Comparative Importance of the Israelitish Nation 1 · ... ON THE OLD TESTAMENT. DISSERTATION I. INTRODUCTION; SUBJECTS PROPOSED; TEN- THE claims set up by the patrons of infidelity for deference to be paid to their opinions, as to those of men who are impartial in their search after truth, have never been justified by the manner in which they have conducted their hostility. Instead of relying for success upon direct and fair reasons, they descend to sneers and innuendos; which proceeding, even in a partial advocate, marks a deficiency of argument and betrays a consciousness of a weak cause. It is impossible also not to perceive, that the shafts of their ridicule have always been indirectly aimed at the Great Author of all: the fear of whom they have wished to represent as a delusion, laying an unwarrantable restraint upon human life. Their objections and sarcasms have now descended into very low hands; and it is grievous to reflect, that the vulgar scoffers of the present day may plead the example of B crowned heads, of men of genius and science. By them they have been taught to endeavour to bring religion into contempt by scurrility and abuse; and from them they borrow their hatred of a character1, which has nothing to provoke their spleen, but its silent as well as avowed condemnation of principles, which they wished to uphold. The moderns have hardly surpassed their masters, either in impiety or vulgarity; though they shamelessly utter the most gross invective and profaneness, which, under pretence of invalidating the authority of the Scriptures, really arraigns the conduct of the great Governor of all. But even if Revelation were false, can He fail to be an object of reverence to every reasonable being? They are now however not content with the attempt to persuadé the multitude to throw by the charter of the present and future happiness, as an antiquated roll; but also wrest the record itself to the defence of crimes the most destructive of the peace of society; and allege the histories, which it preserves, in serious justification of the crime of assassination; while inconsistently enough they 1 Mr. Scott, in the preface to his Bible, has an admirable observation upon the simple and artless manner, in which the Gospels exhibited that one character, which is perfection itself; compared with the efforts, which the ancient philosophers, orators and poets had made to draw, what they thought, a complete model; and derives from thence an argument in favour of the Divine Inspiration of the Evangelists. impugn the authority of these sacred writings, on the plea that they represent the Almighty Governor of all as giving countenance to things cruel, unjust, indecent, incredible and absurd. In the hope of being able to prove, that the obloquy thus indiscriminately poured upon Scripture rests on no solid foundation, the writer of the following sheets proposes to examine some parts of the Sacred History, which are supposed to describe the Almighty as the cause of evil; as the approver of it; or as unequal in his government of the world. These chiefly concern the Old Testament. With respect to the New Testament, it is proposed to shew briefly, that there is nothing unreasonable in the principle of faith on which the Christian religion is founded; in the objects proposed to that faith; in the morality enjoined by the Gospel; or in the sanction of the whole in a judgment to come. He does not purpose to enter at all into the field of metaphysical inquiry; but to take up the Divine Revelation in the simplicity in which it was given. He views it as a dispensation fitted to the circumstances of a being living in this world with the hope of going to a better. He considers it as intended to make known important truths connected with religious and moral practice, and therefore level as far as concerns that purpose, to the capacity of those whose conduct it was meant to influence; though, from the very nature of the com |