the machine of clockwork I have supposed. But both are broken to pieces; I see all the fragments before me; I can put almost all together again, or at least account for those which I cannot. Who, then, shall tell me that one of these machines is to live again, and not the other? Or who shall say there is nothing in the clockwork, (because we cannot see that there is,) which will either continue to live itself, or make that work live again; and yet that there is something in the man which is to produce all this effect, although, any more than in the clockwork, no one has ever seen it, will see it, or can see it ?"

"Again I say," observed Evelyn, "you put this matter exceedingly well; Voltaire himself would have been obliged to you. You beat him all to nothing with his bellows and its clapper, which, he says, is its soul."

"Whatever I may once have thought, I have long felt that to be a very foolish sally," said Tremaine.

"Not so foolish for his profligate purpose," answered Evelyn, "which was to sap, by ridicule and disrespect, what he could not beat down by argument. And yet, as an argument, though your image is the nobler, his (excuse me) is at least as convincing."

"I meant it as a mere illustration," said Tremaine, "to show, that if one machine was destroyed,

and confessedly could not be restored, so must it be with the other. But I shall rejoice if you can show my supposition to be a fallacy."

"Voltaire meant no more than you," replied Evelyn, "and both of you are open to this answer, -you both take for granted, that the mind of man, as well as his body, is a machine."

"It is even so," said Tremaine. "Every thing I see, every thing I know, is lost and closed in death. Without revelation, (to which, as you say, we have not yet come, and I agree it is better for the argument that we should keep it for its own place,) who ever heard of the other world, except in the fond fancies of poets and philosophers? Who ever visited it, who ever knew that any one was carried to it, much less returned from it, or was brought to judgment before its tribunals? Who ever saw or felt either Heaven or Hell?-But as, like children in the dark, we generally fear what we are uncertain about, and this fear is at least a convenient instrument for our nurses, and afterwards for our governors, can I think that sentiment either very foolish or very impious, which has caused so much alterca

tion on both sides

'Primus in orbe Deos fecit timor ?" *

"Let us take you upon your own supposition,"

It was fear that first produced Gods.

answered Evelyn, "and see, practically, to what this would amount."

"I desire nothing better," said Tremaine.

"Suppose a ship were periodically to arrive from some far off and unknown country; that a band of armed men should land from it without opposition; should call upon all the chiefs and rulers of the place, and, like the famous Cretan ship of old, should demand from them a certain number of victims, which should be obediently supplied to them; suppose the armed men themselves should point out these victims, at their will and pleasure, without any known rule or principle, seizing upon the young, the gay, and the happy, the innocent infant, or the blooming bride; and although the most bitter grief and lamentation possessed every body, no one had ever the thought, much less the power, of resisting the demand; on the contrary, that all should submit to it in silent awe. Suppose, farther, that these victims, once embarked, were never known to return, so that every one was utterly ignorant of their fate; but that the ship regularly returned for more, until all the inhabitants of the place were carried off, and new generations succeeded to await the same fate."

"Your supposition is awful enough," cried Tremaine; "and it is evident that by your ship you mean death."

"I do," said Evelyn; " and I ask you, or any

thinking man, whether you could possibly behold this regular arrival and regular departure with indifference ?"

"I could not," answered Tremaine.

"I ask you farther," continued Evelyn, "whether you could possibly refrain from wondering whence this ship came, or whither she returned? Or if any thoughtless, or even thoughtful man were to say she came from no place, and returned to no place; and because you could not tell what became of the victims, that therefore nothing became of them; would you be satisfied with this, and set the whole. matter at rest, as if the ship had never come, or never would come again?"

"I should not," replied Tremaine.

"You will observe," pursued Evelyn, " I say "I nothing of the influence of this periodical visit upon, conduct, but merely upon opinion. You would then, probably, speculate upon the destination of this ship, and not easily believe those who said she had no destination at all."

"It is natural so to suppose," said Tremaine.

"And if," asked Evelyn, "during one or two visits, the head of this armed band were to point his dart at you, or to throw his eyes over you, as if examining whether you might not be a proper addition to the next cargo of victims ;-if, indeed, he were to tell you in terms, to prepare, for that your › turn would be next.

"What then?" said Tremaine.

"Why, then, your curiosity and speculation would probably increase; and you would not deem it satisfactory to be told by any of your friends, however sincere in their opinions, that it ought not to concern you, except in so far as that it took you from your family, and the good things you were enjoying; for as nothing ever was known of the fate of these victims that had gone before you, it was presumable they had no fate at all. Would this be a reasonable supposition?" asked Evelyn.

Tremaine owned it would not.

"But what," continued the Doctor, "if you were told, (still upon no evidence but a presumption, and that a capricious one,) that at best they all fell asleep, never again to wake? Once more I ask, if this would satisfy, would make you indifferent as to what was to happen to you when your turn came to obey the summons ?”

"I allow it would not," answered Tremaine ; "yet, I think, there is this fallacy in your illustration:-We see the ship sail away, and you suppose these victims carried off alive; whereas, in death, we see no being whatever carried off, and the poor remnants of mortality still remain, mouldering to nothing, or actually mixing into other substances before our eyes. Thus, death is a mere privation, a negation, as it were, of the powers we see in the