founded on reafon, is carried to a higher degree of purity and perfection than in any other of the wifeft philofophers of preceding ages; every moral precept founded on falfe principles is totally omitted, and many new precepts added peculiarly cor.refponding with the new object of this religion. Lastly, that fuch a fyftem of religion and morality could not have been the work of any man, or set of men; much less of those obscure, ignorant, and illiterate perfons, who actually did difcover and publish it to the world; and that therefore it muft undoubtedly have been effected by the interpofition of divine power, that is, that it must derive its origin from God,'

Under the third propofition, the Author reckons valour, patriotifm, and friendship, among fictitious virtues, founded on falfe principles, and productive of no falutary effects; and, he apprehends, that, however they have been celebrated and admired, they are in fact no virtues at all.

Nothing, I believe, has fo much contributed to corrupt the true fpirit of the Chiflian inftitution, as that partiality which we contract from our earlieft education for the manners of Pagan antiquity: from whence we learn to adopt every moral idea, which is repugnant to it; to applaud falfe virtues, which that difavows; to be guided by laws of honour, which that abhors; to imitate characters, which that detefts: and to behold heroes, patriots, conquerors, and suicides, with admiration, whofe conduct that utterly condemns. From a coalition of these oppolite principles was generated that monstrous fyftem of cruelty and benevolence, of barbarifa and civility, of rapine and justice, of fighting and devotion, of revenge and generosity, which haraffed the world for feveral centuries with crufades, holy wars, knight-errantry, and fingle combats, and even fill retains influence enough, under the name of honour, to defeat the most beneficent ends of this holy inftitution. I mean not by this to pafs any cenfure on the principles of valour, pátriotifm, or honour: they may be useful, and perhaps neceffary, in the commerce and bufinefs of the prefent turbulent and imperfect state; and those who are actuated by them may be virtuous, honeft, and even religious men: all that I affert is, that they cannot be Chriftians: a profligate may be a Chriftian, though a bad one, because he may be overpowered by paffions and temptations, and his actions may contradict his principles; but a man, whofe ruling principle is honour, however virtuous he may be, cannot be a Chriftian, because he erects a standard of duty, and deliberately adheres to it, diametrically oppofite to the whole tenour of that religion.'

In eftablishing the last propofition, our ingenious Author fums up the evidence, and collects it into one point of view

with the following obfervation: If any man can believe that at a time when the literature of Greece and Rome, then in their meridian luftre, were infufficient for the task, the Son of a Carpenter, together with twelve of the meanest and most illiterate mechanics, his affociates, unaffifted by any fupernatural power, fhould be able to discover or invent a fyftem of theology the moft fublime, and of ethics the most perfect, which had efcaped the penetration and learning of Plato, Ariftotle, and Cicero; and that from this fyftem, by their own fagacity, they had excluded every false virtue, though univerfally admired, and admitted every true virtue, though defpife and ridiculed by the reft of the world: if any one can believe, that these men could become impoftors for no other purpose than the propagation of truth, villains for no end but to teach honefty, and martyrs without the leaft profpect of honour or advantage; or that, if all this fhould have been poffible, thefe few inconfiderable perfons fhould have been able, in the courfe of a few years, to have spread their religion over moft parts of the then known world, in oppofition to the interefts, pleafures, ambition, prejudices, and even reason of mankind; to have triumphed over the power of princes, the intrigues of ftates, the force of cuftom, the blindness of zeal, the influence of priests, the arguments of orators, and the philofophy of the world, without any fupernatural affiftance; if any one can believe all thefe miraculous events, contradictory to the conttant experience of the powers and difpofitions of human nature, he must be poffeffed of much more faith than is neceffary to make him a Chriftian, and remain an unbeliever from mere credulity.

But should these credulous infidels after all be in the right, and this pretended revelation be all a fable; from believing it what harm could enfue? Would it render princes more tyrannical, or subjects more ungovernable? the rich more infolent or the poor more diforderly? Would it make worse parents or children, hufbends or wives, mafters or fervants, friends or neighbours? Or would it not make men more virtuous, and confequently more happy in every fituation? It could not be criminal; it could not be detrimental. It could not be criminal, because it cannot be a crime to affent to fuch evidence, as has been able to convince the best and wifeft of mankind; by which, if falfe, Providence must have permitted men to deceive each other, for the most beneficial ends, and, which therefore it would be furely more meritorious to believe, from a disposition of faith and charity, which believeth all things, than to reject with fcorn frem obftinacy and felf-conceit: it cannot be detrimental, because, if Chriftianity is a fable, it is a fable, the belief of which is the only principle which can retain men in a feady and uniform courfe of virtue, piety, and devotion, or can

fupport

fupport them in the hour of diftrefs, of fickness, and of death. Whatever might be the operations of true deifm on the minds of Pagan philofophers, that can now avail us nothing; for that light which once lightened the Gentiles is now abforbed in the brighter illumination of the gofpel; we can now form no rational fyftem of deifm, but what must be borrowed from that fource, and as far as it reaches towards perfection, must be exaly the fame; and therefore if we will not accept of Chriftianity, we can have no religion at all. Accordingly we fee, that thofe who fly from this, fcarce ever ftop at deifm; but haften on with great alacrity to a total rejection of all religious and moral principles whatever.'

Our Author next proceeds to examine and obviate the objections which have been commonly alleged against Chriftianity; and we cannot help thinking that he has made some conceffions not the most favourable to the caufe which he proposes to ferve. He firft evinces the neceffity of revelation in proof of its credibility: he then confiders the objection that has been deduced from the errors and inconfiftencies, the fabulous ftories, falfe facts and falfe philofophy, which are contained in the books of revelation. Let our Readers judge of his reply:

I readily acknowledge, that the fcriptures are not revelations from God, but the hiftory of them: the revelation itself is derived from God; but the hiftory of it is the production of men, and therefore the truth of it is not in the least affected by their fallibility, but depends on the internal evidence of its own fupernatural excellence. If in thefe books fuch a religion, 2s has been defcribed, actually exifts, no feeming, or even real, defects to be found in them can difprove the divine origin of this religion, or invalidate my argument. Let us, for inftance, grant, that the Mofaic hiftory of the creation was founded on the erroneous but popular principles of thofe early ages, who imagined the earth to be a vast plain, and the celestial bodies no more than luminaries hung up in the concave firmament to enlighten it: Will it from thence follow, that Mofes could not be a proper inftrument in the hands of Providence, to impart to the Jews a divine law, because he was not infpired with a foreknowledge of the Copernican and Newtonian fystems? Or that Chrift must be an impoftor, becaufe Mofes was not an aftronomer? Let us alfo fuppofe, that the accounts of Chrift's temptation in the wilderness, the devil's taking refuge in the herd of fwine, with feveral other narrations in the New Teftament, frequently ridiculed by unbelievers, were all but ftories accommodated to the ignorance and fuperftitions of the times and countries in which they were written, or pious frauds intended to imprefs on vulgar minds a higher reverence of the powers and fanctity of Chrift; Will this in the leaft impeach the excellence

cellence of his religion, or the authority of its founder? Or is Christianity answerable for all the fables of which it may have been the innocent occafion? The want of this obvious diftinction has much injured the Chriftian caufe; because on this ground it has ever been moft fuccefsfully attacked, and on this ground it is not eafily to be defended: for if the records of this revelation are fuppofed to be the revelation itself, the least defect difcovered in them must be fatal to the whole.

If in thefe books a religion fuperior to all human imagination actually exifts, it is of no confequence to the proof of its divine origin, by what means it was there introduced, or with what human errors and imperfections it is blended. A diamond, though found in a bed of mud, is ftill a diamond, nor can the dirt, which furrounds it, depreciate its value or destroy its Juftre.'

In ftating the objection derived from the spirit and tendency of the Chriftian precepts, this Writer remarks, that to fome fpeculative and refined obfervers, it has appeared incredible, that a wife and benevolent Creator fhould have conftituted a world upon one plan, and a religion for it on another; that is, that he should have revealed a religion to mankind, which not only contradicts the principal paffions and inclinations which he has implanted in their natures, but is incompatible with the whole economy of that world which he has created, and in which he has thought proper to place them. This, fay they, with regard to the Chriftian is apparently the cafe: the love of power, riches, honour, and fame, are the great incitements to generous and magnanimous act ons; yet by this inftitution are all thefe depreciated and difcouraged. Government is effential to the nature of man, and cannot be managed without certain degrees of violence, corruption, and impofition; yet are all thefe ftrictly forbid. Nations cannot fubfift without wars, nor war be carried on without rapine, defolation, and murder; yet are thefe prohibited under the fevereft threats. The non-refiftance of evil muft fubject individuals to continual oppreffions, and leave nations a defenceless prey to their enemies; yet is this recommended. Perpetual patience under infults and injuries must every day provoke new infults and new injuries; yet is this enjoined. A neglect of all we eat, and drink, and wear, must put an end to all commerce, manufactures, and industry; yet is this recommended. In short, were thefe precepts univerfally obeyed, the difpofition of all human affairs must be entirely changed, and the business of the world, conftituted as it now is, could not go on.'

Can any ferious advocate for Chriftianity admit all these contradictions? Can any one, who has no fecret intention to expose it, allow the truth and validity of the grounds of this objection,

objection, as above ftated? Our Author, we truft, is serious and fincere; and yet to all this I anfwer (he fays) that fuch indeed is the Chriftian revelation, though fome of its advocates may perhaps be unwilling to own it, and fuch it is conftantly declared to be by him who gave it, as well as by those who published it under his immediate direction.'

Some may be ready to afk, Whether the Author, lately recovered from infidelity, has commenced enthusiast? After reciting fonte paffages of fcripture, which by no means admit the conclufions he draws from them; Thefe (he adds) are plain declarations, which, in fpite of all the evafions of thofe good managers, who choose to take a little of this world în their way to heaven, ftand fixed and immovable againft all their arguments drawn from public benefit and pretended neceffity, and muft ever forbid any reconciliation between the pursuits of this world and the Christian inftitution: but they who reject it on this account enter not into the fublime spirit of this religion, which is not a code of precife laws defigned for the well ordering of fociety, adapted to the ends of wordly convenience, and amenable to the tribunal of human prudence; but a divine leffon of purity and perfection, fo far fuperior to the low confideration of conqueft, government, and commerce, that it takes no more notice of them than of the battles of game-cocks, the policy of the bees, or the induftry of ants: they recollect not what is the firft and principal object of this inftitution; that this is not, as has been often repeated, to make us happy, or even virtuous in the prefent life, for the fake of augmenting our happiness here, but to conduct us through a state of dangers and fufferings, of fin and temptation, in fuch a manner as to qualify us for the enjoyment of happinefs hereafter. All other inftitutions of religion and morals were made for the world, but the characteristic of this is to be against it; and therefore the merits of Chriftian doctrines are not to be weighed in the fcales of public utility, like thofe of moral precepts, becaufe worldly utility is not their end.It can therefore be no imputation on this religion, or on any of its precepts, that they tend not to an end which their Author profeffedly difclaims: nor can it furely be deemed a defect, that it is adverfe to the vain pursuits of the world; for fo are reafon, wisdom, and experience; they all teach us the fame leffon, they all demonftrate to us every day, that thefe are begun on false hopes, carried on with difquietude, and end in difappointment. This profeffed incompatibility with the little, wretched, and iniqui tous bufinefs of the world, is therefore fo far from being a defect in this religion, that, was there no other proof of its divine origin, this alone, I think, would be abundantly fufficient.'