I. THEIR SUPERSTITIONS AND RITES OF WORSHIP: II. THEIR CIVIL INSTITUTIONS AND THEIR DEFECTIVE MORALS:

III. THEIR UNCERTAIN CONJECTURES IN RELATION TO FUTURITY.

I. THEIR SUPERSTITIONS AND RITES OF WORSHIP. And in contemplating the state of religion during the boasted reign of reason and philosophy, we cannot but be struck with their ignorance of

1. THE NATURE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. When man was left to wander over this wide globe without one cheering ray to guide his feet, the light of nature excepted, the progression of erroneous conclusions founded upon one false principle was rapid and extensive. He beheld this fair world covered with every thing necessary to his existence, and to his enjoyments. Spring enchanted all his senses: a summer's sun poured his glories around him: autumn furnished his table; and experience taught him to secure her bounty in his rude habitation, while the blasts of winter howled round his dwelling, and spread desolation over the plains. He perceived that these seasons regularly returned, and that they departed in their order. He concluded that they had their appointed periods; and this suggested to him the conviction of a supreme, over-ruling Intelligence. In every nation, and in every age, the conception of the being of a God, presented itself to the human mind; and an Atheist was a monster even in the days of heathenism. He had no clear conception, however, of spirit distinct from matter; and therefore conjectured that this God might be visible. HERE COMMENCED HIS ERRORS. He looked around in search of this great first cause. He beheld the sun as he performed his apparent journey

round the globe.

When his beams were tempered with gentleness, it was spring: when they poured their most fervid radiance upon the earth, it was summer: their continued vivification produced the maturity of autumn; and their total absence, or partial influence, the storms and the gloom of winter. re-appeared, the snow dissolved, rivers and the face of nature was renewed. jects around him, which could be so likely to be the God of nature? or, in the eye of philosophy itself, what presented so perfect a resemblance of the Deity? The Persian raised him an altar, and bowed with fervor before his shrine.

But, when he flowed afresh, Of all the ob

But the sun was not the only benefactor of man. Night spread her mantle over him, and he sought repose. The moon lighted him from his labor, and dif fused a silvery, partial illumination upon the face of creation, which before her rising was enveloped in perfeet obscurity. In her appearance she resembled the ruler of the day; and the conclusion was irresistible, that she ought to divide with him the honors of worship. Thus while the sun scorched the head of the adoring Persian: the worshippers of the moon rent the air with shouting, "Great is Diana of the Ephesians." Still but treo of the hosts of heaven were considered. The smaller appearances of light, kindled in the skies, during the absence of the sun, were deemed of the same nature, and supposed to answer the same purposes, with the larger; and it was at length inferred that they also should be remembered as objects of adoration; although possibly subordinately to the others, as they were inferior in glory. HENCE SPRANG POLY

THEISM.

The arts and sciences in the mean time advanced;

and while they were erecting for themselves splendid habitations, they thought that their deities ought to derive some honor from the enlargement of useful knowledge. Temples arose, and altars were elevated. There the worshipper adored his supposed deity with greater convenience. A resemblance of his God occurred to his mind, as desirable. The idea was eagerly adopted. On some altars the fire flamed, as the purest emblem of the sun. Others copied the figure of the waxing moon, and described a crescent. Others adored the resemblance of a star.* But the Egyptian ever ready in symbols, considered the qualities of his deities; and whether they were energy or fervor as in the sun, or gentleness and softness as in the moon, he represented them by the unbending strength of manhood, or the mild, dignified chastity of the woman. When the inind had once seized the counterpart of its imaginary god in nature, there quickly sprang up an Apollo, and a Hercules,and a Diana. HERE AROSE IMAGE-WORSHIP.

Nor did human infatuation end here. Every object around them was deified. The heavens, the air, the sea, the very earth, were adored under the names of Jupiter, Juno, Neptune, and Cybele. The catalogue was swelled to infinity! Their fellow men whom they either feared or loved, were exalted to heavenly dominion. A conqueror deluged the world in blood. Desolation attended his footsteps. The wreath with which he bound his forehead was nurtured in the field of slaughter, and washed in the tears of widows and orphans. Sighs filled the floatings of his banner; and he drove his chariot with frozen insensibility over the slain in the midst of the battle. He was a curse to the earth, and execrated by the nations. He enlarged indeed

⚫ Acts vii, 43.

the limits of his empire; but every inch of ground added to his own dominions, was an encroachment upon those of his neighbors, and was purchased at the expense of the heart's blood of his contemporaries. After his death, dazzled by his exploits, his infatuated subjects paid him divine honors, and placed him among their worthless deities. One man taught his countrymen to cast seed into the ground, after it had been broken up, and thus to cause "the little one to become a thousand:" and he was worshipped as presiding over the fruits of the earth. Another availed

himself of the cloudless atmosphere of Babylon, and ascending a lofty tower, made early observations on the heavenly bodies: he was adored as the king of heaven. A third by dint of attention, foretold the return of periodical winds; and he was worshipped as having charge of the storms, under the name of Æolus. A fourth crossed the ocean, and in a frail bark committed himself to the mercy of the winds and waves. Both the hero and his ship were instantly translated to the skies; and at this hour a constellation in the heavens bears their name, and keeps the daring enterprise in remembrance. While a fifth discovering medicinal virtues in plants, and applying them with success in certain cases, became the god of medicine, was said to unpeople the grave, and was adored under the name of Esculapius. To pursue the subject, would be useless and wearisome; every part of the heavens, the earth, the air, the sea, and the supposed infernal world, was crowded with deities; and every succeeding tyrant, as the first act of his reign, gave his merciless predecessor a place among the gods.

While they all professedly admitted that there was

• See note 1, at the end of the Volume.

one supreme being who presided over their multiplied divinities, and held them all in subjection, they perpetually disagreed on the point to whom this honor belonged; and the supreme deity of one country, held only a subordinate place in another.

Respecting the attributes of the objects of their worship, they discovered unequalled ignorance and impiety. We are compelled to draw a veil over the principles and operations of these pretended deities; for the tale is too gross to recite in the ear of modesty; and the picture could not meet the eye, without calling up a blush of shame, sorrow, and indignation, on the check of innocence. Who must not shudder with horror when he reads, that these sons of reason and philosophy, ascribed to the holy and invisible God, uncleanness, and every detestable vice?* We will pass on from the nature and number of their deities, to consider,

2. THEIR WORSHIP OF GOD. Their religious adoration, so called, was such as would have been better suited to the house of an harlot, than to the temple of God. Lasciviousness was sanctioned, encouraged, and practised, under the holy and venerable name of religion. The more infamous the rites, the more acceptable were they supposed to be to the Deity. apostle Paul has delineated in strong colors, the affecting depravity of that dreary and comfortless period.

The

"Because when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imagination; a ad their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools; and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God,

The gross impurity to which this paragraph alludes, was principally ascribed in the mythology of the heathens to Jupiter, their supreme deity.