life in the practice of virtue and the attainment of knowledge, that when the winter approaches and is about to shut the scene, the bed of death will be smoothed with the reflection, that they have so well employed every season of their life, that they can look forward with hope and even certainty to a state beyond the grave, where there is no care or sorrow, but where blooms eternal spring.

EXTRACTS FROM A PORT-FOLIO.

[Communications for this Article will be at all times acceptable.]

TH

CURSING WITH BELL, BOOK, AND CANDLE.

HE following is extracted from Burn's history of Westmoreland, and explains the use that was made by priests of cursing with Bell, Book, and Candle--" At the further Brough there was a chapel or oratory, founded by John Brumskill, unto whom Thomas Blenkinsop, Esq. of Holbeck, gave the ground called Gibgarth, on condition that he should build a chapel there and also an hospital, with two beds in it for travellers and other poor people, and maintain and repair the same for ever; paying to him and his heirs two pence rent at Pentecost yearly. And on defect of such maintaining and repairing the said cha pel, hospital, and beds, the land to revert to the said Thomas and his heirs. In pursuance whereof, he the said John Brumskill founded an oratory orchapel, dedicated to our lady St. Mary, the Mother of Christ, and to St. Gabriel the archangel, who, as Roger Bishop of Carlisle, and Richard Abbot of Shap, did by writing under their hands and seals affirm, wrought many fair and divers miracles by the sufferance of our Lord God. Two priests were established to sing and to pray in the said chapel for evermore, for the souls of the benefactors of the said chapel that were departed from the world, and for the welfare of them that were living; one of the said priests was to teach grammar, the other to instruct children, willing to learn, singing, freely, without any salary from them. The foundation of this chapel was confirmed both by the bishop of Carlisle and the archbishop of York, and yet was afterwards opposed by the Vicar of Brough, who conceived himself much prejudiced thereby, and particularly in respect of the oblations which were given from him to the said chapel. Whereupon he set up the cross, and lighted up candles in the church at mid-time of the day, caused the bells to be rung, and cursed with bell, book, and candle, all those that should receive any oblations of them that resorted to the said chapel, or should give any encou ragement unto the same. Brumskill, the founder, complained to the archbishop's court at York against the Vicar, Mr. Raisbeck, and obtained a sharp citation against him, censuring him as an abandoned wretch, and inflated with diabolical venom for opposing so good a work."

A Prayer used by the original Inhabitants of Madagascar, vulgarly termed Savages.

Oh! Eternal, have pity on me, because I am transitory; Oh! Infinite! because I am but an atom; Oh! Almighty! because I am weak; Oh! source of life because I am drawing near to the grave; Oh! thou who seest all things! because I amin darkness; Oh! all bounteous! because I am poor; Of all sufficient ! because I am nothing!

ORIGINAL POETRY.

MAGAZINE.

No. 15.]

MARCH, 1812.

[VOL. 2.

I

EVIDENCES OF REVEALED RELIGION.

Whence, but from heaven, could men, unskill'd in arts,
In diff'rent nations born, in diff'rent parts,
Weave such agreeing truths? or how, or why,
Should all conspire to cheat us with a lie?
Unask'd their pains--ungrateful their advice--
Starving's their gain, and martyrdom their price!

To the Editor of the Freethinking Christians' Magazine.

SIR,

STILL must express my surprise that none of your deistical correspondents have attempted to answer my questions. Surely, they are plainly stated, and if fallacious admit of a plain and easy answer. These gentlemen are extremely dictatorial in their demands when they propose questions, and why are they not as prompt when they are proposed to them? It is in deed urged by one, that all the arguments adduced in these evidences are the same as have been repeatedly urged before, and that there is nothing new in them. Admitting this to be the fact, there can then be no difficulty in answering them; for he will, no doubt, have the assistance of those who have before replied to such arguments. But if this were a justifiable reason why they should not be answered, might we not with equal propriety say, that all the objections which Deists now bring against revealed religion have been frequently urged and as often answered, and are therefore not entitled to any notice? This is a line of conduct we should be ashamed of; and to obviate the necessity of going over the old ground, I have placed the old argument in a new light, and put it on a new ground-one so simple and plain, that it cannot be mistaken by men of common sense, and which requires no great share of talent to refute, if Christianity be false.

In this essay 1 shall endeavour to bring proof of the resurrection of Jesus; a fact which, if it can be established, must compleatly destroy all cavilling for the future against the Christian religion. That such a person as Jesus existed and was crucified, even the Jews and Mr. Paine admit; but to put the matter beyond all dispute, we have the authority of Tacitus, the Roman historian, who was born about thirty, and wrote about seventy years, after the death of Jesus. He says, "with this view he VOL. II.

(Nero) inflicted the most exquisite torments on those men who, under the vulgar appellation of Christians, were already branded with deserved infamy. They derived their name and origin from Christ, who in the reign of Tiberius had suffered death by the sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate."**" And Mr. Gibbon says, that "the most sceptical criticism is obliged to respect the truth of this extraordinary fact, and the integrity of this celebrated passage of Tacitus." Here then we have established from enemies the important truth, that Jesus did live, and that he was put to death agreeable to the Scripture account of that circumstance. It only remains to prove that the other part, viz. his resurrection, is true also; but this must be established upon other ground, as it is not reasonable to expect the testimony of these men in its favor, whose prejudices and interest it so strongly militated against.

A correspondent in your last number (whom I do not quote by way of answering, as it would be contrary to the plan I have prescribed to myself, but by way of illustrating the subject), proposes a case as analogous to the resurrection of Jesus, and supposes that "a British consul in America writes to his government at home, that, on the first of January 1812, General Washington, who died in December, 1799, and was buried like other people, appeared in the senate-house, and in full congress delivered a most animated speech of three hours and a half, and then as suddenly and unexpectedly disappeared and was seen no more. Now (says he) let any man of sense and information ask himself if he could listen for a single instant to such a tale as this, though sworn to by Aristides and Cato." He then asks, "but why do we resist such a tale as the foregoing? is it not because we regard the settled and inflexible course of nature as furnishing motives of conviction, infinitely superior to those which result from any human testimony whatsoever?" I agree with him, that we could not give credit to the tale he has related, but not for the reasons assigned by him; for, in the first place, we are very imperfectly acquainted with what he calls the settled and inflexible laws of nature; in the second place, because though such a thing had never been heard of before, our present existence, which is equally mysterious, would prove that it was not impossible; "for the Being who gave it us (to use the words of Mr. Paine) can call us again into existence, when and in what manner and form he pleases." The thing, therefore, not being impossible, while I admit the existence of a God, and only being contrary to my little experience of the laws of nature, I could not reject it on such ground; but as

* Vide Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 2. page 405 + Ibid, page 407.

all facts of which we cannot be eye-witnesses, depend upon the combination of a variety of circumstances, either to detect their fallacy, or establish their truth-and the more improbable and contrary to our experience they are, the greater need there is for a number of these corroborating circumstances-I should examine it on quite different grounds. 1 should first enquire if the parties so reporting it were by any means interested in the story; and in this instance I should think it very probable that a government might propagate it for interested or political purposes; and therefore unless I had stronger evidence than he has stated, I of course should reject it. I should next enquire if the persons so reporting were prejudiced in favour of it by previous expectations of such an event-if they were men, under all the circumstances of the case, capable of being deceived themselves, or of dispositions and characters to wish to deceive others; if they exposed themselves to danger and death by the propagating such a story; and if on this story they founded a system that had for its end the promotion of virtue and happiness among mankind, or the contrary? These and a variety of other enquiries I should make, and from the combination of all these circumstances 1 should draw my conclusion; and 1 do hope to shew, that every necessary proof a reasonable man can require is connected with the resurrection of Jesus, and that the fact itself is as different, and stands upon as different evidence to the supposed case of General Washington, as a belief in the existence of witches and the shining of the sun at noon-day.

Now, Sir, as it respects the resurrection of Jesus, it is asserted that he died and was buried, and that God raised him from the dead the third day, and that he appeared to, and dwelt with his disciples for forty days. Here is no pretension that it originated from the settled and inflexible laws of nature, but by the immediate power of God; and no man will presume to say it is beyond the power of Deity to do such an act. Our only enquiry then is, what reasons have we at this distance of time for believing that he did so act; and the best mode of shewing those reasons will be by taking a view of all the circumstances of the case; and first, those persons who assure us of the fact, also tell us that Jesus constantly declared, before his death, that he should suffer, and rise again on the third day. Even his enemies bore testimony to this in their accusations against him before Pilate; and lest an imposition should be practised upon them, they intreated the Roman governor that a seal and guard should be put over his sepulchre. Here then his death, burial, and pretensions to a resurrection, are publicly recognised by the Jews, and Roman government; and every precaution taken that human foresight