"There is a class of minds, of which I consider Robert Owen and Fanny Wright as specimens, who, while wanting in that fine mental balance called common sense, are supplied with a large amount of enthusiasm. Such a combination, if united with a contemplative turn of mind and lively imagination, often leads to that mysticism whose votaries reside in a world of imagination and feeling. But when united to an active and fearless temperament, and under certain influences, it tends to that practical Atheism, which is exhibited in the projects and visionary efforts of Owen and Fanny Wright. … Robert Owen and his followers proceed on a principle which, if carried out, would banish gravitation and destroy fire and water, on account of the incidental evils they involve. They spend their time and breath in collecting and portraying the evil passions, persecutions, and contentions engendered by religion, the injurious action of law, the evils attending the marriage relation, and the family state, and on account of these incidental evils would labor to banish all the blessings secured by these healthful and indispensable institutions. If they should proceed still farther in carrying out their principles, they would be seen roaming through the world, boasting of their superior wisdom while destroying fire with water, and water with fire, as mischievous principles no longer to be tolerated. I have never seen or heard of any thing attempted by persons who have claims to rationality and to an enlightened education, that to me seemed more like the wild vagaries of lunacy than the establishment of Robert Owen at New Harmony. To collect together a company of persons of all varieties of age, taste, habits, and preconceived opinions, and teach them that there is no God, no future state, no retributions after death, no revealed standard of right and wrong, and no free agency; that the laws that secure private property are a nuisance, that religion is a curse, that marriage is a vexatious restraint, that the family state is needless and unwise, and then to expect such a community to dwell together in harmony, and practice upon the rules of benevolence, what can be conceived more childish or improbable, by any person who has seen the world or known any thing of human nature! And yet such is the plan and expectation of the leaders of practical Atheism."