We affirm, without hesitation, that when the new advocates of
infidelity descend from their airy elevation, and state their objections
in intelligible terms, they are found, for the most part, what we
have represented them. When we read many of the speculations of German
infidelity, we seem to be re-perusing many of our own authors of the
last century. It is as if our neighbours had imported our manufactures;
and, after re-packing them, in new forms and with some additions,
had re-shipped and sent them back to us as new commodities. Hardly an
instance of discrepancy is mentioned in the 'Wolfenbutted Fragments,'
which will not be found in the pages of our own deists a century ago;
and, as already hinted, of Dr. Strauss's elaborate strictures, the vast
majority will be found in the same sources. In fact, though far from
thinking it to our national credit, none but those who will dive a
little deeper than most do into a happily forgotten portion of our
literature, (which made noise enough in its day, and created very
superfluous terrors for the fate of Christianity,) can have any idea of
the extent to which the modern forms of unbelief in Germany--so far as
founded on any positive grounds, whether of reason or of criticism,--are
indebted to our English Deists.
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