“In this consists your error. There is no certainty as to who wrote the history of the wonders, said to have been wrought in your behalf, nor at what time they were first recorded. But the internal evidence of the books ascribed to Moses, fully prove him not to have been the author. The same evidence also proves that the first five books were not written till after the reign of the first kings of Israel. So that, by antedating the wonders recorded to have taken place in the infancy of your nation, and then by a cunning impostor to have been subsequently presented for the first time to the Jews, giving them an account of those wonders of old, an ignorant nation would be likely to believe them; and in that case a whole people would be converted at once, giving credit to an absurdity producing an influence in the world which has far exceeded any imposture that ever has been Saddled on the human race. The dreadful error into which your forefathers fell, and by handing down to their posterity the foolish story of your being _a chosen people_, the greatest curse which could befal you, you have, without doubt, been the most unfortunate people on earth; for by considering yourselves _God’s chosen people_, you have despised the rest of the human race, and you have in return been persecuted and plundered. You have been treated by all nations as outcasts. “On the ground-work of your having been chosen by the supposed God of the universe, the world has assumed an appearance very unlike to what it would have had, if no such imposition had been practised on your progenitors. Wars innumerable have taken place, and rivers of blood have flowed through the earth, occasioned by theological strife. Religious quarrels, ending in the application of the rack and torture, and persecutions in quick succession, have been the result, and thousand of horrid cruelties have taken place in every age, all in consequence of that curse of all curses, the belief that _God has a chosen people_. Although it had doubtless been thought by your nation the highest possible honor to be chosen by the Lord, this has proved your greatest misfortune; for from this source, Christianity has been produced. You may exult in the idea, that you have in your sacred books, the doctrine of but one God, notwithstanding your religion and its Christian offspring has been more cruel and intolerant than any on earth. According to your own books, your nation and the God who chose them, were forever at war; your people continually rebelling and receiving chastisement, till, at last, you are to appearance forsaken. But as has been before mentioned, the Infidels are your friends; for, by means of free discussion, and the diffusion of useful knowledge, they will ultimately destroy that intolerant spirit which has been the earth’s greatest curse, and you will eventually, with the rest of the human family, open your eyes, and discover the folly and absurdity of