tains,
and the methods he proposes, are accordant with reason--are illustrated
and supported by "self-evident truths"--they are plainly "beside
themselves." They have lost the use of reason. They are not to be argued
with. They belong to the mad-house.

"COME NOW, LET US REASON TOGETHER, SAITH THE LORD."

Are we to honor the Bible, which Prof. Stuart quaintly calls "the good
old book," by turning away from "self-evident truths" to receive its
instructions? Can these truths be contradicted or denied there? Do we
search for something there to obscure their clearness, or break their
force, or reduce their authority? Do we long to find something there, in
the form of premises or conclusions, of arguing or of inference, in
broad statements or blind hints, creed-wise or fact-wise, which may set
us free from the light and power of first principles? And what if we
were to discover what we were thus in search of?--something directly or
indirectly, expressly or impliedly prejudicial to the principles, which
reason, placing us under the authority of, makes self-evident? In what
estimation, in that case, should we be constrained to hold the Bible?
Could we longer honor it, as the book of God? _The book of God opposed
to the authority of_ REASON! Why, before what tribunal do we dispose of
the claims of the sacred volume to divine authority? The tribunal of
reason. _This every one acknowledges the moment he begins to reason on
the subject_. And what must reason do with a book, which reduced the
authority of its own principles--broke the force of self-evident truths?
Is he not, by way of eminence, the apostle of infidelity, who, as a
minister of the gospel or a professor of sacred literature, exerts
himself, with whatever arts of ingenuity or show of piety, to exalt the
Bible at the expense of reason? Let such arts succeed and such piety
prevail, and Jesus Christ is "crucified afresh and put to an
open shame."

What saith the Princeton professor? Why, in spite of "general
principles," and "clear as we may think the arguments against DESPOTISM,
there have been thousands of ENLIGHTENED _and good men_, who _honestly_
believe it to be of all forms of government the best and most acceptable
to God."[A] Now, these "good men" must have been thus warmly in favor of
despotism, in consequence of, or in opposition to, their being
"enlightened." In other words, the light, which in such abundance they
enjoyed, conducted them to the position in