No. 9. The following Letters passed between Mr. M'Calla and Mr. Kneeland after the close of the foregoing Discussion: MR. KNEELAND, In the Democratic Press" I observe a dispute between "PAUL" on one side, and you and "A VESTRYMAN" on the other side, whether or not I was brought to a premature close, in the discussion in Lombard-street Church. Your arguments and statements I deem incorrect. Yet one feature of your publication gives me pleasure. It is an indication of a willingness on your part to hear me until I am satisfied. You have, now, at least, given me " to understand, that in all probability, the house might be abtained as long as it should be wanted. Another meeting would give you an opportunity of answering that new matter to which you made no reply, and it would show whether my materials were exhausted or not. This would be suitable on another account: your challange which was accepted in my letter of the 2d inst. "invites and intreats the clergy" "to discuss" not only one error, but_"* the supposed errors" of your Lectures. During the debate I showed that they erred on the Divinity of Christ, and intimated a willingness to meet you at a convenient season on that point. That intimation is now renewed. If you still entertain the desire manifested in your repeated challenges, it can now (God willing, be gratified at the same place, with the same rules, and under the same moderation: Your speedy answer will be a gratification to Philadelphia, July 31, 1824. No. 69 North Third Street. Mr. M'CALLA, W. L. M'CALLA. As our former letters are published in the "Gazetteer," and the subsequent discussion is now in the Press, I shall publish, through the same medium, yours of the 31st ult. together with this my reply. You say that you deem my "arguments and statements" to be "incorrect;" but you have not informed me to what arguments you allude, nor wherein my statements have been incorrect. This is reprehensible. No man ought to be charged with having made incorrect statements, without being informed, at the same time, wherein. Although I had pledged myself, and was determined to hear you through at that time, yet I have given no pledge to meet you again in the same way; and whether I do, must depend on cir cumstances which are first to be considered.-As the Church in Lombard street, in which we held our late discussion, has been since, (at considerable expense,) both cleaned and repaired, I am not able to say whether it could be so soon obtained again for a similar purpose. As to the new matter to which I had not an opportunity to reply, (Ps. ix. 5.) since it makes nothing in your favour, nor against any of my arguments, a bare note of a very few lines, will be all the reply I shall need. Whether your materials were all exhausted or not, is a matter of no consequence; for if you could spend four days without the least attempt to reply to either my first or second argument, both of which were presented in my first speech, (to neither of which did you attempt any reply,) you probably might continue a month in the same way; and, after all, to no purpose. If y you wish to discuss the supposed errors" of my Lectures, you must do it in the way the challenge (as you call it) was given, namely, through the medium of the press; for, as those Lectures have been so long before the public, I shall discuss that subject in no other way: nor, unless you are able to point out errors which are material and important in point of doctrine or fact, do I pledge myself to reply. You have said that there were errors in my Lectures, but you have not yet shown any. I did not think proper to contradict what you was pleased to say about them during the discussion, (except when you tried to pervert a single sentence,) and it was for this plain reason,--because they were not mentioned in the proposition for discussion. Now, sir, I wish you distinctly to understand, notwithstanding whatever you may say about challenges, that before I will consent to debate with a man on any religious subject whatever, at any time or place, who has not only refused to unite with me in religious worship, but who has refused to give me his hand when mine was extended to him in token of friendship, in my own desk, he must give me satisfactory evidence that the clergy with whom he is connected, and with whom he professes to be in fellowship, however much they may disapprove of his conduct in this particular, nevertheless consider him as a brother in the faith, and approve of his mode of arguing on religious subjects. This, with me, is a sine qua non, and unless it be complied with, it will be useless to urge any thing further on the subject. If I meet a man to discuss religious subjects before the public, I must meet him on the level;-he is not to have the privilege of assuming that he is a christian, and that his antagonist is an infidel, until he has proved, both from theory and practice, that such is the fact.-I ask, in this case, no more than what I am willing to give, should it be required.-Or, let your friends open the doors of one of their Churches, to accommodate the au dience, as mine have done, and I will consider it a satisfactory evidence that they are with you in this debate. These preliminaries being settled, the first thing in order to be attended to, is, what has been already proposed. 1. You must show the law of God which requires "absolutely eternal punishment," or else acknowledge that no such law has been given to man. 2. You must show that God has threatened man, through the medium of his prophets, with a punishment which is "absolutely eternal," or else acknowledge that you cannot. 3. You must prove, from the New Testament, that there will be the wicked, (Ps. xxxvii. 10,) and, of course, a punishment for the wicked, after this mortal shall have put on immortality, or after that death is swallowed up of life, or acknowledge that you cannot. 4. No evidence will be admitted as a proof of a punishment between death and the resurrection, that is, in what is called an intermediate state, unless you can first prove that the soul or spirit of man (whatever you may understand by those terms) is susceptible of consciousness, and of course, of happiness or misery, independent of the organs of sense, or seperate from a body. 5. I, on my part, will prove the latter part of our former proposition true, and that all mankind will ultimately be saved from sin, and consequently from punishment, or else acknowledge that I cannot. 6. It shall be mutually agreed, that the moment either wanders from the point in debate, in the opinion of either two of the moderators, he shall be stopped; and unless he will confine himself to the subject, in proper and decorous language, he shall not be allowed to proceed. 7. The moderators to be the same as on the last day of our former discussion, or such as may be mutually agreed upon. With these regulations, and as many of the former as are not inconsistent with these, I should have no objection to continue the discussion till every point is fully settled, if practicable. No. 31, South Second Street, August 2, 1824. A. KNEELAND. No. 11. In the Franklin Gazette of Aug. 23d, the following letter appeared, which was afterward copied into the Democratic Press of September 2d. DEBATE ON UNIVERSALISM. FOR THE FRANKLIN GAZETTE. TO MR. ABNER KNEELAND. SIR-In my letter of the 31st ultimo, published in the Gazette of Monday, a plan was proposed for bringing the dispute between you and Paul, a writer in the Democratic Press, to a speedy settlement;-for giving you an opportunity of answering my new matter;-for securing to me the stipulated privilege of speaking until satisfied;-and of discussing with you, (if you thought proper,) the doctrine of Christ's divinity, on which subject your lectures afford another of those errors, for the discussion of which you have challenged the clerical world. In your answer of the 2d instant, published also by you on yesterday, you intimate that it is unimportant whether I spoke until satisfied or not;-unimportant that you should answer the new matter;-and inadmissable that we should hold an ore tenis investigation of the divinity of Christ. Although your printed challenge is still standing, and your pulpit challenges are still uttered, you decline another meeting. Since the debate, you have altered your course. Whether this has arisen from a change in your views of policy or of propriety, the public must judge. Let it be however distinctly understood, that it is not the orthodox clergy, but Mr. Kneeland, the man of challenging memory, who retires from investigation. Whether your stenographical squire, the ostensible Editor of the pretended "Minutes" of the discussion, will, with your assistance, succeed better from the press than you have done from the rostrum, is problematical. To a second meeting you object the expense of cleaning the house. It was never before graced with a greater proportion of females and respectable characters. But you say that the house has been since repaired, and, therefore, although you were willing to continue the former debate, you think a second interview impracticable. Strange, that in a state of repair, a house cannot hold an overwhelming congregation, as well as when it has begun to give way! Until after the debate was closed, I did not know that the building, though propped on the last day, was ready to fall in ruins on the audiNotwithstanding this, you have intimated to the public, that it might then have been obtained longer. Yet as it has since ence. been repaired, and there is little reason to expect that it will fall, we cannot have it again but must procure another church! Your insisting that I should finish from the press a discussion which was begun in conference, shows that, you are learning by experience. With the help of God, you shall be satisfied here also. As you are unwilling to have your flight from the controversy viewed in its real character, you propose new terms of conference. Three of your requisitions are, that I shall prove eternal punishment from the law, the prophets, and the New Testament. Without by any means, admitting that this is impracticable, it may be correctly observed that no man who believes in the inspiration of Scripture will reject any doctrine or precept, merely because it is not revealed by every inspired writer. A bundant testimony from the Old and New Testament was advanced in the debate. Yet, as you arrogate to yourself, though a party, the sole right of judging of my evidence; and as you have already decided that the Old Testament gives no intimation even of a future state, this demand for proof from that quarter was only intended as an insurmountable obstacle to another meeting. The same general features characterize your fourth demand, requiring proof that the soul can exist separate from the body, before you will admit even the testimony of Moses and the prophets and the apostles, that it does so exist; as if infallible proof of the fact itself did not at once establish the possibility of the fact. You might as well say, that before you will admit scriptural testimony of the existence of God, this must first be proved from reason, independently of revelation. Although sound reason is entirely consistent with revelation, none but an infidel will give it paramount authority. Our relative standing in this businness may be plainly shown by the following supposed case: A Kentucky duellist, a char acter far too common, publishes a general challenge, and repeats it often. Suppose that the last edition reads as follows: "He once more respectfully invites and entreats the gentlemen of other states, or some one of them, the more expert the better, to exchange a few shots with him." Suppose that an eastern merchant, not scrupulous about the sixth commandment, is in Lexington on business, and meets him on his own premises. After four rounds, the Kentuckian, faint for the loss of blood, gives a hint to his antagonist, that they cannot probably occupy the ground any longer. They part, but after the invitation is again repeated and accepted, the Kentuckian demurs to the former regulations, and insists upon many new conditions, among which the following are four: 1. The lock of his antagonist's weapon must come from Europe. 2. The stock must come from |