. Domestic manners of the Americans . had listened to liim for halfan hour ; and having continued speaking for a fewminutes after he had looked at it, he sat down with,I should think, the universal admiration of hisauditory. Mr. Owen again addressed us; and liis firstfive minutes were occupied in complimenting with all the strength his exceedinghearty laughter had left him. But then he changedhis tone, and said the business was too serious topermit the next half hour to pass so hghtly and sopleasantly as the last; and then he read us whathe called his twelve fundamental laws of hum
. Domestic manners of the Americans . had listened to liim for halfan hour ; and having continued speaking for a fewminutes after he had looked at it, he sat down with,I should think, the universal admiration of hisauditory. Mr. Owen again addressed us; and liis firstfive minutes were occupied in complimenting with all the strength his exceedinghearty laughter had left him. But then he changedhis tone, and said the business was too serious topermit the next half hour to pass so hghtly and sopleasantly as the last; and then he read us whathe called his twelve fundamental laws of humannature. These twelve laws he has taken so muchtrouble to circulate to all the nations of the earth,that it must be quite vmnecessary to repeat themhere. To me they appear twelve truisms, that noman in his senses would ever think of contradict-ing ; but how any one can have conceived that theexplanation and defence of these laws could fur-nish forth occupation for his pen and his voice,through whole years of unwearying declamation,. OF THE AMERICANS. 207 or how he can have dreamed that they could betwisted into a refutation of the Christian religion, isa mystery which I never expect to understand. From this time Mr. Owen entrenched himselfbehind his twelve laws, and Mr. Campbell, withequal gravity, confined himself to bringing forwardthe most elaborate theological authorities in evi-dence of the truth of revealed religion. Neither appeared to me to answer the other ;but to confine themselves to the utterance of whatthey had uppermost in their owti minds when thediscussion began. I lamented this on the side ofMr. Campbell, as I am persuaded he would havebeen much more powerful had he trusted more tohimself and less to his books. Mr. Owen is anextraordinary man, and certainly possessed of talent,but he appears to me so utterly benighted in themists of his own theories, that he has quite lost thepower of looking through them, so as to get a peepat the world as it really exists ar
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1830, booksubjectuniteds, bookyear1832
