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RELIGION IN AMERICA.

In theory nothing appears more rational than that every one should worship the Deity according to his own ideas-form his own opinion as to his attributes, and draw his own conclusions as to hereafter. An established church appears to be a species of coercion, not that you are obliged to believe in, or follow that form of worship, but that, if you do not, you lose your portion of certain advantages attending that form of religion which has been accepted by the majority and adopted by the government. In religion, to think for yourself wears the semblance of a luxury, and, like other luxuries, it is proportionably taxed.

And yet it would appear as if it never were intended that the mass should think for themselves,

as every thing goes on so quietly when other

people think for them, and every thing goes so wrong when they do think for themselves: in the first instance, where a portion of people think for the mass, all are of one opinion; whereas in the second, they divide and split into so many molecules, that they resemble the globules of water when expanded by heat, and like them are in a state of restlessness and excitement.

That the partiality shown to an established church creates some bitterness of feeling is most true, but, being established by law, is it not the partiality shown for the legitimate over the illegitimate? All who choose may enter into its portals, and if people will remain out of doors of their own accord, ought they to complain that they have no house over their heads? They certainly have a right to remain out of doors if they please, but whether they are justified in complaining afterwards is another question. Perhaps the unreasonableness of the demands of

the Dissenters in our own country will be better brought home to them by my pointing out the effects of the Voluntary System in the United States.

In America every one worships the Deity after his own fashion; not only the mode of worship, but even the Deity itself, varies. Some worship God, some Mammon; some admit, some deny, Christ; some deny both God and Christ; some are saved by living prophets only; some go to heaven by water, while some dance their way upwards. Numerous as are the sects, still are the sects much subdivided. Unitarians are not in unity as to the portion of divinity they shall admit to our Saviour; Baptists, as to the precise quantity of water necessary to salvation; even the Quakers have split into controversy, and the men of peace are at open war in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love.

The following is the table of the religious denominations of the United States, from the American Almanac of 1838:

TABLE of the RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS of the UNITED STATES.

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TABLE of the RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS of the UNITED STATES-Continued.

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