wisdom. You may give him as many names as you please, provided you allow but one sole principle, every where present." Agreeably to Plato's notions, he considered the divine understanding as comprehending in itself the model of all things, which he styles the immutable and almighty ideas. "Every workman, (says he) hath a model by which he forms his work. It signifies nothing whether this model exists outwardly and before his eyes, or be formed within him by the strength of his own genius: so God produces within himself that perfect model, which is the proportion, the order, and the beauty of all things. The ancients (says he in another place) did not think Jove such a being, as we represent him in the capitol, and in our other buildings. But by Jove they meant the guardian and governor of the universe, the understanding, and the mind, the master and the architect of this great machine. All names belong to him. You are not in the wrong, if you call him Fate; for he is the cause of causes, and every thing depends on him. Would you call him Providence; you fall into no mistake, it is by his wisdom that this world is governed. Would you call him Nature: you would not offend in doing so it is from him that all beings derive their origin; it is by him that they live and breathe." There is no reading the works of Epictetus, of Arrian his disciple, and of Marcus Antoninus, without admiration. We find in them rules of morality worthy of Christianity. Socrates in particular, professed to be guided by an inward monitor, which he called his good Genius, (but which I call the good spirit of God) and though a heathen, was a martyr for the truth and who dare say, Socrates is in hell? I answer; none but the presumptuous or ungenerous. : I must confess, I am pointed in my animadversions, but they are only applicable to political and clerical impostors; and those who are offended with me for exposing the villany of king-craft and priest-craft, are their advocates, and of course enemies of man, and virtually infringe the rights of God. I do not exhibit any honest man, or set of men, to popular animadversion and contempt; I only exhibit criminals let not the innocent, therefore, think that I implicate them; I do not, I dare not do it. I believe there are good ministers and good people in every denomination, as well as bad ones. I need not, I do not expect either affection or favour from lordly and crafty priests, or tyrannical and treacherous kings or rulers, or from their father the devil; and much less from priest-ridden, politician-ridden, or devil-ridden people. They remember to forget what I have so repeatedly and pointedly declared, to wit, "that no true minister of Christ, and no pure patriot, directly or indirectly, has any connection with my animadversions:" indeed, no people on earth do I so much love, admire and venerate as them. But although I admire virtue in church and in state, must I be calumniated because I expose villany? THE PLEASURES OF CONTEMPLATION. WHERE is the inhabitant of the air, from the moth to the eagle, or of the sea, from the shrimp to the whale, or of the earth, from the mouse to the mammoth, that ever deviates from the laws of nature? I answer, not one, man only excepted. Yet man is the lord of the creation; in him are united both beauty and intelligence. He only can view the harmonies between each species of plants and of animals, and the utility of minerals and fossils.; he can, with his lens, see in a grain of sand a globe in miniature, and with his tel. escope behold millions of globes in magnitude, on the milky way; he can measure the distances of the planets from each other; and from the sun, the centre of the solar system, he can calculate the exact period that an eclipse will take place, even an age before the time, and not miss a minute in his calculation. He only, of all animals, can command fire, wind, and water to obey him, the wild beasts to fear him, the tame ones to serve him. The vegetable as well as the animal creation is likewise subject to his dominion; he is sensible of these and innumerable other advantages, and yet, of all animals, he is the most ungrateful to the Divine Author of all his mercies; he well knows that it is his duty to be kind to others, as God is kind to him, yet of all monsters he is the most cruel; he sees the harmonies, beauties, and benefits of this terrestrial globe, and enjoys the countless favours and blessings resulting from the variation and contrasts of the seasons, yet scarce ever bows with grateful acknowledgments to the benevolent Being who supports him and the earth on which he crawls, as it were, in the palm of his benevolent hand. Spring crowns him with flowers, summer with yellow sheaves, autumn with purple fruit, and winter with ventilating storms and healthful snow. The seas and lakes are stored with fish, the valleys with medicinal herbage, the woodlands with spontaneous fruit, wine, oil, and honey, for the aliment of man. I have seen the wine taken from the lofty palm-tree, and drank it; I have eaten the palm oil with rice, as also the wild honey, and various wild fruits have I gathered and participated in, in the forests of Africa, a land flowing with milk and honey, rendered so by the liberality of God, but metamorphosed to a dismal dungeon by the cruelty of man. When force begins, free agency ends. What truth can be plainer than this? yet who believes it? I will add, if we are not free agents, but animal machines, without liberty or will, we cannot be rewardable for any virtue, or punishable for any vice. But it is necessary not only to see, but to obey the truth. As the good Spirit can and does hold up the light of truth before our intellectual eyes, but cannot see for us, so likewise, even if we do see the truth, we must obey it for ourselves; he cannot do it for us; the thing is impossible. God has made my mouth, but he cannot eat for me; he has graciously formed my corporeal and intellectual eyes and ears, but he can neither hear nor see for me; he has blessed me with reason, but he cannot reason for me; if he did, the reasoning would be his own, not mine. He does exhibit the natural light of Divine truth, before the intellectual eyes of every man that cometh into the world, sage and savage, Pagan and Christian, Turk and Jew, clergyman and layman. Though many Christians, so called, contend that it is impossible for any but sectarian believers in the Gospel to enter the kingdom of heaven, I have found more hospitality among the savages of Africa, than I have among the greatest professors of religion in Europe or America, and that in the time of my greatest need. I would mention one instance: a certain adventure once put me in their power, and they knew me to be a slavedealer. My only food was the spontaneous fruit of the forests, unless what they supplied, yet they never let me want. They had not sufficient food for themselves, yet they divided it without my solicitation. I have often asked Christians for a drink of water, and they would not give it whereas savages have regaled me with palm wine, without asking it. Who listened to, and forthwith obeyed the spirit of truth? I mean the third person in the Holy Trinity, whose positive command, to sage and savage, is "Love your neighbour, and learn from my kindness to you all, to be kind to one another;" Toussaint and the good Samaritan, or our modern sectarians. Few have had a better opportunity to answer this interrogation than myself, as I have travelled by land and water hundreds of thousands of miles. To the Africans, I have been a deadly foe, yet they treated me as a friend; to my Christian cotemporaries I have been a most ardent friend, yet they have treated me as a foe. The first have accommodated me in my extremity, even without solicitation, or any compensation, with the best they possessed; and the last have absolutely refused me a drink of cold water, when I was thirsty, though I humbly solicited for it. This I declare is the truth, and I could particularize numerous anecdotes, connected with my experience, to elucidate and consolidate the above fact. I have been often astonished, in my extensive travels, to find so great a contrast in professors of Christianity, who had the word religion always playing upon their lips, and in Heathens, who did not even understand the etymology of the word. I have often wondered what was the cause, the simple unlettered children of nature imitated the author of nature in his most amiable characteristic, I mean benevolence, more than the sons of science and the daughters of polite literature; and that savages, who never heard one sermon on charity, should be more charitable than those who hear one hundred and four sermons every year. But what seems to me the greatest misfortune of all, is the improbability of any person, who is a bigotted member of a corps or sect, ever listening to any other reasoning but what is sanctioned and supported by his party; hence, they are only acquainted with one side of the question, and consequently cannot give a candid and reasonable decision on any subject of importance. In the different corps or societies, philosophical, political, and religious, there are a diversity of opposite opinions, interests and hypotheses; but in no party are opinions so diametrically opposite, advanced and confuted, supported and censured, as on the subject of revealed religion. Millions of books have been written, and sermons preached by each |