Mr. Chairman: In the first place, I beg leave to post up the argument so far as prosecuted. I therefore submit the following items by way of recapitulation--Imprimis: We have shown that my friend's system of necessity, renders men as incapable of society and of moral and civil government as if they were trees, stones, or machines. To this refutation of his system, Mr. Owen has, as yet, paid no attention. 2d. We have shown that Mr. Owen's system is not founded upon any philosophic analysis of the physical, intellectual, or moral man. 3d. We have shown that, so far as religion is concerned, Mr. Owen's opposition to it has been principally founded upon a palpable error, viz: that man's volition has no power over his belief. To this argument he has not thought proper to reply. 4th. That his system is radically defective in this--that it leaves entirely out of view our power of acquiring information through testimony. 5th. That his system ascribes to imagination a creative power which it does not possess. 6th. That, according to Mr. Owen's views, it was impossible to account for the derivation or existence of the spiritual ideas and language now prevalent in the world. 7th. That his twelve facts, admitting them to be true, fall far short of presenting a view of the whole man; and, consequently, that every system founded upon them must fail to furnish objects commensurate with man's capacity of enjoyment, or the dignity of his intellectual nature. To not one of these capital items has Mr. Owen replied. As Mr. Owen has very courteously presented me with a copy of his twelve facts, I may present him with some notes in writing, in the shape of objections to some of his fundamental points.

      The objection that my friend has been urging this morning against Christianity, reminds me of certain objection which I have heard to the revolution of this globe round the center of the planetary system. In speaking of the sphericity of the earth, I have, in language adapted to vulgar apprehension, informed the uninformed and illiterate, that this earth was round as a ball. They have replied that they were very sure this statement was untrue, because they perceived hills, mountains, valleys, and a very uneven surface, which, as they conceived, were altogether irreconcilable with the rotundity of this globe. In like manner they have objected to the immobility of the sun. They reply, "We see the sun move; we see it rise in one place and set in another; and if the earth moved round the sun, the position of our plantations and houses must necessarily be shifted: your theory about the earth and sun, then, is contrary to our experience and observation." Now, [199] it is just in a similar style of objection that my friend attacks the Christian religion. Mr. Owen, it seems, wants to elicit my opinion on what constitutes the Christian religion. Does he suppose that Christianity consists in matters of opinion? I am free to declare that neither the Jewish nor the Christian religion was ever designed by their Author to consist in any matter of opinion whatever. I hesitate not also to aver, that this error is the root from which all sectarianism has sprung, and has given rise to all the skepticism which now prevails. Mr. Owen informs us that he became a skeptic from the jarring sectarianism and irreconcilable discrepancies in the different dogmas of Christianity. This would, indeed, be an unprofitable discussion, were it to be confined to a mere war of words concerning the opinions which constitute this, that, or the other system of religion. This would suit my friend's scheme well enough; but I hardly think he will be able to seduce us into a discussion upon the subject of free will, a topic on which he himself is so fond of expressing his opinions. But I was proceeding to observe, that if we had no other proof of the scriptures being divine oracles than just the contents of the book (Biblos), that alone would warrant us in the conclusion, for we see the handwriting of the Almighty indelibly inscribed in the pages of this volume. The same grand developments displayed in the "pillar'd firmament," are to be found in the sacred volume; and they both proclaim with equal emphasis, that "the hand which made them is divine." In the physical organization of the material universe, we discover that the laws of attraction and repulsion are the most operative. We see the great God of Nature continually producing most wonderful results by the simple operation of one single law. What philosopher does not know the power of the centrifugal and centripetal forces in balancing our globe? Who does not know that the successive change of the seasons results from one single unerring law laid down by the great Creator himself? Now in expelling from the human heart that darkness in which, without the light of revelation it must ever have remained, in elevating the human mind to the contemplation of spiritual things, the Almighty acts by a few general laws. He raises man to heaven by the simple operation of two or three fundamental principles. Were this point in argument now, I would boldly hazard the assertion that the sacred volume contains intrinsic evidences of being come from God--because the same plan and consummate wisdom displayed in the construction of the material universe, are equally developed in these holy oracles in the renovation of man. But if the contents of the volume of revelation and the constituent principles of religion therein [200] inculcated are to become the subjects of investigation in this debate, they should be taken only from the book which contains them.

      In such an investigation I apprehend that Mr. Owen cannot be permitted to travel out of the record. But we will take the book (Biblos) and examine what is written there, by the same criteria which we would apply in an analysis of the writings of Cicero, of Demosthenes, of Sallust, or of Xenophon. But the time has not yet come for me to reply to my friend's religious opinions and social views in his own favorite style.

      There was, however, one point on which my opponent had nearly staggered upon the truth. He asked if Christianity consisted in the whole of the New Testament, or primarily in a few general principles and leading facts therein contained? He apprehended the latter, and that these might be stated in a very few words. I presume he must have had reference to the historic facts that Jesus Christ died for the salvation of sinners, that he rose from the dead, and ascended to heaven, etc. Now, this is the only legitimate mode of arguing this topic.

      Yesterday we discussed the evidences of the Jewish religion. We have been pursuing the very plan which our opponent suggests. Has it not been repeatedly affirmed that both the Jewish and Christian religion are founded upon historic facts--facts triable by the same criteria as all other historic facts? After proceeding a little farther in the argument, I shall be perfectly willing to conform strictly to Mr. Owen's plan. I have asserted that the Christian religion, as well as the Jewish, was founded on facts. And I will rest the whole merits of this controversy upon my ability to prove the three leading facts on which Christianity is based, and the consequent inability of my opponent to disprove them. First, That Jesus Christ was crucified upon Mount Calvary, as attested by the four Evangelists. Second, That his body was deposited in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. And thirdly, That he did actually rise from the dead, and appeared upon the earth for forty days, having during that time repeated intercourse with his disciples, and that at the end of that period he did actually ascend to heaven. Now, this tender closes every avenue to the introduction of metaphysical subtilty, or mere opinions about Christianity into this argument. I am thoroughly convinced that it was the simple, sublime, and majestic design of him "whose ways are not as man's ways," to effect an entire moral revolution in mankind by the simple operation of the intrinsic weight, validity, and moral energy of these facts. I am thoroughly convinced that all the principles necessary to make [201] man happy, and elevate his nature to its highest point of dignity, and to enable him to meet death fearlessly, are native to, inherent in, and inalienable from, these facts--I mean the facts that Jesus Christ was crucified, buried, and that he rose again on the third day. The influence of these facts is irresistible. No man ever did honestly believe them who did not in consequence thereof experience that all his powers and faculties were exalted and refined. And thus, in the wonderful wisdom of God, has the whole moral and religious revolution which he designed to effect over the world, been founded upon the operative moral energy of these facts.

      Mr. Owen speaks of the endless varieties of religion; but the world has never had but three divine religious dispensations; the first adapted to the primitive state of man; the second adapted to the spirit and genius of a people living under social and municipal institutions, and prophetic and typical of the advent of Christ, the Son of God and the founder of Christianity. And these three divine developments of religion all concentrate themselves upon the fact that Jesus rose from the dead, ascended to heaven, and was there received as the Son of God. We do know that all the superstitions in the world have grown out of these three developments of divine authority in matters of religion. What is Mahometanism but a corruption of Christianity? I would not call the Persian, the Roman, nor the Egyptian religions different religions, but different sects of the same religion; just as I would call Mahometanism a corruption of Christianity. There is not a single supernatural truth in the Koran, that is not borrowed from the Testaments. Whatever may have been invented by the licentiousness of human imagination, there never has been but one divinely revealed religion. Hence, in all these superstitions we find capital ideas, sentiments, and terms which could not have been originated by human imagination, or derived from any other source than an immediate and direct divine revelation. We can show that all the national records which have come down to us from times of the highest antiquity, embrace the outlines of the Mosaic account in the book of Genesis. We can show that, in the days of Abraham, with the exception of the Chaldeans, there was not a circumjacent nation that had not all the knowledge possessed by Abraham, save with regard to his own posterity. It was in consequence of the defection of the Chaldeans that Abraham was commanded to depart into a strange land, because that people were apostatizing and falling off from the knowledge of the true God to the worship of idols. So far we have submitted the outlines of this matter with a reference to the past and present. [202] Yesterday I introduced an argument founded upon the historic evidences in support of Judaism and Christianity. I presented, in the first instance, certain criteria by which we are enabled to decide whether historic facts are credible, and gave an analysis of these evidences and their criteria. With a reference to the true merits of this controversy, we have laid down four criteria of the verity of historic facts: First, That the recorded facts on which we may rely with safety, must be cognizable by the senses. Second, Have been exhibited in the face of day. Third, That, in perpetual commemoration of these facts, monumental institutions were adopted simultaneously with their occurrence. And, Fourth, continued down to the present day. We did affirm and adduce some proofs that no fact possessing these four criteria of its verity, could possibly be false; that it was entirely out of Mr. Owen's power to select a single fact, recorded in the annals of any nation of the world, which, possessing these four criteria of verity, ever was proved to be false. But we intend, before coming to the point more immediately at issue, to show that these matters of fact were not (as skeptics affirm) greedily believed by merely a few friends and partisans; but that these stupendous facts were exhibited, not for the purpose of confirming the belief of friends, but to overcome the disbelief of enemies. Moses (for example) was sent to lead the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, but this people were as unwilling to leave the land, as Pharaoh was to let them go. Hence, the ten stupendous miracles exhibited by Moses were as necessary to persuade the people to depart, as they were to coerce Pharaoh to permit them. The necessary inference is, that the enactment of these ten wonders was as necessary for the conviction of the Israelites as for their oppressors. Moses himself demurred when the conduct of the Israelitish host was cast upon him; the people were unwilling to quit the land of their captivity, and Pharaoh strenuously opposed their departure; but by the resistless influence of these ten wonderful facts, all were made conformable to the divine will. These facts were designed to be of such high import as to reconcile Moses to his responsible undertaking, to overcome the pertinacity and avarice of Pharaoh, and inspire the Israelites with a courage which enabled them to pass fearlessly through the Red Sea. You perceive, then, that all circumstances concurred to preclude the possibility of any deception in regard to the truth of the facts as well as the possibility of their reception upon any slight and superficial evidence. They were, in their nature, calculated to arouse every energy, and to take fast hold upon every feeling of man. They must, therefore, be regarded as facts of the sublimest character, the [203] most momentous import, and the most irresistible influence. The course adopted by my opponent, in this debate, has compelled me to introduce at this stage of the argument the evidences that not only the institutions of the passover, circumcision, the redemption of the first-born, but that divers other commemorative institutions and ritual observances of the Jewish law warrant us in the conclusion that the whole system of the Jewish religion is an antitypical symbolic attestation in proof of the divine mission of the Messiah. And now, as I do not wish immediately to introduce another part of the subject, I resign the floor to my opponent.

[COD 199-204]