men also believed in a God; was therefore the belief in a God the cause of their wars and persecutions? And must that belief also be consigned to the "tomb of the Capulets !" The editor professes to believe in a Cod, notwithstanding men so believing have warred, and persecuted each other. Does he really mean to consign all faith to "the tomb of the Capulets" and be an open atheist ?

The fact is this, a disposition to war and persecution has its source in the selfishness and passions of men. In the ages of intolerance and religious persecution, the populace were taught to believe that persecution for opinion was right. It all originated with ambitious, and atheistical priests and potentates, who feared not God, and who aroused and inflamed the dark passions of the populace, and blew up the flame of persecution, under the impression that it was right. But no believer in endless punishment would ever have dared to do such things, had he not first been persuaded it was right. That doctrine will not restrain men from doing what they conceive to be duty; but what they know to be wrong, it has a powerful tendency to prevent. Had men in those days been properly taught the rights of conscience, they would not have dared to murder and persecute as they did, for opinion.

Mr. Skinner looks up like one just rising from a dream and asks,

"What religious persecutions were ever commenced and carried on to the death of individuals, except by believers in that heart-withering doctrine."

Does it wither Mr. Skinner's heart that men will sin and often make themselves very miserable in this world? If not, how comes the thought so withering, that men will sin and be miserable in the coming state? If the thought of human misery so withers his heart, let him stop pouring out on society those principles, which unbridle the wicked, and scatter crime and wo over the states. Many men is gloomy cells, and on seaffolds, will lament his labours of

love" with tears and groans. Many a weeping wife, distracted mother, and beggared child, will curse that sophistry, which under pretence of religion, shook a husband's faith, a father's virtue, and made him a fiend.

But who ever persecuted, but believers in endless punishment? Did those Jews who "killed the prophets and stoned those that were sent unto them" believe in endless punishment? No doubt they did. But did Jesus know that they not only believed it, but that such belief in them was the cause of all their wicked persecutions? If so, when he said so much to them about their "killing the prophets" and so pointedly reproved them for their persecutions, why did he not tell them as universalists now do, that it was that "heart-withering doctrine" which made them do so? So far from it, he said, "ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can you escape the damnation of hell."-Math. xx111. 33.

Who can believe, that Jesus knew the doctrine of endless punishment was the fruitful source of all the wars and persecutions in the world, and reproved men for these crimes so much as he did, and yet never once intimated that it was that "heart-withering doctrine" which caused it all? That the Jews, through belief in that sentiment, would put him to death and the apostles, and thousands of christians after him, and yet never took any pains to warn his disciples, nor the Jews against that pernicious sentiment !

Again, was it this doctrine which made the enemies of Christ stone, scourge, and imprison the apostles? If so, why did not these martyrs, while smarting and bleeding from their wounds, never point out the cause to be this doctrine, and warn mankind against it. So far from this, there was no dispute about the doctrine till the third century, notwithstanding "persecutions and wars" were common. These editors seem to think the doctrine of endless punishment the principal evil that does or ever has existed

in the world. That it was even so in the days of Christ and the apostles-and yet I never knew them pretend that Jesus and the apostles were ever very particular to point out the evil, and warn mankind against its bloody consequences! No doubt these editors think themselves advanced in the science of moral truth far beyond Christ and his apostles! They doubtless think them in the "torrid zone of enthusiasm and fanaticism." What a pity, it was not known in the days the Bible was written, that the doctrine of endless punishment was the cause of all the persecutions and most of the wars in the world, so that those writers might have told us so; and that they might have been more careful to avoid appearing to teach the doctrine of endless misery, so much that most all their readers have really supposed them to believe it. and skill of universalist teachers are many cases, to invent any other sense for passages. But those days have gone by. finding out secrets that have been hid from the creation of the world; whether they find them on plates of gold" or by immediate revelation, or by "gifts of tongues" we know not; but su e it is, that these adventurers will be entitled to seats of high distinction when their Master hall make up his jewels. Let me ask this immortal Skinner, whose superiour knowledge and philanthropy seem to cast all the honour of Christ and the apostles so far into the shade behind, whether the doctrine of endless punishment was the cause of the Roman Emperors persecuting the christians, from the days of Christ to Constantine?

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Nay-all the wit now requisite in many of these

The editors are

Especially let me ask him, if the atheists of France, who, in the short period of seven years, put to death twenty hundred thousand men, women, and children, for no other crime than being called christians, were believers in the doctrine of endless punishment? Robespierre and his infidel party murdered this amount, including about twentyfour thousand clergymen, who were beheaded for their

religion. But I never knew till this wondrous editor suggested the idea, that these infidels believed in endless punishment!

Let me here improve the opportunity to remark, that infidelity in the United States is the same as in France; and whatever disguise it may assume, it is the same enemy to religion, to law, and to human happiness. The same levelling monster, which confounds all the distinctions of virtue and vice; seeks for universal liberty, that it may indulge its passions: universal anarchy, that it may feast upon the plunder of mankind; and for universal darkness, under which it may hide its crimes. It changes the names of things, calling all law, despotism; all religion, priestcraft; profligacy, liberality; licentiousness, liberty; and intolerance, charity.

An admonitory voice rises from the graves of martyred millions, and sighs along the hills, and breathes along the vales of these United States, in solemn and affecting warning. From its mournful truths, I distinguish this prophetick sentence, "IF THE GOSPEL IS EVER EXTINGUISHED IN THESE UNITED STATES, IT WILL BE DONE BY THE DEVIL IN THE DISGUISE OF A FRIEND."

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That the doctrine of endless punishment must be "consigned to the tomb of the Capulets;" because it produces insanity, cannot be admitted. People believing it, sometimes have become insane from religious excitement, without a doubt. The human mind exists under infinite variety of susceptibilities. Some are very excitable and much inclined to derangement by predisposition.

Such minds are more easily deranged than others; and any thing that has a strongly exciting power, whether it be love, hatred, jealousy, fear, hope, joy, or grief, when brought to act upon them with full energy, is apt to derange them. Hence, we might expect the fear of future punishment, so necessary to restrain the wicked, would sometimes have that effect. But fear has no more tendency

to derange the mind than hope. The hope of heaven, of endless blessedness, has just as much power to derange the mind as the fear of hell. All those emotions which religion, in any of its forms, has power to awaken, if carried to excess, may produce insanity. Why is Mr. Skinner so awfully concerned about the effects of fear, which is about the only inlet to the guilty and abandoned soul, while he gives himself no uneasiness about the range of all other passions and emotions? Or does he expect in the end to banish all religion from the world; and with it all the hopes and fears, and joys and sorrows, which it awakens in different conditions of life? Let him not expect, when the fear of hell, and the hope of heaven, cease to move the human mind, that its fountains of feeling and of action will be dried up. No. There will then be a sufficient source of insanity in the blackening gloom that will enwrap the thoughts of men in the scenes of crime, of perfidy, of blood, and horrour-in the extinction of the last vestige of human goodness, and the universal growth and reign of all the dark passions of men, hitherto partially chained by the solemn majesty of religion. No one has probably reflected more upon the evil of religious insanity than the writer of these remarks. And my conclusion is, that it is one of those evils, which sometimes will result from a good thing.

I have no doubt, that most of the cases of religious insanity, however, are the result of complex causes, and not attributable to any particular point of doctrine. And a large proportion of them, are brought on by the injudicions management of well meaning but mistaken men. I will not disguise the impression, that ignorant enthusiasts sometimes get into the ministry, so unacquainted with the human heart, and the best means of curing souls, that they are about as apt to drive men to insanity as to win them to Christ. But this is no objection to the doctrine of eternal retribution. The skilful physician gives his medicines in such quantities and under such circumstances as to clear