



Produced by Charles Klingman





FIVE PEBBLES

From

THE BROOK.

A Reply

TO

"A DEFENCE OF CHRISTIANITY"

WRITTEN BY

EDWARD EVERETT,

GREEK PROFESSOR OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY
IN ANSWER TO
"THE GROUNDS OF CHRISTIANITY EXAMINED
BY
COMPARING THE NEW TESTAMENT WITH THE OLD"

BY
GEORGE BETHUNE ENGLISH.

"Should a wise man utter vain knowledge, and fill his belly with the
east wind?"
"Should he reason with unprofitable talk? or with speeches
wherewith he can do no good?--Thou chooseth[fn1] the tongue of
the crafty. Thy own mouth condemneth thee, and not I: yea, thine
own lips testify against thee."
"Behold I will make thee a new sharp threshing instrument having
teeth."

PHILADELPHIA:

PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR.

1824.

[PG Editor's Note: Many  printer's errors in this text
have been retained as found in the original--in particular
the will be found a large number of mismatched and
wrongspace quotation marks.]

ADVERTISEMENT.

WHEN I left America, I had no intention of giving Mr. Everett's
book a formal answer: but having learned since my arrival in the
Old World, that: the controversy in which I had engaged myself
had attracted some attention, and had been reviewed by a
distinguished member of a German university, my hopes of being
serviceable to the cause of truth and philanthrophy are revived,
and I have therefore determined to give a reply to Mr. Everett's
publication.

In this Work, as in my prior writings, I have taken for granted the
Divine Authority of the Old Testament, and I have argued upon the
principle that every book, claiming to be considered as a Divine
revelation and building itself upon the Old Testament as upon a
foundation, must agree with it, otherwise the superstructure
cannot stand. The New Testament, the Talmud, and the Koran are
all placed by their authors upon the Law and the Prophets, as an
edifice is upon its foundation; and if it be true that any or all of
them be found to be irreconcileable with the primitive Revelation
to which they all refer themselves, the question as to their Divine
Authority is decided against them, most obviously and completely.

This work was written in Egypt and forwarded to the U. States,
while I was preparing to accompany Ismael Pacha to the conquest
of Ethiopia; an expedition in which I expected to perish, and
therefore felt it to be my duty to leave behind me, something from
which my countrymen might learn what were my real sentiments
upon a most important and interesting subject; and as I hoped
would learn too, how grossly they had been deluded into building
their faith and hope upon a demonstrated error.

On my arrival from Egypt I found that the MS. had not been
published, and I was advised by several, of my friends to abandon
the struggle and to imitate their example; in submitting to the
despotism of popular opinion, which, they said, it was imprudent to
oppose. I was so far influenced by these representations--
extraordinary indeed in a country which  boasts that here freedom
of opinion and of speech is established by law--that I intended to
confine myself to sending the MS. to Mr. Everett; in the belief that
when he should have the weakness of his arguments in behalf of
what he defended and the injustice of his aspersions upon me,
fairly and evidently laid before him, that he would make me at
least a private apology. He chose to preserve a sullen silence,
probably believing that he is so securely seated in the saddle
which his brethren have girthed upon the back of "a strong ass"
that; there is no danger that the animal will give him a fall.

Not a little moved at this, I determined to do my myself justice, and
to publish the pages following.

This book is not the work of an Infidel. I am not an infidel; what I
have learned and seen in Europe, Asia and Africa, while it has
confirmed my reasons for rejecting the New Testament, has
rooted in my mind the conviction that the ancient Bible does
contain a revelation from the God of Nature, as firmly as my belief
in the first proposition of Euclid.

The whole analogy of Nature, while it is in many respects opposed
to the characteristics ascribed to the Divinity by the
metaphysicians, yet bears witness in my opinion, that this world
was made and is governed by just such a Being as the Jehovah of
the Old Testament; while the palpable fulfillment of predictions
contained in that book, and which is so strikingly manifest in the
Old World, leaves in my mind no doubt whatever, of the ultimate
fulfillment of all that it promises, and all that it threatens.

I cannot do better than to conclude these observations with the
manly declaration of the celebrated Christian orator Dr. Chalmers,
"We are ready, (says he,) to admit that as the object of the inquiry
is not the character, but the Truth of Christianity, the philosopher
should be careful to protect his mind from the delusions of its
charms.  He should separate the exercises of the understanding
from the tendencies of the fancy or of the heart. He should be
prepared to follow the light of evidence, though it should lead him
to conclusions the most painful and melancholy. He should train
his mind to all the hardihood of abstract and unfeeling intelligence.
He should give up every thing to the supremacy of argument and
he able to renounce without a sigh all the tenderest
possessions[fn 2] of infancy, the moment that TRUTH demands of
him the sacrifice." (Dr. Chalmers on the Evidence and Authority of
the Christian Religion. Ch. I.)

Finally, let the Reader remember, that "there is one thing in the
world more contemptible than the slave of a tyrant--it is the dupe
of a SOPHIST."

G. B. E.

PEBBLE I

And David "chose him five smooth stones out of the brook, and
put them in a shepherd's bag which he had, even in a scrip: and
his sling was in his hand: and he drew near to the Philistine."

Mr. Everett commences his work with the following remarks. "Was
Jesus Christ the person foretold by the prophets, as the Messiah
of the Jews?; one method, and a very obvious one, of examining
his claims to this character, is to compare his person, life, actions,
and doctrine, with the supposed predictions of them. But if it also
appear that this Jesus wrought such works, as evinced that he
enjoyed the supernatural assistance and cooperation of God, this
certainly is a fact of great importance. For we cannot say, that in
estimating the validity of our Lord's claims to the character of
Messiah, it is of no consequence whether, while he advanced
those claims, he wrought such works as proved his intimacy with
the God of truth. While he professed himself the Messiah, is it
indifferent whether he was showing himself to be as being beyond
delusion, and above imposture?--Let us make the case our own.
Suppose that we were witnesses of the miraculous works of a
personage of pretensions like our Lord's, should we think it
necessary or reasonable to resort to long courses of argument, or
indeed to any process of the understanding, except what was
requisite to establish the fact of the miracles? Should we, while he
was opening the eyes of the blind, and raising the dead from their
graves, feel it necessary to be deciphering prophecies, and
weighing these[fn 3] difficulties? Now we may transfer this case to
that of Christianity. The miracles of our Lord are either true or
false. The infidel if he maintain the latter must prove it; and if the
former can be made to appear, they are beyond all comparison
the