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1. All who regard this evil in the same light with the writer, should unite in petitioning Congress to lay a heavy tax on domestic distilled liquors. If a tax should be imposed, it would operate to some extent at least to suppress the evil. I take it for granted, that the tax now imposed upon stills is so extremely small, as to have scarcely a perceptible effect. If the petitions should not be successful, they would at least awaken the attention of the public to the nature of the subject; and this would of itself be a great achievement.

2. Moral Societies should be formed, wherever they can be formed, with an express intention to discountenance and prevent drunkenness and every approach to it; and particularly to discountenance the manufacture and the use of domestic spirits.

3. Every method should be adopted, which promises to expose to public view the greatness and odiousness of the evil. It should be portrayed in all periodical publications; tracts and sermons against it should be published and extensively circulated; and no expedient should be left untried to represent its true character.

4. Christians should earnestly intreat, that God would bring about a national repentance and reformation; that all our evil passions may be subdued; that no abuse or perversion of the Divine bounty may be found among us; and that we may not provoke our merciful Creator to withhold from us those supplies which are necessary to our comfort, and even our existence.-Panoplist. A. B.

INDIFFERENCE TO RELIGION IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF A GOVERNMENT A GREAT NATIONAL SIN.

(Continued from Page 271.)

I OBSERVE, that after the remarks which have been already made, it may perhaps be deemed superfluous to observe that infidelity,or a disbelief and rejection of the Gospel,is one of the national sins of our land at the present day. The prevalence of a spirit of infidelity in our nation may be considered as, in different respects, both the cause and effect of that irreligious feature in our national government which has been the subject of the preceding remarks. Had not such a spirit been so prevalent that it was deemed necessary to enter into a sort of compromise with infidelity, I can hardly induce myself to believe that this feature in our national government would have ever assumed the shape in which it now appears. And this fea

ture taken in connection with an administration in every respect correspondent,* has had a tendency to nourish those seeds which had been before so plentifully sown, and had begun to vegetate with so much luxuriance. It is now almost two centuries since an attempt was made to organise infidelity into a system with the fascinating title of natural religion. The fabulous Proteus himself never assumed, in the fertile imagination of a poet, so many shapes as it has done since that time. But although this mystery of iniquity had long before begun to work, it was not until the last century, nor indeed until after the middle of it, that it made such alarming progress. This spread has perhaps been the most general in some catholic countries. Exclusixe of a general superintendance of providence, which has probably ordained this as one mean to be used in overturning the monstrous fabric of the Romish hierarcy, causes founded in the nature of things have had a powerful operation. In this enlightened and enquiring age, multitudes in catholic countries have had sufficient light and penetration to discover the absurdity of many of the superstitions of popery. These they confounded with christianity to which they never belonged, and rejected the whole together. But although the spread of infidel principles may have been the most extensive in catholic countries, its roots have struck deep in a protestant soil. We have seen it assuming a bold front, and proclaiming without a blush, an intention to banish christianity out of the world, at the same time expressing the most exulting assurances of ultimate success. We have seen barefaced atheism, rearing up its hydra bead in one nation, and attempting to deal destruction in every direction where a vestige of christianity was to be found.

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Although the United States have not gone all the lengths of revolutionary France in her mad career of atheism and impiety, yet its roots have struck deep. It is but too certain that in many instances and places, the christian religion is openly contemned, while infidelity is, with equal publicity, avowed without shame and without a blush; and it is not to be doubted but the secret influence of these principles, equally corrupt and corrupting, has been extended much farther than the open avowal. In general the operation of irreligious principles is, at first, not only begun but spread to a considerable extent in secret, Strike, but hide the hand, is a max

*It is not my intention to say that the administration has been in general actually composed of infidels, but that the way is perfectly open to men of that description.

im on which infidels have practised but too successfully from time to time. Like other evil doers, when they first begin to disseminate their poison, they hate the light; nor do they usually bring forward their principles to the public until they have been so far spread and matured in secret that society is prepared to bear the open avowal. One art which has been practised with great success is to impress the public mind with the belief, that that which has been usually termed infidelity is nothing but a harmlesss speculation which may be indulged without guilt and without danger.It is represented to be a mere honest, or, it may be, a laudable enquiry after truth, and as the result of that enquiry, that the belief or rejection of certain doctrines is not the effect of volition, but depends on the nature and clearness of the evidence which has been presented to the mind. But when divine inspiration asserts that he who believeth not shall be damned, and that an unbelieving heart is emphatically an evil heart, it presents an idea to the mind of something very different from that of harmless speculation. The true state of the matter appears to be, that infidelity has its original rather in the heart than the head, and is the fruit of a depraved disposition rather than the dictate of an erroneous judgment. Because men do not like to retain GoD in their knowledge he gives them up to strong delusions to believe a lie. The soul-humbling doctrines and the holy and self denying precepts of the Gospel are, in the first instance, disliked, and to quiet the remonstrances of conscience while trampling on its precepts, the authenticity of the sacred records is called in question. This therefore is not only a moral evil but one of the deepest die. It is in some respects the root of all evils, as it goes to unhinge every principle of morals, and dissolve every social tie which connects man either to his fellow men or to society. Like every other species of immorality, it becomes more or less aggravated, in proportion to the several religious and moral advantages which people enjoy. The advantages for understanding the evidences, and for duly appreciating the worth of the christian religion, enjoyed by the people of these United States, have been incomparably greater than: those with which the French nation have been favoured, where the Bible has been studiously kept from the perusal of the laity, and the pure and simple doctrines and duties of the gospel debased by superstition, and their beauty concealed from public view by the inventions of men. It does not arise from the want of evidence that the christian religion has been in any instance disbelieved. No history was ever better attested than that of the

Gospel. And when we consider the wonderful display of divine love made to man, in the obedience, death and sufferings of the Redeemer, as well as the benevolent tendency of the gospel system to promote present and future happiness, it is entitled to the warmest, most cordial and grateful reception. But experience teaches us that it seldom meets with that reception from the children of men to which it is entitled. Men in every age have been too prone to imitate the Jews of whom our Lord complains, saying, And ye will not come to me that ye may have life. Whoever carefully attends to the present situation of christianity in the United States, and sees it not only excluded from all connxeion with, or countenance and support from the national government, and equally excluded from some of the states and but slightly noticed in others, and, also observes the degree of carelessness and indifference prevailing in many parts of the country, which is in some places so great that you may trável for days and see scarcely a vestige, that christianity is the religion publicly professed, taken in connexion with the too general neglect of christian institutions, and the profanation of the sabbath, even where there is some appearance of religion, and together with this, brings into view the general prevalence of vice, as well as the smallness of the number of those who publicly own, and zealously espouse the cause of Christ, cannot but be convinced that the roots of infidelity have struck deep, and that its spirit prevails so extensively in the United States as to render it one of our national sins.When we bring into view the nature and importance of the christian religion, connected with the elearness of its evidences, may we not consider the commination in the text as pertinently applicable to us. Shall I not visit for these things saith the Lord? Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

It may be considered as an enquiry of some importance and deserving a moment's consideration in this place, whether infidelity is to be considered as gaining or loosing ground at present in the United States? To answer this question with precision, our information is insufficient. There are, however, some hopeful symptoms that, in many places, it is rather on the decline. In various instances which have come either within the sphere of personal observation, or of information, the authenticity of which cannot be called in question, it appears that some of its votaries have, by a happy change in the temper of their minds, become the humble followers of Christ. Others have been hopefully convinced of their

error, and others have been so far abashed as to become less bold and confident in their opposition to religion. Perhaps it may, on general principles be said, that the tone of infidelity has become less bold and assuming than it was a few years ago; and that the number, both of real and professed Christians, has been hopefully enlarged. It may still admit of a doubt whether an increase of zeal and activity in promoting the cause in private, while its votaries are waiting for a more convenient time to avow themselves openly to the world, does not fairly balance any diminution of boldness. We have seen that it can assume any shape to suit the times. If the crude, absurd, and vulgar blasphemies of Thomas Paine will not pass current, it can assume a milder form, and insinuate as much of its poison as possible, under the name of liberal, rational and catholic christianity; liberal to every class of opinions only to the truth as it is in Jesus. And whoever impartially examines some of the popular opinions in vogue, under the name of christian doctrines, will find little else in them than infidelity in disguise.

But should the cause of infidelity be, in some respects, really on the decline, this will not be sufficient to exempt us from all fear of God's visitation on that account. GOD vis its the iniquities of the Fathers upon the Children to the third and fourth generation. The calamities which befel the Jews, which terminated in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple; the desolation of the nation, and the seventy years captivity in Babylon, are expressly said to be for the sins of Manasseh, and the innocent blood which he shed, although but few who had arrived to maturity at that time now survived. The destruction of Samaria, and the captivity of the ten tribes, was also an event which happened under one of the least wicked of their kings. GOD has also seen fit to make inquisition for the blood shed by the house of Bourbon, upon one of the most virtuous of the race. The oceans of blood spilt in the destruction and slaughter of the protestants, under the auspices of Lewis fourteenth, have been avenged, not upon himself but his descendants; not upon the individual body of the clergy who were the principal instigators of that bloody work, but upon their successors who never had, in their own persons, been guilty of the like enormity. Should GoD reserve his visitation for this crime to a time when there was some abatement of the spirit of infidelity, we must, in that ease, be constrained to acknowledge, that the Judge of all the earth does right.

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