erality, in his celebrated Essay concerning Toleration, lays it down as an axiom, "Those are not to be tolerated, who deny the being of a God. For," reasons he, "promises, covenants, and oaths, which are the bonds of human society, can have no hold upon an Atheist. The taking away of a God, though even in thought, dissolves all."

This exclusion of Atheists from the pale of Toleration has been objected to Mr. Locke as inconsistent with his own. great principle. But let it be considered, as he adds, "that they who by their atheism destroy all religion, can have no pretence of religion, whereupon to challenge the privilege of a toleration." The very idea of toleration supposes some religion, or conscientious scruples concerning it to be tolerated. The terms, in which under the freest constitutions the rights of toleration are secured, always suppose a God to be worshipped. "All men," says the law of Rhode-Island under the first charter, " may walk as their consciences persuade them, every one in the name of his God." Again, "Let the Lambs of the most High walk in this colony without molestation, in the name of Jehovah their God for ever." And the common expression in the constitution of other states, securing liberty to worship God according to the dictates of conscience, imply by the very terms a belief in God, as the object of worship. In fine, toleration regards some form of faith, some scruples of conscience; and these we can hardly concede to atheism, which, to repeat the significant expression of Mr. Locke, "dissolves all."

A recent prosecution in this state for blasphemy, has excited a fresh interest on this great subject of toleration, which might ordinarily be numbered with the settled and hackneyed topics. We of this community have witnessed the melancholy, the heart-withering spectacle of an aged man, once a minister of the Gospel; of one who had passed far beyond the period of life, when passion or vanity might be pleaded in palliation of infirmity; and whose hoary head might admonish him, that his remaining years were few, called to answer to the tribunals of his country for blasphemous publications against the being and government of God, and the person and character of Jesus Christ, not more revolting for their profaneness than for their odious and indescribable obscenity. Of the enormity of offences of this nature it is impossible for any reflecting mind to entertain a doubt.

That they are legitimate subjects for the interposition of the civil arm is no less certain. It is not, let it be remembered, the holding of such opinions, for that every man must answer to God and his own conscience, but the malicious utterance and propagation of such opinions, that the law contemplates. It holds a man responsible, not for his principles, be they good or bad, true or false, but for his acts. And certainly, within the whole range of human offences, we know of none, estimated by their influence upon society, more criminal in themselves, more deeply to be abhorred for their heartless malignity, and allowing less of our compassion for the offender. He, who, in the dark hour of temptation, sins against his own convictions, and yields himself to dishonesty, to intemperance, or any sensual excess, violates indeed the laws of God, and wounds his own soul. But the mischief of his iniquity may not reach far. He may wrong, without intending to corrupt, his neighbour; and possibly, even in settled habits of transgression, he pays some homage to truth and virtue by deploring the weakness of his moral principle, and by his acknowledgments of the shame. But the man, that propagates infidelity, that treats with open insult things sacred, does what he can to corrupt the world. He labors to overthrow the barriers that protect society; to rob his fellow-creatures at once of their law and their hope. He, who for his hunger or his avarice plunders me of my wealth, still leaves me that, with which, if I be only faithful to myself, though having nothing, I possess all things. The murderer, who takes my life, still leaves unhurt my undying soul. He has no power, nor does he seek it, over that which is better than life. he, who undermines my faith in God, or in Christ, and my hope of immortality, takes from me my only effectual motives to virtue and restraints from sin, my solace in sorrow, and my peace in death. He leaves me without principle to the solicitations of every sin; he exposes me impotent and defenceless to the sins of others. Infidelity has no strength for the day of trial; no comfort for the night of sorrow; no spiritual gladness in the life that is, and no prospects for a life to come. It makes void the promises of God. It annuls that precious covenant to the widow, - Thy Maker is thy husband, the Holy One is thy friend." From the orphan it takes the blessed assurance, "Doubtless thou art our father.” And instead of those words of peace

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from a compassionate Saviour, "Let not your hearts be troubled; ye believe in God and ye believe in me," it leaves its miserable victims without hope and without God in the world.

Of the legality of such prosecutions, whatever diversity of opinion may be entertained of their expediency, there can be no question. In various instances within our own country, as well as in Great Britain, blasphemy and open insult of things sacred have been the subjects of exemplary punishment. Unhappily in England prosecutions of this class have been mingled with questions of party and political excitement; so that the indignation, that might justly have been felt against impiety, has been exchanged for sympathy with supposed suffering in the cause of liberty. By the highest judicial authorities in various parts of the United States, blasphemy has been adjudged and punished as an offence against the laws of the commonwealth. In an able article of a recent English journal, in which the writer undertakes to exhibit the "Relation of Christianity to civil government in the United States of America," several instances are adduced, in which such judgments have been pronounced. Among others is a case, which occurred in 1824, when the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, upon an indictment for blasphemy, founded on an act passed in 1700, thus decided:

"It has long been firmly settled, that blasphemy against the Deity generally, or an attack on the Christian religion indirectly, for the purpose of exposing its doctrines to ridicule and contempt, is indictable and punishable by law as a temporal offence." "Even if Christianity were not a part of the law of the Commonwealth, it is the popular religion of the country; an insult on which would be indictable, as directly tending to disturb the public peace. Christianity, general Christianity, is and always has been a part of the common law [of Pennsylvania]; not Christianity, founded upon any particular religious tenets, not Christianity, with an established Church, but Christianity with liberty of conscience to all men.'

Again, no society can tolerate a wilful and despiteful attempt to subvert its religion, any more than it would to break down its laws; a general, malicious, and deliberate intent to overthrow Christianity, general Christianity.

The species of offence may be classed under three general heads. 1. Denying the being and providence of God. 2. Contumelious reproaches of Jesus Christ; profane and malevolent scoffing at the Scriptures, or exposing any part of them to contempt or ridicule; and 3. Certain immoralities tending to subvert all religion and morality, which are the foundations of all governments. Without these restraints no free government could long exist. It is liberty run mad to declaim against the punishment of these offences, or to assert that the punishment is hostile to the spirit and genius of our government."

In the Supreme Court of New-York in 1811, on a trial for blasphemy, the Chief Justice said; "The authorities show, that blasphemy against God, contumelious reproaches and profane ridicule of Christ, or the Holy Scriptures, which are equally treated as blasphemy, are offences punishable at common law, whether uttered by words or writings,

because they tend to corrupt the morals of the people, and to destroy good order." "Nothing could be more offensive to the virtuous part of the community, or more injurious to the tender morals of the young, than to declare such profanity lawful. It would go to confound all distinction between things sacred and profane. For, to use the words of one of the greatest oracles of human wisdom, Lord Bacon, Profane scoffing doth by little and little destroy the reverence of religion,'- and again, 'Two principal causes have I known of Atheism, curious controversies and profane scoffing.'

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Chancellor Kent, in the convention of New-York, assembled, in 1821, to revise the constitution of that state, in defending a decision of the Supreme Court, which had been assailed as dangerous to liberty of conscience, said "Such blasphemy is an outrage upon public decorum: and, if sanctioned by the tribunals of the country would shock the moral sense of the country and degrade the character of a Christian people." "The law, as applied to correct such depravity, is the application of common reason and natural justice to the security of the peace and good order of society."

The former Vice-President of the United States, Tompkins, who presided in that convention expressed the same opinions. "The law does not undertake to uphold any

particular sect; but it does interpose and rightfully, as the guardian of public morals, to suppress those outrages on public opinion and public feeling, which would reduce the community to a state of barbarism, corrupt its purity, and debase its mind."

And, finally, our own Chief-Justice Parsons in one of his ablest and most elaborate decisions in an ecclesiastical case declares;

"Our law certainly provides for the punishment of many breaches of the law of Christianity, not for the purpose of propping up the Christian religion, but because those breaches are offences against the laws of the State; because they corrupt the morals of the people and destroy good order.'

It is evident, therefore, that the wilful teaching or publishing of blasphemy or obscenity is "an iniquity to be punished by the judges," not as an offence against God, who vindicates his own laws, but as revolting to the moral feelings and injurious to the order of society. And we rejoice, that there is a majesty in the law to brand with its own peculiar and indelible stigma such offences, and to compel them who acknowledge no other power, not even the God that made them, to do her homage. Yet it were to be wished, that the expediency or ultimate benefits of such prosecutions were as unquestionable as their legality. In England, as we have seen, such prosecutions have so often been mingled with charges of a libellous or seditious character, in the case of Thomas Paine in 1793, and more recently of Carlisle, that they had little other effect than to give notoriety to the publications, and to unite the abettors of infidelity with the partisans of liberty in sympathy with the offender, as well as in hostility to the government. Even in our country, it is to be feared, that crude notions of freedom; the sympathy naturally felt for almost any criminal suffering under his punishment, however just; the bad eminence given to the reviler of religion by the very disgrace he suffers; the curiosity excited towards his publications even in honest and religious minds; and the various bad passions, easily put in motion on such occasions by the unprincipled in the name and under the pretence of liberty, these and other causes may defeat the benefits of such prosecutions,

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