pocrisy, and denounces against them the full measure of divine vengeance.

This view of vital Judaism was entertained by the wisest of the Jewish doctors. Josephus also represents this as the main tendency of his religion. The prophets, under the Mosaical dispensation, as has been already hinted, always point out in their writings, the infinite superiority of moral duties to all ritual observances whatever. This they frequently inculcate with all the energy of oratorial diction. They sometimes introduce God himself, as viewing with a species of indignant contempt, the rites and ceremonies of his own appointment, whenever these were made to occupy more than their relative and subordinate place. To be convinced of this, no more is necessary than to read the well-known passages of David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Hosea, and Micah, to which I refer the reader.

In fine, the Jewish revelation and the whole of its institutions may be said to have in view three great objects,-the acknowledgment and worship of the one true God, the inculcation of true piety and pure morals, and by preparing for the advent of the Messiah, the excitement of the expectation of an economy of grace and mercy, the greatest inducement to virtue, by combining the pardon of the penitent offender

a Psal. 1. Is. i. 10. &c. Jer. vi. 20. Hos. vi. 6. Micahı vi. 6.

with the assurance of the acceptance of his virtuous and persevering efforts, notwithstanding the infirmity of his degenerate nature and the imperfection of his highest moral attainments.

That these were points of primary importance to mankind at the time when the Jewish revelation was delivered from Mount Sinai, no person of sound judgment, who will direct his attention to the subject, will deny. The world was then sunk in the deepest ignorance in regard to all that can justly be called religion, enslaved to gross superstition, and addicted to abominable idolatry. It is true that men of superior knowledge and penetration, among those nations which had attained to considerable degrees of civilization and science, perceived the absurdity and pernicious effects of the popular creed and practice. But they ventured not to communicate their more rational opinions to the world, nor, if they had, could they have entertained the smallest hopes of success. They confined their doctrines, therefore, within the schools of philosophy, and were satisfied if they were able to instruct a certain number of select disciples. After all, how imperfectly did they instruct even these in divine truth! Their own knowledge on such subjects was clouded with error, and was

a Many heathen philosophers became converts to the gospel, and defended it by their writings.

not sufficient to reform deeply rooted and strongly prevalent vice.

The astonishing phenomenon of the Jewish dispensation was, that a whole people, inferior in every thing else to many other nations of antiquity, should be brought, not merely to acknowledge as a speculative truth, one only true and all-perfect deity, but to adopt this doctrine as the fundamental article of their religious system; should, at least, in their established and national institutions, abjure idolatry, and all the horrors by which it is attended; should admit it to be a detestable crime, and, notwithstanding their natural propensity towards it, and their gross and frequent violations of this fundamental principle, be, at last, inspired with such abhorrence of it as is still characteristical of that infatuated, though heaven-selected, and now, for a season, neglected people. Of what consequence such a fundamental principle, established, and firmly, and invariably maintained among an entire nation, was to the improvement and future happiness of the whole human race, must be evident to every reflecting mind. This fact, when the condition of the rest of mankind at the time of the introduction of the Jewish economy is considered, affords a convincing presumption of its divine origin.

131

CHAP. II.

OF PAGANISM.

PAGANISM has been represented as the religion of nature, and this notion seems to have induced the rejection of every idea of natural religion. Nothing, however, can be more false and absurd than such representation, which has proceeded solely from supposing that natural and revealed religion stand in direct opposition to each other. In fact, as I have already shown," revealed not only presupposes natural religion, but has repromulgated, confirmed, and extended all its genuine dictates. It is no less absurd to qualify all the absurdities and abominations of heathen superstition, by the name of the religion of nature, than it would be, as we see often done, to assert that every species of folly and vice is natural to man, in the true sense of these terms. Yet the former is directly repugnant to his intellectual, and the latter, to his moral nature; and both, on that very account, are denominated folly and vice. I have no objection to allow that paganism is natural religion corrupted, because it is the result of human ignorance and perver

a Part I. chap. iii.

sion, directed to religious matters. For, it is so stained with the blackest colours of vice, and so disfigured by the most distorted inventions of fraud or superstition, that every seed of piety and virtue seems to be buried and suffocated under the disgusting and overwhelming mass by which they are overlaid. It may not, however, be improper to bestow a few thoughts on the principal features of this religious spectacle, in regard to the deities worshipped, the ceremonies and rites practised, and the notions entertained, in relation to morals and a future state.

1st, Those who have most accurately examined this subject, appear to admit that, among such a diversity of deities, the heathen nations of antiquity acknowledged and worshipped one who was supreme and omnipotent, and to whom, as their sovereign, all the others were subject. If it were necessary, it could be evinced by the most credible testimony, that this was even the vulgar creed. That it was the decided opinion of the most illustrious ancient philosophers, and most enlightened poets, cannot be questioned, since they inculcate this doctrine in various parts of their writings. Indeed, the unity and supremacy of deity is so consonant to every dictate of reason, when duly exerted, that the wonder is, that a plurality of gods, and the idolatry consequent on this admission, should ever have become so prevalent as to pervade the whole