ficed more to mammon
than reason."

This was the man who died, because a dominant priesthood insisted on
a dogma which interfered with a purely Secular rite, which blasted two
hearts in a vain attempt to perpetuate a system, which dashes its rude
fingers, and tears out the heart of human felicity to sprinkle the altar
of superstition with the gore of offended innocence. Charles Blount
was a Deist; as such, he believed in a God; which he described in his
account of a Deist's religion. Let us examine his thoughts, and see if
they bear the interpretation which Christianity has always placed upon
them. Blount gives the Deist's opinion of God. He says, "Whatever is
adorable, amiable, and imitable by mankind, is in one Supreme, perfect
Being." An Atheist cannot object to this. He speaks in the manner
in which God is to be worshipped. He says, not by sacrifice, or by a
Mediator, but by a steady adherence to all that is great and good and
imitable in nature. This is the brief religious creed of Charles Blount.
He never seeks to find out fabled attributes of Deity. He knows what is
of value to mankind, and sedulously practices whatever is beneficial to
society.

In his "Anima Mundi, or, History of the Opinions of the Heathens on the
Immortality of the Soul," (p. 97,) Blount says:--

"The heathen philosophers were much divided concerning the soul's
future state; some held it mortal, others immortal. Of those who held
the mortality of the soul, the Epicureans were the chief sect, who,
notwithstanding their doctrines, led virtuous lives." Cardan had so
great a value for their moral actions, that he appeared in justification
of them. It appears (says he) "by the writings of Cicero, Diogenes,
and Laertius, that the Epicureans did more religiously observe laws,
piety, and fidelity among men than either the Stoics or the Platonists;
and I suppose the cause thereof was, that a man is either good or evil
by custom, but none confideth in those that do not possess sanctity of
life. Wherefore they were compelled to use greater fidelity, thereby
the better to justify their profession, from which reason it likewise
proceeds, that at this day few do equal the fidelity of usurers,
notwithstanding they are most base in the rest of their life. Also among
the Jews, whilst the Pharisees, that confessed the resurrection and the
immortality of the soul, frequently persecuted Christ, the Sadducees,
who denied the resurrection, angels, and spirits,