completely exterior to man, and excite neither passion nor prejudice. Their evidence is completely estimated, and, as the effect excites no partiality or opposition, its force is fully felt. This circumstance I remarked at our last meeting; and I added, that morality and religion have to struggle against all those prejudices, partialities, and obstacles, which arise from private passion, public opinion, or vicious indulgences. It is here that we are to look for the source of our ignorance, and our crimes; and the experience of mankind, in every age, completely proves that human efforts cannot stem the torrent, and it is therefore cruel to deprive us of those comforts, and that assistance, by which alone we can oppose it. Mankind are bad, too, too bad, as it is.-Deprive them of religious restraint, and spiritual comfort, and they will become totally insupportable.

"Mr Macleod's second letter appears to me to be a master-piece of confusion and absurdity. He rambles from one thing to another, with a rapidity which it is scarce. possible to follow. He is now busy calumniating revelation, and, while we are expecting him to proceed to argument, we find him in an instant abusing Bishop Horseley and the clergy, and endeavouring to undermine the security, by destroying the influence, of civil government. But, passing by these angry sallies as unworthy of all no

tice, because totally unconnected with the subject, we find him allowing that Thomas Paine's book" could not fail to warp the debauched to absolute profligacy, because men, already unsettled in their creed, readily embrace the religion least irksome to them. This is that which scorns to humble its votaries at any altar, and knows no divine monitor but nature. Undoubtedly such religion pleases the idle, suits the vagrant, is charming in the eyes of robbers, and has a positive tendency to subvert truth. But (he proceeds) although Paine's book be much interlarded with scurrility, and sometimes tinged by obsceneness, the main scope of the author is apparently what I have already stated-to inculcate the practice of every virtuous duty upon his readers." What, I pray you, is to be expected of a man capable of writing such inconsistent nonsense? All the evil tendencies of Paine's book, and all its author's absurdities and crimes, are, in the opinion of Mr M., amply atoned for, because "he boldly attacks the whole body of revealed religion;" because he has thought proper to assert, that "the removal of error, and destruction of tyranny, are his favourite pursuits." Of Christian writers, our author judges in a very different manner. Mr P. he says," has merely proclaimed the war of intellect against error," while he who has endeavoured to defend established order against levelling anarchy, and the truths of

the gospel against infidel reproach, he asserts, "has waged the war of proud superstition against humble truth." After several sentences, replete with insulting language, he asserts, but the assertion is followed by no proof, and supported by no fact; that the disputes about the Godhead of Jesus Christ, (in which Bishop Horseley bore so honourable and distinguished a part,) were introductory to a difference of opinion, and gave rise to doubts concerning the authenticity of the New Testament:" and he asserts, that the perusal of what he calls the anathemas, and conflicts of that period, produced the infidelity of Thomas Paine, and others who have lately followed him in the Mr M., however, will please to recollect, that such improbable assertions are beside the avowed purpose of his book; that, though they were founded in fact, they would produce on his side of the debate no favourable conclusion; that it is probable, however, that they are not founded in fact, since there have been infidels in every age, and of course long before the period to which he points, whose names are now scarce known to the followers of their errors; and, finally, that it is more than likely, judging, as we have a right to do, from universal experience, that the same fate awaits, and will quickly overtake, him and his associates, the infidels of our day. But he adds, with great gravity, that "the

same career.

speculations which led to this infidelity were not uninteresting. For, doubtless, the whole of Christ's precepts, nay, his laws, can be traced to sources, and rest on authorities, entirely mortal." Here, again, is mere assertion, and that, too, respecting the very basis of the debate :-But, let us not misrepresent him, he does attempt to prove it. He says, that those who were most zealous in the propagation of this religion, "like Jesus, generally experienced contumely, and, in particular instances, death. Confucius (however he adds,) gave the same, with many more wise laws, (it would have been condescending if he had men, tioned some of these) to the Chinese people, as Jesus Christ administered to the Jews." But he was also persecuted and insulted;and so he speaks of Solon and of Socrates, who, though persecuted, &c. while they lived, were honoured by their countrymen after their death, as well as the founder of Christianity. "We know (continues he,) that those ancients were not less wise, and certainly more learned, than Jesus Christ, They, too, had associates, pupils, followers, and disciples, who were emulous to equal them in wisdom, in virtue, in austerity, and in continence. But so were not the subsequent followers of these followers, and so are not the Christians of our day." Wherefore, he concludes, what no one will deny, that vice existed long before T. P. contri

buted what our author calls a priest's-mite to the public insecurity, &c. But, surely, a wise or a good man will not contend, that, because much evil already naturally exists. in the world, therefore we may properly add to its sum. In the subsequent part of this letter, Mr M. grants, what cannot indeed be denied, that "the maxims of the Christian Religion are fundamentally good;" and, in one or two paragraphs, he writes in a stile which, as from him it is inconsistent, is also surprising, but to which few Christians will materially object, and he finishes thus: "It is the abuse of Christianity, joined to the avarice of power, which causes that immorality, and produces those crimes, so certainly inimical to the peace of nations and the laws of God." These assertions, and a few others of a similar cast, when compared with the general reasoning and abusive language of the bulk of Mr M's. work, afford a striking example of inconsistency, of perversion of mind, or of downright ignorance, perhaps, indeed, of the three combined. The concession here implied, or rather directly made,-and it is no more than the bitterest enemy of Christianity, if he adhere in the smallest degree to truth, must grant,-renders nugatory and absurd most of the reasoning, such as it is, and all the abuse which he has thought proper to vent against this religion and its professors. The maxims of the Christian religion