" The author of this Apology has searched Scripture in vain
for 'sufficient certainty,' with respect to the long catalogue of
religious beliefs which agitate and distract society. Laying claim to
the character of a 'considering man,' he requires that Scripture to be
_proved_ the word of a God before appealed to, as His Revelation; a feat
no man has yet accomplished. Priests, the cleverest, most industrious,
and least scrupulous, have tried their hands at the pious work, but all
have failed. Notwithstanding the mighty labours of our Lardner's and
Tillemont's and Mosheim's, no case is made out for the divinity of
either the Old or New Testament. 'Infidels' have shown the monstrous
absurdity of supposing that any one book has an atom more divinity about
it than any other book. Those 'brutes' have completely succeeded in
proving that Christianity is a superstition, no less absurd than
Mohammedanism, and to the full as mischievous. To us, we candidly avow
that its doctrines, precepts, and injunctions appear so utterly opposed
to good sense, and good government, that we are persuaded even if it
were practicable to establish a commonwealth in harmony with them at
sun-rise it would infallibly go to pieces before sunset.
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