Directory_and_Chronicle_1850 — Page 671

1850.

Defense of an Essay, &c.

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and so too, you put every town, every district, under some tutelary shin, and to every occupation you give a patron shin: the idea run- ning through all this (we might say to him) is right; man is a weak, dependent being; he must look up to, and depend upon a superior; but you are in great error as to the proper object to whom you should apply for aid. There is but one Being who can really aid you; in our holy book, He is called Jehovah. He it is who presides over all human affairs: the administration of them is not divided out as you suppose among a number of shin; He himself is the alone SHIN. He is the Shin of wealth; pray to him to aid you in your business: He is the Shin of the sea; call upon him in time of danger: He is the Shin of fire; pray to him, &c., &c. In this way we shall avail ourselves of whatever knowledge of divinity in general exists in the mind of this individual, at the same time that we turn to good account whatever devotional feeling he may have connected with the word shin; which is a matter of great importance. The feeling, we tell him, is correct; the object he calls shin: we have no right to complain of his calling it by this or any other name; but his conception of the object—of this shin-is wrong; it must therefore be changed-elevated. Now to do this, to keep the subject on which we would enlighten him before his mind, it is surely wise to adhere to his word shin, and to predicate of this word the truths we would teach him. We should instruct him to put all his shin of wealth, fire, sea, &c., together, as the first process to help him to rise; and then tell him that Jehovah, the true Shin, can afford him ten thousand times more protection and blessing than all he ever fancied all his imaginary shin put together could afford; that He is in truth the ONLY SHIN, the Self-existent, the Almighty, the Holy Shin, &c., &c.

Let us next take the other great errorist, the Pantheist, and set him right with respect to the meaning of this word shin. He too, as we have seen, predicates his errors on the subject of divinity of this word. With him, shin is the informing divinity, spirit, or soul, of the primor- dial substance whose revolutions made the heavens and the earth. Heaven, earth, man, animals, and plants, all share this universal shin : it is the living principle of all things. This shin is evidently no creat. ed spirit, as we regard the human spirit, and all spirits (save God) to be; but a divine power that co-existed with the eternally-existing pri- mary matter.

How are we to set this pantheist right? Tell him that in some respects he is right, and has the advantage of his polytheistic countrymen in his views of the great subject, they in common call Shin. He has a great advantage of them in the unity with which he