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chaste Lucretia adored the impudent Venus; the întrepid Roman sacrificed to Fear; they invoked the God who dif abled his father, and yet died without murmuring by the hand of theirs; the most contemptible divinities were adored by the noblest of men. The voice of nature more powerful than that of the Gods, made itself refpected on earth, and seemed to have banished vice to Heaven.

There evidently exifts, therefore, in the foul of man, an innate principle of justice and goodness; by which, in spite of our own maxims, we approve or condemn the actions of ourselves, and others: to this principle it is that I give the appellation of confcience.

At this word, however, I hear the clamour of our me taphysicians; who all exclaim about the mistakes of infan cy, and the prejudices of education. There is nothing, they say, in the humun mind but what is instilled by experience; nor can we judge of any thing but from the ideas we have acquired. Nay, they go farther, and venture to reject the universal sense of all nations; seeking fome obscure example known only to themselves, to controvert this striking uniformity in the judgment of mankind:

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To be continued.

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PROSPECT; or, View of the Moral World.

VOL. I.

SATURDAY, August 4, 1804.

No. 35.

Comments upon the Sacred Writings of the Jews and Christians. Exodus Chapter 14.

F the writers of the Old Testament had been deter. thed to destroy the moral excellence of God's cha racter, they could not have chosen a better plan of accomplishing this object than that which is presented in the book of Exodus. In this chapter the climax of villainy is completed; God is represented as still going on with rancorous zealand cruel work of hardening Pharaoh's heart, till he brings him at last to dreadful destruction. The chosen band at last make their escape; Pharaoh is infpired with a disposition of heart to pursue them, and he and all his host are faid to have been drowned in the red fea. How came he to pursue them? The answer is found in the 4th verse, and is as follows, "And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, that he shall follow after them; and I will be honored upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host; that the Egyptians may know that I am the Lord." Here God is represented as making Pharaoh do a certain thing, and then killing him for doing it. But he had a reason for this, which is that the Egyptians might know that he was the Lord. How terribly jealous of his fame this Jewish divinity was! And always distressed for fear the people would not know that he was the Lord. I am the Lord, and ye shall know that I am the Lord, was the burden of his fong! Does the real God of nature, the Creator of the world, stand in need of fuch pitiful reforts to make himself known, and preserve the dignity of his character? These are the rancorous ebullitions of man, and not the folemn asseverations of God. In the 8th verse there is a repetition of this same hardening scheme as if the writer was not satisfied with one wicked defcription of the deity whom he adored. In addition to this circumstance of fo often infufing an obdurate temperament into the heart of Pharaoh, we are next presented with a most wonderful and splendid violation of the laws of nature! This is predicted by Moses and he commands his slavish banditti to stand still and fee the salvation of God. Here the Jewish conjurer comes forward again and with his rod of enchantment is represented as having power to divide the red fea and cause the chofen people to pass through upon dry land. (See verses 16 and 17). In this last verse God has extended the sphere of his influence and comprehended within the decree of obduracy the Egyptians themselves, as well as their royal tyrant. Three times in this chapter he is charged with the fame crime, that of hardening the hearts of the creatures whom he had made for purposes of moral sympathy and benevolence. This miracle however of dividing the waters of the red sea is faid to have been performed in a curious kind of manner; in one place Mofes is the ostenfible agent by stretching out his rod, and in another God produces the effect by a strong east wind. Some travellers and naturalists have afferted, that there is a place in the red fea, a large fand-bar where at a certain time of tide, and with the wind in a particular direction it is possible to pass with little or no depth of water. This is probably but an idle story without foundation; for in the first place it is intrinfically improbable, and in the second place if it had been a fact the Egyptians must have known as much of it as the Ifrealites, and therefore could not have been circumvented in the manner herein stated. The whole account, however, is marked with fiction and extravagance; it is a departure from the regular operation of nature's laws; it fubjects the divine character to unjust imputations, and is therefore destitute of all the features of truth and consistency.

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The Bible says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and Boulanger, a writer in defence of the religion of nature, says, it is the beginning of folly. Here then are the bible writers, verfus Boulanger, and Bou langer, versus the bible writers. Those who are strongly attached to revelation, will consider it a profane business to fet up an individual against a host of inspired penmen by which the world is supposed to have been enlightened. Numbers however have nothing to do with truth, and if all the learned clergy in the world were to affirm that one was equal to three, and that three were no more than one, there could not be found on the face of the earth a fure and correct mind that would give credit to the affirmation. If all the believers on earth thould also contend in favour of religious fear it would demonstrate nothing relative to its real utility. This subject is an important one, and at fome future time we intend to bestow upon it further and more serious reflections. At present, however, it will be of use to throw out some leading ideas. The great instrument constantly employed by ecclefiaftical defpotism, for the fubjugation of the world has been fear. This defpotism has made man afraid of himself; it has made him afraid of his fellow creatures; it has made him afraid of the devil, and afraid of God. Here then are four distinct objects to which the weakness of man has yielded in the indulgence of fearful apprehenftCons. The first species of fear relates to himself; man is afraid of his own powers, afraid to exercise his own faculties-he is terrified and alarmed when reflections arife in his mind hostile to the orthodox systems of antiquity. He is also dreadfully alarmed if any of his neighbours call in question any of his opinions. This implies that man has neither the right of thinking nor speaking, what a miferable reflection! when will man learn to exercise intellectual courage? He is afraid of the devil. The only devil that men have to fear is their own vicious actions, and these they have it abundantly in their power to correct. He is afraid of God! What stupid mind was it that first invented the idea that human beings ought to tremble before the Supreme and benevolent Creator of the universe. There is but one thing that man ought to fear, and that is vice.

TO MR. MOORE, of New-York,
Commonly called

BISHOP MOORE.

t

I have read in the newspapers your account of the vifit you made to the unfortunate General Hamilton, and of administering to him a ceremony of your church which you call the Holy Communion.

I regret the fate of General Hamilton, and I fo far hope with you that it will be a warning to thoughtless man not to sport away the life that God has given him; but with respect to other parts of your letter I think it very reprehenfible and betrays great ignorance of what true religion is. But you are a priest, you get your living by it, and it is not your worldly interest to undeceive yourself.

After giving an account of your administering to the deceafed what you call the Holy Communion, you add, "By reflecting on this melancholy event let the humble "believer be encouraged ever to hold fast that precious "faith which is the only source of true consolation in the last extremity of nature. Let the infidel be perfuaded to abandon his oppofition to the Gofpel."

To shew you, fir, that your promise of confolation from fcripture has no foundation to stand upon, I will cite to you one of the greatest falshoods upon record, and whick was given, as the record says, for the purpose, and as a • promife, of confolation.

In the epistle called "the First Epistle of Paul to the Theffalonians," (chap. 4.) The writer confoles the Theffalonians as to the case of their friends who were already dead. He does this by informing them, and he does it he fays, by the word of the Lord, (a most notorious falfhood) that the general refurrection of the dead, and the afcension of the living, will be in his and their days; that their friends will then come to life again, that the dead in Christ will rise first. -" Then WE (fays he v. 17) which

are alive and remain shall be caught up together with "THEM in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and fo "shall we ever be with the Lord-Wherefore comfort "one another with these words."

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