Though there may be other assignable causes for this, it is certain that not the least powerful is the repellency of dogmas claimed to be contained in the Bible, which are revolting both to the intellect and to the moral nature of man. Instead of being able to meet their religious teachers with the assumption that all which they have felt to be contrary to reason, to common sense, and to common honesty is not contained in the Sacred Writings, many have gradually drawn off to the religion of reason and nature, and left the Bible to theologians and the Church. At the same time, there has been a new development of philanthropy, in which those who either repudiate the Bible as of any binding authority, or disallow its commonly-accepted teachings, are as prominent and earnest in works of benevolence as the most orthodox of any sect. To these are added religious teachers, who set forth the morality and benevolence demanded in the Bible as obligatory, and as satisfactorily deducible from the light of nature, so that no revelation is needful to make them more so. Meantime, in popular forms and by popular writers, all the most plausible and startling difficulties that oppose the claims of the Bible are widely disseminated, while little is done to counteract these influences. Another class of religionists has also arisen, that numbers probably its hundreds of thousands, the _Spiritualists_, who rest their faith on a new species of so-called revelations, which ordinarily clash with the accepted teachings of the Bible, and by vast numbers are received as of superior authority. Meantime the press and public lectures are extensively supplanting the pulpit as organs of moral and religious influence over large portions of the community, while a large part of the most popular speakers and writers avowedly reject the Bible as of any binding authority in deciding moral and religious questions. At the same time, there has arisen a freedom of investigation, and an aversion to all traditional or conservative bonds, such as probably never before was so universal and dominant in this nation, especially among those religiously educated. All these influences have combined to place the Bible, and the systems of theology that claim to be educed from it, in entirely new relations. Nothing now is safe on the ground of tradition, or of authority, or of the reverence that belongs to age, learning, genius, or experience. Every thing in religion, as well as other matters, is to stand on its own claims, and not by any factitious supports. In this state of the public mind, the following considerations have had influence in leading to the presentation of the views contained in this volume.