but you should not talk of Christianity, for you have not studied it. I have; and am certain you know nothing of the

matter.'

That there is but too much truth in these statements, none who have given any thing like due attention to the subject will question, far less deny. And how is the deleterious influence of such want of suitable, parental, or other educational tuition, with regard to the evidences and truth of revelation, most likely, through the blessing of its Divine Author, to be counteracted or lessened? Just by the more general diffusion of such treatises as are found in this and the preceding volume of the New Family Library, the perusal of which, if entered on, and conducted with a sincere desire to be instructed by them, can scarcely fail to issue in a full and decided conviction that Christianity, instead of being the invention of fallible men, has every signature of divinity impressed upon it, as coming directly from the all-wise and infallible God. It is no doubt true, that infidelity is a disease more of the heart than of the head: but it is through the medium of the understanding that the moral principles are influenced: and ignorance is the parent equally of superstition and of sin. Neither, when the intellect is uncultivated, is there any security against that credulousness which is as ready to give heed to every insinuation that leads to infidelity, as to submit to the grossest impositions of superstitious belief. But, as Bishop Butler well observes in one of his admirable discourses-" True religion takes up that place in the mind which superstition would usurp, and so leaves little room for it; and likewise lays us under the strongest obligations to oppose it. On the contrary, the danger of superstition cannot but be increased by the prevalence of irreligion: and by its general prevalence the evil will be unavoidable. For the common people, wanting a religion, will, of course, take up with almost every superstition that is thrown in their way; and

A Treatise on the Nature and Causes of Doubt in Religious Questions; with a particular reference to Christianity." London, 1831. Reviewed in the Eclectic Review for December of that year; and from which the above extracts are taken.

in process of time, amidst the infinite vicissitudes of the political world, the leaders of parties will certainly be able to avail themselves of that superstition, whatever it may be, which is getting ground, and will not fail to carry it to the utmost length that occasions require. The general nature of the thing shows this, and history and fact confirm it. It is, therefore, wonderful that those people, who seem to think there is but one evil in life, that of superstition, should not see that atheism and profaneness must be the introduction of it."-To the truth of this the world every where bears witness. Where men have not been taught to know their Creator in the days of their youth, they have worshipped stocks and stones, and made idols for themselves. Where they have not been led to the spiritual observance of true religion, they have imposed on themselves a burden of severe and painful ceremonies. Where they have not been instructed that the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit, they have shed human blood on their altars, and made their children pass through the fire, as an offering to demons. What, therefore, can be of more paramount importance, than to furnish the young, especially in every class of society, from the highest down to the lowest, with suitable antidotes to that religious ignorance which is so fruitful a source of delusion and crimes.

Nor, may it be unimportant to advert to the baneful effects with which the association of persons in early life, with speculative unbelievers, who have some pretensions to superior mental talents, or literary and scientific attainments, is in these days but too frequently attended. Taught by those, to whom, on these accounts, they not unjustly look up with respect and deference, under whom they are placed to acquire the elements of a liberal education, or with whom they are connected in the pursuits of a common or analagous line of study-taught by them, through means of their open assaults on the truth of Christianity, or their more indirect insinuations against the strength of its evidence to regard it first with doubt, and then with suspicion, between which, and absolute infidelity, the step is often but short and rapid; there are multitudes whose principles of belief, never

firmly settled, have been early unhinged, and who have risen, or are rising, to mature and even advanced life, at once the victims and the dupes of an argument, to be influenced or betrayed by which, actually discovers a weakness of understanding, which, if exhibited on almost any other subject, would prove them to be little above the level of idiocy. They are told, and they soon come to believe, what is not only untrue in point of fact, but what, though it were true, should have no weight with them, in so far as they are themselves personally and individually concerned in the matter, that to believe in Christianity is indicative of an unphilosophic or prejudiced mind that no man who values his reputation for power of intellect, or superiority to the opinions of the vulgar, however he may, from secular motives, seem to admit its truth, actually in his heart believes it—and that literature and science, instead of being promoted, have almost uniformly been retarded by its influence.

All these allegations it were easy to disprove, were this a fit place for entering on their particular refutation. Suffice it, however, to say, that whoever gives credit to them, gives himself to the belief of falsehoods, the mere figments of those who utter them, and which, as used by them for misleading the unsuspicious or inconsiderate, deserve no softer epithet than that of lies. For, frequent, and deeply to be lamented, though by no means very difficult of explanation, as has been the alliance of intellect, and literature and science, with infidelity; on looking back to the past history of Christianity, and contemplating even its present triumphs, we can count and name among its genuine disciples, a multitude of men, before whose gigantic powers the other great men of their own and of our day shrink as into littleness, and whose inventive genius and profoundness of research, in almost every department of human knowledge, and scientific acquirement, opened up the path, in which those who now so vain-gloriously boast of their own unrivalled pre-eminence are only following at a humble distance. What, besides, was it but the influence of that very religion, which

the philosophic or literary infidels of modern times, so scoff at and revile, that dispelled the darkness and barbarism in which the whole world, comparatively, was involved, previously to its promulgation? And what but its revival, after being nearly extinguished, under the reign of papal superstition, gave that impulse to the human mind, which has ever since been carrying forward every nation of Europe, where it was felt, in the career of learning and philosophy? There cannot, therefore, be a fouler calumny, than to represent Christianity as having been believed only by the weak or the vulgar, or as being unfriendly to the interests of literature and science; and for any individual amongst us to allow himself to be gulled by so unfounded a statement, is to betray so disgraceful an ignorance of some of the most notorious facts in the history of the world, and of his own country in particular, and to exhibit so despicable an example of credulity in listening to such aspersions, as might justly render him an object of contempt, or, at least, of compassion, to every one not as ignorant and credulous as himself.

But even admitting that such allegations were as true as they certainly are false, they would afford no argument whatever against the truth of Christianity. It must stand or fall by the strength or weakness of the evidence on which it professes to rest, and not by the character for talents or knowledge of either its defenders or its assailants. To set it down at once as untrue, or to permit the mind to be prejudiced against it, because many who disbelieve it have been, or are distinguished in other fields of investigation, is just to submit to the sophistical argument, by which the members of the Jewish Sanhedrim attempted to do away the effect of our Saviour's teaching on the minds of their own messengers to him, by insidiously asking them, "Have any of the rulers, or of the Pharisees, believed on him?" We have no difficulty in perceiving this to have been a mere fallacy, which the touch of reason instantly detects. And if it was so in the case in which it was originally brought forward, it will surely not be averred, that either the continu

ance or the frequency of its reiteration, for a similar purpose, whether of self deception, or infidel proselytism, can have rendered it less truly and palpably unsound.

It may well, indeed, be asked whether the opinion or the authority, and still less the ridicule or sneers, of any man or class of men ought to have the least weight with us, in a case in which we are imperiously called, and, if we would not virtually renounce the prerogative and character of reasonable and honest men, are as imperatively bound to examine for ourselves the evidence on which the truth of Christianity is founded. This is not a matter of speculation on which an excursive fancy might expatiate, but a question of evidence and fact, which requires simply the exercise of a sound judgment to determine. And would we, in any other case of evidence and fact, trust to the alleged examination of it by one set of individuals, when another set were found to aver that the result of their examination of it was directly the reverse of that to which the others were led, if we had the opportunity and means of conducting the investigation for ourselves? Or could we do so, without incurring, and that justly, the charge of submission to the most questionable and suspicious authority, or of gratifying our indolence at the expense of our understanding and credit for integrity? For aught we knew, or could reasonably believe, we might be placing an unlimited confidence in statements as false as falsehood can be, and conjured up for the very purpose of imposing on our credulity, and blinding us to the truth.

The application of these remarks to the subject of Christianity must be obvious at the very first glance. And in so applying them, there is an additional circumstance of too great moment to be overlooked. It is a fact as undeniable as truth

itself, that not a single individual in a hundred, who even avows himself to be an infidel, has ever examined into the evidences of Christianity at all. They have gathered from this or the other sceptical writer, or tutor, or companion, objections and witticisms, which have been refuted and repelled a thousand times over, and which are a disgrace to the understanding and the decency equally of those who invented them,