have been pronounced practically useless, by those who believe that God, for the first time, deigned to make known moral truth, in the revelation of Jesus Christ. Under this false notion, much useless sympathy has been wasted upon the poor benighted races of men, who were left, for four thousand years how consistently with the benevolence of Deity, let those who hold this belief explain - to grope their way, through moral and intellectual darkness in this life, to eternal perdition in the life to come. Surely, the promulgators of such doctrines cannot have studied, with thorough attention, the moral and philosophical productions they dogmatically condemn. On the contrary, whoever is well read in the literature of Greece and Rome, will readily assent to the liberal concession of a pious, learned, and distinguished Christian minister of the present day, that there is not one moral precept of the New Testament which may not be found in the old heathen writers.'* The novelties of physical science and morals are not the only improvements which have encountered this kind of opposition. Biblical criticism and interpretation have in some measure come under the same ban. The Rev. Dr. Milman has received an ample share of theological abuse, for attempting, in his eloquent History of the Jews, to account for some of the miracles of the Old Testament, by the operation of natural means in a preternatural manner; and for intimating that the inspiration of that volume may be safely limited to doctrinal points, exclusive of those which are purely historical.'} We all remember the host of imaginary terrors which sprung up when the assiduity of a learned English critic had collected thirty thousand various readings of the Bible: we also know how greatly those labors contributed to strengthen the authenticity of the inspired writings, when the clamor of bigotry had subsided, and calm reason resumed its ascendancy. But we doubt whether Newton, Porson, Griesbach, and others, have ever received the cordial thanks of certain sectarians, for displacing from the sacred text the fifth verse of the first Epistle of John. At least, the spurious passage is retained in our common Bibles, though no biblical critic pretends to defend it. So much stronger is the love of sect and of party, than the love of truth! Even the harmless science of numbers has not escaped the attacks of fanatical zeal. An ingenious gentleman in a neighboring state, in supporting a favorite religious dogma, enters upon an argument, which, so far as we can understand it, is intended to prove, that in certain senses, and under certain circumstances, three are but one, and one is three! Thus skepticism and false doctrine are found lurking in the ground rules of arithmetic! Strictures almost daily appear in our religious periodicals, whose object is to decry the value of human learning, and bring suspicion *Discourse entitled the Argument from Miracles;' by the Rev. ORVILLE DEWEY, being the Dudleian Lecture, delivered before Harvard University, in May last, Mr. Dewey's argument derives ten fold force, from the candor with which he concedes to his opponents every thing they have a right to claim. + Milman's History of the Jews: Family Library, No. I. The same learned and excellent writer, in his Bampton Lectures, maintained the preternatural character of the miracles of our Saviour and his Apostles. upon the conclusions of reason. We have lately seen an extract from the prospectus of the Scottish Christian Herald,' which pronounces a more sweeping denunciation against the diffusion of secular knowledge, than any which has occurred to us on this side of the Atlantic. All sorts of literary machinery,' says this publication, newspapers, lectures, treatises, magazines, pamphlets, school-books, libraries of knowledge for use and for entertainment, are most diligently and assiduously set in motion, if not for purposes directly hostile to the gospel, at least on the theory that men may be made good and happy without the gospel — nay, though the gospel were forgotten as an old wive's fable.' Such writers must surely be classed, in the language of Dr. Chalmers, among those 'narrow and intolerant professors, who take alarm at the very sound and semblance of philosophy, and feel as if there were an utter and irreconcileable antipathy between its lessons on the one hand, and the soundness and piety of the Bible on the other. It were well, I conceive, for our cause,' continues Dr. Chalmers, that the latter should become a little more indulgent on this subject that they gave up a portion of those ancient and hereditary prepossessions, which go so far to cramp and enthral them.'* Geology is, at this moment, going through the fiery ordeal of ignorant and presumptuous zeal. We have already noticed some dogmatical attempts to raise a prejudice against the study of this science.t The leading principles of geology appear to be as well established as those of any other science. They show, beyond a doubt, that our planet existed — that its surface underwent various changes was covered with vegetables, and inhabited by a long succession of animals for countless ages before the epoch from which our scriptural chronology dates.' 'Whatever difference of opinion may exist among geologists on other points,' says the Rev. Dr. Buckland, in his recent Bridgewater Treatise, this is a truth admitted by all observers — as firmly established, indeed, and on as immoveable evidence, as the Copernican system, the theory of gravitation, or any other of the fundamental doctrines of science.' Yet this truth is laboriously assailed by clerical gentlemen of high reputation in this country-not indeed by attempting to invalidate the evidence on which it rests, but by appealing to obsolete principles of interpretation, or exciting prejudice in the breast of religious men against its moral tendency. § That the earth is a large plain, and is the centre of the universe, is said to be expressly taught, as an article of faith, in the Koran. If this be true, it alone furnishes sufficient ground for rejecting the authority of that pretended revelation. Yet some well meaning persons, at the present day, in ignorance of the proofs of geology, are striving to fasten upon the Bible an interpretation which would render its meaning equally absurd and incredible. How much service they render to the cause of religion, by thus endeavoring to make revelation inconsistent with science, reflecting and judicious * Chalmers' Astronomical Discourses. Preface. + See the Knickerbocker, for May last. As quoted in the London Quarterly Review, for April, 1836. § See Professor Stuart's article in the Biblical Repository, No. 21. persons can determine. It is said that a recent French writer has won an unenviable notoriety, by attempting to refute the Copernican system. The zealous champions of the church, who, beneath the shield of philology, are running a tilt against geological science, may certainly hope to obtain a coeval reputation. It is amusing to see the eagerness with which our modern theological Quixottes press forward for the honor of encountering a new discovery in science or the arts. Geology is now so firmly established, that there can be little rational hope of displacing it. Not so, however, with some more recent subjects of investigation. Phrenology is now the alarming object of their attacks. Ere this new candidate for a place in the list of sciences has had time to bring its pretensions fully before the public, while most persons, like ourselves, are yet mere inquirers, and not well enough informed to believe or disbelieve its doctrines, the hue and cry of 'infidelity,' 'materialism,' and 'sensual philosophy,' is raised against it. We already hear it denounced as the most recent and dangerous conspiracy of men of science against religion. It is already held up to the prejudices of the religious public, as another attempt to exalt human reason above faith; to destroy revelation; to unsettle orthodoxy, and diffuse infidelity. The various heresies and false doctrines to which this age of inquiry gives birth, are severally laid to the charge of phrenology. If a new book trenches upon the sectarian notions of any religious party, it is stamped with the bad name of this new school; the principles of which, we are told, are identical with German neology and French infidelity. We are assured, in advance, almost before phrenology has reached our shores, and certainly before the public have had time to examine its proofs, that it tends to the destruction of all moral responsibility, and forbids the punishment of crime; that it will sap the foundations of social happiness, and annihilate the hope of immortality. The pietists are in advance of all other men in science. They scent infidelity afar off; they detect it under the closest concealment; they know it by instinct,' as Falstaff knew the crown prince, and raise a discreet alarm, that people may shut their eyes and ears against it. Now, according to our apprehension, a truly philosophical spirit will accord to every new science a candid and unprejudiced examination. The question is, not whether its inferences will subvert preconceived opinions, but whether the science itself be true. To raise a cry against its tendencies, without showing a fallacy in the evidence which sustains it, is to make what the lawyers call a false issue before the tribunal of the public. If its truth be established, it must certainly be found in harmony with all other true opinions; if such harmony cannot be shown, it is the part of a lover of truth to revise the grounds upon which the former opinions rest. For it is impossible that scientific truth should ever be found to disagree with religious truth. Whenever the two appear to conflict, there is error on one side or the other, and the presumption is much the strongest in favor of the deductions of science, inasmuch as the evidence is more palpable. Ought phrenology, then, to be subjected to a different test? Shall the world be forbidden to examine its proofs, because the jealousy of superficial observers may fancy that its results will undermine their favorite theories? Perhaps it may, in time, be discovered that even this persecuted branch of inquiry leads to no such damnable heresies as are ascribed to it. Astronomy and geology have been met with equal suspicion; they have triumphed over it, and have largely contributed to illustrate and enforce the truths of religion.* But phrenology is not only attacked theologically, without attempting to examine the proofs which sustain it; it is even loaded with the opprobrium of sins which do not belong to it. The Christian Spectator, the ably-conducted periodical of the New-Haven theological school, led the van in this unfair attack. A recent work from the pen of an eminent physician in a neighboring state, on the Influence of Religion upon Health and the Physical Condition of Mankind,' was made the occasion of the onset. The reviewer affects to have discovered in this book the secret hand of infidelity, and pours forth his wrath upon phrenology as the source of these alarming heresies. The same volume has been answered by a physician of this city, (Dr. Reese,) and the same uncandid and unjust assault renewed upon phrenology. We say uncandid and unjust, for the work alluded to is not phrenological in its principles, nor based upon the peculiar doctrines of that science. The author assumes no fact or principle which is not strictly without the province and range of phrenology. He assumes an innate religious principle in man; but this assumption was common, for centuries, before phrenology was dreamed of. He also assumes a connection between the brain and the intellectual faculties; but this too has long been established by physiology, and is not one of the discoveries of Doctors Gall and Spurzheim. We might remark upon the bitter and denunciatory tone of both these productions, and show how unfavorably it contrasts with the mild and philosophical tenor of the book they are written to refute. But we have nothing to do, at present, with the merits of the theological controversy. We feel obliged, however, to say, that in their gratuitous attack upon phrenology, these writers seem to us to come among the class of those narrow and intolerant professors, (of religion,) who take alarm at the very sound and semblance of philosophy.'t The Watchman,' a publication of the divinity school, at East Windsor, (Connecticut,) not to be behind its antagonist and rival school at New-Haven, in zeal against false science, has produced a series of strictures upon Combe's Constitution of Man.' These strictures are written in a somewhat milder tone, yet we cannot but think they spring from the same sectarian jealousy and misguided zeal which has become so remarkable for its opposition to scientific truth. If the 'Constitution of Man' tends to materialism and irreligion, how happens it that Dr. Chalmers, in his Bridgewater Treatise, which was written at a later period, on a kindred topic, and running nearly parallel with the work of Mr. Combe, has no where cautioned the religious world against that work? Dr. Chalmers' religious * See Dr. Chalmers' Astronomical Discourses, and the Bridgewater Treatise of the Rev. Dr. Buckland, entitled 'Geology and Mineralogy, considered with reference to Natural Theology.' + Dr. Chalmers: sup. cit. views are more liberal and enlarged: he has no wish to screen them from the broad light of science; on the contrary, he hails every accession to the stock of human knowledge, as a new ally in the cause of truth an additional confirmation of religion. 6 The same truly Christian liberality was exhibited by the Rev. John Robinson, the learned and pious pastor of the puritan church which took refuge in Leyden from English intolerance. He looked forward to progress, not only in scientific but in religious truth. If God,' said he, in his parting address to the pilgrims, reveal any thing to you by any other instrument of his, be as ready to receive it as ever you were to receive any truth by my ministry; for I am verily persuaded, I am very confident, the Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of his holy word.' The Lutherans,' said he,' cannot be drawn to go beyond what Luther saw; whatever part of his good will our God has revealed to Calvin, they will rather die than embrace it; and the Calvinists, you see, stick fast where they were left by that great man of God, who yet saw not_all_things.'* From the remarks we have made, we would not be understood as classing geology and phrenology in the same rank. The former has already taken its station in the list of sciences; the latter must yet be regarded as a candidate for the same distinction. We have already intimated, that we have not sufficient knowledge of its proofs, to yield to them our complete assent or dissent; but we have looked far enough into its principles to feel quite certain that no orthodox form of religious belief has any thing to fear from that source. Some phrenologists may have been infidels; many, we know, are eminent Christians, even of the evangelical school. Our reprehension is confined to the spirit in which phrenology is assailed by those who evidently have but a superficial knowledge of its principles. This spirit is the very essence of intolerance and dogmatism the spirit of misguided and blind zeal, opposing free investigation and research in natural science; and whether phrenology be true or false, this method of assailing it is equally reprehensible. The monstrous doctrine of former times, that no faith is to be kept with heretics and infidels' is long since exploded; nor will it be admitted by many at the present day, that error may be exterminated by intolerance and calumny. 'Non tali auxilio, nec defensoribus istis 'How has love for mankind,' says a late religious writer, 'been changed into persecution and damnation! How has the God who came to seek the stray sheep, the God who calls all men unto him, become the God of anathemas and exclusion!' Two books,' he continues, 'verify each other—the book of the Apostles and the book of Nature. I study them, I reflect upon them, and I compare them. In this magnificent examination, the book of Nature interprets the gospel, and the gospel teaches me to read the book of Nature. In each, I discover the same laws-in each, I recognise * Mather's 'Magnalia,' pp. 59, 60. |