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    There are certain facts with which we are all acquainted that fill us with dismay , if this popular objection be the doctrine of revelation : That the great majority of human beings have not lived up- , to the acquirements of Christianity : That sensuality and

    selfishness ( the true original sin of nature ) have generally prevailed : "Phat natural evil ( of-which our native passions and appetites are the greatest beyond all estimation ) has universally produced moral evil : That

    the Scriptures seem to say that there are few that be saved , and if only those be who have completely overcome animal nature , the language o £ Scripture appears to be correct . Now when we take into the account the

    original strength of human appetites , and the unfavourable circumstances in which men are placed for their innocent gratification , the final lot of mankind becomes a most tremendous question . There is so much misery in this life , that it is a momentous

    question whether , considering this life alone , it be right for a man to become the father o £ a human being ; but if the popular doctrine concerning futurity be true , no man that exists should in any case or circumstances become a father . This is the one

    moral duty , which must swallow up every other . And that men become fathers , professing this belief , shews that no one does indeed believe it to be true ; for a man believing it true , iind becoming a father , is a monster , little better , though not indeed so bad * s the God whom he % professes to worship .

    Unprejudiced reason tells us , that although it may be right that the obtaining of eternal felicity should be very difficult , yet that the escape from eternal misery should at least be very ^ asy , if in any case a Creator could be justified in making it possible for any

    being to involve himself in such a calamity . ^ Besides what is this world and what are its enjoyments ? Taken singly and of itself it is what no human being would have on such a condition , and very few would have it upon no other condition , than what their

    present circumstances impose . It may be proper that very few should be saved , but it never can be just , that any should be damned , if by that be meant any thing more than destruction . A human legislator can

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    only punish , a divine can reward and to an extent more than equal to an difference of character . How can then the popular doctrine stand and if it be Christianity — how can that religion be defended . All other

    objections are as dust in the balance this is first , last , amidst , around and above them all , and 1 should hope that your publication would ever keep it in its eye , for the time will soon come , that this doctrine must be otherwise

    explained , or Christianity will be uui versally discarded . SENEX .

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    Sir , July 30 , 1816 . AS truth ought to be the sole object of religious as well as philosophical inquiry , men who pretend to be friends to the human race , will not be permitted by those who really are so , to impose their conjectures on the

    world as so many facts . The art of thinking justly on interesting subjects , especially on religion , is nevertheless generally speaking , but little understood . The multitude are dazzled too much by authority and prejudice , to

    view with steadiness , or to measure correctly the perfect symmetry of unveiled truth . They are used to think as they have been taught , and believe what they have been told ; thus many things which are received , as obvious

    and essential truths , concerning natural and revealed religion , are certainly no better than vulgar prejudices ;— often , pernicious errors , as dishonourable to God as they are contradictory to the concurring dictates of reason and revelation . Commonly

    these errors lie at the root of a system , consequently the data being false , the reasoning from tl \| m is sophistry , and its moral tender ^ often detrimental to the interest of virtue . Such , I am fully convinced , are the popular opinions concerning orig inal sin . in

    this paper I purpose with your permission to lay before some of the occasional readers of your Miscellany who hold that doctrine , my reasons for rejecting it . Educated as I was in the -Established Church , where the

    Calvinistic articles of that Church were constantly enforced , as well in . ^ domestic circle as from the pulp > J was natural that till I began to examine for myself , I should receive them as others do , without hesitation-I supposed that they were believed y

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    514 Scriptural Examination of Original Sin .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1816, page 514, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2456/page/14/