A

No demonstration can be stronger than this; God hath said so, therefore it
is true.-CHILLINGWORTH.

DIVINITY SCHOOL

LIBRARY.

HARVARD

UNIVERSITY

Boston:

T. R. MARVIN, 32, CONGRESS STREET.

SOLD BY CROCKER AND BREWSTER, PEIRCE AND WILLIAMS,
HILLIARD, GRAY, LITTLE, AND WILKINS, BOSTON :
J. P. HAVEN, AND J. LEAVITT, NEW-YORK.

BT 980

C35

1828
cop. 2

DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS......TO WIT:
District Clerk's Office.

BE it remembered, that on the twenty third day of October, A. D. 1828, in the fifty third Year of the Independence of the United States of America, THEOPHILUS R. MARVIN, of the said District, has deposited in this Office the Title of a Book, the Right whereof he claims as Proprietor, in the Words following, to wit:

Letters to the Rev. William E. Channing, D. D. on the existence and agency of Fallen Spirits. By Canonicus. No demonstration can be stronger than this; Go hath said so, therefore it is true.-Chillingworth.

In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, entitled "An Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the times therein mentioned:" and also to an Act entitled "An Act supplementary to an Act, entitled, An Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts and books to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned; and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving and etching historical and other prints."

JNO. W. DAVIS,

Clerk of the District
of Massachusetts.

NOTE A.

The Jewish belief in the existence of Satan not " a

fiction of Oriental Mythology,"

NOTE B.

Consistent Rationalism denies all angelical existences,

NOTE C.

English Unitarian views of the temptation, devil, &c. .

NOTE E.

The credulity and tendency of Rationalism,

NOTE F.

Priestley. Eichhorn. Calvin. The effect of Liberal

sentiments in Switzerland, and of Evangelical senti-

ments in Great Britain,

NOTE G.

References to passages of the New Testament, asserting

the existence of Evil Spirits,

NOTE H.

Reason-its province and use. Judge Story,

NOTE I.

Are Unitarians Universalists? .

Are Unitarians Christians?

NOTE J.

NOTE K.

Books specially deserving attention,

Page.

108

122

123

129

129

134

146

154

LETTER I.

Rev. and Dear Sir,

THE present is a day of free inquiry. Our creed cannot now rest on authority, but on argument. The subject about to be examined, which constitutes one article in "the popular creed," you will, doubtless, think of importance, of great importance, if the view here taken be correct; and even if this view be erroneous, it is surely important to disabuse the public mind of an error so long and so generally prevalent.

But you will ask, "Why are these letters addressed to me?" The question is a fair one, and shall have a frank answer. Your high standing in this community, your acknowledged talents, your various learning, your cultivated taste and extended influence, point you out as the proper person to be addressed, that any mistatement of facts or fallacy of reasoning may at once authorise and invite from your able pen prompt and certain refutation. Another motive, I am free to state, is the influence of your name in arresting attention and inviting inquiry. The simple fact, however, that you have long been known as an intelligent and influential advocate of Unitarianism. would of itself justify the course I have taken. To who could I so appropriately address a series of Letters, troverting the opinions of Unitarians on an important subject, as to the most influential of the Unitarian Another reason, however, for this course will

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