Natural Religion and Deism in America before Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine

Abstract

T 1IMOTHY Dwight in i803 recorded his opinion that Ethan Allen's Reason Only Oracle of Man (1784) was the first formal publication in United States openly directed against Christian religion.1 I propose to show that, except for word openly, this statement more properly applies to a pamphlet published in Boston in I77i bearing title Sermon on Natural Religion by a Natural Man. I shall also show that Dr. Thomas Young, generally considered to be co-author of Allen's Reason Only Oracle of Man, published an openly deistical creed in a Boston newspaper in 1772, year following appearance of Sermon on Natural Religion.2 In so doing, I am making no claim whatsoever to trace history of deism in America. My primary objective is to reveal importance of an acknowledged deistical tract being printed in America in 1771, and my secondary objective is to suggest a transitional relationship between natural religion as presented in this openly heterodox work and natural religion as treated by earlier orthodox theologians. The task of introducing any document associated with deism in its historical and ideological contexts is complicated by manifold connotations associated with concept itself and with overlapping term natural religion. According to some historians, concepts are identical; according to others, they are vastly different. Some of original texts on which scholars have based their conclusions similarly maintain that revealed religion and natural religion are complementary and mutually supporting; others affirm that they are contradictory and diverse. A simple distinction has been offered