HUMANITARIANS-INDEPENDENTS, &c. 39

through his state of trial, his posterity should in consequence be holy also; but if he sinned, his posterity should in consequence be sinners likewise. Adam sinned, and now God brings his posterity into the world sinners. By Adam's sin we are become sinners, not for it; his sin being only the occasion, not the cause of our committing sins.

X. That though believers are justified through Christ's righteousness, yet his righteousness is not transferred to them. For, 1. Personal righteousness can no more be transferred from one person to another, than personal sin. 2. If Christ's personal righteousness were transferred to believers, they would be as perfectly holy as Christ, and so stand in no need of forgiveness. 3. But believers are not conscious of having Christ's personal righteousness, but feel and bewail much indwelling sin and corruption. 4. The Scripture represents believers as receiving only the benefits of Christ's righteousness in justification, or their being pardoned and accepted for Christ's righteousness' sake; and this is the proper Scripture notion of imputation. Jonathan's righteousness was imputed to Mephibosheth when David showed kindness to him for his father Jonathan's sake.

The Hopkinsians warmly contend for the doctrine of the divine decrees, that of particular election, total depravity, the special influences of the Spirit of God in regeneration, justification by faith alone, the final perseverance of the saints, and the consistency between entire freedom and absolute dependence; and therefore claim it as their just due, since the world will make distinctions, to be called HOPKINSIAN CALVINISTS.

The statistics of this denomination are included with those of the Calvinists.

HUMANITARIANS.

THE Humanitarians believe in the simple humanity of Christ, or that he was nothing more than a mere man, born according to the usual course of nature, and who lived and died according to the ordinary circumstances of mankind.

INDEPENDENTS.

(See Church Government.)

INDIAN RELIGIONS.

"LO, the poor Indian! whose untutor'd mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind;
His soul proud science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk or milky way;

Yet simple nature to his hope has given,
Behind the cloud-topp'd hill, an humbler heaven;

Some safer world in depth of woods embraced,
Some happier island in the watery waste,

Where slaves once more their native land behold,
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold.
To be, contents his natural desire,

He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,

His faithful dog will bear him company." POPE.

The natives of CANADA have an idea of the Supreme Being; and they all in general agree in looking upon him as the First Spirit, and the Governor and the Creator of the world. It is said that almost all the nations of the Algonquin language give this Sovereign Being the appellation of the Great Hare. Some again call him Michabou, and others Atahocan. Most of them hold the opinion, that he was born upon the waters, together with his whole court, entirely composed of four-footed animals like himself; that he formed the earth of a grain of sand, which he took from the bottom of the ocean, and that he created man of the bodies of the dead animals. There are likewise some, who mention a god of the waters, who opposed the designs of the Great Hare, or at least refused to be assisting to him. This god is, according to some, the Great Tiger. They have a third, called Mateomek, whom they invoke in the winter season.

The Agreskou of the Hurons, and the Agreskouse of the Iroquois, is, in the opinion of these nations, the Sovereign Being, and the god of war. These Indians do not give the same original to mankind with the Algonquins; they do not ascend so high as the first creation. According to them, there were in the beginning six men in the world, and if you ask them who placed them there, they answer you, they do not know.

The gods of the Indians have bodies, and live much in the same manner as themselves, but without any of those inconveniencies to which they are subject. The word spirit, among them, signifies only a being of a more excellent nature than others.

According to the Iroquois, in the third generation there came a deluge, in which not a soul was saved, so that in order to re-people the earth, it was necessary to change beasts into men.

Beside the First Being, or the Great Spirit, they hold an infinite number of genii or inferior spirits, both good and evil, who have each their peculiar form of worship.

They ascribe to these beings a kind of immensity and omnipresence, and constantly invoke them as the guardians of mankind. But they never address themselves to the evil genii, except to beg of them to do them no hurt.

They believe in the immortality of the soul, and say that the region of their everlasting abode lies so far westward, that the souls are several months in arriving at it, and have vast difficulties to surmount. The happiness which they hope to enjoy, is not believed to be the recompense of virtue only, but to have been a good hunter, brave in war, &c. are the merits which entitle them to this par

adise, which they and the other American natives figure as a delightful country, blessed with perpetual spring, whose forests abound with game, whose rivers swarm with fish, where famine is never felt, and uninterrupted plenty shall be enjoyed without labor or toil.

The natives of NEW ENGLAND believed not only a plurality of gods, who made and governed the several nations of the world, but they made deities of every thing they imagined to be great, powerful, beneficial, or hurtful to mankind. Yet they conceived an Almighty Being, who dwells in the South-west regions of the heavens, to be superior to all the rest. This Almighty Being they called Kichtan, who at first, according to their tradition, made a man and woman out of a stone; but upon some dislike, destroyed them again; and then made another couple out of a tree, from whom descended all the nations of the earth; but how they came to be scattered and dispersed into countries so remote from one another, they cannot tell. They believed their Supreme God to be a good being, and paid a sort of acknowledgment to him for plenty, victory, and other benefits.

But there is another power, which they called Hobamocko, (the devil,) of whom they stood in greater awe, and worshipped merely from a principle of fear.

The immortality of the soul was universally believed among them. When good men die, they said, their souls went to Kichtan, where they meet their friends, and enjoy all manner of pleasures; when wicked men die, they went to Kichtan also, but are commanded to walk away; and wander about in restless discontent and darkness forever.

After the coming of the white people, the Indians in NEW JERSEY, who once held a plurality of deities, supposed there were only three, because they saw people of three kinds of complexion, viz. English, Negroes, and themselves.

It was a notion pretty generally prevailing among them, that it was not the same God made them who made us; but that they were created after the white people; and it is probable they supposed their God gained some special skill by seeing the white people made, and so made them better; for it is certain they looked upon themselves and their methods of living, which they said their God expressly prescribed for them, vastly preferable to the white people and their methods.

With regard to a future state of existence, many of them imagined that the Chichung, i. e. the shadow, or what survives the body, will, at death, go Southward, to some unknown, but curious place; will enjoy some kind of happiness, such as hunting, feasting, dancing, or the like. And what they suppose will contribute much to their happiness in the next state, is, that they shall never be weary of these entertainments.

Those, who have any notion about rewards and sufferings, in a future state, seem to imagine, that most will be happy, and that

those, who are not so, will be punished only with privation, being excluded from the walls of the good world, where happy spirits reside.

Those rewards and punishments, they suppose to depend entirely upon their behaviour towards mankind; and have no reference to any thing, which relates to the worship of the Supreme Being.

The natives of LOUISIANA have an idea of a Supreme Being, whom they call the Grand Spirit, by way of excellence; and whose perfections are as much superior to all other beings, as the fire of the sun is to elementary fire. They believe this omnipotent Being is so good, that he could not do evil to any one, even if he inclined. That though he created all things by his will, yet he had under him spirits of an inferior order, who, by his power, formed the beauties of the universe; but that man was the work of the Creator's own hands. These spirits are, by the Natches, termed free servants or agents; but, at the same time, they are as submissive as slaves. They are constantly in the presence of God, and prompt to execute his will. The air, according to them, is full of other spirits of more mischievous dispositions, and these have a chief, who was so eminently mischievous, that God Almighty was obliged to confine him; and ever since, those ærial spirits do not commit so much mischief, as they did before, especially if they are entreated to be favorable. For this reason the savages always invoke them, when they want either rain or fair weather.

They give this account of the creation of the world, viz. that God first formed a little man of clay, and breathed upon his work, and that he walked about, grew up, and became a perfect man; but they are silent as to the creation of women.

The greatest part of the natives of Louisiana had formerly their temples, and in all these temples a perpetual fire was preserved.

The natives of FLORIDA believe in a supreme benevolent Deity, and a subordinate Deity, who is malevolent; neglecting the former, who they say does no harm, they bend their whole attention to soften the latter, who they say torments them day and night.

The Flat Head Indians, who inhabit the shores of the COLUMBIA RIVER, believe in the existence of a good and an evil Genius, as well as of rewards and punishments in another life. According to their creed, the righteous, after death, go to a land of bliss, where they enjoy a perpetual Spring, where they again dwell with their wives and children, where the rivers are full of fish, and the plains are covered with bison, the flesh of which forms their principal nourishment. There they give themselves up to the pleasures of the chase, fearing neither the rigors of winter, nor hunger, nor the horrors of war. The wicked, on the other hand, are transported to a country which is covered with perpetual snow, and where the cold penetrates to the marrow of their bones. From the midst of

torment, they are condemned to see their righteous brethen

in the delightful fields, chasing the game, or reposing themselves with their families; but the poor frozen sinners cannot stir one step towards that sunny region. Nevertheless, their misery has an end; it is longer or shorter, according to the degree of their guilt; and after its expiation, they are permitted to become inhabitants of the Indian Paradise. (See Appendix, Note I.)

JEWS.

A complete system of the religious doctrines of the Jews, is contained in the five books of Moses, their great lawgiver, who was raised up to deliver them from their bondage in Egypt, and to conduct them to the possession of Canaan, the promised land.

The principal sects among the Jews, in the time of our Saviour, were the Pharisees, who placed religion in external ceremony; the Sadducees, who were remarkable for their incredulity; and the Essenes, who were distinguished by an austere sanctity.

The Pharisees and Sadducees are frequently mentioned in the New Testament; and an acquaintance with their principles and practices, serves to illustrate many passages in the sacred history. At present the Jews have two sects: the Caraites, who admit no rule of religion but the law of Moses; and the Rabbinists, who add to the laws the tradition of the Talmud, a collection of the doctrines and morality of the Jews. The expectation of a Messiah is the distinguishing feature of their religious system. The word Messiah signifies one annointed, or installed into an office by an unction.

Christians believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, in whom all the Jewish prophecies are accomplished. The Jews, infatuated with the idea of a temporal Messiah, who is to subdue the world, still wait for his appearance.

The most remarkable periods in the history of the Jews are, the call of Abraham, the giving of the law by Moses, their establishment in Canaan under Joshua, the building of the Temple by Solomon, the division of the tribes, their captivity in Babylon, their return under Zerubbabel, and the destruction of their city and temple by the Emperor Titus, A. D. 70.

Maimonides, an illustrious rabbi, drew up for the Jews, in the eleventh century, a confession of faith, which all Jews admit. It is as follows:

1. "I believe with a true and perfect faith, that God is the Creator, whose name be blessed, governor and maker of all creatures, and that he hath wrought all things, worketh, and shall work forever.

2. "I believe with a perfect faith, that the Creator, whose name be blessed, is one, and that such an unity as in him can be found in none other, and that he alone hath been our God, is, and forever shall be.

3. "I believe with a perfect faith, that the Creator, whose name be blessed, is not coporeal, nor to be comprehended with any bodily property, and that there is no bodily essence that can be likened unto him.