"The consideration," he says with singular candor, "that biases me as a Christian, exclusive of philosophical considerations, against the doctrine of a separate soul, is, that it has been the foundation of what appears to me to be the very grossest corruptions of Christianity, and even of that very Antichristianism that began to work in the apostles' times, and which extended itself so amazingly and dreadfully afterwards.
I mean the Oriental philosophy of the 'preexistence of souls,' which drew after it the belief of the preexistence and divinity of Christ, the worship of Christ and of dead men, and the doctrine of Purgatory, with all the Popish doctrines and practices that are connected with them, and supported by them."-- "This doctrine (of the preexistence of Christ) is the point to which all that I have written tends, it being the capital inference that I make from the doctrine of Materialism." There is also abundant reason to believe that both Atheists and Pantheists have had recourse to the theory of Materialism with the view of excluding the doctrine of a living, personal God, and explaining all the phenomena of Nature by the eternal laws of matter and motion.

Now, if the question stands related in any way to such themes as these,--the immortality of man, the preexistence and divinity of Christ, and the personality and spirituality of God,--it must be confessed to have at least a very high _relative_ importance, as it bears on some of the most momentous articles of our _religious faith_; and the question naturally arises, What relation it bears to the fundamental principles of Theism, and how far it comports with right views of God, as the Creator and Governor of the world?
We cannot, in the face of direct evidence to the contrary, bring an indiscriminate charge of Atheism, or even of irreligion, against all the advocates of Materialism.

It is true that it has often, perhaps most generally, been associated with infidel opinions, and that in the hands of D'Holbach, Comte, and Atkinson, it has been applied in support of Atheism; but it is equally true, that in the hands of Dr.Priestley and Dr.Good, it is combined with the professed, and, as we believe, the sincere recognition of a personal God and of a future state.

In point of fact, then, all Materialists have not been Atheists; and even were we convinced that Materialists professing religion were illogical or inconsequent reasoners, we should not be justified in ascribing to them those consequences of their system which they explicitly disclaim and disavow.

Still it is competent, and it may be highly useful, to entertain the question, What are the grounds on which the theory of Materialism rests?
And whether, if these grounds be valid, they would not lead, in strict logic, to conclusions at variance with some of the most vital and fundamental articles of the Christian faith?
In attempting to discuss the merits of that theory, we propose to state, confirm, and illustrate a few propositions which are sufficient, in our opinion, to show that the grounds on which it rests, and the reasons to which it appeals, are not such as to warrant or justify any prejudice against the articles of Natural or Revealed Religion.
SECTION II.
PROPOSITIONS ON MATERIALISM.
I.Our _first_ proposition is, that the recent progress of Natural Science, great and rapid as it has been, has not materially altered "the state of the question" respecting the distinction between Mind and Matter, however much it may have extended our knowledge respecting the properties of both, and of the relation subsisting between the two.
We place this proposition on the foreground, because we have reason to believe that a very different impression prevails in certain quarters, associated in some cases with the hope, in others with the apprehension, that the advances which have been made in physical science may ultimately lead to the obliteration of the old distinction between Mind and Matter.