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what I have advanced will not convince you that there is affirmative evidence, and of the ftrongelt kind, for Mofes's being the author of thefe books, nothing that I can advance will convince you.

What if I fhould grant all you undertake to prove (the stupidity and ignorance of the writer excepted)? ... What if I fhould admit, that Samuel or Ezra, or fome other learned Jew, compofed these books, from public records, many years after the death of Mofes ? Will it follow, that there was no truth in them? According to my logic, it will only follow, that they are not genuine books; every fact recorded in them may be true, whenever, or by whom. foever they were written. It cannot be faid that the Jews had no public records; the Bible furnishes abundance of proof to the contráty. I by no means admit, that thefe books, as to the main part of them, were not written by Mofes; but I do contend, that a book may contain a true history, though we know not the author of it, or though we may be mistaken in afcribing it to a wrong author,

The firft argument you produce against Mofes being the author of thefe books is fo old, that I do not know it's original author; and it is fo miferable a one, that I wonder you should adopt it:

"These books cannot be written by Mofes, because they are written in the third perfon --- it is always, The Lord faid unto Mofes, or Mofes faid unto the Lord. This, you fay, is the ftyle and manner that hiftorians ufe in fpeaking of the perfons whose lives and actions they are writing." This obfervation is true, but it does not extend far enough; for this is the ftyle and manner not only of hiftorians writing of other persons, but of eminent men, fuch as Xenophon and Jofephus, writing of themselves. If General Washington fhould write the hiftory of the American war, and thould, from his great modefty, fpeak of himself in the third perfon, would you think it reasonable that, two or three thousand years hence, any perfon fhould, on that account, contend, that the hiflory was not true? Cafar writes of himself in the third perfonit is always, Cæfar made a fpeech, or a fpeech was made to Cæfar, Cæfar croffed the Rhine, Cæfar invaded Britain; but every school-boy knows, that this circumftance cannot be adduced as a serious argument against Cæfar's being the author of his own Commentaries.

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But Mofes, you urge, cannot be the author of the book of Numbers, because he fays of himself." that Mofes was a very meek man, above all the men that were on the face of the earth." If he faid this of himfelf, he was, you fay, "a vain and arrogant coxcomb, (fuch is your phrafe!) and unworthy of credit

and if he did not fay it, the books are without authority." This your dilemma is perfectly harmless: it has not an horn to hurt the weakest logician. If Mofes did not write this little verfe, if it was inferted by Samuel, or any of his countrymen, who knew his character and revered his memory, will it follow that he did

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not write any other part of the book of Numbers? Or if he did not write any part of the book of Numbers, will it follow that he did not write any of the other books of which he is ufually reputed the author? And if he did write this of himfelf, he was juftified by the occafion which extorted from him this commendation. Had this expreffion been written in a modern ftyle and manner, it would probably have given you no offence. For who would be fo faftidious as to find fault with an illuftrious man, who, being calumniated by his neareft relations, as guilty of pride and fond of power, fhould vindicate his character by faying, My temper was naturally as meek and unaffuming as that of any man upon earth? There are occafions, in which a modeft man, who fpeaks truly, may fpeak proudly of himself, without forfeiting his general character; and there is no occafion, which either more requires, or more excufes this conduct, than when he is repelling the foul and envious afperfions of those who both knew his charafter and had experienced his kindnefs: and in that predicament food Aaron and Miriam, the accufers of Mofes. You yourself have, probably, felt the fting of calumny, and have been anxious to remove the impreffion. I do not call you a vain and arrogant coxcomb for vindicating your character, when in the latter part of this very work you boaft, and I hope truly, that the man does not exist that can fay I have perfecuted him, or any man, or any fet of men, in the American revolution, or in the French revolution; or that I have in any cafe returned evil for evil." I know not what kings and priests may fay to this; you may not have returned to them evil for evil, because they never, I believe, did you any harm; but you have done them all the harm you could, and that without provocation.

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I think it needless to notice your obfervation upon what you call the dramatic ftyle of Deuteronomy: it is an ill-founded hypothefis. You might as well afk, where the author of Cæfar's Commentaries got the fpeeches of Cæfar, as where the author of Deuteronomy got the fpeeches of Mofes. But your argument ... that Mofes was not the author of Deuteronomy, because the reafon given in that book for the obfervation of the fabbath is different from that given in Exodus, merits a reply.

You need not be told that the very name of this book imports, in Greek, a repetition of a law; and that the Hebrew doctors have called it by a word of the fame meaning. In the fifth verse of the first chapter it is faid in our Bibles, "Mofes began to declare this law;" but the Hebrew words, more properly tranflated, import that Mofes "began, or determined, to explain the law." This is no fhift of mine to get over a difficulty; the words are fo rendered in moft of the ancient verfions, and by Fagius, Vetablus, and Le Clerc, men eminently fkilled in the Hebrew language. This repetition and explanation of the law, was a wife and benevolent proceeding in Mofes; that those who were either not born, or were mere infants, when it was first (forty years before) deli. 4 E 2 vered

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vered in Horeb, might have an opportunity of knowing it; efpe. cially as Mofes their leader was foon to be taken from them, and they were about to be fettled in the midst of nations given to idolatry and funk in vice. Now where is the wonder, that fome variations, and fome additions, fhould be made to a law, when a legiflator thinks fit to republish it many years after it's first promulgation?

With respect to the fabbath, the learned are divided in opinion concerning it's origin; fome contending, that it was fanctified from the creation of the world; that it was observed by the patri. archs before the flood; that it was neglected by the Ifraelites during their bondage in Egypt; revived on the falling of manna in the wildernefs; and enjoined, as a pofitive law, at mount Sinai. Others efteem it's inftitution to have been no older than the age of Mofes; and argue, that what is faid of the fan&tification of the fabbath in the book of Genefis, is faid by way of anticipation. There may be truth in both thefe accounts. To me it is probable, that the memory of the creation was handed down from Adam to all his pofterity; and that the feventh day was, for a long time, held facred by all nations, in commemoration of that event; but that the peculiar rigidnefs of it's obfervance was enjoined by Mofes to the Ifraelites alone. As to there being two reafons given for it's being kept holy, --- one, that on that day God refted from the work of creation -- the other, that on that day God had given them reft from the fervitude of Egypt I fee no contradiction in the accounts. If a man, in writing the hiftory of England, fhould inform his readers, that the parliament had ordered the fifth of November to be kept holy, because on that day God had delivered the nation from a bloody-intended maffacre by gunpowder; and if, in another part of his hiftory, he fhould affign the deliverance of our church and nation from popery and arbitrary power, by the arrival of King William, as a reafon for it's being kept holy; would any one contend, that he was not juflified in both these ways of expreffion, or that we ought from thence to conclude, that he was not the author of them both?

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You think "that law in Deuteronomy inhuman and brutal, which authorizes parents, the father and the mother, to bring their own children to have them ftoned to death for what it is pleased to call ftubbornnefs." You are aware, I fuppofe, that paternal power, amongst the Romans, the Gauls, the Perfans, and other nations, was of the moft arbitrary kind; that it extended to the taking away the life of the child. I do not know whether the Ifraelites in the time of Mofes exercifed this paternal power; it was not a custom adopted by all nations, but it was by many; and in the infancy of fociety, before individual families had coalefced into communities, it was probably very general. Now Mofes, by this law, which you efteem brutal and inhuman, hindered fuch an extravagant power from being either introduced or exercifed amongst the Ifraelites. This law is fo far from countenancing the arbitrary power of a father over the life of his child, that it

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takes from him the power of accufing the child before a magif trate the father and the mother of the child must agree in bringing the child to judgment -- and it is not by their united will that the child was to be condemned to death; the elders of the city were to judge whether the accufation was true; and the accufation was to be not merely, as you infinuate, that the child was stubborn, but that he was "ftubborn and rebellious, a glutton and a drunkard." Confidered in this light, you must allow the law to have been an humane reftriction of a power improper to be lodged with any parent.

That you may abuse the priests, you abandon your subject ·

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Priefs, you fay, preach up Deuteronomy, for Deuteronomy preaches up tythes."I do not know that priefts preach up Deuteronomy, more than they preach up other books of scripture ; but I do know that tythes are not preached up in Deuteronomy, more than in Leviticus, in Numbers, in Chronicles, in Malachi, in the law, the hiftory, and the prophets of the jewish nation. You go on --66 It is from this book, chap. xxv. ver. 4. they have taken the phrafe, and applied it to tything, "Thou fhalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn :" and that this might not escape obfervation, they have noted it in the table of contents at the head of the chapter, though it is only a fingle verfe of lefs than two lines. O priefts! priefts! ye are willing to be compared to an ox for the fake of tythes!"---Í cannot call this---reasoning---and I will not pollute my page by giving it a proper appellation. Had the table of contents, instead of fimply faying the ox is not to be muzzled --- faid --- tythes enjoined, or priests to be maintained -- there would have been a little ground for your cenfure. Whoever noted this phrase at the head of the chapter, had better reafon for doing it than you have attributed to them. They did it, becaufe St. Paul had quoted it, when he was proving to the Corinthians, that they who preached the gospel had a right to live by the gofpel: it was Paul, and not the priests, who first applied this phrafe to tything. St. Paul, indeed, did not avail himself of the right he contended for; he was not, therefore, interefted in what he faid. The reason, on which he grounds the right, is not merely this quotation, which you ridicule; nor the appointment of the law of Mofes, which you think fabulous; nor the injunction of Jefus, which you def pife; no, it is a reafon founded in the nature of things, and which no philofopher, no unbeliever, no man of common sense can deny to be a folid reafon: it amounts to this that "the labourer is worthy of his hire." Nothing is fo much a man's own, as his labour and ingenuity; and it is intirely confonant to the law of nature, that by the innocent use of these he should provide for his fubfiftence. Hufbandmen, artifts, foldiers, phyficians, lawyers, all let out their labour and talents for a ftipulated reward: why may not a prieft do the fame ? Some accounts of you have been published in England; but, conceiving them to

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have proceeded from a defign to injure your character, I never read them. I know nothing of your parentage, your education, or condition in life. You may have been elevated, by your birth, above the neceffity of acquiring the means of fuftaining life by the labour either of hand or head: if this be the cafe, you ought not to defpise those who have come into the world in lefs favourable circumftances. If your origin has been lefs fortunate, you must have supported yourself, either by manual labour, or the exercife of your genius. Why fhould you think that conduct difreputable in priests, which you probably confider as laudable in yourfelf? I know not whether you have not as great a diflike of kings as of priests: but that you may be induced to think more favourably of men of my profeffion, I will just mention to you that the payment of tythes is no new inftitution, but that they were paid in the most ancient times, not to priests only, but to kings. I could give you an hundred inftances of this: two may be fufficient. Abraham paid tythes to the king of Salem, four hundred years before the law of Mofes was given. The king of Salem was prieft alfo of the most high God. Priefts, you fee, existed in the world, and were held in high estimation, for kings were priests, long before the impoftures, as you efteem them, of the jewish and chriftian difpenfations were heard of. But as this inftance is taken from a book which you call "a book of contradictions and lies" -- the Bible; --- I will give you another, from a book, to the authority of which, as it is written by a profane author, you probably will not object. Diogenes Laertius, in his life of Solon, cites a letter of Pifftratus to that lawgiver, in which he fays I Pififtratus, the tyrant, am contented with the ftipends which were paid to thofe who reigned before me; the people of Athens fet apart a tenth of the fruits of their land, not for my private ufe, but to be expended in the public facrifices, and for the general good."

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A short account of the Life and Death of Mr. JOHN BRETTELL: by his Brother, Mr. JEREMIAH BRETTELL.

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OHN BRETTELL was born at Stourbridge in Worcestershire, in the year 1742. His parents were Members of the Church of England, and having the form of religion, they taught their children early to remember the Sabbath, to pray in private, and confcientiously to regard the daily discharge of that duty. As my brother grew up, he was frequently troubled for fuch parts of his conduct as he thought wrong, and was fenfible that he wanted fomething in religion which he had not. He frequently repeated the Ten Commandments, and made many refolutions to be good: but his rifing paffions and growing inclinations to folly, led him as often to break them. He then endeavoured to fatisfy himself, by hoping for a future day, when he should better perform his purpofes. About this time, one of his Cousins with whom be

was

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