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his position, he is bound not only to say at what date matter was non-existent, but at what date it came into existence, and by what means it was produced. From the very nature of the questions they are unanswerable, and must for ever remain involved in the same obscurity. Do the Scriptures say that matter is but 6000 years of age?-then geology tells him that it is three millions of years since the Mississippi first shot her silver streams into the Atlantic; and how shall we reconcile the two? Nay! difficulties throng the path of the Christian; he is unable to answer the simplest questions of the atheist, and attempts to cramp down the buoyant energies of nature to the age of an American tree. The atheist is free from the difficulties of the Christian; he sees the universe in all its beauty and deformity, and searches, not for its commencement, but for the order of its seasons. He seeks no cause separate from itself to account for its existence; and although life to him may be full of sorrow, or it may be sparkling with joy, yet the knowledge which atheism inspires makes him content in his poverty, or delirious in happiness; he neither repines at his misfortunes nor boasts of his success, for they both proceed necessarily from their causes, and could have been no other than they were. And this happy content of mind, evinced in a state of atheism, ought to weigh in the Phyrronian balances of doubt which partial enquirers might be lost in-for assuredly the eternity of matter is a grander conception of truth than the assumed eternity of another Being, whose existence is merely a hypothesis. I take leave, then, of this subject.

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You tell me my definition of design is far from a happy one;' and you further say, 'when you can show me matter designing, I shall abandon the analogical argument.' I, sir, will accept the analogical argument' when you can positively show me' mind designing;'-as neither matter' nor mind' can be demonstrated as 'designing' in your manner of expressing the subject; for we cannot see the causes working-we can but see the results as they appear; therefore, when you can conveniently introduce me to a mind in full designing' operation, where I can SEE the accurate designs draw out without any materials, then I will become a convert to your doctrine-otherwise I can only accept the word 'design' as a mental operation connected with human organisation.

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You ask me, 'When did nature ever bring forth spontaneously an ear of corn, a plant, or a human being?' I am not able to answer any of this trio of queries; but I can inform you that living creatures have been produced from electricity, and if it would not make my letter too long, I would quote numerous instances of the process and results of such operations.

Speaking of God's intelligence, you say, 'it is an attribute not of matter but of mind.' I ask, how can an effect be an effect of an effect, or how can an 'attribute' be an 'attribute' of an 'attribute?'-for assuredly the mind but occupies this position in relation to matter. But more of this when I treat on the

'Immortality of the Soul.'

You inform me my 'argument for the omnipotence of matter is suicidal,' 'that, because man and matter must have power, God cannot be omnipotent.' You say, 'I admit that man has power, and yet most inconsistently argue for the omnipotence of matter.' Allow re, sir, to throw the suicide upon the theist and not upon the atheist-for you admit that matter and man do possess 'POWER,' forgetting that if God was omnipotent, he would possess ALL POWER, which our experience proclaims a fallacy; so then the omnipotence must be divided betwixt man and matter. I argue for the omnipotence of matter only upon the observances of the power of matter, and man being a FORM of matter's manifestations.

You find fault with my quotation from Shelley, telling me that 'power may be an attribute of being, without being self-existing.' Here you appear to mis

take our argument, which is not human power, but universal power, as found in nature, which, I am afraid, you will not find existing by deputy. When you do, I relinquish Shelley's argument.

You admit that there must be one self-existent CAUSE in the universe, but persist in calling it God. If it is matter, then we agree; if it is not, then it is a nonentity. You speak of matter being an effect,'—an assumption impossible to defend, for ITS CAUSE is yet undemonstrated.

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Carefully have I examined your arguments against my positions, and not one of them yet is logically overthrown. Atheism is still triumphant, and will yet make her opinions a power which shall never end until the claims of Christianity be proved nothing but the weakness of superstition-the pride of a bygone age.

W. H. J.

SIR,

REPLY TO LETTER IV.

TO MR. W. H. JOHNSON.

Paley's noted argument can well defend itself, till it is assailed by 'heavier metal than you have brought against it. Holyoake's attempt at reductio ad absurdum, which you have feebly copied, rests on the unfounded assumption that in God himself, there are proofs of design.

Your lengthened observations on the cardinal point of atheism, may, to some minds, mystify, but do not meet my objections to the eternity of matter. There is a difference between logic and length.

1. You seek to prove the eternity of matter from its indestructibility. But you have not proved, and you cannot prove its indestructibility, till you are omniscient. When you deny that there is any power in the universe able to destroy matter, you beg the question. But even if you had proved the indestructibility of matter, that would be no evidence of its eternity. The facts of history as facts are indestructible, yet they are not eternal. Your conclusion, therefore, is false. It is you, not I, who require to prove not only that Sebastopol will be besieged to all eternity, but that it has been besieged from all eternity. It can never cease to be a fact that Sebastopol has been besieged by the allied forces, but that fact began to be. Everybody admits that a fact is indestructible; all that I require to prove is, that Sebastopol began to be besieged; and this, nobody in his senses will deny.

2. You admit the non-eternity of the globe in its present shape. You even contend for a long series of progressive developments. Matter, then, is subject to change; but that which is subject to change is not self-existent, and therefore, not eternal. You seem quite insensible of the fact, that your long quotation from Dr. Nichol, proves my position. If it is possible to fix the age of the great masses of the mountains, then they have not been eternal. If they had stood for ever, the loss of one particle in a million of years would have proved quite sufficient to reduce them. What are three millions of years, or three millions of ages to the mighty cycles of eternity? I am prepared to defend the Mosaic Cosmogomy at the proper time; and when you are called upon for proof that it represents the creation of the universe as taking place only 6000 years ago, it will be found that you are as feeble in proof as you are valiant in assertion. Meanwhile, remember, that the real question at issue is not whether the world has existed 6000 years, or 6000,000,000 of years, but whether it has existed from all eternity. It is encumbent on you to show that neither its substance nor its forms have had any beginning.

3. You equally fail to meet my next argument. The question is not when the human race began to be, but whether it has been eternal. To prove that it has not been eternal, I point to the thinly-populated condition of the earth. This you attempt to meet by pointing out some of the checks to population. But I want to know, if, notwithstanding those checks, as far as we have reliable statistics, population has not steadily and greatly increased? Who does not know that the Anglo-Saxon, the Celtic, the Sclavonic, the Russian, and other races have made rapid increase notwithstanding all the ravages of war, of pestilence, and of famine, during the past two centuries; and that since more accurate censuses of popnlation have been made the increase has been so rapid, that some Malthusian political economists have feared that the time will soon come, when there will be more mouths than there is meat to fill? Men do not deny that the human race increases; but you question whether it increases at at a rapid rate, or what you call an 'extensive ratio.' But allowing the rate of increase to be ever so small, an eternity would have crowded the earth with inhabitants. If, on the other hand, you hold that the law of population has been that of decrease, then are you impaled on the other horn of the dilemma, that under the operation of such a law from all eternity, the race must have become extinct. And where are the records in the 'great stone-book,' of the existence of human beings for ever? But under the very vague and ambiguous expression, 'I do not confound the eternity of matter with the eternity of organisms', I suppose you to mean that while you believe in the eternity of matter, you do not believe in the eternity of its organised forms. You hold that matter is eternal, but that man began to be. Now if he began to be, whether six thousand, or six thousand million years ago, he must have had a Creator, and that Creator could not be matter, for matter has no will, nor have we the shadow of evidence that matter has ever created anything. You hold that mind is only an attribute of organised matter, consequently there cannot be knowledge without organisation. But you hold the non-eternity of organisation; therefore, there must have been a time when there was no knowledge, nothing known, no knower in the universe. That is, you would have existence without consciousness; but without consciousness you have no means of proving the existence of anything; thus you involve yourself in the absurdity of the supposition of an existence without a being either to perceive or to prove it. No one can hold your dogma without reversing the laws of human knowledge, and denying the fundamental facts of human thought. Your historical facts I do not stay to question, although if I demanded proof of the statement that Xerxes raised an army of five millions of men, you might find yourself in some perplexity; but I wish you to observe that in admitting that the race had a beginning, you give up the question. Remember that what you have to disprove at present is not the chronology of Moses, but the non-eternity of man.

4. You do not see' that the lack of any memorial of the world's eternity warrants the conclusion that it began to be; but it strikes me that our readers will see it readily enough. You say, 'We know nothing about credible universal history since the invention of printing.' It is difficult to perceive what you mean by such language. Do you not mean its opposite, that anything we know about universal history that is credible, is since the invention of printing? If so, why do you talk to me about Babylon, Persia, Carthage, Rome, and Scythia; about Xerxes and Cæsar; about Huns and Goths, and seek to cull from the pages of their history facts inimical to my position? You say writing was discovered 4000 years ago. But how do you know, if not from history? You cannot be allowed at one time to deny the evidence of history, and at another! to appeal to it for proof. Even though the Alexandrian Library has been destroyed, we have some sources of information in reference to the past still left to us. But your statements prove the truth of my proposition. Had the

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But, sir, if a BIBLE DEFENCE ASSOCIATION was formed in every large town in the kingdom, which I urge most strongly upon the readers of the Defender, who could tell of the blessed results which must follow a thorough exposure of infidelity, by this instrumentality? By the report of our public inauguration meeting it will be seen we have now got to work in Liverpool. The Lord prosper our feeble efforts to defend his word from the cavils and quibbles of his enemies.

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Yes, sir, it is high time for the professing Church of God to wake out of sleep! What has yet been done adequate to the wants of the times? How little has the press been used for the defence of our common Christianity! How little the platform; and alas! how seldom the pulpit speaks out as it ought to do in reply to the objections of infidelity. the

Oh, for a thorough arousing of all who profess to call themselves Christians. Oh, that they would quit them like men, and true, brave, and gallant soldiers of the cross; resisting even to blood if called upon, all attempts to detract from the honour due to their glorious captain. Oh, spirit of the living God, come with all thy quickening power! Come and take possession of all thenations of the world. Banish infidelity and scepticism, with their twin-sisters, vice and misery, from the face of the earth. Then may we truly sing oga Grace begun below." 891 farriets en hallga Liverpool, June, 1855. ve yabeno siloffi OBSERVER.

My dear Sir,

FOREKNOWLEDGE AND FATE.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE DEFENDER.

It appears that your correspondent "PHYRRO" is at a loss how to reconcile omniscience with the free-will of man. I cannot wonder at this, as he appears completely ignorant of the nature of both. Let him first give a comprehen-. sive definition of the subjects he wishes to reconcile, and their compatibility, or incompatibility will at once appear. For my own part, though I am not able to enter into, and fully explain, the subjects, yet no difficulty opposes itself to me, but I am able instantly to disperse it to my own satisfaction.

It has been repeatedly affirmed, that foreknowledge cannot be predicated of God, because the infinite existence is not successive, but simultaneous. Thus omniscience sees all things present with itself, as they will be to man as the periods arrive. Yet, for all this, "PHYRRO" goes on throughout his article to speak of omniscience as absolute prescience, eternal foreknowledge, &c., which are objectionable terms. Prescience cannot be absolute, nor can foreknowledge be eternal. Thus it is, that by having the subject and predicate incompatible, the whole is enveloped in confusion.

Again, what can "PHYRRO" mean by infinite experience? If it is infinite, it cannot be experience and vice versa. If Divine prophecy depended upon experience it might be as "PHYRRO" says, or seems to imply, that it is not fulfilled exactly according to prediction But before we conclude that there is any mistake in the prophecy, we ought to be sure that our interpretation is

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I do not wonder that "PHYRRO" should say y that absolute prescience destroys the idea of design, for it destroys itself. But will he say that omniscience destroys the idea of design? If so, he must show us how, as we consider omniscience and design to be or

«PHYRRO" says also, that it can be objected to omnipotence that God cannot cease to exist." . We should consider it a very strange omnipotence that could destroy itself! God is, therefore he must be. What then, does it

that he is not? Phyrro's idea of absolute omnipotence is, that he ought to have to destroy himself. This is to the e most childish idea imaginable! I think the Christians idea of omnipotence is, that he has power to fulfil his own will, which is to give an eternity of bliss to all his creatures, who will, by virtue of their freedom, make application to him for it. Which is also the end and design of all creation.

June 22nd.

I am, dear Sir,

Yours sincerely,

J. G.

ce E

E

IGNORANCE!

It is admirable to consider how many millions of people come into, and go out of the world, ignorant of themselves, and of the world they have lived

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The world is certainly a great and stately volume of natural things, and may be, not improperly, styled the hieroglyphics of a better; but, alas! how very of it we over!

the education of our youth; who, at twent his ought to be the subject o

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THE TRUE SCIENTIFIC ENQUIRER INTO NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

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His mind should always be awake to d devotional feeling; and in contemplating the variety and beauty of the external world, and developing scientific wonders, he will always refer to that Infinite Wisdom through whose benefi cence he is permitted to enjoy knowledge. In becoming wiser he will become better; he will rise at once in the scale of intellectual and moral existence; his increased sagacity will be subservient to a more exalted faith; and in proportion as the veil becomes thinner through which he sees the causes of things, he will admire more the brightness of the divine light by which they are rendered perceptible.

INCONSIDERATION.

The want of due consideration is the cause of all the unhappiness man brings upon himself. For his second thoughts rarely agree with his first; which pass not without à considerable retrenchment or correction. And yet that sensible warning is, too frequently, not precaution enough for his future conduct. Well may we say, "Our infelicity is of ourselves;" since there is nothing we should not do, but we know it and yet do it,

PREPARATION FOR DEATH.

To neglect at any time preparation for death is to sleep on our post at a siege i but to omit it in old age is to sleep at an attack,

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