chafte Lucretia adored the impudent Venus; the intrepid Roman facrificed 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 feemed 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 fpite 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 fay, in the humun mind but what is inftilled 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 univerfal fenfe of all nations; feeking fome obfcure example known only to themselves, to controvert this striking uniformity in the judgment of mankind:

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.

the writers of the Old Testament had been deter mined to destroy the moral excellence of God's chas racter, they could not have chosen a better plan of ac complishing this object than that which is prefented in the book of Exodus. In this chapter the climax of villainy is completed; God is reprefented as still going on with rancorous zeal and cruel work of hardening Pharaoh's heart, till he brings him at last to dreadful destruction. The chofen band at last make their escape; Pharaoh is infpired with a difpofition 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 purfue them? The answer is found in the 4th verfe, and is as follows," And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, that he fhall 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 reprefented as making Pharaoh do a certain thing, and then killing him for doing it. But he had a reafon 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 distreffed for fear the people would not know that he was the Lord. I am the Lord, and ye fhall 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 preferve the dignity of his character? These are the rancorous ebullitions of man, and not the folemn affeverations of God. In the 8th verfe there is a repetition of this fame hardening scheme as if the writer was not fatisfied 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 prefented with a

most wonderful and fplendid violation of the laws of na ture! This is predicted by Mofes and he commands his flavish banditti to stand still and fee the falvation of God. Here the Jewish conjurer comes forward again and with his rod of enchantment is reprefented as having power to divide the red fea and caufe the chofen people to pafs through upon dry land. (See verfes 16 and 17). In this last verfe God has extended the fphere of his influence and comprehended within the decree of obduracy the Egyptians themfelves, 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 fympathy and benevolence. This miracle however of dividing the waters of the red fea is faid to have been performed in a curious kind of manner; in one place Mofes is the ostensible 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 pofsible to pafs with little or no depth of water. This is probab ly but an idle story without foundation; for in the first place it is intrinfically improbable, and in the fecond 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 opera¿tion of nature's laws; it fubjects the divine character to unjust imputations, and is therefore destitute of all the features of truth and confistency.

RELIGIOUS FEAR.

The Bible fays, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and Boulanger, a writer in defence of the re

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ligion of nature, fays, it is the beginning of folly. Herethen are the bible writers, verfus Boulanger, and Bou langer, verfus the bible writers. Those who are strongly attached to revelation, will confider it a profane bufinefs to fet up an individual against a host of infpired penmen by which the world is fuppofed 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 alfo contend in favour of religious fear it would demonstrate nothing relative to its real utility. This fubject is an important one, and at fome future time we intend to bestow upon it further and more ferious reflections. At prefent, however, it will be of ufe to throw out fome leading ideas. The great instrument constantly employed by ecclefiaftical defpotifm, for the fabjugation of the world has been fear. This defpotifm 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 apprehenitons. The first fpecies of fear relates to himfelf; 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 fystems of antiqui ty. He is alfo 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 fpeaking; what a miferable reflection when will man learn to exercife intellectual courage? He is afraid of the devil. The only devil that men have to fear is their own vicious actions, and thefe 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 univerfe. There is but one thing that man ought to fear, and that is vice.

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

BISHOP MOORE.

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 refpect to other parts of your letter I think it very réprehenfible and betrays great ignorance of what true religi on is. But you are a priest, you get your living by it, and it is not your worldly interest to undeceive yourfell 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 fhew you, fir, that your promife of confolation from fcripture has no foundation to stand upon, I will cite to you one of the greatest falfhoods upon record, and which was given, as the record fays, 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 cafe 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 afcenfion 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 rife first." Then WE (fays he v. 17) which

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