•ATOV! Jorol silti to sto ¿TOE592019 guifhed it by manifeft fins and tokens, as the only true one, Thele figns are common to all times and places, 10.all and are equally obvious to all mankind, to the young and old, the learned, and ignorant, touropeans, Indians, Africans and favaris. If there be only one religion in the world that can prevent our faffering eternal damnation, and there be on any part of the earth a fingle mortal who is flocere and is not convinced by its evidence, the God of that religion maft be the most iniquitous and cruel oftýrafits. Would we feek the truth therefore in finderity, we at lay no trefs on the place and circuinftance of our birth, non on the authority of fathers and teachers; hut appeal to the dictates of reafon and confcience concerning every thin that is taught us in our youth. It is to no purpofe to bid me fubject my reafon to the truth of things which it is incapaciated to judge; the man who would impofe on me a falfehood, may bid me do the fame: it is neceflary, therefore, I fhould em. ploy my reafon even to know when it ought to fubmit.

All the theology I am myfelf capable of acquiring, by taking a profpect of the universe, and by the proper ufe of my faculties, is confined to what I have laid down above. To know more, we must have recourfe to extraordinary means. Thefe means cannot depend on the authority of men: for all men being of the fame fpecies with myfelf, whatever another can by natural ineans come to the knowledge of, I can do the fume; and another man is as liable to be deceived as I am: and if I believe, therefore, what he fays, it is not because he fays it, but becaufe he proves it Tire teftimony of mankind, therefore, is at the bottom that of my reafon, and adds nothing to the natural means God hath given me for the difcovery of the truth aidin

ipad vi til To be continued.

3

New-York: Published every Saturday, by ELIHU PALMER, No. 26 Chatham-street, Price Two

Dollars per ann. paid in advance.

C

PROSPECT; or, View of the Moral World.

LOG 29 SATURDAY, October 13, 1804. BLS No. 45

Comments upon the Sacred Writings of the Jews and Christians. Exodus Chapter 32 hom

Tina objectionable mature.

HIS chapter is filled with matters of a moft extraories dinary and objectionable nature. All the embeci-** lities and irafcible paffions of man are ascribed to the Creator; he flies in a rage-he becomes extremely wrathful, and being feconded by his fervant Mofes, the t moft immoral, barbarous and bloody tranfactions are the neceffary confequence. If recurrence be made to the twenty fourth chapter of this book, it will be found that it is there faid, that Mofes went up into the mount and was gone forty days and forty nights, and during this long period was probably occupied with the fabrication of thefe theological extravagancies, and preternatural conjurations with which he was accuftomed to deceive the Jewish nation. The people, however, the deluded followers of Mofes, became impatient and fufpected their chief of having made a final escape; for they fay in the first verse of this thirty fecond chapter," And when the people faw that Mofes delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themfelves together unto Aaron, and faid unto him, up make us gods, which fhall go before us; for as for this Mofes, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him." It is one of the moft extraordinary things in nature, that the Jewish people should so often loofe their confidence in their celebrated chief and leader,. the miracle and wonderworking Mofes, this circumftance alone is fufficient to annihilate all belief in the miracles which he is faid to have wrought. In the present cafe the chofen band feem to fpeak of him with con tempt—as to this man Mofes we wot not what is become of him. This it not the language of refpect and confidence; but that of burlefque, cenfure and reproach, mingled with a perfect indifference whether they ever

faw or heard of him again. This idea has been before expreffed in thefe comments; but in relation to the divinity of the book it is important to prefs its force home upon the human understanding. In the name of common fenfe how can any man rationally suppose, that the Jews who had been carried through fo many difficulties by the mighty and fupernatural power of their God with whom Mofes was fo intimate, and by whom he so often delivered the vagrant tribes-how, we fay, is it poffiblethat these fame tribes fhould exhibit fpecimens of fufpicion, infidelity and rebellion, against their own champi on, and the peculiar favourite of heaven! This account is a burlefque upon all historical truth; it carries falfhood and inconfiftency on the very face of the record; it is a departure from all the laws by which the human heart is influenced, and finks in point of character below almost all the fabulous hiftories of antiquity. In the fourteenth verfe of this chapter we again behold one of the prominent features of the Jewish God; he repents of the evil which he had intended to do to the people. What fort of a god is this, that like an imperfect creature makes refolutions, performs actions and afterwards repents of both? This characteristick of the Hebrew divinity ought, of itfelf, to annihilate all confidence in the bible, and make man ashamed of calling it a revela tion from the Greator.

2 th Theological Enquiries continued.

We now proceed to examine the character of the God of the Hebrews.

It is to be prefumed that the first authentic history of the Jews commences with Abraham, and that some of the anecdotes recorded of him may be true, bat prior to that period all is fiction; foun led, either upon ancient tradition, or the dreams of philofophers, refpecting the dre ation, and an-univerfal deluge, which, by infpecting the

furface of this globe appears an event, in fome degree, probable to have happened;fo that although we go back to the period which we confider altogether fiction, to trace the character of the God, it fuits our purpose well enough; for the whole, being only to fhew what ideas thofe writers had of their God, which is feen as well in fiction as in true hiftory) and confequently that the books of Mofes, as they reprefent a God, changeful in his purpofes; given to caprice and anger; fometimes condemn ing his own inftitutions: confounding in his punithments the innocent with the guilty; deceiving his crea tures by equivocations and lies, and announcing his will in ambiguous language, fhould not be taken as a rule of conduct; or the dictates of the fupreme intelligence. For if we defire that men fhould have a good moral character themselves, the God whom they worship must be as per fect in his moral attributes as the mind of man can poffibly conceive. This is the only protection against the oppreffion and tyranny of wicked men. Men could not then be impofed upon by words, we should not then hear of juft-war; and we fhould difcover the cheat, as foon as we thould now, were any perfon to talk of juft robbery or honeft thieving. We fhould not then be perfuaded to kill one man for the crimes of another, because he fpeaks the fame language, or wears a coat of the fa ne colour. But how fhall we be juft if our God be unjuft? how fhall we be humane if he be cruel and vindictive? how fhall we be fteady to our engagements, if God break his. In our apprehenfion the true God, or fupreme being, can do no action of which he fhall afterwards repent, as the God of the Hebrews is faid to have repented that he made man, Gen. VI. 6. And it repented the Lord that he had made man and it grieved him at his heart.

fa7. And the Lord said I will deftroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beaft and the creeping things and, the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.

It might be enquired what offence the creeping things the beafts, and the fowls of the air, could give him, but

t

the text offers nothing to fatisfy the mind, but the caprice of an angry God. 3 Inokelo owT 120 Although, we confider the flory of Eve and the apple ; as a fiction, and impoffible to have happened in the na ture of things, yet as we do not decide on that ground, or examine by thofe principles, becaufe there is always a ready answer to every objection made to miracles, namely that God can do any thing; his power is infinite, he could make a man's nofe as big as the fteeple of Straf burgh if he pleafes; and fo forth-granted. But tell me would the fupreme being do an unjuft thing? would he tell lies on purpose to deceive?-no, every one would anfwer, and yet the God of the Hebrews is guilty of this and much more, Gen. 11. 17, he fays to Adam (Eve was not then in existence) of the tree of knowledge of good or evil thou shalt not eat of it for in the day thou earest of it thou fhalt furely die. Now this was certainly falfe, for he did not die on that day, nor for many years afterwards; and if by dying fomething elfe was meant, then it comes under the charge of deceiving by ambigu ous language. This is not all, the woman is punished who received no commandment. She might have heard of it indeed from Adam, and the idea fhe had formed was that fomething evil would happen as a neceffary, natural confequence, from eating the fruit; it does not appear that the had any notion of a moral confequence arifing from difobedience, for that reafon the ferpent found no great difficulty in perfuading her to eat, for he fpoke from his own knowledge-and Adam only from report. The ferpent alfo, it is faid was the most fubtil beaft of the field, this epithet he could not acquire but by his fuperie or skill and knowledge-but his wifdom and truth avail. ed him nothing, he is condemned to crawl on his belly and lick the dult of the earth, and he who was only ac ceffors before the fact and not confidered as a moral agent is punifhed with the greatest severity.us (001) engitob en