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your Charge. It is (in your own words) to lay before your Clergy some reasons, drawn from the Christian Revelation itself, which evince the pretensions of morality antecedently to divine Revelation, to be carried much too high, and vindicate the Christian Faith, as well as Morality, from those INVIDIOUS INSINUATIONS that have been CAST upon them by SEVERAL LATE WRITERS, WHO will occasionally be ANIMADVERTED upon in the following Discourse. p. 2.

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Your Lordship having gone through your Reasons, comes, in page 24, to draw your inferences from them. The second of which, you tell us, is, "That though "Christian Morality is much superior to that of all other "religions, yet it does not of itself (that is, abstractedly "from the facts recorded in the Gospel, with which it is incorporated) evince the truth, though it does most clearly the excellency of the Christian Religion. It is certain (says your Lordship) that the reasonableness "and sanctity of the moral precepts of the Gospel give great advantages to Christianity, as compared with any "other religion ancient or modern. And this, of itself is "sufficient to give a well-disposed mind very favourable "thoughts of the Christian Religion, and to induce it to make farther enquiries into the truth of those facts "which es establish its divine authority. And this is as far as the argument needs to be pushed; and in fact it is as far as one of the best modern Apologists for the truth of Christianity, the most learned Grotius, in concurrence with the principal Apologists amongst the Ancients, and more especially the famous Origen, thought fit to urge it. It is clear that they thought themselves obliged only to shew, that the morality of the Gospel does vastly excel that of all other religious and moral institutions, and is most worthy of God in "all respects. But neither they nor any other thought"ful persons, that have formerly engaged on this subject (as far as I can recollect) have thought it reasonable to lay so great a stress on the excellency of the morals of the Gospel, considered distinctly from the facts of the Gospel, and in their own nature solely, as necessarily

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"to infer from thence the certainty of the Christian Re velation. And much less have they asserted, as has "been done by some LATE WRITERS, that the morality "of the Gospel, which they call the internal evidence of "it (though indeed it has not the nature of evidence "properly so called), is the strongest evidence of the "truth of Christianity, and is highly superior to all its "external evidence, that is, the evidence which arises "from the facts recorded in the Gospel, and attended "with other attestations of ancient writers, which support

its divine authority." This is all from your Lordship; where at the word WRITERS we find a mark of reference to the following Note-See Mr. Arscot's Considerations on the Christian Religion, pp. 10. 51, 59, Go, &c. Part II. p. 63. Part III. and elsewhere. SEE TOO MR. WARBURTON'S DIVINE LEGATION OF MOSES, &c. pp. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5*.

So that here, my Lord, I find this proposition affirmed, That Mr. Warburton, in his Divine Legation of Moses, &c. pp. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, has asserted THAT THE MORALITY OF THE GOSPEL, WHICH HE CALLS THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF IT, IS THE STRONGEST EVIDENCE OF THE TRUTH OF CHRISTIANITY, AND IS HIGHLY SUPERIOR TO ALL ITS EXTERNAL EVIDENCE.

This, my Lord, is your accusation; a very capital one it is; and such as, if true, would prove me devoid of common sense, as well as in all other respects unworthy the character I bear of a Christian, a elergyman, or a defender of Revelation. I am therefore necessitated to call upon your Lordship, in this publie manner, either to make it good, or to give me reparation. Your Lordship confines the proof of your accusation to the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth pages of the First Volume of The Divine Legation. But as I am not disposed to chicane in so serious a matter, I hereby promise, that if either in those pages, or in any other pages of that work, or in any thing I have ever written, preached, or said, your Lordship produces the proposition in question as held and maintained by me, either in express terms, or deducible * Vol. I. pp. 193, &c.

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by fair and logical consequence, I promise, I say, to submit to any censure your Lordship's self shall think fit to inflict. But if, on the other hand, you can produce no such proposition, I shall then expect so much from your Lordships's justice as to retract your accusation in the same public manner you have been pleased to advance it.

Nov. 17, 1741,

I am, My LORD,

Your LORDSHIP'S

Most. Obedient Servant,
W. WARBURTON.

REMARKS

ON

SEVERAL OCCASIONAL REFLECTIONS:

IN ANSWER TO

The Rev. Dr. MIDDLETON,
Dr, Рососке,

The MASTER of The Charter House,
Dr. RICHARD GREY,

AND OTHERS;

Serving to explain and justify divers Passages, in

« THE DIVINE LEGATION,”

Objected to by those Learned Writers.

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To which is added, A GENERAL REVIEW of the ARGUMENT of The Divine Legation, as far as is yet advanced: wherein is considered the Relation the several Parts bear to each other, and to the Whole.

Together with An APPENDIX, in answer to a late Pamphlet, entitled, An Examination of Mr. W-'s Second Proposition.

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