Each philosopher took it into his head to build a world of his own, but all these worlds tumbled down like so many edifices built on the sand. Will you succeed better in withdrawing the sacred veil of the unsearchable conduct of. God in the government of this universe? Alas! how should we be able to comprehend the world, weak mortals as we are, since the least and most insignificant of the objeets, that compose it, far exceeds our intelligence? Pray, Sir, what are those beams which enlighten us? What that air which we breathe? What the earth which supports us? These are so many mysteries, to you, to me, and to all mankind. Here, Sir, is a drop of water, a grain of sand, a blade of grass: you see that I do not mean to embarrass you, and that I seize, as it were by chance, whatever falls under my hand: tell me, Sir, what is that drop of water, that grain of sand, that blade of grass? Make me comprehend, if you can, its intrinsic nature, and all its properties; enable me to say: I comprehend this drop of water, this grain of sand, this slender herb. Would you have an age to work and to reflect upon these mighty objects? Would you have two ages? Would you have a thousand? Agreed, Sir, you shall have them, and still I defy you to succeed; and I bid the same defiance to the whole body of the philosophical school.* It is then true, Sir, that you conceive nothing of what you behold with your eyes; what then will it be, if I force you to confess, that you do not conceive even yourself, nor any thing of what is within you?

Are you ready, Sir, to inform me, how your body was framed in the womb of your mother? How your soul entered into your body? How these two beings, so disproportionate in their nature, so seemingly opposed to each other, could

"The judicious reflections of one of the greatest astronomers of the last age, is worthy of notice: "Hinc oritur illa animorum in indagandis rebus naturæ perplexitas, mentisq; stupor, quo perculsa, quanto in intima rerum indagine plus se profecisse ratio videt, tanto a veritatis limine remotiorem adhuc se esse deprehendit." Kirker, M. S.

Lib. 2, Machab. vii. v. 22. "She, (the mother of the Machabees) said to them: I know not how you were formed in my womb, for I neither gave you breath, nor soul, nor life; neither did I frame the limbs of every one of you, but the Creator of the world, that formed the nativity of man," &c.

unite so closely as to constitute one and the same whole? what is your soul? Where is it? How does it subsist? By what sort of tie is it united to the body? Is that tie spiritual, or corporeal; and, in either case, how can it affect either of the two substances? How can your soul command your hand or foot, which, being of their own nature, without sense or feeling, cannot understand its orders? How does your soul put in motion the nerves and muscles, which it knows not? How did your tongue, a mere lump of flesh, learn the astonishing art of beating the air to such advantage, as to form the most rapturous concerts, and to convey, by the distinct artieulation of its sounds, your most secret thoughts to my mind? You possess the faculty of thinking: What is thought, Sir? At one time you feel pleasure, and at another pain: What is pleasure, what is pain? Your eye sees colours: Why does your eye see? What are the colours which it sees? What do you know of all this? Why, no more than what the most stupid know, that is to say, nothing, nothing at all: And still you exist, Sir, and you never doubted of the existence of what surrounds you therefore, not to comprehend, is not always a reason not to believe. What! the world is a mystery to you: every creature that composes it, is a mystery to you: You are yourself, a mystery to yourself, and you pretend to compre hend that supreme and eternal majesty that made the world, and that drew you out of nothing ?*

Did you ever take notice, Sir, of that wonderful stillatory which is within you, by which the nourishment, you daily take, is converted, some into your blood, some into flesh, some into bones, some into chyle, &c.? Could you explain to me the secret of this astonishing mechanism, and who he is that presides over it? Is it the soul? but your soul is spiritual, and

* Prov. xxv. v. 27. "He that is a seacher of majesty, shall be overwhelmed with glory." And Book of Wisdom, ix. v. 16. “And hardly do we guess aright at things that are upon earth and with labour do we find the things that are before us. But the things that are in heaven, who shall search out?",

+ St. Chrysostom de incomp. Dei nat. "Cibos comedo, quo pacto autem dis vidantur in petuitam, sanguinem, humorem, ignoro. Hæc, quæ quotidie come, dentes videmus, ignoramus tamen ; et Dei substantiam cariosę scrutamur.”

has nothing to do with perishable food. Is it your body? but your body has neither reason nor feeling of its nature. Is it chance? but how can chance (a word invented to cover our ignorance,) be the author of so admirable a work, of such constant and uniform operations? You do not comprehend this wonder, and because you do not, is it less true, less real? Could you explain to me, Sir, how one and the same moisture of the earth, insipid as it is, tasteless, and without any smell or colour whatever, can bring forth such an infinite variety of plants, of herbs, of flowers and fruits, as various and different in their shape, size, colours, taste and smell, as the faces of men are from each other? Can you explain, how the same simple and apparently insignificant cause can produce such an enchanting and variegated scenery, as your garden or your verdant meadow exhibits? It is a mystery to you and to me, and yet neither of us doubts the fact.

Lastly, have you sagacity enough to inform me, by what magic art it happens, that by opening your eyes, the immense expanse of the skies is suddenly depicted, in most distinct and lively colours, in the retina of your eye, which is not bigger than the head of a pin? To form that admirable miniature in your optick nerve, and to embrace, as it were, the immensity of the heavens in so imperceptible a space, it is necessary, that, from every sensible point of the firmament, a ray should come to strike the retina: Well, is it very easy for you to conceive, how such an infinity of rays, parting at once, from all the points of the heavens, can meet in so small a focus, without being thrown into confusion, and retrace in one instant in your eye, a landscape as distinct as delightful of the majesty of the heavens ? Reason can admire this wonder, but never comprehend it: still you believe it, and in doing so, you follow the very dictates of your reason: it is therefore reasonable, at times, to believe, even what we can. not conceive.

.

By this time we might with reason expect to find, our Unitarian friend more inclined to give up the principle under consideration, since he cannot but see to what strange straits it

reduces him.

But, as this principle is the cardo rei, on which the whole system turns, he cannot prevail upon himself to relinquish it.

If so, then willing, or unwilling, he must needs launch out into downright atheism, and say with the impious: Non est Deus, there is no God. Psalm, xxx. v. 1. He shudders at the idea of denying that God, who made him but still reason will force him to admit this horrid consequence, as long as he insists on the unhallowed principle; for, is there any thing more unintelligible, more incomprehensible, more above all created understanding, than God? Is not incomprehensibility the most prominent attribute not only of God himself, but also of all his works? Can the Unitarian comprehend a Being, that has neither beginning nor end, and that lives throughout all eternity? Can he conceive, how, by the omnipotent act of his will, he can create myriads of worlds, and annihilate them with as much facility as he called them forth from nought? Can he conceive, how a being can be, at once, infinitely free and still be essentially immutable and unchangeable? How a being can be present in all places, whole and entire, and co-exist whole and entire, in every point of space, and yet be infinitely simple and essentially indivisible? If he could comprehend this, he would be God himself, because he would possess an infinite intellect: he, therefore, cannot comprehend God, and yet there is a God: either, therefore, he must renounce his principle, and with it, Unitarianism, or his creed will be simply this: there is no God.' Unitarianism and

Atheism will be synonymous terms.

XII. It is quite natural to expect, that we should be interrupted by our Unitarian friend, at this last conclusion, and that we should be candidly told, that our logic carries us too far, and that, in fine, to be called "Deists in disguise," as they have

* Job, xi. "Peradventure thou wilt comprehend the steps of God, and find out the Almighty perfectly? He is higher than heaven, and what wilt thou do? He is deeper than hell, and how wilt thou know? The measure of him is higher than the earth, and broader than the sea: if he shall overturn all things, or shall press them together, who shall contradict him?"

been termed by some, is sufficiently illiberal, but, to be styled Atheists, is not to be borne with. To this, I answer, that it is far from me to fix this most odious appellation upon any professor of Unitarianism; nay, I should not do justice to my own feelings, were I not solemnly to declare, that I conceive them to have as great an abhorrence of this last link of human depravity, as I myself do feel. I have already remarked, that I have nothing to do with personalities, but with principles only, and I still maintain, that, consistent with them, the Unitarians must turn out real Atheists, or bad reasoners. Their principles, by a necessary connection, lead to the denial of God. If, then, they do not admit this horrid consequence, they, indeed, will not be Atheists, but they will be inconsist ent logicians.*

It is a subject of surprise to the writer of these tracts, to see the Unitarians repel with so much indignation the appellation of Deists, and to think themselves unjustly dealt with, when they are denied the name of christians. For, if the definition of the Unitarian sect, given by a most venerable character, in a letter published with his permission in a Unitarian periodical review,* be correct, then assuredly they cannot, with any appearance of reason, lay claim to the name of Christians, nor term it illiberality, when they are styled by their proper name, Deists. The definition of the Unitarian church, given in the letter alluded to, runs thus, "There is, my dear Doctor, at present, exist. ing in the world, a church philosophic.... The philosophic church was originally English. Voltaire learned it from Lord Herbert, Hobbes, Morgan, Collins, Shaftesbury, Boliubroke, &c. You may depend upon it, your exertions will promote the Church Philosophic, more than the Church Athanasian, or Presbyterian." Assuredly, a Philosophic Church, a Church established by the English Apostles of Infidelity, and propagated by the Patriarch of Incredulity, throughout France and the rest of Europe, cannot, with any appearance of good sense, be called any other than the Church of Deists.

And, what is still more to the purpose, have not the public, since they have been made acquainted with the strange correspondence of the Unitarians of England, with the ambassador of the mighty Emperor of Fez and Morocco, good reasons to doubt, whether our Unitarian friends themselves set much value on the name of Christian? Men, who hesitate not heartily to salute and congratulate the followers of the Asiatic Impostor Mahomet, as votaries and fellow worshippers; who style themselves as their nearest fellow champions; who profess, that the Supreme God has raised Mahomet to defend the faith of

* See the Christian Disciple, No. 1, v. 3. page 43, 44.