every company in which he sat.-Something similar in character and disposition, I have heard of William Pitt, of Charles Fox, and of George Cooke the actor.

But if we admit the truth of all that has been said of Mr. Paine about drunkenness and neglect of person, it will be found to be confined to the last few years of his life, when he had approached to seventy years of age: and when no other fault can be established against his reputation, after a man has been forty years occupied in promoting the most important interests of mankind, and in accomplishing more on that head than any other man has done, it is too much to ask from the Christian, or the slavish Royalist, that he will pardon the foibles, and join in the common admiration of the virtues of such a man as Thomas Paine?

R. C.

Here, you may see a complete refutation of so much of those lies which you have copied to Mr. Paine's discredit, and, as you vainly presume, to the discredit of his principles. But, do you find no dirty drunken Christians in Sheffield. I should like to take you by the arm, and walk you through the streets, and to the different ale-houses of Sheffield, even of a Sunday, that only day of Christian cleanliness, to shame you out of what you have advanced against ths Anti-Christians on this head.

What Sully has written of young Servin may be all fiction, for what I know. You, Christians, credit any legendary tales that are Christian. If infidels to Christianity had the same propensity to lie, they, too, could fabricate and exhibit horrible death-bed scenes of the Christians—and, I incline to think, that they may do this without lying.

Of Francis Newport, of William Pope, or of the Noble Altamont, I know nothing, whether the tales be true or fictious; but were they true, there is nothing exhibited of their characters beyond that of having been profligate. Once before I called your attention to the distinction between an abstinence from religious ceremonies, by means of profligacy of character, such as was the case of Lord Rochester and others, and a philosophical theism, or atheism, that rejects Christianity through the force of philosophical or historical research. The first character, is, in fact, nothing more than that of a profligate Christian. Where are your death-bed scenes of the avowed philosophical theists or atheists of this country of Shaftesbury, Herbert, or Bolingbroke, of Chubb, Collins, Morgan, Tindal, and Toland-of Hume,

4

Gibbon and Annet? I might add another score of names; but produce one philosophical theist, or atheist, of this Island, who recanted his published opinions on his death-bed, or at any other time. I could produce you a young man of Leeds, who was converted from Christianity, by a clergy man of the established church, on his death-bed assuring him, "That Carlile was right," and his persecutors wrong. The young man is well known in Sheffield, and the clergyman was one of your own immediate neighbourhood. This is a thing more fit for a boast than any thing you have advanced on the contrary side; and this fact has been in my mind unmentioned for more than a year past. I do not wish the principles I advocate to rest upon any thing of this kind. I rest upon their intrinsic merits-the soundness of the argument, the relation to truth, the application of the words to things. You follow Christianity as a system, as one of a sect-you have neither the courage, nor the honesty to enquire if it be well founded.

Now, for Voltaire's death-bed recantation. Where is it? I cannot find it in your words. "Voltaire in his last illness sent for Dr. Trouchin, who, when he came, found him in the greatest agony, exclaiming with the utmost horror, I am abandoned by God and man.' He then said, ' Doctor, I will give you half of what I am worth, if you will give me six months life.' The Doctor answered, Sir, you cannot live six weeks!" Voltaire replied, Then I shall go to hell, and you will go with me.' This is really a stupid story, really Christian. In the first place, if Voltaire wished to recant and repent, I ask the Christian if six weeks were not time enough? Do they not often make six minutes suffice? Do they not press the malefactor to repentance even when the rope is about his neck? Do they not make it an intrinsic part of their system, that a death-bed repentance is sufficient, and that the greater the sinner the greater the certainty of salvation? Why then was not six weeks time enough for Voltaire? But it is clear, that the whole matter was a joke on the part of Voltaire, even if we admit the Doctor's story to be true to the letter. If he was serious about going to hell, an idea of the reality of which, as a place of future punishment, never existed in his mind after he was thirty years old, why should he say to the Doctor, otherwise than as a joke," and you will go with me"? What had the Doctor done, who seems to have been a Christian, to be associated with Voltaire in this future hell? The whole thing, the asking for six months life from the Doctor, proves no

thing more than that Voltaire preserved his witty and gay spirit to the last, and played off a joke upon the Doctor. One thing is well understood; Voltaire was weakly desirous of a Christian burial, and he feared that his body would be insulted, after death, by the Christians, if he did not, towards the last, comply with some of their forms and ceremonies.

It is as wild as any other notion of the Christian, for him to suppose, that a person cannot die without first becoming a Christian. To me the notion is extremely ridiculous. How do they die who never heard of Christianity? How am I to die who can prove that no such person as Jesus Christ existed, and that his name is but fabled? How is it possible under such a circumstance, that I can become a Christian? Are all my historical examinations on this head to be refuted by a few death-bed qualms? Ridiculous and absurd is the notion! It is as impossible for me to become a Christian, to believe in the actual existence and character of Jesus Christ, as described in the Gospels, as to change my sex or my species. Those tales about death-bed scenes are got up for children, and little childish minds, like that of Abel Bywater's. They are nursery tales, black-man, beggar-man, and ghost stories. Men laugh at them, and so do all strongminded, healthy women. But to shew you that Paine and Voltaire were not the first to die Anti-Christians, I introduce the following scrap taken from a newspaper.

EXTRACTS FROM THE WILL OF AN EARL OF PEMBROKE.

Imprimis. For my soul, I confess I have heard much of souls, but what they are, or whom they are, or what they are for, God knows, I know not; they tell me now of another world, where I never was, nor do I know one foot of the way thither. While the King stood, I was of his religion, made my son wear a cassock, and thought to make him a bishop; then came the Scots and made me a Presbyterian; and since Cromwell entered, I have been an independent. These, I believe, are the kingdom's three estates, and if any of these can save a soul, I may claim one; therefore, if my executors, do find I have a soul, I give it to him who gave it to me.

Item.-I give my body, for I cannot keep it, to be buried. Do not lay me in the church porch, for I was a Lord, and would not be buried where Col. Pride was born.

Item. My will is, that I have no monument, for then I must have epitaphs and verses, and all my life long I have had too much of them.

Item.-I give all my deer to the Earl of Salisbury, who I know will preserve them because he denied the King a buck out of one of his own parks.

Item.-I give nothing to Lord Say; which legacy I give him because I know he will bestow it on the poor.

Item.-To Tom May I give 5s.; I intended him more; but whoever has seen his History of the Parliament, thinks 5s. too much.

Item.-I give Lieutenant General Cromwell one word of mine, because he never kept his own.

Item.-I give up the ghost.-Concoqdet cum originali.

Here is a proof, as to what this Earl of Pembroke though about a soul. You may be assured, that Atheism has been, widely spread among the aristocracy of Europe from the time of Lord Bacon: though they now express alarm to see it spreading among the labouring class: and so much for your death-bed stories.

In saying that Sheffield was an abominably black and torpid town-I alluded not to criminality but to ignorance. You have misconstrued the term at page 5, and that wantonly; because, at page 3, you rightly construed it. You insinuate, that the "crimes of my dupes" constitute the blackness of Sheffleld. Can Abel Bywater state an instance of an Anti-Christian of this day in Sheffield having committed a crime? If he cannot, it follows, that all the crimes committed in Sheffield are, that which they are elsewhere, Christian crimes. I do not say it is impossible for an Anti-Christian to commit a crime; but I do say, that they will any where bear, on that head, a comparison with Christians; and that they do every where court that comparison.

In the stealing of an ass, by Jesus Christ and his disciples, you excuse the fact, and in it find the fulfillment of a prophecy! Zechariah chap. ix. ver. 9. "Behold thy king cometh unto thee; he is just, and having salvation; lowly and riding upon on ass." To prove this a prophecy, you must first prove, that Jesus Christ existed, that he was a King, and then how or why the prophecy can be applied to him. Take the remainder of the chapter, and you will see, that the sons of Zion were to fight against the sons of Greece, and to destroy them by the assistance of their Lord. Wheu was this done? The whole chapter is evidently the effusion of a madman. So much for your prophecy. Would an

act of theft be now a day executed on the pretence of being the fulfilment of a prophecy.

But another word may be said about the stealing of the ass. I, who disbelieve the existence of Jesus, cannot of course believe this tale; but you, and they who credit the one circumstance, must credit the other. Now, would it satisfy you for a Priest to come into your house, or into your stable if you kept an ass-loose it, and on your remonstrance, say, in defence of himself, that the Lord had need of it. If such an excuse would satisfy you and others, the Lord would have need of every thing for which the Priest could fancy a need.

About the killing precepts of the Bible, you have endeavoured to get over the difficulty, by misquoting, as you have in several other instances. I said, "if children never saw, nor heard of, nor read of killing, they would never harbour the thought in manhood." You make me say, that, if there were no Bible, there would be no killing-and conclude by calling me a common liar. It would be well for you, if you could gather a little of common honesty from your Christian feelings. I defy you or any one to shew, in the whole of my writings, a single misrepreseniation of the Bible, or of Christians, or of Christianity: and I now tell you, that with Boyle, I think the Bible a matchless volume. The Koran comes near it; but, for blood and murder, it does not match the Bible.

I have yet to learn, that among Christians, the words mind and soul are synonymons. The mind is evidently improveable by human means; will you allow so much to be said for the soul? To use your own phrase, can that which is matter improve that which is spirit?

I, also, confess, that I am so ignorant, as not to know, what the words contingent existence mean. I will give you your own words: "It appears, that this learned man has never yet discovered the difference between a being in whose existence is included, and one whose existence is contingent " Really, I have not learnt this. I have learnt that being and existence are synonymous; but, I have learnt nothing about "a being whose existence is contingent." This may be spiritual learning-and for the life of me I cannot learn any thing about spirits, or that is so sublime as to be spiritual. I am compelled, for the want of this capacity, to be humble, contented as a mere Materialist. I will come to your school, Abel, or to any other school, to find a master to teach me

more.