Though her pain was violent for many hours, and very much hindered the defired composure of her thoughts; yet in this fhe was fubmiffive to the divine will, and patient under his hand. But it pleafed God to give her eafe the remaining part of her time, when she took occafion to exprefs the inward joy that fhe experienced. When cordials were applied for the refreshment of weak and fainting nature, the faid, "I have better cordials to re fresh me than thefe." 66 The last two days of her life she seemed wholly difengaged from every thing in this world, as one that had taken her leave of all things here below, and was at leifure for nothing but heavenly contemplations. Her difcourfe was very affecting. Whenever fhe fpoke of herself it was with the moft foul-humbling expreffions; but how often did the extol and admire the love of God in Chrift! The fame truths that she was refreshed with in life were her comfort and delight in death. She had the felf-fame abafing; yea, felf-abhorring and grace-advancing thoughts. She had a full affurance of falvation, and of an abundant entrance with a holy triumph adminiftered into it; often speaking in the words of the Apoftle, 2 Tim. i. 12, "I know whom I have believed, and I am perfuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed' unto him against that day." And with joy unfpeakable, making ufe of those words with application to herfelf, Jude, ver. 24. "Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to prefent you faultlefs before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy." Her inward peace was too great to be expreffed: She faid, "Time will fail me to exprefs what comfort I have." When nature was very weak, and her ftrength and spirits exhaufted, fhe blessed God that her faith did not fail. No; that was strongest when outward comforts were at a very low ebb; and the had thereby those clear manifeftations of Chrift, and foul-refreshing foretaftes of glory, which were a kind of heaven in her way to it. Her laft words were with rapture of admiration, "O thofe rays of glory!" Thus her foul took its flight into the bofom of Jefus, to enjoy what it had long waited for, namely, further discoveries of his love, and to be clothed with immortality, and enjoy eternal life. LETTER III. from the Bishop of Landaff to Thomas Paine. AVING done with what you call the grammatical evidence that Mofes was not the author of the books attributed to him, you come to your hiftorical and chronological evidence; and you begin with Genefis. Your argument is taken from the fingle word-Dan-being found in Genefis, when it appears from the book of Judges, that the town of Laith was not called Dan, till above three hundred and thirty years after the death of Mofes; VOL. XIX. Dec. 1796. therefore Left therefore the writer of Genefis, you conclude, must have lived after the town of Laish had the name of Dan given to it. this objection fhould not be obvious enough to a common capacity, you illuftrate it in the following manner: "Havre-de Grace was called Havre-Marat in 1793; fhould then any dateless writing be found, in after times, with the name of Havre-Marat, it would be certain evidence that fuch a writing could not have been written till after the year 1793." This is a wrong conclufion. Suppose fome hot republican fhould at this day publish a new edition of any old history of France, and inftead of Havre-de Grace fhould write Havre-Marat; and that, two or three thousand years hence, a man, like yourself, fhould, on that account, reject the whole hiftory as fpurious, would he be justified in fo doing? Would it not be reasonable to tell him that the name Havre-Marat had been inserted, not by the original author of the history, but by a fubfequent editor of it: and to refer him, for a proof of the genuineness of the book, to the teftimony of the whole French nation? This fuppofition fo obviously applies to your difficulty, that I cannot but recommend it to your impartial attention. But it this folution does not please you, I defire it may be proved, that the Dan, mentioned in Genefis, was the fame town as the Dan, mentioned in Judges. I defire, further, to have it proved, that the Dan, mentioned in Genefis, was the name of a town, and not of a river. It is merely faid- Abram pursued them, the enemies of Lot, to Dan. Now a river was full as likely as a town to ftop a purfuit. Lot, we know, was fettled in the plain of Jordan; and Jordan, we know, was compofed of the united freams of two rivers, called for and Dan. Your next difficulty refpects it's being faid in Genefis-" These are the kings that reigned in Edom before there reigned any king over the children of Ifrael: this paffage could only have been written, you fay (and I think you fay rightly), after the first king began to reign over Ifrael; fo far from being written by Mofes, it could not have been written till the time of Saul at the leaft." I admit this inference, but I deny it's application. A fmall addition to a book does not defroy either the genuineness or the au thenticity of the whole book. I am not ignorant of the manner in which commentators have answered this objection of Spinoza, without making the conceffion which I have made; but I have no fcruple in admitting, that the paffage in queftion, consisting of nine verfes containing the genealogy of fome kings of Edom, might have been inferted in the book of Genefis, after the book of Chronicles (which was called in Greek by a name importing that it contained things left out in other books) was written. The learned have fhewn, that interpolations have happened to other books; but these infertions by other hands have never been confidered as invalidating the authority of those books. "Take away from Genefis," you fay, "the belief that Mofes was the author, on which only the frange belief that it is the Word - Word of God has flood, and there remains nothing of Genefis but an anonymous book of ftories, fables, traditionary or invented abfurdities, or of downright lies." What! is it a What is it a flory then that the world had a beginning, and that the author of it was God? If you deem this a story, I am not difputing with a deift. ical philofopher, but with an atheistic madman. Is it a flory, that our first parents fell from a paradifiacal ftate that this earth was deftroyed by a deluge that Noah and his family were preferved in the ark and that the world has been repeopled by his defcendants? Look into a book fo common that almost every body has it, and fo excellent that no perfon ought to be without it Grotius on the truth of the chriftian religion and you will there meet with abundant teftimony to the truth of all the principal facts recorded in Genefis. The teftimony is not that of Jews, chriftians, and priefts: it is the teftimony of the philofophers, hiftorians, and poets of antiquity. The oldeft book in the world is Genefis; and it is remarkable that those books which come nearest to it in age, are those which make, either the most diftinct mention of, or the most evident allufion to, the facts related in Genefis concerning the formation of the world from a chaotic mafs, the primeval innocence and fubfequent fall of macuthe longevity of mankind in the first ages of the world, the dep fority of the antediluvians, and the deftruction of the world,oad the tenth chapter of Genefis. It may appear to you to contain nothing but an uninterefting narration of the defcendants of Shem, Ham, and Japheth; a mere fable, an invented abfurdity, a downright lie, No, fir, it is one of the most valuable, and the moft venerable records of antiquity. It explains what all profane hiftorians were ignorant of the origin of nations. Had it told us, as other books do, that one nation had sprung out of the earth they inhabited; another from a cricket or a grasshopper; another from an oak; another from a mufhroom; another from a dragon's tooth; then indeed it would have merited the appellation you, with fo much temerity, beftow upon it. Inftead of thefe abfurdities, it gives fuch an account of the peopling the earth after the deluge, as no other book in the world ever did give; and the truth of which all other books in the world, which contain any thing on the fubject, confirm. The laft verfe of the chapter fays-"Thefe are the families of the fons of Noah, after their generations, in their nations and by these were the nations divided in the earth, after the flood." It would require great learning to trace out, precifely, either the actual fituation of all the countries in which thefe founders of empires fettled, or to ascertain the extent of their dominions. This, however, has been done by various authors, to the fatisfaction of all competent judges; fo much at least to my fatisfaction, that had I no other proof of the authenticity of Genefis, I should confider this as fufficient. But, without the aid of learning, any man who can barely read his Bible,and has but heard of fuch people as the Affyrians, the Elamites, the Lydians, the Medes, 4 M 2 Medes, the Ionians, the Thracians, will readily acknowledge that they had Affur, and Elam, and Lud, and Madai, and Javan, and Tiras, grandfons of Noah, for their refpective founders; and knowing this, he will not, I hope, part with his Bible, as a fyftem of fables. I am no enemy to philofophy; but when philofophy would rob me of my Bible, I muft fay of it, as Cicero faid of the twelve tables, -This little book alone exceeds the libraries of all the philofophers in the weight of it's authority, and in the extent of it's utility. From the abuse of the Bible, you proceed to that of Mofes, and again bring forward the subject of his wars in the land of Canaan. There are many men who look upon all war (would to God that all men faw it in the fame light!) with extreme abhorrence, as afflicting mankind with calamities not neceffary, fhocking to humanity, and repugnant to reafon. But is it repugnant to reafon that God fhould, by an express act of his providence, defroy a wicked nation? I am fond of confidering the goodness of God as the leading principle of his conduct towards mankind, of conHe punishes infidering his juftice as fubfervient to his mercy. dividuals and nations with the rod of his wrath; but I am perfuadedicat all his punishments originate in his abhorrence of fin; are ca! Dated to leffen it's influence; and are proofs of his goodness; ina. Ouch as it may not be poffible for Omnipotence itfelf to communicate fupreme happiness to the human race, whilft they contintie fervants of fin. The deftruction of the Canaanites exhibits to all nations, in all ages, a fignal proof of God's displeasure against fin; it has been to others, and it is to ourselves, a benevolent warning. Mofes would have been the wretch you reprefent him, had he acted by his own authority alone but you may as reasonably attribute cruelty and murder to the judge of the land in condemning criminals to death, as butchery and maffacre to Mofes in executing the command of God. The Midianites, through the counfel of Balaam, and by the vicious inftrumentality of their women, had feduced a part of the If aelites to idolatry; to the impure, worship of their infamous god Baal-peor-for this offence, twenty-four thousand Ifraelites had perifhed in a plague from heaven, and Mofes received a command from God" to fmite the Midianites who had beguiled the people. An army was equipped, and fent against Midian. When the army returned victorious, Mofes and the princes of the "and Mofes was wroth with the congregation went to meet it ; officers." He obferved the women captives, and he asked with aftonishment, “Have ye faved all the women alive? Behold, thefe caufed the children of Ifrael, through the counfel of Balaam, to commit trefpafs against the Lord in the matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation." He then gave an order that the boys and the women fhould be put to death, but that the young maidens fhould be kept alive for themselves. I fee nothing in this proceeding, but good policy, combined with mercy. 2 The The young men might have become dangerous avengers of, what they would efteem, their country's wrongs; the mothers might have again allured the Ifraelites to the love of licentious pleasures and the practice of idolatry, and brought another plague upon the congregation; but the young maidens, not being polluted by the flagitious habits of their mothers, nor likely to create difturbance by rebellion, were kept alive. You give a different turn to the matter; you fay" that thirty-two thousand womenchildren were configned to debauchery by the order of Moses."Prove this, and I will allow that Mofes was the horrid monster you make him-prove this, and I will allow that the Bible is what you call it a book of lies, wickedness, and blafphemy"-prove this, or excufe my warmth if I fay to you, as Paul faid to Elymas the forcerer, who fought to turn away Sergius Paulus from the faith, "O full of all fubtilty, and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord ?"-I did not, when I began these letters, think that I should have been moved to this feverity of rebuke, by any thing you could have written; but when fo grofs a mifreprefention is made of God's proceedings, coolness would be a crime. The women-children were not referved for the purposes of debauchery, but of flavery ;-a custom abhorrent from our manners, but every where practifed in former times, and ftill practised in countries where the benignity of the christian religion has not foftened the ferocity of human nature. You here admit a part of the account given in the Bible refpecting the expedition against Midian to be a true account; it is not unreasonable to defire that you will admit the whole, or fhew fufficient reafon why you admit one part, and reject the other. I will mention the part to which you have paid no attention. Ifraelitish army confifted but of twelve thousand men, a mere handful when oppofed to the people of Midian; yet, when the officers made a mufter of their troops after their return from the war, they found that they had not loft a fingle man! This circumftance ftruck them as fo decifive an evidence of God's interpofition, that out of the fpoils they had taken they offered "an oblation to the Lord, an atonement for their fouls." Do but believe what the captains of thousands, and the captains of hundreds, believed at the time when these things happened, and we fhall never more hear of your objections to the Bible, from it's account of the wars of Mofes. - The You produce two or three other objections respecting the genuineness of the first five books of the Bible. I cannot ftop to notice them every commentator answers them in a manner fuited to the apprehenfion of even a mere English reader. You calcu Jate, to the thousandth part of an inch, the length of the iron bed of Og the king of Bafan; but you do not prove that the bed was too big for the body, or that a Patagonian would have been loft in it. You make no allowance for the fize of a royal bed; nor ever fufpect |