It is also said, that the efforts of Northern abolitionists have fanned an insurrectionary spirit at the South. Against this charge there is abundant prima facie evidence, without our looking into the history of slave insurrections. It is well known that living anti-slavery agents are not suffered to go at large in the Southern States. The only effort that can be made, therefore, at the South, is by sending anti-slavery books, pamphlets, and newspapers. These are indeed sent and circulated in large numbers, not among the slaves, (for the slaves cannot read,) but among the masters; and, if the slaves are made acquainted with their contents, it must be through the gratuitous agency of their masters. In point of fact, all the great slave rebellions on record took place before the formation of the American Anti-Slavery Society. The writer in the Southern Review, already referred to, says, that "under no circumstances can a servile war ever take place;" that "in vain has the United States mail been infested and burdened with incendiary documents ;" and that "no temptations no temptations or artifices can seduce the slaves from their allegiance." This Review is published at Charleston, which was the seat in 1823 and 1832 of extensive negro insurrections, discovered just on the eve of execution. It is well known to many of our readers, that the whole population of Charleston was, for a long series of years, in a state of perpetual alarm and apprehension from the slaves, and that South Carolina took the lead in those legislative restrictions, which imply a state of dread and consternation. It is truly gratifying, while anti-slavery principles are so rapidly extending themselves at the North, to find descriptions of a state of entire and fearless security emanating from the highest literary authority in that very city and State, in which, prior to the anti-slavery movement, the most fearful elements of combustion were believed to exist.

Is it farther said, that the anti-slavery movement at the North is entirely devoid of influence upon the South? Not thus do Southern people say. We might fill half a score of pages with unimpeachable Southern testimony to the effect of this movement upon the Southern mind and heart. Judge Upshur, a member of the present cabinet, said, in his prospectus for the establishment of the Southern Review: "The defence of the peculiar institutions of the slave-holding States is the great and leading object of the work. That they are in danger, it would be folly to disguise. A party has arisen in

the other States, whose object is the overthrow of the relation between master and slave; and from present appearances it will continue to increase till the object it has in view is consummated, unless efficient measures be taken to arrest further progress.' The editor of the South Carolina Messenger, in earnestly soliciting subscriptions for this same work, says: "If your institutions are ever to be defended, no time is to be lost. Delay, in all cases dangerous, would be fatal in this." The North Carolina Watchman says: "We are inclined to believe there is more abolitionism at the South, than prudence will permit to be openly avowed." A letter from the Maryville Theological Seminary to the Editor of of Emancipator says: "At least one half of the students of this theological institution are decided abolitionists, and are very much strengthened by perusing the publications sent by you." A gentleman of Frederick County, Md., writes: "The anti-slavery cause is rapidly gaining ground in this section of the country. Three years ago, abolitionist and insurrectionist were interchangeable terms, and an abolition paper a prodigy; now anti-slavery papers are read regularly by our most respectable and intelligent citizens." Gen. Duff Green writes in a recent editorial at Washington: "We believe that the South has nothing to fear from a servile We do not believe that the abolitionists intend to excite the slaves to insurrection. We believe that we have most to fear from the organized action upon the consciences and fears of the slave-holders themselves; from the insinuation of their dangerous heresies into our schools, our pulpits, and our domestic circles."

war.

We have, we trust, been successful in defending the antislavery organization from some of the grave charges, which have been made against it. But it is not by societies alone that the work can be accomplished. They can only sow the seed; and this they have done faithfully, diligently, though not always in good temper. It remains for us, citizens, Christians, to supersede them, (as every true friend of the cause will be grateful to have them superseded,) by adopting, all as one, the great principles, which they have cherished.

A. P. P.

THE VALUE OF NATURAL RELIGION.

Read in the College Chapel at Cambridge, May 10, 1843, as the Dudleian Lecture for this year.

THE Founder of this Lecture, in his testamentary provision, directs that it shall be for "the proving, explaining, and proper use and improvement of the principles of Natural Religion." Fortunately for him on whom this service may be laid, language admits of various interpretations, and the obvious sense is not always the true sense. At first it might seem, that he was required to bring within the compass of a single discourse, of moderate length, all that might be said on one of the largest themes of human inquiry - to condense the substance of folios into a tract, the lessons of the universe into a passing word. But, happily, he can construe the terms of the requisition in a sense that shall not impose a task so remote from human faculties. The object of the Lecture on successive years may be such as is described in the passage already quoted; yet of each one of them who contribute their several parts towards the accomplishment of this object no more be demanded, than that he set forth, with such ability as he may possess, some single point whose elucidation shall fall within the province over which the Lecture extends its ample title. So interpreting the duty which has been assigned me, I shun the path which my immediate predecessor in the discussion of this subject pursued, with a success that could wait only on his habits of profound thought and accurate study,* and, instead of attempting to present an abridgment of the "proofs and explanations" which must be given by him who would establish the "principles of Natural Religion," shall confine myself to a single inquiry,what is the value of this branch of knowledge, this source of instruction. It seems to me, that in endeavoring to fix the precise place which it is entitled to have in our regards I shall aim at securing "its proper use and improvement."

*The Dudleian Lecture in 1839, when according to the order prescribed by the Founder the same subject was treated, was delivered by Rev. John G. Palfrey, D. D., and has lately been printed as an Appendix to the first volume of the "Lowell Lectures on the Evidences of Christianity."

If I do not mistake, this topic might lay a special claim on our attention. It has an immediate interest for our minds and hearts, as it involves results more directly practical than any other arising out of the general subject. At the same time, it may be doubted whether it be not the topic on which there is the least of clear discernment or of correct opinion. Comparatively few persons take the trouble to ascertain the precise value of the disclosures which Nature makes on the great subject of religion, and satisfy themselves with vague impressions or superficial judgments. While they whose minds assume a tone of greater decision are apt to run into one or other of the extremes that here, as every where, tempt the fallibility of man to substitute dogmatism for impartial conviction. On the one hand, are those whose estimation of Natural Religion deprives Revelation of much of its importance, and makes the Bible little more than a republication of what is conceived to have been uttered in an equally intelligible, though not perhaps so distinctly audible, a voice by the harmonies of the universe and the testimonies of experience. Some persons indeed appear anxious to strip Christianity of whatever might distinguish it from the oracles whose whispers, as they float on the still air of meditation, reason catches and interprets according to its ability, and imagine that by thus denuding Revelation of its peculiar claims they recommend it to a more hearty confidence. And on the other hand, there is often a depreciation of Natural Religion which almost amounts to a denial of any intrinsic worth, and would reduce it to a mere broken utterance of uncertain sounds. They by whom this view is taken conceive that they too are rendering a service to Christianity, by calling in question the value of all instruction but that which has come through a specially commissioned teacher. But Christianity requires neither of these methods of establishing its right to be welcomed with gratitude and reverence. It is benefitted by neither of them; and it might be difficult to say from which it receives the greater injury.

The inquiry before us then gathers importance alike from its nature and from the mistakes that are either carelessly embraced or religiously entertained. Our sense of the value, if not our judgment concerning the import of Revelation, must be seriously affected by our appreciation of Natural Religion.

Let me approach the answer I should give to this inquiry by placing the meaning of the terms we use beyond the reach of VOL. XXXIV' 3D S. VOL. XVI. NO. III.

37

misapprehension. What do we mean by Natural Religion? It is not the interpretation which Christianity enables us to give to the voices of creation and providence, of our own souls and of the outward universe. We must divest ourselves of our Christian associations, if we would ascertain the force of what may be learned without the aid of Revelation. There is no mistake more common, - yet none more manifest or more fatal to all just decision, than the confounding of Christian reasonings upon natural phenomena, whether material or spiritual, with the conclusions to which an intelligent observer might be led by the phenomena seen under no other light than that of Nature. Natural Religion, in its concrete form, is the amount of instruction which man in the fair and full use of his powers might derive from Nature, independently of Revelation. It is therefore manifestly wrong, in determining what Nature teaches, to borrow from Revelation assistance in studying its lessons. If I would know how distinctly the outlines of objects may be traced in a cavern, I must not let in a gleam of sunshine; nor must I pronounce a judgment, till my organs of vision have ceased to feel the effect of the broad daylight, and have acquired their proper adaptation to the dimness of the place.

But into an error not less serious shall we fall, if we confound Natural Religion with the actual religion of Pagan lands. This is no more Natural Religion than is the actual religion of Christendom Christianity. That we may discover what the Christian Religion is, we go to the Christian Scriptures and study them with an honest mind. So if we would know what might have been learned on the great themes of religion before Christ or Moses spoke, we must go to the Scriptures written on the heavens and the earth, on man's nature and man's experience, and decypher them without regard to the perversions of their meaning into which others have fallen. It is not to the fanes of Roman idolatry, nor to the temples of Egyptian polytheism, that we must resort, to determine what is proclaimed in the ear of a sober and reverent reason concerning the Object of worship or the duty of man. It is not by the graceful mythology of Greece, nor by the ruder forms into which the imagination of Northern Europe shaped its religious fancies, that we must judge of the instruction which Nature conveys respecting the unseen and the Divine. It is neither from the sacred books of Hindoo wisdom, nor from the Aboriginal traditions of our own continent, that we may obtain the grounds of a correct