has partially induced me to make some Remarks on the first part of that book. My aim, in the following pages, has been, to point out such principles as I conceive to be evidently false; to detect some conclusions which are clearly erroneous; and to animadvert on some sophisms, on which much of its popularity is founded. How far I have succeeded in my attempt, those who read this little Volume must decide. I am not conscious of having been actuated by selfish or interested views; and I leave the rectitude of my intentions to that God, from whose judgment there is no appeal.

Deism appears to me to have but little to recommend it. It claims its existence on the fancied inconsistencies which it discovers in religious creeds, without having one original virtue to entitle it to respect. It is a system of negatives, if system that may be called, whose only boast is, that it discovers errors in Revelation; and hence it assumes a title to credit, by instructing its votaries

to disbelieve. Under the influence of this pure negation of excellence, it promotes its interests on the irritation of those passions which it should be the business of our lives to subdue, and fortifies itself in the strange commotions which it contributes to raise. These are some of the errors which I have designed to meet. But I am not warranted in commenting on my own Observations. Such as they are, I commit them to the world, and earnestly recommend them to the candour and attention of those to whom I now appeal. It is the first time that I ever attempted to assume the character of Author; and, without dedication or patron, I abandon these Remarks to their fate.

S. DREW.

September, 1799.

INTRODUCTORY NARRATION,

ADDRESSED TO

THE READERS

OF

THE SECOND EDITION.

THE following Remarks, on the First Part of Paine's "Age of Reason," were originally printed in the year 1799; and the edition, which, in its circulation, was chiefly confined to the County of Cornwall, was speedily sold. The flattering manner in which the Pamphlet was received, and the honourable notice which it obtained in the Antijacobin Review, would have more than justified another impression; but, as the tide of public opinion, in favour of the "Age of Reason," had begun to ebb, and this being the first time that the Author of the Remarks had presumed to

appear in print, he was content, that his Remarks should remain within those narrow confines for which they were primarily intended. The recent attempts, however, which have been made, to disseminate, among the lower classes of society, the principles inculcated in the "Age of Reason;" and the daring front which infidelity has lately assumed in the person of Mr. Carlile and others, in the face of a British court of judicature, the Author hopes, will furnish to every friend of civil society, of Christian doctrines, and of Christian morals, a sufficient apology for the reappearance of this little Treatise, which originally started into existence under the following circumstances.

A young gentleman, by profession a surgeon, had, for a considerable time, been in habits of intimacy with the Author; and their conversation frequently turned on abstract theories, the nature of evidence, under given circumstances, and the primary source of moral principles. The young gentleman had made himself acquainted with the writings of Voltaire, of Rousseau, of Gibbon, and of Hume, whose

speculations had led him to look with a suspicious eye on the Sacred Records, to which he well knew the Author was strongly attached. When Paine's "Age of Reason" made its appearance, he procured it; and fortifying himself with the objections against Revelation, which that book contained, he assumed a bolder tone, and commenced an undisguised attack on the Bible.

On finding the Author willing to hear his objections fairly stated, and more disposed to repel them by fair argument, than opprobrious epithets and wild exclamations, he one day asked him, if he had ever seen the "Age of Reason;" and, on being answered in the negative, he offered to lend it, upon condition, that the Author would engage to peruse it attentively, and give his opinion, with candour, on the various parts which passed under his inspection. These preliminaries being settled, the " Age of Reason" was put into the Author's hands, and he proceeded in its examination, with all the ability of which he was possessed, and with all the expedition that his avocations would allow,

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