219 
1821 .] 'Ueply to CJirisiiamis, 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
Biographer of Fransiiam in reply to 
Christianus. 
{Continued from p. 119.) 
ITH respect to the clause, in 
w’liich the literature of infidelity is 
said to bestow frankneaSj there is disagree¬ 
ment bet'veen Christianus and the biogra- 
pher of Fransham, as well about the fact 
as about the furmof expression. The infe¬ 
rences of our observation do not coincide. 
Singular how ever it is, that Christianus 
should cite an instance o.f frankness as a 
proof that the disciples of infidelity are 
J)i this respect habitually deficient. 
D’Alembert, he says, wrote to Voltaire: 
I told the lie you bade me.” How 
would a Christian have written, “I gave 
him to understand you had confidentially 
informed me you were not the author of 
the philosopliic dictionary.” Without 
any forma! breach of truth would not the 
deception have been equally brought to 
bear, and not have been called by its plain 
frank honest name? 
Let us, however, pass from particular 
instances, which chiefly illustrate indivi¬ 
dual character, to more comprehensive 
tendencies. Duplicity is the quality op¬ 
posed to frankness. In its fainter shades 
it is meritorious; politeness cannot sub¬ 
sist without it. In its intense degree it 
incurs the name of hypocrisy. But it 
has many equivocal intermediate shades. 
One of these easier, every-day, and not 
unamiable, shapes, is termed framing. 
Dr. Johnson does not recognize this ex¬ 
pression, which, however, is common, 
and designates a habit of affected candor, 
of putting the fairest face on all beha¬ 
viour, of assigning purer than the real 
motives for every little action, and of 
blandishing into exertions of benevo¬ 
lence the merest instincts of our nature. 
Now this habit of framing, which has 
its use as a pledge of decorum, as a curb 
of temper, and as a husk, or educatress, 
of virtue, is assuredly very general among 
Christians. They owe it, not to their 
creed, but to their discipline, to their 
being formed into ecclesiastic coml)ina- 
tions. Adam Smith (1. v. c. 1 ) confirms 
this idea. Every congregation, he ob¬ 
serves, constitutes a club of moral com¬ 
petitors, whose reciprocal inspection 
checks the outward symptoms of had pas¬ 
sions, and whose mutual encouragement 
calls forth the studious profession of pu¬ 
rity, and solicitude for others. Where 
the interior discipline is strictest this bo¬ 
dy-spirit is most evolved, and usually 
superinduces a decorous dissimulation, 
when it faps in the inculcation of princi¬ 
ple. But in all this there is some en¬ 
croachment on the frankness of nature. 
The terms presbyterianism, quukerism^ 
jesuitism, are all in use to describe incon¬ 
venient shades of duplicity, which the ex¬ 
perience of mankind consentaneously 
ascribes to religious combination. Now, 
as the disciples of infidelity are not 
formed into worshipful societies, hue 
mostly desert the extant religious associa¬ 
tions, it is evident that they must con¬ 
stantly be tending to lose even that 
wholesome degree of duplicity which 
weaves tl.e drapery of moral refinement, 
and to fall back toward the frankness of 
indiscipline, q. e. d. For frankness is 
but the anarchy of the will, and the nu¬ 
dity of the mind. 
That the literature of infidelity be¬ 
stows moral courage Christianus seems to 
admit. A strong instance in poifit is, 
that no Christian commentator should 
have reprehended those passages above 
cited (Hebrews x. 28 and 29; John xv. 
6.) about persecution. Even in the 
cause of humanity the learned among the 
clergy tremble to argue against a sentence 
of the sacred books. Out of a supersti¬ 
tious cowardice they become traitors to 
virtue; and would be afraid to maintain 
that Apolios, th.e author of Hebrews, is 
an authority of little weight, and that we 
misunderstand the words of John, or he 
misunderstood the w'ojds of Christ. 
That the literature of infidelity 
strengthens the vigor of intellect, is but 
accidental, and arises from the circum¬ 
stance that the best reasoners of modern 
limes have been of this sect, or persua« 
sion; as, for instance, Bayle and Hume, 
The reasoning faculty cannot attain its 
highest improvement without comparing 
and exercising itself with the stiongest 
minds that human society has produced. 
That it enlarges the dominion of intellect 
is a mere truism. One topic more must 
he included within the range of liis exa¬ 
mination, who enquires concerning the 
origin of religioirainong men, than in his, 
who makes no such enquiry. 
This is a long letter in defence of few 
lines. Every clause of the disputed sen¬ 
tence has now been sufficiently explained 
to account for the writer’s then point of 
view, to show that he employs words 
with some precision, and that his phrases, 
if not weighed in the balance of the 
sanctuary, are poised in the no less 
nicely graduated scales of academic phi¬ 
losophy. Christianus is one of those 
heresy-ferrets who can tolerate the public 
expression of no other sentiments than 
his own. His displeasure in this instance 
has 
