NOTES.

NOTE 1, Page 4.

There is no more ground for the belief of the actual personal existence of an Evil Being, than for that of the real existence of the hieroglyphical Serpent in Genesis; which Moses never represents as a superior being in that form, but simply as a serpent: The Jews borrowed their personified principle of evil from the Chaldæans: they applied it to allegorize both moral and physical evil. Diseases were supposed to be inflicted by demons, improperly rendered devils. These were human ghosts, which had been the souls of wicked men; and not fallen angels, as in the modern scheme. "The Angels who sinned," 2 Pet. ii. 4, considering the various import of the word Angels in Scripture, do not of necessity imply metaphysical beings. They have been thought to mean the messengers or spies sent by Moses into Canaan, who brought back a lying report, and were smitten by the plague: Numbers xiv. 37. But they are more probably the same description of persons as those called "the Sons of God," "Gen. vi. 4; the sons of Seth, or true worshippers, whom Moses speaks of as intermarrying with "the daughters of men," or of idolaters; and whom Josephus (Antiquities of the Jews, b. i. ch.3,) calls "Angels." From the connexion of the passage in Peter, it is clear that the "casting into hell," or, more properly, "the abyss," refers to the flood of Noah, and the bituminous lake of Sodom. The same connexion is found in Jude 6, respecting "the Angels who kept not their first estate :" they are therefore identified with the apostates from God, who perished under those judgments.

The demonology of the Jews, consisting of human ghosts, betrays its bàrbaric origin. It had no effect on the serious system of Jewish belief, as connected with their sacred writings and traditions; for the Jews had no idea of any future existence but what depended upon the resurrection of the dead. When Christ was thought, from his miracles, to be either Elijah or John the Baptist, it was not supposed that their spirits had returned and taken a human form, but that they were risen from the dead.

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The agency of these demons was supposed in epilepsy and insanity. Where the madness was outrageous, a number of devils was said to haunt the maniac; and the Hebrew number of seven, applied to magnitude, or excess, or perfection, was used. Thus, Jesus cast seven devils out of Mary Magdalen. In Luke xi. 24, Jesus describes the state of a converted man, who falls again into sin, by an unclean spirit, who returns from whence he came with seven others. In Mark v. 15, the man out of whom a legion of unclean spirits had been cast, is described sitting and clothed, and in his right mind." John x. 21, Can a devil open the eyes of the blind?" that is, one who hath a devil: as 20, "He hath a devil, and is mad." In the book of Tobit, the mortality that fell upon the husbands of Sara is allegorized into an Evil Spirit, who flies from the fumigations of the angel Raphael. A man who was dumb was said to have a demon: Mark ix. 17. Jesus, in Luke xi. 14, describes bodily decrepitude by the agency of Satan. The woman who had a spirit of infirmity, and was bowed together, is said by him to have been "bound by Satan; but his expressing himself in accommodation to the popular notion of the Jews is no proof that he gave them his sanction, or himself believed them. The devils acknowledging Christ are the lunatics themselves. These maniacs who bare witness that Jesus was the Messiah, spoke from what they had heard of him in their lucid intervals. "Unclean spirits, when they saw him, fell down before him, and cried, saying, Thou art the Son of God,' or the Christ; and he strictly charged them that they should

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not make him known:" Mark iii. 11. That is, the maniacs fell down," and " he charged" the maniacs. The lunatic who imagines himself possessed by a legion of devils, and who requests not to be sent into the deep," speaks under the influence of Jewish associations. The madness being transferred to the swine is described by the devils passing into them.

Satan, the Devil, or the Adversary, was used to typify the heathen power, as opposed to the kingdom of Christ. Excommunication from the Christian pale is thus styled, by Paul, "a delivering over to Satan :" 1 Tim. i. 20. Sometimes it is used for an adversary generally: "Get thee behind me, Satan!" Matt. xvi. 23-thou enemy! "There was given unto me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me:" ii. Cor. xii. 7; properly, an Angel-Satan,” or adversary. It seems to be applied to any hindrance, that may oppose itself like an adversary: "We would have come unto you, but Satan hindered us :" 1 Thess. ii. 18.

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The temptation of Jesus is supposed to be decisive of a real Evil Being; but he is said to be "led of the Spirit;" and the whole narrative is evidently a scenical allegory, descriptive of what actually passed in our Saviour's mind. The devil showing him "all the kingdoms of the world, from the top of a high mountain," is a physical contradiction; and indicates the mystical or allegoric nature of the narrative. When the devil is supposed to say, “All this will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me," it was plainly the pomp and glory of this world that he was to worship. Neither can any thing be-inferred from the figurative agency of Satan, in the book of Job, ii. 1, or in prophetical visions, as in Zech. iii. 1, or from allusions to rabbinical legends or apocryphal books, for the sake of illustration, as in Jude 9. The words of Jesus, in Luke xxii. 31, 'Simon, Satan has desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat," seems to be a reference to the allegory in Job, and indicates that a severe trial or temptation awaits him. In James ii. 19, The devils also believe and tremble,” the word is δαιμονια, not διαβολοι. The same

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Apostle declares, i. 14, "Every man is tempted, when drawn aside of his own lusts ;" and the prophet Isaiah ascribes evil, or the appointment of moral evil as an instrument of good, to God alone: "I form the light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil: I, the Lord, do all these things:" Isaiah xlv. 7.

The argument from magicians and necromancers or prophets by the dead, as alluded to in Scripture, proves nothing as to the reality of these practices. The Witch of Endor was really affrighted at the apparition of Samuel, whom she pretended to call up; for she cried out and said that "she saw Gods [that is, a God] ascending out of the earth." The supposition that the oracles of Pythonesses, and Sibyls, were inspired by evil spirits, begs the question in dispute; and such a superstitious awe of these agents of state-craft and priestcraft, in an enlightened age, serves to show that there is no excess of credulity too absurd for the enthusiasm of religious zeal.

Dr. Chalmers lends the aid of his gaudy declamation to the vulgar literal notion of fallen evil beings warring against OMNIPOTENCE: he seems to regard the Apocalyptic vision of the Dragon and his Angels as a sober representation of facts, and has incorporated the poetic machinery of Milton with a series of Christian disIt is thus that men of strong religious prejudices and heated fancies contribute to aid the cause of infidelity, while they dream that they are serving the cause of truth.

courses.

NOTE 2, p. 7.

Dr. Horsley pronounces, that "the moral good of Unitarians is sin." Had the pious Bishop looked at his Gospel instead of his Articles, he would have found that he who doeth righteousness is righteous." Good Bishop Burgess, who called for the renewal of the persecuting edict against the Unitarians, speaks of

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