which has yet been submitted to human calculation. But still, however difficult it may be to conceive an impulse so great, to deny its existence were absurd and presumptuous, while it indicates no contradiction of nature or reason. In the manifold varieties of rational creatures which people the habitable spots of the universe, is it inconsistent with reason to presume that organized beings, so potent, so intelligent, so ardent after truth, so fitted to attain it, so capable of appreciating every species of happiness, so gifted with powers to ensure its acquisition, and so formed of imperishable materials to enjoy it for ever-is it inconsistent with reason to presume the existence of such beings; and if an essence, like spirit, such as it has been fabricated by metaphysical ingenuity, can scarcely be supposed to exist, is it not certain that creatures like these must fill a place in the gradations of nature? — They are not spirits, because they are organized; but in all other points they are similar to that species of being, as conceived by most rational men, till the time of Descartes. Even the early Christians very generally entertained opinions almost identical, and regarded God as the only Mind which acts and thinks without material organs. If they had advanced a step farther, and believed Him to be the only SPIRIT that exists, they would have derogated nothing from his unparticipated nature in asserting that the noblest rank of beings whom he vouchsafed to create essentially differed from him in being simply and specifically organized creatures. pp. 53-56.

Against the calculation of speed given above, we must make the objection before adverted to, that time is probably a very different thing to beings of a more enlarged comprehension than ours, and to ourselves. So many other conditions of existence being supposed to be changed, why should this one be imagined stationary, from the ephemeron to the Supreme himself? To our apprehension, no condition of being seems more liable to variation with varieties of state than this. But to our other extract.

terms

"But what is this cant of dangerous truths? Rude, slanderous, and lacerating truths, affecting the self-esteem of individuals and the peace of families, are unfortunately too common; but, dangerous truths, destructive to the well-being of society or the happiness of mankind, are a contradiction in an impossible chimera. Truths may be mischievous and reprehensible in the schools of good-breeding and humanity: but in those of politics it were slavery in those of physics it were barbarism—in those of morals it were profligacy — and in those of religion it were blasphemy to assert that there is or can be an existing absurdity so enormous as a dangerous truth. Dangerous falsehoods indeed there may be - but freedom of discussion is the true mode of detecting the fallacy, and obviating the danger. The magnificent works of the Creator, whether inanimate, brute, or rational — the laws by which he governs them, whether physical, moral, or divine, demand and invite our researches ; and is it within the range of possibility that in these sacred precincts we can light on a truth degrading to him, or pernicious to ourselves? Such truths are emphatically the truths of God; and whoever has the good fortune to discover, and the guilt to suppress them, is at once ignorant of his duties to God and to man. Despicable as a coward, and odious as a hypocrite, he may lick the feet of authority and prejudice ; but he knows not the way to contribute to the happiness of man by increasing his knowledge, or to acquire the favor of God by studying his works, and unfolding his wisdom.". P. 62.

These are the best possible convictions on which to proceed in inquiries of every kind. Our reader will have discovered that our author is eloquent, and will not therefore wonder at our giving the summing up of his various arguments in his own words (with all their typographical emphasis) rather than our own.

"I conceive that, in the progress of this work, I have demonstrated, in opposition to prevailing notions, this incontrovertible TRUTH, that all real and absolutely existing beings must exist in space, and bear relations to space and time;

and that I have established, as the MOST RATIONAL BELIEF We can entertain on the subject, that God is the only SPIRIT in existence; and that angel and archangel, cherub and seraph, whatever the immortal essence of which they are compounded, are, like man, and all other living creatures with which we are acquainted, merely organized beings. That our hopes of a future state cannot rest with any certainty upon the existence of a soul, as maintained by the ancient philosophers, but upon our resurrection from death, as announced by Christ, and taught by the evangelists and apostles throughout the whole of the Christian revelation. And, lastly, though the kingdom of heaven, when restricted to the triumphant reign of moral and religious feelings upon earth, may properly be called a spiritual kingdom, yet that the promised heaven of hereafter is not an inmaterial world of immaterial spirits, but a local and substantial portion of the universe, peopled by visible, tangible, active, and sociable beings, the more pure, intelligent, permanent, resplendent, and powerful, in proportion as their organization and essence are refined, exalted, and imperishable; and that, with the exception of God himself, who is a SPIRIT, and whose incommunicable essence no creature can participate, all living beings, in their gradations from the highest class to the lowest, bear a semblance or relation, either intimate or remote, to each other; that as planet resembles planet, and sun resembles sun, so universe resembles universe throughout the creation; and whether those universes roll round a void, or round some mighty orb in the centre of all, which may constitute the highest empyrean - the more immediate dwelling of God—the seat of his visible glories, still that NATURE, in all its varieties of worlds and beings, is, like its Creator, but ONE-exemplifying in all its complication of arrangements, however minute or stupendous, an unity of design, the simple, the uniform, the exquisite result of an infinite, all-gracious, omniscient, omnipotent MIND."-P. 95.

No part of this little work is more satisfactory than the section in which the scriptural evidence for and against

a separate soul is collected and weighed. It is perfectly clear that the nature of this evidence has been widely mistaken, as much through an excessive attachment to our common translation of the Scriptures, as through ignorance of the Jewish superstitions. Change spirit into breath, soul into life, hell into hades, and paradise into a garden of rest, as often as they might fairly be so changed, and what becomes of the evidence for the doctrine so long and pertinaciously held as a part of Christianity? With one more extract, containing a suggestion, of whose value our readers will judge for themselves, we conclude.

'And

"With this history of the word Paradise before us, we may reasonably doubt that the modern sense of the word had ever been applied to it in the time of our Saviour. The sense in which he used it in that singular and often-quoted text, Luke xxiii. 43, remains now to be investigated. one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us but the other answering rebuked him and said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom and Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.' It has been suggested to me by a learned and intelligent friend, in whose clear views, unbiassed judgment, and enlightened understanding, I place unqualified confidence, that the meaning of this passage has been utterly mistaken; and that whatever was the penitence of the thief, there was no beatitude in the paradise promised by our Saviour. On the contrary, that his words were intended as a check to those hopes of a temporal kingdom so generally entertained by all his followers, and which, from the preternatural events that attended his crucifixion, appeared on the very verge of being realized. — His revilers and persecutors exclaimed, 'If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe in him.' No wonder that those who already believed him, should also believe that the marvels they witnessed were but a prelude to his actual

descent from the cross, and the establishment of his expected kingdom. No wonder the malefactor, who was a Jew, trained up in the expectation of a Messiah that was to emancipate Judea, and extend his dominion over the earth, should fall into the same self-deception - should rebuke his railing companion; and, confiding in the power of the king of Israel thus awfully manifested, not only to save himself and them, but to advance their temporal interests in a kingdom which was indeed to embrace mankind, but which had no concern save with spiritual and eternal interests, should, with more of self-love than repentance, exclaim, 'Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom;' and Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, instead of that temporal kingdom thou dost hope for, to-day thou shalt be, with me, among the dead." Pp. 125 – 127.

CHRISTIAN DISPENSATION.*

"WHAT is Christianity? the Unbeliever sarcastically demands, after enumerating the various and contradictory creeds of its professors." What is Christianity? he still inquires, when he has witnessed the modes in which it is taught in the cathedral and the conventicle; in the meetinghouse and on the hill side. Those modes are various, as the preachers and auditories by whom they are employed, and to whom they are addressed; but all appear to him, in a greater or less degree, inconsistent with the principles of philosophy, calculated to pervert or impair the intellectual strength which he prizes above all things, and discordant with the spirit of the age. From teachings which are

*The Perpetuity of the Christian Dispensation, viewed in its Connexion with the Progress of Society. A Sermon, preached before the Supporters of the British and Foreign Unitarian Association, at their Annual Meeting, June 2, 1830. By John James Tayler, A. B. London 8vo. pp. 39. 1830.