under the penalty of an infraction of the Divine law, to repose on the seventh day. To labour, is a faculty granted me by God; a faculty which I am at liberty to use or not, according to my strength or wants. Citizens, remark that what I here advance, is perfectly conformable to the opinions of the legislator of Christians. On one Sabbath day he was with his disciples, who worked. How! said the Jews, thou sufferest that thy disciples work on a day like this! And why not? replied the Jewish philosopher, the Sabbath is made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. But God, you continue to assert, punishes for work done on the Sabbath day, as one of the most enormous crimes, and destines the perpetrators of it to the torment of eternal flames. The God that I believe in, is a God of justice and goodness; your God then cannot be mine, when you come in his name to menace me with eternal torments, because I had rather work than beg or steal on the Sunday; I can regard him only as a Being, unjust, capricious, vindictive, sanguinary and ferocious.

But quitting priests and their fables, let us resume the thread of our discourse, and inquire how the institution of a day of rest, naturally passed from Egypt into Judea. Moses was born in Egypt. The Hebrew nation at that time groaned under the dreadful tyranny of the despots of Egypt. Moses, endowed with a vast genius, and a courageous soul, sufficiently bold to undertake any enterprize; sufficiently skilful to execute what he undertook, conceived the sublime idea of delivering Israel from her long and cruel servitude. He succeeded in it, and soon became the legislator of the nation, of which he had been the liberator. Among the Hebrews, as among the Egyptians, there were slaves and as in one nation so in the other, there were hard and barbarous masters, who would not have granted to their slaves a sufficient respite from labour, had they not been compelled so to do, by the superior policy and cunning of their leader, Moses, who claimed divine authority for all the laws which he promulgated amongst this stupid and ignorant people.

[To be continued.]

THE solution of the question, how came evil into a world, formed by a wise, powerful and benevolent Deity, has been a fruitful source of metaphysical debate from the earliest period to the present time. Man in his rude and uncultivated state, perceiving himself surrounded by good and evil, happiness and misery, and justly concluding that the great first cause, which brought him into existence, must be beneficent and kind, naturally conjec. tured that some malign being was constantly endeavouring to thwart his benevolent purposes. Hence all the nations of antiquity figured to their imaginations a good and an evil spirit, denominated by various names, each acting in direct contradiction to the views of the other. Hence the fable of the triumph of evil over good, and the consequent fall of man, by eating the forbidden fruit. The importance of this subject arises from the consideration of its having been made a principal ingredient in the formation of all religious systems.

If it can be proved by philosophical deductions, that the evils which man experiences, necessarily originate from the very nature of his existence, and that those evils could not have been avoided even by omnipotent power, without withholding from him a greater good; then the benevolence and goodness of God in the creation of the world will be fully established, and the story of the fall of man, and the consequent necessity of a redemption, will be no longer worthy of credit. What joyful tidings would not this be to the sincere enquirer after truth. If this fall of man, this millstone around the necks of mankind, acting as a dead weight upon human happiness, can be fairly got rid of, and man left accountable only for his own actions, the road to salvation and happiness would be easy and pleasant. This important disideratum, to our minds, has been clearly and fully obtained by Soame Jenyns, in a work, entitled, The nature and origin of evil. This work we believe to be in few hands, and as it is written in the most pure and elegant stile, and on that account, independent of its intrinsic merits, worthy the perusal of every person of literary taste, we shall publish it entire in the course of the first volumé

of the Theophilanthropist, commencing in the present number. We presume that this celebrated and scarce production, will, in the estimation of our readers, enhance the value of the volume.

We must observe, however, that in an introduction to the second edition, the author has answered at large his numerous opponents; from this we have made such extracts only, as we judged might be interesting to our readers, and proper to be incorporated with the original. Although sound logical reasoning, such as is contained in the work before us, does not require the aid of great character and fame, to give currency to the sentiments, which always ought to depend upon their own intrinsic merits, still there exists in the minds of most readers a laudable curiosity to know something of the character and circumstances of an author; as these frequently give a tone to his opinions, and therefore ought to put the reader on his guard against sophistry. We shall therefore, give a short sketch of the life and character of Mr. Jenyns, extracted from his Biography by Charles N. Cole, to whom he bequeathed the copy-right of all his works.

SOAME JENYNS, the son of Sir Roger Jenyns, was born in London in 1703. His mother was the daughter of Sir Peter Soame, baronet. He received his education at Cambridge University. From the time he left Cambridge, his residence in winter was in London, and in summer in the country, in his father's family, as long as he lived. His pursuits were chiefly literary. His art of dancing, published in 1727, was considered as a presage of what afterwards might be expected from him.

Soon after his father's death, at the general election in 1742, he was unanimously chosen one of the representatives for the county of Cambridge, from which time he sat in parliament until the year 1780. In the year 1755, his late majesty appointed him one of the commissioners of the board of trade and plantations, at which he continued to sit until an alteration was made in its constitution by parliament, and the business of it transferred to the great officers of state.

He was twice married; his last wife survived him; he died in December, 1787, leaving no issue. He was a man of great mildness of temper, which he manifested to all with whom he had concerns, either in the business of life, or its social inter

course. His earnest desire was, as far as possible, never to offend any person; and made such allowances even for those who in their dispositions differed from him, that he was rarely offended with others, of which, in a long life, he gave many notable instances.

He possessed an uncommon vein of the most lively and genuine wit, but which was never the cause of uneasiness to those with whom he conversed, always considering every sally of wit, however bright it might be, which tended to the mortification of those who heard it, as one of its greatest abuses, since he looked upon all pre-eminent gifts of the mind, bestowed by nature, as much for the happiness of others as of those who possess them.

No person felt more for the miseries of others than he did; no person more strictly practised the duty imposed upon those who have the means of aiding the indigent, and rendering their condition as happy as possible.

When he was in the country, he constantly acted as a magistrate in his own district, and attended all those meetings which were holden for the purposes of public justice.

From the general opinion that was entertained of his inflexible integrity and superior understanding, he was much resorted to in that character. From his natural sagacity, quick discernment, and long experience, on hearing and examining the parties, he seldom failed of obtaining a complete knowledge of the cases that came before him, and was thereby enabled to determine according to the rules of complete justice; always giving his reasons for what he did, with a clearness and perspicuity peculiar to himself, and those reasons expressed in words so accommodated to the understanding of all who heard him, that few or none departed dissatisfied with his decisions. Though he was not bred to the study of the law, his understanding was such that he could apply it to every purpose for which it was wanted. When in the course of conversation, among other topics that arose, the duty of a magistrate had its place, he used to say that he had been amply compensated for the pains he had taken, and the dificulties he had met with, during his long exercise of that civil office, by the many opportunities which he had been

gratified with of reconciling those who came before him, inflamed with the highest degree of hatred against each other.

His first entrance into parliament, was in the last year of the administration of Sir Robert Walpole. Through this year he constantly attended the sittings in the house of commons, which the opposition past in hunting that minister, into the toils which they had made to take him, under colour of pursuing the enemies to the happiness and interests of the country.

Unknown to Sir Robert, and unconnected with him by acquaintance or private regard, he supported him to the utmost of his power, till he retired from his high station.

Our author having seen and well considered the causes and progress of the opposition to Sir Robert Walpole, and having weighed the end and consequences of it, acquired an early distaste to oppositions in general; and nothing that passed afterwards in parliament, during the long time he sat there, ever tended to produce any alteration in his mind on that subject.*

Not bred to any profession, nor early instituted in civil business, by which the powers of speaking in public are often called forth and nurtured, though endowed with great quickness of comprehension, which enabled him well to understand, not only what others said, but what they meant, by the several parts they took in debate, a faculty of discrimination most necessary in popular assemblies; yet not having that prompta et profuse eloquentia, which Tacitus ascribes to Augustus, and which our author thought those ought to have who claimed the sole attention

*Mr. Jenyns was a member of parliament in the time of Lord North, and we recollect that Earl Chatham, father of the late William Pitt, one of the greatest statesmen England ever produced, was opposed to his administration, as well as many others of the best men in the kingdom. Appropos, Mr. Jenyns has forgot to notice, in his enumeration of evils, that which arises from a blind and obstinate adherence, in the members of the British parliament, to a wicked and profligate ministry.

Editors.