be converted, and a member in full communion of one of the churches allowed in this dominion. No man fhall hold any office, who is not found in the faith, and faithful to this dominion. Each freeman fhall fwear by the blessed God to bear true allegiance to this dominion, and that Jefus is the only king. No Quaker, or diffenter from the established worship of this dominion, fhall be allowed to give a vote for the election of magistrates, or any officer. No food or londging fhall be offered to a Quaker, Adamite, or other heretic. If any perfon turns Quaker, he fhall be banished, and not fuffered to return but on pain of death. No priest shall abide in the dominion: he shall be banished, and fuffer death on his return. Priests may be feized by any one without a warrant. No one to cross a river but with an authorized ferry man. No one fhall run on the fabbath day, or walk in his garden, or elsewhere, except reverently to and from meeting. No one fhall travel, cook victuals, make beds, fweep houfes, cut hair, or fhave on the fabbath day. No woman thall kifs her children on the fabbath or fasting day. The fabbath fhall begin at fun-fet on Saturday. To pick an ear of corn growing in a neighbour's garden fhall be deemed theft. A perfon accused of trefpafs in the night, fhall be judg ed guilty, unless he clear himself by his oath. When it appears that an accufed has confederates, and he refuses to discover them, he may be racked. No one fhall buy or fell lands without the permiffion of the felectmen. A drunkard fhall have a master appointed by the select *Those who perform the facredotal functions in Protestant Churches or meetings are called ministers, NOT priests a nice distinction without a difference. men, who are to debar him from the liberty of buying and felling. Whoever publishes a lie to the prejudice of his neigh. bour, fhall fit in the stocks, or be whipped ten stripes. No minister fhall keep a school. Every rateable perfon who refuses to pay his proportion to the fupport of the minister of the town or parish, fhall be fined by the court two pounds, and four pounds every quarter, until he or fhe pay the rate to the minister. Men-stealers fhall fuffer death. Whoever wears clothes trimmed with gold, filver, or bone lace, above two fhillings per yard, fhall be prefented by the grand jurors, and the felectmen fhall tax the of dender at three hundred pounds estate. A debtor in prison, fwearing he has no estate, fhall be let out, and fold to make fatisfaction. Whoever fets a fire in the woods, and it burns a house, shall suffer death: and perfons fufpected of this crime fhall be imprisoned without the benefit of bail. Whoever brings cards or dice into this daminion shall pay a fine of five pounds. No one fhall read common prayers, keep Christmas, or set days, make minced pies, dance play cards, or play on any instrument of mufic, except the drum, trumpet, and jew's harp. No gofpel minister shall join people in marriage; the magistrates only fhall join in marriage, as they may do it with less fcandal to Christ's church. When parents refufe their children convenient mar. riages, the magistrate shall determine the point. The felectmen, on finding children ignorant, may take them away from their parents, and put them into better hands, at the expence of their parents. Fornication fhall be punished by compelling marriage, or as the court shall think proper. Adultery shall be punished with death. A man that strikes his wife fhall pay a fine of ten pounds; a woman that strikes her husband fhall be pu nished as the court directs. A wife shall be deemed good evidence against her husband. No man can court a maid in person, or by letter, without first obtaining confent of her parents: five pounds penalty for the first offence; ten pounds for, the fecond, and for the third imprifonment during the pleasure of the court. Married perfons must live together, or be imprifoned. Every male fhall have his hair cut round according to a cap. The foregoing laws, as well as all thofe made before, and fince, by devotees, will remain eternal monuments of the tyrannical, oppreffive, perfecuting, and cruel fpirit of all religions, and religious fects, when not under the direction and control of reafon. Instead of being called blue laws-like thofe of Draco, they fhould have been written in blood, and called RED laws. Instead of the fober precepts of paternal legislators, as might naturally have been expected from men who had recently fled from oppreffion, they unfortunately brought the contagion with them, fo that we fee nothing but the bitterness, the malignity, and ravings of religious infanity and perfecution. Every natural and moral precept, principle, and right, are there most grofsly and fhamefully violated. By those laws, the most favoured and happy were those who were banished; as thofe who were constrained to live under, and to fubmit to fuch laws, could only be confi dered as victims in an inquifition. As physical anatomists dig up dead bodies, and preferve their skeletons, for the ufe and benefit of the living, fo I would prefume I am not lefs justifiable, as a moral anatomist, in recalling to view the frailties of our forefathers, by hanging out their abortions, or deformed monsters, called Laws, in terrorem, that the world may judge of the total infufficiency of religion, independent of reafon and morality, to promote temporal peace; and that a house built on fuch a flippery foundation cannot stand. Profession of faith of a Savoyard Curate, from No material being can be felf-active; and I perceive that I am fo. It is in vain to difpute with me fo clear a point; my own fentiment carries with it a stronger conviction than any reafon which can ever be brought against it. I have a body, on which other bodies act, and which acts reciprocally on them. This reciprocal action is indubitable; but my will is independent of my fenfes. I can either consent to or refist their imprefsions; I am either vanquished or victor, and perceive clearly within myself when I act according to my will, and when I fubmit to be governed by my passions. I have always the power to will, though not the force to execute it. When I give myself up to any temptation, I act from the impulse of external objects. When I reproach myself for my weakness in fo doing, I listen only to the dictates of my will: I am a flave in my vices, and free in my repentance: the fentiment of my liberty is effaced only by my depravation, and when I prevent the voice of the foul from being heard, in oppofition to the laws of the body. All the knowledge I have of violation, is deduced from a fenfe of my own, and the understanding is known no better. When I am asked, what is the cause that determines my will? I ask in my turn, what is the cause that determines my judgement? for it is clear that these two caufes make but one; and, if we conceive that man is active in forming his judgement of things, that his understanding is only a power of comparing and judging, we fhall fee that his liberty is only a fimilar power, or one derived from this: he chooses the good as he judges of the true; and for the fame reafon as he deduces falfe judgment, he makes a bad choice. What then is the cause that determines his will? It is his judgment. And what is the caufe that determines his judgment? It is his intelligent faculty, his power of judging; the determining caufe lies in himself. If we go beyond this point, I know nothing of the matter. Not that I can fuppofe myfelf at liberty, not to will my own good, or to will my own evil: but my liberty confists in this very circumstance, that I am incapable to will any thing but what is useful to me, or at least what appears fo, without any foreign object interfering in my determination. Does it follow from hence that I am not my own master, because I am incapable of affuming another being, or of divesting myself of what is effential to my existence. The principle of action lies in the will of a free being; we can go no farther, in fearch of its fource. It is not the word liberty that Has no fignification; it is that of necellity. To fuppofe any act or effect, which is not de. rived from an active principle, is indeed to fuppofe effects without a caufe. Either there is no first impulfe, or every first impulse can have no prior caufe; nor can there be any fuch thing as will, without liberty. Man is, therefore, a free agent, and as fuch animated by an immaterial fubstance: this is my third article of faith. From these three first you may easily deduce all the rest, without my continuing to number them. If man be an active and free being, he acts of himself; none of his fpontaneous actions, therefore, enter into the general fystem of Providence, nor can be imputed to it. Providence doth not contrive the evil, which is the confequence of man's abufing the liberty his Creator gave him: it only doth not prevent it, either because the evil, which fo impotent a being is capable of doing, is beneath its notice, or because it cannot prevent it, without laying a restraint upon his liberty, and caufing a greater evil, 'by debafing his nature. To be continued. NEW-YORK: Printed and published by the Editor, No. 26, Chathamstreet, at Two Dollars per annum, one half paid in advance, every six months. |