ations are divided into
several Letters, this is one answer given to the whole; for it would be
to no purpose to reply to topics upon which the writers are agreed.
What therefore is not contradicted here, Dr. Priestley may in general
take to be allowed; but to obviate doubts and to allow his argument
every force, it may be fairer perhaps to recite at full length what in
this answer is allowed to be true, what is denied as false, what meant
to be exposed as absurd, and what rejected as assertions without proof,
inadmissible or inconclusive. The conclusion will contain some
observations upon the whole.

TRUISMS.

1. "Effects have their adequate causes."

2. "Nothing begins to exist without a cause foreign to itself."

3. "No being could make himself, for that would imply that he
existed and did not exist at the same time."

4. If one horse, or one tree, had a cause, all had."

5. Something must have existed from all eternity.

6. "Atoms cannot be arranged, in a manner expressive of the most
exquisite design, without competent intelligence having existed
somewhere."

7. "The idea of a supreme author is more pleasing to a virtuous
mind, than that of a blind fate and fatherless deserted world."

8. "The condition of mankind is in a state of melioration, as far as
misery arises from ignorance, for as the world grows older it must
grow wiser, if wisdom arises from experience."

9. "All moral virtue is only a modification of benevolence."

10. "Virtue gives a better chance for happiness than vice."

11. "No instance of any revival."

12. "Atheists are not to think themselves quite secure with respect
to a future life."

13. "Thought might as well depend upon the construction of the
brain, as upon any invisible substance extraneous to the brain."

14. "If the works of God had a beginning, there must have been a
time when he was inactive."

15. "Where happiness is wanting in the creation I would rather
conclude the author had mist of his design than that he wanted
benevolence."

FALSE ASSERTIONS.

1. "A cause needs not be prior to an effect."

2. "If the species of man had no beginning, it would not follow that
it had no cause."

3. "A cause may be cotemporary with the effect."

4. "An atheist must believe he was introduced into the world without
design."

A