appeared in full length exhibition, and had ample scope for all its energies. It arose, like man's evil genius, amidst the thunders, and the storms, and the earthquakes of the French revolution; its appearance was the signal for anarchy and wild uproar; it let loose all the fierce and pent-up passions of man's depravity, subverted the very foundations of morality, uprooted the social system, and threatened to sweep away all the institutions and the virtues of society from the face of the land. But the spectre was too horrible to be endured; the philosophical magicians shrunk from the spirit which their own sorceries had raised; the fickle nation, satiated with the riot of their own licentiousness, grew weary of the frightful power under whose auspices they had run to every excess; and the infamous Robespierre came forward to lay the fiend, and, in a public assembly, to compromise for the past frenzy of the people, by an oration, and a grand fête in honour of the Supreme Being.*

At this period, France was certainly in a state of great political excitement, but the instance adduced proves, I think, beyond doubt, that atheism was thought and felt to be far more congenial to the unbounded licentiousness of that period than any form of religion, or the mere admission of the existence of a God. It is undeniably true, that atheism offers an asylum from the persecutions of an outraged conscience, and a complete indemnity from the punishments of a future state; it must, then, ever present the condte was held on the 20th of the month Prairial, in the second year of regret, ackpublic, that is, the 9th of June, 1794, and the ceremonies, I believe, the Champ de la Reunion. A discourse was pronounced by name have resident of the National Convention, beginning thus-"The them may be length arrived, which the French people consecrate to the It seems that, after this oration, some effigy or symbol of the grossest vice, the fire, and a second oration was pronounced by the conduct of wickeme when atheism disappeared and some representation of o the people, commencing in this way,-" The monster it not renounce thgs vomited on France is now annihilated; with it may

es of the world disappear," &c.

temptations to any one who longs to be free from the restraints of a Supreme Governor, and who dreads the responsibilities of a life to come. All our opinions on moral or religious subjects are greatly influenced by the state of the heart. We are seldom so completely intellectual in our decisions of this kind as we may imagine; when a man strongly wishes anything to be true, he is already half way towards the belief of it. While, therefore, a man of a weak mind, but strong passions, may seek refuge from the accusations of conscience in the rites of superstition; he who is of a speculative turn, with a bold and daring disposition, and a heart reluctant to submit to the moral government of God, will be more likely at once to cut the knot, and to release himself from the annoyance of conscience, by embracing the tenets of infidelity. I do not say that it is exactly and exclusively by this process that the mind always arrives at such a result; its movements are often a complete riddle; but it is a natural, and, I believe, not unfrequent process, which is sufficient to account for the existence of infidelity, without the supposition of more than usual discernment, and a superiority to vulgar prejudices. Is it not sufficient to pervert the reason and to stifle the conscience of any man, that he should feel it to be necessary to his peace to deny his responsibility to a Supreme Being? Such being the moral phenomena attending the existence of atheism, and such the means by which it may gain possession of the mind, I submit to your consideration whether they are not sufficient, independent of any other proof, to throw a suspicion on its truth.

Here, then, we close our first lecture, and, in concluding, I earnestly and affectionately intreat you, my unbelieving hearers, who favour the atheistic scheme, to consider, with seriousness and candour, what has already been advanced.

"Ferè libenter homines id, quod volunt, credunt."-Cæsar, de Bel. Gal. lib. 3, XVIII.

Do not say there has been no direct proof, no attempted demonstration of the existence of a God; this has not been our intention in this lecture, we reserve it to a further stage of the discussion. But, if I mistake not, a strong case has already been made out against the system which we oppose. We have shown that there is no possible source of information, from which an atheist can derive certainty that there is not a Supreme Creator and Governor of the universe; -that the general sense and reason of mankind have always been against him, a fact which atheism can neither deny nor explain ;-that in those seasons when the mind is in the most favourable condition for the perception of moral truth, it is generally the farthest from this form of infidelity, which, in its moral bearings, is such as to make every lover of his kind tremble at the very idea of its prevalence. Now, I appeal to your reason, to your conscience, whether these are not strong presumptions against the system which you have espoused? I most solemnly intreat you to consider well the ground on which you stand, to review the steps by which you have advanced, to inquire impartially whether a fondness for speculation, a love of singularity, a desire to be released from the restraints which the belief in a holy, omniscient, and all-powerful Being imposes ;—whether, in a word, other influences than a love of truth and a submission to evidence, may not have led to the adoption and maintenance of sentiments, at which the most sober and rational part of the community shudder.

Let us be thankful, my Christian brethren, that those hopes which cheer our hearts, and light up our future prospects with glory and immortality, do not rest on an hypothesis which is incapable of proof; that we have all the evidence which is consistent with a state of probation of those sublime verities which inspire both our awe and our confidence; that in the history of the past and a view of the

present, in the researches of antiquity and in the discoveries of science, in the regular course of nature and in its occasional and miraculous deviations, in the testimony of friends and the concessions of enemies, we have undoubted assurance that "the Lord he is God, it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture." Let us rejoice that, while we contemplate the unbounded magnificence of his works, we can exclaim, "this God is our God, for ever and ever;" "who spoke in times past to the fathers, by the prophets," but who "hath in these last days spoken to us by his Son ;"-that "life and immortality are brought to light by the gospel," which "is the power of God unto salvation, to every one that believeth."