that veneration for religion is quite compatible with a sound, practical understanding. Franklin was a man of a truly pious turn of mind. The great truths of natural theology were not only deeply engraved on his mind, but continually present to his thoughts. As far as can be collected from his writings, he appears to have been a Christian of the Unitarian school; but if his own faith had not gone so far, he at least would have respected the religion of his country and its professors, and done everything to encourage its propagation, as infinitely beneficial to mankind, even if doubts had existed in his own mind as to some of its fundamental doctrines."

Such are the opinions of Benj. Franklin on religious subjects. You can judge for yourselves whether they are Christian or anti-christian. I suppose you will take his own word for his belief. How happens it then that you claim him as an unbeliever? Because in early life he was led astray for a period. Let us now attend to this point. To understand the reason why and how he became a Deist. You may listen to the following passages from his own pen.

"From my infancy I was particularly fond of reading, and all the money that came into my hands was laid out in the purchasing of books." "My father's little library consisted chiefly of books in polemic divinity, most of which I read."

"There was

another bookish lad in the town, John Collins by name, with whom I was intimately acquainted. We sometimes disputed, and very fond we were of argument, and very desirous of confuting one another." "I had caught this by reading my father's books of dispute on religion."

"While I was intent on improving my language, I met with an English Grammar, having at the end of it two little sketches on the arts of rhetoric and logic, the latter finishing with a dispute in the Socratic method." "I was charmed with it, adopted it, dropped my abrupt contradiction and positive argumentation, and put on the humble inquirer. And from reading Shaftesbury, and Collins having been made a doubter, as I already was in many points of our religious doctrines, I found this method the safest for myself, and very embarrassing to those against whom I used it."

"I was rather inclined to leave Boston, when I reflected that I had already made myself a little obnoxious to the governing party, and from the arbitrary proceedings of the Assembly in my brother's case. It was likely I might, if I staid, soon bring myself into scrapes; and further, that my indiscreet disputations. about religion, began to make me pointed at with horror by good people as an infidel or atheist."

You here see the progress of his mind. He read his father's Calvinistic books and began to doubt the truth of most of the points in this system. He then read two infidel works, and began to doubt the truth of revelation. All this time you must remember that he was an uneducated printer's boy in Boston; and that his fondness for disputation acquired him the reputation of an unbeliever. We next find him in Philaadelphia. These are his words.

"My chief acquaintance at this time were Charles Osborne, Joseph Watson, James Ralph; all lovers of reading. Watson was a pious, sensible young man of great integrity; the others rather more lax in their principles of religion, particularly Ralph, who, as well as Collins, had been unsettled by me; for which they both made me suffer."-Life.

Ralph and Franklin went to England. Ralph left a wife and one child, and Franklin was engaged to Miss Read. These are his words.

"For myself, I immediately got into work at Palmer's, a famous printing-house at Bartholomew-close, where I continued nearly a year. I was pretty diligent, but I spent with Ralph a good deal of my earnings in plays and public amusements. We had nearly consumed all my pistoles, and now just rubbed on from hand to mouth. He seemed quite to have forgotten his wife and child; and I by degrees my engagements with Miss Read, to whom I never wrote more than one letter, and that was to let her know I was not likely soon to return. This was another of the great errata of my life, which I could wish to correct, were I to live it over again."

"At Palmer's, I was composing for the second edition of Wollaston's Religion of Nature. Some of his reasonings not appearing to me well founded, I wrote a little metaphysical piece in which I made remarks on them. It was entitled a "Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain." I inscribed it to my friend Ralph; I printed a small number. My printing this pamphlet was another erratum."

Soon after this Ralph married a milliner, although he had a wife and child in America. He went into the country to keep school, and left her under the protection of Franklin. Let him state the rest of the affair.

"I grew fond of her company, and being at that time under no religious restraint, and taking advantage of my importance to her, I attempted to take some liberties with her, another erratum, which she refused with a proper degree of resentment."

We now find Franklin returned to Philadelphia, preparing to establish himself in business. Let us see what he now says of his infidelity.

"Before I enter upon my public appearance in business, it may be well to let you know the then state of my mind, with regard to my principles and morals, that you may see how far those influenced the future events of my life. My parents had early given me religious impressions, and brought me through my childhood piously in the dissenting way. But I was scarce fifteen when, after doubting by turns several points, as I found them disputed in the different books I read, I began to doubt of the revelation itself. Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of the sermons which had been preached at Boyle's Lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them. For the arguments of the Deists which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist. My arguments perverted some others, particularly Collins and Ralph. But each of these having wronged me greatly without the least compunction, and recollecting Keith's conduct towards me, who was another free thinker, and my own towards Vernon and Miss Read, which at times gave me great trouble, I began to suspect that this doctrine, though it might be true, was not very useful.

"My London pamphlet appeared now not so clever a performance as I once thought it, and I doubted whether some error had not insinuated itself unperceived into my argument, so as to infect all that followed, as is common in metaphysical reasonings. I grew convinced that truth, sincerity, and integrity, in dealings between man and man, were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life; and I formed written resolutions which still remain in my journal book, to practise them ever while I lived. Revelation had indeed no weight with me as such; but I entertained an opinion, that though certain actions might not be bad, because they were forbidden by it, or because it commanded them; yet probably those actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or commanded because they were beneficial to us, in their own natures, all the circumstances of the things being considered. And this persuasion, with the kind hand of Providence, or some guardian angel, or accidental, favourable circumstances and situations, or all together, preserved me through this dangerous time of youth, and the hazardous situations I was sometimes in among strangers, remote from the eye and advice of my father, free from any wilful, gross immorality or injustice, that might have been expected from my want of religion."

I should think this language must satisfy any unbeliever, that Franklin found that infidelity would not do to live by. I will give one more extract showing just how far he went in his unbelief.

"I had been religiously educated as a Presbyterian; but though some of the dogmas of that persuasion, such as the eternal decrees of God, election, reprobation, etc. appeared to me unintelligible, others doubtful; and I early absented myself from the public assemblies of the sect, Sunday being my studying day, I never was without some religious principles. I never doubted, for instance, the existence of a Deity; that he made the world and governs it by his Providence; that the most acceptable service of God was the doing good to man; that our souls are immortal; and that all crimes will be punished and virtue rewarded, either here or hereafter. These I esteemed the essentials of every religion, and being to be found in all the religions we had in the country, I respected them all, though with different degrees of respect, as I found them more or less mixed with other articles which, without any tendency to inspire, promote, or confirm morality, served principally to divide us, and make us unfriendly to one another. This respect to all, with the opinion that the worst had some good effects, induced me to avoid all discourse that might tend to lessen the good opinion another might have of his religion."

Here then you see an old man writing his early life. He speaks plainly and decidedly against infidelity, and calls all those errors which he should wish to avoid in another life. He leaves the impression all along that his sentiments while writing were Christian. This no honest man will deny. It "may then be asked, on what ground he is claimed as an unbeliever? When R. D. Owen was called upon to prove that Franklin was an unbeliever, he advanced but one single passage, which I will now quote.

"Upon one of Whitefield's arrivals from England, at Boston, he wrote to me that he should soon come to Philadelphia, but knew not where he should lodge when there, as he understood his old friend and host, Mr. Benezet, was removed to Germantown. My answer was, You know my house; if you can make shift with its scanty accommodations, you will be most heartily welcome. He replied that if I made that offer for Christ's sake, I should not miss of a reward. And I returned, Dont let me be mistaken; it was not for Christ's sake, but for your sake.” Now what does all this prove? Simply that Franklin wished to have a joke with the canting Whitefield, and let him

1834.] Considerations for Philosophical Rejecters, &c. 557.

if

know that he had sufficient respect for himself to give him his board, without doing it as a deed to the absent Christ. Truly, you free inquirers can balance this against all the evidence I have presented, and say this outweighs all the passages quoted, your minds must be singularly constructed.

I have room for no further quotations, even if they were needed, as they are not. Now there are two sides to this question. Franklin was either a Christian or an infidel. I have produced enough of his own declarations to satisfy any one that he professed to hold Christian sentiments. If you still call him an unbeliever, you make him a hypocrite and a deceiver. Yes; there is no other ground. If then he was an infidel, he was a hypocrite and a deceiver; for he professed in public and private that he entertained Christian sentiments, and made others believe this. You are welcome to the man if this was his character, for every honest man must despise a hypocrite and deceiver. For my part, I believe he was a Christian, and, thus leave his character fair. BERNARD WHITMAN.

Considerations for Philosophical Rejecters of the Christian Faith.

[Continued from page 536.]

2. In the second place a dishonest will may appear in the examination of the Christian evidences when our faith is charged with evil influences and effects of which it has not been the source. There is an appearance of dishonesty at the outset. For how can there be either moral candour or philosophical exactness in testing the truth of Christianity by the character of its supposed influences and results. Let us for a moment yield the point to the infidel as to what those influences and results have in fact been. Because Christianity seems to me to have acted unfavourably upon man's temporal good, did therefore Christ not live? Because, as the pretence is, his instructions have made men superstitious, did he not therefore, by mighty works, prove his commission from God? Mere opinions as to what have been the tendencies of Christianity can no more overthrow the facts of Christianity, than the fact of the fall and decline of the Roman