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which they fet out; and, inftead of promoting the cause in which they fo boldly embarked, they have rather damped that fpirit which their own generous example could not fail to infpire. Nay, without confidering the inconfiftency of their conduct, they have, in a great measure, denied their pofterity the use of the neceffary means of farther reformation, by reftricting that freedom of inquiry, for which they had been fuch ftrenuous advocates, when it answered their own purpose.

The views of man are always confined; and when our limited and partial ends are gained, we often can conceive no farther ufe of the means which were neceffary to gain them. When a law, rule, or maxim of any kind favours ourselves, we can eafily enter into the reasons of it, and readily approve it; but when that is no longer the cafe, and our adversary begins to avail himself of it, we wifh the law abrogated; and, in that state of mind, can generally find reafons enow why it fhould be fo.

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Those great men who began the reformation from popery, and those great men, alfo, who would have carried it farther than the imperfect state to which it has been brought in the church of England, were, each of them, fully fenfible of certain abuses, but of a certain number only. Indeed it would have been miraculous if, educated as they were, they could have been fenfible of them all. We, who think we can improve upon their plan, have our ne plus ultra fomewhere. Those reformers, therefore, of courfe, fancied that, were thofe particular abuses rectified, every thing would be right; and every advance farther than their own ideas of perfection, muft have appeared to them as really an errour and an abuse, as those which they had reformed : and it is certain that, in all cafes, there are two extremes for one juft medium. It is, likewise, true, that the ardour of reformation may juftly be supposed to carry men too far, and that mankind do frequently pass from one extreme to the oppofite. Those reformers, therefore, having gained

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gained every thing they thought defirable, had the fame motives to oppose all farther reformation, which the perfons they dif fented from had to oppose them; and being now in the fame fituation, they would naturally adopt their maxims, in order, like them, to difcourage all innovations.

This may ferve as an apology for the conduct of thofe great worthies, whofe labours and whofe rifques we now enjoy, and whose human infirmities we ought, therefore, to bear with. But the fame indulgence cannot be claimed by their fucceffors, men who have no extraordinary merit to plead for it; but who, with the common herd of mankind, are content to be just as wife as their parents and inftructors were before them. Thefe are no more to us than the heads of the church, immediately before the reformation, were to the first reformers. These acquiefce in a fyftem handed down from their ancestors; we think we can improve upon that fyftem; and there is no argument which they

they can alledge against our attempts to improve upon it, but what hath been long ago urged against the fimilar attempts of thofe very perfons, on whose authority they themselves build their faith; persons with whom those arguments had no manner of weight, and whom, for that very reason, they, as protestants, profess to applaud.

In whatever respects we may perceive that the fyftem in which we have been educated retains any tincture of the errours and fuperftitions of popery, and deviates from the genuine fimplicity of the gospel, let us fhow the vigour and fpirit of our ancestors in reforming it. Like them, let us fhow that we also can think for ourfelves; and with the fame freedom, and zeal for the common caufe, let us endeavour to enlighten the minds of others. Let us treat every fubject of religion as we would do those of philofophy. Whenever any opinion is freely canvaffed in open day-light, it will be eafy to see on which fide the truth lies; and may the truth equally prevail againa á blind attach

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ment to old opinions on the one hand, and as unjustifiable a fondnefs for innovation on the other.

To me,

I cannot help faying, it appears, that the prefent ftate of christianity is rather critical, and very much requires to be looked into by all its real friends and fincere advocates. Men of good sense, and of cultivated minds in other refpects, cannot but be aware of many things which are evidently abfurd in the prevailing tenets of the far greater part of christians ; and while no real friend of chriftianity has the courage to fhow them, that the things they diflike and object to, do not belong to that religion, it can be no wonder that they conceive a prejudice against the whole scheme, and become fecret, if not open and avowed infidels. That this is the cafe at this day, not with the unthinking and the profligate only, but with many persons of reading, of reflection, and of the moft irreproachable conduct in life, is well known. It is also apparent, that the number of fuch perfons is daily increafing; and unless

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