those who are deceived by him. They will be cast we are told into a lake burning with fire and brimstone, to remain forever because they were deceived by this devil, who was loosed out of his prison by God himself, and sent forth amongst them on purpose to deceive them. If this was done with God's own free will, and not for want of power to keep the devil in confinement, it is impos sible to figure to ourselves a more malevolent and treache rous being than the christian God, who after having created man for his own glory," could thus be the instrument of his destruction, by letting loose a devil who was chained in prison on purpose to deceive him, in consequence of which he must suffer the most excruciating torment to all eternity. If on the other hand it was not in his power to keep the devil in the bottomless pit, then the contest is yet undecided, and the world according to the bible scheme is governed by two powers, the one good and the other wicked, who are in cessantly contending for the prerogative. "Can such a system satisfy the mind; "Are two sole Gods with equal powers enjoined? "Chaos returns, since neither will obey, "Is one superior good or ill must reign, JENY NS. All supernaturalists have decorated their schemes of re ligion with devils and demi Gods-but it must be evident to every man of reflection, that no such beings can exist in nature. For if they were invested with power to controul the will of the deity, the harmony of nature, and the immutability of her laws would be destroyed, and if they do not possess such a power, for what purpose do they exist? JUVENIS. THE Manicheans, once no inconsiderable sect of christians, rejected as spurious our whole New Testament, and shewed other scriptures. The acts of the apostles was denied by the Corinthians and Marcionites. Not only the Acts were reject ed by the Encratites and Severians, but all Pauls epistles. 3 St. Chrysostom, in a Homily he made on the title of the Acts, says, "That in this time (which was the end of the fourth "century) not only the author and collector, but the book itself, was unknown to many." The Valentinians and many ancient sects of christians accused our scriptures of error and imperfection, of contradiction and insufficiency without tradition, as we are informed by Irenæus. The Ebionites or Nazarenes, who were the first christians, rejected all Paul's epistles, as those of an enemy and an impostor, as say Origen and Eusebius. Of the credibility of Heretics and Orthodox. Ir it be objeted, that the Authority of Heretics is of no va F lidity, in answer, with me 'tis equal to that of Orthodoxfor every sect were ever heretics to one another. What credit can be given to the Orthodox when they report falsehoods one after another, as if it were for company's sake, and then their different writings are produced for proof to one another of what they say. So this notorious falsity is asserted by the Orthodox, that Celsus allowed of the miracles of Christ, because they have been taught to say so, they proceed (either without or against conviction) to assert after one another what the first falsely said. In other cases this would argue the greatest partiality in the world, and overturn all those rules, by which the want of the genuineness of writings can be examined and detected. It follows then, that because either side has attested or rejected any thing 'tis no argument with me that it is true or false, on their authority or the want of it. Where is opposition to be sought for but among those of a different party? And till it can be proved that one is given to lying more than another, their evidence will be esteemed alike credible. If the authority of Heretics is of no account, it is because they want power. And 'tis the having power gives authority to the Orthodox. What then can be depended on for truth from any party among them? Certainly an impartial man cannot expect it more on one side than another: Therefore the evidence of one party is equal to the evidence of another with him that is of neither; which sufficiently destroys all authority of christian tradition, and leaves us to the guidance of reason only-especially if we farther consider, that those writings now esteemed apocryphal have been received as true by some christian sects-and those writings that we esteem true, have been deemed apo cryphal. And in ancient churches the true and spurious have been read together-so that originally they may have been alike authentic, for aught any one now living can determine to the contrary; for the same authority has been attributed to the spurious as to the genuine, by one church or another. With what justice then can it be affirmed, that the authenticity of St. Paul's writings cannot be doubted without overturning all rules, by which the authority and genuineness of any writings can be proved and confirmed, when their own inconsistencies, contradictions, and absurdities, to those that carefully search, will be found to be their own refutation.Nothing is more necessary than possitive assertion where plain proof is wanting-but nothing looks worse in a dispu tant. The greatest adversary to truth is usurped authority -and this is to all my adversaries their best defence: without these pretentions they can do nothing; and with it they can do nothing that is right. IT ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. T ever has, and ever will be found, that tyranny and imposition thrive best when sanctioned by and incorporated with religion, this and ignorance being their most suitable soil. Although it cannot reasonably be supposed that the Bible was of much consequence in its original state-neither is it to be doubted, but that there has been strange alterations and large additions made to it since the days of the apostles. Fanan's dictionary informs that the Bible underwent a variety of alteration, corrections, and revisions between the year 1300 and 1600; and it is a fact, well authenticated, that the Bible never appeared in the English language until about 250 years past. The Romish clergy are not without their mysteries: they appear to have created one absurdity to countenance another, affecting to acknowledge the scriptures as the infallible revelation of God's will to man-they, not .withstanding, strictly withhold them from the people under the severest penalties, not permitting them to be explained at all—and, if we attend to the general usefulness of the scriptures at present, we shall find that while a small part of christendom are reading, meditating, and paying their adoration to the Bible, as the wonderful and only means of salvation to man, it is still withheld by their spiritual guides, from a much greater proportion of the christian world, as being liable to be explained by the people in a manner dangerous to their eternal salvation at the same time the Bi ble is ridiculed, by all the remaining part of the world, as a composition of mere deception and absurdity. This is probably the present state of that great and glorious system, which is said to have cost the death of a God, has often set the world in flames, has desolated and distracted countries, and actually cost the lives of fifty millions of the human race -reprobated by three-fourths of the world, disused by far the greater part of the other fourth, and now loosing the confidence of its few remaining friends. The pregnant vir gin the power of the apostles to raise the dead to life, at a time when unable to preserve their own, as well as the birth and death of a God, are involuntary articles of faith, which hardly find place in the breast of any but the interested and designing, or the most ignorant part of mankind. A POLITICAL LECTURE Will be delivered by the Editor of this paper, on Tuesday evening next, at 7 o'clock, at Shepherd's Long-Room, Druid's grove Tavern, No. 11, George-street. PUBLIC DISCOURSES, UPON MORAL and PHILOSOPHICAL SUBJECTS, will be delivered by the Editor every Sunday evening, at 6 o'clock at Snow's long room, No. 89 Broad-Way. NEW-YORK: PRINTED and published by the editor, at No. 26 Chathamstreet, price 2 dollars per annum, one half paid in advance every six months. PROSPECT, OR View of the Moral World, BY ELIHU PALMER. VOL. I. SATURDAY, February 18th, 1804. No. 11. Comments on the sacred writings of the Jews and Chris tians: Genesis, Chapter the 6th. THE incoherency, discordance, and want of connec tion, so often presented in these sacred pages, ought to convince every candid mind that they have no just claim to the character of truth, to divine inspiration, perspicuity of composition, or utility of influence, either in morals or philosophy. This chapter in its commencement presents us with three different kinds of characters: The sons of God, the daughters of men and giants. Who these sons of God were we are not specially informed; whether they were a celestial race of beings, of an extraordinary size, and sent down from the upper regions for the purpose of paying their respects to the female beauties of this terrestrial world, or whether they were of earthly origin, and the peculiar favorites of the most high-whether after they had taken to themselves wives of the daughters of men, this procreative operation produced these giants, or whether the giants sprang from some other source on all these points we are left in a state of total ig norance, and the very manner in which the ideas and the composition are put together, proves that it was done by some body who possessed neither the spirit of God nor the spirit of reason to guide him in his labours. Another point of importance which calls for attention in this chapter, is that which exhibits a most destructive abandonment of the exalted character of God, and consigns the care of the universe to a being as changeable and as imperfect as man himself. For it is here said (Verse 5), that God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every |