But have I not occasion, sir, to be surprised to find your first proposition adduced as evidence unfavourable to the christian scriptures? Was there ever a time when the world of human kind, both Jews and Gentiles, was more deeply involved in the darkness and stupidity of superstition than when the Messiah entered on his public ministry? If the doctrine of Jesus had been pleasing to the superstitious Jews, if it had accorded with the idolatrous notions of the Gentiles, (which was impossible) if his Messiahship had been espoused by both, and by their consent and influence had been handed down, and declared to have been evidenced by all the miracles recorded in the four Evangelists, do you not see that your first proposition would be of Herculean strength against this religion? On the contrary, it being well established, from unquestionable authority, that as St. Paul observed, Christ crucified was a stumbling block to the Jews, and to the Greeks foolishness, the whole force of Jewish and Greek superstition, as it opposed, serves to strengthen the evidences of our faith. Will you be so good as to read the account which is recorded of the miracle which Jesus wrought in giving sight to the man who was born blind, and inquire carefully from beginning to end for any thing that looks in the least as if the writer was endeavouring to write a falsehood in a way to have it deceive the reader. This request might, as I humbly conceive, be made in respect to any of the other miracles; but what I had in view, particularly when this subject came to my mind, was the following words, spoken by the pharisees to him who had been blind; "Thou art his disciple: but we are Moses' disciples. We know that God spake unto Moses; as for this fellow we know not from whence he is." Is it not plain from this as well as from many other scriptures, that in the same degree that the pharisees' superstition run in favour of Moses, it operated against Jesus? I know the objector may say, the Jews expected a Messiah; but then they did not expect such a character as was Jesus. They also expected Elias to come first, but they did not expect such a character as John. You, and all the world know that the protestant clergy in Europe and America used to pray for the downfall of the Pope; but when he was humbled, they all joined in fervent prayer to set him up again. How did this inconsistency happen? Answer: The way in which it pleased God to humble the Pope, was not the way which clerical wisdom and prudence had planned; and we all see now, that they are better pleased with the Pope and the Inquisition, than they were to have him lose his power in a way which endangered their own. Now, sir, if liberal principles do obtain, and if the cause of civil and religious liberty should finally triumph, in spite of popish and protestant clergy with monarchy united, do you believe that this triumph will ever be imputed to the superstition of king-craft and priestcraft? On the ground of your