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also a prolonged body, but it is provided with legs; and the articulation of the covering both of the body and legs is very distinct. Insects, which are distinguished in their perfect state by the possession of one or two pairs of wings; by the restriction of the legs, which are never more than six in number, to the thorax; and by the division of the trunk into three portions, the head, thorax, and abdomen, which are usually very distinct from one another. They are also distinguished by their remarkable metamorphosis, commencing from a form which resembles that of the Annelida.

with in any of the articulata. These animals
have generally five pairs of legs, two strong
mandibles. two pairs of slender maxillæ, and
two pairs of antennæ. The solid crust form-
ing the skeleton of crustacea is cast off peri-
odically. This is accomplished by the ani-
mal first detaching the cutis and muscles from
the inner surface of the old shell; then se-
creting from the surface of the cutis a new
layer of epidermis; next a layer of colouring
matter; and within this the calcareous ma-
terials of the new shell.
W. C.

BECAUSE.

WRITTEN BY CHARLES SOUTHWELL.

IV.

-Arachnida, the spider and scorpion tribe, THE FREE INQUIRER'S WHY AND which differ from insects, in having the head and thorax united, in undergoing uo metamorphosis, and in having eight or more legs.--Crustacea, which have a hard envelope, principally composed of earthy matter, and which are adapted for aquatic respiration. Many of them have the form of insects; but their legs are never less than ten in number.

The foregoing constitute a tolerably regn. lar series, into which we must also introduce the entozoa, which seem to exhibit the characters of the worm tribe in their most degraded condition, and the animals composing which are parasitic upon or within others; the rotifera, or wheel-animalcule tribe, of which some approach the holypifera and polygastrica, whilst others approximate the crustacea; and the cirrhopoda, or barnacle tribe, which bear a strong general resemblance to the mollusca, but unquestionably belong to this series.

The annelida, or red-blooded worms, lead us a step higher in the development of skeleton; for although the halithea, the leech, the nais, &c., possess a flexible membraneous covering, many others, as the serpulæ, are shielded by adventitious, solid, calcareous tubes. The common earth-worm is provided with four pairs of sharp spines, or setæ, for the purpose of progression. The skeletons of insects is for the greater part composed of a thin, epidermic layer, and a thick internal one, resembling the woody fibres of plants, but of an animal nature, termed chitine and coccine, blended with portions of phosphate of lime, magnesia and iron. These animals also present distinct legs and wings. In the arachnida we meet with a more consolidated form of skeleton; generally more than three pairs of legs; and, at the sides of their head, a pair of sharp-pointed piercing instruments, suited to their retired, cunning, and carnivorous habits. These animals throw off periodically their exterior coverings, like the larvæ of insects; and like the crustacea, they are capable of reproducing their members when destroyed. The crustacea affords us by far the most solid form of skeleton met

Why has the science of man been treated of as physical and moral?

Because that branch of science which treats of matter, its bulk, weight, figure, deusity, and general properties, is called physical or natural (the term physics being derived from aGreek word, signifying nature). The term Natural Philosophy, in its comprehensive sense, includes all the sciences, but receives in its primary divisions different names according to the kind of properties which it is its object to investigate. That which has for its subject quantity in general, is called mathematics, figure geometry, motion-that is, motion of entire massesdynamics, from two Greek words, signifying power, or force and motion; while that which investigates the motion of the integ rant particles of masses, and the results of such motion, is denominated chemistry,. Now, sensation, intelligence, and all that phenomena commonly understood by the term mental, belongs to moral science, as before observed; the notion that mind and matter were separate existences was not held by the ancients, who considered the mind or mental phenomena like attraction and repulsion. Life has been called a property of organisation, by which is meant that all atoms of matter, whether organic or inorganic, are the same in essence, the only difference consists in the arrangement of them. Dead matter is called inorganic, that is, not so arranged as to display the phenomena called living, so that the terms inorganised and dead, mean exactly the same thing. Whereas, when we speak of an organised substance, we speak of a living substance. The difference between the life of a man and that of a beetle or caterpillar, is one of degree, not of essence, and is a necessary consequence of the different arrangement of the atoms which compose them. Arrangement generally termed structure, or organisation, is life; derangement, or decomposition is death; so that the phenomena called life,

soul, something and nothing; which body and soul are not to be considered as neces sarily connected, but merely for the time being. Others contend that the soul was matter under a certain point of view, as colour is nothing but effects produced upon the retina of the eye, by the situations and motions of substances. To them the soul

the organ in relation to the instrument which produced it; the sound being nothing of itself-a result, as every one knows, of the undulatory motions of the air, when set in motion by the apparatus called an organ. All the phenomena of sound is but a consequence of the action of one substance upon another, whereby we become the reci pients of shocks or sensations which induce in the brain ideas of sound; and life is nothing more than a succession of shocks or sensations. Those who demand a more mi« nute explanation of what life is, may as well ask what heat is, or require a particular explanation of light, darkness, motion, or gravity. The motions of a steam-engine cannot be separated, even in thought, from the steam engine, and yet motion is not an independent existence. Those who ean erect motion into a something distinct from matter, will find no difficulty in doing the same for mind.

is a consequence of the organs, their powers, being, material and immaterial, body and and susceptibilities. "Life," says a modern author, as far as we affix any scientific meaning to the word, is a peculiar mode of being, in which a certain series of phenomena are observed to take place; these phenomena are never found associated with any other conditions but that one to the designation of which the term life is appropriated; hence we use this word merely as the short ex-was, as regards the body, as the sound of pression by which this peculiar state of being or the associated phenomena which constitute it, are denoted. What life is, independently of this series of phenomena, we are wholly ignorant, as we are of everything but appearances, in relation to every object in nature." We say that matter is the permanent subject of certain qualities, such as extension, divisibility, attraction, repulsion, and so on. We say that mind is the permanent subject of certain faculties, such as perception, memory, association, reason. In like manner, we imagine that there is a permanent subject, which we name the vital principle upon which we conceive the phenomena of living beings to depend. But these permanent subjects, these substrata, in which qualities are supposed to inhere, must be considered, so far as our real knowledge is concerned, fictions of the imagination. All we really know, are the ascertained phenomena; beyond these everything of course must be conjecture; and the most eminent meu have fallen, and at this very time areYOU WILL INJURE OUR CAUSE.' constantly falling, into gross error, by not keeping the distinction here suggested stea dily in view. The opinion held by almost all the ancient philosophers, and some few of the moderns, that the mind of man is nothing of itself, like putrefaction, excitibility, contraction, gravitation, separation, attraction: merely certain conditions of matter, has been deemed harsh and incredible; as it is contended that the nature of man, including body and soul, or mind, could not spring out of senseless or unreasoning atoms; seemingly forgetful, or perhaps, not having known that dead substances are composed of precisely the same particles as living ones, which ouly differ in their ar. rangement; so that dead, or inorganic matter, arranged and modified in a certain mauner, becomes living or organic; how this is accomplished none are wise enough to answer; but that it is done, all must know who place any reliance upon the evidence of their senses. The opinion that the vital principle, or mind of man, is a self-existent immaterial agent, is a mere opinion; and has nothing whatever to do with science. Others assert that the soul, or mind, is a very subtle fluid, which enters into and makes use of the body as a shell or covering; so that man, thus considered, is a twofold

"Bubb, in his bubbism, complained that the irre ligions doctrine tended to undermine the institu tions of the country. Why should they not be undermined, if they cannot stand the test of reason? and if they can stand that test, why cover, cloak, screen, or suppress reason by indictment?" PHILO PUBLICOLA.

"You will hurt our cause!" has been the selfish,

cowardly cry of all pseudo reformers, looking for the countenance and support of wealth and respectabili ty, when honester men, guided by a love of principle alone, have stepped to the front, and asked no man to help them, but he who felt like themselves. Men who are honest in the expression of their opinions, look only to the surest mode of carrying them into practice without compromise or injury. To them the stern truth is everything, the selfish interests of themselves or others nothing. It were much better to allow mankind to remain in ignorance of certain truths, than for the advocates of those truths, by their indiscretion or cowardice, to bring disgrace upon themselves by subsequently compromising, though it be but an iota, what they had previously declared to be essentially necessary, and which they still, perhaps, think necessary. The uneducated and and men, and the defalcation of a professor is ge unreflecting seldom distinguish between principles nerally looked upon as a consequence of his opinions, thus presenting a barrier to their introduction to such minds. Besides, parties who desert generally ruin themselves and those who may be willing

a wife and family, would neither by word nor action lie to save himself and them from ruin. Such men have been and are now, I doubt not: in fact, I know there are. We are the benefiters by their self-sacrifices; they watered the tree of liberty with their blood, and we pluck the fruit. Who will say they died in vain? And yet some cringing sycophants, some deal-tenderly-with-prejudice mongers, soft-spoken temporisers, contemporary with them, doubtlessly exclaimed "Oh! you go too far, a great deal ; there's reason in roasting eggs, but there is no reason in you. Besides, you will injure our cause!" The Rev. Henry Vincent, Sacred Chartist, once said in my presence, when speaking of SOUTHWELL, "I like argument; and for discussions to be conducted on philosophical principles; and not to use abuse und declamation. He (S.) could expect nothing else (than twelve months' imprisonment, etc.), when he so violently attacked people's prejudices!!" Heavens! what was my disgust, to hear a fellow just shot out of Monmouth gaol, where he had been imprisoned for not only hurting people's prejudices, but for endangering their lives, talk after this rate! What wonders solitary confinement for some few months, with bread and water and the Jew-Book, will work! And this is one of the rotten reeds upon which some of the working classes are relying themselves for emancipation! Working - men, cast them off, as your deadliest enemies! themselves-miserable crawling, cringing slaves-to the worst of tyrants, they only labour the more surely to enslave you! These men will be forgotten, or their acts and memory execrated, whilst their deserted, betrayed, and persecuted brethren are im(To be continued.)

Slaves

to stand fast, preferring annihilation to falsehood. Truths are immutable, it is men only who change. If it were indispensably necessary to the real happiness of man eleven years since, that every particle of superstition should be rooted out of his constitution and his institutions, it is necessary now, and will remain so so long as man is man. With the word reform is associated the idea of loss or injury to some one, who had previously been living upon the corruption to be reformed. The men who lose by a change do not necessarily become enemies to such change; it depends upon their philanthropy or love of justice. The just man would smile at his own rnin, if it effected the happiness of a large number; and the honest reformer views with delight the advance of sound principles, though they may go beyond those held by himself, or may be even such as he cannot openly advocate for a fear of the consequences. It is not always wise for men to ruin their social prospects, by an open advocacy of obnoxious principles, unless the good to be accomplished for the mass be greater than the evil to be suffered by the few. When men cannot publicly support certain principles without danger, which danger they are not willing to incur, it were better that they did it privately or not at all; by which means they would not lead the party representing those principles into error with respect to their real numbers, strength, etc., and not be, as in too many cases, its ruin. Where, also, it may be dangerous to defend, care should be taken not to decry; where the public may confound the public principles of a party with the private speculations of some individuals of that party, the strict adherents to what they imagine or know to be the principles of their body, should not hasten such a conclusion, by rushing with breathless anxiety to deery the speculations of their companions, for it not unfrequently generates the opinion so much dreaded: it also most unjustly injures the individuals or party complained of, who are looked upon in a false light from the circumstance of their first denunciation by those most intimately connected with them. Let the moderators show by their conduct their principles, let them live down calumny, and not declaim against those who go beyond them. What party in this or any other country was not at some period the extreme party? What were the feelings of its members then, when they were denounced and villified? The truth is seldom told, be it remembered, when we view principles through the spectacles of fear, and it needs not a love of lying to distort the image or pic-witness described as "a man who does not believe ture presented. As a general principle men should always speak the truth; but it does not follow that they should at all times and seasons speak all the truth they know. A man thrown by accident into the company of thieves, would be mad to tell them he had rifty pounds and a gold watch in his pocket -simply because it was a fact; but if asked the question, it would be immoral to tell a lie. So it is with respect to principles; the Atheist dependent upon a godite for support, is not called upon to declare his unbelief, unless placed in such a position as, by his silence, to convey a wrong impression, which would be a virtual departure from truth upon his part. I am myself of opinion, that it would be better for mankind if reformers never lied, let the consequences to themselves and families be what it may; and can imagine the Spartan like virtue of the man who, with

mortal.

HISSING AN ATHEIST !
(Concluded.)

W. C.

TURN we to Charles Phillips, the hireling advocate of criminals. When JULIAN HIBBERT, the witness who presented himself to speak to the prisoner's character, declared himself to be an Atheist, Charles Phillips affected the extreme of horror, and exclaimed with his usual theatric air, Witness, I will not disgrace myself by asking you another question." But not satisfied with this display, when the witness had retired, he called him back again, and made him go through the definition of an Atheist, which the

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in the existence of a god." Fancy the vapouring
absurdity of a man like Charles Phillips, talking
about "disgracing himself," his hand being polluted
daily and hourly by the vile coin of thieves and mur-
derers, and ruffians, and reptiles, of all descriptions,
who pour in upon him with their five shilling briefs.
He is grateful to his supporters, and does his best to
maintain their respectability and their lives.
lives by the life and not by the death of thieves, and
he preserves them as country squires do their game.
But Atheists bring no grist to the mill, and therefore
he makes war upon Atheists, knowing that the vnl-
gar mob, of high and low, will join with him. It is
a capital thing to make a sensation amongst the re-
ligious folks, especially when there is no fear of con-
sequences. It seems, however, that in point of re-
spectability, JULIAN HIBBERT is far before Charles

Phillips for while Charles Phillips lives on fiveshilling briefs, JULIAN HIBBERT lives on an independent property, and as to his attainments, he is a skilful Greek critic, having written and printed, at a printing press of his own, a work of considerable erndition in that language. He is, moreover, a highly benevolent, though not a wise man. And now a few words to JULIAN HIBBERT. When he was asked to kiss the book, he gratuitously declared that he had no belief in its contents. He must be supposed sincere in his declaration, for it was courting public obloquy, but in so doing he deprived a court of law of the benefit of his evidence. It was a kind of seeking after a martyrdom, a sort of testifying for conscience sake, which was quite uncalled for by circumstances, and therefore it became a ridiculous bravado. What if the trial had been a cause of the highest importance to the community, ought JULIAN HIBBERT in such case to have destroyed his utility to the community by his flippancy? The whole system of oath-taking is vile and absurd. All that is needed is that due punishment await the giving false evidence in a public court. Upon every paltry matter of pounds, shillings, and pence debated in a court of justice, god is invoked to help them, times without number. If this be not blasphemy, what then is? If a tradesman swear to a debt he calls god to witness it, though in many cases the matter is plunder, and in others he has no knowledge of the transaction beyond hearing. What is the value of a sailor's or a nierchant's oath at the custom-house, and what is the real distinction, whether the smug gler kisses the book or kisses his thumb, a mode of evasion considered very quieting to the conscience? When Jonathan had to give evidence as to the occupation of land, he was required by his employer to swear that he had seen corn grow on it at a stated period. His conscience was in the way, and to quiet it, he and his employer took a journey to the spot, and planting some heads of growing maize in a running brook, they suspended to a tree, on one side the figures 1814, and to a tree on the other the figures 1815. Jonathan then went into court, and swore that he had seen some wheat growing in the spring, between 1814-15. The fact is, whenever ceremonies are substituted for substance, the substance is apt to be forgotten.

Now, touching this matter of belief in a god, it is clear that JULIAN HIBBERT spoke without due reflection. He probably had been somewhat annoyed in his youth, with the cant of religion, while he saw through the hypocrisy of its professors, and that gave him so much distaste for the whole thing, that the hatred of the one became synonymous with the hatred of the other. I myself remember passing through similar sensations in my boyhood, being driven to churches and chapels innumerable, sometimes thrice in the day, to hear dull and measured routine services, and still duller sermons, wherein dogmas were made to supply the place of logic, till the very name of religion became loatusome to me, as something invariably connected with privation and suffering; and christianity became synonymous with jesuitry and bigotry. Hatred of this tyranny practised in his name, made me blind to the beautiful spirit of Christ, blind to the fact, that he was a beneficent and radical reformer of the numerous evils to which the hu

man mind is subjected. It was a most unfortunate religion for a race of oppressive rulers to live under, and therefore was it they did what in them lay to change its beautiful morality to vicious practices. Oppression is utterly incompatible with pure caristianity. When JULIAN HIBBERT professed his dis belief of the existence of a god, he was illogical. He may ask others to prove the existence of a god, but they may also challenge him to prove the non-existence. Those who logicize in favour of belief, state their articles very briefly: "Does the general system of the universe give internal evidence of plan or no plan?" If the answer be in the affirmative, then the existence of the plan must premise also the existence of a planner. This, allowed, opens another argument; "Does there seem in the race of men a gene

ral and constant tendency towards perfection through all his changes?" This cannot well be disproved, and the inference must be, that the nature of the planner of the universe must be beneficent. I appre hend that JULIAN HIBBERT would experience some difficulty in disproving this argument, notwithstanding no two witnesses can be found who can say, "We have seen god face to face." Most probably, JULIAN HIBBERT, stung by the illiberality and op pressive nature of those who wield religion as an implement for keeping down the poor, has been driven into the not very mathematical conclusion, that two wrongs make one right. The religious traders say to him, "You shall believe, or we will bait you;" and he replies, "I am bent therefore upon disbelieving, and will disbelieve in spite of you all." The fact is, belief or disbelief does not seem in any way to depend on the will of the individual, but on the peculiarity of his mental organisation, and it is possible for a believer to be a much worse member of society than an unbeliever. A man may readily profess a belief, without examining the premises, just as men profess themselves Christians though a true Christian, i.e. a being regulating all his thoughts and actions upon the principle of "do as you would be done by," is scarcely to be met with. A cold, pure logician, even if he professes to believe in the existence of a god, is not therefore necessarily a benevolent man, nor even if he does really believe. Something of an enthusiastic spirit is necessary to produce good fruit in the shape of religion, and enthusiasm is a matter of temperament. But it is quite certain that a man professing to be an Atheist may nevertheless be a moral man, as far as regards the transaction of his social duties, and if he be a punctilious man in regard to truth, which declaring his belief in opposition to public obloquy, is mostly a proof of, it is utterly absurd and mischievous to incapacitate him from giving evidence in a court of law. It seems by the report, that several of the jury joined in the cry of Turn him out," when WILLIAM MPHERSON declared his unbelief. It is a proof that they were far less fitted for jurymeu thau JULIAN HIBBERT was for an evidence. Their conduct was most disgraceful to them. This boasted trial by jury seems, in many cases, to be very like trial by party. Like Charles Phillips, they would rather justice should be left undone, than that an individual personally obnoxious to them should be instrumental in doing it.

Mr. Alderman Brown addressed Mr. Phillips, "The public, Mr. Phillips, owe you much for the course you have pursued." Mr. Alderman Brown is doubtless a highly respectable person: like Bel, the idol, "eating much meat." But the judge, the recorder, sitting in the seat of judgment and approv ing the interference of the spectators with the course of justice, and clapping them on the back! "Go it, good people all, as has been done by church-andking mobs, before now! You are a British assem bly, therefore show your zeal for the supreme being, by your want of charity to one of his creatures! Hunt him out of the pale of society as fast as pos sible." The recorder had a predecessor who was commonly called by the name of "Black Jack." He did many things, but none more extraordinary than this.

[Some remarks upon the foregoing will appear next week.-ED. O.]

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ORACLE OF REASON;

Or, Philosophy Vindicated.

"FAITH'S EMPIRE IS THE WORLD; ITS MONARCH, GOD; ITS MINISTERS, THE PRIESTS; ITS SLAVES, THE PEOPLE."

No. 32.]

EDITED FOR CHARLES SOUTHWELL, DURING HIS IMPRISONMENT,
BY G. JACOB HOLYOAKE.

MORE PERSECUTION.

J. CHAPPEL, agent for this work in Bristol, has received notice from his Christian landlord to quit his present residence, for announcing the Oracle to be on sale in his shop. Bravo bigotry. Christians! worshippers of the son of a god of war, the lord of hosts -the "meek and lowly," who brought a sword into the world-like unto the inhabitants of the valleys, the lord won't be able to overcome us-because of our nerves of iron.

W. C.

MR. RICHARD CARLILE.

[PRICE ID.

mercy of Jesus, if that was the way he converted sinners.

Knowing Mr. Carlile to be no ordinary man, I suspected he would show his "sincere sorrow for what he had done," like nobody else. Nor was this conjecture far wrong, as he has adopted the following curious and extraordinary mode of showing it.

He has written a letter to Sir R. Peel, stating that he thought the fiendish practice of punishing men for what is called blasphemy (alias, speaking the truth of theology), was abandoned as unworthy a people professing a particle of enlightenment. Also, enclosing a letter from Mr. SOUTHWELL, bearing the stamp of his keepers, showing that all his correspondence was read by them; thus prov

THE friends of liberty will be glad to hearing that not only his body but his mind too is

that this gentleman, so long and deservedly known for his brave and manly advocacy of mental and political freedom, is at this time in the enjoyment of his health and faculties. I have had the great gratification of meeting him in London, and from him have received

much valuable advice.

The priests had boasted the lion had retired to his lair, but I found him active as ever, lecturing on Sunday evenings in the City Road, upon his views of theology; and such views they are, that while mankind have much, the priests have nothing to rejoice at-unless one can suppose them rejoicing at a useful interpretation of their scriptures, a thing to which they are little addicted.

Mr. Jones, one of the Gloucester magistrates, specially boasted to me that, "that horrible man,CARLILE! who had used to be in Fleet-street, was sincerely sorry for what he had done, and was now a humble penitent at the feet of Jesus."

This received no reply; but I thought that, if he was there, it had taken nine years and a half of barbarous imprisonment, besides heavy fines, ruinous confiscations, and the incarceration of his wife and numerous servants, to bring him there. So that Jesus had not much to boast of; besides, awful discounts must be deducted from the gentleness and

imprisoned by his clerical oppressors. Mr. Carlile adds, that if it is thus men are treated for heterodox opinions in 1842, he his self will endeavour to furnish a few more cases of blasphemy, to hasten the termination of the system. Instead of finding Mr. Carlile at the feet of the Cheltenham Daniels “wot " lately feet of Jesus, I found him posting off to the came to judgment. For he was completing arrangements to deliver lectures in that town in explanation of his views of the bible. He intends to do the same in Gloucester, and be present at the trial.

Mr. Carlile's plan is to give rational interpretations to the scriptures, and though the trouble he takes may be much more than they are worth, his curious, ingenious, and profound conjectures are worthy of careful consideration, and to many persons would be very acceptable.

It has been a grand object of the pious to decry so formidable and powerful a thinker and actor as Mr. Carlile, and many persons from whom better things were to have been expected, have been seduced into aiding such injustice. However, this is fast declining— he promises fair to outlive all calumny. Die when he will, his noble and useful "works will follow him." Not as the saints follow them, to execrate their memory, but to render his name ever fresh and beautiful. Reformers of every grade owe much to Carlile- for their honor may their regard ever be commensurate with his merit! G, J. H.

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