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hold on a fabbath-day, Entombed within the walls of his dwelling, he fhuts from his view the temple of ereation. The fun fhines no joy to him. The gladdening voice of nature calls on him in vain. He is deaf, dumb, and blind to every thing around him that God has made Such is the Sabbath day of Connecticut.

From whence could come this miferable notion of devotion? It comes from the gloominefs of the Calvinistical creed. If men love darknefs rather than light, be. cause their works are evil, the ulcerated mind of a Calvanist, who fees God only in terror, and fits brooding over scenes of Hell and damnation, can have no joy in beholding the glories of the creation. Nothing in that mighty and wonderous fystem accords with his principles or his devotion. He fees nothing there that tells him that God created millions on purpose to be damned, and that children of a fpan long are born to burn for ever in hell. The creation preaches a different doctrine to this. We there fee that the care and goodness of God is extended impartially over all the creatures he has made. The worm of the earth fhares his protection equally with the elephant of the defart. The grafs that fprings beneath our feet grows by his bounty as well as the cedars of Lebanon. Every thing in the creation reproaches the Calvinists with unjust ideas of God, and difowns the hardness and ingratitude of his principles. Therefore he fhuns the fight of them on a fabbath day.

AN ENEMY TO CANT AND IMPOSITION.

Profession of Faith from Rousseau, continued.

How easily might men preserve that mastery over themselves and their paffions, even during life, if before their vicious habits are acquired, when the faculties of the mind are just beginning to be difplayed, they should employ themselves on thofe objects which it is necessary for them to know, in order to judge of thofe which are

unknown; if they were fincerely defirous of acquiring knowledge, not with a view to make a parade in the eyes of others, but in order to render themselves wife, good, and happy, in the practice of their natural duties! This study appears difficult, because we only apply to it after being already corrupted by vice, and made flaves to our paffions. We place our judgment and esteem on objects, before we arrive at the knowledge of good and evil; and then, referring every thing to that falfe standard, we hold nothing in its due estimation.

The heart, at a certain age, while it is yet free, ardu ous, restlefs, and anxious after happiness, is ever seeking it with an impatient and uncertain curiofity: when deceived by the fenfes, it fixes on the fhadow of it, and imagines it to be found where it doth not exist. This il lufion hath prevailed too long with me. I discovered it, alas! too late, and have not been able entirely to remove it: No, it will remain with me as long as this mortal body, which gave rise to it.

To be continued.

We are requested to inform all thofe who hold Subfcription Papers for building the Temple of Nature, that there will be a meeting of the Subfcribers on Monday evening next, at seven o'clock, at Shepherd's Long-Room, No. 11, George-street.-All perfons friendly to the cause of natural religion, and who wish to become fhare-holders in the building are invited to attend. Sept. 15.

The manufcripts which we have received from our literary correfpondents in Philadelphia and Boston, fhall be inferted in the Profpect as foon as poffible. We are much obliged to these friends of truth for their communications, and hope they will be fo good as to continue their fcientific favours.

New-York: Published every Saturday, by ELIHU PALMER, No. 6, Chatham-street. Price Two Dollars per ann. paid in advance.

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PROSPECT; or, View of the Moral World.

VOL. 1.

SATURDAY, September 22, 1804.

No. 42.

Comments upon the Sacred Writings of the Jews and Christians. Exodus Chapter 23.

IN

N the third verfe of this chapter we have a specimen of the ideas which the chofen people of God entertained of the principles of justice; but it is holy writ, and therefore, whether right or wrong, must be fwallowed down under pain of everlasting damnation. The phrafe and the principle to which we allude is this" Thou "fhalt not countenance a poor man in his qaufe." The high-toned hypocritical atheistical advocate for christianity, the celebrated Bishop of Landaff, whofe arrows fall pointless from the invulnerable Paine, this great champion of blood and fuperstition has advanced the abominable fentiment that God has made in this world both rich and poor;-a fentiment that difhonors God and tends to corrupt and demoralize the heart of man. When man abandons the plain grounds of fact, the visible phenomona of nature, and entangles himself in the labyrinth of incognifible caufes and principles, he becomes a fuperstiti ous ideot and his writings are calculated only to injure the science and virtue of the world. Take away all the poverty produced by kings and priests; take away all that which refults from human indolence, profligacy and extravagance; take away that which is the effect of unavoidable misfortune, and it would be fair to prefume that there would be very little balance left to charge to the account of God. But Bishop Watson wifhed to make God the author of poverty, and then there would be more reafon for not countenancing a poor man in his cause; for if God has fhewn his difpleafure in making fome men poor, it will furely be right for man to join with God and fhew his difpleafure against thofe on whom divine power has imprefled the terrible mark of poverty. Eternal justice, however, holds the balance even, and administers to all mankind, whether rich or poor, with an e

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qual hand. Justice fhews no distinction, but the fympathetic and benevolent properties of human nature are often invited to bestow upon the poor and unfortunate what the rich neither need nor ought to poffefs. If then we take this paffage of holy writ contained in the third verfe of this chapter, and bring it before the bar of truth and justice, we fhall find it effentially defective in point of moral principle. According to this doctrine, a man already poor and unfortunate is to be made more fo by the tyrannical perfecutions of fociety; he is not to be countenanced in his caufe; he is not to obtain even common justice--the courts of law are to fet their faces against him, and for no other reafon in the world only becaufe he is poor and stands in greater need of justice and humanity than thofe whofe conditions in life are more affluent and fortunate. Society ought to be just to all-to the poor and miferable, not rendered fo by their own vicious actions, it ought to be fympathetic, humane and beneficent. If this be holy writ, which contains fuch injustice, then fave us hereafter from all kinds of holy writs, and give us legal writs or any kind of writs except those of holy writs.

Religion in it most common acceptation is a complex idea compounded of three things totally distinct from each other, the first I fhall mention is the obfervance of certain rites and ceremonies, fuch as circumcifion-baptifm-fasting on particular days-feasting on othersabstaining from pleafures, and many other external fymbols which has, by fome, been confidered as the fum total of religion. 2dly, There is included in the idea of religion, an affent to certain metaphyfical propofitions, fuch as the nature and properties of the fupreme intelligence, the extent of his interference in the affairs of this world, and the nature and effence of the human foul. 3dly, The word religion has alfo included in it an approbation of fome fystems of morality, fuppofed to be deduced as a neceffary inference from the articles of be

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lief. Hence it has been faid, morality itfelf, or the knowledge and practice of duties alone, is not religion, without it be accompanied with the obfervance of certain rites, and the belief in a metaphyfical creed. Neither is the obfervance of the established ceremonies to be confidered as acts of religion, unlefs the prefcribed duties be alfo fulfilled; but above all things the mind must give its affent to the metaphyfical creed. Finally, this metaphyfical creed, which in every cafe is fo effentially neceffary, is not of itfelf religion. Ceremonies must be obferved, and that kind of morality, deduceable from an abfurd creed, must be adhered to, as far as the weaknefs of our fuppofed fallen nature will allow.

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Nothing could have fupported extravagant rites and ceremonies, or chained men's minds down to abfurd creeds if thefe had not been artfully interwoven with a plaufible fystem of morality; nor would men have fubmitted to call that good which is in its nature evil, or that evil, which is naturally good, if the mind had not been prepoffeffed with a falfe creed.

It is, therefore my intention to enquire how this affo ciation of three ideas totally distinct came to take place and affume the name of religion-what connection they have in nature-whether they may not be feparated without injury to morality; and, finally, having thus stript morality of the load with which it has been incumbered, we fhall then fee what ought to be the idea or difinition of true religion.

As it would take up too much time to examine the whole of thefe propofitions, we fhall content ourfelves with an investigation of the probable origin of rites, ceremonies, and creeds. In all ages mankind have believed in the existence of celestial beings, who have been fuppofed to direct the affairs of this lower world, and have been anxious to know their will, and as far back as the history of man has been preferved, the practice was to have recourfe to oracles; and frequently, it is faid, anticipating the wishes of man, communicated their will in dreams or visions: but as oracles and dreams were al

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