"'Did human reason,' saith he, 'unassisted by divine light make the discovery?' (i. e. of the 'unity of God.')—'Then indeed would "all nations, in all ages," have possessed the great object made manifest by revelation.' In answer to this, I would only ask, were not the laws of electricity discovered by 'human reason unassisted by divine light?' Why then were they not known to 'all nations, in all ages?'—The fact is, what reason is capable of discovering may also be long concealed from the eye of reason.
"Yours, &c.
A. KNEELAND."
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LETTER III.
Dear Sir, and Brother,—As I have not the opportunity of presenting your third number to our mutual friend and brother, to whom it most properly belongs to reply, I have thought it no more than reasonable that I should acknowledge the receipt of your favour accompanying this acknowledgement with some observations on the most essential parts of what you have suggested.
You wish us to take it for granted, that those parts of our communications to which you make no reply, are at least, generally speaking, satisfactory to your mind. Respecting this particular, you will suffer me to point out, what appears to me, a very material defect in your proposed method.
Suppose, sir, an argument be laid down on which much depends, in the opinion of the writer, and out of a proper reply to which, he anticipates great advantages; he waits for a reply—No reply comes to this particular, but the very same query which the argument was designed to answer is still urged; is it not easy to see that much labour may be in vain in consequence of this method? If you answer to a question, stating with great seeming earnestness, viewing the question of importance in the mind of him who states it, you would not only expect, but you might really need to be informed what effect your reply was allowed to have in the mind of your opponent. And as he might not anticipate the use which you had designed to make of his answer, you would not judge it advisable to submit to him whether he should reply or not.
You have finally put the dispute about the necessity of retaining the dead languages at issue on the question relative to a future state, in the following words; "If the opinions recorded in scripture relative to a future state of existence are to be relied on, as being dictated by God himself, and in a way too, that was not mistaken; and that the writers of the scriptures being thus inspired, have written nothing but the truth, then I admit," &c. Now from this your own statement you will see the importance of retaining those languages until it be fully discovered that no credit is due to these writings which we have been in the habit of believing to be divinely inspired. Your discernment will at once discover that it would be imprudent in the extreme, to obliterate, without first knowing that what was to be defaced was of no utility. A child, ever so old, who should utterly deface his father's last will and testament, which had made ample provisions for his future wants, merely because he had not a perfect understanding of it, or on suspicion that there were some possible defects in it, could not be considered prudent in so doing. But if the will should finally fail, and prove invalid, no loss would be sustained even if it were committed to the devouring element. To say, the will may be destroyed until it has been proved, would be absurd.
In your further remarks on our brother's communication, you find occasion to suggest a difference between the subject of revelation and the discoveries which have been made by men in the powers and properties of nature. But when you have contended successfully for this (which by no means has any power to refute his argument) you seem not to realize that there must be as great a difference in the evidences by which these different subjects are communicated to the mind, as there are in the subjects themselves. It is acknowledged, without controversy, that we cannot demonstrate by any mathematical or chemical process that there ever was such an emperor in Rome as Augustus Caesar, or such a governor in Judea as Pilate, or such a man as Jesus; but then we are not, on this account, or any other, unable to find such kind of evidence as the nature of the case admits, and such as is sufficient to satisfy the candid mind. Should any one now pretend to deny that Louis XVIth. was beheaded, and allege as proof that no such thing was to be credited, because it had never been discovered as the result of a chemical process, would you hesitate to fault his reasoning?