The Sun.
London, England, 1821-11-10 00:00:00

FOR THE SUN.

PROOFS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.

(LETTER III.)

MR. EDITOR—The existence of man is wholly
made up of pleasure and Of pain, and his constant Occupation
is to procuie the former, and to avoid the latter. These two
opposite sensations exist independently of man, and are not
therefore in the least subject to his will. The notions of justice
and injustice are no less prevalent amongst Men than those of
pleasure and of pain ; and they are no less independent of the
human will. They constitute the very basis of civil societies ;
and no people has been found wholly destitute of the ideas of
right and of wrong, of virtue and of vice, or rather of good and
of bad actions. These ideas of justice and injustice, could not,
however, exist, without a law, and without liberty or free-will ;
because justice can consist only in the observance, and.injstice
in the violation of some established rule or regulation ; and be-
cause if men have no choice in respect to their actions, but Adt
only from the impulse of an irresistible necessity, they cannot be
blamed for doingovhat it was not in their power to avoid,nor for
omitting to do what it was impossible for them to perform.—
The idea of necessity must therefore undoubtedly exclude those
of justice and injustice, of virtue and of crime : and as these
notions do exist, it follows necessarily, that man is a free agent,
or that he may either violate or obey the laws founded upon
these ideas. _ _

No law can poSsibly exist without a Legislator, by whom
they must have been framed. They are intended to protect
virtue, and to awe vice into submission ; to reward the merit, or
to punish the demerit, which are necessary consequences of the
liberty of human actions. Hence we find that the ideas of in-
nocence, and of criminality, or of merit and demerit, are neces-
sarily connected with those of pleasure and of pain, or of reward
and punishment. The task of distributive justice must, there-
fore, undoubtedly be, to apply. pleasure to good actions, and
pain to those that are of a criminal nature. Were not this the
case, we should consider the Legislator as a senseless and op.
pressive tyrant, who punishes those who obey, and rewards
those who disobey his laws ; a line of conduct wholly incom-
patible with "the ideas of law and of justice, and therefore evi-
dently inconsistent and absurd. It is therefore the interest of
men to study thoroughly the laws imposed upon them, and by
conforming to them, avoid the evil which must follow the in-
fringement of them, and secure the benefits which must be the•
portion of those who faithfully submit.
The principles of justice are eternal and unchangeable, like
the Divine source from which they are derived. They were
not acquired by man ; they were implanted in his heart, by the
providential goodness of his Maker, and are the emanations of
eternal and infinite justice. It was his duty, therefore, to frame
his conduct according to these principles, and thus to secure the
good-will of his Author. Such was the obligation imposed
upon him by the Law of Nature, the first guide of his actions,
and the basis of morality and-of religion.
It pleased, however, Divine wisdom to add to the benefits it
had alreedy lavished upon man, the inestimable advantages of
a written law, and the revelation of itself, and of the origin and
end of Creation. As a rational and free- Being, upon whom
duties are imposed purporting to be dictated by God himself, it
is no doubt incumbent on man, ere he submit to these laws, to
acquire the conviction that they are indeed the word of his Lord
and Master. The result of his inquiries is, that this pro-
mulgation of the Divine will was accompanied by the most
surprizing, the most miraculous circumstances; he must
therefore, now believe, either that the laws, thus mira-
culously delivered, are the word of God, and submit to
them ; or that God permitted the. spirit of falsehood to
deceive him by these supernatural means; a conclusion he
cannot possibly adopt, because it is contrary to the idea he
has formed of the very essence of God, who would, were this
the case, be the primary cause and propagator of error. As the
idea of truth necessarily excludes that of error, so theidea•of
God, who is infinite truth, necessarily excludes that of deceit;
therefore, whatever is sanctioned by the evident intervention-of
the Divine power, must carry into our mind the fullest and the
most perfect conviction. .
We are assured that the Jewish nation was convinced of the
Divine origin of its laws and of its institutions, by the miracles
which accompanied their promulgation. In a matter of such
infinite importance, it is however right to employ a certain por-
tion of scepticism. As the wonders which accompanied the re-
velation of the Deity are only handed down to us by tradition,
we must endeavour to ascertain their existence before we admit.-
them as facts. Facts may be proved, either by ocular demon-
stration, or by the strength of the testimony of those by whom
they were witnessed. . The credibility of tile facts recorded in
Scripture might be denied or doubted, because they are super-•
natural, -and because they. happened at a very remote period.
But neither of these objections are founded upon rational prin-
ciples. We can judge of facts, whether natural or supernatural,
only by means of our senses ; the' testimony of which can no
snore deceive us in respect to the one, .than in regard to the
other.' Every deviation from the known and established course
of nature or of events must be immediately noticed, and can-.
not possibly be mistaken. A whole nation that has crossed the
parted waters of the Red Sea, is as certain of this. fact, however
miraculous it may be, as it is sure that thie was not a common
or ordinary occurrence. Besides, if God be the Lord of nature,
and all powerful, he may, whenever he chooses, suspend the Itvs
.he lies himself established, or produce what we term a miracle.
.Facts that happened in distant parts, or in former ages, whe-
ther they be natural or supernatural, are established by the
concurring testimony of creditable witnesses. An eruption .of
Vesuvius has occured in Naples. It 'has.. been witnessed by
thousands ; iters published to the world ; I am therefore
as certain that such an event has happened, as if I had been on
the very spot. Again, -in respect to time ; the daggers of the
Conspirators stretched Ciesar lifeless at the foot of Pompey's
Statue ; this transaction was seen by the Romans, and it has
been handed down to us uncontradicted, from the time when
it occurred to the present day. I have, moreover, no reason to
doubt the truth of the event, and feel therefore as much con-
vinced that it did happen, as if I had been present in the Roman
Senate. Such is the case with religion,
.which has been trans-
mitted to us by the concurring testimony of past generations.
We must now - inquire Whether the force of these testimonies
be such as to carry conviction into our mind ?
' The facts upon Oita our belief in revelation must be found-
ed are contained inA book, said to have been written under the in-
fluence of Divine inspiration, by a person of the name of Moses,
Who lived many centuries before the Christian era. This book
contains an account of the creation of the world ; the cause of
the present imperfect state of man ; the manifestation of God
to a chosen people; the laws which he gave to that people, and
a series of prophecies, announcing the coming of a Saviour, of
a essiah, who is by his death to reconcile sinful man with
his offended Creator. This book has been carefully, preserved
by the people for which it was originally written ; and by which
it is attributed 'to Moses, whom they acknowlege as their legis-
lator, and as a man who wrote under the direction of' God him-
self. In.order to ascertain how far these assertions of the Jews
may be true, we must examine whether the Jews in any man-
ner altered the facts which are contained in the Books of the
()Id Testament. . _ _

As wan naturally prides himself upon a long line of ances,
tors, so we find that Nations have generally endeavoured to
trace back their origin through a series of ages. This system
prevailed chiefly in the East, where the Nations, vying with
each other on this point, have claimed an antiquity Ma hundred
thousand of years,• The Jews alone, though.no doubt equally
desirous with their neighbours to possess this enviable distinc-
tion, not only give . a .very late origin to their Nation, . but fix
the creation of the World at a period comparatively proximate.
This peculiarity in a matter considered highly interesting to the
dignity of a, Nation, and on a point in which it is so easy to de-
ceive mankind, is a proof that the Author of the Jewish Annals.
sacrificed the pride and vanity of his Nation tO truth, and that
the Jews themselves were so much convinced'of the correctness
of his siten:enti, and that his knowledge proceeded from a
source highly respectable, that they did not venture to exalt
themselves in the eyes of their neighbours, by alterirg the ,:ate
of their origin... In this-respect, we are, therefore,.justified in
concluding that no changes have been mode in the Book in
question, by the people-for which it was professedly written.
It mav be objected, however, that if the Jews did indeed sacrifice
th eir pride in this one respect, they have not sent pled to takeample
amends, by representing themselves as the. choice -people of
6 OD, and establishing this-asSertion on the wonders which they
pretend lie worked ih their favour. The events consigned in
the Bible were witnessed not by a few individuals, but were
performed .in the presence of a whole people; amongst which
-there were-many individuals hostile to their Leader, autteonse.