33 man. Infidelity justly rebuked. I do not deny that." "You have told us that before," said my friend. "I should like to know where you learnt f." On this the infidel was struck dumb. My friend was a man of plain good sense; no logician; not practised in the art of the schools; pure common sense suggested this inquiry. (Cheers.) Paine was confounded; he had not a word to say in reply to this simple question, and my friend was obliged to appeal to the company, and to say, "Mr. Paine has frequently violated the laws of good breeding and of hospitality by wounding the feelings of the company on a subject that he knew was dear to their hearts, but when he is applied to for his reasons, he has none to give. I appeal to you, whether, the next time he thus attacks Christianity, he ought not to be turned out of the room?" (Applause.) I enter thus upon the evidences of Christianity, and I assure you that when I first formed this design, I expected that whatever infidels came to this meeting would have been here still. I had no expectation that they would have departed before I made this statement. I am not afraid to meet them at any time and in any place where free discussion can be carried on. But, sir, I do say, that they have no right to be heard in this meeting. If we had presented in our placards an invitation to men to discuss the subject of Divine Revelation, its claims on the belief of man, or the propriety of the Christian Sabbath, or its claims on the consciences of men, or the propriety of keeping it sacred, then, sir, they might have had a right to be heard. But we did no such thing, and as my eloquent friend (the Rev. Joseph Fletcher) has observed, it is equal to a violation of the sanctity of our own domestic abodes, to introduce a discussion on these subjects. As well might a man, when we meet to petition parliament for the relief of one grievance, bring forward a totally different subject, or, in fact, discuss the violation of the Sabbath in the midst of a political meeting. These are things not to be suffered. We can never discuss any subject unless we keep to that subject. While, therefore, I maintain upon these grounds that he has no right to be heard, I am forward to say, that, as Christians, we are bound to put down the profanation of the Sabbath by moral means. I mean such means as example. Surely, that is a proper means for recommending our principles and our practice to the world. Who will say that there is persecution in this? We are disciples of a Saviour who 133.-VOL. XII. 34 has taught us to teach by example. He himself is the great pattern, and while the good Shepherd putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and says, “I have given you an example, to do unto others as I have done unto you." Let us, then, by our example, teach the world the sanctity of that day, and the advantages of its celebration. By influence, too, I would labour, for we ought to employ the influence that Providence has committed to our hands, and I therefore recommend all the influence to be exerted which God has given us with regard to this holy day. So long as there is no persecution, I would say, we ought to encourage those persons in trade that keep the Sabbath sacred, because we know that, in many instances, men are persecuted for righteousness' sake, and it is our duty to come forward, and be a friend to the persecuted. I knew a man, who, because he would not violate the Sabbath, not for a poor man, but for a carriage customer, who would send for commodities upon the Lord's-day, was told by his rich customer, "If you will not serve me on the Sabbathday, you shall not serve me on any other day." Many such instances of persecution have occurred towards those who are firm to their Christian principle. Now it is our duty to befriend those, and to throw all the weight of our influence into the scale which appears to belong to the cause of righteousness. I entreat every one in this meeting to do all they can to support those who keep the Sabbath-day holy. (Applause.) If this be legitimate, I would say that we ought, by that instruction which is most worthy of a rational man and a Christian, to diffuse more widely the evidence and claims of the Sabbath. This queen of days has no reason to be ashamed to adduce her origin; she can prove it to be from heaven, and we ought to present her in all the glories of divine truth, and enable her to sway the mind, the heart, and the conscience, by all the appeals to those faculties which she is so well able to make. While we ought by instruction to promote the celebration of this day, we ought to take care, also, by all legitimate means, to influence the rising generation (as has been very properly remarked) to grow up in the sacred observance of this day. These are means to which no rational man can object, and they are employed to a great extent in America, where the frame of society, and the mode of government, are such as not to admit of the exercise of the law, as some would do here. There the infidel and the Chris. C tian meet foot to foot, argument to argument; and infidelity may be put down by these means. We are brought to a crisis; I grant that if all Christians have generous hearts, they have not all iron nerves. It is not every wise and good man that can meet such faces as have presented themselves before us this evening; but there are men in the world who have Christian hearts and iron nerves, who can feel as Christians, and argue as logicians, and can wield all the elements of moral and intellectual power, that can smite an infidel to the ground. While, therefore, we are called to meet them on this ground, we are not afraid. We remember that Christianity once endured a conflict more terrible than this. You have been reminded already, that Christianity formerly made her way to empire over the minds of men, through seas of blood; but the blood was all her own. While, then, she had nothing but truth, and benevolence, and zeal, and patience, and perseverance, to enable her to make way against racks, and gibbets, and swords, and fire, and blood; though she had philosophers arrayed against her, and some of those philosophers wore an imperial diadem; though she had them to contend with, she put them all down by the force of argument, and the evidence of divinity: she may now recur to her old method, without any fear of being vanquished. She is prepared for the field again, and if she must fight her way by the evidence of her truth, she can do it, though no arm of power be stretched out to strengthen her arguments by blows. With these impressions, I beg to move this second resolution. The reverend gentleman sat down, amidst universal applause. THE WEDDING RING. "Think well on it." Reasons for the use of the Wedding Ring in the Marriage Ceremony - By the Rev. George Montgomery Weet, Chaplain to the Bishop of Ohio. 1. As by turning a ring for ever, no end can be found, so the friendship cemented by marriage union should be endless and perpetual; not even broken off finally by the interruption of death, but the marriage party separating merely during the night of the grave, in sure and certain hope of meeting again on the following morning of a glorious resurrection, when all that was 36 pure and lovely in the union, shall be more so still, with the high additional perfection of continuing uninterrupted through the endless round of a blessed immortality. 2. As the marriage ring should be made of pure gold, which is the most pure or simple of all metals, so the marriage union, cemented by that impressive pledge given and received, should be pure in its origin, pure in its continuance, and so pure in all its motives, as to contradistinguish the contracting parties from all intimacies founded upon gross or carnal principles, and as nearly as possible resembling the love of Christ for His Spouse, the church, who so loved the church, that he gave himself for it. 3. As gold, of which the marriage ring should be made, is esteemed the most valuable of all metals, so the love and friendship implied in the marriage ring should ever be considered as infinitely more valuable than any other of which human nature is capable. 4. As gold is the most compact, or least porous, of all metals, so the marriage love and friendship should be so closely cemented, by the blending into each other of all the kind and good affections of the parties, as to leave no possible aperture or opening for the introduction of any strange or forbidden affection. Each party should always be prepared to say of the other, Thy loveliness my heart hath prepossest, And left no room for any other guest. 5. As gold, by the action of the most intense heat, even in a crucible, cannot lose any particle of its original weight and worth, but comes out of the crucible as heavy and valuable as when it was put in; losing nothing in consequence of the fiery ordeal, except whatever portion of dross or alloy may have been incorporated with the pure metal, so the most severe afflictions, intense troubles, and fiery persécutions, which may be the portion of the marriage parties, during some of the changes and chances of this mortal life, should never be able to deteriorate or take from the marriage union, any part of its intrinsic worth or beauty, but the parties should rise from the furnace of affliction, and dishonours of the grave, without having lost any thing, except the grosser particles of earth and sin, which may have unhappily attached themselves to the mystic union, that was intended to secure their felicity. 6. The marriage ring should be perfectly plain, that is, no chased, raised, or artificial work, should appear on its surface, implying that the marriage union should not be the result of any artifice on account of wealth, equipage, honours, or the undue influence of friends, but the PLAIN result of an honourable and religious affection between the contracting parties, and that GOD who first instituted the "holy estate of matrimony." 7. As gold is an iucorruptible metal, that is, if thrown into the mire, or embedded in the most impure soil, it will never become corrupt, corrode, or imbibe, one speck of rust or impurity; so should the marriage love and friendship, however it may sometimes be obliged to descend from the elevation of affluence into the deep valley of penury or distress, be doomed-" to waste its sweetness in the desert air,"-be incarcerated within the gloomy confines of the prison-cell, or associate with the poor, the mean, or the illiterate, still, like its incorruptible emblem, should it continue as bright and beautiful as ever. 8. As gold is the most ductile of all metals, so that an ounce can be beaten out to cover an acre of ground, or gild a finely attenuated thread to embrace the circumference of the world's surface, so should the result of the marriage union fulfil the original command, to increase, multiply, and cover the earth, with "the precious sons of Zion comparable to fine gold." are 9. As the marriage ring exhibits nothing to imply pre-eminence of the one party over the other, notwithstanding that the word "obey" is applied to the lady rather than the gentleman, yet the gentleman should ever recollect, that as in forensic courts, especially courts of equity, the plaintiff must appear with what called "clean hands;" so, before he can claim any right to command, or the wife be under obligation to obey, he must remember the test of his love and sincerity, which is given in Holy Scripture, viz. "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church:" but how did Christ prove his love for the church?-by dying for it. When a love, of which this is the model, predominates in the husband's heart, he can require no obedience from his wife, but she will feel it to be her honour, pride, and privilege to render. When a lady reads, marks, learns, and inwardly digests the foregoing, with all its implied suggestions and endearments, and then glances at the honoured finger which bears the pure insignia of such voluminous delights and serious responsibility; how inexpressibly happy she must feel, that she can be at all times, and under all circumstances, the bearer of so dear and portable a pledge of all that constitutes real 38 terrestrial felicity, and she may often recur to the title or motto, and-"think well on it." "This alone is worth commending, Still beginning, never ending." Manchester, Nov. 19th, 1829. CAROLUS. ON READING.-NO. I. TO THE EDITOR, SIR. A knowledge of the use of letters, whoever invented them, is the grandest acquisition to fallen incarnation, of which the art of man can boast; seeing they disseminate and perpetuate ideas, once conceived, without that incessant variation, so fatal to truth, to which, from a host of circumstances, the memory of man is ever liable. Books, however, are so rapidly increasing, and printing affords such facility to the dissemination of sentiment, bad as well as good, that reading may be made subservient to almost every purpose mental luxury can devise. Not a passion, not an appetite of the soul can be imagined, to which books will not, in some way or other, administer. Such being the case, if it meets your approbation, I purpose calling, in a series of short essays, the attention of your readers to this important subject; first warning them against various evils, and secondly pointing out certain advantages which result from a course of reading; in order that the good may be made their own, and the evil removed far away from their souls, Your obedient Servant, A CURSORY reader skims over the surface of a subject, and is struck only with prominent features or full-blown incidents, during his rapid passage from the commencement to the development of the historic fragment he engages to run over; and, unmindful of numerous beauties, as to diction and manner, and a greater multitude of interesting notations as to men and things, hies forward to the end of the narration, and contents himself with a bare knowledge of the main facts recorded therein: like that alert summer emigrant, the swallow, which, over the water and over the earth, darts in every direction, without touching either, while its sole occupation is that of catching flies. What do these persons acquire by their reading? Food for vanity. They can boast how much they have devoured, just as a glutton or a drunkard can boast how much he has eaten or drunk without digestion. They are no wiser, no better than when they set out. The flies they have caught are not food for nourishment. A reader biased by a particular passion, no matter what, generally reads with the view of procuring food for his favourite propensity: he, therefore, chooses such books, and selects such parts of them, as minister thereto; disregarding almost every other notation, however wise, however interesting, or however useful, in any other respect. The affinity of congeniality seizes upon the favourite viand, and, with gluttonous ecstasy, gorges this to surfeiting; while a frightful vacuity pervades the soul, as to every other subject. A succession of such readings acts upon the mind like strong drink upon the vitals of the drunkard. Benumbed by the intoxicating power of the preceding dose, the succeeding stimulant must be stronger, in order to produce a sensation upon languishing vitality, overheated and debilitated by continued excess; and, as from weak mixtures of spirit and water, the drunkard increases the strength of his potations, until proof brandy itself is drunk alone, and even accounted not too ardent for the cravings of the sot; so the reading of a person under the influence of passion, must be less and less diluted with extraneous matter, until nothing will please but the clear ardent spirit of the passion itself. Wanton youth and libidinous age read, with increasing avidity, those luscious themes which minister to the baser passions; while within their frame, in unison with the theme, sensations of unhallowed delights debauch their spirits. Myriads, who once blushed as they read, although alone, have eventually familiarized the subject to their souls, by perpetuated recurrences to the same lustful ideas, until at length they have even gloried in what occasioned their former shame. Alas! for youth! While the fear of a tarnish to their fair reputation keeps them aloof from the abandoned multitude, too many indulge, in secret, in the unhallowed debauch of obscene reading; not sufficiently aware of the awful consequences; and, indeed, not even aware of that trite observation, "Shew me the company he keeps, and I will shew you the man!" or, what is precisely the same, "Shew me the books he reads, and I will shew you his character!" Is it possible the books which any man or any woman constantly reads, can be long kept a profound secret? Poetry, the heroes of which are debauchees and seducers, and the heroines strumpets, dignified with names high and 40 pompous, and trimmed with sentiments specious and imposing, flaming with all the paraphernalia of royal, princely, or ducal dignity, and wearing the semblance of honesty and honour, with pretensions to integrity and worth above the greatest of the great of mankind, is one of those vehicles of seduction to the soul. Clothed in well-set terms, eloquent, yea, sublime, and decked with all the pearls and jewels of metaphor and simile, enticing to betray, delusive sentiment abounds in every page, irreligious, yea profane, all is false and hollow. This debauch leads down the infatuated spirit to the chambers of death, amidst the ecstasy of admiration! Alas! with the gorgeous hues of a deadly serpent are these enchanted away from truth; they view the destroyer, and yet are destroyed by him! Fuel to the flame of lust, and to the baseness of depravity, thus piled up, they erect a pyre, amidst which the soul is consumed. Prose, also, under the names of novels, romances, and tales, an endless labyrinth of lewdness and debauchery; clothing crime in robes of honesty, and guilt in garments of celestial hue; portraying life, not as it is or ever can be, but in inflated forms and colourings of the most florid glare, is twin-sister to such poetry; they alike consume their votaries by over excitement, and few who early enter their pavilions escape destruction. Blessed is the man who gives his youth to Jehovah; and equally so the woman: these early acquire a zest for superior reading; the Word of God-the revelation made by Him to man becomes their delight; and therein do they meditate continually. Instead of mental debauchery, theirs is the purity of devotional feelingtheir reading leads up the soul to Him who purifies the heart, and enkindles that hallowed flame of love which is an earnest of, and terminates in, the ecstacy of glory. (To be continued.) AN ESSAY ON INSTINCT. IN its most general acceptation, instinct is a natural disposition, or sagacity, wherewith animals are endued; and by virtue whereof they are enabled to provide for themselves, and know what is good for them, and are determined to preserve and propagate their species. The term instinct, however, has been variously explained and defined. Instinct, acording to Dr. Reid, is a natural blind impulse to certain actions, without having any end in view, without deliberation, and 41 An Essay on Instinct. very often without any conception of what we do; and he considers instinct as one species of the most mechanical principles of action, the other being habits. Arch. deacon Paley defines instinct to be "a propensity prior to experience, and independent of instruction."-volume iii. p. 177. An ingenious writer, of whose observations we avail ourselves in the compilation of this article, defines instinct to be a tendency implanted in the minds of animals, when under the influence of certain feelings or sensations, to perform spontaneously, unerringly, independently of all teaching and experience, and without any determinate view to consequences, certain actions necessary for the preservation of the individual and the continuation of the kind. Instinct in brutes bears some analogy to reason in men. There have been many systems adopted, to explain the principles which produce and direct the spontaneous actions of brute animals. Many of the ancient philosophers ascribed to brutes an understanding differing only in degree from that of man, and attributed their inferiority to the want of proper and sufficient bodily organs. This system has been very strenuously sup. ported by M. Helvetius, de l'Esprit, tom. i. p. 2, &c. Among the moderns, the learned Cudworth endeavoured to explain the instinct of animals, by means of a certain plastic nature. Des Cartes thought that all the actions of brute animals might be explained by the simple laws of mechanism; and he considers them as machines totally devoid of life and sentiment, but so curiously constructed by the Creator, that the mere impressions of light, sound, and other external agents, on their organs, produced a series of motions in them, and caused them to execute those various operations, which had before been ascribed to an internal principle of life and spontaneity. But the actions and manners of animals, which are totally incompatible with the mere principles and laws of mechanism, evince the absurdity of this opinion. The dogma of Des Cartes is said to have been first introduced by Pherecydes, the master of Pythagoras; and though Des Cartes had the merit of developing and applying this hypothesis, the doctrine was before published by the Spaniard Pereira. M. Buffon adopts the opinion of Des Cartes in part, but grants brute animals life, and the faculty of distinguishing be 42 tween pleasure and pain, together with a strong inclination to the former and aversion from the latter. By these inclinations and aversions he undertakes to account for all, even the most striking operations of animals; affirming, that, in consequence of impressions made on the brain by means of the sensitive organs, and by the re-action of the brain and nerves on the muscles, these machines acquire a motion conformable to the nature of the animal, and of the impressions of the different objects which act upon their organs, and excite desire or aversion. The pre-established harmony of Leibnitz has also been applied to explain the actions of brute animals. Others have considered the actions of animals as produced by the constant and immediate influence of the divine energy, directing all their inclinations and motions: such appears to have been the opinion of Mr. Addison, in the second volume of the Spectator. The late ingenious Hermann Samuel Reimar, professor of philosophy at Hamburgh, has enumerated and exposed these and other opinions, with regard to the instinct of animals, in his Observations Physiques, &c. published in two vols, 12mo. at Amsterdam and Paris, 1770: and, defining instinct, in the most comprehensive sense of the word, to be every natural inclination, accompanied with a power, in animals, to perform certain actions, he divides instincts into three parts. The first, which he calls mechanical instincts, belong to the body considered as an organized substance, and are exercised blindly and independently of the will of the animal. Such are those which produce the motion of the heart and lungs, the contraction and dilatation of the pupil, digestion, &c. This class of instincts is possessed in common both by men and brutes, and in some measure even by vegetables. The second class comprehends those which he terms representative instincts, which consist partly in the power of perceiving external objects by their present impression on the senses, and partly in the faculty of rendering the ideas of these objects present to the mind by the powers of imagination, or of memory, in a lax sense of the word. These are common to men and other animals, excepting that brutes possess only the faculty of imagination in common with us, and not that of memory, in the strict and proper sense of the word. Indeed, this author endeavours to prove, that the knowledge of brutes does not merely differ in |