TO THE HONORABLE JOHN BROWN, ESQ.

THE following address is, with great respect for his public generosity, eminent patriotism and liberal patronage of Rhode Island College, most respectfully inscribed, by his obliged friend and very humble servant, JONATHAN MAXCY.

Providence, September 11th, 1798.

AN ADDRESS.

You, gentlemen, have the singular fortune to complete the course of your collegiate education at a period the most alarming and interesting that the world ever saw. Principles and conduct prevail, which threaten destruction to those institutions of religion and government, to which mankind are indebted for all the blessings of civilized life. In that part of Europe where the altar has been profaned, where the bands of society have been burst asunder, where the most endearing connexions have been exchanged for purposes of worse than brutal association— the passions have been wrought up to such a paroxysm of rage, that they have set at defiance the sacred obligations of religion and justice; have proclaimed open war against the Almighty, and covered the earth with blood and murder. There you behold tigers and wolves, in human form, sparing neither age nor sex. To them a Supreme Being is a chimera; immortality, is unconscious sleep; and future responsibility, the frightful offspring of superstition. There the hydra of despotism, riding on her iron car, gnashes her bloody jaws, and growls destruction to the world. From this horrid spectacle, turn off your eyes to your native country, where laws are regarded, where government is equally administered, where the constituted authorities are respected, where the God of heaven is worshipped; and let your full souls rise with an indignant determination to resist at

all events the intruding arm of foreign domination. When you see the pernicious effects of infidelity, atheism and unbridled ambition, learn to venerate and support those sacred institutions, which alone can render men fit subjects for moral and civil government. With a view to guard you against that irreligious, haughty and vengeful spirit, which is striving to convert the world into a vast theatre of carnage and confusion, permit me to recommend to your most serious attention the three following things, from the influence of which, I conceive, all moral improvement is derived.

First. Remember that there is a God. The belief of this truth is the only security of virtue, and the only barrier against vice. For if we say there is no God, we say there is no standard of morality. We equalize virtue and vice, or rather we say there are no such things as virtue and vice. We at once annihilate all moral obligation, and with it all restraint on the sinful propensities and headstrong passions of man. It is truly astonishing that a rational being, who can endure a moment's reflection, should be an atheist; and yet there are many who spurn at the idea of a God, and arrogantly tell you that the universe is not an effect, but a cause. Indeed if you disbelieve the existence of God, you must believe that there is no higher principle than matter. Of consequence, you must say matter is eternal, its various modifications, animate and inanimate, are the result of an inherent central and circumferential power. In this case you will gain nothing, and will lose much; for you will still be as much at a loss to account for this power and its operations, as you will be to account for the existence of an eternal, intelligent, uncaused Being. If you admit the latter, you can account for the origin of all things in a consistent manner; if you admit the former, you can never account for the existence of one atom, or for one modification of matter. Atheism is of

It renders all

all doctrines the most uncomfortable and gloomy. moral and intellectual acquirements useless; levels man to the brutal creation; destroys all order, design and harmony, in the universe. If acted out in its genuine effects, it would convert the world into a theatre of confusion, violence and misery. Never, therefore, forget that there is a God. Let every breath you draw, and every object you behold, remind you of this truth.

Secondly. Remember that you have souls; and that these will never cease to exist. A denial of the existence of the soul as a thing distinct from matter, and of its immortality, is a natural and necessary consequence of a denial of the existence of God. For if there is no higher principle in the universe than matter, what we call the soul is merely the result of animal organization. In this view the soul must be considered as a quality wholly dependent on a particular disposition of matter. Derange that disposition, and you destroy the soul. In this view the fate of man and brutes is the same. Both are matter, and both destroyed by decomposition. In short, the doctrine of a material soul amounts to this, man has no soul. God has so formed you, that you are obliged to rely on the veracity of your senses. If you distrust the evidence of these, or renounce it, you have no standard of certainty left. Your external senses inform you of what exists without; your internal senses, of what exists within. To doubt in either case, is to do violence to nature. You have the same kind and degree of evidence, therefore, that an operative, thinking substance exists within youas you have, that any material body exists without you. Matter makes itself known to you by its qualities. The soul becomes acquainted with itself and its existence, by internal sense; by the knowledge it gains from without, and by its operations concerning that knowledge. The soul has as direct a perception of itself, as it has of any object whatever. To doubt, therefore, whether you have souls, is to doubt whether any thing exists. The qualities of the soul appear to be totally different from the qualities of matter. The soul can originate motion and thought; it can remember, examine, choose, refuse, reflect, judge and decide. Matter can do nothing of a similar nature. It is of itself inert. It exhibits not the most distant appearance of thought or volition. If then the qualities of matter and those of the soul are so different, there certainly is the highest reason to believe that they are substances totally different in nature. The soul appears to be a single, indivisible principle. The parts into which it has been usually divided, ought to be considered not as if they existed as parts, but as the different operations of the same self-active principle. Whether this principle will con