1791' LITERARY INTELLIGENCER. 25I 



mean, to a period after they have departed from this 

 Vorld : — theie hopes, diftant and uncertain, yield to 

 the nearer and more obvious purfuits of this life ; and 

 therefore, when in the exercile of religion, great tem- 

 poral inconveniences are occafioned, the religion 

 ceafes, and the femblance of it only is kept np. 



Hence, I give it as my opinion, that it is a mod de- 

 ftriiclive doiSlrine, in all cafes, to adn.it of a man's oath, 

 nhen it operates either for or againft his own intereft. 

 Yet I am forry to obferVe, that the legiilatofs of my 

 country, have of late been of a different manner of 

 thinking. They have enacted, that every retail dealer 

 of foreign fpirits, wines and tea, fliall make oath from 

 time to time, that he does not fell above the quantity of 

 goods fpecified by him in a Certain book, — or, in other 

 words, he mull fwear that he is an honeft man. — Not 

 a farthifig of duties can be drawn back on the exporta- 

 tion of goods, without one or more oaths of the parties 

 connefted in the tranfaftion. — A bankrupt muft fwear 

 that he has not cheated his creditors : — and I believe 

 there is fcarcely h branch of trade or manufacture un- 

 der taxation, wherein people are not obliged to fwear 

 that they will not take a farthing from the king, al- 

 though they have it in their power. Upon this, let any 

 man reflecl, and afk his own mind, if men will adhere 

 to thele oaths, when it is evidently lofing them very 

 great profits. — I am confident, that in fuch fituations, 

 there is not one in a thoufand who will. — I recolleft of 

 liearing an anecdote of a dealer in tea, who \vas one of 

 thofe apparently aullere religious people, to be met 

 with in every place : When the invention of ihopkeep- 

 ers fwearing to the excife officers of the fairnefs of their 

 trade was firft put in practice, this man, who had alway? 

 been in the pratlice of fmuggllng a little, and was now 

 very unwilling to forego the advantages thereof on ac- 

 count of an oath, fet his invention to work in contriv- 

 ing a method of fmuggltng, fwearing, and having a 

 found confcience : — the refalt of mature deliberation 



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