gloomy
dungeon, racks and gibbets and guillotines would
be shivered to pieces and thrown into the flames,
and the spirit of cruelty and persecution would
be extirpated from the earth. Riot, tumult, and
contention would be banished from our streets,
and harmony and concord would prevail through
out all our borders. War would forever cease
to desolate the nations ; the confused noise of
invading armies, the sounds of martial music,

the groans of dying victims, and the hoarse
shouts of conquerors, would be heard no more.
Peace would descend from heaven to dwell with
man on earth ; prosperity would follow in her
train, science would enlarge its boundaries and
shed its benign influence upon all ranks ; the
useful arts would flourish and advance towards
perfection ; philanthrophy would diffuse its thou
sand blessings in every direction, and every
man would sit " under his vine and fig-tree"
in perfect security from all danger or annoy
ance.

SEVENTH COMMANDMENT.

" Thou shall not commit adultery."

This commandment is to be viewed as com
prehending within its prohibition, every species
of lewdness, both in thought, word, and action;
as adultery, fornication, incest, polygamy, &c. ;
and likewise all those licentious desires and af
fections from which such actions proceed. In
this comprehensive sense it. is explained by our
Saviour, in his Sermon on the Mount, and by the
Apostles, in their letters to the Christian Church
es. It is founded on th« distinction of sexes
which exists among mankind, and on the law of
Marriage, which was promulgated immediately
after the creation of the first pair — a law which
was intended to limit, and to regulate the inter
course of the sexes ; and to promote purity, af
fection, and order, among the several generations
of mankind. By this law the marriage union is
limited to two individuals. He who made man
kind at the beginning, says Christ, made them
male and female, and said, " For this cause shall
a man leave father and mother and shall cleave
to his wife ; and they twain shall be one flesh."
And, it might easily be shown, from an induction
of facts, and from a consideration of the present
circumstances of the human race, that this law,
and this alone, is calculated to promote the mu
tual affection of the married pair, and to seouro
the peace and happiness of families, and the
harmony » f general society. By this law the
union is m* le permanent, so long as the parties
exist in th s world. " What God hath joined,
let no man [Hit asunder." This regulation has
a tendency to promote union of affection and in
terests, and to induce the parties to bear with
patience the occasional inconveniences and con
tentions which may arise. Were divorces ge
nerally permitted, on the ground of unsuitable-
ness of temper, or occasional jars, society would
soon be shaken to its centre. Every real or
supposed insult, or provocation, would be followed
out, till it terminated in the separation of the
parties ; families would thus be torn into shreds ;
the education of the young would be neglected ;
parental authority disregarded ; and a door open
ed for the prevalence of unbounded licentious
ness. Soon after the commencement of the Re»

10*

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

volution in France, a law, permitting divorces,
was passed by the National Assembly ; and, in
less than three months from its date, nearly as
many divorces as marriges were registered in the
city of Paris. In the whole kingdom, within the
space of eighteen months, upwards of twenty
thousand divorces were effected ; and the nation
sunk into a state of moral degradation, from the
effects of which it has never yet recovered. This
is one of the many practical proofs presented
before us, of the danger of infringing on any of
the moral arrangements which the Creator has
established.

The precept under consideration is to be con
sidered as directly opposed to all promiscuous and
licentious intercourse between the sexes. And
the reasonableness of thi.s prohibition will ap
pear, if we consider, for a moment, what would
be the consequences which would inevitably fol
low were this law to be set aside, or universally
violated. A scene of unbounded licentiousness
would ensue, which would degrade the human
character, which would destroy almost all the ex
isting relations of society, and unhinge the whole
fabric of the moral world. — One end of the insti
tution of marriage was, to " replenish the earlh"
with inhabitants, to perpetuate the successive
generations of men, and to train up a virtuous and
intelligent race to people the congregation of the
heavens. But this end would be ultimately frus
trated, were a promiscuous and unlimited inter
course to become either general or universal.
For, it has been found, that, wherever such in
tercourse partially prevails, it strikes at the root
of human existence, and has a tendency to prevent
the operation of that law which the Creator im
pressed on all living beings, " Increase and multi
ply." In the haunts of licentiousness, in large
cities, and in all such societies as those which
formerly existed in Otaheite, under the name of
Arreoy, the laws of nature are violated, the course
of generation obstructed, and numbers of human
beings strangled at the very porch of existence.
So that were mankind at large to relap«e into such
licentious practices, the human race instead of
increasing in number, to replenish ne desolate
wastes of our globe, according to tl e Creator's
intention, would rapidly decrease ev-;ry succeed
ing generation, till after the lapse of a few centu
ries, human beings would be entirely extirpated,
and the earth, barren and uncultivated, would be
left to the dominion of the beasts of the forest.

But, although such a distant event were to be
altogether disregarded, the immediate conse
quences of such unhallowed courses would be
dismal in the extreme. That union of heart, af
fection, and of interests, which subsists between
the great majority of married pairs, and those re
ciprocal sympathies and endearments which flow
from this union, would be altogether unknown.
The female sex, (as already happens in some
nations,) with minds uncultivated and unpolish

ed, would be degraded into mere instruments (A
sensitive enjoyment, into household slaves, or
into something analogous to beasts of burden,
and would be bought and sold like cattle and
horses. The minds of all would be degraded to
the level of brutes, and would be incapable of
prosecuting either rational or religious pursuits.
Their bodies would be wasted and enfeebled will,
squalid disease: the infirmities of a premature
old age would seize upon them ; and before they
had " lived half their days," they would sink into
the grave in hopelessness and sorrow. A uni
versal sottishness, and disregard of every tiling
except present sensual enjoyment, would seize
upon the whole mass of society, and benumb the
human faculties : the God of heaven would be
overlooked, and the important realities of an im
mortal existence completely banished from their
thoughts and affections. Thousands, and ten
thousands of infants would be strangled at their
entrance into life ; and the greater part of those
who were spared, would be doomed to a wretched
and precarious existence. The training up of
the youthful mind to knowledge and virtue would
be quite neglected ; and all that civility and soft
ness of manners, which are now acquired under
the eye of parental authority and affection, would
be unknown in society. The endearing relations
of father and mother, of brothers and sisters, of
uncles, aunts, and cousins, and all the other ra
mifications of kindred, which now produce so
many interesting and delightful associations,
would fail to be recognised among men ; for in
such a state of society, the natural relations of
mankind would be either disregarded, or blended
in (indistinguishable confusion.

Children, neglected or abandoned by their mo
thers, would be left to the full influence of their
own wayward and impetuous passions ; they
would depend for subsistence, either on accident,
on pilfering, or on the tender mercies of general
society ; they would wander about as vagabonds,
tattered and forlorn; their hearts shrivelled with
unkindness, their bodies chilled with the rains
and biting frosts, and deformed with filthiness and
disease. They would be left to perish in the
open fields, without a friend to close their eyes ;
and their bodies, unnoticed and unknown, would
remain as a prey, to be devoured by the fowls
of heaven. In every land would be seen multi
tudes of houseless and shivering females, set
adrift by their seducers, wandering with their
hungry and half famished offspring, the objects
of derision and contempt ; and imploring, in vain,
the comforts of food, of shelter, and protection.
For, among human beings, in such a degraded
state, the kindly and benevolent affections would
seldom be exercised ; cold-blooded selfishness and
apathy, in relation to the sufferings of others,
would supplant all the finer feelings of humanity ;
which would dispose them to view the wretched
objects around them with perfect indifference.

EFFECTS OF LICENTIOUSNESS.

103

and ev*n will contempt. " However it may be
accounted for," says Dr. Paley, " the criminal
commerce of the sexes corrupts and depraves the
mind, and the moral character, more than any
single species of vice whatsoever. That ready
perception of guilt, that prompt and decisive reso
lution against it, which constitutes a virtuous
character, is seldom found in persons addicted to
these indulgences. They prepare an easy ad
mission for every sin that seeks it ; are, in low
life, usually the first stage in men's progress to
the most desperate villanies ; and, in high life,
to that lamented dissoluteness of principle which
manifests itself in a profligacy of public conduct,
and a contempt of the obligations of religion and
of moral probity. Add to this that habits of
libertinism incapacitate and indispose the mind
for all intellectual, moral, and religious plea
sures."*

In short, in such a state of society as would
inevitably accompany a general violation of the
seventh precept of the moral law. all the softness
and loveliness of filial piety, of parental affec
tion, of brotherly attachment, and of the inter
course of kindred, would forever cease ; science
and literature would be neglected ; and churches,
colleges, schools, and academies would crumble
into ruins : a sufficient stimulus would be want
ing to the exercise of industry and economy ; a
lazy apathy would seize upon the mass of socie
ty ; the earth would cease to be cultivated, and
would soon be covered with briers and thorns, or
changed into the barren wastes of an African
desert. The foundation of all regular govern
ment would be undermined : for it is chiefly in
those habits of submission and obedience which
are acquired under the domestic roof, that the
foundations are laid of that subordination which
is necessary »o secure the peace and order of
mankind. Society would, consequently, be
thrown into a state of disorder, and would speed-
iiy sink into oblivion, in the mire of its own
pollution.

The positions now stated could be illustrated,
were it expedient, by a variety of melancholy
facts, borrowed from the history and the present
state, both of savage and of civilized nations.
The annals of Turkey, of Persia, of Hindos-
tan, uf China, of Japan, of the Society Isles,
and even of the civilized nations of Europe
and America, would furnish abundance of im
pressive facts, to demonstrate the demoralizing,
and brutalizing, and miserable effects which
would flow from a spirit of universal licentious
ness. — What revolting scenes would open to
view, were we to survey the haunts of licentious
ness which abound in Algiers, in Constantinople,
in Teheran, in Pekin, in Canton, in Jeddo, and
other populous cities, where the restraints of

• Principle-? of Moral and Political Philosophy
Book III. Part IIJ. chap 2.

Christianity are altogether unknown ! In such
receptacles of impurity, every moral feeling is
blunted, and every moral principle abandoned.
Impiety, profanity, falsehood, treachery, perjury,
and drunkenness, rear their unblushing ftonts ,
and thefts, robberies, and murders, follow in their
train. The unhappy female who enters these
antechambers of hell, is, for the most part, cut
off from all hopes of retreat. From that mo
ment, the shades of moral darkness begin to close
around her; she bids a last adieu to°the smiles
of tenderness and sympathy, to the kind embra
ces of father and mother, of sisters and brothers,
to the house of God, to the instructions of his
word, and to the society of the faithful. Instead
of the cheering sounds of the Gospel of peace,
her ears become accustomed to oaths, and curs
es, and horrid imprecations ; the voice of con
science is hushed amidst the din of revelry and
riot ; every generous feeling is shrunk and with
ered ; she stalks abroad like a painted corpse, to
fill with horror the virtuous mind, and to allure
the unwary to the shades of death ; till at length,
wasted with consumption and loathsome disease,
she is stretched upon the bed of languishing,
abandoned by her former associates, deprived of
the least drop of consolation, haunted with the
ghastly apparitions of departed joys, and the
forebodings of futurity, and sinks, " in the midst
of her days," into the chambers of the grave,
without the least hope of a glorious resurrection.
— And if we consider, that this is a picture of
the wretchedness, not only of a few individuals,
but of thousands, of tens of thousands, and of
millions of human beings, it is impossible to de
scribe the accumulated mass of misery which
impurity has created, or to form any adequate
conception of the horrible and revolting scenes
of wretchedness which would be displayed, were
the law under consideration to be set aside by all
the inhabitants of our globe.

There is a certa in levity and flippancy of speech
in relation to this subject, which prevails among
many who wish to be considered as respectable
characters, which proceeds from a contracted
view of the consequences of human actions.
They conceive, that no great harm can be done
to society, by a few insulated actions of the kind
alluded to, especially if they be concealed from
general observation; and that the Creator will
be disposed to make every allowance for human
frailty. But let such remember that, if it were
right to violate this, or any other law of the
Creator, in one instance, it would be right in a
hundred, in a thousand; in a million, and in eight
hundred millions of instances : and then all the
revolting scenes now described, and thousands
of similar effects, of which we cannot at present
form a distinct conception, would inevitably take
place. And, therefore, every man who, from
levity and thoughtlessness, or from a disregard
to the laws of heaven, persists in the occasional

104

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

indulgence of such unhallowed gratifications, in
dulges in a practice which, were it universally to
prevail, would sap the foundations of all moral
order, exterminate the most endearing relations
of society, prostrate man below the level of the
brute, open the flood-gates of all iniquity, diffuse
misery over the whole mass of human beings,
and, at length, empty the world of its inhabitants.
The precept which we have now been consi
dering, is one which, in all probability, is con
fined, in its references, to the inhabitants of our
globe. At any rate, it would be quite nugatory,
and therefore can have no place, in the moral
code of a world where the distinction of sexes
does not exist. And even in those worlds
where a similar distinction may exist, the very
different circumstances in which their inhabi
tants are placed, may render the promulgation
of such a law altogether unnecessary. It appears
to be a temporary regulation, to remain in force
only during the limited period of the present
economy of Providence ; for, in thi future desti
nation of the righteous, we are told, that ".they
neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are
as the angels of God in heaven." And, there
fore, it is probable, that the recognition of such
a law will not be necessary, in the intercourses
which take place among redeemed men in the
eternal world ; but the principle on which it is
founded, and from which it flows, will run
through all the other new relations and circum
stances in which they may be placed. In the
existing circumstances of mankind, however, the
operation of this law is essentially necessary to
the stability and the happiness of the moral
world ; and, were its requisitions universally
observed, the melancholy scenes to which I have
alluded would no longer exist; the present and
everlasting ruin of thousands, and of millions,
would be prevented ; and a scene of happiness
and love, such as the world has never yet wit
nessed, would be displayed among all the families
of the earth.

THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT.

« Thou shalt not steal."

When the Creator had arranged our globe in
the form in which we now behold it, he furnish
ed it with every thing requisite for the suste
nance and accommodation of living beings, and
bestowed the whole of its riches and decorations
as a free grant to the sons of men. To man he
said, " Behold, I have given you every herb
bearing seed, which is upon the face <>f all the
earth, and every tree in the which is the fruit of
a tree yielding seed ; to you it shall be for meat."
Ever since the period when this grant was
made, God has not left himself without a witness
to his benignity, in that he has unceasingly be
stowed on mankind " rain from heaven, and fruit
ful seasons, filling their hearts with food and

gladness." The earth has, in every age, brought
forth abundance to supply the wants of all tho
living beings it contains ; and there is still ar/».
pie room on its surface, for the accommodation
and support of thousands of millions of the hu
man race, in addition to those which now exist.
But mankind have never yet agreed about the
division and allotment of this free and ample
gift of the Creator ; for every one is disposed to
think that his share in it is too small, and is con
tinually attempting to make inroads upon the
allotment of his neighbours. And to this dispo
sition is to be ascribed more than one half of all
the evils which have afflicted the world in every
age since the fall of man. To counteract such
a propensity in mankind, and to regulate their
dispositions and conduct in relation to property,
is the great object of this command, " Thou shall
not steal."

To steal, is to take the property of others,
without their knowledge or consent, and to apply
it to our own use. The most flagrant and vio
lent breaches of the law, consist in robbery,
housebreaking, pilfering, plunder, and pillage.
But it may be violated in a thousand different
ways of which human laws seldom take any cog*
nizance. It is violated by every species of fraud
by which our neighbour may be injured in his
wealth or property. It is violated in the ordi
nary commerce of mankind, by the use of false
weights and measures ; by selling deteriorated
commodities as if they were sound and good;
by depreciating the value of what we wish to
buy, and concealing the defects of what we
wish to sell; by contracting debts which we
have no prospect of discharging, and neglecting
to pay them when they are due ; by breaches
of trust, in the case of servants, guardians, exe
cutors, or public officers, embezzling and squan
dering away the substance of others, or applying
it to their own use. — It is also violated by tres
passing on the property of others, so as to injure
fences, gardens, orchards, plantations or corn
fields ; and by that disposition to vulgar mischief
which delights in breaking lamps, windows, and
fences ; in injuring and defacing public build
ings, walks, and ornamental improvements ; in
hacking and carving walls, wainscottings, doors,
and balustrades ; and in cutting down trees and
shrubs planted for use or for ornament. — It is
violated when we retain borrowed articles be
yond a reasonable time, when we suffer them to
be injured through negligence, when we circulate
them from one person to another, without the
knowledge or consent of the proprietors, and
when we apply them to purposes for which they
were never intended, and which the lender neve'r
contemplated.— In short, this law is violated b/
every species of idleness, pride, vanity, gaming,
and prodigality, which has a tendency to injure
the external prosperity, either of our own family,
or of the families of others.

EFFECTS OF HONESTY.

105

Wero tho law which forbids those actions to be
entirely set aside, or universally violated, it is
easy to foresee, that, in a very short time, the
whole assemblage of human beings would be
transformed into a set of lawless banditti. Peace,
harmony, and good neighbourhood, would be un
known among men ; the strong would plunder the
possessions of the weak, and deprive them of
every enjoyment ; children would rob their pa
rents, and parents their children ; brothers would
plunder brothers, and servants their masters;
buying and selling would cease, and all regular
trade and commerce would be destroyed : every
man's covetous eye would be directed to the
wealth and property of his neighbour, with a
view of depriving him of his enjoyments; and a
thousand schemes, either of treachery or of open
violence, would be contrived to effectuate his
purpose. Murders would be daily contrived and
perpetrated, for the purpose of more easily ob
taining possession of the wealth and estates of
the powerful and the opulent ; and every man's
life and happiness would be at the mercy of his
covetous neighbour. The inhabitants of one
province would rise up against those of another,
and, by force of arms, plunder them of all their
earthly treasu-«s. One nation would invade the
territories of another, for the purpose of ravaging
its cities and provinces, and of appropriating its
wealth and riches ; and, in the midst of such law
less depredations, towns would be demolished,
villages consumed to ashes, the fruits of the earth
destroyed, men. women, and children, trampled
under foot, and crushed to death, and every city
and fertile field would present a scene of carnage
and desolation. In such a state of society, no
man could have confidence in his brother; fear
would be on every side ; uncertainty would at
tend every pursuit and possession ; of the wealth
which any one had acquired, and of the enjoy
ments which he possessed to-day, he might be
deprived before to-morrow; and if, by means of
circumspection and vigilance, and the strong arm
of power, he were enabled to maintain posses
sion of his property for one year, he could have
no rational ground to expect, that he would enjoy
it in security for another. And, as no one would
think of engaging in regular labour, while he
could subsist in plundering his weaker neighbours
— the earth would soon be left uncultivated, the
useful arts would be abandoned, agricultural in
dustry and improvement would cease, and a uni
versal famine would overspread every land, which
vould thin the human race, and gradually exter
minate them from the face of the earth.

Such scenes of plunder and depredation, have
.n fact been partially realized in every age and
nation of the world, and are still realized, to a
certain extent, even in nations which boast of
their progress in religion, in civilization, and in
ecience. The annals of the human race contain
little more than a number of melancholy records

of wholesale robbery, committed by one tribe of
human beings upon another. One public robber
and desperado has arisen after another, in con
stant succession, and, at the head of numerous
armies, has violated the territories of peaceful in
dustry, demolished the habitations of their unof»
fending inhabitants, broken down their furniture,
and consigned it to the flames ; wasted and de
voured the fruits of their ground, and plundered
them of every thing which could render existence
desirable. And the inferior ranks of mankind,
stimulated by the same principles which actuate
their superiors, have supported a system of pecu
lation, of cheating, of litigation, of injustice, and
oppression, which, were it left solely to its own
native energies, would soon undermine the foun
dations of the moral world. That such princi
ples and practices have never yet become uni
versal in their operation, is not owing so much to
any deficiency in their malignant tendency, as to
the over-ruling providence of the Moral Governor
of the world, who has, by his influence, and his
physical arrangements, confined the lawless pas
sions of men within certain bounds, beyond which
they cannot pass.

Were a principle of honesty and of justice, in
regard to property, to pervade the mind of every
human being ; or, in other words, were the law
to which I am now adverting universally recog
nised, a new scene would open upon the moral
world, altogether different from what has hitherto
been displayed in the transactions of mankind.
The iron rod of oppression would be shivered to
atoms, and destroying armies would no longer
ravage the habitations of men. The crowds of
sharpers, cheats, and jockeys, that now stalk
through the world, with unblushing fronts, to en
trap the unwary, would forever disappear from
the world ; and impartial justice would reign
triumphant over every department of society.
No malignant purpose would ever be formed to
injure any one in his wealth and property ; and
all the harassing law-suits and prosecutions,
which now distress so many thousands of fami
lies, would be swept away. Every loan of money,
books, furniture, or utensils, would be returned
without injury, and v/ithout unnecessary delay;
and every debt punctually discharged, according
to the nature of the obligation, and at the period
at which it was due : Every bargain would be
transacted on the principles ofimmutable justice,
and the conditions of every con tract faithfully per
formed : No suspicions of knavery would ever
harbour in the breast, nor the least alarm at the
possible consequences of any mercantile trans
action. Public buildings would be secure from
the inroads of the genius of mischief, and gardens
and orchards from every wanton depredation.
Locks, and bars, and bolts, would no longer be
required for securing our substance from the pil
ferer and the robber ; and the iron gratings of a
bridewell or a jail, would never again remind uu

106

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

of the dishonesty and the depravity of man. Ser
vants would be universally honest and trust
worthy, and the property of their masters would
be regarded as a sacred deposit.

And what a happy change would such a state
of society introduce among mankind ! What
a host of cares, anxieties, suspicions, vexations,
and perplexities, would be chased away ! and
what a world of conveniences, and of delight
ful associations, would thus be created ! Every
merchant, by marking the price and the quality
of each commodity, might leave his goods open
to the inspection of the public, and enjoy himself
in the bosom of his family, or in active services
for the good of the community, without the east
risk of loss or of depredations ; and every purchas
er might depend upon procuring the articles he
wanted at their just value. Every traveller would
prosecute his journey, either by day or by night,
without the least apprehension from sharpers or
robbers, and without being harassed by the im
positions of inn-keepers, coachmen, carriers,
and porters. Every one's mind would be at per
fect ease, in regard to his property, whether he
were at home or abroad, in health or in sickness ;
being firmly persuaded that every trust would be
faithfully discharged, and every commercial con
cern fairly and honourably transacted. Selfish
ness and rapacity would give place to a spirit of
justice, equity, and benevolence; contentions,
jockeyings, and altercations would cease ; peace
and concord would prevail, and righteousness and
truth would shed their benign influence over the
whole brotherhood of mankind.

THE NINTH COMMANDMENT.

" Thou shaU not bear false witness against thy
neighbour"

This command, like most of the others, is ex
pressed in a negative form. It is directed against
every species of falsehood, and, consequently,
must be viewed as inculcating a sacred and uni
versal adherence to truth, in all our thoughts,
words, and actions. In the remarks I may throw
out in relation to this precept, I shall consider it
chiefly in its positive form, as commanding an
inviolable attachment to truth. Truth may be
considered in two different points of view — logi-
c.ul truth, which consists in the conformity of a
proposition or assertion with the actual state of
things ; and moral truth, which consists in the
agreement of our words and actions with our
thoughts. Logical truth belongs to the thing or
the fact asserted ; moral truth, or what is termed
veracity, has a reference to the person who utters
it. In both these respects, truth is of immense
importance to all intelligent beings. — The im-
dirtance of truth and verachy will appear from
the following considerations.

In the first place, it is the bond of society,
and die foundation of all that confidence and in

tercourse which subsist among raticaal beinj, .
By far the greater part of all t'^e Knowledge *
possess, has been derived from the testimony «£
others. It is from the communication of others,
and from a reliance on their veracity, that those
who were never beyond the limits of Great
Britain, know that there are such cities as Paris,
Vienna, Constantinople, and Cairo ; and that
there are such countries as Canada, Nova
Scotia, Brazil, Peru, Persia, China, and Hin-
dostan. It is from the same source that we have
learned the facts of ancient and modern history,
and that there once existed such empires as the
Greek and Roman, the Persian, Assyrian, and
Babylonian. On the same ground, the veracity
of others, we confide in all the domestic relations
and intercourses of life ; and on this ground all
the transactions of commercial society, and all
the arrangements and operations of government
are conducted. On the implied veracity of others,
we retire from our employments at certain hours,
and sit down to breakfast or dinner ; and, on the
first day of the week, we assemble in a certain
place, at an appointed hour, for religious wor
ship. On this ground, the pupil confides in his
teacher, for instruction — the child in his parents,
for sustenance, clothing and protection, the
master in his servant, for the execution of his
orders, and the wife in her husband for provision
and support. We confide every moment in the
faithfulness of the Almighty for the regular re
turns of day and night, of summer and winter,
of seed-time and harvest. Could the veracity of
God be impeached or rendered liable to suspi
cion, we should remain in awful suspense, whe
ther another day would again dawn upon the
world, or whether the earth would be shattered to
pieces, and its fragments dispersed throughout
surrounding worlds, before the sun again appear
ed in the horizon. A Being possessed of bound
less knowledge and omnipotence, without vera«
city, would be the terror of ihe whole intelligent
universe, and would fill them with universal
agitation and alarm.

Again, truth is the foundation of our present
comfort and of our future prospects. On the ve
racity of those illustrious characters that have
gone before us, whose declarations were con
firmed by signs and miracles, we depend for the
hope of forgiveness and acceptance with God.
and for those rich sources of consolation which
are calculated to support the mind under the aP-
flictions of mortality, and to cheer and animate
us in the prospect of a future world. Our hopes
of happiness beyond the grave, of the resurrec
tion of our bodies at the termination of the pre
sent plan of providence — of the renovation of the
physical system of our globe— of a complete res
toration to holiness and virtue — of a re-union
with departed friends — of associating with vir
tuous beings of a superior order — of mingling in
a happier world with all those illustrious sainti

IMPORTANCE OF TRUTH.

107

who have gone before us — of contemplating the
manifestations of Deity on a more extensive
scale ; and of enjoying unmixed felicity without
interruption and without end ; depend upon the
testimony of the inspired writers, and the light
ic which we view the truths or declarations
which they have recorded. And, therefore, the
man who endeavours to undermine the authority
of the sacred records, or to distort or misrepre
sent their meaning by sophistical reasonings,
ought to be viewed as a deceiver, and as an ene
my to his species, who wishes to deprive his fel
low-men of their most substantial enjoyments,
and of their most cheering prospects.

Again, truth and veracity are of the utmost im
portance in relation to the views we ought to
take of the character of God. The moral cha
racter of the Deity is delineated in the Scrip
tures, and we are enabled to contemplate this
character, in its true light, in so far as we un
derstand and appreciate the delineations of the
sacred writers. But his character is also exhi
bited in the works of creation and providence.
Every physical law of nature, every arrange
ment in the material system, every movement
which exists in the boundless universe ; every
apparent deviation from the general course of na
ture, as in the case of earthquakes and volca
noes ; every event in the history of nations, every
fact in relation to the physical and moral condi
tion of the different tribes of the human race,
and every arrangement in reference to the lower
ranks of animated beings — embodies in it an ex
hibition of certain aspects of the divine charac
ter; and these aspects, if fairly represented, ought
to harmonize with the delineations contained in
the sacred records. To ascertain such facts as
those to which I now allude, requires, in many
instances, the exercise of profound reasoning,
and of accurate investigation, and that the mind
should be free from the influence of prejudice
and of every improper bias, and that the facts,
when ascertained, be fairly represented, and ac
curately recorded ; otherwise, nothing but a dis
torted view of the divine character will be exhi
bited to the mind. For example, if the earth be
represented as among the largest bodies in na
ture, and as placed at rest in the centre of the
universe, and that the sun, moon, and all the
other celestial orbs revolve around it every day,
and consequently, that the planetary bodies move
in orbits which display inextricable confusion —
such a representation is not a true exhibition of
the God of heaven, but a phantom of our own
imagination : and, if carried out to all its legiti
mate consequences, would involve an impeach
ment of the wisdom and intelligence of the Deity,
and of the sublime simplicity and order, which
characterize his operations in the universe. If
the planet Saturn be represented as a globe 900
times larger than the earth, and surrounded with
a ring 600,000 miles in circumference, it conveys

a very different idea of the majesty of the di
vine Being who formed it, from what we are led
to entertain, when we consider it as only a ta
per, or a brilliant stud, fixed in the vault of hea
ven. If the eye of a fly be exhibited as con
taining ten thousand polished transparent globes,
nicely adjusted for the pnrpose of vision, it dis
plays the character of its Maker in a different
light from that in which we might be disposed to
view it, when this animal is represented as a
nuisance in creation, and designed only to be
mangled and tortured by a cruel and unthinking
schoolboy.

1 1 some instances the inaccurate statement of
a pi ysical fact, or the false colouring put upon
it, may have a tendency to endanger the eternal
interests of mankind. Mr. Brydone, in his
" Tour through Sicily," states, on the authority
of a priest, named Recupero, that, in sinking a
pit near Jaci, in the neighbourhood of Mount
JStna "they pierced through seven distinct lavas,
one under the other, the surfaces of which were
parallel, and most of them covered with a bed of
thick earth." From suppositions founded on
questionable data, he concluded, that " it requires
2000 years or upwards to form but a scanty soil
on the surface of a lava," and, consequently,
that " the eruption which formed the lowest of
these lavas, must have flowed from the moun
tain at least 14000 years ago. This pretended
fact was, for a while, triumphantly exhibited by
sceptics, as an unanswerable argument against
the truth of the Mosaic history ; and its publica
tion has, no doubt, tended to stagger weak minds,
and to confirm the in fidel in his prejudices against
the truth of Revelation. But it has been shown
by eminent geologists, that the facts alluded to
are grossly mis-stated, and that no vegetable
mould exists between these beds of lava ; and,
consequently, the argument founded upon them
goes for nothing. Mr. Brydone himself, in the
very same volume in which these pretended facts
are stated, before he had advanced twenty pages
farther in his account of the regions about Mount
-flEtna, states a fact which completely overturns
all his preceding reasonings and calculations.
In describing the country near Hybla, as having
been " overwhelmed by the lava of JEtna, and
having then become totally barren," he adds, "in
a second eruption, by a shower of ashes from the
mountain, it soon resumed its ancient beauty and
fertility" So that it is here admitted, that, in
stead of requiring a period of 2000 years, a bed
of lava may speedily be transformed into a beau
tiful and fertile region. But even although such
facts were fairly represented, — yea, although
Mr. Brydone and the Canon Recupero could
have proved, to a demonstration, that the strata
of the earth is not only fourteen thousand, but
fourteen hundred thousand years old. it would
not in the least invalidate a single assertion
contained in the Mosaic history ; for Moses de-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

»*ibcs only the arrangement of the earth into its
present form, but no where asserts, that the ma
terials of which our globe is composed were crea
ted, or brought out of nothing, at the period at
which his history commences. The circum
stance, however, to which I have now adverted,
shows us of how much importance it is, in many
cases, that even a physical fact be fairly stated,
as well as the r./oral facts and the doctrines con
tained in the Scriptures. For, since every fact
in the economy of nature, and in the history of
providence, exhibits a certain portion of the di
vine character, a very different view of this cha
racter will be exhibited, according to the different
lights in which we view the divine operations.
And therefore, everyone who wilfully misrepre
sents a physical fact or law of nature, is a deceiv
er, who endeavours to exhibit a distorted view of
the character of the Deity. It is nothing less
than a man " bearing false witness" against his
Maker.

Again, veracity is of infinite importance in
reference to our future improvement in the eter
nal world. In that world, we have every reason
to believe our knowledge of the attributes of God
will be enlarged, and our views of the range of
his operations in creation and providence extend
ed far beyond the limits to which they are now
confined. But the Divine Being himself, from
the immateriality and immensity of his nature,
will remain forever invisible to all finite intelli
gences ; and hence he is described by the Apos
tle, as " the King Eternal, Immortal, and Invi-
sible, whom no man hath seen or can see." It
is, therefore, not only probable, but absolutely
certain, that a great portion, perhaps the great
est portion of our knowledge in that state, will
be derived from the communications of other in
telligences. With intellectual beings of a higher
order we shall hold the most intimate converse ;
for we are informed, that "just men made per
fect" will join " the innumerable company of
angels." These beings are endued with capa
cious powers of intellect, and have long been
exercising them on the most exalted objects. As
messengers from the King of heaven to the in
habitants of the earth, they have frequently
winged their way through the celestial regions,
and surveyed many of those glorious systems
which lie hid from the view of mortals. We
have every reason to believe, that they have ac
quired expansive views of the dispensations of
the Almighty, not only in relation to man, but in
relation to numerous worlds and intelligences in
different provinces of the empire of God. And,
therefore, they must be admirably qualified to
impart ample stores of information on the subli-
mest subjects, to the redeemed inhabitants from
our world. From the communications of these
intelligences we may derive information of the
order and arrangements of other systems ; of the
•atural scenery of other worlds ; of the different

orders of intellectual beings who people them ;
of the means by which they are carried forward
in moral and intellectual improvement ; of the
most remarkable events which have happened in
the course of their history ; of the peculiar dis
plays of divine glory that may be made to then?,
and of the various changes through which they
may have passed in the course of the divine dis
pensations.

But the utility of all such sublime communica
tions, and the delightful transports with which they
will be accompanied, will entirely depend upon
the immutable veracity of these moral intelligen
ces who shall be employed in conveying infor
mation respecting the divine plans and opera
tions. No fictitious scenes and narrations will
be invented, as in our degenerate world, to asto
nish a gaping crowd ; nothing but unvarnished
truth will be displayed in that world of light : and
the real scenes which will be displayed, will in
finitely transcend, in beauty, in grandeur, and in
interest, all that the most fertile imagination can
conceive. Were a single falsehood to be told in
heaven, were the tongue of an archangel to mis
represent a single fact in the divine economy, 01
were the least suspicion to exist that truth might
be violated in such communications, the mutual
confidence of celestial intelligences would in
stantly be shaken ; and, from that moment, their
intercourse and their happiness would be de
stroyed. Hence, we are repeatedly told, in the
book of Revelation, that, " Whosoever loveth, or
maketh a lie, shall in no wise enter within the
gates of the new Jerusalem." And, therefore,
every one who expects to be an inhabitant of that
happy world, ought now to cultivate a strict re
gard to truth and veracity in all its researches,
intercourses, and communications ; otherwise he
cannot be admitted, from the very constitution
of things, to the society of saints and angels in
the realms of bliss.

Thus it appears, that truth is of the utmost
importance to all rational beings, as it forms the
source of our knowledge, the foundation of all
social intercourse, the ground of our present
comfort and future prospects, the basis of all the
views we can take of the Divine character and
operations, and of all our prospects of future im
provement in the eternal world. It is the bond
of union among all the inhabitants of heaven ; it
is the chain which connects the whole moral
universe ; and it constitutes the immutable
basis on which rests the throne of the Eternal.

In the depraved society of our world, truth is
violated in ten thousand different ways. It is
violated in thoughts, in words, in conversation,
in oral discourses, in writings, in printed books,
by gestures and by signs, by speaking, and hy
remaining silent. It is violated in reference to
the character of our neighbour, when we invent
tales of falsehood respecting him ; when we li»«
ten "vith pleasure to such talcs when fold fay

VIOLATIONS OF TRUTH.

109

•(hers ; when we sit mute, and refuse to vindi
cate his character when it is unjustly aspersed ;
when we endeavour to aggravate the circum-
•tances which may have accompanied any crimi
nal action ; when we make no allowances for the
force of temptation, and the peculiar circum
stances in which the criminal may have been
placed ; when we fix upon an insulated act of
vice or folly, and apply it to our neighbour as a
general character; when we rake up, with a
malevolent design, an action which he has long
since reprobated and repented of; when his cha
racter is made the subject, of jest or merriment,
and when, by smiles, and noddings, and gestures,
we insinuate any thing injurious to his reputa
tion. It is violated in promises — when we pro
mise, either what we have no intention of per
forming, or what we had no right to promise, or
what is out of our power to perform, or what
would be unlawful for us to execute. It is vio
lated in threatening*, when we neglect to put
them in execution, or we threaten to inflict what
would be either cruel or unjust. It is violated
in history, when the principal facts are blended
with doubtful or fictitious circumstances ; when
the conduct of liars and intriguers, of public rob
bers and murderers, is varnished over with the
false glare of heroism and of glory ; and when the
actions of upright men are, without sufficient
evidence, attributed to knavery, or to the influ
ence of fanaticism ; when the writer construes
actions and events, and attributes to the actors
motives and designs, in accordance with his own
prejudices and passions, and interweaves his
opinions and deductions, as if they were a por
tion of the authenticated records of historical fact.
—It is violated in the invention of fictitious nar
ratives, and in the relation of marvellous stories,
when the system of nature is distorted, historical
facts caricatured, misrepresented, and blended
with the vagaries of a romantic imagination ;
when scenes, events, and circumstances, " which
never did nor can take place," are presented to
the view, merely to convey a transient gratifi
cation to trifling and indolent minds.

It is violated by men of science when they give
an inaccurate statement of the results of their
observations and experiments ; when, either
through carelessness or design, they give an un
fair representation of the facts and principles in
nature, in order to support a favourite system or
hypothesis ; and when they studiously keep out
of view the various circumstances in which every
fact should be contemplated. — It is violated in
the literary vxtrld, when the editor of a magazine
or a review writes an article, and addresses it to
himself, as if it came from the pen of another ;
when, for the sake of" filthy lucre," or to gratify a
friend, he bestows encomiums on a work which is
unworthy of the attention of the public; or when,
to gratify a mean, or revengeful passion, he mis-
represents or abuses the literary productions of his

opponents ; or when an author writes a leview
of his own work, and imposes it on the pub'jc,
as if it were the decision of an impartial critic-
— It is violated by controversialists, when thoj
bring forward arguments in support of any pos»
tion which they are conscious are either weak ol
unsound ; when they appear more anxious to dis
play their skill and dexterity, and to obtain a
victory over their adversaries, than to vindicate
the cause of truth ; when sneers, and sarcasms,
and personal reproaches, are substituted in th«
room of substantial arguments ; when they mis
represent the sentiments of their opponents, by
stating them in terms which materially alter their
meaning; and when they palm upon them the
doctrines and opinions which they entirely dis
avow.

It is violated in commercial transactions, when
deteriorated goods are varnished over with a fair
outside, and puffed off as if they were saleable
and sound ; when a merchant asks more than
he is willing to take for any commodity ; when he
depreciates the commodities of his neighbour ;
when he undervalues whatever he is purchasing,
and makes an overcharge for the articles of which
he is disposing ; when he denies the goods he
has in his possession, when there is the prospect
of an advancing price, — and in a thousand other
ways, best known to the nefarious trader. — It is
violated by persons in every department of life,
not only when they utter what they know to be
false, but when they profess to declare the whole
truth, and keep back part of it with an intention
to deceive ; when they make use of a proposition
that is literally true, in order to convey a false
hood ;* when they flatter the vanity of weak
minds; when they ascribe to their friends or to
others good qualities which do not belong to
them, or refuse to acknowledge those accomplish
ments of which they are possessed; when they
endeavour to cajole children into obedience, by
promising what they never intend to perform,
and threatening what they never intend to inflict ;
and when they indulge in a habit of exaggeration,
in the account they give of their adventures, and
of the things which they have seen or heard.

Truth is violated by signs, as well as by words,
— as, when we point with our finger in a wrong
direction, when a traveller is inquiring about the
road he should take ; when a British ship hoists

• The following fact will illustrate this and simi
lar pieces of falsehood:— A person, when selling a
watch, was asked by the purchaser if it kept time
correctly? He was told by the owner, that neither
the hour nor the minute hand had required to be alter
ed for more than a twelve-month. This was literally
true ; but the watch was, nevertheless, a very bad
regulator of time. When hung in a perpendicular po
sition, it went too slow, and, when laid in a horizon
tal position, it went too fast : but by alternately shift-
in? these positions, and thus modifying the rates of
motion, the hands did not require to be altered. Such
assertions, however, are to be considered as direct
lies, when they are intended to convey a false 01 er
roneous conception, as in the instance now stated.

10

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Spanish colours ; when flags of truce are violated ;
when spies insinuate themselves into society as
upright men, for the purpose of entrapping the
unwary ; when false intelligence is communicat
ed to an enemy ; when fires are lighted, or put
out, in order to deceive mariners at sea; and
when signals of distress are counterfeited by ships
sea, for the purpose of decoying into their
power the ships of an enemy.

Truth is violated in relation to God, when we
conceal from those whom we are bound to in
struct, the grandeur and immensity of his works,
and the displays of divine intelligence and skill
which are exhibited in his visible operations;
when we exhibit a diminutive view of the extent
and glory of his kingdom; when we give an in
accurate and distorted representation of the laws
of nature, and of the order and the economy of
the universe ; when we misrepresent the facts
which exist in the system of nature, and which
occur in the truth of providence ; when we call in
question the history of that revelation which he
has confirmed by signs and miracles, and by the
accomplishment of numerous predictions; when
we misrepresent its facts, its doctrines, and its
moral requisitions ; when we transform its histo
rical narrations into a series of parables and alle
gories ; when we distort its literal meaning by
vague and injudicious spiritualizing comments ;
when we fix our attention solely on its doctrines,
and neglect to investigate its moral precepts ;
and when we confine our views to a few points
in the system of revelation, and neglect to con
template its whole range, in all its aspects and
bearings.

In the above, and in ten thousand other modes,
is the law of truth violated by the degenerate in
habitants of our world. The mischiefs and the
miseries which have followed its violation, in re
ference to the affairs of nations, to the private
interests of societies, families, and individuals,
and to the everlasting concerns of mankind, are
incalculable, and dreadful beyond description. It
is one of the principal sources from which have
sprung the numerous abominations and cruelties
connected with the system of Pagan idolatry, the
delusions and the persecuting spirit of the vota
ries of Mahomet, and the pretended miracles,
and " the lying wonders," of that church which
is denominated " the mother of harlots and abomi
nations of the earth." It has been chiefly owing
to the violation of this law, that the thrones of
tyrants have been supported, that liberty has been
destroyed, that public safety and happiness have
been endangered, that empires have been over
turned, that nations have been dashed one against
another, and that war has produced among the hu
man race so many overwhelming desolations. By
the pernicious influence of falsehood, the peace
of families has been invaded, their comforts blast
ed, their good name dishonoured, their wealth
destroyed, their hopes disappointed, and their

bright prospects of happiness involved in a cloud
of darkness and despair. By the sophistry of
unprincipled men, literature and science have
been perverted, and the avenues to substantial
knowledge rendered difficult and dangerous ; liti
gations have been multiplied without number;
human beings have been agitated, perplexed, and
bewildered ; and the widow and the fatherless
oppressed and robbed of their dearest enjoyments.
Could we search the private records of ancient
kings, princes, and legislators, and trace the de
ceitful plans which have been laid in palaces and
cabinets — or could we, at this moment, penetrate
into all the intrigues, deceptions, treacheries,
plots, and machinations, which are going forward
in the cabinets of despots, the mansions of prin
ces, and the courts of law, throughout Europe,
Africa, and Asia ; such a host of falsehoods and
" lying abominations," like an army of spectres
from the infernal regions, would stare us in the
face, as would make us shrink back with horror
and amazement, and fill us with astonishment
that the patience of the God of heaven has been
so long exercised towards the inhabitants of such
a depraved and polluted world.

Let us now consider, for a little, some of the
effects which would inevitably follow were the
law of truth universally violated. In this case a
scene of horror and confusion would ensue, of
which it is difficult for the mind to form any dis
tinct conception. It is obvious, in the first place,
that rational beings could never improve in
knowledge, beyond the range of the sensitive ob
jects that happened to De placed within the sphere
of their personal observation. For, by far the
greater part of our knowledge is derived from the
communications of others, and from the stimulus
to intellectual exertion which such communica
tions produce. — Let us suppose a human being
trained up, from infancy, in a wilderness, by a
bear or a wolf, as history records to have been
the case of several individuals in the forests of
France, Germany, and Lithuania, — what know
ledge could such a being acquire beyond that of
a brute ? He might distinguish a horse from a
cow, and a man from a dog, and know that, such
objects as trees, shrubs, grass, flowers, and wa
ter, existed around him ; but knowledge, strictly
so called, and the proper exercise of his rational
faculties, he could not acquire, so long as he re
mained detached from other rational beings.
Such would be our situation, were falsehood uni
versal among men. We could acquire a know
ledge of nothing but what was obvious to our
senses in the objects with which we were sur
rounded. We could not know whether the earth
were twenty miles, or twenty thousand miles in
extent, and whether oceans, seas, rivers, ami
ranges of mountains, existed on its surface, un
less we had made the tour of it in person, and,
with our own eyes, surveyed the various objects
it contains. Of course, we should remain in ab

EFFECTS OF UNIVERSAL FALSEHOOD.

Ill

iclute ignorance of the existence and the attri
butes of God, of the moral relations of intelligent
beings to their Creator, and to one another, and
of the realities of a future state. For it is only,
or chiefly, through the medium of testimony, com
bined with the evidence of our senses, that we
acquire a knowledge of such truths and objects.

in the next place, all confidence among intel
ligent beings, would be completely destroyed.
Disappointment would invariably attend every
purpose and resolution, and every scheme we
wished to execute, if it depended in the least de
gree upon the direction or assistance of others.
We durst not taste an article of food which we
received from another, lest it should contain poi
son ; nor could we ever construct a house to shel
ter us from the storm, unless our own physical
powers were adequate to the work. Were we
living in Edinburgh, we could never go to Mus-
selburgh or Dalkeith, if we were previously ig
norant of the situation of these places ; or were
we residing in London, it would be impossible
for us ever to find our way to Hommerton or
Hampstead, unless, after a thousand attempts,
chance should happen to direct us ; and when we
arrived at either of these villages, we should still
be in as much uncertainty as ever whether it was
the place to which we intended to direct our
steps. Confidence being destroyed, there could
be no friendship, no union of hearts, no affection
ate intercourse, no social converse, no consola
tion or comfort in the hour of distress, no hopes
of deliverance in the midst of danger, and no
prospect of the least enjoyment from any being
around us. In such a case, the mind would feel
itself as in a wilderness, even when surrounded
by fellow intelligences, and wherever it roamed
over the vast expanse of nature, or among the
mass of living beings around it, it would meet
with no affectionate interchange of feelings and
sentiments, and no object on which it could rest
for solace and enjoyment. Every one would feel
as if he were placed in the midst of an infinite
void, and as if he were the only being residing
in the universe. In such a case we would flee
from the society of men as we would do from a
lion or a tiger when rushing on his prey ; and
hide ourselves in dens, and forests, and caverns
of the earth, till death should put a period to a
cheerless and miserable existence.

All social intercourses and relations would
cease ; — families could not possibly exist ; nor
any affectionate intercourse between the sexes ;
for truth, and the confidence which is founded
upon it, are implied in all the intercourses of
husbands and wives, of brothers and sisters,
and of parents and children ; — and consequently,
the human race, dropping into the grave, one
after another, like the leaves of autumn, without
any successors, would, in a short time, be extir
pated fiom the earth. In such a state, kindness
and affection would never be exercised ; trade

and commerce, buying and selling,sociat compacts
and agreements would be annihilated ; science,
literature, and the arts, could not exist ; and con
sequently, universities, colleges, churches, aca
demies, schools, and every other seminary of in
struction would be unknown. No villages, towns,
nor cities would be built ; no fields cultivated ;
no orchards, vineyards, nor gardens planted ; no
intercourse would exist between different regions
of the globe ; and nothing but one drerfry barren
waste would be presented to the eye, throughout
the whole expanse of nature. So that were
truth completely banished from the earth, it
would present a picture of that dark and dismal
region where " all liars have their portion !"
where all are deceivers and deceived, and where
the hopeless mind roams amidst innumerable
false intelligences, for one ray of comfort, or one
confidential spirit in which it may confide, but
roams in vain.

In short, were truth banished not only from
this world, but from the universe at large, crea-
tion would be transformed into a chaos ; the
bond which now connects angels and archangels,
cherubim and seraphim, in one harmonious union,
would be forever dissolved; the inhabitants of all
worlds would be thrown into a state of universal
anarchy , they would shun each other's society,
and remain as so many cheerless and insulated
wretches, amidst the gloom and desolations of
universal nature ; all improvements in know
ledge, and all progressive advances towards moral
perfection, would be forever interrupted ; and
happiness would be banished from the whole in
telligent system. Every mind would become the
seat of terror and suspense, and would be haunt
ed with frightful spectres and dreadful expecta
tions. The government of the Eternal would
be subverted, the moral order of the intelligent
system overturned ; all subordination would
cease, and misery would reign uncontrolled
throughout every region of intellectual existence.
For truth is implied in the principle of love ; it
is essential to its existence ; so that the one can
not operate except on the basis of the other : and
we have already shown, that the destruction of
love would be the destruction of all order, and ot
all happiness among intelligent beings.

Such are some of the dreadful effects which
would inevitably follow, were the law under con
sideration reversed or universally violated. In
our world this law has, hitherto, been only/wr-
tially violated ; yet what dreadful mischiefs, be
yond calculation, and even beyond conception,
has its frequent violation created ! Ever since
that moment when " the father of lies" deceived
the first human pair, how many thousands of
millions of liars have trodden in his footsteps !
and what a host of falsehoods has followed in
their train, which have destroyed the harmony of
the moral system, and robbed the werld of hap
piness and repose ! Yet how litt'e are we affect-

112

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

ed by the frequent violations of this law ? and
how seldom do we reflect, that every falsehood
we unadvisedly utter, is an infringement of that
law on which rest the throne of the Almighty
and the eternal happiness of the universe ? For
if one lie may be palliated or vindicated, on the
same principle we might vindicate a thousand,
and a million, and millions of millions, till false
hood became universal among all ranks of
beings and till the moral order of the intelligent
creation was completely subverted. Of how
much importance is it then, that an inviolable at
tachment to truth, in its minutest ramifications,
be early impressed upon the minds of the young,
by persuasion, by precept, by example, by rea
soning, and by a vivid representation of its im
portance, and of its inestimable benefits ? and
how careful should we be to preserve them from
all incentives to the practice of lying, and espe
cially from the company of those " whose mouth
speaketh vanity, and their right hand is a right
hand of falsehood."

Were falsehood universally detested, &nd the
loveof truth universally cherished ; were asingle
lie never more to be uttered by any inhabitant of
this globe, what a mighty change would be ef
fected in the condition of mankind, and what a
glorious radiance would be diffused over all the
movements of the intelligent system ? The
whole host of liars, perjurers, sharpers, seducers,
slanderers, tale-bearers, quacks, thieves, swin
dlers, harpies, fraudulent dealers, false friends,
flatterers, corrupt judges, despots, sophists, hypo
crites, and religious impostors, with the count
less multitude of frauds, treacheries, impositions,
falsehoods, and distresses which have followed in
their train, would instantly disappear from among
men. The beams of truth, penetrating through
the mists of ignorance, error, and perplexity,
produced by sophists, sceptics, and deceivers,
which have so long enveloped the human mind,
would diffuse a lustre and a cheerfulness on the
face of the moral world, like the mild radiance
of the morning afier a dark and tempestuous
night. Confidence would be restored through
out every department of social life ; jealousy,
suspicion, and distrust would no longer rankle
in the human breast ; and unfeigned affection,
fidelity, and friendship, would unite the whole
brotherhood of mankind. With what a beauti
ful simplicity, and with what smoothness and
harmony would the world of trade move onward
in all its transactions ! How many cares and
anxieties would vanish ! how many perplexities
would cease! and how many ruinous litigations
would be prevented ? For the violation of truth
may be considered as the chief cause of all those
disputes respecting property, which have plung
ed so many families into suspense and wretched
ness. The tribunals of justice would be purified
from every species of sophistry and deceit ; and
the promises of kings, and the leagues of nations,

would be held sacred and inviolate. Science
would rapidly advance towards perfection ; for,
as all its principles and doctrines are founded
upon facts, when truth is universally held invio
lable, the facts on which it is built will always
be fairly represented. Every fact asserted by
voyagers and travellers, in relation to the physi
cal or the moral world, and every detail of ex
periments made by the chemist and the philoso-
pher, would form a sure ground-work for the
development of truth, and the detection of error;
without the least suspicion arising in the mind
respecting the veracity of the persons on whose
testimony we rely. For want of this confidence
the mind has been perplexed and distracted by
the jarring statements of travellers, naturalists,
and historians ; false theories have been fram
ed ; systems have been reared on the baseless
fabric of a vision ; the foundations of science
have been shaken ; its utility called in question,
and its most sublime discoveries overlooked and
disregarded.

In fine, the clouds which now obscure many
of the sublime objects of religion, and the reali.
ties of a future world, would be dispelled, were
falsehood unknown, and truth beheld in its na
tive light ; and religion, purified from every mix
ture of eiror and delusion, would appear arrayed
in its own heavenly radiance, and attract the love
and the admiration of men. When exhibited
in its native grandeur and simplicity, all doubts
respecting its divine origin would soon evanish
from the mind — the beauty and sublimity of its
doctrines would be recognised as worthy of its
Author ; and all its moral requisitions would be
perceived to be " holy, just, and good," and
calculated to promote the order, and the ever
lasting happiness of the intelligent universe.
Divine truth irradiating every mind, and accom*
panied with the emanations of heavenly love,
would dispel the gloom which now hangs over
many sincere and pious minds ; would unite
man to man, and man to God ; and the inhabi
tants of this world, freed from every doubt, error,
and perplexity, would move forward in harmony
and peace, to join" the innumerable company of
angels, and the general assembly of the spirits of
just men made perfect, whose names are written
in heaven."

THE TENTH COMMANDMENT.

" Thou shall not covet thy neighbour's house,
thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor
his man-servant, nor his maid-servant, nor his
ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that it thy neigh
bour's."

Every precept of the law to which I have
hitherto adverted, has a reference not only to the
external conduct of moral agents, but also to the
internal motives or principles from which th&f
conduct proceeds This is evident from th* con-

TENDENCY OF COVETOUSNESS.

113

lid :r at ions already stated, and from the whole
tenor of Divine Revelation ; — and it is in unison
with reason, and with the common sense of
mankind, that the merit or demerit of any action
is to be estimated, according to the intention of
the actor, and the disposition from which it
flows. That no doubt may remain on this point,
the Supreme Legislator closes the decalogue
with a command, which has a reference solely to
the desires and dispositions of the mind : " Thou
shall not covet." Covetousness consists in an
inordinate desire of earthly objects and enjoy
ments. This desire, when uniformly indulged,
leads to a breach of almost every other precept of
the Divine law ; and is the source of more than
one half of all the evils which afflict the human
race. It leads to a breach of the eighth com
mand, by exciting either to fraudulent dealings, or
to direct acts of theft and robbery. — It leads to
a breach of the ninth command, by cherishing the
principle of falsehood which is implied in every
fraudulent transaction. — It leads to a violation of
the sixth command, by engendering a spirit of re
venge against those who stand in the way of its
gratification ; and by exciting the covetous man
•to the commission of murder, in order to accom
plish his avaricious desires. — It also leads to a
violation of the seventh command ; for, when one
" covets his neighbour's wife," the next step is
to endeavour to withdraw her affection from her
husband, and to plunge a family into misery and
distress. — It also leads to a violation of the fifth
precept of the law, not only as it steels the heart
against those kindly filial affections which child
ren ought to exercise towards their parents, but
as it excites them to withhold from their parents,
when in old age and distress, those external com
forts which are requisite to their happiness, and
which it is the duty of affectionate children to pro
vide. And, when covetousness has thus led to
the breach of every other precept of the second
table of the law, it follows, that all the precepts of
the first table are also virtually violated. For all
the commandments of the first table are briefly
summed up in this comprehensive precept, "Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart:"
but it is obviously impossible, nay, it would be a
contradiction in terms, to suppose, that supreme
love to the Creator can reside in the same breast
in which an inordinate desire of worldly enjoy
ments reigns uncontrolled, and in which love to
man has no existence. So that covetousness
may be considered as the great barrier which
separates between man and his Maker, and also
as the polluted fountain from whence flow all the
moral abominations and the miseries of mankind.
The more obvious and direct manifestation of
this principle is generally distinguished by the
name of Avarice, or an inordinate desire of riches.
And what a countless host of evils has flowed
from this unhallowed passion, both in relation to
individuals, to families, to nations, and to tho
28

world at large ! In relation *.o the avaricious
man himself, could we trace all the eager desires,
anxieties, perplexities, and cares, which harass
his soul ; the fraudulent schemes he is obliged to
contrive, in order to accomplish his object ; the
miserable shifts to which he is reduced, in order
to keep up the appearance of common honesty ;
the mass of contradictions, and the medley of
falsehoods, to which he is always obliged to have
recourse ; the numerous disappointments to which
his eager pursuit of wealth continually exposes
him, and by which his soul is pierced as with so
many daggers — we should behold a wretched
being, the prey of restless and contending pas
sions, with a mind full of falsehoods, deceitful
schemes, and grovelling affections, like a cage-
full of every unclean and hateful bird, — a mind in
capable of any rational enjoyment in this life, and
entirely incapacitated for relishing the nobler
enjoyments of the life to come. Such a man is
not only miserable himself, but becomes a moral
nuisance to the neighbourhood around him;
stinting his own family of its necessary comforts ;
oppressing the widow and the fatherless ; grasp
ing with insatiable fangs every house, tenement,
and patch of land within his reach ; hurrying
poor unfortunate debtors to jail ; setting adrift
the poor and needy from their long-accustomed
dwellings ; and presenting to the young and
thoughtless a picture, which is too frequently
copied, of an immortal mind immersed in the
mire of the most degrading passions, and wor
shipping and serving the creature more than
the Creator, who is blessed forever.

In relation to large communities and nations,
this grovelling passion has produced, on an ex
tensive scale, the most mischievous and destruc
tive effects. It has plundered palaces, churches,
seats of learning, and repositories of art ; it has
polluted the courts of judicature, and the tribunals
of justice ; it has corrupted magistrates, judges,
and legislators ; and has transformed many even
of the ministers of religion, into courtly syco
phants, and hunters after places and pensions.
It has ground whole nations to poverty, under
the load of taxation ; it has levelled spacious
cities with the dust ; turned fruitful fields into a
wilderness ; spread misery over whole empires ;
drenched the earth with human gore ; and waded
through fields of blood in order to satiate its un
governable desires. What has led to most of
the wars which have desolated the earth, in every
age, but the insatiable cravings of this restless
and grovelling passion? It was the cursed love
of gold that excited the Spaniards to ravage
the territories of Mexico and Peru, to violate
every principle of justice and humanity, to mas
sacre, and to perpetrate the most horrid cruelties
on their unoffending inhabitants. It is the same
principle, blended with the lust of power, which
still actuates the infatuated rulers of that unhappy
nation, in their vain attempts to overthrow the

114

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Independence of their former colonies. The
same principle commenced, and still carries on,
that abominable traffic, the slave trade, — a traffic
which has entailed misery on millions of the
sons of Africa; which has excited wars, and
feuds, and massacres, among her numerous
tribes ; which has forever separated from each
other brothers and sisters, parents and children ;
which has suffocated thousands of human beings
in the cells of a floating dungeon, and plunged
ten thousands into a watery grave ; — a traffic
which is a disgrace to the human species ; which
has transformed civilized men into infernal fiends;
which has trampled on every principle of justice ;
which has defaced the image of God in man, and
extinguished every spark of humanity from the
minds of the ferocious banditti which avarice
has employed for accomplishing her nefarious
designs .*

Ambition, or, an inordinate desire of power,
superiority, and distinction, is another modifica
tion of this malignant principle. This passion is
manifested, in a greater or less degree, by men
of all ranks and characters, and in every situa
tion in life. It is displayed in the school-room
by the boy who is always eager to stand fore
most in his class ; in the ball-room, by the lady
who is proud of her beauty, and of her splendid
attire ; in the corporation-hail, by the citizen who
struts with an air of conscious dignity, and is
ever and anon aiming at pompous harangues ;
on the bench, by the haughty and overbearing
judge ; in the church, by those rulers who, like
Diotrephes, " Love to have the pre-eminence ;"
in the pulpit, by the preacher whose main object
it is to excite the admiration and applause of a
surrounding audience ; in the streets, by the pom
pous airs of the proud dame, the coxcomb, and
the dashing squire ; in the village, by him who
has a better house, and a longer purse, than his
neighbours ; in the hamlet, by the peasant who
can lift the heaviest stone, or fight and wrestle
with the greatest strength or agility ; ^and in the
city, by the nobleman who endeavours to rival
all his compeers in the magnificence of his man
sion, and the splendour of his equipage ; among
the learned, by their eager desire to spread their
name to the world, and to extend their fame to
succeeding generations ; and among all classes

• That this accursed traffic is still carried on, with
unabated vigour, by the civilized powers of Europe,
appears from the following statement: —"The boats
of a British Frigate, the Maidstone, boarded, in
eleven days of June, 1824, no less than ten French
vessels, at a single spot upon the coast of Africa ; the
measurement of which vessels was between 1400 and
1GOO tons, while they were destined for the incarce
ration—we might say, the living burial— of 3000 hu
man beings !" The report to Government says— " The
schooner La Louisa, Capt. Armand, arrived at Gau-
daloupe, during the first days of April, 1824, with a
cargo of 200 negroes, the remainder of a complement
of 375,whi,h the vessel had on board The vessel
not being large enough to accommodate so great a
number of men, the overplus were consigned ALIVE
to ihe waves by the. Captain /"

who assume airs of importance, on account of th»
antiquity of their families, their wealth, their ex
ploits of heroism, and their patrimonial posses
sions.

But it is chiefly on the great theatre of the world
that ambition has displayed its most dreadful en
ergies, and its most overwhelming devastations.
In order to gain possession of a throne, it has
thrown whole nations into a state of convulsion
and alarm. The road to political power and pre
eminence, has been prepared by the overflow of
truth andjustice, by fomenting feuds and conten
tions, by bribery, murder, and assassinations, by
sanguinary battles, by the plunder of whole pro
vinces, the desolation of cities and villages, and
by the sighs, the groans, and lamentations of un
numbered widows and orphans. In order to
raise a silly mortal to despotic power on the
throne of Spain, how many human victims have
been sacrificed at the altar of ambition ! how
many families have been rent asunder, and plung
ed into irremediable ruin ! and how many illustri
ous patriots have been immured in dungeons,
and have expired under the axe of the execution
er! At the present moment, the fertile vales of
Mexico, the mountains and plains of South
America, the forests of the Burmese, and the
shores of Turkey and of Greece, are everywhere
covered with the ravages of this fell destroyer,
whose path is always marked with desolation and
bloodshed. To recount all the evils which am
bition has produced over this vast globe, would
be to write a history of the struggles and con
tests of nations, and of the sorrows and sufferings
of mankind. So insatiable is this ungovernable
passion, that the whole earth appears a field too
small for its malignant operations. Alexander
the Great, after having conquered the greater
part of the known world, wept, because he had
not another world to conquer. Were there no
physical impediments to obstruct the course of
this detestable passion, it would ravage, not only
the globe on which we dwell, but the whole of the
planetary worlds ; it would range from system to
system, carry ing ruin and devastation in its train,
till the material universe was involved in misery
and desolation ; and it would attempt to subvert
even the foundations of the throne of the Eternal.

Such are some of the dismal and destructive
effects of cnvetousness, when prosecuting the
paths of avarice and ambition : and when we
consider that it is uniformly accompanied in its
progress, with pride, envy, discontentment, and
restless desires, — it is easy to perceive, that, were
it left to reign without control over the human
mind, it would soon desolate every region of the
earth, and produce all ihe destructive effects
which, as we have already shown, would flow
from a universal violation of the other precepts
of God's law.

On the other hand, Contentment,— the duty
implied in this command, would draw along with

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS.

115

it an unnumbered train of blnssings, and would
restore tranquillity and repose to our distracted
world. To be contented under the allotments of
tho providence of God, is one of the first and
fundamental duties of every rational creature.
By contentment and resignation to the divine
disposal, we recognise God as the supreme Go
vernor of the universe ; as directed by infinite
wisdom, in the distribution of his bounty among
the children of men ; as proceeding on the basis
of eternal and immutable justice, in all his pro
vidential arrangements ; and as actuated by a
principle of unbounded benevolence, which has
a regard to the ultimate happiness of his crea
tures. Under the government of such a Being,
we have abundant reason, not only to be con
tented and resigned, but to be glad and to rejoice.
" The Lord reigneth, let the earth be glad, let
the multitude of the isles thereof rejoice." How
ever scanty may be the portion of earthly good
measured out to us at present, and however per
plexing and mysterious the external circumstan
ces in which we may now be involved, we may
rest assured, that, under the government of un
erring wisdom, rectitude, and benevolence, all
such dispensations shall ultimately be found to
have been, not only consistent with justice, but
conducive to our present and everlasting inte
rests. Were such sentiments and affections to
pervade the minds of all human beings, what a
host of malignant passions would be chased away
from the hearts and from the habitations of men?
Restless cares, and boundless and unsatisfied de
sires, which constitute the source and the essence
of misery, would no longer agitate and torment
the human mind. Voluptuousness would no lon
ger riot at the table of luxury on dainties, wrung
from the sweat of thousands ; — nor avarice glut
its insatiable desires with the spoils of the widow
and the orphan ; — nor ambition ride in triumph
over the miseries of a suffering world. Every
one, submissive to the allotments of his Creator,
and grateful for that portion of his bounty which
he has been pleased to bestow, would view the
wealth and enjoyments of his neighbour with a
kind and benignant eye, and rejoice in the pros
perity of all around him. Benevolence and
peace would diffuse their benign influence over
the nations, and mankind, delivered from the fear
of every thing that might " hurt or destroy,"
would march forward in harmony and affection,
to that happier world where every wish will be
crowned, and every holy desire satisfied in God
»' their exceeding great reward."

Thus it appears, that, on the observance o*
this law, which closes the Decalogue, and which
lias a reference to a single affection of the mind
— the order and happiness of the intelligent sys
tem almost entirely depends. Let the flood
gates of Cotetousness be burst open, and let it
ilow in every direction without control, — in a
Bliort period the world is desolated, and over

whelmed with a deluge of miseries. Let the
current of every passion and desire be restrained
within its legitimate boundary, and let content
ment take up its residence in every heart, and
this deluge will soon be dried up, and a new world
will appear, arrayed in all the loveliness, and
verdure, and beauty of Eden. May Jehovah
hasten it in his time !

Thus I have endeavoured, in the preceding
sketches, to illustrate the reasonableness of those
laws which God has promulgated for regulating
the moral conduct of the intelligent creation. If
the propriety of these illustrations be admitted,
they may be considered as a commentary on the
words of the Apostle Paul : " The law is holy,
and the commandment is holy and just and good."
In like manner it might have been shown, that
all the Apostolic injunctions, and other precepts
recorded in the volume of inspiration, are accor
dant with the dictates of reason, jind with the
relations of moral agents ; for they are all so
many subordinate ramifications of the principles
and laws, which I have already illustrated.

General Conclusions and Remarks, founded on
the preceding illustrations.

I shall now conclude this chapter with the
statement of a few remarks in relation to the
moral law, founded on the illustrations which
have been given in the preceding pages ; which
may be considered as so many inferences deduc
ed from the general subject which has now occu
pied our attention.

I. In the first place, one obvious conclusion
from the preceding illustrations is, That the
laws of God are not the commands of an arbitra
ry Sovereign, but are founded on the nature of
things, and on the relations which exist in the
intelligent system. Many divines, especially
those of the supralapsarian school, have been dis
posed to ascribe every regulation of the Deity
to the Divine Sovereignty. I have been told
that, in one of the Latin treatises of Mr. Samuel
Rutherford, Professor of Divinity, in St. An
drews, there is a sentiment to the following pur
pose : " That such is the absolute sovereignty
of God, that had it so pleased him, he might have
mtide every precept of the moral law given to
man exactly the reverse of what we now find it."
A sentiment more directly repugnant to the scrip
tural character of God, and to every view we
can take of the divine attributes, it is scarcely
possible for the human mind to entertain ; and it
shows us the dangerous consequences to which
we are exposed, when we attempt to push cer
tain theological dogmas to an extreme. If it were
possible to suppose the Deity capable of such an
act, it would overturn all the grounds on which
we are led to contemplate him as glorious, amia
ble, and adorable. At some future period in the
revolutions of eternit/, his tove, his rectitude

116

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

and his faithfulness, might be changed into male
volence, injustice, and falsehood. If the requi
sitions of the moral law depended solely on the
Divine Sovereignty, then there is no inherent
excellence in virtue ; and theft, falsehood, mur
der, idolatry, profanity, cruelty, wars, devasta
tions, and the malevolence of infernal demons,
might become equally amiable and excellent as
truth, justice, benevolence, and the songs and
adorations of angels ; provided the Deity willed
the change to take place. But this is impossi
ble ; and it is evident, I trust, from the preced
ing illustrations, that, were moral laws, directly
opposite to those contained in the scriptural
code, to be prescribed to men, or to any other
class of moral agents, not only would misery
reign uncontrolled through the universe, but, in
a short time, the operation of such laws would
annihilate the whole intelligent creation.

It is evident, then, that the moral law is not
founded on the will of God, but on the relations
of intelligent beings, and on its own intrinsic
excellence ; or, in other words, on its tendency
to produce happiness throughout the intelligent
system. This idea nearly coincides with that
of some of our modern moralists, who maintain
" that virtue is founded on utility," — if, by utility,
is meant a tendency to promote happiness. But
it by no means follows, from this position, as
some moralists have concluded, that utility is the
guide, or the rule by which we are to be direct
ed in our moral conduct. This may be consi
dered as the rule which directs the conduct of the
Divine Being, whose eye takes in the whole
system of creation, whose knowledge extends
from eternity past, to eternity to come, and who
perceives, at one glance, the remotest conse
quences of every action. But it cannot be a rule
for subordinate intelligences, and especially for
man, who stands near the lowest degree of the
scale of intellectual existence. From the limit
ed range of view to which he is confined, he
cannot trace the remote consequences of any
particular action, the bearings it may have on
unnumbered individuals, and the relation in
which it may stand to the concerns of the eter
nal world. An action which, to our limited
view, may appear either beneficial or indiffer
ent, may involve a principle which, if traced to
its remotest consequences, would lead to the de
struction of the moral universe. It might ap
pear, at first view, on the whole, beneficial to
society, that an old unfeeling miser should be
gently suffocated, and his treasures applied for
the purpose of rearing asylums for the aged
poor, and seminaries of instruction for the young.
But the principle which would sanction such an
action, if generally acted upon, would lead to
universal plunder, robbery, and bloodshed. To
tell a lie to a child, in order to induce it to take
a nauseous medicine which is essential to its
recovery from disease, may appear, in such a

case, to have a benevolent tendency; but w«
have already shown, that were such a principle
universally admitted, it would introduce anarchy
and misery through the universe, and would ul
timately annihilate the intelligent creation.
Man, in his present state, can be directed only
by positive laws preceding from the Almighty,
whose comprehensive mind alone can trace all
their consequences to the remotest corners of the
universe, and through all the ages of eternity.
These laws are contained in the Scriptures — a
comprehensive summary of which has been the
subject of the preceding illustrations. And we
know, in point of fact, that in every country
where these laws are either unknown, or not
recognised, there is no fixed standard of morals :
and vice, in its various ramifications, almost
universally prevails.

From what has been now stated we may infer
— that a full and unreserved obedience to the Di
vine laiu is a most reasonable requisition. Men
are too frequently disposed to view the commands
of God as the dictates of an arbitrary Sovereign.
There is a secret thought that occasionally
lodges in the heart of every human being, that
the law of God is too extensive and rigorous in
its demands, accompanied with a secret wish,
that the severity of its requisitions could be a
little modified or relaxed. Every man is sub
ject to some " besetting sin," and he is apt to
say within himself—" If I were allowed but a
little license with regard to one precept of the
law, I would endeavour to do what I could to
comply with the requisitions of the rest." But,
it would be inconsistent both with the benevolence
of the Deity, and with the happiness of his moral
creation, either to modify or to relax any one re
quirement of his law; for it is & perfect law, from
which nothing can be taken without impairing
its excellence and utility. Were he to do so,
it would be in effect, to shut up the path to hap
piness, and to open the flood-gates of misery
upon the universe. Although it is impossible for
man in his present degraded condition, to yield a
perfect obedience to this law, yet nothing short
of perfect obedience ought to be his aim. For
in as far as we fall short of it, in so far do we
fall short of happiness; and consequently, till that
period arrives when our obedience shall reach
the summit of perfection, our happiness must re
main incomplete, and a certain portion of misery
must be expected to mingle itself with all our en
joyments.

II. There is so intimate a connexion between
all the parts of the Divine law , that the habitual
violation of any one precept necessarily include*
the violation of the greater part, if not the whole
of the other precepts. This is evident from the
general tenor of the preceding illustrations. It
has been shown that a breach of the first com
mandment includes pride, falsehood, blasphemy,
ingratitude, and hatred of moral excellence , aod

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS.

117

that it leads to injustice, cruelty, murder, ob
scenity, and the most revolting abominations. A
breach of the fifth involves a principle which
would sap the foundations of all government and
moral order, and transform society into a rabble
of lawless banditti. The violation of the eighth
is connected with falsehood, treachery, and cove-
iousness, and leads to oppression, robbery, plun
der, murders, and the devastation of empires ;
and the violation of the tenth, though consisting
only in the indulgence of an irregular desire, is
the origin of almost every other species of moral
turpitude, in relation either to God or to man.
In like manner it might be shown, that the strict
and regular observance of any one precept is ne
cessarily connected with a regard for all the other
requirements of God's law.

III. It appears, from the preceding illustra
tions, that a universal violation of any one of the
six precepts of the second table of the law, would
lead to the entire destruction of the human race,
[n the case of the sixth commandment being sup
posed to be reversed, or universally violated, this
effect would be most rapidly produced ; but the
destruction and complete extirpation of human
beings from the earth would be as certainly ef
fected, in the course of two or three generations,
by the universal violation of any one of the other
five precepts. Some of the circumstances which
would necessarily produce this effect, are alluded
to, in the preceding illustration of these pre
cepts. And as the first principle of the moral
law, love to God, is the foundation of the precepts
contained in the second table, it is obvious, that
the same effect would ultimately follow from a
Universal violation of the first four precepts of the
Decalogue.

IV. It follows from what has hitherto been
rtated, That the moral law has never yet been
tniversally violated, nor has any one of its pre-
lepts been completely reversed in the conduct of
the inhabitants of our globe. Every individual,
of all the millions of mankind that have existed
since the fall of Adam, has, indeed, in one shape
or another, broken every one of the command
ments of God; but such breaches have not been
constant and uniform, and running through every
action he performed. Falsehood has always
been mingled with a portion of truth, theft with
honesty, cruelty with clemency and mercy, an
archy with subordination, and licentiousness with
chastity and purity. It is owing to this partial
obedience to the dictates of the law of nature,
impressed upon every human heart, that the
world of mankind has hitherto been preserved in
existence. The partial violation, however, of
the divine law, which has characterized the ac
tions ot' mankind, in all ages, has been the source
of all lit* calamities, miseries, and moral abomi
nation:, under which the earth has groaned from
generation to generation; and, in proportion to
the exttot of this violation, will be the extent of

wretchedness and misery entailed on the human
race. — That a universal violation of God's law
has never yet taken place in any region of the
earth, is not owing so much to any want of en
ergy, or of malignity in the principle of disobe
dience which is seated in the hearts of men as to
the restraining influence of the moral Governor
of the world, and to the physical impediments
which he has placed to prevent the diabolical
passions of men from raging without control.
Whether it be possible for any class of intelligent
organized beings to subsist for any length of time,
under a complete violation of the moral law, it is
not for us positively to determine ; but it is evi
dent to a demonstration, that in the present phy
sical condition of the human race, such a viola
tion would unhinge the whole fabric of society,
and, in a short time, exterminate the race of
Adam from the earth.

V. The greater part of the precepts of the De
calogue is binding upon superior intelligences,
and upon the inhabitants of all worlds, as well as
upon man. For any thing we know to the con
trary, there may be worlds in different regions of
the universe, and oven within the bounds of our
planetary system, where their inhabitants are
placed in circumstances similar to those in which
man was placed in his paradisiacal state; and,
consequently, where the precepts which compose
their moral code may be exactly the same as ours.
But, it is highly probable that, in general, the
inhabitants of the various globes, which float in
the immensity of space, differ as much in their
moral circumsfances and relations, as the globes
themselves do in their size, their physical consti
tution, and their natural scenery. I have already
shown, (p. 78, &c.) that there are seven pre
cepts of our moral law which are common to the
inhabitants of all worlds, namely, thejirst, second,
third, fourth, (seep. 114,) the sixth, the ninth,
and the tenth. And, if there be no portion of
the intelligent system in which subordination, in
a greater or less degree, does not exist, then, the
fifth precept of our code must also be a law com
mon to all intelligences. It was formerly stated,
(p. 102,) that the seventh precept is in all proba
bility, a law peculiar to the inhabitants of the
earth, during the present economy ofProvidence ;
and, perhaps it is the only one which is not ap
plicable to the other inhabitants of the universe.
So that the moral laws given to man may be con
sidered as substantially the same with those
which govern all the other parts of the universal
system.

VI. From the preceding illustrations, we may
infer, the excellency and the divine origin of the
Christian Revelation. The Scriptures contain
the most impressive evidence of their heavenly
original in their own bosom. The wide range
of objects they embrace, extending from the com
mencement of our earthly system, through all
the revolutions of time, to the period of its terrai-

118

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

nation • and from tne countless ages of eternity
past, If. the more grand and diversified scenes of
eternity 'o come — the plan of Providence which
they unfold, and the views they exhibit of the
moral principles of the Divine government, and
of the subordination of all events to the accom
plishment of a glorious design — the character and
attributes of the Creator, which they illustrate
by the most impressive delineations, and the
most lofty and sublime descriptions — the views
they exhibit of the existence, the powers, the
capacities, the virtues, and the employments of
superior orders of intellectual beings — the de
monstrations they afford of the dignified station,
and of the high destination of man — and the sub
lime and awful scenes they unfold, when the earth
" shall melt like wax at the presence of the Lord,"
when the throne of judgment shall be set, and
tho unnumbered millions of the race of Adam
shall be assembled before the Judge of all — infi
nitely surpass every thing which the unassisted
imaginations of men could have devised, and
every thing which had ever been attempted by
the greatest sages of antiquity, either in prose or
in rhyme; and, consequently prove, to a moral
demonstration, that a Power and Intelligence,
superior to the human mind, must have suggest
ed such sublime conceptions, and such astonish
ing ideas; since there are no prototypes of such
objects to be found within the ordinary range of
the human mind.

But the subject to which we have been hither
to adverting, when properly considered, suggests
an evidence of the truth and divinity of the Scrip
tures, as striking, and, perhaps, more convincing
than any other. They unfold to us the moral
laws of the universe — they present to us a sum
mary of moral principles and precepts, which is
applicable to all the tribes and generations of
men, to all the orders of angelic beings, and to
all the moral intelligences that people the ampli
tudes of creation — to man, during his temporary
abode on earth, and to man, when placed in
heaven, so long as eternity endures — precepts,
which, if universally observed, would banish
misery from the creation, and distribute happi
ness, without alloy, among all the intellectual be
ings that exist throughout the empire of God.
Can these things be affirmed of any other system
of religion or of morals that was ever published
to the world ? The Greek and Roman moralists,
after all their laboured investigations, could never
arrive at any certain determination with regard
to the nature of happiness, and the means of at
taining it. We are told by Varro, one of the
most learned writers of the Augustan age, that,
the heathen philosophers had embraced more
than two hundred and eighty different opinions
respecting the supreme good. Some of them
taught that it consisted in sensual enjoyments,
and in freedom from pain ; others considered it
as placed in study and contemplation, in military

glory, in riches, honours, wealth, and fame. Some
of their moral maxims, separately considered,
were rational and excellent; but they were con
nected with other maxims, which completely
neutralized all their virtue, and their tendency to
produce happiness. Pride, falsehood, injustice,
impurity, revenge, and an unfeeling apathy to
the distresses of their fellow-creatures, were
considered as quite consistent with their system
of morality; and such malignant principles and
practices were blended with their most virtuous
actions. But we have already shown, that the
uniform operation of such principles would ne
cessarily lead to the destruction of all happiness,
and to the overthrow of all order throughout the
intelligent creation.

Now, can it be supposed, for a moment, that a
Jew, who had spent forty years of his life as a
shepherd in a desert country, who lived in a rude
age of the world, who had never studied a sys
tem of ethics, and whose mind was altogether
incapable of tracing the various relations which
subsists between intelligent beings and their
Creator, could have investigated those moral
principles and laws which form the foundation ol
the moral universe, and the basis of the divine
government in all worlds; unless they had been
communicated immediately by Him, who, at one
glance, beholds all the physical and moral rela
tions which exist throughout creation, and who
can trace the bearings and the eternal conse
quences of every moral law ? Or can we sup
pose, that, throughout the whole period of the
Jewish economy, and during the first ages of the
Christian dispensation, a multitude of writers
should appear, many of them unknown to each
other, all of whom should uniformly recognise
those laws in their minutest bearings and rami
fications, unless their minds had been enlight
ened and directed by the same powerful and un
erring Intelligence ? If these laws are distin
guished by their extreme simplicity, they are the
more characteristic of their divine Author, who,
from the general operation of a few simple prin
ciples and laws in the system of nature, produces
all the variety we perceive in the material world,
and all the harmonies, the contrasts, the beauties,
and the sublimities of the universe. If it be
asked why these laws, which are so extremely
simple and comprehensive, were not discovered
nor recognised by the ancient sages ? It might
be answered, by asking why the laws of gravita
tion, which are also simple and comprehensive,
were not discovered, till Newton arose to inves
tigate the agencies of nature, and to pour a flood
of light on the system of the universe? But
the true reasons are — the unassisted powers of
the human mind were inadequate to the task of
surveying all the moral relations which subsist
throughout the intelligent system, and of tracing
those moral principles which would apply to the
whole assemblage of moral agents, so as to se-

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS.

119

CMre thi happiness of each individual, and of
the system as one great whoie — that the laws of
God were almost directly contrary to the lead
ing maxims of morality which prevailed in the
world — and that they struck at the root of all
those principles of pride, ambition, revenge, and
iaxi-,urity, which almost universally directed the
conduct of individuals and of nations.

If, then, we find in a book which professes to
be a revelation from heaven, a system of moral
laws which can clearly be shown to be the basis
of fho moral order of the universe, and which
are calculated to secure the eternal happiness of
all intellectual beings — it forms a strong pre
sumptive proof, if not an unanswerable argu
ment, that the contents of that book are of a ce
lestial origin, and were dictated by Him who
gave birth to the whole system of created be
ings.

VII. From this subject we may learn the ab
surdity and pernicious tendency of Antinomian-
ism. Of all the absurdities and abominations
which have assumed the name of Religion, I
know none more pernicious and atheistical in its
tendency, than the sentiment which is tenacious
ly maintained by modern Antinomians, " That
Christians are set free from the law of God as a
rule of conduct." That in the nineteenth cen
tury of the Christian era, amidst the rapid pro
gress of physical and moral science, under the
mask of a Christian profession, and with the
moral precepts and injunctions of the prophets
of Jesus Christ, and of his apostles, lying open
before them, a set of men, calling themselves ra
tional beings, should arise to maintain, that there
is such a thing as " imputed sanctification," that
the moral law is not obligatory upon Christians,
and that " whoever talks of progressive sanctifi
cation is guilty of high treason against the ma
jesty of heaven"* — is a moral phenomenon truly
humbling and astonishing ; and affords an addi
tional proof, to the many other evidences which
lie before us, of the folly and perversity of the
human mind, and of its readiness to embrace
the most wild and glaring absurdities ! If the
leading train of sentiment which has been pro-
recuted in the preceding illustrations be admit
ted, there appears nothing else requisite in order
to show tfie gross absurdity and the deadly ma
lignity of the Antinornian system. If any sys
tem of religion be founded on the cancellation of
every moral tie which connects man with man,
and man with God— if its fundamental and dis
tinguishing principles, when carried out to their
legitimate consequences, would lead men to hate
their Creator and to hate one another— if it can
be shown, that the operation of such principles
constitutes the chief ingredient of the misery
which arises from " the worm that never dies,

• S«e Cottle's " Strictures on the Plymouth Anti
nomians.'

and the fire which is never quenched ;w and that,
if universally acted upon, they would overthrow
all order in the intelligent system, and banish
every species of happiness from the universe— it
necessarily follows, that such a system cannot
be the religion prescribed by the All-wise and
benevolent Creator, nor any part of that revela
tion which proclaims "peace on earth and good
will among men," and which enjoins us to " love
the Lord our God with all our hearts, and our
neighbour as ourselves."

The Antinornian, in following out his own
principles, if no human laws or prudential consi
derations were to deter him, might run to every
excess of profligacy and debauchery — might in
dulge in impiety, falsehood, and profanity— might
commit theft, robbery, adultery, fraud, cruelty,
injustice, and even murder, without considering
himself as acting contrary to the spirit of his reli
gious system. On his principles, the idea of
heaven, or a state of perfect happiness, is a phy
sical and moral impossibility ; and the idea of
hell a mere bugbear to frighten children and fools.
For, wherever the moral law is generally observ
ed, there can be no great portion of misery ex
perienced under the arrangements of a benevo
lent Creator ; and if this law be set aside, or
its observance considered as a matter of indiffer
ence, the foundation of all the happiness of saints
and angels is necessarily subverted. A heaven
without love pervading the breasts of all its in
habitants, would be a contradiction in terms ;
but love, as we have already seen, is the founda
tion of every moral precept.

I trust the moral conduct of the deluded mor
tals who have embraced this system is more re
spectable than that to which their principles
naturally lead ; — but the consideration, that such
absurd and dangerous opinions have been deduc
ed from the Christian revelation, should act as a
powerful stimulus on the Christian world, for di
recting their attention to a more minute and
comprehensive illustration than has hitherto been
given, of the practical bearings of the Christian
system, and of the eternal and immutable obliga
tion of the law of God, which it is the great end
of the gospel of Christ to enforce and demon
strate. For it is lamentable to reflect how many
thousands of religionists, both in North and in
South Britain, even in the present day, have
their minds tinctured, in a greater or less degree,
with the poison of Antinomianism, in conse
quence of the general strain of many of the doc
trinal sermons they are accustomed to hear, and
of the injudicious sentiments they hare imbibed
from the writings of the supralapsarian divines oi
the seventeeth centuaty.

VII J. Faith and icpentance, as required in
the Gospel, are absolutely necessary, in the pre
sent condition of man, in order to acceptable
obedience to the divine law. " Without faitn it
is impossible to please God ; for he that cometb

120

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

fo God must believe that he is, and that he is the
rewarder of them that diligently seek him." —
Faith, as the term is used in scripture, denotes
confidence in the moral character of God, found
ed on the belief we attach to the declarations of
his word. It is defined, by the Apostle Paul, in
the eleventh chapter of the epistle to the He
brews, to be " the confident expectation of things
hoped for," and " the conviction of things which
are not seen."* Faith substantiates and realizes
those objects which are invisible to ihe eye of
sense, and which lie beyond the reach of our
present comprehension. It recognises the exis
tence and the omnipresence of an invisible Being,
by whose agency the visible operations of nature
are conducted ; and views him as possessed of
infinite wisdom, power, benevolence, faithfulness,
rectitude, and eternal duration. It realixes the
scenes of an invisible and eternal world — the
destruction of the present fabric of our globe, the
resurrection of the dead, the solemnities of the
last judgment, the new heavens, and the new
earth, the innumerable company of angels, and
the grandeur and felicity of the heavenly world.
These invisible realities it recognises, on the
testimony of God exhibited in his word ; and
without a recognition of such objects, religion
can have no existence in the mind. — In a parti
cular manner, faith recognises the declarations
of God in relation to the character and the con
dition of men as violators of his law, and as ex
posed to misery ; and the exhibition which is
made of the way of reconciliation, through the
mediation of Jesus Christ, who is " set forth as
a propitiation to declare the righteousness of God
in the remission of sins." The man in whose
heart the principle of faith operates, convinced
that he is guilty before God, and exposed to mi
sery on account of sin, confides in the declarations
of God respecting " the remission of sins through
the redemption that is in Christ Jesus ;" — he
confides in the goodness, mercy, faithfulness, and
power of God, which secure the accomplishment
of his promises, and the supply of all requisite
strength and consolation to support him amidst
the dangers and afflictions of life ; he confides in
the wisdom and excellence of those precepts
which are prescribed as the rule of his conduct,
and which are fitted to guide him to the regions
of happiness ;— and in the exercise of this confi
dence, he " adds to his faith, fortitude and reso
lution, knowledge, temperance, patience, godli
ness, brotherly kindness, and charity ;" and pro
secutes with courage this course of obedience,
till at length " an entrance is abundantly admin
istered to him into the everlasting kingdom of our
Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ." But, without
a recognition of such objects, and an unshaken
confidence in the declarations of God respecting
them, it is obvious, from the nature of things,

• Doddridge'straMlation of Heb. xi. l.

that we " cannot please God," nor yield to him
an acceptable and " reasonable service."

In like manner it might be shown, that repent"
ance is essentially requisite in order to acceptable
obedience. Sin is directly opposed to the cha
racter of God, and is the great nuisance of the
moral universe. While the love of it predomi
nates in any mind, it leads to every species ol
moral turpitude and depravity ; and, conse
quently, completely unfits such a mind for yield
ing a cheerful obedience to the divine law. But
repentance, which consists in hatred of sin, and
sorrow for having committed it, naturally fits
and prepares the mind for the practice of univer
sal holiness. It tends to withdraw the soul from
the practice of sin, and warns it of the danger 01
turning again to folly. It is the commencement
of every course of virtuous conduct, and the ave
nue which ultimately leads to solid peace and
tranquillity of mind. It is intimately connected
with humility and self-denial, and is directly op
posed to pride, vanity, and self-gratulation. It
must, therefore, be indispensably requisite to
prepare us for conformity to the moral character
of God, for universal obedience to his law, and
for the enjoyment of substantial and never-ending
felicity. Hence the importance which is at
tached to the exercise of repentance by our Sa
viour and his Apostles. In connexion with
faith, it is uniformly represented as the first duty
of a sinner, and the commencement of the Chris
tian life. Repentance was the great duty to
which the forerunner of the Messiah called the
multitudes who flocked to his baptism, and on
which the Messiah himself expatiated during the
period of his public ministry. " Repent ye, for
the kingdom of heaven is at hand." "Except
ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." And
the apostles, in their instructions to every nation
and to every class of men, laid down the follow
ing positions as the foundation of every moral
duty. " Repentance towards God, and faith to
wards our Lord Jesus Christ."

IX. From the preceding illustrations we may
learn, that no merit, in the sense in which that
term is sometimes used, can be attached to hu
man actions in the sight of God ; and that the
salvation, or ultimate happiness of sinners, is the
effect of the grace or benevolence of God. —
That the good works of men are meritorious in
the sight of God, is a notion, as unphilosophicai
and absurd, as it is impious and unscriptural.
They are requisite, and indispensably requisite,
as qualifications, or preparations for the enjoy
ment of felicity, without which the attainment of
true happiness either here or hereafter, is an ab
solute impossibility ; but the actions of no created
being, not even the sublimest services and adora
tions of the angelic hosts, can have the least merit
in the eyes of the Creator. " Thy wickedness
may hurt a man as thou art, and thy righteous
ness mav profit the son of man •" but " if thou

GOOD WORKS NOT MERITORIOUS.

121

Binnest, what dost thou against God ; or, if thou
be righteous, what givest thou him ? and what
receiveth he of thine hand?"* " Thy goodness
extendeth not unto him," and ho that sinneth
against him wrongeth his own soul." — What
merit can there he in the exercise of love, and in
the cultivation of benevolent affections, when we
consider, that these affections are essentially re
quisite to our happiness, and that the very exer
cise of them is a privilege conferred by God, and
one of the principal ingredients of bliss? What
merit can be attached, in the presence of the
Most High, to the noblest services we can per
form, when we reflect, that we derived all the
corporeal and intellectual faculties by which we
perform these services, and all the means by
which they are excited and directed, from our
bountiful Creator? What merit can there be in
obedience to his law, when disobedience must
infallibly lead to destruction and misery? Is it
considered as meritorious in a traveller, when he
is properly directed, furnished with strength of
body and mind, and provided with every neces
sary for his journey, — to move forward to the
place of his wished for destination ? Our bene
volent affections, and the active services to which
they lead, may be meritorious in the eyes of our
fellow-men, in so far as they are the means of
contributing to their enjoyment; but in ihe pre
sence of Him who sits on the throne of the uni
verse, dispensing blessings to all his offspring, we
shall always have to acknowledge, that " we are
unprofitable servants." It is probable, that, if
the great object of religion were represented in
its native simplicity, if the nature of salvation
were clearly understood, and if less were said on
the subject of human merit in sermons, and sys
tems of divinity, the idea which I am now com
bating, would seldom be entertained by any mind
possessed of the least share of Christian know
ledge, or of common sense.

That the eternal salvation of men, is the effect
of the iove and the grace of God, is also a neces
sary consequence from what has been now stated.

* Job xxxv. 6. 8. Psalm xvi. 2 &c.

For every power, capacity, and privilege we
possess, was derived from God. " What hive
we thai we have not received ?" Even our \ ery
existence in the world of life, is an act of grace.
We exerted no power in ushering ourselves into
existence : We had no control over the events
which determined that we should be born in Bri
tain, and not in Africa ; which determined the
particular family with which we should be con
nected ; the education we should receive ; the
particular objects towards which our minds shouki
be directed, and the privileges we should enjoy.
And, when we arrive at the close of our earthly
career, when the spirit is hovering on the verge
of life, and about to take its flight from this mor
tal scene, can it direct its course, by its own
energies, through the world unknown ? can it
wing its way over a region it has never explored,
to its kindred spirits in the mansions of bliss?
can it furnish these mansions with the scenes
and objects from which its happiness is to be de
rived ? can it re-animate the bodj after it has
long mouldered in the dust ? can it re-unite itself
with its long-lost partner ? can it transport the
resurrection-body, to that distant world where it
is destined to spend an endless existence ? or
can it create those scenes of glory and magnifi
cence, and those ecstatic joys which will fill it
with transport while eternity endures? If it
cannot be supposed to accomplish such glorious
objects by its own inherent powers, then, it must
be indebted for every entertainment in the future
world to the unbounded and unmerited love and
mercy of God. To Him, therefore, who sits up
on the throne of the heavens, and to the Lamb
who was slain and hath redeemed us to God by
his blood, let all praise, honour, dominion, and
power, be ascribed now and forever. Amen.

Having now finished what I proposed in the
illustration of the principles of love to God and
to man, and of the precepts of the Decalogue,—
in the following chapter, I shall take a bird's eye
view of the moral state of the world ; and endea
vour to ascertain, to what extent these principles
and laws have been recognised and observed by
the inhabitants of our globe.

CHAPTER IV.

A HRIEP SURVEY OF THE MORAL STATE OF THE WORLD ; OR, AN EXAMINATION OF THE GE-
NERAL TRAIN OF HUMAN ACTIONS, IN REFERENCE TO ITS CONFORMITY WITH THE PRINCI.
PLES AND LAWS NOW ILLUSTRATED.

THE discoveries of modern astronomy have
led us infallibly to conclude, that the universe
consists of an immense number of systems and
worlds dispersed, at immeasurable distances from
each other, throughout the regions of infinite
space. When we take into consideration the
Benevolence of the Deity, and that the happiness
of the intelligent creation is the great object which
his Wisdom and Omnipotence are employed to
accomplish — it appears highly probable, that the
inhabitants of the whole, or at least of the greater
part, of those worlds whose suns we behold
twinkling from afar, are in a state of moral per
fection, and consequently, in a state of happiness.
At any rate, it is reasonable to conclude, that
the exceptions which exist are not numerous.
Perhaps this earth is the only material world
where physical evil exists, where misery pre
vails, and where moral order is subverted ; and
these dismal effects may have been permit
ted to happen, under the government of God,
in order to exhibit to other intelligences, a speci
men of the terrible and destructive consequences
of moral evil, as a warning of the danger of in
fringing, in the least degree, on those moral prin
ciples which form the bond of union among the
intelligent system.

Could we trace the series of events which have
occurred, in any one of those happy worlds, where
moral perfection prevails, ever since the period
when it was replenished with inhabitants, and
the objects to which their physical and rational
powers have been directed, we should, doubtless,
be highly delighted and enraptured with the mo
ral scenery which the history of such a world
would display. Its annals would uniformly re
cord the transactions of benevolence. We should
hear nothing of the pomp of hostile armies, of the
shouts of victory, of the exploits of heroes, of
the conflagration of cities, of the storming of for
tifications, of the avarice of merchants and cour
tiers, of the burning of heretics, or of the ambition
of princes. The train of events, presented to
our view, would be directly opposed to every ob
ject of this description, and to every thing which
forms a prominent feature in the hislory of man
kind. To beautify and adorn the scenery of na
ture around them, to extend their views of the
operations of the Almighty, to explore the depths
of his wisdom and intelligence, to admire the exu-
*«rance of his goodness, to celebrate, in unison

the praises of the "King Eternal," the Author
of all their enjoyments, to make progressive ad
vances in moral and intellectual attainments, to
circulate joy from heart to heart, to exert their
ingenuity in the invention of instruments by
which their physical powers may be improved,
and the wonders of creation more minutely ex
plored ; to widen the range of delightful contem
plation, to expand their views of the Divine per
fections, and to increase the sum of happiness
among all their fellow-intelligences, will doubt
less form a part of the employments of the inhabi
tants of a world where moral purity universally
prevails. One circumstance which may probably
diversify the annals of such a world, and form so
many eras in its history, may be the occasional
visits of angelic or other messengers, from distant
regions of creation, to announce the will of the
Almighty on particular emergencies, to relate
the progress of new creations in other parts of the
Divine Empire, and to convey intelligence re
specting the physical aspects, the moral arrange
ments, and the history of other worlds, and of
other orders of intellectual beings. Such visits
and occasional intercourses with celestial beings,
would, undoubtedly, have been more frequent in
our world, had not man rendered himself unquali
fied for such associations, by his grovelling affec
tions, and by the moral pollutions with which his
character is now stained.

When we turn our eyes from the transactions of
such a world, to the world in which we live, how
very different a scene is presented to the view !
The history of all nations embraces little more
than

ARECOBDOFTHE OPERATIONS OF MALEVO
LENCE.

Every occurrence has been considered as lame
and insipid, and scarcely worthy of being record
ed, unles it has been associated with the confused
noise of warriors, the shouts of conquerors, the
plunderofprovinr.es, the devastation of empires,
the groans of mangled victims, the cnes of wi
dows and orphans, and with garments rolled in
blood. When such malevolent operations cease
for a little, in any part of the world, and the tu
multuous passions which produced them, subside
into a temporary calm, the historian is presented
with a blank in the annals of the human race ,
the short interlude of peace and of apparent

MORALS OF THE ANTEDILUVIANS.

J23

tranquillity is passed over as unworthy of notice,
till the restless passions of avarice and ambition
be again roused into fury, and a new set of des
peradoes arise, to carry slaughter and desolation
through the nations. For, during the short tem
porary periods of repose from the din of war,
which the world has occasionally enjoyed, the
malignant passions, which were only smothered,
but not extinguished, prevented the operation of
the benevolent affections ; and, of course, no ex
tensive plans for the counteraction of evil, and
the improvement of mankind, worthy of being
recorded by the annalist and the historian, were
carried into effect.

In order to produce a definite impression of
the moral state of the world, I shall endeavour,
in this chapter, to give a rapid sketch of the pro
minent dispositions of mankind, as displayed in
the general train of human actions — that we may
be enabled to form a rude estimate of the degree
in which the law of God has been recognised,
and of the extent to which its violation has been
carried, on the great theatre of the world, and
in the ordinary transactions of general society.

I shall, in the first place, take a rapid view of
the moral state of the world in ancient times,
and then take a more particular survey of the
present state of morals, among savage and civi
lized nations — in the Christian world — and among
the various ranks and orders of society.

SECTION I.

STATE OF MORALS IN THE ANCIENT WORLD.

MAN was originally formed after the moral
image of his Maker. His understanding was quick
and vigorous in its perceptions; his will subject to
the divine law, and to the dictates of his reason ;
his passions serene and uncontaminated with
evil ; his affections dignified and pure ; his love
supremely fixed upon his Creator ; and his joy
unmingled with those sorrows which have so long
been the bitter portion of his degenerate race.
But the primogenitor of the human race did not
long continue in the holy and dignified station in
which he was placed. Though he was placed
in " a garden of delights," surrounded with every
thing that was delicious to the taste and pleasant
to the eye, yet he dared to violate a positive com
mand of his Maker, and to stretch forth his im
pious hand to pluck and to taste the fruit of the
forbidden tree— a picture and a prelude of the
conduct of millions of his degraded offspring who
despise the lawful enjoyments which lie within
their reach, and obstinately rush on forbidden
pleasures, which terminate in wretchedness and
sorrow. The dismal effects of the depraved dis
positions thus introduced among the human spe
cies, soon became apparent. Cain, the first-born
son of Adam, had no sooner reached to the years

of maturity, than he gave vent to his revengeful
passions, and imbrued his hands in his brother's
blood. And ever since the perpetration of this
horrid and unnatural deed, the earth has been
drenched with the blood of thousands and of mil
lions of human beings, and the stream of corrup
tion has flowed without intermission, and in every
direction around the globe.

Of the state of mankind in the ages before the
flood, the sacred history furnishes us with only a
few brief and general descriptions. But those
descriptions, short and general as they are, pre
sent to us a most dreadful and revolting picture
of the pitch of depravity and wickedness to
which the human race had arrived. We have
the testimony of God himself to assure us, that,
within 1600 years from the creation of the world,
" the wickedness of man had become great upon
the earth — that the earth was filled with violence"
— yea, that " every imagination of the thoughts
of man's heart was only evil continually,"— or,
as it may more literally be rendered from the
Hebrew, " the whole imagination, comprehend
ing all the purposes and desires of the mind, was
only evil from day to day." — " God looked upon
the earth ; and behold it was corrupt ; for all
flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth,"
A more comprehensive summary of the great
ness and the extent of human wickedness it is
scarcely possible to conceive. The mind is left
to fill up the outline of this horrid picture with
every thing that is degrading to the human cha
racter, with every thing that is profligate and
abominable in manners, with every thing that is
base, false, deceitful, licentious, and profane, and
with every thing that is horrible and destructi"«)
in war, and ruinous to the interests of human hap-

The description now quoted, contains the fol
lowing intimations: — 1. That, previous to the
deluge, wickedness had become universal. It
was not merely the majority of mankind that had
thus given unbounded scope to their licentious
desires, while smaller societies were to be found
in which the worship of the true God, and the
precepts of his law were observed. For " all
flesh had corrupted their ways." And, at this
period the world is reckoned to have been much
more populous than it has been in any succeeding
age, and to have contained at least ten billions
of inhabitants, or many thousands of times the
amount of its present population. So that uni
versal wickedness must have produced misery
among human beings to an extent of which we
can form no adequate conception. 2. The des
cription implies, that every invention, and every
purpose and scheme devised both by individuals
and by communities, was of a malevolent nature.
" The imagination of every man's heart was only
evil continually." The dreadful spectacles of
misery and horror which the universal prevalence
of such principles and practices which theu

124

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

existed, must have produced, are beyond the
power of human imagination either to conceive
or to delineate. Some faint idea, however, may
be formed of some of these spectacles, from the
descriptions I have already given of the effects
which would inevitably follow, were the princi-
'>le of benevolence to be eradicated from the mind,
«r were any one of the precepts of the divine law
to be universally violated — (see ch. ii. sect. iv.
and ch. iii. throughout.) 3. The ejects pro
duced by this universal depravity ar£ forcibly ex
pressed in the words, " The earth was filled with
violence." From this declaration we are neces
sarily led to conceive a scene in which universal
anarchy and disorder, devastation and wretched
ness, every where prevailed — the strong and
powerful forcibly seizing upon the wealth and
possessions of the weak, violating the persons of
the female sex, oppressing the poor, the widow,
and the fatherless, overturning the established
order of families and societies, plundering cities,
demolishing temples and palaces, desolating
fields, orchards, and vineyards, setting fire to
towns and villages, and carrying bloodshed and
devastation through every land — a scene in which
cruelty, injustice, and outrages of every kind,
obscenity, revelry, riot, and debauchery of every
description, triumphed over every principle of
decency and virtue — a scene in which the earth
was strewed with smoking ruins, with the frag
ments of human habitations, with mangled
human beings in a state of wretchedness and
despair, and with the unburied carcasses of the
slain.

Such appears to have been the state of gene
ral society at the time when Noah was command
ed to build an ark of refuge — a state of society
which could not have long continued, but must
inevitably, in the course of a few generations,
have thinned the race of mankind, and ultimate
ly have extirpated the race of Adam from the
earth, even although the deluge had never been
poured upon the world. Wickedness appears to
have come to such a height, that no interposition
of Providence could be supposed available to
produce a reformation among mankind, without
destroying their freedom of will ; and, therefore,
it was an act of mercy, as well as of judgment,
to sweep them away at once by the waters of
the flood, after having given them warnings of
their danger ; in order to convince such obstinate
and abandoned characters, that " there is a God
that judgeth in the earth ;" and in order to pre
vent the misery which would otherwise have been
entailed on succeeding generations.

Not only the Sacred, but also the Pagan writ
ers, when alluding to the antediluvians, uniformly
represent them as abandoned to uncleanness,
and all kinds o<* wickedness. Eutychus, in his
Annals, when speaking of the posterity of Cain,
says, " that they were guilty of all manner of
filthy crimes with one another, and, meeting to

gether in public places for that purpose, two at
three men were concerned with the same woman
the ancient women, if possible, being more lustfu
and brutish than the young. Nay, fathers lived
promiscuously with their daughters, and the
young men with their mothers, so that neither the
children could distinguish their own parents, nor
the parents know their own children." — Lucian,
a native of Samosata, a town situated on the Eu
phrates, a spot where memorials of the deluge
were carefully preserved, gives the following ac
count of the antediluvians : — " The present race
of mankind," says he, " are different from those
who first existed ; for those of the antediluvian
world were all destroyed. The present world is
peopled from the sons of Deucalion [or Noah :]
having increased to so great a number from one
person. In respect of the former brood, they
were men of violence, and lawless in their deal
ings. They were contentious, and did many
unrighteous things ; they regarded not oaths, nor
observed the rights of hospitality, nor showed
mercy to those who sued for it. On this account
they were doomed to destruction : and for this
purpose there was a mighty eruption of waters
from the earth, attended with heavy showers
from above ; so that the rivers swelled, and the
sea overflowed, till the whole earth was covered
with a flood, and all flesh drowned. Deucalion
alone was preserved to re-people the world. This
mercy was shown to him on account of his piety
and justice. His preservation was effected in
this manner : — He put all his family, both his
sons and their wives, into a vast ark which he
had provided, and he went into it himself. At
the same time animals of every species — boars,
horses, lions, serpents, whatever kind lived upon
the face of the earth — followed him by pairs ; all
which he received into the ark. and experienced
no evil from them ; for there prevailed a wonder
ful harmony throughout, by the immediate in
fluence of the Deity. Thus were they wafted
with him as long as the flood endured."

Such is the account which Lucian gives of the
antediluvian world, and of the preservation of the
human race, as he received it from the traditions
of the inhabitants ofHierapolis,in Syria, where
the natives pretended to have very particular
memorials of the deluge. It corroborates the
facts stated in the sacred history, and bears a
very near resemblance to the authentic account
which has been transmitted to us by Moses.—
These facts, respecting the depravity of the ante
diluvians, present to us a striking example, and
a demonstrative evidence of the dreadful effects
to which a general violation of the divine law
necessarily leads ; and of the extensive confusion
and misery which are inevitably produced, when
the law of love is set aside, and when malevo
lence exerts, without control, its diabolical ener
gies. All order in society is subverted, every
species of rational happiness is destroyed, and

CARTHAGINIAN WARS.

125

the existence of intelligent beings, in such a
state, becomes a curse to themselves, and to all
around them. Had not this been the case in the
primeval world, we cannot suppose that the Deity
would have exerted his Omnipotence in shatter
ing the crust of the terraqueous globe, and bury
ing its inhabitants under the waters of a deluge.

After the deluge had subsided, and the race of
Noah had begun to multiply on the earth, it was
not long before the depravity of man began to
show itself by its malignant effects ; though hu
man wickedness has never arrived to such a pitch
as in the times before the flood ; for this reason,
among others, that the life of man has been re
duced to a narrow span, which prevents him from
carrying his malevolent schemes to such an ex
tent as did the inhabitants of the world before
the flood, whose lives were prolonged to the pe
riod of nearly a thousand years. The lust of
ambition soon began to exert its baleful influence
over the mind ; and an inordinate desire after
wealth, distinctions, and aggrandizement, paved
the way for the establishment of despotism, and
for encroachments on the rights and the enjoy
ments of mankind. Among the heroes and des
pots of antiquity, Wimrod, the founder of the
Babylonish empire, holds a distinguished place.
He was, the grandson of Ham, the son ot Noah,
and is the first one mentioned in Scripture wh>>
appears to have made invasions on the territories
of his neighbours. Having distinguished him
self, by driving from his country the beasts of
prey, and by engaging in other valorous exploits,
he appears to have aspired after regal dignity and
power, and to have assumed the reins of abso
lute government. He was the first that subvert
ed (he patriarchal government ; and is supposed
to have introduced, among his subjects, the Za-
bian idolatry, or the worship of the heavenly host.
" The beginning of his kingdom," we are told,
" was Babylon, and Erech, and Accad, and
Calneh, in the land of Shinar." In the footsteps
of this proud and ambitious despot, has followed
a train of Alexanders, Caesars, Hannibals, Jeng-
hiz-Kans, Attilas, Alaric, Tamerlanes, Marl-
boroughs, Fredericks, and Bonapartes, who
have driven the plough-share of devastation
through the world, erected thrones over the graves
of slaughtered nations, decorated their palaces
with trophies dyed in blood, and made the earth
to resound with the groans and shrieks of dying
victims, and the voice of mourning, lamentation,
and wo.

To delineate all the scenes of desolation and
horror which have been produced by such des
peradoes, and the atrocious crimes and immo
ralities which have followed in their train, would
be to transcribe the whole records of ancient and
modern history, which contain little else than a
register of human folly, avarice, ambition, and
cruelty ; and of the daring villanies with which
they have been accompanied. Even then, we

should acquire but a very limited conception of
the extent of moral evil, and of the immense
variety of shapes which it has assumed , for the
one tenth of the crimes of mankind has never
been recorded ; and it is to the public transac
tions of only a small portion of the world that
the page of the historian directs our attention. I
shall, therefore, content myself with stating a
few insulated facts, as specimens of the train of
actions which have generally prevailed in the
world.

WARLIKE DISPOSITIONS OF MANKIND.

War, as already noticed, has been the delight
and the employment of man in every age ; and,
under this term may be included every thing that
is base and execrable in moral conduct, every
thing that is subversive of the principle of benevo
lence, every thing that is destructive of human
enjoyment, every thing that rouses the passions
into diabolical fury, every thing that adds to
the sum of human wretchedness, every thing that
is oppressive, cruel, and unjust, and every thing
that is dreadful and appalling to mankind. — As
an exemplification of the destructive effects of
war, I shall, in the first place, state a few facts
in relation to the Carthaginians.

Carthage was originally a small colony of
Phenicians, who, about 800 years before the
Christian era, settled on the northern coast of
Africa, on a small peninsula, adjacent to the bay
of Tunis. Having increased in wealth and
power, by means of their extensive commerce,
like most other nations, they attempted to make
inroads on the territories of neighbouring tribes,
and to plunder them of their treasures. By de
grees they extended their power over all the islands
in the Mediterranean, Sicily only excepted. For
the entire conquest of this island, about 480
years before Christ, they made vast preparations,
which lasted for three years. Their army con
sisted of 300,000 men ; their fleet was composed
of upwards of 2000 men of war, and 3000 trans
ports. With such an immense armament, they
made no doubt of conquering the whole island in a
single campaign. But they found themselves
miserably deceived. Hamilcar, the most expe
rienced captain of the age, sailed from Carthage
with this formidable army, and invested the city
of Hymera. The besieged were much straiten
ed and dismayed by the operations of this power
ful armament ; but Gelon, the tyrant of Syracuse,
flew immediately to their relief, with 50,000 foot
and 5000 horse. A dreadful slaughter ensued :
an hundred and fifty thousand of the Carthagi
nians were killed in the battle and pursuit, and
all the rest taken prisoners ; so that not a singie
person escaped of this mighty army. Of the
2000 ships of war, and the 3000 transports of
which the fleet consisted, eight ships only, which
then happened to be out at sea, made their escape:
these immediately set sail for Carthage, but were

126

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

til C£Uit away, and erery soul perished, except a
few who were saved in a small boat, and at last
reached Carthage with the dismal tidings of the
total loss of the fleet and army. — Here we have
presented to our view, in one short struggle, the
entire destruction of more than two hundred thou
sand human beings, if we take into account the
number which must necessarily have fallen in
the Sicilian army. And, if we take into con
sideration the many thousands of mangled
wretches, whose existence, from that moment,
would be rendered miserable; the destruction of
property in the besieged city; the victims crush
ed to death amidst the ruins of falling houses ;
the cries, and shrieks, and lamentations of wo
men and children ; the diseases and the misery
induced by terror and alarm, and the loss of
friends; the terrific and appalling spectacle of
5000 ships all on a blaze, of ten thousands of
burning and drowning wretches, supplicating in
vain for mercy, and the oaths, execrations, and
furious yells which would be mingled with this
work of destruction, we shall find it difficult to
form an adequate conception of the miseries and
horrors of such a scene. And what was the
cause of this dreadful slaughter and devastation ?
That a proud and opulent city, whose inhabitants
were rioting in every species of luxury, might
gratify its ambition, by tyrannizing over neigh
bouring tribes, and by plundering them of that
wealth of which it did not stand in need. And
this is but one instance out of ten hundred thou
sand of the miseries of war, — one faint shade in
the picture of human wo!

One would have thought, that, after such a
signal loss and discomfiture, the Carthaginians
would have contented themselves with their own
territory, and refrained from aggressive war.
This, however, was not the case. Where bene
volence is banished from the mind, and revenge
occupies its place in the affections, it will hurry
unprincipled men to the most wild and atrocious
actions, although they should terminate in de
struction to themselves and to all around them. It
was not long after this period, when preparations
were again made for the invasion of Sicily.
Hannibal, the grandson of Hamilcar, landed on
the coast of Sicily, and laid sie^e to Selinus.
The besieged made a vigorous defence ; but at
Jast the city was taken by storm, and the inhabi
tants were treated with the utmost cruelty. All
were massacred by the savage conquerors, except
the women, who fled to the temples ; — and these
escaped, not through the merciful dispositions
of the Carthaginians, but because they were
afraid, that, if driven to despair, they would set
fire to the temples, and by that means consume
the treasure they expected to find in those places.
Sixteen thousand were massacred ; the women
and children, about 5000 in number, were carried
away captive ; the temples were plundered of all
their treasures, and the city razed to the ground.

Hymera was next besieged by Hannibal, and
razed to its foundations. He forced three thou
sand prisoners to undergo all kinds of ignominy
and punishments, and at last murdered them, on
the very spot where his grandfather had been kill
ed by Gelon's cavalry, to appease and satisfy his
manes, by the blood of these unhappy victims,
such is the humanity and the justice of those men,
whom we are accustomed to distinguish by the
names of Patriots and Heroes! — Elated with
these partial victories, the Carthaginians medi
tated the reduction of the whole of Sicily. They
marched against the city of Agrigentum, and
battered its walls with dreadful fury. The be
sieged defended themselves with incredible reso
lution. In a sally, they burned all the battering
machines raised against their city, and repulsed
the enemy with immense slaughter. Again the
Carthaginians rallied their forces, beat down the
walls of the city, plundered it of an immense
booty, and with their usual cruelty, put all its in
habitants to the sword, not excepting even those
who had fled to the temples. The Carthaginians
were soon after forced to retire from Sicily.
Again they renewed their expeditions; again
they were repulsed ; and again they plunged into
the horrors of war ; while thousands and ten thou
sands were slaughtered at every onset ; men, wo
men, and children massacred in cold blood and
the pestilence produced by the unburied carcasses
of the slain, proved more fatal to myriads, than
even the sword of the warrior.

In this manner did these infatuated mortals
carry on a series of sanguinary contests for seve
ral centuries, with the Sicilians, Greeks, and
other nations ; till, at length, they dared to en
counter the power, and the formidable forces of
the Romans, and commenced those dreadful and
long-continued conflicts, distinguished in History
by the name of The Punic Wars. The first
Punic war lasted twenty-four years ; the second,
seventeen years ; and the third, four years and
some months. In this last contest, the plough
share of destruction was literally driven through
their devoted city, by the Romans. It was de
livered up to be plundered by their soldiers ; its
gold, silver, statues, and other treasures amount
ing to 4,470,000 pounds weight of silver, were
carried off to Rome ; its towers, ramparts,
walls, and all the works which the Carthaginians
had raised in the course of many ages, were le
velled to the ground. Fire was set to the edifices
of this proud metropolis, which consumed them
all, not a single house escaping the fury of the
flames. And though the fire began in all quar
ters at the same time, and burned with incredible
violence, it continued for seventeen days before
all the buildings were consumed. — Thus perish
ed Carthage — a city which contained 700,000
inhabitants, and which had waged so many
ferocious wars with neighbouring nations — a ter
rible example of the destructive effects produced

SCENES OF HUMAN DESTRUCTION.

127

by malevolent passions, and of the retributive
justice of the Governor of the world. The de
struction of human life in the numerous wars in
which it was engaged, is beyond all specific cal
culation. During the space of sixteen years,
Hannibal, the Carthaginian general, plundered
no less than four hundred towns, and destroyed
300,000 of his enemies ; and we may safely reck
on, that nearly an equal number of his own
men must have been cut off by the opposing ar
mies ; so that several millions of human victims
must have been sacrificed in these bloody and
cruel wars.

The following is a summary statement of the
number of human beings that were slain in seve
ral of the battles recorded in history. — In the
year 101 before Christ, in an engagement between
Marius, the Roman Consul, and the Ambrones
and the Teutones, in Transalpine Gaul, there
were slain of these barbarians, besides what fell
in the Roman army, 200,000, some historians
say, 290,000. And it is related, that the inhabi
tants of the neighbouring country made fences
for vineyards of their bones. In the following
year, the Romans, under the command of the
same general, slaughtered 140,000 of the Cimbri,
and took 60,000 prisoners. In the year 105, B.
C. the Romans, in a single engagement with the
Cimbri and the Teutones, lost upwards of 80,000
men. In the battle of Canrtse, the Romans were
surrounded by the forces of Hannibal, and cut
to p:cces. After an engagement of only three
how *, the carnage became so dreadful, that even
the Carthaginian general cried out, to spare the
conquered. Above 40,000 Romans lay dead on
the field, and six thousand of the Carthaginian
army. What a dreadful display of the rage and
fury of diabolical passions must have been exhi
bited on this occasion ! and what a horrible scene
must have been presented on the field of battle,
when we consider, that, in the mode of ancient
warfare, the slain were literally mangled, and cut
to pieces ! — In the battle of Issus, between Alex
ander and Darius, were slain 110,000; in the
battle of Arbela, two years afterwards, between
the same two despots, 300,000 ; in the battle
between Pyrrhus and the Romans, 25,000 ; in
the battle between Scipio and Asdrubal, 40,000 ;
in the battle between Suetonius and Boadicea,
80,000. In the siege of Jerusalem by Vespa
sian, according to the account of Josephus, there
were destroyed, in the most terrible manner,
1,100,000; and there were slaughtered in Jeru
salem, in 170, B. C. by Antiochus, 40,000. At
Gyrene, there were slain of Romans and Greeks,
by the Jews, 220,000 ; in Egypt and Cyprus, in
the reign of Trajan, 240,000 ; and in the reign
of Adrian, 580,000 Jews. After Julius Csesar
had carried his arms into the territories of Usi-
petes in Germany, he defeated them with such
slaughter, that 400,000 are said to have perished
in one battle. At the defeat of Attila, King of

the Huns, at Chalons, there perished about
300,000. In the year 631, there were slain by the
Saracens in Syria, 60,000 ; in the invasion of
Milan by the Goths, no less than 300,000 ; and
in A. D. 734, by the Saracens in Spain, 370,000.
In the battle of Fontenay, were slaughtered
100,000 ; in the battle of Yermouk, 150,000 ; and
in the battle between Charles Martel and the
Mahometans, 350;000. In the battle of Muret, in
A. D. 1213, between the Catholics and the Al-
bigenses, were slain 32,000; in the battle of
Cressy, in 1346, 50,000 ; in the battle of Hali-
don-hill, in 1333, 20,000; in the battle of Agin-
court, in 1415, 20,000; in the battle of Towton,
in 1461, 37,000; in the battle of Lepanto, in
1571, 25.000; at the siege of Vienna, in 1683,
70,000; and in a battle in Persia, in 1734,
60,000.+

The most numerous army of which we have
any account in the annals of history, was that of
Xerxes. According to the statement of Rollin,
which is founded on the statements of Herodotus,
Isocrates, and Plutarch, this army consisted of
1,700,000 foot, 80,000 horse, and 20,000 men
for conducting the carriages and camels. On
passing the Hellespont, an addition was made to
it from other nations, of 300,000, which made
his land forces amount to 2,100,000. His fleet
consisted of 1207 vessels, each carrying 230
men ; in all 277,610 men, which was augmented
by the European nations, with 1200 vessels car
rying 240,000 men. Besides this fleet thesmall
galleys, transport ships, &c. amounted to 3000,
containing about 240,000 men. Including ser
vants, eunuchs, women, sutlers, and others, who
usually follow an army, it is reckoned, that the
whole number of souls that followed Xerxes into
Greece, amounted to 5,283,220 ; which is more
than the whole of the male population of Gibdt
Britian and Ireland, above twenty years of age,
and nearly triple the whole population of Scot
land. After remaining some time in Greece,
nearly the whole of this immense army, along
with the fleet, was routed and destroyed. Mar-
donius, one of his ablest commanders, with an
army of 300,000, was finally defeated and slain
at the battle of Platea, and only three thousand
of this vast army, with difficulty escaped de
struction.

The destruction of human life in the wars
which accompanied and followed the incursions
of the barbarians, who overthrew the Roman
empire, is beyond all calculation or conception.
It forms an era in history most degrading to the
human species. In the war which was waged in
Africa, in the days of Justinian, Procopius re
marks, " It is no exaggeration to say, that fiv«

• The above statements are collected from the
facts stated in Rollin's Ancient History, Millet's Ele
ments, Mavor s Universal History, the historical Ar
ticles in the Encyclopedia Britannica, from a list at
battles contained in the " Pictures of War," &c.

128

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

millions perished by the sword, and famine, and
pestilence." The same author states that, during
the twenty years' war which Justinian carried
on with the Gothic conquerors of Italy, the loss
of the Goths amounted to above 15 millions ; nor
will this appear incredible, when we find, that in
one campaign, 50,000 labourers died of hunger.
About the beginning of the 13th century arose
that cruel and bloody tyrant Jenghiz-Khan.
With immense armies, some of them amounting
to more than a million in number, he overran
and subdued the kingdom of Hya in China, Tan-
gut, Kitay, Turkestan, Karazum, Great Bucka-
ria, Persia, and part of India, committing the
most dreadful cruelties and devastations. It is
computed, that, during the last 22 years of his
reign, no fewer than 14,470,000 persons were
butchered by this scourge of the human race.
He appeared like an infernal fiend, breathing
destruction to the nations of the East, and the
principle which he adopted, after conquest, was
Htter extermination.

Nearly about the same period when this mon
ster was ravaging and slaughtering the eastern
world, those mad expeditions, distinguished by
the name of the Crusades, were going forward
in the west. Six millions of infatuated wretches,
raging with hatred, and thursting for blood, as
sumed the image of the cross, and marched in
wild disorder to the confines of the Holy land, in
order to recover the city of Jerusalem from the
hands of the infidels. In these holy wars, as
they were impiously termed, more than 850,000
Europeans were sacrificed before they obtained
possession of Nice, Antioch, and Edessa. At
the siege of Acre, 300,000 were slain ; and at
the taking of Jerusalem, in 1099, about seventy
thousand. For 198 years, these wild expedi
tions continued in vogue, and were urged for
ward by proclamations issued from the throne,
and by fanatical sermons thundered from the
pulpit, till several millions of deluded mortals
perished from the earth ; for by far the greater
part of those who engaged in the crusades, were
either slain or taken prisoners. About this pe
riod, and several centuries before it, the whole
earth exhibited little else than one great field of
battle, in which nations were dashing against
each other, conquerors ravaging kingdoms, ty
rants exercising the most horrid cruelties ; su
perstition and revenge immolating their millions
of victims ; and tumults, insurrections, slaughter,
and universal alarm, banishing peace and tran
quillity from the world, and subverting the moral
order of society. " In Europe, Germany and
Italy were distracted by incessant contests be
tween the pope and the emperors ; the interior
of every European kingdom was torn in pieces
by the contending ambition of the powerful
barons ; in the Mahomedan empire, the caliphs,
sultans, emirs, &c. waged continual war ; new
sovereignties were daily arising, and daily de

stroyed ; and amidst this universal slaughter and
devastation, the whole earth seemed in danger
of being laid waste, and the human race to suffer
a total annihilation."*

Such is the bird's eye view of the destruction
of the human species, which war has produced
in different periods. The instances I have
brought forward present only a few detached cir
cumstances in the annals of warfare, and relate
only to a few limited periods in the history of
man : and yet in the four instances above stated,
we are presented with a scene of horror, which
includes the destruction of nearly 50 millions of
human beings. What a vast and horrific picture,
then, would be presented to the eye, could we
take in at one view all the scenes of slaughter,
which have been realized in every period, in
every nation, and among every tribe! If wo
take into consideration not only the number o(
those who have fallen in the field of battle, but of
those who have perished through the natural
consequences of war, by the famine and the pes
tilence, which war has produced ; by disease,
fatigue, terror, and melancholy ; and by the op
pression, injustice, and cruelty of savage con«
querors, — it will not, perhaps, be overrating the
destruction of human life, if we affirm, that one
tenth of the human race has been destroyed by
the ravages of war. And if this estimate be ad
mitted, it will follow, that more than fourteen
thousand millions of human beings have been
slaughtered in war, since the beginning of the
world — which is about eighteen times the number
of inhabitants which, at the present, exist on
the globe ; or, in other words, it is equivalent
to the destruction of the inhabitants of eighteen
worlds of the same population as ours. I That
this conclusion is rather within than beyond the
bounds of truth, will appear, from what has been
stated above respecting the destruction of the
Goths, in the time of Justinian. In the course of
20 years, 15 millions of persons perished in the
wars. Now, if the population of the countries of
Europe, in which these wars took place, did not
exceed 60 millions, the proportion of the slaugh-
tred to the whole population was as one to four,
and, if 20 years be reckoned as only half the pe
riod of a generation, the proportion was as one to
two ; in other words, at the rate of one half of a
whole generation in the course of 40 years. What
a horrible and tremendous consideration ? — to re
flect, that 14,000,000,000 of beings, endowed with
intellectual faculties, and furnished with bodies
curiously organized by divine wisdom — that the
inhabitant of eighteen worlds should have been
massacred, mangled, and cut to pieces, by those

• Mavor's Universal History, Robertson's Charles
V. &c.

calculation proceeds on the ground, that 145
thousand millions of men have existed since the Mo
saic creation. See Chr.stian philosopher, Art.
Geography.

ATROCITIES CONNECTED WITH WAR.

129

who were partakers of the same common nature,
as if they had been created merely for the work
of destruction ! Language is destitute of words
sufficiently strong to express the emotions of the
•nind, when it seriously contemplates the horrible
scene. And how melancholy is it to reflect, that
in the present age, which boasts of its improve
ments in science, in civilization, and in religion,
neither reason, nor benevolence, nor humanity,
nor Christianity, has yet availed to arrest the
progress of destroying armies, and to set a mark
of ignominy on "the people who delight in
war !"

ATROCITIES CONNECTED WITH WAR.

However numerous may have been the victims
tiathave been sacrificed in war, it is not so much
the mere extinction of human life that renders the
scene of warfare so horrible, as the cruelties with
which it has always been accompanied, and the
infernal passions which it has engendered and car
ried into operation. It extirpates every princi
ple of compassion, humanity, and justice; it
blunts the feelings, and hardens the heart ; it in
vents instruments of torture, and perpetrates,
without a blush, cruelties revolting to every prin
ciple of virtue and benevolence.

When Jerusalem was taken by Antiochus
Epiphanes, in the year 168, B. C. he gave orders
to one division of his army to cut in pieces all
who were found in the temple and synagogues ;
while another party, going through the streets of
the city, massacred all that came in their way.
He next ordered the city to be plundered and set
on fire ; pulled down all their stately buildings,
caused the walls to be demolished, and carried
away captive ten thousand of those who had es
caped the slaughter. He set up the statue of Ju
piter Olympus on the altar of burnt-offerings, and
all who refused to come and worship this idol
were either massacred, or put to some cruel tor
tures, till they either complied or expired under
the hands of the executioners. In the war which
the Carthaginians waged with the Mercenaries,
Hamilcar, the Carthaginian general, threw all
the prisoners that fell into his hands to be devour
ed by wild beasts. Asdrubal, another Cartha
ginian general, when engaged in war against the
Romans, in revenge for a defeat he had sustain
ed, brought all the Roman prisoners he had taken
during two years, upon the walls, in the sight of
the whole Roman army. There he put them to
the most exquisite tortures, putting out their eyes,
cutting off" their noses, ears, and fingers, legs and
arms, tearing their skin to pieces with iron rakes
or harrows ; and then threw them headlong from
the top of the battlements.* He was of a temper
remarkably inhuman, and it is said that he even
jook pleasure in seeing some of these unhappy
!nen flayed alive. — In the year 1201, when Jeng-

• Rollin's Ancient History, Vol. I
29

hiz-Khan had reduced the rebels whc ftad seized
upon his paternal possessions, as a specimen of
his lenity, he caused seventy of their chiefs to be
thrown into as many cauldrons of boiling water.
The plan on which this tyrant conducted his ex
peditions, as already stated, was that of total ex
termination. For some time he utterly extirpated
the inhabitants of those places which he conquer
ed, designing to people them anew with his Mo
guls ; and, in consequence of this resolution, he
would employ his army in beheading 100,000 pri
soners at once. — Tamerlane, one of his success
ors, who followed in his footsteps, is said to have
been more humane than this cruel despot. Histo
rians inform us that " his sportive cruelty seldom
went farther than the pounding of three or four
thousand people in large mortars, or building
them among bricks and mortar into a wall." If
such be the " tender mercies of the wicked,"
how dreadful beyond description must their cruel
ties be !

We are accustomed to hear Alexander the
Great eulogized as a virtuous and magnanimous
hero ; and even the celebrated Montesquieu, in
his " Spirit of Laws," has written a panegyric
on his character. Yet we find him guilty of the
most abominable vices, and perpetrating the most
atrocious crimes. At the instigation of the
strumpet Thais, during a drunken banquet, he
set on fire the beautiful city of Persepolis, and
consumed it to ashes. Clitus, one of his cap
tains, and brother of Helenice who had nursed
Alexander, and saved his life at the battle of the
Granicus, at the imminent danger of his own.
Yet this man, to whom he was so highly indebt
ed, he thrust through with a javelin, at an enter
tainment to which he had invited him ; on ac
count of his uttering some strong expressions,
which were intended to moderate Alexander's
vanity. His treatment of the Branchidae fur
nishes an example of the most brutal and frantic
cruelty which history records. These people
received Alexander, while pursuing his con
quests, with the highest demonstrations of joy,
and surrendered to him, both themselves and
their city. The next day, he commanded his
phalanx to surround the city, and, a signal being
given, they were ordered to plunder it, and to
put every one of its inhabitants to the sword,
which inhuman order was executed with the
same barbarity with which it had been given.
All the citizens, at the very time they were go
ing to pay homage to Alexander, were murdered
in the streets and in their houses ; no manner of
regard being had to their cries and tears, nor the
least distinction made of age or sex. They
even pulled up the very foundations of the walls, in
order that not the least traces of that city might
remain. And why were these ill-fated citizens
punished in so summary and inhuman a man
ner ? Merely because their forefathers, up
wards of one hundred and fifty years before, ha<?

ISO

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

delivered up to Xerxes the treasure of the tem
ple of Dulymaon, with which they had been in
trusted !* — When he entered the city of Tyre,
after a siege of seven months, he gave orders to
kill all the inhabitants, except those who had fled
to the teroples, and set fire to every part of the
city. Eight thousand men were barbarously
slaughtered ; and two thousand more remaining,
after the soldiers had been glutted with slaughter,
he fixed two thousand crosses along the sea
shore,! and caused them all to be crucified.

War has given rise to the most shocking and
unnatural crimes, the idea of which might never
otherwise have entered into the human mind.
Lathyrus, after an engagement with Alexander,
king of the Jews, on the banks of the river Jor
dan, — the same evening he gained the battle, in
going to take up his quarters in the neighbour
ing villages, he found them full of women and
children, and caused them all to be put to the
sword, and their bodies to be cut to pieces, and
put into cauldrons in order to their being dress
ed, as if he intended to make his army sup
upon them. His design was to have it believed,
that his troops ate human flesh, to spread the
greater terror throughout the surrounding coun
try, t

Even under the pretext of religion, and of the
Christian religion too, the most shocking barba
rities have been committed. Under the pretence
of vindicating the cause of Him who, in the
midst of cruel sufferings from men, prayed, " Fa
ther, forgive them, for they know not what they
do," the crusaders . hurried forward towards
Jerusalem, wading through seas of blood. When
their banners were hoisted on a principal emi
nence of Antioch, they commenced their butche
ry of the sleeping inhabitants. The dignity of
age, the helplessness of youth, and the beauty of
the weaker sex, were disregarded by these
sanctimonious savages. Houses were no sanc
tuaries ; and the sight of a mosque added new
virulence to cruelty. The number of Turks
massacred, on this night of frantic fury, was at
least ten thousand. After every species of habi
tation, from the marble palace to the meanest
hovel, had been converted into a scene of slaugh
ter; when the narrow streets and the spacious
squares were all alike disfigured with human
gore, and crowded with mangled carcasses, then
the assassins turned robbers, and became as mer
cenary as they had been merciless. When Je
rusalem was taken by these furious fanatics, they
suffered none to escape the slaughter : " Yet,
after they had glutted themselves with blood and
carnage, they immediately became devout pil
grims, and in religious transports, ran barefooted
to visit the holy sepulchre."§ In what light
must that religion appear to Eastern Infidels
which is supposed to lead to the perpetration of

• Rollln's Ancient Hist. * Ibid. t Ibid.
{ Millet's Elements of Gen. Hist.

such enormities ? And how ivyfu)'.y z.re tba
mild precepts and doctrines of Christianity mis
represented, when desperadoes oi'lais description
dare assume the Christian name '

Even the finer feelings of the female sex have
been blunted, and, in many instances, quite ex
tirpated by the mad schemes of ambition, and
the practices connected with war. Towards the
beginning of the thirteenth century, a Queen
of Hungary took the sign of the cross, and em-
barked in the mad expeditions of the crusaders,
as did likewise fifty thousand children and a
crowd of priests; because, according to the Scrip
ture, " God has made children the instruments
of his glory. "|| — Cleopatra, daughter of Ptol
emy Philometer, in order to gratify her restless
ambition of reigning alone and uncontrolled in
her dominions, killed her son Seleucus, with her
own hand, by plunging a dagger into his breast.
She had been the wife of three Kings of Syria
and the mother of four, and had occasioned the
death of two of her husbands. She prepared a
poisoned draught to destroy Grypus another of
her sons ; but her intention having been sus
pected, she was compelled to swallow the deadly
potion she had prepared, which took immediate
effect, and delivered the world from this female
monster. The Carthaginians were in the prac
tice of offering human sacrifices to their god Sa
turn, when they were defeated in war, in order
to propitiate the wrath of this deity. At first,
children were inhumanly burned, either in a fiery
furnace, like those in the valley of Hinnom, so
frequently mentioned in Scripture, or in a flam
ing statue of Saturn. — The cries of these un
happy victims were drowned by the uninterrupt
ed noise of drums and trumpets. Mothers made
it a merit, and a part of their religion, to view
the barbarous spectacle with dry eyes, and with
out so much as a groan ; and if a tear or sigh
stole from them, the sacrifice was considered as
less acceptable to the deity. This savage dis
position' was carried to such excess, that even
mothers would endeavour, with embraces and
kisses to hush the cries of their children, lest
they should anger the god.1T When Carthage
was taken by the Romans, the wife of Asdrubal,
the Carthaginian general, who had submitted to
the Romans, mounted to the upper part, of one
of the temples which had been set on fire ; and,
placing herself, with her two children, in sight of
her husband, uttered the most bitter imprecations
against him. " Base coward (said she) the
mean things thou hast done to save thv life shall
not avail thee ; thou shalt die this instant, at
least in thy two children." Having thus spoken,
she stabbed both the infants with a danger, and
while they were yet struggling for life, threw
them both from the top of the temple, an<l Jhec
leaped down after them into the flames !* *

B Millet's Elem. 1T Roilin's An. Hist-
'* Ency. Brit. Art. Uurthagc.

ATROCITIES CONNECTED WITH WAR.

13

Such are only a few insulated pictures of the
atrocities of war, and of the unnatural and infer
nal passions which uniformly follow in its train,
which may be considered as specimens of many
thousands of similar instances, which the records
of history furnish of the malignity and depravity
of mankind. I have selected my examples chief
ly from the history of ancient warfare : but were
we to search the annals of modern warfare, and
confine our attention solely to the battles of Alex
andria, of the Pyramids, of Borodina, of Smo-
lensko, of Austerlitz, of Leipsic, of Jena, of
Eylan, of Waterloo, and other warlike events
which have happened within the last thirty years,
we should meet with atrocities and scenes of
slaughter, no less horrible than those which I
have now related. I shall content myself with
stating only two or three instances.

After the taking of Alexandria by Bona
parte, " We were under the necessity," says
the relator, " of putting the whole of them to
death at the breach. But the slaughter did not
cease with the resistance. The Turks and in
habitants fled to their mosques, seeking protec
tion from God and their prophet ; and then , men
and women, old and young, and infants at the
breast, were slaughtered. This butchery continu
ed for four hours ; after which the remaining part
of the inhabitants were much astonished at not
having their throats cut." Be it remembered
that all this bloodshed was premeditated. " We
might have spared the men whom we lost," says
General Boyer, " by only summoning the town ;
but it was necessary to begin by confounding our
enemy."* After the battle of the Pyramids, it
is remarked by an eye-wintess, that " the whole
way through the desert, was tracked with the
bones and bodies of men and animals who had
perished in these dreadful wastes. — In order
to warm themselves at night, they gathered to
gether the dry bones and bodies of the dead,
which the vultures had spared, and it was by a
fire composed of this fuel that Bonaparte lay
down to sleep in the desert."\ A more revolting
and infernal scene it is scarcely possible for the
imagination to depict.

Miot gives the following description in rela
tion to a scene at Jaffa :— " The soldier aban
dons himself to all the fury which an assault
authorizes. He strikes, he slays, nothing can
impede him. All the horrors which accompany
the capture of a town by storm, are repeated in
every street, in every house. You hear the
cries of violated females calling in vain for help
to those relatives whom they are butchering.
No asylum is -espected. The blood streams on
every side ; at every step you meet with human
boings groaning and expiring," &c.— Sir Robert
Wilson, when describing the campaigns in Po
land relates, that" the ground between the wood.

Miot's Memoirs.

Ibid.

and the Russian batteries, about a quarter of
mile, .was a sheet of naked human bodies, wnich
friends and foes had during the night mutuallt
stripped, not leaving the worst rag upon them.
although numbers of these bodies still retained
consciousness of their situation. It was a sight
which the eye loathed, but from which it could
not remove." — In Labaume's " Narrative of the
Campaign in Russia," we are presented with
the most horrible details of palaces, churches,
and streets, enveloped in flames, — houses tum
bling into ruins, — hundreds of blackened car
casses of the wretched inhabitants, whom the fire
had consumed, blended with the fragments, —
hospitals containing 20,000 wounded Russians
on fire, and consuming the miserable victims, —
numbers of half-burned wretches crawling among
the smoking ruins, — females violated and mas
sacred, — parents and children half naked, shiver
ing with cold, flying in consteration with the
wrecks of their half-consumed funiture, — horses
falling in thousands, and writhing in the agonies
of death, — the fragments of carriages, muskets,
helmets, breast-plates, portmanteaus, and gar
ments strewed in every direction, — roads covered
for miles with thousands of the dying and the
dead heaped one upon another, and swimming
in blood, — and these dreadful scenes rendered
still more horrific by the shrieks of young fe
males, of mothers and children, and the piercing
cries of the wounded and the dying, invoking
death to put an end to their agonies.

But I will not dwell longer on such revolting
details. It is probable, that the feelings of some
of my readers have been harrowed up by the
descriptions already given, and that they have
turned away their eyes in disgust from such
spectacles of depravity and horror. Every mind
susceptible of virtuous emotions, and of the com
mon feelings of humanity, must, indeed, feel
pained and even agonized, when it reflects on
the depravity of mankind, and on the atrocious
crimes they are capable of committing, and have
actually perpetrated. A serious retrospect 01
the moral state of the world in past ages, is cal
culated to excite emotions, similar to those which
overpowered the mourning prophet when he ex
claimed, " O that my h >ad were waters, and
mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep
day and night, for the slain of the daughters ol
my people !" But, however painful the sight,
we ought not to turn away our eyes, with fasti
dious affectation, from the spectacles of misery
and devastation which the authentic records of
history present before us. They form traits in
the character of man, which ought to be contem
plated,— they are/octein the history of mankind,
and not the. mere pictures of fancy which are ex
hibited in poetry, in novels, and romances, — facts
which forcibly exemplify the operations of tho
malevolent principle, and from which we ought
to deduce important instructions, in reference

132

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

to the evil of sin, and the malignancy of pride,
covctousuess, ambition, and revenge. We think
nothing, in th^e common intercourse oflife, of,in-
dulgirig a selh&h disposition, of feeling proud and
indignant at a real or supposed affront, of looking
with a covetous eye at the possessions of our
neighbours, of viewing the success and prosperity
of our rivals with discontentment and jealousy,
or of feeling a secret satisfaction at the distress
or humiliation of our enemies ; and we seldom
reflect on the malignant effects which such pas
sions and dispositions would produce, were they
suffered to rage without control. But, in the
scenes and contentions of warfare which have
been realized on the great theatre of the world,
we contemplate the nature and effects of such
malignant dispositions in their true light ; we
perceive the ultimate tendency of every malevo
lent affection, when no physical obstruction im
pedes its progress ; we discern that it is only the
same dispositions which we daily indulge, ope-
^ rating on a more extensive scale; and we learn
the necessity of mortifying such dispositions, and
counteracting their influence, if we expect to en
joy substantial felicity either here 'or hereafter;
and if we wish to see the world restored to order,
to happiness and repose.

I shall only observe farther on this part of my
subject, that, besides the atrocities already no
ticed, war has been the nurse of every vicious dis
position, and of every immoral practice. The
Carthaginians, who were almost incessantly en
gaged in war, were knavish, vicious, cruel, and
superstitious ; distinguished for craft and cunning,
lying and hypocrisy, and for the basest frauds and
the most perfidious actions. The Goths and
Vandals are uniformly characterized, as not only
barbarous and cruel, but avaricious, perfidious,
and disregardful of the most solemn promises. It
was ever a sufficient reason for them to make an
attack, that they thought their enemies could not
resist them. Their only reason for making
peace, or for keeping it, was because their ene
mies were too strong ; and their only reason for
committing the most horrible massacres, rapes,
and all manner of crimes, was because they had
gained a victory. The Greeks and Romans, it
is well known, notwithstanding their superior
civilization, were distinguished for the most de-
griding and immoral practices. They gloried in
being proud, haughty, and revengeful ; and ever.
their amusements were characterized by a spirit
of ferocity, and by the barbarisms of war.— It is
almost needless to say that war blunts the finer
feelings of humanity, and engenders a spirit of
selfishness, and of indifference even towards
friends and companions. Ofthis many shocking
instances could be given.

Miot in his Memoirs of the War in Egypt,
relates the case of a soldier who was seized with
the plague, and with the delirium which some
times accompanies the disease. He took up his

knapsack, upon which his head was resting, and
placing it upon his shoulders, made an effort ta
rise, and to follow the army. The venom of the
dreadful malady deprived him of strength, and
after three steps, he fell again upon the sand,
headlong. The fall increased his terror of being
left by the regiment, and he rose a second time,
but with no better fortune. In his third effort,
he sunk, and, falling near the sea, remained upon
that spot which fate had destined for his grave.
The sight of this soldier was frightful: the dis
order which reigned in his senseless speech — his
figure, which represented whatever is mournful — •
his eyes staring and fixed — his clothes in rags —
presented whatever is most hideous in death.
The reader may perhaps believe that his com
rades would be concerned for him ; that they
would stop to help him ; that they would hasten
to support him, and direct his tottering steps.
Far from it : the poor wretch was only an object
of horror and derision. They ran from him, anu
they burst into loud laughter at his motions,
which resembled those of a drunken man, " Ho
has got his account," cried one; " He will not
march far,". said another ; and, when the wretch
fell for the last time, some of them added, " See,
he has taken up his quarters !" This terrible
truth, says the narrator, which I cannot help re
peating, must be acknowledged — Indifference
and se{fishness are the predominant feelings of an
army.

Rocca, in his " Memoirs of the War in Spain,"
remarks, " The habit of danger made us look
upon death as one of the most ordinary cir
cumstances of life ; when our comrades had once
ceased to live, the indifference which was shown
them amounted almost to irony. When the
soldiers, as they passed by, recognised one ol
their companions stretched among the dead, they
just said, ' He is in want of nothing, he will not
have his horse to abuse again, he has got drunk
for the last time,' or something similar, which
only worked, in the speaker, a sloical contempt
of existence. Such were the funeral orations
pronounced in honour of those who fell in our
battles." — Simpson, in his " Visit to Flanders,"
in 1815, remarks, "Nothing is more frightful
than the want of feeling which characterizes the
French soldiery. Their prisoners who were
lying wounded in the hospitals of Antwerp, were
often seen mimicking the contortions of counte
nance which were produced by the agonies of death,
in one of their own comrades in the next bed.
There is no ^u. ~e to be compared with the power
of fiends r.'.ve these."

Thus, it appears, that wars have prevailed in
every period, during the ages that are past, and
have almost extirpated the principle of benei-olenct
from the world ; and, therefore, it is obvious, that,
before the prevailing propensity to *varfare bo
counteracted and destroyed, the happiness which
flows from the operation of the benevolent affec

DISPOSITIONS OF SAVAGE NATIONS.

183

•ions cannot be enjoyed' by mankind at large.
To counteract this irrational and most deplora
ble propensity, by every energetic mean which
reason, humanity, and Christianity can suggest,
must be the duty of every one who is desirous to
promote the present and everlasting happiness of
his species.*

SECTION II.

STATE OF MORALS IN MODERN TIMES.

Moral state of Savage Nations.

I shall now take a very brief survpy of the
state of morals in modern times, and 01 the pre
vailing dispositions which are displayed by the
existing inhabitants of our globe. Were I to
enter into those minute and circumstantial details
which the illustration of this subject would re
quire, several volumes would be filled with the
detail of facts, and with the sketches of moral
scenery which might be brought forward. And
such a work, if judiciously executed, might be
rendered highly interesting, and might produce a
variety of benignant effects both on Christian
and on general society. But the narrow limits
within which the present work must be com
prised, compels me to confine my attention to
a few prominent features in the characters of
mankind, and, to a few insulated facts by which
they may be illustrated. — I shall consider, in the
first place, some of the

Prominent dispositions which appear a nong Sa -
vage and Half Civilized Nation '.

It is not to be disputed, that numerous indi
viduals among the uncivilized tribes of mankind,
have occasionally displayed the exercise of many
of the social virtues, — that they have been brave
and magnanimous, faithful to their promises,
strong in their attachments, and generous and
affectionate to their friends and relatives. But
their virtues, for the most part, proceed from a
principle of selfishness, and are confined to the
clan or tribe to which they belong. Towards
their enemies, and towards all who have injured
them in the slightest degree, they almost uni
formly display cruel, perfidious, and revengeful
dispositions. The following facts and descrip
tions, selected from the authentic records of voy
agers and travellers, will tend to corroborate these
positions.

The most prominent feature which appears in

* The Author intended, had his limits permitted, to
6t;ite some additional considerations to show the
felly and wickedness of war. In the mean time, he
refers his readers to "Letters addressed to Caleb
Strong, Esq.," which contain a series of energetic and
impressive reasonings on the subject.—" Pictures of
War," by Irenicus, and a duodecimo volume, lately
l-ujblished, entitled, " An Inquiry into the accordancy
of War with the principles of Christianity," &c.

the character of savage nations, is, their disposi
tion for war, and to inflict revenge (or real or sup
posed injuries. With respect to .the NORTH
AMERICAN Indians, it is the uniform description
given of them by all traveller's, that, if we except
hunting, war is the only employment of the men,
and every other concern is left to the women. ^
Their most common motive for entering into war,
is, either to revenge themselves for the death of
some lost friends, or to acquire prisoners, who
may assist them in their hunting, and whom they
adopt into their society. In these wars, they are
cruel and savage, to an incredible degree. They
enter unawares, the villages of their foes, and,
while the flower of ^the nation are engaged in
hunting, massacre all the children, women, and
helpless old men, or make prisoners of as many as
they can manage. But when the enemy is appriz
ed of their design, and^ coming on in arms against
them, they throw themselves flat on the ground,
among the withered herbs and leaves, which
their faces are painted to resemble. They then r
allow a part to pass unmolested ; when, all at
once, with a tremendous shout, rising up from
their ambush, they pour a storm of musket-balls on
their foes. If the force on each side continues
nearly equal, the fierce spirits of these savages,
inflamed by the loss of friends, can no longer be
restrained. They abandon their distant war,
they rush upon one another with clubs and
hatchets in their hands, magnifying their own
courage, and insulting their enemies. A cruel
combat ensues •, death appears in a thousand hide
ous forms, which would congeal thebloodof civi
lized nations to behold, hut which r >use the fury
of these savages. They trample, they insult over
the dead bodies, tearing the scalp from the head,
wallowing in their blood like wild beasts, and
sometimes devouring their flesh. The flame
rages on till it meets with no resistance ; then
the prisoners are secured, whose fate is a thou
sand times more dreadful than theirs who have
died in the field. The conquerors setup a hide
ous howling, to lament the friends they have lost.
They approach to their own village ; the women,
with frightful shrieks, come out to mourn their
dead brothers, or their husbands. An orator
proclaims aloud a circumstantial account of every
particular of the expedition; and as he mentions
the names of those who have fallen, the shriek's
of the women are redoubled. The last ceremony
is the proclamation of victory : each individual
then forgets his private misfortune, and joins in
the triumph of his nation ; all tears are wiped
from their eyes, and, by an unaccountable transi
tion, they pass in a moment from the bitterness o»
sorrow, to an extravagance of joy.*

As they feel nothing but revenge for the ene
mies of their nation, their prisoners are treated
with cruelty in the extreme. The cruelties in-

* See Ency. Brit- Art. America-

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

flicted on thos-i prisoners who are doomed to
death, are too shocking and horrible to be ex
hibited in detail : one plucks out the nails of the
prisoner by the roots; another takes a finger in-
10 his mouth, and tears off the flesh with his
teeth; a third thrusts the finger, mangled as it
is, into the bowl of a pipe made red hot, which
he smokes like tobacco: they then pound his
toes and fingers to pieces between two stones ;
they apply red hot irons to every part of his
mangled body; they pull off his flesh, thus man
gled and roasted, and devour it with greediness ; —
and thus they continue for several hours, and
sometimes for a whole day, till they penetrate to
the vital parts, and completely exhaust the
springs of life. Even the women, forgetting the
human, as well as the female nature, and trans
formed into something worse than furies, fre
quently outdo the men in this scene of horror;
while the principal persons of the country sit round
the stake to which the prisoner is fixed, smoking,
arid looking on without the least emotion. What
is most remarkable, the prisoner himself endea
vours to brave his torments with a stoical apathy.
" I do not fear death, (he exclaims in the face of
'his tormentors,) nor any kind of tortures; those
that fear them are cowards, they are less than
women. May my enemies be confounded with
despair and rage ! Oh, that I could devour
them, arid drink their blood to the last drop!"

Such is a faint picture of the ferocious disposi
tion of the Indians of America, which, with a few
slight modifications, will apply to almost tl.
whole of the original natives of that vast conti
nent. Instead of the exercise of benevolent affec
tions, and ot'forgiving dispositions; instead of
humane feelings, and compassion for the 'suffer
ings offellovv-mortals, we here behold them trans
ported into an extravagance of joy, over the
sufferings they had produced, the carnage they
had created, the children whom they had depriv
ed of their parents, and the widows whose hus
bands they had mangled and slain ; because they
had glutted their revenge, and obtained a victory.
Nothing can appear more directly opposed to the
precepts of Christ, and to the benevolence of
heaven.

If, from America, we cross the Atlantic, and
land on the shores of AFRICA, we shall find tho '
existing innabitants of that continent display
ing dispositions no less cruel and ferocious. —
Bosrnan relates the following instances of cruel
lies practised by the Adomese Negroes, inhabit
ing the banks of the Praa or Chamah river.

" Anqua, the king, having in an engagement
taken five of his principal Antese enemies pri
soners, he wounded them all over ; after which,
w.ih a more than brutal fury, he satiated, though
not tired himself, by sucking their blood at the
gaping wounds ; but, bearing a more than ordi
nary grudge against one of them, he caused him
to be laid bound at his feet, and his body to he

pierced with hot irons, gathering his blood tha-
issued from him in a vessel, one half of which he
drank, and offered up the rest to his god. On
another occasion, he put to death one of his
wives and a slave, drinking their blood also, as
was his usual practice with his enemies."*—
Dispositions and practices no less abominable,
are regularly exhibited in the kingdom of Dnho-
my, near the Gulf of Guinea. An immolation
of human victims, for the purpose of watering the
graves of the king's ancestors, and of supplying
them with servants of various descriptions in the
other world, takes place every year, at a grand
festival which is held generally in April and May,
about the period, possibly, when the Bible and
Missionary Societies of this country are holding
their anniversaries. The victims are generally
prisoners of war, reserved for the purpose; hut.
should there be lack of these, the number (between
sixty and seventy) is made up from the most con
venient of his own subjects. The immolation ol
victims is not confined to this particular period ;
for at any time, should it be necessary to send an
account to his forefathers of any remarkable
event, the king despatches a courier to the shades,
by delivering a message to whoever may happen
to be near him, and then ordering his head to be
chopped off immediately. It is considered an
honour where his majesty personally condescends
to become the executioner in these cases ; an
office in which the king prides himself in being
expert. Tf"? governor was present on one occa
sion, when a poor fellow, whose fear of death out
weighing 'he sense of the honour conferred upon
him, on I jing desired to carry some message to
his fat he , humbly declared on his knees, that he
was unacquainted with the way. On which tho
tyrant vociferated, " I'll show you the way," and,
with one blow, made his head fly many yards
from his body, highly indignant that there should
have been the least expression of reluctance, f
On the thatched roofs of the guard-houses which
surround the palace of this tyrant, are ranged,
on wooden stakes, numbers of human skulls ; the
top of the wall which encloses an area before it,
is stuck full of human jaw-bones, and the path
leading to the door is paved with the skulls.

In the kingdom of ASHANTEE, similar prac
tices uniformly prevail. " When the king of this
country (says Dupuis) was about to open the
campaign in Gaman, he collected together his
priests, to invoke the royal Fetische, and perform
the necessary orgies to ensure success. These
ministers of superstition sacrificed thirty-two
male, and eighteen female victims as an expia
tory offering to the gods ; but the answers from
the priests being deemed by the council as stil!
devoid of inspiration, the king was induced to
make a custom, at the sepulchres of his ances
tors, where many hundreds bled. This, it is a£

* Dupuis' Journal in Ashantee:
' M'Leod's voyage to Afri ta.

DISPOSITIONS OF SAVAGE NATIONS.

185

crmed, propitiated the v <ath of the adverse god."
The same king, when he returned, having dis
covered a conspiracy, decreed, that seventeen
if his wives, along with his own sister, should
5)e strangled and beheaded. •' His sister's para
mour, and all those of his party, were doomed to
the most cruel deaths, at the grave of the king's
mother. While these butcheries were transact
ing, the king prepared to enter the palace; and
in the act of crossing the threshold of the outer
gate, was met by several of his wives, whose
anxiety to embrace their sovereign lord impelled
them thus to overstep the boundary of female
decorum in Ashantee ; for it happened that the
king was accompanied by a number of his cap
tains, who, accordingly, were compelled to cover
their faces with both their hands, and fly from
the spot. This is said to have angered the mo
narch, although his resentment proceeded no
farther than words, and he returned tho embraces
of his wives. But another cause of anger soon
after occurred, and he was inflamed to the highest
pitch of indignation, and, in a paroxysm of an
ger, caused these unhappy beings to be cut in
pieces before his face, giving orders, at the same
time, to cast the fragments into the forest, to be
devoured by birds and beasts of prey. Nor did
the atonement rest here ; for six more unhappy
females were impeached of inconstancy, and
they also expiated their faults with their lives.
Like another Ulysses, his majesty then devoted
himself to the purification of his palace, when,
to sum up the full horrors of these bloody deeds,
two thousand wretches, selected from the Gaman
prisoners of war, were slaughtered over the royal
death-stool, in honour of the shades of departed
kings and heroes."*

Such are a few specimens of the ferocious dis
positions of the petty tyrants of Africa. But
we are not to imagine, that such dispositions are
confined to kings, and to the higher ranks of
society. Wherever such malevolent passions
are displayed among barbarous chieftains, they
pervade, in a greater or less degree, the whole
mass of the people, and almost everyone, in pro-
po/tion to the power with which he is invested,
perpetrates similar barbarities. The following
instance will corroborate this position, and, at the
same time, show, for how many cruelties and
acts of injustice the abettors of the infamous
traffic in slaves, are accountable. It is extract
ed from Major Gray's " Travels in Africa, in
1824."

The Kaartan force which the Major accom
panied, had made 107 prisoners, chiefly women
and children, in a predatory excursion into Bon-
doo, for the purpose of supply ing themselves with
slaves. The following is an account of the man
ner in which they were dragged along. " The
men were tied in pairs by the necks, their hands

• Dtipuls' Mission to Ashantee, in 1323

secured behind their backs ; the women by the
necks only ; but their hands were not left free,
from any sense of feeling for them, but in order
to enable them to balance the immense loads of
corn or rice which they were obliged to carry on
their heads, and their children on their backs."
— "I had an opportunity," says Major Gray,
" of witnessing, during this short march, the
new-made slaves, and the sufferings to whicn
they are subjected in their first state of bondage.
They were hurried along (tied) at a pace little
short of running, to enable them to keep up with
the horsemen, who drove them on, as Srnithfield
drovers do fatigued bullocks. Many of the wo
men were old, and by no means able to endure
such treatment. One, in particular, would not
have failed to excite the tenderest feelings of
compassion in the breast of any, save a savage
African. She was at least sixty years old, in
the most miserable state of emaciation and debi
lity, nearly doubled together, and with difficulty
dragging her tottering limbs along. To crown
the heart-rending picture, she was naked, save
from her waist, to about halfway to the knees.
All this did not prevent her inhuman captor from
making her carry & heavy load of water, while,
with a rope about her neck, he drove her before
his horse ; and whenever she showed the least
inclination to stop, he beat her in the most un
merciful manner with a stick."

Were we to travel through the whole interior of
Africa, and round its northern, eastern, and
western coasts, we should find, among almost
every tribe, numerous displays of the most inhu
man and depraved dispositions. The Algerines
are characterized as the most cruel and dangerous
pirates — base, perfidious, and rapacious, to the
last degree. No oaths, nor ties, human or di
vine, will avail to bind them, when their interest
interferes. Whatever respect they may pretend
to pay to their prophet Mahomet, gold is the only
true idol which they worship. The emperors ol
Morocco are well known as a set of rapacious
and blood-thirsty tyrants, who have lived in a
state of habitual warfare with Christian nations,
and in the perpetration of deeds of injustice and
cruelty. The Gattas, on the borders of Abyssi
nia, are a barbarous and warlike nation. They
are hardy, and of a ferocious disposition ; they
are trained to the love of desperate achievements,
taught to believe that conquest entitles them to
the possession of whatever they desire, and to
look upon death with the utmost contempt ; and,
therefore, in their wars, they fight with the most
desperate resolution, and neither give nor take
any quarter. The inhabitants oFAdel, too. are
of a warlike disposition, and most frequently live
in enmity and hoMihty with those around them.
The Feloops are gloomy and unforgiving in their
tempers, thirsting for vengeance even in the hour
of dissolution, and leaving their children to avenge
their quarrels. The inhabitants of the Grain

136

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Coast, especially the Mulattoes, are said to be a
most abandoned set of people. The men are
drunkards, levva, thievish, an 1 treacherous, and
the women are the most abandoned prostitutes,
sacrificing themselves at al! times, and to all
sorts of men, without the least degree of re
straint.* The natives of _<4/Jsico, which borders
on Angola, live by plundering all who happen to full
in their way, some of whom they kill, and others
they keep as slaves, j " The Boshemen are land
pirates, who live without laws and without disci
pline ; who lurk in thickets, to watch the passage
of travellers, and shoot them with poisoned ar
rows, in order to seize their cattle. ''J " The ne
groes of Congo, (says M. do la Brosse in his
Travels along the coast of Angola, in 1738,) are
extremely treacherous and vindictive. They
daily demanded of us some brandy for the use of
the king and the chief men of the town. One day
this request was denied arid we had soon reason to
repent it; for all the English arid French officers
having gone to fish on a small lake near the sea-
coast, they erected a tent for the purpose of dress
ing and eating the fishes they had caught. When
amusing themselves after their repast, seven or
eight negroes, who were the chiefs of Loango,
arrived in sedans, and presented their hands ac
cording to the custom of the country. These ne
groes privately rubbed the hands of the officers
with a subtle poison, which acts instantaneous
ly : and, accordingly, five captains and three sur
geons died on the spot."

The Moors are characterized by Mr. Park as
having cruelty and low cunning pictured on their
countenances. Their treachery and malevo
lence are manifested in their plundering excur
sions against the Negro villages. Without the
smallest provocation, and sometimes under the
fairest professions of friendship, they will seize
upon the Negroes' cattle, and even on the inha
bitants themselves. The Bedouins are plun
derers of the cultivated lands, and robbers on the
high roads; they watch every opportunity of re
venging their enemies, and their animosities are
transmitted as an inheritance from father to chil
dren. Even the Egyptians, who are more civil
ized than the tribes to which I have now alluded,
art characterized by excessive pride, vindictive
tempers, inordinate passions, and various species
of moral turpitude. There is a trait in the cha
racter of the women of this country, pointedly
adverted toby Sonini, in his " Travels in Egypt,"
which is particularly odious and horrible. On
discovering any partiality in their husbands for
other females, they are transported into an un
bounded and jealous fury. Such are their deceit
and cruelty on these occasions, that they instil
into the blood of their faithless husband, a slow
and mortal poison. Their revenge is meditated

Cooke's Universal Geography, To!. I. p- 447.
Lfcid 1 Valiant's Travels.

in silence, and they indulge the diabolical satis
faction of taking off an unhappy being by a linger
ing death. It is said, with confidence, that their
own persons supply the horrid means of perpe
trating their malicious designs on their husbands,
and that they mix with their aliment a certain
portion of an ingredient of a poisonous nature,
which infallibly induces a slow langour and con
sumption, and in time brings the wretched vic
tims to the grave. The symptoms are dreadful.
The body desicates, the limbs become excessive
ly weak, the gums rot, the teeth loosen, the hair
falls off, and, at length, after having dragged a
miserable and tortured existence, for a whole year
or more, the unhappy beings die in the most ex
treme torment.

If we pass from Africa to the regions of Asia,
we shall find similar depraved principles and
practices pervading its several tribes, and the
various ranks of its population. Here, tyranny,
in all its degrading and cruel forms, reigns su
preme and uncontrolled over a superstitious, a
deluded, and an idolatrous race of mankind, — of
which the following recent instances, in relation
to a petty despot of Persia, may serve as a spe
cimen. " The governor Zulfecar Khun is pro
nounced to be a cruel and unprincipled tyrant;
unfortunately for the people, he has the ear of the
sovereign, and they have no resource against his
rapacity. He pays to the crown 7000 tornauns
a year, but it is asserted, that he collects from
the district 100,000. His oppression was so
grievous, that the inhabitants, wearied out, went
in a body to the king to complain ; but his ma
jesty only referred them back to their tyrant, who,
exasperated at their boldness, wreaked upon them
a cruel vengeance. It is said, that he maimed
and put to death upwards of a thousand of both
sexes, cult ing off the hands, putting out the eyes,
and otherwise mutilating the men, and cutting
off the noses, ears, and breasts of the women.
The people, desponding and brokenhearted after
this, paid, in as far as they were able, the rapa
cious demands of their oppressor, and the na
tural consequence, ruin and desolation has en
sued.'^

Sir John Chardin gives us the following ac
count of the inhabitants of Mingrelia, particu
larly of the women. " The people are generally
handsome, ihe men strong and well-made, and
the women very beautiful ; but both sexes are
very vicious and debauched. The women,
though lively, civil, and affectionate, are very
perfidious; for there is no wickedness which
they will not perpetrate, in order to procure, to
preserve, or to get rid of their gallants. The
men likewise possess many bad qualities. All
of them are trained to robbery, which thev study
both as a business, and as an amusement. With
great satisfaction they relate the depredation*

§ Frazer's Journey to Khorasan, 1823

DISPOSITIONS OF SAVAGE NATIONS.

137

they have committed ; and, from this polluted
source, they derive their greatest praise and hon
our. In Mingrelia , falsehood, assassination, and
theft, are good actions ; and whoredom, bigamy,
and incest, are esteemed as virtuous habits.
The men marry two or three wives at a time,
and keep as many concubines as they choose.
They not only make a common practice of sell
ing their children, either for gold, or in exchange
for wares and provisions, but even murder them,
or bury them alive, when they find it difficult to
bring them up."

The Tartars, who occupy vast regions of the
Asiatic continent, are uniformly described by
travellers, as a rude, plundering, and uncultivated
race of men. " There is something frightful,"
says Smellie, " in the countenances of the Cal-
Jiuck Tartars. All of them are wandering va
gabonds, and live in tents made of cloth or of
skins. They eat the flesh of horses, either raw,
or a little softened by putrifying under their
saddles. No marks of religion, or of decency in
their manners, are to be* found among most of
these tribes. They are fierce, warlike, hardy,
and brutally gross, They are all robbers ; and
the Tartars of Daghestan, who border on civiliz
ed nations, have a great trade in slaves, whom
they carry off by force, and sell to the Persians
and Turks."*

The Arabians, like the Tartars, live mostly
without government, without law, and almost
without any social intercourse. They still con
tinue in a state of rudeness and of lawless inde
pendency. Their chiefs authorize rape, theft,
and robbery. They have no estimation for vir
tue, and glory in almost every species of vice.
They roam about in the deserts, and attack cara
vans and travellers of every description, whom
they frequently murder, and plunder of their pro
perty. — The Chinese, though more highly civil
ized than the tribes now mentioned, and though
they merit great applause for their ingenuity,
industry, and perseverance, are as despicable in
their moral characters, and as destitute of true
benevolence, as almost any nation upon earth.
Avarice is their leading passion ; and in order
to gratify it, they practise every species of du
plicity and fraud. They cannot be influenced
by motives either of honesty or of humanity ;
and they surpass every nation on the globe "in
private cheating. Captain Cook observes, that
(the danger of being hanged for any crime being
ev.ccpted) " there is nothing, however infamous,
which the Chinese will refuse to do for gain."
In this opinion he concurs with every precedins
and subsequent writer, and confirms it by a
variety of striking proofs, of which an additional
number may be se<?n in the accounts which have
boen published of our late embassies to that
empire.

• Smellie's Philosophy of Natural History.

The Birmans are a lively inquisitive race,
active, irascible, and impatient. While in peace,
they give proofs of a certain degree of gentleness
and civilization ; in war, they display the ferocity
of savages. — The Malays, though inhabiting a
country beautiful and delightful in the extreme,
where refreshing gales and cooling streams as
suage the heat, where the soil teems with deli
cious fruits, where the trees are clothed with a
continual verdure, and the flowers breathe their
fragrant odours, are remarkably ferocious in their
manners. They go always armed (except the
slaves,) and would think themselves disgraced,
if they went abroad without their poignards.
The inland inhabitants of Malacca, called Mo-
nucaboes, are a barbarous savage people, delight
ing in doing continual mischief to their neigh
bours ; on which account, no grain is sown about
Malacca, but what is enclosed in gardens, with
the thickest hedges, or deep ditches ; for when
the grain is ripe in the open plains, the Monu-
caboes never fail to set fire to it. The Persians,
in their dispositions, says Mr. Franklin, are
much inclined to sudden anger, are quick, fiery,
and very sensible of affronts, which they resent
on the spot. Chardin describes them as " war
like, vain, and ambitious of praise ; exceedingly
luxurious, prodigal, voluptuous, and addicted to
gallantry." It is well known that the wars and
fiend-like cruelties in which the despots of this
country have been engaged, have transformed
man}' of its provinces into scenes of sterility and
desolation. — The Hindoos are effeminate, luxuri
ous, and early initiated into the arts of dissimu
lation. They can caress those whom they hate,
and behave with the utmost affability and kind
ness to such as they intend to deprive of exist
ence, by the most sanguinary means. Though
they seldom scold or wrangle, they often stab
each other insidiously, and, without any public
quarrel, gratify a private revenge. The destruc
tion of infants, the immolation of widows, the
drowning of aged parents, which prevail among
them, and the cruel and idolatrous rites which
distinguish their religious services, are too well
known to require description. — The Turks,
though grave, sedate, and rather hypocondriac,
yet when agitated by passion, are furious, raging,
ungovernable, fraught with dissimulation, jea
lous, suspicious, and vindictive beyond concep
tion. They are superstitious, and obstinately
tenacious in matters of religion, and are incapa->
ble of exercising benevolence or even humanity
towards Christians, or towards Jews. Interest
is their supreme good, and when that comes in
competition, all ties of religion, consanguinity,
or friendship, are with the generality, speedily
dissolved. They have deprived of their liberty,
and of their wealth, all who have been subjected
to their iron sceptre, and have plunged them into
the depths of moral and of mental debasement.
The page of history is filled with details of theu

38

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

devastations and cruelties, and the deeds of in
justice and of horror which they have perpetrat
ed, even in our own times, are scarcely equalled
by the atrocities of the most savage hordes if
mankind.

If we take a survey of the numerous tribes
which inhabit the Islands of the Indian and the
Pacific Oceans, we shall find similar depraved
and malevolent passions, raging without control,
and producing all those malignant and desolating
effects which have counteracted the benevolence
of the Creator, and entailed misery on the human
race. The dismal effects of the principle of
hatred directed towards human beings, the dis
position to engage in continual warfare, and the
savage ferocity of the human mind, when unre
strained by moral and prudential considerations,
are nowhere so strikingly displayed, as in the
isles which are scattered throughout the wide
expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Of the truth of
these positions we have abundance of melancholy
examples, in the reports of missionaries, and in
the journals which have been published by late
navigators, from which I shall select only two or
three examples.

The first instance I shall produce, has a rela
tion chiefly to the inhabitants of New Zealand.
With respect to these islanders Captain Cook
remarks, " Their public contentions are fre
quent, or rather perpetual; for, it appears from
their number of weapons, and dexterity in using
them, that war is their principal profession." —
" The war-dance consists of a great variety of
violent motions, and hideous contortions of the
limbs, during which the countenance also per
forms a part ; the tongue is frequently thrust out
to an incredible, length, and the eye-lid so forci
bly drawn up, that the white appears both above
and below, as well as on each side of the iris, so
as to form a circle around it; nor is anything
neglected so as to render the human shape fright
ful and deformed. To such as have not been ac
customed to such a practice, they appear more
like demons than men, and would almost chill the
boldest with fear ; at the same time they brandish
their spears, shake their darts, and cleave the
air with their patoo-patoos. To this succeeds a
circumstance almost foretold in their fierce de
meanour, horrid and disgraceful to human nature,
which is, cutting to pieces, even before being
perfectly dead, the bodies of their enemies;
and, after dressing them on a fire, devouring the
flesh, not only without reluctance, but with pe
culiar satisfaction." There is perhaps nothing
that can convey a more striking idea of the ac
tions of pure malevolence, and of the horrible
rage and fury of infernal fiends, than the picture
here presented of these savage islanders.

These people live under perpetual apprehen
sions of being destroyed by each other; there
being few of their tribes that have not, as they
think, sustained wrongs from some other tribe,

which they are continually on the watch to avenge
and the desire of a good meal is no small incite
ment. Many years will sometimes elapse before
a favourable oppoitunity happens, yet the son
never loses sight of an injury that has been done
to his father. — " Their method of executing their
horrible designs is by stealing upon the adverse
party in the night, and if they find them unguard
ed (which is very seldom the case) they kill
every one indiscriminately, not even sparing the
women and children. When the massacre is
completed, they either feast and gorge themselves
on the spot, or carry off as many of the dead
bodies as they can, and devour them at home,
with acts of brutality too shocking to be described.
If they are discovered before they execute theii
bloody purpose, they generally steal off again ;
and sometimes are pursued and attacked by the
other party in their turn. To give quarter, or to
take prisoners, makes no part of their military
law ; so that the vanquished can save their lives
only by flight. This perpetual state of war, and
destructive method of conducting it, operates so
strongly in producing habits of circumspection,
that one hardly ever finds a New Zealander oft
his guard, either by night or by day."* While
the mind is kept in such a state of incessant
anxiety and alarm, il must be impossible for hu
man beings to taste the sweets of rational, or
even of sensitive enjoyment. A melancholy
gloom must hang over these wretched beings,
and the dark suspicions, and the revengeful pas
sions which agitate their minds, can only fit
them for those regions of darkness where the
radiations of benevolence are completely extin
guished.

The implacable hatred which these savages
entertain towards each other, is illustrated, in the
following short narrative from Captain Cook. —
"Among our occasional visitors was a chief named
Kahoora, who, as I was informed, headed tho
party that cut off Captain Furneaux's people,
and himself killed Mr. Rowe, the officer who
commanded. To judge of the character of Ka
hoora, by what I had heard from many of his
countrymen, he seemed to be more feared than
beloved among them. Not satisfied with telling
me that he was a very bad man, some of them
even importuned me to kill him: and, I believe
they were not a little surprised that I did not lis
ten to them ; for according to their ideas of equity,
this ought to have been done. But if I had fol
lowed the advice of all our pretended friends, I
might have extirpated the whole race ; for the
people of each hamlet or village, by turns, applied
to me, to destroy the other. One would have ai-
most thought it impossible, that so striking a •
proof of the divided state in which this people
live, could have been assigned."

Similar dispositions are displayed throughout

' Cooke's Voyages-

DISPOSITIONS OF THE NEW ZEALANDERS.

ilmcst all the other islands of the Southern
Ocean. The following description is given by
M. de la Perouse, of the inhabitants of Maouna
Oyolava, and the other islands in the Navigator's
Archipdago. " Their native ferocity of coun
tenance always expresses either surprise or an
ger. The least dispute between them is follow
ed by blows of sticks, clubs, or paddles, and of
ten, without doubt, costs the combatants their
lives." With regard to the women, he remarks :
"The gross effrontery of their conduct, the in
decency of their motions, and the disgusting of
fers which they made of their favours, rendered
them fit mothers and wives for the ferocious be
ings that surrounded us.". The treachery and
ferocity of these savages were strikingly display
ed in massacring M. de Langle, the astronomer,
and eleven of the crew that belonged toPerouse's
vessel, and such was their fierce barbarity,
that, after having killed them, they still continued
to wreak Jieir fury upon the inanimate bodies
with their clubs. The natives of New Caledonia
are a race of a similar description. Though
Captain Cook describes them as apparently a
good natured sort of people, yet subsequent na
vigators have found them to be almost the very
reverse of what ho described ; as ferocious in the
extreme, addicted to cannibalism, and to every
barbarity shocking to human nature. The French
navigator, Admiral D'Entrecasteaux, in his in
tercourse with these people, received undoubted
proofs of their savage disposition, and of their
being accustomed to feed on human fiVsh. Speak
ing of one of the natives, who had visited his
ship, and had described the various practices
connected with cannibalism, he says, — " It is
difficult to depict the ferocious avidity with which
he expressed to us, that the flesh of their unfor
tunate victims was devoured by them after they
had broiled it on the coals. This cannibal also
let us know, that the flesh of the arms and legs
was cut into slices, and that they considered the
most muscular parts a very agreeable dish. It
was then easy for us to explain, why they fre
quently felt our arms and legs, manifesting a
violent longing ; they then uttered a faint whist
ling, which they produced by closing their teeth,
and applying to them the tip of the tongue ; af
terwards opening their mouth, they smacked their
lips several times in succession."

The characters of the islanders now described,
may be considered as common to the inhabitants
of the New Hebrides, the Friendly Islands, the
Marquesas, the Sandwich, New Guinea, New
Britain, the Ladrones, and almost all the islands
which are dispersed over the vast expanse of
the Pacific Ocean. Captain Cook, when de
scribing th-s natives of New Zealand, remarks,
that, " the inhabitants of the other parts of the
South Seas have not even the idea of indecency
with respect to any object, or to any action.''
T.ie inhabitants even of the Society and of the

Sandwich K.es, prior to the state of moral and
religious impiwement to which they have iateiy
advanced, though their dispositions were some
what milder tiian those of the other islancs
were almost equally low in point of moral de
basement. Captain Cook, speaking of the na
tives of Otaheile, declares, " They are all ar
rant thieves, and can pick pockets with the dex
terity of the most exoert London blackguard.''*
When describing the societies distinguished by
the name of Arreoy, he declares, us a character
istic of the female part of the community, " If
any of the women happen to be with child, which
in this manner of life, happens less frequently
than in ordinary cases, the poor infant is smo
thered the moment it is born, that it may be no
incumbrance to the father, nor interrupt the
mother in the pleasures of her diabolical pros
titution."! Another circumstance, stated by the
same navigator, exhibits their former moral cha
racter in a still more shocking point of view.
On the approach of war with any of the neigh
bouring islands, or on other interesting occa
sions, human sacrifices were a universal practice.
" When I described," says this illustrious voya
ger, " the Natibe at Tongabatoo, I mentioned,
that, on the approaching sequel of that festival,
we had been told that ten men were to be sacri
ficed. This may give us an idea of the extent
of this religious massacre on that islar.c1. And
though we should suppose, that never more than
one person is sacrificed on any single occasion
at Otaheite, it is more than probable, that ihese
occasions happened so frequently, as to maxe a
shocking waste of the human race ; for I counted
no less than forty-nine skulls of former victims,
lying before the Morai, where we saw one more
added to the number. And, as none of these
skulls had, as yet, suffered any considerable
change from the weather, it may hence be infer
red, that no great length of time had elapsed, since
this considerable number of unhappy wretches
had been offered on this altar of blood. "J
He also informs us, that human sacrifices were
more frequent in the Sandwich, than in any of
the other islands. " These horrid rites," says
he, " are not only had recourse to upon the rorn-
mencement of war, and preceding great battles,
and other signal enterprises; but the death of
any considerable chief calls for a sacrifice cf one
or more Towtows, (that is, vulgar or low persons,)
according to his rank ; and we were told that ten
men were destined to suffer on the death of
Teneeoboo, one of their great chiefs. §

Such are a few specimens of the moral dispo
sitions — the hatred, the horrid warfare, and the
abominable practices, which are displayed over

* Hawkesworth's Narrative of Cook's Voyages,
vol. II.

t Ibid. : Ibid.

§ Hawkesworth's Narrative of Cook's Voyages.
Vol. n.

140

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

the greater portion of the Eastern and Western
Continents, and among the thousands of islands
which diversify the surface of the Ocean — dispo
sitions and practices, which, if permitted to ex
tend their influence universally, and without
control, would soon extirpate the intelligent
creation, and banish happiness from the empire
of God.

WARLIKE ATTITUDE OF NATIONS.

Were benevolence a characteristic of the in
habitants of our globe, every traveller would be
secure from danger from his fellow-men : he
might land on every shore without the least sus
picion or alarm, and confidently expect that his
distresses would be relieved, and his wants sup
plied, by every tribe of the human race among
whom he might occasionally sojourn. No hos
tile weapons would be lifted up to repel a stranger,
when gratifying his curiosity in visiting distant
lands, and contemplating foreign scenes ; and no
instruments of destruction would require to be
forged, to preserve a nation from the inroads of
destroyers. But when we survey the actual
state of mankind, we find almost every nation
under heaven, if not actually engaged in war, at
least in a warlike attitude, and one of their chief
employments consists in divising schemes, either
of conquest or revenge, and in furbishing the in
struments ofdeath. The following instances may
suffice, as illustrations of this position.

The armies of ASHANTEE, says Dupuis,
amount to upwards of eighty thousand men, arm
ed with tomahawks, lances, knives, javelins,
bows, and arrows ; and forty thousand, who can
occasionally be put in possession of muskets and
blunderbusses. — The opposing armies of MOS
LEM and DINHERTJ, amounted at times to
140.000 men.— The King ofDAHOMY, and his
auxiliaries, can raise about 50,000 men, armed
with bows arid arrows, sabres, and iron maces. —
The king of BENIN can arm 200,000, upon an
emergency, and furnish 10,000 of them with
muskets. In those countries of Africa, where
fire-arms and gunpowder are unknown, they
wield the following kinds of arms with great dex
terity and execution. These are, very strong
supple lances, which are barbed and poisoned,
targets, bows and arrows, tomahawks, and iron
maces ; the former of which they are in the prac
tice of poisoning with a venom more deadly than
that which is used by any other nation, as its
operation is said to be sometimes instantaneous,
and its wound, though ever so slight, usually pro
duces death within the lapse of a few minutes.*

Such is the warlike disposition displayed by a
few comparatively insignificant tribes in Africa,
and similar dispositions are manifested, and si
milar attitudes assumed, by almost all the tribes
which inhabit that vast continent. Their time,

* Dupuis' " Mission to Ashontee, in 1823 "

and their physical and mental exertions, seem to
be spent much in war, and in the preparation ol
warlike instruments, as if these were the great
ends for which the Creator had brought them in
to existence. If the ingenuity and the energies
displayed in such preparations and pursuits, were
employed in operations calculated to promote the
benefit of mankind, what an immense proportion
of happiness would be distributed among nume
rous tribes which are just now sunk into depra
vity, and into the depths of wretchedness and
wo !

Pallas, in his description of the nations inha
biting the Caucasus, when speaking of the CIR
CASSIANS, says, " Persons of wealth and rank
never leave the house without a sabre, nor do
they venture beyond the limits of the village
without being completely arrayed, and having
their breast pockets supplied with ball cartridges/
In regard to the lower class, " when they do not
carry a sabre, with other arms, they provide
themselves with a strong staff, twoarshines long.
on the top of which is fixed a large iron head, ai»>i
the lower end is furnished with a sharp iron pike,
about eighteen inches long, which they are ac
customed to throw expertly, like a dart. Th3
princes and knights pursue no other business
or recreation than war, pillage, and the amuse
ments of the chase ; they live a lordly life, wan
der about, meet at drinking parties and undertake
military excursions." Among these people,,
" the desire of revenge, for injuries received, is
hereditary in the successors, and in the whole
tribe. It remains, as it were, rooted with so
much rancour, that the hostile princes or nobles
of two different tiibes, when they meet each
other on the road, or accidentally in another place,
are compelled to fight for their lives ; unless they
have given previous notice to each other, ano
bound themselves to pursue a different route.
Unless pardon be purchased, or obtained by in
termarriage between the two families, the prin
ciple of revenge is propagated to all succeeding
generations."*

It is well known, that it: almost all the islands
in the Indian and the Southern Oceans, when
navigators attempt to land, in order to procure
water and provisions, they are almost uniform
ly opposed by crowds of ferocious savages, armed
with long spears, clubs, lances, bows and arrows
and, with horrid yells, brandishing them in t'ne
most hostile attitudes. Jn some instances, these
warlike attitudes might be accounted for, from a
fear of the depredations and murders which might
be committed by strangers, with whose disposi
tions and characters they are unacquainted. Bui
the implacable hatred which they manifest to
wards even the neighbouring tribes, with whieii
they are acquainted, and of which I have already

• Pallas' " Travels through the Sonthr rn Province
of the Russian Empire." Vol II. pp. 401 4C5.

INHUMANITY TO SHIPWRECKED MARINERS.

141

stated several instances, shows, that war, re
venge, and the preparation ofthe instruments of
leath, are both their employment, and th^ir de-
-ight. Yea, not only savage and half-civilized
tribes, but almost every civilized nation on the
face of the earth, is found in a hostile attitude
with respect to surround ing nations — either actu
ally engaged in a deadly warfare with a foreign
lower, or preparing for an attack, or keeping up
fleets and standing armies, and forging cannons,
and balls, and swords, in the prospect of a rup
ture with neighbouring states. And in such
deadly preparations and employments, a great
proportion of those treasures is expended, which,
if directed by the hand of benevolence, would be
the means of transforming the wilderness into a
fruitful field, ofdistributing intelligence and moral
principle among all ranks, and of making the
hearts of the poor, the widow, and the orphan,
" to leap for joy." What a pitiful picture is here
presented of Man, who was originally formed
after the image of his Maker, for the purpose
of displaying benevolent affections towards his
fellows, — now divided into hostile tribes, and
brandishing, with infernal fury, at all around, the
instruments of destruction! How art thou fallen,
O.man, from thy original station of dignity and
honour! " How is the gold become dim, and the
most fine gold changed ! The crown is fallen
from our heads ; wo unto us, for we have sin
ned !"

INHUMANITY OF UNCIVILIZED TRIBES TO
UNFORTUNATE TRAVELLERS.

In passing through the scene of his earthly pil
grimage, Man is exposed to a variety of distresses
and dangers. Sometimes he is exposed to " the
pestilence that walketh in darkness," and to the
•ever " that wasteth at noon-day." Sometimes
he is exposed to the desolations of the earthquake
and the volcano ; the blasts of the tempest, the
hurricane, and the tornado, and the billows of
the stormy ocean ; and, at other times, he is ex
posed to the attacks ofthe lion, the tiger, and the
hyena, in the dark recesses of the forest. It
would be well, however, with man, were these
the only evils and enemies which he had to en
counter. But the greatest enemy which man has
to encounter, is Man himself— those who are
partakers of the same nature, and destined to the
same immortal existence ; and from these
kindred beings, he is exposed to evils and dis
tresses, incomparably greater anJ 7nore numerous,
than all the evils which he suffers from the rave
nous beasts ofthe forest, or from the fury of the
taking elements. It is a most melancholy re-
liection, that, throughout the greater part of the
habitable world, no traveller can prosecute his
:ourney, without being in hazard either of being
dragged into captivity, or insulted and maltreated,
or plundered of his treasures, or deprived of his
jfe, by those who ought to be his friends and pro-

lectors. After he has eluded the pursuit of the
lion or the wolf, or after he has escaped, with
difficulty, from the jaws of the devouring deep, he
is frequently exposed to the fury of demons in
human shape, who insult over his misfortunes,
instead of relieving the wants of his body, and
soothing the anguish of his mind. The following
relations, among a numerous series which might
be presented to the view of the reader, will lend
to illustrate these remarks.

My first example shall be taken from tho
" Narrative of the Loss ofthe Grosvenor India-
man." This vessel sailed from Trincomalee,
June 13th, 1782, on her homeward-bound voyage,
and was wrecked on the coast of Caffraria, on
the 4th of August following. It is needless to
dwell on the circumstances which attended the
shipwreck, and on the consternation, distraction,
and despair, which seized upon the passengers
and the crew, when they became alive to all the ter
rors of the scene. Shipwreck, even in its mildest
form, is a calamity which never fails to fill the
mind with horror; but what is instant death,
considered as a temporary evil, compared with
the situation of those who had hunger, and thirst,
and nakedness, to contend with ; who only escap
ed the fury of the waves, to enter into conflicts
with the savages of the forest, or the still greater
savages of the human race ; who were cut off
from all civilized society, and felt the prolonga
tion of life to be only the lengthened pains of
death ?

After losing about twenty men, in their first
attempts to land, the remaining part of the crew
and the passengers, in number about a hundred,
after encountering many difficulties and dangers,
reached the shore. Next morning a thousand
uneasy sensations were produced, from the na
tives having come down to the shore, and,
without ceremony, carried off whatever suited
their fancy. They were at this time about 447
leagues from the Cape of Good Hope, and 226
beyond the limits of any Christian habitation.
Their only resource appeared to be, to direct
their course by land to the Cape, or to the nearest
Dutch settlement. As they moved forward, they
were followed by some of the natives, who, in
stead of showing compassion to this wretched
group, plundered them from time to time, of
what they liked, and sometimes pelted them with
stones. In this way they pursued their journey
for four or five days ; during which the natives
constantly surrounded them in the day, taking
from them whatever they pleased, but invariably
retired in the night. As they proceeded, they
saw many villages, which they carofully avoided,
that they might be less exposed to the insults of
the natives. At last, they came to a deep gully,
where three ofthe Caffres met them, armed with
lances, which they held several times to the cap
tain's throat. Next day, on coming to a large
village, they found these three men, with three

1-J2

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

or four hundred of their countrymen, all armed
with lances and targets, who stopped the English,
and began to pilfer and insult them, and at last
fell upon them and beat them. With these in
human wretches they had to engage in a kind of
/unning fight for upwards of two hours ; after
which, they cut the buttons from their coals, and
presented them to the natives, on which, they
went away and returned no more. The follow
ing night they were terrified with the noise of
the wild beasts, and kept constant watch for fear
both of them and the natives. How dreadful a
situation, especially for those delicate ladies and
children, who had so lately been accustomed to. all
the delicacies of the East! Next day, as they
were advancing, a party of natives came down
upon them, and plundered them, among other
things, of their tinder-box, flint and steel, which
proved an irreparable loss. Evzry man was now
obliged to travel, by turns, with a fire-brand in
his hand ; and before the natives retired, they
showed more insolence than ever, robbing the
gentlemen of their watches, and the ladies of
their jewels, which they had secreted in their
hair. Opposition was vain; the attempt only
brought fresh insults or blows.

This group of wretched wanderers now sepa
rated into different parties, and took different
directions ; their provisions were nearly exhaust
ed ; and the delay occasioned by travelling with the
women and children was very great. Their dif
ficulties increased, as they proceeded on their
journey ; they had numerous rivers, sometimes
nearly two miles in breadth, to swim across in
the course of their route, while the women and
children were conveyed across on floating sta
ges, at the imminent hazard of their lives, and of
being carried down by the impetuous current into
the sea. Whole days were spent in tracing the
rivers towards their source, in order to obtain a
ford. They traversed vast plains of sand, and
bleak and barren deserts, where nothing could be
found to alleviate their hunger, nor the least drop
of water to quench their raging thirst. They
passed through deep forests, where human feet
had never trod, where nothing was heard but the
dreadful howlings of wild beasts, which filled
them with alarm and despair. Wild sorrel,
berries which the birds had picked at, and a few
shell-fish which they occasionally picked up on
the shore, were the only food which they had to
subsist on for several days ; and on some occa
sions the dead body of a seal, or the putrid car
ets of a whale, was hailed as a delicious treat to
their craving appetites. One person fell after
another into the arms of death, through hunger,
tatigue, and despair, and were sometimes obliged
to be left in the agonies of dissolution, as a prey
to ravenous beasts, or to the fowls of heaven.
The following circumstance shows the dreadful
situation to which they were reduced for want of
rood. " It appeared that the captain's steward

had been buried in the sand of the last desen
they had passed, and that the survivors were re
duced to such extremity, that, after he had been
interred, they sent back two of their companions
to cut off part of his flesh; but while they pro
ceeded in this horrid business, they had the good
fortune to discover a young seal, newly driven
on shore, which proved a most seasonable re
lief."

Imagination cannot form a scene of deeper
distress than what the tender sex, and the little
children must, in such a case, have experienced.
It harrows up the very soul to think what pangs
those delicate females who had so lately been in
ured to all the pleasures and luxuries of India,
must have endured, when they were fain to ap
pease their craving appetites on the putrid car
cass of a whale, and were obliged to repose on
the bare ground, amidst the howlings of the tem
pest, and the more dismal yells of the beasts ot
prey. But, amidst this heart-rending scene,
their fellow-men, who ought to have been their
soothers and protectors, and who had it in their
power to have alleviated their distresses, were
the greatest enemies they had to encounter •, and
their appearance filled their minds with greater
alarm than if they had beheld a roaring lion, or a
raging bear. The following are some speci
mens of the perfidy and inhumanity of the na
tives. In passing through a village, one of the
company observing, " that a traffic would not
be unacceptable, offered them the inside of his
watch for a calf; but though they assented to the
terms, no sooner had they obtained the price,
than they withheld the calf, and drove the Eng
lish from their village." In the same manner
were they used on many other occasions. One
time, when resting at a village, where the natives
offered no particular resistance, "they produced
two bowls of milk, which they seemed willing to
barter, but as our wretched countrymen had no
thing to give in exchange, they denied them this
humble boon without an equivalent, and ale it
up themselves." At the same place, they im
plored in the most impressive terms, to partake
with the natives of the spoils of a deer, which
they had just killed, but they turned a deaf ear
to their solicitations, and insisted, moreover, on
their quitting the kraal. On another occasion,
" on coming to a large village, the inhabitants
set upon them with such fury, that several
were severely wounded, and one of them died
soon after."

In this manner, did the wretched remains of
these hapless wanderers traverse the wilds ol
Africa, during the space of one hundred and
seventeen days, till they accidentally met with
some Dutch settlers, when within 400 miles ol
the Cape. Here they were treated with the
kindest attention, and their wants relieved. But.
by this time, only 15 or 20 emaciated beings sur-
vived, out of more than 120 persons who were on

INHUMANITY TO SHIPWRECKED MARINERS.

143

board the Grosvenor. What became of the cap
tain an.l his party is still unknown. Some are
supposed to have perished from hunger, some
through grief and fatigue, and others to have
oecn killed by the inhospitable natives. — Now,
all the accumulated miseries endured by these
unfortunate travellers, and the premature death
of nearly a hundred persons, are to be attribut
ed to that spirit a*" selfishness, inhumanity, and
hostility, which, in all ages, has prevented en
joyment, and entailed misery on the human race.
Had a principle of love to mankind pervaded the
hearts of die wretched Caffres, or had even the
common feelings of humanity been exercised to
wards their fellow-creatures in distress, the whole
of the unfortunate individuals that perished in
Africa's inhospitable clime, might have been con
ducted in safety to their friends and their native
land.

My next example is taken from M. De Bris-
son's " Narrative of his shipwreck, and captivity
among the Moors."

M. Brisson was shipwrecked on the coast of
Barbary, on the 10th July, 1785, and, after
much difficulty and danger, he, along with the
irew, escaped safe to land. No sooner had they
reached the shore, than they were surrounded by
a crowd of savages, and seized by the collars.
' The Arabs," says M. Brisson, " armed with
cutlasses and large clubs, fell upon my compa
nions with incredible ferocity ; and I had the
mortification of soon seeing some of them wound
ed, whilst others, stripped and naked, lay stretchr
ed out and expiring on the sand. The news of
our shipwreck being spread abroad through the
country, we saw the savages running with the
greatest eagerness from all quarters. The wo
men, enraged that they could not pillage the
ship, threw themselves upon us, and tore from
us the few articles of dress which we had left.
While they went to the shore to obtain more
plunder, a company of Ouadelims discovered and
pillaged our retreat, and beat us in the most un-
marciful manner, till I was almost at the last
g.isp. My mind was so much affected that I
could not refrain from tears: and some of the
women having observed it, instead of being
moved with compassion, threw sand in my eyes,
' to dry up my tears,' as they expressed it." M.
Brisson was forced, by these rude barbarians,
into the interior of the country, as a captive.
" After passing," says he, " mountains of a pro
digious height, which were covered with small
sharp flints, I found that the soles of my feet
were entirely covered with blood. I was per
mitted to get up behind my master on his camel ;
but as I was naked, I could not secure myself
from the friction of the animal's hair, so that in a
very little time my skin was entirely rubbed off.
My blood trickled down over the animal's sides,
and this sight, instead of moving the pity of these
Wrbarians, afforded them a subject of diversion.

They sported with my sufferings ; and that their
enjoyments might be still higher, they spurred on
their camels." After travelling for sixteen days,
during which they were exposed to the greatest
fatigue, and the most dreadful miseries, they at
length reached the place of their destination, in
a most wretched and exhausted condition. And
what was the manner of their reception ? The
women having satisfied their curiosity in inqui
ries about the strangers, immediately began to
load them with abuse. " They even spat in our
faces," says M. B. " and pelted us with stones.
The children, too, copying their example, pinch
ed us, pulled our hair, and scratched us with their
nails, whilst their cruel mothers ordered them to
attack sometimes one and sometimes another,
and took pleasure in causing them to torment
us."

They were compelled to work at the most fa
tiguing and menial employments, and beaten
with severity when they did not exert themselves
far beyond their strength, while they were denied
a single morsel of wholesome food, " As we
were Christians," says the narrator, " the dogs
fared' better than we, and it was in the basins
destined for their use that we received our allow
ance : our food was raw snails, and herbs and
plants trodden under foot by the multitude." In
this manner did these unfortunate travellers drag
out the period of their captivity ; some died of
the blows and harsh treatment they received, and
others died of hunger and despair. M. Brisson
one day found the captain of the vessel in a
neighbouring hamlet, stretched out lifeless upon
the sand, and scarcely distinguishable but by the
colour of his body. In his mouth he held one of
his hands, which his great weakness had no
doubt prevented him from devouring. He was so
changed by hunger, that his body exhibited the
most disgusting appearance ; all his features
being absolutely effaced. A few days after, the
second captain, having fallen down through
weakness below an old gum tree, became a prey
to the attacks of a monstrous serpent. Some
famished crows, by their cries, frightened away
the venomous animal, and, alighting on the body
of the dying man, were tearing him to pieces,
while four savage monsters, in human shape,
still more cruel than the furious reptile, heheld
this scene without offering him the least assist
ance. " I attempted to run towards him," says
M. Brisson, " and to save his life, if possible,
but the barbarians stopped me, and after insult
ing rne, said, ' This Christian will soon become
a prey to the flames.' " The bad state of health
of this unfortunate man would not permit him
to labour, and his master and mistress would not
allow him the milk necessary for his subsistence.
— Such were the scenes of inhumanity and cruel
ty which M. Brisson witnessed, during the
whole period he remained in the territories of
these barbarous tribes. They present to our

144

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

view so many pictures of abominable selfishness
and even of pure malevolence. And it is a most
melancholy reflection, that numerous tribes of a
s-imilar description are spread over a very large
portion of the habitable world. It makes one feel
degraded when he reflects that he is related, by
the ties of a common nature, to beings possessing
a character so malignant and depraved.

I shall select only another example, illustrative
of this topic, extracted from the travels of Mr.
Park. This enterprising traveller prosecuted a
journey of many hundred miles in the interior of
Africa, for the most part on foot, and alone.
Sometimes, his way lay over a burning sandy
wilderness, where he found little to alleviate
either his hunger or his thirst ; and sometimes he
travelled among woods and thickets, and across
rivers and marshes, exposed to the wild beasts,
and without any path to guide him. Though
the negroes of that country frequently relieved
his wants and distresses, yet the Moors used him
with great cruelty and inhumanity, so that ha
hardly escaped with life. The chiefs through
whose territories he passed, generally exacted a
tribute from him, so long as he had any thing to
give, and, under that plea, they often robbed him
of all the articles which he had it not in his pow
er to conceal. When he passed through the
town ofDeena,the Moors insulted him in every
form which malignity could invent. A crowd of
them surrounded the hut in which he lodged, and,
besides hissing and shouting, uttered much abu
sive language. Their aim seemed tobe to nrovoke
Park to make retaliation, that they might have
some pretence to proceed to greater outrages, and
to rob him of his property. Suspecting their in
tentions he bore all with the greatest patience,
and, though they even spit in his face, he showed
no marks of resentment. Disappointed in their
aim, they had recourse to an argument common
among Mahometans, to convince themselves
that they had a right to whatever the stranger
might have in his possession. He was a Chris
tian. They opened his bundles, and took what
ever they thought might be of use, and whatever
suited their fancy.

Having been kept for some time in captivity
by a Moorish tribe, they not only robbed him of
the few articles which were still in his possession,
but insulted and oppressed him with the most
wanton cruelty. The day was passed in hunger
and thirst ; to hunger and thirst were added the
malignant insults of the Moors, of whom many
visited him, whose only business seemed to be to
torment him. He always saw the approach of
the evening v/ith pleasure; it terminated another
day of his miserable existence, and removed from
him his troublesome visitants. A scanty allow
ance of kouskous,* and of salt and water, was

* A species of food somewhat resembling Scotch
oorridg-e.

brought him generally about midnight. Phil
scanty allowance was all that he and bis two at
tendants were to expect during the whole of the
ensuing day. " I was a stranger," says he, " I
was unprotected, and I was a Christian; each
of these circumstances is sufficient to drive every
spark of humanity from the heart of a Moor.
Anxious, however, to conciliate favour, and, if
possible, to afford the Moors no pretence for ill-
treating me, I readily complied with every com
mand, and patiently bore every insult. But
never did any period of my life pass away so
heavily. From sun-rise to sun-set, was I oblig
ed to bear, with an unruffled countenance, the in
sults of the rudest savages upon earth." Having,
at length, made his escape from these barbarians,
he declares, " It is impossible to describe the joy
that arose in my mind, when I looked around,
and concluded that I was out of danger. I felt
like one recovered from sickness. I breathed
freer ; I found unusual lightness in my limbs :
even the desert looked pleasant; and I dreaded
nothing so much as falling in with some wandering
parties of the Moors, who might convey me back
to the land of thieves and murderers from
which I had just escaped." — Alas ! what a load
of sorrow and of misery have the selfishness and
inhumanity of man accumulated upon the heads
of forlorn and unfortunate sufferers ! While our
disconsolate traveller, after his escape, was
wandering in an unknown desert, fainting with
hunger, and parched with thirst, surrounded
with pitchy darkness, which was only relieved
by the flashes of the lightnings; where no sounds
were heard but the bowlings of wild beasts, and
the rolling thunders : — " About two in the morn
ing," says he, "my horse started at something,
and, looking round, I was not a little surprised to
see a light, at a short distance among the trees,
and supposing it to be a town, I groped along
the sand, in hopes of finding corn stalks, cotton,
or other appearances of cultivation, but. found
none. As I approached, I perceived a number
of lights in other places, and, leading my horse
cautiously towards the light, I heard, by the low
ing of the cattle, and the clamorous tongues of the
herdsmen, that it was a watering place, ana
most likely belonged to the Moors. Delightful as
the sound of the human voice was to me, I resolv
ed once more to strike into the woods, and ra
ther run the risk of perishing with hunger, than
trust myself again into their hands." — It is a
most affecting consideration, and shows to what
a degree of malignity human beings have arriv
ed, when a hungry, houseless, and benighted
traveller prefers to flee for protection to the
haunts of the beasts of prey, rather than commit
himself to the tender mercies of those who are
partakers of the same common nature, and who
have it in their power to alleviate his distresses.
Mr. Park, when among the Moors, was forced
to pass many days, almost without drink, undei

INHUMANITY TOWARDS TRAVELLERS.

a burning climate, where, to a European, the
heat is almost insufferable. His raging thirst
induced him to run every risk, and to burst
through every restraint. He sent his boy to the
wells to fill the skin which he had for holding
water ; but the Moors were exasperated that a
Christian should presume to fill his vessel at
wells consecrated to the use of the followers of
Mahomet. Instead, therefore, of permitting the
boy to carry away water, they gave him many
severe blows ; and this mode of treatment was
repeated as often as an attempt was made. — On
another occasion, when awaking from a dream,
;'i which, during his broken slumbers, his fancy
had transported him to his native country, and
placed him on the verdant brink of a transparent
rivulet, and perceiving that his raging thirst had
exposed him to a kind of fever, he resolved to
expose himself to the insults of the Moors at the
wells, in hopes that he might procure a small
supply. When he arrived at them he found the
Moors drawing water. He desired permission
to drink, but was driven from well to well with
reiterated outrage. At length he found one well
where only an old man and two boys drew for
their cattle. He earnestly begged a small quan
tity. The old man drew the bucket from the
well, and held it out. Park was about eagerly
to seize it, when the Moor, recollecting that the
stranger was a Christian, instantly threw the
water into the trough, where the cows were
already drinking, and told Park to drink ther.ce.
He hesitated not for a moment. His sufferings
made even this offer acceptable. He thrust his
head between those of two cows, and, with feel
ings of pleasure which can be experienced only
by those who have been reduced to a similar
state of wretchedness, he continued to quench
his thirst till the water was exhausted, and " till
the cows began to contend with each other for
the last mouthful."

In this instance, we can partly account for the
barbarity of the action, from the inveterate preju
dices which all Mahometans entertain against
Christians ; but it still remains to be accounted
for, why any one should refuse to a suffering fel
low-creature the common bounties of Providence,
which he has in his power to bestow, however
different he may be in complexion, in national
character, or in the religion he professes. A
religion which encourages such prejudices, and
which leads to such inhumanity, must be an
abomination in the sight of Him who has a spe
cial regard to the wants of all his creatures, and
who " sendeth rain to refresh the fields of the
just and of the unjust." The prevalence of such
characters and dispositions over so large a por
tion of the world, shows that the moral constitu
tion of man has suffered a sad derangement since
the period when he proceeded as a pure intelli
gence from the hands of his Creator.

Such incidents as those to which I have now
30

adverted, when properly considered, are calcu
lated to inspire us with contentment, and to ex
cite to gratitude for the common blessings which
we enjoy without the least fear of danger or an
noyance. How often do we enjoy the refresh •
ment of a delicious beverage, without thinking
of the parched tongues of the African pilgrims ;
and how often do we spurn at a wholesome dish,
which would be hailed with transports of grati
tude by the houseless and hungry wanderer ot
the desert ! Yea, how many are there, even in
our civilized country, who enjoy, in luxurious
abundance, all the blessings which nature and
art can furnish, who never once acknowledge,
with heart-felt gratitude, the goodness of Him
" who daily loads them with his benefits," nor
reflect on the wants and the sufferings of their
fellow-men ! Mr. Park, when oppressed with
hunger and fatigue, applied, at the chief magis
trate's house, in a village named Shrilla, for some
relief, but was denied admittance. He passed
slowly through the village till he came without
the walls, where he saw an old motherly-looking
woman at the door of a mean hut. She set be
fore him a dish of boiled corn, that had been left
the preceding night, on which he made a tolera
ble meal. " Overcome with joy," says Park,
" at so unexpected a deliverance, I lifted up my
eyes to heaven, and, while my heart swelled with
gratitude, I returned thanks to that gracious and
bountiful Being, whose power had supported me
under so many dangers, and had now spread for
me a table in the wilderness."

When Mr. Park was returning from the in
terior of Africa, he was encountered by a party
of armed negroes, who led him into a dark place
of the forest through which he was passing, and
stripped him entirely naked, taking from him
every thing which he possessed, except an old
shirt and a pair of trowsers. He begged them to
return his pocket compass; but, instead of com
plying with his request, one of them assured
him, that, if he attempted to touch that, or any
other article, he would immediately shoot him
dead on the spot. He was thus left in the midsl
of a vast wilderness, in the depth of the rainy
season, naked and alone, without food, and with
out the means of procuring it ; surrounded by
savage animals, and by men still more savage,
and 500 miles from the nearest European settle
ment. "All these circumstances," says this
intrepid traveller, " crowded at once on my recol
lection, and, I confess, my spirits began to fail
me. I considered that I had no other alternative,
but to lie down and die. The influence of reli
gion, however, aided and supported me. At
this moment, painful as my reflections were, the
extraordinary beauty of a small moss irresistibly
caught my eye. Can that Being, thought I,
who planted, watered, and brought to perfection,
in this obscure part of the world, a thing which
appears of so small importance, look with. u»»

Hft

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

concern on the situation and sufferings of crea
tures formed afier his own image ? Surely not.
Reflections like these would not allow me to de
spair. I started up, and, disregarding both hun
ger and fatigue, travelled forwards, assured that
•elief was at hand, and I was not disappointed."
Thus was this unfortunate adventurer delivered,
by the care of Providence, from those accumu
lated distresses which had been brought upon
him by the malignity and inhumanity of man.

Such are a few specimens of the inhumanity
displayed by uncivilized tribes towards strangers,
and unfortunate voyagers and travellers. They
t-xhibit dispositions and conduct directly repug
nant, to every principle of benevolence, and pre
sent to our view a gloomy prospect of the diffi
culties and dangers to be surmounted by philan
thropic missionaries, before the habitable world
cart be thoroughly explored, and before the bless
ings of knowledge, civilization, and religion can
be communicated to the benighted and depraved
tribes of mankind.

MALEVOLENT DISPOSITIONS, AS DISPLAYED
IN DISFIGURING THE HUMAN BODV.

The human frame, when preserved in its ori
ginal state, is one of the finest pieces of mechan
ism which the mind can contemplate. In
beauty, in symmetry, in the harmony and pro
portion of all its parts and functions, it is su
perior to the organical structures of all the other
ranks of sensitive existence. There is no part
imperfect or deformed, no part defective, and no
part useless or redundant. All its members are
so constructed and arranged as to contribute to
the beauty and perfection of the whole, and to
I he happiness of the intelligent mind by which it
is governed and directed. In combination with
the power of thought and volition, and when un
stained by malignant passions, it is a visible re
presentative of the Creator, having been formed
after his image ; and it displays, in a most strik
ing manner, the wisdom and the goodness of its
Almighty Maker. But, notwithstanding the ac
knowledged excellence of the human frame, it has
been the practice of the degraded tribes of man
kind, in almost every country, and in every age,
to disfigure its structure, and to deface its beauty;
as if the Creator, when he farmed it, had been
deficient in intelligence and in benevolent design.
Such practices, I am disposed to think, imply a
principle of malevolence directed towards the
Creator, and a disposition to find fault with his
wise contrivances and arrangements. At any
rate, they display a degree of ignorance and fol
ly, a vitiated taste, and a degradation of rnind,
inconsistent with the dignity of a rational intelli
gence. The following facts wiil, perhaps, tend
to illustrate these remarks : —

Condamine, when describing the natives of
South America, informs us, that the Omaguas,
and some other savages, flatten the faces of their

children, by lacing their heads between twc
boards ; that others pierce the nostril?, lips, or
cheeks, and place in them feathers, thu bones oi
fishes, and similar ornaments ; — and that the
savages of Brazil pull the hair out of their beards,
their eye-brows, and all parts of iheir bodies,
which make them have an uncommon, and a fe
rocious appearance. Their under-lip they piercc?
and, as an ornament, insert into it a green storu;,
or a small polished bone. Immediately after
birth the mothers flatten the noses of their child
ren. The whole of them go absolutely naked,
and paint their bodies of different colours. —
Captain Cook informs us, that, in New Zealand,
both sexes mark their faces and bodies with
black stains, similar to the tattooing in Otaheite.
The men, particularly, add new stains every
year, so that, in an advanced period of life, they
are almost covered from head to foot. Besides
this, they have marks impressed, by a method
unknown to us, of a very extraordinary kind.
They are furrows of about a line deep, and a
line broad, such as appear upon the bark of a
tree which has been cut through after a year's
growth. The edges of these furrows are after
wards indented by the same method, and, being
perfectly black, they make a most frightful ap
pearance. Both sexes bore their ears : they
gradually stretch the holes till they are so large as
to admit a finger. Into these holes they put
feathers, coloured cloth, bones of birds, twigs of
wood, and frequently the nails which they receiv
ed from the ships. — The same voyager, when
describing the New Hollanders, tells us, —
" Their chief ornament is a bone, which is thrust
through a hole bored in the cartilage which di
vides the nostrils. This bone is as thick as a
man's finger, and six inches in length. I'
reaches quite across the face, and so effectually
stops up both nostrils, that they are forced to
keep their mouths wide open for breath, and
snuffle so when they attempt to speak, that they
are scarcely intelligible to each other. Our sea
men with some humour, called it their sprit-sail
yard; and indeed it had so ludicrous an appear
ance, that, till we were used to it, we found it diffi
cult to restrain from laughter." He also describes
a custom of a peculiar nature which prevails in the
Friendly Islands. " The greater part of the in
habitants, both male and female, were observed
to have lost one or both of their little fingers.
This custom seemed not to be charaei<->ristic of
rank, of age, or of sex; for, with the exception
of some young children, very few people were
discovered in whom both hands were perfect.
They likewise burn or make incisions in their
cheeks."

All the eastern nations are said to have a pre
dilection for long ears. Some draw the lobe o.
the ear, in order to stretch it to a greater length,
and pierce it so as to allow the admission }f ao
ordinary pendant. Tl>e nntivos of /Vic* ->o pro-

DISFIGURING OF THE HUMAN BODY.

147

fiigiously widen the holes in their ears, that a
man's hand may be thrust th ough them. Hence,
the ears of these people often descend to the
tops of their shoulders.* Gentil assures us,
that the women, in the northern parts of China,
employ every art in order to diminish their eyes.
For this purpose, the girls, instructed by their
mothers, extend their eye-lids continually, with
the view of making their eyes oblong and small.
These properties, in the estimation of tho Chi
nese, when joined to aflat nose, and large, open,
pendulous ears, constitute the perfection of beau
ty. — We are informed by Struys, that the wo
men of Siam wear so large and heavy pendants
in their ears, that the holes gradually become
wide enough to admit a man's thumb. The na
tives of New Holland pull out the two fore-teeth
of the upper jaw. In Calicut, there is a band
of nobles called iVewrcs, who lengthen their ears
to such a degree, that they hang down to their
shoulders, and sometimes even lower. f The
Arabs paint their lips, arms, and the most con
spicuous parts of their bodies, with a deep blue
colour. This paint, which they lay on in little
dots, and make it penetrate the flesh, by punc
turing the skin with needles, can never be effac
ed. Some of the Asiatics paint their eye-brows
of a black colour, and others eradicate the hairs
with rusma, and paint artificial eye-brows, in the
form of a black crescent, which gives them an
uncommon and ugly appearance. The inhabi
tants of Prince William's Sound, paint their
fanes and hands, bore their ears and noses, and
slit their under lips. In the holes made in their
noses, they hang pieces of bone or ivory, which
are often two or three inches long ; and, in the
slit of the lip, they place a bone or ivory instru
ment with holes in it, from which they suspend
beads that reach below the chin. These holes
in the lip disfigure them greatly, for some of them
are as large as their mouths.J

Such distortions of the beautiful structure of the
human frame, are not peculiar to the savage tribes
of the human race, but are practised by nations
which have made considerable advances in sci
ence and civilization. It is well known that, in
China, a ridiculous custom prevails, of rendering
the feet of their females so small, that they can
with difficulty support their bodies. This is
deemed a principal part of their beauty ; and no
swathing nor compression is omitted, when they
are young, to give them this fancied accomplish
ment. Every woman of fashion, and every wo
man who wishes to be reckoned handsome, must
have her feet so small, that they could easily
enter the shoe of a child of six years of age.
The great toe is the only one left to act with
'reedom ; the rest are doubled down under the
loot, in their tenderest infancy, and restrained by

Smellie's Philosophy of Natural History, vol. II.
livid. I Portlock's Voyage round the World.

tight bandages, till they unite with, and are bu
ried in the sole. I have inspected a model of a
Chinese lady's foot, exactly of this description,
which, I was assured, was taken from life. The
length was only two inches and three-fourths ;
the breadth of the base of the heel, seven eighths
of an inch ; the breadth of the broadest part ol
the foot, one and one fourth of an inch ; and the
diameter of the ankle, three inches above the
heel, one and seven eighths of an inch. With
feet of this description the Chinese ladies may
be said rather to totter than to walk ; and, by
such practices, they evidently frustrate the be
nevolent intentions of the Creator, and put them
selves to unnecessary inconvenience and pain.
Yet such is the powerful influence of fashion,
however absurd and ridiculous, that women of
the middling and inferior classes frequently suf
fer their feet to be thus maimed and distorted,
in order to ape the unnatural customs of their
superiors.

We have every reason to believe that the
harsh and ugly features, and the ferocious as
pect, by which numerous tribes of mankind are
distinguished, are owing to such voluntary dis
tortions of the human frame, and to the filthy and
abominable practices in which they indulge.
Father Tertre assures us, that the flat noses of
the negroes are occasioned by a general practice
of mothers, who depress the noses of their new
born infants, and squeeze their lips, in order to
thicken them ; and that those children who es
cape these operations have elevated noses, thin
lips, and fine features. — It is somewhat unac
countable, and it shows the perversity of tho
human mind, in its present degraded state, that
such practices should be so general, and so obsti
nately persisted in, when we consider the pain
and inconvenience with which they are attended.
— To pull the hairs of the chin or eye-brows
from the roots ; to slit the under lip, till the inci
sion be as large as one's mouth ; to pierce the
nostrils, till a bone as large as a man's finger
can be thurst through them; and to. cover the
body with black streaks, which make the blood
to flow at every stroke of the instrument by which
they are produced, must be attended with excru
ciating pain. Sir Joseph Banks, who accompa
nied Captain Cook in his first voyage, was pre
sent, in the island of Otaheite, at the operation
of tattooing, performed on the back of a girl o.
thirteen years of age. The instrument used had
twenty teeth ; and at each stroke, which was re
peated every moment, issued an ichor or serum,
tinged with blood. The girl bore the pain with
great resolution, for some minutes, till, at length,
it became so intolerable, that she burst out into
violent exclamations ; but the operator, notwith
standing the most earnest entreaties to desist,
was inexorable, while two women, who attended
upon the occasion, both chid and beat her for
struggling.

148

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

I am therefore disposed to view such absurd
and barbarous practices, as intimately connected
with the operation of a principle of malevolence,
as an attempt to frustrate the wise designs of di
vine benevolence, and as directly repugnant to
the spirit of Christianity, and to the benevolent
precepts of the gospel of peace. And it becomes
some of the ladies, and the dandies of modern
Europe to consider, whether some of their awk
ward attempts to improve the symmetry of the
human frame ought not to be viewed in the same
light. Not many years ago, it was considered,
in the higher circles of society, as an admirable
improvement of the female form, to give the lower
half of the body the appearance of the frustum of a
large tun, as if it had been ten times the capacity
of its natural size, by supporting their robes with
enormous hoops ; — and, about the same period,
the lower ranks of female society considered it
as the perfection of proportion and beauty, to have
their waists compressed into the smallest possible
space, till the vital functions, in many instances,
were deranged, and ultimately destroyed. Were
the dictates of sound reason universally attended
to, and were the influence of Christianity fully
felt among all nations, the preposterous and sa
vage practices to which I have now adverted,
would not only be discontinued, but held in abhor
rence. And were such customs completely
abolished, we might soon expect to behold,
among all the tribes of mankind, every distortion
of the features or the countenance removed, and
the human form restored to its original beauty
and perfection. Instead of a warlike visage, and
a ferocious aspect, and the frightful appearance
of naked savages, streaked with colours of black
and blue, we should behold, in every land, every
countenance beaming with the radiations of be
nevolence, and reflecting the moral image of the
Creator.

MALEVOLENCE AS IT APPEARS IN THE
RELIGION OF SAVAGE TRIBES.

There is scarcely a nation on the surface of
the globe but what appears to have some impres
sions of the existence of a Superior Power, and
to have formed a system of religious worship.
But, it is a striking fact, that, among the greater
portion of human beings, their religious notions,
and their sacred rites, instead of breathing a
spirit of kindness and benevolence towards their
fellow-creatures, are blended with a principle of
hatred and revenge. This might be illustrated
by an induction of a great variety of instances,
in reference to almost every uncivilized portion
of tht) human race. I shall content myself, how
ever, with stating only one instance, in reference
to the Nesserie, a tribe not much known in Eu
rope, and which may serve as an example of
many others.

The territory of this people extends from
Antioch nearly to Tripoli. They occupy almost

all the mountains to the cast of Latakia. and 9
great part of the plain. Among them is perceiv*
ed a mixture of the religious usages of Paganism
of the Jewish law, of that of Mahomet and AH,
and of some dogmas of the Christian Religion.
— The women are considered as a part of the
domestic animals of the house, and treated as
slaves. They have no idea of religion, and when
they are bold enough to inquire of their masters
concerning it, the latter answer them that their
religion is, to be charged with the reproduction ol
the species, and to be subject to the will of their
husbands. — The Nesserie say their prayers at
midnight, and before sun-set. They may sav
them either sitting, standing, or walking; but
they are obliged to begin again repeating their
ablution, if they speak toa person not of their reli
gion, — if they perceive, either near or at a dis
tance, a camel, a pig, a hare, or a negro. In their
prayers, they curse the man who shaves below the
chin, him who is impotent, and the two Caliphs,
Omar and Abou-Bekr. They detest the Turks,
to whom they are sworn enemies. This warlike
people of mountaineers would be strong enough
to shake off the yoke of the Turks, and live inde
pendently, if they were not divided by interested
motives, almost all occasioned by implacable
family hatreds. They are vindictive, and cherish
their rancour for a length of time : even the death
of the guilty person cannot assuage their fury ;
their vengeance is incomplete, if it does not fall
besides on one or several members of his family.
They are so obstinately superstitious in their at
tachment to their peculiar system, that no threats
nor punishments can extort from them the secrets
of their religion.*

Here, then, we are presented with a system of
religion which appears to be founded on male
volence, — which directs its devotees to curse their
fellow-men — which leads them to keep their wo
men in profound ignorance of every thing which
they hold sacred — which induces them to conceal
its mysteries from all the rest of the world — and
which, in so far from producing any beneficial ef
fects on their own conduct, leads to "implacable
family hatreds." A religion, unless it be found
ed on a principle of benevolence, is unworthy of
the name ; it must be an abhorrence in the sight
of God, and can never communicate happiness
to man. And were we to examine the various
religious systems which prevail in the numerous
islands of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, in Ca-
bul, Thibet, and Hindostan, and among the un
civilized tribes which are scattered over a largft
portion of Asia and of Africa, we should find
them, not only blended with malevolent princi
pies and maxims, but sanctioning the perpetration
of deeds of cruelty, obscenity, and horror.

In the preceding pages, I have endeavoured *o

* See Dupont's " Memoirs of the Manners and Re
ligious Ceremonies of the Nesserie," a work latel>

published.

MORAL STATE OF CIVILIZED NATIONS.

149

illustrate some of the prominent features in the
moral character of the savage and uncivilized
tribes of the human race. The examples I have
selected have not been taken from the records of
missionaries, or of professed religionists, who
might be suspected by some to give an exagge
rated description of the depravity of the Pagan
world — but from the unvarnished statements of
respectable voyagers and travellers, who could
nave no motives for misrepresenting the facts
which they have recorded. These illustrations
might have been extended to a much greater
iength, had it been consistent with the limited
nature of the present work. Instead of occupying
only forty or fifty pages, they might have been ex
tended so as to have filled as many volumes ; for
every book of travels, as well as every historical
document, contains a record of the operations of
malignity, and of the diversified modes in which
human depravity is displayed. The dispositions
which I have illustrated, it will be readily ad
mitted, are all of a malignant character, directly
repugnant to that benevolent principle which
forms the basis of the moral laws of the universe.
And when we consider, that such malevolent dis
positions are displayed by a mass of human be
ings, amounting to more than three fourths of me
population of the globe, and that true happiness
cannot be experienced where malignant passions
reign uncontrolled, a benevolent mind cannot re
frain from indulging a thousand melancholy re
flections, when it casts its eye over the desola
tions of the moral world, and from forming an
anxious wish, that the period may soon arrive,
when the darkness which covers the nations shall
oe dispelled, and when benevolence and peace
shall reign triumphant over all the earth.

I shall now endeavour to present a few facts
and sketches which may have a tendency to il
lustrate the present state, and the moral charac-
,er and aspect of the civilized world.

SECTION III.

MORAL STATE OF CIVILIZED NATIONS.

The present population of the globe may be
estimated at about 800 millions. Of these, if we
except the empires of China and Hindostan, we
cannot reckon above 180 millions as existing in
a state of enlightened civilization ; a number
which is less than the fourth part of the human
race. Were even this small portion of mankind
uniformly distinguished for intelligence, and for
the practice of benevolence, it would form a glo
rious picture for the philanthropist to contem
plate ; and would be a sure prelude of the near
approach of that happy period, when " all the
ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the
Lord, when all the kindreds of the nations shall do

homage unto him, and when there shall be nothing
to hurt nor destroy" among all the families of
mankind. But alas ! when we investigate the
moral state even of this portion of human beings,
we find the principle of malignity distinctly visi
ble in its operations, and interwoven, in nume
rous and minute ramifications, through all the
ranks and gradations of society. Though its
shades are less dark and gloomy, they are no less
real than among the hordes of Africa and Tar-
tary, and the other abodes of savage life. To
illustrate this position is the object of the fol
lowing sketches ; in which I shall chiefly refer
to the state of society among the nations of Eu
rope, and the United States of America, and
particularly to the moral character and aspect of
the British empire.

I shall, in the first place, consider the opera
tion of the malevolent principle as it appears in
the actions and dispositions of the young, and in
the modes of tuition by which they are trained.

In many thousands of instances, it may be ob
served, that, even before a child has been wean
ed from its mother's breasts, malignant disposi
tions are not only fostered, but are regularly
taught both by precept and example. Does a
child happen to hit its head accidentally against
the corner of a table — it is taught by its nurse,
and even by its mother, to avenge the injury on
the inanimate object which caused it, and to ex
hibit its prowess and its revenge Dy beating the
table with all its might. Does it cry, through
peevishness or pain — it is immediately threatened
with being thrown into the ditch, tossed out ol
the window, or committed to the charge of some
frightful spectre. Is it expedient to repress its
murmurings, and to cajole it into obedience — it
is then inspired with fallacious hopes, and allur
ed with deceitful promises of objects and of plea
sures which are never intended to be realized.
Does it require to have its physical powers exer
cised — a wooden sword or a whip is put into its
hands ; and it is encouraged to display its ener
gies in inflicting strokes on a dog, a cat, or any
of its play-fellowc. or companions. I have seen
a little urchin of ti,;s description, three or four
years of age, brandishing its wooden sword with
all the ardour of a warrior, and repeating it«
strokes on every person around, while the foolish
parents were exulting in the prowess displayed
by their little darling, and encouraging it in all
its movements. By these and similar practices,
revenge, falsehood, superstition, and the elements
of war, are fostered in the youthful mind ; and is
it to be wondered at, that such malignant prin
ciples and passions should "grow with their
growth, and strengthen with their strength," till
they burst forth in a!l those hideous forms which
they assume amidst the contests of communities
and of nations ? — The false maxims by which
children are frequently trained under the domes
tic roof, and the foolish indulgence with which

150

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

they are treated by injudicious parents, in too
Tiat.y instances lay the foundation of those petu-
jant and malignant tempers, which are a pest
both to Christian and to general society. Indul
gence often leads to an opposite extreme; and
produces such a degree of insubordination among
the young, that nothing is to be seen and heard
but a perpetual round of scolding and healing,
and the contest of angry passions. " Among the
lower ranks of people," says Dr. Witherspoon,
" who are under no restraint from decency, you
may sometimes see a father or mother running
out into the street, after a child who has fled from
them, with looks offury and words of execration,
and they are often stupid enough to imagine that
neighbours or passengers will approve them in
mis conduct." Wherever parental authority is
thus undermined, and such conduct uniformly pur
sued, a sure foundation is laid for an extensive dis
play, in after life, of the malignant passions of the
human heart.

If we follow our youth from the nursery to the
school-room, we shall find the same malevolent af
fections developing themselves on a larger scale,
and indirectly cherished, by the books they read,
the discipline by which they are trained, and the
amusements in which they indulge. Here we
may behold one little fellow taking a malicious
pleasure in pinching his neighbour, another in
kicking him, a third in boxing him, a fourth in
tearing his book, a fifth in pilfering his property,
and a sixth in endeavouring to hold him up to
scorn and ridicule ; and all of them combined to
frustrate, if possible, the exertions of their teacher,
and to prevent their own improvement. — If we
look into the majority of the books which are read
in schools, we shall find them full of encomiums
upon war, and upon warriors. The Caesars, the
Alexanders, and the Bonapartes, whose restless
ambition has transformed the earth into scenes
of desolation and carnage, are represented as pat
terns of every thing that is brave, noble, generous,
and heroic. The descriptive powers of the poet
are also called in, in order to inflame the youth
ful mind with warlike dispositions, and to excite
an ardent desire for mingling in scenes of conten
tion, and for the acquisition of false glory and of
military renown. Hence, there is no part of their
school exercises in which the young so much de
light, and in which they so much excel, as in that
in which they are called upon to recite such
speeches as " Sempronius's speech for war," or
to ape the revengeful encounter of Norval and
Glenalvon. While the spirit of war is thus vir
tually cherished, the counteraction of vicious
propensities, and the cultivation of the moral
powers of the young, are considered as a matter
of inferior importance, and, in many seminaries
ot instruction, are altogether overlooked. Many
of the school collections to which I allude — in
stead of exhibiting, in simple language, the beau-
.ies and sublimities of the works of nature, the

displays of the natural and moral character of the
Deity, the facts of Sacred History, the morality
of the Gospel, the scenes of rural and domestic
life, and the operations of philanthrophy — are
filled with extracts from metaphysical writers,
from parliamentary debates, and from old plays,
novels, and farces, which are frequently interlard
ed with oaths, obscenity, and the slang ofBilling;-
gate, which can have no other tendency than
to pollute and demoralize the youthful mind Ii
needs, therefore, excite no surprise, that the
great body of mankind is still so deficient in ra
tional information and substantial knowledge,
and that a warlike spirit is afloat, and exerting its
baleful influence among the nations.

If we follow the young from the school-room
to the play-ground, or to the streets and the hi"h-
ways, we shall find the spirit of malignity dis
playing itself in a vast diversity of forms. Here,
we may behold one mischievous little boy slap
ping his neighbour in the face, another tearing
his neighbour's clothes, another tossing his cap
into a dirty ditch, another chalking his back in
order to hold him up to ridicule, and another
pouring out upon him a torrent of nicknames,
and of scurrilous epithets. There, we may be
hold a crowd of boys pelting a poor beggar 01 an
unfortunate maniac with stones and dirt for their
diversion ; mocking the lame, the deformed, and
the aged, and insulting the passing traveller.
And, when such objects do not happen to occur,
we may see them assailing, with a shower of
stones, a cat, a dog, a hare, or a fowl, that happens
to cross the path, and enjoying a diabolical plea
sure in witnessing the sufferings of these unfortu
nate animals. Here, we may behold an insolent
boy insulting a timid girl, overturning her pitcher,
and besmearing her with mire ; — there we be
hold another saluting his fellow with a malignant
scowl, and a third brandishing his whip, and
lashing a horse or a cow, for his amusement.
On the one hand, we may sometimes behold a
ring of boys, in the centre of which two little de
mons are engaged in mutual combat, with eyes
glaring with fury and revenge, exerting their phy
sical powers to the utmost stretch, in order to
wound and lacerate, and cover with blood and
gore, the faces of each other : on the other hand,
we may behold an unfortunate boy, whom a natural
temperament, or a virtuous principle, prevents
from engaging in similar combats, assailed witb
opprobrious epithets, and made a laughing-stock,
and an object of derision and scorn, because he
will not be persuaded to declare war against his
neighbour. And, what is stiil more atrocious
and disgusting, we may behold children of thirty
or forty years of age, encouraging such malevo
lent dispositions, and stimulating such combatants
in their diabolical exertions!* Such inferna!

* The practice of boxing, among boys, which s»>
jnerally prevails, especially in England, is a dis
ruce to the boasted civilization and Christianity c

MORAL STATE OF CIVILIZED NATIONS.

151

practices, among creatures originally formed
after the divine image, if they were not so com
mon, would be viewed by every one in svhose
breast the least spark of virtue resides, with feel
ings of indignation and horror.

The great body of our youth, habituated to
such dispositions and practices, after having left
school at the age of fourteen or fifteen — a period
when head-strong passions and vicious propen
sities begin to operate with still greater violence
— have access to no other seminaries, in which
their lawless passions may be counteracted and
controlled, and in which they may be carried for
ward in the path of moral and intellectual im
provement. Throughout the whole of the civi
lized world, I am not aware that there exist any
regular institutions exclusively appropriated for
the instruction of young persons, from the age of
fifteen to the age of twenty-five or upwards, on
moral, religious, and scientific subjects ; in order
to expand their intellectual capacities, and to di
rect their moral powers in the path of universal
benevolence. Yet, without such institutions, all
the knowledge and instructions they may have
previously acquired, in the great majority of in
stances, are rendered almost useless and ineffi
cient for promoting the great end of their exist
ence. From the age of fifteen to the age of
twenty-five, is the most important period of hu-
ma.ilife ; and, for want of proper instruction and
direction, during this period, and of rational ob
jects to employ the attention at leisure hours,
many a hopeful young man has been left to glide
insensibly into the mire of vice and corruption,

that country, and to the superintendents of its public
seminaries. That pugilistic contests between grown
up savages in a civilized shape, should be publicly
advertised, and described in our newspapers, and
the arena of such contests resortea to by so many
thousands of the middling and higher classes of
society, is a striking proof that the spirit of folly and
of malignity still prevails to a great extent, and that
the spirit of Christianity has made little progress,
even within the limits of the British empire.— The
following late occurrence shows the fatal effects with
which such practices are sometimes attended. " On
Monday, February 48, is-25, two of the scholars at
Eton, the Hon. F. A. Cooper, the son of the Earl of
Shiflcsbury, and Mr. Wood, the son of Colonel
Wood, arid nephew to the Marquis of Londonderry,
in consequence of a very warm altercation on the
play-ground, on the preceding day, met, for the pur
pose of settling the unhappy quarrel by a pugilistia
encounter— a prevalent practice at Eton and all our
public scMols. Almost the whole school assembled
to witness the spectacle The inexperienced youth
commenced fighting at four o'clock, and partly by
their o .vn energy, and partly by the criminal excite
ment of others, continued the fatal contest till with
in a little of six, when, mournful to relate, the Earl
of Shaftesbury's son fell very heavily upon his head,
ami never spoke afterwards. He was carried off to
his lodgings, where he expired in a few hours On
the coroner's inquest it came out, that brandy had
been administered very freely, and that no decisive
effort had been made to discontinue a contest pro-
.onged beyond all due limits.— About forty years a^o
a similar cause led to a similar result at the same
establishment. The survivor is a clergyman of
great respectability."— See the Public Prints for Feb
and Evan. Mag. fur April, 1325.

and to become a pest to his friends, and to general
society. Our streets and highways are infested,
and our jails and bridewells filled with young per
sons of this age, who, by means of rational and
religious training, might have been rendered a
comfort to their friends, blessings to society, and
ornaments of the Christian Church.

It would be inconsistent with the limited plan
of this work, to attempt to trace the principle of
malignity through all the scenes of social, com
mercial, and domestic life. Were I to enter
into details of filial impiety, ingratitude, and re
bellion — of faithless friendships — of the aliena
tions of affection, and of the unnatural conten
tions between brothers and sisters — of the abo
minable selfishness which appears in the general
conduct and transactions of mankind — of the bit
terness, the fraud, and the perjury, with which
law-suits are commenced and prosecuted — of the
hatred, malice, and resentment, manifested for
injuries real or supposed — of the frauds daily
committed in every department of the commer
cial world — of the shufflings and base deceptions
which are practised in cases of bankruptcy — of
the slanders, the caballing, and the falsehood,
which attend electioneering contests — of the
envy, malice, and resentment displayed between
competitors for office and power — of the haugh
tiness and insolence displayed by petty tyrants
both in church and state — of the selfishness and
injustice of corporate bodies, and the little regard
they show for the interests of those M"*io are op
pressed, and deprived of their rewards — of the
gluttony, drunkenness, and prodigality, which so
generally prevail — of the brawlings, fightings,
and contentions, which are daily presented to the
view in taverns, ale-houses, and dram-shops,
and the low slang and vulgar abuse with which
such scenes are intermingled — of the seductions
accomplished by insidious artfulness and outra
geous perjury — of the multiplied falsehoods ol
all descriptions which are uttered in courts, in
camps, and in private dwellings — of the unblush
ing lies of public newspapers, and the perjuries
of office — of the systematic frauds arid robberies
by which a large portion of the community are
cheated out of their property and their rights —
of the pride, haughtiness, and oppression of the
rich, and of the malice, envy, and discontentment
of the poor — such pictures of malignity might
be presented to the view, as would fill the mind
of the reader with astonishment and horror, and
which would require a series of volumes to re
cord the revolting details.

There is one very general characteristic ot
civilized, and even of Christian society, that
bears the stamp of malignity, which may parti
cularly be noticed ; and that is, the pleasure with
which men expatiate on the faults and delin
quencies of their neighbours, and the eagerness
with which they circulate scandalous reports
through every portion of the community. Almost

152

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

the one half of the conversation of civilized men,
when strictly analyzed, will be found to consist
of malignant insinuations, and of tales of scan
dal and detraction, the one half of which is des
titute of any solid foundation. How comes it to
pass, that the slightest deviation from propriety
or rectitude, in the case of one of a generally
respectable character, is dsvelt upon with a fiend-
like pleasure, and aggravated beyond measure,
while all his good qualities are overlooked
and thrown completely into the shade ? What
is the reason why we are not as anxious to
bring forward the good qualities and actions of
our fellow-men, and to bestow upon them their
due tribute of praise, as we are to blaze abroad
their errors and infirmities ? How often does it
happen, that a single evil action committed by an
individual, contrary to the general tenor of his
life, will be trumpeted about by the tongue of
malice, even to the end of his life, while all his
virtuous deeds and praiseworthy actions will be
overlooked and forgotten, and attempted to be bu
ried in oblivion ! If benevolence were the pre
vailing characteristic of mankind, such disposi
tions would seldom be displayed in the intercour
ses of human beings. If benevolence per
vaded every heart, we would rejoice to expatiate
on the excellences of others ; — these would form
the chief topics of conversation in our personal
remarks on others ; we would endeavour to
throw a veil over the infirmities of our brethren,
and would be always disposed to exercise that
candour and charity " which covers a multitude
of sins."

If we now turn our eyes for a moment, to the
amusements of civilized society, we shall find
many of them distinguished by a malignant cha
racter and tendency. What an appropriate ex
hibition for rational and immortal beings do the
scenes of a cockpit display ! to behold a motley
group of bipeds, of all sorts and sizes, from the
peer to the chimney-sweep, and from the man of
hoary hairs to the lisping infant, betting, bluster
ing, swearing, and feasting their eyes with a
savage delight on the sufferings of their fel
low-bipeds, whom they have taught to wound, to
torment, and to destroy each other! There is
scarcely any thing that appears so congenial to
the spirit which pervades the infernal regions, as
the attempt to inspire the lower animals with the
same malignant dispositions which characterize
the most degraded of the human species. That
such a cruel and disgusting practice still prevails
in England, and that it formed, until lately, a
part of the amusements of almost all the schools
in Scotland, is a reproach to the civilization, the
humanity, and the Christianity of our country.
And what a fine spectacle to a humane and civili
zed mind is the amusement of bull-baiting ! an
amusement in which the strength and courage
of this animal are made the means of torturing
jiiu with the most exquisite agonies ! Can be

nevolence, can even the common feelings of hu
manity, reside in the breast of that man who
can find enjoyment in encouraging and in witness
ing such barbarous sports? And what a dig
nified amusement is the horserace ! where crowds
of the nobility, gentry, and of the most polished
classes of society, as well as the ignob'e rabble,
assemble from all quarters, to behold two noble
animals panting, and heaving, and endeavourin
to outstrip each other on the course! What
scene of bullying, and jockeying, and betting
and cheating, and cursing, and swearing, an
fighting, is generally presented on such occa
sions ! What a wonderful degree of importance
is attached, by the most dignified rank of soci
ety, to the issue of the race ; as if the fate of an
empire, or the salvation of an immortal spirit,
were depending on the circumstance of one horse
getting a start of another ! I do not mean to de
cry, indiscriminately, public amusements ; nor
to call in question the propriety of improving the
locomotive powers of the horse ; but, surely, it
would require no great stretch of invention, to
devise spectacles and entertainments, much more
dignified and congenial to the noble powers, and
to the high destination of the human mind, and
which might be exhibited with as little expense
either of time or of money.

And what shall we say of lion fights, and dog
Rights, and boxing matches between animals in
the shape of men, which have been lately adver
tised in the public prints with so much impu
dence and effrontery ? Are the patrons of such
revolting exhibitions, and the crowds which re
sort to them, to be considered as patterns of taste,
of humanity, and of refined benevolence ? And
what shall we think of the amusements of one hal!
of our gentry, country squires, gentlemen farmers,
and the whole tribe of the sporting community,
who derive more exquisite enjoyment in maim
ing a hare, a partridge, or a moorfowl, than in
relieving the wants of the friendless poor, in me
liorating the condition of their dependants, or in
patronising the diffusion of useful knowledge ?
If one of our best moral poets declared, that " he
would not enter, on his list of friends, though
graced with polished manners and fine sensa,
the man who needlessly sets foot upon a worm,"
what would be his estimate of the man who de
rived one of his chief gratifications, day after
day, from making havoc among the feathered
tribes, and from lacerating and maiming a timid
hare, for the sole purpose of indulging a sporting
humour, and proving himself an excellent marks
man ? Can we suppose that the benevolent Crea
tor so curiously organized the beasts of the earth
and the fowls of heaven, and endowed them with
exquisite feelings and sensibility, merely that ty«
rannical man might torture and destroy them for
his amusement ? For the persons io whom I al
lude cannot plead necessity for such conduct, as
if they were dependant for subsistence on then

SPANISH BULL-FIGHTS.

Carcasses. Such is still the mania for these cruel
arguments, that the butchery of the brutal and the
winged tribes, it is likely, will soon be reduced
to a regular system, and enrolled among the num
ber of the fine arts. For, an octavo volume, of
470 pages, which has already passed through
three editions, has been lately published, entitled,
" Instructions to young Sportsmen in all that re
lates to Game and Shooting :" by Lieut. Colo
nel Hawker. The author, after having stated
that he has now lost his eyes and nerves for a
good shot, says " The greatest pleasure that can
possibly remain for me, is to resign the little I
have learned for the benefit of young sportsmen.
The rising generation of shooters might other
wise be left for many years,to find out all these little
matters." And a most important loss, doubtless,
the rising generation would have sustained, had
not the worthy Colonel condescended to commu
nicate his discoveries ! I was lately making an
excursion in a steam-boat, through one of the
Scottish lakes. Among the passengers were
several of the sporting gentry, furnished with all
their requisite accoutrements, who seemed to en
joy a higher gratification in disturbing the happi
ness of the feathered tribes, than in contemplat
ing the natural beautiesof the surrounding scene.
When any of these hapless animals appeared in
view, a hue and cry commenced, a shot was pre
pared, and a musket levelled at the unoffending
creatures, which created among them universal
agitation and alarm. Some of them were kill
ed ; and others, doubtless, maimed, and re der-
ed miserable for life ; while no human being
could enjoy the least benefit from such wanton
cruelty. To kill, or even to maim any living crea
ture that is doing us no harm, and when there is
no possibility, nor even a desire, to procure its
carcass for food, cannot, I should think, hy any
sophistry of reasoning, be construed into an act
of benevolence.*

I cannot, here, forbear inserting a passage
from " Salt's Travels in Abyssinia," which ex
hibits a very different spirit in one whom some
would be disposed to rank among the class of
semi-barbarians. " In the evening, Baharnegash
Yasons, a servant of the Ras (of Abyssinia) *vho
had attended me during my whole stay in the
country, took his leave. Among all the men

* In throwing out these reflections, the author by
no means wishes to insinuate, that it is improper in
every instance, to kill any of the inferior animals ;
his remarks being directed solely against the prac
tice of wantonly maiming or destroying them for the
sake of mere sport or amusement. Even in those cases
where it may appear expedient or necessary, to ex
tirpate a portion of the animal tribes, it appears
somewhat strange, that gentlemen should be the vo
luntary agents employed in this work of destruction
aAd thai their minds should be so much absorbed in
the satisfaction which it creates. One would have
tho-jcht that the very lowest class of the community
would have been selected for this purpose, as there
is scmethinc: naturally revolting in the employment
of destroying the life of any sensitive beinjj.

with whom I have been intimately \
consider this old man as one of tnel
and blameless characters. His mir
be formed upon the purest princJ
Christian religion ; his every thought^arid action
appeared to be the result of its dictates. He
would often, to ease his mule, walk more than
half the day; and as he journeyed by my side,
continually recited prayers for our welfare and
future prosperity. On all occasions he sought to
repress in those around him, every improper
feeling of anger ; conciliated them by the kindest
words, and excited them, by his example, to an
active performance of their duties. If a man
were weary, he would assist him in carrying his
burden ; if he perceived any of the mules' backs
to be hurt, he would beg me to have them reliev
ed ; and, constantly, when he saw me engaged
in shooting partridges, or other birds, he would
call out to them to fly out of the way, shaking his
head, and begging me, in a mournful accent, not
to kill them. I have remarked, in my former
journal, that, with all this refined feeling of hu
manity, he was far from being devoid of courage ;
and, I had an opportunity, subsequently, of wit
nessing several instances of his bravery, though
he appeared on all occasions peculiarly anxious
to avoid a quarrrel. We parted, I believe, with
mutual regret ; at least for my own part, I can
truly say, that I have seldom felt more respect
for an individual than I did for this worthy man."
As a contrast to the benevolent dispositions
displayed by this worthy Abyssinian, — I shall
give a short description of a bull-fight, in Mad
rid, extracted from a work, the author of which
was a spectator (in 1803) of the scene he de
scribes. " The Spanish bull-fights are certainly
the most extraordinary exhibition in Europe : we
were present at one of them this morning. The
places in the amphitheatre were nearly all filled
at half past nine, and at ten, the corregidor came
into his box ; upon which the trumpet sounded,
and the people rose and shouted, from the delight
that the show was to begin immediately. Four
men in black gowns then came forward, and read
a proclamation, enjoining all persons to remain
in their seats. On their going out of the arena,
the six bulls which were to be fought this morn
ing, were driven across, led on by a cow, with a
bell round her neck. The two Picadores (the
men who were appointed to fight the furious ani
mals) now appeared, dressed in leathern gaiters,
thick leathern breeches, silk jackets covered with
spangles, and caps surmounted by broad brimmed
while hats ; each rode a miserable hack, and
carried in his hand a long pole, with a goad at
the end. As soon as they were prepared, a door
was opened, and the first bull rushed in. In the
course of the contest, I felt first alarmed for the
men, and then for the horses. Soon the acci
dents of the men withdrew my pify from the
beasts; and, latterly, by a natural, and dreadful

154

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

operation of the mind, I began to look without
tiorror on the calamities of both. The manner
of the fight is thus: — the bull rushes in, and
makes an attack severally upon the picadores,
who repulse him ; he being always, upon these
occasions, wounded in the neck ; after a few ren
counters, he becomes somewhat shy ; but at
the same time, when he does rush on, he is
doubly dangerous. He follows up the atlack,
and frequently succeeds in overthrowing both
horse and rider. As long as the horse has
strength to bear the picadore, he is obliged to
ride him. This morning one of these wretched
animals was forced to charge, with his guts hang
ing in festoons between his legs ! His belly was
again ripped open by the bull, and he fell for
dead ; but the attendants obliged him to rise and
crawl out ! This seems the cruellest part of the
business ; for the men almost always escape ; but
the blood and sufferings of thirteen horses were
exhibited in the short space of two hours. Four
men were hurt ; one who was entirely overturn
ed with his horse upon him, was carried out like
a corpse ; but the spectators, totally disregarding
this melancholy sight, shouted for his companion
to renew the attack. The bull after his first rage
and subsequent fury during many rounds, begins
to feel weakness, and declines further attacks on
the horsemen. Upon this, a loud shout re-echoes
through (he theatre, and some of the attendants
advance and stick his gored neck full of arrows
which cause him to writhe about in great torment.
When the efforts he makes under these sufferings
have considerably spent his strength, the corregi-
dor makes a motion with his hand, and the
trumpets sound as a signal to the matador to de
spatch him. This is a service which requires
great skill and bravery ; for the madness of the
bull, and the torture he endures, prompt him to
destroy every one around. The matador ad
vances with a red cloak in one hand, and a sword
in the other. He enrages the bull with the cloak,
till, at length getting opposite to him, he rushes
forward, and the sword pierces his spinal mar
row, or what is more common, is buried ^o the hilt
in his neck; upon which he turns aside, at first
moaning, but a torrent of blood gushes from his
mouth ; and he staggers round the arena, and
falls. The trumpets sound ; three mules, orna
mented with ribbons and flags, appear, to drag
the wretched victim out by the horns, and the
horsemen to prepare for the attack of a fresh
animal."

" In the evening the show began at half-past
four, and ten bulls were brought forward. To
tame them before the matador approached, anew
expedient was resorted to, most infamously cruel,
namely, the covering of the darts with sulphur
and fireworks. The torments of these were so
dreadful, that th* animals whose strength was
fresh, raged about terribly, so that the assistants
were forced to use great agility to get from them.

There were many hair-breadth escapes , one of the
animals in pursuit of a man, leaped the barrier ol
the arena, which is about eight feet high. A
second bull was still more furious, and made more
tremendous attacks. In one of these he pinned the
man and horse against the barriers, got his horns
under the horse, and lacerated him dreadfully ;
in a moment afterwards, he lifted him up, and
threw the man with such force through one ol
the apertures, as to kill him on the spot. He
was borne past the box in which we were with
his teeth set, and his side covered with blood ;
the horse staggered out spouting a stream of gore
from his chest. The remaining picador renewed
the charge, and another came in with shouts to take
the dead wian's place. One of these had his
horse's skin dreadfully ripped off his side, and
when he breathed, the entrails swelled out of the
hole ; to prevent which, the rider got off and stuff
ed in his pocket handkerchief," &c.* — " I have
seen," says Bourgoing, " eight or ten horses torn,
and their bellies ripped open, fall and expire in
the field of battle. Sometimes these horses, af»
feeling models of patience, of courage, of docility
— present a spectacle, at which it may be allow*
able to shudder. You see them tread under their
feet, their own bloody entrails, hanging out o{
their open sides, and still obey, for some time the
hand that guides them."

Such are the amusements which, in Spain
fascinate all ranks of the community, from the
prince to the peasant. Young ladies, old men,
servant girls, and people of all ages and all cha
racters are present. The art of killing a bull,
which seems exclusively to be the business of a
butcher, is gravely discussed and exalted with
transport, not only by the rabble, but by men of
sense, and by women of delicacy. The day of
a bull-fight is a day of solemnity for the whole
canton. " The people come," says Bourgoing,
" from ten and twelve leagues dislance. The ar
tisan who can with difficulty earn enough for his
subsistence, has always sufficient to pay for tho
bull-fight. Wo be to the chastity of a young gin
whose poverty excludes her ! The man who pays
for her admittance, will be her first seducer. It is
indeed a very striking sight, to see all the inha
bitants assemble round the circus, waiting the
signal for the fight, and wearing in their exterior
every sign of impatience." There is not a town
in Spain, but what has a large square for the pur
pose of exhibiting bull-fights ; and it is said, that
even the poorest inhabitants of the smallest villa
ges will often club together, in order to procure a
cow or an ox, and fight them riding upon asses
for want of horses. f Can a spirit of pure bene-

* Travels through Spain and part of Portugal in
1803, Vol. 2. pp. 35—45. A more circumstantial ac
count of these fights, and in perfect accordance with
the above description, may be seen in Bourgoing's
" Modern State of Spain," vol. II. pp. 346— SCO.

tit is said that these fights were prohibited in 1805
to the deep regret of the most numerous part oj :ht

UTILITY OF THE REAL SCENES OF NATURE.

155

volence be general among a people addicted to
such cruel and savage amusements ! And, need
we wonder to find, that troops of lawless banditti
are continually prowling among the mountains
and forests of that country, committing murders
and deoredations ? One of the authors just now
quoted, when alluding to banditti, and detailing
the incidents which occurred on his route to
Madrid, says, "In this country it is impossible
to distinguish friends from foes, as all travellers
go well armed. We met just here half a dozen
horsemen, many of whom had swords and pistols,
and we afterwards saw peasants riding on asses,
armed in the same way. A few leagues further
on, we met a strong detachment of cavalry patrol-
ing the road, in consequence of a daring robbery,
which had just been committed on a nobleman
who was bringing his bride to court from Bacre-
lona. He had a numerous retinue ; the banditti
were twelve in number, and completely armed."

If we now take a cursory glance at our
POPULAR LITERARY WORKS, and at several of
our publications intended for the nursery, we
shall find that a goodly portion of them is stamp
ed with the character of frivolity and of maligni
ty. When the young mind is just beginning to
expand, instead of being irradiated with the
beams of unadulterated truth, a group of distort
ed and unsubstantial images, which have no pro
totypes in nature, is presented to the view of the
intellect, as the groundwork of its future progress
in wisdom and knowledge. Instead of the sim
ple and sublime precepts of Christian benevo
lence, the wild and romantic notions connected
with chivalry, the superstitions of the dark ages,
and the love of false heroism, and of military
glory, are attempted to be indelibly riveted on
the minds of the young. What else can be ex
pected, when such legends and romances as the
following, occupy the principal part of the nur
sery library? — Slue Beard; Cinderella; Tom
Thumb ; Jack the Giant-Killer ; Valentine and
Orson ; The Seven Champions of Christendom ;
Robin Hood ; Goody Two-Shoes ; Puss in
Boots; Sinbad the Sailor; Aladdin, or, the
Wonderful Lamp; Thalaba, or, the Destroyer ;
The Blood-Red Knight ; The Maid and" the
Magpie ; Fairy Tales, and a long list of similar
tales and romances , equally improving and im
portant ! Such works are published, even at the
present time, not only in a Lilliputian size, to
suit the lower ranks of the community, but in a
style of splendour and elegance, calculated to
fascinate the highest circles of society. Ten thou
sands of copies of such publications, are present
ly in circulation throughout every part of the
British empire : — and what is the great object

nation; but another entertainment, called fiesta de
novillos, which is an image of the hull-fi<:ht, is still
retained and it is notimprobable, that, by this time
the true bull-fight has been again revived.

they are calculated to accomplish ? To exhibit
distorted views of the scenes of nature, and of
human society ; to foster superstitious notions ;
to inspire the minds of the young with an inordi
nate desire after worldly honour and distinction 4
to set before them, as an ultimate object, the
splendour and felicity of" riding in a coach and
six ;"and to familiarize their minds to chivalrous
exploits, and to scenes of butchery and revenge.
If we glance at the popular literary works of
the present day, intended for the amusement of
children of a larger growth, we shall find many
of them imbued with a similar spirit, and having
a similar tendency. What is it that just now
fascinates our literary loungers, our polished
gentry, our educated females, nay, all ranks of
the community, from the dignified clergyman to
the humble weaver, and which threatens to de
stroy all relish for plain unvarnished facts, and
for substantial knowledge ? The novels of
Waverley, Guy Mannering, Rob Roy, Tales of
my Landlord, The Fortunes of Nigel, St. Ro-
nan's Well, Marmion, The Corsair, Childe
Harold, and a shoal of similar publications, which
are daily issuing from the press. And what is
the general tendency of the great majority of
such works ? To distort and caricature the facts
of real history ; to gratify a romantic imagina
tion ; to pamper a depraved mental appetite ; to
excite a disrelish for the existing scenes of na
ture, and for the authenticated facts which have
occurred in the history of mankind ; to hold up
venerable characters to derision and contempt ;
to excite admiration of the exploits and the ma
lignant principles of those rude chieftains and
barbarous heroes, whose names ought to descend
into everlasting oblivion; to revive the revenge
ful spirit of the dark ages ; to undermine a sacred
regard for truth and moral principle, which are
the basis of the happiness of the intelligent uni
verse ; and to throw a false glory over scenes of
rapine, of bloodshed, and of devastation. — To
such works, and to their admirers, we might ap
ply the words of the ancient Prophet : " He
feedeth on ashes ; a deceived heart hath turned
him aside, that he cannot say, Is there not a lie
in my right hand ?"

" For, sure, to hug a fancied case,
That never did, nor can take place,
And for the pleasures it can give,
Neglect the ' facts of real life,'
Is madness in its greatest height,
Or I mistake the matter quite."— WUTcle.

To affirm, that it is necessary for the entertain
ment of the human mind, to have recouse to ficti
tious scenes and narratives, and to the wild
vagaries of an unbridled imagination, is, in effect
to throw a reflection upon the plans and the con
duct of the Creator. It implies, that, in the
scenes of nature which surround us, both in the
heavens and on the earth, and in the administra
tions of his moral government among men, God

156

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

tas not produced a sufficient variety of interest
ing objects for the contemplation, the instruction,
and the entertainment of the human race— and
that the system of the moral and physical world
must be distorted and deranged, and its economy
misrepresented and blended with the creations of
human folly, before its scenery be rendered fit
to gratify the depraved and fastidious tastes of
mankind.* And is it indeed true, that there is
not a sufficient variety to gratify a rational mind
in the existing scenes of creation and providence?
If we survey the Alpine scenes of nature ; if we
explore the wonders of the ocean ; if we pene
trate into the subterraneous recesses of the globe ;
if we direct our view to the numerous objects of
sublimity and of beauty to ne found in every
country ; if we investigate the structure and
economy of the animal and the vegetable tribes ;
if we raise our eyes to the rolling orbs of heaven ;
if we look back to the generations of old, and
trace the history of ancient nations ; if we con
template the present state of civili/ed and of
savage tribes, and the moral scenery which is
every where displayed around us — shall we not
find a sufficient variety of every thing which is
calculated to interest, to instruct, and to entertain
a rational mind ? I am bold to affirm, that were
a proper selection made of the facts connected
with the system of nature, and with the history
and the present slate of human society, and were
the sketches of such facts executed by the hand
of a master, and interspersed with rational and
moral reflections — volumes might be presented to
the public, no less entertaining, and certainly far
more instructive, than all the novels and roman
ces which the human imagination has ever pro
duced ; and that, too, without distorting a single
fact in the system of nature or of human society,
or exciting a sentiment of admiration or of ap
probation of the exploits of warriors. If we wish
to be amused with entertaining narrations and
novel scenes, the narratives of adventurous voy
agers and travellers, when written with spirit

• The following sketch of Sir Walter Scott, the
supposed author of some of the works alluded to, is
given in Hazlitt's "Spirit of the A ire, or Contempo
rary Portraits " " His mind receives and treasures
up every thin? brought to it by tradition or custom-
it does not project itself beyond this into the world
unknown, but mechanically shrinks back as from
the edge of a precipice. The land of pure reason is
to his apprehension like Van Dieman's Land, bar
ren, miserable, distant, a place of exile, the dreary
abode of savages, convicts, and adventurers. Sir
Walter would make a bad hand of a description of
the millennium, unless he would lay the scene in
Scotland 500 years ago; and then he would want
»acts and worm-eaten parchments to support his
drooping style. Our historical novelist firmly
thinks, that nothing is but what has been— that the
moral world stands still, as the material one was
supposed to do of old— and that we can never get
beyond the point where we actually are, with
out utter destruction, though every thing changes
and will change, from what it was 300 years ago
and what it is now ; from whut it is now, to all
that the bigoted admirer of the good old times most
Ireads and hates "

and animation, will supply us with entertain
ment scarcely inferior to that of the best writen
novel ; and it is the reader's own fault, if he do
not, from such sources, derive moral instruction.
Such adventures as those of Mungo Park in
Africa, and Captain Cochrane in Siberia, and
such narratives as those of Byron, Brisson,
Pierre Viaud, Anson, Cook, Bligh, Perouse,
and others, abound with so many striking and
affecting incidents, that the reader's attention is
kept alive, and he feels as lively an interest in
the fate of the adventurers, as is usually felt in
that of the fictitious hero of a novel, or a ro
mance.

If man were only the creature of a day,, whose
whole existence was confined within the limits
of this sublunary scene, he might amuse himself
either with facts or with fictions, or with any
toys or gewgaws that happened to strike his
fancy while he glided down the stream of time to
the gulf of oblivion. But if he is a being destin
ed for eternity, the train of his thoughts ought
to be directed to objects corresponding to his
high destination, and all his amusements blended
with those moral instructions which have an ul
timate reference to the scene of his immortal
existence. When I read one of our modern
novels, I enjoy, for a few hours, a transitory
amusement, in contemplating the scenes of fancy
it displays, and in following the hero through
his numerous adventures ; I admire the force
and brilliancy of the imagination of the writer
(for I am by no means disposed to underrate the
intellectual talent which has produced some ol
the works to which I allude,) but when I have
finished the perusal, and reflect, that all the
scenes which passed before my mental eye, were
only so many unsubstantial images, the fictions
of a lively imagination — I cannot indulge in ra
tional or religious reflections on the subject, nor
derive a single moral instruction, any more than
I can do from a dream or a vision of the night.
When I survey the scenes of creation ; when I
read the history of ancient nations ; when I pe
ruse the authentic narratives of the voyager and
traveller ; when I search the records of revela
tion ; and when I contemplate the present state
of society around me, — I learn something of the
character, the attributes, and the providence ol
God, and of the moral and physical state of man
kind. From almost every scene, and every in
cident, I can deduce instructions calculated to
promote the exercise of humility, meekness, grati
tude, and resignation — to lead the mind to
God as the source of felicity, and as the righte
ous governor of the world — and to impress the
heart with a sense of the folly and depravity o,
man. But it is obvious, that no distinct mora.
instructions can be fairly deduced from scenes,
circumstances, and events " which never did nor
can take place." — Such however is, at present
the tide of public opinion on this subject that we

SYSTEM OF PRISON DISCIPLINE.

157

mignt as soon attempt to stem a mountain tor- er have their spirits taken tneir flight into the
rent by a breath of wind, or to interrupt the world unknown, thaji subscriptions are set on
dashings of a mighty cataract by the waving of foot, statues and mausoleums are erected, flat-

our hand, as to expect to counteract, by any
considerations that can be adduced, the current
of popular feeiing in favour of novels, and tales
of knights, and of tournaments ; of warlike chief
tains, and military encounters. Such a state of
feeling, I presume, never can exist in a world
where moral evil has never shed its malign in
fluence.

Again, if we consider the sentiments and the
conduct of many of our Literary and Scientific
characters, we shall find that even philosophy has
had very little influence, in counteracting the
stream of malignity, and promoting the exercise
of benevolence. Do not many of our literary cha-
idclers in their disputes frequently display as keen
resentments, and as malevolent dispositions, as
the professed warrior, and the man of the world ?
and have they not some times resorted even to
horsewhips and to pistols to decide their con
tests ? In proof of this, need I refer to the
gentlemen now or formerly connected with the
" Edinburgh Magazine," " Blackwood's Maga
zine, " the " London Magazine," the " Quarterly
Review," and other periodical works — and to the
mean jealousies and contentions which have
been displayed, and the scurrilous paragraphs
which have been written by various descriptions
of competitors for literary fame ? Such a display
of temper and conduct in men of professed erudi
tion, is not only inconsistent with moral princi
ple, and the dignity of true science, but has a
tendency to hold up philosophy and substantial
knowledge to the scorn and contempt both of the
Christian and of the political world.

Again, is it an evioence that benevolence
forms a prominent character of modern civilized
society, when philanthropists, who have devoted
their substance and their mental activities to the
promotion of the best interests of mankind ; and
when men of science, who have enlarged the
sphere of our knowledge, and improved the useful
arts, are suffered to pine away in penury and neg
lect, and to descend into the grave, without even
a " frail memorial" to mark the spot where their
mortal remains are deposited; while, on the
warrior, who has driven the ploughshare of de
struction through the world, and wounded the
peace of a thousand families, enormous pensions
are bestowed, and trophies erected to perpetuate
his momory to future generations? And how
conies it to pass, if benevolence and justice
be distinguishing features of our age and nation,
that authors, whose writings afford instruction
and entertainment to a numerous public, are fre
quently suffered to pine away in anxiety and dis
tress, and to remain in hopeless indigence, while
publishers and booksellers are fattening on the
fruit of their labours? Yet, while we leave them
to temain in abject penury, during life, — nosoon-

tering inscriptions are engraved on their tombs,
and anniversary dinners are appointed to cele
brate their memories. Such displays of liberali
ty might have been of essential benefit to the
individuals, while they sojourned within the limits
of this sublunary sphere; but they are altogether
futile and superfluous in relation to the separate
spirits, which are now placed forever beyond the
reach of such vain pageantry and posthumous
honours.

If we now attend, for a little, to thePenal Code*
of civilized nations, we shall find them, not
only glaringly deficient in a spirit of benevolence,
but deeply imbued with a spirit of cruelty and
revenge. The great object of all civil punish
ments ought to be, not only the prevention of
crimes, but also the reformation of the criminal,
in order that a conviction of the evil of his con
duct may be impressed upon his mind, and that
he may be restored to society as a renovated cha
racter. When punishments are inflicted with a
degree of severity beyond what is necessary to
accomplish these ends, the code which sanctions
them, becomes an engine of cruelty and of injus
tice. Bui, the reformation, and the ultimate
happiness of the criminal, never seem to have
been once taken into consideration, in the con
struction of (he criminal codes of any nation in
Europe. The infliction of pain, and even of to?
ture, and of every thing that is degrading and
horrible, to a degree far beyond what is necessary
for the security of the public, and which has no
other tendency than to harden the culprit, seems
to have been the great object of the framers of
our penal statutes. If a man has committed an
offence against society, he is either confined to a
jail, thrown into a dungeon, loaded with irons,
whipped through the streets, banished to a dis
tant land, hung upon a gallows, or broken on the
wheel. No system of moral regimen, calculated
to counteract his criminal habits, to impart in
struction to his mind, and to induce habits of in
dustry and temperance, (except in a few insulated
cases) has yet been arranged by our legislators,
so as to render punishment a blessing to the cri
minal, and to the community which he has injured.

The following circumstances, in relation to
punishments, manifest a principle both of folly
and of malignity in the arrangements of our cri
minal jurisprudence. — In the first place, the
present system of our prison discipline, instead
of operating to prevent the increase of crime^
has a dire :t and inevitabls tendency to produce
vice and wretchedness, and to render our jails
the nurseries of every depraved propensity, and
of every species of moral turpitude. From th»
indiscriminate association of the young and the
old, and of persons charged with every degree 01
criminality, the youthful and inexperienced cul-

158

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

prit is soon tutored in all the arts of fraud, decep
tion, and robbery, and prepared for acting a more
conspicuous and atrocious part on the theatre of
crime. " I make no scruple to affirm," says
Mr. Howard, " that if it were the aim and wish
of magistrates to effect the destruction, present
and future, of young delinquents, they could not
desire a more effectual method than to confine
them in our prisons." Of the truth of this po
sition, the reader will find an ample and impress
ive proof in the Honourable T. F. Buxton's
" Inquiry wheiher crime and misery are produc
ed or prevented by our present system of Prison
Discipline."

In the second place, the disproportion be
tween crimes and punishments, and the sangui
nary character of every civilized code of penal
statutes, are directly repugnant to every princi
ple of justice and benevolence. The punishment
assigned by the law to the man who steals a
sheep, or pilfers a petty article of merchandise,
is the same as that which it inflicts on the mis
creant who has imbrued his hands in his father's
blood. In France, prior to the revolution, the
punishment of robbery, either with or without
murder, was the same ; and hence it happened,
that robbery was seldom or never perpetrated
without murder. For, when men see no dis
tinction made in the nature and gradations of
punishment, they will be generally led to con
clude, that there is nodistinction in the guilt. In
our own country, it is a melancholy truth, that,
among the variety of actions which men are daily
liable to commit, no less than one hundred and
sixty have been declared, by act of parliament,
to be felonies, without benefit of clergy ; or, in
other words, to be worthy of instant death.* It
is an indelible disgrace to an age which boasts of
its being enlightened with the beams of science
and of religion, that laws, framed in an ignorant
and barbarous age, and intended to apply to tem
porary or fortuitous occurrences, should still be
acted upon, and stand unrepealed in the criminal
codes of the nations of Europe, in the 19th cen
tury of the Christian era, when so many distin
guished writers have demonstrated their futility,
their injustice, and their inadequacy for the pre
vention of crime. For, instead of diminishing
the number of offenders,, experience proves, that
crimes are almost uniformly increased by an un
due severity of punishment. This was striking
ly exemplified in the reign of Henry VIII. re
markable for the abundance of its crimes, which
certainly did not arise from the mildness of pu
nishment. In that reign alone, says his historian,
seventy-two thousand executions took place, for
robberies alone, exclusive of the religious mur
ders which are known to have been numerous,
— amounting, on an average, to six executions a
aay, Sundays included, during the whole reign of
that monarch.

* Ency Brit. Art. Crime

In the next place, the shocking and ii-nnecessc, 4
cruelties which are frequently inflicted upon cri
minals, are inconsistent with every principle of
reason and of justice, and revolting to every feel
ing of humanity. If the forfeiture of life ought,
in any case, to be resorted to as the punishment
of certain crimes, humanity dictates, that it should
be accompanied with as little pain as possible to
the unfortunate criminal. But man, even civili
zed man, has glutted his savage disposition by
inventing tortures to agonize his fellow man, at
which humanity shudders. It is not enough
that a poor unfortunate wretch, in the prime of
life, whom depravity has hurried to the commis
sion of crime, should be deprived of his mortal
existence, — his soul must be harrowed up at the
prospect of the prolonged torments which he
must endure, before his spirit is permitted to
take its flight to the world unknown. Instead of
simply strangling or beheading the unhappy cri
minal, his flesh must be torn with pincers, his
bones dislocated, his hands chopped off, or
his body left to pine away in exquisite torments,
amidst devouring flames. In Sweden, murder is
punished by beheading and quartering, after hav
ing previously chopped off the hand. In Ger
many, Poland, Italy, and other parts cf the con
tinent, it was customary, and, I believe, still is,
in some places, to put criminals to death, by
breaking them alive on the wheel. The follow
ing account is given, by a traveller, who was in
Berlin, in 1819, of the execution of a man for
murder, which shows that the execution of crimi
nals, in Prussia, is frequently distinguished by a
species of cruelty worthy of the worst days of
the inquisition. Amidst the parade of execu
tioners, officers of police, and other judicial au
thorities, the beating of drums, and the waving
of flags and colours, the criminal mounted the
scaffold. No ministers of religion appeared to
gild the the horrors of eternity, and to sooth the
agonies of the criminal ; and no repentant prayer
closed his quivering lips. " Never," says the
narrator, " shall I forget the one bitter look of
imploring agony that he threw around him, as im
mediately on stepping on the scaffold, his coat was
rudely torn from off his shoulders. He was then
thrown down, the cords fixed round his neck, which
were drawn until strangulation almost commen
ced. Another executioner then approached, bear
ing in his hands a heavy wheel, bound with iron,
with which he violently struck the legs, arms,
and chest, and lastly the head of the criminal. I
was unfortunately near enough to witness his
mangled and bleeding body still convulsed. It
was then carried down for interment, and, in less
than a quarter of an hour from the beginning o!
his torture, the corpse was completely covered
with earth. Several large stones, which were
thrown upon him, hastened his last gasp ; he was
mangled into eternity /"

In Russia, the severest punishments are fre-

CRUEL PUNISHMENTS.

159

quently inflicted for the most trivial offences.
The knout is one of the most common punish
ments in that country. This instrument is
a thong made of the skin of an elk or of a wild
ass, so hard that a single stroke is capable of
cutting the flesh to the bone. The following
description is given by Olearius of the manner in
which he saw the knout inflicted on eight men,
and one woman, only for selling brandy and to
bacco without a license. " The executioner's
man, after stripping them down to the wast, tied
'heir feet, and took one at a time on his back.
The executioner stood at three paces distance,
and, springing forward with the knout in his
hand, — whenever he struck, the blood gushed out
at every blow. The men had each twenty-five
or twenty-six lashes ; the woman, though only
sixteen, fainted away. After their backs were
thus dreadfully mangled, they were tied together
two and two ; and those who sold tobacco having
a little of it, and those who sold brandy a little
bottle put about their necks ; they were then whip
ped through the city of Petersburgh for about a
mile and a half, and then brought back to the
place of their punishment, and dismissed." That
is what is termed the moderate knout ; for when
it is given with the utmost severity, the execu
tioner, striking the flank under the ribs, cuts the
flesh to the bowels ; and, therefore, it is no won
der that many die of this inhuman punishment. —
The punishment of the pirates and robbers who
infest the banks of the Wolga, is another act of
savage cruelty common to Russia. A float is
built, whereon a gallows is erected, on which is
fastened a number of iron hooks, and on these
the wretched criminals are hung alive by the
ribs. The float is then launched into the stream,
and orders are given to all the towns and villages
on the borders of the river, that none, upon pain
of death, shall afford the least relief to any of
these wretches. These malefactors sometimes
hang, in this manner, three, four, and even five
days alive. The pain produces a raging fever,
in which they utter the most horrid impreca
tions, imploring the relief of water and other
liquors.* During the reign of Peter the Greal,
the robbers who infested various parts of his do
minions, particularly the banks of the Wolga,
were hung up in this manner by hundreds and
thousands, and left to perish in the most dreadful
manner. Even yet, the boring of the tongue,
and the cutting of it out, are practised in this
country as an inferior species of punishment.
Such cruel punishments, publicly inflicted, can
have no other tendency than to demoralize the
minds of the populace, to blunt their natural feel
ings, and to render criminal characters still more
desperate : and hence we need not wonder at

• See Han way's "Travels through Russia and
Persia"— Salmon's " Present State a' all Nations,"
vol. 6. Outline's Geography, &c

what travellers affirm respecting the Russians,
that they are very indifferent as to life or death,
and undergo capital punishment? with unparal
leled apathy and indolence.

Even among European nations more civilize^
than the Russians, similar tortures have been
inflicted upon criminals. The execution of Da-
miens, in 1757, for attempting to assassinate Louis
XV. King of France, was accompanied with
tortures, the description of which is sufficient to
harrow up the feelings of the most callous mind
— tortures, which could scarcely have been ex
ceeded, in intensity and variety, although they
had been devised and executed by the ingenuity
of an infernal fiend. And yet, they were beheld
with a certain degree of apathy by a surrounding
populace ; and even counsellors and physicians
could talk together about the best mode of tearing
asunder the limbs of the wretched victim, with as
much composure as if they had been dissecting a
dead subject, or carving a pullet. Even in Bri
tain, at no distant period, similar cruelties were
practised. Those who are guilty of high treason
are condemned, by our law, " to be hanged on a
gallows for some minutes ; then cut down, while
yet alive, the heart to be taken out and exposed
to view, and the entrails burned." Though the
most cruel part of this sentence has never been
actually inflicted in our times, yet it is a dis
grace to Britons that such a statute should still
stand unrepealed in our penal code. — The prac
tice, too, of torturing supposed criminals for the
purpose of extorting a confession of guilt, was,
till a late period, common over all the countries
of Europe ; and if I am not mistaken, is still re
sorted to, in several parts of the continent.
Hence, Baron Bielfeld, in his " Elements of
Universal' Erudition," published in 1770, lays
down as one of the branches of criminal jurispru
dence, " The different kinds of tortures for the
discovery of truth." Such a practice is not only
cruel and unjust, but absurd in the highest de
gree, and repugnant to every principle of reason.
For, as the Marquis Beccaria has well observed,
" It is confounding all relations to expect that a
man should be both the accuser and the accused,
and that pain shouled be the test of truth ; as i(
truth resided in the muscles and fibres of a wretch
in torture. By this method, the robust will es
cape, and the feeble be condemned. — To disco
ver truth by this method, is a problem which may
be better resolved by a mathematician than a
judge, and may be thus stated : The force of tht
muscles and the sensibility of the nerves of an in
nocent person being given, it is required to find the
degree of pain necessary to make him confess him
self guilty of a given crime."*

* See Beccaria's " Essay on Crimes and Punish
ments," p. 52. 56. The following is a brief summary
of the principal punishments that have been adopted
by men, in different countries, for tormenting and
destroying each other. Capital punishments— b«

160

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

If the confined limits of the present work had
admitted, I might have prosecuted these illustra
tions to a much greater extent. I might have
traced the operations of malevolence in the practice
of that most shocking and abominable traffic, the
Slave Trade — the eiernal disgrace of individuals
and of nations calling themselves civilized. This
is an abomination which has been encouraged
by almost every nation in Europe, and even by
the enlightened states of America. And al
though Great Britain has formally prohibited, by
a law, the importation of slaves from Africa ;
yet, in all her West Indian colonies, slavery in
its most cruel and degrading forms still exists ;
and every proposition, and every plan for resto
ring the negroes to their natural liberty, and to
the rank which they hold in the scale of exist
ence, is pertinaciously resisted by gentlemen
planters, who would spurn at the idea of being
considered as either infidels or barbarians. They
even attempt to deprive these degraded beings
of the chance of obtaining a happier existence in
a future world, by endeavouring to withhold
from them the means of instruction, and by
persecuting their instructors. " In Demerara
alone there are 76,000 immortal souls linked to
sable bodies, while there are but 3,500 whites ;
and yet, for the sake of these three thousand
whites, the seventy-six thousand, with all their
descendants, are to be kept in ignorance of the
way of salvation, for no other purpose than to
procure a precarious fortune for a very few indi
viduals out of their sweat and blood." Is such
conduct Consistent with the spirit of benevolence,
or even with the common feelings of humanity?

heading, strangling, crucifixion, drowning, burning,
roasting, hanging by the neck, the arm, or the leg ;
starving, sawing, exposing to wild beasts, rending
asunder by horses drawing opposite ways , shoot
ing, burying alive, blowing from the mouth of a can
non, compulsory deprivation of sleep, rolling on a
barrel stuck with nails, cutting to pieces, hanging
by the ribs, poisoning, pressing slowly to death by
a weight laid on the breast ; castins headlong from
a rock, tearing out the bowels, pulling to pieces with
red hot pincers, stretching on the rack, breaking on
the wheel, impaling, flaying alive, cutting out the
heart, &c. &c. &c. Punishments short of death
have been such as the following. Fine, pillory, im-

Crisonment , compulsory labour at the mines, gal-
jys, highways, or correction-house ; whipping,
bastinading; mutilation by cutting away the ears,
the nose, the tongue, the breasts of women, the foot,
the h-ind ; squeezing the marrow from the bones
with screws or wedges, castration, putting out the
eyes ; banishment, running the gauntlet, drumming,
shaving off the hair, burning on the hand or fore
head ; and many others of a similar nature. Could
the ingenuity of the inhabitants of Top/ift have in
vented punishments more cruel and revolting? Has
any one of these modes of punishment a tendency
to reform the criminal, and promote his happiness?
On the contrary, have they not all a direcLtendency
to irritate, to harden, and to excite feelings of re
venge ? Nothing shows the malevolent dispositions
of a great portion of the human race, in so striking
.alight, as the punishments they have inflicted on
one^ another ; for these are characteristic, not of
insulated individuals only, but of nations, in their
collective capacity.

I might have traced the same malignant prin
ciple, in the practice of a set of men denominat
ed wreckers, who, by setting up false lights, allure
mariners to destruction, that they may enrich
themselves by plundering the wrecks — in the
warlike dispositions of all the governments of
Europe, and the enormous sums which have
been expended in the work of devastation, and
of human destruction, while they have refused
to give the least direct encouragement to philan
thropic institutions, and to the improvement of
the community in knowledge and virtue — and in
that spirit of tyranny, and thirst for despotic
power, which have led them to crush the rising
intelligence of the people, and to lend a deaf ear
to their most reasonable demands. For, there
is no government on this side of the Atlantic, so
far as I know, that has ever yet formed an in
stitution for promoting the objects of general
benevolence, for counteracting the baleful effects
of depravity and ignorance, and for enlightening
the minds of the people in useful knowledge ; or
which has even contributed a single mite to en
courage such institutions after they were set on
foot by the people themselves. Knowledge is
simply permitted to be diffused ; it is never di
rectly encouraged ; its progress is frequently
obstructed ; and, in some instances, it is posi
tively interdicted, as appears from the following
barbarous edict, published in the year 1825. —
" A royal Sardinian edict directs, that hence
forth no person shall learn to read or write who
cannot prove the possession of property above
the value of 1500 livres, (or about 60/. sterling.)
The qualification for a student is the possession
of an income to the same amount."* Such is
the firm determination of many of the kings and
princes of Europe to hold their subjects in aoject
slavery and ignorance ; and such is the despe
rate tendency of proud ambition, that they will
rather suffer their thrones to shake and totter be
neath them, than give encouragement to liberal
opinions, and to the general diffusion of know
ledge.— But, instead of illustrating such topics
in minute detail, I shall conclude this section by
presenting a few miscellaneous facts, tending to
corroborate several of the preceding statements,
and to illustrate the moral state of the civilized
world.

The following statement, extracted from
"Neale's Travels through Germany, Poland,
Moldavia, and Turkey," exhibits a faint picture
of the state of morals in Poland. " If ever
there was a country," says Mr. Neale, " where
' might constitutes right,' that country was Po-
land, prior to its partition." The most dreadful
oppression, the most execrable tyranny, the most
wanton cruelties were daily exercised by the no
bles upon the unfortunate peasants. — Let us
quote a few facts ; they will speak volumes. A

• Hamburgh Paper, August, 1825

STATE OF MORALS IN CUBA.

181

Polish peasant's life was held of the same value
with one of his horned cattle ; if his lord slew
him, he was fined only 100 Polish florins, or 21.
16s. sterling. If, on the other hand, a man of
ignoble birth dared to raise his hand against a
nobleman, death was the inevitable punishment.
It anv one oresumed to question the nobility of a
magnate, he was forced to prove his assertion,
or suffer death ; nay, if a powerful man chose
to take a fancy to ttia field of his humbler neigh-
oour, and to erect a landmark upon it, and if that
landmark remained for three days, the poor man
lost, his possession. The atrocious cruelties that
were habitually exercised, are hardly credible.
A. Masalki caused his hounds to devour a pea
sant who happened to frighten his horse. A
Radzivil had the belly of one of his subjects rip
ped open, to thrust his feet into it, hoping thereby
to be cured of a malady that had tormented him.
One of the most infallible signs of a degraded
state of morals in any country, is the corrupt ad
ministration of justice. As specimens of Polish
justice, Mr. Neale mentions the case of a mer
chant of Warsaw, whom it cost 1400 ducats to
procure the conviction and execution of two rob
bers who had plundered him; and another case,
still more flagrant, that of a peasant who had
apprehended an assassin, and who, on taking him
to the Staroste, was coolly dismissed with the
prisoner, and the corpse of the murdered person
which he had brought in his wagon; because he
had not ten ducats — the fee demanded by the
magistrate for his interference. — " During the
reign of Stanislaus Poniatowsky, a petty noble
having refused to resign to Count Thisenhaus
his small estate, the Count invited him to dinner,
as if desirous of amicably adjusting the affair;
and whilst the knight, in the pride of his heart
at such unexpected honour, assiduously plied the
bottle, the Count despatched some hundreds of
peasants with axes, ploughs, and wagons, order
ing the village, which consisted only of a few
wooden buildings, to be pulled down, ihe mate
rials carried away, and the plough to be passed
over the ground which the village had occupied.
This was accordingly done. The nobleman, on
his return home in the evening, could find neither
road, house, nor village. The master and his
servant wer« alike bewildered, and knew not
whether they were dreaming or had lost the
power of discrimination ; but their surprise and
a<jony wrre deemed so truly humorous, that the
whole court was delighted with the joke !" How
depraved must be the state of moral feeling, when
the injustice inflicted upon fellow-creatures, and
the miseries they endure, become the subjects of
merriment and derision! — "The morals of the
people of Poland," says Mr. Neale, " were, and
continue to be, nearly at the lowest point of de
basement. Female chastity is a phenomenon ;
while the male sex are proportionally profligate.
Drunkenness, gluttony, and sensuality, orevail
31

to a degree unknown in other countries in Eu
rope."

The following extract from Mr. Howison's
" Foreign Scenes and Tr£ veiling Recreations,"
will convey some idea of the state of morals in
the island of Cuba. " Nothing can be worse,"
says Mr. H., " than the state of society in Ha
vana. The lower classes are all alike dissolute
and unprincipled. Assassinations are so fre
quent that they excite little attention ; and as
sault and robbery are matters of course, when a
man passes alone and at night through a solitary
quarter of the town. Several assassinations
take place in the streets every week." This de
praved and lawless state of things may be ascribed
to three causes : the inefficiency of the police ;
the love of gaming and dissipation which pre
vails among the lower orders ; and the facility
with which absolution of the greatest crimes may
be obtained from the priests. In fact, the Ca
tholic religion, as it now exists in Cuba, tends
to encourage rather than to check vice. We
shall suppose, for example, that a man makes
himself master of 100 dollars by robbing or by
murdering another ; and that the church grants
him absolution for half the sum thus lawlessly
obtained ; it is evident that he will gain 50 dol
lars by the whole transaction, and think himself
as innocent as he was before he committed the
crime. No man need mount the Havana scaf
fold, whatever be his crime, if he has the means
of ministering to the rapacity of the church, and
of bribing the civil authorities. A poor friend
less criminal is executed in a few days after sen
tence is pronounced upon him ; but a persoR of
wealth and influence generally manages to put
off capital punishment for a series of years, and
at last get it commuted to fine and imprisonment.
Of these depraved practices, Mr. Hewison states
several striking examples. — Those statements of
Mr. H. in reference to the moral state of Cuba,
I find corroborated by a short account of this isl
and in the Monthly Magazine for March, 1820,
page 120. " They act here very frequently
those sacred mysteries which so delighted our
good forefathers. I have witnessed (says the
writer) the triumph of the Ave Maria, a tragi
comedy, which closes with the sudden appear
ance, in the midst of a theatre, of a chivalrous
worthy, mounted on a real horse, shaking at the
end of a lance the bloody head of an infidel.
This horrid exhibition excited a titter of enjoy
ment in all the spectators. The ladies, in particu
lar, seemed to be highly entertained, — no fainting
fits, no nervous attacks. How could a mere fic
tion agonize the blunt feelings of women, har
dened by the spectacle of bull-fights, and almost
every day meeting with the dead body of some
human being who has been assassinated ?" ^

There is no situation in which human beingt
can be placed, where we should n ore naturaUj
expect the manifestation of benevole at affection*,

162

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

than in those scenes of danger where all are equal
ly exposed to deep distress, and where the ex
ercise of sympathy and kindness is the only thing
that can alleviate the anguish of the mind.
Whtn ihe prospect of immediate death, or of
prolonged agonies even more dreadful than the
simple pain of dissolution, is full before the
inirid, one should think that ferocious disposi
tions would be instantly curbed, and kindly af
fections begin to appear. Yet, even in such situ
ations, it frequently happens, that feelings of
malevolence and revenge, and all the depraved
passions, are most powerfully excited to action.
The following facts will tend to illustrate this re
mark. Mr. Byron "was shipwrecked, in a vio
lent storm on the coast of South America. A
mountainous sea broke over the ship ; she was
laid on her beam ends; darkness surrounded
them ; nothing was to be seen but breakers all
around ; and every soul on board looked upon the
present minute as his last. "So terrible was
ihe*scene of foaming breakers around us," says
Mr. B. " that one of the bravest men we. had
could not help expressing his dismay at it, saying
it was too shocking a sight to bear." Even in
this dreadful situation, malignant passions began
to appear : and, like the dashing waves around,
to rage with unbounded violence. No sooner
had the morning thrown a ray of light over the
dismal gloom, and a faint glimpse of land was
perceived, than many of the crew who, but a
few minutes before, had shown the strongest
signs of despair, and were on their knees pray
ing for mercy, " grew extremely riotous, broke
open every chest and box that was at hand, stove
in the heads of casks of brandy and wine, and
got so drunk that some of them were drowned
on board, and lay floating about the decks for
some days after." After the greater part, to the
number of 150 persons, had got to shore — " the
boatswain and some of the people would not
leave the ship so long as there was any liquor to
begot at; they fell to beating every thing to
pieces that came in their way, and carrying their
intemperance to the greatest excess, broke open
chests and cabins for plunder that could be of no
use to them. So earnest were they in this wan
tonness of theft, that one man had evidently
been murdered on account of some division of
the spoil, or for the sake of the share that fell to
him, having all the marks of a strangled corpse."
The same malignant dispositions weredisplayed,
in numerous instances, during their abode on
the desolate and barren island on which they
had been thrown, notwithstanding the hunger,
the rains, the cold, and the attacks of wild
beasts to which they were all equally ex-
oosed.*

There is, perhaps, no occurrence that has hap-

' See Byron's " Narrative of the Loss of the Wager
Man of War."

pened in modern times, which so striking dis
plays the desperate malignity of human beings in
the rnidst of danger, as the conduct of the crew
of the Medusa Frigate, while tossing on the rafl
by which they endeavoured to save themselves,
after that vessel had been shipwrecked. The
Medusa was stranded, in the month of June,
1816. on the bank of Arguin, near the western
coast of Africa. A raft was hastily constructed,
which was but scantily supplied with provisions.
There were five boats, which contained in all
about 240 persons ; and upon the raft, there em
barked about 150 individuals. The boats pushed
off in a line, towing the raft, and assuring tho
people on board that they would conduct them
safely to land. They had not proceeded, however,
above two leagues from the wreck, when they,
one by one. cast off the tow lines, and abandoned
the raft to its fate. By this time the raft had
sunk below the surface of the water to the depth
of three feet and a half, and the people were sc
squeezed one against another, that it \v,is found
impossible to move ; fore and aft they were up to
the middle in water. Night at length came on ;
the wind freshened ; the sea began to swell ;
about midnight the weather became very stormy,
and the waves broke over them in every direction.
Tossed by the waves from one end to the other,
and sometimes precipitated into the sea ; floating
between life and death; mourning over their
own misfortunes ; certain of perishing; yet con-i
tending for the remains of existence with that
cruel element which menaced to swallow their
up — such was their situation till break of day,
when a dreadful spectacls presented itself. Ten
or twelve unhappy men, having their extremities
jammed between the spars of the raft, had perish
ed in that situation, and others had been swept
away by the violence of the waves. — All this,
however, was nothing to the dreadful scene
which took place the following night. "Al
ready," says the narrator, " was the moral cha
racter of the people greatly changed. A. spirit of
sedition spread from man to man. and manifested
itself by the most furious shouts." Night came
on ; the heavens were obscured with thick
clouds ; the wind rose, and with it the sea ; the
waves broke over them every moment; numbers
were swept away, and several poor wretches
were smothered by the pressure of their comrades.
Both soldiers and sailors resolved to sooth iheir
last moments by drinking to excess ; they be( ame
deaf to the voice of reason ; boldly declared heir
intention of murdering their officers; and, cut
ting the ropes which held the rafts together, one
of them seizing an axe, actually began the dread
ful work. The officers rushed forward to quell
the tumult, and the man with the hatchet was
the first that fell — the stroke of a sabre terminat
ed his existence. One fellcw was detected se
cretly cutting the ropes, and was immediately
thrown overboard ; others destroyed ihs shrouds

DEPRAVITY IN THE MIDST OF DANGER.

163

aiic! iiaulyards; and the mast, destitute of support,
immediately fell on a captain of infantry, and
broke his thigh ; he was instantly seized by the
soldiers and thrown into the sea, but was saved
by the opposite party. About an hour after mid
night the insurrection burst forth anew. They
rushed upon the officers like desperate men, each
having a knife or a sabre in his hand ; and such
was the fury of the assailants, that they tore their
flesh, and even their clothes with their teeth.
There was no time for hesitation ; a general
slaughter took place, arid the raft was strewed with
dead bodies. On the return of day, it was found
that, in the course of the preceding night of hor
ror, sixty-Jive of the mutineers had perished, and
two of the small party attached to the officers.
A third night of horror approached, distinguished
by the piercing cries of those whom hunger and
thirst devoured ; and the morning's sun showed
them a dozen unfortunate creatures stretched
lifeless on the raft. The fourth night was mark
ed by another massacre. Some Spaniards and
Italians conspired to throw the rest into the sea.
A Spaniard was the first to advance with a drawn
bate; the sailors seized him and throw him into
the sea. The Italian seeing this, jumped over
board ; the rest were mastered, and order was
restored. But, before the ship Argus came to
their relief, of the 150 that embarked on the raft,
15 unhappy creatures only remained, covered
with wounds and bruises, almost naked, stripped
of their skin, shrivelled with the rays of the sun,
iheir eyes hollow, and their countenances sa
vage. — Such are the dreadful effects of maligni
ty, which produces more sufferings and fatal
effects, than the most tremendous elements of
nature !

A certain portion of the same spirit was lately
displayed by several individuals on board of
the Kent East Indiaman. In the midst of a
most violent gale, in the Bay of Biscay, when
the sea was running mountains high, this vessel,
containing about. 600 persons, took fire, in conse
quence of the spirits from a stoved cask having
communicated with a lamp ; and all hopes of
safety became extinguished, till the ship Cam
bria, Captain Cooke, hove in sight. But the
danger of passing from one ship to the other, in
boats, in such a tempestuous sea, rendered the
preservation of the passengers and crew in a
degree doubtful. Yet, in the midst of the danger,
the alarm and the anguish which accompanied
this tremendous scene, we are told by the narra
tor, page 24, that " it is suspected that one or
two of those who perished, must have sunk un
der the weight of their spoils; the same indivi
duals having been seen eagerly plundering the
cuddy cabins." And, a little afterwards, page
31, he adds: "Some time after the shades of
night had enveloped us, I descended to the cuddy
in quest of a blanket to shelter me from the in
creasing cold, and the scene of desola'ion that

there presented itself was melancholy in the ex
treme. The place, which only a few short hours
before had been the seat of kindly intercourse,
and of social gayety, was now entirely deserted,
save by a few miserable wretches, who were
either stretched in irrecoverable intoxication on
the floor, or prowling about, like beasts of prey,
in search of plunder."*

The following is a short description of the
moral character of the inhabitants of Carolina,
and of one of the amusements of a people who
boast of their liberty and their civilization, — as
it is found in " Morse's American Geography."
" The citizens of North Carolina who are not
better employed, spend their time in drinking, or
gaming at cards or dice, in cock-fighting, or
horse-racing. Many of the interludes are filled
up with a boxing match ; and these matches fre
quently become memorable by feats of gouging.
This delicate and entertaining diversion is thus
performed : When two boxers are worried with
fighting and bruising each other, they come, as
it is called, to close quarters ; and each endea
vours to twist his fore-fingers in the ear-locks of
his antagonist. When these are fast clenched,
the thumbs are extended each way to the nose,
and the eyes gently twined out of their Rockets.
The victor, for his expertness, receives shouts of
applause from the sporting throng, while his poor
eyeless antagonist is laughed at for his misfortune.
In a country that pretends to any degree of
civilization, one would hardly expect to find a
prevailing custom of putting out the eyes of each
other. Yet this more than barbarous custom is
prevalent in both the Carol inas, and in Georgia
among the lower class of people." — " Lord,
what is man !" In a savage and a civilized state
— in infancy and in manhood — in his games and
diversions — in the instructions by which he is
trained — in the remarks he makes upon his
neighbours — in the sports and amusements in
which he indulges — in his literary pursuits and
lucubrations — in his system of rewards and

* See a " Narrative of the Loss of the Kent East
Indiaman, by fire, in the Bay of Biscay, on the 1st of
March, 1825, by a Passenger," supposed to be Major
Macgregor.— The humanity and intrepidity display
ed, amidst the heart-rending scene which this narra
tive describes— by Captain Cobb of the Kent ; by
Messrs. Thompson, Fearon, Macgregor, and the
other officers, and many of the soldiers ; by Captain
Cooke of the Cambria, his crew, and the Cornish
miners-is above all praise. Their benevolent and
heroic conduct at that alarming crisis, is far more
deserving of a public monument being raised for its
commemoration, than that of many of our military
heroes, in honour of whom so many trophies have
been erected. If men, who have been instrumental
in destroying the lives and the happiness of hun
dreds and of thousands, have pensions bestowed on
them, and are exalted to posts of honour, surely
those who have exerted tfeir energies in preserving
the lives of hundreds, and in preventing the anguish
of thousands, oueht not to be suffered to sink into
oblivion, or to pass unrewarded. It is, I presume,
one reason among others, why virtue is so xittle
practised, that it is seldom rewarded according to it*
merit.

164

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

punishments — in his intercourses and contests
with communities and nations — in his commer
cial transactions — in his judicial administrations
— in the height of prosperity — and in scenes of
danger, and of the deepest distress, — a principle
of malignity is forever operating to destroy his
comfcits, and to undermine the foundation of his
happiness!

The above sketches may suffice, in the mean
time, as specimens of some of the prominent dis
positions of that portion of the human race who
have assumed to themselves the character of
civilized nations. It will readily be admitted,
by most of my readers, that the dispositions dis
played in the instances I have selected; are
all directly repugnant, to the principle of benevo-
cnce recognised in the divine law, and tend to
undermine the happiness of intelligent beings.
— I shall now conclude with a very brief sketch
of the conduct of Christians, and of Christian
societies towards each other, and of the leading
traits of character which appear in the religious
world.

SECTION IV.

MORAL STATE OF THE PROFESSING CHRISTIAN
WORLD.

I have already endeavoured to show, that
Christianity is a religion of love ; that its facts,
its doctrines, and its moral precepts, are all cal
culated to promote " peace on earth," and to
form mankind into one affectionate and harmo
nious society. This glorious and happy effect,
in the first instance, it actually produced. We
are told, in the history of the Apostles, that the
multitudes who were converted to the Christian
faith, by the powerful sermons delivered by Peter
on the day of Pentecost, had their malignant pro
pensities subdued, and their minds animated
with an ardent affection for each other ; and, as
a practical proof of the operation of this noble
principle, " they had all things common, and sold
their possessions and goods, and parted them to
all, as every man had need." During the early
ages of Christianity, a goodly portion of the
same spirit was manifested by the greater part
of those who had enrolled themselves as the dis
ciples of Christ. Even in the midst of the re
proaches, and the severe persecutions to which
they were subjected during the two first centuries
of the Christian era, a meek and forgiving dis
position, and a spirit of benevolence towards
one another, and towards all men, distinguished
them from the heathen around, and constrained
even their enemies to exclaim, " Behold how these
Christians love one another!" — But no sooner
was the Christian Church amalgamated with the
kingdoms of this world, in the reign of Constan-
nne, than its native purity began to be tainted,
and Pagan maxims, and worldly ambition began

to be blended with the pure prectpts and the su >
blime doctrines of the Gospel. Many of it»
professed adherents, overlooking the grand prac
tical bearings of the Christian system, began te
indulge in vain speculations on its mysterious
doctrines ; to substitute a number of unmeaning
rites and ceremonies in the room of love to God
and to man ; and even to prosecute and destroy
all those who refused to submit to their opinions
and decisions. Pride, and a desire of domina
tion, usurped the place of meekness and humi
lity ; and the foolish mummeries of monastic su
perstition, and ihe austerities of the Ascetics,
were substituted in the room of the active duties
of justice and benevolence. Saints were deified ;
the power of the clergy was augmented; celi
bacy was extolled; religious processions were
appointed ; pilgrimages were undertaken to the
tombs of the martyrs ; monasteries and nunneries,
without number, were erected ; prayers were of
fered up to departed saints ; the Virgin Mary
was recognised as a species of inferior deity ; the
sign of the cross was venerated as capable of
securing victory in all kinds of trials and calami
ties, and as the surest defence against the influ
ence of malignant spirits ; -the bishops aspired
after wealth, magnificence, and splendour : errors
in religion were punished with civil penalties and
bodily tortures ; and the most violent disputes
and contentions convulsed every section of the
Christian world ; while the mild and beneficent
virtues of the religion of Jesus were either dis
carded, or thrown into the shade.

Of these, and similar dispositions and prac
tices, details might be exhibited which would
fill many volumes, and which would carry con
viction to every impartial mind, that the true
glory of Christianity was sadly tarnished and ob
scured, and its heavenly spirit almost extinguish
ed amidst the mass of superstitious observances,
of vain speculations, and of angry feuds and
contentions. Millot. when adverting to the state
of the Church in the days of Constantine and
the succeeding emperors, justly remarks : " The
disciples of Christ were inspired with mutual
feuds, still more implacable and destructive than
the factions which were formed for or against
different emperors. The spirit of contention
condemned by St. Paul became almost universal.
New sects sprung up incessantly, and combated
each other. Each boasted its apostles, gave its
sophisms for divine oracles, pretended to be the
depository of the faith, and used every effort to
draw the multitude to its standard. The church
was filled with discord ; bishops anathematized
bishops ; violence was called in to the aid of ar
gument, and the folly of princes fanned the flame
which spread with so destructive rage. They
played the theologists, attempted to command
opinions, and punished those whom they could
not convince. The laws against idolaters were
soon extended to heretics ; but what one emperoi

KARLY AGES OF CHRISTIANITY.

165

as heretical, was to another sound
doctrine. What was the consequence? The
clergy, whose influence was already great at
court, and still greater among the people, began
to withdraw from the sovereign authority that
respect which religion inspires. The popular
ferments being heightened by the animosity of
the clergy, prince, country, law, and duty, were
no longer regarded. Men were Arians, Dona-
tists, Priscillianists, Nestorians, Eutychians,
Monotholites, &c., but no longer citizens; or
rather, every man became the mortal enemy of
those citizens whose opinions he condemned. —
This unheard-of madness, for irreconcilable quar
rels on subjects that ought to have been referred
to the judgment of the Church, never abetted amidst
trie, most dreadful disasters. Every sect formed
a different party in the state, and their mutual
animosities conspired to sap its foundations."*

At the period to which these observations re
fer, it appears that two erroneous maxims gene
rally prevailed, which tended to undermine the
moral system of revelation, and which were pro
ductive of almost all the tumults, massacres, and
disasters, which distinguished that era of the
Christian church. These were, 1. That reli
gion consists chiefly in the belief of certain ab
stract and incomprehensible dogmas, and in the
performance of a multitude of external rites and
ceremonies: and, 2. That all heresies or differ
ences of opinion on religious points, ought to be
extirpated by the strong arm of the civil power.
Than such maxims, nothing can be more repug
nant to reason, more subversive of genuine mo
rality, or more inconsistent with the spirit and
genius of the Christian religion. And yet, to
this very hour, they are recognised and acted
upon by more than three fourths of the Christian
world, notwithstanding the melancholy examples
wnich history has furnished of their futility, and
tneir pernicious tendency. — The narrow limits
to which I am confined will permit me to state
only two or three instances in reference to the
period to which I allude.

Theodosius, one of the emperors, who com
menced his reign in the year 379, and who re
ceived baptism during a dangerous distemper, in
the second year of it, professed great zeal in fa
vour of religion. By a law addressed to the
people of Constantinople, he enacted, " That all
(subjects shall profess the catholic faith with re
gard to the articles of the Trinity ; and that they
who do not conform shall ignominiously be called
heretics, until they shall feel the vengeance of
God and our own, according as it shall please
Divine providence to inspire us." He declared
apostates and Manicheans incapable of making a
will, or receiving any legacy ; and having pro
nounced them worthy of death, the people thought
they had a right to kill them as proscribed per-

• Mill-rt's Modern History, voL i

sons. He enacted a law, condemning lo the
flames cousins german who married without a
special license from the emperor. He establish
ed inquisitors for the discovery of heretics. He
drove the Manicheans* from Rome as infamous
persons, and, on their death, ordered their goods
to be distributed among the people. Yet, with
all this religious zeal, he, on one occasion, gave
orders for a universal massacre at Thessalonica,
because some persons of distinction had been
killed in a sedition at the time of the races. The
inhabitants were caused to assemble in the circus,
under the pretence of an exhibition of games,
and slaughtered without distinction of age.
Seven thousand, according to some, and fifteen
thousand according to others, the greatest part
unquestionably innocent, were thus sacrificed to
atrocious revenge. f Leo, another emperor,
" commanded every person to be baptized, under
pain of banishment, and made it capital to relapse
into idolatry, after the performance of the cere
mony ;" just as if Christians could be made by
a forced baptism, or by a law of the state. Such
edicts clearly showed, that, whatever zeal prin
ces or the clergy might manifest in favour of the
Christian religion, they were grossly ignorant of
its true spirit, and of the means by which its
benevolent objects were to be accomplished.

As a specimen of the manner in which such
edicts were sometimes carried into effect, the
following instance may be stated. Hypatia,
daughter of the celebrated Geometrician, Theon
of Alexandria, exceeded her father in learning, and
gave public lectures in Philosophy, with the
greatest applause ; nor was she less admirable
for the purity of her virtue, joined to an uncom
mon beauty, and every accomplishment that
could adorn human nature. But this excellent
woman, because she was a Pagan, trusted by the
magistrates and suspected to be active against
St. Cyril, the bishop, became an object of detes
tation to the Christian multitude. A set of
monks and desperadoes, headed by a priest, seiz
ed her in the open street, hurried her into a
church, where they stripped her naked, tore her
body with whips, cut her in pieces, and publicly
burned her mangled limbs in the market place.J
St. Cyril, who was suspected of having fomented
this tragedy, had previously attacked the syna
gogues, and driven out the Jews ; their goods
were pillaged, and several persons perished in the
tumult. Such conduct plainly demonstrates the
tendency of the human mind, in every situation,
to abuse power and authority, for the purposes of
persecution and revenge; and shows us what
false ideas the Christians of that period must
have entertained of the God of Mercy ; and how

* The distinguishing characteristic of the Mani
cheans was, their recognising the doctrine of two
independent and eternal principles, the one the au
thor of all good, and the other the author ot tui evil.

t Millet's Ancient History, vol. li.

I Millot's Ancient Hist. vol. ii.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

soon they had forgotten the sufferings which their
fathers had so laiely endured, under the reign of
the heathen emperors.

About this period, loo, vain speculations about
abstruse and incomprehensible subjects, occupi
ed the attention of theologians, and engendered
religious quarrels and disputes, which burst asun
der the bonds of affection and concord. A play
of words and vain subtleties, were substituted in
pja.ce of clear conceptions and substantial know
ledge, which, instead of directing the faculties
of the human mind to their proper objects, tend
ed only to darken the light of reason, and to in
troduce the long night of ignorance which soon
succeeded. It was a prevailing madness among
the Greek theologians, who were intractable in
their opinions, — and it is too much the case with
certain modern divines, — to dispute about incom
prehensible mysteries, to render them more ob
scure by their attempts to explain them, an 1 per
petually to revive the most dangerous conten
tions. The Arians rejected the Divinity of th,e
Word, in order to maintain the unity of God ; —
the Nestorians denied that Mary is the mother
of God, and gave two persons to Jesus Christ,
to support the opinon of his having two natures ;
—the Eutychians, to maintain the unity of the
person, confounded the two natures into one.
This heresy became divided into ten or twelve
branches ; some of the sections maintaining that
Jesus Christ was merely a phantom, or appear
ance of flesh, but no real flesh. The Monolho-
lites maintained, that there was only one will in
Christ, as they could not conceive two free wills
to exist in the same person. Another sect main
tained, that the body of Christ was incorruptible)
and that from the moment of his conception, he
was incapable of change, and of suffering. This
chimera Justinian attempted to establish by an
edict. He banished the Patriarch Eutychius,
and several other prelates, who opposed his sen
timents; and was proceeding to tyrannize over the
consciences of men with more violence than ever,
when death interposed, and transported him to
another scene of existence. — Tn such vain and
preposterous disputes as these, were the minds
of professed Christians occupied, notwithstand
ing the perils with which they were then envi
roned. Councils were held, to determine the
orthodox side of a question ; anathemas were
thundered against those who refused to acquiesce
in their decisions ; princes interposed their au
thority, and the civil sword was unsheathed to
compel men to believe what they could not un
derstand ; — while the substantial truths of reli
gion were overlooked, and its morality disregard
ed. — " Religion," says Millot, " inspires us
with a contempt of earthly vanities, a detestation
of vice, and indulgence for the frailties of our
neighbour ; invincible patience in misfortunes,
ind compassion for the unhappy ; it inspires us
>vith charity and heroic courage ; and tends to

sanctity every action in common and social life,
How sublime and comforting the idea it gives of
the Divinity! What confidence in his justice
and infinite mercy ! What encouragement for the
exercise of every virtue ! Wherefore, then, such
errors and excesses on religious pretences ? It is
because heresy, shooting up under a thousand dif
ferent forms, incessantly startles the faith by sub
tleness and sophistry, by which almost the whole
energy of men's minds is absorbed in the contest
Disputes engender hatred ; from hatred springs
every excess ; and virtue, exhausted with words
and cabals, loses her whole power." — How
happy would it be, and how glorious for the cause
of genuine Christianity, were the present gene
ration of Christians to profit by the sad experi
ence of the past!

As we advance in the history of the Christian
church, through the middle ages, the prospect
appears still more dark and gloomy. The human
mind, at that period, appeared to have lost its
usual energy, and its powers of discrimination ;
the light of reason seemed almost extinguished ;
sophisms, and absurdities of all kinds, were
greedily swallowed ; and superstition displayed
itself in a thousand diversified forms. Morality
was in a manner smothered under a heap of cere
monies and arbitrary observances, which acquir
ed the name of devotion. Relics, pilgrimages,
offerings, and pious legacies, were thought capa
ble of opening the gate of heaven to the most
wicked of men. The virgin Mary, and the souls
of departed saints, were invoked; splendid
churches were erected to their honour ; their as
sistance was entreated with many fervent prayers ;
while the mediation of Jesus Christ was thrown
into the shade, ami almost disregarded. An
irresistible efficacy was attributed to the bones ot
martyrs, and to the figure of the cross, in defeat
ing the attempts of Satan, in removing all sorts
of calamities, and in healing the diseases Doth of
the body and of the mind. Works of piety and
benevolence were viewed as consisting chiefly in
building and embellishing churches and chapels
in endowing monasteries ; in hunting after the
relics of martyrs ; in procuring the intercession of
saints, by rich oblations ; in worshipping images ,
in pilgrimages to holy places ; in voluntary acts
of mortification; in solitary masses ; and in a
variety of similar services, which could easily be
reconciled with the commission of the most
abominable crimes. So that the worship of" the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," was
exchanged for the worship of bones, hair, frag
ments of fingers and toes, tattered rags, images of
saints, and bits of rotten wood, supposed to be
the relics of the cross. The dubbing of saints
became a fruitful source of frauds and abuses
throughout the Christian world ; lying wonders
were invented, and fabulous histories composedv
to celebrate exploits that were never performed,
and to glorify persons that never had a bdng ,

ECCLESIASTICAL FEUDS.

167

and absolution from the greatest crimes could ea
sily be procured, either by penance, or by money.

The absurd principle, that Religion consists in
acts of austerity, produced the most extravagant
behaviour in certain devotees, and reputed saints.
They lived among the wild beasts; they ran
naked through the lonely deserts, with a furious
aspect, and with all the agitations of madness and
frenzy ; they prolonged their wretched lives, by
grass and wild herbs ; avoided the sight and con
versation of men, and remained almost motion
less for several years, exposed to the rigour and
inclemency of the seasons ; — and all this was con
sidered as an acceptable method of worshipping
the Deity, and of attaining a share in his favour. —
But of all the instances of superstitious frenzy,
which disgraced those times, none was held in
higher veneration than that of a certain order of
men, who obtained the name of Pillar 'iaints.
These were persons of a most singular and extra
vagant turn of mind, who stood motionless on the
tops of pillars, expressly raised for this exercise of
their patience, and remained there for several
years, amidst the admiration and applause of a
stupid and wondering populace. This strange
superstitious practice began in the fifth century,
and continued in the East for more than six
hundred years. — To the same principle are to be
attributed the revolting practices of the Flagel
lants, a sect of fanatics who chastised themselves
with whips in public places. Numbers of per
sons of this description, of all ages and sexes,
made processions, walking two by two, with their
shoulders bare, which they whipped till the blood
ran down in streamlets ; in order to obtain mercy
from God, and appease his indignation against
the wickedness of the age. They held, among
other things, that flagellation was of equal virtue
with baptism, and the other sacraments ; that
the forgiveness of all sins was to be obtained by
it, without the merits of Jesus Christ; that the
old law of Christ was soon to be abolished, and
that a new law, enjoining the baptism ofblood, to
be administered by whipping, was to be substi
tuted in its place.

The enormous power conferred on the ministers
of religion was another source of immorality and
of the greatest excesses. The pope and the cler
gy reigned over mankind without control, and
made themselves masters of almost all the wealth
of every country in Europe. They were im
mersed in crimes of the deepest dye ; and the
laity, imagining themselves able to purchase the
pardon of their sins for money, followed the ex-
wtnple of their pastors without remorse. The
most violent contentions, animosities, and hatred,
reigned among the different orders of monks, and
between the clergy of all ranks and degrees.
" Instead of consecrating ecclesiastical censures
solely to spiritual purposes, they converted them
into a weapon for defending their privileges, and
•upporting their pretensions. The priesthood,

which was principally designed to bless, was most
frequently employed in cursing. Excommunica
tion was made the instrument of damning, instead
of saving souls, and was inflicted according lo the
dictates of policy or of revenge." The great
and the noble, and even kings and emperors, were
excommunicated, when it was designed to rob, or
to enslave them; and this invisible engine,
which they wielded with a powerful and a sove
reign hand, was used to foment dissensions be
tween the nearest relatives, and to kindle the
most bloody wars. The generality of priests and
monks kept wives and concubines, without shame
or scruple, and even the papal throne was the
seat of debauchery and vice. The possessions of
the church were either sold to the highest bidder,
or turned into a patrimony for the bastards of the
incumbents. Marriages, wills, contracts, the in
terests of families and of courts, the state of the
living and the dead, were all converted into in
struments for promoting their credit, and increas
ing their riches. It was, therefore, a necessa
ry result from such a state of things, that vices of
every description abounded, that morals were
ruined, and that the benevolence of the divine
law was trampled under foot.

The theological speculations in which they in
dulged, corresponded to the degrading practices
to which I have adverted, and tended to with-
drawthe mind from the substantial realities both of
science and of religion. Sophisms and falsehoods
were held forth as demonstrations. They at
tempted to argue after they had lost the rules of
common sense. The cultivation of letters was
neglected ; eloquence consisted in futile decla
mations ; and philosophy was lost in the abyss
of scholastic and sophistical theology. "They
attempted to penetrate into mysteries, and to de
cide questions which the limited faculties of the
human mind are unable to comprehend or to
resolve ;" and such vain speculations they endea
voured to incorporate into the system of religion,
and to render theology a subject of metaphysical
refinement, and of endless controversy. A false
logic was introduced, which subtilized upon
words, but gave no idea of things ; which em
ployed itself in nice and refined distinctions
concerning objects and operations which lie be
yond the reach of human understanding, which
confounded every thing by attempting to analyze
every thing, and which opened an arena for men
of fiery zeal to kindle the flame of controversy,
and to give birth to numerous heresies. The
following are a few instances, out of many, whicu
might be produced, of the questions and contro
versies which occupied the attention of bishops
and seraphical doctors, and gave rise to furious
contentions : — Whether the conception of the
Blessed Virgin was immaculate ? Whether
Mary should be denominated the Mother of God,
or the Mother of Christ ? Whether the bread
and wine used in the eucharist were digested ?

168

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

In what manner the will of Christ operated, and
whether he had one will or two? Whether the
Holy Ghost proceeded from the Father and Son,
or only from the Father ? Whether leavened or
unleavened bread ought to be used in the eucha-
rist ? Whether souls in their intermediate state
see God, or only the human nature of Christ?
It was disputed between the Dominicans and the
Franciscans, Whether Christ had any property?
The Pope pronounced the negative proposition to
be a pestilential and blasphemous doctrine, sub
versive of catholic faith. Many councils were
held at Constantinople, to determine what, sort of
light it was the disciples saw on Mount Tabor :
it was solemnly pronounced to be the eternal light
with which God is encircled ; and which may be
termed his energy or operation, but is distinct
from his nature and essence. The disputes
respecting the real presence of Christ in the
eucharist, led to this absurd conclusion, which
came to be universally admitted — " That the
substance of the bread and wine used in that
ordinance is changed into the real body and blood
of Christ ;" and consequently, when a man eats
what has the appearance of a wafer, he really
and truly eats the body and blood, the soul and
divinity of Jesus Christ ; and when he afterwards,
drinks what has the appearance of wine, he
drinks the very same body and blood, soul and
divinity, which, perhaps, not a minute before, he
had whilly and entirely eaten ! — At the period to
which I now allude, the authenticity of a suspect
ed relic was proved by bulls — councils assembled
and decided upon the authority of forged acts
with regard to the antiquity of a saint, or the
place where his body was deposited ; and a bold
impostor needed only to open his moulh, to per
suade the multitude to believe whatever he
pleased. To feed upon animals strangled or un
clean, to eat flesh on Tuesday, eggs and cheese
on Friday, to fast on Saturday, or to use unleaven
ed bread in the service of the mass — were, by
some, considered as indispensable duties, and by
others, as vile abominations. In short, the his
tory of this period is a reproach to the human
understanding ; an insult offered to the majesty of
reason and of science, and a libel on the benevo
lent spirit which breathes through the whole of
the Christian system.*

• As a striking instance of the folly and imbecility
cf the human mind at this period, it may be noticed,
(hat in several churches in France they celebrated a
festival in commemoration of the Virgin Mary's
flight into Egypt, which was called the Feast of the
ass A youns girl richly dressed, with a child in her
arms, was set upon an ass richly caparisoned. The
ass was led to the altar in solemn procession. High
mass was said with great pomp. The ass was taught
to kneel at proper places ; a hymn, no less childish
than impious, was sung in his praise ; and when
the ceremony was ended, the priest, instead of the
usual words with which he dismissed the people,
brayed three times like an ass, and the people, instead
of the usual response, "We bless the Lord," brayed
tr. the same manner. Thir ridiculous ceremony was

Nothing can be conceived more directly repug
nant to the benevolence which the religion of
Jesus inculcates, than the temper and conduct o*
those who arrogated to themselves the character
of being God's vicegerents on earth, and who as
sumed the supreme direction and control of the
Christian church. In persons who laid claim to
functions so sacred and divine, it might have
been expected, that the appearance at least, of
piety, humility, and benevolence, would have
been exhibited before the eyes of the Christian
world. But the history of the popes and their
satellites, displays almost every thing which is
directly opposed to such heavenly virtues. Their
avarice, extortion, and licentiousness, became in
tolerable and excessive almost to a proverb.
To extend their power over the kingdoms of this
world, to increase their wealth and revenues, to
live in opulence and splendour, to humble kings,
to alienate the affections of their subjects, and

not a mere farcical entertainment ; but an act of de
votion, performed by the ministers of religion, anf
by the authority of the church. — Robertson's His
tory of Charles V. vol. I. —In accordance with such
ceremonies were the ideas which prevailed of the
foolish qualifications requisite to constitute a good
Christian. " He is a good Christian," says St. Eloy, a
Ccinonized saint of the Romish church, " who comes
frequently to church ; who presents the oblation
offered to God upon the altar; who doth not taste of
the fruits of his own industry until he has conse
crated a part of them to God; who when the holy
festivals approach, lives chastely even with his own
wife during several days, that with a safe conscience
he may draw near to the altar of God ; and who, in
the last place, can repeat the Creed and the Lord's
prayer. Redeem, then, your souls from destruction,
while you have the means in your power ; offer pre
sents and tithes to churchmen ; come more frequent
ly to church ; humbly implore the patronage of the
saints; for if you observe these things, you may
come with security in the day of retribution to the
tribunal of the eternal Judge, and say, ' Give to us,
O Lord, for we have given unto thee."'— Here we have
an ample description of a good Christian, in which
there is not the least mention of the love of God, of
resignation to his will, obedience to his laws, or of
justice, benevolence, or charity towards men.— Mo-
sheim'ls Church History.

The fo'.lowing are the terms in which Tctzel and
his associates describe the benefit of indulgences,
about the beginning of the 16th century, a little be
fore the era of the reformation. "If any man," said
they, "purchase letters of indulgence, his soul may
rest secure with respect to its salvation. The soul?
confined in purgatory, for whose redemption indul
gences are purchase !, as soon as the money tinkles
in the chest, instantly escape from that place of tor
ment, and ascend into heaven. The efficacy of in
dulgences were so great, that the most heinous sins,
even if one should violate (which was impossible)
the Mother of God, would be remitted and expiated
by them, and the person be free both from punish
ment and guilt. That this was the unspeakable gift
of God, in order to reconcile men to himself. That
the cross erected by the preachers of indulgences,
was as efficacious as the cross of Christ it<elf. Lo.'
the heavens are open, if you enter not now, when
will you enter ? For twelve pence you may redeem
the soul of your father out of purgatory : and are you
so ungrateful that you will not rescue your parent
from torment ? if you had but one coat, you ought to
strip yourself instantly and sell it, in order to pur
chase such benefits," &c.— Robertson's Charles V
vol. ii.

THE INQUISITION.

169

to riot in the lap ofluxury and debauchery, seem-
ea to be the great objects of their ambition. In
stead of acting as the heralds of mercy, and the
ministers of peace, they thundered anathemas
against all who called in question their authority,
kindled the flames of discord and of civil wars,
armed subjects against their sovereigns, led forth
hostile armies to the battle, and filled Europe
with confusion, devastation, and carnage. In
stead of applying the mild precepts of Christi
anity, and interposing the authority they had ac
quired for reconciling enemies, and subduing the
jealousies of rival monarchs, they delighted to
widen the breach of friendship, and to fan the
flame of animosity and discord. Dr. Robertson,
when adverting to the personal jealousies of
Francis I. and Charles V. remarks, " If it had
been in the power of the Pope to engage them in
hostilities, without rendering Lombardy the the
atre of war, nothing would have been more agree
able to him than to see them waste each other's
strength in endless quarrels."* The Son of man
came into the world, not to destroy men's lives,
but to save them ; but, in such instances, we be
hold his pretended vicars, preparing and arrang
ing the elements of discord, laying a train for the
destruction of thousands and tens of thousands,
and takino a diabolical delight in contemplating
the feuds, the massacres, and the miseries which
their infernal policy had created. The decrees
of the papal throne, instead of breathing the mild
ness and benevolence of Jesus, became thunder
ing curses, and sanguinary laws, and a set of
frantic enthusiasts, or a lawless banditti, were
frequently appointed to carry them into effect.

Not contented with the insurrections and the de-
solations they had produced among the European
nations, they planned an expedition for the pur
pose of massacring the inhabitants of Asia, and
ravaging their country. Urban II. about A. D.
1095, travelled from province to province, levying
troops, even without the consent of their princes ;
preaching up the doctrine of" destruction to the
infidels ;" and commanding the people, in the
name of God, to join in the holy war. St. Ber
nard ran from town to town haranguing the mul
titude, performing pretended miracles, and induc
ing all ranks, from the emperor to the peasant, to
enrol themselves under the banners of the cross.
Peter the Hermit, a man of a hideous figure and
aspect, covered with rags, walking barefooted,
arid speaking as a prophet, inspired the people
every where with an enthusiasm similar to his
own. Thousands of wicked and abandoned de
bauchees were thus collected ; bishops, priests,
monks, women and children, were all enrolled in
the holy army. A plenary absolution of all their
sins was promised : and if they died in the con
test, they were assured of a crown of martyrdom
in the world to come. With hearts burning with
ury and revenge, this army of banditti, without
* Robertson's Charles V. vol. ii.

22

discipline or provisions, marched in wild confu
sion through the eastern parts of Europe, and, at
every step of their progress, committed the meat
dreadful outrages. So inveterate was their zeal
against the Jews, wherever they were found, that
many of those unfortunate beings, both men and
women, murdered their own children, in the
midst of the despair to which they were driven
by these infuriated madmen ; and when they ar
rived at Jerusalem, and had taken that city by as
sault, they suffered none of the infidels to escape
the slaughter. Such was the way in which the
successors of the Apostle Peter displayed their
general benevolence, and their love to the souls
and bodies of men.

The establishment of the Inquisition, is ano
ther mode in which the tyranny and cruelty of
the Romish church has been displayed. This
court was founded in the 12th century, by Fa
ther Dominic, and his followers, who were sent
by Pope Innocent III. with orders to excite the
Catholic princes and people to extirpate heretics.
It is scarcely possible to conceive any institution
more directly opposed to the dictates of justice
and humanity, to the genius of Christianity, and
to the meekness and gentleness of Christ, than
this infernal tribunal. The proceedings against
the unhappy victims of this court, are conducted
with the greatest secrecy. The person granted
them as counsel is not permitted to converse
with them, except in the presence of the Inqui
sitors ; and, when they communicate the evi
dence to the accused persons, they carefully con
ceal from them the names of the authors. The
prisoners are kept for a long time, till they them
selves, through the application of the torture,
turn their own accusers; for they are neither
told their crime, nor confronted with witnesses.
When there is no shadow of proof against the
pretended criminal, he is discharged, after suf
fering the most cruel tortures, a tedious and
dreadful imprisonment, and the loss of the greatest
part of his effects. When he is convicted and
condemned, he is led in procession, with other
unfortunate beings, on the festival of the Auto da
fe, to the place of execution. He is clothed wivh
a garment, painted with flames, and with his
own figure, surrounded with dogs, serpents, and
devils, all open-mouthed, as if ready to devour
him. Such of the prisoners as declare that they
die in the communion of the church of Rome,
are first strangled, and then burned to ashes.
Those who die in any other faith, are burned
alive. The priests tell them, that they leave
them to the devil, who is standing at their elbow,
to receive their souls, and carry them with him
into the flames of hell. Flaming furzes, fasten
ed to long poles, are then thrust against their
faces, till their faces are burned to a coal, which
is accompanied with the loudest acclamations ol
joy, among the thousands of spectators. At
last fire is set to the furze at the bottom of the

170

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

stake, over which the criminals are chained so
high, that the top of the flame seldom reaches
higher than the seat they sit on ; so that they
Beem to be roasted rather than burned. There
cannot be a more lamentable spectacle ; the suf
ferers continually cry out, while they are able,
" Pity, for the love of God ;" yet it is beheld by
all sexes and ages, with transports of joy and
satisfaction ; and even the monarch, surrounded
by his courtiers, has sometimes graced the scene
with his presence, imagining that he was per
forming an act highly acceptable to the Deity ! !*
And what are the heinous crimes for which
such dreadful punishments are prepared ? Per
haps nothing more than reading a book which
has been denounced as heretical by the holy
office, such as " Raynal's History of the Indies,"
— assuming the title of a freemason — irritating
a priest or mendicant friar — uttering the lan
guage of freethinkers — declaiming against the
celibacy of the clergy — insinuating hints or sus
picions respecting their amours and debauche
ries — or throwing out a joke to the dishonour of
the Virgin Mary,| — or, at most, holding the
sentiments of a Mahometan, of a Jew, or the
followers ofCalvin or Luther. In the year 1725,
the Inquisition discovered a family of Moors at
Grenada, peaceably employed in manufacturing
silks, and possessing superior skill in the exer
cise of this profession. The ancient laws, sup
posed to have fallen into disuse, were enforced
in all their rigour, and the wretched family was
burnt alive.\ On the entry of the French into
Toledo, during the late Peninsular war, General
Lasalle visited the palace of the Inquisition.
The great number of instruments of torture,
especially the instruments to stretch the limbs,
and the drop-baths, which cause a lingering
death, excited horror, even in the minds of sol
diers hardened in the field of battle= One of
these instruments, singular in its kind for refined
torture, and disgraceful to humanity and religion,
deserves particular description. In a subterra
neous vault adjoining to the audience chamber,
stood, in a recess in the wall, a wooden statue
made by the hands of monks, representing the
Virgin Mary. A gilded glory beamed round her
head, and she held a standard in her right hand.
Notwithstanding the ample folds of the silk gar
ment which fell from her shoulders on both sides,
it appeared that she wore a breastplate ; and,

* See Ency. Brit. Art. Act of faith, and Inquisition,
and Bourgoing's " Modern state of Spain," Vol. I.
The " Instructions for the office of the holy Inquisi
tion given at Tobda in 1561," may be seen in the Ap-
pcndir to " Peyron's Essays on Spain.' which forms
the fourth volume of Bourgoing's worK.

1 The Chevalier de St. Gervais, was imprisoned in
the Inquisition on the following occasion.— A men
dicant having come to his chamber, with a purse,
beeged him to contribute something for the lights
or tapers to be lighted in nonour of the Virgin, he
replied, " My good father, the Virgin lias no need of
Jights, she need only go to bed at an earlier hour."

I Bo irgoing's State of Spain, Vol. I. p. 349.

upon a closer examination, it was found, that th«
whole front of the body was covered with ex
tremely sharp nails, and small daggers, or blades
of knive6, with the points projecting outwards.
The arms and hands had joints, and their mo
tions were directed by machinery, placed behind
the partition. One of the servants of the Inqui
sition was ordered to make the machine ma
noeuvre. As the statue extended its arms, and.
gradually drew them back, as if she would affec
tionately embrace, and press some one to her
heart, the well-filled knapsack of a Polish grena
dier supplied for this time the place of the poor
victim. The statue pressed it closer and closer ;
and when the director of the machinery made it
open its arms and return to its first position, the
knapsack was pierced two or three inches deep,
and remained hanging upon the nails and dag
gers of the murderous instrument.

This infamous tribunal is said to have caused,
between the years 1481 and 1759, 34.658 per
sons to be burnt alive ; and between 1481 and
1808, to have sentenced 288,214 to the galleys,
or to perpetual imprisonment.* In the Auto ot
Toledo, in February, 1501, 67 women were de
livered over to the flames for Jewish practices.
The same punishment was inflicted on 900 fe
males for being witches, in the Dutchy of Lor
raine, by one Inquisitor alone. Under this ac
cusation, upwards of thirty thousand women have
perished by the hands of the Inquisition. f Tor-
quemada, that infernal inquisitor of Spain,
brought into the Inquisition, in the space of 14
years, no fewer than 80,000 persons ; of whom
6000 were condemned to the flames, and burned
alive with the greatest pomp and exultation ; and,
of that vast number, there was perhaps not a
single person who was not more pure in religion,
as well as morals, than their outrageous perse
cutors. | — Has the Deity, then, whdm the Inqui
sition professes to serve, such a voracious appetite
for the blood of human victims ? Has that be
nevolent Being, who maketh his sun to cheer the
habitations of the wicked as well as of the righ
teous, and whose " tender mercies are over all
his works" — commissioned such bloodthirsty
monsters to act as his ministers of vengeance, and
to torment and destroy the rational creatures he
has formed ? The very thought is absurd and
blasphemous in the highest degree. All his be
neficent operations in creation around us, and all
the gracious promises and declarations of his
word, stand directly opposed to such hellish prac
tices, and condemn the perpetrators as audacious
rebels against the divine government, and as nui
sances in the universe of God.

The numerous Massacres which, in different
ages, have taken place, on account of religious

* Histoire Abreg<?e de 1'Inquisition.
t<( The Inquisition Unmasked." By Antonio
Puigblanch.
I Kaim's Sketches, Vol. iV.

BARTHOLOMEW MASSACRE.

171

opinions, is another revolting and melancholy
trait in the character of the professed votaries of
the Christian cause. Of these, the massacre of
the Protestants in France on the feast of St.
Bartholomew, on the 24th August, 1572, was
perhaps, one of the most diabolical acts of perfidy,
injustice, and cruelty, which have stained the
character of our race. Every thing was atro
cious and horrible in this unexampled conspiracy
and assassination ; feelings of the most sacred na
ture were annihilated ; religious zeal was chang
ed into an impious frenzy ; and filial piety de
generated into sanguinary fury. Under the di
rection of the infamous Duke of Guise, the sol
diers and the populace en masse, at the signal of
the tolling of a hell, flew to arms, seizing every
weapon that presented itself; and then rushing in
crowds to every quarter of the city of Paris, — no
sound was heard but the horrible cry, Kill the
Huguenots! Every one suspected of being a
Calvinist, without any distinction of rank, age,
or sex, was indiscriminately massacred. The
air resounded with the horrid cries and blasphe
mous imprecations, of the murderers, the piercing
shrieks of the wounded, and the groans of the
dying. Headless trunks were every instant pre
cipitated from the windows into the court-yards,
or the streets ; the gate-ways were choked up
with the bodies of the dead and dying, and the
streets presented a spectacle of mangled limbs,
and of human bodies, dragged by their butchers
in order to be thrown into the Seine. Palaces,
hotels, and public buildings, were reeking with
blood ; the image of death and desolation reign
ed on every side, and under the most hideous ap
pearances ; and in all quarters, carts were seen
loaded with dead bodies, destined to be cast into
the river, whose waters were for several days
sullied by tides of human gore. The infuriated
assassins, urged on by the cry, that " It was the
king's will that the very last of this race of vi
pers should be crushed and killed," became fu
rious in the slaughter ; in proof of which, one
Cruce, a jeweller, displaying his naked and
bloody arm, vaunted aloud, that he had cut the
throats of more than 400 Huguenots in one day.
During this horrid period, every species of the
most refined cruelty became exhausted ; the
weakness of infancy proved no impediment to
the impulse of ferocity ; children of ten years,
exercising the first homicidal deed, were seen
committing the most barbarous acts, and cutting
the throats of infants in their swaddling clothes !
the number of victims thus slaughtered in the
city of Paris, amounted to above six thousand ;
and, in the provinces, at the same time, there
perished about sixty thousand souls. And, what
is still more shocking, the news of this massa
cre was welcomed at Rome with the most lively
transports of joy. The Cardinal of Lorraine
gave a large reward to the courier : and interro
gated him upon the subject, in a manner that de

monstrated he had been previously aware of the
intended catastrophe. The cannons were fired,
bonfires were kindled, and a solemn mass was
celebrated, at which Pope Gregory XIII. assist
ed, with all the splendour which that court is
accustomed to display on events of the most glo
rious and important consequence !*

The horrid practice of Dragooning, which
was used by Papists, for converting supposed he
retics, was another melancholy example of reli
gious cruelty and frenzy. In the reign of Louis
XIV. of France, his troopers, soldiers, and dra
goons, entered into the houses of the Protestants,
where they marred and defaced their household
stuff", broke their looking-glasses, let their wine
run about their cellars, threw about and trampled
under foot their provisions, turned their dining-
rooms into stables for their horses, and treated
the owners with the highest indignity and cru
elty. They bound to posts mothers that gave
suck, and let their sucking infants lie languishing
in their sight for several days and nights, cry
ing, mourning, and gasping for life. Some they
bound before a great fire, and after they were half
roasted, let them go. Some they hung up by the
hair, and some by the feet, in chimneys, and
smoked them with wisps of wet hay till they
were suffocated. Women and maids were hung
up by their feet, or by their arm-pits, and exposed
stark naked to public view. Some they cut and
slashed with knives, and after stripping them
naked, stuck their bodies with pins and needles
from head to foot ; and, with red hot pincers, took
hold of them by the nose and other parts of the
body, and dragged them about the rooms till they
made them promise to be Catholics, or till
the cries of these miserable wretches, calling
upon God for help, induced them to let them go.
If any, to escape these barbarities, endeavoured
to save themselves by flight, they pursued them
into the fields and woods, where they shot at
them, as if they had been wild beasts ; and pro
hibited them from departing the kingdom, upon
pain of the galleys, the lash, and perpetual im
prisonment. On such scenes of desolation and
horror, the Popish clergy feasted their eyes, and
made them only a matter of laughter and of sport.f
— What a striking contrast to the benevolence of
the Deity, whom they impiously pretend to serve !
Could a savage American have devised more
barbarous and infernal cruelties ?

In the civil wars, on account of religion, which
happened in France, in the beginning of the 17th
century, above a million of men lost their lives,
and nine cities, 400 villages, 2000 churches,
2000 monasteries, and 10,000 houses were burn-

* See a late publication entitled "Memoirs of
Henry the Great, and of the Court of Prance during
his reign," 2 vols. 8vo, in which is contained the
fullest description of this massacre whicn has ap
peared in our language.

t For a more particular account of such
see Ency. Brit. Articie Dragooning.

172

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

ed or destroyed, during their continuance ; besides
the many thousands of men, women, and chil
dren, that were cruelly butchered : and 150,000,000
of livres were spent in carrying forward these
slaughters and devastations. It is said of Louis
XIII. who carried on these wars, by one of his
biographers and panegyrists, Madame cle Motte-
ville that, " what gave him the greatest pleasure,
was his thought of driving heretics out of the
kingdom, and thereby purging the different reli
gions which corrupt and infect the church of
God."* In the Netherlands alone, from the
time that the edict of Charles V. was promulgated
against the reformers, more than 100,000 persons
were hanged, beheaded, buried alive, or burned
on account of religion. The prisons were crowd
ed with supposed heretics; and the gibbet, the
scaffold, and the stake, filled every heart with
horror. The Duke of Alva, and his bloody tri
bunal, spread universal consternation through
these provinces ; and, though the blood of eight
een thousand persons, who, in five years, had
been given up to the executioner for heresy, cried
for vengeance on this persecutor, and his adhe
rents, yet they gloried iu their cruelty. Philip
II. in whose reign these atrocities were com
mitted, hearing one day, that thirty persons at
least had a little before been burned at an auto
da fe, requested that a like execution might be
performed in his presence; and he beheld with
joy forty victims devoted to torments and to death.
One of them, a man of distinction, requesting a
pardon, " No," replied he, coldly, " were it my
own son I would give him up to the flames, if he
obstinately persisted in heresy."f

Even in our own island, the flames of religious
persection have sometimes raged with unrelent
ing fury. During two or three years of the short
reign of Q,ueen Mary, it was computed that 277
persons were committed to the flames, besides
those who were punished by fines, confiscations,
and imprisonments. Among those who suffered
by fires were five bishops, twenty-one clergymen,
eight lay gentlemen, and eighty-four tradesmen ;
one hundred husbandmen, fifty-five women, and
four children. And, a century and a half has
scarcely elapsed, since the Presbyterians in
Scotland were hunted across moors and mosses,
like partridges of the wilderness, slaughtered by
bands of ruffian dragoons, and forced to seek their
spiritual food in dens, arid mountains, and forests,
at the peril of their lives. Hunter, a young man
about nineteen years of age, was one of the un
happy victims to the zeal for Papacy of Mary
queen of England. Having been inadvertently
betrayed by a priest, to deny the doctrine of
transubstantiation, he absconded to keep out of
harn/s way. Bonner, that arch-hangman of Po
pery, threatened ruin to the father if he did not

Motteville's Memoirs of Anne of Austria, Vol. 1.

p. 98

t Millet's Modern History, vol. li. p. 190.

deliver up the young man. Hunter, hearing of
his father's danger, made his appearance, and
rvas burned alive, instead of being rewarded for
his filial piety. A woman of Guernsey was
brought to the stake, without regard to her ad
vanced pregnancy, and she was delivered in the
midst of the flames. One of the guards snatched
the infant from the fire ; but the magistrate, who
attended the execution, ordered it to be thrown
back, being resolved, he said, that nothing should
survive which sprung from a parent so obsti
nately heretical.*

What a dreadful picture would it present of
the malignity of persons who have professed the
religion of Christ, were we to collect into one
point of view, all the persecutions, tortures,
j>urnings, massacres, and horrid cruelties, which,
in Europe, and Asia, and even in the Wes* In
dies and America, have been inflicted on con
scientious men for their firm adherence to what
they considered as the truths of religion ! When
we consider, on the one hand, the purity of
morals, and the purity of faith which generally
distinguished the victims of persecution; and, on
the other, the proud pampered priests, abandoned
without shame to every species of wickedness,
we can scarcely find words sufficiently strong to
express the indignation and horror which arise
in the mind, when it views this striking contrast,
and contemplates such scenes of impiety and
crime. Could a religion, which breathes peace
and good will from heaven towards men, be more
basely misrepresented ? or can the annals of our
race present a more striking display of the per
versity and depravity of mankind? To repre
sent religion as consisting in the belief of certain
incomprehensible dogmas, arid to attempt to con
vert men to Christianity, and to inspire them
with benevolence, by fire, and racks, and tor
tures, is as absurd as it is impious and profane
and represents the Divine Being as delighting in
the torments and the death of sinners, rather than
that they should return and live. — But, without
dwelling longer on such reflections and details,
I shall just present an example or two of the moral
state of Roman Catholic countries, as a speci
men of the effects to which their system of reli
gion naturally leads.

" By their fruits shall ye know them," says
our Saviour. Wherever religion is viewed as
consisting chiefly in the observance of a number
of absurd and unmeaning ceremonies, it is natural
to expect that the pure morality of the Bible will
seldom be exemplified in human conduct. This
is strikingly the case in those Countries, both in
Europe and America, where the Catholic reli
gion reigns triumphant. — Mr. Howison, whose
work, entitled "Foreign Scenes," I formerly quot
ed, when speaking of the priesthood in the island
of Cuba, says, " The number of priests in Ha
vana exceeds four hundred. With a lew excep*
* Kaim's Sketches, vol. iv.

TEMPERS DISPLAYED BY CONTROVERSIALISTS.

179

lions, they neither deserve nor enjoy the respect
of the community. However no one dares
openly to speak against them. In Havana, ihe
church is nearly omnipotent, and every man feels
himself under its immediate jurisdiction. Most
people, therefore, attend mass regularly, make
confession, uncover, when passing a religious
establishment of any kind, and stand still in the
streets, or stop their volantos, the moment the
vesper-bell begins ringing. But they go no
further; and the priests do not seem at all
anxious that the prartir,_ „. auch individuals
should correspond to their profession. The
priests show, by their external appearance, that
they do not practice those austerities which are
generally believed to be necessary concomitants
of a monastic life. The sensual and unmeaning
countenances that encircle the altars of the
churches, and the levity and indifference with*
which the most sacred partsof the service are hur
ried through, would shock and surprise a Protest
ant, were he to attend mass with the expectation
of finding the monks, those solemn and awe-inspir
ing persons, which people, who have never visit
ed Catholic countries, often imagine them to be.

The following extract, from a late writer, ex
hibits a specimen of the religion and of the
moral feelings of the NEAPOLITANS. " When
Vesuvius thunders aloud, or when an earthquake
threatens them with destruction — when fiery
streams vomited from the roaring mouth of the
volcano roll on, carrying desolation over the
plains below — when the air is darkened by clouds
of smoke, and showers of ashes, the Neapolitans
will fall on their knees, fast, do penance, and
follow the processions barefooted ; but as soon
as the roar has ceased, the flame has disappear
ed, and the atmosphere has recovered its wonted
serenity, they return to their usual mode of life,
they sink again to their former level, and the
tinkling sounds of the tumburella call them again
to the lascivious dance of the tarentella."* — As
an evidence of the litigious dispositions of the
Neapolitans, the same author informs us, " That
there is scarcely a landholder but has two or
three causes pending before the courts — that a
lawyer, and a suit, are indispensable appendages
of property ; — and that some of the principal
families have suits which have been carried on
for a century, and for which a certain sum is
yearly appropriated, although the business
never advances-, and, at last the expenses swal
low up the whole capital."—" The infinite num
ber of churches," says a late writer, " is one of
the most efficient causes of the decline of the
religion of Rome, whose maxims and practice
are diametrically opposite to those of the Gospel.
The Gospel is the friend of the people, the con
soler of the poor. The religion of Rome, on the
contrary, considers all nations as great flocks,
made to be shorn or eaten according to the good

• Vieusseux's " Italy in the 19th century," 1824.

pleasure of the shepherds : for her the golden
lever is the lever of Archimedes. The favours
of the church are only showered on those who
pay ; with money we may purchase the right to
commit perjury and murder, and be the greatest
villains at so much per crime ; according to the
famous Tariff" printed at Rome, entitled, (l> Taxes
of the Apostolic Chancery."*

M. Jouy, in his late publication, " The Her
mit in Italy." presents the following picture of
the religion and the practical morality of the
Tuscans. The greediness after profit is such,
among the lower classes of shop-keepers, that
they adulterate their merchandise so much as to
render it almost intolerable. Milk, cheese, and
butter, are always in peril under the hands of a
Florentine shop-keeper. It is impossible to meet
with good butter, except at the dairies. Tho
grocers are not exempt from the imputation of these
illicit mixtures, and adulterations of their goods. I
bought, from one of them, some brown sugar,
which would not dissolve in the mouth ; and, on
examination, I found, that nearly one third part
consisted of powdered marble, which had been
mixed up with it. Yet they are excessively
punctual in the outward ceremonies of religion;
and whenever they remove from one place to
another, a large cross, or a madonna, is always
stuck up at full length in the cart."

In a conversation which Bonaparte had with
his friends at St. Helena, on the subject of reli
gion, as related by Las Casas, in his Journal,
he said, among many other things, " ' How is it
possible that conviction can find its way to our
hearts, when we hear the absurd language, and
witness the acts of iniquity of the greatest num
ber of those whose business it is to preach to
us ? I am surrounded with priests, who preach
incessantly that their reign is not of this world,
and yet they lay hands upon every thing they
can get. The Pope is the head of that religion
from heaven, and he thinks only of this world,'
&c. The Emperor ended the conversation, by
desiring my son to bring him the New Testa
ment, and taking it from the beginning, he read
as far as the conclusion of the speech of Jesus
on the mountain. He expressed himself struck
with the highest admiration at the purity, the
sublimity, the beauty of the morality it contain
ed, and we al! experienced the same feeling.

Such facts may suffice as specimens of the
benevolence and morality which exist in Roman
Catholic countries.

MORAL STATE OF THE PROTESTANT CHURCH,
AND OF THE DISPOSITIONS GENERALLY
MANIFESTED AMONG CHRISTIANS IN OUB.
OWN COUNTRY.

This is a topic which would admit of a very
extended illustration ; but my present limits .will

* « Picture of Modern Rome," by M. Santo Do-
mlngo. 1824.

174

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

Dermit me to do little more than simply to allude
to a few prominent dispositions displayed by the
different sections of the Protestant church. — We
nave already seen some of the pernicious effects
which flowed from the divisive and contentious
spirit of Christians, under the reign of the Chris
tian emperors, and during the middle ages, when
ignorance and intolerance so extensively pre
vailed.

The present state of the Christian world
affords abundant proofs that this spirit is far
from being extinguished. Christians are at pre
sent distinguished by the peculiarity of their
opinions respecting — the person of Christ, and
the attributes of which he is possessed — the
means by which salvation is to be obtained — the
measure and extent of divine benevolence — the,
Government of the Christian church — and the
ceremonies connected with the administration
of the ordinances of religion. Hence the reli
gious world appears arranged into such sects
and parties as the following : — Arians, Socini-
ans, Unitarians, Sabellians, Necessarians, and
Trinitarians ; — Baxterians, Antinomians, Ar-
minians, Calvinists, Lutherans, Sub-lapsarians,
Supra-lapsarians, Sandemanians, Swedenborgi-
?ns, and Moravians ; — Roman Catholics, Pro
testants, Huguenots, EpiscopalianSj Presbyterians,
Independents, Seceders, Brownists, Pasdo-Bap-
tists, Anti-Ptedo-Baptists, Keilamites, Metho
dists, Jumpers, Universal ists, Sabbatarians, Mil-
lennarians, Destructionists, Dunkers, Shakers,
Mystics, Hutchinsonians, Muggletonians, the fol
lowers of Joanna Southcott, &c. &c. — Most of
these sectaries profess their belief in the existence
of One Eternal, Almighty, Wise. Benevolent, and
Righteous Being, the Creator and Preserver of
all things ; — in the Divine authority of the Holy
Scriptures ;— that God is the alone object of re
ligious worship ; — that Jesus of Nazareth is the
true Messiah, and the Son of God ; — " that he
died for our offences, and was raised again for
our justification ;" — that there is a future state of
rewards and punishments ; — that there will be a
resurrection from the dead ; — that it is our duty
to love God with all our hearts, and our neigh
bour as ourselves ; — that the Divine law is
obligatory on the consciences of all men ; —
that virtue and piety will be rewarded, and
vice and immorality punished, in the world to
come.

Yet, though agreeing in these important arti
cles of the Christian system, how many boiste
rous and malignant disputes have taken place
between Calvinists and :Arminians, Episcopa
lians, Presbyterians, Independents, and Metho
dists, respecting the speculative points in which
they disagree ! While controversies among phi-
•osophers have frequently been conducted with a
certain degree of candour and politeness, the
temper with which religious disputants have en
countered the opinions of each other, has gene-

raiiy been opposed to the spirit of Christian love,
to the meekness and gentleness of Christ, and
even to common civility and decorum. The
haughty and magisterial tone which theological
controversialists frequently assume, — the indig
nant sneers, the bitter sarcasms, the malignant
insinuations, the personal reproaches, they throw
out against their opponents, — the harsh and un
fair conclusions they charge upon them, — the
general asperity of their language, — and the bold
arid unhallowed spirit with which they apply the
denunciations of Scripture to those whom they
consider as erroneous, are not only inconsistent
with every thing that is amiable and Christian,
but tend to rivet more powerfully in the minds of
their opponents, those very opinions which it was
their object to subvert. To gain a victory over
his adversary, to hold up his sentiments to ridi
cule, to wound his feelings, and to bespatter the
religious body with which he is connected, is
more frequently the object of the disputant, than
the promotion of truth, and the manifestation of
that " character which is the bond of perfec
tion." And what are some of the important
doctrines which frequently rouse such furious
zeal ? Perhaps nothing more than a metaphysi
cal dogma respecting the sonship of Christ, abso
lute or conditional election, the mode of baptism,
the manner of sitting at a communion-table, an
unmeaning ceremony, or a circumstantial puncti
lio in relation to the government of the church !
While the peculiar notions of each party, on such
topics, are supported with all the fierceness of
unhallowed zeal, the grand moral objects which
Christianity was intended to accomplish are over
looked, and the law of meekness, humility, and
love, is trampled underfoot.

The following are some of the ideas entertain
ed respecting the rights of religious disputants,
as assumed by the disputants themselves : — " The
Controversialist," says Mr. Vaughan, in his
" Defence of Calvinism," " is a wrestler; and
is at full liberty to do all he can, in the fair and
honest exercise of his art, to supplant his anta
gonist. He must not only be dexterous to put
in his blow forcibly ; but must have a readiness
to menace with scorn, and to tease with derision,
if haply he may, by these means, unnerve or un
man his competitor. I know not that he is under
any obligation to withhold a particle of his skill
and strength, whether offensive, or defensive, in
this truly Spartan conflict." In perfect ac
cordance with' these maxims, he thus addresses
his adversary: " Why, Sir, I \\i\\Jightyou upon
this theme, as the Greeks did for the recovery
of their dead Patroclus ; as Michael the arch
angel, when, contending with the Devil, he dis
puted about the body of Moses ; as the famed
Athenian, who grasped his ship with his teethy
when he had no longer a hand to hold it by. It
shall be with a loss not less than life, that I re-
sign this splendid attestation (Rom. viii. 28-

TEMPER DISPLAYED BY CONTROVERSIALISTS.

175

30.) lo the triumphal origin, procession, and co
ronation, of grace in the redeemed."

Wo to religion, when it meets with such
boisterous " wrestlers !" Its true glory will be
obscured, its beauty defaced, its interests betray
ed, and its benevolent spirit smothered, amidst
the 4moke and dust raised by the onsets of such
angry combatants. Do such controversialists
really imagine, that " the wrath of man worketh
the righteousness of God ?" or, that ihe religion
of Heaven stands in need of such warlike arts,
and unhallowed passions, for its vindication and
defence? If it did, it would be a religion un
worthy of our reception and support. What a
contrast to the mild and gentle spirit of Christi
anity, to behold one zealot dipping his pen in
wormwood and gall, when he sits down to defend
the Religion of Love! and another, standing up
in a Synod or Assembly, with eyes sparkling
with indignation, a mouth foaming with rage,
and a torrent of anathemas and abusive epithets
bursting from his lips, against the supposed abet
tors of an erroneous opinion! while at the same
time, they imagine that they are fired with holy
zea! for the honour of the Lord God of Sabaoth.
Such disputants seem not to he aware, that they
are grossly misrepresenting the genius of the
Christian system, and bidding defiance to its
most distinguishing principles and laws. — There
are heresies in conduct, as well as heresies in
doctrine; and of all heresies, the former are the
most pestilential and pernicious. And why do not
Controversialists and Religious Societies mani
fest as much zeal against heresies in temper and
morality, which are nursed among the members
of every church, as they do against heresies in
theology ? If these heresies were more particu
larly investigated and subverted, and a greater
atitude allowed for the exercise of private judg
ment, the church of Christ would present a very
different moral aspect from what she has hitherto
done.

Again, there is nothing which so strikingly
marks the character of the Christian world in
general, as the %vant of candour, the spirit of
jealousy, and the evil surmisings which the dif
ferent denominations of religionists manifest to
wards each other. There is a prevailing dispo
sition in one religious party to speak evil of
another ; and it appears, in many instances, to
atfiird a high degree of satisfaction, when one
party can lay hold of the inadvertencies of an
other denomination, or even of the imprudence
of a single individual, in order to asperse the cha
racter of the whole body, and to hold it up to
general derision and contempt. Episcopalians
look down with feelings of scorn and contempt on
Methodists and Dissenters ; Independents sneer
at Methodists, and Methodists at Independents ;
Presbyterians are disposed to revile Independ
ents, as self-conceited, sanctimonious pretenders,
and Independents, to treat with unbecoming

levity, and even with ridicule, the opinions and
practices of Presbyterians ; while the different
classes of Baptists, distinguishable only by the
slightest shades of opinion, stand aloof from each
other, in a warlike attitude, and refuse to join
with cordiality in the ordinances of Divine wor
ship. I have seldom been in company with in
dividuals of any particular party, in which I have
not found, when allusions were made to another
denomination, innuendoes thrown out to their
prejudice ; and that the detail of any error or im
perfection which attached to them, was generally
relished, and even received with a high degree
of satisfaction. Hence it happens, that the rulea
of comm >n civility are every day violated by the
different sectaries. If a person belonging to a
particular denomination be accidently introduced
into a company composed of persons belonging
to another religious party, he is frequently treat
ed with reserve, and with a spirit ofjealousy and
suspicion, even although he may be viewed, on
the whole, as a Christian at bottom. I have
known individuals of respectable character and
attainments, who, from conscientious motives,
had forsaken the denomination to which they
formerly belonged, have, merely on this account,
been treated with scorn and neglect, been banish
ed from the intimacies of social and friendly in
tercourse, and been regarded nearly in the same
light as a Turk or an infidel ; and that, too, by
men who pretended to liberality, and to literary
accomplishments.

There is certainly neither heresy nor ortho
doxy inherent in stone or lime, in a church-pew,
or a pulpit cushion : — yet one denomination will
rudely refuse to another, the liberty of preach
ing in their place of worship, when it can con
veniently be spared, although nothing but the
fundamental doctrines acknowledged by both are
intended to be proclaimed ; just as if the walls,
the pews, and the pulpit of a church, would re
ceive a stain of pollution from the presence ol
another sectary. Even in those cases where the
common interests of Christianity are to be sup
ported, — as in vindicating the cause of Mission-
ary, and other Philanthropic institutions, — if the
preacher belongs to a dissenting body, he is shu1.
out from the spacious churches of the Establish
ment, where he might address a numerous au
dience, and obtain a large collection ; and is
obliged to confine his exertions within the nar
row walls of any public hall, or meeting-house,
that he can procure. We account it r.o more
than a piece of common civility, to accommodate
a neighbour with a htfk a parlour, or even a din
ing-room, for the enSRinment of his friends at a
wedding or a funeral; but such is the little progress
that professed Christians have made in the exer
cise of a noble and generous liberality, that, when
we ask the use of a church, or meeting-house, only
for a couple of hours, we are spurned away with
rudeness and indignation. — The Christian world

176

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

is unhappily divided into sects and parties; and
these divisions must still continue for a time ;
but what should hinder Christian ministers of
different parties from, occasionally at least, offi
ciating for each other, in order to show to the
world, that they entertain no malignant jealou
sies, and that they are united in the bonds of a
common Religion ? Yet, do we ever behold an
Episcopalian officiating for a Methodist, an In
dependent preaching in an Established church,
or a Baptist leading the devotional exercises of a
society of Presbyterians'? If such a case occa
sionally occur, it is so far from being a matter of
course, that it is considered a phenomenon in
the religious world. Yet all these different par
ties recognise the leading doctrines and duties
exhibited in the Christian Revelation ; and the
points in which they differ are " trifles light as
air," when compared with those important truths
in which they all agree,*

Even among Christians belonging to the same
religious society how often do we behold a dis
play of " bitter envyings," contentious disposi
tions, and malignant passions! Perhaps a mere
punctilio respecting a certain mode of worship, or
a difference in opinion about the choice of a pas
tor, will throw the whole society into a flame.
Evil passions will be engendered ; backbitings,
whisperings, tumults, and dissensions, will arise;
harsh and unfounded conclusions, respecting the
motives and characters of individuals, will be
drawn : alienations of affection will be induced ;
friendly intercourse interrupted ; an attitude of
hostility assumed ; and even the rules of common
civility violated ;— so that a calm and impartial
spectator will plainly discern, that the spirit of
Christianity has never been thoroughly imbibed,
and that they have never learned the apostolic
precept, " to forbear one another in love," how
ever high pretensions they may have previously
made to spirituality of affection and deportment.
Among Christians of every name, we find dis
positions and practices daily prevailing, which

* The following recent facts will illustrate some of
the positions contained in this paragraph.— It ap
pears that the minister of the parish of Annan has
been in the habit of allowing Dissenters occasionally
to preach in the parish church. His Assistant
brought this heavy offence before a late meeting of
the Presbytery ; and, by that body, it was declared,
that no Dissenter should, in future, pollute the said
pulpit. Tl.ey, at the same time, voted thanks to the
Assistant, for his manly and liberal conduct in mak
ing the complaint.— Public Prints, April, 1324.

" Lately, the minister of a parish, a few miles to
the westward of Cupar, hearing that, at the request
of some of his parishionMt a sermon was to be
preached to them, by a Dissenting clergyman from
Cupar, and knowing that wFschool-room was the
only place where that could be conveniently done,
he called upon the teacher and commanded him not
to allow the school-room to be used for such a pur
pose- In a few days, a company of strolling players
visited the parish ; whereupon the worthy pastor,
calling on the schoolmaster, ordered the school-room
to be 'at their service, to perform in."— Dundee
Courier April 1825.

are altogether inconsistent with the genius of
the religion of Christ, and directly repugnant
to its precepts. Slander, dishonesty, falsehood,
cheating, swindling, and vexatious litigations,
are far from being uncommon among those who
profess to be united in the bonds of a common
Christianity. How little dependence can we
have, in social and commercial transactions, on
the promise or the declaration of a man, merely
on the ground of his being a Christian in profes
sion ! If written engagements, and civil laws,
did not secure our property, and the performance
of promises and contracts, our reliance on Chris
tian principle, abstractly considered, in the pre
sent state of the religious world, would prove
like that of a person who leans upon a broken
reed. How few would fulfil their promises
and engagements, when they interfered with
their ambitious schemes, and their pecuniary in
terests ! How many instances of fraudulent
bankruptcy happen among the professors of reli
gion ! And in cases of common bankruptcy, where
a legal settlement has been obtained, is there one
out of a hundred that ever thinks of performing
an act of natural justice, in restoring to his cre
ditors the loss they had sustained, when he aftei-
wards has it in his power?

Finally, the degree in which the spirit of in
tolerance and persecution still prevails, shows a
lamentable deficiency of benevolence and of
Christian spirit in the religious world. Notwith
standing the unjust and cruel sufferings which
English Protestants endured from Popish priests
and rulers, a short period only elapsed, after they
had risen to power, before they began in their
turn, to harass their Dissenting brethren, with
vexations and cruel prosecutions, and fines and
imprisonments, till they were forced to seek for
shelter in a distant land. And no sooner had
the English Independents settled in America,
than they set on foot a persecution against the
Quakers, no less furious than that which they
themselves had suffered in the country from
which they had fled. A number of these worthy
persons they threw into prison, and seized upon
the books they had brought from England, and
committed them to the flames. In virtue of a
law which had been made against heretics in
general, sentence of banishment was passed
upon them all ; and another law punished with
death, " all Quakers who should return into the
jurisdiction after banishment ;" and it is a fact,
that four persons actually suffered death, under
this impolitic and unjust law.* Nor did the
Reformed clergy in Scotland lose sight of that

* Morse's American Geography.— The following
severe laws, among others, were enacted against the
Quakers. " Any Quaker, after the first conviction,
it a man, was to lose one ear,— and for the second of
fence, the other :— a woman, to be each time severely
whipped;— and the third time, whether man or wo
man, to have iheir tongues bored through with a red
hot iron.

PERSECUTION IN SWITZERLAND.

raagistorial authority which had been assumed
by the Romish church. Upon a representation,
in 1646, from the commission of the Kirk of
Scotland, James Bell, and Colin Champbell,
baillies of Glasgow, were committed to prison
by the Parliament, merely for having said, that
" Kirkmen meddled too much in civil matters."*
Even so late as the middle of the eighteenth
century, when Whitefield, Wesley, and other
pious men, began to address the ignorant villa
gers of England on the most important subjects,
" a multitude has rushed together, shouting and
howling, raving, and cursing, and acccompany-
ing their ferocious cries and yells with loathsome
or dangerous missiles, dragging or driving the
preacher from his humble stand, forcing him,
and the few who wished to hear him, to flee for
their lives, sometimes not without serious injury
before they could escape. And these savage
tumults have, in many cases, been well under
stood to be instigated by persons, whose advan
tage of superior condition in life, or even express
vocation to instruct the people better, has been
infamously lent in defence of the perpetrators,
against shame or remorse, or legal punishment
for the outrage. And there would be no hazard
in affirming, that, since Wesley and Whitefield
oegan to conflict with the heathenism of the
country, there have been in it hundreds of in
stances answering in substance to this descrip
tion. — Yet the good and zealous men who were
thus set upon by a furious rabble of many hun
dreds, the foremost of whom active in direct vio
lence, and the rest venting their ferocious de
light, in a hideous blending of ribaldry and exe
cration, of joking and cursing, — were taxed with
a canting hypocrisy, or a fanatical madness, for
speaking of the prevailing ignorance, in terms
equivalent to those of the prophet, ' The people
are destroyed for lack of knowledge.' "f

But we need not go back even to the distance
of half a century in order to find instances of
religious intolerance among Protestant commu
nities and churches ; our own times unhappily
furnish too many examples of a bigoted, intolerant,
and persecuting spirit. Little more than two
years have elapsed since the Methodist chtipel
in Barbadoes was thrown down and demolished
by the mob-gentry, and with the connivance of
the public authorities of that slave trafficking
island, and Mr. Shrewsbury, a worthy aud re
spected pastor and missionary, obliged to flee for
his life. Previous to this outrage, he suffer
ed every species of insult, contumely, and re
proach. He was abused as a villain, and hissed
at in the streets, not by mere rabble, but by the
great vulgar; by merchants from their stores,
and individuals in the garb of gentlemen. By
such characters his chapel was surrounded, and
partly filled, on Sunday the 5th October, 1823.

* Kairr.'s Sketches.

; Foster's "Essay on Popular Ignorance.
32

Thin glass bottles had been previously prepared
and filled with a mixture of oil and assafoetida,
and all of a sudden, they were thrown with
great violence in the midst of the people, and
one was aimed at the head of the preacher; and
during the whole service, stones were rattling
against the chapel from every quarter. On the
next Sabbath an immense concourse of people
assembled, " breathing out threatenings and
slaughter ;" and from 20 to 30 of the gentlemen-
mob planted themselves around the pulpit appa
rently ready for any mischief. Men wearing
masks, and having swords and pistols, came
galloping down the street and presenting their
pistols, fired them at the door; and it was oriai-
nally designed to have fire crackers among the
females, to set their clothes ou fire. At length, on
Sabbath, the 19th, this execrable mob, consisting
of nearly 200 gentlemen, and others, again assem
bled, with hammers, saws, hatchets, crows, and
every other necessary implement ; and in the
course of a few hours, the lamps, benches, pews,
pulpit, and even the walls, were completely de
molished. They entered the dwelling-houso
broke the windows and doors, threw out the
crockery ware, chopped up tables, chairs, and
every article of furniture; tore the manuscripts
of the preacher, and destroyed a library of more
than 300 volumes. All this was done under the
light of the full moon, in the presence of an im
mense crowd of spectators, without the least at
tempt being made to check them either bv the
civil or military authorities — while the unfortu
nate preacher, with his wife in an advanced state
of pregnancy, had to flee to a neighbouring island
to save his life ! Such is the tolerant and hu
mane conduct of gentlemen Protestants of the
nineteenth century! gentlemen who would, no
doubt, consider it very unhandsome were they to
be compared to Goths and Vandals, or to the
rude and barbarous savages of Papua or New
Holland.*

About the same period, the authorities of De-
merara set on foot a persecution against Mr.
Smith, Missionary irom the London Society,
under various pretexts : but his real crime in the
eyes of his persecutors, was, his unwearied zeal
in instructing the negroes in the knowledge of
religion. He was condemned to death by a
court-martial, in the face of every principle of
justice : he died in prison, was refused the pri
vilege of a Christian burial, and his friends were
prohibited from erecting a stone to mark the spot
where his body wasj^. The whole details of
this transaction present a scene of savage bar
barity, created by the lust of gain, scarcely to be
paralleled in the history of Europe.

In Switzerland, which was formerly the head

* For a more particular detail of these exccraMa
transactions, see " Report of the Wesleyan Mission
ary Society for 1324:" and the debates in Parliament
in 1825.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

quarters of Protestantism, the demon of religious
persecution has again reared its head. The
council of state of the Pays de Vaud, at the in
stigation of tlv clergy, on January 15, 1825,
published a decree, " ppohibiting, under the
penalty of severe fines ana imprisonments, all
meetings for religious worship or instruction,
other than those of the Established Church :"
and in the following May, another decree was
issued, which denounces " fines, imprisonment,
or banishment, upon the most private kind of
religious assembly, or even the admission of a
single visiter to family worship." In pursuance
of these disgraceful laws, several ministers and
private Christians of high character for piety and
acquirements, have been banished from the Can
ton, some for one and some for two years — cut
off from all means of subsistence, unless possess
ed of independent fortunes, and left perhaps to
starve and perish in foreign lands. If they re
turned before the expiration of their sentence, it
is said that death is the punishment to be inflict
ed. One poor man, a school-master, in the
principality of Neufchatel, has been condemned
to ten years' banishment. He was brought out
from prison, tied with cords, and compelled to
kneel in the snow in the nnblic square to hear his
scr.'tciicw read. His crime was, gathering toge
ther a few fellow Christians in his own house,
and there having the Lord's supper administer
ed by a regularly ordained minister!*

And is England pure from the spirit of perse
cution and intolerance? Let us see. — At Ken-
neridge in Dorsetshire a worthy and excellent
individual, belonging to the Wesleyan denomi
nation, had attended on a green, where 20 or 30
persons usually congregated, on a Sunday after
noon, to listen to the truths he thought it impor
tant to declare. The clergyman of the parish
approached with a retinue of servants, and com
manded him to desist. The preacher look no
notice o; the command and proceeded to read his
text. rl he clergyman then commanded the
tithing-mao to seize him. He was directed to
be conveyed to Wareham jail ; and to every
question the preacher put, as to the ground of his
being seized upon, the reverend and worthy cler
gyman only replied by the brandishing of his
stick. — Instances have occurred in which clergy
men of the establishment have refused to bury
the dead. At Chidds Evcal, in Shropshire, the
child of a poor man was refused interment, and
the father was obliged to carry it six miles, be
fore it could be laid at rest in its mother earth.
— Ai Catsfield, in SussMfa similar act of in
famy was committed.— At the moment when the
bell had tolled, when the earth was to fall heavily
upon the coffin, containing the only remains of
the being that affection had endeared, and when

See a pamphlet on this subject by Dr. Pye Smith.
=5ee also Cons- Mag. for June, 1825, and other peri-
Ik .1 works of that date.

those who stood by needed all tLj .^if-v>lation3
that religion can supply — at thij moment the
clergyman appeared, but advanced only to give
pain to the mourners, and to agonize a parent's
heart, by saying, " Now that you have waited an
hour till it suited me to come, I will not inter
your child ! I did not know that you were Dis
senters — take your child some where else — take
it where you please — but here it shall not lie ii,.
consecrated ground." And, in fact, they were
compelled to carry the child away eleven miles
from the abode of its parents, and from the place
that gave it birth, before it could find repose in
its kindred dust. — At Mevagissey, in the county
of Cornwall, the vicar refused to allow the corpse
of a Dissenter to be brought within the church,
and, therefore, read the burial service in the open
air; but, in consequence of which, he read only
a part of that service, and omitted the most
beautiful portion. — Such a power appears to be
conceded to the clergy by the laws of the church ;
but the spirit which gave it existence is deeply to
be deplored, as the spirit of bigotry and intole
rance. At \Vellingborough, a clergyman, in op
position to a custom which had been established
for sixty years, issued orders, that no bell should
toll when a Dissenter expired. He boldly avow
ed, " that he never would permit the passing bell
to be rung for a Dissenter, even in the event of
an interment in the church-yard ; that whilst he
held the curacy, no bell of his church should
ever toll for a Dissenter ; and that he would not
even permit the bells to ring for a marriage where
the parties were Dissenters." In reference to
this case, an appeal was made to the Bishop of
Peterborough, who wrote a long letter on the
subject, and defended the conduct of this Well-
ingborough curate. — At Newport Pagnel, two
persons of decent appearance, teachers of Bap
tist Societies, were colled ing subscriptions for
the erection of a new place of worship. — Aftei
arriving at the residence of the parish clergyman,
they were taken before a clerical magistrate, who
upon the oath of the other clergyman, that they
were rogues and vagrants, committed them to
Aylesbury jail ; where they were confined for
three weeks in common with the basest felons '}
among convicted thieves of the most abandoned
character; — nay, more, they were sentenced to
the tread-mill, and kept at hard labour there,
though, during the whole time, one of them was
afflicted with spitting of blood. Their papers
were seized upon ; their money was taken from
them ; and by means of it the expense of sending
them to prison was defrayed.*

All the above-stated instances, and many
others of a similar description, occured within
the limits of the year 1824 ; and every year since

* The reader will find a more particular detail of
these cases, in the "Address of John Wilka, Esq at
the Fourteenth Anniversary of the Protestant Bo-
ciety for the Protection of religious Liberty, in
May, 1825,

GENERAL REFLECTIONS.

279

the " Society for the Protection of Religious Li
berty" was formed, similar instances, some of
them of a more barbarous nature, have been
brought forth to public view. And, were it not
for the protection which this Society affords to the
victims of intolerance, it is highly probable, that
vexatious persecutions, insults, fines, and impri
sonments, on account of differences in religious
opinions, would be much more common than they
now are. Were such individuals as those to
whom we have now alluded, permitted, by the
laws of our country, to carry their intolerant
spirit to its utmost extent, Dissenters would have
no security either for their property or their
lives ; and the fires of Smithfield would again be
kindled, to torture the souls, and to consume the
bodies, of all who refused to conform to the dog
mas of a national church.

After what has been stated in the preceding
part of this work, it is almost needless to say,
that such an intolerant and persecuting spirit is
diametrically opnosite to every principle that
pervades the Christian system : and there cannot
be a grosser misrepresentation of its spirit and
tendency, than to ascribe such dispositions and
conduct to the genius of that religion which IN
TOLERANCE has thought proper to assume. Can
a single instance be produced of a persecuting
spirit in the conduct of Jesus Christ, or in that of
any one of his apostles ! When he " was reviled,
he reviled not again ; and when he suffered, he
threatened not ; and he solemnly rebuked his fol
lowers when the least symptom of intolerance or
revenue was displayed. Can a religion, which
commands us to love our neighbours as ourselves
— to be kindly affectionate one towards another
— to love our enemies — to do good to them that
hate us — to bless them that curse us— and to
pray for them that despitefully use us," — can
such a religion be supposed to give the least
countenance to actions that are both intolerant
and inhumane? If the religion of Christ have
anyone prominent object which distinguishes it
from all others, it is this — to unite mankind in
one harmonious and affectionate society ; and
such an object is altogether incompatible with
resentment, intolerance, or persecution in any
shape. " By this shall all men know," says
Jesus, " that you are my disciples, if ye love one
another."

Here I must close the illustration of the moral
state of mankind, though they might have been
carried to a much greater extent. They present
to every benevolent mind a gloomy picture of the
moral aspect of the human race, and of the de
pravity which the principle of malevolence car
ries in its train. It is a picture which shows us
that those moral principles and laws which the
Creator intended to promote, the felicity of all
worlds, nave never yet been brought into full ef

fect in the world in which we live. It is a pic
ture, however, from which we ought not to turn
away our eyes. It sets before us the evils which
require to be counteracted, and the obstacles
which must be surmounted, before the principles
of malignity be extirpated, and the moral princi
ples of the Christian system take root in the
world. But such views of the existing state of
the moral world, so far from operating as seda
tives, ought to stimulate us to exert every ener
gy, and to use every judicious and powerful
mean, which has a tendency 1.0 promote the ac
complishment of this important object.

It would have given me pleasure to have pre
sented before the eye of the reader a more cheer
ful and alluring picture ; but " facts are stubborn
things," and there is no resisting the force of the
evidence which they adduce, — I intend to re
lieve some of the dark shades of this picture, by
exhibiting some faint radiations of truth and be
nevolence which are still visible amidst the sur
rounding gl jom. For, amidst the moral darkness
which has so long covered the earth, some streaks
of celestial light have always been visible ; and
the dawning of a brighter day now begins to
gild our horizon. Substantial knowledge is now
beginning to diffuse its benign influence on all
ranks ; the shackles of despotism are bursting
asunder ; the darkness of superstition is gradu
ally dispelling ; the spirit of persecution is borne
down and powerfully opposed by the force of
truth and of common sense, and the rights of
conscience are beginning to be generally recog
nised. Philanthropic institutions of various de
scriptions have been established, education is
extending its beneficial effects ; the instruction
of the young is becoming an object of more ge
neral attention ; philosophical institutions, village
libraries, and associations for intellectual im
provement, are rapidly organizing; Bible and
missionary societies are extending their influence
through every portion of the religious world, and
Christianity is now beginning to display its be
neficent energies on distant continents, and the
islands of the ocean. — But, instead of entering
into details in the illustration of these and si
milar effects which have always, in a greater or
less degree, accompanied the progress of the
Christian religion, I shall, in the mean time, refer
the reader to the excellent work of Dr. Ryan,
" On the History of the effects of Religion on
Mankind."

Here a question may be proposed by some ot
my readers, — Is it possible to bring the inhabi
tants of this world, in their present depraved
state, to a general observance of the laws of be
nevolence which have been illustrated in the pre
ceding part of this work ? To such a question
I would reply, — Whatever man has done, man
may do. Amidst the depravity and the dark
ness with which the earth has been generally en
veloped, individuals have occasionally arisen

180

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

who have shone as lights in the moral world, and
exhibited bright patterns of Christian temper and
of active beneficence. The Apostle Paul had
his mind imbued with a large portion of the spirit
of love. He voluntarily embarked in a tour of
benevolence through the nations ; and in spite of
reproaches, persecutions, stripes and imprison
ments ; in the midst of " perils in the waters,
perils of robbers, perils by his own countrymen,
perils in the city, and perils in the wilderness ;"
and in the face of every danger, and of death it
self, he prosecuted, with a noble heroism, his la
bour of love, purely for the sake of promoting the
best interests of mankind. All the Apostles en
gaged in the same benevolent undertaking ; they
sacrificed every private interest, every selfish
consideration ; " neither counted they their lives
dear unto themselves, so that they might finish
their course with joy," and be the means of ac
complishing the salvation of their fellow-men.

Even in our own times, many distinguished
individuals have arisen, who have reflected ho
nour on our species. The name of Howard is
familiar to every one who is in the least acquaint
ed with the annals of philanthropy, (see p. 20.)
This excellent man, and truly philanthropic cha
racter, devoted his time, his strength, his genius,
his literary acquisitions, and his fortune, and
finally sacrificed his life, in the pursuits of human
ity, and in the unwearied prosecution of active
benevolence. He travelled over every country
in Europe and in the adjacent regions of Asia,
impelled by the spirit of Christian love, in order
to survey the mansions of sorrow and of pain, and
to devise schemes for the reliefof human wretch
edness wherever it existed ; and, in the execu
tion of this scheme of benevolence, the energies
of his mind were so completely absorbed, that
" he never suffered himself, for a moment, to be
diverted from carrying it into effect, even by the
most attractive of those objects which formerly
possessed all their most powerful influence upon
his curiosity and his taste."*

The late Walter Yenning, Esq., who has
been denominated, by Prince Galitzin, the second
Howard, walked in the steps of his illustrious
predecessor, and with the most fervent Christian
zeal, devoted his short, but useful life, to the al
leviation of human misery, and to the promotion
of the best interests of thousands of wretched
individuals who " were ready to perish." He
withdrew himself from the ordinary round of
genteel society, and declined all commercial bu
siness, that he might devote the whole energies
of his soul to benevolent occupations. He com
menced his philanthropic career, by co-operating
in the formation of the " Society for improve
ment of Prison discipline," which was formed
in London in 1816 ; and afterwards visited the

* For a particular account of the labours of this
eminent philanthropist, see Brown's "Memoirs of
foe public and private life of John Howard."

prisons in Petersburg!!, Novogorod, Tver,MoB-
cow, and other cities in the Russian empire.
The prisons, hospitals, work-houses, madhouses,
houses of correction, and the abodes of misery
of every description in Petersburgh, were visited
by him, day after day : " and many a prisoner,
bowed down with affliction and iron, was cheered,
instructed, and saved by his ministrations;" for
his philanthropy extended both to the bodies
and to the souls of men."*

Many other examples might be produced from
the annals of our times, and of illustrious charac
ters, presently existing, to demonstrate, that a
noble and disinterested benevolence is a princi
ple, capable of being exercised even in the pre
sent degenerated state of the inhabitants of our
world. We find parents some times displaying
a high degree of benevolent feeling towards their
offspring, and sacrificing their ease, and their
personal interests, in order to secure their health,
their happiness, and enjoyments. We find bo
som friends like David and Jonathan, and Kke
Damon and Pythias, rejoicing in the welfare of
each other, and encountering difficulties and
dangers in promoting the interests of the objects
of their friendship. What, then, should hinder
such dispositions from becoming universal?
What should hinder them from being transferred
to all the sensitive and intellectual beings, with
whom we may have occasion to correspond, or to
associate ? Would not the universal exercise of
such dispositions be highly desirable? would it
not tend to banish war and discord from the
world, and promote peace on die earth, and good
will among men ? Why, then, are such disposi
tions so seldom displayed? Not because the
universal exercise of them is a thing impossible ;
but because men, actuated by selfishness, are
unvnlling to give full scope to the benevolent af
fections ; because they have never yet employed
all the requisite means for bringing them into
full operation. If all the energies of the intel
lect, and all the treasures which have been ex
pended in fostering malignant passions, and in
promo-ting contentions and warfare, had been
devoted to the great object of cultivating the prin
ciple of benevolence, and distributing happiness
among men ; the moral and physical aspect of
our world would long ago have assumed a very
different appearance from what it now wears.

The philanthropic individuals, to whom I have
alluded, were men, whose actions were some-
times blended with the failings and imperfections
incident to degenerated humanity ; but the prin
ciple of benevolence ruled supreme over all the
subordinate affections ; and if the world were
peopled with such men, notwithstanding the im
perfections which attached to them, society, in
every land, would present the appearance of a
moral paradise, and form an image of the har-

* Mr. Yenning died in Petersburgh, In 1821, In the
fortieth year of his age.

MEANS OF PROMOTING CHRISTIAN MORALITY.

181

mony and felicity of " the saints in light."
Every one who believes in the existence of a
future state, fondly imagines that he shall enjoy
happiness in that state. But, whence is his
happiness to arise in the future world, but from
the exercise of those dispositions which the law
of God requires? And if the exercise of bene
volent dispositions be essentially requisite for
securing supreme felicity in the eternal state,
their cultivation, even in the present world,
must be an indispensable duty, in order to our
preparation for the employments of the celestial
world. For it is a law of the Creator, which is
eternal and immutable, that " without holiness,
no man can see the Lord." And whenever the
requisite means are employed for the cultivation
of holy and beneficent dispositions, we may rest
assured, that our labour will be crowned with
success. For the energy of the divine Spirit,
from whom proceedeth every good and perfect
gift, is promised to accompany the use of every
proper mean, so as to render it effectual for
counteracting the effects of moral evil, and for
promoting the renovation of the world.

We have examples before us, not only of a
few insulated individuals, but of societies,
where the principle of benevolence, in a greater
or less degree, pervades the whole mass. The
people who have been denominated Quakers,
have always been distinguished by their humane
and peaceable dispositions, their probity and
hospitality to each other, the cheerfulness of
their manners, their opposition to war, and the
active zeal which they have displayed in contri
buting to the good of mankind. The Mora
vians are also distinguished for their affectionate
intercourse with each other, the liberality of
their dispositions, the peaceableness of their
tempers, the purity and simplicity of their lives,
and their missionary efforts for evangelizing the
heathen world.* Would to God that the whole

* The following anecdote, is illustrative of the
character of nviriy of the Moravians, or Hernhutters
as they are sometimes called.— In a late war in Ger
many, a captain of cavalry was ordered out on a
foraging party. He put himself at the head of his
troop, and marched io the quarter assisncd him. It
was a solitary valKy, in which hardly any thin? hut
woods was to be -je-in. In the midst stood a little
cottage ; on percf.<vlng it he rode up, and knocked at
the door; out conges an ancient Hernhutter with a
beard silvered of age. "Father," says the officer,
" show me a field where I can set my troopers a
foraging." " P esently," replied the Hernhutter.
The good o'd man walked hefore, and conducted
them out of tt.e valley. Alter a quarter of an hour's
march, they found a field of barley. "There is the
very t.lun? we want," says the captain.—" Have pa
tience for .1 very few minutes," replied the guide
" and you shall be satisfied." They went on, and
about the distance of a quarter of a It-ague farther,
ihey arrived at another field of barley.' The troop
immediately dismounted, cut down the grain, truss
ed it up, and remounted. The officer upon this, says
to his conductor, " Father, you have given yourself
and us unnecessary trouble ; the first field was much
better than this." " Very true, Sir," replied the good
old man. " Butit was not mine." —Here we have a

world were Quakers and Moravians, notwith
standing their peculiarities of opinion ! With
all their foibles and imperfections, society would
then wear a more beautiful and alluring aspect
than it has ever yet done ; peace and industry
would be promoted : the fires of persecution
would be quenched ; philanthropy would go forth
among the nations, distributing a thousand
blessings, and the people would learn war, no
more.

I intend in this place, to inquire into the

MEANS BY WHICH THE PRACTICE OF CHRIS
TIAN MORALITY MIGHT BE PROMOTED. But

I find that this is a subject which would require
a distinct volume for its illustration. At present,
I can suggest only two or three hints.

In the first place, The intellectual instruction
of the young, should be an object of universal at
tention, both in public and private. For true
knowledge is the spring of all religious emotions,
and of all virtuous actions. By intellectual in
struction, I do not mean merely a series of exer
cises in spelling, pronouncing, parsing, constru
ing, writing, and figuring ; but a communication
of the elements of thought, and of clear and ex
tensive conceptions of the physical and moral re
lations of the universe. — 2. The moral instruc
tion of the young should be an object of particu
lar and incessant attention. Moral instruction
should be inculcated, not merely by a reiteration
of dry precepts, maxims, and abstract doctrines,
or by a reference to the details and flimsy senti
ments contained in fictitious narratives ; but by
a pointed and pacific reference to real facts ; as
exhibited in the Sacred History, the annals of
nations, and in the scenes of the family, and of
general society. I would expect no greater as
sistance in the work of moral instruction from
the religious novels with which the Christian
world is now deluged, than I would do from a
circulation of the Pious Frauds which were so
common in the first ages of the church. In
schools, and in families, every thing which has a
tendency, either directly or indirectly to foster
pride, envy, contention, revenge, and other ma
lignant affections, should be firmly and sedu
lously discouraged and counteracted ; and higher
rewards (if rewards be expedient) should in
every instance, be bestowed on the individual
who cultivates and displays benevolent affections,

beatiful -practical exhibition vflovetoourneig-hbour,
and of calm resignation to the providential dispen
sations of God. How few professed Christians have
been found acting in this manner1 And yet I doubt
not, tha, this <rood man would experience more true
satisfaction in the temper and conduct he displayed,
than if he had offered resistance, practised dissimu
lation, or set them to plunder his neighbour's field.
A number of disinterested actions such as this,
would contribute more powerfully to the support ot
the Christian cause than a thousand theological
disputes, imbued with the spirit and temper with
which they have been most frequently conducted.

182

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

than on him who is distinguished merely for in
tellectual acquirements. Hitherto, a more de
cided preference seems to have been given to
whit is termed genius than to moral accomplish
ments. — 3. Institutions should be formed for com
municating literary and scientific knowledge,
blended with moral and religious instructions, to
persons of both sexes, and of every rank and age,
from fifteen years and upwards, particularly to
apprentices, journeymen, clerks, shop-keepers,
and others, for the purpose of calling forth into
action the energies of their minds, and for pre
venting the growth of habits of dissipation. In
such institutions, the manifestation of benevolent
affections, and propriety of moral conduct, should
be made the conditions of enjoying the instruc
tions and privileges of the association. — 4. In
connexion with these and other means, the cause
of practical morality would be powerfully promot
ed, were the ministers of religion, among all
parties, to direct their energies to the discussion
of moral subjects, on Christian principles, instead
of confining their attention almost exclusively to
doctrinal discussions. Religion is not a system
merely of speculative and metaphysical truths,
nor does it consist in the contemplation of myste
rious facts, or incomprehensible dogmas ; but it
is a rational and tangible subject, addressed to
the reason, the hopes, and fears, and the common
sense of mankind; and therefore, its illustrations
should be chiefly derived from the facts of Sacred
History, the system of nature, and from the ex
isting objects, scenes, and associations with
which we are connected. — A much greater de
gree of animation, and of energy, than is now
displayed in instructions from the pulpit, is also
requisite for arresting the attention, and riveting
impressions of moral and religious truths upon
the mind. If fewer sermons were delivered, and
a greater portion of intellectual energy concentrat
ed in each discourse , and if preachers, particu
larly among Dissenters, had fewer discourses to
compose, and more time for taking an ample in
tellectual range through the system of nature, of
Providence, and of revelation, a more powerful
effect would undoubtedly be produced on the
Christian world, and upon all who occasionally
attend on the ministrations of religion.

I need scarcely add, that all such means ought to
be accompanied with fervent prayer to the "Fa
ther of lights," and dependence on the promised
aid of the Spirit of holiness. But without the
application of all the energetic means which rea
son and revelation suggest, we have no reason
to conclude, and it would be presumption to ex
pect, that the influences of heaven will descend
upon the moral world. For it appears, in point
of fact, to be one part of the plan of the divine
procedure, that human agents shall be the means
of enlightening each other, and of promoting the
renovation of the world, as " workers together
with God."

CONCLUSIONS FROM THE GENERAL

PLES ILLUSTRATED IN THIS VOLUME.

If the general train of sentiment which runs
through the preceding discussions and illustra
tions be admitted, the following conclusions mav
be deduced respecting,

I. The subject of preaching, and the grand
aim which the ministers of religion, in their dis
courses, ought always to have in view.* We
have already seen, that it is the great object of
revelation to bring into practical operation the
principles of love to God and to man : and, it is
obvious, that,what is the main object of Christian
ity to accomplish, ought to be the ultimate aim of
every Christian preacher. It is not merely to
convert men to the belief of certain opinions, or
to induce them to embrace the peculiarities of a
party. It is, that they may " be renewed in the
spirit of their minds," and, " made meet for the
inheritance of the saints in light" — it is, that
they may " deny ungodliness and worldly lusts,
and live soberly, righteously, and godly, in the
present evil world ;" and be " united together
in love, which is the bond of perfection." — Meta
physical disquisitions, respecting dogmas in reli
gion, have very little tendency to meliorate the
heart, and to promote benevolent dispositions
and affections. On the contrary, they have fre
quently produced a temper of mind directly oppo
site to the spirit of Christianity. They have
led multitudes to pique themselves on the sup
posed purity oftheir profession, and the orthodoxy
of their creed, and to point at others as heretics,
and subverters of the gospel, on account of some
slight differences in sentiment about a particular
doctrine ; while they themselves have never at
tempted to cultivate heavenly dispositions, and
to display that charity which " suffereth long,
and is kind, which is not easily provoked, and
thinketh no evil." There are certain doctrines
and facts, which we ought always to recognise,
and to keep in view as fundamental axioms in
the Christian system ; — such as, that" there is
one God, and one Mediator between God ana
man, the man Christ Jesus ;" that " he died for
our offences, and rose again for our justifica
tion ;" that " all have sinned and come short of
the glory of God;" and that " we are justified
freeiy by his grace, through the redemption that
is in Christ Jesus." But, there is no necessity
for expatiating almost exclusively on these and
similar doctrines, as is frequently done, to the
exclusion of practical morality; since they ought
to be regarded in the light rather of first princi
ples in religion, than as topics which require to

* The Author originally Intended to illustrate this,
and the following conclusions, at considerable

sngth, and to enter into a variety of circumstantial
details ; hut, as the intended illustrations would oc
cupy more than a hundred pages, and as the work
has already swelled to a considerable size, he is
under ^the necessity of postponing them for tht

MORAL PREACHING.

183

laboured and diffused arguments.
Yet, it is a fact, that such doctrines, which are
only the means of religion, have been expatiated
upon without intermission, as if the simple be
lief of them were the end of religion ; while the
great moral object of Christianity has been eiiher
entirely overlooked, or thrown into the shade.
What should we think of the instructer of youth,
who confined the attention of his pupil solely to
the characters of the alphabet, and to the pro
nunciation of a few elementary sounds, and then
dismissed him with a general exhortation, to ap
ply them to all the combinations of letters and
syllables he might find in every book ? Could
we ever expect, that, in ordinary cases, such a
pupil would either make progress in the art of
reading, or use it as the medium of acquiring
knowledge ? And what shall we think of those
who do little more than attempt to explain the
axioms of the Christian system, but never show
their bearings on the scenery of real life, nor en
deavour to extend our views of the providential
operations of God, and of the glory of his king
dom ? If Christianity consisted merely in ab
stract disquisitions, and metaphysical dogmas,
such a practice might be, in some measure,
defensible ; but since it is, in every sense of the
word, a practical system, it is next to trifling
with its prominent objects, to confine the range
of religious discussions within so narrow bounds
as is generally done by many of those who are
designated by the term evangelical ; and argues
a complete forgetfulness of the apostle's exhorta
tion, " Therefore, leaving the first principles of
the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection,"
tracing first principles through all their diversi
fied bearings on mortal action, and on Christian
contemplation.

One of the great objects of preaching ought,
undoubtedly, to be, to investigate the numerous
and minute ramifications of human conduct ; to
explore every avenue of corruption ; to endea
vour to draw forth from its hiding-place every
immoral principle and action, which exerts its
pernicious influence in Christian or in general
society ; and with all the powers of graphical
description we can command, to portray them
before the eyes of men, in all their repulsive
features, and in all their abominations. At the
same time, we ought to apply the touch-stone of
the divine law to every unchristian propensity
and practice; to exhibit its contrariety to the
spirit of our holy religion ; to show how the
principle of love ought to operate in every given
case and circumstance, and in the minutest ac
tions of human life ; and how very different ef
fects would be produced, were the principles laid
down by our Saviour and his apostles, to operate
with full effect throughout every department of
the moral world. Unless such objects be gene
rally aimed at, and steadily kept in view, in the
course of public instruction, religion will be apt

to degenerate into a mere figment, or, at most,
into a subject of wrangling, or a matter of curi
ous speculation.

Let no class of religionists presume to tell us,
that, if the fundamental doctrines of religion b<;
simply declared, Christian morality will follow as
a matter of course ; and that, to expatiate on any
particular branch of social conduct, is to dege
nerate into legal preaching. If this principle
were to be admitted, then all the expostulations
and denunciations of the prophets, all the reproofs
and exhortations of the apostles, all the moral
sermons of our Saviour, and all the minute di
rections in reference to moral conduct, detailed
in every epistle to the Christian churches, may
be regarded as egregious trifling. If it be one
grand design of revelation to restore mankind
from the ruins of the fall, and to reinstate them
in that integrity which they at first possessed ; —
if it was the chief design of" the law and the
prophets" to bring forth into action, on the theatre
of the world, the two fundamental principles of
the moral law, as the Lawgiver himself has ex
pressly stated ; (Matt. xxii. 37 — 40 ;) — if the
sweet singer of Israel devoted a large portion of
his inspired strains to the celebration of the di
vine precepts, (Psalm cxix. &c. ;) — if most of the
sermons and parables of our Saviour have a di
rect bearing on the same important subject ; — if
the apostle Paul, in his instructions to a Christian
minister, enlarged particularly on the duties
which should be inculcated on the various ranks
and relations of men, (Titus ii. iii. ;) — if all the
apostolic letters to the Christian churches are
full of minute directions, in relation to every
branch of moral duty ; — if heaven be the scene of
perfect moral rectitude, where ardent affection
towards God, and towards fellow-intelligences,
ever reigns — where love, peace, and harmony,
eternally prevail ; — if the happiness of that world
depend upon the absence of moral evil, and the
attainment of moral perfection; — if the present
world be a state of preparation for the enjoyments
of that happier region ; — if this preparation con
sist in having the principles of love to God and
to man interwoven through the whole constitution
of the mind, and brought forth into action in .he
diversified scenes of civil and religious inter
course ; — if such important effects cannot be pro
duced, unless by laying open to view the latent
abominations of the heart, by impelling the moral
principles of the gospel through all the avenues
and windings of the human passions and affec
tions ; and by illustrating, with minute particu
larity, every subordinate branch of Christian
duty ;— if these positions be admitted, it will fol
low, that the duties of Christian morality, so far
from being thrown into an obscure corner, ought
to occupy a prominent place in the range of the
ministration of every Christian minister, who Is
desirous to promote the improvement of society,
and the renovation of the world.

184

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

In short, we expect no grand moral reforma
tion to be achieved — no commencement of the
millennial era of the church, till " the watchmen
upon Mount Sion," with more energy than they
have yet displayed, " shall lift up their voice like
a trumpet, and show to the house of Jacob their
transgressions" — till they " lift it up with
strength, and not be afraid" of any suspicions
that may be thrown out against their orthodoxy,
when they show unto men the path of duty in all
its bearings on the relations of time, and on the
employments of eternity — till they make the mo
ral principles of Revelation bear, in all their
force, not only on the prominent features of social
life, but upon every minute ramification of human
conduct till every lurking principle of jealousy,
envy, avarice, and revenge be made to feel their
energy — till even the very amuss?nents of public
and domestic life be made to bend to the eternal
laws of rectitude, and to carry on their fronts
that noble inscription, " HOLINESS TO THE
LORD."

II. If the preceding train of sentiments be ad
mitted, we may be directed in our views of the
nature and ends of church discipline, and the
persons on whom it ought to be exercised.

In a great majority of Christian churches, cen
sures are inflicted chiefly, or solely, on persons
guilty of an external breach of one or two precepts
of the decalogue — only one or two species of vio
lation of the moral law are considered as worthy
of cognizance ; while the systematic operations of
slander, revenge, envy, and avarice — the indica
tions of harsh, sour, and ungovernable tempers,
and the absence of Christian candour and affec
tion — circumstances which display the real cha
racters of men far more distinctly than any
insulated acts of immorality can do — are either
wholly overlooked, or considered as characteris
tics of very trivial import. The censures to
which I allude, are likewise accompanied, in
many instances, with a degree of magisterial
haughtiness, severity, and unchristian feeling,
which is directly repugnant to every amiable,
candid, and generous principle. A person guilty,
in a single instance, of a breach of the seventh
or eight commandments, will lie under the frown
of a religious society for years, and even to the
close of his life, notwithstanding every evidence
he can give of the sincerity of his repentance,
and even be deprived of the means of earning his
subsistence ; while another may habitually vio
late almost all the other precepts of the decalogue,
and be screened from the discipline of the church.
He may be avaricious, cunning, and deceitful ;
harsh and unfeeling in his conduct ; uncandid and
uncharitable in his dispositions towards others ;
proud, selfish, and obstinate in his temper.; ad
dicted to slander and to incessant litigations ;
impatient of control ; and boisterous and conten
tious in his general deportment — and yet be con-
•idered as no proper object of censure; and,

though never manifesting the least rjympicm of
penitence, will be viewed as a tolerably fair cha
racter in religious society, especially if he has
acquired a considerable share of wealth and of
influence in general society. — Of such cases and
practices, the author had selected a number of
striking examples, which the narrow limits to
which he is confined in the present work, con
strain him, in the mean time, to postpone.

Now, if the general sentiments already thrown
out be founded on truth, and on the nature of
things, such a practice as that to which we allude,
must be absurd, unchristian, and inconsistent
with the preservation of the moral purity of reli
gious society. It has this pernicious tendency,
among others, that it leads multitudes to imagine,
that, if they can keep clear of two or three acts
of moral delinquency, they may trample on every
divine principle and law with impunity. A poor
wretch, under the pressure of poverty, steals a
hen or a pocket handkerchief, and, notwithstand
ing his subsequent repentance, is banished from
social intercourse, and held up to execration-,
while a sanctimonious hypocrite will swindle his
neighbour out of a hundred pounds, if no criminal
law can take hold of him, and will retain his sta
tion in the church, and hold up his face without
a blush in the presence of general society. It is
obvious, if there he any truth in what we havo
hitherto stated, that the general tenor of the con
duct, and the uniform manifestation of beneve-
lent affections, ought, in every case, to form the
grand criterion of a man's being entitled to the
character of a Christian; and, that dispositions
of an opposite nature habitually displayed, how
ever much overlooked in the general intercourse
of life, ought to form a ground of exclusion from
the society of the faithful.

III. This subject has a particular bearing
upon the divisions which subsist in the icligious
world, and the grand principles which ought to
form a bond of union among all who acknowledge
the truth of the Christian Revelation. — If the
train of thought illustrated in the preceding
pages be correct, it will follow, that a cordia!
union of the various sections of the Christian
church is to be expected from the cultivation of
the Spirit of Love, more than from any attempt
to produce an exact coincidence of opinion OH
these theological points in which they now differ
Wherever this spirit is found expanding the soul,
and governing the affections, it will lead its pos
sessors to view the peculiar opinions of others
with candour ; to respect their persons ; to al»
low them liberty of thought on all the subordinate
ramifications of theological sentiment ; and to
set a higher value on moral qualifications, and
the manifestation of benevolent affections, than
on those circumstantial opinions which do not
enter into the essence of the Christian scheme.
If the professing Christian world were thoroughly
investigated, it would be found, that it is owing

MEANS OF CHRISTIAN UNION.

185

more to the absence of this spirit, that Chris
tians stand so much aloof from each other, than
to the speculative opinions which they respec
tively maintain. The prevalent disposition for
sneering at other denominations, and the plea
sure that seems to be felt in laying open their
fiores, will generally be found to proceed from a
nrinciple of pride, and of self-conceit in regard
to our own favourite opinions, some of which,
when ptohed to the bottom, will be found as rot
ten as out1 neighbour's. Why are men not as
much disposed to pass encomiums on what is
sound in the opinions, and laudable in the con
duct, of other parties, as they are to censure them
for minor peculiarities of sentiment ? Why?
Because it appears, that many professed Chris
tians take more delight in the exercise of male
volent feelings than of benevolent affections ; and
are like flies, that pass over the sound parts of a
man's body, and fix upon his sores. Till such
unchristian dispositions be undermined, and tem
pers of an opposite description pervade the ranks
of Christian society, we can expect no cordial
nor lasting union in the visible church, however
many ingenious schemes may be formed, to bring
about this desirable event. For every effect
must have an adequate cause : this cause will be
found to consist more in the affection than in
opinion ; and a union formed on an apparent
coincidence of sentiment, unmingled with ardent
love and affection, would be unworthy of the
name, and would soon be dissolved.

It can form no decisive mark of a man's Chris
tianity, that he recognises the peculiar opinions
of the Baptists or Pzcdo-Baptists, of Presbyte
rians, Episcopalians, or Independents; it is a
matter, comparatively of little importance,
whether a man believes that Christ was an ac
tual or a virtual Mediator under the Old Testa
ment ; whether he be designated the Son of God
in virtue of his office, or of his nature ; whether
or not we be guilty of Adam's first sin; whether
the transaction which passed between him and
his Creator, should be viewed as a law, or as a
covenant; whether the ordinance of baptism
should be administered by dipping, or by sprin
kling, &c. &c. — But it is, unquestionably, a mat
ter of the highest moment, both to the person
himself, and to Christian society, that his temper,
affections, and conduct, should be in unison with
the holy law of God, and that he should display
ihe love which it requires, in all his social, com
mercial, domestic, and Christian intercourses ; —
" itsd if such dispositions and conduct were univer-
sauy^to prevail among the various denominations
ol theN.religious world, union would soon follow,
as a mi'.tter of course. — If, iherefore,'we wish to
heholdY he unhappy divisions of the church ce-
•Tiented let us cultivate, with ardour, those
miablf and affectionate dispositions which our
j<jnevJent religion inculcates, and be more
f * to correct our own mental and moral

aberrations, than to magnify the errors and the
faults of others. Let us make every allowance
for the effects which education, habit, temper
local circumstances, and particular associations,
may have produced on the opinions of our sup
posed erring brethren •, and let us consider, that
we ourselves, had we been placed in the same
circumstances, might have imbibed the same
sentiments. Let us endeavour to acquire clear
and well-defined ideas on every subject connect
ed with religion ; that we may not contend about
trifles, about mere abstract ideas, or the appli
cation of particular terms or phrases. Let u*
keep our eyes fixed on the great and prominent
objects of revelation, and on all the suboidinate
active means by which they may be promoted,
Let us consider religion as consisting more in
action, than in speculation. Let our love to
Christian brethren be founded, not so much on a
general coincidence of opinion, as on the resem-
olance they bear to the Divine image ; and then
we may confidently expect, that that period vvil.
soon approach, when the saints of God " shall see
eye to eye," in reference to all the grand bearings
of the Gospel scheme, and when the name of
Jehovah shall bo ONE throughout all the earth.

IV. We may learn from the subject we have
been illustrating, what notions we ought to form of
the NATURE of a future state of happiness, and of
the PREPARATION requisite to enable us to engage
in its employments. — The felicity of the future
world will not consist simply in a change of
place ; nor will it consist chiefly in change of
sentiment or opinion. Its foundation must be
laid in the principle of Love, and in the com
plete renovation of the moral powers of the hu
man mind, without which no celestial scene could
produce permanent enjoyment. Although all
the theologians who now exist were united in
opinion about every article of the system of Di
vinity; and although they were transported to
the most splendid world that revolves aroun'
the star Arcturus ; after the first transports,
arising from the novelty and the grandeur of the
scene had subsided, they would enjoy little more
happiness in that orb, than they do in this ter
restrial sphere, unless they were actuated with
moral dispositions and affections very diffe
rent from those which many of them now display.
For, not only rancour and malice, but even cold
ness and indifference to the welfare of others,
would prevent happiness from being enjoyed in
any region of the material universe. All who
believe in the reality of a future world, indulge
in anxious wishes to be made happy when they
pass from this mortal scene to the world of
spirits. Even wicked men, whose consciences
frequently forebode evil to them in the other
world, indulge the hope that God will ultimately
oe merciful to them, and admit them to the joyg
of heaven. But this is impossible, in the very
nature of things, unless they be "renewed in the

186

THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION.

ipirit of their minds," and endowed with those
noly dispositions which alone can qualify them
for relishing substantial happiness, and for par
ticipating in " the inheritance of the saints of
light." How could Malignity associate with
Benevolence, Contention with Friendship, or
War with Peace ? How could the sons of
•iiscord dwell in unity, in an assembly where all
4s harmony and love ? How could the malicious
and revengeful spirit find delight in the employ
ments of kindness and pure benignity? How
could the man who now finds his chief pleasure
in hounding and horse-racing, in brawling and
fighting, have any relish for the sublime adora
tions, the enraptured praises, and the lofty and
refined contemplations, of the celestial inhabi
tants ? The thing is impossible, unless the mo
ral order of all worlds were completly subverted.
Such characters will be banished from the abodes
of bliss ; not by any arbitrary decree of the Al
mighty, but in virtue of the moral constitution of
the intelligent universe.

It is, therefore, evident, that the happiness of
heaven must be founded upon the exercise of love,
affection, harmony, perfect good-will to fellow-
intelligences, and the infinite variety of ramifi
cations into which such principles may diverge ;
combined with profound, enlightened, and venera
ble views and affections, in relation to the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. When
these and similar dispositions are uniformly ex
ercised, without the least mixture of any one in
gredient of moral evil, it is easy to conceive,
with what transports of delight the inhabitants
of heaven will contemplate the displays of Di
vine Power, Wisdom, and Goodness, and inves
tigate the history of his dispensations in the
moral government of our world, and in the ar
rangements of all the other worlds whose physi
cal and moral economy may be laid open to their
view.*

Such views are in perfect accordance with
the representations of Scripture. — " Without
holiness, no man shall see the Lord." " The
pure in heart (and they alone) shall see God."
"Nothing that worketh abomination, can enter
within the gates of the heavenly city." " As we
have borne the image of the earthly, (says the
Apostle,) so shall we bear the image of the hea
venly." " Christ Jesus gave himself for the
church, that he might sanctify and cleanse it. and
that he might present it to himself a glorious
church, holy, and without blemish." The crown
of glory, reserved in heaven for the faithful, is
designated " a crown of righteousness." " The

• The Author will have an opportunity of illus
trating this topic in more minute detail, in a work
entitled, " The Philosophy of a Future state; or, an
Illustration of the Connexion of Science with the
Eternal World,— and of the Aids which its discove
ries afford, for enabling us to form a conception of
-he perpetual improvement of the celestial Inhabit
wits In knew 'edge and felicity."

spirits of just men," in the future wor.d, " ar«
made perfect," freed from every taint of moral
pollution, and unrestrained in the exercise (ft
their moral powers. The inheritance to
which they are destined, is " undefiled" with
the least stain of corruption, or with the exam
ple of impure and malignant spirits. " Wheo
Christ, who is our life, shall appear, we shall be
like him ;" transformed into his moral image,
and animated with those Divine principles and
virtues, which he displayed in his conduct, when
he tabernacled among men. The saints " shall
walk with him in white," an emblem of their
perfect moral purity ; " they shall receive an in
heritance among them that are sanctified ," and
" there shall be no more death, neither sorrow,
nor crying ; for the former things shall have pass
ed away."

V. From the preceding illustrations we may
learn something of the nature and essence of fu
ture punishment. If the exercise of love, in all its
diversified modifications, constitutes the founda
tion and the essence of happiness, the unrestrain
ed operations of malevolence must be the source
and the sum of misery. We cannot form a more
dreadful picture of future punishment, than by
conceiving the principles of falsehood, deceit,
and malignity, and the passions of pride, hatred,
malice, and revenge, raging with uncontrolled
and perpetual violence. We need represent to
ourselves nothing more horrible in the place of
punishment, than by supposing the Almighty
simply to permit wicked men to give full scope
to their malevolent dispositions ; leaving them
" to eat of the fruit of their own ways, and to be
filled with their own devices." The effects
produced by the uncontrolled operation of such
principles and passions would be such, as may
be fitly represented by the emblems of " the
worm that never dies," of" devouring fire," and
of their necessary concomitants, " weeping, and
wailing, and gnashing of teeth." (See Chap.
II. Sect. iv. pp. 55. 58.) What other ingre
dients of misery, arising either from local cir
cumstances, from the recollection of the past, or
the anticipation of the future, may be mingled
with the cup of future wo. it becomes not us par
ticularly to determine. And, whether this scene
of misery will ever come to a termination, must
be determined by the consideration, whether the
effects produced by such a punishment will have
a tendency to produce repentance and reforma
tion on the minds of the sufferers. If, after a
lapse of ages, the principles of hatred to God,
and to surrounding intelligences, continue to
operate with increasing violence, without pro
ducing the least desire of returning to their al
legiance to God, or the least symptom of reforma
tion, — then, we may conclude, that the misery
of wicked intelligences will continue so long a*
they remain in existence.

THE

CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER,

OR,

THE CONNEXION OP

SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY

WITH

RELIGION

BY THOMAS DICK,

OF A VARIETV OF LITERARY / VD SCIENTIFIC COMMUWIC ATJO1

IFI NICHOLSON'S PHILOSOPHICAL TOURNAL, THE AHKALS
OF PHILOSOPHY, ETC. ETC.

HARTFORD:

PUBLISHED BY A. C. GOODMAN & CO.
1850.

PREFACE TO THIS EDITION.

THE following pages were written under the impression that the visible
manifestations of the attributes of the Deity are too frequently overlooked by
Christians in their views of the great objects of Religion, and" in the worship
they offer to the Father of their spirits; and are intended to show, that the
Teachers of Religion, in imparting instruction either to the old or to the yal.ng,
ought to embrace a wider range of illustration, in reference to Divine subjects,
than that to which they are usually confined.

Throughout the whole of the discussions contained in this work, the Author
has pursued his own train of thought; and, in so doing, he trusts that he has
been enabled to render some of his illustrations more interesting to the young
and untutored mind than if he had adhered rigidly to the sentiments of others,
and to the technical language of science. The" sketches of the different sciences
are not mere extracts, or compilations, but are, for the most part, orio-inal com
position — in which it has been his main object to imbody as many iacts as his
limits would permit — in order to excite the inquiring mind to farther investiga
tions into the different departments of physical science.

It is presumed, that no Christian reader will for once imagine, that the views
illustrated in this work are intended to be substituted in place of the peculiar
revelations of the Bible. The object of the volume is to illustrate the harmony
which subsists between the system of Nature and the system of Revelation ; and
to show, that the manifestations of God in the material universe ought to be
blended with our views of the facts and doctrines recorded in the volume oi
Inspiration.

It is taken for granted, throughout the whole rancre of the following illustra
tions, that the Scriptures contain a Revelation from Heaven ; and, under a firm
belief of this important truth, the Author has embellished his work with frequent
quotations from the energetic and sublime language of this Sacred Book. It
wouid, therefore, be unfair in any critic, who entertains doubts on this point, to
find fault with such quotations, or with the allusions to Bible phraseology which
occur, unless they can be shown to be introduced without judgment or dis
crimination.

The Author has carefully revised every portion of the present editic n, and
introduced a variety of corrections and modifications. He has likewise intro
duced additional matter, to the extent of between 20 and 30 pages, and also

1V PREFACE.

several illustrative engravings. In its present form, the Author trusts, thax
independently of the moral reflections it contains, it will be found lo comprise
popular descriptions of a greater number of scientific facts than is to be found in
any other volume of the same size.

Various topics, originally intended to be illustrated, have been unavoidably
omitted. Some of these are stated in the last paragraph of Chapter IV. the
illustration of which, in combination with other kindred topics, would fill a
volume of nearly the same size as the present. This subject (for which the
author has abundance of materials) will be prosecuted in another volume, under
the title of THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION; and will comprise, among many
other objects of discussion, illustrations of the moral relation of intelligent beings
to their Creator, and to one another — the physical and rational grounds of those
moral laws ,which the Deity has promulgated — the views which science affords
of the incessant energies of Creating Power, and of the grand and multifarious
objects over which Divine Providence presides — the relation of science to a
future state, and of the aids which the discoveries of science afford, for enabling
us to form a conception of the perpetual improvement of the celestial inhabitants
in knowledge and felicity. These subjects will be illustrated by a variety of
interesting details of facts, in relation to the system of nature, the history of
nations, and the moral state of Christian and general society

CONTENTS.

StfTRODUCTlON ... ...... ... 1.7

Necessity of Revelation. Folly of discarding the Science of Nature from Religion.
Beneficial Effects which flow from the study of the Works of God.

CHAPTER I.

OF THE NATURAL ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITY.
SECTION I.

*?M THE RELATION OP THE NATURAL ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITY TO RELI
GION ..-.......----16

The Christian Religion founded on the Natural Attributes of God. His Power as
interesting a subject as his Mercy — Illustrated in two instances. Evils which arise
from imperfect conceptions of Divine Power. Defects in Religious Instruction on
this subject. Sources of Illustration.

SECTION II.
ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY - - - - -38

The material world exhibits a more striking display of this Perfection than the super
natural facts recorded in Scripture. Immense quantity of Matter in the universe.
Mode of acquiring the most comprehensive conception of the bulk of the Earih —
its variety of scenery — its mass of solid matter. Magnitude of the bodies which
compose the Solar System. Magnitude and number of the Stars. Procedure of
the mind in acquiring the most impressive conceptions of such august objects. Re
flections. Rapid Motions of the Celestial Bodies. How we acquire the ideas of
relative velocities — weight of the Earth — immense physical forces — Grandeur of
the motion of Saturn — immense number of bodies impelled through the heav**10
Reflections. Immense Spaces which surround the Heavenly Bodies- T ..^nons.
Popular illustration of the Motions of the Earth and Heavens. Extract from Dr.
Ridgeley, with remarks. Universe intended to adumbrate the Attributes of God, and
to make a sublime impression on created beings. Similar trains of thought sug-.
gested in the Scriptures. Moral Effects of such contemplations. Humility. Folly
of pride — low rank of man in the scale of being. Reverence and Veneration — Rea
son why mankind feel so little veneration of God — how it may be increased. The
Deity unsearchable. Hope and Confidence in the prospect of futurity — Resurrec
tion — Scenes of Eternity.

SECTION III.
ON THE WISDOM AND INTELLIGENCE OF THE DEITY ----- 61

Wisdom denned— Displayed in the Structure of the Solar System. Distance of the
Sun. Rotation of the Planets — Principal reason why such a motion exists. Wisdom
displayed in other Systems. Minute displays of this attribute cannot be traced in the
heavens. Wisdom, as displayed in the constitution of our globe — adjustment of its solid
parts to the necessities of the beings which inhabit it. Mountains, their uses — exist in
other worlds. Diversity of colour — argument for a plurality of worlds — general colour
which prevails in the scene of nature — Water, its use in the system of nature — its
composition, evaporation— motion of the liquid element — its beneficial effects. The
Atmosphere — its weight and pressure — its component parts — its various properties —
necessary to animal life, flame, sound, twilight — wisdom displayed in its constitution.
Expansion of water in the act of freezing.
33

VI CONTENTS.

VARIETY OF NATURE ----- ..... 7?

Vegetables — their number and variety. Animals — variety in their organization. Eyes
of insects — their exquisite mechanism. Subterraneous Regions. Atmosphere. The
Variety of Nature affords a faint idea of the infinity of the Creator. Illustrated
in the number of animal parts and functions. Reflection. Variety the foundation of
our judgments. Beauty and sublimity of Nature. Primeval state of our globe —
other worlds.

Mechanism of Animated Beings ._._---_. -88

STRUCTURE OF THE HUMAN EYE — its coats, humours, muscles, orbit, and motions.
Wisdom displayed in its construction. Light — its velocity, minuteness, colours, .ind
adaptation to the eye. MANNER IN WHICH VISION is PERFORMED — explained
by a figure, and an experiment — illustrated by the view from Salisbury Craigs. Mul
titude of rays which flow from every object — smallness of the image on the retina,
illustrated by calculation — what proportion of the solar light falls on our globe — Re
flections. Mechanism for viewing near and distant objects — contraction and dilata
tion of the pupil — distance at which we see distinctly. Summary view of adaptations
in the structure of the eye. Eyes of superior intelligences. Visual organs of the
inferior animals. Mechanism of the Bones illustrated — exemplified in the joints of the
fingers, the wrist, and the movements of which the head is susceptible. Moral Reflec
tions on the impropriety of overlooking the Divine Wisdom in the system of nature.

SECTION IV.
Of* THE GOODNESS OR BENEVOLENCE OF THE DEITY - - - - - 111

Benevolence of God in relation to Man — considered as a depraved intelligence. Mercy
displayed in the system of nature. Benevolence as displayed towards the lower
animals. Extract from Dr. Paley. General Reflections.

CHAPTER II.

A CURSORY VIEW OF SOME OF THE SCIENCES WHICH ARE RELATED
TO RELIGION AND CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY.

INTRODUCTION. Extensive range of Theology. Bad effects of setting Religion in oppo
sition to Science. Harmony of the operations of God in Nature and Revelation 117

NITURAL HISTORY - - - - - • - - - - - -110

Its extensive range. Outline of its principal objects — on the surface, and in the interior
recesses of the earth — in the atmosphere— the vegetable, mineral, and animal king
doms — and in the region cf the heavens. Description of the Banian Tree. Reflec
tions. Monkey Bread Tree. Splendour and felicity of insect life. Invisible worlds
— infinity of the universe. Religious tendency of this Science. It affords a manifest
ation of the Deity, and expands our conceptions of his operations — ennobles the human
mind. — Recommended by the Sacred writers.

GEOGRAPHY - -.-- _-. 134

Its object — Figure of the Earth — Proofs of its spherical form. Relation which the dis
covery of the figure of the earth bears to the plan of Providence. Magnitude and
natural divisions of the earth. General features of its surface. Mountains — their
general ranges, and the sublime scenes they exhibit The Ocean — its extent, depth,
bottom, and motions. Rivers — their number, size, and the quantity of water they
pour into the ocean. How they are supplied — their use in the system of nature.
Artificial division of the earth. Number and variety of its inhabitants. Number
which have existed since the Creation — number at the resurrection, and the space they
would occupy. Number which the earth would contain — strictures on Malthus.
Utility of the study of Geography to Religion — to Directors of Missionary Societies
— to Private Christians. Grandeur of its physical objects — utility of its moral facts.

jrEOLOGY - ' - "."." " " " " " " ' -157

Its object and connexion with religion — an interesting subject of inquiry. Materials which

compose the crust of our globe. Various geological phenomena. Organic remains —

Mammoth, Tapir, Elk, Megatherium, &c. Geological deductions not inconsistent

with the Mosaic History — Genesis i. 1, 2. exolained. Short duration of the earth

CONTENTS.

in its present form. The Deluge, and its effects on the earth's strata. Marine shells,
&c. Grand and terrific objects which this science exhibits — illustrate the sublime
descriptions of the Deity recorded in the. Scriptures.
ASTRONOMY ----- --_.... 163

Its sublime objects. Apparent motions of the Sun — of the Moon. Eclipses of the Sun
and Moon. Apparent motion of the starry heavens. Stars and planets seen in the
day-time, and with what powers of the telescope they may be distinguished. Appar*
ent revolution of the celestial vault indicates Almighty power. Stars never shift their
relative positions. Solar System. The Sun — his size and probable destination illus
trated — his spots and atmosphere — different kind of rays emitted from his body — his
distance illustrated. Mercury — his size, rotation, quantity of light and heat, &c.
Proportions of caloric on the different planets. Venus — her size, phases, mountains,
transits, and general phenomena. Original observations on, and mode by which her
diurnal rotation may be determined. Earth — proofs of its annual and diurnal motions.
The moon — description of her majestic mountain scenery, luminous spots, celestial
appearances, illuminating power, superficial contents, &c. Mars — his distance,
atmosphere, luminous zone, &c. New Planets — Ceres, Pallas, Juno, and Vesta —
their anomalies, singularities, and probable origin. Meteoric Stones. Jupiter — his
bulk, rotation, belts, and the appearances of his moons. Saturn — his figure, belts,
moons, and quantity of light. His Rings, their dimensions, motion, and phenomena
— illustrated by a figure. Splendour of the firmament, as viewed from this planet (see
the engraving.) Herschel — his distance, size, and quantity of light. Comets — their
tails, velocity, orbits, size, and number. New Comet. Motion of the solar system
in absolute space — its destination — plurality of worlds intimated in Scripture. The
Fixed Stars— their distance illustrated — their arrangement, changes — moral reflections.
Relation of Astronomy to Religion — moral effects which its objects have a tendency
to produce — criminality of overlooking the works of God, &c.

NATURAL PHILOSOPHY 20!

Its objects and different departments. Mechanics — subjects it embraces, and its impor
tance to the improvement of mankind. Hydrostatics — its leading principles and uses,
illustrated by figures. Pneumatics — its principles, and the experiments by which they
are illustrated. Acoustics. Optics — leading facts and principles of this science.
Burning-glasses, &c. Electricity — its nature, phenomena, effects, and agency in the
system of nature. Galvanism — its singular effects on metals, &c. and on the animal
system — various facts which it explains. Magnetism — its various phenomena and
effects. Relation of Natural Philosophy to Religion — its inventions meliorate the con
dition of mankind — illustrated in the case of the electric fluid — it undermines the influ
ence of superstition — unfolds the incessant agency of God — indifference to this subject
unreasaonble.

CHYMISTRY ------- 210

Its objects, and present dignified station. General forms of matter — simple and com
pound substances. Caloric — its sources and properties. Oxygen, its properties and
combinations — nitrous oxide, its singular effects. Nitrogen, its effects on flame and
animal life. Hydrogen, its properties and uses. Carbon, its nature, combinations,
and antiseptic properties. Sulphur, its origin, combinations, and properties. Phos
phorus, history of its discovery — how prepared — curious experiments with this sub
stance — Phosphoric phenomena in the system of nature. Connexion of this science
with Religion — it displays the wisdom and benevolence of God, and the mode of his
present and future operations — improves the condition of man — and carries forward
our views to a more glorious and auspicious era.

ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY ----------- 231

Their general object — human body, its different parts and divisions. Bones, their num
ber, form, and positions. Muscles, their nature, use, and extraordinary strength.
Heart and blood-vessels, and the circulation of the blood. Respiration — curious struc
ture of the lungs. Digestion. Perspiration. Sensation, and the system of nerves.
Summary. Moral reflections — this branch of study teaches us our dependence on a
Superior Power — and excites to gratitude.

HISTORY - 241

Its objects, advantages, and connexion with Religion. Connexion of the sciences and
of the Divine dispensations with each other. Concluding remarks.

viii (.CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III.

THE RELATION WHICH THE INVENTIONS OF ART BEAR TO THE
OBJECTS OF RELIGION.

Art of Printing, its origin and beneficial effects— Dr. Church's Improvements in. Art of
Navigation. Mariner's Compass, its discovery and use. The Telescope, its invention,
and the discoveries made by it— serves instead of a celestial vehicle. Magnifying pow
ers of Dr. HerschePs Telescopes. The Microscope, and the views it exhibits of the
wisdom of God Steam Navigation, its utility in promoting the intercourse of man
kind, and its relation to the objects of religion. Air Balloons, utility of, when arrived
at perfection — proposed improvement in. History of their invention — Lunardi's ascent —
the Parachute. Acoustic Tunnels. Experiments on the Conveyance of Sound. M.
Blot's remarkable experiment. Don Gautier's experiment and suggestion. Conclusions
in reference to the extensive conveyance of sound. Practical remarks — utility of the
arts in relation to the Millennial Era - .... - - --114

CHAPTER IV.

SCRIPTURAL FACTS ILLUSTRATED FROM THE SYSTEM
OF NATURE.

!. Science may frequently serve as a guide to the true interpretation of Scripture. Canon
or rule for Scripture interpretation — illustrated. II. The Depravity of Man illustrated,
from a consideration of the state of the interior strata of the earth. Volcanoes, and the
terrible ravages they produce. Earthquakes, and their dreadful effects. Thunderstorms,
tempests, and hurricanes. General Reflections on this subject. III. The Resurrection
illustrated. Transformations of Insects. Indestructibility of matter — conclusions from
this fact. IV. General Conflagration. Concluding reflections. Topics omitted in this
volume - ............. 124

CHAPTER V.

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS WHICH WOULD RESULT FROM CONNECTING
SCIENCE WITH RELIGION.

[. The variety of topics wou d allure the attention of intelligent minds to religious subjects.
Principle of novelty intended by the Creator to be gratified — illustrated in the variety
which appears in the earth, the heavens, and the volume of Revelation. II. Science en--
ables us to take an extensive survey of the empires of God — illustrates many sublime passa
ges of the Bible — qualifies us for complying with several Divine Injunctions — danger of
selfishness and indifference in this respect. Our conceptions of God depend on our views
of the extent of his dominions. III. Science enlarges our views of the operations of Provi
dence^ in relation to the past and present scenes of the world. The economy of the in
ferior animals. The physical and moral economy of the celestial worlds. IV. Science,
blended with Religion, would produce a general expansion of mind, and liberality of
views, in reference to the opinions and actions of men, and to the works and the ways of
God, illustrated at large. V. It would induce a spirit of piety, and profound humility.
Sources of piety — illustrated by an example. Humility — illustrated by the examples of
Mr. Bovle, of Sir Isaac Newton, and of superior intelligences. General conclusions • 134

CONTENTS

APPENDIX.

No. I. Illustration of the rate of motion in the heavenly bodies, on the supposition that the t«iu-th
is at rest.

No. II. Experimental illustrations of the pressure of the atmosphere.

No. III. On the means by which it may probably be ascertained whether the Moon be a habita
ble world.

No. IV. Remarks on the late prcteoded discovery of a Lunar Fortification.

No. V. On the ideas of Magnitude. Motion, and Duration, as expressed by numbers.

No. VI. On a Plurality of Worlds.

No. VII. On the first inventor of Printing.

No. VIII. On Telescopes ; with a brief notice of a New Reflecting Telescope constructed by ih«
Author.

No. iX. On Steam Navigation.

No. X. Strictures on a cettain sentiment respecting Human Redemption.

No. XI. Extract from Dr. Dwighu

Na, XII. List of PopuUr Works on the different sciences treated of in this volume, wita o*>
casiona! remarks.

THE

CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

INTRODUCTION.

Or? Cft subject of RELIGION, mankind have,
»n all ages, been prone to run into extremes.
While some have been disposed to attach too
much importance to the mere exertions of the
human intellect, and to imagine that man, by
the light of unassisted reason, is able to explore
the path to true wisdom and happiness, — the
greater part of religionists, on the other hand, have
been disposed to treat scientific knowledge, in
its relation to religion, with a degree of indiffer
ence bordering upon contempt. Both these dis
positions are equally foolish and preposterous.
For he who exalts human reason, as the only
cure guide to wisdom and felicity, forgets, that
man, in his present state, is a depraved intelli
gence, and, consequently, liable to err; and that
all those who have been left solely to its dictates,
have uniformly failed in attaining these desira
ble objects. During a period of more than
5,800 years, the greater part of the human race
have been left solely to the guidance of their
rational powers, in order to grope their way to
the Tempe of Knowledge, and the Portals of
Immortality ; but what has been the result of
all their anxious researches ? Instead of acquir
ing correct notions of the Great Author of their
existence, and of the nature of that homage
which is due to his perfections, " they have
become vain in their imaginations, and their
foolish hearts have been darkened. Professing
themselves to be wise, they have become fools ;
and have changed the glory of the Incorruptible
God into an image made like to corruptible man,
and to four-footed beasts, and creeping things."
Instead of acquiring correct views of the princi
ples of moral action, and conducting themselves
according to the eternal rules of rectitude, they
have displayed the operation of the most diabo
lical passions, indulged in continual warfare, and
desolated the earth with rapine and horrid car
nage ; so that the history of the world presents
to our view little more than a series of revolt
ing details of the depravity of our species, and
of the wrongs which one tribe of human beings
has wilfully inflicted upon another.

This has been the case, not only among a few
uncultivated hordes on the coasts of Africa, in
the plains of Tartary, and the wilds of America,
but even among those nations which stood highest
ui the ranks of civilization, and of science. —

The ancient Greeks and Romans, who boasted
of their attainments in philosophy, and their pro
gress in the arts, entertained the most foolish,
contradictory, and unworthy notions of the Ob
ject of Divine worship, of the requirements of
religion, and of the eternal destiny of man.
They adored a host of divinities characterized
by impiety, fraud, injustice, falsehood, lewdness,
treachery, revenge, murder, and every other vice
which can debase the human mind, instead of
offering a tribute of rational homage to that Su
preme Intelligence who made and who governs
the universe. Even their priests and philoso
phers indulged in the most degrading and abomi
nable practices,and entertained the most irrational
notions in regard to the origin of the universe, and
the moral government of the world. Most of them
denied a future state of retribution, and all of them
had their doubts respecting the reality of an im
mortal existence : and as to the doctrine of a resur
rection from the dead, they never dreamed of such
an event, and scouted the idea, when proposed to
them, as the climax of absurdity. The glory to
which their princes and generals aspired, was,
to spread death and destruction among their fel
low-men — to carry fire and sword, terror and
dismay, and all the engines of destruction, through
surrounding nations — to fill their fields with heaps
of slain — to plunder the survivors of every earthly
comfort, and to drag captive kings at their cha
riot wheels — that they might enjoy the splendour
and the honours of a triumph. What has been
now stated, with regard to the most enlightened
nations of antiquity, will equally apply to the
present inhabitants of China, of Hindostan, of
the Japanese Islands, of the Birman Empire,
and of every other civilized nation on which the
light of revelation has never shone— with this
additional consideration, That they have enjoyed
an additional period of 1800 years for making
further investigations ; and are, at this moment,
as far from the object of their pursuit as when
they first commenced their researches ; and noi
only so, but some of these nations, in modern
times, have mingled with their abominable su
perstitions and idolatries many absurdities and
horrid cruelties, which were altogether unknown
among the Greek and Roman population.

Such are the melancholy results to which
men have been led, when left to the guidaiUM

10

INTRODUCTION.

of unassisted reason, in the most interesting and
important of all investigations. They have
wandered in the mazes of error and delusion •,
and their researches, instead of directing and
expanding our religious views, have tended only
to bewilder the h^man mind, and to throw a
deeper shade of intellectual gloom over our
apostate world. After a period of six thousand
years has been spent in anxious inquiries after
the path to true knowledge and happiness — Igno
rance, Superstition, Idolatry, Vice, and Misery
still continue to sway their sceptre over the great
majority of the human race ; and, if we be allow
ed to reason from the past to the future, we may
rest assured, that while mankind are destitute
of a Guide superior to the glimmerings of deprav
ed reason, they would be no nearer the object of
their pursuit, after the lapse of sixty thousand
years, than at the present moment. It is only
in connection with the discoveries of Revelation,
that we can expect that the efforts of human
reason and activity will be successful in abolishing
the reign of Ignorance and degrading Supersti
tion — in illuminating the benighted tribes of the
Pagan World — and in causing" Righteousness,
and Order, and Peace, to spring forth before all
the nations." Though the Christian Religion
has never yet been fully understood and recognis
ed in all its aspects and bearings, nor its require
ments been cordially complied with, by the great
body of those who profess to believe in its Divine
origin, yet it is only in those nations who have
acknowledged its authority, and in some mea
sure submitted to its dictates, that any thing
approximating to just conceptions of the Supreme
Intelligence, and of his moral government, is
found to prevail.

But, on the other hand, though the light of
Nature is of itself a feeble and insufficient guide,
to direct us in our views of the Supreme Intel
ligence, and of our eternal destination, yet it is
a most dangerous and delusive error to imagine,
that Reason, and the study of the material world,
ought to be discarded from the science of religion.
The man who would discard the efforts of the
human intellect and the science of Nature from
Religion, forgets — that He who is the Author of
human redemption, is also the Creator and Go
vernor of the whole system of the material uni
verse — that it is one end of that moral renovation
which the Gospel effects, to qualify us for con
templating aright thedisplays of Divine Perfec
tion which the works of creation exhibit — that
the visible works of God are the principal medium
by which he displays the attributes of his nature
to intelligent beings — that the study and con-
temnlation of these works employ the faculties of
intelligences of a superior order* — that man, had
he remained in primeval innocence, would have
been chiefly employed in such contemplations —

* Rev. iv. 11 TV 3, &c.

that it is one main design of Divi/ie Revelation
to illustrate the operations of Providence, and the
agency of God in the formation and preserva
tion of all things — and that the Sciiptures are full
of sublime descriptions of the visible creation, and
of interesting references to 'he various objects
which adorn the scenery of Nature. Without
the cultivation of our reasoning powers, and an
investigation of the laws and economy of Nature,
we could not appreciate many of the excellent
characters, the interesting aspects, and the
sublime references of revealed religion : we
should lose the full evidence of those arguments
by which the existence of God and his attributes
of Wisdom and Omnipotence are mo«t power
fully demonstrated : we should remain destitute
of those sublime conceptions of the perfections
and agency of Jehovah which the grandeur and
immensity of his works are calculated to inspire .
we should never perceive, in its full force, the
evidence of those proofs on which the Divine
authority of Revelation is founded : we could not
give a rational interpretation of the spirit and
meaning of many parts of the Sacred Oracles :
nor could we comply with '• fO'ze positive com
mands of God which enjoin us to contemplate
the wonder of his power, to" meditate on all his
works, and to talk of all his doings."

Notwithstanding these and many other consi
derations, which show the folly of overlooking
the visible manifestations of Deity in the exer
cises of Religion, it has long been the practice
of certain theologians to depreciate the wonderful
works of Jehovah, and to attempt to throw them
into the shade, as if they were unworthy of our
serious contemplation. In their view, to be a
bad philosopher is the surest way to become a
good Christian, and to expand the views of the
human mind, is to endanger Christianity, and to
render the design of religion abortive. They
seem to consider it as a most noble triumph to the
Christian cause, to degrade the material world,
and to trample under foot, not only the earth, but
the visible heavens, as an old, shattered, and cor
rupted fabric, which no longer demands our study
or admiration. Their expressions, in a variety
of instances, would lead us almost to conclude,
that they considered the economy of Nature as set
in opposition to the economy of Redemption,
and that it is not the same God that contrived
the system of Nature, who is also ihe "Author
of eternal salvation to all them that obey him.''

It is, unquestionably, both foolish and impious
to overlook or tc undervalue any of the modes
by which the Divine Being has been pleased
to make known his nature and perfections to
mankind. Since he has given a display of his
" Eternal Power and Godhead" in the grand
theatre of nature, which forms the subject of
scientific investigation, it was surely never in
tended, and would ill comport with revetence for
its adorable Author, that such magnificent dis-

INTRODUCTION.

Dlays of his Power, Wisdom, and Beneficence,
as the material universe exhibits, should be treat
ed, by his intelligent offspring, with indifference
or neglect. It becomes us to contemplate, with
adoring gratitude, every ray of our Creator's
glory, whether as emanating from the light of
Revelation, or as reflected from the scenery of
nature around us, or as descending from those-
regions where stars unnumbered shine, and
planets and comets run their solemn rounds.
Instead of contrasting the one department of
knowledge with the other, with a view of depre
ciating the science of nature, our duty is, to
derive from both as much information and in
struction as they are calculated to afford ; to
mark the harmony of the revelations they re
spectively unfold ; and to use the revelations of
nature for the purpose of confirming and am
plifying, and carrying forward our views of the
revelation contained in the Sacred Scriptures.
With regard to the revelation derived from the
Sacred Records, it has been imagined by some,
that it has little or no reference to the operations
of the material system, and that, therefore, the
study of the visible works of God can be of little
importance, in promoting religious knowledge
and holy affections. In the sequel of this vo
lume, I shall endeavour to show, that this senti
ment is extremely fallacious, and destitute of a
foundation. But, in the mean time, although it
were taken for granted, it would form no argu
ment against the combination of science with re
ligion. For it ought to be carefully remarked,
that Divine Revelation is chiefly intended to in-
truct us in the knowledge of those truths which
interest us as subjects of the moral administra
tion of the Governor of the world, — or, in other
words, as apostate creatures, and as moral
agents. Its grand object is to develop the open
ings and bearings of the plan of Divine Mercy ;
to counteract those evil propensities and pas
sions which sin has introduced; to inculcate those
holy principles and moral laws which tend to
unite mankind in harmony and love ; and to pro
duce those amiable tempers and dispositions of
mind, which alone can fit us for enjoying happi
ness either in this world, or in the world to come.
For this reason, doubtless, it is, that the moral at
tributes of Deity are brought more prominently
into view in the Sacred Volume, than his natural
perfections ; and that those special arrangements
of his Providence, which regard the moral reno
vation of our species, are particularly detailed ;
while the immense extent of his universal king
dom, the existence of other worlds, and their
moral economy, are but slightly hinted" at, or
veiled in obscurity. Of such a Revelation we
stood in need ; and had it chiefly embraced sub
jects or" a very different nature, it would have
failed in supplying the remedies requisite for
correcting the disorders which sin has introduced
tmong mankind — But, surely, it was never

intended, even in a religious point of "iew, that
the powers of the human mind, in their contem
plations and researches, should be bounded by
the range of subjects comprised in that revelation,
which is purely, or chiefly, of a moral nature,
since the Almighty has exibited so magnificent
a spectacle in the universe around us, and en
dowed us with faculties adequate to the survey
of a considerable portion of its structure, and ca
pable of deducing from it the most noble and
sublime results. To walk in the midst of this
"wide extended theatre," and to overlook, or to
gaze with indifference on those striking marks
of Divine omnipotence and skill, which every
where appear, is to overlook the Creator him
self, and to contemn f he most illustrious displays
he has given of his eternal power and glory. That
man's religious devotions are much to be suspect
ed, whatever show of piety he may affect, who
derives no assistance, in attempting to form some
adequate conceptions of the object ofhis worship,
from the sublime discoveries of astronomical
science ; from those myriads of suns and systems
which form but a small portion of the Creator's
immense empire !* The professing Christian,
whose devotional exercises are not invigorated,
and whose conceptions of Deity are not extended,
by a contemplation of the magnitude and variety
of his works, may be considered as equally a
stranger to the more elevated strains of piety, and
to the noble emotions excited by a perception of
the beautiful and the sublime.

" The works of the Lord," says an inspired
writer, " are great, and are sought out by all
those who have pleasure therein." They all
bear the stamp of Infinite Perfection, and serve
as so many sensible mediums to exalt and ex
pand our conceptions of him, whose invisible
glories they represent and adumbrate. When
contemplated in connection with the prospects
opened by Divine Revelation, they tend to ex
cite the most ardent desires after that state of
enlarged vision, where the plans and operations
of Deity will be more clearly unfolded — and to
prepare us for bearing a part in the immortal
hymn of the church triumphant: — " Great and
marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty,
just and true are thy ways,thou King of Saints."
The most illustrious characters that have adorn
ed our race in all ages, have been struck with
the beauty and magnificence of the visible crea
tion, and have devoted a certain portion of their

• As some readers seem to have mistaken the
Author's meaning, in this and similar passages, it
may be proper to state, that his meaning is not—
that a knowledge of natural science is essential to
genuine piety ; but, that the person who has an op
portunity of making- himself acquainted with tfa
science of nature, and of contemplating the wonders
of the heavens in their true light, and who does not
find his views of the Creator expanded, ar. 1 his reli
gious emotions elevated, by such studies, has reason
to call in question the nature and the sincerity of hii
devotional feelings.

INTRODUCTION.

152

time and attention in investigating its admirable
economy and arrangement : and there can be no
question, that a portion of our thoughts devoted
to the study of the wondrous works of the Most
High, must ultimately be conducive to the im
provement of our intelleclual powers, to our
advancement in the Christian life, and to our
preparation for the exalted employments of the
eternal world.

In fine, since the researches of modern times
have greatly enlarged our views of the System
of Universal Nature, and of the vast extent to
which the operations of the Creator are carried
on in the distant regions of space, — since the
late discoveries of Naturalists and Experimental
Philosophers, with respect to the constitution of
the atmosphere, water, light, heat, the gases,
the electric, galvanic and magnetic fluids, and
the economy and instincts of animated beings,
have opened to our view a bright display of
Divine Wisdom, in the contrivance and ar
rangement of the different parts of our terrestrial
habitation, — since improvements in the useful
arts have kept pace with the progress of science,
and have been applied to many beneficial pur
poses, which have ultimately a bearing on the

interests and the progress of religion — since a
general desire to propagate the truths of Chris
tianity in Heathen lands now animates the
mass of the religious world — since the nations
of both Continents are now aroused to burst
asunder the shackles of despotism, and to inquire
after rational liberty and mental improvement, —
and since all these discoveries, inventions, and
movements, and the energies of the human mind,
from which they spring, are under the direction
and control of that Omnipotent Being who made
and who governs the world — they ought to be
considered as parts of those Providential arrange
ments, in the progress of which He will ultimately
accomplish the illumination of our benighted
race, and make the cause of righteousness and
truth to triumph among all nations. And, there
fore, the enlightened Christian ought thankfully
to appreciate every exhibition, and every dis
covery, by which his conceptions of the attributes
of God, and of the grandeur of his works, may
be directed and enlarged, in order that he may
be qualified to " speak of the honour of his ma
jesty, and talk of his power ; to make known tr
the sons of men his mighty acts, and the gJoriour
majesty of his kingdom."

CHAPTER I.

OF THE NATURAL ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITY, WITH PARTICULAR ILLUSTRATIONS OF
HIS OMNIPOTENCE AND WISDOM.

SECTION I.

On tho Relation of the Natural Attributes of
DEITY to RELIGION.

A FIRM conviction of tha existence of God,
and a competent knowledge of his natural perfec-
tions,lie at the foundation of all religion, both na
tural and revealed. In proportion as our views
of the perfections of Deity are limited and ob
scure, in a similar proportion will be our con
ceptions of all the relations in which he stands to
his creatures, of every part of his providential
procedure, and of all the doctrines and require
ments of revealed religion.

By the natural or essential attributes of God,
we understand such perfections as the follow
ing : — His Eternity, Omnipresence, Infinite
Knowledge, Infinite Wisdom, Omnipotence, and
Boundless Beneficence. These are the charac
ters arid attributes of Deity, which, we must
suppose, form the chief subjects of contemplation
to angels, and to all other pure intelligences — and
in investigating the displays of which, the sons
of Adam would h?ve been chiefly employed, had
they continued in primeval innocence. These
attributes form the ground-work of all those gra
cious relations in which the God of salvation
stands to his redeemed people in the economy
of redemption — they lie at the foundation of the
whole Christian superstructure — and were they
not recognized as the corner-stones of that sa
cred edifice, the whole system of ,he Scripture
Revelation would remain a baseless fabric. The
full display of these perfections will be exhibit
ed in the future world — the contemplation of
this display will form one of the sublime employ
ments " of the saints in light" — and to prepare
us for engaging in such noble exercises, is one
of the chief designs of the salvation proclaimed
in the Gospel.

The ChristianRevelation ought not to be con
sidered as superseding the Religion of Nature,
but as carrying it forward to perfection. It in
troduces the Deity to us under new relations,
corresponding to the degraded state into which
we have fallen. It is superadded to our natural
relations to God, and takes it for granted, that

these natural relations must for ever subsist-
It is true, indeed, that the essential attributes of
God, and the principles of Natural Religion,
cannot be fully discovered without the light o!
Revelation, as appears from the past experience
of mankind in every generation ; but it is equally
true, that, when discovered by the aid of this
celestial light, they are of the utmost importance
in the Christian system, and are as essentially
connected with it, as the foundation of a build
ing is with the superstructure. Many professed
Christians, however, seem to think, and to act,
as if the Christian Revelation had annulled the
natural relations which subsist between man and
the Deity 5 and hence the zealous outcry against
every discussion from the pulpit, that has not a
direct relation to what are termed the doctrines
of grace. But nothing, surely, can be more ab
surd than to carry out such a principle to all its
legitimate consequences. Can God ever cease to
be Omnipotent, or can man ever cease to be
dependent for existence on his infinite power ?
Can the Divine Being ever cease to be Omnipre
sent and Omniscient, or can man ever cease to
be the object of his knowledge and superintend
ence ? Can Infinite Wisdom ever be detach
ed from the Almighty, or can man ever be in a
situation where he will not experience the effects
of his wise arrangements? Can Goodness
ever fail of being an attribute of Jehovah, or can
any sentient or intelligent beings exist that do
not experience the effects of his bounty ? In
short, can the relation of Creature and of Crea
tor ever cease between the human race, in what
ever moral or physical situation they may be
placed, and that almighty Being, " who giveth
to all, life and breath, and all things ?" If none
oi these things can possibly happen, then the
relations to which we refer must be eternal and
unchangeable, and must form the basis of all the
other relations in which we can possibly stand
to the Divine Being, either as apostate or as
redeemed creatures ; and, therefore, they ought
to be exhibited as subjects for our frequent and
serious contemplation, as religious and moral
agents. But, unless we make such topics a dis
tinct subject of attention, and endeavour to ac
quire a clear and comprehensive conception of
our natural relations to God, we can neper form a

14

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

clear conception of those new and interesting
relations into which we have been brought by the
mediation of Jesus Christ.

If man had continued in his primitive state of
integrity, he would have been for ever exercised
iti tracing the Power, the Beneficence, and other
attributes of Deity, in the visible creation alone.
Now that his fallen state has rendered additional
revelations necessary, in order to secure his hap
piness — is he. completely to throw aside those con
templations and exercises which constituted his
chief employment, while he remained a pure moral
intelligence? Surely not. One great end of his
moral renovation, by means of the Gospel, mast
be, to enable him to resume his primitive exercises,
and to qualify him for more enlarged views and
contemplations of a similar nature, in that future
world, where the physical and moral impedi
ments which now obstruct his progress will be
completely removed.

It appears highly unreasonable, and indicates
a selfish disposition of mind, to magnify one class
of the Divine attributes at the expense of another,
to extol, for example, the Mercy of God, and ne
glect to celebrate his Power and Wisdom — those
glorious perfections, the display of which, at the
formation of our globe, excited the rapture and
admiration of angels, and of innocent man. All
the attributes of God are equal, because all of
them are infinite ; and, therefore, to talk of darling
attributes in the Divine Nature, as some have
done, is inconsistent with reason, unwarranted
by Scripture, and tends to exhibit a distorted
view of the Divine character. The Divine mercy
ought to be celebrated with rapture by every indi
vidual of our fallen race ; but with no less rapture
should we extol the Divine Omnipotence ; for
the designs of mercy cannot be accomplished with
out the intervention of Infinite Power. All that
we hope for, in consequence of the promises of
God, and of the redemption accomplished by Jesus
Christ, must be founded on the conception we
form of the operations of Omnipotence. An ex
ample or two may not be unnecessary for illus
trating this position.

We are warranted, by the sacred oracles, to
entertain the hope, that these mortal bodies of
ours, after they have mouldered in the dust, been
dissolved into their primary elementary parts, and
become the prey of devouring reptiles, during a
lapse of generations or of centuries, — shall spring
forth from the tomb to new life and beauty, and
be arrayed in more glorious forms than they now
wear ; yea, that all the inhabitants of our globe,
from Adam to the end of time, though the bodies
of thousands of them have been devoured by can
nibals, have become the food of fishes and of
beasts of prey, and have been burnt to cinders,
and their ashrs scattered by the winds, over the
different regions of a'r and land, — shall be reani
mated by the voice of the Son of God, and shall
appear, each in his proper person and identical

body, before God, the Judge of all. Now, the
firmness of our hope of so astonishing an event,
which seems to contradict all experience, and
appears involved in such a mass of difficulties
and apparent contradictions, must be in propor
tion to the sentiments we entertain of the Divine
Intelligence, Wisdom, and Omnipotence. And
where are we to find the most striking visible
displays of these perfections, except in the actual
operations of the Creator, within the range of
our view in the material world ?

Again, we are informed, in the same Divine
records, that, at some future period, the earth on
which we now dwell shall be wrapt up in devour
ing flames, and its present form and constitution
for ever destroyed ; and its redeemed inhabitants,
after being released from the grave, shall be trans
ported to a more glorious region ; and that " new
heavens and a new earth shall appear, wherein
dwelleth righteousness." The Divine mercy hav
ing given to the faithful the promise of these
astonishing revolutions, and most magnificent
events, our hopes of their being fully realized
must rest on the infinite wisdom and omnipotence
of Jehovah ; and, consequently, if our views of
these perfections be limited and obscure, our hope
in relation to our future destiny will be propor-
tionably feeble and languid ; and will scarcely
perform its office " as an anchor to the soul, both
sure and steadfast." It is not merely by telling
a person that God is All-wise, and All-powerful,
that a full conviction of the accomplishment ol
such grand events will be produced. He must
be made to see with his own eyes what the
Almighty has already done, and what he is now
doing in all the regions of universal nature which
lie open to our inspection ; and this cannot be
effected without directing his contemplations to
those displays of intelligence and power which
are exhibited in the structure, the economy, and
the revolutions of the material world.

If the propriety of these sentiments be admit
ted, it will follow that the more we are accustom
ed to contemplate the wonders of Divine intelli
gence and power, in the objects with which we
are surrounded, the more deeply shall we be im
pressed with a conviction, and a confident hope,
that all the purposes of divine mercy will ulti
mately be accomplished in our eternal felicity.
It will also follow, that, in proportion as the mind
acquires a clear, an extensive, and a reverential
view of the essential attributes of the Deity, and
of those truths in connection with ihern, which
are objects of contemplation common to all holy
beings, in a similar proportion will it be impress
ed, and its attention arrested, by every other
divine subject connected with them. And it is,
doubtless, owing to the want of such clear and
impressive conceptions of the essentin' char.icte*
of Jehovah, and of the first truths of religion, tnai
the bulk of mankind are so little impressed and
influenced by the leading doctrines and duties

NATURAL ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITY.

15

connected with the plan of the Gospel salvation,
and that they entertain so many vague and unte
nable notions respecting the character and the ob-
lects of a superintending Providence. How often,
for example, have we witnessed expressions of the
foolish and limited notions which are frequently
entertained respecting the operations of Omni
potence ? When it has been asserted that the
earth with all its load of continents and oceans,
is in rapid motion through the voids of space —
that the sun is ten hundred thousand times larger
than the terraqueous globe — and that millions of
such globes are dispersed throughout the immen
sity of nature — some who have viewed them
selves as enlightened Christians, have exclaimed
at the impossibility of such facts, as if they were
beyond the limits ofDivine Power, and as if such
representations were intended to turn away the
mind from God and religion ; while, at the same
time, they have yielded a firm assent to all the
vulgar notions respecting omens, apparitions, and
hobgoblins, and to the supposed extraordinary
powers of the professors of divination and witch
craft. How can such persons assent, with intel
ligence and rational conviction, to the dictates of
Revelation respecting the energies of Omnipo
tence which will be exerted at " the consummation
of all things," and in those arrangements which
are to succeed the dissolution of our sublunary
system ? A firm belief in the Almighty Power
and unsearchable wisdom of God, as displayed
in the constitution and movements of the material
world, is of the utmost importance, to confirm
our faith, and enliven our hopes, of such grand
and interesting events.

Notwithstanding the considerations now stat
ed, which plainly evince the connection of the
natural perfections of God with the objects of
the Christian Revelation, it appears somewhat
strange, that, when certain religious instructors
happen to come in contact with this topic, they
seem as if they were beginning to tread upon
forbidden ground ; and, as if it were unsuitable
to their office as Christian teachers, to bring for
ward the stupendous works of the Almighty
to illustrate his nature and attributes. Instead
of expatiating on the numerous sources of illus
tration, of which the subject admits, till the
minds of their hearers are thoroughly affected
with a view of the essential glory of Jehovah—
they despatch the subject with' two or three
va^ie propositions, which, though logically true,
make n-j impression upon the heart; as if they
believed that such contemplations were suited
only to carnal men, and mere philosophers ; and
as if they were afraid, lest the sanctity of the
pulpit should be polluted by particular descrip
tions of those operations of the Deity which are
perceived through the medium of the corporeal
senses. We do not mean to insinuate, that the
essential attributes of God, and the illustrations
'j( them derived from the material world, should

form the sole, or the chief topics of discussion,
in the business of religious instruction — but, if
the Scriptures frequently direct our attention to
these subjects — if they lie at the foundation of
all accurate and extensive views of the Christian
Revelation— if they be the chief subjects of con
templation to angels, and all other pure intelli
gences, in every region of the universe — and if
they have a tendency to expand the minds of pro
fessed Christians, to correct their vague and er
roneous conceptions, and to promote° their con
formity to the moral character of God — we can
not find out the shadow of a reason, why such
topics should be almost, if not altogether, over
looked, in the writings and the discourses of
those who profess to instruct mankind in the
knowledge of God, and the duties of his worship.
We are informed by our Saviour himself, that
" this is life eternal, to know thee ihe living and
true God," as well as " Jesus Christ whom he
hath sent." The knowledge of God, in the
sense here intended, must include in it the know
ledge of the natural and essential attributes of
the Deity, or those properties of his nature by
which he is distinguished from all " the idols of
the nations." Such are, his Self-existence, his
All-perfect knowledge, his Omnipresence, his
Infinite Wisdom, his Boundless Goodness, and
Almighty Power — attributes, which, as we have
just now seen, lie at the foundation of all the
other characters and relations of Deity revealed
in the Scriptures. The acquisition of just and
comprehensive conceptions of these perfections,
must, therefore, lie at the foundation of all pro
found veneration of the Divine Being, and of
all that is valuable in religion. Destitute of
such conceptions, we can neither feel that habi
tual humility, and that reverence of the majesty
of Jehovah, which his essential glory is calculat
ed to inspire, nor pay him that tribute of adora
tion and gratitude which is due to his name.
Devoid of such views, we cannot exercise that
cordial acquiescence in the plan of his redemption,
in the arrangements of his providence, and in
the requirements of his law, which the Scriptures
enjoin. Yet, how often do we find persons who
pretend to speculate about the mysteries of the
Gospel, displaying — by their flippancy of speech
respecting the eternal counsels of the Majesty of
Heaven — by their dogmatical assertions respect
ing the Divine character, and the dispensations
of providence — and by their pertinacious opi
nions respecting the laws by which God must
regulate his own actions — that they have never
felt impressive emotions of the grandeur of that
Being, whose" operations are unsearchable, and
his ways past finding out?" Though they do not
call in question his immensity and power, his
wisdom and goodness, as so many abstract pro-
perties of his nature, yet the unbecoming fami
liarity with which they approach this august Be
ing, and talk about him, shows that thev have

.6

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

never associated in their minds, the stupendous
displays which have been given of these perfec
tions, in the works of his hands ; and that their
religion (if it may be so called) consists merely
in a farrago of abstract opinions, or in an empty
name.

If, then, it be admitted, that it is essentially
requisite, as the foundation of religion, to have
the mind deeply impressed with a clear and com
prehensive view of the natural perfections of the
Deity, it will follow, that the ministers of reli
gion, arid all others whose province it is to com
municate religious instruction, ought frequently
to dwell, with particularity, on those proofs and
illustrations with tend to convey the most defi
nite and impressive conceptions of the glory of
that Being whom we profess to adore. But from
what sources are such illustrations to be deriv
ed? Is it from abstract reasonings and metaphy
sical distinctions and definitions, or from a survey
of those objects and movements which lie open
to the inspection of every observer? There
can be no difficulty in coming to a decision on
this point. We might affirm, with the school
men, that " God is a Being whose centre is every
where, and his circumference no where ;" that
" he comprehends infinite duration in every mo
ment;" and that" infinite space may be consi
dered as the sensorium of the Godhead ;" but such
fanciful illustrations, when strictly analyzed, will
be found to consist merely of words without
ideas. We might also affirm with truth, that
God is a Being of infinite perfection, glory, and
blessedness — that he is without all bounds or
limits either actual or possible — that he is possess
ed of power sufficient to perform all things which
do not imply a contradiction — that he is independ
ent and self-sufficient — that his wisdom is un
erring, and that he infinitely exceeds all other
beings. But these, and other expressions of a
similar kind, are mere technical terms, which
convey no adequate, nor even tolerable, notion
of what they import. Beings, constituted like
man, whose rational spirits are connected with
an organical structure, and who derive all their
knowledge through the medium of corporeal
organs, can derive their clearest and most affect
ing notions of the Divinity, chiefly through the
same medium, namely, by contemplating the
effects of his perfections, as displayed through
the ample range of the visible creation. And
to this source of illustration, the inspired writers
uniformly direct our views — " Lift up your eyes
on high, and behold ! who hath created these
orbs? who bringeth forth their host by number,
and caileth them all by their names? The ever
lasting God, the Lord, by the greatness of his
might, for that he is strong in power." — "~Ie
hath made the earth by his power ; he hath
established the world by his wisdom ; he hath
stretched out the heavens by his understanding."
These writers do not perplex our minds by a mul

titude of technical terms and subtle reasoning«
but lead us directly to the source whence our
most ample conceptions of Deity are to be deriv
ed, that, from a steady and enlightened contem
plation of the effects, we may learn the great
ness of the Cause ; and their example, in this
respect, ought, doubtless, to be a pattern for
evey religious instructer.

SECTION II.
Illustrations of the Omnipotence of the DEITT.

IN order to elucidate more distinctly what has
been now stated, I shall select a few illustrations
of some of the natural attributes of the Deity.
And, in the first place, I shall offer a few consi
derations which have a tendency to direct and to
amplify our conceptions of Divine Power.

Omnipotence is that attribute of the Divine
Being, by which he can accomplish every thing
that does not imply a contradiction — however far it
may transcend the comprehension of finite minds.
By his power the vast system of universal natur«
was called from nothing into existence, and ii
continually supported, in all its movements, from
age to age. In elucidating this perfection of
God, we might derive some striking illustrations
from the records of his dispensations towards
man, in the early ages of the world — when he
overwhelmed the earth with the deluge, which
covered the tops of the highest mountains, and
swept the crowded population of the ancient
world into a watery grave — when he demolished
Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around
them, with fire from heaven — when he slew all
the first-born of Egypt, and turned their rivers
into blood — when he divided the Red Sea and
Ihe waters of Jordan before the tribes of Israel
— when he made the earth to open its jaws and
swallow up Korah and all his company — and
when he caused Mount Sinai to smoke and trem
ble at his presence. But these and similar events,
however awful, astonishing, and worthy of re
membrance, were only transitory exertions of
Divine Power, and are not calculated, and were
never intended, to impress the mind in so power
ful a manner as those displays of Omnipotence
which are exhibited in the ordinary movements
of the material universe. We have no hesita
tion in asserting, that, with regard to this attri
bute of the Divinity, there is a more grand and
impressive display in the works of Nature, than
in all the events recorded in the Sacred History.
Nor ought this remark to be considered as throw-
ing the least reflection on the fulness and suf
ficiency of the Scripture revelation ; for that re
velation, as having a special reference to a moral
economy, has for its object to give a more parti
cular display of the mvral than of the natural per*

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

U

factions of God. The miracles to which we have
now referred, and every other supernatural fact
recorded in the Bible, were not intended so much
to display the plenitude of the power of Deity,
as to bear testimony to the Divine mission of
particular messengers, and to confirm the truths
they declared. It was not, for example, merely
to display the energies of Almighty power, that
the waters of the Red Sea were dried up before
the thousands of Israel, but to give a solemn and
•triking attestation to all concerned, that the Most
High God had taken this people under his peculiar
protection — that he had appointed Moses as their
leader and legislator — and that they were bound
to receive and obey the statutes he delivered.
The most appropriate and impressive illustra
tions of Omnipotence, are those which are taken
from the permanent operations of Deity, which
are visible every moment in the universe around
us; or, in other words, those which are derived
from a detail of the facts which have been observ
ed in the material world, respecting magnitude
and motion.

In the first place the immense quantity of mat
ter contained in the universe, presents a most
striking display of Almighty power.

In endeavouring to form a definite notion on
this subject, the mind is bewildered in its con
ceptions, and is at a loss where to begin or to
end its excursions. In order to form something
approximating to a well-defined idea, we must
pursue a train of thought commencing with those
magnitudes which the mind can easily grasp, pro
ceeding through all the intermediate gradations
of magnitude, and fixing the attention on every
portion of the chain, till we arrive at the object
or magnitude of which we wish to form a con
ception. We must endeavour, in the first place,
to form a conception of the bulk of the world
in which we dwell, which, though only a point
in comparison of the whole material universe, is
in reality a most astonishing magnitude, which
the mind cannot grasp, without a laborious effort.
We can form some definite idea of those protu-
berate masses we denominate hills, which arise
above the surface of our plains ; but were we
transported to the mountainous scenery of Swit
zerland, to the stupendous range of the Andes in
South America, or to the Himmalayan moun
tains in India, where masses of earth and rocks,
in every variety of shape, extend several hun
dreds of miles in different directions, and rear
their projecting summits beyond the region of
the clouds — we should find some difficulty in
forming an adequate conception of the objects of
our contemplation. For, (to use the words of
one who had been a spectator of such scenes,)
•''Amidst those trackless regions of intense si-
fence and solitude, we cannot contemplate, but
with feelings of awe and admiration, the enor-
pious masses of variegated matter which lie
around, beneath, and above us. The mind la

bours, as it were, to form a definite idea of those
objects of oppressive grandeur, and feels unable to
grasp the august objects which compose the sin*
rounding scene." But what are all these mou&-
tainous masses, however variegated and sublime,
when compared with the bulk of the whole
earth ? Were they hurled from their bases, ana
precipitated into the vast Pacific Ocean, they
would all disappear in a moment, except perhaps
a few projecting tops, which, like a number of
small islands, might be seen rising a few fathoms
above the surface of the waters.

The earth is a globe whose diameter is nearly
8,000 miles, and its circumference about 25,000,
and, consequently, its surface contains nearly two
hundred millions of square miles — a magnitude
too great for the mind to take in at one. concep
tion. In order to form a tolerable conception of
the whole, we must endeavour to take a leisurely
survey of its different parts. Were we to take
our station on the top of a mountain, of a mode
rate size, and survey the surrounding landscape,
we, should perceive an extent of view stretch
ing 40 miles in every direction, forming a circle
80 miles in diameter, and 250 in circumference
and comprehending an area of 5,000 square
miles. In such a situation the terrestrial scene
, around and beneath us — consisting of hills and
plains, towns and villages, rivers and lakes —
would form one of the largest objects which the
eye, and even the imagination, can steadily
grasp at one time. But such an object, grand and
extensive as it is, forms no more than the forty-
thousandth part of the terraqueous globe ; so that
before we can acquire an adequate conception of
the magnitude of our own world, we must con
ceive 40,000 landscapes of a similar extent, to
pass in review before us : and were a scene, of
the magnitude now stated, to pass before us every
hour, till all the diversified scenery of the earth
were brought under our view, and were 12 hours
a day allotted for the observation, it would re
quire 9 years and 48 days before the whole sur
face of the globe could be contemplated, even in
this general and rapid manner. But, such a
variety of successive landscapes passing before
the eye, even although it were possible to be real
ized, would convey only a very vague and im
perfect conception of the scenery of our world ;
for objects at the distance of 40 miles cannot be
distinctly perceived ; the only view which would
be satisfactory would be, that which is compre
hended within the range of 3 or 4 miles from the
spectator.

Again, I have already stated, that the surface
of the earth contains nearly 200,000,000 of square
miles. Now, were a person to set out on a minute
survey of the terraqueous globe, and to travel till
he passed along every square mile on its surface,
and to continue his route without intermission,
at the rate of 30 miles every day, it would require
18,264 years before he could finish his tour, and

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

complete tho survey of "this huge rotundity on
which we tread :" so that, had he commenced his
excursion on the day in which Adam was creat
ed, and continued it to the present hour, he would
not have accomplished one third part of this vast
tour.

In estimating the size and extent of the earth,
we ought also to take into consideration the vast
variety of objects with which it is diversified,
and the numerous animated beings with which
it is stored ; the great divisions of land and
water, the continents, seas, and islands into
which it is distributed : the lofty ranges of moun
tains which rear their heads to the clouds ; the
unfathomed abysses of the ocean ; its vast subter
raneous caverns and burning mountains; and the
lakes, riverSj and stately forests with which it is
so magnificently adorned ; — the many millions of
animals, of every size and form, from the ele
phant to the mite, which traverse its surface ;
the numerous tribes of fishes, from the enormous
whale to the diminutive shrimp, which " play"
in the mighty ocean ; the aerial tribes which sport
in the regions above us, and the vast mass of the
surrounding atmosphere, which encloses the earth
and all its inhabitants as " with a swaddling
band." The immense variety of beings with
which our terrestrial habitation is furnished, con
spires with every other consideration, to exalt our
conceptions to that power by which our globe, and
all that it contains, were brought into exigence.

The preceding illustrations, however, exhibit
the vast extent of the earth, considered only as a
mere superficies. But we know that the earth is a
solid globe, whose specific gravity is nearly five
times denser than water, or about twice as dense
as the mass of earth and rocks which compose its
surface. Though we cannot dig into its bowels
beyond a mile in perpendicular depth, to explore
its hidden wonders, yet we may easily conceive
what a vast and indescribable mass of matter
must be contained between the two opposite por
tions of its external circumference, reaching 8000
miles in every direction. The solid contents of
this ponderous ball is no less than 263,858,149,-
'120 cubical miles — amass of material substance
of which we can form but a very faint and im
perfect conception — in proportion to which all the
loftv mountains which rise above its surface are
less than a few grains of sand, when compared
with the largest artificial globe. Were the earth
a hollow sphere surrounded merely with an ex
ternal shell of earth and water, 10 miles thick, its
internal cavity would be sufficient to contain a
quantity of materials one hundred and thirty-three
times greater than the whole mass of continents,
islands and oceans, on its surface, and the foun
dations on which they are supported. We have
(he strongest reasons, however, to conclude,
that the earth, in its general structure, is one
solid mass, from the surface to the centre, ex
cepting, perhaps, a few caverns scattered here

and there amidst its subterraneous recesses : and
that its density gradually increases from its sur
face to its central regions. What an enormous
mass of materials, then, is comprehended within
the limits of the globe on which we tread ! The
mind labours, as it were, to comprehend the
mighty idea, and after all its exertion, feels it
self unable to take in such an astonishing mag
nitude at one comprehensive grasp. Ho'.v great
must be the power of that Being who com
manded it to spring from nothing into existence,
who " measureth the ocean in the hollow of his
hand, who weigheth the mountains in scales, and
hangeth the earth upon nothing !"

It is essentially requisite, before proceeding to
the survey of objects and magnitudes of a supe
rior order, that we should endeavour, by such a
train of thought as the preceding, to form some
tolerable and clear conception of the bulk of the
globe we inhabit; for it- is the only body we can
use as a standard of comparison to guide the
mind in its conceptions, when it roams abroad
to other regions of material existence. And,
from what has been now stated, it appears, that
we have no adequate conception of a magnitude
of so vast an extent; or, at least, that the mind
cannot, in any one instant, form to itself a dis
tinct and comprehensive idea of it, in any
measure corresponding to the reality.

Hitherto, then, we have fixed only on a de
terminate magnitude — on a scale of a few inches,
as it were, in order to assist us in our measure
ment and conception of magnitudes still more
august and astonishing. When we contem
plate, by the light of science, those magnificent
globes which float around us, in the concave of
the sky, the earth with all its sublime scenery,
stupendous as it is, dwindles into an inconsi
derable ball. If we pass from our globe to some
of the other bodies of the planetary system, wo
shall find that one of these stupendous orbs is
more than 900 times the size of our world, and
encircled with a ring 200,000 miles in diame
ter, which would nearly reach from the earth
to the moon, and would enclose within its vast
circumference several hundreds of worlds as
large as ours. Another of these planetary bodies,
which appears to the vulgar eye only as a bril
liant speck on the vault of heaven, is found to
be of such a size, that it would require 1,400
globes of the bulk of the earth to form one equal
to it in dimensions. The whole of the bodies
which compose the solar system, (without tak
ing the sun and the comets into account,) con
tain a mass of matter 2,500 times greater than
that of the earth. The sun himself is 520 times
larger than all the planetary globes taken to
gether; and one million three hundred thousand
times larger than the terraqueous globe. This
is one of the most glorious and magnificent
visible objects, which either the eye or the ima
gination can contemplate ; especially when we

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

19

.onsider, what perpetual and incomprehensible
<nd powerful influence he exerts, what warmth
and beauty and activity he diffuses, not only
on the globe we inhabit, but over the more ex
tensive regions of surrounding worlds. His
energy extends to the utmost limits of the pla
netary system — to the planet Herschel, which
revolves at the distance of 1,800 millions of
miles from his surface, and there he dispenses
light, and colour, and comfort, to all the beings
connected with that tar-distant orb, and to all the
moons wh'ch roll around it.

Hero the imagination begins to be overpower
ed and bewildered in its conceptions of magni
tude, when it has advanced scarcely a single step
in its excursions through the material world :
For it is highly probable that all the matter
contained within the limits of the solar system,
incomprehensible as its magnitude appears, bears
a smaller proportion to the whole mass of the
material universe, than a single grain of sand
to all the particles of matter contained in the
body of the sun and his attending planets.

If we extend our views from the solar system
to the starry heavens, we have to penetrate, in
our imagination, a space which the swiftest ball
that was ever projected, though in perpetual mo
tion, would not traverse in ten hundred thousand
years. In those trackless regions of immensity,
we behold an assemblage of resplendent globes,
similar to the sun in size and in glory, and,
doubtless, accompanied with a retinue of worlds,
revolving, like our own, around their attractive
influence. The immense distance at which the
nearest stars are known to be placed, proves
that they are bodies of a prodigious size, not
inferior to our sun, and that they shine, not bv
reflected rays, but by their own native light. But
bodies encircled with such refulgent splendour
would be of little use in the economy of Jeho
vah's empire, unless surrounding worlds were
cheered by their benign influence, and enlight
ened by their beams. Every star is, therefore,
with good reason, concluded to be a sun, no less
spacious than ours, surrounded by a host of
planetary globes, which revolve around it as a
centre, and derive from it light, and heat, and
comfort. Nearly a thousand of these 'umina-
ries may be seen in a clear winter nigh', b, the
naked eye ; so that a mass of matter equal to
a thousand solar systems, or to thirteen hun
dred and twenty millions of globes of the size
of the earth, rnav be perceived, by every com
mon observer, in the canopy of heaven. But
all the celestial orbs which are perceived by
the unassisted sight, do not form the eighty-
thousandth part of those which may be descried
by the help of optical instruments. The tele
scope has enabled us to descry, in certain spaces
of the heavens, thousands of stars where the naked
*tye could scarcely discern twenty. The late
eeleb-ated astronomer, Dr. Herschel, has in-
34

formed us, that, in the most crowded parts <ifthe
Milky-way, when exploring that region with his
best glasses, he has had fields of view which
contained no less than 588 stars, and these were
continued for many minutes: so that" in one
quarter of an hour's time there passed no less
than one hundred and sixteen thousand start
through the field of view of his telescope."

It has been computed, that nearly one hundred
millions of stars might be perceived by the mosf
perfect instruments, were all the regions of tha
sky thoroughly explored. And yet, all this, vast
assemblage of suns and worlds, \\hen compared
with what lies beyond the utmost boundaries of
human vision, in the immeasurable spaces of
creation, may be no more than as the smallest
particle of vapour to the immense ocean. Immea
surable regions of space lie beyond the utmost
limits of mortal view, into which even imagina
tion itself can scarcely penetrate, and which are,
doubtless, replenished with the operations of Di
vine Wisdom and Omnipotence. For, it cannot
be supposed, that a being so diminutive as man,
whose stature scarcely exceeds six feet — who
vanishes from the sight at the distance of a
league — whose whole habitation is invisible from
the nearest star — whose powers of vision are so
imperfect, and whose mental faculties are so limit-
ted — it cannot be supposed that man, who " dwells
in tabernacles of clay, who is crushed before the
moth," and chained down, by the force of gra
vitation, to the surface of a small planet, — should
be able to descry the utmost boundaries of the
empire of Him who fills immensity, and dwells in
" light unapproachable." That portion of his
dominions, however which lies within the range
of our view, presents such a scene of magni
ficence and grandeur, as must fill the mind of
every reflecting person with astonishment and
reverence, and constrain him to exclaim, " Great
is our Lord, and of great power, his under
standing is infinite." — " When I consider the
heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and
the stars which thou hast ordained — what is
man that thou art mindful of him !" — ;( I have
heard of thee by hearing of the ear ;" I have
listened to subtle disquisitions on thy character
and perfections and have beer, but little affect
ed, " but now Vie eye seeth thee ; wherefore
I humble myseh, and repent in dust and ashes."

In order to feel the full force of the impression
made by such contemplations, the mini must
pause at every step, in its excursions through
the boundless regions of material existence : for
it is not by a mere attention to the figures and
numbers by which the magnitudes of the great
bodies of the universe are expressed, thit we
arrive at the most distinct and ample concep
tions of objects so grand and overwhelming.
The mind, in its intellectual range, must dwell
on every individual scene it contemplates, and
on the various objects of which it is composed,

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

It must add scene to scene, magnitude to
magnitude, and compare smaller objects with
greater — a range of mountains with the whole
earth, the earth with the planet Jupiter, Jupiter
with the sun, the sun with a thousand stars, a
thousand stars with 80 millions, and 80 millions
with all the boundless extent which lies beyond
the limits of mortal vision ; and, at every step
of this mental process, sufficient time must be
allowed for the imagination to expatiate on the
objects before it, till the ideas approximate, as
near as possible, to the reality. In order to
form a comprehensive conception of the extent
of the terraqueous globe, the rnind must dwell on
an extensive landscape, and the objects with
which it is adorned ; it must endeavour to sur
vey the many thousands of diversified land
scapes which the earth exhibits — the hills and
plains, the lakes and rivers and mountains,
which stretch in endless variety over its surface
— it must dive into the vast caverns of the
ocean — penetrate into the subterraneous regions
of the globe, and wing its way amidst clouds
and tempests, through the surrounding atmos
phere. It must next extend its flight through
the most expansive regions of the solar system,
realizing, in imagination, those magnificent
scenes which can be described neither by the
nakod eye nor by the telescope, and comparing
the extent of our sublunary world with the more
magnificent globes that roll around us. Leav
ing the sun and all his attendant planets behind,
till they have diminished to the size of a small
twinkling star, it must next wing its way to the
starry regions, and pass from one system of
worlds to another, from one Nebulae* to another,
from one region of Nebulae to another, till it ar
rive at the utmost boundaries of creation which
human genius has explored. It must also en
deavor to extend its flight beyond all that is
visible by the best telescopes, and expatiate at
large in that boundless expanse into which no
human eye has yet penetrated, and which is,
doubtless, replenished with other worlds, and
systems, and firmaments, where the operations
of infinite power and beneficence are displayed
in endless variety, throughout the illimitable
regions of space.

Here, then, with reverence, let us pause, and
wonder ! Over all this vast assemblage of material
existence, God presides. Amidst the diversified
objects and intelligences it contains, he is eter
nally and essentially present. By his unerring
wisdom, all its complicated movements are di
rected. By his Almighty fiat, it emerged from
nothing into existence, and is continually sup
ported from age to age. " HE SPAKE AND IT

WAS DONE ; HE COMMANDED AND IT STOOD

PAST. " — " By the word of the Lord were the

• For an account of the Nebula, see Ch. II. Art.
tstronomy.

heavens made, and all the host of them by the spirit
of his mouth." What an astonishing display of
Divine power is here exhibited to our view ! How
far transcending all finite comprehension must bo
the energies of Him who only '; ...pake and it
was done ;" who only gave the command, and
this mighty system of the universe, with all its
magnificence, started into being ! The infinite
ease with which this vast fabric was reared, leads
us irresistibly to conclude, that there are powers
and energies in the Divine mind which have
never yet been exerted, and which may unfold
themselves to intelligent beings, in the production
of still more astonishing and magnificent effects,
during an endless succession ofexister.ee. That
man who is not impressed with a venerable and
overwhelming sense of the power and majesty
of Jehovah, by such contemplations, must have
a mind incapable of ardent religious emotions,
and unqualified for appreciating the grandeur of
that Being " whose kingdom ruleth over all."
And shall such ennobling views be completely
withheld from a Christian audience ? Shall it
be considered as a matter of mere indifference,
whether their views of the Creator's works bo
limited to the sphere of a few miles around them,
or extended to ten thousand worlds '.' — whether
they shall be left to view the operations of the
Almighty throughout eternity past and to come,
as confined to a small globe placed in the immen
sity of spac*:, with a number of brilliant studs fixed
in the arch of heaven, at a few miles distance ; or
as extending through the boundless dimensions <>i
space? — whether they shall be left to entertain
no higher idea of the Divine majesty than what
may be due to one of the superior orders of
the seraphim or cherubim, — or whether they
shall be directed to form the most august concep
tions of the King eternal, immortal, and invisible,
corresponding to the displays he has given of his
glory in his visible works ? If it be not, both
reason and piety require, that such illustrations
of the Divine perfections should occasionallv bo
exhibited to their view.

In the next place, the rapid motions of the
great bodies of the universe, no less than t heir mag
nitudes, display the Infinite Power of the Creator.

We can acquire accurate ideas of the relative
velocities of moving bodies, only by comparing
the motions with which we are familiar, with
one another, and with those which lie bevonn
the general range of our minute inspection. W«
can acquire a pretty accurate conception of ihe
velocity of a ship impelled by the wind — of a
steamboat — of a race-hoi se — of a bird darting
through the air — of an arrow flying from a bow
— and of the clouds when impelled by a stormy
wind. The velocity of a ship is from 8 to 12
miles an hour — of a race-horse, from 20 to SO
miles — of a bird, say from 50 to 60 miles, and of
the clouds, in a violent hurricane, from 80 to 10G
miles an hour. The motion of a ball from •

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

tuaded cannon is incomparably swifter then any
of tho motions now stated ; but of the velocity of
such a body we have a less accurate idea ; be
cause, its rapidity being so great, we cannot
trace it distinctly by the eye thiough its whole
range, from the mouth of the cannon to the object
against which it is impelled. By experiments,
it has been found, that its rate of motion is from
480 to 800 miles in an hour, but it is retarded
every moment, by the resistance of the air and
the attraction of the earth. This velocity,
however, great as it. is, bears no sensible propor
tion to the rate of motion which is found among
the celestial orbs. That such enormous masses
of matter should move at all, is wonderful ; but
when we consider the amazing velocity with
which they are impelled, we are lost in astonish
ment. The planet Jupiter, in describing his
circuit round the sun, moves at the rate of 29,000
miles an hour. The planet Venus, one of the
nearest and most brilliant of the celestial bodies,
and about the same size as the earth, is found to
move through the spaces of the firmament at
the rate of 76,000 miles an hour, and the planet
Mercury with a velocity of no less than 150,000
miles an hour, or 1750 miles in a minute — a
motion two hundred times swifter than that of a
cannon ball.

These velocities will appear still more asto
nishing, if we consider the magnitude of the
bodies which are thus impelled, and the immense
forces which are requisite to carry them along
in their courses. However rapidly a ball flies
from the mouth of a cannon, it is the flight of a
body only a few inches in diameter ; but one of
the bodies, whose motion has been just now
stated, is eighty-nine thousand miles in dia
meter, and would comprehend, within its vast
circumference, more than a thousand globes as
large as the earth. Could we contemplate such
motions, from a fixed point, at the distance of
only a few hundreds of miles from the bodies
thus impelled — it would raise our admiration to
its highest pitch, it would overwhelm all our
faculties, and, in our present state, would pro
duce an impression of awe, and even of terror,
beyond the power of language to express. The
earth contains a mass of matter equal in weight
to at least 2,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 tons,
supposing its mean density to be only about 2£
times greater than water. To move this pon
derous mass a single inch beyond its position,
were it fixed in a quiescent state, would require
a mechanical force almost beyond the power of
numbers to express. The physical force of all
the myriads of intelligences within the bounds
of tha planetary system, though their powers
were far superior to those of men, would be
altogether inadequate to the production of such
a motion. How much more must be the force
requisite to impel it with a velocity one hundred
and forty times swifter than a cannon ball, or

68,000 miles an hour, the actual rate of ita
motion, in its course Bound the sun ! But what
ever degree of mechanical power would be re
quisite to produce such a stupendous effect, it
would require a force one hundred and fifty times
greater to impel the planet Jupiter, in his actual
course through the heavens ! Even the planet
Saturn, one of the slowest, moving bodies of our
system, a globe 900 times larger than the earth,
is impelled through the regions of space at the
rate of 22,000 miles an hour, carrying along
with him two stupendous rings, and seven moons
larger than ours, through his whole course round
the central luminary. Were we placed within
a thousand miles of this stupendous globe, (a
station which superior beings may occasionally
occupy,) where its hemisphere, encompassed by
its magnificent rings, would fill the whole extent
of our vision — the view of such a ponderous
and glorious object, flying with such amazing
velocity before us, would infinitely exceed every
idea of grandeur we can derive from terrestrial
scenes, and overwhelm our powers with asto
nishment and awe. Under such an emotion, we
could only exclaim, "GREAT AND MARVELLOUS

ARE THY WORKS, LORD GoD ALMIGHTY 1"

The ideas of strength and power implied in
the impulsion of such enormous aiasses of
matter through the illimitable tracts of space,
are forced upon the mind with irresistible energy,
far surpassing what any abstract propositions
or reasonings can convey ; and constrain us to
exclaim, " Who is a strong Lord like unto
thee ! Thy right hand is become glorious in
power ! .the Lord God omnipotent reigneth !"

If we consider the immense number of bodies
thus impelled through the vast spaces of the uni
verse — the rapidity with which the comets, when
near the sun, are carried through the regions they
traverse, — if we consider the high probability, if
not absolute certainty, that the sun, with all his
attendant planets and comets, is impelled with a
still greater degree of velocity towards some dis
tant region of space, or around some wide cir
cumference — that all the thousands of systems of
that nebulae to which the sun belongs, are mov
ing in a similar manner — that all the nebulae in
the heavens are moving around some magnificent
central body — in short, that all the suns and
worlds in the universe are in rapid and perpetual
motion, as constituent portions of one grand and
boundless empire, of which Jehovah is the So
vereign — and, if we consider still further, that all
these mighty movements have been going on,
without intermission, during the course of many
centuries, and some of them, perhaps, for my
riads of ages before the foundations of our world
were laid— it is impossible for the human mind 'to
form any adequate idea of the stupendous forces
which are in incessant operation thoughout the
unlimited empire of the Almighty. To estimate
such mechanical force eren in a single instance,

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

completely baffles the mathematician's skill, and
sets the power of numbers at defiance. " Lan
guage," and figures, and comparisons, are " lost
in wonders so sublime," and the mind, over
powered with such reflections, is irresistibly led
upwards, to search for the cause in that OMNI
POTENT BEING who upholds the pillars of the
universe — the thunder of whose power none can
comprehend. While contemplating such august
objects, how emphatic and impressive appears
the language of the sacred oracles, " Canst thou
by searching find out God ? Canst thou find out
the Almighty to perfection ? Great things doth
he, which we cannot comprehend. Thine, O
Lord, is the greatness, and the glory, and the
majesty ; for all that is in heaven and earth is
thine. Among the gods there is none like unto
thee, O Lord, neither are there any works like
unto thy works. Thou art great, and dost won
drous things ; thou art God alone. Hast thou
not known, hast thou not heard, that the ever
lasting God, the Lord, the Creator of all things,
fainteth not, neither is weary ? there is no search
ing of his understanding. Let all the earth fear
the Lord, let all the inhabitants of the world
stand in awe of him ; for, he spake, and it was
done; he commanded, and it stood fast."

Again, the immense spaces which surround the
heavenly bodies, and in which they perform their
revolutions, tend to expand our conceptions on
this subject, and to illustrate the magnificence of
the Divine operations. In whatever point of
view we contemplate the scenery of the heavens,
an idea of grandeur irresistibly bursts upon the
mind ; and, if empty space can, in any sense,
be considered as an object of sublimity, nothing
can fill the mind with a grander idea of magni
tude and extension, than the amplitude of the
scale on which planetary systems are construct
ed. Around the body of the sun there is allot
ted a cubical space, 3,600 millions of miles in
diameter, in which eleven planetary globes re
volve — every one being separated from another,
by intervals of many millions of miles. The space
which surrounds the utmost limits of our system,
extending in every direction, to the nearest fixed
stars, is, at least, 40,000,000,000 ,000 miles in
diameter ; and, it is highly probable, that every
star is surrounded by a space of equal, or even
of greater extent. A body impelled with the
greatest velocity which art can produce, a can
non ball, for instance would require twenty years
to pass through the space that intervenes between
the earth and the sun, and four millions, seven
hundred thousand years, ere it could reach the
nearest star. Though the stars seem to be
crowded together in clusters, and some of them
almost to touch one another, yet the distance be-
*ween any two stars which seem to make the
nearest approach, is such as neither words can
express, nor imagination fathom. These im
mense spaces are as unfathomable on the one

hand, as the magnitude of the bodies which
move in them, and their prodigious velocities, are
incomprehensible on the other ; and they form a
part of those magnificent proportions according
to which the fabric of universal nature was ar
ranged — all corresponding to the majesty of that
infinite and incomprehensible Being, " who
measures the ocean in the hollow of his hand, and
meteth out the heavens with a span." How
wonderful that bodies at such prodigious distances
should exert a mutual influence on one another .*
that the moon at the distance of 240.CCO miles
should raise tides in the ocean, and currents in
the atmosphere ! that the sun, at the distance of
ninety-five millions of miles, should raise the va
pours, move the ocean, direct the course of the
winds, fructify the earth, and distribute light, and
heat, and colour, through every region of the globe ;
yea, that his attractive influence, and fructifying
energy, should extend even to the planet Her-
schel, at the distance of eighteen hundred millions
of miles ! So that, in every point of view in
which the universe is contemplated, we perceive
the same grand scale of operation by which the
Almighty has arranged the provinces of his uni
versal kingdom.

We would now ask, in the name of all that is
sacred, whether such magnificent manifestations
of Deity ought to be considered as irrelevant in
the business of religion, and whether they ought
to be thrown completely into the shade, in the
discussions which take place in religious topics,
in " the assemblies of the saints ?" If religion
consists in the intellectual apprehension of the
perfections of God, and in the moral effects pro
duced by such an apprehension — if all the rays
of glory emitted by the luminaries of heaven, ai^
only so many reflections of the grandeur of Him
who dwells in light unapproachable — if they have
a tendency to assist the mind in forming its con
ceptions of that ineffable Being, whose uncreat
ed glory cannot be directly contemplated— and if
they are calculated to produce a sublime and
awful impression on al' created intelligences. —
shall we rest contented with a less glorious idea
of God than his works are calculated to afford ?
Shall we disregard the works of the Lord, and
contemn " the operations of his hands," and
that, too, in the face of all the invitations on ihis
subject, addressed to us from heaven ? For thus
saith Jehovah : " Lift up your eyes on high, and
behold, who hath created these things, "who
bringeth forth their host by number. I, the Lord,
who maketh all things, who stretcheth forih the
heavens alone, and spread abroad the earth by him*
self ; all their host have I commanded." And, if,
at the command of God, we lift up our eyes to
the " firmament of his power," surely we ought
to do it, not with a brute, unconscious gaze," not
with the vacant stare of a savage, not as if w«
were still enveloped with the mists and prejudices
of the dark ages — but as surrounded by that 1>1»7»

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

rf light which modern science has thrown upon
the scenery of the sky, in order that we may con
template, with fixed attention, all that enlighten
ed reason, aided by the nicest observations, has
ascertained respecting the magnificence of the
Celestial orbs. To overlook the sublime disco
veries of modern times, to despise them, or to
call in question their reality, as some religionists
have done, because they bring to our ears such
astonishing reports of the " eternal power" and
majesty of Jehovah— is to act as if we were afraid
lest the Deity should be represented as more
grand and magnificent than he really is, and as if
we would be better pleased to pay him a less share
of homage and adoration than is due to his name.
Perhaps some may be disposed to insinuate,
that the views now stated are above the level
of ordinary comprehension, and founded too
much on scientific considerations, to be stated
in detail to a common audience. To any in
sinuations of this kind, it may be replied, that
such illustrations as those to which we have re-
ferred, are more easily comprehended than many
of those abstract discussions to which they are
frequently accustomed; since they are definite
and tangible, being derived from those objects
which strike the senses and the imagination.
Any person of common understanding may be
made to comprehend the leading ideas of extend
ed space, magnitude, and motion, which have
been stated above, provided the descriptions be
Bufficiently simple, clear, and well-defined ; and
should they be at a loss to comprehend the prin
ciples on which the conclusions rest, or the mode
by which the magnificence of the works of God
has been ascertained, an occasional reference
to such topics would excite them to inquiry and
investigation, and to the exercise of their powers
of observation and reasoning on such subjects —
which are too frequently directed to far less impor
tant objects. The following illustration, however,
stands clear of every objection of this kind, and
is level to the comprehension of every man of
common sense : Either the earth moves round
its axis once in twenty-four hours — or, the sun,
moon, planets, comets, stars, and the whole frame
of the universe move 'round the earth, in the
same time. There is no alternative, or third
opinion, that can be formed on this point. If
the earth revolve on its axis every 24 hours, to
produce the alternate succession of day and night,
the portions of its surface about the equator must
move at a rate of more than a thousand miles an
hour, since the earth is more than twenty-four
thousand miles in circumference. This view
of the fact, when attentively considered, fur
nishes a most sublime and astonishing idea.
That a globe of so vast dimensions, with all its
load of mountains, continents, and oceans, com
prising within its circumference a mass of two
hundred and sixty-four thousand million of cubi
cal miles, should whirl around with so amazing

velocity, gives us a most august and impressive
conception of the greatness of that Power which
first set it in motion, and continues the rapid
whirl from age to age ! Though the huge masses
of the Alpine mountains were in a moment
detached frofh their foundations, carried aloft
through the regions of the air, and tossed into the
Mediterranean sea, it would comey no idea of
a force equal to that which is every moment ex
erted, if the earth revolve on its axis. But
should the motion of our earth be called in ques
tion, or denied, the idea of force, or power, wil.
be indefinitely increased. For, in this case, it
must necessarily be admitted, that the heavens,
with all the innumerable host of stars, have a
diurnal motion around the globe ; which motion
must be inconceivably more rapid than that of
the earth, on the supposition of its motion.
For, in proportion as the celestial bodies are
distant from the earth, in the same proportion
would be the rapidity of their movements. The
sun, on this supposition, would move at the rate
of 414,000 miles in a minute ; the nearest stars,
at the rate of fourteen hundred millions of miles
in a second : and the most distant luminaries,
with a degree of swiftness which no numbers
could express.* Such velocities, too, would be
the rate of motion, not merely of a single globe
like the earth, but of all the ten thousand times
ten thousand spacious globes that exist within
the boundaries of creation. This view conveys
an idea of power still more august and over
whelming than any of the views already stated,
and we dare not presume to assert, that such a
degree of physical force is beyond the limits of
infinite perfection ; but on the supposition it
existed, it would confound all our ideas of the
wisdom and intelligence of the Divine mind, and
would appear altogether inconsistent with the
character which the scripture gives us of the
Deity as " the only wise God." For, it would
exhibit a stupendou > system of means altogether
disproportioned to t ne end intended — namely, to
produce the alternate succession of day and night
to the inhabitants of our globe, which is more
beautifully and harmoniously effected by a simple
rotation on its axis, as is the case with the other
globes which compose the planetary system.
Such considerations, however, show us, that, on
whatever hypothesis, whether on the vulgar or
the scientific, or in whatever other point of view,
the frame of nature may be contemplated, the
mind is irresistibly impressed with ideas of
power, grandeur, and magnificence. And, there
fore, when an inquiring mind is directed to con
template the works of God, on any hypothesis it
may choose, it has a tendency to rouse reflec
tion, and to stimulate the exercise of the moral
and intellectual faculties, on objects which are
worthy of the dignity of immortal minds.

* See Appendix, No. I.

24

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

We may now be, ir. some measure, prepared
to decide, whether illustrations of the omnipo
tence of the Dei'y, derived from the system of
the material world, or those vague and metaphy
sical disquisitions which are generally given in
theological systems, be most calculated to im
press the mind, and to inspire it with reverence
and adoration. The following is a description,
given of this attribute of God, by a well-known
systematic writer, who has generally been consi
dered as a judicious and orthodox divine : —

" God is almighty, Rev. i. 18, chap. iv. 8.
This will evidently appear, in that, if he be infi
nite in all his other perfections, he must be so in
power: thus, if he be omniscient, he knows what
is possible or expedient to be done ; and if he be
an infinite sovereign, he wills whatever shall come
to pass. Now this knowledge would be insigni
ficant, and his power inefficacious, were he not
infinite in power, or almighty. Again, this might
be argued from his justice, either in rewarding or
punishing : for if he were not infinite in power,
he could do neither of these, at least so far as to
render him the object of that desire or fear,
which is agreeable to the nature of these perfec
tions ; neither could infinite faithfulness accom
plish all the promises which he hath made, so as
to excite that trust and dependence which is a
part of religious worship ; nor could he say with
out limitation, as he does, / have spoken it, I
will also bring it to pass ; I have purposed it, I
will also do it ; Isa. xlvi. 11. But since power
is visible in, and demonstrated by its effect, and
infinite power by those effects which cannot be
produced by a creature, we may observe the
almighty power of God in all his works, both of
nature and grace : thus his eternal power is un
derstood, as the apostle says, By the things that
are made, Rom. i.20, not that there was an eter
nal production of things, bu the exerting this
power in time proves it to 1 e infinite and truly
divine ; for no creature can pi oduce the smallest
particle of matter out of noth ng, much less fur
nish the various species of creatures with those
endowments in which they excel one another,
and set forth their Creator's glory. And the
glory of his power is no less visible in the works
of providence, whereby he upholds all things,
disposes of them according to his pleasure, and
brings about events which only he who has an
almighty arm can effect." — Ridgley's Body of
Divinity, p. 39.

This is the whole that Dr. Ridgley judges it
necessary to state, in illustration of the attribute
of Omnipotence, except what he says in relation
to its operation " in the work of grace," in " the
propagation and success of the Gospel," &c.
subjects, to which the idea of power, or physical
energy, does not properly apply. Such, however,
are the meager and abstract disquisitions gene
rally given by most systematic writers. There
is a continual play on the term " infinite," which

to most minds conveys no idea at all, unless i*
be associated with ample conceptions of motion,
magnitude, and extension ; and it is constantly
applied to subjects to which it was never intended
to apply, such as il infinite faithfulness, infinite
justice, infinite truth," &.c. an application of the
term which is never sanctioned by Scripture, and
which has a tendency to introduce confusion into
our conceptions of the perfections of God. Grant
ing that the statements and reasonings in such an
extract as the above were unquestionable, yet
what impression can they make upon the mind ?
Would an ignorant person feel his conceptions of
the Divinity much enlarged, or nis moral powers
aroused, by such vague and general statements ?
And, if not, it appears somewhat unaccountable,
that those sources of illustration, which would
convey the most ample and definite views of ihe
" eternal power" and glory of God, should be
studiously concealed from the view. Vague de
scriptions and general views of any object will
never be effectual in awakening the attention,
and arresting the faculties of the mind. The
heart will always remain unimpressed, and the
understanding will never be thoroughly excited
in its exercise, unless the intellect have presented
before it a well-defined and interesting object,
and be enabled to survey it in its various aspects •
and this object must always have a relation to
the material world, whether it be viewed in con
nexion with religion, or with any other subject.

Thus I have endeavoured, in the preceding
sketches, to present a few detached illustrations
of the omnipotence and grandeur of the Deity,
as displayed in the vast magnitude of the material
universe — the stupendous velocities of the celes
tial bodies — and in the immeasurable regions of
space which surround them, and in which their
motions are performed. Such a magnificent spec
tacle as the fabric of the universe presents — so
majestic, God-like, and overwhelming, to beings
who dwell " in tabernacles of clay" — was surely
never intended to be overlooked, or to be gazed
at with indifference, by creatures endowed with
reason and intelligence, and destined to an im
mortal existence. In forming a universe com
posed of so many immense systems and worlds,
and replenished with such a variety of sensitive
and intelligent existences, the Creator doubtless
intended that it should make a sublime and re
verential impression on the minds of all the intel
lectual beings to whom it might be displayed, and
that it should convey some palpable idea of the
infinite glories of his nature, in so far as material
objects can be supposed to adumbrate the perfec
tions of a spiritual and uncreated Essence. Dwell
ing in " light inaccessible" to mortals, and f»*
ever veiled from the highest created being, b >
the pure spirituality and immensity of his natui

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

ilUwrf. 's no conceivable mode by which the in-
fiwfu grav.deur of Deity Could be exhibited to
fintt* intelligences, but through the medium of
those magnificent operations which are inces
santly going forward throughout the boundless
regions of space. Concealed from the gaze of
all the " principalities and powers" in heaven,
in the unfathomable depths of his Essence, he dis
plays his presence in the universe he has created,
and the glory of his power, by launching magni
ficent worlds into existence, by adorning them
with diversified splendours,by peopling them with
various ranks of intelligent existence, and by im
pelling them in their movements through the illi
mitable tracts of creation.

It will readily be admitted by every enlighten
ed Christian, that it must be a highly desirable
attainment, to acquire the most glorious idea of
the Divine Being which the limited capacity of
our minds is capable of receiving. This is one of
the grand difficulties in religion. The idea of a
Being purely IMMATERIAL, yet pervading in
finite space, and possessed of nosensible qualities,
confounds and bewilders the human intellect, so
that its conceptions, on the one hand, are apt to
verge towards extravagancy, while, on the other,
they are apt to degenerate into something ap
proaching to inanity. Mere abstract ideas and
reasonings respecting infinity, eternity, and abso
lute perfection, however sublime we may con
ceive them to be, completely fail in arresting the
understanding, and affecting the heart; our con
ceptions become vague, empty, and confused, for
want of a material vehicle to give them order, sta
bility, and expansion. Something of the nature of
vast extension, of splendid and variegated objects,
and of mighty movements, is absolutely necessary,
in order to convey to spirits dwelling in bodies of
clay, a definite conception of the invisible glories
of the Eternal Mind ; and, therefore, in the im
mense variety of material existence with which
the universe is adorned, we find every requisite
assistance of this kind to direct and expand our
views of the great object of our adoration. When
the mind is perplexed and overwhelmed with its
conceptions, when it labours, as it were, to form
some well-defined conceptions of an Infinite Be
ing, it here finds some tangible objects on which
to fix, some sensible substratum for its thoughts
to rest upon for a little, while it attempts to pene
trate, in its excursions, into those distant regions
which eye hath not seen, and to connect the whole
of its mental survey with the energies of the
" King, Eternal, Immortal, and Invisible.

To such a train of thought we are uniformly
directed in the sacred oracles, where Jehovah is
represented as describing himself by the effects
which his power and wisdom have produced.
" Israel shall be saved in the Lord with an ever
lasting salvatfc For thus saith Jehovah that
created the heavens ; God himself that formed
the earth and made it ; he hath established it, he

created it not in vain, he furmed it to be inhabit
ed ; I am the Lord, and there is none else." — " 1
have made the earth and created man upon it, my
hands have stretched out the heavens, and all
their host have I commanded." — " Hearken unto
me, O Israel : [ am the first, I also am the last.
Mine hand also hath laid the foundation of the
earth, and my right hand hath spanned the
heavens : when I call unto them, they stand up
together." — " Who hath measured the waters in
the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with
the span, and weighed the mountains in scales?
He who sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and
the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers ; that
stretched out the heavens as a curtain, that faint-
eth not, neither is weary." — " The Lord made
the heavens, the heaven of heavens, with all their
hosts ; honour and majesty are before him, and his
kingdom ruleth over all."* Such sublime descrip
tions of Jehovah, and references to his material
works, are reiterated in every portion of the sa
cred volume ; and the import and sublimity of such
expressions cannot be fully appreciated, unless
we take into view all the magnificent objects
which science has unveiled in the distant re
gions of creation.

This subject ia calculated not merely to over
power the intellect with ideas of sublimity and
grandeur, but also to produce a deep moral im
pression upon the heart ; and a Christian philo
sopher would be deficient in his dutv, were he to
overlook this tendency of the objects of his
contemplation.

One important moral effect which this subject
has a natural tendency to produce, is, profound
HUMILITY. What an insignificant being does
man appear, when he compares himself with the
magnificence of creation, and with the myriads
of exalted intelligences with which it is peopled !
What are all the honours and splendours of this
earthly ball, of which mortals are so proud, when
placed in competition with the resplendent glo
ries of the skies ? Such a display as the Almighty
has given of himself, in the magnitude and va
riety of his works, was evidently intended " to
stain the pride" of all human grandeur, that " no
flesh should glory in his presence." Yet, there is
no disposition that appears so prominent among
puny mortals, as pride, ambition, and vainglory
— the very opposite of humility, and of all those
tempers which become those " who dwell in
tabernacles of clay, and whose foundation is in
the dust." Even without taking into account
the state of man as a depraved intelligence,
what is there in his situation that should inspire
him with " lofty looks," and induce him to look
down on his fellow-men with supercilious con
tempt ? He derived his origin from the dust,
he is allied with the beasts that perish, and he is
fast hastening to the grave, where his carcass

* Isa. Xlv 18, 12. xlvill, 12, 13. Xl. 12, 2S, 4c.

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

will become the food for noisome reptiles. He
is every moment dependent on a Superior Being
for every pulse that beats, and every breath he
draws, and for all that he possesses ; he is de
pendent even on the meanest of his species for
his accommodations and comforts. He holds
every enjoyment on the most precarious tenure,
— his friends may be snatched in a moment from
his embrace ; his riches may take to themselves
wings and fly away ; and his health and beauty
may be blasted in an hour, by a breath of wind.
Hunger and thirst, cold and heat, poverty and
disgrace, sorrow and disappointment, pain and
disease, mingle themselves with all his pursuits
and enjoyments. His knowledge is circum
scribed within the narrowest limits, his errors
and follies are glaring and innumerable •, and he
stands as an almost undi.stinguishable atom,
amidst the immensity of God's works. Still,
with all these powerful inducements to the ex
ercise of humility, man dares to be proud and
arrogant.

" Man, proud Man,

Dressed in n liule brief authority,

Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven,

As make the angels weep."

How affecting to contemplate the warrior, flush
ed with diabolical pride, pursuing his conquests
through heaps of slain, in order to obtain pos
session of " a poor pitiable speck of perishing
earth;" exclaiming in his rage, " I will pur
sue, I will overtake. I will divide the spoil, my
lust shall be satisfied upon them, I will draw
my sword, my hand shall destroy them" — to be
hold the man of rank glorying in his wealth, and
his empty titles, and looking around upon the
inferior orders of his fellow-mortals as the worms
of the dust — to behold the man of ambition push
ing his way through bribery, and treachery, and
•laughter, to gain possession of a throne, that he
may look down with proud pre-eminence upon
his fellows — to behold the haughty airs of the
noble dame, inflated with the idea of her beauty,
and her high birth, as she struts along, surveying
the ignoble crowd as if they were the dust be
neath her feet — to behold the smatterer in learn
ing, puffed up with a vain conceit of his super
ficial acquirements, when he has scarcely entered
the porch of knowledge — in fine, to behold all
ranks, from the highest to the lowest, big with an
idea of their own importance, and fired with pride
and revenge at the least provocation, whether
imaginary or real ! How inconsistent, the mani
festations of such tempers, with the many humi-
Hating circumstances of our present condition,
and with the low rank which we hold in the scale
of Universal Being?

It is not improbable, that there are in t\it>
universe intelligences of a superior order, in
whose breasts pride never found a place — to
whom this globe of ours, and all its inhabitants,
appear as inconsiderable as a drop of water filled

with microscopic animalculre, does to the prond
lords of this earthly region. There is at least
one Being to whom this sentiment is applicable,
in its utmost extent : — " Before HIM all nations
are as a drop of a bucket, and the inhabitants
of the earth as grasshoppers ; yea, they are as
nothing, and are counted to him less than no
thing, and vanity." Could we wing our way, with
the swiftness of a seraph, from sun to sun, and
from world to world, till we had surveyed all the
systems visible to the naked eye, which are only
as a mere speck in the map of the universe —
could we, at the same time, contemplate the
glorious landscapes and scenes of grandeur they
exhibit — could we also mingle with the pure and
exalted intelligences which people those resplen
dent abodes, and behold their humble and ardent
adorations of their Almighty Maker, their be
nign and condescending deportment towards
one another; "each esteeming another better
than himself," and all united in the bonds of the
purest affection, without one haughty or discord
ant feeling — whcit indignation and astonishment
would seize us, on our return to this obscure
corner of creation, to behold beings enveloped in
the mist of ignorance, immersed in depravity and
wickedness, liable to a thousand accidents, ex
posed to the ravages of the earthquake, the vol
cano and the storm ; yet proud as Lucifer, and
glorying in their shame ! We should be apt to
view them, r.s we now do those bedlamites, who
fancy themselves to be kings, surrounded by their
nobles, while they are chained to the walls of a
noisome dungeon. " Sure pride was never made
for man." How abhorrent, then, must it appear
in the eyes of superior beings, who have taken
an expansive range through the field of creation 7
How abhorrent it is in the sight of the Almighty,
and how amiable is the opposite virltie, we learr
from his word : — " Every one that is proud in
heart is an abomination to the Lord." — " Go}
resisteth the proud, but givelh grace to the hum
ble." — " Thus saith the High and Lofty One
who inhabiteth eternity, I dwell in the high and
holy place ; with him also that is of ai humble
and contrite spirit; to revive the spirit of iho
humble, and the heart of the contiite ones." —
\Vhile, therefore, we contemplate the omnipo
tence of God, in the immensity of creation, let
us learn to cultivate humility and self-abase
ment. This was one of the lessons which the
pious Psalmist deduced from his survey of the
nocturnal heavens. When he beheld the moon
walking in the brightness, and the innumerable
host of sters, overpowered with a sense of his
own insignificance, and the greatness of divine
condescension, he exclaimed, " O Lord ! what
is man, that thou art mindful of him, or the SOD
of man, that thou shouldest visit him !"

Again, this subject is also calculated to inspire
us with REVERENCE and VENERATION of God.
Profound veneration of the Divine Being lies at

OMNIPOTENCE OF THE DEITY.

the foundation of all religious worship and obe-
Jzence. But. in order to venerate God aright, we
must know him : and, in order to acquire the
true knowledge of him, we must contemplate him
throught the medium of those works and dispen
sations, bv which he displays the glories of his
nature to the inhabitants of our world. I have
already exhibited a few specimens of the stupen
dous operations of his power, in that portion of
the system of the universe which lies open to our
inspection ; and there is surely no mind in which
the least spark of piety exists, but must feel
strong emotions of reverence and awe, at the
thought of that Almighty and Incomprehensible
Being, who imnels the huge masses of the pla
netary globes witn so amazing a rapidity through
the sky, and who has diversified the voids of
space with so vast an assemblage of magnificent
worlds. Even those manifestations of Deity
which are confined to the globe we inhabit, when
attentively considered, are calculated to rouse
even .he unthinking mind, to astonishment and
awe. The lofty mountains, and expansive plains,
the mass of water in the mighty ocean, the thun
ders rolling along the sky, the lightnings flashing
from cloud to cloud, the hurricane and the tem
pest, the volcano vomiting rivers of fire, and the
earthquake shaking kingdoms, and levelling cities
with the ground — all proclaim the Majesty of
Him, by whom the elements of nature are ar
ranged and directed, and seem to address the sons
of men in language like this : " The Lord
reigneth, he is clothed with majesty ; at his wrath
the earth trembles ; a fire goeth before him, and
burneth up his enemies." — " Let all the earth
fear the Lord, let all the inhabitants of the world
stand in awe of him."

There is one reason, among others, why the
bulk of mankind feel so little veneration of God,
and that is, that they seldom contemplate, with
fixed attention, " the operations of his hands."
If we wish to cherish this sublime sentiment in
our hearts, we must familiarize our minds to
frequent excursions over all those scenes of
Creation and Providence, which the volume of
nature, and the volume of inspiration unfold to
view. We must endeavour to assist our concep
tions of the grandeur of these objects, by every dis
covery which has been or may yet be made, and
by every mode of illustration by which a sublime
and comprehensive idea of the particular object of
contemplation may be obtained. If we would
wish to acquire some definite, though imperfect,
conception of the physical extent of the universe,
our minds might be assisted by such illustrations
as the following : — Light flies from the sun with
a velocity of nearly two hundred thousand
miles in a moment of time, or, about 1,400,000
times swifter than the motion of a cannon ball :
Suppose that one of the highest order of intelli
gences is endowed with a power of rapid motion
superior to that of light, and with a corresponding

degree of intellectual energy ; that he has been
flying without intermission, from one province of
creation to another, for six thousand years, and
will continue the same rapid course for a thousand
millions of years to come ; it is highly probable,
if not absolutely certain, thai, at the end of this
vast tour, he would have advanced no further than
" the suburbs of creation" — and that all the mag
nificent systems of material and intellectual be
ings he had surveyed, during his rapid flight,
and for such a length of ages, bear no more pro
portion to the whole Empire of Omnipotence,
than the smallest grain of sand does to all the
particles of matter of the same size contained in
ten thousand worlds. Nor need we entertain
the least fear, that the idea of the extent of the
Creator's power, conveyed by such a representa
tion, exceeds the bounds of reality. On the other
hand, it must fall almost infinitely short of it.
For, as the poet has justly observed —

" Can man conceive beyond what God can do .•"»

Were a seraph, in prosecuting the tour of
creation in the manner now stated, ever to arrive
at a limit beyond which no farther displays of the
Divinity could be perceived, the thought would
overwhelm his faculties with unutterable anguish
and horror: he would feel, that he had now, in
some measure, comprehended all the plans and
operations of Omnipotence, and that no farther
manifestation of the Divine glory remained to be
explored. But we may rest assured, that this
can never happen in the case of any created in
telligence. We have every reason to believe,
both from the nature of an Infinite Being, and
from the vast extent of creation already explored,
that the immense, mass of material existence, and
the endless variety of sensitive and intellectual
beings with which the universe is replenished, are
intended by Jehovah to present to his rational off
spring a shadow, an emblem, or a representation,
(in sjo far as finite extended existence can be a
representation,) of the Infinite Perfections of his
nature, which would otherwise have remained for
ever impalpable to all subordinate intelligence.

In this rnanner,then, might we occasionally exer
cise our minds on the grand and diversified objects
which the universe exhibits ; and in proportion as
we enlarge the sphere of our contemplations, in a
similar proportion will our views of God himself
be extended, and a correspond ing sentiment of ve
neration impressed upon the mind. For the soul
of man cannot venerate a mere abstract being, that
was never manifested through a sensible medium, .
however many lofty terms may be used to describe
his perfections. It venerates that Ineffable Being,
who conceals himself behind the scenes of Crea-
tion,through the medium of the visible displays he
exhibits of his Power, Wisdom, and Beneficence,
in the Economy of Nature, and in the Record*
of Revelation. Before the universe was formed
Jehovah existed alone, possessed of every attri-

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

bute which he now displays. But, had only one
solitary intelligence been created, and placed in
the infinite void, without a material substratum
beneath and around him, he could never have
been animated with a sentiment of profound ve
neration for his Creator ; because no objects ex
isted to excite it, or to show that his Invisible
Maker was invested with those attributes which
he is now known to possess. Accordingly, we find,
in die sacred writings, that, when a sentiment of
reverence is demanded from the sons of men,
those sensible objects which are calculated to
excite the emotion, are uniformly exhibited.
" Fear ye not me ? saith the Lord. Will ye not
tremble at my presence ? who have placed the
sand for the bound of the sea, by a perpetual de
cree, that it cannot pass it ; and though the waves
thereof toss themselves, yet they cannot prevail ;
though they roar, yet can they not pass over it."
" "Who would not fear thee, O King of nations ?
Thou art the true God, and an everlasting
King. Thou hast made the earth by thy power,
thou hast established the world by thy wisdom,
thou hast stretched out the heavens by thy discre
tion. When thou utterest thy voice, there is a
noise of waters in the heavens, thou causest the
vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth, thou
makest lightnings with rain, and bringest forth
the winds out of thy treasures."*

But, however enlarged and venerable concep
tions of God we may derive from the manifesta
tions of his power, they must fall infinitely short
of what is due to a being of boundless perfection.
For there may be attributes in the Divine Es
sence, of which we cannot possibly form the
least conception — attributes which cannot be
shadowed forth or represented by any portion of the
material or intellectual world yet discovered by us,
or by all the mighty achievements by which hu
man redemption was effected — attributes which
have not been yet displayed, in their effects, to
the highest orders of intelligent existence. And,
therefore, as that excellent philosopher and di
vine, the honourable Mr. Boyle, has well observ
ed — " Our ideas of God, however so great, will
rather express the greatness of our veneration,
then the Immensity of his perfections ; and the
notions worthy of the most intelligent men are
far short of being worthy the incomprehensible
God — the brightest idea we can frame of God be
ing infinitely inferior, and no more than a Parhe-
&mf in respect of the sun ; for though that meteor
is splendid, and resembles the sun, yet it resides
in a cloud, and is not only much beneath the sun
hi distance, but inferior in bigness and splendour."

• Jerem. x. 7—13.

t A Parhelion or Mock-Sim, is a meteor in the
form of a very bright lisht, appearing on one side of
the sun, and somewhat resembling the appearance
of that luminary. This phenomenon is supposed to
be produced by the refraction and reflection of the
sun's rays from a watery cloud Sometimes three or
four of these p:\rhelia.all of them bearing a certain re-
•em Diance to the real sun, have been seen at one time.

In short, were we habitually to cherish tn*»
profound veneration of God which his works are
calculated to inspire, with what humility would
we approach the presence of this august Being '
with what emotions of awe would we present
our adorations ! and with what reverence would
we talk of his inscrutable purposes, and incom
prehensible operations ! We would not talk about
him, as some writers have done, with the same
ease and indifference, as a mathematician would
talk about the properties of a triangle, or a phi
losopher about the effects of a mechanical en
gine ; nor would we treat, with a spirit of levity,
any of the solemn declarations of his word, or the
mighty movements of his providence. We would
be ever ready to join with ardour in the sublime de
votions of the inspired writers, " Great and mar
vellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty, just
and true are thy ways, thou King of saints. Who
would not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name ?
Let all the earth fear the Lord, let all the inha
bitants of the world stand in awe of him."

Lastly, the views we have taken of the om
nipotence and grandeur of the Deity are calcu
lated to inspire us with HOPE and CONFIDENCE
in the prospect of that eternal existence which
lies before us. The period of our existence in
this terrestrial scene will soon terminate, and
those bodies through which we now hold a corre
spondence with the visible creation, be crumbled
into dust. The gradual decay, and the ultimate
dissolution of human bodies, present a scene at
which reason stands aghast; and, on a cursory
survey of the chambers of the dead, it is apt to
exclaim, in the language of despair, " Can these
dry bones live ?" A thousand difficulties crowd
upon the mind, which appear repugnant to the idea
that " beauty shall again spring out of the ashes,
and life out of the dust." But, when we look
abroad to the displays of Divine power and intel
ligence, in the wide expanse of Creation, we
perceive that

-"Almighty God

Has done much more ; nor is his arm impaired
Through lensth of days. And what he can, he will
His faithfulness stands bound to see it done."

We perceive that he has created systems in
such vast profusion, that no man can number
them. The worlds every moment under his su
perintendence and direction, are unquestionably
far more numerous than all the human beings
who have hitherto existed, or will yer exist till
the close of time. And, if he has nor only ar
ranged the general features of each of these worlds,
and established the physical laws, by wnich its
economy is regulated, but has also arranged the
diversified circunistances, and directs the mi
nutest movements of the mvriads of sensitive and
intellectual existences it con'ains, we ought neve*
for a moment to doubt, that the minutest poli
cies of every human body, however widely sepa
rated from each other and mingled with other

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

29

extraneous substances, are known to him whose
presence pervades all space ; and that all the
atoms requisite for the construction of the Re
surrection body will be reassembled for this
purpose " by the energy of that mighty power,
whereby he is able to subdue all things to him
self." If we suppose that a number of human
beings, amounting to three hundred thousand
millions, shall start from the grave into new life,
at the general resurrection, and that the atoms
of each of these bodies are just now under the
special superintendence of the Almighty — and
that at least an equal number of worlds are
under his particular care and direction — the ex
ertion of power and intelligence, in the former
case, cannot be supposed to be greater that what
is requisite in the latter. To a Being possess
ed of infinite Power, conjoined with boundless
Intelligence, the superintendence of countless
atoms, and of countless worlds, is equally easy,
where no contradiction is implied. For as the
poet has well observed,—

" He summons into being, with like ease,
A whole creation, and a single grain."

And since this subject tends to strengthen our
hope of a resurrection from the dead, it is also
calculated to inspire us with confidence in the
prospect of those eternal scenes which will burst
upon the view, at the dissolution of all terrestrial
things. Beyond the period fixed for the con*
flagration of this world, " a wide and unbounded
prospect lies before us ;" and though, at present,
" shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it,"
yet the boundless magnificence of the Divine
empire which science has unfolded, throws a
radiance over the scenes of futurity, which is
fraught with consolation in the view of " the
wreck of matter and the crush of worlds." It
opens to us a prospect of perpetual improvement
in knowledge and felicity ; it presents a field in
which the human faculties may be for ever ex
panding, for .ever contemplating new scenes of
grandeur rising to the view, in boundless per
spective, through an interminable succession of
existence. It convinces us that the happiness
of the eternal state will not consist in an unva
ried repetition of the same perceptions and enjoy
ments, but that new displays of the Creator's
glory will be continually bursting on the asto
nished mind, world without end. And as we
know the same beneficence and care which are
displayed in the arrangement of systems of
worlds, are also displayed in supporting and
providing for the smallest microscopic animal-
culae, we have no reason to harbour the least
fear, lest we should be overlooked in the immen
sity of creation, or lost amidst the multiplicity
of those works among which the Deity is in
cessantly employed ; for, as he is Omnipresent
and Omniscient, his care and influence must ex
tend to every creature he has formed. There-
fre, though " the elements shall mell with fer

vent heat, and the earth, and ail the works there
in be dissolved, yet we, according to his promise,
look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein
dwelleth righteousness."

SECTION III.
On the JVisdom and Intelligence of the DKITV.

IN surveying the system of nature with a
Christian and a Philosophic eye, it may be con
sidered in different points of view. It may be
viewed either as displaying the power and mag
nificence of the Deity in the immense quantity of
materials of which it is composed, and in the au
gust machinery and movements by which its
economy is directed \ — or, as manifesting his
Wisdom in the nice adaptation of every minute
circumstance to the end it was intended to ac
complish ; — or as illustrating his unbounded bene
ficence in the provision which is made for the
accommodation and happiness of the numerous
tribes of sentient and intelligent beings it con
tains. Having, in the preceding section, endea-
vured to exhibit some of those objects which
evince the Omnipotence of Deity, and the pious
emotions they are calculated to excite, I shaU
now offer a few popular illustrations of Divine
Wisdom, as displayed in the arrangements of
the material world — which shall chiefly be con
fined to those objects which are most prominent
and obvious to the vulgar eye.

Wisdom is that perfection of an intelligent
agent, by which he is enabled to select and employ
the most proper means in order to accomplish a
good and important end. It includes the idea of
knowledge or intelligence, but may be distinguish
ed from it. Knowledge is opposed to ignorance,
wisdom is opposed to folly or error in conduct.
As applied to God, it may be considered as com
prehending the operations of his Omniscience
and benevolence, or, in other words, his know
ledge to discern, and his disposition to choose
those means and ends which are calculatvd to pro
mote the order and the happiness of the aniverse.
The Wisdom of God is, doubtless, displayed
in every arrangement he has made throughout
all the provinces of his immense and eternal king
dom, however far they may be removed from the
sphere of human observation. But it is only in
those parts of the system of nature which lie open
to our particular investigation, that the traces of
this perfection can be distinctly perceived. The
Heavens declare the glory of God's Wisdom, as
well as of his Power. The planetary system — that
portion of the heavens with which we are best
acquainted — displays both the magnificence and
the skill of its Divine Author, in the magnitudes,
distances, revolutions, proportions, and uses of
the various globes of which it is composed, and in

30

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

ihe diversified apparatus by which light and dark
ness are alternately distributed. The sun, an
immense luminous world, by far the largest body
in the system, is placed in the centre. No other
position would have suited for an equable distri
bution of illumination and heat through the dif
ferent parts of the system. Around him, at dif
ferent distances, eleven primary planets revolve,
accompanied with eighteen secondaries, or moons,
— all in majestic order and harmony, no one inter
rupting the movements of another, but invariably
keeping the paths prescribed them, and perform
ing their revolutions in their appointed times.
To all these revolving globes, the sun dispenses
motion, light, heat, fertility, and other unceasing
energies, for the comfort and happiness of their
respective inhabitants — without which, perpe
tual sterility, eternal winter, and eternal night,
would reign over every region of our globe, and
throughout surrounding worlds.

The distance at which the heavenly bodies,
particularly the sun, are placed from the earth, is
a manifest evidence of Divine Wisdom. If the
sun were much nearer us than he is at present,
the earth, as now constituted, would be wasted
and parched with excessive heat ; the waters
would be turned into vapour, and the rivers, seas,
and oceans, would soon disappear, leaving no
thing behind them but frightful barren dells and
gloomy caverns ; vegetation would completely
cease, and the tribes of animated nature languish
and die. On the other hand, were the sun much
farther distant than he now is, or were his bulk,
or the influence of his rays, diminished one. half
of what they now are, the land and the ocean
would soon become one frozen mass, and univer
sal desolation and sterility would overspread the
fair face of nature, and, instead of a pleasant and
comfortable abode, our globe would become a
frightful desert, a state of misery and perpetual
punishment.* But herein is the wisdom of God
displayed, that he hasformed the sun of such a de
terminate size, and placed it at such a convenient
distance, as not to annoy, but to refresh and
cheer us, and to enliven the soil with its genial
influence ; so that we plainly perceive, to use the
language of the prophet, that " He hath esta
blished the world by his wisdom, and stretched
out the heavens by his understanding."

• It farms no objection to these remarks, that calo-
ic, or the matter of heat, does not altogether depend
upon the direct influence of the solar rays. The
substance of caloric may be chiefly connected with
the constitution of the globe we inhabit. But still,
it is quite certain that the earth, as presently consti
tuted, would suffer effects most disastrous to sentient
beings, were it removed much nearer to, or much
farther from the central luminary. Those planets
wnich are removed several hundreds of millions of
miles farther from the sun than our globe, may pos
sibly experience a degree of heat much greater then
ours ; but, in this case, the constitution of the solid
parts of these globes, and of their surrounding at
mospheres, must be very different from what ob
tains in the physical arrangements of our globe.

The rotation of the several planetary glebes
around their axis, to produce the alternate . uc~
cession of day and night, strikingly demonstr aee
the wisdom and benevolence of their great Au
thor. Were the earth and the other planetary
worlds destitute of a diurnal motion, only one
half of their surfaces could be inhabited, and the
other half would remain a dark and cheerless
desert. The sun woud be the only heavenly orb
which would be recognized by the inhabitants of
each respective world,as existing in the universe;
and that scene of grandeur which night unfolds
in the boundless expanse of the sky, would be
for ever veiled from their view. For, it appears
to be one grand design of the Creator, in giving
these bodies a diurnal motion, not only to cheer
their inhabitants with light and warmth, and the
gay colouring produced by the solar rays, but also
to open to them a prospect of other portions of
his vast dominions, which are dispersed in end
less variety throughout the illimitable regions of
space ; in order that they may acquire a more
sublime impression of the glory of his kingdom,
and of his eternal Power and Godhead. But,
were perpetual day to irradiate the planets, it
would throw an eternal and impenetrable veil
over the glories of the sky, behind which, the
magnificent operations of Jehovah's power would
be, in a great measure, concealed. It is this
circumstance which we should consider as the
principal reason why a rotatory motion has been
impressed on the planetary globes ; and not
merely that a curtain of darkness might be
thrown around their inhabitants, during the re
pose of sleep, as in the world in which we dwell.
For in some of the other planetary worlds be
longing to our system, the intelligent beings with
which they are peopled may stand in no need of
that nocturnal repose which is necessary for man ,*
their physical powers may be incapable of being
impaired, and their mental energies may be in
perpetual exercise. And in some of those bodies
which are surrounded with an assemblage of
rings and moons, as the planet Saturn, the di
versified grandeur of their celestial phenomena,
in the absence of the sun, may present a scene
of contempation and enjoyment, far more interest
ing than all the splendours of their noon-day.
Besides, had the planets no motion round their
axis, and were both their hemispheres supposed
to be peopled with inhabitants, their physical state
and enjoyments would be as opposite to each
other, as if they lived under the government of
two distinct independent beings. While the one
class was basking under the splendours of perpe
tual day, the other would be involved in all the
horrors of an everlasting night. While the one
hemisphere would be parched with excessive heat
the other would be bound in the fetters of etrrnaJ
ice ; and, in such a globe as ours, the motion of
the tides, the ascent of the vapours, the current*
of the atmosphere, the course of the winds, tir»

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

51

benign influences of the rains and dews, and a
thousand other movements which produce so
many salutary and beneficial effects, would be
completely deranged. Hence we find that in all
the planetary bodies on which observations can
conveniently be made, a rotatory motion actually
exists, in the secondary, as well as in the pri
mary planets, and even in the sun himself, the
centre, and the mover of the whole : in which ar
rangement of the Almighty Creator, the evidences
of wisdom and design are strikingly apparent.

This amazing scene of Divine workmanship
and skill,which the planetary system exhibits, we
nave reason to believe, is multiplied, and diversi
fied, to an indefinite extent, throughout all the other
systems of creation, displaying to the intelligences
of every region, " the manifold wisdom of God.'
For there can be no question, that ewery star
we now behold, either by the naked eye, or by
the help of a telescope, is the centre of a system
of planetary worlds, where the agency of God,
and his unsearchable wisdom, may be endlessly
varied, and, perhaps, more strikingly displayed
than even in the system to which we belong.
These vast globes of light could never have been
designed merely to shed a few glimmering rays
on our far-distant world ; for the t.en- thousandth
part of them has never yet been seen by the in
habitants of the earth, since the Mosaic creation,
except by a few astronomers of the past and the
present age ; and the light of many of them, in
all probability, has never yet reached us ; and
perhaps never will, till the period of " the con
summation of all terrestrial things." They were
not made in vain ; for such a supposition would
oe inconsistent with every idea we can form of
rhe attributes of a Being of infinite perfection.
They were not intended merely to diversify the
voids of infinite space with a useless splendour,
which has no relation to intellectual natures ; foi
this would give us a most distorted and inconsist
ent idea of the character of Him who is " the
only-wise God ;" and we are told,by an authority
which cannot be questioned, that " by his wis
dom he made the heavens, and stretched them
out by his understanding." The only rational
conclusion, therefore, which can be deduced, is
that they are destined to distribute illumination
and splendour, vivifying influence, and happiness,
among incalculable numbers of intelligent beings,
of various degrees of physical, moral, and intel
lectual excellence. And, wherever the Creator
has exerted his Almighty energies in the produc
tion of sensitive and intellectual natures, we may
rest assured, that there also his infinite wisdom
ind intelligence, in an endless variety of arrange
ments, contrivances, and adaptations, are unceas
ingly displayed.

But, after all, whatever evidences of contri
vance and design the celestial globes may ex
hibit, it is not in the heavens that the most
striking displays of Divine wisdom can be traced

by the inhabitants of our world. It is only a
few general relations and adaptations that can be
distinctly perceived among the orbs of the firma
ment ; though, in so far as we are able to trace
the purposes which they subserve, the marks
of beauty, order, and design are uniformly ap
parent. But we are placed at too great a dis
tance from the orbs of heaven, to be able to
investigate the particular arrangements which
enter into the physical and moral economy of
thf» celestial worlds. Were we transported to
the surface of the planet Jupiter, and had an
opportunity of surveying, at leisure, the regions
of that vast globe, and the tribes of sensitive
and intellectual existence which compose its po
pulation — of contemplating the relations of its
moons to the pleasure and comfort of its inha
bitants — the constitution of its atmosphere as to
its reflective and refractive powers, in producing
a degree of illumination to compensate for the
great distance of that planet from the sun — its
adaptation to the functions of animal life — the
construction of the visual organs of its inha
bitants, and the degree of sensibility they pos
sess corresponding to the quantity of light re
ceived from the sun — the temperature of the
surface and atmosphere of this globe correspond
ing to its distance from the central source of
heat, and to the physical constitution of sensitive
beings — in short, could we investigate the re
lations which inanimate nature, in all its va
rieties and sublimities,, bears to the necessities
and the happiness of the animated existences
that traverse its different regions, we should,
doubtless, behold a scene of Divine Wisdom and
intelligence, far more admirable and astonishing
that even that which is exhibited in our sublu
nary world. But since it is impossible for us
to investigate the economy of other worlds, while
we are chained down to this terrestrial sphere,
we must direct our attention to those arrange
ments and contrivances in the constitution of our
own globe, which lie open to our particular in
spection, in order to perceive more distinctly
the benevolent designs of Him " in whom we
live and move, and have our being." And here
an attentive observer will find, in almost every
object, when minutely examined, a display of
goodness and intelligence, which will constrain
him to exclaim, " Oh the depth of the riches both
of the wisdom and the knowledge of God."

Wisdom, considered as consisting in con
trivance, or the selection of the most proper
means in order to accomplish an important end,
may be exemplified and illustrated in a variety
of familiar objects in the scene of nature.

The earth on which we tread was evidently
intended by the Creator to support man and other
animals, along with their habitations, and to fur
nish those vegetable productions which are ne
cessary for their subsistence; and, accordingly,
he has given it that exact degree of consistency

32

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

which is requisite *cr these purposes. Were it
much harder than it now is ; were it, for exam
ple, as dense as a rock, it would be incapable of
cultivation, and vegetables could not be produced
from its surface. Were it softer, it would be in
sufficient to support us, and we should sink at
every step, like a person walking in a quagmire.
Had this circumstance not been attended to in its
formation, the earth would have been rendered
useless as a habitable world, for all those animated
beings which now traverse its surface. The ex
act adjustment of the solid parts of our globe to
the nature and necessities of the beings which
inhabit it, is, therefore, an instance and an evi
dence of Wisdom.

The diversity of surface which it every where
presents, in the mountains and vales with which
it is variegated, indicates the same benevolent
contrivance and design. If the earth were di
vested of its mountains, arid its surface every
where uniformly smooth, there would be no rivers,
springs, or fountains ; for water can flow only
from a higher to a lower place ; the vegetable
tribes would droop and languish ; man and other
animals would be deprived of what is necessary
for their existence and comfort ; we should be
destitute of many useful stones, minerals, plants,
and trees, which are now produced on the sur
face, and in the interior of mountains ; the sea itself
would become a stagnant marsh, or overflow the
'and ; and the whole surface of nature in our ter
restrial sphere would present an unvaried scene
of dull uniformity. Those picturesque and sub
lime scenes which fire the imagination of the
poet, and which render mountainous districts so
pleasing to the philosophic traveller, would be
completely withdrawn ; and all around, when com
pared with such diversified landscapes, would ap
pear as fatiguing to the eye as the vast solitudes
of the Arabian deserts, or the dull monotony of
the ocean. But in consequence of the admirable
distribution of hills and mountains over the sur
face of our globe, a variety of useful and orna
mental effects is produced. Their lofty summits
are destined by providence to arrest the vapours
which float in the regions of the air ; their inter
nal cavities form so many spacious basins for the
reception of waters distilled from the clouds ; they
are the original sources of springs and rivers,
which water and fertilize the earth ; they form
immense magazines, in which are deposited
stones, metals, and minerals, which are of so
essential service in the arts that promote the com
fort of human life ; they serve for the production
of a vast variety of herbs and trees ; they arrest
the progress of storms and tempests ; they afford
shelter and entertainment to various animals
which minister to the wants of mankind : in a
word, they adorn and embellish the face of na
ture — they form thousands of sublime and beau-
• iful landscapes, and afford from their summits
•j»e most delightful prospects of the plains below.

All these circumstances demonstrate the consum
mate wisdom of the Great Architect of nature,
and lead us to conclude, that mountains, so far
from being rude excrescences of nature, as some
have asserted, form an essential part in the con
stitution, not only of our globe, but of all habita
ble worlds. And this conclusion is confirmed, so
far as our observation extends, with regard to the
moon, and several of the planetary bodies which
belong to our system, whose surfaces are found
to be diversified by sublime ramifications of
mountain scenery ; which circumstance forms
one collateral proof, among many others. that they
are the abodes of sentient and intellectual beings.
Again, the colouring which is spread over the
face of nature indicates the wisdom of the Deity.
It is essential to the present mode of our exist
ence, and it was evidently intended by the
Creator, that we should be enabled easily to
recognize the forms and properties of the various
objects with which we are surrounded. But
were the objects of nature destitute of colour, or
were the same unvaried hue spread over the
face of creation, we should be destitute of all the
entertainments of vision, and be at a loss to dis
tinguish one object from another. We should
be unable to distinguish rugged precipices from
fruitful hills ; naked rocks from human habita
tions ; the trees from the hills that bear them,
and the tilled from the unfilled lands. " We
should hesitate to pronounce whether an adja
cent enclosure contained a piece of pasturage,
a plot of arable land, or a field of corn ; and it
would require a little journey, and a minute in
vestigation, to determine such a point. We
could not determine whether the first person w«
met were a solder in his regimentals, or a swain
in his Sunday suit ; a bride in her ornaments,
or a widow in her weeds." Such would have
been the aspect of nature, and such the incon
veniences to which we should have been subject
ed, had God allowed us light, without the dis
tinction of colours. We could have distinguished
objects only by intricate trains of reasoning, and
by circumstances of time, place, and relative
position. And, to what delays and perplexities
should we have been reduced, had we been
obliged every moment to distinguish one thing
from another by reasoning ! Our whole life
must then have been employed rather in study
than in action; and, after all, we must have re
mained in eternal uncertainty as to many things
which are now quite obvious to every one as
soon as he opens his eyes. We could neither
have communicated our thoughts by writing,
nor have derived instruction from others through
the medium of books : so that we should now
have been almost as ignorant of the transactions
of past ages, as we are of the events which are
passing in the planetary worlds; and, conse
quently, we could never have enjoyed a written
revelation from heaven, nor any other infallible

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

33

guide to direct us in the path to happiness, is
the Almighty had not distinguished the rays of
light, and painted the objects around us with a
diversityof colours, — so essentially connected are
the mini'test, and the most magnificent works
of Deity. But now, in the present constitution
of things, colour characterizes the class to which
every individua1 belongs, and indicates, upon the
first inspection, its respective quality. Every
object wears its peculiar livery, and has a dis
tinguishing mark'by which it is characterized.

The different hues which are spread over the
scenery of the world, are also highly ornamental
to the face of nature, and afford a variety of
pleasures to the ej e and the imagination. It
is this circumstance which adds a charm to the
fields, the valleys, and the hills, the lofty moun
tain, the winding river, and the expansive lake ;
and which gives a splendour and sublimity to the
capacious vault of heaven. Colour is, therefore,
an essential requisite to every world inhabited
by sensitive beings ; and we know, that provision
has been made for diffusing it throughout all the
globes which may exist in the distant regions
which our telescopes have penetrated ; for the
light which radiates from the most distant stars
is capable of being separated into the prismatic
colours, similar to those which are produced by
the solar rays; which furnishes a presumptive
proof that thay are intended to accomplish de
signs in their respective spheres analogous to
those which light subserves in our terrestrial
habitation — or, in other words, that they are des
tined to convey to the minds of sentient beings,
impressions of light and colour, and consequent
ly, beings susceptible of such impressions must
reside within the sphere, or more immediate
influence of these far-distant orbs.

The same benevolent design is apparent in the
general colour which prevails throughout the scene
of sublunary nature. Had the fields been clothed
with hues of a deep red, or a brilliant white, the
eye would have been dazzled with die splendour
of their aspect. Had a dark-blue or a black
colour generally prevailed, it would have cast a
universal gloom over the face of nature. But an
agreeable green holds the medium between these
two extremes, equally remote from a dismal gloom
and excessive splendour, and bears such a relation
to the structure of the eye, that it refreshes, in
stead of tiring it, and supports, instead of dimi
nishing its force. At the same time, though one
general colour prevails over the landscape of the
earth, it is diversified by an admirable variety of
shades, so that every individual object in the
vegetable world can be accurately distinguished
from another ; thiis producing a beautiful and
variegated appearance over the whole scenery
of nature. " Who sees not in all these things
that the hand of the Lord hath wrought this ?"

If from the earth we turn our attention to the
5

waters, we shall perceive similar traces (if the
exquisite wisdom and skill of the Author of nature.
Water is one of the most essential elementary
parts in the constitution of our globe, without
which the various tribes of'beings which now
people it could not exist. It supplies a necessary
beverage to man, and to all the animals that peo
ple the earth and the air. It forms a solvent for
a great variety of solid bodies ; it is the element
in which an infinitude of organized beings pass
their existence ; it acts an important part in con
veying life and nourishment to all the tribes of
the vegetable kingdom, and gives salubrity to the
atmospherical regions. Collected in immense
masses in the basins of the sea, it serves as a
vehicle for ships, and as a medium of communi
cation between people of the most distant lanas.
Carried along with a progressive motion over the
beds of streams and of rivers, it gives a brisk im
pulse to the air, and prevents the unwholesomw
stagnation of vapours ; it receives the filth of po
pulous cities, and rids them of a thousand nui
sances. By its impulsion it becomes the move*
of a multitude of machines ; and, when rarefied
into steam, it is transformed into one of the most
powerful and useful agents under the dominion of
man. All which beneficial effects entirely depend
on the exact degree of density, or specific gravity,
which the Creator has given to its constituent
parts. Had it been much more rarified than it
is, it would have been altogether unfit to answer
the purposes now specified ; the whole face of
the earth would have been a dry and barren waste ;
vegetable nature could not have been nourished •
our floating edifices could not have been support
ed ; the lightest bodies would have sunk, arid all
regular intercourse with distant nations would
have been prevented. On the other hand, had its
parts been much denser than they are ; for exam
ple, had they been of the consistency of a thin
jelly, similar disastrous effects would have in
evitably followed ; no ships could have ploughed
the ocean ; no refreshing beverage would have
been supplied to the animal tribes ; the absorbent
vessels of trees, herbs, and flowers would have
been unable to imbibe, the moisture requisite for
their nourishment ; and we should thus have been
deprived of all the beneficial effects we now derive
from the use of that liquid element, and of all the
diversified scenery of the vegetable world. But
the configuration and consistency of its parts are
so nicely adjusted to the constitution of the other
elements, and to the wants of the sensitive and
vegetable tribes, as exactly to subserve the ends
intended in the system of nature.

Water has been ascertained to be a compound
body formed by the union of two different kinds
of air — oxygen and hydrogen. It has the pro
perty of becoming, in certain cases, much lighter
than air ; though, in its natural liquid state, it is
800 times heavier than that fluid ; and has also

34

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

the property of afterwards resuming its natural
weight. Were it not for this property, evapora
tion could not be produced ; and, consequently, no
clouds, rain, nor dew, could be formed, to water
and fertilize the different regions of the earth.
But, in consequence of this wonderful property,
the ocean becomes an inexhaustible cistern to our
world. From its expansive surface are exhaled
those vapours which supply the rivers, and nourish
the vegetable productions of every land. " The
air and the sun," says an elegant writer, " con-
ititute the mighty engine which works without
intermission to raise the liquid treasure ; while
the clouds serve as so many aqueducts to convey
them along the atmosphere, and distribute them,
at seasonable periods, and in regular proportions,
through all the regions of the globe."

Notwithstanding the properties now sta'ed,
motion was still requisite, to ensure all the advan
tages we now derive from the liquid element.
Had the whole mass of waters been in a stag
nant state, a thousand inconveniences and dis
astrous consequences would have inevitably en
sued. But the All-wise Creator has impressed
upon its various masses a circulating motion,
which preserves its purity, and widely extends
its beneficial influence. The rills pour their
liquid stores into the rivers ; the rivers roll their
watery treasures into the ocean ; the waters of
the ocean, by alibratory motion, roll backwards
and forwards every twelve hours, and, by means
of currents, and the force of winds, are kept in
constant agitation. By the solar heat, a portion
of these waters is carried up into the atmosphere,
and, in the form of clouds, is conveyed by the
winds over various regions ; till, at last, it de
scends in rain and dew, to supply the springs
" which run among the hills." So that there is
a constant motion and circulation of the watery
element, that it may serve as an agent for carry
ing forward the various processes of nature, and
for ministering to the wants of man and beast.

In fine, were the waters in a state of perpe
tual stagnation, the filth of populous cities would
be accumulated to a most unwholesome degree;
the air would be filled with putrid exhalations ;
and the vegetable tribes would languish and die.
Were they deprived of the property of being
evaporated, (in which state they occupy a space
1400 times greater than in their liquid state,)
rain and dew could never be produced, and the
earth would be turned into " a dry and parched
wilderness ;" neither grass nor corn could be
sufficiently dried to lay up for use ; our clothes,
when washed, could never be dried ,* and a variety
of common operations, which now conduce to
our convenience and comfort, could never be
carried on. But the infinite wisdom of the
Creator, foreseeing all the effects which can
possibly arise from these principles of nature,
has effectually provided against such disasters,

by arranging all things, in number, weight md
measure, to subserve the beneficial ends for
which they were ordained, " He causeth the
vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth .
hesendeth the springs into the valleys, which run
among the hills. They give drink to every beast
of the field ; the wild asses quench their thirst.
By them the fowls of heaven are refreshed,
which sing among the branches. He watereth
the hills from his chambers, and the earth is sa
tisfied with the the fruit of his works."

Let us now attend to the atmosphere, in the con
stitution of which the wisdom of God is no less con
spicuous than in the" other departments of nature.

The atmosphere is one of the most, essential
appendages to the globe we inhabit, and exhibits
a most striking scene of Divine skill and omni
potence. The term atmosphere is applied to the
whole mass of fluids, consisting of air, vapours,
electric fluid, and other matters, which surround
the earth to a certain height. This mass of
fluid matter gravitates to the earth, revolves with
it in its diurnal rotation, and is carried along
with it in its course round the sun every year.
It has been computed to extend about 45 miles
above the earth's surface, and it presses on the
earth with a force proportioned to its height and
density. From experiments made by the ba
rometer, it has been ascertained, that it presses
with a weight of about 15 pounds on every
square inch of the earth's surface ; and, therefore,
its pressure on the body of a middle-sized man, is
equal to about 32.000 Ibs. or 14 tons avoirdupois,
a pressure which would be insupportable, and
even fatal, were it not equal in every part, and
counterbalanced by the spring of the air within
us. The pressure of the whole atmosphere up
on the earth, is computed to be equivalent to
that of a globe of lead 60 miles in diameter, or
about 5,000,000,000.000,000 tons ; that is, the
whole mass of air which surrounds the globe,
compresses the earth with a force or power equal
to that of Jive thousand millions of millions of
tons. * This amazing pressure is however,
essentially necessary for the preservation of the
present constitution of our globe, and of the ani
mated beings which dwell on its surface. It
prevents the heat of the sun from converting
water, and all other fluids on the face of the earth,
into vapour ; and preserves the vessels of all orga
nized beings in due tone and vigour. Were the
atmospherical pressure entirely removed, the
elastic fluids contained in the finer vessels of
men and other animals, would inevitably burst
them, and life would become extinct ;| and most

* See Appendix, No. II.

+ The necessity of tlie atmospherical pressure, for
the comfort and preservation of animal life, might
be illustrated by the effects experienced by those
who have ascended to the summits of very high
mountains, or who have been carrie/' to a great
height above the surface of the eartV in balloon*

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

of the substances on the face of the earth, par
ticularly liquids, would be dissipated into vapour.
The atmosphere is now ascertained to be a
compound substance, formed of two very differ
ent ingredients, termed oxygen and nitrogen
gas. Of 100 measures of atmospheric air, 21
are oxygen, and 79 nitrogen. The one, namely,
oxygen, is the principle of combustion, and the
vehicle of heat, and is absolutely necessc-y for
the support of animal life, and is the most pow
erful and energetic agent in nature. The other
is altogether incapable of supporting either flame
or animal life. Were we to breathe oxygen air,
without any mixture or alloy, our animal spirits
would be raised, and the fluids in our bodies
would circulate with greater rapidity ; but we
should soon infallibly perish by the rapid and
unnatural accumulation of heat in the animal
frame. If the nitrogen were extracted from the
air, and the whole atmosphere contained nothing
but oxygen, or vital air, combustion would not
proceed in that gradual manner which it now
does, but with the most dreadful and irresistible
rapidity: not only wood and coals, and other
substances now used for fuel, but even stones,
iron, and other metallic substances, would blaze
with a rapidity which would carry destruction
through the whole expanse of nature. If even
the proportions of the two airs were materially
altered, a variety of pernicious effects would in
stantly be produced. If the oxygen were less
in quantity then it now is, fire would lose its
strength, candles would not diffuse a sufficient
light, and animals would perform their vital func
tions with the utmost difficulty and pain. On
the other hand, ware the nitrogen diminished,
and the oxygen increased, the air taken in by re
spiration would be more stimulant, and the cir
culation of the animal fluids would become ac
celerated ; but the tone of the vessels thus sti
mulated to increased action would be destroyed
by too great an excitement, and the body would
inevitably waste and decay. Again, were the
oxygen completely extracted from the atmosphere,
and nothing but nitrogen remained, fire and flame
would be extinguished, and instant destruction
would be carried throughout all the departments
of vegetable and animated nature. For a lighted
taper will not burn for a single moment in nitro-

Acosta, in his relation of a journey among the moun
tains of Peru, states, that " he and his companions
were surprised with such extreme pangs of strain
ing and vomiting, not without casting\ip of blood
too, and with so violent a distemper, that they would
undoubtedly have died had they remained two or
three hours longer in that elevated situation." Count
Zambeccari, and his companions, who ascended in
a balloon, on the 7th of November, 1783, to a great
height, found their hands and feet so swelled, that
it v/as necessary for a surgeon to make incisions
in the skin. In both the cases now stated, the per
sons ascended to so great a height that the pressure
of the atmosphere was not sufficient to counter
balance the pressure of the fluids of the body. •

35

gen gas, and if an animal be plunged into it^ it is
instantly suffocated.

Again, not only the extraction of any one of
the component parts of the atmosphere, or the
alteration of their respective proportions, but even
the slightest increase or diminution of their ape-
cific gravity, would be attended with the most
disastrous effects. The nitrogen is found to be t
little lighter than common air, which enables it
to rise towards the higher regions of the atmo
sphere. In breathing, the air which is evolved
from the lungs, at every expiration, consists
chiefly of nitrogen, which is entirely unfit to be
breathed again, and therefore rises above our
heads before the next inspiration. — Now, had
nitrogen, instead of being a little lighter, been a
slight degree heavier than common air, or of the
same specific gravity, it would have accumulated
on the surface of the earth, and particularly in
our apartments, to such a degree as to have pro
duced diseases, pestilence, and death, in rapid
succession. But being a little lighter than the
surrounding air, it flies upwards, and we never
breathe it again, till it enters inio new and salu
tary combinations. Such is the benevolent skih
which the Author of Nature has displayed, for
pronx)ting the comfort and preservation of every
thing that lives.*

Farther, were the air coloured, or were its par
ticles much larger than they are, we could never
obtain a distinct view of any other object. The
exhalations which rise from the earth, being
rendered visible, would disfigure the rich land
scape of the universe, and render life disagreeable.
But the .^ 'mighty, by rendering the air invisible,
has enableu us not only to take' a delightful and
distinct survey of the objects that surround us, but
has veiled from our view the gross humours inces
santly perspired from animal bodies, the filth ex
haled from kitchens, streets, and sewers, and every
other object that would excite disgust. Again,
were the different portions of the atmosphere com'
pletely stationary, and not susceptible of agitation,

• The necessity of atmospherical afr for the sup
port of life, was strikingly exemplified in the fate
of the unhappy men who died in the Black-hole of
Calcutta. On the 20th of June, 1756, about 8 o'clock
in the evening, 146 men were forced, at the point of
the bayonet, into a dungeon only 18 feet square.
They had been but a few minutes confined in this
infernal prison, before every one fell into a per
spiration so profuse, that no idea.can be formed of
it. This brought on a raging thirst, the most difficult
respiration, and an outrageous delirium. Such was
the horror of thei. situation, that every insult that
could be devised against the guard without, and all
the opprobrious names that the Viceroy and his
officers could be loaded with, were repeated, to pro
voke the guard to fire upon them, and terminate their
sufferings. Before 11 o'clock the same evening, one-
third of the men were dead; and before 6 next
morning, only 23 came out alive, but most of them
in a high putrid fever. All these dreadful effects
were occasioned by the want of atmospheric air, and
by their breathing a superabundant quantity of the
nitrogen emitted from their lumr?.

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

all nature would soon be thrown into confu
sion. The vapours which are exhaled from the sea
by the heat of the sun would be suspended, and
remain for ever fixed over those places from
whence they arose. For want of this agitation
of the air, which now scatters and disperses the
clouds over every region, the sun would con
stantly scorch some districts, and be for ever hid
from others ; the balance of nature would be de
stroyed ; navigation would be useless, and we could
no longer enjoy the productions of different cli
mates. In fine, were the atmosphere capable of
being frozen, or converted into a solid mass, as
all other fluids are, (and we know no reason why
it should not be subject to congelation, but the
will ofthe Creator,) the lives of every animal in
the air, the waters, and the earth, would, in a
few moments, be completely extinguished. But
the admirable adjustment of every circumstance,
in relation to this useful element, produces all the
beneficial effects which we now experience, and
strikingly demonstrates, that the intelligent Con
triver of all things is " wonderful in counsel, and
excellent in working."

From the instances now stated, we may plainly
perceive, that if the Almighty had not a particular
regard to the happiness of his intelligent offspring,
and to the comfort of every animated existence ;
or, if he wished to inflict summary punishment
on a wicked world, he could easily effect, by a
very slight change in the constitution of the at
mosphere, the entire destruction of the human
race, and the entire conflagration of the great
globe they inhabit, — throughout all its elementary
regions. He has only to extract <v..e of its con
stituent parts, and the grand catastrophe is at
once accomplished. With what a striking pro-
' priety and emphasis, then, do the inspired wri
ters declare, that, " In Him we live, and move,
and have our being ;" and that " in His hand is
the soul of every living thing, and the breath of
all mankind !"

A great variety of other admirable properties
is possessed by the atmosphere, of which I shall
briefly notice only the following : — It is the ve
hicle of smells, by which we become acquainted
with the qualities of the food which is set before
us, and learn to avoid those places which are
damp, unwholesome, and dangerous. It is the
medium of sounds, by means of which knowledge
is conveyed to our minds. Its undulations, like
so many couriers, run for ever backwards and
forwards, to convey our tnoughts to others, and
theirs to us ; and to bring news of transactions
which frequent!} occur at a considerable distance.
A few strokes on a large bell, through the minis
tration ofthe air, will convey signals of distress,
or of joy, in a quarter of a minute, to the popula
tion of a city containing a hundred thousand in
habitants. So that the air may be considered
as the conveyer ofthe thoughts of mankind, which

are the cement of society. It transmits to our eara
all the harmonies of music, and expresses every
passion of the soul: it swells the notes ofthe
nightingale, and distributes alike to every car the
pleasures which arise from the harmonious sounds
ofa concert. It produces the blue colour ofthe sky»
and is the cause ofthe morning and evening twi
light, by its property of bending the rays of light,
and reflecting them in all directions. It forms an
essential requisite for carrying on all the pro
cesses of the vegetable kingdom, and serves for
the production of clouds, rain, and dew, which
nourish and fertilize the earth. In short, it would
be impossible to enumerate all the advantages we
derive from this noble appendage to our world.
Were the earth divested of its atmosphere, or
were only two or three of its properties changed
or destroyed, it would be left altogether unfit for
the habitation of sentient beings. Were it di
vested of its undulating quality, we should be de
prived of all the advantages of speech and con
versation — of all the melody of the feathered sonf «
sters, and of all the pleasures of music ; and, like
the deaf and dumb, we could have no power ol
communicating our thoughts but by visible signs.
Were it deprived of its reflective powers, the sun
would appear in one part of the sky of a daz
zling brightness, while all around would appear as
dark as midnight, and the stars would be visible at
noon-day. Were it deprived of its refractive
powers, instead of the gradual approach of the
day and the night which we now experience, at
sunrise, we should be transported all at once from
midnight darkness to the splendour of noon-day
and, at sunset, should make a sudden transition
from the splendours of day to all the horrors of
midnight, which would bewilder the traveller in
his journey, and strike the creation with amaze
ment. In fine, were the oxygen of the atmos
phere completely extracted, destruction would
seize on all the tribes ofthe living world, through
out every region of earth, air, and sea.

Omitting at present the consideration of an in
definite variety of other particulars, which suggest
themselves on this subject, I shall just notice one
circumstance more, which has a relation both to
the waters and to the atmosphere. It is a well-
known law of nature, that all bodies are expanded
by heat, and contracted by cold. There is only
one exception to this law which exists in the
economy of our globe, and that is, ike expansion
of ivater, in the act of freezing. While the
parts of every other body are reduced in bulk,
and their specific gravity increased by the appli
cation of cold ; water, on the contrary, when
congealed into ice, is increased in bulk, and be
comes ofa less specific gravity than the surround-
ing water, and, therefore, swims upon its surface.
Now, had the case been otherwise : had water,
when deprived of a portion of its heat, followed
the general law of nature, and, like all other

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

bodies, become specifically heavier than it was
before, the present constitution of nature would
have been materially deranged, and many of our
present comforts, and even our very existence,
would have been endangered. At whatever time
the temperature of the atmosphere became reduced
to 32° of the common thermometer, or to what is
called the freezing point, the water on the surface
of our rivers and lakes would have been convert
ed into a layer of ice ; this layer would have sunk
to the bottom as it froze ; another layer of ice
would have been immediately produced, which
would also have sunk to the former layer, and so
on in succession, till, in the course of time, all our
risers from the surface to the bottom, and every
other portion of water, capable of being frozen,
would have been converted into solid masses of
ice, which all the heat of summer could never
have melted. "We should have been deprived of
most of the advantages we now derive from the
liquid element, and, in a short time, the face of
nature would have been transformed into*a frozen
chaos. But in the existing constitution of things,
all such dismal effects are prevented, in con
sequence of the Creator having subjected the
waters to a law contrary to that of other fluids,
by means of which the frozen water swims upon
the surface, and prevents the cold from pene
trating to any great depth in the subjacent fluid ;
and when the heat of the atmosphere is increased,
is exposed to its genial influence, and is quickly
changed into its former liquid state. How ad
mirably, then, does this exception to the general
law of nature display the infinite intelligence
of the Great Contriver of all things, and his
providential care for the comfort of his creatures,
when he arranged and established the economy
of nature!

Variety of Nature.

As a striking evidence of Divine Intelligence,
we may next consider the immense variety which
the Creator has introduced into every department
of the material world.

In every region on the surface of the globe, an
endless multiplicity of objects, all differing from
one another in shape, colour, and motion, present
themselves to the view of the beholder Moun
tains covered with forests, hills clothed will, ver
dure, spacious plains adorned with vineyards,
orchards, and waving grain : naked rocks, abrupt
precipices, extended vales, deep dells, meandering
rivers, roaring cataracts, brooks and rills •, lakes
and gulfs, bays and promontories, seas and oceans,
caverns and grottoes — meet the eye of the student
of Nature, in every country, with a variety which
is at once beautiful and majestic. Nothing can
exceed the variety of the vegetable kingdom,
which pervades all climates, and almost every
portion of ihe dry land, and of the bed of the ocean.
The immense collections of Natural History

which are to be seen in the Muse-im at Paris,
show, that botanists are already acquainted with
nearly fifty-six thousand different species of
plants.* And yet, it is probable, that these form
but a very small portion of what actually exist,
and that several hundreds of thousands of spe
cies remain to be explored by the industry of
future ages. For, by far the greater part of the
vegetable world still remains to be surveyed by
the scientific botanist. Of the numerous tribes
of vegetable nature which flourish in the inte
rior of Africa and America, in the immense
islands of New Holland, New Guinea, Borneo,
Sumatra, Java, Ceylon, Madagascar, and
Japan ; in the vast regions of Tartary, Thibet,
Siberia, and the Burman empire ; in the Philip
pines, the Moluccas, the Ladronas, the Caroli-
nas, the Marquesas, the Society, the Georgian,
and in thousands of other islands which are scat
tered over the Indian and Pacific oceans — little or
nothing is known by the naturalists of Europe,
and yet it is a fact which admits of no dispute,
that every country hitherto explored produces a
variety of species of plants peculiar to itself; and
those districts in Europe which have been fre
quently surveyed, present to every succeeding
explorer a new field of investigation, and reward
his industry with new discoveries of the beauties
and varieties of the vegetable kingdom. It has
been conjectured by some naturalists, on the
ground of a multitude of observations, that
" there is not a square league of earth, but what
presents some one plant peculiar to itself, or, at
least, which thrives there better, or appears more
beautiful than in any other part of the world."
This would make the number of species of vege
tables to amount to as many millions as there are
of square leagues on the surface of the earth.

Now, every one of these species of plants
differs from another, in its size, structure, form,
flowers, leaves, fruits, mode of propagation, colour,
medicinal virtues, nutritious qualities, internal
vessels, and the odours it exhales. They are of
all sizes, from the microscopic mushroom, invi
sible to the naked eye, to the sturdy oak, and the
cedar of Lebanon, and from the slender willow
to the banian tree, under whose shade 7000
persons may find ample room to repose. A
thousand different shades of colour distinguish
the different species. Every one wears its pe
culiar livery, and is distinguished by its own na
tive hues ; and many of their inherent beauties
can be distinguished only by the help of the mi
croscope. Some grow upright, others creep
along in a serpentine form. Some flourish for
ages, others wither and decay in a few months ;
some spring up in moist, others in dry soils ;
some turn towards the sun, others shrink and

• Edinburgh Philosophical Journal. July, 1822.
p. 48.

38

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

contract when we approach to touch them. Not
only are the different species of plants and
flowers distinguished from each other, by their
different forms, but even the different individuals
of the same species. In a bed of tulips or car
nations, for example, there is scarcely a flower
in which some difference may not be observed
in its structure, size, or assemblage of colours ;
nor can any two flowers be found in which the
shape and shades are exactly similar. Of al! the
oundred thousand millions of plants, trees, herbs,
and flowers, with which our globe is variegated,
there are not, perhaps, two individuals precisely
alike, in every point of view in which they may
be contemplated; yea, there is not, perhaps, a
single leaf in the forest, when minutely examin
ed, that will not be found to differ, in certain
aspects, from its fellows. Such is the wonderful
and infinite diversity with which the Creator has
adorned the vegetable kingdom.

His wisdom is also evidently displayed in this
vast profusion of vegetable nature — in adapting
each plant to the soil and situation in which it
is destined to flourish — in furnishing it with those
vessels by which it absorbs ihe air and moisture
on which it feeds — and in adapting it to the na
ture and necessities of animated beings. As the
earth teems with animated existence, and as the
different tribes of animals depend chiefly on the
productions of the vegetable kingdom for their
subsistence, so there is an abundance and a va
riety of plants adapted to the peculiar constitutions
of every individual species. This circumstance
demonstrates, that there is a precontrived rela
tion and fitness between the internal constitution
of the animal, and the nature of the plants which
afford it nourishment; and shows us, that the ani
mal and vegetable kingdoms are the workmanship
of one and the same Almighty Being, and that,
in his arrangements with regard to the one, he had
in view the necessities of the other.

When we direct our attention to the tribes of
animated nature, we behold a scene no less va
riegated and astonishing. Above fifty thousand
species of animals have been detected and de
scribed by naturalists, besides several thousands
of species which the naked eye cannot discern,
and which people the invisible regions of the
waters and the air. And, as the greater part of
the globe has never yet been thoroughly explor
ed, several hundreds, if not thousands, of species
unknown to the scientific world may exist in the
depths of the ocean, and in the unexplored regions
of the land. AH these species differ from one
another in colour, size, and shape ; in the inter
nal structure of their bodies, in the number of
their sensitive organs, limbs, feet, joints, claws,
wings, and fins ; in their dispositions, faculties,
movements, and modes of subsistence. They
are of all sizes, from the mite and the gnat, up to
the elephant and the whale, and from the mite

downwards to those invisible animalrulse, a hun»
dred thousand of whicn would not equal a grain
of sand. Some fly through the atmosphere, somo
glide through the waters, others traverse the solid
land. Some walk on two, some on four, somo
on twenty, and some on a hundred feet. Some
have eyes furnished with two, some with eight,
some with a hundred, and some with eight
thousand distinct transparent globes, fur the pur
pose of vision.*

Our astonishment at the variety which appears
in the animal kingdom is still farther increased
when we consider not only the diversities which
are apparent in their external aspect, but also in
their internal structure and organization. When
we reflect on the thousands of movements, adjust
ments, adaptations, and compensations, which
are requisite in order to the construction of an
animal system, for enabling it to perform its in
tended functions ; — when we consider, that every
species of animals has a system of organization
peculiar to itself, consisting of bones, joints, blood
vessels, and muscular motions, differing in a
variety of respects from those of any other spe
cies, and exactly adapted to its various necessi
ties and modes of existence ; and when we con
sider, still farther, the incomprehensibly delicate
contrivances, and exquisite borings, polishings,
claspings, and adaptations, which enter into the
organization of an animated being ten thousand

• The eyes of beetles, silk-worms, flies, and se
veral other kinds of insects, are among the most
curious and wonderful productions of the God of
Nature. On the head of a fly are two large pro
tuberances, one on each side ; these constitute its
organs of vision. The whole surface of these pro
tuberances is covered with a multitude of small
hemispheres placed with the utmost regularity, in
rows, crossing each other in a kind of lattice
work. These little hemispheres have each of them a
minute transparent convex lens in the middle, each
of which has a distinct branch of the optic nerve
ministering toil; so that the different lenses may
be considered as so many distinct eyes. Mr. Leeu-
wenhoek counted 6236 in the two eyes of a silk
worm, when in its J2y slate ; 3180 in each eye of the
beetle ; and sooo in the two eyes of a common fly.
Mr. Hook reckoned 14,000 in the eyes of a drone
fly ; and, in one of the eyes of a drago-n fly there
have been reckoned 13,500 of these lenses, and, con
sequently, in both eyes, 27, 000, every one of which
is capable of forming a distinct image of any object,
in the samp manner as a common convex glass ; so
that the>" ^re 27,000 images formed on the retina
of this little animal. Mr. Leeuwenhoek having
prepared the eye of a fly for the purpose, placed
it a little farther from his microscope than when
he would examine an object, so as to leave a proper
local distance between it and the lens of his micro
scope ; and then looked through both, in the manner
of a telescope, at the steeple of the church, which
was 299 feet high, and 750 feet distant, and could
plainly see through every little lens, the whole
steeple inverted, though not larger than the point
of a fine needle : and then directing it to a neigh
bouring house, saw through many of these little
hemispheres, not only the fron* of the house, but also
the doors and windows, and could discern distinctly
whether the windows were open or shut. Such an
exquisite piece of Divine mechanism transcends aU
human comprehension.

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

times less than a mite ; and that the different
species of those animals are likewise all differ
ently organized from one another, — we cannot
but be struck with reverence and astonishment, at
the Intelligence of that Incomprehensible Being
who arranged the organs of all the tribes of ani
mated nature, who " breathed into them the breath
of life," and who continually upholds them in all
their movements !

Could we descend into the subterraneous apart
ments of the globe, and penetrate into those un
known recesses which lie towards its centre, we
should, doubtless, behold a variegated scene of
wonders, even in those dark and impenetrable re
gions. But all the labour and industry of man have
not hitherto enabled him to penetrate farther in
to the bowels of the earth than the six thousandth
part of its diameter ; so that we must remain for
ever ignorant of the immense caverns and masses
of matter that may exist, and of the processes
that may be going on, about its central regions.
In those regions, however, near the surface,
which lie within the sphere of human inspection,
we perceive a variety analogous to that which
is displayed in the other departments of nature.
Here we find substances of various kinds formed
into strata, or layers, of different depths — earths,
sand, gravel, marl, clay, sandstone, freestone,
marble, limestone, fossils, coals, peat, and simi
lar materials. In these strata are found metals
and minerals of various descriptions — salt, nitrate
of potash, ammonia, sulphur, bitumen, platina,
gold, silver, mercury, iron, lead, tin, copper, zinc,
nickel, manganese, cobalt, antimony, the dia
mond, rubies, sapphires, jaspers, emeralds, and a
countless variety of other substances, of incalcu
lable benefit to mankind. Some of these sub
stances are so essentially requisite for the comfort
of man, that, without them, he would soon dege
nerate into the savage state, and be deprived of all
those arts which extend his knowledge, and which
cheer and embellish the abodes of civilized life.

If we turn our eyes upward to the regions of
the atmosphere, we may also behold a spectacle
of variegated magnificence. Sometimes the sky
is covered with sable clouds, or obscured with
mists ; at other times it is tinged with a variety
of hues, by the rays of the rising or the setting sun.
Sometimes it presents a pure azure, at other times
it is diversified with strata of dappled clouds. At
one time we behold the rainbow rearing its ma
jestic arch, adorned with all the colours of light ;
at another, the Aurora Borealis illuminating the
sky with its fantastic coruscations. At one
time we behold the fiery meteor sweeping through
the air ; at another, we perceive the forked
lightning darting from the clouds, and hear the
thunders rolling through the sky. Sometimes the
vault of heaven appears like a boundless desert,
and at other times adorned with an innumerable
nost of stars, and with the moon " walking in
orightness." In short, whether we direct our

view to the vegetable or the animal tribes, to the
atmosphere, the ocean, the mountains, the plains,
or the subterranean recesses of the globe, we be
hold a scene of beauty, order, and variety, which
astonishes and enraptures the contemplative
mind, and constrains us to join in the devout ex
clamations of the Psalmist, " How manifold are
thy ivorks, O Lord ! In wisdom hast thou made
them all, the earth is full of thy riches ; so is the
great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping,
innumerable, both small and great beasts."

This countless variety of objects which appears
throughout every department of our sublunary
system, not only displays the depths of Divine wis
dom, but also presents us with a faint idea of the
infinity of the Creator, and of the immense mul
tiplicity of ideas and conceptions which must have
existed in the Eternal Mind, when the fabric of
our globe, and its numerous tribes of inhabitants,
were arranged and brought into existence. And,
if every other world which floats in the immen
sity of space be diversified with a similar varie
ty of existence, altogether different from ours, (as
we have reason to believe, from the variety we
already perceive, and from the boundless plans
and conceptions of the Creator,) the human mind
is lost and confounded, when it attempts to form
an idea of those endlessly diversified plans, con
ceptions, and views, which must have existed
during an eternity past, in the Divine mind.
When we would attempt to enter into the con
ception of so vast and varied operations, we feel
our own littleness, and the narrow limits of oar
feeble powers, and can only exclaim, with the
Apostle Paul, "Oh the depth of the riches both
of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how un<-
searchable are his counsels, and his ways of crea
tion and providence past finding out."

This characteristic of variety, which is stamp
ed on all the works of Omnipotence, is doubtless
intended to gratify the principle of curiosity
and the love of novelty, which are implanted in
the human breast ; and thus to excite rational
beings to the study and investigation of the works
of the Creator ; that therein they may behold the
glory of the Divine character, and be stimulated
to the exercise of love, admiration, and reve
rence. For as the records of revelation, and the
dispensations of providence, display to us the
various aspects of the moral character of Deity,
so, the diversified phenomena, and the multipli
city of objects and operations which the scenery
of nature exhibits, present to us a specimen of the
ideas, as it were, of the Eternal Mind, in so far
as they can be adumbrated by material objects,
and exhibited to mortals, through the medium of
corporeal organs.

To convey an adequate conception of the num
ber of these ideas, as exhibited on the globe in
which we live, would baffle the arithmetician's
skill, and set his numbers at defiance. We
may, however, assist our conceptions a little, by

40

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

confining our attention to one department of na
ture , for example, the ANIMAL, KINGDOM. The
number of the different species of animals, taking
into account those which are hitherto undisco
vered, and those which are invisible to the naked
eye, cannot be estimated at less than 300,000.
In a human body there are reckoned about 446
muscles, in each of which according to anatomists,
there are at least 10 several intentions, or due
qualifications to be observed — its proper figure,
its just magnitude, the right disposition of its
several ends, upper and lower, the position of the
whole, the insertion of its proper nerves, veins,
arteries, &c. so that in the muscular system alone
there are 4,460 several ends or aims to be attend
ed to. The bones are reckoned to be in number
about 245, and the distinct scopes or intentions
of each of these are above 40 ; in all, about 9,800 ;
so that the system of bones and muscles alone,
without taking any other parts into consideration,
amounts to about 14,000 different intentions or
adaptations. If now, we suppose, that all. the
species of animals above stated are differently
constructed, and, taken one with another, contain
at an average a system of bones and muscles as
numerous as in the human body — the number of
species must be multiplied by the number of dif
ferent aims or adaptations, and the product will
amount to 4,200,000,000. If we were next to at
tend to the many thousands of blood vessels in an
animal body, and the numerous ligaments, mem
branes, humours, and fluids of various descriptions
—the skin, with its millions of pores, and every
other part of an organical system, with the aims
and intentions of each, we should have another sum
of many hundreds of millions to be multiplied by
the former product, in order to express the diver
sified ideas which enter into the construction of
the animal world. And, if we still farther con
sider, that of the hundreds of millions of indi
viduals belonging to each species, no two indi
viduals exactly resemble each other — that all the
myriads of vegetables with which the earth is
covered, are distinguished from each other, by
some one characteristic or another, and that every
grain of sand contained in the mountains, and in
the bed of the ocean, as shown by the microscope,
discovers a different form and configuration from
another — we are here presented with an image
of the infinity of the conceptions of Him in whose
incomprehensible mind they all existed, during
countless ages, before the universe was formed.

To overlook this amazing scene of Divine In
telligence, or to consider it as beneath our notice
as some have done — if it be not the characteristic
of impiety, is, at least, the mark of a weak and
undiscriminating mind. The man who disre
gards the visible displays of Infinite Wisdom,
or who neglects to investigate them, when op
portunity offers, acts as if he considered himself
already possessed of a sufficient portion of in
telligence, and stooH in no need of sensible

assistances to direct his conceptions of the Cre
ator. Pride, and false conceptions of the nature
and design of true religion, frequently lie at the
foundation of all that indifference and neglect
with which the visible works of God are treated,
by those who make pretensions to a high de
gree of spiritual atlainments. The truly pious
man will trace, with wonder and delight, the foot
steps of his Father and his God, wherever
they appear in the variegated scene of creation
around him, and will be filled with sorrow, and
contrition of heart, that, amidst his excursions and
solitary walks, he has so often disregarded " the
works of the Lord, and the operation of his hands. *
In fine, the variety which appears on the face
of nature, not only enlarges our conceptions of In
finite Wisdom, but is also the foundation of all
our discriminations and judgments as rational
beings, and is of the most essential utility in the
affairs of human society. Such is the variety
of which the features of the human countenance
are susceptible, that it is probable that no two in
dividuals, of all the millions of the race of Adam
that have existed since the beginning of time,
would be found to resemble each other. We
know no two human beings presently existing,
however similar to each other, but may be dis
tinguished either by their stature, their forms,
or the features of their faces ; and on the ground
of this dissimilarity, the various wheels of the
machine of society move onward, without clash
ing or confusion. Had it been otherwise — had
the faces of men and their organs of speech been
cast exactly in the same mould, as would have
been the case, had the world been framed accord
ing to the Epicurean system, by blind chance
directing a concourse of atoms, it might have
been as difficult to distinguish one human coun
tenance from another, as to distinguish the eggs
laid by the same hen, or the drops of water which
trickle from the same orifice ; and consequently,
society would have been thrown into a state of
universal anarchy and confusion. Friends would
not have been distinguished from enemies, villains
from the good and honest, fathers from sons, the
culprit from the innocent person, nor the branches
of the same family from one another. And what a
scene of perpetual confusion and disturbance
would thus have been created! Frauds, thefts,
robberies, murders, assassinations, forgeries, and
injustice of all kinds, might have been daily com
mitted without the least possibility of detection.
Nay, were even the variety of tones in the hu
man voice, peculiar to each person, to cease, and
the handwriting of all men to become perfectly
uniform, a multitude of distressing deceptions and
perplexities would be produced in the domestic,
civil, and commercial transactions of mankind.
But the All-wise and Beneficent Creator has pre
vented all such evils and inconveniences, by the
character of variety which he has impressed on
the human species ; and on all his works. By the

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

41

peculiar features of his countenance every man
may be distinguished in the light; by the tones
of his voice he maybe recognized in the dark,
or when h« is separated from his fellows by an
impenetrable partition ; and his handwriting can
attest his existence and individuality, when con
tinents and oceans interpose between hitn and his
relations, and be a witness of his sentiments and
purposes to future generations.

Thus, I have taken a very cursory view of
some evidences of Divine Wisdom, which ap
pear in the general constitution of the earth, the
waters, and the atmosphere, and in the charac
teristic of variety, which is impressed on all the
objects of the visible creation. When these and
other admirable arrangements, in our sublunary
system, are seriously contemplated, every ratio
nal and pious mind will be disposed to exclaim
with the Psalmist — " There is none like unto
thee, O Lord, neither are there any works like
unto thy works." — " Thou art great, and dost
wondrous things, thou art God alone." — " O
that men would praise the Lord for his good
ness, and for his wonderful works towards the
children of men!"

When we consider not only the utility, but the
beauty and grandeur of the wise arrangements
of nature, what reason have we to admire and
adore the goodness of the great Author of our
existence ! Were all the diversities of shape and
colour, of mountains and vales, of rivers and lakes,
of light and shade, which now embellish the va
rious landscapes of the world, to disappear, and
were one unvaried scene perpetually to present it
self to the eye, how dull and wearisome, and unin
teresting, would the aspect of the universe appear
to an intelligent mind ! Although the variegated
beauties which adorn the surface of our globe,
and the vault of heaven, are not essential to our
existence, as sensitive beings, yet, were they
completely withdrawn, and nothing presented to
the eye but a boundless expanse of barren sands,
the mind would recoil upon itself, its activity
would be destroyed, its powers would be confin
ed, as it were, to a prison, and it would roam
in vain amidst the surrounding waste, in search
of enjoyment. Even the luxuries of a palace,
were it possible to procure them amidst such
a scene of desolation, would become stale and
insipid, and would leave the rational soul, almost
destitute of ideas and of mental energy, to the
tiresome round of a cheerless existence. But
in the actual state of the world we live in, there
is no landscape in nature, from the icebergs of
Greenland to the verdant scenes of the torrid
lone, in which objects, either of sublimity or of
beauty, in boundless variety, are not presented
to the view ; in order to stimulate the mind to
activity, to gratify its desire of novelty, and to
elevate its conceptions of the Beneficent Creator.

And, if the present constitution of our world
6

displays so evident marlrs of beauty and benevo
lent design, now that it is inhabited by an assem
blage of depraved intelligences, and Us physical
aspect deformed, in consequence of " the wicked
ness of man" — what transporting beauties and
sublimities must it have presented, when it ap
peared fresh from the hand of its Almighty Ma
ker, and when all things were pronounced by him
to be very good ? After a deluge of waters has
swept away many of its primeval beauties, and has
broken and deranged even its subterraneous strataj
this terrestrial world still presents to the eye a
striking scene of beauty, order, and benefice'nce.
But we have the strongest reason to believe, that
before sin had disfigured the aspect of this lower
world, all was " beauty to the eye, and music to
the ear" — that " immortality breathed in the
winds, flowed in the rivers," and exhaled from
every plant and flower. No storms disturbed the
tranquillity of nature, nor created the least alarm
in the breasts of its holy inhabitants. No earth
quakes shook the ground, nor rent the foundations
of nature. No volcanoes vomited their rivers of
lava, nor overwhelmed the plains with deluges of
fire. No barren deserts of heath and sand dis
figured the rich landscape of the world — no tem
pests nor hurricanes tossed the ocean, nor scorch
ing heats, nor piercing colds, nor pestilence, nor
disease, annoyed the human frame. In the pa
radisaical state of the world, we may reasonably
suppose, that all the elements of nature contri
buted directly to the pleasure and enjoyment of
man, and of the other tribes of animated nature ;
and that they were not subjected, as they now
are, to the operation of those natural agents which
so frequently spread destruction and ruin among
the abodes of men. To suppose the contrary to
huve happened, would be inconsistent with the
state of pure and happy intelligences, and with
the benignity of the Creator ; and would imply,
that God was either unwilling or unable to re
move such physical evils. But we cannot sup
pose it beyond the limits of Infinite Wisdom and
Omnipotence, to create and arrange a world en
tirely free from those evils and inconveniences
which now flow from the operation of certain phy
sical agents; without, at the same time, supposing
that his power and intelligence are confined
within certain bounds, iseyond which they cannot
pass. And, therefore, if, in the existing consti
tution of things, the harmony of nature is occa
sionally disturbed, and its beauty defaced, by
earthquakes, storms, and tempests — we must re
member, that the inhabitants of the earth are now
a depraved race of mortals, no longer adorned
with primeval purity and innocence ; and that the
physical economy of our globe has undergone a
certain derangement, corresponding to the moral
state of its present occupants. But since this
earth, even in its present state of degradation and
derangement, presents to the view of every be
holder so many objects ofbeauty and magnificence,

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

and so numerous traces of Divine Beneficence —
we may reasonably conclude, that scenes of Di
vine Wisdom and Goodness, far more glorious
ind transporting, must be displayed in those
worlds where moral evil has never shed its ma
lign influence, and where the inhabitants — supe
rior to disease and death — bask for ever in the
regions of immortality. And, therefore, however
admirable the displays of Divine Wisdom may
appear in the sublunary scene around us, they
must be considered as inferior to those which are
exhibited in many other provinces of Jehovah's
empire, in so far as they are blended with those
physical derangements which indicate his dis
pleasure against the sins of men.

Were we now to direct our attention to the
mechanism of animated beings, and to consider
the numberless contrivances and adaptations in
their organical structure and functions, a thou
sand instances of exquisite wisdom and design,
still more striking and admirable, would crowd
upon our view. For, although the general fabric
of the world, and the immense variety of objects
it contains, are evident proofs of a Wise and In
telligent Contriver, yet it is chiefly in the minute
and delicate contrivances of organical structures,
their adaptation to the purposes of life, motion,
and enjoyment, and their relation and correspon
dence to the surrounding elements, that the con
summate skill of the Great Architect of nature
is most strikingly perceived. But as it forms no
part of my present plan to enter on so extensive
a field of illustration, on which volumes might be
written, I shall content myself with merely sta
ting an example or two. My first example shall
be taken from

The Structure of the Human Eye.

The eye is one of the nicest pieces of mecha
nism which the human understanding can contem
plate ; but as it requires a knowledge of its ana
tomical structure, and of the principles of optics,
to enable us to appreciate its admirable functions,
I shall confine myself to a few general descrip
tions and remarks.

The eye is nearly of a globular form. It con
sists chiefly of three coats, and three humours.
The first or outer coat, is termed sdcrotica ; it
is every where white and opaque, and is joined
at its anterior edge to another which has more
convexity than any other part of the globe of ihe
eye. and, being exceedingly transparent, is call
ed the cornea. These two parts are perfectly
different in their structure, and are supposed,
fay some anatomists, to be as distinct from each
other as the glass of a watch is from the case into
which it is fix*d. Next within this coat is that
called the choroides, on account of its being fur
nished with a great nun.uer of vessels. It serves,
fts it were, for a ining to th»» ->ther, and is joined

with that part of the eye termed irw. The ini
is an opaque membrane like the choroides, but
ofdifferent colours in different eyes, as gray, black,
or hazel. It is composed of two sets of muscular
fibres, the one of a circular form, which contracts
the hole in the middle, called the pupil, when the
light is too strong for the eye ; and the other, of
radial fibres, tends every where from the circum
ference of the iris towards the middle of the pupil;
which fibres, by their contractions, dilate and
enlarge the pupil, when the light is we^k, in or
der to let in more of its rays. The third coat is
called the retina, upon which are painted the
images of all visible objects, by the rays of light
which flow from them. It spreads like net-work
all over the inside of the choroides, and is no
thing more than a fine expansion of £,ie optic
nerve ; by which nerve the impressions of visi
ble objects are conveyed to the brain.

The inside of the globe of the eye, within these
tunics or coats, is filled with three humours, called
the aqueous, the crystalline, and the vitreous.
The aqueous humour lies at the fore part of the
eye, and occupies all the space between the crys
talline and the prominent cornea. It has the same
specific gravity and refractive power as water, and
seems chiefly of use to prevent the crystalline
from being easily bruised by rubbing, or by a blow
— and perhaps it serves for the crystalline humour
to move forward in, while we view near objects,
and backward for remoter objects; without
which, or some other mechanism effecting the
same purpose, we could not, according to the
laws of optics, perceive objects distinctly, wnen
placed at different distances. Behind the aque
ous lies the crystalline humour, which is shaped
like a double convex glass, and is a little more
convex on the back than on the fore part. This
humour is transparent like crystal, is nearly of the
consistence of hard jelly, and converges the rays
which pass through it, from visible objects, to its
focus at the bottom or back part of the eye.
The vitreous humour lies behind the crystalline,
and fills up the greatest part of the orb of the eye,
giving it a globular shape. It is nearly of the con
sistence of the white of an egg, and very trans
parent ; its fore part is concave, for the crystal
line humour to lodge in, and its back part being
convex, the retina is spread over it. It serves
as a medium to keep, the crystalline humour and
the retina at due distance. From what has now
been stated, it is obvious, that the images of
external objects are depicted in the retina, in an
inverted position, in the same manner as the
images formed by a common convex lens ; but
how the mind, in this case, perceives objects
erect, is a question, about which the learned have
divided in their opinions.*

• An idea of the relative positions of the coattvtA
humours described above, may be obtained by •
simple inspection of the Plate, Fig. 6.— Fig. 6, re
presents a front view of the human eye, as 't ap-

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

43

The ball of the eye, as now described, is situ-
ate'd in a bony cavity, called its orbit, composed
by the junction of seven different bones, hol
lowed out at their edges. This cavity i? in all
the vacant spaces filled with a loose fat, wh;ch
serves as a proper medium for the eye to rest in,
and as a socket in which it may move. It is
sheltered by the eyebrows, which are provided
with hair, to prevent the descending sweat of
the forehead from running down into it. As a
still farther protection to this delicate organ, it
is furnished with the eyelid, which, like a cur
tain, is drawn over it with inconceivable swift
ness, for its security, on the approach of danger.
Il also serves to wipe it from superfluous
m tisture, and to cover it during sleep. In the
upper part of its orbit, it is furnished with a
gland, to supply it with water sufficient to wash
off dust, and to keep its outer surface moist,
without which the cornea would be less trans
parent, and the rays of light would be disturbed
in their passage ; and the superfluous water is
conveyed to the nose through a perforation in
the bone.

For the purpose of enabling the eye to move in
its socket, six muscles are provided. These are
admirably contrived to move it in every direction,
upwards or downwards, to the right or to the left,
or in whatever direction the occasion may re
quire ; and thus we are spared the trouble of
turning our heads continually towards the objects
we wish to inspect. If we want to look upward,
one of these muscles lifts up the orb of the eye ; if
we would cast our eyes to the ground, another
muscle pulls them down. A third muscle moves
Ihe globe outwards towards the temples, and a
fourth draws it towards the nose. A fifth, which
elides within a cartilaginous ring, like a cord
over a pulley, and is fastened to the globe of the
eye in two points, makes it roll about at pleasure.
A sixth lies under the eye, and is designed to
temper and restrain, within proper bounds, the
action of the rest, to keep it steadily fixed on
the object it beholds, and to prevent those frightful
contortions which otherwise might take place.
By these, and a multitude of other mechanical
contrivances, all acting in harmonious combina
tion, the eye, as a natural telescope and micro
scope, is made to advance, to recede, to move to
the right and to the left, and in every other direc
tion ; and to view near and distant objects with
equal distinctness ; so that a single eye, by the
variety of positions it may assume, performs the
office of a thousand.*

The utility of these several movements, and
the pain and inconvenience which would be suf
fered, were any of them wanting, can scarcely be

pears in its natural state, and exhibits the relative
positions of the Cornea, Iris, and Pupil.

• Files and other insects, whose eyes are 1m-
mnvenble, have several thousands of distinct globes
In each eye. See note page 38.

conceived, by any one whose eyes have always
remained in a sound state. We are so much ac
customed to the regular exercise of our visual or
gans, that we seldom reflect on the numerous
delicate springs which must be set in action, be
fore the functions of vision can, with ease, be
performed. But were any one of the muscular
organs, now described, to fail in its functions, we
should soon experience so many inconveniences,
as would throw a gloom on all the other comforts
of life; and convince us, how much we are in
debted, every moment, to the provident care and
goodness of our Beneficent Creator, for thousands
of enjoyments which we seldom think of, and for
which we are never sufficiently grateful.—
" With much compassion, as well as astonish
ment at the goodness of our loving Creator," says
Dr. Nieuwentyt," have I considered the sad state
of a certain gentleman, who, as to the rest, was
in pretty good health, but only wanted the use of
those two little muscles that serve to lift up the
eyelid, and so had almost lost the use of his sight
— being forced, as long as this defect lasted, to
shove up his eyelids every moment, with his own
hands."f

How admirable, then, is the formation of the
eye, and how grateful ought we to feel at the con
sideration, that we are permitted to enjoy all the
transporting pleasures of vision, without the least
perplexity or effort on our part ! If the loss of
action in a single muscle produces so many dis
tressing sensations and efforts, what would be the
consequence if all the muscles of the eye were
wanting or deranged 0 And is it man that go
verns these nice and intricate movements 1 or is
it the eye itself, as a self-directing machine, that
thus turns around, seasonably and significantly,
towards every visible object? Man knows
neither the organs of vision, nor the functions
they ought to perform. The eye is only an un
conscious machine, in the hands of a Superior
Intelligence, as a watch, or a steam engine, is in
the hands of a mechanic. It is God alone who
constantly performs its movements, according
to certain laws, which he has submitted to our
inclinations and desires; "for in him we live
and move" We are desirous to see certain
objects around us: this is all the share we have
in the operations of our eyes ; and without per
plexing our understanding, without the least care
or management, in regard to any of the functions,
we can, in a few moments, take a survey of the
beauties and sublimities of an extensive land
scape, and of the glories of the vault of heaven.
Thus, the Divine Being operates not only in this,
but in a thousand different ways, in the various
senses and contrivances which belong to our ani»
miti system; and yet, thoughtless and ungrate
ful man often inquires, in the language of doubt

t Nleuwentyt's Religious Philospher, vol. i, p. 238.

44

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

and hesitation, " Where is God my Maker ?"
He is in us, and around us, directing every
movement in our animal frame to act in harmony
with the surrounding elements, and to minister
to our enjoyments ; and it is only when his ex
quisite operations are deranged by external vio
lence, that we feel inconvenience or pain.

Such are only a few general outlines of the
structure of the eye: for no notice has been
taken of the numerous minute veins, arteries,
nerves, lymphatics, glands, and many other par
ticulars which are connected with this organ.
But all this delicate and complicated apparatus,
in the structure of the eye, would have been of
no use whatever for the purpose of vision, had
not a distinct substance been created to act upon
it, exactly adapted to its nature and functions.
In order that the eye might serve as the medium
of our perceptions of visible objects, light was
formed, and made to travel from its source at
the rate of 195,000 miles in a second of time.
This prodigious velocity of light is, doubtless, es
sential to the nature of vision ; since it actually
exists, and since we find that it radiates with the
same swiftness from the most distant visible star,
as from the sun which enlightens our system.
To abate the force of this amazing velocity,
its particles have been formed almost infinitely
small — a circumstance which alone prevents this
delightful visitant from becoming the most tre
mendous and destructive element in nature. Dr.
Nieuwentyt has computed, that, in one second of
time, there flows 418,660,000,000,000,000,000,-
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000* particles of
light out of a burning candle, which number con-
tainsat least 6,337,242,000,000 times the number
of grains of sand in the whole earth, supposing
every cubic inch of the eanh to contain a million
of grains. It has been justly remarked, by Mr.
Ferguson and other authors, that " if ihe particles
of light were so large, that a million of them
were equal in bulk to an ordinary grain of
sand, we durst, no more open our eyes to the
light, than suffer sand to be shot point blank
against them, from the mouth of a cannon." It
may also be remarked, that the property which
all bodies possess, of reflecting light, is essen
tial to the purpose of vision, without which, the
splendid and variegated scene of nature would
be changed into a dreadful gloom ; and were the
rays of light of one uniform colour, and not com
pounded of various hues, one object could not
be distinguished from another, and the beauti
ful aspect of our globe would instantly disappear.

Thus we see, that the eye is adapted to light,
and light to the eye ; and in this admirable
adaptation the wisdom of the Creator is e«r>Uinerly
displayed. For light has no effect upon me ear,
or upon any other organ of sensation ; so as to

• See Appendix, No. V

produce a perception of visible objects ; as, on
the other hand, the undulations of the air have n&
effect upon the eye, so as to produce the sensa
tion of sound. The eye did not produce the
light, nor did the light form the eye ; they arts
perfectly distinct from each other, yet so nicely
adapted in every particular, that had any one
quality or circumstance been wanting in either,
the functions of vision could not have been per
formed in the manner in which they now operate,
which strikingly demonstrates, that one and the
same Intelligent Being, possessed of a wisdom
beyond our comprehension, formed the curious
structure of the eye, and endued the rays of light
with those properties of colour, motion, and mi
nuteness, which are calculated, through the me
dium of this organ, to produce, in sentient beings,
the ideas of visible objects. And, surely, he
never intended that such exquisite skill and con
trivance should be altogether overlooked by ra
tional beings, for whose pleasure and enjoyment
all this benevolent care is exercised.

Manner in which vision is performed.

Let us now attend a little to the manner in
which vision is performed, by the medium of
light acting on the organs of sight. If we take
a common convex glass — a reading glass for ex
ample — and hold it at some distance from a
candle or a window sash, placing a piece of
white paper behind the glass, at the distance of
its focus, the image of the candle or sash will be
painted on ihe paper, in an inverted position.
This experiment may be performed, with a better
effect, by darkening a room, and placing the con
vex glass in a hole cut out of the window shutter,
when the rays of light flowing from the objects
without, and passing through the glass, will forma
picture of the objects opposite the window, on the
white paper, adorned with the most beautiful co
lours. In a manner similar to this, are the images
of external objects depicted on the back part
of the inner coat or membrane of the eye. The
rays of light, proceeding in all directions, from
surrounding objects, and falling on the eye, are
transmitted through the pupil ; arid being refract
ed by the different humours, (particularly by the
crystalline humour, which acts the part of a con
vex lens,) they converge to a focus on the retina,
where the images of visible objects are painted in
an inverted position ; and, by means of the optic
nerve, these images are conveyed to the mind.

The following figure will perhaps more dis
tinctly illustrate this point. Let a, b, c, x, y,
represent the globe of the eye, and A, B, C, an
object at a certain distance from it. Now, it is
well known that every point of a visible object
sends out rays of light in all directions ; and,
therefore, a certain portion of the rays which
flow from the object ABC, will fall upon the
cornea^ between x and y, and, passing through the

WISDOM OF TIIiS DEITT.

aqueous humour, m, n, and the crystalline humour
», p, and the vitreous humour, D, E, will be con
verged to a focus on the retina, and paint a dis
tinct picture, a 6 c, of the object ABC, in an
inverted position. The rays from the point A
of the object, after being refracted by the different
humours, will be brought to a point at a ; those
from B will be converged at b ; and those from
C ate; and, of course, the intermediate rays
between A B, and B C, will be formed between
a 6, and b c, and the object will become visible
by means of its image or representation being
painted on the retina, in all the colours and pro
portions which belong to it. If we take a bul
lock's eye, and cut off the three coats from the
back part, and put a piece of thin white paper
over that part, and hold the eye towards the win
dow or any bright object, we shall see the image
of the object depicted upon the paper, and in an
inverted position, as stated above.

In order that we may more distinctly perceive
the wonders of vision, and the numerous circum
stances on which it depends, let us suppose our
selves placed on an eminence, which commands
a view of a variegated and extensive landscape.
Let us suppose ourselves stationed on Arthur's
seat, or on the top of Salisbury Crags, in the vi
cinity of Edinburgh. Turning our face to the
north-west, the city, with its castles, spires, and
stately edifices, presents itself to our view. Be
yond it, on the north and west, a beautiful coun
try, adorned with villas, plantations, and fertile
fields, stretches as far as the eye can reach, till
the view is bounded by the castle of Stirling, at
the distance of more than thirty miles. On the
right hand, we behold the port of Leith, the ship
ping in the roads, the coast of Fife, the isles of
Inchkeith and of May, and the Frith of Forth,
gradually losing itself in the German ocean. If
we suppose the length of this landscape to be
forty miles, and its breadth twenty-five, it will,
of course, comprehend an area of a thousand
square miles.

The first circumstance which strikes the mind,
is the immense multitude of rays of reflected light
which flow, in all directions, from the myriads
of objects which compose the surrounding scene.
In order to form a rude idea of this infinity of
radiations, I fix my attention on a single object —
I direct my eye to Nelson's monument, o the
Gallon hill. From the parapet at the top, a thou
sand different points send forth a thousand differ

ent cones of rays, which, entering my eye, re»'
der the different parts of it distinctly visible, be
sides myriads of rays from the same points,
which flow in every other direction through the
open spaces of the atmosphere which surround
them. How many thousands of millions, then,
of different radiations, must be issuing forth
every moment from the whole mass of the monu
ment ! And if one object pours forth such a flood
of rays, how immense must be the number of ra
diations which are issuing from all the objects
which compose this extensive landscape ! My
riads of rays, from myriads of objects, must be
crossing each other in an infinity of directions,
so that the mind is confounded at the apparent
confusion which seems to exist in this immensity
of radiations ; yet every ray passes forward in
the crowd, in the most perfect order, and without
being blended or confused with any other ray, pro
duces its specific effect on every eye that is open
to receive it. But this is not all : these millions
of rays which flow from the minutest points of
the surrounding scene, before they can produce
the sensation of vision, and form a picture of the
landscape on the retina, must be compressed into
a space little more than one-eighth of an inch in
diameter, before they can enter the pupil of the
eye ; yet they all pass through this small aperture
without the least confusion, and paint the images
of their respective objects in exactly the same
order in which these objects are arranged. An
other circumstance demands attention. The
rays which proceed from the objects before me
are not all directed to the spot where I stand, but
are diffused throughout every point of the sur
rounding space, ready to produce the same effect,
wherever sentient beings are present to receive
them. Were the whole inhabitants of Edin
burgh placed on the sloping declivity of Arthur's
seat, and along the top of Salisbury Crags, and
were millions of other spectators suspended in the
surrounding atmosphere, similar sensations would
be produced, and a scene similar to that which
I now behold, would be depicted in every eye.
Amidst the infinity of cones of light, crossing
each other in an infinity of directions, no confu
sion would ensue, but every spectator, whose
eyes were in a sound state, would obtain a cor
rect view of the scene before him ; and hence it
happens, that, whenever I shift my position to
the right hand or to the left, other streams of light
enter my eye, and produce the same «Cect Vt

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

me now attend to another circumstance, no less
admirable than the preceding, and that is, the
distinct impression which I have of the shape,
colour, and motion, of the multiplicity of objects
I am now contemplating, and the small space
within which their images are depicted at the
bottom of my eye. Could a painter, after a long
series of ingenious efforts, delineate the extensive
landscape now before me, on a piece of paper not
exceeding the size of a silver sixpence, so that
every object might be distinctly seen, in its pro
per shape and colour, as it now appears when I
survey the scene around me, he would be incom
parably superior to all the masters of his art that
ever went before him. This effect, which far
transcends the utmost efforts of human genius,
is accomplished in a moment, in millions of in
stances, by the hand of nature, or, in other words,
by " the finger of God." All the objects I am now
surveying, comprehending an extent of a thousand
square miles, are accurately delineated in the bot
tom of my eye, on a space less than half an inch
in diameter. How delicate, then, must be the
strokes of that Divine pencil, which has formed
such a picture ! I turn my eyes to the castle of
Edinburgh, which appears one of the most con
spicuous objects in my field of view. Supposing
that portion of it which strikes my eye to be 500
feet long, and 90 in height, I find, by calculation,
that it occupies only the six hundred thousandth
part of the whole landscape, and, consequently,
fills in my eye no more than the twelve hundred
thousandth part of an inch. I next direct my
eye towards the Frith of Forth, and perceive a
steamboat sailing between Q,ueensferry and New-
haven, — I distinctly trace its motion for the space
of 40 minutes, at the end of which it reaches the
chain pier at Newhaven, having passed over a
space of five miles in length, which is but the
eighth part of the lineal extent of the landscape
in that direction ; and, consequently, occupies,
in the picture formed on my retina, a lineal space
of only one-sixteenth of an inch in extent. And,
if the boat be reckoned about 88 feet in length,
its image is only the three hundredth part of this
extent ; and of course, fills a space in the eye of
only the four thousand eight hundredth part" of a
lineal inch. Yet, my perception of the motion
of the vessel could be produced only by a corres
ponding motion of its image in my eye ; that is,
by the gradual motion of a point one 4,800th of
an inch in diameter, over a space one-sixteenth
of an inch in length. How inconceiveably fine
and accurate, then, must be the impression of
those strokes which the rays of light, from visible
objects, produce on the retina of the eye ! The
mind is lost, in wonder when it attempts to trace
so exquisite and admirable an effect.

I take a reflecting telescope, and, through it,
view some of the distant parts of the landscape.
My wonder is still increased, when I consider
<he new direction into which the rays of light are

bent — the crossings and recrossings, and refrao
tions, and reflections, that take place between
the mirrors and the lenses of the instrument,
and the successive images that are formed — so
that, instead of a scene of confusion, which,
previous to experience, might have been expecf-
ed from the numerous additional bondings and in
tersections of the rays — I now perceive hun
dreds of objects, with the most perfect distinct
ness, which were before invisible. Rays of light
from distant and minute objects, which a moment
before made no sensible impression on my eye,
being collected and variously modified by tiie
telescope, now paint a vivid representation of
their objects, in their true figures, colours, and
positions.

From a consideration of the innumerable
modifications of the rays of light, and of the
immense variety of effects they produce in every
region of the earth — I am led to investigate what
proportion of the solar light falls upon our globe,
in order to produce so diversified a scene of sub
limity and beauty. Supposing the sun's rays to
be chiefly confined, in their effects, within the
limits of the planetary system, since they diverge
in every direction, they must fill a cubical spaee
of 3,600,000,000 miles in diameter ; which, con
sequently, will contain about 24,000,000,000,-
000,000,000.000,000,000 cubical miles; so that
an eye, placed in any point of this vast space,
would receive a distinct impression from the
solar rays. The solidity of the earth is about
264,000,000,000 cubical miles, and, therefore,
it receives only the ——I-j—th part of

the light which fills the sphere of the solar sys
tem. So that the light which cheers all the in
habitants of the world, and unveils such a variety
of beautiful and magnificent objects, is nothing
more than a single stream of celestial radiance
out of ninety thousand billions of similar streams
which the great source of light is every moment
diffusing throughout the surrounding worlds.
But the solar rays are not confined within the
bounds of the planetary system ; their influence
extends, in every direction, as far as the nearest
stars, filling a cubical space at least 40.000,000,-
000,000 miles in diameter, and which contains
33,500,000.000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,-
000,000 000, or thirty-three thousand, five hun
dred sextillions of cubical miles. And, were
we to institute comparisons and calculations,
with respect to the possible variety of effects
they might produce throughout this immense
region, whole pages might be filled with figures,
cyphers, and computations. We might compute
how many globes similar to the earth, or any of
the larger planets, might be contained within
this vast space, allowing several hundreds of
cubical miles of empty space around each jjfobe
—how many myriads of refractions and reflec
tions the rays of light would suffer, in regard to
the peculiar objects connected with every one

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

47

of these globes — how many eyes of sentient
beings might be affected by the diversities of
colour, shape, and motion, which would thus be
produced — and what a variety of shades of light
and colour, and what a diversity of scenery,
•would be produced, according to the distances
of the respective globes from the central lumi
nary. After what we have just now stated, how
ever, we may rest satisfied with joining in the
pious exclamation of one who had just finished
a devout survey of the structure of the human
frame: "Marvellous are thy works, and that
my soul knoweth right well. How precious are
thy thoughts unto me, O God!" (or, as the words
might be rendered,) " How precious are thy
wonderful contrivances concerning me, O God!
how great is the sum of them ! If I should count
them, they are more in number than the sand."
In what direction soever I turn mine eyes, what
ever portion of thy works I investigate, " lam
still with thee."* Thine infinity and unsearch
able wisdom are impressed on every object, so
that I feel myself every moment encompassed
by thine immensity, and am irresistibly led to
wonder and adore.

I shall now conclude these reflections on vi
sion, with two or three additional remarks. It
is worthy of notice, in the first place, that the
eye has the power of adapting itself to objects
placed at different distances. By means of some
delicate pieces of mechanism, not hitherto satis
factorily explained, it can perceive, with dis
tinctness, a large object, at the distance of six
miles, and the next moment it can adjust itself
to the distinct perception of an object at the dis
tance of six inches ; so that it acts the part both
of a telescope and a microscope, and can be in
stantaneously adjusted to perform either as the
one instrument or as the other. This necessarily
supposes a corresponding alteration in the state
of the organ, every time we l^ft our eye from a
near, to look at a distant object. Either the cor
nea is somewhat flattened, or the crystalline
humour is pushed backwards, or both these
changes, in combination with others, may con
cur in causing the rays from distant obje'cts to
unite exactly on the retina, without which distinct
vision cannot be produced. This contrivance, in
whatever kind of mechanism it may consist, is
one which art would vainly attempt to imitate.
We can see objects that are near us, with a mi
croscope, and those that are distant, with a tele
scope ; but we would in vain attempt to see dis
tant objects with the former, or those that are
onljjiR few inches from us with the latter, with
out a variety of changes being made in the aper
tures and positions of the glasses belonging to
the respective instruments. In this respect, there-
fore, as well as in every other, the eye is an
optical instrument, incomparably superior to any

• Psalm cxxxlx. 14, 17, is.

instrument or imitation that art ran produce . and,
were it not for the peculiar property now de
scribed, it would be almost unfit for the purpose
of vision, notwithstanding all the other delicate
contrivances which enter into its construction. If
it were adjusted only for the distinct perception
of distant objects, every object within the limits
of an ordinary apartment would appear a mass of
confusion ; arid were it adjusted solely for viewing
objects within the limits of a few feet or inches,
the glories of the heavens, and the beautiful land
scape of the earth, would be veiled from our sight
as ifthey were enveloped in a mist.

Another circumstance worthy of attention, is,
the power which the pupil of the eye possesses
of contracting or enlarging the aperture or hole
through which the light is admitted. When the
light is too weak, the pupil is enlarged ; when it
is too strong, it is again contracted. Accord ingly,
we find, that when we enter a darksome apart
ment, though, at first, nothing can be accurately
distinguished, yet, in the course of a minute or
two, when the pupil has had time to dilate, we
can perceive most objects with considerable
distinctness. And, on the other handj when we
pass from a dark room to an apartment lighted
up with a number of lustres, we feel uneasy at
the sudden glare, till the pupil Has contracted
itself, and excluded a portion of the superfluous
rays. Were it not for this property, we should for
the most part either be surrounded with a disagree
able gloom or oppressed with an excessive splen
dour. It is for this reason, that we are unable to
look upon the sun without being dazzled, and are
under the necessity of closing the eyelids, or of
turning away the head, when a strong light sud
denly succeeds to darkness.

Again, it may not be improper to observe, how
wisely the Author of nature has fixed the dis
tance at which we ordinarily see near objects most
distinctly. This distance is generally from five
to eight inches from the eye. But had the eye
been formed for distinct vision at the distance of
only one inch, the object would have obstructed
the light, and room would have been wanting for
the performance of many necessary operations,
which require the hand to intervene between the
eye and the object. And had the limits of dis
tinct vision for near objects been beyond two or
three feet, sufficient light wouid not have been
afforded for the inspection of minute objects, and
we could neither have written a letter, nor have
read a book, with the same convenience and ease
we are now enabled to do.

From the preceding descriptions and remarks,
it will evidently appear, with what admirable skill
the different parts of the organs of vision are con
structed, and how nicely they are adapted to the
several ends they were intended to subserve.
Were any one of ihese parts wanting, or obstruct
ed in its functions, vision would either be im
peded, or rendered painful and distressing, or

48

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

completely destroyed. If any of the humours of
the eye were wanting — if they were less transpa
rent — if they were of a different refractive power
—or if they were of a greater or less convexity
than they now are, however minute the altera
tion might be, vision would inevitably be ob-
stucted, and every object would appear confused
and indistinct. If the retina, on which the im
ages of objects are painted, were flat, instead of
being concave, while objects in the middle of the
view appeared distinct, every object towards the
sides would appear dim and confused. If the cor
nea were as opaque as the sclerotica, to which it is
joined, or if the retina were not connected with
the optic nerve, no visible object could possibly
be perceived. If one of the six muscles of the
eye were wanting, or impeded in its functions,
we could not turn it to the right ; if a second
were deficient, we could not turn it to the left ;
if a third, we could not lift it upwards ; ifa fourth,
we could not move it downwards ; and if it were
deprived of the other two muscles, it would be
apt to roll about in frightful contortions. If the
eyes were placed in any other part of the body
than the head — if they were much more promi
nent than they now are — if they were not sur
rounded by the bony socket in which they are
lodged — and if they were not frequently covered
by the eyelid — they would be exposed to a thou
sand accidents from which they are now protected.
If they wanted moisture, and if they were not fre
quently wiped by the eyelids, they would be
come less transparent, and more liable to be in
flamed ; and if they were not sheltered by the
eyebrows, the sweat and moisture of the fore
head would frequently annoy them. Were the
tight which acts upon them devoid of colour — were
it not reilected from objects in every direction —
were its motion less swift, or its particles much
larger than they now are — in short, were any
one circumstance connected with the structure
of this organ, and with the modification of the
rays of light, materially different from its present
arrangement, we should either be subjected to the
hourly recurrence of a thousand painful sensa
tions, orbe altogether deprived of the entertain
ments of vision.

How admirable an organ, then, is the eye, and
how nicely adapted to unveil to our view the
glories of the universe ! Without the application
of any skill or laborious efforts, on our part, it
turns in every direction, transports us to every
surrounding object, depicts the nicest shades and
colours on its delicate membranes, and

" Takes in, at once, the landscape of the world,
At a small inlet, which a gram might dose,
And half creates the wond'rous world we see."
Young.

—How strikingly does it display, in every part
of its structure and adaptations, the marks of
benevolent design, and of Infinite Intelligence !
However common it is to open our eyes, and to

behold, in an instant, the beauties of an extensive
landscape, and however little we may be ac
customed to admire this wonderful effect. — there
is not a doctrine in Religion, nor a fact recorded
in Bevelation, more mysterious and incompre
hensible. An excellent French writer has wel
observed — " The sight of a tree and of the sun,
which God shows me, is as real and as imme
diate a revelation as that which led Moses to
wards the burning bush. The only difference
between both these actions of God on Moses and
me, is, that the first is out of the common order
and economy ; whereas the other is occasioned
by the sequel and connexion of those laws which
God has established for the regulation both ol
man and nature."

If, then, the eye of man (who is a depraved
inhabitant of a world lying partly in ruins) is an
organ so admirably fitted for extending our pros
pects of the visible creation — we may reason
ably conclude, that organized beings, of superior
intelligence and moral purity, possess the sense
of vision in a much greater degree of perfection
than man, in his present state of degradation —
and that they may be enabled, by their natural
organs, to penetrate into regions of the universe
far beyond what man, by the aid of artificial
helps, will ever be able to descry. It may not
be altogether extravagant, nor even beyond the
reality of existing facts, to suppose, that there
are intelligences in the regions of Jupiter or Sa
turn, whose visual organs are in so perfect a
state, that they can descry the mountains of our
moon, and the continents, islands, and oceans
which diversify our globe, and are able to de
lineate a map of its surface, to mark the period
of its diurnal rotation, and even to distinguish
its cities, rivers, and volcanoes. It is quite
evident, that it must be equally easy to Divine
Wisdom and Omnipotence, to form organs with
powers of vision far surpassing what I have now
supposed, as to form an organ in which the mag
nificent scene of heaven and earth is depicted,
in a moment,within the compass of half an inch.
There are animals whose range of vision is cir
cumscribed within the limits of a few feet or
inches ; and, had we never perceived objects
through an organ in the same state of perfec
tion as that with which we are furnished, we
could have formed as little conception of the
sublimity and extent of our present range of
sight, as we can now do of those powers of
vision, which would enable us to descry the in
habitants of distant worlds. The invention of
the telescope shows, that the penetrating power
of the eye may be indefinitely increased ; and
since the art of man can extend the limits of natu
ral vision, it is easy to conceive, that, in the hand
of Omnipotence, a slight modification of the
human eye might enable it, with the utmost dis*
tinctness, to penetrate into regions to which the
imagination can set no bounds. And, therefore,

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

49

it is not Unreasonable to believe, that, in the
"uture world, this will be one property, among
others, of the resurrection-body, that it will be
furnished with organs of vision far superior to
the present, in order to qualify its intelligent in
habitant for taking an ample survey of the "riches
and glory'' of the empire of God.

I have dwelt somewhat particularly on the
functions of the eye, in order to show, that it is
only when we take a minute inspection of the ope
rations of the Creator, that his Infinite Wisdom
and Intelligence are most distinctly perceived.
The greater part ofChristians will readily admit
that the Wisdom of God is manifested in every
object, but few of them take the trouble to inquire
in what particular contrivances and adaptations
this wisdom is displayed ; and, therefore, rest
satisfied with vague and general views, which
seldom produce any deep impression on the mind.
"The works of theLord," which are "great"
and admirable, " must be sought out by all those
who have pleasure therein ;" and the more mi
nutely they are inspected, the more exquisite and
admirable do all his arrangements appear.

Were we to enter into an investigation of the
visual organs of the lower animals, and to con
sider the numerous varieties which occur in
their structure, position, and movements, and
how nicely the peculiar organization of the eye
is adapted to the general structure of the animal,
and to its various necessities and modes of ex
istence — the operation of the same inscrutable
Wisdom and Intelligence would meet our eye at
every step. Birds, for example, which procure
their food by their beak, have the power of seeing
distinctly at a very small distance ; and, as their
rapid motion through the air renders it neces
sary that they should descry objects at a con
siderable distance, they have two peculiar me
chanical contrivances, connected with their organs
of vision, for producing both these effects. One
of these contrivances consists in a flexible rim
formed of bone, which surrounds the broadest
part of the eye, and by occasionally pressing upon
its orb, shortens its focal distance, and thus
enables it to inspect very near objects. The
other consists of a peculiar muscle, which draws
back, as occasion requires, the crystalline humour,
by which means it can take a distinct view of a
distant landscape ; and can pass from the sight
of a very near, to the sight of a distant object,
with rapidity and ease. Injishes, which live in a
medium of a different refractive power from that
of air, the crystalline humour has a greater degree
of convexity, and more nearly approaches to a
globular form than that of land animals— which
conformation is essentially requisite to distinctness
of vision in the watery element. A fish of course
cannot see distinctly in air, nor a quadruped
under water ; and every person who has dived
into the water with his eyes open, knows, that
7

though he may perceive the general forms and
colours of objects, his vision is obscure and in
distinct. In hares and rabbits the eyes are very
convex and prominent, so that they can see nearly
quite round them ; whereas,in dogs, which pursue
these animals, the visual organs are placed mote
in the front of the head, to look rather before than
behind them. Some animals, as cats and owls
which pursue their prey in the dark, have the
pupil of their eye so formed as to be capable of
great expansion, so that a few rays of light may
make a lively impression on their retina ; while
the eagle, which is able to look directly at the sun,
has its pupil capable of being contracted almost
to a point. Insects, such as the beetle, the fly,
and the butterfly, whose eyes are incapable of
motion, have several thousands of small transpa
rent globes set in a convex hemisphere, everyone
of which is capable of forming an image of an ob
ject; so that they are enabled to view the objects
around them without moving their heads . But, it
would be beyond the limits of my plan to prose
cute this subject any farther ; enough has already
been stated, to show, that the eyes of men and
other animals are master-pieces of art, which far
transcend the human understanding ; and that
they demonstrate the consummate wisdom of Him
who planned and constructed the organical func
tions of the various tribes of animated existence.

I shall now conclude this branch of my subject,
by presenting an instance or two of the mecha
nism of the bones, and the movements it is fitted
to produce.

The bones of the human frame are articulated,
or connected together, in different ways, but
most frequently in the following manner. Either,
1. a bone with a round head is articulated with
a cavity, and plays in it as a ball in a socket;
or, 2. they are connected together by a hinge-
like articulation, which enables a bone to move
up or down, backwards or forwards, like a door
upon its hinges. An idea of these two motions,
and the purposes they serve, may be obtained,
by considering the construction of the pedestal of
a telescope, and the joints on which it moves.
One of the joints is of the nature of a hinge, by
which a vertical motion, or a motion upwards'^
and downwards is produced. A horizontal
motion, or a motion towards the right, hand or
the left, is produced by a pivot moving in a socket;
so that, by these two motions, the telescope can
be made to point in any direction. Such is the
nature of the articulations of the bones, and the
movements they produce ; and wherever one or
other of these motions, or both of them combined ,
are requisite for the comfort and convenience of
the individual, such a power of motion is uni
formly found to exist. If the movement of a joint
in every direction would, in any particular case,
be found inconvenient, the hinge-like articulation
is fixed upon : but if a motion in everw direct^* Is

50

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

iequired for the convenient use of particular mem
bers, and for the variety of evolutions which a sen
tient being may have occasion to make, the ball and
socket articulation is combined with the former.
For example, let any person, for a moment,
consider the joints of his fingers, and compare
them with the joint at his wrist , where the hand
is connected with the fore arm. If he hold the
back of his hand upwards, he will find that he
can move his fingers upwards, or downwards ;
out he cannot turn them to the right hand, or to
the left, so as to make them describe a circular
motion. He will also find that his wrist is ca
pable of a similar movement, so that the hand
may be bent in a vertical direction. But, in
addition to this motion, it is also capable of
being turned in, a horizontal direction, or from
one side to another. In the former case, we have
an example of the hinge articulation ; in the
latter, it is combined with an articulation which
produces nearly the same effect as a pivot mov
ing in a socket. Now, had the joints of the
fingers been capable of the same motions as the
wrist, the hand would have lost its firmness, and
been incapable of performing a variety of mecha
nical operations which require objects to be held
with a steady grasp. On the other hand, if the
joint of the wrist had been formed in the same
manner as the joints of the fingers, and confined
to a vertical motion, the hand would have been
incapable of one out of a hundred varied move
ments, which it can now perform with the
greatest ease. In this case, we could not have
bored a hole with a gimblet, cut down corn with
a sickle, digged the earth with a spade, sewed
clothes with a needle, tossed up a ball, or turned
up the palm of the hand, for any of the useful
purposes for which that motion was ordained.
In short, without the rotatory motion of the
wrist, the greater part of the operations connected
with gardening, agriculture, cookery, washing,
spinning, weaving, painting, carving, engraving,
building, and other mechanical arts, could not be
performed ; and such of them as could be effected,
would be accomplished only with the greatest
inconvenience and labour. Any person may con
vince himself of this, by holding his hand in a
horizontal position, and preventing his wrist
joint from turning round, and then by trying what
operations he can easily perform without the
rotatory motion ; and he will soon perceive with
what exquisite skill the numerous movements
of our animal frames have been contrived by
the great Author of our existence. In each hand
there are 27 bones, all of which are essential to
the different motions we wish to perform. Every
•uiger is composed of three bones, connected
together by articulations, muscles, and ligaments.
If, instead of three, each finger were composed
of only one bone, it would be quite impossible
for us to grasp a single object.

The same admirable contrivance may bv per
ceived in the movements of which the head iff
susceptible. It was requisite, in order to out
convenience and comfort, lhat we should be ena
bled to move our head backwards or forwards —
to look up towards the heavens, or downwards
to the ground. It was also expedient, that it.
should have a power of turning to the right, or to
the left, so as to take in a considerable portion
of a circle, wilhout being under the necessity of
turning round the whole body. Accordingly we
find, that both these motions are provided for, in
the manner in which the head is connected with
the vertebrae. The head rests upon the uppermost
of these bones, to which it is connected by a hinge
joint, similar to those in the fingers, which allows
it to move backwards and forwards ; and, by means
of a round, longish process, or projection, which
moves in a socket, it is enabled to move horizon
tally, as upon an axis. Had the first motion
been wanting, we could not have looked up to the
zenith, without laying flat on our back ; nor could
we have looked to the ground, without placing
our bodies in a prone position, and, in such a
case, we could never have seen our own feet, un
less when they were bent considerably forward.
Had the second motion been wanting, we could
have looked to .lothing except the objects directly
before us, without the trouble of turning round
the whole body, either to the right, or to the left.
But in the construction of our corporeal system,
every thing is so arranged and adapted to another,
as at once to contribute to ease, and facility of
motion, in all the varied operations and move
ments we have occasion to perform ; which
circumstance forcibly demonstrates both the be
nevolent intentions, and the admirable wisdom
of Him " whose hands have made and fashioned
us," and who " breathed into our nostrils the
breath of life."

The above are only two or three out of a
hundred of similar instances, which might be
produced to show the benevolent care which has
been exercised in arranging and articulating
the system of bones, of which the prop-work of
the human frame is composed. Were we to enter
into an investigation of the actions and uses of
the various muscles, the wonderful system of veins
and arteries, the action of the heart, stomach,
and bowels ; the process of respiration, and in
sensible perspiration, and the system of nerves,
glands, lymphatics, and lacteals — a thousand in
stances of Divine wisdom and beneficence would
crowd upon our view, which could not fail to ex
cite the pious and contemplative mind to join in
the devotions of the " sweet singer of Israel,"
" I will praise thee ; for I am fearfully and won
derfully made ; marvellous are thy works, and that
my soul knoweth right well." — But as I intended
to present only a few specimens of the Wisdom
of God, as displayed in the construction of

WISDOM OF THE DEITY.

the material world, I shall conclude this depart
ment of my subject with a single reflection.*

How foolish and ungrateful is it for rational
beings to overlook the wise and benevolent arrange-
ments of the Creator, in the material universe !
How many thousands of human beings pass their
existence without once reflecting on the numerous
evidences of Divine Wisdom and Beneficence,
which appear around them, or feeling the least
spark of gratitude for their preservation and com
forts, to that Being " in whose hand their breath
is, and whose are all their ways !" Yea, how
many are there who consider themselves as stand-
jnghigh in the ranks of the Christian profession,
who affect to look down, with a certain degree
of contempt, on the study of the material works
of God, as if it were too gross a subject for their
spiritual attainments ! They profess to trace the
wisdom of God in the Scriptures, and to feel gra
titude for his pardoning mercy ; but they seldom
feel that gratitude which they ought to do for those
admirable arrangements in their own bodies, and
the elements around them, by which their lives
are preserved, and their happiness promoted ;
and even seem to insinuate, that they have little
or nothing to do with the contrivances of the God
of Nature. They leave it to the genius of infidel
philosophers to trace the articulations of the
bones, the branchings of the veins and arteries,
the properties of light, and the composition of
the atmosphere, while they profess to feast their
minds on more sublime and spiritual entertain
ments. But, surely, such astonishing displays
of the wisdom and benignity of the Most High,
as creation exhibits, were never intended to be
treated by his intelligent offspring with apathy
or indifference ; and to do so, must indicate a
certain degree of ingratitude towards Him whose
incessant energy sustains the whole assemblage
of sentient and intelligent beings, and who dis
plays himself, in their construction and preser
vation, tobe " wonderful in counsel, and excellent
in working." Shall we imagine, that, because
God stands in the gracious relation of our Re
deemer, he has ceased to stand in the relation of
our Creator and Preserver ? Or shall we con
sider those subjects as unworthy of our attention,
which are the theme of the praises of the hea
venly host ? Rev. iv. 11. Can we suppose
that the Almighty displayed his infinite wisdom
in the curious organization of the human eye,
that man — the only being in this world who is
endowed with faculties capable of appreciating

* Those who wish to prosecute this subject, par
ticularly that part of it which relates to the con
trivances of Divine Wisdom, which appear in the
animal system, will find ample gratification in Nieu-
wentyt's " Religious Phiiosorher," Vol. 1, and Dr.
Paley's " Natural Theology." A variety of useful
remarks on this subject will also he found in Ray's
" Wisdom of God in the Creation," Derham's " Phy-
slco-Theology," and Bonnet's " Contemplation of
Nature."

36

its structure, and for whose use and entertainment
it was intended — should overlook such a wonder
ful piece of Divine workmanship, and feel not
gratitude for the bestowment of so admirable a
gift ? Shall we extol the ingenuity displayed in
a clock or a watch, in a chess-player, or a steam
engine, and shall we feel no sentiment of admira
tion at the view of millions of instances of Divine
mechanism which infinitely transcend the powers
of the human understanding ? To act in this
manner, as too many are disposed to do, is un
worthy of man, both as a Christian and as an
intelligent agent. Such was not the conduct of
the inspired writers ; their spirituality of views
did not lead them to neglect the contemplation
of any of the works of God. " I will meditate
on all thy works," says the Psalmist, " and talk
of all thy doings ; I will utter abundantly the me
mory of thy great goodness, and speak of thy
wondrous works." Accordingly we find, that
the wonders of the human frame, the economy
of the animal and the vegetable tribes, the scenery
of the " dry land," and of the " mighty deep,"
and the glories of the heavens, were the frequent
subjects of their devout contemplation. They
consider them in relation to the unceasing agency
of God, by whom they were formed and arranged,
and as declaring his Wisdom, Goodness, and Om
nipotence : and, with this view, ought all the
scenes of the visible creation to be investigated
by his intelligent creatures.

We have reason to believe, that it is owing,
in part, to want of attention to the Divine wisdom
and beneficence, as exhibited in the construction of
the visible world, that many professed Christians
entertain so vague and confused ideas respect
ing the wisdom and goodness (if Deity, as dis
played in the economy of Redemption. The
terms, Wisdom, Goodness, and Beneficence,
in their mouths, become words almost without
meaning, to which no precise or definite ideas
are attached ; because they have never considered
the instances and the evidence of these attribute,"
displayed in the material creation. And, ifow
minds have not been impressed with a sense e/
the wisdom and beneficence of God, in those ob
jects which are presented to the external sens*,
we cannot be supposed to have luminous and
distinct ideas of those spiritual objects and ar
rangements which are removed beyond the sphere
of our corporeal organs. For all our ideas, in reJa-
tion to Religion and its objects, are primarily
derived from the intimations we receive of exter
nal objects, through the medium of ou* senws ;
and, consequently, the more clearly we perccir*
the agency of God, in his visible operates, &*
more shall we be qualified to perceive the w'aitff
and harmony ofhis dispensations, &s mxsnfei &
the volume of inspiration.

We live in a world, all the arrangers***!* V
which are the effects of infinite Wisri^w, £?*

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

are surrounded with wonders on every hand ; and
therefore we cease to admire, or to fix our atten
tion on any one of the wonders daily performed by
God. Wo have never been accustomed to con
template or to inhabit a world where benevolence
and wisdom are not displayed ; and, therefore, we
tire apt to imagine, that the circumstances of our
terrestrial existence could not have been muoh
otherwise than they actually are. We behold
the sun in the morning, ascending from the east
— a thousand shining globes are seen in the ca
nopy of the sky, when he has disappeared in the
west. We open our eyelids, and the myriad
of objects which compose an extensive landscape
are, in a moment, painted on our retina, — we
wish to move our bodies, and, in an instant, the
joints and muscles of our hands and feet perform
their several functions. We spread out our wet
clothes to dry, and in a few hours the moisture is
evaporated. We behold the fields drenched with
rain, and in a few days it disappears, and is
dispersed through the surrounding atmosphere, to
be again imbodied into clouds. These are all
common operations, and, therefore, thoughtless
and ungrateful man seldom considers the obliga
tions he is under to the Author of his existence,
for the numerous enjoyments which flow from
these wise arrangements. But were the globe
we inhabit, and all its appendages, to remain in
their present state — and were only the principle
of evaporation and the refractive and reflective
properties of the air to be destroyed — we should
soon feel, by the universal gloom which would en
sue, and by a thousand other inconveniences we
should suffer, what a miserable world was allotted
for our abode. We should most sensibly per
ceive the wisdom and goodness we had formerly
overlooked, and would most ardently implore the
restoration of those arrangements for which we
were never sufficiently grateful. And why should
we not now — while we enjoy so many comforts
flowing from the plans of infinite Wisdom —
have our attention directed to the benevolent con
trivances within us, and around us, in order that
grateful emotions may be hourly arising in our
hearts, to the. Father of our spirits ? For the es
sence of true religion consists chiefly in gratitude
to the God of our life, and the Author of salva
tion 5 and every pleasing sensation we feel from
the harmonies and the beauties of nature, ought
to inspire us with this sacred emotion. " Hearken
into this, O man ! stand still, and consider the
wonderful works of God. Contemplate the
balancings of the clouds, the wondrous works
of Him who is perfect in knowledge." — " He
hath made the earth by his power, he hath esta
blished the world by his wisdom. When he
uttereth his voice, there is a noise of waters in
the heavens ; he causeth the vapours to ascend
from the ends of the earth, and bringeth the winds
out of his treasures." While it is shameful for

man to be inattentive to the wonders which sur
round him, what can be more pleasing and con
genial to a rational and devout mind, than con
templations on the works of the Most Hijil
" What can be more gratifying," says Sturm
" than to contemplate, in the heavens, in the
earth, in the water, in the night arid day, and
indeed, throughout all nature, the proofs which
they afford of the wisdom, the purity, and the
.goodness of our great Creator and Preserver !
What can be more delightful than to recognize,
in the whole creation, in all the. natural world,
in every thing we see, traces of the ever-work
ing providence and tender mercy of the great
Father of all!"

SECTION IV.
On the Goodness or Benevolence of the DEITY.

THE Benevolence of God is that perfection
of his nature, by which he communicates hap
piness to the various ranks of sensitive and in
telligent existence.

The system of Nature, in all its parts, exhibits
an unbounded display of this attribute of the
Divine Mind, both in relation to man, and in
relation to the subordinate tribes of animated
existence. In relation to Man — the magnificence
and glory of the heavens — the variegated colouring
which is spread over the scene of nature — the
beautiful flowers, shrubs, and trees, with which
the earth is adorned, which not only delight the
eye, but perfume the air with their delicious
odours — the various kinds of agreeable sounds
that charm the ear — the music of the feathered
songsters, which fill the groves with their me
lody — the thousands of pleasant images which
delight the eye, in the natural embellishments of
creation — the agreeable feelings produced by the
contact of almost every thing we have occasion
to touch — the pleasure attached to eating, drink
ing, muscular mot ion, and activity — the luxuriant
profusion, and rich variety of aliments \\hich the
earth affords — and the interchanges of thought
and affection — all proclaim the Benevolence of
our Almighty Maker, and show that the commu
nication of happiness is one grand object of all
his arrangements. For these circumstances
are not essentially requisite to our existence
We might have lived, and breathed, and walked
though every thing we touched had produced
pain ; though every thing we ate and drank had
been bitter; though every movement of our hand?
and feet had been accompanied with uneasiness
and fatigue ; though every sound had been as harsh
as the saw of the carpenter ; though no birds had
warbled in the groves ; though no flowers had
decked the fields, or filled the air with their per-

BENEVOLENCE OF THE DEITY.

femes; though one unvaried scene of dull uni
formity had prevailed, and beauty and sublimity
had been swept from the face of nature ; though
the earth had been covered with a mantle of black,
and no radiant orbs had appeared in our nocturnal
sky. But what a miserable world should we then
have inhabited, compared with that which we
now possess! Life would have passed away
without enjoyment : and pain would have over
balanced the pleasure of existence. Whereas, in
the existing constitution of things, all the objects
around us, and every sense of which we are pos
sessed, when preserved in its natural vigour, have
». direct tendency to produce pleasing sensations,
and to contribute to our enjoyment: and it is
chiefly when we indulge in foolish and depraved
passions, and commit immoral actions, that the
benevolent intentions of the Deity are frustrated,
and pain and misery produced.

If we consider, further, that the inexhaustible
bounty of the Creator, and the numerous pleasures
we enjoy, are bestowed upon a guilty race of men,
the benevolence of the Deity will appear in a
still more striking point of view. Man has dared
to rebel against his Maker ; he is a depraved and
ungrateful creature. The great majority of our
race have banished God from their thoughts,
trampled upon his laws, neglected to contemplate
his works, refused to pay him that tribute of
reverence and adoration which his perfections
demand, have been ungrateful for his favours,
have blasphemed his name, and have transferred
to " four-footed beasts, and creeping things," that
nomage which is due to him alone. It has been
the chief part of their employment, in all ages,
to counteract the effects of his Beneficence, by
inflicting injustice, oppression, and torture, upon
each other ; by maiming the human frame, burn
ing cities and villages, turning fruitful fields into
a wilderness, and by every other act of violence,
carrying death and destruction through the world.
And if water, air, and the light of heaven, had
been placed within the limits of their control, it
is more than probable, that whole nations would
have been occasionally deprived of these elements,
so essential to human existence. Yet, notwith
standing the prevalence of such depraved dispo
sitions, the streams of Divine benevolence to
wards our apostate race have never yet been
interrupted. The earth has never stopped in its
career, and thrown nature into a scene of confu
sion ; the light of heaven has never ceased to
illume the world ; the springs of water have never
been dried up, nor has the fertile soil ceased to
enrich the plains with golden harvests. God
" hath not left himself without a witness," to his
beneficence, in any age, in that he hath unceas
ingly bestowed on the inhabitants of the world
11 rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling
their hearts with food and gladness." This is
ene of the characters of Deity which forms the

most perfect contrast to the selfish and revengefu*
dispositions of man, which as far transcends
human benevolence, as the heavens in extent
surpass the earth — a character calculated to ox-
cite our highest love and admiration, and which
we are called upon, in the Sacred Oracles, to
imitate and revere. " Be ye merciful, as your
Father who is in heaven is merciful : for he
inaketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the
good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the
unjust."— " O that men would praise the Lord for
his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the
children of men."

From such considerations, we learn, even from
the system of nature, that mercy is an attribute
of the Deity ; for, if mercy consists in bestowing
favours on those who are unworthy, or who merit
punishment, the greatest sinners in all ages have
shared in it, and every individual of the human
race now existing enjoys a certain portion of
those comforts which flow from the benevolent
arrangements which the Creator has established.
" He maketh the sun to rise on the evil and on the
good." Though the nations in ancient times,
as well as at present, " walked in their own way,:)
indulging in impiety, falsehood, lewdness, war,
devastations, revenge, abominable idolatries, and
every other violation of his law, he still supported
the functions of their animal frames, and caused
the influence of the sun, the rains, and the dews,
to descend upon their fields, that they might be
refreshed with his bounty, and filled " with food
and gladness." If mercy were not an essential
attribute of the Deity, he would have cut them
down in the midst of their first transgressions,
shattered to pieces the globe on which they dwelt,
and buried them in eternal oblivion. But whether
Divine mercy will extend to the final forgiveness
of sin, and the communication of eternal happi
ness to such beings, can be learned only from the
discoveries of revelation.

In relation to the inferior animals — the im
mense multitude of living creatures with which
the earth is replenished, is a striking evidence
of the vast profusion of Divine Beneficence.
More than a hundred thousand species of ani
mated beings are dispersed through the differ
ent regions of the air, the water, and the earth,
besides myriads which arc invisible to the un
assisted eye. To estimate the number of in
dividuals belonging to any one species is beyond
the power of man. What countless myriads
of herrings, for example, are contained in a single
shoal, which is frequently more than six miles
long and three miles broad. To estimate the
number of individuals in all the different species
would, therefore, be as impossible as to count the
grains of sand in the Arabian deserts. There
is not a single spot, in any region of the globe,
but what teems with animated beings. Yet, all
this vast assemblage of sensitive existence ig

54

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

amply provided for by the bountiful Creator.
" These all wait upon him, and he giveth
them their meat in due season." They enjoy
not only life, but also a happy existence. The
sportive motions and gesticulations of all the
animal tribes — the birds skimming through the
air, warbling in the groves, and perching on the
trees — the beasts of the field, bounding in the
forests, and through the lawns — the fishes sport
ing in the waters — the reptiles wriggling in the
dust, and the winged insects, by a thousand
wanton mazes — all declare that they are re
joicing in their existence, an.J in the exercise of
those powers with which the Creator has fur
nished them. So that, wherever we turn our eyes,
we evidently perceive, that u the earth is full of
the goodness of the Lord;" and that " his tender
mercies are over all his works." This subject
is boundless — but it would be inconsistent with
the limited plan of this work, to enter into any
particular details. And it is the less necessary,
when we consider, that every instance of Divine
Wisdom is, at the same time, an instance of
benevolence; for it is the ultimate object of all
the wise contrivances in the system of Nature,
that happiness may be communicated to the va
rious ranks of sensitive and intelligent existence.
Goodness chooses the end. and wisdom selects
the most proper means, for its accomplishment;
so that these two attributes must always be con
sidered in simultaneous operation. And, there
fore, the instances I have already specified, of
the Wisdom and Intelligence of the Creator, may
also be considered, asexemplifications of Divine
Benevolence. I shall, therefore, conclude this
topic with the following extract from Dr. Paley.
" Contrivance proves design ; and the promi
nent tendency of the contrivance, indicates the
disposition of the designer. The world abounds
with contrivances ; and all the contrivances we
are acquainted with, are directed to beneficial
purposes. Evil, no doubt, exists ; but it is never
that we can perceive, the object of contrivance.
Teeth are contrived to eat, not to ache ; their
aching now and then, is incidental to the con
trivance, perhaps inseparable from it ; or even,
if you will, let it be called a defect in the con
trivance, but it is not the object of it. This is a
distinction which well deserves to be attended to.
In describing implements of husbandry, you will
hardly say of a sickle, that'll is made to cut the
reaper's fingers, though from the construction
of the instrument, and the manner of using it,
this mischief often happens. But if you had
occasion to describe instruments of torture or ex
ecution, This, you would say, ia to extend the si
news ; this to dislocate the joints ; this to break
the bones; this to scorch the soles of the feet.
Here pain and misery are the very objects of the
contrivance. Now nothing of this sort is to be
found in the works of nature. W» never dis

cover a train of contrivance to bring aboat a»
evil purpose. No anatomist ever discovered a
system of organization calculated to produce
pain and disease ; or in explaining the parts of the
human body, ever said, This is to irritate ; this to
inflame ; this duct is to convey the gravel to the
kidneys ; this gland to secrete thn humour which
forms the gout. If, by chance, he come at a
part of which he knows not the use, the most he
can say is, that it is uselses ; no one ever suspects
that it is put there to incommode, to annoy, or
torment. Since, then, God hath called forth his
consummate wisdom to contrive and provide for
our happiness, and the world appears to have
been constituted with this design at first, so
long as this constitution is upheld by him, we
must, in reason, suppose the same design to con
tinue." — Paley's Moral Philosophy, Book II.
Chap. 5.

Thus, I have endeavoured, in this and the pre
ceding section, to exhibit a few specimens of the
Wisdom and Goodness of God, in the system of
nature. These might have been multiplied to an
indefinite extent, but the instances adduced, I
presume, are sufficient to show, that the economy
of the material world is not altogether a barren
subject, to a pious and contemplative mind/
Every intelligent believer in Revelation will
readily admit, that it would be a highly desirable
object, to induce upon the mass of Christians such
a habit of devout attention to the visible works of
creation, as would lead them, in their social and
solitary walks, to recognize the agency of God,
in every object they behold ; to raise their thoughts
to Him as the Great First Cause, and to ex
pand their hearts with emotions of gratitude.
How very different must be the sentiments and
the piety of the man who looks on the scene
of wisdom and magnificence around him, with
a " brute unconscious gaze," as thousands of
professed Christians do — and the grateful and
pious emotions of him who recognizes the be
nevolent agency of God, in the motions of his
fingers, and his eyeballs ; in the pulsation of
his heart; in the picture of external objects
every moment formed on his retina ; in the re
flection of the rays of light, and the diversified
colours they produce; in the dry ing of his clothes;
in the constitution of the atmosphere ; in the
beauty and magnificence of the earth and the
heavens ; and in every other object that meets his
eye, in the expanse of nature ! The numberless
astonishing instances of Divine agency, which
every where present themselves to our view in
the scene around us, seem evidently intended
to arrest the mind to a consideration of an
" ever-present Deity ;" and I envy not the sen
timents or the feelings of that man who ima
gines, that he stands in no need of such sensible
mediums, to impress his mind with a sense of
the benevolent care and omnipresence of God.

CHAPTER II.

CONTAINING A CURSORY VIEW OF SOME OP THE SCIENCES WHICH ARE RELATED
TO RELIGION AND CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY.

THEOLOGY has generally been viewed as a
study of a very limited range : and, hence, when
it has been admitted into the circle of the sciences,
a much smaller space has been allotted for its dis
cussion, than has been devoted to almost any
other department of human knowledge. When
considered, however, in its most extensive sense,
— in its relations to the Divine Being — to his past
and present dispens ations towards the human race
— to the presf nt circumstances and the future
destiny of mar- — and to the physical and moral
condition of all the sentient and intelligent beings
of which we have any intimation — it ought to be
viewed as the most varied and comprehensive of
all the sciences ; as embracing, within its exten
sive grasp, all the other departments of useful
knowledge, both human and divine. As it has
God for its object, it must include a knowledge
of the universe he has formed — of the movements
which are continually going on throughout the
wide extent of his empire, in so far as they lie
open to our inspection — of the attributes which
appear to be displayed in all his operations — of
the moral laws he has framed for the regulation
of holy intelligences — of the merciful arrange
ments he has made for the restoration of fallen
man — of the plans by which the knowledge of his
will is to be circulated and extended in the world
in which we live — of the means by which truth,
and moral purity, and order, are to be promoted
among our apostate race, in order to their resto
ration to the happiness they have lost — together
with all those diversified ramifications of know-
iedge, which have either a more remote or a
more immediate bearing on the grand object now
specified. Like the lines which proceed from
the circumference to the centre of an immense
circle— all the moral* arts and sciences which
have been invented by men — every department
of human knowledge, however far it may, at first
sight, appear to be removed from religion— may
be considered as having a direct bearing on The
ology, as the grand central point, and as having a
certain tendency to promote its important objects.

It is much to be regretted, that Theology has
so seldom been contemplated in this point of
view — and that the sciences have been considered

• The epithet moral Is here used in its application
to arts, because there are certain arts which must
be considered as having an immoral tendency such
as the art of war, the art of boxing, of gambling,
&c. and which, therefore, cannot have a direct ten-
dency to promote the objects tf religion

rather as so many independent branches of sect*,
lar knowledge, than as subservient to the elucida
tion of the facts and doctrines of religion and to th«
accomplishment of its benevolent designs. Hence,
it has happened that Philosophy and Religion,
instead of marching hand in hand to the portals of
immortality, have frequently set themselves in
hostile array ; and combats have ensued equally
injurious to the interests of both parties. The
Philosopher has occasionally been disposed to
investigate the economy of nature, without a refer
ence to the attributes of that Almighty Being who
presides over its movements, as if the universe
were a self-moving and independent machine;
and has not unfrequently taken occasion, from
certain obscure and insulated facts, to throw out
insinuations hostile to the truth and the charac
ter of the Christian Revelation. The Theolo
gian, on the other hand, in the heat of his intem
perate zeal against the infidel philosopher, has un
guardedly been led to declaim against the study
of science, as if it were unfriendly to religion —
has, in effect, set the works of God in opposition
to his word — has confounded the foolish theories
of speculative minds with the rational study of the
works of Deity — and has thus prevented the mass
of mankind from expanding their minds, by the
contemplation of the beauties and sublimities of
nature.

It is now high time that a complete reconcilia
tion were effected between these contending par
ties. Religion ought never to disdain to derive
her supports and illustrations from the researches
of science ; for the investigations of philoso
phy into the economy of Nature, from whatever
motives they may be undertaken, are nothing
else than an inquiry into the plans and opera
tions of the Eternal Mind. And Philosophy
ought always to consider it as her highest honour,
to walk as an handmaid in the train of that reli
gion which points out the path to the regions of
eternal bliss. By their mutual aid, and the sub
serviency of the one to the other, the moral end
intellectual improvement of man will be promot
ed, and the benevolent purposes of God, in the
kingdom of providence, gradually accomplished.
But when set in opposition to each other, the
human mind is bewildered and retarded in its
progress, and the Deity is apt to be considered
as set in opposition to himself— as proclaiming
one system of doctrines from the economy of re«
velation, and another, and an opposite system,
from the economy of nature. But if the Chria-

56

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

tian Revelation and the system of the material
world derived their origin from the same Al
mighty Being, the most complete harmony must
subsist between the revelations they respectively
unfold ; and the apparent inconsistencies which
occur must be owing chiefly to the circum
stances of our present station in the universe, and
to the obscure and limited views we are obliged
to take of some of the grand and diversified ob
jects they embrace. And, therefore, we have
reason to believe that, when the system of nature
shall be more extensively explored, and the lead
ing objects of revelation contemplated in a clearer
light, without being tinged with the false colour
ing of party opinions and contracted views, and
when rational inquirers shall conduct their re
searches with a greater degree of reverence, humi
lity and Christian temper, tha beauty and harmo
ny of all the plans and revelations of the Deity, in
reference both to the physical and the moral world,
will be more distinctly perceived and appreciated.

In the following cursory sketches, it forms no
part of my plan to trace even an outline of the
different sciences which are connected with reli
gion, much less to enter into any particular de
tails, in relation to their facts and principles. It
would be comparatively easy to fill up the remain
ing sheets of this volume with skeletons of the
different sciences ; but such meager details as
behooved to be brought forward, could not be
interesting to the general reader, and would fail
in accomplishing the object proposed. My de
sign simply is, to select some leading facts, or
general truths, in relation to some of the physical
sciences, for the purpose of showing their connec
tion with the objects of religion and the interests
of rational piety. At the same time, such de
finite descriptions will be given as will enable
common readers to appreciate the objects and
bearings of the different branches of knowledge
which may be presented to their view.

The first science* I shall notice is that of

NATURAL HISTORY.

This science, taken in its most comprehensive
sense, includes a knowledge and description of
all the known facts in the material universe.

It is to be regretted, that most books published
under the title of Natural History, to which com
mon readers have access, contain nothing more
than a general description of animals, as if this
science were confined merely to one class of
beings ; whereas there is an infinite variety of

• The term science, in its most general and exten
sive sense, signifies knowledge, particularly that
species of knowledge which is acquired by the exer
tion of the human faculties. In a more restricted
sense, it denotes a systematic species of knowledge,
which consists of rule and order, such as Mathema
tics, Astronomy, Natural Philosophy, &c.- In the
discussions contained in this work, it is used in its
most general sense, as denoting the various depart
ments of human knowledge, in which sense history,
both natural, civil, and sacred, may be termed
tcience,

other objects seldom noticed, which would appea-
no less interesting, and, in some instances, much
more novel and gratifying to the general readtu
and to the youthful mind. All the diversified
forms of matter, whether existing on the surface
or in the bowels of the earth, in the ocean, the
atmosphere, or in the heavens, form the legiti
mate objects of this department of the science of
nature.

Were we, therefore, to sketch a comprehen
sive outline of the subjects of Natural History,
we might, in the first place, take a cursory sur
vey of the globe we inhabit, in reference to its
magnitude, figure, motions, and general arrange
ments — the form, relations, and extent of its con
tinents — the numerous islands which diversify
the surface of the ocean — the magnitude, the direc
tion, and the extent of its rivers, and the quantity
of water they pour into the ocean — the direc
tion, elevation, and extent of the different ranges
of mountains which rise from its surface — the
plains, morasses, lakes, forests, dells, and sandy
deserts, which diversify its aspect — the extent,
the motions, the colour, and the different aspects
of the ocean, and the facts which have been ascer
tained respecting its saltness, its depth,its bottom,
and its different currents. We might next take
a more particular view of some of the most re
markable objects on its surface, and give a detail
of the facts which are known respecting the his
tory of volcanoes — their number — the countries
in which they are situated — the awful pheno
mena they exhibit — and the devastations they
have produced ; the history of earthquakes, their
phenomena and effects, and the countries most
subject to their ravages — basaltic and rocky
wonders, natural bridges, precipices, cataracts,
ice islands, icebergs, glaciers, whirlpools, mine
ral wells, reciprocating fountains, boiling springs,
sulphuric mountains, bituminous lakes, volcanic
islands — the various aspects of nature in the
different zones, and the contrasts presented be
tween the verdant scenes of tropical climes, and
the icy cliffs of the polar regions. We would
next take a survey of the subterraneous wonders
which lie beneath the surface of the earth — the
immense chasms and caverns which wind in va
rious directions among the interior strata of our
globe — such as the great Kentucky cavern, and
the grotto of Antiparos — the mines of salt, coal,
copper, lead, diamond, iron, quicksilver, tin, £t>ld,
and silver — the substances which compose the
various strata, the fossil bones, shells, ai:d petri
factions, which are imbedded in the different
layers, and the bendings and disruptions -vhich
appear to have taken place in the substances
which compose the exterior crust of the earth.
"We might next survey the atmosphere with which
the earth is environed, and give a detail of the
facts which have been ascertained respecting its
specific gravity and pressure, the elementary prin
ciples of which it is compounded, its refractive

NATURAL HISTORY.

57

and reflective powers, and the phenomena which
result from its various properties and modifica
tions — the meteors which appear in its different
regions — thunder and lightning, winds, hail, rain,
clouds, rainbows, parhelias or mock-suns, mete
oric stones, the aurora boreaiis, luminous arches,
ignes fatui, the mirage, the fata morgana, hur
ricanes, monsoons, whirlwinds and waterspouts,
sounds and echoes.

In prosecuting our survey of sublunary nature,
we would next advert to the various orders of
the vegetable tribes — their anatomical structure
— the circulation of their juices — the food by
which they are nourished — the influence of light
and air on their growth and motions — their male
and female organs — their periods of longevity —
iheir modes of propagation — their diseases and
dissolution — iheir orders, genera, and species —
their immense variety — their influence on the
salubrity of the atmosphere — the relation which
their roots, leaves, and fruits bear to the wants
of man and other animals, in supplying food,
clothing, and materials for constructing habita
tions — the gums and resinous substances they
exude — the odours they exhale — the variety of
colours they exhibit — the vast diversity of forms
in which they appear — and the beauty and va
riety which they spread over the whole face of
nature.

The mineral kingdom would next require to be
surveyed. We would inquire into the facts which
have been ascertained respecting the earthy, sa
line, inflammable, and metallic substances which
are found on the surface and in the bowels of
the earth — their specific and distinguishing cha
racters — the elementary principles, or simple
substances, of which they are composed — the
regions of the earth where the respective mine
rals most frequently abound — and the ends
which they are designed to accomplish in the
constitution of the globe. We would consider,
more particularly, the various metals, such as
iron, copper, lead, tin, gold, silver, bismuth, zinc,
&c. in reference to the substances with which
they are united in their native ores — the changes
produced upon them by the action of oxygen and
the different acids — their combustibility — their
combination with phosphorus, sulphur, and car
bon ; and the various compounds into which they
may be formed — their important uses in the arts
which minister to the comfort and embellishment
of human life — their relation to the multifarious
necessities of man — and the wisdom and good
ness of the Creator, as displayed in their ar
rangement in the bowels of the earth, and in
the admirable properties of which they are pos
sessed. In these details, the natural history
of Iron would hold a prominent place. In point
of utility, it claims the highest rank in the class
of metals, and is intrinsically more v aluible than
gold and silver, and all the diamonds of the East.
•—There is scarcely a mineral substance in the

whole compass of nature, which affords a more
striking instance of the beneficial and harmo
nious adaptation of things in the universal sys
tem. We would, therefore, consider it in reference
to its vast abundance in all parts of the world —
the numerous substances into which it enters
into combination — its magnetical property — its
capability of being fused and welded — the nu
merous useful utensils it has been the means
of producing — its agency in carrying forward im
provements in art and science, in the civilization
of barbarous tribes, and in promoting the progress
of the human mind ; and the aids which it affords
to the Christian missionary in heathen lands.

Having surveyed the inanimate parts of the
terraqueous globe, and its appendages, we might
next direct our attention to the animated tribes
with which it is peopled. Beginning at Man,
the head of the animal creation, we would de
tail the principal facts which have been ascer
tained respecting his structure and organicai
functions — the muscular movements of the hu
man body, the system of bones, nerves, veins,
and arteries ; the process of respiration ; and the
organs of vision, hearing, smelling, tast.ing, and
feeling, by which he holds a correspondence
with the material world — the modifications which
appear. in his corporeal frame and in his mental
faculties, during the periods of infancy, puberty,
manhood, and old age — the causes and phenomena
of sleep and dreaming — the varieties of the human
race, in respect of colour, stature, and features —
the deviations from the ordinary course of nature,
which occasionally occur, in the case of monsters,
dwarfs, and giants — the moral and intellectua.
faculties — and those distinguishing characteristics
which prove the superiority of man over the other
tribes of animated nature.

The inferior ranks of the animal creation
would next demand our attention. We would
take a survey of the numerous tribes of Quadru
peds, Birds, Fishes, Serpents, Lizards, and In
sects, in reference to the characteristic marks by
which the different species are distinguished, —
their food and habitations — the different modes
in which they display their architective faculty,
in constructing places of abode for shelter and
protection — the clothing with which they are
furnished — their sagacity in finding out the pro
per means for subsistence and self-preservation —
their hostilities— their artifices in catching their
prey, and escaping their enemies — their modes
of propagation — their transformations from one
state and form to another— their migrations to
different countries and climates— their various
instincts— their care in rearing and protecting
their young — their passions, mental characters,
and social dispositions— their language, or modes
of communication with each other — their capaci
ties for instruction and improvement — their dif
ferent powers of locomotion — the adaptation of
all their organs to the purposes for which they

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

intended — the indications they give of
being possessed of moral dispositions and rational
powers — their different periods of longevity, and
the ends which they are intended to subserve in
the system of nature. Along with these details,
certain views might be exhibited of the various
forms of sensitive life, and modes of existence,
which obtain in those numerous species of an-
'.rnals which are invisible to the naked eye, and
which the microscope discovers in almost every
department of nature.

Having surveyed the objects which compose
our sublunary system, we would next, direct our
view to the regions of the sky, and contemplate
the facts which have been discovered in relation to
the celestial orbs. We would first aitend to the
apparent motion of the sun, the different points of
the horizon at which he seems to rise and set,
and the different degrees of elevation to which he
arrives, at different seasons of the year, — the
different aspects he presents as viewed from dif
ferent parts of the earth's surface, and the differ
ent lengths of days and nights in different parts
of the world. We would next attend to the varied
phases of the moon — the direct and retrograde
motions of the planets — the apparent diurnal
motion of the whole celestial sphere, from east
to west — and the different clusters of stars which
are seen in our nocturnal sky, at different sea
sons of the year. We would next consider the
deductions which science has made, respecting
the order and arrangement of the planets which
compose the solar system — their distances from
the sun, and from the earth — their magnitudes
— the periods of their diurnal and annual revo
lutions — the secondary planets, or moons,
which accompany them — their eclipses — the
various phenomena which their surfaces present
when viewed through telescopes — the physical
influence .which some of them produce on the
surface of our globe — and the singular appear
ance of those bodies called Comets, which
occasionally visit this part of our system. We
would, in the next place, extend our views to
the starry regions, and consider the number
of stars which present themselves to the naked
eye — the immensely greater numbers which
are discovered by telescopes — the systems into
which they appear to be arranged — the facts
which have been ascertained respecting new
stars — double and triple stars — stars once visi
ble, which have now disappeared from the hea
vens — variable stars, whose lustre is increased
and diminished at different periods of time — and
the stiucture and position of the many hundreds
of Nebula, or starry systems, which appear to be
dispersed throughout the immensity of creation.
All the particulars now stated, and many
others which might have been specified — consi
dered simply as facts which exist in the system
of Nature — form the appropriate and legitimate
objects of Natural History, and demand the se

rious attention of every rational intelligence
that wishes to trace the perfections and agenci
of the Almighty Creator. To investigate thp
causes of the diversified phenomena which the
material world exhibits, and the principles and
modes by which many of the facts now alluded
to are ascertained, is the peculiar province of
Natural Philosophy, Chymistry, and the Mathe
matical Sciences.

Amid so vast a variety of objects as Natural
History presents, it is difficult to fix on any par
ticular facts, as specimens of the interesting
nature of this department of knowledge, without
going beyond the limits to which I am necessarily
confined in this volume. I shall content myself
with a description of two objects, which have a
reference chiefly to the vegetable kingdom. —
The first of these is

THE BANIAN TREE. — "This tree, which is
also called the Sun Tree, or the Indian Fig, is
one of the most curious and beautiful of Nature's
productions, in the genial climate of India, where
she sports with the greatest variety and profusion.
Each tree is in itself a grove; and some of them
are of an amazing size and extent, and, contrary
to most other animal and vegetable productions,
seem to be exempted from decay. E very branch
from the main body throws out its own roots ;
at first, in small tender fibres, several yards from
the ground ; these continually grow thicker, until,
by a gradual descent, they reach the surface, and
there, striking in, they increase to large trunks,
and become parent trees, shooting out new
branches from the tops. These, in time, sus
pend their roots, and receiving nourishment
from the earth, swell into trunks, and shoot forth
other branches ; thus continuing in a state of
progression, so long as the earth, the first parent
of them all, contributes her sustenance. A
banian tree, with many trunks, forms the most
beautiful walks, vistas, and cool recesses, that
can be imagined. The leaves are large, soft,
and of a lively green ; the fruit is a small fig, when
ripe of a bright scarlet, affording sustenance to
monkeys, squirrels, peacocks, and birds of va
rious kinds, which dwell among the branches.

" The Hindoos are peculiarly fond of the
banian tree ; they consider its long duration, its
outstretching arms, and its overshadowing bene
ficence, as emblems of the Deity, and almost pay
it divine honours. The brahmins, who thus
' find a fane in every sacred grove,' spend much of
their time in religious solitude, under the shade
of the banian tree ; they plant it near <heir tem
ples or pagodas ; and in those villages where there
is no structure erected for public worship, they
place an image under one of these trees, and there
perform a morning and evening sacrifice. The
natives of all castes and tribes are fond of recreat
ing in the cool recesses, beautiful walks, and love
ly vistas of this umbrageous canopy, impervioua
to the hottest beams of a tropical sun. Thes*

NATURAL HISTORY.

59

are the trees under which a sect of naked phi
losophers, called Gymnosophists, assembled in
Arriari's days, and this historian of Ancient
Greece presents a true picture of the modern
Hindoos. — ' In winter,' he says, 'the Gymno
sophists enjoy the benefit of the sun's rays in the
open air; and in summer, when the heat becomes
excessive, they pass their time in cool and moist
places, under large trees, which according to the
accounts of Nearchus, cover a circumference of
Jive acres, and extend their branches so far, that ten
thousand men may easily find shelter under them.
" On the banks of the river Narbuddy, in the
province of Gu/zerat, is a banian tree, supposed,
by some persons, to be the one described by
Nearchus, and certainly not inferior to it. It is
distinguished by the name of Cubbeer Burr,
which was given it in honour of a famous saint.
High floods have, at various times, swept away
a considerable part of this extraordinary tree ;
but what still remains, is nearly two thousand
feet in circumference, measured round the princi
pal stems ; the overhanging branches, not yet
struck down, cover a much larger space; and
under it grow a number of custard-apple and
other fruit trees. The large trunks of this single
tree amount to three hundred and fifty; and the
smaller ones exceed three thousand; every one
of these is constantly sending forth branches and
hanging roots, to form other trunks and become
the parents of a future progeny. The Cubbeer
Burr is famed throughout Hindostan, not only
on account of its great extent, but also of its sur
passing beauty The Indian armies generally
encamp around it ; and at stated seasons, solemn
Jatarras, or Hindoo festivals, to which thousands
of votaries repair, from every part of the Mogul
empire, are there celebrated. It is said that se
ven thousand persons find ample room to repose
under its shade. It has long been the custom of
the British residents in India, on their hunting
and shooting parties, to form extensive encamp
ments, and spend weeks together, under this de
lightful and magnificent pavilion, which affords
a shelter to all travellers, particularly to the reli
gious tribes of the Hindoos. It is generally filled
witn greenwood pigeons, doves, peacocks, and a
variety of feathered songsters — with monkeys,
wnich both divert the spectator, by their antic
tricks, and interest him by the paternal affection
they display to their young offspring, in teaching
them to select their food, and to exert themselves
in jumping from bough to bough, — and is shaded
by bats of a large size, many of them measuring
upwards of six feet from the extremity of one
wing to the other. This tree affords not only
shelter, but sustenance, to all its inhabitants,
being covered, amid its bright foliage, with small
figs, of a rich scarlet, on which they all regale
with as much delight as the lords of creation on
their more costly fure,in their parties of pleasure."
» 'See Encyclopedia Britannica, Art. Ficus.

This tree, which is doubtless one of the most
singular and magnificent objects in the vegetable
kingdom, appears to be a world in miniature, in
which thousands, both of human beings and of
the inferior tribes that traverse the earth and the
air, may find ample accommodation and subsist
ence. What a striking contrast does it present
to the forests of trees, or mushrooms, which are
perceived by the help of the microscope, in a
piece of mouldiness— every plant of which is se
veral hundreds of times smaller than the point o«
a fine needle! Yet both are the effects of the
agency of the same All-wise and Omnipotent
Being. And what an immense variety of gra
dations is to be found in the vegetable world, be
tween these two extremes — every part of the vast
interval being filled up with flowers, herbs, shrubs,
and trees of every colour, form, and size, and in
such vast multitudes and profusion that no man
can number them !

An object, which approximates in a certain de
gree to the one now described, is mentioned in
" Staunton's Account of Macartney's Embassy
to China," p. 70. It is called by botanists Adan-
sonia, and is also known by the name of the
Monkey Bread Tree, and was discovered in the
island of St. Jago. " The circumference or girth
of the base was 56 feet, which soon divided into
two vast branches, the one in a perpendicular
direction, whose periphery, or girth, was 42 feet,
the other 26. Another, of the same species, stood
near it, whose single trunk, girthing only 38 feet,
was scarcely noticed."

The only other specimen I shall exhibit to the
reader has a relation both to the animal and to the
vegetable kingdom. It is well known that the
examination of flowers, and vegetables of every
description, by the microscope, opens anew and
interesting field of wonders to the inquiring
naturalist. Sir John Hill has given the following
curious account of what appeared on his examin
ing a carnation.

"The principal flower in an elegant bouquet
was a carnation: the fragrance of this led me to
enjoy it frequently atiu near. The sense of smell
ing was not the only one affected on these occa
sions: while that was satiated with the powerful
sweet, the ear was constantly attacked by an
extremely soft, but agreeable murmuring sound.
It was easy to know that some animal within the
covert must be the musician, and that the little
noise must come from some little creature, suited
to produce it. I instantly distended the lower part
of the flower, and placing it in a full light, could
discover troops of little insects frisking, with wild
jollity, among the narrow pedestals that support
ed its leaves, and the little threads that occupied
its centre. What a fragrant world for their ha
bitation ! What a perfect security from all an
noyance, in the dusky husk that surrounded the
scene of action ! Adapting a microscope to take
in, at one view, the whole base of the flower, I

60

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER,

gave myself an opportunity of contemplating what
they were about, and this for many days toge
ther, without giving them the least disturbance,
Thus, I could discover their economy, their
passions, and their enjoyments. The microscope,
on this occasion, had given what nature seemed
tc have denied to the objects of contemplation.
The base of the flower extended itself under its
influence to a vast plain ; the slender stems of
the leaves became trunks of so many stately
cedars ; the threads in the middle seemed co
lumns of massy structure, supporting at the top
several ornaments ; and the narrow spaces be
tween were enlarged into walks, parterres, and
terraces. On the polished bottoms of these, brighter
than Parian marble, walked in pairs, alone,
or in larger companies, the winged inhabitants ;
these from little dusky flies, for such only the
naked eye would have shown them, were raised
to glorious glittering animals, stained with living
purple, and with a glossy gold, that would have
made all the labours of the loom contemptible in
the comparison. I could, at leisure, as they
walked together, admire their elegant limbs,
their velvet shoulders, and their silken wings ;
their backs vying with the empyrean in its blue ;
and their eyes, each formed of a thousand others,
outglittering the little planes on a brilliant ; above
description, and too great almost for admiration.
I could observe them here singling out their fa
vourite females ; courting them with the music of
their buzzing wings with little songs, formed for
their little organs ; leading them from walk to walk,
among the perfumed shades, and pointing out to
their taste the drop of liquid nectar, just burst
ing from some vein within theliving trunk — here
were the perfumed groves, the more than mystic
shades of the poet's fancy realized. Here the
happy lovers spent their days in joyful dalliance,
or, in the triumph of their little hearts, skipped
after one another from stem to stem, among the
painted trees, or winged their short flight to the
close shadow of some broader leaf, to revel un
disturbed in the heights of all felicity."

This picture of the splendour and felicity of
insect life, may, to certain readers, appear
somewhat overcharged. But those who have
been much in the habit of contemplating the beau
ties of the animal and vegetable world, through
microscopes, can easily enter into all the views
which are here described. I have selected this
example, for the purpose of illustrating the un
bounded goodness of the Creator, in the vast
profusion of enjoyment he has communicated,
even to the lowest tribes of animal existence.,
and as a specimen of those invisible worlds
which exist beyond the range of our natural
vision. Fur it appears that there is a gradation
of worlds downward as well as upward. How
ever small our globe may appear when compared
with the sun and with the immensity of starry
systems which lie dispersed through the infinity

of space, there are worlds filled with myriads
of living beings, which, in point of size and ex»
tent, bear as small a proportion to the earth, as
the earth bears to the vast assemblage of the
celestial worlds. A single flower, a leaf, or a
drop of water, may appear as large and as diver
sified in its structure, to some o4 the beings
which inhabit it, as the whole earth appears to
the view of man ; and a thousand scenes of mag
nificence and beauty may be presented to their
sight, of which no distinct conception can be
formed by the human mind. The many thousands
of transparent globes, of which their eyes are
composed, mav magnify and multiply the objects
around them without end, so that an object
scarcely visible to the eye of man may appear
to them as a vast extended universe.

"Having examined," says St. Pierre, "one
day, by a microscope, the flowers of thyme, I dis
tinguished in them, with equal surprise and de
light, superb flagons with a long neck, of a sub
stance resembling the amethyst, from the gullets
of which seemed to flow ingots of liquid gold. I
have never made observations of the corolla,
simply of the smallest flower, without finding it
composed of an admirable substance, half trans
parent, studded with brilliants, and shining in
the most lively colours. The beings which live
under a reflex thus enriched, must have ideas
very different from ours, of light, and of the othei
phenomena of nature. A drop of dew, filtering in
the capillary and transparent tubes of a plant,
presents to them thousands of cascades ; the same
drop fixed as a wave on the extremity of one of
its prickles, an ocean without a shore ; evaporat
ed into air, a vast aerial sea. It is credible, then,
from analogy, that there are animals feeding on
the leaves of plants like the cattle in our meadows
and on our mountains, which repose under the
shades of a down imperceptible to the naked eye,
and which, from goblets formed like so many
suns,quafTnectarof the colour of gold and silver."

Thus it appears, that the universe extends to
infinity on either hand ; and that whenever mat
ter exists, from the ponderous globes of heaven
down to the invisible atom, there .he Almighty
Creator has prepared habitations ibr countless
orders of existence, from the seraph to the ani-
malcula, in order to demonstrate his boundless
beneficence, and the infinite variety of modes by
which he can diffuse happiness through the uni
versal system.

" How sweet to muse upon His skill Jisplay'd
Infinite skill ! in all that he has made ;
To trace in nature's most, minute design
The signature and stamp of power divine;
Contrivance exquisite, expressed with ease,
Where unassisted sight no beauty sees ;
The shapely limb and lubricated joint,
Within the small dimensions of a point:
Muscle and nerve miraculously spun,
His mighty work who speaks and it is .lone j
Th' invisible in things scarce seen reveal'd;
To whom an atom is an ample field !"

Cowper's Retirttntrt,

NATURAL HISTORY.

61

With regard to the religious tendency of the
•tudy of Natural History, it may be remarked—
that, as all the objects which it embraces are the
workmanship of, God — the delineations and de
scriptions of the Natural Historian must be con
sidered as " The history of the operations of the
Creator ;" or, in other words, so far as the science
extends, " The histor of the Creator himself:"
for the marks of his incessant agency, his power,
wisdom, and beneficence, are impressed on every
object, however minute, throughout the three
kingdoms of nature, and throughout every region
of earth, air, and sky. As the Deity is invisi
ble to mortal eyes, and cannot be directly con
templated by finite minds, without some material
medium of communication — there are but two me
diums \vith which we are acquainted, by which
we can attain a knowledge of his nature and per
fections. These are, either the facts which have
occurred in the course of his providential dispen
sations towards our race, since the commence
ment of time, and the moral truths connected
with them — or, the facts which are displayed in
the economy of nature. The first class of facts is
recorded in the Sacred Hisory, and in the Annals
of Nations ; the second class is exhibited in the
diversified objects and motions which appear
throughout the system of the visible universe.
The one may be termed the Moral History, and
the other, the Natural History, of the operations
of the Creator. It is obviously incumbent on
every rational being, to contemplate the Creator
through both these mediums ; for each of them
conveys its distinct and peculiar revelations ; and
consequently our perception of Deity through
the one medium does not supersede the neces
sity of our contemplating him through the other.
While, therefore, it is our duty to contemplate
the perfections, the providence, and the agency
of God, as displayed in the Scripture Revelation,
it is also incumbent upon us, to trace his attri
butes in the System of Nature, in order that we
may be enable to contemplate the eternal Jeho
vah, in every variety of aspect, in which he has
been pleased to exhibit himself, in the universe
he has formed.

The visible creation may be considered as a
permanent and sensible manifestation of Deity,
intended every moment to present to our view
the unceasing energies of Him " in whom we
live and move." And if the train of our thoughts
were directed in its proper channel, we would
perceive God in every object, and in every move
ment : we would behold him operating in the
whirlwind, and in the storm ; in the subterra
neous cavern, and in the depths of the ocean ; in
the gentle rain, and the refreshing breeze ; in the
rainbow, the fiery meteor, and the lightning's
flash ; in the splendours of the sun, and the majes
tic movements of the heavens ; in the frisking of
the lambs, the songs of birds, and the buzz of in-
f ecti , in the circulation of our blood, the move

ments of our joints, the motion of our eyeballs,
and in the rays of light which are continually
darting from surrounding objects, for the purposes
of vision. For these, and ten thousand other
agencies in the system of nature, are nothing
else but the voice of Deity, proclaiming to the
sons of men, in silent but emphatic language,
" Stand still, and consider the wonderful works
of God."

If, then, it be admitted, that the study of
Nature is the study of the Creator — to overlook
the grand and beautiful scenery with which we
are surrounded, or to undervalue any thing which
Infinite Wisdom has formed, is to overlook ind
contemn the Creator himself. Whatever God
has thought proper to create, and to present to
our view in the visible world, it becomes man
to study and contemplate, that, from thence, he
may derive motives to excite him to the exercise
of reverence and adoration, of gratitude and
praise. In so far as any individual is unac
quainted with the various facts of the history of
nature, in so far does he remain ignorant of the
manifestations of Deity; for every object, on the
theatre of the universe, exhibits his character
and designs in a different point of view. He
who sees God only as he displays himself in his
operations on the earth, but has never contem
plated the firmament with the eye of reason, must
be unacquainted with those amazing energies of
eternal Power, which are displayed in the stu
pendous fabric and movements of the orbs of
heaven. He who sees God only in the general
appearances of nature, but neglects to penetrate
into his minute operations, must remain igno
rant of those astonishing manifestations of divine
wisdom and skill which appear in the contri
vances, adaptations, and functions of the animal
and the vegetable kingdoms. For, the more we
know of the work, the more accurate and com
prehensive will be our views of the Intelligence
by whom it was designed ; and the farther we
carry our investigations of the works of God, the
more admirable and astonishing will his plans
and perfections appear.

In short, a devout contemplation of the works
of nature tends to ennoble the human soul, and
to dignify and exalt the affections. It inspires
the mind with a relish of the beauty, the harmo
ny, and order which subsist in the universe around
us — it elevates the soul to the love and admira
tion of that Being who is the author of our com
forts, and of all that is sublime and beneficent in
creation, and excites us to join with a!l holy
beings in the chorus of praise to the God and
Father of all. For they

"Whom Nature's works can charm, with God himself
Hold converse, grow familiar day by day
With his conceptions, act upon his plan,
And form to his the relish of their souis."

The man who surveys the vast field of nature
with the eye of reason and devotion, will not only

THE CHR AN PHILOSOPHER.

gain a more comprehensive view of that illimit
able power which organized the universe, but
will find his sources of enjoyment continually
increased, and will feel an ardent desire after
that glorious world, where the veil which now
hides from our sight some of the grandest mani
festations of Deity will be withdrawn, and the
wonders of Omnipotence be displayed in all their
splendour and perfection.

In conformity with these sentiments, we find
the inspired writers, in numerous instances, call
ing our attention to the wonders of creating
power and wisdom. In one of the first speeches
in which the Almighty is introduced as address
ing the sons of men, and the longest one in the
Bible,* our attention is exclusively directed to
the subjects of Natural History ; — the whole
address having a reference to the economy of
Divine Wisdom in the arrangement of the world
at its first creation — the wonders of the ocean,
and of light and darkness — the phenomena of
thunder and lightning, rain, hail, snow, frost, and
other meteors in the atmosphere — the intellectual
faculties of man, and the economy and instincts
of quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and other tribes of
animated existence. Indeed, the greater part of
the sublime descriptions contained in the book of
Job has a direct reference to the agency of God
in the material creation, and to the course of his
providence in relation to the different characters
of men ; and the reasonings of the different
speakers in that sacred drama proceed on the sup
position that their auditors were intimately ac
quainted with the varied appearances of nature,
and their tendency to exhibit the character and
perfections of the Omnipotent Creator. We find
the Psalmist, in the 104th Psalm, employed in a
devout description of similar objects, from the
contemplation of which his mind is raised to
adoring views of their Almighty Author — and,
from the whole of his survey, he deduces the fol
lowing conclusions: — "How manifold are thy
works, O Lord ! In wisdom thou hast made them
all ! The earth is full of thy riches ; so is this
great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping
innumerable, both small and great beasts. The
glory of the Lord shall endure for ever ; the
Lord shall rejoice in all his works. f I will sing
unto the Lord as long as I live ; I will sing
praises to my God, while I have my being."

• Job, chap, xxxviii. xxxix. xl. xli.

t The glory of the Lord, in this passage, denotes the
display of his perfections in the material universe :
and the declaration of the inspired writer plainly
intimates, that this display will continue for ever,
and will remain as an object of unceasing contem
plation to all intelligences, and as an eternal monu
ment of his power and wisdom. For, although the
earth and the aerial heavens will be changed at the
close of that dispensation of Providence which re
spects our word, yet the general frame of the uni
verse, in its other parts, will remain substantially
the same ; and not only so, but will in all probability
be perpetually increasing in magnitude and gran
deur. And the change which will be effected in respect

But in order to enter into the spirit of sucft
sublime reflections, we must not content ourselves
with a superficial and cursory view of the objects
and operations of nature, — we must not think
it sufficient to acquiesce in such vague proposi
tions as these — " The glory of God is seen in
every blade of grass, and every drop of water;
all nature is full of wonders, from the dust of the
earth to the stars of the firmament." "We must
study the works of creation with ardour, survey
them with minute attention, and endeavour to
acquire a specific and comprehensive knowledge
of the Creator's designs. We must endeavour
to acquire a knowledge of the particular modes,
circumstances, contexture, configurations, adap
tations, structure, functions, and relations of
those objects in which benevolence and design
conspicuously appear — in the animal arid the
vegetable world, in the ocean, the atmosphere,
and the heavens ; that the mind may be enabled
to draw the conclusion with full conviction and
intelligence—" In wisdom thou hast made them
all" The pointed interrogatories which Jeho
vah addressed to Job, evidently imply, that Job
hat! previously acquired an intimate acquaintance
with the works of nature. It seems to be laken
for granted, as a matter of course, that he made
himself acquainted with the general range of facts
in the visible creation ; and the intention of the
several questions presented to his consideration
evidently was to impress him with a sense of his
own impotency, and to lead him to the investiga
tion of the wonders of Creating Power which he
had formerly overlooked. The conclusion which
the Psalmist draws respecting the Wisdom dis
played throughout all the works of God, plainly
intimates, that he had made the different parts of
nature the subject of minute examination, and of
deep reflection ; otherwise he could not have ra
tionally deduced his conclusion, or felt those emo
tions which filled his mind with the pious rapture
so beautifully expressed in that hymn of praise
to the Creator of the world.

We have, therefore, reason to believe, from
these and other instances, that pious men, " in
the days of old," were much more accustomed
than modern Christians to contemplate and ad
mire the visible works of the Lord — and it is
surely much to be regretted, that we who enjoy
so many superior means of information; and who
have access to the brilliant discoveries of later
and more enlightened times, should manifest so
much disregard to " the works of Jehovah and
the operations of his hands." To enable the
common mass of Christians to enter into the
spirit of this delightful study and Christian duty,
should, therefore, be one object of those period
ical and other religious works which are put into
their hands ; so that they may be enabled, with

to the terraqueous globe and its appendages wl/1 be
such that Jehovah will have reason to " rejoice" i»
this as well as in all his other works.

GEOGRAPHY.

vigour and intelligence, to form the pious reso- and pernicious consequences which flow from
lution of Asaph, " I will meditate on all thy ignorance of the phenomena of nature, and of
Works, O Lord ! and talk of thy doings."—" I those laws by which the Almiahtv eoverns the

will utter abundantly tne memory of thy great
goodness, and tell of thy wondrous works."*

GEOGRAPHY.

The next department of knowledge I shall
notice is the science of Geography.

The object of this science is, to describe the
world we inhabit, in reference to the continents,
islands, mountains, oceans, seas, rivers, em
pires, and kingdoms with which it is diversified,
together with the manners, customs, and reli
gion of the different tribes which people its
surface.

In order to form an accurate conception of
the relative positions of objects on the surface
of the earth, and to enter with intelligence on

ghty governs the
universe he has formed ; and which prove it to
be a Christian duty for every rational being to
study the order and economy of the visible
world.

That the earth is nearly of a globular figure,
is proved by the following considerations: — 1.
When we stand on the seashore, while the sea
is perfectly calm, we perceive that the surface
of the water is not quite plain, but convex or
rounded ; and if we are on one side of an arm
of the sea, as the Frith of Forth, and, with
our eyes near the water, look towards the oppo
site coast, we shall plainly see the water ele
vated between our eyes and the opposite shore,
so as to prevent our seeing the land near the
edge of the water. The same experiment may

the study of this subject, it is requisite, first of be madf on an.v portion of still water, of a mile

all irt Vt017£» ort ns**>t.»nt:A isJon r^f I t« (* , . t i . ««,1 OF tWQ III CXtCnt. VVllfin itS (VttlVATltV «7 1 1 I V»Q w^a..

all, to have an accurate idea of its figure and
magnitude. For a long series of ages it was
supposed, by the bulk of mankind, that the sur
face of the earth was nearly a plane, indefinitely
extended, and bounded on all sides by the sky.
Lactantius, and several of the fathers of the
Christian church, strenuously argued that the
earth was extended infinitely downwards, and
established upon several foundations. The an
cient philosopher Heraclitus is said to have be
lieved that the earth was of the shape of a skiff
or canoe, very much hollowed ; and the philo
sopher Leucippus supposed it to be of the
form of a cylinder or a drum. It is only within
the period of the last three hundred years that
the true figure of the earth has been accurately
ascertained. This figure is now found to be
that of an oblate spheroid, nearly approach
ing to the shape of a globe or sphere. To
have asserted this opinion several ages ago
would have been considered as a heresy in reli
gion, and would have subjected its abettors to
the anathemas of the church, and even to the
peril of their lives. Historians inform us that
the learned Spigelius, Bishop of Upsal, in Swe
den, suffered martyrdom at the stake, in de
fence of the doctrine of the Antipodes ; and we
know that, fSr asserting the motion of the earth,
the celebrated philosopher Galileo was immured
in a dungeon, and condemned by an assembly of
cardinals to all the horrors of perpetual imprison
ment. The doctrine ne maintained, and which
is now universally received by every one ac
quainted with the subject, was declared by those
arrogant ecclesiastics to be « a proposition
absurd in its very nature, false in philosophy,
heretical in religion, and contrary to the Holy
Scriptures." Such are some of the horrible

• A select list of popular works on Natural His
tory, and the ether sciences noticed in the followin"
•Hatches, will i>e found iatto appendix.

•o in extent, when its convexity will be per
ceived by the eye. A little boat, for instance,
may be perceived by a man who is any height
above the water, but if he stoops down, and lays
his eye near the surface, he will find that the
fluid appears to rise, and intercept the view of
the boat. 2. If we take our station on the sea
shore, and view the ships leaving the coast, in
any direction — as they retire from our view,' we
may perceive the masts and rigging of the ves
sels when the hulls are out of sight, and, as it
were, sunk in the water. On the other hand,
when a ship is approaching the shore, the first
part of her that is seen is the topmast ; as she
approaches nearer, the sails become visible, and
last of all, the hull comes gradually into view.f
The reason of such appearances obviously is,
that the round or convex surface of the water
interposes between our eye and the body of the
ship, when she has reached a certain distance,
while, at the same time, the sails and topmast,
from their greater elevation, may be still in
view. To the same cause it is owing, that the
higher the eye is placed, the more extensive is
the prospect ; and hence it is common for sailors
to climb to the tops of masts, in order to discover
land or ships at a distance. The contrary of all
this would take place, if the earth and waters were
an extended plane. When a ship came within
view, the hull would first make its appearance,
being the largest object, next the sails, and, last
of all, the topmast. These considerations,
which hold true in all parts of the world, prove
to a certainty, that the mass of the ocean is of
a globular form : and if the ocean be a portion
of a sphere, it follows that the land also is of
the same general figure ; for no portion of the
earth's surface is elevated above four or five
t In order to make such observations to advantage
the observer's eye should be as near as possible on
a level with the sea, and he should use a telescope
to enable him to perceive more distinctly the upper
part of the vessel.

64

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

miles above the level of the ocean. 3. That the
earth is round from north to south, appears from
the following circumstance : — When we travel a
considerable distance from north to south, or from
south to north, a number of new stars succes
sively appear in the heavens, in the quarter to
which we are advancing, and many of those in the
opposite quarter gradually disappear, which "A-ould
not happen if the earth were a plane in that direc
tion. 4. That the earth is round from east to west,
appears from actual experiment ; for many navi
gators, by sailing in a westerly direction, have
gone quite round it, from east to west ; and were
it not for the frozen seas within the polar regions,
which interrupt navigation in those directions,
it would, long ere now, have been circumnavi
gated from north to south. 5. All those proofs
are confirmed and illustrated by eclipses of the
moon, which present an ocular demonstration of
the earth's rotundity. An eclipse of the moon
is caused by the intervention of the body of the
earth between the sun and moon ; in which case
the shadow of the earth falls upon the moon.
This shadow is found, in all cases, and in every
position of the earth, to be of a circular figure ;
which incontrovertibly proves, that the whole
mass of land and water, of which the earth is
composed, is nearly of a globular form. The
mountains and vales which diversify its surface
detract little or nothing from its globular shape ;
for they bear no more proportion to its whole
bulk than a few grains of sand to a common ter
restrial globe ; the highest mountains on its sur
face being little more than the two-thousandth
part of its diameter. Some of the mountains
on the surface of the moon are higher than those
on the earth, and yet that body appears, both to
the naked eye and through telescopes, of a
spherical figure.

To some readers, the discovery of the true
figure of the earth may appear as a matter of
very trivial importance in religion. I hesitate
not, however, to affirm that it constitutes a most
important fact in the history of Divine Provi
dence. Had not this discovery been made, it
is probable that the vast continent of America
might yet have remained undiscovered ; for,
Columbus, who first discovered that new world,
had learned, contrary to the general opinion of
the times, that the earth was of a spherical
figure ; and, from the maps then existing, he
began to conjecture, that the nearest way of
sailing to the East Indies would be to sail
westward. And although he missed the object
of his research, he was the means of laying
open to view a vast and unknown region of the
earth, destined, in due time, to receive from the
Eastern world the blessings of knowledge, civi
lization, and religion. On the knowledge of the
spherical figure of the earth, the art of naviga
tion in a great measure depends ; and all the
voyages of discovery, which have been made

in later years, were undertaken in consequence
of the knowledge of this fact. Had mankina
remained unacquainted with this discovery, the
circumnavigation of the globe would never have
been attempted — vast portions of the habituble
world would have remained unknown and unex
plored — no regular intercourse would have been
maintained between the various tribes of the
human race ; and, consequently, the blessings
of Divine Revelation could never hive been
communicated to the greater part of the Gentile
world. Besides, the knowledge of the true figure
and magnitude of our sublunary world forms the
groundwork of all the sublime discoveries
which have hitherto been made in the regions
of the firmament. For its diameter forms the
base line of those triangles by which the dis
tances and magnitudes of the celestial globes
have been determined ; without a knowledge of
the extent of which, the important results which
have been deduced respecting the system of the
universe could not have been ascertained, and,
consequently, our views of the grandeur and
omnipotence of the Deity, and of the magnifi
cence and extent of his dominions, must have
been much more circumscribed than thsy now
are. Such is the intimate connexion that sub
sists between every part of the chain of Divino
dispensations, that if any one link had been
either broken or dissolved, the state of things,
in the moral and intellectual world, would have
been veiy different from what it now is; and
the plans of Providence, for accomplishing the
renovation and improvement of mankind, would
have been either partially or totally frustrated.

With regard to the magnitude of the earth —
I have already stated the mode by which we
may acquire the most accurate and comprehen
sive conception of this particular, in the course
of the illustrations which were given of the om
nipotence of Deity, (pp. 9 — 11.) It is ne
cessary here only to remark — that, according to
the latest computations, the diameter of the
earth is about 7,930 miles, and its circumference
24,912 miles ; and consequently, the whole sur
face of the land and water it contains compre
hends an area of 197,552,160 miles. The pro
portion of land and water on its st^face cannot
be very accurately ascertained ; but it is quite
evident, from an inspection of a map of the
world, that the water occupies at least two-thirdg
of its surface, and, of course, the land cannot
occupy more than one-third. Supposing it to be
only one-fourth of the earth's surface, it will
contain 49,387,040 square miles, which is con
siderably more than what is stated in most of
our late systems of geography ; in some of which
the extent of the land is rated at 39 millions,
and in others so low as 30 millions of square
miles — the former of which statements being
less than one-fifth, and the latter less than one-
sixth of the surface of the globe. But it ifl

GEOGRAPHY.

65

quite obvious that the extent of the land cannot
be leas than one-fourth of the area of the globe,
and must, therefore, comprehend at least 50
millions of square miles. And if a large arc
tic continent, eleven hundred leagues in length,
exist around the North Pole, as some French
philosophers infer from Captain Parry's late
discoveries* — the quantity of land on the terra
queous globe will be much greater than what has
been now stated.

GENERAL DIVISIONS OF THE EARTH. —
The surface of the earth is divided, from north
to south, by two bands of earth, and two of water.
The first band of earth is the ancient or East
ern Continent, comprehending Europe, Asia,
and Africa; the greatest length of which is
found to be in a line beginning on the east
point of the northern part of Tartary, and ex
tending from thence to the Cape of Good Hope,
which measures about 10,000 miles, in a direc
tion nearly from north-east to south-west ; but
if measured according to the meridians, or from
north to south, it extends only 7,500 miles, from
the northernmost cape in Lapland to the Cape of
Good Hope. This vast body of land contains
about 36 millions of square miles, forming nearly
one-fifth of the whole surface of the globe. The
other band of earth is what is commonly called
the New Continent, which comprehends North
and South America. Its greatest length lies in
a line beginning at the mouth of the river Plata,
passing through the island of Jamaica, and ter
minating beyond Hudson's Bay ; and it measures
about 8,000 miles. This body of land contains
about 14 millions of square miles, or somewhat
more than a third of the old continent.

It may not be improper here to remark, that
the two lines now mentioned, which measure
the greatest lengths of the two continents, divide
them into two equal parts, so that an equal por
tion of land lies on each «ide of these lines, and
that each of these line* has an inclination of
about 30 degrees to tSe equator, but in opposite
directions ; that of the old continent extending
from the north-east to the south-west, and that
of the new continent from the north-west to the
south-east ; and that they both terminate at the
same degree, of northern and southern latitude.
It may also be noticed, that the old and new
continents are almost opposite to each other, and
that the old is more extensive to the north of the
equator, and the new more extensive to the
south. The centre of the old continent is in the
17th degree of north latitude, and the centre of
the new in the 17th degree of south latitude ; so
that the^ seem to be made to counterbalance
each other, in order to preserve the equability
of the diurnal rotation of the earth. There is
also a singular connexion between the two con
tinents, namely, that if they were divided into

two parts, all four would be surrounded by the
sea, were it not for the two small necks of land
called the isthmuses of Suez and Panama.f

Between the two continents now mentioned, lie
two immense bands of water, termed the Pacific
and the Atlantic oceans, whose greatest length '••
likewise in a direction from north to south.

Besides the two bands of earth to which I
have adverted, many extensive portions of lard
are dispersed through the ocean, which covers
the remaining part of the earth's surface ; par
ticularly the extensive regions of New Holland,
which occupy a space nearly as large as the
whole of Europe, and the arctic continent,
which probably exists within the northern polar
regions, and which some French writers pro
pose to designate by the name of JJoreosia, is in
all probability, of equal extent. There are also
the extensive islands of New Guinea, Borneo,
Madagascar, Sumatra, iJapan, Great Britain,
New Zealand, Ceylon, Iceland, Cuba, Java,
and thousands of others, of different dimensions,
scattered through the Pacific, the Indian, and
the Atlantic oceans, and which form a very
considerable portion of the habitable regions of
the globe.

GENERAL FEATURES OF THE EARTH'S
SURFACE. — In taking a general survey of the
external features of the earth, the most prominent
objects that strike the eye are those huge eleva
tions which rise above the level of its general sur
face, termed HILLS AND MOUNTAINS. These
are distributed, in various forms and sizes,
through every portion of the continents and
islands ; and, running into immense chains, form
a sort of connecting band to the other portion of
the earth's surface. The largest mountains are
generally formed into immense chains, which
extend, in nearly the same direction, for several
hundreds, and even thousands of miles. It has
been observed by some philosophers, that the
most lofty mountains form two immense ridges,
or belts, which, with some interruptions, extend
around the whole globe, in nearly the same direc
tion. One of these ridges lies between the 45th
and 55th degree of north latitude. Beginning
on the western shores of France and Spain, it
extends eastward, including the Alps and the
Pyrenees, in Europe, the Uralian and Altaic
mountains, in Asia — extending from thence to
the shores of Kamschatka, and after a short in
terruption from the sea, they rise again on the
western coast of America, and terminate at
Canada, near the eastern shore. It is supposed
that the chain is continued completely round the
globe, through the space that is covered by the
Atlantic ocean, and that the Azores, and other
islands in that direction, are the only summits that
are visible, till we come to the British isles,
The other ridge runs along the Southern hemi-

See Monthly Magazine, April, 1823, p. 259.

t See Buffon's Natural History, vol. L.

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

Bphere, between the 50th and 30th degrees of
south latitude, of which detached portions are
found in the mountains of Tucuman, and of Para
guay, in South America, — of Monomotapa and
Caffraria, in Africa ; in New Holland, New
Caledonia, the New Hebrides, the Friendly, the
Society, and other islands in the Pacific ocean.
Prom these ridges flows a variety of ramifica
tions, in both hemispheres, towards the Equator,
and the Poles, which altogether present a mag
nificent scenery, which diversifies and enlivens
the surface of our globe.

The highest mountains in the world, accord
ing to some late accounts published in the
" Transactions of the Asiatic Society," are the
Himalaya chain, north of Bengal, on the borders
of Thibet. The highest mountain in this range
is stated to be about 27,000 feet, or a little more
than five miles, in perpendicular height, and is
visible at the distance of 230 miles. Nineteen
different mountains in this chain are stated to
be above four miles in perpendicular elevation.
Next to the Himalayas, are the Andes, in South
America, which extend more than 4000 miles in
length, from the province of Quito to the straits
of Magellan. The highest summit of the Andes
is Chimborazo, which is said to be 20,600 feet,
or nearly four miles, above the level of the sea.
The highest mountains in Europe, are the Alps,
which run through Switzerland and the north of
Italy, — the Pyrenees, which separate France
from • Spain, and the Dofrafeld, which divide
Norway from Sweden. The most elevated
ridges in Asia, are Mount Taurus, Imaus, Cau
casus, Ararat, the Ura'.ian, Altaian, and the
mountains of Japan — in Africa, Mount Atlas,
and the mountains of the Moon. Some of the
mountains in these ranges are found to contain
immense caverns or perforations, of more than
two miles in circumference, reaching from their
summits to an immeasurable depth into the bow
els of the earth. From these dreadful openings
are frequently thrown up, to an immense height,
torrents of fire and smoke, rivers of melted metals,
clouds of ashes and cinders, and sometimes
red-hot stones and enormous rocks, to the dis
tance of several miles, accompanied with thun
ders, lightnings, darkness, and horrid subterrane
ous sounds — producing the most terrible devasta
tions through all the surrounding districts. The
most noted mountains of this kind in Europe,
aie mount Hecla, in Iceland; Etna, in Sicily;
and Vesuvius, near the city of Naples, in Italy.
Numbers of volcanoes are also to be found in
South America, in Africa, in the islands of the
Indian ocean, and in the Empire of Japan.*

We who live in Great Britain, where the
highest mountain is little more than three-quar
ters of a mile in perpendicular elevation, can

• A more particular description of the phenome
na of these terrific objects will be found in Chap,
iv. Sect. 2.

form no adequate idea of the magnificence and
awful sublimity of the mountain scenery in some
of the countries now mentioned ; especially when
the volcano is belching forth its flames with a
raging noise, and spreading terror and desolation
around its base. From the tops of the lofty
ridges of the Andes, the most grand and novel
scenes sometimes burst upon the eye of the as
tonished traveller. lie beholds the upper sur
face of the clouds far below him, covering the
subjacent plain, and surrounding, like a vast sea,
the foot of the mountain ; while the place on
which he stands appears like an island in the
midst of the ocean. He sees the lightnings
issuing from the clouds, and hears the noise of
the tempest, and the thunders rolling far beneath
his feet, while all is serene around him, and the
blue vault of heaven appears without a cloud.
At other times, he contemplates the most sub
lime and extensive prospects — mountains ranged
around him, covered with eternal snows, and sur
rounding, like avast amphitheatre, the plains be
low — rivers winding from their sources towards
the ocean — cataracts dashing headlong over tre
mendous cliffs — enormous rocks detached from
their bases, and rolling down the declivity of the
mountains with a noise louder than thunder —
frightful precipices impending over his head —
unfathomable caverns yawning from below — and
the distant volcano sending forth its bellowings,
with its top enveloped in the fire and smoke. —
Those who have studied nature on a grand scale,
have always been struck with admiration and
astonishment at the sublime and awful exhibition
of wonders which mountainous regions exhibit
and, perhaps, there is no terrestrial scene which
presents, at one view, so many objects of over
powering magnitude and grandeur, and which
inspires the mind with so impressive an idea of
the power of that Almighty Being, who " weigh-
eth the mountains in scales, and taketh up the
isles as a very little thing."

THE OCEAN. — The ocean surrounds the
earth on all sides, and penetrates into the inte
rior parts of different countries ; sometimes by
large openings, and frequently by small straits.
Could the eye take in this immense sheet of
waters at one view, it would appear the most
august object under the whole heavens. It oc
cupies a space on the surface of the globe at
least three times greater than that which is oc
cupied bv the land ; comprehending an extent
of 148 millions of square miles. Though the
ocean, strictly speaking, is but one immense
body of waters extending in different directions,
yet different names have been appropriated to
different portions of its surface. That portion
of its waters which rolls between the western
coast of America and the eastern of Asia, is
called the Pacific ocean ; arid that portion
which separates Europe and Africa from Ame
rica, the Atlantic ocean. Other portions are

GEOGRAPHY.

67

ed the Northern, Southern, and Indian
oceans. When its waters penetrate into the
land, they form what are called gulfs, and medi
terranean seas. But without following it
through all its windings and divisions, I shall
state a few general facts.

With regard to the depth of this body of
water, no certain conclusions have yet been
formed. Beyond a certain depth, it has hitherto
been found unfathomable. We know, in gene
ral, that the depth of the sea increases gradually
as wp leave the shore ; but we have reason to
believe that this increase of depth continues
only to a certain distance. The numerous
islands scattered every where through the ocean,
demonstrate, that the bottom of the waters, so
far from uniformly sinking, sometimes rises
into lofty mountains. It is highly probable, that
the depth of the sea is somewhat in proportion
to the elevation of the land ; for there is some
reason to conclude, that the present bed of the
ocean formed the inhabited part of the ancient
world, previous to the general deluge, and that
we are now occupying the bed of the former
ocean ; and, if so, its greatest depth will not ex
ceed four or five miles ; for there is no moun
tain that rises higher above the level of the sea.
But the sea has never been actually sounded to
a greater depth than a mile and sixty-six feet.
Along the coast its depth has always been found
proportioned to the height of the shore ; where
the coast is high and mountainous, the sea that
washes it is deep ; but where the coast is low,
the water is shallow. To calculate the quantity
of water it contains, we must therefore suppose
a medium depth. If we reckon its average
depth at two miles, it will contain 296 millions
of cubical miles of water. We shall have a
more specific idea of this enormous mass of
water, if we consider, that it is sufficient to
cover the whole globe, to the height of more than
eight thousand feet ; and if this water were
reduced tc one spherical mass, it would form a
globe of more than 800 miles in diameter.

With regard to its bottom — As the sea covers
so great a part of the globe, we should, no doubt,
by exploring its interior recesses, discover a vast
number of interesting objects. So far as the
bed of the ocean has been explored, it is found
to bear a great resemblance to the surface of the
dry land ; being, like it, full of plains, caverns,
rocks, and mountains, some of which are abrupt
and almost perpendicular, while others rise with
a gentle acclivity, and sometimes tower above
the water, and form islands. The materials,
too, which compose the bottom of the sea, are
the same which form the basis of the dry land.
It also resembles the land in another remarkable
particular ; — many fresh springs, and even rivers,
rise out of it ; an instance of which appears
near Goa, on the western coast of Hindostan,
and ia the Mediterranean sea, not far from
37

Marseilles. The sea sometimes assumes dif
ferent colour*. The materials which compose
its bottom causo it to reflect different hues ia
different places ; and its appearance is also
affected by the winds and by the sun, while the
clouds that pass over it communicate all their
varied and fleeting colours. When the sun
shines, it is green ; when he gleams through a
fog, it is yellow ; near the poles, it is black ,
while, in the torrid zone, its colour is often
brown; and, on certain occasions, it assumes
a luminous appearance, as if sparkling with
fire.

The ocean has three kinds of motion. The
first is that undulation which is produced by the
wind, and which is entirely confined to its sur
face. It is now ascertained that this motion
can be destroyed, and its surface rendered
smooth, by throwing oil upon its waves. The
second motion is, that continual tendency which
the whole water in the sea has towards the
west, which is greater near the equator than
towards the poles. It begins on the west side
of America, where it is moderate ; but as
the waters advance westward, their motion is
accelerated ; and, after having traversed the
globe, they return, and strike with great vio
lence on the eastern shore of America. Being
stopped by that continent, they rush, with impe
tuosity, into the Gulf of Mexico, thence they
proceed along the coast of North America, till
they come to the south side of the great bank
of Newfoundland, when they turn off and run
down through the Western Isles. This motion
is most probably owing to the diurnal revolu
tion of the earth on its axis, which is in a direc
tion contrary to the motion of the sea. The
third motion of the sea is the tide, which is a
regular swell of the ocean every 12^ hours.
The motion is now ascertained to be owing to
the attractive influence of the moon, and also
partly to that of the sun. There is always a
flux and reflux at the same time, in two parts
of the globe, and these are opposite to each
other ; so that when our antipodes have high
water we have the same. When the attractive
powers of the sun and moon act in the same
direction, which happens at the time of new and
full moon, we have the highest, or spring tides;
but when their attraction is opposed to each
other, which happens at the quarters, we have
the lowest, or neap tides.

Such is the ocean, — a most stupendous scene
of Omnipotence, which forms the most magnifi
cent feature of the globe we inhabit. When
we stand on the seashore, and cast our eyes
over the expanse of waters, till the sky and the
waves seem to mingle, all that the eye can take
in at one survey, is but an inconsiderable speck,
less than the hundred-thousandth part of the
whole of this vast abyss. If every drop of
water can be divided into 26 millions of distinct

68

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

parts, as some philosophers have demonstrated,*
what an immense assemblage of watery parti
cles must be contained in the unfathomable ca
verns of the ocean ! Here the powers of cal
culation are completely set at defiance ; and an
image of infinity, immensity, and endless dura
tion is presented to the mind. This mighty ex
panse of waters is the grand reservoir of nature,
and the source of evaporation, which enriches
the earth with fertility and verdure. Every
cloud which floats in the atmosphere, and every
fountain, and rivulet, and flowing stream, are
indebted to this inexhaustible source for those
watery treasures which they distribute through
every region of the land. In fine, whether we
consider the ocean as rearing its tremendous
billows in the midst of the tempest, or as stretch
ed out into a smooth expanse — whether we con
sider its immeasurable extent, its mighty move
ments, or the innumerable beings which glide
through its rolling waves — we cannot but be
struck with astonishment at the grandeur of that
Omnipotent Being who holds its waters " in
the hollow of his hand," and who has said to its
foaming surges, "Hitherto shall thou come,
and no farther, and here shall thy proud waves
be stayed."

RIVERS. — The next feature of the earth's
surface which may be noticed, is, the rivers
with which it is indented in every direction.
These are exceedingly numerous, and seem to
form as essential a part in the constitution of
our globe, as the mountains from which they
flow, and as the ocean to which they direct
their course. It is reckoned, that in the old con
tinent there are about 430 rivers which fall di
rectly into the ocean, or into the Mediterra
nean and the Black seas ; but in the new conti
nent, there are only about 145 rivers known, which
fall directly into the sea. In this enumeration,
however, only the great rivers are included, such
as the Thames, the Danube, the Wolga, and
the Rhone. Besides these, there are many
thousands of streams of smaller dimensions,
which, rising from the mountains, wind in every
direction, till they fall into the large rivers, or
are carried into the ocean. The largest rivers
in Europe are— the Wolga, which, rising in the
northern parts of Russia, runs a course of 1700
miles, till it falls into the Caspian Sea — the
Danube, whose course is 1300 miles, from the
mountains of Switzerland to the Black Sea —
and the Don, which runs a course of 1200 miles.
The greatest rivers in Asia are — the Hoanho,
iv. China, whose course is 2400 miles — the
"Boorhampooter, the Euphrates, and the Ganges.
The longest river in Africa is the Nile, the
course of which is estimated at 2000 miles.
In tne continent of America, the rivers appear

• The demonstration of this proposition may be
neen in Niouwentyt's Religious Philosopher, vol.
iii. p. 883.

to be formed on the grandest scale, both as to
the length of their course, and the vast body of
waters which they pour into the ocean. The
Amazon, the largest river in the world, runs a
course of above 3000 miles across the conti
nent of South America, till it falls into the
Atlantic ocean, where it discharges j. body of
waters 150 miles in breadth. Next to this is
the river St. Lawrence, which is more than
2400 miles from its mouth through the lake
Ontario to the Lake Alernpigo and the Assini-
boils ; and the rivers La Plata and Mississippi,
each of whose courses is not less than 2000
miles.

When we consider the number and the magni
tude of these majestic streams, it is evident that
an enormous mass of water is continually pouring
into the ocean, from every direction. From ob
servations which have been made on the rivet
Po, which runs through Lombardy, and waters
a tract of land 380 miles long and 120 broad, it
is found, that it moves at the rate of four miles
an hour, is 1000 feet broad, and 10 feet in depth,
and, consequently, supplies the sea with 5068
millions of cubical feet of water in a day, or a
cubical mile in 29 days. On the supposition
that the quantity of water which the sea receives
from the great rivers in all countries is propor
tional to the extent and surface of those coun
tries, it will follow, that the quantity of waters
carried to the sea by all the other rivers on the
globe is 1083 times greater than that, furnished
by the Po, (supposing the land, as formerly
stated, to contain about 49 millions of square
miles,) and will supply the ocean with 13,630
cubical miles of water in a year. Now reckon
ing the ocean, as formerly, to contain 296 mil
lions of cubical miles of water, this last number,
divided by the former, will give a quotient of
21,716. Hence it appears, that, were the
ocean completely drained of its waters, it would
require more than twenty thousand year «f before
its caverns could be again completely filled
by all the rivers in the world running into it at
their present rate.

Here, two questions will naturally occur —
Whence do the rivers receive so constant a sup
ply of waters ? and why has not the ocean long
ago overflowed the world ? since so prodigious a
mass of water is continually flowing into its
abyss. This was a difficulty which long puz
zled philosophers ; but it is now satisfactorily
solved from a consideration of the effects of
evaporation. By the heat of the sun the parti
cles of water are drawn up into the atmosphere

f Buffon makes this result to be 812 years, in
which he is followed by Goldsmith, and most subse
quent writers ; but he proceeds on the false assump
tion, that the ocean covers only half the surface of
the globe, and that it contains only 85 millions of
square miles, and he estimates the average depth of
the ocean to be only 440 yards, or one-fourth of a

69

from the surface of the ocean, ana float in the
air in the form of clouds cr vapour. Tnese va
pours are carried, by the winds, over tne surface
of the land, and are again condensed into water
on the tops and the sides of mountains, which,
gliding down into their crevices ana caverns, at
length break out into springs, a nuroD*"- ot which
meeting in one common va'ley oecomes a river ;
and many of these united together at length form
such streams as the Tay, the Thames, the Da
nube, and the Rhine. That evaporation is suf
ficient to account for ihis effect, has Deen demon
strated by many experiments and calculations.
It is found that, from the surface of the Mediter
ranean sea, which contains 762,000 square miles,
there are drawn up into the air, every day, by
evaporation, 5280 millions of tons of water,
while the rivers which flow into it yield only
1827 millions of tons in the same time; so that
there is raised in vapour from the Mediterranean
nearly three times the quantity of water which is
poured into it by all its rivers. One third of this
falls into the sea before it reaches the land ;
another part falls on the low lands, for the nou
rishment of plants ; and the other third part is
quite sufficient to supply the sources of all the
rivers which run into the sea. This is in full
conformity to what was long ago stated by an
inspired naturalist : " All the rivers run into
the sea, and yet the sea is not full ; unto the
place from whence the rivers came, thither do
they return again;" but, before they regain their
former place, they make a circuit over our heads
through the regions of the atmosphere.

Such are the varied movements and transfor
mations which are incessantly going on in the
rivers, the ocean and the atmosphere, in order to
preserve the balance of nature, and to supply
the necessities of the animal and the vegetable
tribes; all under the agency and direction of
Him who " formed the sea and the dry land,"
and who has arranged all things in number,
weight, and measure, to subserve the purposes
of his will.

Rivers serve many important purposes in the
economy of our globe. They carry oflf the re
dundant waters which fall in rains, or which
ooze from the springs, which might otherwise
settle into stagnant pools ; they supply to the
seas the loss of waters occasioned by their daily
evaporation ; they cool the air and give it a gen
tle circulation ; they fertilize the countries through
which they flow ; their waters afford a whole
some drink, and the fishes they contain a deli
cious food, for the nourishment of man ; they
facilitate commerce, by conveying the produc
tions of nature and art from the inland countries
to the sea; they form mechanical powers for
driving machinery of different kinds; they enli
ven and diversify the scenery of the countries
through which they pass; and the cataracts
which they frequently form among the mountains

present us with scenes the most picturesque and
sublime ; so that every part of the constitution
of nature is rendered subservient both to utility
and to pleasure

Waiving the consideration of other particulars,
I shall simply state some of the artificial divisions
of the earth, and two or three facts respecting its
inhabitants.

The land has generally been divided into four
parts, Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, to
which has been lately added the division called
Australasia, which comprehends New Holland,
New Guinea, New Zealand, Van Dieman'g
land, and several other islands in the Pacific
ocean. Europe comprehends the following
countries, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Russia,
Prussia, Germany, Austria, Turkey, Italy, Swit
zerland, France, Holland, or the Netherlands,
Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain and Ireland,
together with the islands of Sicily, Malta, Can-
dia, Corsica, Sardinia, Majorca, Minorca, Ivica,
Zealand, Funen, Gothland, Iceland, and several
others of smaller note. — Asia, the largest and
most populous division of the ancient continent,
contains the Empires of China and Japan, Chi
nese Tartary, Thibet, Hindostan, or British
India, the Burman Empire, Persia, Arabia,
Turkey in Asia, Siberia, Independent Tartary,
and a variety of territories inhabited by tribes
with which we are very imperfectly acquainted;
together with the immense islands of Borneo,
Sumatra, Java, Ceylon, Segalien, the Philip
pines, and thousands of others of smaller dimen
sions. It was in Asia where the human race
was first planted ; it became the nursery of the
world after the universal deluge, and it was the
scene in which the most memorable transactions
recorded in the sacred history took place. But
its inhabitants are now immersed in Mahometan
and Pagan darkness ; and the Christian religion,
except in a few insulated spots, is almost unknown
among its vast population. It is the richest
and most fruitful part of the world, and produces
cotton, silks, spices, tea, coffee, gold, silver,
pearls, diamonds, and precious stones : but des
potism, in its worst forms, reigns uncontrolled
over every part of this immense region.

Africa comprehends the following kingdoms, —
Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, Egypt, Zaa-
ra, Negroland, Guinea, Nubia, Abyssinia, Caf-
fraria, Dahomey, Benin, Congo, Angola, and
various other territories. By far the greater
part of Africa remains hitherto unexplored, and,
consequently, we are possessed of a very slender
portion of information respecting the numerous
tribes that may inhabit it. This quarter of the
world, which once contained several flourishing
kingdoms and states, is now reduced to a gene
ral state of barbarism. That most abominable
traffic, the slave trade, is carried on to an un
limited extent on its eastern coasts, by a set of
European ruffians, whose villanies are a <ii»->

70

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

<nr»r,e to human nature. Its most striking fea
tures are those immense deserts, near its north
ern parts, which comprise nearly one-third of its
•urface. The deserts of Zaara are 1500 miles
•ong, and 800 broad.

America is divided into North and South. It
-cmained unknown to the inhabitants of the east
ern hemisphere till the year 1492, when it was
discovered by Columbus, who first landed on
Guanahani, or Cat island, one of the Bahama
isles. North America comprehends the follow
ing countries : The United States, New and Old
Mexico, Upper and Lower Canada, Nova Sco
tia, New Brunswick, and Labrador. South
America comprehends the immense districts
called Terra Firma, Peru, Guiana, Amazonia,
Paraguay, Brazil, Chili, and Patagonia.— Be
tween N. and S. America lie the islands of
Cuba, St. Domingo, Jamaica, and Porto Rico,
known by the name of the West Indies. Be
sides these, there are connected with America,
the Bahama and Carribbee islands, Newfound
land, Cape Breton, Tobago, Trinidad, Terra
del Fuego, &c. America is distinguished by its
numerous and extensive lakes, which resemble
large inland seas. Its rivers, also, form one of
its grand and distinguishing features, being the
largest on the globe. It is likewise diversified
with lofty and extensive ranges of mountains.
When first discovered it was almost wholly cover
ed with immense forests, and thinly peopled with
a number of savage tribes. Its mingled popula
tion of Aborigines and Europeans is now ma
king rapid advances in knowledge, civilization,
and commerce.

In regard to the human inhabitants that occu
py the different regions now specified — they have
oeen divided by some geographers into the six
following classes— 1. The dwarfish inhabitants
of the polar regions ; as the Laplanders, the
Greenlanders, and the Esquimaux. — 2. The
flat-nosed olive-coloured tawny race ; as the Tar
tars, the Chinese, and the Japanese. — 3. The
blacks of Asia with European features. Of this
description are the Hindoos, the Burmans, and
the inhabitants of the islands in the Indian ocean.
—4. The woolly-haired negroes of Africa, dis
tinguished by their black colour, their flat noses,
and their thick lips. — 5. The copper-coloured
native Americans, distinguished likewise by
their black hair, small black eyes, high cheek
bones, and flat noses.— 6. The sixth variety is
the white European nations, as the British, the
French, the Italians, and the Germans.

The number of inhabitants which people the
earth at one time may be estimated to amount to
at least eight hundred millions ; of which 500
millions may be assigned to Asia ; 80 millions
to Africa ; 70 millions to America : and 150
millions to Europe.— With regard to their reli
gion, they may be estimated as follows :

Pagans,

Mahometans,

Roman Catholics,

Protestants,

Greeks and Arminians,

Jews,

490,000,00*
130,000,000
100,000,000
43,000,000
30,000,000
7,000,000

800,000,000

From this estimate it appears, that there are
more than four Pagans and Mahometans to one
Christian, and only one Protestant to 17 of all the
other denominations. Although all the Roman
Catholics, Greeks, and Protestants were reckonea
true Christians, there still remain more than
620 millions of our fellow men ignorant of the
true God, and of his will as revealed in the
Sacred Scriptures ; which shows what a vast
field of exertion still lies open to Christian be«
nevolence, before the blessings of civilization,
mental improvement, rational liberty, and Chris
tianity be fully communicated to the Pagan and
Mahometan world.

If we suppose that the earth, at an average,
has always been as populous as it is now, and
that it contains 800 millions of inhabitants, as
above stated, and if we reckon 32 years for a
generation, at the end of which period the
whole human race is renewed ; it will follow,
that 145 thousand millions of human beings
have existed on the earth since the present sys
tem of our globe commenced, reckoning 5829
years from Adam to the present time.* And,
consequently, if mankind had never died, there
would have been 182 times the present number
of the earth's inhabitants now in existence. It
follows from this statement, that 25 millions of
mankind die every year, 2853 every hour, and
47 every minute, and that at least an equal num
ber, during these periods, are emerging from
non-existence to the stage of life ; so that
almost every moment, a rational and immortal
being is ushered into the world, and another is
transported to the invisible state. Whether,
therefore, we contemplate the world of matter,
or the world of mind, we perceive incessant
changes and revolutions going on, which are
gradually carrying forward the earth and its in
habitants to some important consummation. —
If we suppose that, before the close of time,

* This calculation proceeds on the supposition,
that only 4004 years elapsed between the Mosaic
creation and the birth of Christ, according to the
Hebrew chronology. But Dr. Hales, in his late
work on Scripture chronology, has proved, almost
to a demonstration, that, from the creation to the
birth of Christ are to be reckoned 5411 years; ani
this computation nearly agrees with the Samaritan
and Septuagint chronology, and with that of Jose-
phus. According to this computation, 7235 years
arc to be reckoned from the creation to the present
time; and, consequently, 220 thousand millions of
human beings will have existed since the creation
which is more than 22 times the number of inha
bitants presently existing.

GEOGRAPHY.

u manv human beings will be brought into ex
istence, as have already existed, during the by-
past ages of the world, there will, of course, be
found, at the general resurrection, 290,000,000,-
000 of mankind. Vast as such an assemblage
would be, the whole of the human beings here
supposed, allowing six square feet for every indi
vidual, could be assembled within the space of
62,400 square miles, or on a tract of land not
much larger than that of England, which con
tains, according to the most accurate calcula
tions, above 50,000 square miles.

Our world is capable of sustaining a much
greater number of inhabitants than has ever yet
existed upon it at any one time. And since we
are informed in the Sacred Oracles, that God
" created it not in vain, but formed it to be in
habited," we have reason to believe, that, in
future ages, when the physical and moral ener
gies of mankind shall be fully exerted, and when
Peace shall wave her olive branch over the na
tions, the earth will be much more populous
than it has ever been, and those immense deserts,
where ravenous animals now roam undisturbed,
will be transformed into scenes of fertility and
beauty. If it be admitted, that the produce of
twelve acres of land is sufficient to maintain a
family consisting of six persons, and if we reckon
only one-fourth of the surface of the globe ca
pable of cultivation, it can be proved, that the
earth could afford sustenance for 16,000 millions
of inhabitants, or twenty times the number that
is presently supposed to exist. So that we have
no reason to fear that the world will be over
stocked with inhabitants for many ages to come ;
or that a period may soon arrive when the in
crease of population will surpass the means of
subsistence, as some of the disciples of Mal-
thus have lately insinuated. To suppose, as
some of these gentlemen seern to do, that wars
and diseases, poverty and pestilence, are neces
sary evils, in order to prevent the increase of
the human race beyond the means of subsist
ence which nature can afford — while the im
mense regions of New Holland, New Guinea,
Borneo, and ths greater part of Africa and
America are almost destitute of inhabitants —
is both an insult on the dignity of human nature,
and a reflection on the wisdom and beneficence
of Divine Providence. The Creator is bene
volent and bountiful, and " his tender mercies
are over all his works ;" but man, by his tyranny,
ambition, and selfishness, has counteracted the
streams of Divine beneficence, and introduced
into the social state poverty, disorder, and mi
sery, with all their attendant train of evils ; and
it is not before such demoralizing principles be
in some measure eradicated, and the principles
of Christian benevolence brought into active
operation, that the social state of man will be
greatly meliorated, and the bounties of heaven
fully enjoyed by the human race. If, in the pre

sent deranged state of the social and politica
world, it be found difficult, in any particular
country, to find sustenance for its inhabit wits,
emigration is the obvious and natural remedy
and the rapid emigrations which are now taking
place to the Cape of Good Hope, New Holland
Van Dieman's Land, and America, are, doubt
less, a part of those arrangements of Providence,
by which the Creator will accomplish his de
signs, in peopling the desolate wastes of our
globe, and promoting the progress of knowledge
and of the true religion among the scattered tribes
of mankind.

With th'at branch of knowledge to whicn I
have now adverted, every individual of the hu
man race ought to be, in some measure, ac
quainted. For it is unworthy of the dignity of
a rational being, to stalk abroad on the surface
of the earth, and enjoy the bounty of his Crea
tor, without considering the nature and extent
of his sublunary habitation, the variety of au
gust objects it contains, the relation in which he
stands to other tribes of intelligent agents, and
the wonderful machinery which is in constant
operation for supplying his wants, and for pro
ducing the revolutions of day and night, spring
and autumn, summer and winter. In a reli
gious point of view, geography is a science of
peculiar interest. For " the salvation of God,"
which Christianity unfolds, is destined to be
proclaimed in every land, in order that men of
all nations and kindreds and tongues may par
ticipate in its blessings. But, without exploring
every region of the earth, and the numerous
islands which are scattered over the surface of
the ocean, and opening up a regular intercourse
with the different tribes of human beings which
dwell upon its surface, we can never carry into
effect the purpose of God, by " making known
his salvation to the ends of the earth.'' As
God has ordained, that " all flesh shall see the
salvation" he has accomplished, and that human
beings shall be the agents for carrying his de
signs into effect — so we may rest assured that
he has ordained every mean requisite for accom
plishing this end ; and, consequently, that it is
his will that men should study the figure and
magnitude of the earth, and all those arts by
which they may be enabled to traverse and ex
plore the different regions of land and water,
which compose the terraqueous globe — and that
it is also his will, that every one who feels an
interest in the present and eternal happiness
of his fellow men, should make himself acquaint
ed with the result of all the discoveries in this
science that have been, or may yet be made, in
order to stimulate his activity, in conveying to
the wretched sons of Adam, wherever they
may be found, " the unsearchable riches of
Christ."

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

To the Missionary, and the directors of
Bible and Missionary Societies, a minute and
comprehensive knowledge of the science, and
of all the facts connected with it, is essentially
requisite ; without which they would often grope
in the dark, and spend their money in vain, and
"their labour for that which doth not profit."
They must be intimately acquainted with the
extensive field of operation which lies before
them, and with the physical, the moral, and the
political state of the different tribes to which
they intend to send the message of salvation ;
otherwise their exertions will be made at ran
dom, and their schemes be conducted without
judgment or discrimination. To attempt to
direct the movements of Missionary Societies,
without an intimate knowledge of this subject,
is as foolish and absurd as it would be for a land
surveyor to lay down plans for the improvement
of a gentleman's estate, before he had surveyed
the premises, and made himself acquainted with
the objects upon them, in their various aspects,
positions, and bearings. If all those who direct
and support the operations of such societies,
were familiarly acquainted with the different
fields for missionary exertions, and with the
peculiar state and character of the diversified
tribes of the heathen world, so far as they are
known, injudicious schemes might be frustrated
before they are carried into effect, and the funds
of such institutions preserved from being wasted
to no purpose. In this view, it is the duty of
every Christian, to mark the progress and re
sults of the various geographical expeditions
which are now going forward in quest of disco
veries, in connexion with the moral and political
movements which are presently agiiating the
nations: for every navigator who ploughs the
ocean in search of new islands and continents,
and every traveller who explores the interior of
unknown countries, should be considered as so
many pioneers, sent beforehand, by Divine Pro
vidence, to prepare the way for the labours of
the missionary, and for the combined exertions
of Christian benevolence.*

* On this subject the author feels great pleasure
in referring his readers to a small volume, lately
published, by James Douglas, Esq. of Cavers, enti
tled, " Hints on Missions,"— a work which deserves
the attentive perusal, both of the philosopher, the
politician, and the Christian, and particularly of the
directors of Missionary Societies; and which is
characterized by a spirit of enlightened philanthro
py and a condensation of thought, which has sel
dom been equalled in the discussion of such topics.
It concentrates, as it were, into a focus, the light
which has been reflected from hundreds of volumes ;
and the original hints it suggests claim the serious
consideration of the superintendents of missionary
schemes ; without an attention to some of which,
the beneficial effects resulting from such undertak
ings will te few and unimportant. Should this note
happen to strike the eye of the worthy author, it is
submitted, with all due deference, whether a more
extensive circulation of the substance of this vo
lume, in a less expensive form, and with a few mo
difications, to bring it within the range of thought

But even to every private Christian, geography
is an interesting branch of study, without some
knowledge of which his prayers and his Christian
sympathies cannot be judiciously and extensively
directed. We occasionally hear the ministers of
religion, at the commencement of public worship,
on the first day of the week, imploring the Di
vine blessing on their brethren throughout the
Christian church, who are commencing the same
exercises ; and at the close of worship in the
afternoon, that the same blessing may seal the
instructions which have been delivered in all the
churches of the saints ; as if all the public reli
gious services of the universal church were, at
that moment, drawing to a close. This is all
very well, so far as it goes: the expression of
such benevolent wishes is highly becoming, and
congenial to the spirit of Christianity. But
a very slight acquaintance with geographical
science will teach us, that, when we in this
country are commencing the religious services
of the first day of the week, our Christian bre
thren in the East Indies, who live under a very
different meridian, have finished theirs ; those
in Russia, Poland, Greece, Palestine, and on
the banks of the Caspian sea, have performed
one-half of their public religious worship and
instructions; and those in New Holland and
Van Dieman's Land have retired to rest, at the
close of their Sabbath. On the other hand, our
friends in the West India islands and in Ame
rica, at the close of our worship, are only about
to commence the public instructions of the Chris
tian Sabbath. If, then, it be submitted, that
our prayers, in certain cases, ought to be specific,
to have a reference to the particular cases and
relations of certain classes of individuals, there
can be no valid reason assigned, why they
should not have a reference to the geographical
positions of the different portions of the Chris
tian church, as well as to those who live on or
near our own meridian : that, for example, in
the beginning of our public devotions, we might
implore that the blessing of God may accom
pany the instructions which have been delivered
in the eastern parts of the world ; and at the
close of worship, that the same agency may di
rect in the exercises of those in the western
hemisphere, who are about to enter on the sa
cred services of that day. On the same princi
ple, we may perceive the absurdity of those
" concerts'^ for prayer in different places at the

possessed by general readers, would not have a ten
dency to promote its benevolent objects.

+ The author does not seem to mean, that it is ab
surd for Christians in every part of the earth to
assemble on the same day in their respective places
of devotion, to pray for a universal extension of
Christianity. This objection would lie with equal
weight against the Sabbath. His only objection
appears to be against the supposition, that Chris
tians, meeting in different parts of the earth at the
same hour of the day, are praying in all place! «I
the same moment.— American Editor.

GEOLOGY.

73

wt*i,* hevr, which were lately proposed, and
iltermpted by a certain portion of the religious
world. Even within the limits of Europe, this
could not be attempted, with the prospect of
Christians joining in devotion at one and the
same time ; for, when it is six o'clock in one
part of Europe, it is eight at another, and five
o'clock at a third place ; much less could such a
concert take place throughout Europe, Asia, and
America. So that science, and a calm consi
deration of the nature and relations of things,
may teach us to preserve our devotional fervour
and zeal within the bounds of reason and pro
priety ; and, at the same time, to direct our
reflections, and our Christian sympathies, to
take a wider range than that to which they are
usually confined.

Besides the considerations now suggested, a
serious contemplation of the physical objects
and movements which this science exhibits, has
a tendency to excite pious and reverential emo
tions. To contemplate this huge globe of land
and water, flying with rapidity through the voids
of space, conveying its vast population from one
region to another at the rate of fifteen hundred
thousand miles in a day, and whirling round its
axis at the same time, to produce the constant
succession of day and night, — to contemplate
the lofty ridges of mountains that stretch around
it in every direction ; the flaming volcanoes ;
the roaring cataracts ; the numerous rivers, in
cessantly rolling their watery treasures into the
seas ; the majestic ocean, and its unfathomable
caverns ; the vapours rising from its surface, and
replenishing the springs and rivers ; the ava-
•anche hurling down the mountain's side with a
noise like thunder; the luxuriant plains of the
torrid zone ; the rugged cliffs and icebergs of
the polar regions ; and thousands of other ob
jects of diversified beauty and sublimity, — has
an evident tendency to expand the conceptions
of the human mind, to increase its sources of
animal enjoyment, and to elevate the affections
to that all-powerful Being who gave birth to all
the sublimities of Nature, and who incessantly
superintends all its movements.

In fine, from the numerous moral facts, which
geography unfolds, we learn the vast depth and
extent of that moral degradation into which the
nu man race has fallen— the ferocious tempers,
and immoral practices, which are displayed in
the regions of pagan idolatry — the horrid cru
elties, the vile abominations, that are daily per
petrated under the sanction of what is termed
religion — the wide extent of population, over
which the prince of darkness sways his sceptre
— the difficulties which require to be surmount
ed before the " gospel of salvation" can extend
its full influence throughout the pagan world —
and the vast energies which are requisite to ac
complish this glorious event. All these por
tions of information are calculated to confirm
10

and illustrate the scriptural doctrine of the uni
versal depravity of man — to exercise the faith
of the Christian, on the pronuses of Jehovah,
in reference to the conversion of the benighted
nations — to rouse his sympathies towards his
degraded brethren of mankind, to excite his in
tercession in their behalf, and to direct his be
nevolence and activity in devising and execut
ing schemes for enlightening the people who are
sitting " in darkness, and in the shadow of
death."

GEOLOGY.

Another subject intimately related to the for
mer, is the science of Geology.

This science has for its object, to investigate
and describe the internal structure of the earth,
the arrangement of the materials of which it is
composed, the circumstances peculiar to its ori
ginal formation, the different states under which
it has existed, and the various changes which it
appears to have undergone, since the Almighty
created the substance of which it is composed.
From a consideration of the vast quantity of ma
terials contained in the internal structure of our
globe, and of the limited extent to which men can
carry their operations, when they attempt to pene
trate into its bowels, it is obvious, that our know
ledge of this subject must be very shallow an-1
imperfect. The observations, however, which
have been made on the structure of our globe
during the last half century, and the conclusions
deduced from them, are highly interesting, both
to the philosopher and to the Christian. Before
the facts, on which this branch of natural histo
ry is founded, were accurately ascertained, a
variety of objections to the Mosaic history of the
creation were started by certain skeptical philo
sophers, founded on partial and erroneous views
of the real structure and economy of the earth.
But it is now found, that the more accurately
and minutely the system of nature is explored,
the more distinctly do we perceive the harmony
that subsists between the records of Revelation,
and the operations of the Creator in the material
world. If both be admitted as the effects of the
agency of the same Almighty and Eternal Being,
they must, in the nature of things, completely
harmonize, and can never be repugnant to each
other — whether we be capable, in every instance,
of perceiving their complete coincidence, or not.
If any facts could be produced in the visible crea
tion which directly contradict the records of the
Bible, it would form a proof, that the oracles
which we hold as divine were not dictated by
the Creator and Governor of the universe. But,
although some garbled facts have been trium
phantly exhibited in this view, it is now ascer
tained, from the discoveries which have been
lately made in relation to the structure and forma
tion of the earth, that the truth of the facts d«-

74

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

tailed in sacred history rests on a solid and
immutable basis; and that the Supreme Intelli
gence who arranged the fabric of heaven and
earth, and he alone, communicated to the inspir
ed writers the doctrines and the facts they have
recorded ; and we have reason to believe, that, as
geologists proceed in their researches and inves
tigations, still more sensible proofs of the authen
ticity of Revelation will be brought to light.

Geology has, of late, become an interesting
object of inquiry to the student of general science,
and is now prosecuted with ardour by many dis
tinguished philosophers. Tho observations which
have been made in various parts of the world,
by late navigators; the facts which have been
ascertained by Pallas, Saussure, De Luc, Hum-
boldt, and other intelligent travellers ; and the
discoveries which have been brought to light by
modern chyrnists and mineralogists, have all
conspired to facilitate geological inquiries, to
render them more enlightened and satisfactory,
and to prepare the way for future ages establish
ing a rational, scriptural, and substantial theory
of the earth. The man who engages in such in
quiries has always at hand a source of rational
investigation and enjoyment. The ground on
which he treads — the aspect of the surrounding
country — the mines, the caves, and the quarries
which he explores — every new country in which
h* travels, every mountain he climbs, and every
new surface of the earth that is laid open to his
inspection, offer to him novel and interesting
stores of information. On descending into mines,
we are not only gratified by displays of human in
genuity, but we also acquire views of the strata of
the earth, and of the revolutions it has undergone
since the period of its formation. Our research
es on the surface of the earth, amidst abrupt pre
cipices and lofty mountains, introduce us to the
grandest and most sublime works of the Creator,
and present to our view the effects of stupendous
forces, which have overturned mountains, and
rent the foundations of nature. " In the midst of
such scenes, the geologist feels his mind invigo
rated ; the magnitude of the appearances before
him extinguishes all the little and contracted no
tions he may have formed in the closet ; and he
learns, that it is only by visiting and studying
those stupendous works, that he can form an
adequate conception of the great relations of
the crust of the globe, and of its mode of forma
tion."*

The upper crust, or surface of the earth, is
found to be composed of different strata, or beds
placed one above another. These strata, or lay
ers, are very much mixed, and their direction,
matter, thickness, and relative position, vary
considerably in different places. These strata
are divided into seven classes, as follows : —
Dlack earth, clay, sandy earth, marl, bog, chalk,

• Edinburgh Encyclop A.rt. Mineralogy.

and scabeous or stony earth. The surface of
the globe, considered in relation to its inequali
ties, is divided into highland, lowland, and the
bottom of the sea. Highland comprises Alpine
land, composed of mountain groups, or series of
mountain chains : lowland comprises those
extensive flat tracts which are almost entirely
destitute of small mountain groups. To the
bottom of the sea belong the flat, rocky bottom,
shoals, reefs, and islands.

At first sight, the solid mass of the earth
appears to be a confused assemblage of rocky
masses, piled on each other without regularity or
order, where none of (hose admirable displays of
skill and contrivance are to be observed, which
so powerfully excite attention in the structure of
animals and vegetables. But, on a nearer and
more intimate view, a variety of beautiful ar
rangements has been traced by the industry of
geologists, and the light of modern discoveries;
by which they have been enabled to classify these
apparent irregularities of nature. The materials
of which the solid crust of the earth is composed,
have been arranged into the four following class
es: — 1. Those rocks which contain neither any
animal nor vegetable remains themselves, nor
are intermixed with rocks which do contain
them, and are therefore termed primitive, or
primary rocks ; the period of whose formaf ion
is considered as antecedent to that of the crea
tion of organic beings. These are granite,
gneiss, mica slate, and clay slate, which occur
abundantly in all regions of the globe, with
quartz rock, serpentine, granular limestone, &c.
which occur more sparingly. 2. Rocks con
taining organic remains, or generally associated
with other rocks in which such substances are
found, and which, as having been formed pos
terior to the existence of organized beings, are
termed secondary. These are greywacke,
sandstone, limestone, and gypsum of various
kinds, slate clay, with certain species of trap,
and they are found lying above the primary or
older rocks. 3. Above these secondary rocks,
beds of gravel, sand, earth, and moss are found,
which have been termed alluvial rocks or for*
malions. This class comprehends those rocky
substances formed from previously existing rocks,
of which the materials have been broken down
by the agency of water and air; they are there
fore generally loose in their texture, and are
never covered with any real solid and rocky
secondary strata. 4. Volcanic rocks ; under
which class are comprehended all those rocks,
beds of lava, scoriae, and other matter, thrown
out at certain points of the earth's surface by the
action of subterraneous fire.

" The phenomena of geology show, that the
original formation of the rocks has been accompa
nied, in nearly all its stages, by a process of
waste, decay, and re composition. The rocks
as they were successively deposited, were acted

GEOLOGY.

upon by air and water, heat, &c. broken into
fragments, or worn down into grains, out of
which new strata were formed. Even the newer
secondary rocks, since their consolidation, have
been subject to great changes, of which very dis
tinct monuments remain. Thus, we have single
mountains which, from their structure, can be
considered only as remnants of great formations,
or of great continents no longer in existence.
Mount Meisner, in Hesse, six miles long and
three broad, rises about 1800 feet above its bas«,
and 2100 above the sea, overtopping all the
neighbouring hills from 40 to 50 miles round.
The lowest part of the mountain consists of the
same shell, limestone, and sandstone, which
exist in the adjacent country. Above these
are, first, a bed of sand, then a bed of fossil
wood, 100 feet thick at some points, and the
whole is covered by a mass of basalt, 500 feet in
height. On considering these facts, it is impos
sible to avoid concluding, that this mountain
which now overtops the neighbouring country,
occupied at one time, the bottom of a cavity in
the midst of higher lands. The vast mass of
fossil wood could not all have grown there, but
must have been transported by water from a
more elevated surface, and lodged in what was
then a hollow. The basalt which covers the
wood must also have flowed in a current from a
higher site; but the soil over which both the
wood and the basalt passed, has been swept
away leaving this mountain as a solitary memo
rial to attest its existence. Thus, also, on the
side of Mount Jura next the Alps, where no
other mountain interposes, there are found vast
blocks of granite (some of 1000 cubic yards) at
the height of more than 2000 feet above the lake
of Geneva. These blocks are foreign to the
rocks among which they lie, and have evidently
come from the opposite chain of the Alps ; but
the land which constituted the inclined plane
over which they were rolled or transported, has
been worn away, and the valley of lower Swit
zerland, with its lakes, now occupies its place.
Transported masses of primitive rocks, of the
same description, are found scattered over the
north of Germany, which Van Buch ascertained
by their characters to belong to the mountains of
Scandinavia ; and which, therefore, carry us
back to a period when an elevated continent,
occupying the basin of the Baltic, connected
Saxony with Norway. — S-upp. to Ency. Brit.
vol.6.

The production of a bed for vegetation is ef
fected by the decomposition of rocks. This de
composition is effected by the expansion of water
in the pores or fissures of rocks, by heat or con
gelation — by the solvent power of moisture and

%y electricity, which is known to be a powerful
Agent of decomposition. As soon as the rock
begins to be softened, the seeds of lichens, which
are constantly flouting in the air, make it their

resting place. Their generations occupy it till
a finely divided earth is formed, which becomes
capable of supporting mosses and heath ; acted
upon by light and heat, these plants imbibe the
dew, and convert constituent parts of the air
into nourishment. Their death and decay afford
food for a more perfect species of vegetable ; and,
at length, a mould is formed, in which even the
trees of the forest can fix their roots, and which
is capable of rewarding the labours of the culti
vator. The decomposition of rocks tends to the
renovation of soils, as well as their cultivation.
Finely divided matter is carried by rivers from
the higher districts to the low countries, and al
luvial lands are usually extremely fertile. By
these operations, the quantity of habitable sur
face is constantly increased 5 precipitous cliffs
are generally made gentle slopes, lakes are filled
up, and islands are formed at the mouths of great
rivers ; so that as the world grows older, its ca
pacity for containing an increased number of in
habitants is gradually enlarging.

Of all the memorials of the past history of our
globe, the most interesting are those myriads of
remains of organized bodies which exist in the
interior of its outer crusts. In these, we find
traces of innumerable orders of beings existing
under different circumstances, succeeding one
another at distant epochs, and varying through
multiplied changes of form. " If we examine
the secondary rocks, beginning with the most
ancient, the first organic remains which present
themselves, are those of aquatic plants and large
reeds, but of species different from ours. To
these succeed madrepores, encrenities, and other
aquatic zoophites, living beings of the simplest
forms, which remain attached to one spot, and
partake, in some degree, of the nature of vege
tables. Posterior to these, are ammonites, and
other mollusci, still very simple in their forms,
and entirely different from any animals now
known. After these, some fishes appear ; and
plants, consisting of bamboos and ferns, increase,
but still different from those which exist. In the
next period, along with an increasing number of
extinct species of shells and fishes, we meet with
amphibious and viviparous quadrupeds, such as
crocodiles and tortoises, and some reptiles, as
serpents, which show that dry land now existed.
As we approach the newest of the solid rock
formations, we find lamantins, phocjB, and other
cetaceous and mamrniferous sea animals, with
some birds. And in the newest of these for
mations, we find the remains of herbiferous land
animals of extinct species, the paleotherium,
anaplotherium, &c. and of birds, with some fresh
water shells. In the lowest beds of loose soil,
and in peat bogs, are found the remains of the
elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, elk, &c. of
different species from those which now exist, but
belonging to the same genera. Lastly, the bones
of the species which are apparently the same

7C

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

with tnose now existing alive, are never found
except in the very latest alluvial depositions, or
those which are either formed in the sides of
rivers, the bottoms of ancient lakes and marshes
now dried up, in peat beds, in the fissures and
caverns of certain rocks, or at small depths be
low the present surface, in places where they
may have been overwhelmed by debris, or even
buried by man. Human bones are never found
except among those of animal species now liv
ing, and in situations which show, that they
have been, comparatively speaking, recently de
posited." — Supp. to Ency. Brit. vol. 6.

More than thirty different species of animals
have been found imbedded in the secondary stra
ta — no living examples of which are now to be
found in any quarter of the globe. Among the
most remarkable of these are the following. —

1. The Mammoth, which bears a certain re
semblance to the Elephant, but is much larger,
and differs considerably in the size and form of the
tusks, jaws, and grinders. The fossil remains
of this animal are more abundant in Siberia than
in other countries ; there being scarcely a spot,
from the river Don to Kamtschatka, in which
they have not been found. Not only single bones
and perfect skeletons of this animal are fre
quently to be met with ; but, in a late instance,
the whole animal was found preserved in ice.
This animal was discovered on the banks of
the frozen ocean, near the mouth of the river
Jena, in 1799 ; and in 1805, Mr. Adams got it
conveyed over a space of 7000 miles to Peters-
burgh, where it is deposited in the Museum.
The flesh, skin, and hair were completely pre
served, and even the eyes were entire. It was
provided with a long mane, and the body was
covered with hair. This hair was of different
qualities. There were stiff black bristles from
12 to 15 inches long, and these belonged to the
tail, mane, and ears. Other bristles were from
9 to 10 inches long, and of a brown colour ; and
besides these, there was a coarse wool, from 3
to 5 inches long, of a pale yellow colour. This
mammoth was a male : it measured 9 feet 4
inches in height, and was 16 feet 4 inches long
without including the tusks. The tusks, mea
suring along the curve, are 9 feet 6 inches ; and
the two together weigh 360 Ibs. avoirdupois.
The head alone without the tusks, weighs 414 Ibs.
avoirdupois. The remains of this animal have
been found likewise in Iceland, Norway, Scot
land, England, and in many places through the
continent onwards to the Arctic ocean.

2. The Megatherium. A complete skeleton
of this colossal species was found in diluvial
soil, near Buenos Ayres, and sent to Madrid.
The specimen is 14 feet long, and 7 Spanish
feet in height.

3. The great Mastodon of the Ohio. This
species appears to have been as tall as the ele
phant, but with longer and thicker limbs. It had

tusks like the elephant, and appears to have lifv
ed on roots. Its remains abound in America,
particularly on the banks of the Ohio.

4. The Tapir, which also abounds in Ame
rica. The one named Gigantic Tapir, is about
18 feet long, and 12 feet high.

5. The Irish Elk, or Elk of the Isle of Man.
This gigantic species, now apparently extinct,
occurs in a fossil state, in Ireland, Isle of Man}
England, Germany, and France. The most
perfect specimen of this species, which was
found in the Isle of Man, may be seen in the
Museum of the University of Edinburgh. It is
6 feet high, 9 feet long, and in height to the tip of
the right horn, 9 feet 7^ inches. An engraving
of this skeleton may be seen in vol. 6 of Supp. to
Ency. Brit.

From a consideration of the phenomena above
described, geologists have been led to conclude,
" that rocks now buried at a great depth, consti
tuted, at one time, the surface of continents, and
the seat of organic life ; and that many orders of
beings have been called into existence, and after
wards destroyed by great revolutions, which
introduced new classes of mineral deposits, ac
companied with new tribes of organic beings."
It has also been concluded by some, that the ap
pearance of man upon the face of the globe, is,
geologically speaking, a very recent event ; be
fore which the earth had been inhabited thousands
of years by various families of plants and tribes
of animals, which had been destroyed and re
newed in a long series of successions. Whether
these conclusions be necessary inferences from
the phenomena of organic remains and other
geological facts, I shall not, at present, stop to
inquire. It is sufficient for the Christian philoso
pher to show, that though they should be admit
ted in their full extent, they are not inconsistent
with the records of sacred history, as some di
vines have been disposed to maintain. Though
it could be proved to a demonstration, that the
materials of which the present system of our
globe is composed, have existed for millions of
years, it would not, in the least, invalidate
the Mosaic account of the arrangement of our
world. For Moses no where affirms, that the
materials or substance of the earth were created,
or brought from nothing into existence, at the pe
riod when his history commences. His language,
on the contrary, evidently implies, that the ma
terials which enter into the constitution of our
globe did exist, at the epoch at which he com
mences his narration. " The earth was with
out form, and void ; and darkness was upon the
face of the deep." This passage plainly implies
the following things — 1. That the original atoms,
or materials, out of which the terraqueous globe
in its present state, was formed, were then in
existence, or had been previously created. How
long they had been in existence is not stated.
We may suppose them to have existed for a

GEOLOGY.

77

year, a thousand years, or a million of years,
•ust as geological phenomena seem to warrant,
without in the least invalidating the authority of
the sacred historian, who states nothing contra
ry to the truth of either supposition. 2. That
the materials of our globe, as then existing, were
in a chaotic state. Instead of that order and
beauty which we perceive on the face of nature,
the whole mass presented a scene of confusion
and disorder — such a scene, perhaps, as would
be presented, were the earth stripped of its ver
dure, were its strata universally disrupted, its
mountains hurled into the plains, and its rivers
and seas, by some terrible convulsion, to forsake
their ancient channels. 3. The passage seems
to imply, that the whole, or the greater portion
of the earth, as it then existed, was covered with
a deluge of water : " Darkness covered the face
of the deep," or the abyss.

Such was the state of the terrestrial system at
the period when Moses commences his narra
tion ; no intimation being given of the period of
its duration in this condition ; and, consequently,
nothing asserted to militate against any geologi
cal system which is founded on the facts which
have been discovered respecting the organic re
mains which are found in the strata of our globe.
It is a mistake into which too many have been
apt to fall, to suppose, that Moses begins his
history at the period when the first portions of
material existence were created out of nothing ;
and that it was his design to mark the precise
epoch when the whole assemblage of created be
ings throughout the universe was brought into
existence. His primary, if not his sole inten
tion evidently was, to detail the progress of those
arrangements by which the earth was gradually
reduced to that form and order in which we now
behold it, from the chaotic materials which pre
viously existed. And, as an emphatic and ap
propriate introduction to his narration, he states
this important truth : " In the beginning God
created the heaven and the earth." This pass
age, being of a general and comprehensive na
ture, decides nothing with regard to the period,
or precise epoch, at which the different bodies in
the universe were called into being ; but is evi
dently intended to convey the following import
ant truth, in opposition to all fanciful, chimeri
cal, and atheistical notions respecting the origin
of the world ; namely, " That, at what period
soever, in the lapse of duration, any object was
brought into existence, it derived that existence
from the God of Israel, the self-existent and eter
nal Jehovah." — "In the beginning God created
the heaven and the earth." As the language of
the sacred historian, therefore, decides nothing
with regard to time— to limit the creation of
every portion of the material system within the
period of six thousand years, is to make an un
necessary 'concession to the infidel philosopher,
which may afterwards be found inconsistent

with certain facts which exist in the material
world.

But, whatever may be said with respect to the
state and duration of the earth prior to the pe
riod at which Moses commences nis narration,
it is admitted by every geologist, that our globe,
os to its present form and arrangement, has been,
comparatively, of but short duration. Cuvier,
one of the most enlightened geologists of the
age, deduces, from certain progressive changes
on the earth's surface, as well as from the con
current traditions of many nations, that the first
appearance of man upon the face of the globe,
or, at least, the renewal of the human race after
some great catastrophe, cannot be referred to a
period farther back than 5000 or 6000 years
from the present time. Geologists, too, of every
description, however different the systems or
theories they have adopted, have all been con
strained, from the evidence of fact, to admit this
conclusion, " That every part of the dry land
was once covered by the ocean;" thus confirming
the scriptural account of that stupendous event,
the universal deluge. This event, from its very
nature, must have been accompanied with the
most terrible convulsions, both on the exterior
surface, and in the interior strata of the globe.
Accordingly we find, that traces of this awful
catastrophe exist in every region of the earth.
Mr. Parkinson describes the whole island of
Great Britain, as having, since its completion,
" suffered considerable disturbance from some
prodigious and mysterious power. By this
power all the known strata, to the greatest depths
that have been explored, have been more or less
broken and displaced, and, in some places, have
been so lifted, that some of the lowest of them
have been raised to the surface ; while portions
of others, to a very considerable depth and ex
tent, have been entirely carried away." The
whole of the Alpine region in Switzerland, and
the north of Italy, considered as one mass, shows
the most evident marks of dislocation. At the
height of 3500 feet above the level of the sea,
M. Saussure met with a chasm a hundred feet
wide, and so deep that he saw no bottom. All
travellers on the Alps have regarded them with
horror. They mark the most evident convul
sions, but show no signs of having been occa
sioned by attrition. Mr. Townsend, speaking
of the Pyrenees, which he personally inspected,
says, " What is most remarkable is, to see four
enormous chasms, almost perpendicular, which
divided both mountains and their valleys, and
which appear as if they had just been rent
asunder." Throughout the ranges of the Andes,
and in every other mountainous region, similar
chasms and disruptions, indicating the former
operation of some tremendous power, are fre
quently observed by those who visit such scenes
of grandeur. — In some of the coal mines in our
country, the coal is in some places lifted up or

78

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

thrown down several hundreds of feet from (he
places it appears originally to have occupied.
" Two miles north of Newcastle," says Mr.
Townsend, "one great dyke or fault throws
down the coal 540 feet — at the distance of 3 miles
it is cut off, and thrown down again 240 feet."

An evidence of the effects which could be
produced only by a general deluge, is also af
forded by those organic remains to which I have
already adverted, and particularly by those im
mense quantities of marine shells, which have
been discovered in situations so elevated, and
in places so far removed from the sea, as to
prove that they were left there by a flood ex
tending over the whole globe. At Touraine, in
France, a hundred miles from the sea, is a bed
of shells stretching 9 leagues in extent, and 20
feet in depth, and including shells not known to
belong to the neighbouring sea. Humboldt
found sea shells on the Andes at an elevation of
14,120 feet above the level of the sea. The slaty
mountain of La Bolca, near Verona, is famous
for petrifactions, among which are enumerated
more than one hundred species of fish, natives
of Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, here as
sembled in one place.

It appears, therefore, that the researches of
geology confirm the fact of a universal deluge,
and thus afford a sensible proof of the credibility
of the sacred historian, and, consequently, of
the truth of the doctrines of Divine Revelation.
But, besides the testimony which this science
bears to the authenticity of Scripture History, it
exhibits some of the grandest objects in the his
tory of the physical operations of Divine Provi
dence. It presents to our view, in a most im
pressive form, the majestic agency of God, in
convulsing and disarranging the structure of our
globe, which at first sprung from his hand in
perfect order and beauty. When we contem
plate the objects which this science embraces,
we seem to be standing on the ruins of a former
world. We behold " hills" which " have melt
ed like wax at the presence of the Lord," and
" mountains" which " have been carried into
the midst of the sea." We behold rocks of
enormous size, which have been rent from their
foundations, and rolled from one continent to an
other — the most solid strata of the earth bent
under the action of some tremendous power,
and dispersed in fragments through the sur
rounding regions. We behold the summits of
lofty mountains, over which the ocean had rolled
its mighty billows — confounding lands and seas
in one universal devastation — transporting plants
and forests from one quarter of the world to an
other, and spreading universal destruction among
\he animated inhabitants of the water and the
earth. When we enter the wild and romantic
scene of a mountainous country, or descend into
the subterraneous regions of the globe, we are
ever) where struck with the vestiges of opera

tions carried en by the powers of nature, upon a
scale of prodigious magnitude, and with the ex
ertion of forces, the stupendous nature of which
astonishes and overpowers the mind. Contem
plating such scenes of grandeur, we perceive tho
force and sublimity of those descriptions of Deity
contained in the volume of inspiration: "The
Lord reigneth, he is clothed with majesty ; in his
hand are the deep places of the earth, the
strength of the hills is his also. He removeth the
mountains, and they know not : he overturneth
them in his anger ; he shaketh the earth out
of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble.
At his presence the earth shook and trembled :
the foundations also of the hills moved; and were
shaken, because he was wrath." — " Thou cover-
edst the earth with the deep, as with a gar
ment ; the waters stood above the mountains
At thy rebuke they fled ; at the voice of thy
thunder they hastened away." While retracing
such terrific displays of omnipotence, we are na
turally led to inquire into the moral cause which
induced the benevolent Creator to inflict upon the
world such overwhelming desolations. For rea
son, as well as revelation, declares that a moral
cause must have existed. Man must have vio
lated the commands of his Maker, and frustrated
the end of his creation ; and to this conclusion
the sacred historian bears ample testimony. —
" God saw that the wickedness of man was
great in the earth, and that every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil con
tinually : and Jehovah said, I will destroy man
whom I have created, from the face of the earih,
both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and
the fowls of the air."

ASTRONOMY.

Another science which stands in an intimate
relation to religion, is Astronomy.

This sublime science teaches us the magni
tudes and distances of the heavenly bodies, their
arrangement, their various motions and pheno
mena, and the laws by which their movements
are regulated. It presents to our view objects the
most wonderful and sublime ; whether we consider
the vast magnitude of the bodies about which it is
conversant — their immense number — the velocity
of their motions — the astonishing forces requisite
to impel them in their rapid career through the
regions of the sky — the vast spaces which sur
round them, and in which they perform their re
volutions — the magnificent circles they describe
— \.\\esplendour of their appearance — or the impor
tant ends they are destined to serve in the grand
system of the universe. Having adverted to this
subject, when illustrating the omnipotence of
the Deity, I shall here simply state a few addi
tional facts with respect to the general appear
ance of the heavens, the bodies which Com
pose the planetary system, and the discoverie*
which have been made in tne region of the siara.

GEOLOGY.

When we aft our eyes towards the sky, we
perceive an apparent hollow hemisphere, placed
at an indefinite distance, and surrounding the
earth en every hand. In the day time, the prin
cipal object which appears in the hemisphere, is
the sun. In the morning, we see him rise above
the distant mountains, or from the extremity of
the ocean; he gradually ascends the vault of
heaven, and then declines, and disappears in the
opposite quarter of the sky. In the northern
parts of the globe, where we reside, if about the
21st of March, we place ourselves on an open plain,
with our face towards the south, the sun will
appear to rise on our left, or due east, about six
in the morning, and about the same hour in the
evening, he will set due west. In the month of
June he rises to our left, but somewhat behind
us, in a direction towards the north-east, ascends
to a greater height at noon than in the month of
March, and, after describing a large arc of the
heavens, sets on our right, and still behind us, in
the north-western quarter of the sky. In the
month of December, if we stand in the same
position, we may observe, without turning our
selves, both his rising and setting. He rises in
the south-east, ascends to a small elevation at
noon, and sets in the south-west, after having
described a very small arc of the heavens. Every
day he appears to move a little towards the east,
or contrary to his apparent diurnal motion ; for
the stars which are seen to the eastward of him,
appear every succeeding day to make a nearer
approach to the place in which he is seen. All
the variety of these successive changes is accom
plished within4he period of 365 days 6 hours, in
which time he appears to have made a complete
revolution round the heavens from west to east.

The moon is the next object in the heavens
which naturally attracts our attention ; and she is
found to go through similar variations in the course
of a month. When she first becomes visible at
new moon, she appears in the western part of
the heavens, in the form of a crescent, not far
from the setting sun. Every night she increases
in size, and removes to a greater distance
from the sun, till at last, she appears in the east
ern part of the horizon, just as the sun disap
pears in the western ; at which time she presents
a round full-enlightened face. After this, she
gradually moves farther and farther .eastward,
and her enlightened part gradually decreases, till
at last she seems to approach the sun as nearly
in the east as she did in the west, and rises only
a little before him in the morning, in the form of
a crescent. All these different changes may be
traced by attending to her apparent positions,
from time to time, with respect to the fixed stars.

A dark shadow is occasionally seen to move
across the face of the moon, which obscures
her light, and gives her the appearance of tar-
tished copper. Sometimes this shadow covers
ar'y a small portion of her surface ; at other

times it covers the whole of her disk for an nour
or two, and its margin always appears of the
figure of a segment of a circle. This phenome
non, which happens, at an average, about twice
every year, is termed an eclipse of the moon. It
is produced by the shadow of the earth falling
upon the moon, when the sun, the earth, and the
moon, are nearly in a straight line; and can
happen only at the time of full moon. Some
times the moon appears to pass across the body
of the sun, when her dark side is turned towards
the earth, covering his disk either in whole or in
part, and intercepting his rays from a certain
portion of the earth. This is called an eclipse
of the sun, and can happen only at the time of
new moon. In a total eclipse of the sun, which
seldom happens, the darkness is so striking, that
the planets, and some of the larger stars, are dis
tinctly seen, and the inferior animals appear
struck with terror.

Again, if, on a winter's evening, about six
o'clock, we direct our view to the eastern quar
ter of the sky, we shall perceive certain stars
just risen above the horizon : if we view the
same stars about midnight, we shall find them at
a considerable elevation in the south, having
apparently moved over a space equal to one half
of the whole hemisphere. On the next morning,
about six o'clock. the same stars will be seen set
ting in the western part of the sky. If we tumour
eyes towards the north, we shall perceive a simi
lar motion in these twinkling orbs, but with this
difference, that a very considerable number of
them neither rise nor set, but seem to move
round an immoveable point, called the north
pole. Near this point is placed the polar star,
which seems to have little or no apparent motion,
and which, in our latitude, appears elevated a
little more than half way between the northern
part of our horizon and the zenith or point above
our heads. A person who has directed his
attention to the heavens for the first time, after
having made such observations, will naturally in
quire — Whence come those stars which begin to
appear in the east ? Whither have those gone,
which have disappeared in the west? and, what
becomes, during the day, of the stars which are
seen in the night? — It will soon occur to a ra
tional observer, who is convinced of the round
ness of the earth, that the stars which rise above
the eastern horizon come from another hemis
phere, whicn we are apt to imagine below us,
and when they set, return to that hemisphere
again ; and, that the reason why the stars are
not seen in the day-time, is, not because they
are absent from our hemisphere, or have ceased
to shine, but because their light is obscured by
the more vivid splendour of the sun.* From such

• This is put beyond all doubt, by the invention of
the telescope ; by which instrument, adapted to an
equatorial motion, we are enabled to see many of
the stars even at noon-day. The Author of thia

80

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

observations we are led to conclude, that the
globe on which we tread is suspended in empty
space — is surrounded on all sides by the celes
tial vault — and that the whole sphere of the
heavens has an apparent motion round the earth
every twenty-four hours. Whether this motion
be real, or only apparent, must be determined by
other considerations.

Such general views of the nocturnal heavens,
which every common observer may take, have
a tendency to expand the mind, and to elevate it
to the contemplation of an invisible power, by
which such mighty movements are conducted.
Whether we consider the vast concave, with all
its radiant orbs, moving in majestic grandeur
around our globe, or the earth itself whirling
round its inhabitants in an opposite direction —
an idea of sublimity, and of Almighty energy,
irresistibly forces itself upon the mind, which
throws completely into the shade the mightiest
etforts of human power. The most powerful
mechanical engines that were ever constructed

work, about eleven years ago, made a number of
observations, by means of an equatorial telescope,
to determine the following particulars :— What stars
and planets may be conveniently seen in the day
time, when the sun is above the horizon ? What de
grees of magnifying power are requisite for distin
guishing them ? How near their conjunction with
the sun they may be seen ;— and, whether the dimi
nution of the aperture of the telescope, or the in
crease of magnifying power, conduces most to ren
der a star or planet visible in day-light. The results
of several hundreds of observations on these points,
accompanied with some original deductions and re
marks, are inserted in " Nicholson's Philosophical
Journal," for October, 1813, vol. 36, p. 109—123. The
following are some of the results which were de
duced from the observations :— That a star of the
first magnitude maybe distinguished at any time of
the day, with a magnifying power of SO times, but
that a higher magnifying power is preferable— That
most of the stars of the second magnitude may be
seen with a power of 100; and with a power of 60
times, when the sun is not much more than two
hours above the horizon— That the planet Jupiter,
when not within so or 40 degrees of the sun, may be
seen with a power of 15 times ;— and that Venus
may, in most instances, be seen with a power of
from 7 to 100 times, and upwards— That Jupiter
can scarcely be distinguished in the day-time, when
within 26 degrees of the sun ; but that Venus may
be distinctly perceived near her superior conjunc
tion, when only one degree and 27 minutes from
the sun's margin ; and, consequently, may be visible
at the time of thai conjunction, when her geocen
tric latitude equals or exceeds l degree 43 minutes
—That she may be perceived, like' a fine, slender
crescent, within 35 hours after passing her inferior
conjunction, &c. &c. One practical purpose to
which such observations on Venus, at the time of
her superior conjunction, may be applied, is, to
determine the difference (if any) between her polar
and equatorial diameters. For, it is only at that
conjunction that she presents to the earth a full en
lightened hemisphere ; and in no other position can
the measure of both diameters be taken, except
when she makes a transit across the sun's disk.
As the Earth, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, are found
•to be spheroids, it is highly probable that Venus
Is of a similar figure; but this point has never yet
been ascertained by actual observation. See also
"The Edinburgh Philos. Journal," No. 5, for July
1820, p. 191 ; and No. 13, for July, 1822—" The Scots
Mag." for Feb. 1814, p. 84.— "Monthly Mag." Feb.
814, and August 1620, p. 62.

by the agency of man, can scarcely afford us tht-
least assistance in forming a conception of that
incomprehensible power, which, wilh unceas
ing energy, communicates motion to revolving
worlds. And yet such is the apathy with which
the heavens are viewed by the greater part of
mankind, that there are thousands who have oc
casionally gazed at the stars, for the space of
fifty years, who are still ignorant of the fact, that
they perform an apparent diurnal revo'uiion
round our globe.

Again, if we contemplate the heavens with
some attention, for a number of successive
nights, we shall find, that by far the greater part
of the stars never vary their positions with re
spect to each other. If we observe two stars at
a certain apparent distance from each other,
either north or south, or in any other direction,
they will appear at the same distance, and in the
same relative position to each other, the next
evening, the next month, and the next year. The
stars, for instance, which form the sword and
belt of Orion, present to our eye the same figure
and relative aspect, during the whole period they
are visible in winter, and from one year to
another rand the same is the case with all the
fixed stars in the firmament. On examining the
sky a litlle more minutely however, we perceive
certain bodies which regularly shift their posi
tions. Sometimes they appear to move towards
the east, sometimes towards the west, and at
other times seem to remain in a stationary posi
tion. These bodies have obtained the name of
planets, or wandering stars ; and, in our latitude,
are most frequently seen, either in the eastern
and western, or in the southern parts of the hea
vens. Ten of these planetary orbs have been
discovered ; six of which are, for the most part,
invisible to the naked eye. By a careful exami
nation of the motions of these bodies, and their
different aspects, astronomers have determined,
that they all move round the sun as the centre of
their motions, and form, along with the earth and
several smaller globes, one grand and harmonious
system. This assemblage of planetary bodies is
generally termed the solar system, of which I
shall now endeavour to exhibit a brief outline.

THE SOLAR SYSTEM.

Of this system, the sun is the centre and the
animating principle, and by far the largest body
that exists within its limits. The first thing
that strikes the mind when contemplating this
glorious orb, is its astonishing magnitude. This
vast globe is found to be about 880,000 miles ir
diameter, and, consequently, contains a mass of
matter equal lo thirteen hundred thousand globes
of the size of the earth. Were its central parts
placed adjacent to the surface of the earth, it"
circumference would reach two hundred thou
sand miles beyond the moon's orbit on every

ASTRONOMY.

side, filling a cubical space of 681,472,000,000,-
000,000 miles. If it would require 18.000 years
to traverse every square mile on the earth's sur
face, at the rate of thirty miles a day, (see p.
9,) it would require more than two thousand
millions of years to pass over every part of the
sun's surface, at the same rate. Even at the
rate of 90 miles a day it would require more
than 80 years to go round its circumference. Of
a body so vast in its dimensions, the human mind,
with all its efforts, can form no adequate con
ception. It appears an extensive universe in it
self; and, although no other body existed within
the range of infinite space, this globe alone
would afford a powerful demonstration of the
omnipotence of the Creator. Were the sun a
hollow sphere, surrounded by an external shell,
and a luminous atmosphere ; were this shell per
forated with several hundreds of openings into
the internal part ; were a globe as large as the
earth placed at its centre, and another globe as
large as the moon, and at the same distance from
tho centre as the moon is from us, to revolve
round the central globe, — it would present to the
view a universe as splendid and glorious as that
which now appears to the vulgar eye, — a uni
verse as large and extensive as the whole crea
tion was conceived to be, by our ancestors, in
the infancy of astronomy. And who can tell,
but that Almighty Being, who has not left a
drop of water in a stagnant pool without its in
habitants, has arranged a number of worlds with
in the capacious circuit of the sun, and peopled
them with intelligent beings in the first stages of
their existence, to remain there for a certain
period, till they be prepared for being transported
to a more expansive sphere of existence ? It is
easy to conceive, that enjoyments as exquisite,
and a range of thoughts as ample as have ever
yet been experienced by the majority of the in
habitants of our world, might be afforded to my
riads of beings thus placed at the centre of this
magnificent luminary. This supposition is, at
least, as probable as that of the celebrated Dr.
Herschel, who supposed that the exterior surface
of the sun was peopled with inhabitants. For,
if this were the case, the range of view of these
inhabitants would be confined within the limits
•f two or three hundred miles, and no celestial
jody, but an immense blaze of light, would be
visible in their hemisphere. Such is the variety
which appears among the works of God, and
such is the diversity of situations in which sen
sitive beings are placed, that we dare not pro
nounce it impossible that both these suppositions
may be realized.

Though the sun seems to perform a daily cir
cuit around our globe, he may be said, in this
respect, to be fixed and immoveable. This motion
is not real, but only apparent, and is owing to
the globe on which we are placed moving round
its axis from west to east ; just as the objects on

17

the bank of the river seem to move in a contrary
direction, when we are sailing along its stream
in a steamboat. The only motion which is
found to exist in the sun is, a motion of rotation^
like that of a globe or ball twirled round a pivot
or axis, which is performed in the space of 25
days and 10 hours. This motion has been as
certained by means of a variety of dark spots
which are discovered by the telescope on the
sun's disk ; which first appear on his eastern
limb, and, after a period of about thirteen days,
disappear on his western, and, after a similar
period, reappear on his eastern edge. These
spots are various, both in number, in magnitude,
and in shape : sometimes 40 or 50, and some
times only one or two are visible, and at other
times the sun appears entirely without spots. —
Most of them have a very dark nucleus, or cen
tral part, surrounded by an umbra, or fainter
shade. Some of the spots are as large as wouid
cover the whole continent of Europe, Asia, and
Africa, others have been observed of the size of
the whole surface of the earth ; and one was seen,
in the year 1779, which was computed to be
more than fifty thousand miles in diameter.

With regard to the nature of this globe — it
appears highly probable, from the observations of
Dr. Herschel, that the sun is a solid and opaque
body, surrounded with luminous clouds which
float in the solar atmosphere, and that the dark
nucleus of the spots is the opaque body of tho
sun appearing through occasional openings in
this atmosphere. The height of the atmosphere,
he computes to be not less than 1843, nor more
than 2765 miles, consisting of two regions ; that
nearest the sun being opaque, and probably re-
sertbling the clouds of our earth ; the outermost
emitting vast quantities of light, and forming the
apparent luminous globe we behold.

The sun is the grand source of light and heat,
both to the earth and to all the other planetary
bodies. The heat he diffuses animates every
part of our sublunary system, and all that vari
ety of colouring which adorns the terrestrial land
scape is produced by his rays. It has been
lately discovered, that the rays of light, and the
rays of heat, or caloric, are distinct from each
other; for, it can be demonstrated, that some
rays from the sun produce heat, which have no
power of communicating light or colour. The
greatest heat is found in the red rays, the least
in the violet rays ; and in a space beyond the
red rays, where there is no light, the tempera-
lure is greatest. The rays of the sun have also
been found to produce different chymical effects.
The white muriate of silver is blackened in the
violet ray, in the space of 15 seconds, though the
red will not produce the same effect in less than
20 minutes. Phosphorus is kindled in the vici
nity of the red ray, and extinguished in the vici
nity of the violet. The solar light, therefore,
consists of three different orders of rays, one

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

producing colour, a second producing heat, and a
third chymical effects. Euler has computed that
the light of the sun is equal to 6500 candles at a
foot distance, while the moon would be as one
candle at 7| feet ; Venus at 421 feet ; and Jupi
ter at 1320 feet. — That this immense luminary
appears so small to our eyes, is owing to its vast
distance, which is no less than ninety-five mil
lions of miles. Sooie faint idea of this distance
may be obtained, by considering, that a steam
boat, moving at the rate of 200 miles a day,
would require thirteen hundred years before it
could traverse the space which intervenes be
tween us and the sun.

"Hail sacred source of inexhausted light!
Prodigious instance of creating might .'
His distance man's imagination foils ;
Numbers will scarce avail to count the miles.
As swift as thought he darts his radiance round
To distant worlds, his system's utmost bound."

. Brown.

The Planet Mercury . — Mercury is the nearest
planet to the sun that has yet been discovered.
He is about 37 millions of miles distant from the
sun, and revolves around him in 88 days. His
diameter is about 3200 miles. Before the dis
covery of the four new planets, Ceres, Pallas,
Juno, and Vesta, in the beginning of the present
century, this globe was considered as the smallest
primary planet in the system. His surface,
however, contains above 32 millions of square
miles, which is not much less than all the habi
table parts of our globe. On account of his near
ness to the sun, he is seldom seen by the naked
eye ; being always near that quarter of the hea
vens where the sun appears ; and therefore, few
discoveries have been made on his surfac*, by
the telescope. M. Schroeter concludes, from
certain observations, that this planet revolves
round its axis in 24 hours and five minutes. The
sun will appear to an inhabitant of Mercury
seven times larger than to an inhabitant of the
earth ; and, if the degree of heat be in propor
tion to a planet's nearness to the sun, the heat
in this planet will be seven times greater than
on the surface of our globe ; and, consequently,
were the earth placed in the same position, all
the water on its surface would boil, and soon be
turned into vapour. Bjut the All-wise Creator
has, doubtless, attempered the surface of this
globe, and the constitution of the beings that
may occupy it, to the situation in which they
are placed.*

• From a variety of facts which have been observ
ed in relation to the production of caloric, it does not
appear probable, that the degree of heat on the sur
faces of the different planets is inversely propor
tional to the squares of their respective distances
from the sun. It is more probable, that it depends
chiefly on the distribution of the substance of caloric
on the surfaces and throughout the atmospheres of
these bodies— in different quantities, according to the
different situations the v occupy in the solar system j

Venus, the next planet in order from the .sun;
revolves around him in 224 days, at the distance
of 68 millions of miles, and its diameter is about
seven thousand seven hundred miles, or nearly
the size of the earth ; and it turns round its axis
in the space of 23 hours and 20 minutes. This
planet is the most brilliant orb which appears in
our nocturnal heavens, and is usually distinguish
ed by the name of t'.it morning and evening star.
When it approaches nearest to the earth, it is
about 27 millions of miles distant ; and at its
greatest distance, it is no less than 163 millions
of miles from the earth. Were the whole of
its enlightened surface turned towards the earth,
when it is nearest, it would exhibit a light and
brilliancy twenty-five times greater than it ge
nerally does, and appear like a small brilliant
moon ; but at that time, its dark hemisphere is
turned towards our globe. Both Venus and
Mercury, when viewed by a telescope, appear to
pass successively through all the shapes and ap
pearances of the moon ; sometimes assuming a
gibbous phase, and at other times the form of a half
moon, or that of a crescent ; which proves that
they are dark bodies in themselves, and derive
their light from the sun. The most distinct and
beautiful views of Venus, especially when she
appears as a crescent, are to be obtained in the
daytime, bv means of an equatorial telescope. —
From a variety of observations which the author
has made with this instrument, it has been found
that Venus may be seen every clear day without
interruption, during a period of 583 days, with
the occasional exception of 13 days in one case,
and only 3 days in another — a circumstance
which cannot be affirmed of any other celestial
body, the sun only excepted.f M. Schroeter

and that these different quantities of caloric are put
into action by the influence of the solar rays, so as
to produce that degree of sensible heat requisite for
each respective planetary globe. On this hypothesis
—which is corroborated by a very great variety of
facts and experiments— there may be no more sen
sible heat felt on the surface of the planet Mercury,
than on the surface of Herschel, although one oi
these bodies is nearly 50 times nearer the sun than
the other. "We have only to suppose that a small
quantity of caloric exists in Mercury, and a larger
quantity in Herschel, proportionate to his distance
from the centre of the system. On this ground, we
have no reason to believe, either that the planets
nearest the sun are parched with excessive heat, or
that those that are most distant are exposed to all the
rigours of insufferable cold, or that the different de
grees of temperature which may be found in these
bodies render them unfit for being the abodes of
sensitive and intellectual beings.

t See Edin. Phil. Journ. No. V. July, 18-20, and No.
XIII. July 1822.— I have found from observation, that
this planet may be seen in the day-time, when only
1° 43' from the sun's centre ; and consequently
when its geocentric latitude at the time of the supe
rior conjunction exceeds that quantity, it may be
distinctly seen during the whole period of 583 days,
excepting about 35 hours before and after its inferior
conjunction. It is well known to astronomers, that
there has been a difference of opinion with respect
to the period of the rotation of this planet. Cassini,
from observations on a bright spot which advanced

ASTRONOMY.

83

tffirms, that he haa discovered mountains on the
surface of this globe, one of which is 10, another
11, and a third 22 miles high. It appears also
to be encompassed with an atmosphere, the
densest part of which is about 16,000 feet high.
About twice in the course of a century, this pla
net appears to pass, like a dark spot, across the
sun's disk. This is termed the transit ot Venus.
The last transit happened June 3, 1769 ; the
next will happen on December 8, 1874, which
will be invisible in Europe. Another will hap
pen on the 6th of December, 1882, which will be
partly visible in Great Britain.

The Earth is the next planet in the system.
Ii moves round the sun in 365 days, 5 hours, and
49 minutes, at the distance of 95 millions of
miles, and round its axis in 23 hours, 56 minutes,
4 seconds. The former is called its annual, and
the latter, its diurnal motion. That the earth
is, in reality, a moving body, is a fact which can
no longer be called in question ; it is indeed sus
ceptible of the clearest demonstration. But my
limits will not permit to enter into a detail of the
arguments by which it is suppprted. I have al
ready adverted to one consideration, from which
its diurnal rotation may be inferred. (See p.
23.) Either the earth moves round its axis
every day, or the whole universe moves round it
in the same time. To suppose the latter case to
be the fact, would involve a reflection on the
wisdom of its almighty Author, and would form
the only exception that we know to that beauti
ful proportion, harmony, and simplicity, which
appear in all the works of nature. Were it pos
sible to construct a machine as large as the city
of London, and to apply to it mechanical powers
sufficient to make it revolve on an axis, so as to
carry round a furnace for the purpose of roasting
a joint of mutton, suspended in the centre of its
motion — while we might admire the ingenuity
and the energies displayed in its construction —
all mankind would unite in condemning it as a
display of consummate folly. But such an extra
vagant piece of machinery would not be half so

20 degrees, in 24 hours, 34 minutes, determined the
time of its rotation to be 23 hours and 20 minutes.
On the other hand, Bianchini, from similar observa
tions, concluded, that its diurnal period was 24 days
and 8 hours. The difficulty of deciding between
these two opinions, arises from the short time in
which observations can be made on this planet, either
before sun-rise or after sun-set, which prevents us
from tracing, with accuracy, the progressive motion
of its spots for a sufficient length of time. And al
though an observer should mark the position of the
spots, at the same hour, on two succeeding evenings,
and find they had moved forward about 20 decrees
1n 24 hours, he would still be at a loss to determine,
wu^her they had moved 20 degrees in all, since the
prece« "ig observation, or had finished a revolution,
and 20 decrees more.— In " Nicholson's Philosophical
Journal," vol. 38. I endeavoured to show how this
point maybe determined by observations on Venus
in the day-time, by which, in certain cases, the pro
gressive motion of her spots might be traced, without
Interruption, for 12 hours or more, which would
completely settle the period of rotation.
38

preposterous as to suppose, that the vast universe
is daily revolving around our little globe, and that
all the planetary motions have an immediate re
spect to it. And shall we dare to ascribe to him
who is " the only wise God," contrivances
which we would pronounce to be the perfection
of folly in mankind ? It is recorded of the astro
nomer Alphonsus, king of Castile, who lived in
the 13th century, that, after having studied the
Ptolemaic system, which supposes the earth at
rest in the centre of the universe, he uttered the
following impious sentence : " If I had been of
God's privy council, when he made the world, I
would have advised him better." So that false
conceptions of the system of nature, lead to erro
neous notions of that adorable Being who is pos
sessed of infinite perfection. We find that bodies
much larger than the earth have a similar rota
tion. The planet Jupiter, a globe 295,000 miles
in circumference, moves round his axis in less
than ten hours ; and all the other planetary
bodies, on which spots have been discovered, are
found to have a diurnal motion. Besides, it is
found to be a universal law of nature that smaller
globes revolve round larger ; but there is no ex
ample in the universe, of a larger body revolving
around a smaller. The moon revolves around
the earth, but she is much smaller than the
earth; the moons which move around Jupiter,
Saturn, and Herschel, are all less than their pri
maries, and the planets which perform their re
volutions around the sun are much less than that
central luminary.

With regard to the annual revolution of the
earth, if such a motion did exist, the planetary
system would present a scene of inextricable con
fusion. The planets would sometimes move
backwards, sometimes forwards, and at other
times remain stationary; and would describe
looped curves, so anomalous and confused, thai
no man in his senses could view the all-wise
Creator as the author of so much confusion.
But, by considering the earth as revolving in an
orbit between Venus and Mars, (which all ce
lestial observa'ions completely demonstrate,) all
the apparent irregularities of the planetary mo
tions are completely solved and accounted for ;
and the solar system presents a scene of beauty,
harmony and grandeur, combined with a simplicity
of design which characterizes all the works of
Omnipotence.

The Moon. — Next to the sun, the moon is to
us the most interesting of all the celestial orbs.
She is the constant attendant of the earth, and
revolves around it in 27 days, 8 hours ; but the
period from one new or full moon to another is
about 29 days, 12 hours. She is the nearest of
all the heavenly bodies ; being only about two
hundred and forty thousand miles distant from the
earth. She is much smaller than the earth ; be
ing only 2,180 miles in diameter. Her surface,
when viewed with a telescope, presents an into

64

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER

resting and a variegated aspect ; being diversified
with mountains, valleys, rocks, and plains, in
every variety of form and position. Some of
these mountains form long and elevated ridges,
resembling the chains of the Alps and the Andes ;
while others, of a conical form, rise to a great
height, from the middle of level plains, some
what resembling the Peak of Teneriffe. But the
most singular feature of the moon, is, those cir
cular ridges and cavities which diversify every
portion of her surface. A range of mountains of
a circular form, rising three or four miles above
the level of the adjacent districts, surrounds, like
a mighty rampart, an extensive plain ; and, in
the middle of this plain or cavity, an insulated
conical hill rises to a considerable elevation.
Several hundreds of these circular plains, most of
which are considerably below the level of the sur
rounding country, may be perceived, with a good
telescope, on every region of the lunar surface.
They are of all dimensions, from two or three
miles to forty miles in diameter ; and, if they be
adorned with verdure, they must present to the
view of a spectator, placed among them, a more
variegated, romantic, and sublime scenery than
is to be found on the surface of our globe. An
idea of some of these scenes may be acquired by
conceiving a plain of about a hundred miles in
circumference, encircled with a range of moun
tains, of various forms, three miles in perpendicu
lar height, and having a mountain near the cen
tre, whose top reaches a mile and a half above
the level of the plain. From the top of this cen
tral mountain, the whole plain, with all its variety
of objects, would be distinctly visible; and the
view would appear to be bounded on all sides by
a lofty amphitheatre of mountains, in every di
versity of shape, rearing their summits to the
sky. From the summit of the circular ridge, the
conical hill in the centre, the opposite circular
range, the plain below, and some of the adjacent
plains, which encompass the exterior ridge of the
mountains, would form another variety of view ;
and a third variety would be obtained from the
various aspects of the central mountain, and the
surrounding scenery, as viewed from the plains
below.

The lunar mountains are of all sizes, from a
furlong to five miles in perpendicular elevation.
Certain luminous spots, which have been occa
sionally seen on the dark side of the moon, seom
to demonstrate that fire exists in this planet. Dr.
Herschel and several other astronomers suppose,
that they are volcanoes in a state of eruption. It
would be a more pleasing idea, and perhaps as
nearly corresponding to fact, to suppose, that
these phenomena are owing to some occasional
splendid illuminations, produced by the lunar in
habitants, during their long nights. Such a scene
as the burning of Moscow, the conflagration of an
extensive forest, or the splendid illumination of
a large city with gas-lights, might present simi

lar appearances to a spectator in the moon. Tr*
bright spots of the moon are the irwnuitair.ous
regions ; the dark spots are the plains, or nioro
level parts of her surface. There may probably
be rivers or small lakes on this planet ; but there
are no seas or large collection of water. It ap
pears highly probable, from the observations of
Schroeter, that the moon is encompassed with
an atmosphere ; but no clouds, rain, nor snow
seem to exist in it. The illuminati))*; power o
the light derived from the moon, according to the
experiments made by Professor Leslie, is about
the one hundred and fifty thousandth part of the
illuminating power of the sun. According to
the experiments of M. Boguer, it is only as 1 to
300,000.

The Moon always presents the same face to
us ; which proves, that she revolves round her
axis in the same time that she revolves round the
earth. As this orb derives its light from the
sun, and reflects a portion of it upon the earth,
so the earth performs the same office to the moon.
A spectator on the lunar surface would behold
the earth, like a luminous orb, suspended in the
vault of heaven, presenting a surface about 13
times larger than the moon does to us, and ap
pearing sometimes gibbous, sometimes horned,
and at other times with a round full face. The
light which the earth reflects upon the dark side
of the moon may be distinctly perceived by a
common telescope, from three to six or eight
days after the change. The lunar surface con
tains about 15 millions of square miles, and is,
therefore, capable of containing a population
equal to that of our globe, allowing only about
53 inhabitants to every square mile. That this
planet is inhabited by sensitive and intelligent
beings, there is every reason to conclude, from a
consideration of the sublime scenery with which
its surface is adorned, and of the general benefi
cence of the Creator, who appears to have left no
large portion of his material creation without
animated existences ; and it is highly probable,
that direct proofs of the moon's being inhabited
may hereafter be obtained, when all the varie
ties on her surface shall have been more minute
ly explored.*

The planet Mars. — Next to the earth and
moon, the planet Mars performs his revolu
tion round the sun, in one year and ten months,
to the distance of 145 millions of miles. His
diameter is about 4,200 miles, and he is distin
guished from all the other planets, by his ruddy
appearance, which is owing to a dense atmos
phere with which he is environed. With a good
telescope, his surface appears diversified by a
variety of spots ; by the motion of which it is
found, that he turns round his axis in 24 hours
and 40 minutes. The inclination of his axis to
the plane of his orbit being about 28° 42', the

* • See Appendix, No. m.

ASTRONOMY.

85

days and nights, and the different seasons in this
planet, will bear a considerable resemblance to
those we experience in our terrestrial sphere.*

At his nearest approach to the earth, his dis
tance from us is about 50 millions of miles ;
and, at his greatest distance, he is about 240
millions of miles ; so that in the former case he
appears nearly 25 times larger than in the latter.
To a spectator in this planet, our earth will
appear, alternately, as a morning and evening
star, and will exhibit all the phases of the moon,
just as Venus does to us, but with a less degree
of apparent magnitude and splendour. A lumi
nous zone has been observed about the poles of
Mars, which is subject to successive changes.
Dr. Herschel supposes that it is produced by the
reflection of the sun's light from his frozen re
gions, and that the melting of these masses of
polar ice is the cause of the variation in its mag
nitude and appearance. This planet moves, in
its orbit, at the rate of fifty-five thousand miles
an hour.

The new planets. — Between the orbits of
Mars and Jupiter, four planetary bodies have
been lately discovered, accompanied with cir
cumstances somewhat different from those of the
other bodies which compose our system. They
are named Ceres, Pallas, Juno, and Vesta.
The planet Ceres was discovered at Palermo,
hi Sicily, by M. Piazzi, on the first day of the
present century. It is of a ruddy colour, and
appears abour the size of a star of the 8th magni
tude, and is consequently invisible to the naked
eye. It performs its revolution in 4 years and 7
months, at the distance of 260 millions of miles
from the sun, and is reckoned, by some astrono
mers, to be about 1624 miles in diameter, or
about half the diameter of Mercury. It appears
to be surrounded with a large dense atmosphere.
— Pallas was discovered the following year,
namely, on the 28th of March, 1802, by Dr.
Olbers of Bremen. It is supposed to be about
2000 miles in diameter, or nearly the size of the
moon. It revolves about the sun in 4 years and
7 months, or nearly in the same time as Ceres,
at the distance of 266 millions of miles; and is
surrounded with a nebulosity or atmosphere,
above 400 miles in height, similar to that of
Ceres. — The planet Juno was discovered on the
1st September, 1804, by Mr. Harding of Bre
men, its mean distance from the sun is about
253 millions of miles ; its revolution is comple
ted in 4 years and 130 days, and its diameter is
computed to be about 1425 miles. It is free
from the nebulosity which surrounds Pallas, and
is distinguished from all the other planets by the

• The inclination cf the earth's axis to the ecliptic,
or, in other words, to the plane of its annual orbit,
is 23 degrees and 25 minutes, which is the cause of
the diversity of seasons, and of the different length
of days and nights. Were the axis of the earth per
pendicular to its orbit, as is the case with the pla
ne* Jupiter, there would be no diversity of seasons.

great eccentricity of its orbit : being, at its least
distance from the sun, only 189 millions of miles,
and at its greatest distance 316 millions. — Vesta
was discovered by Dr. Olbers on the 29th
March, 1807. It appears like a star of the 5th
or 6th magnitude, and may sometimes be distin
guished by the naked eye. Its light is more in
tense and white than any of the other three, and
it is not surrounded with any nebulosity. It is
distant from the sun about 225 millions of miles,
and completes its revolution in 3 years and 240
days. Its diameter has not yet been accurately
ascertained ; but from the intensity of its light,
and other circumstances, it is concluded, that it
exceeds in magnitude both Pallas and Juno.

These planetary globes present to our view a
variety of anomalies and singularities, which
appear incompatible with the regularity, pro
portion, and harmony which were formerly sup
posed to characterize the arrangements of the
solar system. — They are bodies much smaller in
size than the other planets — they revolve nearly
at the same distances from the sun, and perform
their revolutions in nearly the same periods —
their orbits are much more eccentric, and have a
much greater degree of inclination^ the ecliptic,
than those of the old planets — and, what is alto
gether singular, (except incase of comets,) their
orbits cross each other; so that there is & possibi
lity that two of these bodies might happen to in
terfere, and to strike each other, in the course of
their revolutions. The orbit of Ceres crosses
the orbit of Pallas. Vesta may sometimes be at
a greater distance from the sun than either Ceres,
Pallas or Juno, although its mean distance is less
than that of either of them, by several millions
of miles ; so that the orbit of Vesta crosses the
orbits of all the other three. From these and
other circumstances, it has, with a high degree
of probability, been concluded — that these four
planets are the fragments of a large celestial body
which once revolved between Mars and Jupiter,
and which had been burst asunder by some im
mense irruptive force. This idea seems to have
occurred to Dr. Olbers after he had discovered
the planet Pallas, and he imagined that other
fragments might possibly exist. He concluded,
that, if they all diverged from the same point,
" they ought to have two common points of re
union, or two nodes in opposite regions of the
heavens, through which all the planetary frag
ments must sooner or later pass." One of these
nodes he found to be in the constellation Virgo,
and the other in the Whale ; and it is a remark
able ( oincidence, that it was in the latter of
these regions that the planet Juno was discover
ed by Mr. Harding. In order to detect the re
maining fragments (if any existed) Dr. Olbers
examined, three times every year, all the small
stars in Virgo and the Whale ; and it was ac
tually in the consellation Virgo, that he dis
covered the planet Vesta. It is not unlikely

86

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

that other fragments of a similar description may
be discovered. Dr. Brewster attributes the fall
of meteoric stones* to the smaller fragments of
these bodies happening to come within the sphere
of the earth's attraction. His ingenious rea
sonings on this subject, and in support of Dr.
Gibers' hypothesis above stated, may be seen in
Edin. JEncy. vol. ii. p. 641, and in his u Sup
plementary chapters to Ferguson's Astronomy."

The facts to which I have now adverted seem
to unfold a new scene in the history of the dis
pensations of the Almighty, and to warrant the
conclusion, that the earth is not the only globe
in the universe which is subject to physical
changes and moral revolutions.

The Planet Jupiter.— This planet is 490
millions of miles distant from the sun, and per
forms its annual revolution in nearly twelve of
our years, moving at the rate of twenty-nine
thousand miles an hour. It is the largest planet
in the solar system ; being 89,000 miles in di
ameter, or about fourteen hundred times larger
than the earth. Its motion round its axis is per
formed in nine hours and fifty-six minutes ; and,
therefore, the portions of its surface about the
equator move at the rate of 28,000 miles an hour,
which is nearly twenty-seven times swifter than
the earth's diurnal rotation. The figure of Ju
piter is that of an oblate spheroid, the axis, or
diameter passing through the poles, being about
6000 miles shorter than that passing through the
equator. The Earth, Saturn, and Mars are
also spheroids ; and it is highly probable that
Mercury, Venus, and Herschel are of a similar
figure, though the fact has not yet been ascer
tained by actual observation. When viewed
with a telescope, several spots have been occa
sionally discovered on the surface of this planet,
by the motion of which, its rotation was deter
mined.

But what chiefly distinguishes the surface of
Jupiter is several streaky appearances, or dusky
strips, which extend across his disk, in lines
parallel to his equator. These are generally

• Meteoric stones, or, what are generally termed
aerolites, are stones which sometimes fall from the
upper regions of the atmosphere, upon the earth.—
The substance of which they are composed is, for the
most part, metallic; but the ore of which they con
sist is not to be found in the same cortstituent pro
portions in any terrestrial substances. Their fall is
generally preceded by a luminous appearance, a hiss
ing noise, and a loud explosion ; and, when found
immediately after their descent, are always hot.—
Their size differs, from small fragments, of inconsi
derable weignt, to the most ponderous masses. Some
of the largest portions of these stones have been
found to weigh from 300 Ibs. to several tons ; and
they have often descended to the earth with a force
sufficient to bury them many feet under the soil.—
Some have supposed that these bodies are projected
from volcanoes in the moon ; others, that they pro
ceed from volcanoes on the earth ; while others ima
gine that they are generated in the regions of the
atmosphere ; but the true cause is, probably, not yet
ascertained. In some instances, these stones have
penetrated through the roofs of houses, and proved
deiHructive to the inhabitants.

termed his belts. Three of thfse belts, or zones
nearly equi-distant from each other, are most fre
quently observed ; but they are not regular or
constant in their appearance . f Sometimes c oly
one is to be seen, sometimes five, and sometii ie.t
seven or eight have been distinctly visible; and,
in the latter case, two of them have been known
to disappear during the time of observation. On
the 28lh May, 1780, Dr. Herschel perceived
" the whole surface of Jupiter covered with small
curved belts, or rather lines, that were not con
tinuous across his disk." Though these belts
are generally parallel to each other, yet they are
not always so. Their breadth is likewise varia
ble j one belt having been observed to grow nar
row, while another in its neighbourhood has in
creased in breadth, as if the one had flowed into
the other. The time of their continuance is also
uncertain; sometimes they remain unchanged
for several months, at other times, new belts
have been formed in an hour or two. What
these belts or variable appearances are it is diffi
cult to determine. Some have regarded them as
strata of clouds floating in the atmosphere of Ju
piter ; while others imagine, that they are the
marks of great physical revolulions which are
perpetually changing the surface of that planet.
The former opinion appears the most probable.
But, whatever be the nature of these belts, the
sudden changes to which they are occasionally
subject, seem to indicate the rapid operation of
some powerful physical agency ; for some of
them are more than five thousand miles in
breadth ; and since they have been known to dis
appear in the space of an hour or two, and even
during the time of a casual observation — agents
more powerful than any with which we are ac
quainted must have produced so extensive an
effect.

Jupiter is attended by four satellites or moons,
which present a very beautiful appearance when
viewed through a telescope. The first moon, or
that nearest the planet, is 230,-OCO miles dislant
from its centre, and goes round it in 42£ hours ;
and will appear from its surface four times
larger than our moon does to us. The second
moon, being farther distant, will appear about
the size of ours ; the third, somewhat less ; and
the fourth, which is a million of miles distant
from Jupiter, and takes sixteen days to go round
him, will appear only about one-third the diame
ter of our moon. These moons suffer frequent
eclipses from passing through Jupiter's shadow,
in the same way as our moon is eclipsed by
passing through the shadow of the earth. By

t A representation of these belts, in the positions
in which they most frequently appear, is exhibit
ed in the engraving, Fig. 2. Fig. 1. represents ths
double ring of Saturn, as it appears when viewed
through a powerful telescope— Figures 1,2,8, 4,
and 5, represent Saturn, Jupiter, Herschei. the
Earth and Moon, in their relative sizes and pro
portions.

ASTRONOMY

87

Ae eclipse of these moons, the motion of light
was ascertained ; and they are found to be of es
sential use in determining the longitude of places
on the surface of our globe. This planet, if seen
from its nearest moon, will present a surface a
thousand times as large as our moon does to us,
and will appear in the form of a crescent, a half-
moon, a gibbous phase, and a full-moon, in regu
lar succession, every 24 hours. Jupiter's axis
being nearly perpendicular to his ortJJt, he has no
sensible change of seasons, such as ve experi
ence on the earth. Were we placed on ^e sur
face of this planet, with the limited powers of
vision we now possess, our earth and moon
would entirely disappear, as if they were blotted
out from the map of creation ; and the inhabitants
of these regions must have much better eyes than
ours, if they know that there is such a globe as
the earth in the universe.

The planet Saturn. — This planet is 900 mil
lions of miles distant from the sun, being nearly
double the distance of Jupiter. Its diameter is
79,000 miles, and, consequently, it is more than
nine hundred times the bulk of the earth. It
takes 29 £ years to complete its revolution about
the sun: but its diurnal motion is completed in
ten hours and sixteen minutes ; so that the year
in this planet is nearly thirty times the length of
ours, while the day is shorter, by more than one-
half. The year, therefore, contains about twen
ty-five thousand one hundred and fifty days, or
periods of its diurnal rotation, which is equal to
10,759 of our days. Saturn is of a spheroidal
figure, or somewhat of the shape of an orange ;
his equatorial being more than six thousand miles
longer than his polar diameter. His surface,
like that of Jupiter, is diversified with belts and
dark spots. Dr. Herschel, at certain times, per
ceived five belts on his surface, three of which
were dark, and two bright. The dark belts had
a yellowish tinge, and generally covered a larger
zone of the disk of Saturn, than the belts of Jupi
ter occupy upon his surface. On account of the
great distance of this planet from the sun, the
light it receives from that luminary is only the
ninetieth part of what we enjoy ; but, by calcula
tion, it is found, that this quantity is a thousand
times greater than the li^ht which the full moon
affords to us. Besides, it is surrounded by no
fewer than seven moon^, which supply it with
light in the absence of the sun. Five of these
inoons were discovered during the seventeenth
century, by Huygens and Cassini ; and the sixth
and seventh were discovered by Dr. Herschel, in
1789, soon after his large forty feet reflecting
Islescope was constructed. These moons, and
also those which accompany Jupiter, are esti
mated to be not less than the earth in magnitude,
and are found, like our moon, to revolve round
the:1- axis in the same time in which they revolve
about their re«p<ictive primaries.

Rings of Saturn. — The most extraordinary

circumstance connected with this planet, is,
the phenomenon of a double ring, which sur
rounds its body, but no where touches it, being
thirty thousand miles distant from any part ol
the planet, and is carried along with the planet
in its circuit round the sun. This is the most
singular and astonishing object in the whole range
of the planetary system ; no other planet being
found environed with so wonderful an appendage ;
and the planets which may belong to other sys
tems, being placed beyond the reach of our ob
servations, no idea can be formed of the peculiar
apparatus with which any of them may be fur
nished. This double ring consists of two con
centric rings, detached from each other ; the in
nermost of which is nearly three times as broad as
the outermost. The outside diameter of the exte
rior ring is 204,000 miles ; and, consequently, its
circumference will measure six hundred and
forty thousand miles, or eighty times the diame
ter of our globe. Its breadth is 7,200 miles, or
nearly the diameter of the earth. Were four
hundred and fifty globes, of the size of the earth,
placed close to one another, on a plane, this
immense ring would enclose the whole of them,
together with all the interstices, or open spaces
between the different globes. The outsioe dia
meter of the innermost ring is 184,000 miles, and
its breadth twenty thousand miles, or about 2$
times broader than the diameter of the earth.
The dark space, or interval, betwoen the two
rings, is 2,800 miles. The breadth of both the
rings, including the dark space between them,
is thirty thousand miles, which is equal to the
distance of the innermost ring from the body of
Saturn.

The following figure represents a view of Sa
turn and his rings, as they would appear, were
our eye perpendicular to one of the planes of those
rings ; but our eye is never so much elevated
above either plane, as to have the visual ray
standing at right angles to it ; it is never ele
vated more than 30 degrees above the planes of
the rings. When we view Saturn through a
telescope, we always see the ring at an oblique
angle, so that it appears of an oval form, the
outward circular rim being projected into an
ellipsis more or less oblong, according to the
different degrees of obliquity with which it is
viewed, as will be seen in the figure of Saturn
in the copperplate engraving.

These rings cast a deep shadow upon the
planet, which proves that they are not shining
fluids, but composed of solid matter. They ap
pear to be possessed of a higher reflective power
than the surface of Saturn ; as the light re
flected by them is more brilliant than that of
the planet. One obvious use of this double ring
is, to reflect light upon the planet, in the absence
of the sun; what other purposes it may be in
tended to subserve, in the system of Saturn, is,
at present, to us unknown. The sun illuminates

38

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

one side of it during fifteen years, or one-half
of the period of the planet's revolution ; and
during the next fifteen years, the other side is
enlightened in its turn. Twice in the course of
thirty years, there is a short period, during which
nei'her side is enlightened, and when, of course,
it ceases to be visible ; — namely, at the time
when the sun ceases to shine on one side, and
is about to shine on the other. It revolves
round its axis, and, consequently, around Saturn,
in ten hours and a half, which is at the rate of a
thousand miles in a minute, or fifty-eight times
swifter than the earth's equator. When viewed
from the middle zone of the p'anet, in the absence
of the sun, the rings will appear like vast lumi
nous arches, extending along the canopy of hea
ven, from the eastern to the western horizon ;
having an apparent breadth equal to a hundred
times the apparent diameter of our moon, and
will be seen darkened about the middle, by the
shadow of Saturn.*

There is no other planet in the solar system,
whose firmament will present such a variety of
splendid and magnificent objects, as that of Sa
turn. Th« yarious aspects of his seven moons,
one rising above the horizon, while another is
setting, and a third approaching to the meridian ;

* See the engraving, fig. 7, which represents a
view of the appearance which the rings and moons
of Saturn will exhibit, in certain cases, about mid
night, when feehcld from a point 20 or 30 degrees
north from his equator. The shade on the upper
part of the rings represents the shadow of the body of
Saturn. The shadow will appear to move gradually
.0 the west as the morning approaches.

one entering into an eclipse, and av*»trier emerg
ing from it; one appearing as a crescent, and
another with a gibbous phase ; and sometimes
the whole of them shining in the same hemi
sphere, in one bright assemblage ; the majestic
motions of the rings, — at one time illuminating
the sky with their splendour, and eclipsing the
stars ; at another, casting a deep shade over cer
tain regions of the planet, and unveiling to view
ihe wonders of the starry firmament — are scenes
worthy of the majesty of the Divine Being to
unfold, and of rational creatures to contemplate.
Such magnificent displays of wisdom and om
nipotence lead us to conclude that the numerous
splendid objects connected with this planet were
not created merely to shed their lustre on naked
rocks and barren sands ; but that an immense
population of intelligent beings is placed in those
regions, to enjoy the bounty and to adore the
perfections of their great Creator. The double
ring of Saturn, when viewed through a good te
lescope, generally appears like a luminous handle
on each side of the planet, with a dark interval
between the interior edge of the ring and the
convex body of Saturn ; which is owing to its
oblique position with respect to our line of vision.
When its outer edge is turned directly towards
the earth, it becomes invisible, or appears like a
dark stripe across the disk of the planet. This
phenomenon happens once every fifteen years.

The planet Herschel. — This planet, which
is also known by the names of the Georgium
Sidus, and Uranus, was discovered by Dr.
Herschel on the 13th March, 1781. It "is the

ASTRONOMY.

89

most distant planet from the sun, that has yet
been discovered ; being removed at no less than
1800 millions of.niles from that luminary, which
is nineteen tmes farther than the earth is from
the sun — a distance so great, that a cannon ball,
flying at the rate of 480 miles an hour, would
not reach it in 400 years. Its diameter is about
35,000 miles ; and, of course, it is about eighty
times larger than the earth. It appears like a
star of the sixth magnitude ; but can seldom be
distinguished by the naked eye. It takes about
83 years and a half to complete its revolution
round the sun; and, though it is the slowest
moving body in the system, it moves at the rate
of 15,000 miles an hour. As the degree of sen
sible heat in any planet does not appear to de
pend altogether on its nearness to the sun, the
temperature of this planet may be as mild as
that which obtains in the most genial climate of
our globe.* The diameter of the sun, as seen
from Herschel, is little more than the apparent
diameter of Venus, as seen by the naked eye ;
and the light which it receives from that lumi
nary, is 360 times less than what we experience ;
yet this proportion is found by calculation to be
equal to the effect which would be produced by
248 of our full moons ; and, in the absence of
the sun, there are si* moons which reflect light
upon this distant planet, all of which were dis
covered likewise by Dr. Herschel. Small as the
proportion of light is, which this planet receives
from the sun, it is easy to conceive, that beings
similar to man, placed on the surface of this
globe, with a slight modification of their organs
of vision, might be made to perceive objects with
a clearness and distinctness even superior to
what we can do. We have only to suppose,
that the Creator has formed their eyes with pupils
capable of a much larger expansion than ours ;
and has endued their retina with a much greater
degree of nervous sensibility. At all events, we
may rest assured, that He who has placed sen
tient beings in any region, has, by laws with
which we are partly unacquainted, adapted the
constitution of the inhabitant to the nature of
the habitation.

" Strange and amazing must the difference be,
'Twixt this dull planet and bright Mercury ;
Vet reason says, nor can we doubt at all,
Millions of beings dwell on either ball,
"With constitutions fitted for that spot
Where Providence, all -wise, has fixed their lot."
Baker's Universe.

The celestial globes which I have now de
scribed, are all the planets which are at present
known to belong to the solar system. It is pro
bable that other planetary bodies may yet be dis
covered between the orbits of Saturn and Her
schel, and even far beyond the orbit of the latter ;
•n<* it is also not improbable that planets may

• See Note, page 82.

exist in the immense interval of 37 millions of
miles between Mercury and the Sun.f These
(if any exist) can be detected only by a series of
day observations, made with equatorial telescopes ;
as they could not be supposed to be seen, after
sunset, on account of their proximity to the sun.
Five primary^ planets, and eight secondaries,
have been discovered within the last 42 years ,
and, therefore, we have no reason to conclude,
that all the bodies belonging to our system have
yet been detected, till every region of the heavens
be more fully explored.

Comets. — Besides the planetary globes to
which I have now adverted, there is a class of
celestial bodies which occasionally appear in the
heavens, to which the name of comets has been
given. They are distinguished from the other
celestial bodies, by their ruddy appearance, and
by a long train of light, called the tail, which
sometimes extends over a considerable portion of
the heavens, and which is so transparent, that
the stars may be seen through it. The tail is
always directed to that part of the neavens which
is opposite to the sun, and increases in size as it
approaches him, and is again gradually dimi
nished, as the comet flies off to the more distant
regions of space. Their apparent magnitude is
very different : sometimes they appear only of
the bigness of the fixed stars ; at other times
they equal the diameter of Venus ; and some
times they have appeared nearly as large as the
moon. They traverse the heavens in all direc
tions, and cross the orbits of the planets. When
examined through a telescope, they appear to
consist of a dark central nucleus, surrounded by
a dense atmosphere, or mass of vapours. They
have been ascertained to move in long narrow
ellipses or ovals, around the sun ; some of them,
on their nearest approach to him, having been
within a million of miles of his centre ; and then
fly off to a region several thousands of millions
of miles distant. When near the sun, they move
with amazing velocity. The velocity of the
comet which appeared in 1680, according to Sir
Isaac Newton's calculation, was eight hundred
and eighty thousand miles an hour. They ap
pear to be bodies of no great density, and their

t The Author, some years ago, described a method
by which the planets (if any) within the orbit of
Mercury, may he discovered in the day-time, by
means of a simple contrivance for intercepting the
solar rays, and by the frequent application, by a num
ber of observers, of powerful telescopes, to a certain
portion of the sky, in the vicinity of the sun. The
details of this plan have not yet been published ; but
the reader will see them alluded to in No. V. of the
Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, for July 1820, p.

I'A primary planet is that which revolves roui.d
the sun as a centre ; as Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.
A secondary planet is one which revolves round a
primary planet as its centre ; as the Moon, and the
satellites of Jupiter and Saturn. The primary pla
nets are distinguished from the fixed stars by the
steadiness of their light ; not having a twinkling
appearance, as the stars exhibit.

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

size seldom exceeds that of the moon. The
Jength of the tails of some comets has been esti
mated at fifty millions of miles. According to
Dr. Herschel's computations, the solid nucleus
or central part of the comet which appeared in
1811, was only 428 miles in diameter ; but the
real diameter of the head, or nebulous portion
of the comet, he computed to be about 127 thou
sand miles. The length of its tail he computed
«.o be above one hundred millions of miles, and
its breadth nearly fifteen millions. It was near
est to the earth on the llth of October, when its
distance was 113 millions of miles. The num
ber of comets which have occasionally been seen
within the limits of our system, since, the com
mencement of the Christian era, is about 500,
of which the paths or orbits of 98 have been cal
culated.

As these bodies cross the paths of the planets
in every direction, there is a possibility, that
some of them might strike against the earth in
their approach to the sun ; and, were this to
happen, the consequences would be awful beyond
description. But we may rest assured that that
Almighty Being who at first launched them into
existence, directs aril their motions, however
complicated ; and that the earth shall remain se
cure against all such concussions from celestial
agents, till the purposes of his moral government
in this world shall be fully accomplished. What
regions these bodies visit, when they pass beyond
the limits of our view ; upon what errands they
are sent, when they again revisit the central
parts of our system ; what is the difference in
their physical constitution, from that of the sun
and planets ; and what important ends they are
destined to accomplish, in the economy of the
universe, are inquiries which naturally arise in
the mind, but which surpass the limited powers
of the human understanding at present to deter
mine. Of this, however, we may rest assured,
that they were not created in vain ; that they
subserve purposes worthy of the infinite Creator ;
and that wherever he has exerted his power,
there also he manifests his wisdom and bene
ficence.*

Such is a general outline of the leading facts
connected with that system of which we form a
part. Though the energies of divine power had
never been exerted beyond the limits of this sys
tem, it would remain an eternal monument of the
wisdom and omnipotence of its Author. Inde-

• A comet has lately been discovered, whose peri
odical re volution is found to be only 3 years and 107
days. At its greatest distance from the sun, it is
within the orbit of Jupiter, and it possesses this
peculiar ad vantage for observation, that ix will be
come visible ten times in thirty -three years. It was
last seen in June, 1822, by the astronomers in the
observatory of Paramatta, New Holland, in positions
very near to those which had been previously calcu
lated by Mr Enke. It is probable, that the observa
tions which may hereafter be made on this comet,
will lead to more definite and accurate views of the
nature and destination of these singular bodies.

pendent of the sun, which is like a vast universe
in itself, and of the numerous comets which are
continually traversing its distant regions, it con
tains a mass of material existence, arranged in
the most beautiful order, two thousand five hun
dred times larger than our globe. From late
observations, there is the strongest reason to
conclude, that the sun, along with all this vast
assemblage of bodies, is carried through the re
gions of the universe, towards some distant point
of space, or around some wide circumference, at
the rate of more than sixty thousand miles an
hour; and if so, it is highly probable, if not ab
solutely certain, that we shall never again occu
py that portion of absolute space, through which
we are this moment passing, during all the suc
ceeding ages of eternity.

Such a glorious system must have been
brought into existence, to subserve purposes
worthy of the infinite wisdom and benevolence
of the Creator. To suppose that the distant
globes, of which it is composed, with their mag
nificent apparatus of rings and moons, were
created merely for the purpose of affording a
few astronomers, in these latter times, a peep at
them through their glasses, would be inconsistent
with every principle of reason ; and would be
charging Him, who is the source of wisdom,
with conduct which we would pronounce to be
folly in the sons of men. Since it appears, so
far as our observation extends, that matter exists
solely for the sake of sensitive and intelligent be
ings, arid that the Creator made noshing in vain;
it is a conclusion to which we are necessarily
led, that the planetary globes are inhabited by
various orders of intellectual beings, who parti
cipate in the bounty, and celebrate the glory o.
their Creator.

When this idea is taken into consideration, it
gives a striking emphasis to such sublime decla
rations of the sacred volume as these: — "Ail
nations before him are as nothing — He sitteth
upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants
thereof are as grasshoppers — The nations are as
the drop of a bucket — All the inhabitants of the
world are reputed as nothing in his sight; ar>d he
doth according to his will in the army of heaven,
and among the inhabitants of the earth — Thou
hast made heaven, and the heaven of heavens,
with all their host ; and thou preservest them all,
and the host of heaven worshippcth thee — When I
consider thy heavens, what is man, that thou art
mindful of him !" If the race of Adam were the
principal intelligences in the universe of God,
such passages would be stripped of all their sub
limity, would degenerate into mere hyperboles,
and be almost without meaning. If man were
the only rational being who inhabited the mate
rial world, as some arrogantly imagine, it would
be no wonder at all, that God should be " mind
ful of him;" nor could " all the inhabitants of
this world," with any propriety, be compared to

ASTRONOMY.

91

K a drop of a bucket," and be " reputed as
nothing in his sight.'' Such declarations would
be contrary to fact, if this supposition were ad
mitted ; for it assumes that man holds the princi
pal station in the visible universe. The expres
sions — " The heavens, the heaven of heavens,"
and " the host of heaven worshipping God,"
would also, on this supposition, degenerate into
something approaching to mere inanity. These
expressions, if they signify any thing that is wor
thy of an inspired teacher to communicate, evi
dently imply, that the universe is vast and exten
sive, beyond the range cf human comprehension
— that it is peopled with myriads of inhabitants
— that these inhabitants are possessed of intel
lectual natures, capable of appreciating the per
fections of their Creator — and that they pay him
a tribute of rational adoration. "The host of
heaven worshippeth thee." So that the language
of scripture is not only consistent with the doc
trine of a plurality of worlds, but evidently sup
poses their existence to all the extent to which
modern science can carry us. However vast the
universe now appears — however numerous the
worlds and systems of worlds, which mav exist
within its boundless range — the language of
scripture is sufficiently comprehensive and sub
lime, to express all the emotions which naturally
arise in the mind, when contemplating its struc
ture — a characteristic which will apply to no
other book, or pretended revelation. And this
consideration shows not only the harmony which
subsists between the discoveries of revelation
and the discoveries of science, but also forms by
its-elf a strong presumptive evidence, that the
records of the Bible are authentic and divine.*
Vast as the solar system, we have now been
contemplating, may appear, it is but a mere
point in the map of creation. To a spectator
placed in one of the stars of the seventh magni
tude, not only the glories of this world, and the
more resplendent scenes of the planet Saturn,
but even the sun himself would entirely disap
pear, as if he were blotted out of existence.
" Were the sun," says Mr. Addison, " which
enlightens this part of the creation, with all the
host of the planetary worlds that move about him,
utterly extinguished and annihilated, they would
not be missed by an eye that could take in the
whole compass of nature, more than a grain of
sand upon the seashore. The space they pos
sess is so exceedingly little, in comparison of the
whole, that it would scarce make a blank in cre
ation."

The Fixed Stars. — When we pass from the
planetary system to other regions of creation,
we have to traverse, in imagination, a space so
immense, that it has hitherto baffled all the ef
forts of science to determine its extent. In these
remote and immeasurable spaces, are placed

See Appendix, No VI.

those immense luminous bodies usually denomi
nated the fixed stars. The nearest stars are, on
good grounds, concluded to be at least twenty bit'
lions of miles distant from our globe — a distance
through which light (the swiftest body in nature)
could not travel in the space of three years ; and
which a ball, moving at the rate of 500 miles an
hour, would not traverse in four millions five
hundred thousand years, or 750 times the period
which has elapsed since the Mosaic creation. —
But how far they may be placed beyond this dis
tance, no astronomer will pretend to determine.
The following consideration will prove, to those
unacquainted with the mathematical principles
of astronomy, that the stars are placed at an im
measurable distance. When they are viewed
through a telescope which magnifies objects a
thousand times, they appear no larger than to
the naked eye ; which circumstance shows, that
though we were placed at the thousandth part of
the distance from them at which we now are,
they would still appear only as so many shining
points; for we should still be distant from the
nearest of them, twenty thousand millions of
miles : or, in other words, were we transported
several thousands of millions of miles from the
spot we now occupy, though their numbers would
appear exceedingly increased, they would appear
no 'aiger than they do from our present station ;
anu ve behooved to be carried forward thousand?
of millions of miles further in a long succession,
before their disks appeared to expand into large
circles, like the moon. Dr. Herschel viewed
the stars with telescopes, magnifying six thou-
sand times, yet they still appeared only as bril
liant points, without any sensible disks, or in
crease of diameter. This circumstance incon-
testably proves the two following things :-—

1. That the stars are luminous bodies, which
shine by their own native light ; otherwise they
could not be perceived at such vast distances.

2. That they are bodies of an immense size, not
inferior to the sun ; and many of them, it is
probable, far exceed that luminary in bulk and
splendour.

The stars, on account of the difference in their
apparent magnitudes, have been distributed into
several classes or orders. Those which appear
largest are called stars of the first magnitude ;
next to those in lustre, stars of the second mag
nitude, and so on to stars of the sixth magnitude,
which are the smallest that can be distinguished
by the naked eye. Stars of the 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th,
&c. magnitudes, which cannot bo seen by the
naked eye, are distinguished by the name of tele
scopic stars. Not more than a thousand stars can
be distinguished by the naked eye, in the clearest
winter's night ; but, by means of the telescope,
millions have been discovered. (See p. 11.)
And, as it is probable that by far the greater
part lie beyond the reach of the best glasses which
have been or ever will be constructed bv mail— • •

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

the real number of thj stars may be presumed
to be beyond all human calculation or concep
tion, and perhaps beyond the grasp of an angelic
comprehension.

In consequence of recent discoveries, we have
now the strongest reason to believe, that all the
stars in the universe are arranged into clusters,
or groups, which astronomers distinguish by the
name of Nebulae or Starry Systems, each ne
bula cop.'jisting of many thousands of stars. The
nearest nebula is that whitish space or zone,
which is known by the name of the Milky Way,
to which our sun is supposed to belong. It con
sists of many hundreds of thousands of stars. —
When Dr. Herschel examined this region, with
his powerful telescopes, he found a portion of it
only 15 degrees long and 2 broad, which con
tained fifty thousand stars large enough to be
distinctly counted ; and he suspected twice as
many more, which, for want of sufficient light in
his telescope, he saw only now and then. More
than two thousand five hundred nebulae have al
ready been observed ; and, if each of them con
tain as many stars as the Milky Way, several
hundreds of millions of stars must exist, even
within that portion of the heavens which lies
open to our observation.

It appears, from numerous observations, that
various changes are occasionally taking place in
the regions of the stars. Several stars have ap
peared for a while in the heavens, and then
vanished from the sight. Some stars which
were known to the ancients, cannot now be dis
covered ; and stars are now distinctly visible,
which were to them unknown. A few stars
have gradually increased in brilliancy, while
others have been constantly diminishing in lustre.
Certain stars, lo the number of 15, or upwards,
are ascertained to have a periodical increase and
decrease of their lustre, sometimes appearing
like stars of the 1st or 2d magnitude, sometimes
diminishing to the size of the 4th or 5th magni
tude, and sometimes altogether disappearing lo
the naked eye. It also appears, that changes
are taking place among the nebulae — that seve
ral nebulae are formed by the decomposition of
larger nebulae, and that many nebulae of this
kind are at present detaching themselves from
the nebula of the milky way. These changes
seem to indicate, that mighty movements and
vast operations are continually going on in the
distant regions of creation, under the superin
tendence of the Sovereign of the Universe, upon
a scale of magnitude and grandeur which over
whelms the human understanding.

To explore, more extensively, the region of
the starry firmament ; to mark the changes that
are taking place ; to ascertain all the changea
ble stars ; to determine the periodical variations
of their lignt; the revolutions of double and tri-
nle stars ; and the motions, and other pheno
mena peculiar to these great bodies, will furnish

employment for future enlightened generation
and will, perhaps, form a part of the studies ana
investigations of superior intelligences, in a
higher sphere of existence, during an indefinite
lapse of ages.

If every one of these immense bodies be a
Sun, equal or superior to ours, and encircled
with a host of planetary worlds, as we have every
reason to conclude, (see pp. 11, 31,) how vast
must be the extent of creation ! how nume
rous the worlds and beings which exist within its
boundless range ! and, how great, beyond all hu
man or angelic conception, must be the power
and intelligence of that glorious Being, who call
ed this system from nothing into existence, and
continually superintends all its movements ! The
mind is bewildered and confounded when it at
tempts to dwell on this subject ; it feels the nar
row limits of its present faculties ; it longs for
the powers of a seraph, to enable it to take a
more expansive flight, into those regions which
"eye hath not seen;" and, while destitute of
these, and chained down to this obscure corner of
creation, it can only exclaim, in the language of
inspiration, " Who can by searching find out
God? — Great is our Lord, and of great power ;
his understanding is infinite ! — Great and mar
vellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty ! —
Who canutterthe mighty acts of Jehovah — who
can show forth all his praise !"

After what has been now stated in relation to
the leading facts of astronomy, it would be need
less to spend time in endeavouring to ^how its
connexion with religion. It will be at once ad
mitted, that all the huge globes of luminous and
oqaque matter, to which we have adverted, are
the workmanship of Him " who is wonderful in
counsel and excellent in working ;" and form a
part of the dominions of that august Sovereign,
" whose kingdom ruleth over all." And shall if
ever be insinuated, that this subject has no rela
tion to the great object of our adoration ? and
that it is of no importance in our views of the
Divinity, whether we conceive his dominions as
circumscribed within the limits of little more
than 25,000 miles, or as embracing an extent
which comprehends innumerable worlds? The
objects around us in this sublunary sphere stri
kingly evince the superintendency, the wisdom,
and benevolence of the Creator; but this sci
ence demonstrates, beyond all other departments
of human knowledge, the grandeur and magni
ficence of his operations : and raises the mind to
sublimer views of his attributes than can be ac
quired by the contemplation of any other objects.
A serious contemplation of the sublime objects
which astronomy has explored, must, therefore,
have a tendency to inspire us with profound
veneration of the eternal Jehovah — to humbie us
in the dust before his august presence — to excite
admiration of his condescensior and grace in the
work of redemotion — to show us the littleness of

ASTRONOMY.

93

this world, and the insignificancy of those riches
and honours 10 which ambitious men aspire with
so much labour and anx>ety of mind — to demon
strate the glory and magnificence of God's uni
versal kingdom — to convince us of the infinite
sources of varied felicity which he has in his
power to communicate to holy intelligences — to
enliven our hopes of the splendours of that " ex
ceeding great and eternal weight of glory" which
will burst upon the spirits of good men, when
they pass from this region of mortality — and to
induce us ta aspire with more lively ardour after
that heavenly world, where the glories of the
Deity and the magnificence of his works will be
more clearly unfolded.

If, then, such be the effects which the objects
of astronomy have a tendency to produce on a de
vout and enlightened mind — to call in question
the propriety of exhibiting such views in religious
publications, or in the course of religious instruc
tion, would be an approach to impiety, and an
attempt to cover with a veil the most illustrious
visible displays of divine glory. It forms a
striking evidence of the depravity of man, as well
as of his want of true taste, and of a discernment
of what is excellent, that the grandeur of the noc
turnal heavens, and the perfections of Deity they
proclaim, are beheld with so much apathy and
indifference by the bulk of mankind. Though
" the heavens declare the glory of God," in the
most solemn and impressive language, adapted
to the comprehension of every kindred and every
tribe, yet " a brutish man knoweth not, neither
doth a fool understand this." They can gaze
upon these resplendent orbs with as little emo
tion as the ox that feeds on the grass, or as the
horse that drags their carcasses along in their
chariots. They have even attempted to ridicule
the science of the heavens, to caricature those
who have devoted themselves to such studies, and
to treat with an indifference, mingled with con
tempt, the most august productions of Omnipo
tence. Such persons must be considered as ex
posing themselves to that divine denunciation —
" Because they regard not the works of Jehovah,
neither consider the operations of his hands, he
will destroy them and not build them up." If
the structure of the heavens, and the immensity
of worlds and beings they contain, were intended
by the Creator to adumbrate, in some measure,
his invisible perfections, and to produce a sub
lime and awful impression on all created intelli
gences, (see pp. 22, 26, 28,) it must imply a high
degree of disrespect to the Divinity wilfully to
overlook these astonishing scenes of Power and
Intelligence. It is not a matter of mere taste or
caprice, whether or not we direct our thoughts
to such subjects, but an imperative duty to
which we are frequently directed in the word of
God; the wilful neglect of which, where there
is an opportunity of attending to it, must subject
us to all that is included in the threatening

now specified, if there be any meaning in lan
guage.

That the great body of professed Christians
are absolute strangers to the sublime sentiments
which a serious contemplation of the heavens in
spires, must be owing, in part, to the minds of
Christian parents and teachers not having been
directed to such subject, or to the views they en
tertain respecting the relation of such contempla
tions to the objects of religion. In communi
cating religious instructions in reference to the
attributes of God, the heavens are seldom referred
to, except in such a vague and indefinite manner
as can produce no deep nor vivid impression on
the mind ; and many pious persons, whose views
have been confined to a narrow range of objects,
have been disposed to declaim against such stu
dies, as if they had a tendency to engender pride
and self-conceit, and as if they were even dan
gerous to the interests of religion and piety.
How very different were the feelings and the
conduct of the sacred writers ! They call upon
every one of God's intelligent offspring to " stand
still, and consider the wondrous works of the
Most High ;" and describe the profound emo
tions of piety which the contemplation of them
produced on their own minds; " Lift up youf
eyes on high and behold ! Who hath created
these things ! The heavens declare the glory of
God, and the firmament showeth his handy-work.
— When I consider thy heavens, the work of
thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou
hast ordained — what is man that thou art mind
ful of him, and the son of man that thou visitest
him ! Thou, even thou, art Lord alone ; thou
hast made heaven, and the heaven of heavens,
with all their host ; and thou preservest them all;
and the hosts of heaven worship thee. All the
gods of the nations are idols ; but the Lord made
the heavens : Honour and Majesty are before him.
Jehovah hath prepared his throne in the heavens:
and his kingdom ruleth over all. Sing praises
unto God, ye kingdoms of the earth, to him that
rideth on the heaven of heavens. Ascribe ye
power to our God ; for his strength is in the
heavens. Praise him for his mighty acts, praise
him according to his excellent greatness." If we
would enter, with spirit, into such elevated strains
of piety, we must not content ourselves with
a passing and vacant stare at the orbs of heaven,
as if they were only so many brilliant studs fixed
in the canopy of the sky; but must " consider"
them, with fixed attention, in all the lights in
which revelation and science have exhibited
them to our view, if we wish to praise God for
his mighty works, and " according to his excel
lent greatness." And, for this purpose, the con
clusions deduced by those who have devoted
themselves to celestial investigations, ought tc
be presented to the view of the intelligent Chris
tian, that he may be enabled to " speak of the glory
of Jehovah's kingdom, and to talk of his power."

94

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

Having, in the preceding sketches, consider
ably exceeded the limits originally prescribed
for this department of my subject, I am reluc
tantly compelled to despatch the remaining sci
ences with a few brief notices.

NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

The object of Natural Philosophy is, to ob
serve and describe the phenomena of the mate
rial universe, with a view to discover their
causes, and the laws by which the Almighty di
rects the movements of all bodies in heaven and
on earth. It embraces an investigation of the
laws of gravitation, by which the planets are di
rected in their motions — the laws by which wa
ter, air, light, and heat are regulated, and the
effects they produce in the various states in which
they operate — the nature of colours, sounds, elec
tricity, galvanism, and magnetism, and the laws
of their operation — the causes which operate in
the production of thunder, lightning, luminous
and fiery meteors, hail, rain, snow, dew, and
other atmospherical phenomena. In short, it
embraces all the objects of Natural History for
merly alluded to, with a view to ascertain the
causes of their varied appearances, and the
principles that operate in the changes to which
they are subject ; or, in other words, the laws by
which the diversified phenomena of universal na
ture are produced and regulated. One subordi
nate u?e of the knowledge derived from this
science, is, to enable us to construct all those me
chanical engines which facilitate human labour,
and increase the comforts of mankind, and all
those instruments which tend to enlarge our views
of the operations of nature. A still higher and
nobler use to which philosophy is subservient,
is, to demonstrate the wisdom and intelligence
of the Great First Cause of all things, and to
enlarge our conceptions of the admirable con
trivance and design which appear in the different
departments of universal nature. In this view, it
may be considered as forming a branch of Natural
Theology, or, in other words, a branch of the reli
gion of ange's, and of all other holy intelligences.

This department of Natural Science has ge
nerally been divided into the following branches :

I. Mechanics. — This branch, considered in
its most extensive range, includes an investiga
tion of the general properties of matter ; such as
solidity, extension, divisibility, motion, attrac
tion, and repulsion — the laws of gravitation, and
of central forces, as they appear to operate in
the motions of the celestial bodies, and on the
surface of our globe, in the phenomena of falling
bodies, the motions of projectiles, the vibration
of pendulums, &c. — the theory of machines, the
principles on which their energy depends ; the
properties of the mechanical powers — the lever,
the viheel and axle, die pulley, the inclined plane,
the wedge, and the screw — and the effects result
ing from their various combinations. From the

investigations of philosophers on these subjects,
we learn the laws by which the great bodies of
the universe are directed in their motions ; the
Jaws which bind together the different portions of
matter on the surface of the earth, and which
regulate the motions of animal, vegetable, and
inanimate nature ; and the principles on which
cranes, mills, wheel-carriages, pile-engines,
threshing-machines, and other engines, are con
structed ; by means of which, man has been
enabled to accomplish operations far beyond the
limits of his own physical powers.

Without a knowledge of the laws of motion,
and assistance from the combined effects of the
mechanical powers, man would be a very limited
being, his enjoyments would be few, and his ac
tive energies confined within a very narrow
range. In a savage state, ignorant of manufac
tures, agriculture, architecture, navigation, and
the other arts which depend upon mechanical
combinations, he is exposed, without shelter, to
the inclemencies of the season ; he is unable to
transport himself beyond seas and oceans, to
visit other climes and other tribes of his fellow
men ; he exists in the desert, comfortless and
unimproved ; the fertile soil, over which he
roams, is covered with thorns, and briers, and
thickets, for the haunt of beasts of prey ; his en
joyments are little superior to those of the lion,
the hyjena, and the elephant, while he is much
their inferior in point of agility and physical
strength. But when philosophy l.as once de
monstrated the principles of mechanics, and in
troduced the practice of the useful arts, " the
wilderness and the solitary place are made glad,
and the desert rejoices and blossoms as the rose."
Cities are founded, and gradually rise to opu
lence and splendour ; palaces and temples are
erected ; the damp cavern and the rush-built
hut are exchanged for the \\arm and comfortable
apartments of a substantial mansion ; ships are
built, and navigated across the ocean ; the trea
sures of one country are conveyed to another,
an intercourse is carried on between the most
distant tribes of mankind ; commerce flourishes,
and machinery of all kinds is erected, for facili
tating human labour, and promoting the enjoy
ments of man. And when the principles and
the practice of "pure and undefiled religion"
accompany these physical and mechanical ope
rations, love and affection diffuse their benign
influence ; the prospect brightens as years roll
on, and man advances with pleasure and im
provement to the scene of his high destination.

II. Hydrostatics treats of thejrressure and equi
librium of fluids. From the experiments which
have been made in this branch of philosophy,
the following important principles, among man)
others have been deduced : —

(1 . ) That the surface of all waters which haw
a communication, v;hilst they are at rent, will be
perfectly level. This principle will oe more

HYDROSTATICS.

clearly understood by an inspection of the follow
ing figures. If water be poured into the tube A,

(Fig. 1.) it will run through the honzonta. tube
E, and rise in the opposite tube B, to the same

nright a. which it stands at A. It is on this
orinciple that water is now conveyed under
ground, through conduit pipes, and made to rise
to the level of the fountain whence it is drawn.
The city of Edinburgh, a considerable part of
which is elevated above the level of the surround
ing country, is supplied with water from a reser
voir on the Pentland hills, several miles distant.
The water is conveyed in leaden pipes down the
jeclivity of the hill, along the interjacent plain,
and up to the entrance of the castle, whence it is
distributed to all parts of the city. If the point
A represent the level of the reservoir, C D will
represent the plain along which the water is con
veyed, and B the elevation to which it rises on
the castle hill. On the same principle, and in
a similar manner, the city of London is supplied
with water from the water-works at London
bridge. Had the ancients been acquainted with
this simple but important principle, it would
have saved them the labour and expense of rear
ing those stupendous works of art, the aqueducts,
which consisted of numerous arches of a vast
size, and sometimes piled one above another.

Fig. 2. represents the syphon, the action of
which depends upon the pressure of the atmos
phere. If this instrument be filled with water,
or any other liquid, and the shorter leg, G,
plunged to the bottom of a cask, or other vessel,
containing the same liquid, the water will run
out at the longer leg, F, till the vessel be emptied,
in consequence of the atmospheric pressure upon
the surface of the liquid. On this principle,
water may be conveyed over a rising ground to
any distance, provided the perpendicular height
of the syphon above the surface of the water in
the fountain does not exceed 32 or 33 feet. On
the same principle are constructed the fountain

J>

at command, the cup of Tantalus, and oiher en
tertaining devices. The same principle, too,
enables us to account for springs which are some
times found on the tops of mountains, and for
the phenomena of intermitting springs, or those
which flow and stop by regular a/ternations.

(2.) Any quantity of fluid, however small,
may be made to counterpoise any quantity, however
large. This is what has generally been termed
the Hydrostatical Paradox ; and from this princi
ple it follows, that a given quantity of water may
exert a force several hundred times. greater or
less, according to the manner in which it is em
ployed. This force depends on the height of the
column of water, independent of its quantity; for
its pressure depends on its perpendicular height.
By means of water conveyed through a very
small perpendicular tube, of great length, a very
strong hogshead has been burst to pieces, and
the water scattered about with incredible force.
On this principle, the hydrottatic press, and other
engines of immense power, have been con
structed.

(3.) Every body which is heavier than water,
or which sinks in it, displaces so much of the water
as is equal to the bulk of the body immersed in the
water. On this principle, the specific gravities,
or comparative weight, of all bodies are deter
mined. It appears to have been first ascertained
by Archimedes, and, by means of it. he deter
mined that the goWen crown of the king of Sy
racuse had been adulterated by the workmen.
From this principle we learn, among many other
things, the specific gravity of the human body ;
and that fo,ur pounds of cork will preserve a per
son weighing 135 pounds from sinking, so that
he may lemain with his head completely above
water.

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

Hydraulics, which has sometimes been treated
as a distinct department of mechanical philoso
phy, may be considered as a branch of hydrosta
tics. It teaches us what relates to the motion of
fluids, and how to estimate their velocity and
force. On the principles of this science, all ma
chines worked by water are constructed — as
steam-engines, water-mills, common and for
cing pumps, syuhons, fountains, and fire-en
gines.

III. Pneumatics. — This branch of philosophy
treats of the nature and properties of the atmos
phere, and of their effects on solid and fluid bo
dies. Fro«ri this science we learn, that air has
weight, and presses on all sides, like other fluids ;
that the pressure of the atmosphere upon the top
of a mountain is less than on a plain beneath ;
that it presses upon our bodies with a weight of
several thousand pounds more at one time than
at another ; that air can be compressed into forty
thousand times less space than it naturally occu
pies ; that it is of an elastic or expansive nature,
and that the force of its spring is equal to its
weight ; that its elasticity is increased by heat ;
that it is necessary lo the production of sound,
the support of flame and animal life, and the ger
mination and growth of all kinds of vegetables.

These positions are proved and illustrated by
such experiments as the following : — The gene
ral pressure of the atmosphere is proved by such
experiments as those detailed in No. II. of the
Appendix. The following experiment proves
that air is compressible. If a glass tube, open
at one end, and closed at the other, be plunged,
with the open end downwards, into a tumbler of
water, the water will rise a little way in the tube ;
which shows, that the air which filled the tube
is compressed by the water into a smaller space.
The elasticity of air is proved by tying up a
bladder, with a very small quantity of air within
it, and putting it under the receiver of an air-
pump, when it will be seen gradually to inflate,
till it becomes of its full size. A similar effect
would take place, by carrying the bladder to the
higher regions of the atmosphere. On the com
pression and elasticity of the air, depends the
construction of that dangerous and destructive in
strument, the air-gun.

That it is capable of being rarified by heat, is
proved by holding to the fire a half-blown bladder,
tightly tied at the neck, when it will dilate to
nearly its full size ; and if either a full-blown
bladder, or a thin glass bubble filled with air is
held to a strong fire, it will burst. The elasti
city of the air is such, that Mr. Boyle, by means
of an air-pump, caused it to dilate till it occupied
fourteen thousand times the space that it usually
does. That air is necessary to sound, flame,
animal and vegetable life, is proved by the fol
lowing experiments : When the receiver of an
air-pump is exhausted of its air, a cat, a mouse,
or a bird, placed in it, expires in a few moments,

in the greatest agonies. A bell rung in the same
situation produces no sound ; and a lighted cundl*
is instantly extinguished. Similar experiments
prove that air is necessary for the flight of birds
the ascent of smoke and vapours, the explosion
of gunpowder, and the growth of plants ; am1
that all bodies descend equally swift in a place
void of air; a guinea and a feather being found
to fall to the bottom of an exhausted receiver al
the same instant.

On the principles which this science has es-^
tablished, have been constructed the air-pump,
the barometer, the thermometer, the diving-bell,
the hygrometer, the condenser, and various other
instruments, which have contributed to the com
fort of human life, and to the enlargement of our
knowledge of the constitution of nature.

IV. Acoustics. — This science treats of the
nature, the phenomena, and the laws of souna,
and the theory of musical concord and harmony.
From the experiments which have been made on
this subject, we learn, that air is essential to the
production of sound ; that it arises from vibrations
in the air, communicated to it by vibrations of
the sounding body ; that these vibrations, or
aerial pulses, are propagated all around in a
spherical undulatory manner ; that their density
decreases, as the squares of the distances from
the sounding body increase; that thev are pro
pagated together in great numbers from different
bodies, without disturbance or confusion, as is
evident from concerts of musical instruments ;
that water, timber, and flannel, are also good
conductors of sound ; that sound travels at the
rate of 1142 feet in a second, or about thirteen
miles in a minute ; that the softest whisper flies
as fast as the loudest thunder; and that the ut
most limits, within which the loudest sounds
produced by artificial means can be heard, is
180 or 200 miles;* that sound striking against
an obstacle, as the wall of a house, may, like
light, be reflected, and produce another sound^
which is called an echo; and that, after it has
been reflected from several places, it may be
collected into one point or focus, where it will
be more audible than in any other place. On
these principles, whispering galleries, speaking
trumpets, and other acoustic instruments, are
constructed.

V. Optics. — This branch of philosophy treats
of vision, light, and colours, and of the various
phenomena of visible objects produced by the
rays of light, reflected from mirrors, or trans
mitted through lenses. From this science we

* In the war between England and Holland, In
1672, the noise of the guns was heanl in those parts
of "Wales which were estimated to be two hundred
miles distant from the scene of action. But the
sounds produced by volcanoes have been heard at a
much greater distance ; some instances of which
are stated in Chap. IV. Sect. 2. Several otfier facts
in relation to sound are detailed in Chap. III. Art
Acoustic Tunnels.

OPTICS— ELECTRICITY.

97

fearr., that light flies at the rate of nearly twelve
millions of miles every minute — that it moves in
straight lines — that its particles may be several
thousands of miles distant from each other — that
every visible body emits particles of light from
its surface, in all directions — that the particles of
light are exceedingly small ; for a lighted candle
will fill a cubical space of two miles every way
with its rays, before it has lost the least sensible
part of its substance ; and millions of rays, from
a thousand objects, will pass through a hole not
larger than the point of a needle, and convey to
the mind an idea of the form, position, and colour
of every individual object — that the intensity or
degree of light decreases, as the square of the
distance from the luminous body increases ; that
is, at two yards' distance from a candle, we shall
have only the fourth part of the light we should
have at the distance of one yard ; at three yards'
distance, the ninth part ; at four yards, the six
teenth part, and so on — that glass lenses may be
ground into the following forms , plano-convex,
plano-concave, double convex, double concave, and
meniscus, that is, convex on one side, and con
cave on the other — that specula, or mirrors, may
be ground into either a spherical, parabolical, or
cylindrical form — that, by means of such mirrors
and lenses, the rays of light may be so modified
as to proceed either in a diverging, converging,
or parallel direction, and the images of visible
objects represented in a variety of new forms,
positions, and magnitudes — that every ray of
white light may be separated into seven primary
colours : red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo,
and violet — that the variegated colouring which
appears on the face of nature is not in the objects
themselves, but in the light which falls upon
them— that the rainbow is produced by the re
fraction and reflection of the solar rays in the
drops of falling rain — that the rays of light are
refracted, or bent out of their course, when they
fall upon glass, water, and other mediums — that
the light of the sun may be collected into a point
or focus, and made to produce a heat more in
tense than that of a furnace* — that the rays from
visible objects, when reflected from a concave
mirror, converge to a focus, and paint an image
of the objects before it, and that when they pass
through a convex glass, they depict an image be
hind it.

* This is produced by means of lenses, or mirrors
of a large diameter, called burning-glasses. By these
instruments the hardest metals, on which common
fires, and even glass-house furnaces, could produce
no effect, have been melted in a few seconds M
Villette, a Frenchman, nearly a century ago, con
structed a mirror, three feet eleven inches in diame
ter, and three feet two inches in focal distance, which
melted copper ore in eight seconds, iron ore in twenty-
four seconds, a fish's tooth in thirty-two seconds,
cast iron in sixteen seconds, a silver sixpence in
seven seconds, and tin in three seconds. This
mirror condensed the solar rays 17,257 times a de
gree of heat which is about four hundred and ninety
times greater than common fire. Mr. Parker, of
London, constructed a lens three feet in diameter,

On these and other principles demonstrated by
this science, the Camera Obscura, the Magic
Lantern, the Phantasmagoria, the Kaleidoscope,
the Heliostata, the Micrometer — Spectacles,
Opera-Glasses, Prisms, single, compound, lu«
cernal, and solar Microscopes, reflecting and re
fracting Telescopes, and other optical instru
ments, have been constructed by means of whie'
the natural powers of human vision have bee**
wonderfully increased, and our prospects into
the works of God extended far beyond what for
mer ages could have conceived.

VI. Electricity. — This name has been given
to a science which explains and illustrates the
operations of a very subtile fluid called the elec
tric fluid, which appears to pervade every part
of nature, and to be one of the chief agents em
ployed in producing many of the phenomena ol
the material world. If a piece of amber, seal
ing wax, or sulphur, be rubbed with a piece ol
flannel, it will acquire the power of attracting
small bits of paper, feathers, or other light sub«
stances. If a tube of glass, two or three feet in
length, and an inch or two in diameter, bo rubbed
pretty hard, in a dark room, with a piece of dry
woollen cloth, besides attracting light substan
ces, it will emit flashes of fire, attended with
a crackling noise. This luminous matter is
called electricity, or the electric fluid. If a large
globe or cylinder of glass be turned rapidly
round, and made to rub against a cushion, streams
and large sparks of bluish flame will be elicited,
which will fly round the glass, attract light bo
dies, and produce a pungent sensation if the
hand be held to it. This glass, with all its re-

Juisite apparatus, is called an eiectrical machine.
t is found, that this fluid will pass along some
bodies, and not along others. The bodies ovei
which it passes freely are, water, and most othet
fluids, except oil and the aerial fluids ; iron, cop
per, lead, and in general all the metals, semi-
metals, and metallic ores ; which are, therefore,
called conductors of electricity. But it will not
pass over glass, resin, wax, sulphur, silk, baked
woods, or dry woollen substances ; nor through
air, except by force, in sparks, to short distances.
Thesebodies are, therefore,called non-conductors.
The following facts among others, have been
ascertained respecting this wonderful agent :— •
That all bodies with which we are acquainted
possess a greater or less share of this fluid — tha
the quantity usually belonging to any body pro
duces no sensible effects ; but when any surface

and six feet eight inches focus, which weighed 212
pounds. It melted twenty grains of gokl in four se
conds, and ten grains of platina in three seconds.
The power of burning glasses is as the area of the
lens directly, and the square of the focal distance in
versely — or, in other words, the broader the mirror
or lens and the shorter the focal distance, the more
intense is the heat produced by such instruments.
A globular decanter of water makes a powerful
burning-glass ; and house furniture has been set on
fire by incautiously exposing it to the rays of tb-«
Bun.

98

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

becomes possessed of more or less than its natu
ral share, it exhibits certain appearances, in the
form of light, sound, attraction, ot repulsion,
which are ascribed to the power called electric —
that there are two different species of the electri
cal fluid, or, at least two different modifications
of the same general principle, termed positive
and negative electricity — that positive and nega
tive electricity always accompany each other ;
for if a substance acquire the one, the body with
which it is rubbed acquires the other — that it
moves with amazing rapidity ; having been trans
mitted through wires of several miles in length,
without taking up any sensible space of time ;
and, therefore, it is not improbable, that were an
insulated conducting substance extended from
one continent to another, it might be made to fly
to the remotest regions of the earth in a few
seconds of time — that it has a power of suddenly
contracting the muscles of animals, or of giving
a shock to the animal frame — that this shock may
be communicated, at the same instant, to a hun
dred persons, or to an indefinite number who
forma circle, by joining their hands together —
that it may be accumulated to such a degree as
to kill the largest, animals — that vivid sparks of
this fluid, attended with a crackling noise, may
be drawn from different parts of the human body,
when the person is insulated, or stands upon a
stool, supported by glass feet — that electricity
sets fire to gunpowder, spirits of wine, and other
inflammable substances — that it melts iron wire,
and destroys the polarity of the magnetic needle —
that it augments the natural evaporation of fluids,
promotes the vegetation of plants, and increases
the insensible perspiration of animals, and can
be drawn from the clouds by means of electrical
kites, and other elevated conductors. By means
of the electrical power, small models of machinery
have been set in action: orreries to represent
the movements of the planets, have been put in
motion ; and small bells have been set a ringing
for a length of time; and, in consequence of the
knowledge we have acquired of the mode of its
operation in the system of nature, the lightnings
of heaven have been arrested in their course, and
constrained to descend to the earth, without pro
ducing any injurious effects.

From these, and a variety of other facts and
experiments, it is now fully ascertained, that
lightning and electricity are identical ; and that
it is the prime agent in producing the awful phe
nomena of a thunder-storm; the lightning being
the rapid motion of vast masses of electric mat
ter, and thunder the noise, with its echoes, pro
duced by the rapid motion of the lightning through
the atmosphere. There can be little doubt that,
in combination with steam, the gases, and other
agents, it also produces many of the terrific phe
nomena of earthquakes, volcanoes, whirlwinds,
water-spouts, and hurricanes, and the sublime
coruscations of the aurora borealis. In the ope

rations of this powerful fluid we behold a at/i
king display of the sovereignty and majestic
agency of God. In directing its energies, " his
way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and the
clouds are the dust of his feet ; the heavens are
covered with sackcloth, the mountains quake be
fore him, the hills melt, the earth is burned at his
presence, and the rocks are thrown down by him :"
Nah. i. 3—6. It is easy to conceive that, by a
few slight modifications produced by the hand of
Omnipotence, this powerful fluid might become
the agent of producing either the most awful and
tremendous, or the most glorious and transport
ing scenes, over every region of our globe. As
it now operates, it is calculated to inspire us
rather with awe and terror than with admiration
and joy : and to lead our thoughts to a consider
ation of the state of man as a depraved intelli
gence, and a rebel against his Maker.

VII. Galvanism is intimately connected with
electricity, though it is generally considered as a
branch of chymistry. It is only another mode
of exciting electrical action. In electricity the
effects are produced chiefly by mechanical action ;
but the effects of galvanism are produced by the
chymical action of bodies upon each other. If
we take a piece of zinc, and place it under the
tongue, and lay a piece of silver, as big as a half-
crown, above it ; by bringing the outer edges of
these pieces in contact, we shall immediately
experience a peculiar and disagreeable tase, like
that of'copper. The same thing maybe noticed
with a guinea and a piece of charcoal. If a per
son, in the dark, put a slip of tinfoil upon one of
his eyes, and a piece of silver in his mouth, by
causing these pieces to communicate, a faint
flash will appear before his eyes. If a living
frog or fish, having a slip of tinfoil pasted upon
its back, be placed upon a piece of zinc, by for
ming a communication between the zinc and tin
foil, the spasms of the muscles are excited.
These and similar effects are produced by that
modification of electricity which has been termed
galvanism. Three different conductors, orwhat
is called a galvanic circle, are requisite to pro
duce such effects. A piece of copper, apiece of
flannel, moistened with water or acid, and a
piece of zinc, laid upon one another, form a cir
cle ; and if this circle be repeated a number of
times, a galvanic pile or battery may be formed
capable of giving a powerful shock. The most
common and convenient form, however, of a bat
tery, is found to be a trough of baked wood, three
or four inches deep and as many wide. In the
sides are grooves, opposite to each oihcr, into
each of which is placed a double metallic plate8 of
zinc and copper soldered together, and the cells
are then filled either with salt and water, or
with a solution of nitrous acid and water.

By means of the galvanic agency, a variety of
surprising effects have been produced. GUP-
povvder, cotton, and other inflammable SUB

GAL VANISM— MAGNE TISM.

99

stances, have been inflamed — charcoal has been
made to burn with a most brilliant and beautiful
white flame — water has been decomposed into
its elementary parts — metals have been melted
and set on fire — fragments of diamond, charcoal,
and plumbago, have been dispersed, as if they
had been evaporated — platina, the hardest and
heaviest of the metals, has been melted as readily
aa wax in the flame of a candle — the sapphire,
quartz, magnesia, lime, and the firmest com
pounds in nature, have been made to enter into
fusion. Its effects on the animal system are no
less surprising. When applied to a fowl or a
rabbit, immediately after life is extinct, it produ
ces the most strange and violent convulsions on
the nervous and muscular system, as if the vital
functions were again revived , and when applied
to the human body after death, the stimulus has
produced the most horrible contortions and gri
maces in the muscles of the head and face, and
the most rapid movements in the hands and feet.

The galvanic agency enables us to account for
the following among other facts : — Why porter
has a different and more pleasant taste, when
drunk out of a pewter vessel, than out of glass or
earthenware, — why a silver spoon is discoloured
when used in eating eggs, — why the limbs of
people, under amputation, are sometimes con
vulsed by the application of the instruments, —
why pure mercury is oxydized when amalgama
ted with tin, — why works of metal, which are
soldered together, soon tarnish in the places
where the metals are joined, — and why the cop
per sheathing of ships, when fastened with iron
nails, is soon corroded about the place of con
tact. In all these cases a galvanic circle is
formed, which produces the effects. We have
reason to believe, that, in combination with the
discoveries which modern chymistry is daily un
folding, the agencies of this fluid will enable us to
carry the arts forward towards perfection, and to
trace the secret causes of some of the sublimest
phenomena of nature.

VIII. Magnetism.— This department of phi
losophy describes the phenomena and the pro
perties of the loadstone, or natural magnet. The
natural magnet is a hard dark-coloured mineral
body, and is usually found in iron mines. The
following are some of its characteristic proper
ties : — 1. It attracts iron and steel, and all sub
stances which contain iron in its metallic state.
2. If a magnet be suspended by a thread, or
nicely poised on a pivot, or placed on a piece of
wood, and set to float in a basin of water, one
end will constantly point nearly towards the
north pole of the earth, and the other towards
the south ; and hence those parts of the magnet
have been called the north and south poles? 3.
When the north pole of one magnet is presented
near to the south pole of another, they will at
tract each other ; but if the north pole of one be
presented to the north pole of another, or a south
39

pole to a south, they will repel each other. 4,
A magnet placed in such a manner as to be en
tirely at liberty, inclines one of its poles to tne
horizon, and of course elevates the other above
it. This property is called the dipping of the
magnet. 5. Magnets do not point directly north
and south ; but in different parts of the world
with a different declination eastward or westward
of the north ; it is also different at the same place
at different times. In London, and in most pla
ces of Great Britain, the magnetic needle, at
present, points about 24 degrees to the west of
north. For more than 160 years it has been
gradually declining from the north to the west :
but seems of late to have begun its declination to
the eastward. 6. Any magnet may be made to
communicate the properties now mentioned to
any piece of iron or steel. For example, by
gently rubbing a penknife with a magnet, it will
be immediately invested with the property of at
tracting needles, or small pieces of iron or steel.
7. Heat weakens the power of a magnet, and the
gradual addition of weight increases the mag
netic power. 8. The properties of the magnet
are not affected either by the presence or the ab
sence of air ; and the magnetic attraction is not
in the least diminished by the interposition of
any bodies except iron. A magnet will equally
affect the needle of a pocket compass when a
thick board is placed between them as when it is
removed. It has been lately discovered, that the
violet rays of the solar spectrum, when condensed
with a convex glass, and made to pass along a
piece of steel, have the power of communicating
to it the magnetic virtue.

The cause which produces these singular
properties of the magnet has hitherto remained
a mystery ; but the knowledge of the polarity of
the magnet has been applied to a most important
practical purpose. By means of it, man has
now acquired the dominion of the ocean, and has
learned to trace his course through the pathless
deep to every region of the globe. There can
be little doubt that magnetism has an intimate
connexion with electricity, galvanism, light,
heat, and chymical action ; and the discoveries
which have been lately made, and the- experiments
which are now making by Morichini, Oersted,
Abraham, Hansteen, Barlow, Eeaufoy, and
Scoresby, promise to throw some light on this
mysterious agent, and on the phenomena of na
ture with which it is connected.

Such is a faint outline of some of the inte
resting subjects which natural philosophy em
braces. Its relation to religion will appear from
the following considerations :

1. Its researches have led to the invention of
machines, engines, and instruments of various
kinds, which augment the energies, increase tho
comforts, and promote the general improvement
of mankind; and these objects are inseparaniy
connected with the propagation of Christianity

100

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

through the world. If we admit, th.it, in future
ages, the religion of the Bible will shed its benign
influence over all nations — that the external
condition of the human race will then be prosper
ous and greatly meliorated beyond what it has
ever been — and, that no miraculous interposition of
Deity is to be expected to bring about such desi
rable events — it will follow, that such objects can
be accomplished only in the ordinary course of
Providence, by rational investigations into the
principles and powers of nature, and the appli
cation of the inventions of science to the great
objects of religion and of human improvement,
as I shall endeavour briefly to illustrate in the
following chapter. As the destructive effects of
many physical agents, in the present condition of
our globe, are, doubtless, a consequence of the
sin and depravity of man ; we have reason to be
lieve that, when the economy of nature shall be
more extensively and minutely investigated, and
the minds of men directed to apply their discove
ries to philanthropic and religious objects, they
will be enabled to counteract, in a great measure,
those devastations and fatal effects which are
now produced by several of the powers of nature.
The general happiness of all ranks, which will
be connected with the universal extension of
Christianity, necessarily supposes that this ob
ject will be accomplished ; for, were a dread of
destruction from the elements of nature frequent
ly to agitate the mind, as at present, no perma
nent tranquillity would be enjoyed ; nor would
that ancient prediction, in reference to this era,
receive its full accomplishment, that " there shall
be nothing to hurt or destroy in all God's holy
mountain, when the earth shall be full of the
knowledge of the Lord." And since miraculous
interpositions are not to be expected, to what
quarter can we look for those subordinate agen
cies by which this object is to be effected, but to
the discoveries and inventions of philosophical
science?

Science has already enabled us to remedy
many of those evils which are the accidental ef
fects of the operation of physical agents. For
example — the discoveries of the philosopher, with
respect to the nature of the electric fluid, have
enabled us to construct conductors for preserving
buildings from the stroke of lightning : and we
have every reason to hope, that in the progress of
electric, galvanic, and chymical science, more
complete thunder-guards, applicable to all the
situations in which a person may be exposed,
will be invented. Nay, our increasing know
ledge of the electric fluid, and of the chymical
agents which concur in its operation, njay ena
ble us to dissipate thunder-storms altogether, by
disturbing the electricity of the clouds by means
of a series of elevated artificial conductors. This
is not only possible, but has already been in
some degree effected. The celebrated Euler in
forms nsl in his " Letters to a German Princess,"

that he corresponded with a Moravian priest-
named Divisch, who assured him " that he ha<!
averted, during a whole summer, every thunder
storm which threatened his own habitation and
the neighbourhood, by means of a machine con
structed on the principles of electricity — that the
machinery sensibly attracted the clouds, and con
strained them to descend quietly in a distillation,
without any but a very distant thunder-clap."
Euler assures us that " the fact is undoubted,
and confirmed by irresistible proof." Yea, not
only may the destructive effects of lightning be
averted by the inventions of philosophy, but its
agency may be rendered subservient to human
industry, and made to act as a mechanical power.
This effect, too, has been partially accomplished.
About the year 1811, in the village of Philips-
thai, in Eastern Prussia, an attempt was made
to split an immense stone into a multitude of
pieces, by means of lightning. A bar of iron, in
the form of a conductor, was previously fixed to
the stone, and the experiment was attended with
the most complete success ; for, during the very
first thunder-storm, the lightning burst the stone
without displacing it.*

It is, therefore, probable, that in the future ages
of the world, this terrific meteor, and other de
structive agents, which now produce so much
alarm, and so many disastrous effects, may, by
the aid of philosophy, be brought under the con
trol of man, and be made to minister to his
enjoyment.

The electric fluid has also been, in many in
stances, successfully applied in curing palsies,
rheumatisms, spasms, obstructions, and inflam
mation ; and it is known to have a peculiar ef
fect on the nervous system. Lightning has been
known to restore the blind to a temporary enjoy
ment of sight. Mr. Campbell, of Succoth, in
Dumbartonshire, who had been blind for several
years, was led by his servant one evening through
the streets of Glasgow, during a terrible thunder
storm. The lightning sometimes fluttered along
the streets for a quarter of a minute without ceas
ing. While this fluttering lasted, Mr. C. saw
the street distinctly, and the changes which had
been made in that part by taking down one of
the city gates. When the storm was over, his
entire blindness returned. A still more rematk-
able instance is stated, along with this, tinder
the article Thunder, in Dr. Gleig's Supp. to
Ency, Brit, which was written by tin: late Profess
or Robison. It is also possible that barren deserts
might be enriched with fertility, and immense
portions of the desolate wastes of our globe pre
pared for the support and accommodation of hu
man beings, by arresting the clouds, and draw
ing down their electrical virtue and their watery
treasures by means of an extended series of ele
vated metallic conductors. What has been now

• See Monthly Magazine, vol. 32, p. 162

NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

101

it&ted is only one instance, out of many, which
might be adduced, of the extensive and beneficial
effects which may be produced, in future ages,
by the application of the discoveries of natural
science.

2. A knowledge of natural philosophy enables
us to detect pretended miracles, and to discrimi
nate oetween those phenomena which are pro
duced by the powers of nature, and the supposed
effects of diabolical influence. It has been chiefly
owing to ignorance of the principles of natural
science, that mankind, in all ages, have been so
easily imposed upon by pretenders to supernatu
ral powers. It is owing to the same cause, that
superstitious notions and vain alarms have spread
their influence so extensively among the lower
ranks of the population of every country. The
pretended miracles by which Pagan and Popish
priests endeavour to support the authority of
their respective religious systems, and every spe
cies of degrading superstition, vanish into smoke,
when examined by the light of modern science ;
and there can be no question that an enlightened
missionary would, in many instances, find the
principles and the instruments of natural philo
sophy important auxiliaries in undermining the
fabric of heathen idolatry and priestcraft. They
tend to dissipate a thousand idle terrors which
haunt and agitate the human mind ; to detect a
thousand kinds of imposture by which it has
been held in cruel bondage , and to prevent the
perpetration of those deeds of cruelty which have
uniformly marked the reign of superstition.*
Had our forefathers connected a knowledge of
this subject with thev? >vjdy of the Scriptures,
they would not have Drought upon themselves
that indelible disgrace which now attaches to
their memories, on account of their having con
demned and burned at the stake hundreds of un
happy women, accused of crimes of which they
could not possibly have been guilty. In New-
England, towards the close of the 17th century,
the witchcraft phrensy rose so high, that the ex
ecution of witches became a calamity more

• Mr. Dfluglas, in his " Hints on Missions," for
merly referred to, when speaking of the facilities
which Christians now possess for extensive mis
sionary exertions, suggests, that natural philosophy
might be an important auxiliary to Christian mis
sionaries. " All the ancient ' war weapons of vic
tory,' excepting 7niracles. are at their disposal ; and
new instruments of still greater potency, which the
science of tne latter days has been accumulating for
a universal revolution of the mind, are ready to be
brought into action, upon a scale of overpowering
magnitude. Even the single resource which is lost
may yet be recompensed by equivalents, and a sub
stitute, in many respects, may be found for miracles.
Tne first effect of a miracle is, to rouse the attention,
and to overawe opposing prejudices.- the second to
afford a proof of the religion of which it is a sealin^
accompaniment. The first object might be g-ained
6y ttte nntan'.l mag-ic of experimental p/Mnsnphi/ :
and ns to the second, the difference in the proof from
miracles lies rather in its being more circuitous
than in its being less conclusive at the present day
thai?, in the times of the apostles."

dreadful than the sword or the pestilence. Not
only old women, but children of ten years, were
put to death ; young girls were stripped naked,
and the marks of witchcraft searched for upon
their bodies with the most indecent curiosity;
and those spots of the scurvy which age impress
es upon the bodies of old men, were taken for
evident signs of infernal power. So that igno
rance of the laws and phenomena of nature has
led even Christians to commit acts of injustico
and horrid cruelty. For, let it be remembered,
that it was Christian magistrates and ministers,
under a pretended zeal for the honour of God,
who sanctioned such cruel and unrighteous de
crees. This cunsideration, viewed in connexion
with many others, tends to show, that the Chris
tian revelation, considered abstractly by itself,
without a reference to the visible system of the
universe, is not sufficient for all the purposes for
which it was intended; as, on the other hand,
the study of the works of nature is not sufficient
of itself to lead the mind to the true knowledge
of God, without the aid of the discoveries de
rived from the sacred oracles. For, although the
Bible has been in the hands of Protestant Chris
tians ever since the reformation, yet it is only
since the light of modern science began to diffuse
its influence, that the superstitions of the dark
ages, and the vulgar notions respecting witch
craft, necromancy, and other species of infernal
agency, began to vanish, even from the minds of
Christian teachers ; as is evident from the writ
ings of many eminent divines who flourished dur
ing the 16th and 17th centuries. As the two
revelations which God has given us throw a mu
tual lustre on each other; the one must always
be considered as incomplete without the other.
Both are necessary in order " to make the man
of God perfect," and to enable him to prosecute,
with intelligence and success, the great objects
of religion ; and the Christian minister who af
fects to despise the aids of science in the cause
of religion, has yet much to learn with respect to
some of the grand bearings of the Christian system.
3. The investigations of natural philosophy un
fold to us the incessant agency of God, and the
plans by which his wise and benevolent designs
in the system of nature are accomplished. From
the immeasurable globes of heaven, down to the
minutest atoms, we perceive a regular chain of
causes and effects, conspiring, in a thousand dif
ferent modes, to accomplish the purposes of in
finite wisdom and goodness. The operation of
central forces and of the law of gravitation on
the earth and in the heavens — the hydrostatical
laws which regulate the pressure and the motion
of fluids — the chymical properties of the atmos
phere, its undulatory, refractive, and reflective
powers — the motion of the rays of light, arid the
infinite variety of effects they produce— the pro
cess of evaporation- -the agencies of electricity
and galvanism — the properties of the magnet,

102

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

and the chymical action of acids and alkalies,
and of the minutest particles of matter upon each
other— ought to be viewed as so many modifica
tions of the agency of Deity, and as manifesta
tions of his wisdom, in carrying forward those
plans which regard the interests of his universal
kingdom; just as we consider the rise and fall of
empires, the revolutions of nations, and the cir
culation of the Scriptures in heathen lands, as
so many acts of his moral administration as the
Governor of mankind. For let it be carefully re
membered, that all these physical agencies have
ultimately a moral and intellectual bearing ; and
are essentially connected with every other part
of God's providential procedure. Though we
may be apt to consider them as so many detach
ed and insulated piece? of machinery, with which
we have little concern, «w may even 'disdain to
notice their mode of operation; yet, in the all-
comprehensive mind of Him who takes in, at
one glance, the whole chain of causes and effects,
they are as essentially connected with his ultimate
purposes, and the eternal destiny of man, as are
the revelations of his word. Were a single
principle or motion which now animates the
system of nature to cease — were the agencies of
electricity, for example, or the principle of eva
poration, to be destroyed — the physical constitu
tion of our globe would instantly be deranged ;
nature would be thrown into confusion ; and the
sentient and intellectual beings that now in
habit the earth would either be destroyed, or
plunged into an abyss of misery. If, therefore,
we admit that the moral agency of God is worthy
of our contemplation, we ought to consider his
physical operations also as no less worthy of our
study and investigation ; since they form the
groundwork of all his other manifestations.

There is nothing, however, which so striking
ly characterizes the bulk of mankind, and even
the great mass of the Christian world, as that
apathy and indifference with which they view
the wonders of creation which surround them.
They can look on all that is grand, and beautiful,
and beneficent in nature, without feeling the least
sentiment of admiration, or of gratitude to that
Being who is incessantly operating within them
and around them ; and they are disposed to con
sider the experiments of philosophers, by which
the wonderful agency of God is unveiled, as only
so many toys and amusements for the entertain
ment of children. They would prefer the paltry
entertainments of a card-table, of a ball-room, or
of a gossipping party, to the inspection of the
nicest pieces of divine mechanism, and to the
contemplation of the most august scene in nature.
However lightly some religionists may be dis
posed to treat this subject, that spirit of indif
ference with which the visible works of God are
treated must be considered as flowing from the
game depraved principle which leads multitudes
\o nject. the revelations of the Bible, and to trifle

with their everlasting interests. " Man," say
Rollin, " lives in the midst of a world of wmch
he is the sovereign, as a stranger, who looks
with indifference upon all that passes in it, and
as if it was not his concern. The universe, in
all its parts, declares and points out its Author ;
but, for the most part, to the deaf and blind, who
have neither ears to hear, nor eyes to see. One
of the greatest services that philosophy can 60
us, is to awaken us from this drowsiness, and
rouse us from this lethargy, which is a dishonour
to humanity, and in a manner reduces us below
the beasts, whose stupidity is the consequence of
their nature, and not the effect of neglect or in
difference. It awakens our curiosity, it excites
our attention, and leads us as it were by the hand,
through all the parts of nature, to induce us to
study and search out the wonderful works of it."
—Belles Lettres, vol. 4.

Since, therefore, the science of natural philo
sophy is conversant about the works of the Al
mighty, and its investigations have a direct
tendency to illustrate the perfections of his
nature, to unveil the plan of his operations, to
unfold the laws by which he governs the king
dom of universal nature, and to display the order,
symmetry, and proportion, which reign through
out the whole — it would be needless to enter into
any further process of reasoning, to show that
the study of it is connected with the great objects
of religion. Whatever studies tend to raise our
minds to the Supreme Ruler of all worlds — to
expand our views of his infinite knowledge and
wisdom — to excite our gratitude and our admira
tion of the beneficent designs which appear in
all his arrangements — to guard us against erro
neous conceptions of his providential procedure —
and to furnish us with important auxiliaries for
extending the influence of his religion through the
world ; must always be interesting to every Chris
tian who wishes to enlarge his intellectual views,
and to make progress in the knowledge of God.

CHYMISTRY.

This science, which is intimately related tc
the preceding, has for its object to ascertain the
ingredients, or first principles, of which all matter
is composed — to examine the compounds formed
by the combination of these ingredients — to in
vestigate those changes in natural bodies, which
are not accompanied with sensible, motion, and
the nature of the power which produces these
combinations and changes.

Within the limits of the last half century, the
empire of chymistry has been wonderfully ex
tended. From an obscure and humble place
among the objects of study, it has risen to a hi^h
and dignified station among those sciences which
improve and adorn the human mind. No longer
confined to the paltry and mercenary object of
searching for the philosopher's stone, or of fur
nishing a little amusement, it now extends its

CHYMISTRY.

108

sway overall the arts which minister to the com
fort and improvement of social life, and over
every species of animate and inanimate matter,
within the range of human investigation. " The
forms and appearances," (says Sir Humphrey
Davy,) " of the beings aud substances of the
external world, are almost infinitely various, and
they are in a state of continued alteration. Even
the earth itself, throughout its whole surface,
undergoes modifications. Acted on by moisture
and air, it affords the food of plants ; an immense
number of vegetable productions arise from ap
parently the same materials ; these become the
substance of animals; one species of animal
matter is converted into another ; the most perfect
and beautiful of the forms of organized life ulti
mately decay, and are resolved into inorganic
aggregrates; and the same elementary sub
stances, differently arranged, are contained in
the inert soil, or bloom and emit fragrance in
the flower, or become in animals the active
organs of mind and intelligence. In artificial
operations, changes of the same order occur;
substances having the characters of earth, are
converted into metals ; clays and sands are united,
so as to become porcelain ; earths and alkalies
are combined into glass ; acrid and corrosive
matters are firmed from tasteless substances ;
colours are fixed upon stuffs, or changed, or made
to disappear; and the productions of the vegeta
ble, mineral, and animal kingdoms are convert
ed into new forms, and made subservient to the
purposes of civilized life. To trace, in detail,
these diversified and complicated phenomena;
to arrange them, and deduce general laws from
their analogies, is the business of chymistry." —
Elements of Chymical Philosophy.

Cliymists have arranged the general forms of
matter into the four following classes. Theirs?
class consists of Solids, which form the principal
parts of the globe, and which differ from each other
in hardness, colour, opacity, transparency, densi
ty, and other properties. The second class consists
of Fluids, such as water, oils, spirits, &c., whose
parts possess freedom of motion, and require
great mechanical force to make them occupy a
smaller space. The third class comprehends
Elastic Fluids, or Gases, which exist freely in
the atmosphere; but may be confined by solids
and fluids, and their properties examined. Their
parts are highly moveable, compressible, and
expansive ; they are all transparent ; they pre
sent two or three varieties of colour ; and they
differ greatly in density. The fourth class
comprehends Ethereal Substances, which are
known to us only in their states of motion, when
acting upon our organs of sense, and which are
not susceptible of being confined. Such are the
rays qf tight, and radiant heat, which are inces
santly in motion, throughout the spaces that in
tervene between our "lobe and the sun and the
»tars. Chymists divide the substances in nature

also into simple and compound. Simple Sub
stances are those which have never yet oeen do-
composed, nor formed by art. Compound Sub
stances are those which are formed by the union
of two or more simple substances. The follow
ing are all the simple substances, with which we
are at present acquainted: Caloric, Light, Oxy
gen, Nitrogen, Carbon, Hydrogen, Sulphur,
Phosphorus, the Metals, and some of the Earths.
AH that I propose, under this article, is, simply
to state some of the properties of two or three of
these simple substances.

Caloric, or elementary fire, is the name now
given by chy mists to that element or property
which, combined with various bodies, produces
the sensation of heat, while it is passing from one
body to another. This substance appears to
pervade the whole system of nature. There are
six different sources, from whence caloric may
be procured. It may be produced by combus
tion, in which process the oxygen gas of the
atmosphere is decomposed, and caloric, one of
its component parts, set at liberty — by friction,
or the rubbing of two substances against each
other — by percussion, as the striking of steel
against a piece of flint — by the mixture of two
or more substances ; as when sulphuric acid is
poured upon water or magnesia — by electricity
and galvanism. The discharge of an electric
or galvanic battery will produce a more intense
degree of heat than any other means whatever.
But the principal, and probably the original
source of caloric, is the Sun, which furnishes
the earth with a regular supply for the support
and nourishment rf the animal and vegetable
tribes. From this source it moves at the rate of
195,000 miles in a second of time ; for it has
been already stated, that the sun sends forth rays
of heat, which are distinct from those which pro
duce illumination, and which accompany them
in their course through the ethereal regions.

Caloric is the cause of fluidity, in all sub
stances which are capable of becoming fluid. A
certain portion, or dose of it, reduces a solid body
to the state of an incompressible fluid ; a larger
portion brings it to the state of an aeriform or
gaseous fluid. Thus, a certain portion of caloric
reduces ice to a state of water ; a larger portion
converts it into steam or vapour. There is
reason to believe that the hardest rocks, the
densest metals, and every solid substance on
the face of the earth, might be converted into
a fluid, and even into a gas, were they submit
ted to the action of a very high temperature.
This substance is called sensible caloric, when
it produces the sensation of heat ; and latent
caloric, when it forms an insensible part of
the substance of bodies. All bodies are. in a
greater or less degree, conductors of caloric.
Metals and liquids are good conductors of heat,
but silk, cotton, wool, wood, &c. are bad conduc
tors of it. For example, if we put a short po-

104

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

ker into the fire at one end, it will soon become
hot at the ether ; but this will not happen with a
piece of wood of the same length, and under the
same circumstances. A person with a silken
purse, containing metal coin, may stand so near
the fire, as to make the metal almost too hot to
touch, though the temperature of the purse will
apparently be scarcely altered. If ahand be put
upon a hot body, part of the caloric leaves the
hot body and enters the hand, producing the sen
sation of heat. On the contrary, if a hand be
put on a cold body, as a piece of iron, or another
cold hand, part of the caloric contained in the
hand leaves it to unite with the colder body,
producing the sensation of cold. In short, ca
loric is diffused throughout all bodies, and enters
into every operation in nature ; and were it not
for the influence of this subtile fluid, there is
reason to believe, that the whole matter of the
universe would be condensed into a solid mass.
Oxygen is a very pure, subtile, and elastic
substance, generally diffused throughout nature ;
but is never found unless in combination with
other substances. It is one of the most impor
tant agents in nature ; there being scarcely a
single process, whether natural or artificial, in
which oxygen has not some important share.
When combined with caloric, it is cal led oxygen
gas, which forms one of the constituent parts of
the atmosphere. In this state, it forms the
principle of combustion ; producing the most
rapid deflagration of all combustible substances.
If a lighted taper be let down into ajar of oxy
gen gas, it burns wii'n such splendour, that the
eye can scarcely bear the gla' e of light ; and at
the same time produces a much greater heat
than when burning in common air. If a steel
wire, or a thin file, having a sharp point, armed
with a bit of wood in inflammation, be introduced
into a jar filled with this gas, the steel will take
fire, and its combustion will continue, producing
a most brilliant phenomenon. It has been
proved, by numerous experiments, that this gas
is so essential to combustion, that no substance
will burn in common air, which has been pre
viously deprived of its oxygen. It is also es
sential to animal life; so that man, and all the
inferior ranks of animated nature, may be said
to depend upon this fluid for their existence. Its
basis gives the acid character to all mineral and
vegetable salts : and the calcination of metals is
altogether effected by their union with oxygen.
It constitutes the basis both of the atmosphere
which surrounds the earth, and of the water
which forms its rivers, seas, and oceans. It
pervades the substance of all the vegetable tribes,
and enables them to perform their functions ;
and, in combination with the different metals,
serves the most important purposes in the use
ful arts. In the operation of this elementary
principle, we perceive a striking display of the
agency of the Creator, and of the admirable

means which his wisdom has contrived for pro-
serving, in due order, the system of nature. And,
as this wonderful substance is so essentially ne
cessary to animal and vegetable existence, every
thing is so arranged as to produce a regular sup
ply of it, notwithstanding its incessant changes,
and the multifarious combinations into which it
is continually entering.

One of the most extraordinary effects of oxygen
appears, when it is combined in a certain pro
portion with nitrogen, so as to form the gaseous
oxide of nitrogen, or what is commonly called
nitrous oxide. This gas consists of 63 parts ni
trogen, and 37 oxygen, by weight. When in
haled into the lungs, it produces an extraordinary
elevation of the animal spirits, a propensity to
leaping and running, involuntary fits of laughter,
a rapid flow of vivid ideas, and a thousand de
lightful emolions ; without being accompanied
with any subsequent feelings of debility. This
circumstance shows what a variety of delightful
or pernicious effects might flow from the slightest
change in the constitution of the atmosphere,
were the hand of the Almighty to interpose in
altering the proportion of its constituent parts :
for atmospheric air is composed of 79 parts of
nitrogen, and 21 of oxygen, which is not a very
different proportion from the above. Another gas
called nitric oxide, composed of 56 parts oxygen,
and 44 nitrogen, produces instant suffocation in
all animals that attempt to breathe it. One of
the most corrosive acids, the nitrous acid, or
aquafortis, is composed of 75 parts oxygen and
25 parts nitrogen ; so that we are every moment
breathing a certain substance, which, in anothei
combination, would produce the most dreadful
pain, and cause our immediate destruction.
What a striking proof does this afford of the in
finite comprehension of the divine mind, in fore
seeing all the consequences of the elements of
nature, and in directing their numerous combi
nations in such a manner as to promote the hap
piness of animated beings !

Nitrogen, or azote, is a substance generally
diffused throughout nature, and particularly in
animated bodies. It is not to be found in a solid
or liquid state, but, combined with caloric, it
forms nitrogen gas, which is one of the ingre
dients of the atmosphere. It is capable of sup
porting either flame or animal life. This is
proved by introducing an animal, or a burning
candle, into a vessel full of this gas : in which
case, the animal is suddenly suffocated, and the
candle instantly extinguished. It is this gas
which is expelled from the lungs at every respi
ration, and, rising over our heads, soon enters
into new combinations. Though it is destruc
tive to animal life, it appears to be favourable to
plants, which vegetate freely when surrounded
with nitrogen.

Hydrogen is another elementary substance,
abundant in nature, and, when united to caloric

CHYMISTRY.

It

6x m* hydrogen gas. It is one of the constitu
ent parts of wafer ; for it has been completely
demonstrated by experiment, that water is com
posed of 85 parts by weight of oxygen, and 15
of hydrogen, in every Hundred parts of the fluid.
This gas was forrauily known by the name of
inflammable, air. It is distinguished among mi
ners by the name ofjfre-damp; it abounds in
coal-mines, and sometimes produces the most
tremendous explosions, it is incapable, by it
self, of supporting combustion, and cannot be
breathed without the most imminent danger. It
is the chief constituent of oils, fats, spirits, ether,
coals, and bitumen ; and is supposed to be one
of the agents which produce the ignes fatui and
the northern lights. It is the lightest of all pon
derable bodies ; being from twelve to fifteen times

powerful antiseptic, or preserver from putrefac
tion. Meat which has been sealed up in it (says
Mr. Parkes) has been known to have preserved
its texture and appearance for more than twenty
years. There is no substance of more import
ance in civilized life than the different forms of
Carbon. " In nature," says Sir. H. Davy,
" this element is constantly active in an import
ant series of operations, 'it is evolved in fer
mentation and combustion, in carbonic acid ; it
is separated from oxygen in the organs of plants ^
it is a principal element in animal structures ;
and is found in different forms in almost all the
products of organized beings."

Sulphur is a substance which has been known
from the earliest ages. It was used by the an
cients in medicine, and its fumes have, for more

lighter than common air. A hundred cubic in- than 2000 years, been employed in bleaching
ches of it weigh about 2£ grains. On account wool. It is found combined with many mineral
of its great levity it is used for filling air-balloons.
In contact with atmospheric air, it burns with a

pale blue colour. When mixed with oxygen gas,
it may be exploded like gunpowder, with a vio
lent report. CarbureUed hydrogen gas, which
u carbon dissolved in hydrogen, is that beautiful
gas, which is now employed in lighting our
streets, shops, and manufactories.

Carbon is another simple substance extensively
diffused throughout nature. It is found pure and
solid only in the diamond; but it may be pro
cured in the state of charcoal, by burning a piece
of wool closely covered with sand, in a cruci
ble. Carbon enters into the composition of bi
tumen and pit coal, and of most animal and some
mineral substances ; and it forms nearly the
whole of the solid basis of all vegetables, from
the most delicate flower to the stately oak. It is
also a component part of sugar, and of all kinds
of wax, oils, gums, and resins. It combines
veith iron in various proportions, and the results
are cast iron and steel. Black lead is a corn-
position of nine parts of carbon to one of iron ;
and is, therefore, called a carburet of iron. Carbon
is indestructible by age, and preserves its iden
tity in all the combinations into which it enters.
Carbonic acid gas is a combination of carbon and
oxygen. It is found in a state of combination with
lime, forming limestone, marble, and chalk; and
may be separated from them by heat, or by means
of the mineral acids. This gas, which was for
merly called fixed air, is found in mines, caves,
the bottoms of wells, wine cellars, brewers' vats,
and in the neighbourhood of lime-kilns. It is
unown lo miners by the name of the choke-damp,
and too frequently runs on deadly errands. It
extinguishes flame and animal life. It is the
heaviest of all the gases ; being nearly twice the
wei<;ht of common air, and twenty times the
weight of hydrogen. Tt may, therefore, be
poured from onu vessel to another; and if a
«miall quantity of it be poured upon a lighted
taper, it will be instantly extinguished. It is a
14

substances, as arsenic, antimony, copper, and
most of the metallic ores. It exists in many mi
neral waters, and in combination with vegetable
and animal matters, but is most abundant in vol
canic countries, particularly in the neighbour
hood of Vesuvius, Etna, and Hecla in Iceland.
It is a solid, opaque, combustible substance, of
a pale yellow colour, very brittle, and almost
without taste or smell. Its specific gravity is
nearly twice that of water ; it is a con-conduct
or of electricity, and, of course, becomes elec
tric by friction. When heated to the tempera
ture of 170° of Fahrenheit's thermometer, it
rises up in the form of a fine powder, which is
easily collected in a proper vessel, and is named
the flowers of sulphur. It is insoluble in water,
but may be dissolved in oils, in spirit of wine,
and in hydrogen gas. When sulphur* is heated
to the temperature of 302° in the open air, i»
takes fire spontaneously, and burns with a pale
blue flame, and emits a great quantity of fumes
of a strong suffocating odour. When heated
to the temperature of 570°, it burns with a bright
white flame, and emits a vast quantity of fumes.
When these fumes are collected, they are founa
to consist entirely of sulphuric acid; BO that sul
phur, by combustion, is converted into an acid.
It is the base of several compound substances.
It unites with oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, phos
phorus, the alkalies, the metals, and some of the
earths. This substance is of great importance
in medicine, as it is found to penetrate to the ex
tremities of the most minute vessels, and to im
pregnate all the secretions. It is also used in the
arts, particularly in bleaching and dying ; it forms
a very large proportion of gunpowder ; and one
of its most common, but not least useful proper
ties, is that of its combustibility, by which, with
the help of a tinder-box, light is almost instanta
neously produced. As this substance has not
yet been decomposed, it is considered by chy-
mists, in the mean time, as one of the simple
substances.

106

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

Phosphorus is another simple combustible sub
stance, but is never found in a pure state in na
ture. It is commonly united to oxygen in a state
of phosphoric acid, which is found in different
animal, vegetable, and mineral substances. It
was first discovered by Brandt, a chymist of
Hamburgh, in the year 1667, and afterwards by
the Honourable Mr. Boyle, in 1679. It was
formerly obtained by a disgusting process ; but
it is now extracted from the bones of animals, by
burning them, and then reducing them to a fine
powder, and afterwards pouring sulphuric acid
upon them. This substance, when pure, resem
bles bees' wax, being of a clear, transparent,
yellowish colour ; it is insoluble in water ; it
may be cut with a knife, or twisted to pieces with
the fingers ; and it is about double the specific
gravity of water. Its most remarkable property
is its very strong attraction for oxygen, from
which circumstance, it burns spontaneously in
the open air at the temperature of 43° : that is,
it attracts the oxygen gas from the atmosphere,
and heat and flame are produced. It gradually
consumes when exposed to the common tempe
rature of air, emits a whitish smoke, and is lu
minous in the dark ; for this reason it is kept in
phials of water ; and as the heat of the hand is
sufficient, to inflame it, it should seldom be han
dled except under water. At the temperature of
99° it melts ; it evaporates at 219°, and boils at
554°. When heated to 148° it takes fire, and
burns with a very bright flame, and gives out a
very large.quantity of white smoke, which is lu
minous in the dark ; at the same time it emits
an odour, which has some resemblance to that of
garlic ; and this smoke, when collected, is proved
to be an acid. It burns with the greatest splen
dour in oxygen gas, and when taken internally,
it is found to be poisonous. If any light sub
stance, capable of conducting heat, be placed
upon the surface of boiling water, and a bit of
phosphorus be laid upon it, the heat of the water
will be sufficient to set the phosphorus on fire.
If we write a few words on paper with a bit of
phosphorus fixed in a quill, when the writing is
carried into a dark room it will appear beauti
fully luminous If a piece of phosphorus, about
the size of a pea, be dropped into a tumbler of
hot water, and a stream of oxygen gas forced di
rectly upon it, it will display the most brilliant
combustion under water that ran h^ imagined.
All experiments with phosphorus, however, re
quire to be performed with great caution. This
substance is used in making phosphorus match-
bo ties, phosphoric oil, phosphoric tapers, and
various phosphoric fireworks. Phosphorized hy
drogen gas is produced by bits of phosphorus
remaining some hours in hydrogen gas. It is
supposed to be this gas which is of en seen
hovering on the surface of burial grounds and
marshes, known in Scotland by the name of»pun-
kie, and in England b) that of wiU-o-the-wisp.

Some animals, as the glow-worm and the./fi>
fly, and fish in a putrescent state, exhibit phos
phorescent qualities. M. Peron describes a sin
gular instance of this kind in an animal which he
calls the pyrosoma atlanticum, which he observe^
in his voyage from Europe to the IsleofFrrtnce
The darkness was intense when it was first das-
covered ; and all at once there appeared at some
distance, as it were, a vast sheet of phosphorus
floating on the waves, which occupied a great
space before the vessel. When the vessel had
passed through this inflamed part cf the sea, it
was found that this prodigious light was occa
sioned by an immense number of small animals,
which swam at different depths, and appeared to
assume various forms. Those which were deep
est looked like great red-hot cannon balls, while
those on the surface resembled cylinders of red-
hot iron. Some of them were caught, and were
found to vary in size from three to seven inches.
Al! the exterior surface of the animal was bristled
with thick long tubercles, shining like so many
diamonds ; and these seemed to be the principal
seat of its wonderful phosphorescence.

Such is a brief description of the principal
elementary substances, which, in a thousand di
versified forms, pervade the system of nature,
and produce all that variety which we behold in
the atmosphere, the waters, the earth, and the
various processes of the arts. It is probable that
some of these substances are compounds, though
they have not yet been decomposed. Yea, it is
possible, and not at all improbable, that there are
but two, or almost three, elementary substances
in nature, the various modifications of which
produce all the beauties and sublimities in the
universe. Perhaps caloric, oxygen, and hydro
gen, may ultimately be found to constitute all
the elementary principles of nature. Without
prosecuting this subject farther. I shall conclude
this article with a few cursory reflections, tend
ing to illustrate its connexion with religion.

The remarks which I have already thrown out
in reference to natural philosophy will equally
apply to the science of chymistry ; and, there
fore, do not require to be repeated. In addition
to these, the following observations may be
stated : —

1. This science displays, in a striking point
of view, the wisdom and goodness of God, in
produrinir, by the. moat nmpje, means, the most
astonishing and benevolent effects. All the va
ried phenomena we perceive, throughout the
whole system of sublunary nature, are produced
by a combination of six or seven simple sub
stances. I formerly adverted to the infinite
variety which exists in the vegetable kingdom,
(see pp. 37, 38.) About fifty-six thousand dif
ferent species of plants have already been dis
covered by botanists. All these, from the hum
ble shrub to the cedar of Lebanon, which adorp
the surface of the globe, in every clime, with

CHYMISTRY.

107

•ueh a diversity of forms, shades, and colours, are
me result of the combinations of " four or five
natural substances — caloric, light, water, air,
and carbon." " When we consider," says Mr.
Parkes, " that the many thousand tribes of ve
getables are not only all formed from a few simple
substances, but that they all enjoy the same sun,
vegetate in the same medium, and are supplied
with the same nutriment, we cannot but be struck
with the rich economy of Nature, and are al
most, induced to doubt the evidence of those
senses with which the God of nature has fur
nished us. That it should be possible so to
modify and intermingle a few simple substances,
and thence produce all the variety of form, colour,
odour, &c. which are observable in the different
families of vegetables, is a phenomenon too as
tonishing for our comprehension. Nothing short
of Omnipotence could have provided such a pa
radise for man." — Chymical Catechism, chap. 9.

Soft soil your incense, herbs, and fruits, and

flowers,

In mingled clouds to Him, whose sun exalts,
Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil

paints." T/iomson.

What an admirable view is here opened up of
the economy of divine wisdom, and of the bene
ficent care which has been taken to secure the
comfort and happiness of every living creature :
and how ungrateful a disposition must it indicate
in rational beings to overlook such benevolent
arrangements ! It is highly probable, that in all
other worlds disposed throughout the universe
an infinite diversity of scenery exists, and that
no one globe or system exactly resembles an
other; and yet, it is probable, that the primary
elements of matter, or the few simple substances
of which our world is composed, may be of the
same nature as those which form the constituent
parts of every other system ; and may give birth
to all the variety which exists throughout Ihe
wide extent of creation, and to all the changes
and revolutions through which the different sys
tems may pass, during every period of infinite
duration.

2. From this science we have every reason to
conclude, that matter is indestructible. In the
various changes that take place in material sub
stances, Ihe particles of matter are not destroyed,
but only assume new forms, and enter into new
combinations. When a piece of wood, for ex
ample, is burned to ashes, none of its principles
are destroyed ; the elementary substances of
which it was composed are only separated from
one another, and formed into new compounds.
Carbon, as already slated, appears to be inde
structible by age, and to preserve its essential
properties in every mode of its existence.
That Being, indeed, who created matter at first,
may reduce it to nothing when he pleases : but
it is highly improbable that his power will ever
be \nterposed to produce this effect ; or that any

particle of matter which now exists will ever be
annihilated, into whatever new or varied com
binations it may enter. When any particular
world, or assemblage of material existence, has
remained in its original state for a certain period
of duration, and accomplished all the ends it was
intended to subserve in that state, the materials
of which it is composed will, in all probability,
be employed for erecting a new system, and es
tablishing a new series of events, in which new
scenes, and new beauties uid sublimities, will
arise from new and varied combinations. For
the Creator does nothing in vain. But to anni
hilate, and again to create, would be operating in
vain; and we uniformly find, that in all the
arrangements of Deity in the present state of
things, Nature is frugal and economical in all
her proceedings; so that there is no process,
when thoroughly investigated, that appears un
necessary or superfluous.

From the fact, that matter appears to be in
destructible, we may learn, that the Creator
may, with the self-same materials which now
exist around us, new-model and arrange the
globe we inhabit, after the general conflagration,
so as to make a more glorious world to arise
out of its ashes ; purified from those physical
evils which now exist ; and fitted for the ac
commodation either of renovated men, or of
other pure intelligences. From the same fact,
combined with the consideration of the infinite
diversity of effects which the simple substances
of nature are capable of producing, we may be
enabled to form a conception of the ease with
which the Creator may new-model our bodies,
after they have been dissolved in the dust ; and
how, from the same original atoms, he may con
struct and adorn them with more glorious forms
and more delightful and exquisite senses than
they now possess.

In short, the rapid progress which chymical
science is now making, promises, ere long, to
introduce improvements among the human race,
which will expand their views of the agency of
God, counteract many physical evils, and pro
mote, tq an extent which has never yet been
experienced, their social and domestic enjoy
ment. The late discoveries of chymistry tend
to convince us, that the properties and powers of
natural subjects are only beginning to be disco
vered. Who could have imagined, a century
ago, that an invisible substance is contained in a
piece of coal, capable of producing the most
beautiful and splendid illumination— that this
substance may be conveyed, in a few moments,
through pipes of several miles in length — and
that a city, containing several hundred thousands
of inhabitants, may be instantly lighted up by it,
without the aid of either wax, oil, or tallow ?
Who, could have imagined, that one of the in
gredients of the air we breathe is the principle of
combustion — that a rod of iron may be made to

108

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

burn with a brilliancy that dazzles the eyes —
that a piece of charcoal may be made to burn
with a white and splendid light, which is infe
rior only to the solar rays — and that the diamond
is nothing more than carbon in a crystallized
state, and differs only in a slight degree from a
bit of common charcoal ? Who could have sur
mised, that a substance would be discovered, of
such a degree of levity, as would have power
sufficient to buoy up a number of men to the up
per parts of the atmosphere, and enable them to
swim, in safety, above the regions of the clouds ?
These are only specimens of still more brilliant
discoveries which will, doubtless, be brought to
light by the researches of future generations.
We have reason to believe, that the investiga
tions of this science will, in due time, enable us
to counteract most of the diseases incident to the
human frame ; and to prevent many of those fatal
accidents to which mankind are now exposed.
Davy's safety lamp has already preserved many
individuals from destruction, when working in
coal mines ; and thousands, in after ages, will
be indebted to this discovery, for security from
the dreadful explosions of hydrogen gas. And,
we trust, that the period is not far distant, when
specific antidotes to the diseases peculiar to the
different trades and occupations in which man
kind are employed will be discovered ; and the
health arid vigour of the mass of society be pre
served unimpaired, amidst all the processes in
which they may be engaged. In fine, the rapid
progress of chyrnical discovery carries forward
our views to a period, when man, having tho
roughly explored the powers of nature, and sub
jected them, in some measure, to his control, will
be enabled to ward off most of those physical
evils with which he is now annoyed, and to
raise himself, in some degree, to the dignity and
happiness he enjoyed before moral evil had shed
its baleful influence on our terrestrial system.
Such a period corresponds to many of the de
scriptions contained in the Sacred Oracles of the
millenial state of the church; when social, do
mestic, moral, and intellectual improvement shall
be carried to the utmost perfection which our
sublunary station will permit ; when wars shall
cease; when the knowledge of Jehovah shall
cover the earth ; when every man shall sit under
his vine and fig-tree, without being exposed to
the least alarm ; and when there shall be nothing
to hurt nor destroy throughout the church of the
living God. And, therefore, we ought to con
sider the various discoveries and improvements
now'going forward in this and other departments
of science, as preparing the way for the introduc
tion of this long-expected and auspicious era.

ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY.

The general object of both these sciences is
o investigate and describe the structure and

economy of the animal frame. Anatomy di«-
sects dead bodies, physiology investigates the
functions of those that are living. The former
examines the fluids, muscles, viscera, and all the
other parts of the human body, in a state of rest ,
the latter considers them in a state of action.

The parts of the human body have been dis
tinguished into two different kinds — solids and
fluids. The solid parts are bones, cartilages,
ligaments, muscles, tendons, membranes, nerves,
arteries, veins, hair, nails, and ducts, or fine tu
bular vessels of various kinds. Of these 'solid
parts, the following compound organs consist ,•
the brain and cerebellum; the lungs; the heart,
the stomach; the liver; the. spleen; ihe pancreas;
ihe glands ; the kidneys ; the intestines ; the me
sentery ; the larynx ; and the organs of sense—
the eyes, ears, nose, and tongue. The fluid parts
are, the saliva, or spittle, phlegm, serum, the
chyle, blood, bile, milk, lympha, urine, the pan
creatic juice, arid the aqueous humour of the eyes.
The human body is divided into three great ca-*
vities — the head; the thorax, or breast ; and the
abdomen, or belly. The head is formed of the
bones of the cranium, and encloses the brain
and cerebellum. The thorax is composed of the
vertebrae of the back, the sternum, and true ribs ;
and contains the heart, the pericardium, the
breast, and the lungs. The abdomen is separated
from the thorax by means of the diaphragm,
which is a fleshy and membranous substance,
composed, for the most part, of muscular fibres.
This cavity is formed by the lumbar vertebrae,
the os sacrum, the ossa innominata, the false
ribs, the peritonaeum, and a variety of muscles.
It encloses the stomach, intestines, omentum, or
caul, the liver, pancreas, spleen, kidrieyt, and
urinary bladder. Without attempting any tech
nical description of these different pars, which
could convey no accurate ideas to a general
reader, I shall merely state two or three facts in
relation to the system of bones, muscles, and
blood-vessels, as specimens of the wonderful struc
ture of our bodily frame.

The Bones may be regarded as the prop-work
or basis on which the human body is constructed.
They bear the same relation to the animal sys
tem, as the wood-work to a building. They give
shape and firmness to the body ; they support its
various parts, arid prevent it from sinking by its
own weight ; they serve as levers for the muscles
to act upon, and to defend the brain, the heart,
the lungs, and other vital parts, from external in
jury. Of the bones, some are hollow, and filled
with marrow ; others are solid throughout ; some
are very small * — others very large ; some are
round, and others flat ; some are plane, and
others convex or concave ; — and all these several
forms pro requisite for the situations they oc
cupy, and the respective functions they have to
perform. The spine, or back-bonp, consists of 24
vertebrae, or small bones connected together by

ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY.

.09

cartilages, articulations, and ligaments ; of which
seven belong to the neck, twelve to the back, and
five to the loins. In the centre of each vertebra
there is a hole fi:r the lodgment and continuation
of the spinal marrow, which extends from the
brain to the rump. From these vertebrae the
arched bones called ribs proceed ; and seven of
them join the breast-bone on each side, where
they terminate in cartilages, and form the cavity
of the thorax or chest. The five lower ribs, with
a number of muscles, form the cavity of the ab
domen, as above stated. The spine is one of
the most admirable mechanical contrivances in
the human frame. Had it consisted of only three
or four bones, or had the holes in each bone not
exactly corresponded and fitted into each other,
vhe spinal marrow would have been bruised, and
life endangered at every bending of the body.
The skull is composed often bones, and about 51
are reckoned to belong to the face, the orbits of
the eyes, and the jaws in which the teeth are
fixed. There are seldom more than 16 teeth in
each jaw, or 32 in all. The number of bones in
a human body is generally estimated at about
245 ; of which there are reckoned, in the skull,
head, and face, 61 ; in the trunk, 64 ; in the
arms, and hands, 60 , in the legs, and feet, 60.
The bones are provided with ligaments or hinges,
which bind and fasten them together, and pre
vent them from being displaced by any violent
motion ; and, that the ligaments may work
smoothly into one another, the joints are sepa
rated by cartilages or gristles, and provided with
a gland for the secretion of oil or mucus, which
is constantly exuding into the joints ; so that
every requisite is provided by our benevolent
Creator, to prevent pain, and to promote facility
of motion. '• In considering the joints," says
Dr. Paley, " thoe is nothing, perhaps, which
ought to move our gratitude more than the re
flection, how well they wear. A limb shall swing
upon its hinge or play in its socket many hun
dred times in an hour, for 60 years together,
without dimlnu'.ion of agility ; which is a long
time for any thing to last— for any thing so much
worked aa the joints are."

The Muscular System. — A muscle is a bundle
of fleshy, and sometimes of tendinous fibres.
The fleshy fibres compose the body of the muscle ;
and the tendinous fibres the extremities. Some
muscles are long and round ; some plain and cir
cular ; some are spiral, and some have straight
fibres. Some are double, having a tendon run
ning through the body from head to tail ; some
have two or more tendinous branches running
through, with various rows and orders of fibres.
All these, and several other varieties, are essen
tially requisite for the respective offices they have
to perform in the animal system. The muscles
constitute the fleshy part of the human body,
n.nd give it that varied and beautiful form we ob
serve over all its surface. But their principal

design is to serve as the organs of motion. They
are inserted, by strong tendinous extremities,
into the different bones of which the skeleton is
composed ; and, by their contraction and disten-
tion, give rise to all the movements nf the body.
The muscles, therefore, may be considered as so
many cords attached to 'he bones , and the Author
of nature has fixed them according to the most
perfect principles of mechanism, so as to produce
the fittest motions in the parts for the movement
of which they are intended.

One of the most wonderful properties of the
muscles is, the extraordinary force they exert,
although they are composed of such slender
threads or fibres. The following facts, in rela
tion to this point, are demonstrated by the cele
brated Borelli, in his work, " De Motu Ani-
malium." When a man lifts up with his teeth a
weight of 200 pounds, with a rope fastened to
the jaw-teeth, the muscles named temporal™ and
masseter, with which people chew, and which per
form this work, exert a force of above 15,0001bs.
weight. If any one hanging his arm directly
downwards lifts a weight of 20 pounds, with the
third or last joint of his thumb, the muscle which
bends the thumb and bears that weight exerts a
force of about three thousand pounds. When a
man, standing upon his feet, leaps or springs up
wards to the height of two feet, if the weight of
such a man be 150 pounds, the muscles employed
in that action will exert a force 2000 times great
er; that is to say, a force of about three hundred
thousand pounds. The heart, at each pulse or
contraction, by which it protrudes the blood out
of the arteries into the veins, exerts a force of
above a hundred thousand pounds. Who can
contemplate this amazing strength of the mus
cular system, without admiration of the power
and wisdom of the Creator, who has thus endued
a bundle of threads, each of them smaller than
a hair, with such an astonishing degree of me
chanical force ! There have been reckoned about
446 muscles in the human body, which have been
dissected and distinctly described ; every one of
which is essential to the performance of some
one motion or other, which contributes to our
ease and enjoyment ; and, in most instances, a
great number of them is required to perform their
different functions at the same time. It has
been calculated, that about a hundred muscles are
employed every time we breathe. " Breathing
with ease," says Dr. Paley, " is a blessing of
every moment ; yet, of all others, it is that which
we possess with the least consciousness. A man
in an asthma is the only man who knows how to
estimate it."

The Heart and Blood-vessels.— The heart is
a hollow muscular organ, of a conical shape, and
consists of four distinct cavities. The two larg
est are called ventricles, and the two smallest
auricles. The ventricles send out the blood to
the arteries ; the auricles receive it from the

110

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

veins. The heart is enclosed in the pericardium,
B. membranous bag, which contains a quantity
of water, or lymph. This water lubricates the
heart, and facilitates all its motions. The heart
is the general reservoir of the blood. When the
heart contracts, the blood is propelled from the
right ventricle into the lungs, through the pulmo
nary arteries, which, like all the other arteries,
are furnished with valves that play easily for
ward, but admit not the blood to return toward
the heart. The blood, after circulating through
the lungs, and having there been revivified by
coming in contact with the air, and imbibing a
portion of its oxygen, returns into the left auricle
of the heart, by the pulmonary vein. At the
same instant, the left ventricle drives the blood
into the aorta, a large artery which sends off
branches to supply the head and arms. Another
large branch of the aorta descends along the in
side of the back-bone, and detaches numerous
ramifications to nourish the bowels and inferior
extremities. After serving the most remote ex
tremities of the body, the arteries are converted
into veins, which, in their return to the heart,
gradually unite in to larger branches, till the whole
terminate in one great trunk, called the vena
cava, whicli discharges itself into the right au
ricle of the heart, and completes the circulation.
Each ventricie of the heart is reckoned to con
tain about one ounce, or two tabiespoonsfull of
blood. The heart contracts 4000 times every
hour; and, consequently, there passes through
it 250 pounds of blood in one hour. And if the
mass of blood in a human body be reckoned at
an average of twenty-five pounds, it will follow
that the whole mass of blood passes through the
heart, and consequently through the thousands
of ramifications of the veins and arteries, four
teen times every hour, or about once every four
minutes. We may acquire a rude idea of the
force with which the blood is impelled from the
heart, by considering the velocity with which
water issues from a syringe,' or from the pipe of
a fire-engine. Could we behold these rapid mo
tions incessantly going on within us, it would
overpower our minds with astonishment, and
even with terror. We should be apt to feel
alarmed on making the smallest exertion, lest
the parts of this delicate machine should bo
broken or deranged, and its functions interrupted.
The arteries, into which the blood is forced,
branch in every direction through the body, like
the roots and branches of a tree ; running through
the substance of the bones, and every part of the
animal frame, till they are lost in such fine tubes
as to be wholly invisible. In the parts where
the arteries are lost to the sight, the veins take
their rise, and in their commencement are also
imperceptible.

Respiration, — The organs of respiration are
the lungs. They are divided into five lobes;
three >f which lie on the right, and two on the

left side of the thorax. The substance of the
lungs is chiefly composed of infinite ramifica
tions of the trachea, or windpipe, which, aftei
gradually becoming more and more minute, ter
minate in little cells, or vesicles, which have a
free communication with one another. At each
inspiration, these pipes and cells are filled with
air, which is again discharged by expiration.
In this manner, a circulation of air, which is ne
cessary to the existence of men and oiher ani
mals, is constantly kept up as long as life re
mains. The air-cells of the lungs open into the
windpipe, by which they communicate with the
external atmosphere. The whole internal struc
ture of the lungs is lined by a transparent mem
brane, estimated at only the thousandth part of
an inch in thickness ; but whose surface, from
its various convolutions, measures fifteen square
feet, which is equal to the external surface of the
body. On this thin and extensive membrane
innumerable veins and arteries are distributed,
some of them finer than hairs ; and through these
vessels all the blood of the system is successively
propelled, by a most curious and admirable me
chanism. It has been computed, that the lungs,
on an average, contain about 280 cubic inches,
or about five English quarts of air. At each
inspiration, about forty cubic inches of air are
received into the lungs, and the same quantity dis
charged at each expiration. On the supposition
that 20 respirations take place in a minute, it
will follow, that, in one minute we inhale 800
cubic inches ; in an hour, 48,000 ; and in a day,
one million, one hundred and fifty-two thousand
cubic inches — a quantity which would fill seventy-
seven wine hogsheads, and would weigh fifiv-
three pounds troy. By means of this function,
a vast body of air is daily brought into contact
with the mass of blood, and communicates to it
its vivifying influence; and, therefore, it is of
the utmost importance to health, that the air, of
which we breathe so considerable a quantity,
should be pure, and uncontaminated with nox
ious effluvia.

Digestion. — This process is performed by the
stomach, which is a membranous and muscular
bag, furnished with two orifices. By the one, it
has a communication with the gullet, arid by the
other, with the bowels. The food, after being
moistened by the saliva, is received into the sto
mach, where it is still farther diluted 'by the
gastric juice , which has the power of dissolving
every kind of animal and vegetable substance.
Part of it is afterwards absorbed by the lymphatic
and lacteal vessels, and carried into the circulat
ing system, and converted into blood for supply
ing that nourishment which the perpetual waste
of our bodies demands.

Perspiration is the evacuation ofthejuir.es of
tne body throu<;h the pores of the skin. It has
been calculated that there are above three hundred
thousand millions of pores in the glands of th»

ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY.

Ill

akin which covers the body of a middle-sized
man. Through these pores, more than one-half
of what we eat and drink passes off by insensible
perspiration. During a night of seven hours'
sleep, we perspire about forty ounces, or two
pounds and a half. At an average, we may es
timate the discharge from the surface of the
body, by sensible and insensible perspiration, at
from half an ounce to four ounces an hour. This
is a most wonderful part of the animal economy,
ar.d is absolutely necessary to our health, and
even to our very existence. When partially ob
structed, colds, rheumatisms, fevers, and other
inflammatory disorders, are produced ; and were
it completely obstructed, the vital functions
would be clogged and impeded in their move
ments, and death would inevitably ensue.

Sensation. — The nerves are generally consi
dered as the instruments of sensation. They
are soft white cords which proceed from the brain
and spinal marrow. They come forth originally
by pairs. Ten pair proceed from the medullary
substance of the brain, which are distributed to
all parts of the head and neck. Thirty pair pro
ceed from the spinal marrow, through the ver
tebra?, to all the other parts of the body ; being
forty in all. These nerves, the ramifications of
which are infinitely various and minute, are dis
tributed upon the heart, lungs, blood-vessels,
bowels, and muscles, till they terminate on the
skin or external covering of the body. Impres
sions of external objects are received by the
brain from the adjacent organs of sense, and the
brain exercises its commands over the muscles
and limbs by means of the nerves.

Without prosecuting these imperfect descrip
tions farther, I shall conclude this very hasty
sketch with the following summary of the parts
of the body, in the words of Bonnet. " The
bones, by their joints and solidity, form the foun
dation of this fine machine : the ligaments are
strings which unite the parts together: the
muscles are fleshy substances, which act as elas
tic springs to put them in motion: the nerves,
which are dispersed over the whole body, con
nect all the parts together : the arteries and veins,
like rivulets, convey life and health throughout :
the heart, placed in the centre, is the focus where
the blood collects, or the acting power by means
of which it circulates and is preserved: the
lungs, by means of another power, draw in the
external air, and expel hurtful vapours: the sto
mach and intestines are the magazines where
every thing that is required for the daily supply
is prepared: the brain, that seat of the soul, is
formed in a manner suitable to the dignity of its
inhabitant : the senses, which are the soul's mi
nisters, warn it of all that is necessary either for
its pleasure or use.* Adorable Creator! with
what wonderful art hast thou formed us !

• Contemplation of Nature, vol. I. p. 64.

Though the heavens did not exist to proclaim
thy glory; though there were no created being
on earth but myself, my own body might suffice
to convince me that thou art a God of unlimited
power and infinite goodness."

This subject suggests a variety of moral and
religious reflections, but the limits to which I
am confined will permit me to state only the
following : —

1. The economy of the human frame, when
seriously contemplated, has a tendency to excite
admiration and astonishment, and to impress ut
with a sense of our continual dependence on a su-
perior power. What an immense multiplicity of
machinery must be in action to enable us to
breathe, to feel, and to walk ! Hundreds of
bones, of diversified forms, connected together by
various modes of articulation : hundreds of
muscles to produce motion, each of them acting
in at least ten different capacities, (see p. 40 5)
hundreds of tendons and ligaments to connect the
bones and muscles; hundreds of arteries to con
vey the blood to the remotest part of the system ;
hundreds of veins to bring it back to its reser
voir the heait ; thousands of glands secreting
humours of various kinds from the blood ;
thousands of lacteal and lymphatic tubes, ab
sorbing and conveying nutriment to the circulat
ing fluid ; millions of pores, through which the
perspiration is continually issuing ; an infinity
of ramifications of nerves, diffusing sensation
throughout all the parts of this exquisite ma
chine ; and the heart at every pulsation exerting
a force of a hundred thousand pounds, in order to
preserve all this complicated machinery in con
stant operation ! The whole of this vast system
of mechanism must be in action before we can
walk across our apartments ! We admire the
operation of a steam-engine, and the force it ex
erts. But, though it is constructed of the hardest
materials which the mines can supply, in a few
months some of its essential parts are worn and
deranged, even though its action should be fre
quently discontinued. But the animal machine,
though constructed, for the most part, of th«
softest and most flabby substances, can go on
without intermission in all its diversified move
ments, by night and by day, for the space ol
eighty or a hundred years ; the heart giving
ninety-six thousand strokes every twenty-four
hours, and the whole mass of blood rushing
through a thousand pipes of all sizes every four
minutes! And is it man that governs these
nice and complicated movements ? Did he set
the heart in motion, or endue it with the muscu
lar force it exerts ? And when it has ceased to
beat, can he command it again to resume its
functions? Man knows neither the secret
springs of the machinery within him, nor the
half of the purposes for which they serve, or of
the movements they perform. Can any thing
more strikingly demonstrate our dependence

112

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

every moment on a superior Agent, and that it
is " in God we live, and move, and have our
being? Were a single pin of the machinery
within us, and over which we have no control,
either broken or deranged, a thousand move
ments might instantly be interrupted, and our
bodies left to crumble into the dust.

It was considerations of this kind that led the
celebrated physician Galen, who was a skeptic
in his youth, publicly to acknowledge that a Su
preme Intelligence must have operated in ordain
ing the laws by which living beings are con
structed. And he wrote his excellent treatise
" On the uses of the parts of the human frame,"
as a solemn hymn to the Creator of the world.
" I first endeavour from His works," he says,
" to know him myself, and afterwards, by the
same means, to show him to others ; to inform
them, how great is his wisdom, his goodness,
his power." The late Dr. Hunter has observed,
that astronomy and anatomy are the studies
which present us with the most striking view of
the two most wonderful attributes of the Supreme
Being. The first of these fills the mind with
the idea of his immensity, in the largeness, dis
tances, and number of the heavenly bodies ; the
last astonishes us with his intelligence and art,
in the variety and delicacy of animal mechanism.

2. The study of the animal economy has a
powerful tendency to excite emotions of gratitude.
Man is naturally a thoughtless and ungrateful
creature. These dispositions are partly owing
to ignorance of the wonders of the human frame,
and of the admirable economy of the visible
world ; and this ignorance is owing to the want
of those specific instructions which ought to be
communicated by parents and teachers, in con
nexion with religion. For, there is no rational
being who is acquainted with the structure of
his animal system, and reflects upon it with the
leas! degree of attention, but must feel a senti
ment of admiration and gratitude. The science
which unfolds to us the economy of our bodies,
shows us on what an infinity of springs and
motions, and adaptations, our life and comfort de
pend. And when we consider, that all these
movements are performed without the least care
or laborious effort on our part, if we be not alto
gether brutish, and insensible of our dependence
on a superior Power, we must be filled with emo
tions of gratitude towards Him " whose hands
have made and fashioned us, and who giveth us
life, and breath, and all things." Some of the
motions to which I have adverted depend upon
our will ; and with what celerity do they obey
its commands ? Before we can rise from our
chair, and walk across our apartment, a hundred
muscles must be set in motion ; every one of
these must be relaxed or constricted, just to a
certain degree, and no more ; and all must act
harmoniously at the same instant of time ; and,
at the command of the soul, all these movements

are instantaneously performed. When I wish
to lift my hand to my head, every part of the
body requisite to produce the effect is put in mo
tion : the nerves are braced, the muscles are
stretched or relaxed, the bones play in their sock
ets, and the whole animal machine concurs in
the action, as if every nerve and muscle had
heard a sovereign and resistless call. When I
wish the next moment to extend rny hand to my
foot, all these muscles are thrown into a different
state, and a new set are brought along with them
into action : and thus we may vary, every mo
ment, the movements of the muscular system,
and the mechanical actions it produces, by a
simple change in our volition. Were we not
daily accustomed to such varied and voluntary
movements, or could we contemplate them in
any other machine, we should be lost in wonder
and astonishment.

Besides these voluntary motions, there are a
thousand important functions which have no de-
pendance upon our will. Whether we think of
it or not, whether we are sleeping or waking,
sitting or walking — the heart is incessantly exert
ing its muscular power at the centre of the sys
tem, and sending off streams of blood through
hundreds of pipes ; the lungs are continually ex
panding and contracting their thousand vesicles,
and imbibing the vital principle of the air; the
stomach is grinding the food ; the lacteals and
lymphatics are extracting nourishment for the
blood ; the liver and kidneys drawing off their
secretions; and the perspiration issuing from
millions of pores. These, and many other im
portant functions with which we are unacquaint
ed, arid over which we have no control, ought
to be regarded as the immediate agency of the
Deity within us, and should excite our incessant
admiration and praise.

There is one peculiarity in the constitution of
our animal system, which we are apt to overlook,
and for which we are never sufficiently grateful,
and that is, the power it possesses of self-restora
tion. A wound heals up of itself; a broken bone
is made firm again by a callus; and a dead part
is separated and thrown off. If all the wounds
we have ever received were still open and bleed
ing afresh, to what a miserable condition should
we be reduced ? But by a system of internal
powers, beyond all human comprehension as to
the mode of their operation, such dismal effects
are effectually prevented. In short, when we
consider that health depends upon such a nume
rous assemblage of moving organs, and that a
single spring out of action might derange the
whole machine, and put a stop to all its compli
cated movements, can we refrain from joining
with the psalmist, in his pious exclamation, and
grateful resolution, " How precious are thy won
derful contrivances concerning me, O God ! how
great is the sum of them ! I will praise thee ,
for I am fearfully and wonderfully made, Mat-

HISTORY.

113

vellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth
right well."

Omitting the consideration of several other
•departments of science, I shall in the mean time
notice only another subject connected with reli
gion, and that is History.

History embraces a record and description of
past facts and events, in reference to all the na
tions and ages of the world, in so far as they are
known, and have been transmitted to our times.
As natural history contains a record of the ope
rations of the Creator in the material world, so
sacred and civil history embraces a record of his
transactions in the moral and intellectual world,
or, in other words, a detail of the plans and
operations of his providence, in relation to the
inhabitants of our globe. Through the medium
of Sacred History, we learn the period and the
manner of man's creation — the reason of his fall
from the primitive state of integrity in which he
was created, and the dismal consequences which
ensued : the various movements of Providence
in order to his recovery, and the means by which
human redemption was achieved ; the manner
in which the gospel was at first promulgated, the
countries into which it was carried, and the im
portant effects it produced. Through the me
dium of Civil History we learn the deep and
universal depravity of mankind, as exhibited in
the wars, dissensions, and ravages, which have
desolated our fallen race, in every period, and in
every land ; we learn the desperate wickedness
of the human heart, in the more private acts of
ferocity, cruelty, and injustice, which, in all ages,
men have perpetrated upon each other ; we be
hold the righteousness of the Supreme Ruler of
the world, and the equity of his administration,
in the judgments which have been inflicted on
wicked nations — and the improbability, nay, the
impossibility, of men being ever restored to moral
order and happiness, without a more extensive
diffusion of the blessings of the gospel of peace,
and a more cordial acquiescence in the require
ments of the divine laws.

Such being some of the benefits to be derived
from history, it requires no additional arguments
to show, that this branch of knowledge should
occasionally form a subject of study to every in
telligent Christian. But in order to render the
study of history subservient to the interests of
religion, it is not enough merely to gratify our
curiosity and imagination, by "following out a
succession of memorable events, by tracing the
progress of armies and of battles, and listening
to the groans of the vanquished, and the shouts
of conquerors. This would be to study history
merely as skeptics, as atheists, or as writers of
novels. When we contemplate the facts which
tne historian presents to our view, we ought to

rai^e our eyes to Him who is the Governor
among the nations, u who doth according to his
will in the armies of heaven, and among the in
habitants of the earth," and who overrules the
jarring interests of mortals, for promoting the
prosperity of that kingdom which shall never be
moved. We should view the immoral propensi
ties and dispositions of mankind as portrayed in
the page of history, as evidences of the depravity
of our species, and as excitements to propagate,
with unremitting energy, the knowledge of that
religion, whose sublime doctrines and pure pre
cepts alone can counteract the stream of human
corruption, arid unite all nations in one harmoni
ous society. We should view the contests of
nations, and the results with which they are ac
companied, as guided by that invisible Hand,
which " mustereth the armies to the battle ;" and
should contemplate them either as the accom
plishment of divine predictions, as the inflictions
of retributive justice, as paving the wav for the
introduction of rational liberty and social happi
ness among men, or as ushering in that glorious
period, when " the knowledge of the Lord shall
cover the earth," and the nations shall learn war
no more.

Thus I have taken a very cursory survey of
some of those sciences which stand in a near
relation to the objects of religion ; and which
may, indeed, be considered as forming so many
of its subordinate branches. There are many
other departments of knowledge, which, at first
view, do not seem to have "any relation to theo
logical science ; and yet, on a closer inspection,
will be found to be essentially connected with the
several subjects of which I have been treating
For example — some may be apt to imagine that
arithmetic, geometry, trigonometry, and other
branches of mathematics, can have no relation
to the leading objects of religion. But if these
sciences had never been cultivated, the most im
portant discoveries of astronomy, geography3
natural philosophy, and chymistry, would never
have been made ; ships could not have been na
vigated across the ocean ; distant continents,
and the numerous " isles of the sea," would have
remained unexplored, and their inhabitants left
to grope in the darkness of heathenism ; and
most of those instruments and engines by which
the condition of the human race will be gradu
ally meliorated, and the influence of Christianity
extended, would never have been invented.
Such is the dependence of every branch of useful
knowledge upon another, that were any one por
tion of science, which has a practical tendency,
to be discarded, it would prevent, to a certain
degree, the improvement of every other. And,
consequently, if any one science can be shown
to have a connexion with religion, all the rest
must likewise stand in a certain relation to it.
It must, therefore, have a pernicious effect on the

114

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

minds of the mass of the Christian world, when
preachers, in their sermons, endeavour to under
value scientific knowledge, by attempting to con
trast it with the doctrines of revelation. It would
be just as reasonable to attempt to contrast the se
veral doctrines, duties, and facts recorded in the
New Testament with each other, in order to de-
ermine their relative importance, and to show
which of them might be altogether overlooked
and discarded. The series of facts and of divine
revelations comprised in the bible; the moral
and political events which diversify the history
of nations; and the physical operations that are
going on among the rolling worlds on high, and
in the chymical changes of the invisible atoms of
matter, are all parts of one comprehensive sys
tem, under the direction of the Eternal Mind ;
every portion of which must have a certain rela
tion to the whole.

And, therefore, instead of attempting to de
grade one part of the divine fabric in order to
enhance another, our duty is to take an expan
sive view of the whole, and to consider the
symmetry and proportion of its parts, and their
mutual bearings and relations — in so far as our
opportunities, and the limited faculties of our
minds, will permit.

If the remarks which have been thrown out in
this chapter, respecting the connexion of the
sciences with religion, have any foundation, it
will follow — that sermons, lectures, systems of
divinity, and religious periodical works, should
embrace occasional illustrations of such subjects,
for the purpose of expanding the conceptions of
professed Christians, and of enabling them to
taKe large and comprehensive views of the per

fections of the providence of the Almighty. It
is much to be regretted, that so many members
of the Christian church are absolute strangers
to such studies and contemplations ; while the
time and attention that might have been devoted
to such exercises, have, in many cases, been
usurped by the most grovelling affections, by
foolish pursuits, by gossiping chit-chat, and
slanderous conversation. Sha'l the most trifling
and absurd opinions of ancient and modern he
retics be judged worthy of attention, and occupy
a place in religious journals, and even in discus
sions from the pulpit, and shall " the mighty acts
of the Lord," and the visible wonders of his
power and wisdom, be thrown completely into
the shade ? To survey, with an eye of intelli
gence, the wide-extended theatre of the divine
operations — to mark the agency of the Eternal
Mind in every object we behold, and in every
movement within us and around us, are some of
the noblest attainments of the rational soul ; and,
in 'conjunction with every ether Christian study
and acquirement, are calculated to make " the
man of God perfect, and thoroughly furnished
unto every good work." By such studies, we
are. in some measure, assimilated to the angelic
tribes, whose powers of intellect are for ever
employed in such investigations — and are gra
dually prepared for bearing a part in their im
mortal hymn — " Great and marvellous are thy
works, Lord God Almighty ; just and true are
thy ways, thou King of saints. Thou art wor-
vhy to receive glory, and honour, and power ; for
thou hast created all things, and (or thy pleasure
they are and were created."

CHAPTER III.

THE RELATION WHICH THE INVENTIONS OP HUMAN ART BEAR TO THE OBJECTS
OF RELIGION.

IN this chapter, I shall briefly notice a few
philosophical and mechanical inventions which
nave an obvious bearing on religion, and on the
general propagation of Christianity among the
nations.

The first, and perhaps the most important, of
the inventions to which I allude, is the Art cf
Printing. This art appears to have been in
vented (at least in Europe) about the year 1430,
by one Laurentius, or Lawrence Koster, a native
of Haerlem, a town in Holland. As he was
waiking in a wood near the city, he began to cut
some letters upon the rind of a beach tree, which,
for the sake of gratifying his fancy, being im
pressed on paper, he printed one or two lines as
% specimen for his grandchildren to follow. This

having succeeded, he meditated greater things ;
and, first of all, invented a more glutinous writing
ink ; because he found the common ink sunk and
spread ; and thus formed whole pages of wood,
with letters cut upon them.* By the gradual

•I am aware, that the honour of this invention
has been claimed by other cities besides Haerlem,
particularly by Strasburg, and Mentx, a city of Ger
many ; and by other individuals besides Lanrentius,
chiefly by one Fust, commonly called Dr. Faustus ;
by Schoeffer, and by Gutenberg. It appears that the
art, with many of its implements, was stolen from
Laurentius by one of his servants, whom he had
bound, by an oath, to secrecy, who fled to Mentz,
and first commenced the process of printing in that
city. Here the art was improved by Fust and Schoef
fer, by their invention of metnttic, instead of wooden
types, which were first used. When Fust was in
Paris, disposing of some bibles he had printed, at

PRINTING' MARINER'S COMPASS.

improvement of this art, and its application to
the diffusion of knowledge, a new era was formed
in the annals of the human race, and in the pro
gress of science, religion, and morals. To it we
are chiefly indebted for our deliverance from ig
norance and error, and for most of those scien
tific discoveries and improvements in the arts
which distinguish the period in which we live.
Without its aid, the Reformation from Popery
could scarcely have been achieved ; for, had the
books of Luther, one of the first reformers, been
multiplied by the slow process of handwriting
and copying, they could never have been diffused
to any extent ; and the influence of bribery and
of power might have been sufficient to have ar
rested their progress, or even to have erased their
existence. But, being poured forth from the
press in thousands at a time, they spread over the
nations of Europe like an inundation, and with
a rapidity which neither the authority of princes,
nor the schemes of priests and cardinals, nor the
bulls of popes, could counteract or suspend. To
this noble invention it is owing that copies of the
bible have been multiplied to the extent of many
millions — that ten thousands of them are to be
found in every Protestant country — and that the

the low price (as was then thought) of sixty crowns,
the number and the uniformity of the copies he pos
sessed created universal agitation and astonish
ment. Informations were given to the police against
him as a magician, his lodgings were searched, and
a great number of copies being found, they were
• seized ; the red ink Avith which they were embel
lished was said to be his blood ; it was seriously
adjudged, that he was in league with the devil ; and
if he had not fled from the city, most probably he
would have shared the fate of those whom ignorant
And superstitious judges, at that time, condemned
for witchcraft. From this circumstance, let us learn
to beware how we view the inventions of genius,
and how we treat those whose ingenious- contri
vances may afterwards be the means of enlightening
and meliorating mankind. See Appendix, No. VII.
Various improvements have been made, of late
years, in the art of printing. That which has lately
been announced by Dr. Church of Boston, is the
most remarkable ; and, if found successful, will
carry this art to a high degree of perfection. A prin
cipal object of this improvement is, to print con
stantly from new types, which is effected by simpli
fying the process for casting and composing. The
type is delivered perfect by machinery, and laid as
it is cast, in separate compartments, with unerring
order and exactness. The composition is then ef
fected by other apparatus, directed by keys like
those of a piano-forte, and the type may then be ar
ranged in words and lines, as quickly as in the per
formance of notes in music. No error can arise
except from touching the wrong key: and hence an
expert hand will leave little labour for the re;vder.
It is then found less expensive under Dr. Church's
economical system of re-casting, to re-melt the types,
and re-cast them, than to perform the tedious opera
tion of distribution. The melting takes place with
out atmospheric exposure, by which oxydation and
waste of metal are avoided. It » calculated that
two men can produce 75,000 new types per hour, and
in re-composing, one man will perform as much as
three or four compositors. In the production of
types, the saving is ninety-nine parts in a hundred ;
and in the composition, distribution, and reading, is
three parts in four. In regard to press-work, Dr. C.
has invented a machine to work with plattens, in
stead of cylinders, from which he will be enabled to
take SO fine impressions per minute.
40

poorest individual who expresses a desiie for its
may be furnished with the vt word of life" which
will guide him to a blessed immortality. That
divine light which is destined to illuminate every
region of the globe, and to sanctify and reform
men of all nations, and kindreds, and tongues, is
accelerated in its movements, and directed in its
course through the nations, by the invention of
the art of printing ; and ere long it will distri
bute among the inhabitants of every land, the
" law and the testimony of the Most High,"
to guide their steps to the regions of eternal hliss.
In short, there is not a more powerful engine in
the hands of Providence, for diffusing the know
ledge of the nature and the will of the Deity,
and for accomplishing the grand objects of re
velation, than the art of multiplying books, and
of conveying intelligence through the medium of
the press. Were no such art in existence5 we
cannot conceive how an extensive and universal
propagation of the doctrines of revelation could
be effected, unless after the lapse of an indefinite
number of ages. But, with the assistance of
this invention, in its present improved state, the
island of Great Britain alone, within less than a
hundred years, could furnish a copy of the Scrip
tures to every inhabitant of the world, and would
defray the expense of such an undertaking, with
much more ease, and with a smaller sum, than
were necessary to furnish the political warfare in
which we were lately engaged.

These considerations teach us, that the in
genious inventions of the human mind are under
the direction and control of the Governor of the
world — are intimately connected with the ac
complishment of the plan of his providence, and
have a tendency, either directly or indirectly, to
promote, over every region of the earth, the pro
gress and extension of the kingdom of the Re
deemer. They also show us. from what small
beginnings the most magnificent operations of
the divine economy may derive their origin.
Who could have imagined that the simple cir
cumstance of a person amusing himself by cutting
a few letters on the bark of a tree, and impress
ing them on paper, was intimately connected
with the mental illumination of mankind ; and
that the art which sprung from this casual pro
cess was destined to be the principal means of
illuminating the nations, and of conveying to the
ends of the earth, "the salvation of our God 1*
But, " He who rules in the armies of heaven, and
among the inhabitants of the earth," and who sees
" the end from the beginning," overrules the most
minute movement of all his creatures, in subservi
ency to his ultimate designs, and shows himself,
in this respect, to be " wonderful in counsel, and
excellent in working."

The Mariner's Compass. — Another invention
which has an intimate relation to religion, is,
the art of Navigation, and the invention of the
Mariner's Compass. Navigation is the art oi

116

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

conducting a ship through the sea, from one port
to another. This art was partly known and
practised in the early ages of antiquity, by the
Phenicians, the Carthaginians, the Egyptians,
the Romans, and other nations of Europe and
Asia. But they had no guide to direct them in
their voyages, except the sun in the day-time,
and the stars by night. When the sky was over
cast with clouds, they were thrown into alarms,
and durst not venture to any great distance from
the coast, lest they should be carried forward in
a course opposite to that which they intended,
or be driven against hidden rocks, or unknown
shores. The danger and difficulty of the navi
gation of the ancients, on this account, may be
learned from the deliberations, the great prepa
rations, and the alarms of Homer's heroes, when
they were about to cross the Egean sea, an ex
tent of not more than 150 miles ; and the expe
dition of the Argonauts under Jason, across the
sea of Marmora and the Euxine, to the island
of Colchis, a distance of only four or five hun
dred miles, was viewed as a most wonderful ex
ploit, at which even the gods themselves were said
to be amazed. The same thing appears from the
narration we have in the Acts of the Apostles,
of Paul's voyage from Cesarea to Rome. —
" When," says Luke, " neither sun nor stars in
many days appeared, and no small tempests lay
on us, all hope that we should be saved was then
taken away." Being deprived of these guides,
they were tossed about in the Mediterranean, not
knowing whether they were carried to the north,
south, east, or west. So that the voyages of an
tiquity consisted chiefly in creeping along the
coast, and seldom venturing beyond sight of
land : they could not, therefore, extend their ex
cursions by sea to distant continents and nations ;
and hence, the greater portion of the terraqueous
globe and its inhabitaats were to them altogether
unknown. It was not before the invention of the
mariner's compass, that distant voyages could
be undertaken, that extensive oceans could be
traversed, and an intercourse carried on between
remote continents and the islands of the ocean.
It is somewhat uncertain at what precise pe
riod this noble discovery was made ; but it ap
pears pretty evident, that the mariner's compass
was not commonly used in navigation before the
year 1420, or only a few years before the inven
tion of printing.* Tho loadstone, in all ages,
was known to have the property of attracting
iron ; but its tendency to point towards the north
and south seems to have been unnoticed till the
beginning of the twelfth century. About that

• The invention of the compass is usually ascribed
to Falvlo Gioia, of Amalfi, in Campania, about the
year 1302 ; and the Italians are stienuous in support
ing this claim. Others affirm, that Marcus Paulus, a
Venetian, having made a journey to China, brought
back the invention with him in 1260. The French
also lay claim to the honour of this invention, from
Uie ciicumstance, that all nations distinguish the

time some curious persons seem to have amused
themselves by making to swim, in a basin of
water, a loadstone suspended on a piece of cork ;
and to have remarked, that, when left at liberty,
one of its extremities pointed to the north.
They had also remarked, that, when a piece of
iron is rubbed against the loadstone, it acquires
also the property of turning towards the north,
and of attracting needles and filings of iron.
From one experiment to another, they proceed
ed to lay a needle, touched with the magnet, on
two small bits of straw floating on the water
and to observe that the needle invariably turned
its point towards the north. The first use they
seem to have made of these experiments, was,
to impose upon simple people by the appear
ance of magic. For example, a hollow swan,
or the figure of a mermaid, was made to swirn
in a basin of water, and to follow a knife with a
bit of bread upon its point, which had been pre
viously rubbed on the loadstone. The experi
menter convinced them of his power, by com
manding, in this way, a needle laid on the sur
face of the water to turn its point from the north
to the east, or in any other direction. But some
geniuses, of more sublime and reflective powers
of mind, seizing upon these hints, at last applied
these experiments to the wants of navigation,
and constructed an instrument, by the help of
which the mariner can now direct his course to
distant lands, through the vast and pathless ocean.
In consequence of the discovery of this in
strument, the coasts of almost every land on the
surface of the globe have been explored, and a re
gular intercourse opened up between the remotest
regions of the earth. Without the help of this
noble invention, America, in all probability,
would never have been discovered by the eastern
nations — the vast continent of New-Holland —
the numerous and interesting islands in the In
dian and Pacific oceans — the isles of Japan, and
other immense terriiories inhabited by human
beings, would have remained as much unknown
and unexplored as if they had never existed
And as the nations of Europe and the western
parts of Asia were the sole depositories of the
records of revelation, they could never have
conveyed the blessings of salvation to remote
countries and to unknown tribes of mankind, of
whose existence they were entirely ignorant.
Even although the whole terraqueous globe had
been sketched out before them, in all its aspects
and bearings, and ramifications of islands, con
tinents, seas, and oceans, and the moral and po
litical state of every tribe of its inhabitants

north point of the card r>y a fleur-de-lis, and, with
equal reason, the English have laid claim to the same
honour, from the name compass, by which most na
tions have agreed to distinguish it. But whoever
were the inventors, or at whatever period this in
strument was first constructed, it does not nppeat
that it was brought into general use before the pe
riod mentioned in the text.

MARINER'S COMPASS— TELESCOPE.

117

displayed to view • without a guide to direct
their course through the billows of the ocean,
they could have afforded no light and no relief
to cheer the distant nations " who sit in darkness,
and in the shadow of death." Though the art
of printing had been invented ; though millions
of bibles were now prepared, adequate to the
supply of all the " kindreds of the heathen ;"
though ships in abundance were equipped for
the enterprise, and thousands of missionaries
ready to embark, and to devote their lives to the
instruction of the pagan world — all would be of
no avail, and the " salvation of God" could never
be proclaimed to the ends of the world, unless
they had a mariner's compass to guide their
course through the trackless ocean.

In this invention, then, we behold a proof of
the agency of Divine Providence, in directing
the efforts of human genius to subserve the most
important designs, and contemplate a striking
specimen of the " manifold wisdom of God."
When the pious and contemplative Israelite re
flected on the declaration of the prophets, that
" the glory of Jehovah would be revealed, and
that all flesh would see it together ;" — from the
state of the arts which then existed, he must
have felt many difficulties in forming a concep
tion of the manner in which such predictions
could be realized. " The great and wide sea,"
now termed the Mediterranean, formed the bound
ary of his view, beyond which he was unable to
penetrate. Of the continents, and " the isles
afar off," and of the far more spacious oceans
that lay between, he had no knowledge ; and how
" the ends of the earth" were to be reached, he
could form no conception ; and, in the midst of
his perplexing thoughts, he could find no satis
faction but in the firm belief, that " with God
all things are possible." But now we are ena
bled not only to contemplate the grand designs
of the divine e«onomy, but the principal means
bv which they shall all, in due time, be accom
plished, inconsequence of the progress of science
and art, and of their consecration to the rearing
and extension of the Christian church.

The two inventions to which I have now ad
verted, may perhaps be considered as among the
most striking instances of the connexion of hu
man art with the objects of religion. But there
are many other inventions, which, at first view,
do not appear to bear so near a relation to the
progress of Christianity, and yet have an ulti
mate reference to some of its grand and interest
ing objects.

The Telescope.— We might he apt to think,
on a slight view of the matter, that there can be
no immediate relation between the grinding and
polishing of an optic glass, and fitting two or
more of them in a tube, and the enlargement
of our views of the operation of the Eternal
Mind. Yet the connexion between these two
objects, and the dependence of the latter upon

the former, can be fairly demonstrated. The
son of a spectacle- maker of Middleburg in Hol
land, happening to amuse himself in his father's
shop, by holding two glasses between his finger
and his thumb, and varying their distance, per
ceived the weathercock of the church spire op
posite to him much larger than ordinary, and
apparently much nearer, and turned upside down.
This new wonder excited the amazement of the
father ; he adjusted two glasses on a board, ren
dering them moveable at pleasure ; and thus
formed the first rude imitation of a perspective
glass, by which distant objects are brought near
to view. Galileo, a philosopher of Tuscany,
hearing of the invention, set his mind to work,
in order to bring it to perfection. He fixed his
glasses at the end of long organ-pipes, and con
structed a telescope, which he soon directed to
different parts of the surrounding heavens. He
discovered four moons revolving around the pla
net Jupiter — spots on the surface of the sun, and
the rotation of that globe around its axis — moun
tains and valleys in the moon — and numbers of
fixed stars where scarcely one was visible to the
naked eye. These discoveries were made about
the year 1610, a short time after the first invention
of the telescope. Since that period this instru
ment has passed through various degrees of im
provement, and, by means of it, celestial won
ders have been explored in the distant spaces of
the universe, which, in former times, were alto
gether concealed from mortal view. By the help
of telescopes, combined with the art of measur
ing the distances and magnitudes of the heavenly
bodies, our views of the grandeur of the Almighty,
of the plenitude of his power, and of the extent
of his universal empire, are extended far beyond
what could have been conceived in former ages.
Our prospects of the range of the divine opera-
ions are no longer confined within the limits of
the world we inhabit ; we can now plainly per
ceive, that the kingdom of God is not only " an
everlasting dominion," but that it extends through
the unlimited regions of space, comprehending
within its vast circumference thousands of suns,
and tens of thousands of worlds, all ranged in
majestic order, at immense distances from one
another, and all supported and governed " by
Him who rides on the Heaven of heavens,"
whose greatness is unsearchable, and whose un
derstanding is infinite.

The telescope has also demonstrated to ua
the literal truth of those scriptural declarations
which assert that the stars are " innumerable."
Before the invention of this instrument, not
more than about two thousand stars could be
perceived by the unassisted eye in the clearest
night. But this invention has unfolded to view
not only thousands, but hundreds of thousands,
and millions, of thtfse bright luminaries, which
lie dispersed in every direction throughout the
boundless dimensions of space. And the higher

119

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

the magnifying powers of the telescope are, the
anore numerous those celestial orbs appear;
'eaving us no room to doubt, that countless
myriads more lie hid in the distant regions of
creation, far beyond the reach of the finest glasses
that can be constructed by human skill, and
which are known only to Him " who counts
the number of the stars, and calls them by their
names."

In short, the telescope may be considered as
serving the purpose of a vehicle for conveying
us to the distant regions of space. We would
consider it as a wonderful achievement, could
we transport ourselves two hundred thousand
miles from the earth, in the direction of the
moon, in order to take a nearer view of that
celestial orb. But this instrument enables us
to take a much nearer inspection of that planet,
than if we had actually surmounted the force of
gravitation, traversed the voids of space, and
left the earth 230,000 miles behind us. For,
supposing such a journey to be accomplished,
we should still be ten thousand miles distant
from that orb. But a telescope which magnifies
objects 240 times, can carry our views within
one thousand miles of the moon ; and a tele
scope, such as Dr. Herschel's 40 feet reflector,
which magnifies 6000 times, would enable us to
view the mountains and vales of the rnoon, as
if we were transported to a point about 40 miles
from her surface.* We can view the magnifi
cent system of the planet Saturn, by means of
this instrument, as distinctly, as if we had per
formed a journey eight hundred millions of miles
in the direction of that globe, which at the rate
of 50 miles an hour, would require a period of
more than eighteen hundred years to accomplish.
By the telescope, we can contemplate the region
of the fixed stars, their arrangement into sys
tems, and their immense numbers, with the
same distinctness and amplitude of view, as if

• Though the highest magnifying power of Dr.
Herschel's large telescope was estimated at six-
thousand times, yet it does not appear that the doc
tor ever applied this power with success, when
viewing the moon and the planets. The deficiency
of light, when using so high a power, would ren
der the view of these objects less satisfactory than
when viewed with a power of one or two thousand
times. Still, it is quite certain, that if any portions
of the moon's surface were viewed through an in-
gtrument of such a power, they would appear as
large, (but not nearly so bright and distinct) as if
we were placed about 40 miles distant from that
body. The enlargement of the angle of vision, in
this case, or, the apparent distance at which the
moon would be contemplated, is found by dividing
ttie moon's distance— 240,000 miles by 6000, the mag
nifying power of the telescope, which produces a
quotient of 40— the number of miles at which the
moon would appear to be placed from the eye of the
observer. Dr. Herschel appears to have used the
highest power of his telescopes, only, or chiefly,
when viewing some very minute objects in the re
gion of the stars. The powers he generally used,
and with which he made most of his discoveries
were, 227, 460, 754, 932, and occasionally 2010, 3)68,
and 6450, when inspecting double and triple stars,
and the more distant nebula;.

we had actually taken a flight of ten hundiea
thousand millions of miles into those unexplored
and unexplorable regions, which could not be
accomplished in several millions of years, though
our motion were as rapid as a ball projected from
a loaded cannon. We would justly considei it
as a noble endowment for enabling us to take an
extensive survey of the works of God, if we had
the faculty of transporting ourselves to such im
mense distances from the sphere we now occupy
but, by means of the telescopic tube, we may
take nearly the same ample views of the domi
nions of the Creator, without stirring a foot from
the limits of our terrestrial abode. This instru
ment may, therefore, be considered as a provi
dential gift, bestowed upon mankind, to serve,
in the mean time, as a temporary substitute for
those powers of rapid flight with which the
seraphim are endowed, and for those superior
faculties of motion with which man himself may
be invested, when he arrives at the summit ol
moral perfection.*

The Microscope. — The microscope is another
instrument constructed on similar principles,
which has greatly expanded our views of the
" manifold wisdom of God." This instrument,
which discovers to us small objects, invisible to
the naked eye, was invented soon after the
invention and improvement of the telescope. By
means of this optical contrivance, we peceive a
variety of wonders in almost every object in the
animal, the vegetable, and the mineral kingdoms.
We perceive that every particle of matter, how
ever minute, has a determinate form — that the
very scales of the skin of a haddock are all beauti
fully interwoven and variegated, like pieces of
net-work, which no art can imitate — that the
points of the prickles of vegetables, though mag
nified a thousand times, appear as sharp and
well polished as to the naked eye — that every
particle of the dust on the butterfly's wing is a
beautiful and regularly organized feather — that
every hair of our head is a hollow tube, with
bulbs and roots, furnished with a variety of
threads or filaments — and that the pores in our
skin, through which the sweat and perspiration
flow, are so numerous and minute, that a grain
of sand would cover a hundred and twenty-five
thousand of them. We perceive animated beings
in certain liquids, so small, that fifty thousand of
them would not equal the size of a mite ; and
yet each of these creatures is furnished with a
mouth, eyes, stomach, blood-vessels, and other
organs for the performance of animal functions.
In a stagnant pool which is covered with a
greenish scum during the summer months, every
drop of the water is found to be a world teeming
with thousands of inhabitants. The mouldy
substance which usually adheres to damp bodies
exhibits a forest of trees and plants, where the
branches, leaves, and fruit, can be plainly dis-
* See Appendix, Nfr v«j.

STEAM NAVIGATION.

119

tnguished. Tn a word, by this admirable instru
ment we behjld the same Almighty Hand which
/ounded the soacious globe on which we live,
and the huge masses of the planetary orbs, and
directs them in their rapid motions through the
sky, — employed, at the same moment, in round
ing and polishing ten thousand minute transpa
rent globes in the eye of a fly ; and boring and
arranging veins and arteries, and forming and
clasping joints and claws, for the movements of a
mite ! We thus learn the admirable and asto
nishing effects of the wisdom of God, and that
the divine care and benevolence are as much
displayed in the construction of the smallest
insect, as in the elephant or the whale, or in
those ponderous globes which roll around us in
the sky. These, and thousands of other views
which the microscope exhibits, would never have
been displayed to the human mind, had they not
been opened up by this admirable invention.

In fine, by means of the two instruments to
which I have now adverted, we behold Jeho
vah's empire extending to infinity on either
hand. By the telescope we are presented with
the most astonishing displays of his omnipotence,
in the immense number, the rapid motions, and
the inconceivable magnitudes of the celestiai
globes 5 and, by the microscope, we behold,
what is still more inconceivable, a display of his
unsearchable wisdom in the divine mechanism
by which a drop of water is peopled with myriads
of inhabitants — a fact which, were it not sub
ject to ocular demonstration, would far exceed
the limits of human conception or belief. We
have thus the most striking and sensible evi
dence, that, from the immeasurable luminaries
?f heaven, and from the loftiest seraph that
stands before the throne of God, down to this
'ower world, and to the smallest microscopic
animalcula that eludes the finest glass, He is
every where present, and, by his power, intel
ligence, and agency, animates, supports, and
directs the whole. Such views and contempla
tions naturally lead us to advert to the charac
ter of God as delineated by the sacred writers,
that " He is of great power, and mighty in
strength ;" that '< His understanding is infinite ;'
that " His works are wonderful ;" that " His
operations are unsearchable and past finding
out ;" and they must excite the devout mind to
join with fervour in the language of adoration

and praise.

When thy amazing works, O God !

My mental eye surveys,
"Transported with the view, I'm lost
In wonder, love, and praise."

Steam Navigation. — We might have been
apt to suppose that the chymical experiments
that were first made to demonstrate the force of
steam as a mechanical agent, could have little
relation to the objects of religion, or even to the
comfort of human life and society. Yet it has

now been applied to the impelling of ships and
large boats along rivers and seas, in opposition
to both wind and tide, and with a velocity
which, at an average, exceeds that of any other
conveyance. We have no reason to believe
that this invention has hitherto approximated to
a state of perfection ; it is yet in its infancy,
and may be susceptible of such improvements,
both in point of expedition and of safety, as may
render it the most comfortable and speedy con
veyance between distant lands, for transporting
the volume of inspiration and the heralds of the
gospel of peace to " the ends of the earth." By
the help of his compass the mariner is enabled
to steer his course in the midst of the ocean,
in the most cloudy days, and in the darkest
nights, and to transport his vessel from one end
of the world to another. It now only remains,
that navigation be rendered safe, uniform, and
expeditious, and not dependent on adverse
winds, or the currents of the ocean ; and, per
haps the art of propelling vessels by the force of
steam, when arrived at perfection, may effectu
ate those desirable purposes. Even at present,
as the invention now stands, were a vessel to be
fitted to encounter the waves of the Atlantic,
constructed of a proper figure and curvature,
having a proper disposition of her wheels, and
having such a description of fuel, as could be
easily stowed, and in sufficient quantity for the
voyage— at the rate of ten miles an hour, she
could pass from the shores of Britain to the
coast of America, in less than thirteen days ; —
and, even at eight miles an hour, the voyage
could be completed in little more than fifteen
days ; so that intelligence might pass and re-
pass between the eastern and western conti
nents within the space of a single month — a
space of time very little more than was requi
site, sixty years ago, for conveying intelligence
between Glasgow and London. The greatest
distance at which any two places on the globe
lie from each other, is about 12,500 miles ; and,
therefore, if a direct portion of water intervene
between them, this space could be traversed in
fifty-four or sixty days. And, if the isthmus of
Panama, which connects North and South
America, and the isthmus of Suez, which sepa
rates the Mediterranean from the Red sea,
were cut into wide and deep canals, (which we
have no doubt will be accomplished as soon as
civilized nations have access to perform opera
tions in those territories,) every country in the
world could then be reached from Europe, in
nearly a direct line, or at most by a gentle
curve, instead of the long, and dangerous, and
circuitous route which must now be taken, in sail
ing for the eastern parts of Asia, and tho north
western shores of America. By this means,
eight or nine thousand miles of sailing would be
saved in a voyage from England to Nootka
sound, or the peninsula of California; and

120

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

more than six thousand miles, in passing from
London to Bombay in the East Indies ; and
t'ew places on the earth would be farther distant
from each other by water than 15,000 miles ;
which space might be traversed, at the rate
mentioned above, in a period of from sixty-two
to si-venty-seven days.*

But we have reason to believe, that when this
invention, combined with other mechanical as
sistances, shall approximate nearer to perfection,
a much more rapid rate of motion will be ef-
rected ; and the advantages of this, in a religious
as well as in a commercial point of view, may
be easily appreciated, especially at the present
period, when the Christian world, now aroused
from their slumbers, have formed the grand de
sign of sending a bible to every inhabitant of
the globe. When the empire of the prince of
darkness shall be shaken throughout all its de
pendencies, and the nations aroused to inquire
after light, and liberty, and divine knowledge —
intelligence would thus be rapidly communicated
over every region, and between the most distant
tribes. "Many would run to and fro, and
knowledge would be increased." The ambassa
dors of the Redeemer, with the oracles of heaven
in their hands, and the words of salvation in their
mouths, would quickly be transported to every
clime, " having the everlasting gospel to preach
to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and
people.'''

Air Balloons. — Similar remarks may be ap
plied to the invention of Air Balloons. We
have heard of some pious people who have
mourned over such inventions, and lamented the
folly of mankind in studying their construction,
and witnessing their exhibition. S\ich disposi
tions generally proceed from a narrow range of
thought, and a contracted view of the divine eco
nomy and arrangements in the work of redemp
tion. Though the perversity of mankind has
often applied useful inventions to foolish, and
even to vicious purposes, yet this forms no rea
son why such inventions should be decried;
otherwise the art of printing, and many other
useful arts, might be regarded as inimical to the
human race. We have reason to believe that
air balloons may yet be brought to such perfec
tion, as to be applied to purposes highly benefi
cial to the progress of the human mind, and sub
servient, in some degree, for effecting the pur
poses of providence in the enlightening and
renovation of mankind. For this purpose, it is
only requisite that some contrivance, on chymi-
caf or mechanical principles, be suggested, ana
logous to the sails or rudder of a ship, by which
they may be moved in any direction, without
being directed solely bv the course of the wind ;
and, there can be little doubt that such a contriv
ance is possible to be effected. It requires only
tuitable encouragement to be given to ingenious
• See Appendix, No IX.

experimental philosophers, and a sufficient sun
of money to enable them to prosecute their ex
periments on an extensive scale. To the want
of such prerequisites, it is chiefly owing, that
the hints on this subject, hitherto suggested, have
either failed of success or have never been car
ried into execution. A more simple and expe
ditious process for filling balloons has lately been
effected — the use of the parachute, by which a
person may detach himself from the balloon, and
descend to the earth, has been successfully tried,
— the lightning of heaven has been drawn from
the clouds, and forced to act as a mechanical
power in splitting immense stones to pieces,
— the atmosphere has been analyzed into its
component parts, and the wonderful properties of
the ingredients of which it is composed exhibited
in their separate state : and why, then, should
we consider it as at all improbable that the means
of producing a horizontal direction in aerial na
vigation may soon be discovered? Were this
object once effected, balloons might be applied
to the purpose of surveying and exploring coun
tries hitherto inaccessible, and of conveying the
messengers of divine mercy to tribes of our fel
low men, whose existence is as yet unknown.

We are certain that every portion of the in
habited world must be thoroughly explored, and
its inhabitants visited, before the salvation of
God can be carried fully into effect ; and, for
the purpose of such explorations, we must, of
course, resort to the inventions of human genius
in art and science. Numerous tribes of the
sons of Adam are, doubtless, residing in regions
of the earth with which we have no acquaintance,
and to which we have no access by any of the
modes of conveyance presently in use. More
than one-half of the interior parts of Africa ana
Asia, and even of America, are wholly unknown
to the inhabitants of the civilized world. The
vast regions of Chinese Tartary, Thibet, Siberia,
and the adjacent districts ; almost the whole
interior of Africa, and the continent of New
Holland — the extensive isles of Borneo, Suma
tra, New Guinea, and Japan, the territory ci
the Amazons, and the internal parts of North
America, remain, for the most part, unknown and
unexplored. The lofty and impassable ranges
of mountains, and the deep and rapid rivers,
which intervene between us and many of those
regions, together with the savage and plundering
hordes of men, and the tribes of ravenous beasts,
through which the traveller must push his way,
present to European adventurers barriers which
they cannot expect to surmount by the ordinary
modes of conveyance, for a lapse of ages. But
by balloons constructed with an apparatus for
directing their motions, all such obstructions
would at once be surmounted. The most im
penetrable regions, now hemmed in by streams
and marshes, and lofty mountains, and a barba
rous population, would be quickly laid open

AIR BALLOONS.

121

Rnd cities and nations, lakes and rivers, and
fertile plains, to which we are now entire stran
gers, would soon burst upon the view. And the
very circumstance, that the messengers of peace
and salvation descended upon such unknown
tribes from the regions of the clouds, might arouse
their minds, and excite their attention and regard
to the message of divine mercy which they
came thither to proclaim.* Such a scene (and
it may probably be realized-) would present a
literal fulfilment of the prediction of " angels
flying through the midst of" the aerial " heaven,
having the everlasting gospel to preach to them
that dwell upon the earth, and to every kindred
and nation."

That the attention of the philosophical world
is presently directed to this subject, and that we
have some prospect of the views above suggested
being soon realized, will appear from the follow
ing notice, which lately made its appearance in
the London scientific journals : — " A prize being
offered for the discovery of a horizontal direction
in aerostation, M. Mingreli of Bologna, M.
Pietripoii of Venice, and M. Lember of Nu
remberg, have each assumed the merit of resolv
ing this problem. It does not appear that any
one of these has come forward to establish, by
practical experiment, the validity of his claim ;
but a pamphlet has lately been reprinted at
Paris (first printed at Vienna) on this subject,
addressed to all the learned societies in Europe.
The following passage appears in the work : —
" Professor Robertson proposes to construct an

• In this point of view, we cannot but feel the
most poignant regret at the conduct of the Spaniards,
after the discovery of America, towards the natives
of that country. When those untutored people be
held the ships which had conveyed Columbus and
his associates from the eastern world, the dresses
tnd martial order of his troops, and heard their
music, and the thunder of their cannon, they were
filled with astonishment and wonder at the strange
objects presented to their view ; they fell prostrate
at their feet, and viewed them as a superior race of
men. When Cortes afterwards entered the territo
ries of Mexico, the same sentiments of reverence and
admiration seemed to pervade its inhabitants. Had
'jure Christian motives actuated the minds of these
adventurers, and had it been their ruling desire to
communicate to those ignorant tribes the blessings
of the gospel of peace, and to administer to their
external comfort, the circumstances now stated
would have been highly favourable to the success of
missionary exertion, and would have led them to
"Isten with attention to the message from heaven.
But, unfortunately for the cause of religion, trea
chery, lust, cruelty, selfishness, ami the cursed love of
gold, predominated over every other feeling, affixed
s. stigma to the Christian name, and rendered them
curses instead of blessings, to that newly-discover
ed race of men. It is most earnestly to be wished,
that, in future expeditions in quest of unknown
tribes, a few intelligent and philanthropic missiona
ries may be appointed to direct the adventurers in
their moral conduct and intercourse with the peo
ple they visit, in order that nothing inconsistent
with Christian principle make its appearance. The
uniform manifestation of Christian benevolence,
purity, and rectitude, by a superior race of men,
would win the affections of a rude people far more
aflectually than all the pomp and ensigns of mili
tary i»rade.

10

aerostatic machine, 150 feet in diameter, to be
capable of raising 72,954 kilograms, equivalent
to 149,037 Ibs. weight, (French,) to be capa
ble of conveying all the necessaries for the sup
port of sixty individuals, scientific character*,
to be selected by the academicians, and the
aerial navigations to last for some months,
exploring different heights and climates, &c. in
all seasons. If, from accident, or wear, the ma
chine, elevated above the ocean, should fail in
its functions, to be furnished with a ship that
will ensure the return of the aeronauts."

Should any one be disposed to insinuate, that
the views now stated on this subject are chime
rical and fallacious, I beg leave to remind them,
that, not more than twenty years ago, the idea
of a large vessel, without oars and sails, to be
navigated against the wind, with the rapidity of
ten miles an hour, would have been considered
as next to an impossibility, and a mere fanciful
scheme, which could never be realized. Yet we
now behold such vehicles transporting whole vil
lages to the places of their destination, with a
degree of ease, comfort, and expedition, formerly
unknown. And little more than forty years have
elapsed, since it would have been viewed as still
more chimerical to havj broached the idea, that
a machine might be constructed, by which hu
man beings might ascend more than two miles
above the surface of the earth, and fly through
the region of the clouds at the rate of seventy
miles an hour, carrying along with them books,
instruments, and provisions. Yet both these
schemes have been fully realized, and, like many
other inventions of the human intellect, are
doubtless intended to subserve some important
ends in the economy of divine providence. f

t Balloons were first constructed in the year 1783,
by Messrs. S. and J. Mongolfier, paper manufactu
rers at Annonay, in France. A sheep, a cock, and
a duck, were the first animals ever carried up into
the air by these vehicles. At the end of their jour
ney, they were found perfectly safe and. unhurt, and
the sheep was even feeding at perfect ease. The
first human being who ascended into the atmosphere
in one of these machines, was M. Pilatrede Rozier.
This adventurer ascended from amidst an astonished
multitude assembled in a garden in Paris, on the 15th
October, 1783, in a balloon, whose diameter was 48
feet, and its height about 74 : and remained sus
pended above the city about four hours. Mr. Lu-
nardi, an Italian, soon after, astonished the people
of England and Scotland, by his aerial excursions.
Dr. G. Gregory gives the following account of his
ascent:-"! was myself a spectator of the flight of
Lunardi, and I never was present at a sight so inte
resting and sublime. The beauty of the gradual
ascent united with a sentiment of terror, on account
of the danger of the man, and the novelty and gran
deur of the whole appearance, are more than words
can express. A delicate woman was so overcome
with the spectacle, that she died upon the spot, as
the balloon ascended ; several fainted ; and the silent
admiration of the anxious multitude was beyond any
thing I had ever beheld."

Balloons have been generally made of varnished
silk and of the shape of a globe or a spheroid, from
thirty to fifty feet in diameter. They are filled with
hydrogen §a«, which, as formerly stated, is from
twelve to fifteen times lighter than common air

22

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER,

Acoustic Tunnels. — By means of the inven
tions just now adverted to, when brought toper-
lection, mankind may be enabled to transport
themselves to every region of the globe, with a
much greater degree of rapidity that has hitherto
been attained. By the help of the microscope,
we are enabled to contemplate the invisible
worlds of life, and by the telescope we can pe
netrate intc regions far beyond the range of the
unassisted eye. By the arts of writing and
printing, we can communicate our sentiments,
after a certain lapse of time, to every quarter of
the world. In the progress of human knowledge
and improvement, it would obviously be of con
siderable importance, could we extend the range
of the human voice, and communicate intelligence
to the distance of a thousand miles, in the course
of two or three hours ; or could we hold an
occasional conversation with a friend at the dis
tance of 20 or 30 miles. From the experiments
which have been lately made, in reference to the
conveyance of sound, we have some reason to
believe, that such objects may not be altogether
unattainable. It has been long known, that
wood is a good conductor of sound. If a watch
be laid on the end of a long beam of timber, its
beating will be distinctly heard, on applying the
ear to the other end, though it could not be heard
at the same distance through the air. In " Ni
cholson's Philosophical Journal" for February,
1803, Mr. E. Walker describes a simple appa
ratus, connected with a speaking trumpet, by
means of which, at the distance of 17$ feet, he
held a conversation with another in whispers, too
low to be heard through the air at that distance.
When the ear was placed in a certain position,
the words were heard as if they had been spoken
by an invisible being within the trumpet. And
what rendered the deception still more pleasing,
the words were more distinct, softer, and more
musical, than if they had been spoken through
the air.

About the year 1750, a merchant of Cleves,
named Jorisen, who had become almost totally
deaf, sitting one day near a harpsichord, while
some one was playing, and having a tobacco-
pipe in his mouth, the bowl of which rested acci
dentally against the body of the instrument, he
was agreeably and unexpectedly surprised to
hear all the notes in the most distinct manner.
By a little reflection and practice, he again ob-

and they rise into the atmosphere, on the same prin
ciple as a piece of cork ascends from the bottom of
a pail of water. The aerial travellers are seated in
a basket below the balloon, which is attached to it
by means of cords. The parachute is an invention,
by which the voyager, in cases of alarm, may be
enabled to desert his balloon in mid-air, and descend,
without injury, to the ground. They resemble an
umbrella, but are of far greater extent. With one
jf these contrivances, twenty-three feet in diameter,
M. Garnerin, having detached himself from h.s t-a.»
oon, descended from a height of more than 4000 feet,
and Ian led without shock or accident.

tained the use of this valuable sense ; for he soo»
learned, by means of a piece of hard wood, one
end of which he placed against his teeth, while
another person placed the other end on his teeth,
to keep up a conversation, and to be able to un
derstand the least whisper. In this way, two
persons who have stopped their ears may con
verse with each other, when they hold a long
stick or a series of sticks between their teeth, or
rest their teeth against them. The effect is the
same, if the person who speaks rests the stick
against his throat, or his breast, or when one
rests the stick which he holds in his teeth against
some vessel into which the other speaks ; and
the effect will be greater, the more the vessel is
capable of tremulous motion. These experi
ments demonstrate the facility with which the
softest whispers may be transmitted. Water
also is found to be a good conductor of sound.
Dr. Franklin assures us, that he has heard under
water, at the distance of half a mile, the sound
of two stones struck against each other. It has
been also observed, that the velocity of sound is
much greater in solid bodies, than in the air.
By a series of experiments, instituted for the
purpose of determining this point, Mr. Chladni
found that the velocity of sound, in certain solid
bodies, is 16 or 17 times as great as in air.

But what has a more particular bearing on the
object hinted at above, is, the experiments lately
made by M. Biot, " on the transmission of sound
through solid bodies, and through air, in very
long tubes." These experiments were made by
means of long cylindrical pipes, which were
constructing for conduits and aqueducts, to em
bellish the city of Paris. With regard to the
velocity of sound, it was ascertained that " its
transmission through cast iron is 10$ times as
quick as through air." The pipes by which he
wished to ascertain at what distance sounds are
audible, were 1,039 yards, or nearly five furlongs,
in length. M. Biot was stationed at the one end
of this series of pipes, and Mr. Martin, a gen
tleman who assisted in the experiments, at the
other. They heard the iowest voice, so as per
fectly to distinguish the words, and to keep up
a conversation on all the subjects of the experi
ments. " I wished," says M. Biot, " to deter
mine the point at which the human voice ceases
to be audible, but could not accomplish it : words
spoken as low as when we whisper a secret in
another's ear, were heard and understood ; so that
not to be heard, there was but one resource, that
of not speaking at all. This mode of conversing
with an invisible neighbour is so singular, that
we cannot help being surprised, even though
acquainted with the cause. Between a question
and answer, the interval was not greater thar
was necessary for the transmission of sound.
For Mr. Martin and me, at the distance of 1,039
yards, the time was about 5j seconds." Re-
ports of a pisto, fired at one end, occasioned

ACOUSTIC TUNNELS.

123

considerable explosion at the other. The air
was driven out of the pipe with sufficient force
to give the hand a smart blow, to drive light sub
stances out of it to the distance of half a yard,
and to extinguish a candle, though it was 1,039
yards distant from the place where the pistol was
fired. A detailed account of these experiments
may be seen in Nicholson's Phil. Jour, for Oc
tober, 1811. Don Gautier, the inventor of the
telegraph, suggested also the method of convey
ing articulate sounds to a great distance. He
proposed tobuilH horizontal tunnels, widening at
the remoter extremity, and found that at the
distance of 400 fathoms, or nearly half a mile,
the ticking of a watch could be heard far better
than close to the ear. He calculated that a se
ries of such tunnels would convey a message
900 miles in an hour,

From the experiments now stated, it appears
highly probable, that sounds may be conveyed to
an indefinite distance. If one man can converse
with another at the distance of nearly three
quarters of a mile, by means of the softest whis
per, there is every reason to believe, that they
could hold a conversation at the distance of 30
or 40 miles, provided the requisite tunnels were
constructed for this purpose. The latter case
does not appear more wonderful than the former.
Were this point fully determined, by experiments
conducted on a more extensive scale, a variety
of interesting effects would follow, from a prac
tical application of the results. A person at one
end of a large city, at an appointed hour, might
communicate a message, or hold a conversation
with his friend, at another ; friends in neigh
bouring, or even in distant towns, might hold an
occasional correspondence by articulate sounds,
and recognize each other's identity by their
tones of voice. In the case of sickness, acci
dent, or death, intelligence could thus be commu
nicated, and the tender sympathy of friends in
stantly exchanged. A clergyman sitting in his
own room in Edinburgh, were it at any time
expedient, might address a congregation in
Musselburgh or Dalkeith, or even in Glasgow.
He might preach the same sermon to his own
church, and the next hour to an assembly at forty
miles distant. And surely there could be no va
lid objection to trying the effect of an invisible
preacher on a Christian audience. On similar
principles, an apparatus might be constructed for
augmenting the strength of the human voice, so
as to make it extend its force to an assembled
multitude, composed of fifty or a hundred thou
sand individuals ; and the utility of such a power,
when the mass of mankind are once thoroughly
aroused to attend to rational and religious in
struction, may be easily conceived. In short,
intelligence respecting every important discove
ry, occurence, and event, might thus be commu
nicated, through the extent of a whole kingdom,
within the space of an hour after it had taken place.

Let none imagine that such a project is either
chimerical or impossible. M. Biot's experiment
is decisive, so far as it goes, that the softest
whisper, without any diminution of its intensity,
may be communicated to the distance of nearly
three quarters of a mile; and there is nothing
but actual experiment wanting to convince us,
that the ordinary tones of the human voice may
be conveyed to at least twenty times that dis
tance. We are just now acting on a similar
principle, in distributing illumination through
large cities. Not thirty years ago, the idea of
lighting our apartments by an invisible substance,
produced at ten miles' distance, would have been
considered as chimerical, and as impossible to
be realized, as the idea of two persons convers
ing together, by articulate sounds, at such a dis
tance. It appears no more wonderful, that we
should be able to hear at the distance of five or
six miles, than that we should be enabled to sec
objects at that distance by the telescope, as dis
tinctly as if we were within a few yards of them.
Both are the effects of those principles and laws
which the Creator has interwoven with the sys
tem of the material world ; and when man has
discovered the mode of their operation, it re
mains with himself to apply them to his necessi
ties. What the telescope is to the eye, acoustic
tunnels would be to the ear ; and thus, those
senses on which our improvement in knowledge
and enjoyment chiefly depends, would be gra
dually carried to the utmost perfection of which
our station on earth will permit. And, as to
the expense of constructing such communications
for sound, the tenth part of the millions of money
expended in the twenty-two years' war in which
we were lately engaged, would, in all probability,
be more than sufficient for distributing them, in
numerous ramification, through the whole island
of Great Britain. Even although such a project
were partially to fail of success, it would be a
far more honourable and useful national under
taking, than that which now occupies the atten
tion of the despots on the continent of Europe,
and might be accomplished with far less expen
diture, either of blood or of money. Less than
the fourth part of a million of pounds would be
sufficient for trying an experiment of this kind,
on an extensive scale ; and such a sum is con
sidered as a mere item, when fleets and armies
are to be equipped for carrying destruction
through sea and land. When will the war mad
ness cease its rage ! When will men desist
from the work of destruction, and employ their
energies and their treasures in the cause of hu
man improvement ! The most chimerical pro
jects that were ever suggested by the most en
thusiastic visionary, are not half so ridiculous,
and degrading to the character of man, as those
ambitious and despotic schemes, in which the
powers of the earth in all ages have been chiefly
engaged. But on this topic it is needless to

124

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

enlarge, till more extended experiments shall
have been undertaken.

In the preceding sketches I have presented a
few specimens of the relation which the inven
tions of human ingenuity bear to religious ob
jects I intended to have traced the same
relation in several other instances ; in the inven
tion of the electrical machine, the air-pump,
mills, clocks and watches, gas-lights, chymical
fumigations, inventions for enabling us to walk
upon the water, to prevent and alleviate the dan
gers of shipwreck, &c. &c. But, as my pre
scribed limits will not permit farther enlarge
ment, I trust that what has been already stated
will be sufficient to establish and illustrate my
general position. From this subject we may
learn —

1st. That the various processes of art, and
the exertions of human ingenuity, are under the
special direction of Him who arranges all things
" according to the counsel of his will." As
" the king's heart is in the hand of the Lord,
and, as the rivers of waters, he turns it whither
soever he pleases," so all the varied schemes
and movements of the human mind, the disco
veries of science, and the diversified experi
ments of mechanics, chymists, and philosophers,
are directed in such channels as may issue in
the accomplishment of His eternal purposes, in
respect to the present and future condition of
the inhabitants of our world. This truth is also
plainly taught us in the records of inspiration.
" Doth the ploughman plough all day to sow ?
Doth he open and break the clods of his ground ?
When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth
he not cast abroad the fitches, and /scatter the
cummin,* and cast in the wheat in the principal
[place,] and the barley in the appointed place,
and the rye in its proper place ? For his God
doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach
him. This also cometh forth from the Lord of
hosts, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent
in working." Agriculture has, by most nations,
been attributed to the suggestions of Deitv ; for
" every good and perfect gift cotneth down from
the Father of lights." It is he who hath taught
men to dig from the bowels of the earth iron,
copper, lead, silver, and gold, and to apply them
to useful purposes in social life; and who hath
given them "wisdom and understanding" to
apply the animal and vegetable productions of
nature to the manufacture of cloths, linen, mus
lin, and silk, for the use and ornament of man."
For "all things are of God." "Both riches
and honour come from him, and he reigneth over
all, and in his hand is power and might; and in
his hand it is to make great, and to give strength
to all." When the frame of the Mosaic ta
bernacle and all its curious vessels were to be

• Pitches is a kind of seed frequently sown in
Judea, for the use of cattle : and cummin is the seed
*f a plant somewhat like fennel.

constructed, the mind of Bezaleel "was fiiieo
with the spirit of God, in wisdom and undei-
standing, and in knowledge, and in all manner
of workmanship, to devise curious works in
gold, and in silver, and in brass." And, when
the fabric of the New Testament church is to
be reared, and its boundaries extended, arti
ficers of every description, adequate for carrying
on the different parts of the work are raised
up, and inspired with the spirit of their respective
departments — some with the spirit, of writing,
printing, and publishing ; some with the spiri*
of preaching, lecturing, and catechising; some
with the spirit of fortitude, to make bold and
daring adventures into distant and barbarous
climes; and others with the spirit of literature,
of science, and of the mechanical arts — all act
ing as pioneers " to prepare the way of the
Lord," and as builders for carrying forward
and completing the fabric of the Christian
church.

2dly. All the mechanical contrivances to
which I have adverted, all the discoveries of
science, and all the useful inventions of genius
which may hereafter be exhibited, ought to be
viewed as preparing the way for the millennial
era of the church, and as having a certain ten
dency to the melioration of the external condi
tion of mankind during its continuance. We
are certain, from the very nature of things, as
well as from scriptural predictions, that, when
this period advances towards the summit of its
glory, the external circumstances of this world's
population will be comfortable, prosperous, and
greatly meliorated beyond what they have ever
been in the ages that are past. " Then shall the
earth yield her increase, and God, even our own
God, shall bless us. Then shall he give the rain
of thy seed, that thou shalt sow thy ground with
al; and bread of the increase of the earth ; and
it shall be fat and plenteous. In that day shall thy
cattle feed in large pastures ; the oxen likewise
and the young asses that ear the ground shall eat
savoury provender, which hath been winnowed
with the shovel and with the fan. And ihe in
habitants shall not say, I am sick. They shall
build houses and inhabit them, and plant vine
yards, and eat the fruit of them. They shall
not build, an i another inhabit; they shall not
plant, and another eat ; for as the days of a tree
are the days of my people, aiid mine elect shall
long enjny the work of their hands. They sha!\
not labour in vain, nor bring forih for trouble;
for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord,
and their offspring with them. Th* ifeii shall
be prosperous, the vine shall give her fruit, and
the ground shall give her increase, and the hea
vens shall give their dew ; the evil beasts shall
cease out of the land, and they shall sit every
man under his vine, and under his fiii-tree, and
none shall make him afraid ; for wars shall cease
to the ends of the world, and the knowledge of the

MILLENNIAL ERA.

125

Lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover
the sea."* Diseases will be, in a great mea
sure, banished from the world, and the life of
man extended far beyond its present duration
—agriculture will be brought to perfection —
commodious habitations erected for the com
fortable accommodation of all ranks — cities built
on elegant and spacious plans, adapted to health,
ornament, and pleasure; divested of all the filth,
and darkness, and gloom, and narrow lanes, which
now disgrace the abodes of men — roads will be
constructed on improved principles, with com
fortable means of retreat for shelter and accom
modation at all seasons ; and conveyances in
vented for the ease, and safety, and rapid con
veyance of persons and property from one place
to another. Either the climates of the earth will
be meliorated, by the universal cultivation of the
soil, so that storms am! tempests, thunders and
lightnings, shall no longer produce their present
ravages , or chymical and mechanical contrivan
ces will be invented to ward off their destructive
effects. The landscape of the earth will be
adorned with vegetable and architectural beauty ;
and, instead of horse-racing, demoralizing plays,
routs and masquerades, boxing and bull-baits —
artificial displays of scenery will be exhibited,
more congenial to the dignity of rational, reno
vated, and immortal minds. For " the knowlege
of the Lord," and the " beauties of holiness,"
will pervade men of all ranks and ages, " from
the least even to the greatest."!

Now, as we have no reason to expect any
miraculous interference, we must regard the past
and the future useful inventions of philosophy
and mechanics, as having a bearing on this glo
rious period, and a tendency to promote the im
provement and the felicity of those who shall

• Psalm Ixvii. Isaiah xxx. 23, 24, xxxiii. 24. Ixv.
21, 23, &c-

t The various circumstances above stated may be
considered as the natural results of a state of society
on which the light of science and of revelation has
diffused its full influence, and where the active
powers of the human mind are invariably directed
by the pure principles and precepts of Christianity.
That the duration of human life, at the era referred
to, will be extended beyond its present boundary,
appears to be intimated in some of the passages
above quoted particularly the following—" As the
days of a tree shall be the days of my people, and
mine elect sha.ll Ion? enjoy the work of their hands."
And, if the life of man will be thus protracted to an
indefinite period, it will follow, that those diseases
which now prey upon the human frame, and cut
short its vital action, will be in a great measure ex
tirpated. Both these effects may be viewed (with
out supposing any miraculous interference) as the
natural consequence of that happiness and equa
nimity of mind which will flow from the practice of
Christian virtues, from the enlargement of our
knowledge of the principles of nature, and from the
physical enjoyments which sue U a state of society
will furnish

live during this era of Messiah's reign. If dis
eases are to be generally abolished, it will be
owing to the researches of the scientific physi
cian in discovering certain antidotes against
every disorder, and to the practice of temperance,
meekness, equanimity of mind, and every other
mean of preserving the vigour of the animal
frame. If the earth is to produce its treasures
in abundance, and with little labour, it will be,
owing in part to the improvement of agricultural
science and of the instruments by which its ope
rations are conducted. If the lightnings of
heaven shall no longer prove destructive to man
and to the labours of his hands, it will be effect
ed either by machinery for drawing off the
electricity of a stormy cloud, or by the invention
of thunder-guards, which shall afford a complete
protection from its ravages. In these, and nu
merous other instances, the inventions of men,
under the guidance of the Spirit of wisdom, will
have a tendency to remove a great part of the
curse which has so long hung over our sinful
world. And since the inventions of human skill
and ingenuity for the melioration of mankind,
and for the swift conveyance of intelligence,
have, of late years, been rapidly increasing, at
the same time when the Christian world is roused
to increased exertions in disseminating the
Scriptures throughout all lands, when general
knowledge is increasingly diffused, and when the
fabric of superstition and despotism is shaking
to its foundations — these combined and simul
taneous movements seem plainly to indicate,
that that auspicious era is fast hastening on,
when " the glory cf Jehovah shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together," when " right
eousness and praise shall spring forth before all
nations," and when "holiness to the Lord"
shall be inscribed on all the pursuits, and imple
ments, and employments of men.

Lastly, — If the remarks suggested above be
well founded, wo may conclude, that the me
chanical and philosophical inventions of genius
are worthy of the attentive consideration of the
enlightened Christian, particularly in the rela
tion they may have, to the accomplishment of
religious objects. He should contemplate the
experiments of scientific men, not as a waste of
lime, or the mere gratification of an idle curi
osity, but as imbodying the germs of those im
provements, by which civilization, domestic
comfort, knowledge, and moral principle may
be diffused among the nations. To view such
objects with apathy and indifference, as beneath
the regard of a religious character, argues a
weak and limited understanding, und a contract-
ed vie-v of the grand operations of a superin
tending Providence.

126

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

CHAPTER IV.

SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINES AND FACTS ILLUSTRATED FROM THE SYSTEM OF NATURE."

WITHOUT spending time in any introductory
observations on this subject, it may bo remarked
in general,

I. — That scientific knowledge, or an acquaintance
with the system of nature, may frequently
serve as a guide to the true interpretation of
Scripture.

It may be laid down as a universal principle,
that there can be no real discrepancy between
a just interpretation of Scripture and the facts
of physical science ; and on this principle, the
following canon is founded, which may be con
sidered as an infallible rule for Scripture inter
pretation, namely, — That no interpretation of
Scripture ought to be admitted which is inconns-
tent with any well-authenticated facts in the ma
terial world. By well-authenticated facts, I do
not mean the theories of philosophers, or the
deductions they may have drawn from them, nor
the confident assertions or plausible reasonings
of scientific men in support of any prevailing
system of <iatural science ; but those facts which
are universally admitted, and the reality of
which every scientific inquirer has it in his power
to ascertain : such as that the earth is not an ex
tended plane, but a round or globular body, and
that the rays of the sun, when converged to a focus
by a large convex glass, will set fire to combus
tible substances. Such facts, when ascertained,
ought to be considered as a revelation from God,
as well as the declarations of his word. For
they make known to us a portion of his charac
ter, of his plans and his operations. — This rule
may be otherwise expressed as follows : — Where
a passage of Scripture is of doubtful meaning, or
capable of different interpretations, that interpreta
tion ought to be preferred which will best agree
with the established discoveries of science. For
since the Author of revelation and the Author of
universal nature is one and the same infinite
being, — there must exist a complete hartnony be
tween the revelations of his word, and the facts or
relations which are observed in the material uni
verse. To suppose the contrary, would be to

* Under this head, it was originally intended to
embrace an elucidation of a considerable variety of
the facts recorded in sacred history, and of the
allusions of the inspired writers to the system of
feature ; but as the volume has already swelled be
yond the limits proposed, I am reluctantly compelled
to confine myself to the illustration of only two or
three topics

suppose the Almighty capable of inconsistency
a supposition which would go far to shake our
confidence in the theology of nature, as well as
of revelation. If, in any one instance, a record
claiming to be a revelation from heaven were
found to contradict a well-known fact in the
material world ; if, for example, it asserted, in
express terms, to be literally understood, that the
earth is a quiescent body in the centre of the
universe, or that the moon is no larger than a
mountain ; it would be a fair conclusion, either
that the revelation was not divine, or that the
passages imbodying such assertions are interpo
lations, or that science, in reference to these
points, has not yet arrived at the truth. The
example, we are aware, is inapplicable to the
the Christian revelation, which rests securely
on its own basis, and to which science is gradu-
ually approximating, as it advances in the ampli
tude of its views, and the correctness of its de
ductions ; — but it shows us how necessary it is,
in interpreting the word of God, to keep our eve
fixed upon his works; for we may rest assured,
that truth in the one will always correspond with
fact in the other.

To illustrate the rule now laid down, an exam
ple or two may be stated. If it be a i'act that
geological research has ascertained that the
materials of the strata of the earth are of a more
ancient date than the Mosaic account of the com
mencement of the present race of men ; the
passages in the first chapter of Genesis, and
other parts of Scripture, which refer to the origin
of our world, must be explained as conveying
the idea, that the earth was then merely arranged
into its present form and order, out of the mate
rials which previously existed in a confused
mass, and which had been created by the Al
mighty at a prior period in duration. For
Moses no where asserts, that the materials of
our globe were created, or brought into existence
out of nothing, at the time to which his history
refers; but insinuates the contrary. "Forlh«
earth" says he, prior to its present constitution,
" was without form and void," &c. Again, ifit
be a fact that the universe is indefinitely extend'
ed, that, of many millions of vast globes which
diversify the voids of space, only two or three
have any immediate connexion with the earth ,
then it will appear most reasonable to conclude,
that those expressions in the Mosaic history of
the creation, which refer to the creation of the
fixed stars, are not to be understood as referring

SCRIPTURAL FACTS ILLUSTRATED.

127

to the time when they were brought into exist
ence, as if they had been created about the
same time with our earth ; but, as simply de
claring the fact, that, at what period soever in
duration they were created, they derived their ex
istence from God. That they did not all com
mence their existence at that period, is demon
strable from the fact, that, within the space of
2000 years past, and even within the space of
the two last centuries, new stars have appeared
in the heavens which previously did not exist
in the concave of the firmament ; which, conse
quently, have been created since the Mosaic
period ; or, at least, have undergone a change
analogous to that which took place incur globe,
when it emerged from a chaotic state to the
form and order in which we now behold it.
Consequently, the phrase, " God rested from all
his works," must be understood not absolutely,
or in re'.erence to the whole system of nature,
but meicly in relation to our world ; and as im
porting, that the Creator then ceased to form
any new species of beings on the terraqueous
globe. The same canon will direct us in the in
terpretation of those passages which refer to the
last judgment, and the destruction of the present
constitution of our globe. When, in reference
to these events, it is said, "that, the stars shall
fall from heaven," that " the powers of heaven
shall be shaken," and that " the earth and the
heaven shall flee away," our knowledge of the
system of nature leads us to conclude, either that
such expressions are merely metaphorical, or
that they describe only the appearance, not the
reality of things. For it is impossible that the
stars can ever fall to the earth, since each of
them is of a size vastly superior to our globe,
and could never be attracted to its surface, with
out unhinging the laws and the fabric of univer
sal nature. The appearance, however, of the
" heaven fleeing away," would be produced,
should the earth's diurnal rotation at that pe
riod be suddenly stopped, as will most probably
happen ; in which case, all nature, in this sublu
nary system, would be thrown into confusion,
and the heavens, with all their host, would ap
pear to flee away.

Now, the scientific student of Scripture alone
can judiciously apply the canon to which I have
adverted ; he alone can appreciate its utility in
the interpretation of the sacred oracles ; for he
knows the facts which the philosopher and the
astronomer have ascertained to exist in the sys
tem of nature ; from the want of which informa
tion, many divines, whose comments on Scrip
ture have, in other respects, been judicious,
have displayed their ignorance, and fallen into
egregious blunders, when attempting to explain
the first chapters of Genesis, and several parts
of the book of Job, which have tended to bring
discredit on the oracles of heaven.

H. — The system of nature confirms and illus
trates the scriptural doctrine of the DEPRAVITY

OF MAN.

In the preceding parts of this volume, I have
stated several striking instances of divine be
nevolence, which appear in the construction of
the organs of the animal system, in the con
stitution of the earth, the waters, and the atmos
phere, and in the variety of beauties and sublimi
ties which adorn the face of nature ; all which
proclaim, in language which can scarcely be
mistaken, that the Creator has a special regari.
to the happiness of his creatures. Yet the
Scriptures uniformly declare, that man has fallen
from his primeval state of innocence, and has
violated the laws of his Maker ; that " histheart
is deceitful above all things, and desperately
wicked ;" and that " destruction and misery are
in his ways." Observation and experience also
demonstrate, that a moral disease pervades the
whole human family, from the most savage to the
most civilized tribes of mankind ; which has dis
played its virulence in those wars and devasta
tions which have, in all ages, convulsed the
world ; and which daily displays itself in those
acts of injustice, fraud, oppression, malice, ty
ranny, and cruelty, which are perpetrated in
every country, and among all the ranks even of
civilized life. That a world inhabited by moral
agents of this description would display, in its
physical constitution, certain indications of its
Creator's displeasure, is what we should natu
rally expect, from a consideration of those attri
butes of his nature with which we are acquainted.
Accordingly, we find, that, amidst all the evi
dences of benevolence which our globe exhibits,
there are not wanting certain displays of " the
wrath of Heaven against the ungodliness and
unrighteousness of men," in order to arouso
them to a sense of their guilt, and to inspire
them with reverence and awe of that Being
whom they have offended. The following facts,
among many others, may be considered as cor
roborating this position.

In the first place, the present state of the interi
or strata of the earth may be considered as a pre
sumptive evidence, that a moral revolution has
taken place since man was placed upon the globe.
When we penetrate into the interior recesses of
the earth, we find its different strata bent into
the most irregular forms ; sometimes lying hori
zontally, sometimes projecting upwards, and
sometimes downwards, and thrown into confu
sion ; as if some dreadful concussion had spread
its ravages through every part of the solid crust
of our globe. Tliis is visible in every region of
the earth. Wherever the miner penetrates among
its subterraneous recesses, wherever the fissures
and caverns of the earth are explored, and wher
ever the mountains lay bare their rugged clifls.

128

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

the marks of ruin, convulsion, and disorder meet
the eje of the beholder. Evidences of these facts

are to be found in the records of all intelligent
travellers and geologists who have visited Alpine
districts, or explored the subterraneous regions
of the earth ; of which I have already stated a
few instances, in the article of Geology, pp. 74,
75,77. These facts seem evidently to indicate
that the earth is not now in the same state in
which it originally proceeded from the hand of its
Creator ; for such a scene of disruption and de
rangement appears incompatible with that or
der, harmony, and beauty which are apparent
in the other departments of nature. We dare
not assert, that such terrible convulsions took
place by chance, or independent of the will of
the Creator; nor dare we insinuate, that they
were the effects of a random display of Al
mighty Power; and therefore, we are neces
sarily led to infer, that a moral cause, connected
with the conduct of the rational inhabitants of
the globe, must have existed, to warrant so
awful an interposition of divine power ; for
the fate of the animated beings which then
peopled the earth was involved in the conse
quences which must have attended this terri
ble catastrophe. The volume of revelation,
on this point, concurs with the deductions of
reason, and assigns a cause adequate to war
rant the production of such an extraordinary
effect. " The wickedness of man was great
upon the earth ; the earth was filled with vio
lence; every purpose and desire of man's heart
was only evil continually. Man had frustrated
the end of his existence ; the earth was turned
into a habitation of demons ; the long period to
which his life was protracted only served to
harden him in his wickedness, and to enable
him to carry his diabolical schemes to their
utmost extent, till the social state of the hu
man race became a scene of unmixed depra
vity and misery. And the physical effects of
the punishment of this universal defection from
God are presented to out view in every land,
and will remain to all ages, as a visible me
morial that man las rebelled against the autho
rity of his Make-,

2. The existence of Volcanoes, and the terri
ble ravages they produce, bear testimony to the
state of man as a depraved intelligence. A
volcano is a mountain, generally of an immense
gize, from whose summit issue fire, smoke, sul
phur, and torrents of melted lava, (see p. 66.)
Previous to an eruption, the smoke, which is
continually ascending from the crater, or open
ing in the top, increases and shoots up to an im
mense height ; forked lightning issues from the
ascending column; showers of ashes are thrown
oat to the distance of forty or fifty miles ; volleys
of red-hot stones are discharged to a great
neight in the air ; the sky appears thick and dark ;

he luminaries of heaven disappear ; and these

terrible forebodings are accompanied with thun*
der, lightning, frequent concussions of the earth,
and dreadful subterraneous bellowings. When
these alarming appearances have continued
sometimes four or five months, the lava begins to
make its appearance, either boiling over the top,
or forcing its way through the side of the moun
tain. This fiery deluge of melted minerals rolls
down the declivity of the mountain, forming a dis
mal flaming stream, sometimes fourteen miles
long, six miles broad, and 200 feet deep. In its
course, it destroys orchards, vineyards, cornfields,
and villages; and sometimes cities, containing
twenty thousand inhabitants, have been swallow
ed up and consumed. Several other phenomena,
of awful sublimity, sometimes accompany these
eruptions. In the eruption of Vesuvius, in 1794,
a shock of an earthquake was felt ; and, at the
same instant, a fountain of bright fire, attended
with the blackest smoke, and a loud report, was
seen to issue, and to rise to a great height from
the cone of the mountain ; and was soon suc
ceeded by fifteen other fiery fountains, all in a
direct line extending for a mile and a half down
wards. This fiery scene was accompanied with
the loudest thunder, the incessant reports of
which, like those of a numerous heavy artillery,
were attended by a continued hollow murmur,
similar to that of the roaring of the ocean during
a violent storm. The houses in Naples, at seven
miles' distance, were for several hours in a con
stant tremor ; the bells ringing, and doors and
windows incessantly rattling and shaking. The
murmur of the prayers and lamentations of a
numerous population added to the horrors of the
scene. All travellers, who have witnessed these
eruptions, seem to be at a loss to find words
sufficiently emphatic to express the terrors of the
scene. " One cannot form a juster idea," says
Bishop Berkley, " of the noise emitted by the
mountain, than by imagining a mixed sound
made up of the raging of a tempest, the mur
mur of a troubled sea, and the roaring of thun
der and artillery, confused altogether. Though
we heard this at the distance of twelve miles,
yet it was very terrible." In 1744, the flames of
Cotopaxi, in South America, rose 3,000 feet
above the brink of the crater, and its roarings
were heard at the distance of six hundred mile.1!.
" At the port of Guayaquil, 150 miles distant
from the crater," says Humboldt, " we heard,
day and night, the noise of this volcano, like
continued discharges of a battery, and we dis
tinguished these tremendous sounds even on the
Pacific ocean."

The ravages produced by volcanoes are in
proportion to the terror they inspire. In the
eruption of ^Etna, in 1669, the stream of lava
destroyed, in 40 days, the habitations of 27,000
persons ; and of 20,000 inhabitants of the city
of Catania, only 3,000 escaped. In the yeai
79, the celebrated cities of Pompeii and Hercu-

DEPRAVITY OF MAN.

129

laneum were completely overwhelmed and burie'1
uncier ground by an eruption of Vesuvius, and
the spots on which they stood remained unknown
for 1600 years. Since that period, about 40
eruptions have taken place, each of them pro-
ducincr the most dreadful ravages. But the
volcanoes of Asia and America are still more
terrible and destructive than those of Europe.
The voicanic mountain Pichinca, near Q,uito,
caused, on one occasion, the destruction of
55,000 inhabitants. In the year 1772, an erup
tion of a mountain in the island of Java destroyed
40 villages, and several thousands of the inhabit
ants ; and in October, 1822, eighty-eight ham
lets, and above 2000 persons, were destroyed in
the same island, by a sudden eruption from a
new volcano. The eruption of Tomboro, in the
island of Sumbawa, in 1815, was so dreadful,
that all the Moluccas, Java, Sumatra, and Bor
neo, to the distance of a thousand miles from
the mountain, felt tremulous motions, and heard
the report of explosions. In Java, at the dis
tance of 340 miles, the clouds of ashes from the
volcano produced utter darkness.

Volcanoes are more numerous than is gene
rally imagined. They are to be found in every
quarter of the world, from the icy shores of
Kamtschatka to the mountains of Patagonia.
Humboldt enumerates 40 volcanoes constantly
burning, between Cotopaxi and the Pacific
ocean ; 20 have been observed in the chain of
mountains that stretches along Kamtschatka;
and many of them are to be seen in the Phillip-
pines, the Moluccas, the Cape de Verd, the
Sandwich, the Ladrone, and other islands in the
Indian and Pacific oceans. It is stated in vol.
6th of Sup. to Ency. Brit, lately published, that
about 205 volcanoes are known, including only
those which have been active within a period to
which history or tradition reaches. Europe
contains 14 ; and, of the whole number, it is
computed, that 107 are in islands and 98 on the
great continents.

Can we then suppose, that so many engines
of terror and destruction, dispersed over every
quarter of the globe, are consistent with the con
duct of a benevolent Creator to wards an innocent
race of men ? If so, we must either admit that
the Creator had it not in his power, when ar
ranging our terrestrial system, to prevent the oc
casional action of these dreadful ravagers, or that
he is indifferent to the happiness of his innocent
offspring. The former admission is inconsistent
with the idea of his omnipotence, and the latter
with the idea of his universal benevolence. It
is not therefore, enthusiasm, but the fairest de
duction of reason to conclude, that they are in
dications of God's displeasure against a race of
transgressors who have apostatized from his
laws.

S. The same reasoning will apply to the ra
vages produced by earthquakes. Next to volca

noes, earthquakes are the most terrific phenome
na of nature, and are even far more destructive
to man, and to the labours of his hands. An
earthquake, which consists in a sudden motion
of the earth, is generally preceded DV a rum
bling sound, sometimes like that of a number of
carriages driving furiously along the pavement
of a street, sometimes like the rushing noise of a
mighty wind, and sometimes like the explosions
of artillery. Their effect on the surface of the
earth is various. Sometimes it is instanta
neously heaved up in a perpendicular direction,
and sometimes it assumes a kind of rolling mo
tion, from side to side. The ravages which
earthquakes have produced, are terrible beyond
description ; and are accomplished almost in a
moment. In 1692, the city of Port-Royal, in
Jamaica, was destroyed by an earthquake, in the
space of two minutes, and the houses sunk into
a gulf forty fathoms deep. In 1693, an earth
quake happened in Sicily, which either destroyed,
or greatly damaged, fifty-four cities, and an in
credible number of villages. The city of Cata
nia was utterly overthrown : the sea all of a sud
den began to roar ; mount ^Etna to send forth
immense spires of flame ; and immediately a
shock ensued, as if all the artillery in the world
had been discharged. The birds flew about as
tonished ; the sun was darkened ; the beasts ran
howling from the hills ; a dark cloud of dust
covered the air ; and, though the shock did not
last three minutes, yet nineteen thousand of the
inhabitants of the city perished in the ruins.
This shock extended to a circumference of 7000
miles.

Earthquakes have been producing their ra
vages in various parts of the world, and in every
age. Pliny informs us, that 12 cities in Asia
Minor were swallowed up in one night. In
the year 115, the city of Antioch, and a great
part of the adjacent country, were buried by an
earthquake. About 300 years after, it was
again destroyed, along with 40,000 inhabitants ;
and, after an interval of only 60 years, it was a
third time overturned, with the loss of not less
than 60,000 souls. In 1755, Lisbon was de
stroyed by an earthquake, and it buried under its
ruins above 50,000 inhabitants. The effects of
this terrible earthquake were felt over the greater
part of Europe and Africa, and even in the
midst of the Atlantic ocean ; and are calculated
to have extended over a space of not less than
four millions of square miles. In August, 1822,
two-thirds of the city of Aleppo, which con
tained 40,000 houses, and 200,000 inhabitants,
were destroyed by an earthquake, and nearly
thirty thousand inhabitants were buried under
the ruins. To suppose that the human beings
who have been victims to the ravages of earth
quakes and volcanoes, " were sinners above al.
those who dwelt around them," would be t
height of impiety and presumption. But,

130

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

%ct that thousands of rational beings have been
iwept from existence, in a manner so horrible
md tremendous, seems plainly to indicate, that
.hey belonged to a race of apostate intelligences,
who had violated the commands of their Crea
tor. Such visitations are quite accordant to the
idea of man being in the condition of a trans
gressor; but, if he were an innocent creature,
they would be altogether unaccountable, as hap
pening under the government of a Being of un
bounded benevolence.

4. The phenomena of thunder-storms, tem
pests, and hurricanes, and the ravages they
produce, are also presumptive proofs that man is
a depraved intelligence. In that season of the
year when Nature is arrayed in her most beau
tiful attire, and the whole terrestrial landscape
tends to inspire the mind with cheerfulness —
suddenly a sable cloud emerges from the hori
zon — the sky assumes a baleful aspect — a dismal
gloom envelopes the face of nature — the light
nings flash from one end of the horizon to another
— the thunders roll with awful majesty along the
verge of heaven, till at length they burst over
head in tremendous explosions. The sturdy
oak is shattered and despoiled of its foliage;
rocks are rent into shivers ; and the grazing
herds are struck into a lifeless group. Even
man is not exempted from danger in the midst
of this appalling scene. For hundreds in every
age have fallen victims either to the direct stroke
of the lightning, or to the concussions and con
flagrations with which it has been attended. In
tropical countries, the phenomena of thunder
storms are more dreadful and appalling, than in
our temperate climate. The thunder frequently
continues for days and weeks in almost one in
cessant roar ; tho rains are poured down in tor
rents ; and the flashes of lightning follow each
other in so rapid a succession, that the whole
atmosphere and the surrounding hills seem to be
in a blaze. In some instances, the most dread
ful effects have been produced by the bursting of
an electrical cloud. In 1772, a bright cloud
was observed at midnight to cover a mountain
in the island of Java ; it emitted globes of fire
so luminous, that the night became as clear as
day. Its effects were astonishing. Every thing
was destroyed for 7 leagues round ; houses were
demolished ; plantations buried in the earth ;
and 2140 people lost their lives, besides 1500
head of cattle, and a vast number of horses and
other animals.— Ency. Brit. Art. Cloud.

Is it not reasonable, then, to conclude, that
such awful phenomena as storms, volcanoes, and
earthquakes, are so many occasional indications
of the frown of an offended Creator upon a race
of transgressors, in order to arouse them to a
sense of their aposiacy from the God of heaven ?
We cannot conceive that such physical opera
tions, accompanied by so many terrific and
destructive effects, are at all compatible with the

idea that man is at present in a paradisaical
state, and possessed of that moral purity in
which he was created. Such appalling displays
of almighty power are in complete unison with
the idea, that man is a transgressor, and that the
present dispensations of God are a mixture of
mercy and of judgment ; but if he belong to an
innocent race of moral intelligences, they appear
quite anomalous, and are altogether inexplicable^
on the supposition, that a Being of infinite be
nevolence and rectitude directs the operations
of the physical and moral world ; more espe
cially when we consider the admirable care which
is displayed in the construction of animal bodies,
in order to prevent pain, and to produce plea
surable sensations. When man was first brought
into existence, his thoughts and affections, we
must suppose, were in unison with the will of
his Creator; his mind was serene and unruf
fled ; and, consequently, no foreboding appre
hensions of danger would, in such a state, take
possession of his breast. But after he had
swerved from the path of primeval rectitude,
and especially after the deluge had swept away
the inhabitants of the antediluvian world, the
constitution of the earth and the atmosphere
seems to have%undergone a mighty change, cor
responding to the degraded state into which he
had fallen ; so that those very elements which
may have formerly ministered to his enjoyment
— by being formed into different combinations—
now conspire to produce terror and destruction.

The same important conclusion might have
been deduced, from a consideration of the im
mense deserts of marshes and barren sands which
are dispersed over the globe — the vast and fright
ful regions of ice around the poles — the position
of the mineral strata, and the vast disproportion
which the extent of the dry land bears to the ex
panse of the ocean — all which circumstances,
and many others, in conjunction with the facts
above stated, conspire to show, that man no
longer stands in the rank of a pure intelligence ;
and that his habitation corresponds, in some de
gree, to his state of moral degradation. By over
looking this consideration, St. Pierre and other
naturalists have found themselves much at a loss,
when attempting to vindicate the wisdom and
equity of Providence, in the physical disorders
which exist in the present constitution of our
globe. The circumstance, that man is a fallen
creature, appears the only clue to guide us in un
ravelling the mysteries of Providence, and to
enable us to perceive the harmony and consistency
of the divine operations in the system of nature;
and no other consideration will fully account for
the disorders which exist in the present economy
of our world.

But it is a most consoling consideration, that,
amidst a!I the physical evils which abound, the
benevolence and mercy of God are admirably
blended with the indications of his displeasure.

THE RESURRECTION ILLUSTRATED.

131

Thunder-storms and tempests contribute to the
purification of the atmosphere ; and volcanoes
are converted into funnels for vomiting up those
fiery materials which produce earthquakes, and
which might otherwise swallow up whole pro
vinces in one mighty gulf. In the ordinary
course of things, such phenomena are more ter
rific than destructive ; and are calculated rather
to rouse an unthinking world to consideration,
than to prove the instruments of human destruc-
lion. Compared with the miseries which men
have voluntarily inflicted on one another, the
destructive effects of the elements of nature
dwindle into mere temporary and trifling acci
dents. We have reason to believe, that a much
greater destruction of human beings has been
produced by two or three of the late battles in
modern Europe, such as those of Waterloo,
Borodina, and Smolensko, than has been pro
duced by all the electrical storms, earthquakes,
and volcanic eruptions, which have raged for the
space of a hundred years. It has been calcu
lated, that during the Russian campaign of 1812,
including men, women, and children, belonging to
the French and Russians, there were not less
than five hundred thousand human victims sacri
ficed to the demon of war. It is probable, that
the destruction produced among the human race,
by the convulsions of nature, since the com
mencement of time, (the deluge only excepted,)
does not amount to above four or five millions of
lives; but were we take into account the de
struction of human life produced by ambition,
tyranny, oppression, superstition, wars, devast
ations, murders, and horrid cruelties, in every
period of the world, it would, doubtless, amount
to several hundreds of millions. So that, amidst
the most terrible displays of the displeasure of
God against the sins of men, mercy is mingled
with judgment ; and while man is the greatest
enemy and destroyer of his own species, bene
volence is the prominent feature of all the ar-
-angements of the Deity in the physical world.
For " his tender mercies are over all his works."*

III. — The discoveries which have been made in
the system of nature, illustrate the doctrine of

the RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD.

The doctrine of a resurrection from the dead,
at first view, appears to involve in it a variety
of difficulties, and apparent contradictions. That
a complex organical machine, as the human bodv
is, consisting of thousands of diversified parts
for the performance of its functions, after it has
been reduced to atonic, and those atoms dispersed

*The facts stated in this section are expressed
for the most part in the author's own words, for the
sake of compression. His authorities are, Gold
smith's " Natural History," Humholdt's " Travels,"
Brydon's, "Tour," Sir W. Hamilton's "Observa
tions," Raffles' " History of Java," Ency. Brit. Art.
Etna, Volcano, Earthquake, Antioch, Cloud; The Li-
Icrary and Scientific Journals for 1822, &c
41

to " the four winds of heaven" — should be again
reared up with the same materials, in anew and
more glorious form — is an idea which seems to
baffle the human comprehension ; and, in all pro
bability, would never have entered the mind of
man, had it not been communicated by divine
revelation. Accordingly we find, that the phi
losophers of antiquity, though many of them be
lieved in the doctrine of a future state, never
once dreamed, that the bodie's of men, after they
had been committed to the dust, would ever
again be reanimated ; and hence, when the apos
tle Paul proposed this doctrine to the Athenian
philosophers, they scouted the idea, as if it had
been the reverie of a madman. And, indeed,
without a strong conviction, and a lively impres
sion of the infinite power and intelligence of God,
the mind cannot rely with unshaken confidence
on the declaration of a future fact so widely dif
ferent from all the obvious phenomena of nature,
and from every thing that lies within the range
of human experience. " If a man die," says
Job, " shall he live again ? There is hope of a
tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again,
and bring forth boughs like a plant. But man
dieth and wasteth away ; yea, man giveth up the
ghost, and where is he?" When the mind,
however, is frequently exercised in contempla
tions on the stupendous works of the Almighty,
it must feel an impressive conviction, that " no
thing can be too hard for Jehovah." When we
endeavour to draw aside the veil which conceals
many of the scenes of nature from the vulgar
eye, we perceive a variety of operations and
analogies, which tend to assist us in forming a
conception, not only of the possibility of a resur
rection, but also of the manner in which it may
probably be effected, when the power of Omni
potence is interposed.

The transformations of insects afford us a
beautiful illustration of this subject. All the
butterflies which we see fluttering about in the
summer months, were originally caterpillars.
Before they arrive at that highest stage of their
existence, they pass through four different trans
formations. The first state of a butterfly is that
of an egg; it next assumes the form of a loath
some crawling worm ; after remaining some
time in this state, it throws off its caterpillai
skin ; languishes ; refuses to eat ; ceases to move ,
and is shut up, as it were, in a tomb. In (his
state, the animal is termed a chrysalis ; it is co
vered with a thin crust or shell, and remains
sometimes for six or eight months without mo
tion, and apparently without life. After remain
ing its allotted time in this torpid condition, it
begins to acquire new life and vigour; it bursts
its imprisonment, and comes forth a butterfly
with wings tinged with the most beautiful co«
lours. It mounts the air ; it ranges from flower
to flower, and seems to rejoice in its new and
splendid existence. How very different does il

132

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

appear in this state from what it did in the pre
ceding stages of Us existence ! How unlikely
did it seem thit a rough, hairy, crawling worm,
which lay for such a length of time in a death
like torpor, and enshrouded in a tomb, should be
icanimaled, as it were, and changed into so
beautiful a form, and endowed with such powers
of rapid motion ! Perhaps the change to be ef
fected on the bodies of men, at the general resur
rection, may not be greater, nor more wonderful in
its nature, than are the changes which take place
from the first to the last stage of a caterpillar's
existence. In such transformations, then, we
behold a lively representation of the death and
resurrection of a righteous man. " A little
while he shall lie. in the ground, as the seed lies
in the bosom of the earth ; but he shall be raised
again, and shall never die any more."

There is another illustration, taken from a
consideration of the chymical changes of matter,
which has a still more direct bearing on the doc
trine of a resurrection. We know, that sub
stances which are invisibly incorporated with
air, water, and other fluids, and which seem to
be des'royed, may be made to reappear in
their original form by the application of certain
chymical agents. For example ; put a small
piece of solid camphor into a phial half filled
with alcohol or spirits of wine ; in a short time
the camphor will be dissolved in the fluid, and
the spirit will be as transparent as at first. If
water be now added, it will unite with the ardent
spirit, and the camphor will be separated and
fall to the bottom of the phial. In this way the
camphor may be nearly all recovered as at first ;
and, by distillation, the alcohol may also be se
parated from the water, and exhibited in a sepa
rate state. I have already noticed, that carbon,
which forms an essential part of all animal and
vegetable substances, is found to be not only in
destructible by age, but in all its combinations,
which are infinitely diversified, it still preserves
its identity. In the state of carbonic acid it ex
ists in union with earths and stones in unbounded
quantities; and though buried for thousands of
years beneath immense rocks, or in the centre of
mountains, it. is still carbonic acid ; for no sooner
is it disengaged from its dormitory than it rises
with all the life and vigour of recent formation,
not in the least impaired by its torpid inactivity
during a lapse of ages. The beams of the the
atre at Herculaneum were converted into charcoal
(which is one of the compounds of carbon) by
the lava which overflowed that city, during an
eruption of Mount Vesuvius ; and during the
lapse of 1700 years, the charcoal has remained
as entire as if it had been formed but yesterday,
and it will probably continue so to the end of the
world. In addition to these facts it may be
stated, that provision has been made for the re
storation of the fallen leaves of vegetables which
ot upon the ground, and, to a careless observer,

would appear to be lost for ever. It has bee« .
shown by experiment, that whenever the soil be
comes charged with such matter, the oxygen of
the atmosphere combines with it, and converts
it into carbonic acid gas. The consequence
of which is, that this very same carbon is, in
process of time, absorbed by a new race of ve
getables, which it clothes with a new foliage, and
which is itself destined to undergo similar putre
faction and renovation to the end of time."*

These facts and others of a similar description
which might have been stated, demonstrate, that
one of the constituent parts of animal bodies
remains unalterably the same, amidst all the revo
lutions of time, and all the changes and decompo
sitions which take place in the system of nature-,
and, consequently, that though human bodies
may remain in a state of putrefaction for ages,
in the earth and in the waters, yet their compo
nent parts remain unchanged, and in readines*
to enter into a new and more glorious combina
tion, at the command of that Intelligence Jo
whom all the principles of nature and all their
diversified changes are intimately known ; and
whose Power is able to direct their combina
tions to the accomplishment of his purposes. —
Though such considerations as these may have
no weight on certain unreflecting minds, that
never meet with any difficulties in the economy
either of nature or of redemption ; yet, the
man of deep reflection, who has frequently had
his mind distracted with the apparent improba
bility of the accomplishment of certain divine
declarations, will joyfully embrace such facts in
the economy of nature, as a sensible support to
his faith in the promises of his God ; and will
resign his body to dust and putrefaction, in the
firm hope of emerging from the tomb to a future
and more glorious transformation.

IV. The discoveries of science tend to illustrate the
doctrine of the GENERAL CONFLAGRATION.

We are informed, in the Sacred Oracles, that
a period is approaching, when " the elements
shall melt with fervent heat, and the earth, and
the works that are therein, shall be burned up."
Science has ascertained certain facts in the con
stitution of nature, which lead us to form some
conception of the manner in which this awful
catastrophe may probably be effected, and also
of the ease with which it may be accomplished,
when the destined period shall have arrived. It
was formerly stated, (pp. 35, 104,) that the
atmosphere, or the air we breathe, is a com
pound substance, composed of two very different
and opposite principles, term°d oxygen and ni
trogen. The oxygen, which forms about a fifth
part of the atmosphere, is now ascertained to
be the principle of flame ; a lighted taper im
mersed in this gas, burns with a brilliancy too

• Parkes's " Chym. Catechism," p. 266, an« the ad
ditional notes.

GENERAL CONFLAGRATION.

18S

great (or the eyf; to bear ; and even a rod of iron
or steel is made to blaze under its energy.

The modern infidel, like the scoffers of old,
BCouts the idea of the dissolution of the world,
and of the restitution of the universe, " because
all things continue as they were from the begin
ning of the creation ; not knowing the Scrip
tures, nor the power of God ;" and not consi
dering the principles and facts in the system of
nature, which indicate the possibility of auch an
event. But, from the fact now stated, we may
learn how easily this effect may be accom
plished, even in conformity with those laws
which now operate in the constitution of our
globe. For should the Creator issue forth his
almighty fiat — " Let the nitrogen of the atmos
phere be completely separated from the oxygen,
and let the oxygen exert its native energies
without control, wherever it extends ;" — from
what we know of its nature, we are warranted
to conclude, that instantly a universal conflagra
tion would commence throughout all the king
doms of nature — not only wood, coals, sulphur,
bitumen, and other combustible substances, but
even the hardest rocks and stones, and all the
metals, fossils, and minerals, and water itself,
which is a compound of two inflammable sub
stances, would blaze with a rapidity which would
carry destruction through the whole expanse .of
the terraqueous globe, and change its present
aspect into that of a new world :— at the same
time, all the other laws of nature might still
operate as they have hitherto done since the
creation of the world.

I do not mean positively to assert, that this
is the agent which the Almighty will certainly
employ for accomplishing this terrible catas
trophe, (though we think it highly probable,)
since Infinite Power is possessed of numerous
resources for accomplishing its objects, which
lie beyond the sphere of our knowledge and
comprehension. But I have brought forward
this fact, to show with what infinite ease this
event may be accomplished, when Almighty
Power is interposed. By means of the know
ledge we have acquired of the constitution of
the atmosphere, and by the aid of chymical ap
paratus, we can perform experiments on a. small
scale, similar in kind, though infinitely inferior
in degree, to the awful event under considera
tion. And, therefore, we can easily conceive
that He who formed the expansive atmosphere
which surrounds us, and who knows the native
energy of its constituent principles, may, by a
simple volition, make that invisible fluid, in a
few moments, the cause of the destruction of the
present constitution of our world, and, at the
same time, the means of its subsequent, renova
tion. For, as fire does not annihilate, but only
changes, the forms of matfer, this globe on. which
we now tread, and which bears the marks of

ruin and disruption in several parts of its struc
ture, may come forth from the flames of the-
general conflagration, purified from all its physi
cal evils, adorned with new beauties and subli*
mities, and rendered a fit habitation for pure in
telligences, either of our own species or of:
another order. For, though the " heavens," or
the atmosphere, " shall be dissolved, and the
elements melt with fervent heat ;" "yet," sayg
the Apostle Peter, " we, according to his pro
mise, look for new heavens and a new earth,
wherein dwelleth righteousness." Whether,
after being thus renovated it shall be allotted as
the residence of the redeemed inhabitants of
our world, is beyond our province at present to
determine. But if not, it will, in all probability}
be allotted as the abode of other rational beings,
who may be transported from other regions, to
contemplate a new province of the divine em
pire, or who may be immediately created for the
purpose of taking possession of this renovated
v/orld. For we have reason to believe, that the
energies of creating power will be continually
exerted, in replenishing the boundless universe,
throughout all the ages of infinite duration, and
that no substances or worlds which God has
created, will ever be suffered to fall into annihi
lation — at least, that the original atoms of matter
will never be destroyed, whatever new forms
they may assume, and however varied the com
binations into which they may enter.

The above are only a few examples out of
many which were intended to be specified, of
the illustrations which the system of nature
affords of the doctrines and facts of revela
tion, but the narrow limits of this volume pre
vent further enlargement.

It was also intended to follow up the pre
ceding discussions with particular illustrations
of the following topics: — The views which sci
ence affords of the incessant energies of crea
ting power — the changes and revolutions which
appear to have happened, and which are still
going on in the distant regions of the uni
verse, as tending to amplify our views of tht
grand and multifarious objects over which Di
vine Providence preside* — the connexion of sci
ence with a future state — the aids which the
discoveries of science afford, in enabling us to
form a conception of the scenes of future fe
licity — of the employments of the heavenly
inhabitants, and of their perpetual advances in
knowledge and happiness, and in their views
of the perfections of Deity— the morui relation*
of intelligent beings to their Creator, and to
each other ; and the physical grounds or reason
of those moral laws which the Deity has pro
mulgated for regulating the conduct, and for
promoting the harmony and order of intelligent
agents — illustrations of the allusions of the sa
cred writers to the system of the material worU

134

THE CHRT3TIAN PHILOSOPHER.

—the simultaneous progress of science and reli
gion, considered as an evidence of the con
nexion of the one with the other — the moral
Affects of the study of science in connexion with
leligon— replies to objections and insinuations
which have been thrown out against the idea
of combining the discoveries of science with
the discoveries of revelation, &c. But, as il-

hundred pages, they must, in the mean time,
be postponed.*

• A work, embracing illustrations of some of tha
topics here stated, is preparing for the press, undei
the title of " The Philosophy of Religion ; or, an
illustration of the Moral Laws of the Universe, on
the principles of Reason and Divine Revelation." In
this work, an original, and, at the same time, a popu
lar train of thought will be prosecuted, and the dif-

liietratinne nf thp<?p and varinna nthpr' tnnSnc ferent topics will be enlivened with illustrative facts,
lustrations oi these, and various other topics borrowed from the scenery of nature and the moral
connected with them, would occupy two or three history of mankind.

CHAPTER V.

BENEFICIAL EFFECTS WHICH MIGHT RESULT TO CHRISTIAN SOCIETY FROM CONNECTING
THE DISCOVERIES OF SCIENCE WITH THE OBJECTS OF RELIGION.

I,— THE VARIETY OF TOPICS which would be
introduced into Christian instructions, by con
necting them with the manifestations of Deity in
the system of nature, WOULD HAVE A TEN
DENCY TO ALLURE THE ATTENTION OF THE
YOUNG TO RELIGIOUS SUBJECTS, and to af-

ford mental entertainment and moral instruc
tion to intelligent minds of every description.

NOVEL TY and variety appear to be essentially
requisite in order to rouse the attention, not only
of the more ignorant, but even of the more intel
ligent class of mankind, and to excite them to
make progress in the path of intellectual and
moral improvement. The principle of curiosity,
which appears at a very early period of life, and
which variegated scenery and novel objects tend
to stimulate and to gratify— so far from being
checked and decried, in a religious point of view,
as some have been disposed to do, ought to be
encouraged and cultivated in the minds both
of the old and of the young. As it is a prin
ciple which God himself has implanted in our
natures, for wise and important purposes, it
requires only to be chastened, and directed in
a proper channel, in order to become one of
the most powerful auxiliaries in the cause of
religion, and of intellectual improvement. To
gratify this principle, and to increase its ac
tivity, the Creator has adorned our globe with
a combination of beauties and sublimities, strew
ed in endless variety over all its different regions.
The hills and dales, the mountains and plains ;
the seas, the lakes, the rivers, the islands of
every form and size which diversify the surface
of the ocean ; the bays, the gulfs, and penin
sulas; the forests, the groves, the deep dells,
and towering cliffs ; the infinite variety of trees,

plants, flowers, and vegetable productions of
every hue, so profusely scattered over the face of
nature ; the diversified productions of the minera1
kingdom ; the variegated colouring spread ovei
the face of nature ; together with the many thou
sands of different species of animated beings
which traverse the air, the waters, and the earth
— afford so many stimuli to rouse this principle
into exercise, and to direct the mind to the con
templation of the Creator. And as the earth
displays an endless diversity of objects, so the
heavens, in so far as they have been explored, ex
hibit a scenery both grand and variegated. There
is not a planet in the solar system but differs
from another, in its magnitude, in its distance
from the central luminary about which it re
volves, in the velocity of its motion, in the ex
tent of the circle it describes around the sun, in
the period of time in which its revolution is
completed, in its rotation round its axis, in the
number of moons with which it is attended, in
the inclination of its axis to the plane of its orbit,
and the diversity of seasons which results from
this circumstance ; in the density of its atmos
phere, and the various appearances which diver
sify its surface. And if we were favoured with
a nearer view of these majestic orbs, we should,
doubtless, behold a similar variety in every part
of their internal arrangements. The surface of
the moon presents a variegated prospect of
mountains and vales, but so very different i»
their form, position, and arrangement, from what
obtains on the surface of our globe, that it would
exhibit a scenery altogether new and uncom
mon to an inhabitant of this world, were he
placed on the surface of that planet. Every
comet, too, is distinguished from another, by its
magnitude, the extent of its atmosphere, tn«

VARIETY OF TOPICS IN RELIGION.

135

fength of its blazing tail, the rapidity of its mo
tion, and the figure of the curve it describes
around the sun. With regard to the fixed stars,
which are distributed, of every size, and in every
direction, through the immensity of space, our
senses, as well as the declaration of an inspired
writer, convince us, that, in point of brilliancy,
colour, and magnitude, " one star differeth from
another star in glory."

And as the system of nature in all its parts
presents a boundless variety of scenery, to arouse
the attention, and to gratify the desire for novel
ty, so the revelation of God contained in the
Sacred Records displays a diversified combina
tion of the most sublime and interesting subjects
and events. Were we to form an opinion of the
compass of divine revelation, from the range of
subjects to which the minds of some professing
Christians are confined, it might all be compre
hended within the limits of five or six chapters of
the New Testament ; and all the rest might be
thrown aside, as a dead- weight upon the Chris
tian system. But here, as in all the other dis
plays of the Almighty, divine perfection and
providence are exhibited in the most diversified
aspects. Here we have recorded a history of the
creation and arrangement of our globe, — of thef
formation of the first human pair,— of their pri
meval innocence, temptation, and fall. — of the
arts which were cultivated in the first ages of the
world, — of the increase of human wickedness,—
of the building of the ark,-— of the drowning of
the world by a universal deluge, — of the burning
of Sodom by fire from the clouds,— -of the ori
gin of languages,— of the dividing of the Red
sea, — of the journeying of the tribes of Israel
through the deserts of Arabia,— of their conquest
of the promised land, and their wars with the
nations of Canaan,— of the corporeal translation
of Elijah from earth to heaven, — of the manifes
tation of the son of God in human flesh, the be
nevolent miracles he performed, and the tri
umphs he obtained over all the powers of hell and
earth. We are here presented with the most
interesting and affecting narratives, elegies, dra
matic poems, and triumphal songs, — with views
of society in the earliest ages of the world, when
the lives of men were prolonged to nearly a thou
sand years, — with splendid miracles performed
in the land of Egypt, in the wilderness of Horeb,
and in the " field of Zoan," when "the sun and
moon stood still in their habitation ;" when the
waters of the great deep were divided, and
mountains shook and trembled " at the presence
of Jehovah," — with the glorious marching of a
whole nation through the Arabian deserts, under
the guidance of a miraculous pillar of cloud and
fire, — with the visits of celestial messengers,
and the visible symbols of " a present Deity,"
— with prophetical delineations of the present
and future condition of the race of Adam, — with
description of the power, wisdom, love, and

majesty of the Almighty, and of his operations in
heaven and earth, — with the results and bear
ing of the economy of redemption, — with divine
songs, odes, and hymns, composed by angels and
inspired men, — with maxims of moral wisdom,
examples of sublime eloquence, of strength of
reasoning, and of manly boldness of reproof, —
with proverbs, parables, allegories, exhortations,
promises, threatenings, and consolatory address
es. In short, we have here detailed, in the
greatest variety, history, antiquities, voyages,
travels, philosophy, geography, natural and mo
ral science, biography, arts, epic poetry, epistles,
memoirs, delineations of nature, sketches of hu
man character, moral precepts, prophecies, mira
cles, narrations, wonderful providences, marvel
lous deliverances, the phenomena of the air, the
waters, and the earth; the past, the present, and the
future scenes of the world — all blended together in
one harmonious system, without artificial order,
but with a majesty and grandeur corresponding
to the style of the other works of God, — and all
calculated to gratify the principle of curiosity —
to convey " reproof, correction, and instruction
in righteousness," and " to make the man of
God perfect, and thoroughly furnished to every
good work."

And, as the scenes of nature, and the scenes
of revelation, are thus wonderfully diversified,
in order to excite the attention of intelligent
beings, and to gratify the desire for variety, so
we have every reason to believe, that the scenes,
objects, and dispensations, which will be dis
played in the heavenly world, will be incompa
rably more grand and diversified. When we
consider the immensity of God's universal king
dom, and the numerous systems, and worlds, and
beings comprehended within its vast circumfe
rence, and that the energies of creating power
may be for ever exerted in raising new worlds
into existence -we may rest assured, that the
desire of variety and of novelty, in holy intelli
gences, will be completely gratified throughout
an endless succession of existence ; and that the
most luxuriant imagination, in its boldest ex
cursions, can never go beyond the reality of
those scenes of diversified grandeur which the
heaven of heavens will display.

Now, since the book of nature, and the book
of revelation, since all the manifestations of
the Creator in heaven and earth, are character
ized by their sublime and diversified aspect ; we
would ask, why should we not be imitators of
God, in displaying the diversified grandeur of
his kingdom of providence and of grace, befora
the minds of those whom we profess to instruct?
Why should we confine our views to a few points
in the Christian system, to a few stones in tho
fabric of the divine operations, when " a wide
and unbounded prospect lies before us ?" Why
should we not rather attempt to rouse the moral
and intellectual energies of mankind, from the

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

press, in the school-room, and in the family cir
cle, by exhibiting the boundless variety of aspect
which the revelations of heaven present, and
the holy tendencies of devout contemplation
on the works and the ways of God ? that they
may learn, with intelligence, to "meditate on
all the works of the Lord, and to talk of all his
doings." By enlarging and diversifying the to
pics of religious discussion, according to the
views now stated, we have it in our power to
spread out an intellectual feast to allure and to
gratify every variety of taste, — the young and
the old, the learned and the unlearned ; yea, even
the careless and the ignorant, the skeptical and
the dissipated, might frequently be allured by
the selection of a judicious variety of striking
and impressive objects and descriptions, to par
take of those mental enjoyments which might
ultimately issue in the happiest results. The
man of an inquisitive turn of mind, who now
throws aside every thing that has the appearance
of religion, on account of its dulness, might
nave his curiosity gratified amidst such a va
riety as that to which I allude ; and, from per
ceiving the bearing of every discussion on the
great realities of religion and a future state,
might be led to more serious inquiries after the
path that leads to immortality. In a word, to
associate and to amalgamate, as it were, the
arts and sciences, and every department of use
ful knowledge, with divine subjects, is to conse
crate them to their original and legitimate ends,
and to present religion to the eyes of men, in
its most sublime, and comprehensive, and at
tractive form, corresponding to what appears to
oe the design of the Creator, in all the mani
festations he has given of himself, in the system
of nature, in the operations of Providence, and
in the economy of redemption.

II. — By connecting science with religion, Chris
tians would be enabled to take AN EXTENSIVE

SURVEY OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

How very narrow and limited are the views
of most professors of religion respecting the
universal kingdom of Jehovah, and the range
of his operations! The views of some indivi
duals are confined chiefly within the limits of
their own parish, or at farthest, extend only to
the blue mountains that skirt their horizon, and
form the boundary of their sight. Within this
narrow circle, all their ideas of God, of religion,
and of the relations of intelligent beings to each
other, are chiefly confined. There are others,
who form an extensive class of our population,
whose ideas are confined nearly to the county in
which they reside, and to the adjacent districts;
and there are few, comparatively, whose views
extend beyond the confines of the kingdom to
which they belong— though the whole island in
which we reside is less than the two-thousandth

part of the globe we inhabit. Of the vast extttft
of this earthly ball, of its figure and motion*
of its continents, seas, islands, and oceans, of
its volcanoes and ranges of mountains, of itj
numerous and diversified climates and land
scapes ; of the various nations and tribes of
mankind that people its surface, and of the mo
ral government of God respecting them, — they
are almost as completely ignorant as the untu
tored Greenlander, or the roving savage. With
regard to the objects which lie beyond the boun
dary of our world, they have no precise and
definite conceptions. When the moon is •' walk
ing in brightness'' through the heavens, they
take the advantage of her light to prosecute their
journeys ; and, when the sky is overcast with
clouds, and they are anxious to travel a few
miles to their destined homes, they will lift up
their eyes to the heavens to see if any of the
stars are twinkling through the gloom, that their
footsteps may be directed by their glimmering
rays. Beyond this they seldom soar. What
may be the nature of the vast assemblage of
shining points which adorn the canopy of their
habitation, and the ends they are destined to
accomplish in the plan of the Creator's opera
tions, they consider as no part of their province
to inquire.

"Their minds, fair science never taught to stray
Far as the solar worlds, or milky way."

How very different, in point of variety, of
grandeur, and of extent, are the views of the
man who connects all the different departments
of knowledge, and the discoveries of science,
with his prospects of God's universal dominion
and government? With his mental eye he can
traverse the different regions of the earth, and
penetrate into the most distant and retired re
cesses where human beings have their residence.
— He can contemplate and adore the conduct of
divine sovereignty, in leaving so many nations
to grope amidst the darkness of heathen ido
latry, — he can trace the beams of the Sun of
righteousness, as they gradually rise to illumine
the benighted tribes of men, — he can direct his
prayers, with intelligence and fervour, in behalf
of particular kindreds and people, — he can de
vise, with judgment and discrimination, schemes
for carrying the " Salvation of God" into effect,
— he can realize, in some measure, to his menta
sight, the glorious and happy scenes which wil
be displayed in the future ages of time, when
"the kingdoms of this world shall become the
kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ," and
when the "everlasting gospel" shall be pub
lished, and its blessings distributed among all
who dwell upon the face of the earth. He can
bound from this earth to the planetary worlds
and survey far more spacious globes, peopled
with a higher order of intelligences, arranged
and superintended by the same Almighty Sove
reign, who " doth according to his will among

AMPLITUDE OF THE DIVINE EMPIRE.

137

Ae inhabitants of the earth." He can wing his
way beyond the visible region of the sky, till he
find himself .surrounded on every hand with suns
and systems of worlds, rising to view in bound
less perspective, throughout the tracts of immen
sity—diversified with scenes of magnificence,
and with beings of every order — all under the
government and the wise direction of Him who
" rules amon<* the armies of heaven," and who
" preserveth them all," and whom the " host of
neaven worship" and adore. He can soar be
yond them all to the throne of God, where angels
and archangels, cherubim and seraphim, celebrate
* the praises of their Sovereign Lord, and stand
ready to announce his will, by their rapid flight
»o the most distant provinces of his empire. He
can descend from that lofty eminence to this ter
restrial world, allotted for his temporary abode,
and survey another unbounded province of the
empire of God, in those living worlds which lie
hid from the unassisted sight, and which the
* microscope alone can descry. He can here
perceive the same Hand and Intelligence which
direct the rolling worlds above, and marshal all
the angelic tribes — organizing, arranging, and
governing the countless myriads of animated
existence which people the surface of a muddy
pool. He can speed his course from one of these
departments of Jehovah's kingdom to another,
till, astonished and overwhelmed with the order,
the grandeur, and extent of the wondrous scene,
he is constrained to exclaim, " Great and mar
vellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty !"
" Thine understanding is infinite !" The limits
of thy dominions are " past finding out !"

By taking such extensive surveys of the em
pire of Jehovah, we are enabled to perceive the
spirit and references of those sublime passages in
the sacred writings which proclaim the majesty
of God, and the glory of his kingdom. Such
passages are diffusely scattered through the in
spired volume, and have evidently an extent of
reference far beyond what is generally conceived
by the great mass of the Christian world. The
following may suffice as a specimen : —

" Thine, O Lord ! is the greatness, anu the
glory, and the majesty ; for all in heaven and
earth is thine ! Thine is the kingdom, O Lord !
Thou art erfalted above all, thou reignest over all,
and in thine hand is power and might. — Behold,
the heaven, and the heaven of heavens, is the
Lord's ; the earth also, with all that therein is.
— Ascribe ye greatness to our God ; for there is
none like unto the God of Israel, who rideth upon
the heavens in his strength, and in his excellency
on the sky. Thou, even thou, art Lord alone ; thou
hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with
all their host; the earth, and all things that are
therein ; the sea, and all that is therein ; and
thou preservest them all, and the host of heaven
worshippeth thee. — He divideth the sea by his
power ; by his Spirit he hath garnished the
18

heavens : Lo ! these are only parts of his ways,
but how little a portion is heard of him, and the
thunder of his power who can understand ?—
The Lord hath prepared his throne in the hea
vens, and his kingdom ruleth over all. — O Lord
our God ! how excellent is thy name in all tho
earth ! who hast set thy glory above the heavens.
When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy
fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast
ordained ; what is man, that thou art mindful of
him ! — His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom
honour and majesty are before him ; all the in-
habitants of the earth are reputed as nothing in
his sight, and he doth according to his will in the
army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of
the earth. — He measures the waters in the hol
low of his hand ; he meteth out heaven with a
span, and comprehendeth tho dust of the earth in
a measure. — He sitteth upon the circle of the
earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grass
hoppers. — I have made the earth, and created
man upon it ; I, even my hands, have stretched
out the heavens, and all their host have I com
manded. — The Most High dwelleth not in tem
ples made with hands ; for the heaven is his
throne, and the earth is his footstool.— With
God is awful majesty. — Great things doth He,
which we cannot comprehend ; yea, the Lord
sitteth King for ever. — Praise ye the Lord in the
heavens ; praise him in the heights ; praise him,
all his angels ; praise ye him, all his hosts.
Praise him, sun and moon; praise him, all ye
stars of light ; praise him, ye heaven of heavens.
Praise him, ye kings of the earth, and all people,
princes and judges of the earth ; both young
men and maidens ; old men and children— let
them praise the name of the Lord ; for his name
alone is excellent, his glory is above the earth
and heaven."

These sublime descriptions of the supremacy
of God, and of the grandeur of his kingdom,
must convince every reflecting mind, of the in
conceivable magnificence and extent of that do
minion " which ruleth over all." It is quite
evident, that we can never enter, with intelli
gence, into the full import and the grand refer
ences of such exalted language employed by in
spired writers, unless we take into view all the
discoveries which science has made, both in the
earth and in the heavens, respecting the variety
and extent of the dominions of the Creator. Il
the " kingdom of the most High" were as limited
in its range as most Christians seem to conceive,
such descriptions might be considered as mere
hyperboles, or bombast, or extravagant declama*
tion, which far exceeds the bounds of" truth and
soberness." But we are certain, that the con
ceptions and the language of mortals can never
go beyond the reality of what actually exists
within the boundless precincts of Jehovah's em
pire. For " who can utter the mighty acts ol
the Lord?" or " who can show forth all bis

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

praise ?" The language and descriptions to
which we have now adverted, seem to have had
a prospective reference to later and more en
lightened times, when more extensive prospects
of God's dominions would be opened up by the
exertions of human intellect. And were we to
search the records of literature, in ancient or
modern times, we should find no descriptions nor
language of such dignified nature as to express
tile views and feelings of an enlightened Christian
philosopher, when he contemplates the sublimity
and extent of divine operations — except those
which are to be found in the inspired volume —
the strength, and majesty, and comprehension of
which no human language can ever exceed.

Again, by familiarizing our minds to such ex
tended prospects of God's universal kingdom, we
shall be qualified and disposed to comply with
the injunctions of Scripture, which represent it
as an imperious duty, to communicate to the minds
of others such elevated conceptions. This duty is
enjoined in numerous passages of Sacred Scrip
ture, particularly in the book of Psalms : " De
clare his glory among the heathen, and his
wonders among all people. — I will extol thee,
my God, O King. — One generation shall praise
thy works to another, and shall declare thy
mighty acts. — I will speak of the glorious honour
of thy majesty, and of thy wondrous works. And
men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts ;
and shall declare thy greatness. All thy works
shall praise thee, O Lord ; and thy saints shall
bless thee. They shall speak of the glory of thy
kingdom, and talk of thy power ; to make known
to the sons of men thy mighty acts, and the glo
rious majesty of thy kingdom."* When we look
around us in the world, and in the visible church,
and mark the conceptions and the conversation
of the members of religious societies, we need
scarcely say how little this ennobling duty is at
tended to by by the mass of those who bear the
Christian name. We hear abundance of idle
chat about the fashions and the politics of the
day — how Miss A. danced so gracefully at the
ball, and how Miss B. sung so sweetly at the
concert ; how Mr. C. acted his part so well in
the character of Rob Roy, and how Mr. D. made
such a flaming speech at the corporation dinner.
We listen to slanderous conversation, and hear
abundance of mean, and base, and uncharitable
insinuations against our neighbours ; which in
dicate the operation of malice, hatred, envy, and
other malevolent tempers. We spend whole
hours in boisterous disputations about metaphy
sical subtleties in religion, and questions " which
gender strife rather than godly edifying;" but
" to speak of the glory of God's kingdom, and
to talk of his power," with the view of" making
Known to the sons of men his mighty works," is
a duty which remains yet to be learned by a ma-

• Psalm cxlv. and xcvi. 3, 4

jority of those who profess the religion of Jesus.
And how can they be supposed to be qualified to
enter into the spirit of this duty, and to proclaim
to others " the glorious majesty of God's king
dom," unless such subjects be illustrated in rm-
nutedetail, and proclaimed with becoming energy,
both from the pulpit and from the press ? These
powerful engines, when conducted with judgment
and discrimination, are capable of producing OR
the mass of mankind a tone of thinking, and an
enlargement of conception, on such subjects,
which no other means can easily effect ; and it
is to be hoped, that more precise and luminous
details, and more vigour and animation, will soon
be displayed, in this respect, than in the ages
that are past.

There is a certain principle of selfishrtess which
pervades the minds of many professed religion
ists, which leads them to conclude, that, if they
can but secure their own personal salvation, they
need give themselves no trouble about the glory
and extent of the kingdom of the Most High.
" What ne«d we care," say they, " about nations
in the far-distant parts of the world, and about
the planets and the stars ; our business is to at
tend to the spiritual interests of our souls." Such
persons seem neither to understand in what sal
vation really consists, and what is conducive to
their spiritual interests, nor to appreciate those
tempers and habits which will qualify them for
the enjoyment of eternal life. It forms but a
very slender evidence of their possessing any
spark of Christianity at all, if they wish to rest
satisfied with the most vague and grovelling con
ceptions, and if they do not ardently aspire after
a more enlarged view of the attributes of God, of
the glory of his empire, and of whatever may
tend to expand their conceptions of" the inherit
ance of the saints in light." We have often
been astonished at the opinions of some of those
who move in a higher sphere of intelligence,
who seem to consider it as a matter of pure in
difference, whether or not Christians should attain
to the highest conception in their power of the
God whom they worship, and of his boundless
dominions ; because they conceive that such
views are not essentially connected with salva
tion ? Though they may not have been essen
tial to the salvation of men in the dark ages that
are past, or to obscure tribes of people at present,
who have no access to the proper sources of in
formation, yet, since God, in the course of his
providence, which guides all human inventions
and discoveries, has disclosed to us a far more
expansive view of the " glory of his kingdom,'1
than former ages could obtain, for the purpose of
illustrating the revelations of his word — who will
dare to assert, that the man who has access, by
his studious efforts, to contemplate this wondrous
scene, and to display its grandeur to others, and
yet wilfully shuts his eyes on the divine glory
therein displayed, does not thereby hazard the

AMPLITUDE OF THE DIVINE EMPIRE.

139

divine displeasure ? In this point of view, the
following passage deserves a serious considera
tion : " Because they regard not the works of
the Lord, nor the operations of his hands, he shall
destroy tnem, and not build them up." We have
no hesitation in admitting, that persons may have
obtained salvation who never saw more of the
sacred writings than what is contained in the
gospel of Mark, or in one of Paul's epistles ;
but what would we say of the man who had ac
cess to all the revelations of heaven we now pos
sess, and y«H confined his attention solely to a
chapter or two in the N ew Testament, and would
aot deign to look into any other part of the in
spired volume ? We should not hesitate at once
to pronounce that such a person was grossly de
ficient in his duty, and devoid of that reverence
and submission which are due to the oracles of
God. And, if it be admitted, that the person
who has access to the bible, and who refuses to
peruse its important contents, is guilty of a cri
minal neglect, we do not see how the man, who
has free access to the other volume of God's re
velation, and views it as a matter of mere indif
ference whether he looks into into it or not, can
be deemed, in this respect, entirely innocent.
If it be understood, that we shall be judged ac
cording to the light and privileges we enjoy, and
the use we make of them, in our improvement
in the knowledge of God — we would deem it a
hazardous position for any one to support, that
" inattention to the visible glories of the kingdom
of God, and to the ' declaration of his wonders
among the people,' is a matter either of indiffer
ence or of trivial importance."

For, let it be considered, further — that on the
extent of our views respecting the universal king
dom of God depends our conceptions of the ma
jesty and glory of the Creator himself. We be
come acquainted with the nature of God, only in
so far as he has manifested himself to us by ex
ternal operations,* and in so far as we form just
conceptions of these operations. If we conceive
his empire as included within the bounds of
eighty or ninety thousand miles, our conceptions
of the Sovereign of that empire will be circum
scribed within nearly the same limits. The mind
of every reasonable man must, indeed, admit the
abstract proposition, " That the Divine Being
is infinite, and, consequently, fills all space with
his presence." But. this infinity, in our view,
is nothing more than a vague conception of empty
space, extending a little way beyond the sphere
of his visible operations. The mind must have
some material, visible, or tangible objects to rest
upon, and to guide it in its excursions, when it
would attempt to form the most definite and com
prehensive conceptions of an infinite, eternal,
and invisible existence. For however much we

* Hen I include the manifestations of Deity, as
exhibited both in divine revelation, and in the sys
tem of nature.

may talk about purely spiritual ideas, it is quite
evident, from the nature of things, and from the
very constitution of man, that we can have no
ideas at all without the intervention of sensible
objects. And, therefore, if we would wish to form
the most sublime conceptions of God himself,
we must endeavour, in the first place, to take the
most extensive views which science and revela
tion exhibit, of his vast dominions. We must
endeavour to form some adequate idea of the
wide extent of the globe on which we dwell, its
diversified scenery, and the numerous tribes of
human beings, and other animated existences,
visible and invisible, which people its different
provinces. We must explore the vist regions of
the planetary system, and compaie the bulk of
the earth, large as it is, with some of those
more magnificent globes, which would contain a
thousand worlds as large as ours. We must
next wing our way, in imagination, over a space
which a cannon-ball, flying five hundred mile?
every hour, would not traverse in ten hundred
thousand years, till we arrive at the nearest fixed
stars, and find ourselves in the centre of thou
sands of systems and worlds, arranged at im
measurable distances from one another. We
must pass from one nebula, or cluster of systems,
to another ; continuing our excursions as far as
th« eye or the telescope can direct our view ;
and, when the aid of artificial instruments begins
to fail, our imagination must still take its flight
far beyond the boundaries of mortal vision, and
add system to system, and nebula to nebula,
through the boundless regions of space, till we
arrive at the grand centre of the universe, the
throne of God, around which all worlds and
beings revolve, where "thousands thousands" of
bright intelligences " minister to Him, and ten
thousand times ten thousand stand before him."
We must, consider all this magnificent assem
blage of objects, not merely as so many masses
of inert matter, or as a grand raree-show, to
dazzle the eyes of a few hundreds of human
spectators, — but as destined for purposes worthy
of the plans and the intelligence of Him who is
" the only wise God," — as peopled with nume
rous orders of intelligent beings, whose physical
and moral economy is superintended and direct
ed by Him, who, at the same time, rules amidst
the tumults of human revolutions, and governs
the living myriads which people a drop of water.
In this way, then, do we come to acquire the
most extensive views of tne amplitude and glory
of the kingdom of the Most High ; and it is only
by the same process of thought that we can ever
attain the most exalted conceptions of the attri
butes of its almighty Sovereign. For our views of
the Sovereign of the universe must always corres
pond with our views of the extent and magnifi
cence of those dominions which sprung from his
creating hand, and over which he every moment
presides. His essence must (or ever remain im-

140

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

perceptible to finite minds ; for he is " the King
eternal, immortal, and invisible, dwelling in that
light which no man can approach unto, whom no
man hath seen, or can see.1' From his nature, as a
spiritual uncompounded substance, and from his
immensity, as filling infinite space with his pre
sence, it appears impossible, in the very nature of
things, that the glory of his perfections can be dis
played in any other way than through the medium
of the visible operations ofhis hands, or in the dis
pensations of his providence towards particular
worlds or classes of intelligences. And if, in the
future world, the souls of good men will enjoy a
more glorious display than at present, of the at
tributes of Deity, it will be owing chiefly to their
being placed in more favourable circumstances
than they now are, for contemplating this display ;
to their faculties being more invigorated : and
every physical and moral impediment to their
exercise being completely removed ; so as to
enable them to perceive more clearly than they
now do, the unbounded displays he has given of
his power, wisdom, and benevolence. And, if
we expect to be introduced to this state of en
larged vision, when we pass from the scenes of
mortality, it cannot be a matter of mere indiffer
ence, even now, whether or not our minds are
prepared for such exalted employments, by en
deavouring to form the most ample conceptions
of the attributes of God which can be obtained
through the medium of his word, and by a con
templation of the variety and magnificence ofhis
works. In the prospect of that world where we
hope to spend an interminable existence, it must
also be interesting to ascertain, whether or not
the dominions of the universal Sovereign pre
sent such an extent of empire, and such a variety
of objects, that new scenes of wonder and glory
may be expected to be displayed in continual
succession, for the contemplation and entertain
ment of holy beings, while eternal ages are roll
ing on. And, on this point, the discoveries of
science confirm and illustrate the notices of hea
venly glory and felicity recorded in the inspired
volume, and lead us to rest with full assurance
on the prophetic declaration, that " eye hath not
seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the
heart of man to conceive, the things which God
hath prepared for them that love him."

III. — By connecting the discoveries of science
with religion, the minds of Christians would
be enabled to take a more minute and compre
hensive survey of the OPERATIONS OF PRO
VIDENCE.

Providence is that superintendence and care
which God exercises over all creatures and
events, in order to accomplish the eternal pur
poses of his will. In creation, God brought the
universe out of nothing, and arranged all its
provinces and inhabitants in due order. By
his providence he supports and governs all the

movements of the mat rial system, and the sen
sitive and rational beings with which it is peopled.
It is evident, that, in proportion as our views of
the Creator's dominions are extended, our views
ofhis providence will, to a certain extent, be pro-
portionablv enlarged. For wherever worlds and
beings exist, there will God be found, preserving,
superintending, and governing the movements of
all creatures and events. It is chiefly, however,
in the world in which we reside, that the diver
sified dispensations of Providence can be dis
tinctly traced. Now an acquaintance with the
prominent parts of the different branches of
knowledge to which I have already adverted,
would enable us to take a particular and com
prehensive view, not only of the ways of God
to man, but also of his arrangements in reference
to all subordinate creatures and events.

From the inspired history of the Old Testa
ment, we can trace the prominent lines of the
dispensations of God towards man, particularly
in regard to the Israelites and the surrounding
nations — from the creation to a period about 400
years before the coming of Christ. But in order
to perceive the farther progress and bearings of
these lines till the commencement of the New
Testament economy, we must have recourse to
the most authentic records of profane history.
From the era of the birth of Christ to near the
close of the first century, we can acquire, from
the evangelists and the history of the apostles,
a particular account of the life of Christ, of the
events which preceded and accompanied the
finishing of the work of redemption, and of the
progress of the gospel through Judeaand the ad
jacent countries. But after this period we have
no inspired guide to direct us in tracing the di
vine dispensations towards the various nations
of the earth ; and. therefore, we must have re
course to the annals, memoirs, chronicles, and
other records of the history of nations, down to
the period in which we live ; otherwise we could
never contemplate the continued series of events
in the divine economy towards the inhabitants of
our world. Unless men of learning and of ob
servation had recorded the prominent facts which
have occurred in the history of nations, for 1700
years past, we must have remained almost as ig
norant of the dispensations of God towards our
race, during that period, as the inhabitants of the
planet Saturn : and unless we study the events
thus recorded in the writings of the historian,
and contemplate their varied aspects and bearings
in the light of divine revelation, we must still
remain ignorant of the grand movements and
tendencies of divine providence. This single
circumstance shows, in the clearest light, that it
is the intention of God, that we should learn the
operations of his providence from the researches
of science and history, as well as from the records
of revelation ; and that the scriptures, though they
contain every supernatural discovery requisiic te

RANGE OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE.

141

our happiness, are not of themselves sufficient to
present us with a connected view of the promi
nent dispensations of heaven, from the creation
to the period in which we live.

From the science of geography we acquire a
knowledge of the extent of the surface of the
earth — of the various tribes of human inhabit
ants with which it is peopled — of the physical
aspect of the different climates they inhabit — of
their arts, manners, customs, laws, religion,
vices, wars, and political economy : and, conse
quently, we can, in these and similar respects,
trace some of the aspects of Divine Providence
towards them in relation to their present and fu
ture condition. From the same source, we learn
the number of human beings which the Governor
of the world has under his direction at one
time, which is nearly a thousand millions, Or
five hundred times the number of the inhabitants
of Scotland. From the data afforded by this
science, we may also form an estimate of the
number of disembodied spirits that have passed
from this world since the creation, and are now
under the superintendence of the Almighty in the
invisible state, which cannot be much less than
145,000 millions ; and on similar grounds we may
also learn the number of rational beings that are
coming forward into existence, and passing into
the eternal world every day, which is at least
68,000, and, consequently, nearly 60 during each
passing minute, — every individual of which, the
Supreme Disposer of events superintends at his
entrance into life ; and, at his departure from it,
directs to his respective and eternal state of des
tination. All which circumstances, and many
others of a similar kind, must be taken into ac
count, in order to our forming a comprehensive
conception of the numerous bearings and the in
cessant agency of a Superintending Providence.
Frotn natural history we learn the immense
number and variety of the subordinate tribes of
animated beings which inhabit the different re
gions of earth, air, and sea — their economy and
instincts — their modes of existence, and the man
ner in which the Creator provides for their
various necessities. From an acquaintance with
the history of the arts and mechanical inven
tions, we learn the gradual manner in which God
directs the movements of the human mind, in
making those improvements and discoveries
which have a bearing upon the accomplishment
of his eternal plans of mercy, and which tend
to enlarge our views of the amplitude and the
glories of his kingdom. From natural philosophy
and chymistry, we learn the secondary causes or
subordinate laws by which the Almighty supports
and directs the natural constitution of the world
— the wonderful manner in which our lives are
every moment supported — and the agencies
by which fire, air, light, heat, and fertility are
distribute^ through the globe, for promoting the
comfort ana .ja^oiness '' of every thing that

lives." From anatomy and physiology, we
learn, how "fearfully and wonderfully we are
made and preserved" — that our health and com
fort depend upon the regular action of a thousand
organical parts and functions, over which we
have no control — and that our very existence
every moment is dependent on the superintend
ence of a Superior Power, " in whose hand
our breath is, and whose are all our ways."

By an occasional study, then, of the subjects
to which we have now alluded, we would gra
dually expand our conceptions of the range and
operations of Divine Providence. Every geo
graphical exploration of a new region of the
globe — every scientific improvement and disco
very — every useful invention — every eruption
of a volcano — every shock of an earthquake—
every hurricane, and storm, and tempest — every
battle of the warrior — every revolution among
the nations — and every detail in the newspapers
we daily read, would lead us to form some con
ceptions of the providential purposes of Him
who is the Supreme disposer of all events. —
Even the arrangements of Divine Wisdom,
with regard to the economy of the lower ani
mals, ought not to be overlooked in such a sur
vey. When we consider the immense number
and variety of animated beings — that there are
500 species of quadrupeds, every species con
taining, perhaps, many millions of individuals;
4000 species of birds ; 2500 species of fishes ;
700 species of reptiles; and 44,000 different
kinds of insects, besides many thousands of
species altogether invisible to the unassisted
sight— when we consider that the structure and
organization of all these different species are
different from each other, and exactly adapted
to their various situations and modes of exist
ence, and that their multifarious wants, in regard
to food and habitation, are all provided for, and
amply supplied by Him, who, at the same time,
arranges and governs the affairs of ten thou
sand worlds — we must be lost in astonishment
at the greatness of that Intelligence which
formed them, and at the exuberance of that
Bounty which spreads so full a table for so im
mense an assemblage of living beings ! And
were we transported to other worlds, we should,
doubtless, behold still more ample displays of
Divine Beneficence.

We are here presented with a striking com
mentary on such passages of the sacred volume
as these : " The eyes of all look unto Thee, O
Lord ! and thou givest them their meat in due
season. Thou openest thy hand liberally, and
satisfies! the desire of every living thing. The
earth is full of thy riches, O Lord ! so is the great
and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innu
merable, both great and small beasts. These all
wait upon thee, and thou givest them their meat
in due season. That which thou givest them
they gather : Thou openest thy hand, they ara

142

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

filled with good."— " O Lord, thou preservest
man and beast ! How excellent is thy loving-
kindness ! Therefore the children of men shall
put their trust under the shadow of thy wings :
They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fat
ness of thy house,"* (of the table thou hast
spread in thy world for all thine offspring,) " and
thou shall make them drink of the river of thy
pleasures." One excellent practical effect which
wight flow from such contemplations would be,
to inspire us with feelings of humanity towards
the inferior order of animals, and to prevent us
from wantonly and unnecessarily torturing, or
depriving them of existence. For since the Cre
ator and Preserver of all has so curiously orga
nized their bodies, and fitted them for the different
regions in which they reside, and so carefully
provided for all their wants, it must be His will
that they should enjoy happiness according to the
extent of their capacities ; and, therefore, they
ought to be considered as necessary parts of our
sublunary system. Another practical lesson we
may derive from such surveys, is. to place an un
shaken dependence upon God for our temporal
subsistence, while we, at the same time, exert
all our faculties in the line of active duty.
" Blessed is the man who trusteth in him ; for
there is no want to them that fear him. The
young lions may suffer hunger, but they that fear
the Lord shall not want any good thing." He
who decks the lily of the vale, and spreads out
a plentiful table to the fowls of heaven, to the
beasts of the forests, to the creeping insects, and
oven to the microscopic animalculae, will never
fail to supply the necessary wants of those who
" do His will, and hearken to the voice of his
commandments." And if, at any time, we be
found destitute of daily food, and pining away in
penury and squalid disease, we have too much
reason to conclude, that in one way or another,
either our deviation from the path of rectitude,
or our distrust of divine providence, or our want
of prudence and economy, has procured for us
these things.

I have said, that it is chiefly in the world in
which we dwell, that the dispensations of Pro
vidence can be distinctly traced. But we must
nevertheless admit that the care and superin
tendence of God are as minutely exercised in the
distant regions of the universe as in our terres
trial sphere ; though we are not permitted, at
present, to inspect the particular details of His

* This, and several other similar passages, may be
considered as more especially applicable to the
bounty of providence which God has provided for
all his creatures. The practice of spiritualizing-
such passages, as it is termed, has a tendency to
caricature Scripture, and to twist it from its pre
cise and sublime references, to accord with the vague
fancies of injudicious minds. The literal meaning
of Scripture is always the most appropriate, em
phatic, and sublime : but it may, in some cases, be
used hy way of accommodation, in illustrating divine
subjects, when it is applied with judgment and dis
crimination.

procedure in reference to other orders of intelH
gences. We are not, however, altogether igno
rant of some prominent features of the physical
and moral economy of other worlds, in conse
quence of the discoveries of modern astronomical
science.

With respect to their physical economy, we
behold a striking variety in the divine arrange
ments. We perceive one planetary world sur
rounded by two splendid and magnificent rings,
one of (hern 204,000, and the other 184.000 miles
in diameter, stretching across its celestial cano
py from one end of the heavens to another — mov
ing with majestic grandeur around its inhabitants
every ten hours, and diffusing a light equal to
several thousands of moons like ours — which
may be considered as a visible and permanent
emblem of the majesty and glory of their Cre
ator. We perceive connected with the same
globe, seven moons, all larger than ours, of dif
ferent magnitudes, and placed at different dis
tances, and revolving in different periods of time
around that spacious world. The diversified as
pects of these rings, as viewed from the different
regions of the planet at different times, and the
variety of appearances produced by the alternate
rising and setting, culmination, and frequent
eclipses, and other aspects of the moons, must
present to the inhabitants a very grand and va
ried and magnificent scene of divine operation.*
On the other hand, we behold another planetary
globe, destitute both of rings and moons, but
which has the starry heavens presented to view
nearly in the same aspect in which we behold
them. We perceive a third globe much larger
than them both, capable of containing 200 times
the number of the inhabitants of our world — ac
companied in its course with four moons to dif
fuse light in ihe absence of the sun, and to di
versify the aspect of its sky. In some of these
worlds, the succession of day and night is ac
complished within the space often hours; in
others, this revolution is not completed till after
the lapse of twenty-four hours, or of as many
days. In some, the days and nights are nearly
equal on every part of their surface, and they
have little variety of seasons ; in others, the va
riety in the length of the days, and the vicissi
tudes of the seasons, are nearly the same as those
we experience in our terrestrial world. Around
some there appears a dense atmosphere, while
others are environed with atrr.ospheres more rare
and transparent. Some move in the vicinity of
the sun, and enjoy an abundant efflux of light
and heat, while others are removed to the dis
tance of eighteen hundred millions of miles from
that central luminary. Some finish the revolu
tion of their year in a few months ; while others
require twelve, thirty, or even eighty of our years"
to complete their annual round. Some appear

•Seetre .late, Fig. 7

RANGE OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE.

tcforned with majestic mountain scenery, and
others seem to have great changes occasionally
taking place in their atmosphere, or on their sur
faces. There are four planetary bodies lately
discovered, which, there is every reason to be
lieve, once formed the component parts of a large
globe ; but by some mighty catastrophe in the
dispensations of heaven, it appears to have been
burst asunder into the fragments we now behold.
If the general proposition illustrated in section
2. of the preceding chapter be admitted, such a
fact would seem to indicate that a moral revolu
tion has taken place among the intelligent beings
who had originally been placed in those regions ;
and that their fate was involved in the dreadful
shock which burst asunder the globe they inha
bited ; just as the fate of the antediluvians was
involved in the shock by which the solid crust of
our globe was disrupted, at the period of the uni
versal deluge.

These are some outlines in the economy of
Providence which we can trace with regard to
the arrangements of other worlds ; but beyond
such general aspects we are not permitted to pe
netrate, so long as we sojourn in tabernacles of
clay. But even such general views afford some
scope to the contemplative mind, for forming en
larged conceptions of the grandeur and diversity
of the dispensations of God, in the worlds which
roll in the distant regions of space.

With regard to their moral economy — we may
rest assured that the prominent outlines of it are
materially the same as of that economy which re
lates to the inhabitants of our world. The fun
damental principles of the moral laws given to
men, and which it is the great object of revela
tion to support and illustrate, are, " Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and un
derstanding," and, " Thou shalt love thy neigh
bour as thyself." On these two commandments
hang all the law and the prophets. Now, we
must admit, from the nature of the Divine Being,
and from the relations in which rational beings
stand to Him and to one another, that the Cre
ator has enacted these laws, as the great govern
ing principles by which the actions of all intel
ligences in heaven, as well as upon earth, are to
be directed. For the Governor of the world can
never be supposed to issue a law to any order of
rational creatures, which would permit them to
hate their Creator, or to hate those whom he has
formed after his own image. Such a supposition
would be inconsistent with the eternal rules of
rectitude, and with the perfections of Deity — and
the fact supposed, (if it could exist,) would in
troduce confusion and misery throughout the
whole intelligent universe. And, therefore, we
must necessarily admit, that the laws to which I
now advert, are binding upon all the rational in
habitants which exist throughout Jehovah's do
minions ; and that it is by these that the moral
Older of all the principalities and powers of hea

ven is preserved and directed. In those worlds
where there is no change in the succession of
their inhabitants— or, inothei words, where there
is no death, or where they are not produced by
any process analogous to generation, but have a
fixed and permanent residence, there will be no
need for moral precepts corresponding to the fifth
and the seventh commandments of our moral law •
and in those worlds where property is common,
and the bounties of the Creator are equally en
joyed by all, there will be no necessity for a law
corresponding to the eighth commandment; but
the general principles on which these laws are
founded, will be applicable to all the other cir
cumstances and relations which actually exist ;
so that the principle, and spirit, and essence of
our religion must be common to all the holy in
habitants of the universe. And, therefore, it
will follow, that every intelligent being that is
animated and directed by such principles and af
fections, will be qualified for holding delightful
intercourse with all holy beings throughout the
universe of God, in whatever province of the
Creator's empire he may hereafter be placed ;
and, to qualify us for such harmonious and af
fectionate intercourse, is one great end of the
salvation exhibited in the gospel. So that, al
though we cannot, in our present state, acquire
a minute and comprehensive knowledge of the
moral history of other worlds, of the special in
terpositions or manifestations of Deity in rela
tion to them, or of the means by which they are
carried forward in moral and intellectual improve
ment — yet we can trace the general principles or
laws which form the basis of their moral and re
ligious economy. For as the laws of optics, and
the principle of gravitation, pervade the -whole
material system, as far as the universe is visible
to our assisted vision, so the principle of su
preme love to God, and sincere affection to fel
low-intelligences, must pervade the intellectual
universe, wherever it extends ; and, if any in
telligent agents besides men, have violated these
laws, they must experience pain, and misery,
and disorder, analogous to those which are felt
by the inhabitants of our apostate world.

Thus I have endeavoured to show, that the
combination of science with religion would tend
to expand our views of divine providence —
in the various arrangements of God, in rela
tion to the human race, and to the subordinate
tribes of sensitive beings — and in reference to
some of the prominent features of his adminis
tration in distant worlds. And, therefore, though
the Christian ought never to overlook the ways
of Providence in relation to himself, and to his
spiritual and domestic concerns, yet it would
argue a selfishness and a sottishness altogether
inconsistent with the noble and expansive spirit
of Christianity, to overlook all the other parts
of the theatre of divine dispensations, when
a very slight degree of labour and research

144

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

might be instrumental in unfolding them to his
Tiew

IV. — The connexion of science with religion
would have a tendency to induce upon Chris
tians A SPIRIT OF LIBERALITY, OF CANDOUR,

and of ACCURACY IN JUDGING OF THE OPI
NIONS AND ACTIONS OF MEN, and of THE
DIVINE PROCEDURE AND OPERATIONS.

Who is the most candid and liberal Being in
the Universe ? God. — And why is God to be
considered as the most liberal intelligence that
exists ? Because he embraces a minute, a full,
and comprehensive view of all the circumstances,
connexions, relations, habits, motives, tempta
tions, modes of thinking, educational biases,
physical affections, and other causes, that may
influence the sentiments or the conduct of any
of his creatures. — Who among created intelli
gences may be viewed as endowed with these
qualities in the next degree? The loftiest. se
raph that God has created, who has winged his
way to numerous worlds, and taken the most
extensive survey of the dispensations of the
Almighty, and of all creatures and events. —
Who, among the sons of men, is the most illi
beral and inaccurate in judging of opinions, of
persons, and of things? The man who has
lived all his days within the smoke of his father's
chimney, or within the confines of his native
village — who has never looked beyond the range
of his own religious party — whose thoughts have
always run in one narrow track — whose reading
has been confined to two or three musty volumes,
which have lain for ages on the same smoky
shelf — who cares for nothing either in the hea
vens or the earth, but in so far as it ministers to
his convenience, his avarice, or his sensual en
joyment — who will admit no sentiment to be
true, but what he may have heard broached by
his parson — and whose conversation seldom rises
beyond mere gossipping chit-chat, and the slan
derous remarks which are circulated among his
neighbours. — Such characters are entirely un
qualified for forming a correct judgment, either of
the sentiments and the actions of men, or of the
works and the ways of God; for they are
completely destitute of the requisite data where
on to form a rational decision in relation to
either of these subjects.

It may be admitted as a kind of axiom, in our
estimate of human character, that in proportion
to the ignorance and the narrow range of view
which characterise any individual, in a similar
proportion will be his want of candour and his
unfitness for massing a sound judgment on any
subject that is laid before him,— and that the
man who has taken excursions through the widest
range of thought, accompanied with a corres
ponding improvement of his moral powers, will
always be the most liberal and candid in his de

cisions on the moral and intellectual qualities of
others. To these maxims few exceptions will
generally be found. — In forming an enlightened
judgment in regard to any action or object, it is
essentially requisite, that we contemplate it in
all its different features and aspects, and in all
its minute circumstances, bearings, and rela
tions. We would not hesitate for a moment to
determine who^is best qualified to give an accu
rate descriptiSn of a city, — he who has only
viewed its spires from a distance, while in rapid
motion in his chariot — or he who has minutely
surveyed all its streets, lanes, squares, public
edifices, and surrounding scenery, in every va
riety of aspect ; or, who appears most likely to
form the most accurate and enlightened judgment
in relation to any particular kingdom — he who
has just skirted along a few miles on one of its
coasts, or he who has traversed its length and
breadth in all directions, and mingled with every
class of its inhabitants. On the same principle,
it must be admitted, that he who has viewed re
ligion in all its aspects and bearings, who has
taken the most extensive survey of the manifes
tations of God, and of the habits and relations
of men, is the best qualified to pronounce a can
did and accurate decision on all the intellectual
and moral cases that may come before him.

If the spirit of the above stated sentiments he
founded on reason and on fact, it will follow, that
the more we resemble God in the amplitude of
our intellectual views and benevolent affections,
the more candid, and liberal, and accurate will
our judgments be in reference to all the actions,
objects, and relations we contemplate. — On the
other hand, the man who is confined to a narrow
range of thought and prospect is continually
blundering in the estimates he forma, both in
respect to physical facts, to general principles,
and to moral actions. He forms a premature
and uncharitable opinion on every slander and
report against his neighbour. He condemns,
without hesitation, and throws an unmerited
odium on whole bodies of men, because one or
two of their number may have displayed weak
ness or folly. He hates and despises men and
their opinions, because they belong not to his
political or religious party. He pronounces his
decisions on the motives of men, with as mucn
confidence as if he had surveyed their hearts
with the eye of omniscience. He cannot hear
an objection against his favourite opinions witn
patience, nor an apology for any set of opinions
but his own. He is arrogant and dogmatical in
his assertions, and will make no concessions to
the superior wisdom of others. He sets him
self, with violence, against every proposal for
reformation in the church, because his forefathers
never thought of it, and because such " innova
tions" do not suit his humour and preconceived
opinions. He decides, in the most confident
tone, on what God can and cannot do, as if h«

EXPANSION OF INTELLECTUAL VIEWS.

145

naJ taken the gauge of infinite perfection ; and
he frets at the divine dispensations when they
do not exactly quadrate with his own humours
and selfish views.

With regard to the operations of the Most
High, he also forms the most foolish, and vague,
and contradictory conceptions. Tell him of the
vast dimensions of the planetary system, of the
men and animals that live on the opposite side
of the globe, of the annual and diurnal motion
»f the earth — that this world and its inhabitants
are moving through the regions of space many
thousands of miles every hour — that one of the
planets is so large that it would contain 1400
worlds as spacious as ours— that another is fly
ing through the tracts of immensity, at the rate
of a hundred thousand miles in an hour— and
that light is darted from the sun with a velocity
of 195,000 miles in a moment of time — he will
stare at you with astonishment at such extrava
gant assertions, and will sooner believe the sto
ries of giants 100 feet high, and of fairies that
can enter in crowds through the key-hole of his
door. Instead of frankly acknowledging that
" He is ignorant of such subjects, and of the .
grounds of such conclusions, — that those who
have studied them with intelligence are best ca
pable of judging, — that, if true, they must fill
us with admiration of the glory of God,— but
that, as he has hitherto had no opportunity of
examining such matters, he must suspend his
assent till he inquire into the reasons which can
be given for such amazing deductions ;" — instead
of such concessions, which are the dictates of
modesty and of common sense— he will tell you
at once, without hesitation, and without a blush
at his presumptuous decisions, that " it is all
extravagance, and folly, and idle romance, con
trary to Scripture, and reason, and common
sense ;" and will not hesitate to brand you as a
aeretic, for endeavouring to break loose his in
tellectual trammels ! — thus tacitly declaring, that
he is far better qualified to pronounce a decision
on such topics, than all the philosophers and
divines, and all the brightest geniuses who have
appeared in the world for ages past ; though he
will at the same time admit, that he never gave
himself the trouble to examine into such mat
ters.

His views of the providential dispensations of
God arc equally partial and distorted. If dis
ease, or poverty, or misfortune, happen to his
neighbour, especially if he had withdrawn from
the religious party to which he belongs, it is con
sidered as a penal judgment for his error and
ipostacy. If prosperous circumstances attend
iis family or his religious party, it is viewed
as a sign of divine approbation. He seldom
views the hand of God, except in uncommon oc
currences ; and then, he imagines that a miracle
is performed, and that the wheels of nature are
(Stopped in order to accomplish the event. He

seldom looks beyond the precincts of his own
church or nation, to observe the movements of
the divine footsteps towards other tribes of his
fallen race. He overlooks the traces of divine
operation which are every moment to be scon
above and around him— and yet, in the midst
of all such partial and contracted views, he will
sometimes decide on the wisdom and rectitude
of the ways of God, with as much confidence, as
if he had entered into the secret counsels of the
Eternal, and surveyed the whole plan of his
procedure.

Such are a few prominent outlines of the cha
racter of thousands whose names are enrolled as
members of the visible church — whose illiberal-
ity and self-conceit are owing to the contracted
notions they have formed of God and of religion.
And, surely, it must appear desirable to ever)
enlightened Christian, that all proper mean?
should be used to prevent rational immortal be
ings from remaining enchained in such mental
thraldom.

On the other hand, the man who takes an en
lightened view of all the works and dispensations
of God, and of all the circumstances and rela
tions of subordinate beings, necessarily acquires
a nobleness and liberality of mind, and an accu
racy in judging of things human and divine,
which no other person can possess. He does
not hastily take up an evil report against his
neighbour ; for he considers how unfounded such
reports often are, and how much they are owin^ to
the insinuations of envy or of malice. And when
he can no longer doubt of an evil action being
substantiated against any one, he does not tri
umph over him in the language of execration ;
for he considers all the circumstances, relations,
feelings, and temptations with which he may
have been surrounded ; he considers, that he
himself is a frail sinful creature, and might pos
sibly have fallen in a similar way, had he been
placed in the same situation. He does not
trumpet forth the praises of a man who has per
formed one brilliant benevolent deed, as if he
were a character to be admired and eulogized —
while the general course of his Hfe is marked
with vice, and an utter forgetfulness of God and
religion ; nor does he fix a stigma of immorality
upon the person who may have acted foolishly or
sinfully, in one or two instances, while the gene
ral tenor of his conduct has been marked by
purity and rectitude : for, in both cases, he con
siders, that it is not uninsulated action, but gene
ral habits, which determine the character of any
individual. He esteems the wise and the good,
and holds friendly intercourse with them, to
whatever political or religious party they belong.
He can bear, with affability and candour, to have
his opinions contradicted, and can differ from
his neighbour in many disputed points, while, at
the same time, he values and esteems him. He
will not brand a man as a heretic or a Deis*,

146

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

because he takes a view of some dogmas in
theology, in a different light from what he himself
does ; for he considers the difference of habits,
studies, pursuits, and educational prejudices
which must have influenced his opinions ; and
makes due allowance for the range of thought to
which he may have been accustomed. He is
always disposed to attribute the actions of others
to good motives, when he has no proof of the
contrary. He uses no threats nor physical force
to support his opinions, or to convince gainsay-
ers; for he knows that no external coercion can
illuminate the mind, and that the strength of ar
guments, and the force of truth, can alone pro
duce conviction. He is convinced how igno
rant he is, notwithstanding all his study, obser
vations, and researches ; and presses forward, as
long as he lives, to higher degrees of knowledge
and of moral improvement.

He is an active promoter of every scheme
that tends to enlighten and meliorate mankind,
and to extend the knowledge of salvation tq the
ends of the earth ; for he considers that it is not
by miracles, but by the subordinate agency of in
telligent beings, that God will effectuate the illu
mination and the moral renovation of our apos
tate race. He views the special agency of God
in all the movements of the scientific, the reli
gious, and the political world, and perceives Him
accomplishing his purpose in the inventions of
human genius, and in the economy of the minutest
insect, as well as in the earthquake, the storm,
and the convulsions of nations ; for he considers
the smallest atom, and the hosts of heaven, as
equally directed by eternal wisdom, and equally
necessary in the universal chain of creatures and
events. He displays a becoming modesty in
speaking of the ways and the works of God.
When he meets with any dark and afflictive dis •
pensation in the course of Providence, he does
not fret and repine, but is calm and resigned,
conscious that he perceives only a small portion
of the chain of God's dispensations, and is, there
fore, unable to form a just comparison of the
connexion of any one part with the whole.
When he contemplates the depraved and wretch
ed condition of the greater part of the world, at
present, and for thousands of years past, not
withstanding the salvation which has been
achieved for sinners of mankind, he is far from
arraigning the divine goodness and rectitude, in
leaving so many nations " to walk in their own
ways ;" for he knows not what relation this dis
mal scene may bear, what influence it may have,
or what important impressions it may produce,
on worlds and beings with which we are at pre
sent unacquainted.

He is cautious in pronouncing decisively re
specting the dispensations of God, in regard to
the universe at large. He does not, for example,
assert, with the utmost confidence, as some have
done, " that there never was, and never will be,

to all the ages of eternity, such a bright display
of the divine glory as in the cross of Christ."
He admires and adores the condescension and
the love of God, in the plan of salvation, which
the gospel exhibits, and feels an interest in it far
beyond that of any other special manifestation of
Deity ; but he dares not set limits to the divine
attributes and operations. He considers himself
at present, with regard to the grand system of
the universe, in a situation similar to that of a
small insect on one of the stones of a magnificent
edifice, which sees only a few hair-breadths
around it, and is altogether incapable of survey
ing the symmetry, the order, and beauty of the
structure, and of forming an adequate conception
of the whole. He considers that he has never
yet surveyed the millionth part of Jehovah's
empire, and therefore, cannot tell what the eter
nal Sovereign has been pleased to exhibit in its
numerous provinces ; and, least of all, can he
ever presume to dive into the depths of intermi
nable ages, and boldly declare what the Almighty
will, or will not do, through eternity to come.
He, therefore views it as presumption, while he
has no dictate of revelation for his warrant, to
pronounce decisively, either on the one side or
the other, of such a deep and important question,
which seems above the reach of the loftiest se
raph to determine.* In short, he endeavours to
take a view of all the manifestations of Deity
within his reach, from every source of infor
mation which lies before him, and as far as his
limited faculties will permit. He does not call in
question the discoveries of science, because they
bring to his ears most astonishing reports of the
wisdom and omnipotence of Jehovah, and of the
boundless extent of his kingdom ; but rejoices to
learn, that the grandeur of his dominions is ac
tually found to correspond with the lofty descrip
tions of divine majesty and glory recorded in
the volume of inspiration, and is thereby inspi
red with nobler hopes of the glory and felicity of
that heavenly world where he expects to spend
an endless existence.

If, then, such be some of the features in the
character of the enlightened Christian ; if libe
rality and candour, and accurate investigation,
mark the judgments he pronounces on the senti
ments and the actions of men, and on the works
and the ways of God; and if such views and
feelings ought to be considered as more conge
nial to the noble and benevolent spirit of our
religion, than the narrow and distorted notions
of a contracted mind, it must be an object much
to be desired, that the mass of the Christian world
be led into such strains of thought, as might im
bue their minds with a larger proportion of this
spirit. And, if diversified and occasional dis
cussions on the topics to which we have adverted
would have a tendency to produce this desirable

• See Appendix, No. X.

PIETY AND HUMILITY.

147

effect, it is obvious, that such branches of know-
.edge as are calculated to enlarge the capacity
•f the mind, and to throw a light over the reve-
«ations and the works of Goa, should no longer
8e overlooked in the range of our religious con
templations.

V. — The extensive range of thought which the
diversified objects in nature present, WOULD

HAVE A TENDENCY TO INSPIBE US WITH
A SPIRIT OF PIETV, AND OF PROFOUND
HUMILITY.

It is owing, in many instances, to want of
attention to the impressive displays of wisdom
and omnipotence in the material world, that our
pious feelings and devotional exercises are so
cold and languid. We stalk about on the sur
face of the earth, and pass from one day to an
other, without reflecting on the grand and com
plicated machinery around us, which is carrying
us along through the regions of space, and from
one portion of duration to another, as if the
mighty energies of the Eternal Mind, exerted in
our behalf, were unworthy of our acknowledge
ment or regard. How few, for example, reflect,
when they open their eyes in the morning, and
perceive the first beams of the rising sun, that
since they lay down to sleep, the divine power
has been exerted in carrying them more than
four thousand miles round to the eastward, in
order that they might again be cheered with the
morning light ; and that, during the same period,
they, along with the earth and its vast popula-
ion, have been carried forward 476,000 miles
from that portion of space which they occupied
seven hours before ! Or, if they have no idea of
the motion of the earth, and attach no belief to
such an opinion, how is it they do not re
flect, that after night has thrown its shades
around them, the sun, and ten thousand other
vast globes, must move several hundreds of mil-
Jions of miles before their eyes can again behold
the light of day? Either the one or the other of
these cases must be the fact ; and, in either case,
Jhere is presented to our view a display of the
omnipotence and the superintendence of Him in
whom we live and move, which demands our
gratitude, our admiration, and praise. And can
it ever be supposed, that such reflections, com
bined with all the other excitements to reverence
and gratitude, will not tend to elevate our con
templations, and to raise our pious feelings to a
higher pitch of devotion? Whether the psalmist
entertained any views of this kind when he com
posed the ninety-second Psalm, we cannot cer
tainly determine ; but I presume, the pious and
contemplative mind, when awaking from the
slumbers of the night, under such impressions,
might sing the first part of that song of praise
with peculiar emphasis and delight — "It is a
good thing to give thanks to Jehovah, and to
sing praise to thy name, O thou Most Hi»h ! to
42

show forth thy loving kindness in the morning.
For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy
work," (or thy powerful energy :) " I will tri
umph in the works of thy hands. O Lord !
how great are thy works! and thy thoughts" (or
contrivances) " are very deep ! A brutish man
knoweth not, neither doth a fool understand
this."

An extensive acquaintance with nature ar,J
science, combined with Christian principle,
would also induce profound humility. The maa
who has made excursions through the most di
versified regions of thought, is deeply sensible of
the little progress he has attained, and of the
vast and unbounded field of divine science which
still remains to be explored. When he consi
ders the immense variety of sublime subjects
which the volume of inspiration exhibits, and of
which he has obtained but a very faint and im
perfect glimpse — the comprehensive extent, and
the intricate windings of the operations of Pro
vidence, and the infinite number of beings over
which it extends — the amplitude and magnifi
cence of that glorious universe over which Je
hovah presides, and how small a portion of it
lies open to his minute inspection — he is hum
bled in the dust at the view of his own insigni
ficance ; he sees himself to be a very babe in
knowledge ; and, as it were, just emerging from
the gloom of ignorance into the first dawning?
of light and intelligence. He feels the full force
and spirit of the poet's sentiments — •

" Much learning shows how little mortals know."

When he considers the comprehensive extent of
the divine law, and its numerous bearings on
every part of his conduct, and on all the diver
sified relations in which he stands to his God.
and to his fellow men ; and when he reflects on
his multiplied deviations from that eternal rule of
rectitude, he is ashamed and confounded in the
presence of the Holy One of Israel ; and, on a
review of his former pride and self-conceit, is
constrained to adopt the language of Agur and
of Asaph — " Surely I am more brutish than an)
man, and have not the understanding of a man.*
" So foolish was I, and ignorant, I was as a
beast before thee." He views the meanest and
the most ignorant of his species, as but a very
few degrees below him in the scale of intelli
gence, and sees no reason why he should glory
over his fellows.

This sentiment might be illustrated from tha
example of somo of the most eminent men, in
whose minds science and religion were combuiea.
The Honourable Mr. Boyle was the most un
wearied and successful explorer of the works oj
God, in the age in which he lived, and all nis
philosophical pursuits were consecrated to tna
service of religion. Among other excellent
traits in his character, humility was the most
conspicuous. " He had about him," says Bishop

148

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

Burnet, * all that unaffected neylect of pomp in
clothes, lodging, furniture, and equipage, which
agreed with his grave and serious course of life,"
and was courteous and condescending to the
meanest of his fellow men. " He had, "says the
same author, "the profoundest veneration for the
great God of heaven and earth, that I ever ob
served in any person. The very name of God
was never mentioned by him without a pause,
and a visible stop in his discourse •," and the
tenor of his philosophical and theological writings
is in complete unison with these traits of cha
racter. Sir Isaac Newton, too, whose genius
seemed to know no limits but those of the visible
universe, was distinguished by his modesty, hu
mility, and meekness of temper. He had such
an mimble opinion of himself, that he had no re
lish of the applause which was so deservedly paid
him. He would have let others run away with
the glory of his inventions, if his friends and
countrymen had not been more jealous of his ho
nour than he was himself. He said, a little be
fore his death, " I do not know what I may ap
pear to the world, but to myself I seem to have
been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore,
and diverting myself in now and then finding a
pebble or a pre'ttier shell than ordinary, whilst
the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered be
fore me."

The same sentiment might have been illus
trated from the lives of Bacon, Locke, Dr.
Boerhaave, Hervey, Nieuwentyt, Ray, Derham,
the Abbe Pluche, Bonnet, and other eminent
characters, who devoted their stores of know
ledge to the illustration of the Christian system.
For an extensive knowledge of the operations of
God has a natural tendency to produce humility
and veneration ; and wherever it is combined with
pride and arrogance, either among philosophers
or divines, it indicates a lamentable deficiency,
if not a complete destitution of Christian prin
ciple, and of all those tempers which form the
bond of union among holy intelligences. After
the attention of Job had been directed to the
works of God, and when he had contemplated
the inexplicable phenomena of the divine agency
in the material world, he was ashamed and con
founded at his former presumption ; and, in deep
humility, exclaimed, u I have heard of thee by
the hearing of the ear ; but now mine eye seeth
thee; wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in
dust and ashes." In accordance with what has
been now stated, we find that the most exalted
intelligences, who, of course, possess the most
views of the works and providential

arrangements of God. are representeo us also
the most mini Die in '.heir ulsportment aad as
displaying the most u-ofound "everence in their
incessant adorations. Tbev "^'sui aou;n before
Him who sits upon '.he throne : and coat thev
crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art wor
thy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and
power; for thou hast created all things, and for
thy pleasure they are and were created." Their
moral conduct evinces the same lowly temper of
mind. They wait around the throne, in the at
titude of motion, with wings outspread ready to
fly, on the first signal of their Sovereign's will ;
they " do his commandments, hearkening to the
voice of his word," and do not disdain to perform
important services, in our wretched world, to
the meanest, human being who is numbered
among " the heirs of salvation." In like man
ner, were we endued with the grasp of intellect,
the capacious minds, the extensive knowledge,
and the moral powers which they possess, we
would also display the same humble and reve
rential spirit, and feel ashamed of those emotion?
of vanity and pride, which dispose so many of
the human family to look down with contempt
on their fellow mortals.

If the leading train of sentiment which per
vades this volume be admitted, the following ge
neral conclusions may be adduced :— That, in
conducting the religious instruction of the young,
the works of God in the material world, and the
most striking discoveries which have been made
as to their magnitude, variety, and mechanism,
should be frequently exhibited to their view in
minute detail ; as illustrations of the attributes
of the Deity, and of those descriptions of his
nature and operations contained in the volume
of inspiration ; — that the books put into their
hands should contain, among other subjects, po
pular and striking descriptions of the facts and
appearances of nature ; — that seminaries should
be established for the occasional instruction of
young persons, from the age of 15 to the age of
20 or 30, or upwards, in all those popular branches
of natural and moral science which have a ten
dency to enlarge the capacity of their minds, and
to expand their conceptions of the incessant agen
cy of God ; — and that the ru-rdsters cf religion, in
their public instructions, snouia rreouently blend
their discussions of divine TOPICS vrith illustra
tions derived from the scenes 01 creation and pro
vidence.

APPENDIX,

CONTAINING

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

No. I. p. 23 — Illustration of the Rate of Motion
in the Heavenly Sadies, on the supposition that
the earth is at rest.

THE distance of the sun is about 95 millions
of miles; consequently, the diameter of the cir
cle he would describe around the earth would be
190 millions, and its circumference 597,142.857,
which forms the extent of the circuit through
which he would move in 24 hours, if the earth
were at rest. This number divided by 24, gives
25,880,952, the number of miles he would move
in an hour ; and this last number, divided by 60,
gives 414,682, the number of miles he would
more in a minute. The nearest star is reckon

ed to be at least 20,000,000.000,000, or twenty
billions of miles distant from the earth ; conse
quently, its daily circuit round our globe would
measure more than 125,000.000,000,000 miles.
This sum divided by 86,400, the number pf se
conds in a day, would give 1,454,861,111, or
somewhat more than one thousand four hundred
millions of miles, for its rate of motion in a
second of time — a motion which, were it actuallv
existing, would, in all probability, shatter the
universe to atoms.

The unlearned reader may, perhaps, acquire
a more distinct idea of this explanation from the
following figure:

Let the small circle A, in the centre, represent round the earth every 24 hours. The line A B
-he earth, and the circle B C D E the orbit will represent the distance of the sun from the
»f the sun, on the supposition that he moves earth, or 95 millions of miles; the line B D the

150

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

diameter of the orbit he would describe ; and the
circle B C D E the circumference along which
he would move every day, or 597 millions of
miles, which is somewhat more than three times
the diameter. If the line A F represent the dis
tance of the nearest star, the circle F G H I will
represent the circuit through which it would
move every 24 hours, if the earth were at rest.
It is obvious, from the figure, that since the stars
are at a greater distance from the earth than the
sun, the circle they would describe around the
earth would he larger in proportion, and, conse
quently, their velocities would be proportionably
more rapid ; since they would move through
their larger circles in the same time in which the
sun moved through his narrow sphere. But the
supposition that the earth is the centre of all the
celestial motions, and that the different stars are
daily moving around it with different velocities,
and the slowest of these motions is so inconceiva
bly rapid — is so wild and extravagant, that it
appears altogether inconsistent with the harmony
of the universe, with the wisdom and intelli
gence of the Deity, and with all the other ar
rangements he has made in the system of nature.

No. II. p. 34. — Experimental illustrations of
the Pressure of the Atmosphere,

The pressure of the atmosphere is most strik
ingly illustrated by means of the air-pump. But
as few persons, comparatively, possess this in
strument, the following experiments, which any
person may perform at pleasure, are sufficiently
convincing on this point. Take a common
wine-glass, and fill it with water; apply a piece
of paper over the mouth of the glass ; press the
paper to the rim of the glass with the palm of
the hand ; turn the glass upside down ; with
draw the hand from the paper, and the water
will be supported by the pressure of the atmos
phere. That it is the atmospherical pressure,
and not the paper, which supports the water, is
evident ; for the paper, instead of being pressed
down by the weight of the water, is pressed
upward by the pressure of the atmosphere, and
nppears concave, or hollow in the middle. If the
flame of a candle be applied to the paper, it
may be held, for an indefinite length of time,
close to the paper, without setting fire to it.
The same fact is proved by the following expe-
-iment : — Take a glass tube, of any length, and
of a narrow bore ; put one end of it in a basin
of water ; apply the mouth to the other end,
and draw out the air by suction •, the water will
immediately rise toward the top of the tube ;
and if the finger or thumb be applied to the top
of the tube, to prevent the admission of air, and
the tube removed from the basin of water, the
water in the tube will be supported by the pres
sure of the atmosphere on the lower end. Again :
—Take a wine-glass, and burn a small bit of

paper in it ; and when the paper is burning
press the palm of the hand upon the mouth of
the glass, and it will adhere to the hand with
considerable force. In this case, the pressure
of the atmosphere will be sensibly felt : for i:
will sometimes require considerable force to de
tach the glass from the hand.

The pressure of the atmosphere explains a
variety of common phenomena. When we take
a draught of water out of a basin, or a running
stream, we immerse our mouths in the water,
and make a vacuum by drawing in the air ; the
pressure of the atmosphere upon the external
surface of the water then forces it into the
mouth. The same cause explains the process
of a child sucking its mother's breasts — the ac
tion of a boy's sucker, in lifting large stones —
the rise of water in pumps — the effects produced
by cements — the firm adhesion of snails and
periwinkles to rocks and stones — the scarcity of
water in the time of hard frosts — and the fact
that a cask will not run by the cock, unless a
hole be opened in some other part of the cask.

No. III. p. 118. — On the means by which it
may probably be ascertained whether the Moon
be a Habitable World.

About six years ago, the author published, in
the Monthly Magazine, a few observations on
the surface of the moon, in which a few remarks
were offered on this subject. The following is
an extract from that communication : —

" If we be ever to obtain an ocular demon
stration of the habitability of any of the celestial
orbs, the moon is the only one, where we can
expect to trace, by our telescopes, indications
of the agency of sentient or intelligent beings ;
and I am pretty much convinced, that a long
continued series of observations on this planet,
by a number of individuals in different places,
might completely set at rest the question, ' Whe
ther the moon be a habitable world?' Were a
vast number of persons, in different parts of the
world, to devote themselves to a particular sur
vey of the moon — were different portions of her
surface allotted to different individuals, as the
object of their particular research — were every
mountain, hill, cavern, cliff, and plain accurately
inspected — and every change and modification
in the appearance of particular spots carefully
marked and represented in a series of delinea
tions, it might lead to some certain conclusions,
both as to her physical constitution, and her
ultimate destination. It can be demonstrated,
that a telescope which magnifies 100 times,
will show a spot on the moon's surface, whose
diameter is 1223 yards ; and one which magni
fies a thousand times, will, of course, enable ug
to perceive a portion of her surface, whose size
is only 122 yards : and, consequently, an object,
whether natural or artificial, of no greater extent

APPENDIX.

15.

than one of our large edifices, (for example, St.
Paul's church, London,) may, by such an in
strument, be easily distinguished. Now, if every
minute point on the lunar surface were accu
rately marked by numerous observers, it might
be ascertained whether any changes are taking
place, either from physical causes, or from the
operations of intelligent agents. If a large forest
were cutting down — if a city were building in
an open plain, or extending its former bounda
ries—if a barren waste were changing into a
scene of vegetation— or, if an immense con
course of animated beings were occasionally
assembled on a particular spot, or shifting from
one place to another — such changes would be
ind'"" d by certain modifications of shade, co-
loui, or motion ; and, consequently, would furnish
a direct proof of the agency of intelligent beings
analogous to man, and of the moon being a ha
bitable globe. For although we may never be
able to distinguish the inhabitants of the moon,
(if any exist,) yet if we can trace those Affects
which can flow only from the operations of intel
ligent agents, it would form a complete demon
stration of their existence, on the same ground
on which a navigator concludes an unknown
island to be inhabited, when he perceives human
habitations, and cultivated fields.

" That changes occasionally happen on the
lunar hemisphere next the earth, appears from
the observations of Horschel and Schroeter, par
ticularly from those of the latter. In the trans
actions of the 'Society of Natural Philosophy,'
at Berlin, Schroeter relate-s, that on the SOt^i
December, 1791, at five o'clock, P.M. with a seven
feet reflector, magnifying 161 times, he perceived
the commencement of a small crater on the
Bouth-we-st declivity of the volcanic mountain
in the Mare Crisium, having a shadow of at
least 1" 5. On the llth January, at twenty
minutes past five, on looking at this place again,
he could see neither the new crater nor its sha
dow. Again, on the 4th January, 1792, he
perceived, in the eastern crater of Helicon, a
central mountain, of a clear gray colour, 3r/ in
diameter, of which, during many years' obser
vations, he had perceived no trace. ' This ap
pearance,' he adds, ' is remarkable, as probably
from the time of Hevelius, the western part of
Helicon has been forming into its present shape,
and nature seems, in that district, to be parti
cularly active.' — In making such minute obser
vations as those to which I allude, it would be
proper, along with an inspection of the moon's
luminous disk, to mark the appearances of dif
ferent portions of her dark hemisphere, when it
is partially enlightened by the reflected light
from the earth, soon after the appearance of new
moon. These researches woul:l require a long-
continued series of the most minute observa
tions, by numerous observers ir. different regions
of the globe, which could be effected only by

exciting, among the bulk of mankind, a general
attention to such investigations. But were this
object accomplished, and were numerous obser
vations made from the tops of mountains, and in
the serene sky of southern climes, where the
powers of the telescope are not counteracted by
dense vapours, there can be little doubt that direct
proofs would be obtained that the moon is a
habitable world ; or, at least, that the question
in relation to this point would be completely set
at rest."

No. IV. — Remarks on the late pretended due*
very of a Lunar Fortification.

The British public was lately amused by the
announcement of a discovery said to have been
made by Professor Frauenhofer, of Munich.
This gentleman was said to have discovered a
fortification in the moon, and to have distin
guished several lines of road, supposed to be the
work of the 'unar inhabitants. It is scarcely
necessary to say, that such announcements are
obviously premature. To perceive distinctly
the shape of an object in the moon, which re
sembles a fortification, it is requisite, that that
object be of a much larger size than our terres
trial ramparts. Besides, although an object
resembling one of our fortifications were per
ceived on the surface of the moon, there would
be no reason to conclude, that it served the same
purpose as fortifications do among us. We are
so much accustomed to war in our terrestrial
system, and reflect so little on its diabolical na
ture, that we are apt to imagine that it must form
a necessary employment even in other worlds.
To be assured that a fortification existed in the
moon for the same purpose as with us, would
indeed be dismal tidings from another world ;
for it would be a necessary conclusion, from such*
intelligence, that the inhabitants of that globe
are actuated by the same principles of depravity,
ambition, and revenge, which have infected the
moral atmosphere of our sublunary world. With
regard to the pretended discovery of the lunar
roads, it may not be improper to remark, that
such roads behooved to be at least 400 feet
broad, or ten times the breadth of ours, in order
to be perceived as faint lines through a telescope
which magnifies a thousand times ; which is a
higher power, I presume, than Frauenhofer can
apply with distinctness to any of his telescopes.
It is not at all likely that the lunar inhabitants
are of such a gigantic size, or employ carriages
of such an enormous bulk, as to require roads of
such dimensions, since the whole surface of the
moon is only the thirteenth part of the area of
our globe.

Schroeter conjectures the existence of a great
city to the north of Manus, (a spot in the moon,)
and of an extensive canal towards Hygena, (an
other spot,) and he represents part of the spot

152

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

named Mare Imbrium, to be as fertile as the
Campania. SeeEdin. Phil. Jour. No. 21, for
July, 1824. Similar remarks to those now stated
will apply to these conjectures of Schroeter. We
are too apt to imagine, that the objects we per
ceive in the moon must bear a certain resem
blance to those with which we are acquainted on
the earth ; whereas, there is every reason to be
lieve, from the variety we perceive in nature,
that no one world resembles another, except in
some of its more prominent and general arrange
ments. The moon bears a general resemblance
to the earth, in its being diversified with moun
tains and valleys ; but the positions and arrange
ment of these objects in the moon, and the scenery
they exhibit, are materially different from what
appears on the surface of the terraqueous globe.

No. V. — On the ideas of Magnitude, Motion,
and Duration, as expressed by numbers. See
pp. 44, 46.

In the pages referred to, and other parts of
this volume, some very large numbers are ex
pressed in figures. Some readers have insinu
ated, that it would have been better to have ex
pressed such numbers in words. The author,
however, is of a different opinion ; because to
some readers, not much acquainted with nume
ration, a thousand trillions would convey nearly
the same idea as a thousand nonilions, though
the one number contains 58 places of figures, and
the other only 22. It is chiefly the number of
figures, or ciphers, in such large sums, that leads
us to form a comparative estimate of their value
or extent. Our ideas of magnitude and exten
sion, conveyed by such numbers, must, of course,
be very vague and undefined. If we have been
accustomed to travelling, we have a tolerable
clear conception of a hundred, and even of a
thousand miles ; but we have no clear nor ade
quate conception of a body, or a portion of space,
ten hundred thousand, ten hundred millions, or
ten hundred billions of miles in extent. The
mind, however, may be assisted in its concep
tions, and in its comparative estimate of different
numbers, by fixing on some particular number as
a standard. If, according to the common reck
oning, we suppos-e, that 5828 years have elapsed
since the commencement of time, the number of
seconds, or moments, in this period, will amount
to 183,913,782,212, or one hundred and eighty-
three thousand nine hundred and thirteen mil
lions, seven hundred and eighty-two thousand,
two hundred and twelve, which is less than the
fifth part of a billion. If the distance of the
nearest stars from the earth be at least 20 bil
lions of miles, then this distance may be other
wise expressed, by saying, that the number of
miles which intervene between us and these bo
dies is more than a hundred times g^ealer than
the number of moments which have elapsed since

the creation ; and, by a similar comparison, it
will be found that the number of cubical miles
within the limits of the planetary system, is
130,000,000,000,000,000, or one hundred and
thirty thousand billions of times greater than the
number of moments in 5828 years.

It has been computed, that the earth, suppos
ing it a solid globe, conlains about 30,000,000,-
000,000,000,000,000,000,000 ;000, or thirty sep-
tillions of grains of sand, supposing a hundred
grains of sand to be equal in length to an inch,
and, consequently, a million of such grains for
every cubical inch. If we use this number as
a standard for estimating the number of cubical
miles contained within the space which inter
venes between us and the nearest stars, -^all
find that the number of cubical miles compre
hended within this space, is more than ten thou
sand millions of times greater than the number
of the grains of sand contained in the globe on
which we dwell.

Though the human mind can form no definite
conceptions of such numbers and magnitivdes,
yet it may be useful, occasionally, to ruminate
on such subjects ; as it is the only, or, at least,
the principal mode by which limited miixis like
ours can approximate to an idea of the infinity
of the Creator. And if an image of infinity is
presented to the mind in the spaces comprehend
ed within the limits of our system, how over
powering the conception of innumerable systems,
to which ours bears no more proportion than a
drop of water to the mighty ocean ! How in
effably glorious must be the attributes of that
incomprehensible Being who pervades every part
of this vast universe, and who continually super
intends all its minute and diversified movements '

No. VI. p. 91.— On a Plurality of Worlds.

The doctrine of a plurality of worlds is now
admitted as highly probable both by philosophers
and by enlightened divines. But it has been
admitted by many persons on grounds that are
too general and vague, and consequently, a full
conviction of its truth is seldom produced in the
mind. In different parts of the preceding volume,
I have all along taken it for granted, because I
consider it as susceptible of a moral demonstra
tion. The following heads of argument, were
they fully illustrated, would go far to carry de
monstration to the mind on this subject : namely,
That there are numerous bodies in the universe
of a bulk sufficient to contain myriads of intelli
gent beings, and to afford them enjoyment — tha(
there appears, in the constitution of many ol
these bodies, a variety of arrangements evi
dently adapted to this end — that, in relation to
the planets of our system, there are many cir
cumstances which bear a striking resemblance
to the constitution of our globe and its appen
dages-, they have annual uid diurnal motions,

APPENDIX.

moons, atmospheres, mountains, and vales — that
lioht, and boat, and colour, appear to be dis
tributed throughout the regions of immensity ;
and that these agents can have a relation only
to the necessities and the happiness of orga
nized intelligences — that every part of nature,
so far as our observations on the surface of
this globe extend, appears to exist solely for
the sake of sentient beings — that this doctrine
is more worthy of the Infinite Creator, and gives
a more glorious and magnificent idea of his na
ture, than to suppose his benevolent regards
confined to the globe on which we dwell. When
these and a variety of other arguments are con
sidered, in connexion with the wisdom and other
attributes of the Deity, they amount not only to
a high degree of probability, but to something
approaching to a moral demonstration. But to
illustrate these arguments in a minute detail, so
as to make a convincing impisssion on the mind,
would require a volume of a considerable size.
The author flatters himself he has some original
thoughts on this subject, which may probably see
the light should the present work meet with public
acceptance. There is no work in our language
which takes an extensive view of this subject,
in connexion with the attributes of the Deity, and
the intimations contained in divine revelation.
Fontenelle's " Plurality of Worlds" contains a
number of ingenious reasonings ; but he treats
the subject in too light and flippant a manner,
and without the least reference to a Supreme
Intelligence. The celebrated Huygens, in his
" Cosmotheoros" instead of attempting to prove
the doctrine of a plurality of worlds, takes it fur
granted, and indulges chiefly in conjectures re
specting the original structure and faculties of
their inhabitants.

That the scriptures are silent on this head,
has been assumed by some as a presumptive ar
gument that this doctrine is without a solid foun
dation. I have already endeavoured to show
that this assumption is unfounded ; (see page
90.) A plurality of worlds is more than once
asserted in scripture, and in numerous passages
is evidently taken for granted. Celestial intel
ligences are represented as ascribing " glory,
honour, wisdom, and power" to the king of hea
ven, " because he hath created all things," and
because they perceive his works to be " great
and marvellous." But if all the great globes in
the firmament were only so many frightful de-
•erts, destitute of inhabitants, such a universe
could never inspire superior intelligences with
admiration of the wisdom of the Creator. For
wisdom consists in proportioning means to ends ;
but, in the case supposed, there would be no pro
portion between the means and the end. The
means are indeed great and astonishing ; but no
and appears to justify such a display of creating

energy. The psalmist, when ne contemplated
the heavens, was so affected with the idea of the
immense population of the universe, that ne
seems to have been almost afraid lest he should
be overlooked amidst the immensity of beings
that are under the superintendence of God.
" When I consider thy heavens — what is man
that thou art mindful of him !" There would be
no propriety nor emphasis in this exclamation,
if the heavenly orbs were devoid of inhabitants;
for if no intelligent beings exist beside man,
and a colony of angels, it would not appear
wonderful that the Creator should exercise a
particular care over the one-half of his intelligent
offspring. But, if we conceive the universe as
composed of ten thousand times ten thousand
worlds, peopled with myriads of intellectual
beings of various orders, the sentiment of admi
ration implied in the passage is extremely natu
ral and emphatic, and conveys to us an im
pressive idea of the intelligence, the beneficence,
and the condescension of the Founder and Go
vernor of all worlds.

No. VII. pp. 114, 115. — On the first Inventor of
Printing.

Mr. Ireland, in his " Picturesque Tour through
Holland, Brabant, and part of France, in 1789,"
gives the following account of the inventor of
printing, when describing the city of Haerlem.

" Haerlem claims the invention of the art of
printing. It is attributed to Lawrence Koster, an
alderman of this city, in 1440 ; whose house is yet
standing in the market-place opposite the church.
Amusing himself one day in the neighbouring
wood, with cutting the bark of trees into the let
ters that formed the initials of his name, he is
said to have laid them on paper, and falling
asleep, when he awoke, observed, that from the
dew, their form was impressed on the paper.
This accident induced him to make further ex
periments : he next cut his letters in wood, and,
dipping them in a glutinous liquid, impressed
them on paper, which he found an improvement ;
and, soon after, substituting leaden and pewter
letters, erected a press in his house ; thus laying
the foundation of this noble art, which has thence
gradually risen to its present excellence. The
art, it is said, was stolen from him by his ser
vant, John Faustus, who conveyed it to Mentz,
and, from the novelty of the discovery, soon ac
quired the title of doctor and conjuror. The
original specimens are now shown at the library
in Ihe Town Hall. The first is on a leaf of
parchment, and the second and third on paper,
printed only on one side, and the corners left
blank for capitals. At the top are wooden cuts,
representing the creation, and, as it is called,
Lucifer's Fall."— Pp. 109— 1 ',

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

No. Vin. p. 118.— On Telescopes ; with a brief
notice of a NEW REFLECTING TELESCOPE,
constructed hy the author.

It is doubtful to what particular individual
we owe the invention of the telescope. Some
nave supposed that Roger Bacon and Baptista
Porta invented this instrument. Borelli ascribes
the invention to Zacharias Jansen, a native of
Middleburgh. Perhaps the account given in the
article to which this note refers, and which is
stated by a variety of authors, may be as proba
ble as any other. It is certain that the telescope
was not in general use until the beginning of
the 17th century, and that no discoveries in the
heavens were made with it, till the year 1609.

There are two kinds of telescopes, refracting
and reflecting. In refracting telescopes, the rays
of light pass through convex or concave glasses
or lenses. The object-glass is always convex,
and forms an image or picture of the object in an
inverted position in its focus ; which image is
viewed by the eye-glass ; and the magnifying
power is in the proportion of the focal distance of
the object-glass to that of the eye-glass. The
focal distance of a convex glass may be ascer
tained by holding it in the rays of the sun, op
posite to a piece of white paper, and measuring
the distance between the glass and the white
spot, or burning point, formed on the paper. An
astronomical telescope for viewing celestial ob
jects may be constructed with only two glasses.
If an object-glass, 30 inches focal distance, be
fixed in the end of a tube, and an eye-glass of
one inch focus be placed at. the other end, at the
distance of 31 inches from the object-glass, a
telescope will be formed, which will magnify in
the proportion of one to thirty, or 30 times ; that
is, objects seen through such a telescope will ap
pear thirty times larger in diameter, or thirty
times nearer, than to the naked eye. By such
an instrument, the inequalities on the moon's
surface, and some of the satellites of Jupiter,
may be perceived ; but when directed to land ob
jects they will appear inverted, or turned upside
down. In order to reverse the appearance of
the object, two other eye-glasses are required ;
or, if a concave eye-glass of a similar focus be
placed at 29 inches from the object-glass, the
object will appear in its natural position, and the
magnifying power will be the same ; but the
field of view will be much smaller. Astro
nomical telescopes of this construction were for
merly made of 120, and even of 200 feet in
length, and were used without a tube ; the ob
ject-glass being placed on the top of along pole ;
but these are now entirely superseded by achro
matic telescopes. In the achromatic telescope,
the object-glass is compounded of two, and
sometimes of three lenses, placed close to each
other, one of which is a double concave of
white flint glass, and the other a double convex

of crown glass. By this means an image is
formed without being blended with .the prismatic
colours ; and it will, therefore, bear a much
greater magr jfying power than a common refrac
tor. An achromatic telescope four feet long
will magnify objects as much as a common re
fractor 100 feet long.

In reflecting telescopes the images of objects
are formed by speculums or mirrors, instead of
lenses. They are of two kinds, the Gregorian
and the Newtonian. The Gregorian reflector
consists of a tube, in which a concave mirror,
having a hole in its centre, is placed. The rays
of light from distant objects falling upon this
mirror, form an image before it, in its centre or
focus. This image is intercepted by a smaller
mirror, which reflects it back through the hole in
the large mirror, to an eye-glass, through which
the observer views the object. In the Newtonian
reflector, a plane mirror, placed at an angle of
45 degrees, is substituted in place of the small
mirror in the Gregorian construction, and the
observer looks down upon the object through the
side of the tube. Dr. Brewster has suggested
an interesting improvement in the construction
of this instrument, which is described in the
Edinburgh Ency. Art. Optics, p. 644.

New Reflector. — About three years ago, the
author commenced a series of experiments on
reflecting telescopes ; and has lately constructed
several on a new plan and principle. In this
construction, there is no small speculum, either
plane, convex, or concave ; there is no tube, ex
cept a short one of two or three inches in length,
for holding the speculum. The observer sits with
his back to the object, and views the image formed
by the speculum through an eye-piece, which re
quires to be nicely directed and adjusted. Three
or four instruments of this construction have been
fitted up, with specula of 5, 8, 16, 28, 35, and
49 inches focal distance. One of them, having
a speculum of eight inches focus, and two inches
diameter, with a terrestrial eye-piece, magnify
ing about 25 times, forms an excellent parlour
telescope for viewing land objects, and exhibits
them in a brilliant and novel aspect. When
compared with a Gregorian of the same size
and magnifying power, the quantity of light upon
the object appears nearly doubled, and the image
is equalty distinct. It represents objects in their
natural colours, without that dingy and yellowish
tinge which apnears when looking through a
Gregorian. Another of these instruments, hav
ing a speculum of 28 inches focal distance, and
an eye-piece producing a magnifying power of
about 100 times, serves as an excellent astrono
mical telescope. By this instrument the belts
and satellites of Jupiter, the ring of Saturn, and
the mountains and cavities of the moon, may be
contemplated with great ease and distinctness.
By placing the pedestal on the four of the apart*

APPENDIX.

155

ment, when the object is at a high elevation, we
can view celestial phenomena with the same ease
as if we were sitting at a writing desk reading a
book. With a magnifying power of about 40 or
jO times applied to this telescope, terrestrial ob-
>ects appear extremely aright and well defined.
A speculum of 49 inches focal distance, and 6i
inches diameter, has lately been fitted up on the
same principle. With magnifying powers of
from 100 to 160 times, it exhibits distinct and in
teresting views of the moon's surface, and of the
ring of Saturn, and with a power of 56 times it
affords a beautiful view of land objects. The
specula used in these instruments are far from
being good ; being of a yellowish colour, and
scarcely half polished, and having large holes in
the centre ; as they were originally intended for
Gregorian reflectors ; yet the brightness of vision
approaches nearly to that of achromatic tele
scopes. The experiments which have been made
on this subject demonstrate, that a tube is not
necessary for a reflecting telescope, when view
ing either celestial or terrestrial objects ; and,
therefore, this construction of the instrument may
be denominated, The Aerial Reflector. The
simplicity of the construction, and the excellence
of the performance of these instruments, have
been much admired by several scientific gentle
men to whom they have been exhibited. A
caveat has lately been lodged at the Patent Of
fice, in the view of taking out a patent for this
construction of reflecting telescopes ; and a more
detailed account of it will probably soon appear
in some of the scientific journals.

In the system of Optics, lately published in
the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, (one of the most
luminous and comprehensive treatises which has
yet appeared on this subject,) the writer, in his
introduction to the account of Dr. Brewster's
improvement on the Newtonian telescope, re
marks : — " If we could dispense with the use of
the small specula in telescopes of moderate length,
by inclining the great speculum, and using an
oblique, and, consequently, a distorted reflection,
as proposed first by La Maire, we should consider
the Newtonian telescope as perfect ; and on a
large scale, or when the instrument exceeds 20
feet, it has undoubtedly this character, as nothing
can be more simple than to magnify, by a single
eyeglass, the image formed by a single speculum.
— As the front view is quite impracticable, and,
indeed, has never been attempted in instruments
of a small size, it becomes of great practical con
sequence to remove as much as possible the evils
which arise from the use of a small speculum,"
&c. — The instruments noticed above have ef
fectuated the desirable object alluded to by this
respectable writer; and the principle of the con
struction is neither that of Dr. Herschel's/ron/
view, nor does it coincide with that proposed
by La Maire, which seems to have been a mere
nint, which was never put intc executior.

No. IX. p. 256. — On Steam Navigation.

The application of steam, as a mechanical
power for impelling vessels along rivers and seas,
is one of the most brilliant and useful achieve
ments of art which distinguish the present age
and seems destined to produce an important and
interesting change in the general intercourse of
nations. From the " Report of a Committee of
Parliament," published in 1822, it appears, that
the first application of steam to the impelling of
vessels was made by an Englishman, of the
name of Hull, who, in 1736, obtained a patent
for the invention of a steam-boat, to be moved
with a crank and paddles. But it was only in
1807, that the invention was fairly brought into
practical use, by Mr. Fulton, an American,
who had the assistance and advice of Mr. Bell,
a Scots engineer. There are now, according
to Mr. Perkins* statement, about 300 steam
boats on the rivers, bays, and coasts of the
United States, varying in their size from 100
to 700 tons. In Britain, the first successful
application of steam to vessels was made by
the above-mentioned Mr. Bell,* who built the
Comet of 25 tons, and four horses' power, to
ply on the Clyde. There are now reckoned
about 150 steam-boats, from 40 to 500 tons,
plying on (he rivers and coasts of the British
isles. Glasgow, which had the honour of in
troducing steam navigation on this side of the
Atlantic, is still the seat of its greatest activity.
According to a statement given in the " Edin
burgh Philosophical Journal," published in July,
1822, there were then no less than 36 steam
boats, of various sizes, plying on the Clyde.
Some of these, besides performing regular voy
ages to Inverary, Campbelton, Belfast, Liver
pool, and other places, are also performing
tours, during the summer months, to the Giant's.
Causeway, Staffa, Skye, and other ports of
the Western isles, and to Inverness by the
Caledonian canal. Steam-boats are also plying
between Aberdeen and Leith — between New-
haven and Aberdour, Brunt island, Kinghorn,
Kirkaldy, and Dysart; and to Queensferry,
Alloa, Grangemouth, and Sterling — between
Leith and London — Dover and Calais. One
has been plying for several years on Loch-
Lomond, which enables the traveller, at a small
expense, to take an interesting view of the di
versified scenery of that beautiful lake. Five
are just now plying on the Tay ; two of which,
with engines of 30 and 40 horse powers, and
fitted up with elegant accommodations ply daily
between Perth and Dundee; each of them, during

* It is much to be regretted, and it is certainly not
congenial to the liberal spirit of the age, that this
gentleman, who was among the first inventors of
steam navigation, and who has done so much to
promote its success in the neighbourhood of Glas
gow, has never received any public reward for his
exertions, and has been left to sink into a state ap
proaching to poverty.

156

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

most of the summer months, transporting nearly
a hundred passengers at every trip.

Steam navigation, though less understood on
the Continent than with us, is now beginning
to make considerable progress. There are 8
steam-boats on the Garonne, and several on
the Seine. There are two on the Lake of
Geneva, and two are about to be established
on the Lake Constance, and there are, besides,
one or two on the Danube. It is likely, that
in the course of a few years such conveyances
will be established on all our friths and rivers,
and the period is, no doubt, hastening on, when
excursions will be taken, in such vehicles, be
tween Europe and America. A steam-boat of
700 tons burden, and 100 horse power, has sailed
regularly, summer and winter, for three or four
years, between New-York and New-Orleans,
a distance of 2000 miles, in an open sea, ex
posed to great storms ; and, by many, she is
preferred to the packets, not only for the cer
tainty of making shorter voyages, but on ac
count of greater safety. In America, steam
vessels are fitte'd up with every accommodation
and elegancy which art can devise ; so as to
produce, if possible, as great a variety of en
joyment to passengers on sea as on land. Mr.
Church, the American consul in France, has
invented a paddle, which revolves on the pad
dle wheel, by very simple mechanism, which
is found to save power. In the United States,
a new mode of constructing cabins has been
lately introduced, so as to place them beyond
the reach of injury from explosions of the boiler.
A steam vessel of a large size has lately been
fitted up, which is intended to sail between
London and Calcutta.

" Steam vessels have been built in this coun
try of from 10 to 500 tons, and from 3 or 4 to 1 10
horse power. The length of the City of Edin
burgh, on the upper deck, is 143 feet ; and some
have lately been constructed of still larger dimen
sions. The American steam-boats are larger
than ours, and are much more used for the con
veyance of merchandise. The Frontinac, which
plies on the Canadian side of Lake Ontario, is
170 feet long on deck, and 32 feet broad ; and
the Chancellor Livingston, which plies on the
Hudson, is of the same size. The velocity aimed
at is generally 8 or 9 miles an hour. The pro
portion is, on an average, about one horse power
for every four tons of burden, computed in the
usual way. Tne velocity is found to be nearly
as the square root of the power, so that an 80
horse power engine will produce only twice the
velocity of one of 20 horse power. Something
depends also on the make and size of the vessel.
The " Sovereign," of 210 tons, and 80 horse
power, goes 9| miles an hour in still water ; and
the " James Watt," of 448 tons, and 100 horse
power, is stated to go 10 miles. For the paddle-
iioards, the rule is, that 3-10ths of a square foot

of surface should be immersed in the water for
each horse power. The paddle wheels varv
from 10 to 15 feet in diameter, dip from 12 to 20
inches in the water, and have about one foot in
breadih for each 10 horse power. Mr. Gladstone
affirms, that so much power is wasted in dis
placing the water by the stroke of the board,
that the velocity of the ship is only about one-half
of that of the outer surface of the paddle-wheel.

" There are two sources of apprehension in
steam-boats — fire, and the bursting of the boiler.
With regard to the latter, when the boiler is of
low pressure, it is satisfactorily established that
not the smallest danger exists. And in the bes'
constructed vessels, the danger from fire is com
pletely obviated, by separating the furnace from
the sides of the vessels by five inches of water."

The power of stearn is now rendered subser
vient to the breaking of stones for the construc
tion of roads. The stones are put into a kind
of hopper above, and pushed down with a rake,
and the machine is worked by a rotatory motion
of one horse power ; and will break a ton of hard
pebbles completely, in from six to eight minrtes.
A steam machine has also been invented for the
dressing of woollen cloth, which does as much work
in 50 minutes as two men could do in two days.
Mon. Mag. Aug. 1823, p. 71. — A steam car
riage, for conveying goods and passengers on
land, was lately constructing by Mr. Griffiths.
Its rate of motion, on common roads, is estimated
at five miles an hour, at an average ; about three
miles when going up hill, and above seven when
running down. But pecuniary embarrassments,
or other impediments, have, hitherto, prevented
the completion of his design.

Mr. Perkins has lately made improvements on
the steam engine, which promise to carry its
powers to a high degree of perfection. The en
gine he has lately constructed is calculated to a
ten horse power, though the cylinder is no more
than two inches in diameter, and 18 inches long,
with a stroke of only 12 inches. Although the
space occupied by the engine is not more than
six feet by eight, yet Mr. P. considers the ap
paratus (with the exception of the working cy
linder and piston) as perfectly sufficient for a
thirty horse engine. When the engine performs
full work, it consumes only two bu;-hels of coal
in the day. Mr. Perkins has also announced a
discovery still more extraordinary, viz. that he
has been able " to arrest, the heat, after it has
performed its mechanical functions, and actually
pump it back to the generator, to unite with a
fresh portion of water, and renew its useful la
bours." A particular account of Pe rkins's engine,
accompanied with an engraving, is given in the
Edin. Philos. Journal, No. 17, for July 1823.
The pretensions of Mr. Perkins, however, have
not yet been so fully substantiated by experiment
as to satisfy the anxious expec .ation of the

APPENDIX.

157

An interesting report has lately been published
of a series of experiments, made with a new
steam engine, invented by an American machi
nist, called the capillary steam engine. Three
great objects are said to be accomplished by this
invention, lightness, safety, and economy of fuel.
In an engine calculated for a four horse power,
tne generator is formed of a copper tube i inch
in diameter, and 100 feet long, which weighs
aoout 161bs. It is arranged in coils, one above
another, m the form of a sugar loaf, 30 inches
high ; the bottom coil being 18 inches in diame
ter, and the top one considerably less. The
wood is prepared as is usual for a stove, and put
within the coils. The steam cylinder is formed
of sheet copper, three inches in diameter, 27
inches in stroke, and, with all its appendages,
weighs about 251bs. It has been ascertained,
that the generator and main cylinder, with their
contents and appendages, exclusive of fuel, need
not weigh more than 201bs. to the horse power.
JVo harm can be done by the bursting of boilers
— even a safety-valve is considered as useless.
In the course of the experiments, the experi
menters several times burst the tube ; but, so far
from doing any injury, it could not. always be
perceived oy the spectators. To ascertain what
may be done towards aerial navigation, by steam,
experiments were made on the power of wings
in the air, and on the power necessary to work
them. The result is, that it requires a horse
power to carry SOIbs. in the air ; so that a flying
engine, to be worked by charcoal, would weigh
about SOIbs. to the horse power, wings, conden
ser and fuel included. It was also ascertained
by experiments and calculations, that a balloon
could be made to carry a man with an engine,
which would push it at the rate of 15 miles an
hour in the air. A more particular detail of
these experiments may be seen in the " London
Mechanics' Magazine," No. 60, for 16th Octo
ber, 1824.

No. X. p. 146. — Strictures on a certain sentiment
respecting the work of Human Redemption.

The sentiment referred to in this paragraph,
" That there never was, nor ever will be, through
all the ages of eternity, so wonderful a display
of the divine glory, as in the cross of Christ,"
has been reiterated a thousand times, in sermons
and in systems of divinity, and is still repeat
ed by certain preachers, as if it were an in
controvertible axiom, which ought never to be
called in question ; and is, no doubt, intended to
magnify the divine attributes, and the work of
redemption.* But it is nothing more than a

• It is not important to determine how often the
sentiment here expressed has been " reiterated in
iermons and systems r.f divinity." We cannot, how
ever, believe that it has been repeated with the same
frequency as the author's language seems to imply.
That there ate instances, in which it was designed

presumptuous assumption, which has a tendency
to limit the perfections of Deity, and to present
a partial and distorted view of the economy of
human redemption. For, in the first place, it
has no foundation in Scripture. There is not a
single passage from which it can be legitimately
deduced. The onus probandi, on this point,
rests with those who make the assertion. A
gentleman, when lately conversing on this sub
ject, brought forward the following interrogation,
as a demonstrative argument in proof of the po
sition in question: " Is not redemption declared
in Scripture to be the chief of all the work? of
God ?" but he was not a little surprised, when
he was informed that the passage, which he had
partly misquoted, is applied to the behemoth or
the elephant, as stated in Job xl. 19.— 2dly, the
assertion is as presumptuous as it is unfounded.
It takes for granted, that we know all the events
which have already happened, and which are now
taking place throughout the whole range of God's
universal empire. This empire appears un
bounded ; and that portion of it which we can
minutely explore, is but as a point in comparison

to express all the meaning here attributed to it, can-
not be denied. But why may it not have been some
times used to distinguish the work of mediation from
all the other favours which God has conferred on
our race ? In his History of Redemption, p. 342, Pre
sident Edwards says, " From what has been said, one
may argue, that the work of redemption is the great
est of all God's works, of which we have any notice,
and it is the end of all his other works." This view
of the subject accords with the scriptures. Though
it cannot be asserted, that in a single instance they
directly affirm the work of redemption to be the
greatest of all the works of God, yet they give it
such an importance and prominency, as arc conced
ed to no other of His dispensations. In this light the
apostles seem to have regarded it. Paul counted all
the distinctions and honours and advantages which
he had acquired among the Jews, as loss in coin
parison with the glory of the gospel. He went even
farther. He declared that he counted all things but
loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ
Jesus his Lord. In this view of the subject there is
no presumption and no limitation of the " divine
perfections and operations." It has no tendency
either to damp the hopes, or obscure the prospects
of immortal beings.

On the other hand, who, that is not presumptuous
beyond endurance, will suppose, that he now under
stands the full extent of the love of Christ, and its
bearings on all the other divine operations ? Who
will dare to assert, that this theme will not be suffi
cient for ever to employ the meditations and the
songs of the redeemed ? Has any one ascertained,
that it is so limited, as to be soon exhausted ? On
these topics the author is happily silent; or rather
he "pronounces nothing decisively;" but affirms,
that were he "to hazard a conjecture." he should
sav that the converse of the proposition" undei
consideration "is true." But for ourselves "wa
feel chained down to an obscure corner ot (jocl i
domains," and possess no light except that which
he has given us. In our present condition we dare
not launch with the author into the ocean of con-
iecture Guided by the revelation which God has
made we are compelled to regard the work of re-
demptlon as the greatest of all the divine works ol
which we have any knowledge ; and we are satisfied,
that the development of the relations and bearings
and effects of this stupendous work will be sufficient
to employ all our powers of comprehension, and
ever to minister to us new and constant <Might.-
Am. Editor

158

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

of the whole. But before we can, on good
grounds, hazard such an assertion as that under
consideration, we must have explored all the dis
pensations of God, through every portion of his
vast dominions ; and be able to form a compari
son between the different displays of divine glory,
made to all the different classes of intellectual
oeings, under the government of the Creator.
And who, among the sons of Adam, can lay claim
to such high qualifications for pronouncing so
sweeping a decision on this point ? 3dly, It sets
limits to the dimne perfections and operations. For
although it could be proved, (which it cannot be,)
that no such displays have hitherto been made to
any other beings, yet who can take upon him to
assert, that displays of divine perfection far more
glorious and astonishing will not be exhibited
during the countless ages of eternity which are
yet to come ? To set limits to the operations of
almighty power and boundless benevolence, dur
ing the lapse of infinite duration, is not the pro
vince of any created intelligence, and far less
of man, who stands so low in the scale of uni
versal being. 4th!y, It fends to damp the hopes
and prospects of immortal beings, when looking
forward to an interminable existence. For this
sentiment leads them to conclude, that they are
already acquainted with the greatest display of
divine glory which can be made ; and that what
ever scenes of wonder may be exhibited in the
future world, they must, of course, be all inferior
to this, in point cf extent and grandeur.

The redemption of the human race, as dis
played in the Christian revelation, is a theme
sufficiently grand, astonishing, and interesting,
to command the attention of all who are con
vinced that they belong to an apostate race of
intelligences, and to excite the admiration and
gratitude of all who have experienced its bene
fits ; and it stands in no need of such unfounded
and extravagant assertions, to display its riches
and glory. " Will a man speak deceitfully for
God ? Shall not his excellency make you afraid,
and his dread fall upon you ?" — We pronounce
nothing decisively on this subject. We feel our
selves chained down to an obscure corner of
God's dominions, to be in the very infancy of
our knowledge, and withal, to be connected with
a race of beings whose "understandings ~.e
darkened by reason of sin ;" and are therefore
unable to prori'ounce an infallible decision on
what God will or will not do. Were we to ha
zard a conjecture on this subject, we would say,
that the converse of the proposition under consi
deration is more probable than the proposition
itself. We can conceive of worlds ten thousand
times more populous than ours, and peopled with
a higher order of intellectual beings, towards
whom a similar display of benevolence and mercy,
were it necessary, may be made ; and, therefore,
in point of the extent of its objects, we can con
ceive the love of God more illustriously mani

fested than even to the inhabitants of ou* globe
But whether such an event shall ever take place
it would be presumption in us to determine. For
the thoughts and the ways of God as far transcend
ours, " as the heavens are high above the earth."
It demands our highest tribute of irra'eful adora
tion, that the Almighty condescended to " regard
us in our low estate," and to deliver us from the
moral degradation into which we had fallen ; but,
surely, it would be unreasonable to conclude,
from this consideration, that of all the rational
tribes which people the universe, man is ihe only
favourite of the Most High, " when thousand
worlds are round." Though myriads of other
intelligences were to share in similar favours, it
would not lessen the happiness conferred on us,
nor ought it in the least to detract from our ad
miration of " the love of God, which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord."

There are a great many other vague and un
tenable notions which are entertained and reite
rated bv certain commentators and divines, as
indisputable axioms, which it would be of im
portance to the cause of religion to discard
such as — that angels are pure immaterial sub
stances* — that they were formed on the first day
of the Mosaic creation — that the wisdom of
God is no where so illustriously displayed
throughout the universe as in the scheme of re-
demptionf — that the chief employment of the
future world will be to pry into the mysteries of
salvation]. — that sin is an infinite evil§ — that the

* In the Scriptures ansels are called spirits. And
till some evidence is offered of their materiality, we
shall see no reason to abandon the opinion, that they
are pure spirits. — Ed.

+ To show that it is important to discard this sen
timent, the author ought at least to have stated some
good reason for believing it to be without, founda
tion. Until something more decisive of this point
shall be made to appear, there cannot be tlie least
occasion to abandon the sentiment in question.— Kd.

% Here substantially the same reply may be made
as in the preceding instance. Prove that this wifl
not be the chief employment of heaven — fihow that
any thing else will, lor the most part, occupy the
attention of the spirits of just men made perfect in
glory, and the sentiment under consideration will
be readily renounced. Till then we shall claim the
risrht to belie";,, <<nd maintain, that the employment
of the redeemed in glory will consist, to a pretxt ex-
t.e»>*, m beholding, admirin-r, a»d adoring Him, who
nath loved them ami died for them.— Kd.'

§ Infinite is once used in the scriptures to qualify
the term iniquity, Jobxxii.5. Is net thy wickedness
great and thine iniquities infinite? But not to in
sist on perhaps a too literal interpretation of the
term, it will be sufficient to show what it is ordina
rily used to denote.

Some authors, regarding only the very limited
faculties and powers of human beings, deem it im
possible, that any of their deeds can be an infinite
evil.

Others, considering only the infinity of the Being
against whom sin is committed, find no difficulty in
convincing themselves, that it is an infinite evil.

There is also a third class, who, takimr the word
of God for their guide, and learning that sin exposes
men to everlasting punishment, do not hesitate tp
denominate that an infinite, evil, which brings on its
guilty victim sufferings infinite in duration/ Under
stood in this last sense, we can feel no obligation to

APPENDIX.

159

whole material universe was brought into exist
ence at the same time with our earth — that the
Creator ceased to create any new order of beings
in the universe, after arranging the fabric of our
globe— that the whole system of material nature
in heaven and earth will be destroyed at the
period of the dissolution of our world — that our
thoughts and affections should be completely de
tached from all created things, &c. &c.— Several
vague notions of this description are founded on
the false assumption, that the globe we inhabit,
and the rational beings that have appeared on its
surface from age to age, are the chief objects of
God's superintendence and care — and that the
Scriptures are the only medium through which
we. can view the plans and operations of the
Deity — assumptions, which are contrary to rea
son, which are unwarranted in revelation, nay,
which are directly contradicted in numerous
passages of Scripture, some of which have al
ready been referred to in the course of this vo
lume. It would be of essential service to the
cause of Christianity, that its doctrines, facts,
and moral requisitions were uniformly exhibited
in their native simplicity and grandeur, without
being obscured and distorted by the vague and
extravagant representations with which they are
too frequently blended by injudicious minds.

No. XI.

As authority has a considerable degree of
weight on some minds, I shall conclude with an
extract on the subject of this volume, from that
respectable and enlightened divine, Dr. Dvvight,
late president of Yale college : — ' ' The works
of God were by him intended to be, and are, in
fact, manifestations of himself; proofs of his
character, presence, and agency. In this light
he requires men continually to regard them :
and to refuse this regard is considered by him as
grossly wicked, and highly deserving of punish
ment, Psalm xxviii. 5. Isa. v. 12 — 14. I am
apprehensive, that even good men are prone to
pay less attention to the works of creation and
providence than piety demands, and the scrip
tures require. We say and hear so much con
cerning the insufficiency of these works to un
fold the character of God, and the nature of
genuine religion, that we are prone to consider
them as almost uninstructive in moral things,
and, in a great measure, useless to the promo
tion of piety. This, however, is a palpable and
dangerous error. The works alone, without the
aid of the scriptures, would, I acknowledge, be
far less instructive than they now are, and ut
terly insufficient to guide us in the way of right-
reject it. It must, however, be admitted that it is
not always used in this manner, aiid that it is some-
tomes an occasion of ambiguity.— Ed

eousness. The scriptures were designed to DO
a comment on these works ; to explain their na
ture, and to show us the agency, purposes, wis
dom, and goodness of God in their formation.
Thus explained, thus illuminated, they become
means of knowledge, very extensive and emi
nently useful. He who does not find in the va
rious, beautiful, sublime, awful, and astonishing
objects presented to us in creation and provi
dence, irresistible and glorious reasons for ad
miring, adoring, loving, and praising his Crea
tor, has not a claim to evangelical piety." — Sys
tem of Theology, vol. iii. p. 477.

No. XII. — List of Popular Works on the differ'
ent Sciences treated of in this volume, with
occasional remarks.

SELECT BOOKS ON NATURAL HISTORY.

" Goldsmith's History of the Earth, and ani
mated nature," with notes by T. Brown, Esq.
published at Manchester, 6 vols. 8vo. The co«
pious notes appended to this edition, contain an
account of the latest discoveries, and form a
valuable addition to the original work — " The
Gallery of Nature and Art," by Dr. Mason
Good, and others, 6 vols. 8vo. — " Spectacle de
la Nature," or Nature Displayed, 7 vols. 12mo.
— " Nature Displayed," by Dr. Simeon Shaw, 3
vols. 8vo. or ii 6 vols. 12mo. This work, though
chiefly a compilation, imbodies a great variety
of interesting and popular descriptions of tho
most remarkable facts in the system of nature,
which are illustrated with numerous engravings,
both plain and coloured. — Clarke's " Hundred
Wonders of the World," one vol. 12mo. and
Platt's " Book of Curiosities," contain a num
ber of interesting selections on this subject.—
Smellie's " Philosophy of Natural History," 2
vols. 4to. and his translation of " BufTon's Na
tural History." — Works entitled, " System" and
" Elements" of " Natural History," are nu
merous ; but the greatest part of them is confi
ned to descriptions of the forms, habits, and in
stinct of animals. On this department of natu
ral science, a work is just now in course of pub
lication, by the celebrated Cuvier, entitled " The
Animal Kingdom" with engravings, chiefly
from the living subjects in the Museum of Na
tural History at Paris.— A popular and compre
hensive history of the facts which have been
ascertained respecting the earth, the atmosphere,
the meteors, the heavens, &c. calculated for
general readers, and interspersed with appropri
ate moral and religious reflections, is still a desi
deratum. The facts of natural history, next to
the facts recorded in the sacred volume, are the
first subjects to which the minds of the young
should be directed in the course of a general
education.

160

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

6F.1.ECT BOOKS ON GEOGRAPHV.

Pinkerton's Modern Geography, 2 vols. 4to.
and the Abridgment, one vol. 8vo. — Guthrie's
Geographical Grammar. — The Glasgow Geo
graphy, ir. 5 vols. 8vo. This work comprehends
an immense mass of information, on the histori
cal and descriptive parts of geography. It also
contains comprehensive compends of astrono
my, geology, meteorology, &c. — Malte Brim's
" System of Geography," 8vo. The English
translation of this work, when completed, will
comprise the fullest and most comprehensive
view of universal geography that has yet ap
peared in our language, including details of the
most recent discoveries. Five volumes of the
English translation have already appeared. The
first volume contains a luminous and compre
hensive outline of the science of Geology, and
Physical and Mathematical Geography. —
Myers " System of Modern Geography," with
maps, views, engravings representing costumes,
&c. 2 large vols. 4to. — Cooke's " System of
Universal Geography," in 2 very large quarto
vols. closely printed, contains a great variety of
interesting sketches in relation to Descriptive
Geography, extracted from the writings of mo
dern voyagers and travellers ; the details of
incidents, &c. being related for the most part,
in the words of the respective authors from whom
the information is collected. — Winterbotham's
" Geographical and Historical view of the
United States of America, &c." 4 vols. Svo.
— Morse's American Geography," Svo. — Gold
smith's " Geography on a popular plan," con
tains an interesting account of the manners and
customs of nations, for the entertainment and in
struction of the young, illustrated with above 60
engravings. Of smaller systems, there is a
great abundance in the English language, but
most of them are extremely deficient, particulary
in what relates to General Geography. — On Sa-
cred Geography, Wells's Geography, modernized
by the editor of Calmet's Dictionary, is the most
complete work of its kind. — On Physical or Ge
nera/Geography — Playfair's System of Geogra
phy, vol. I. and Varenius's General Geography.
A Modern system of Geography, in a separate
form, on the plan of Varenius, is a desideratum.
— Edin. Ency. Art. Geography. — Sup. to Ency.
Brit. Art. Physical Geography, &c. &c. Books
of Voyages and Travels, generally contain the
most circumstantial details of the physical as
pects of the different countries, and of the dis
positions and customs of their inhabitants ; and
present to the view of the Christian philanthro
pist, those facts and incidents, from which the
moral state and character of the various tribes of
human beings may be inferred. The following
works contain comprehensive abridgments of
the most celebrated voyages and travels. — "Pin-
icrton's General Collection of Voyages and

Travels in all parts of the World," 1? vok 4to
— " Mavor's Voyages," &c. 28 vols. I8mo. —
" The World Displayed," 18 vols. 18mo.—
"Philips'* Collection of Voyages and Travels,"
&c.

The following are among the most respectable
modern publications on this subject, arranged
according to the different quarters of the world.
ASIA. — " Valencia's Travels in India, Arabia,"
&c. — " Porter's Travels in Georgia, Armenia,"
&c. — " Golownin's Travels in Japan." — " Staun-
ton's Account of Macartney's Embassy to
China."— "Raffle's Travels in Java."— "Clarke's
Travels in Asia Minor, and the Holy Land." —
" Chateaubriand's Travels in Palestine." — " Ali
Bey's Travels in Arabia." — "Morier's Travels
through Persia," &c. AFRICA. — " Lyori's Tra
vels in Northern Africa." — Burckhard's Travels
in Nubia. — Bruce's Travels in Abyssinia. —
Salt's Travels in Abyssinia. — Bowdich, Button,
and Dupuis's Account of Ashantee. — Leigh's
Jour, in Egypt. — Belzoni's Travels in Egypt. —
Sonini's Travels in Egypt. — Barrow's, Bur-
chell's, and Campbell's Travels in Southern
Africa, &c. &c. AMERICA. — Howison's Sketch
es of Upper Canada. Fearon's Sketches of the
United States. — Miss Wright's Views of So
ciety in the United States. — Humboldt's Travels
in South America. — Duncan's Travels in the
United States. — Luccock's, Vidal's, Kosters's,
and Hall's Travels in South America, &c.
EUROPE. — Henderson's and Mackenzie's Tra
vels in Iceland. — Thompson's Travels in Swe
den. — Carr's Travels in Russia, Denmark, &c

— Pallas's Travels in Russia. Wraxhall's,

Neale's, Coxe's, and Lemaistre's Tours through
France, Switzerland, Germany, &c, — Bour-
going's and Jacob's Travels in Spain. — Brydon's
Tour in Sicily, &c. — Von Buch's Travels in
Norway and Lapland. — Cochrane's Travels in
Siberia, £c. — Cook's, Anson's, Byron's. Pe-
rouse's, and Bougainville's Voyages round the
World, &c. — Prior's Universal Traveller, one
thick vol. 12mo. closely printed, with one hun
dred engravings.

SELECT BOOKS ON GEOLOGY.

Kirwan's " Mineralogy," and his " Geological
Essays." — De Luc's " Geology," and his " Geo
logical Travels." — Parkinson's "Organic Re
mains of a former World," 3 vols. 4to. — " The
Fossils of the South Downs, or Illustrations of
the Geology of Sussex, by G. Mantel, F. L. S."
The preliminary essay to this splendid work
contains several excellent remarks respecting
the connexion of geology with religion, which
are calculated to advance the interests of both.
— Cuvier's " Essay on the Theory of the Earth.'
with illustrations by Professor Jameson ; 4th
edition. — Playfair's illustrations of the Huttonian
Theory of the Earth. — Transactions of the

APPENDIX.

161

Geological and Wernerian Societies. — Jame
son's Mineralogy. — Buckland's Account of the
Discovery of a Den of Hyenas in a cavern in
Yorkshire. — Philips's " Outlines of Mineralogy
and Geology," 12mo. This last work forms a
good introduction to the study of Geology, for
those who are just commencing their inquiries
on this subject. The object of this science, in
the mean time, should be chiefly to the collecting
of facts in reference to the structure of the earth,
arid the changes it has undergone. The exterior
aspect of our globe, and its internal recesses,
must be still more extensively explored, before
any theory of the earth can be established on a
broad and solid foundation. It should be left to
future ages to build a system with the materials
we are now preparing.

POPULAR WORKS ON ASTRONOMY.

Brewster's " Ferguson's Astronomy," 2 vols.
8vo. with a vol. of plates. The notes and sup
plementary chapters of this work, written by
Dr. Brewster, contain a full and comprehensive
detail of all the modern discoveries in this
science. — " Bonnycastle's Introduction to Astro
nomy," 1 vol. 8vo. — La Place's " System of the
World," 2 vols. 8vo. Dr. Olinthus Gregory's
Astronomy, 1 vol. 8vo. — Mrs. Bryan's " System
of Astronomy," 8vo. — Dr. Mylne's " Elemen
tary Treatise on Astronomy," 8vo. — Adam's
" Astronomical and Geographical Essays," 8vo.
• — Philips's " Eight Familiar Lectures on Astro
nomy," 12mo. — Squire's "Grammar of Astro
nomy," 1 thick vol. 18mo. closely printed and
illustrated with 35 plates. — The " Wonders of
the Heavens." 12mo. This work contains a
popular view of the principal facts of Astronomy,
and is illustrated with 50 elegant engravings, of
a variety of interesting objects connected with
the scenery of the heavens; but its discussions
are too frequently blended with the peculiarities
of a modern physical theory. — Martin's " Gen
tleman and Lady's Philosophy," vol. 1. — Der-
lum's " Astro-Theology," and Whiston's "As
tronomical principles of Religion," 8vo. — Bax
ter s "Matho," 2 vols. &c. — An elegant and
comprehensive outline of the leading facts of
Astronomy, in their relation to revealed Reli
gion, will be found in Dr. Chalmers's" Discourses
on the Christian Revelation, viewed in connec
tion with the Modern Astronomy," 8vo. — The
general reader in commencing his study of this
jcience, will find Bonnycastle's " introduction"
a very interesting work. It is written in an
elegant and animated style, and is agreeably in
terspersed with a number of appropriate reflec
tions ; but it is deficient in the detail of modern
discoveries. He might next proceed to the pe
rusal of Ferguson, Gregory, Squire, &c. La
Place's work contains a beautiful exposition of
the Newtonian systrm, but it is glaringly defi

cient in a reference to the wisdom and ajency
of a Supreme Intelligence. " An undevout as
tronomer is mad." Baxter's " Matho," contains
a popular and inleresting view of this subject,
and forms a striking contrast to the apathy of
La Place, who carefully keeps out of view the
agency of the Creator — the main design of this
author being to connect the phenomena of the
heavens ai.-d the earth with the attributes of
Deity, and the high destination of immortal
minds. Though this work passed through thre^
editions, it does not seem to have been appre
ciated according to its merilo. As it has now
become scarce, a new edition, with notes, con
taining a detail of modern discoveries, might be
an acceptable present to the public. Those
who wish to prosecute this subject to a greater
extent, may be referred to "Long's Astronomy,"

2 vols. 4to. — Robinson's "Mechanical Philoso
phy," vol. 1. — Vince's "Complete System of
Astronomy," 3 vols. 4to. — "La Lande Astro
nomic,1' 3 vols. 4to. — and Biot's " Traite Ele-
mentaire d'Astronomie Physique." A compre
hensive work on Descriptive Astronomy, detailing,
in a popular manner, all the facts which have
been ascertained respecting the scenery of the
heavens, accompanied with a variety of striking
delineations, and interspersed with appropriate
reflections, accommodated to the general reader,
is a desideratum.

SELECT BOOKS OW NATURAL PHILOSOPrfY.

Hauy's " Elementary treatise on Natural
Philosophy," translated by Dr. O. Gregory, 2
vols. 8vo. This translation contains a number
of valuable notes by the translator. — Ferguson's
" Lectures on Select Subjects in Mechanics,"
&c. by Dr. Brewster, 2 vols. 8vo with a volume
of plates. The Appendix to this work, by Dr.
Brewster, contains a mass of valuable informa
tion on Mechanics, Hydraulics, Dialling, and
the construction of Optical Instruments ; besides
a variety of illustrative notes interspersed through
the body of the work. A new edition of this
work, comprising a detailed account of the recent
discoveries in Experimental Philosophy, has
been lately published.— Nicholson's " Introduc
tion to Natural Philosophy," 2 vols. 8vo. —
Cavallo's " Complete Treatise on Natural and
Experimental Philosophy," 4 vols. 8vo.— Mar
tin's " Philosophia Britannica,"3 vols. 8vo.
His " Gentleman and Lady's Philosophy," 3
vols. 8vo. and his "Philosophical Grammar,"
1 vol. 8vo. — Gregory's " Economy of Nature,"

3 vols. 8vo. and his " Lectures on Experimen
tal Philosophy, Astronomy, and Chymistry," 2
vols. 12mo.— Joyce's "Letters on Experimental
Philosophy," 2 vols. 12mo. and his " Scientific
Dialogues/' 6 vols. 18m o. — Adam's " Lecture*
on Natural and Experimental Philosonh* » *.
vols. 8vo. with - "'.\^~ o. piaies. — roung'i

162

THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER.

* Lectures on Natural Philosophy," 2 vols. 8vo.
—Walker's system of " Familiar Philosophy,"
4to. in 12 lectures, with 47 quarto engravings.
—Conversations on Natural Philosophy, by the
author of Conversations on Chymistry, 1 thick
vol. 12mo. with 23 engravings. — Blair's " Gram
mar of Natural and Experimental Philosophy,"
especially the late editions, contains (at a small
price) a comprehensive view of the principal
departments of Philosophy, including Astrono
my, Geology, Chymistry, Meteorology, &c. —
Euler's " Letters to a German Princess," 2 vols.
8vo. contains a popular view of the most interest
ing subjects connected with Natural and Expe
rimental Philosophy, Logic, and Ethics. This
work is distinguished by a vein of dignified and
scriptural piety, which runs through every part
of it. Euler was one of the most distinguished
philosophers and mathematicians of his day.
He died in 1783, at the age of 77. A new edi
tion of this work, with notes by Dr. Brewster,
has been lately published. These notes are-ex
cellent, so far as they extend ; but it is to be
regretted that they are so sparingly distributed,
and that the passages suppressed byM. Condor-
cet, and De la Croix, which were restored by
Dr. Hunter, who translated the work, and the
notes of the French and English editors, are, for
the most part, discarded. Notwithstanding the
numerous excellent treatises which are to be
found on this subject, a comprehensive work on
experimental philosophy, blended with sketches
of those parts of natural history, which are con
nected with it, and enlivened with appropriate
reflections on the peculiar agencies of the Deity,
which appear in the various processes of nature —
is still wanting to interest the general reader, and
to attract his attention to this department of know
ledge. Were philosophers, in their discussions
of natural science, more frequently to advert to
the agency of the Deity, and to point put the
religious arid philanthropic purposes to which
modern discoveries might be applied, they
might be the means of promoting, at the same
time, the interests both of science and of reli
gion ; by alluring general readers to direct their
attention to such subjects ; and by removing
those groundless prejudices which a great pro
portion of the Christian world still entertain
against philosophical studies. About the period
when Boyle, Ray, Derham, Nieuwentyt, Whis-
ton, Addison, the Abbe Pluche, and other
Christian philosophers flourished, more atten

tion seems to have been paid to this object than
at present. Since the middle of the last cen
tury, the piety of philosophers appears to have
been greatly on the decline. It is to be hoped
that it is now beginning to experience a revival.
But, whatever may be the varying sentiments
and feelings of mere philosophers, in reference to
the agencies of the material system — " all the
works of God invariably speak of their Author,"
to the humble and enlightened Christian ; and if
he be directed to contemplate the order of na
ture, with an eye of intelligence, he will never
be at a loss to trace the footsteps and the attri
butes of his Father and his God.

SELECT BOOKS OS CHYMISTRT

Davy's Elements of Chymical I .ilosophy,
8vo. — Ure's Dictionary of Chymistry, on tho
basis of Mr. Nicholson's, 1 large vol. 8vo.
Henry's Epitome of Chymistry, 2 vols. Svo. —
Accurn's Chymistry, 2 vols. Svo. — Thomson's
System of Chymistry, 4 vols. 8vo. — Murray's
System of Chymistry, 4 vols. Svo. and Appen
dix. — Kerr's translation of Lavoisier's Elements
of Chymistry, 8vo.— ChaptaPs Chymistry, ap
plied to the Arts, 4 vols. Svo. — Fourcroy's
Chymistry, 4 vols.--Accurn's " Chymical Amuse
ments," and Griffin's " Chyrnioal Recreations,"
contain a description of a variety of interesting
chymical facts and amusing experiments. —
Gurney's Lectures on the EU-inen/s of Chymi
cal Science. Svo. — Mackenzie'si One Thousand
Experiments in Chymistry, &c. — Mitel, ell's
Dictionary of Chymistry. — ( onversations on
Chymistry, by a Lady, 2 VO!F. 12mo. — Joyce's
Dialogues on Chymistry, 2 v< Is. 18mo. — Par
ker's Rudiments of Chymistry, 18mo. and his
Chymical Catechism, Svo. The four works last
mentioned may be recommended as popular in
troductions to the study of this science. Parker's
Rudiments and Catechism are distinguished by
their constant reference to the agency of the
Deity, and by the anxiety which the author dis
plays to fix the attention of his readers on the^
evidences of benevolent design which appear
in the constitution of nature. The numerous
notes appended to the Chyu<lv.al Catechism, im-
body a great variety of interesting facts in re
ference to the economy of nature, and the pro
cesses of the arts. To this amiable and intelligent
writer I feel indebted for severe of the chvmica.
facts svated in this volume.

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