The Buchanan County guardian. (Independence, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1858-1864, 1859-04-07

vocates lying for good cause, and JUS
titles himself by the example of PLATO
and the Hebrew Scriptures. The lee
turer also quoted Bishop WARDURroN,
Rev. DR.. CHALMERS, Rev. DR.. LARDNER,
and others, who also commended that this
passage in JosEPHUs was an Interpolation
"a lame and palpable forgery.
In pursuance of his argument, the
lecturer also contended there were forger-
les and important mistranslations in the
New Testament itself. He adduced John
V. Z, For there are three that bear rec
ord in heaven, the Father, the Word,
and the Holy Ghost, and these three are
one" He said this verse was given up
by the most eminent and learned biblical
critics, as forgery, and yet it was more
relied on than any other passage, to sus-
tain the doctrine of the Trinity, and was
still printed and circulated as part of the
word Of God. He considered the mat
ter at some length, and cited as authority
Sir Isaac NEWTON, the Rev. DR.. ADAM
CLARKE, THOMAS HARrwELL HORNE, and
others. He cited likewise | Timothy, iii
l6, Great is the mystery of Goodness
GoD was manifest in the hesh," &c. He
brought forward Sir ISAAC NEWTON and
other Christian authority to show that
this was corruption, and should read
" Great is the mystery of goodness WHICH
was manifested in the fesh," DC.
The lecturer next denounced some of
the publications of the American Tract
Society, and spoke specially of Nelson's
Cause and Cure Of hafdelity, work
highly lauded by Christians, and by
many pronounced to be the annihilator of
scepticism. He thought the boosted steel
defences of NELSON were as weak as the
pasteboard vizor of the doughty Don
QUIxorE, and that they were cut through
and through with every stroke of the
sceptical sword. He had given the work
a thorough examination, and he did not
hesitate to charge the Rev. DAVID MEL
SON with lnnumerable Misrepresentation
and downright falsehoods. He read from
the " Cause and Cure part of the chap
ter on "the Saviour's Prediction" in
reference to Jerusalem, in which the au-
thor speaks of the attempt made by the
Jews, with the assistance of the emper-
or JULIAN and his army, to rebuild the
temple. NELSON accuses GIBBoN of distor-
ton and suppression in his account Of
this matter, but the lecturer showed con-
clusively that GIBDoN had done precisely
what NELSON complained of him for not
doing, and that the Misrepresentation was
entirely on the side of the author of the
Cause and Cure" He also showed
that at the time NELSON states the EN-
peror JULIAN and his army attempted to
rebuild the temple. that monarch was up
on his Persian expedition, in which he
was killed. The lecturer asserted that
the emperor was never in Jerusalem in
his life, never superintended the rebuild
ing of the temple, never employed his
army in such manner, never went with
his army on any such expedition. Ad-
hitting that fire did come up out of the
earth at the time of the attempt to rebuild
the temple, which was abundantly de-
MED, Christian writers had satisfactorily
accounted Cor the fact, in supposing that
it was only the explosion of noxous gas
es, generated for centuries in the vaults
and underground recesses of the old
temple. and fired by the torches Of the
Jews-thus invalidating the miracle sto-
ry. DR.. LARDYER, and other erudite
scholars, repudiate the whole story.
The lecturer had by this time exhaust
ed the evening" and announced that he
should continue the subject on next Sat
urday evening. when he would take up
the death bed stories, and demonstrate
their falsitv.