part I am fully satisfied that what I am now doing with an endeavor to
conciliate mankind, to render their condition happy, to unite nations that have hitherto been enemies, and to extirpate the horrid practice of war, and break the chains of slavery and oppression, is estimable in his sight, and being the best service I can perform, I act it cheerfully.
"I do not believe that any two men, on what are called doctrinal points, think alike who think at all."
[And this, my reader, is Thomas Paine who hath spoken. I would like to have Henry Ward Beecher, after he has read this book, take the above passage as a text and preach a sermon from it.]
I now call attention to a few parallels:
_Paine._
"A narrow system of politics like a narrow system of religion, is calculated only to sour the temper, and be at variance with mankind."--Crisis, iii.
_Junius._
"Superstition is certainly not the characteristic of this age; yet some men are bigoted in politics who are infidels in religion."--Let. 67.
"Secluded from the world, attached from his infancy to one set of persons and one set of ideas, he can neither open his heart to new connections nor his mind to better information. A character of this sort is the soil fittest to produce that obstinate bigotry in politics and religion which begins with a meritorious sacrifice of the understanding and finally conducts the monarch and the martyr to the block."--Let. 39.
Junius is here speaking of the king, who with a narrow understanding would naturally have a narrow system of politics and religion. But again:
_Paine._
"We persecute no man, neither will we abet in the persecution of any man for religion's sake."--Crisis, iii.
_Junius._
"The fundamental principles of Christianity may still be preserved though every zealous sectary adheres to his own exclusive doctrine, and pious ecclesiastics make it part of their religion to persecute one another."--Let. 58.
"The writer of this is one of those few who never dishonors religion, either by ridiculing or caviling at any denominations whatsoever. To God and not to man are all men accountable on the score of religion."--Epistle to the Quakers.
"If I thought Junius capable of uttering a disrespectful word of the religion of his country I should be the first to renounce and give him up to the public contempt and indignation."--Let. 54.
Above it is Philo Junius who is speaking; but the reader will remember he is the real Junius. He had been attacked for his impiety, and he puts Philo Junius forward to defend himself. The reader can not fail to notice the same hand in the last parallel. Paine says: "The _writer_ of this is one of _those few_ who never dishonors religion" by abusing the professors of it. And he never did. Junius ridiculed the ceremonial in the Catholic Church which denies the cup to the laity; and of this he says: "It is, in this country, as fair an object of ridicule as _transubstantiation_, or any other part of Lord Peter's History in the Tale of the Tub." This reminds me of what Paine says of popery and Peter: "A man hath as good reason to believe that there is as much of kingcraft as priestcraft in withholding the scripture from the public in popish countries. For monarchy in every instance is the popery of government."--Common Sense. In regard to Peter, we see the same temptation to touch his pen with satire and ridicule, and the passage may be found in Rights of Man, part first. It is as follows: "I will quote Mr. Burke's catalogue of barriers that he has set up between man and his maker. Putting himself in the character of a herald, he says: 'We fear God; we look with _awe_ to kings; with affection to parliaments; with duty to magistrates; with reverence _to_ priests; and with respect to nobility.' Mr. Burke has forgot to put in chivalry. _He has also forgot to put in Peter._"
* * * * *
They both considered it true that there is a wide difference between _piety_ and _morality_. Paine himself says (and it is the noblest sentiment ever uttered by man): "MY COUNTRY IS THE WORLD, AND MY RELIGION IS TO DO GOOD." Junius frequently puts piety and morality in antithesis, as the following examples will show: "They care not what injustice is practiced upon a man whose _moral character_ they _piously_ think themselves obliged to condemn."--Let. 39. "The _unfeigned piety_, the _sanctified religion_ of George the Third have taught him to new-model the civil forces of the State. _Corruption glitters in the van_," etc. Then, speaking of some of his predecessors, he says: "They were kings or gentlemen, not hypocrites or priests. They were at the head of the Church, but did not know the value of their office. They said their prayers without ceremony, and had too little of priestcraft in their understanding to reconcile the _sanctimonious forms_ of religion with the utter destruction of the _morality_ of the people."--Let. 55.
* * * * *
But Mr. Paine was the inveterate enemy to priestcraft as well as kingcraft. His whole life was spent in waging war against the two. Let us now see what Junius thought of the former. I have shown him to run parallel with Mr. Paine in the latter.
Junius says: "The resentment of a priest is implacable: no sufferings can soften; no penitence can appease."--Let. 53. In speaking of the Rev. Mr. Horne, he says: "No, my lord; it was the solitary, vindictive malice of a monk, brooding over the infirmities of his friends, until he thought they quickened into public life, and feasting with a rancorous rapture upon the sordid catalogue of his distresses. Now let him go back to his cloister. The Church is a proper retreat for him; in his principles he is already a bishop. The mention of this man has moved me from my natural moderation."--Let. 49. Again:
"The priesthood are accused of misinterpreting the scriptures. Mr. Horne has improved on his profession. He alters the text, and creates a refutable doctrine of his own."--Let. 53.
The above passages can not be mistaken for Mr. Paine's spirit, style, and language. These tell us they are his with much more truth than a name attached to any writing tells us its author.
* * * * *
It seems they both had the same opinion of a _Methodist_:
_Paine._
"But when he [man] multiplies his creed with imaginary things, he forces his mind, and pretends to believe what he does not believe. This is, in general, the case with the _Methodists_--their religion is all creed and no morals."--Let. to Mr. Dean.
_Junius._
"You meanly evaded the question, and, instead of the explicit firmness and decision of a king, gave us nothing but the misery of a ruined grazier, and the whining piety of a _Methodist_."--Let. 36.
Now the reader will recall the parallel I gave in regard to never dishonoring religion by saying any thing against particular forms or denominations. With the exception of the Catholic Church, this is the only instance which has fallen under my eye; and it seems they had such a disliking to Methodism, a sarcasm must be let loose upon it. Trifling as this instance may seem, there is great force in its being solitary, and apparently contradictory to what they both before affirmed in general. Such an instance has, in fact, more weight than a score of parallels on common characteristics, for it shows a peculiar and strong bias in a particular direction.
* * * * *
Of the term Christian there is no positive ground for a parallel, because it is one of no definite meaning. We call ourselves, as a nation, Christians; yet we are divided into a hundred forms of {172}religion, and many of them in the articles of faith contradictory and antagonistic. Yet, in the fundamental principles of morality, we are, in common with all civilized races, agreed. The Christian religion happens to belong to the highest civilization, and we frequently use the term as synonymous with the _morality_ of this civilization. But when we come to define strictly according to the theological import of the word, there are many of us who are not Christians. In the former sense, Mr. Paine and Junius were Christians; in the latter sense, they were not. And now for the proof. Junius says, in Letter 15, to the Duke of Grafton: "It is not, indeed, the least of the thousand contradictions which attend you, that a man marked to the world by the grossest violation of ceremony and decorum, should be the first servant of a court in which _prayers are morality_, and _kneeling is religion_." For this, and his attacks on the priesthood, and his frequently putting piety in antithesis to morality, he was at last accused of being an impious and irreligious man. He now puts Philo Junius forward to explain his religious views, who says, in