If Christians in general, happily, for society, were not inconsistent, and did not neglect the peculiar precepts of their religion, no large society of them could exist; and the nations enlightened by the gospel would turn hermits, and nuns.

All business, but fasting and prayer, would be at an end.

There would be nothing but groaning in "this vale" of tears;" and they would make themselves, and others, as miserable as possible, from the best of motives, viz; the desire to fulfill what they mistakenly conceived to be the will of God.
Is this a picture taken from the life, or is it a fanciful representation of something different from the peculiar morality of the New Testament?
This serious question demands a serious answer.

If it be such as it is represented above and such it really appears to me, and such I have unfortunately experienced its operation to be on my own mind--I would respectfully ask--can such a religion, whose peculiar principles tend to render men hateful, and hating one another: which has often rendered sovereigns, persecutors, and subjects, either rebels, or slaves: a religion, whose peculiar moral principles and maxims, teach the mind to grovel, and humble, and break down the energies of man; and which divert him from thinking of his true interests, and the true happiness of himself and his fellow men.

Can such a religion, I would respectfully ask, be from God, since where fully obeyed, it would prove utterly destructive to society?
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