a likelihood of material difference, both in the representations of truth and in the grounds adopted for the refutation of error,-a difference hardly less important, perhaps, in those points, than the coincidence in others,-I was equally solicitous to shun the appearance of writing, with personal allusion, against any individual on the same side with myself of the general controversy.

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In the first advertisement of this little work, the ral title given to it was "SIMPLE TRUTH."-Various objections, however, were started against this title. By some, it was conceived to be deficient in dignity. And yet, what is there that can vie in real dignity with unadorned truth? To what, more justly or forcibly than to truth, can the poet's line be applied "Majestic in its own simplicity?"

By others, it was reprehended, as assuming what it was the object of the work to prove,-taking for granted, in the very Title-page, that truth was on my side. This brought to my recollection a sentiment of the late Mr. Fuller, that "those writers, who are not ashamed to beg the question in the title-page, are sel

dom the most liberal or impartial in the execution of the work." And although, in giving to the very Volume, in the preface to which this sentiment occurs, the title of, "The Gospel its own witness; or the holy

nature and divine harmony of the Christian religion, contrasted with the immorality and absurdity of Deism," the excellent and able writer appears to have allowed his own remark to slip from his remembrance, yet is the remark itself by no means destitute of truth. It is always, however, conceived to contain even more of truth than really belongs to it, by persons who are predisposed against the particular views of which the writer avows himself the advocate. Such persons say immediately, with an emotion half-indignant, half disdainful Simple truth! that remains to be proved:" and the very feeling thus excited gives an addition of strength to their prejudice, and fortifies them the more against conviction. Yet surely, every one who publishes his sentiments, on any subject, to the world, must, if he be an honest man, believe what he publishes to be truth; and a title-page ought, perhaps, to be considered, rather as expressing what the author be

lieves his Book to be, than as a demand upon all others, to receive and acknowledge it as such. Yet, since a love of truth, and a desire for its prevalence, should make us anxious to throw no obstacle, of any kind, in the way of its acceptance, I have thought it better to dismiss my original title, and to leave the sentiments, on the important subjects discussed, with nothing which even a single reader might construe into a presumptuous prejudication of their claims, to the free examination, and candid judgment, of my fellow-christians.

I have endeavoured to make my appeal exclusively to the Holy Scriptures. In doing this, however, I have not, on all occasions, merely quoted them. I have reasoned upon them. But my reasonings, I trust it will be found, are all directed to one or other of two ends; to the elucidation and establishment of their true meaning, or to the deduction from them of those conclusions to which they legitimately lead. No judicious reader will put these discussions aside, under the disparaging designation of human reasonings; those reasonings which justly merit this title

being such only as, instead of resting their decisions simply upon the sacred word, lead the mind away from it, and would found divine truth on the authority of human wisdom. I think I can say, with a clear conscience, that I have not written a sentence of the following Treatises, under the influence of any other principle, than either a sincere conviction of truth, or an earnest desire to find it. If any one shall convict me of error, it is my wish to have my mind kept open to the conviction :-for nothing should be so dear to us as truth,—and we should welcome, as an angel of light, whosoever brings it; there being no one thing, for which we ought to be more truly grateful, than the displacing from our minds of what is wrong, and the introduction of what is right in its room.

"If any one were required, without premeditation," says the eloquent author of the Natural History of enthusiasm," to give a reply to the question, What "is the most prominent circumstance in the present "state of the Christian Church-he would, if suffi

ciently informed on the subject, almost certainly

answer-The honour done to the Scriptures.'

Among other indications of this favourable characteristic of the present age, he subsequently mentions, "the prevalence of an improved method of exposition, attended by an increasing disposition to "bow to the Bible, as the only arbiter in matters of

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religion:"-and in another place, in still stronger terms, he says," Happily, in the age in which we live, "if there be not, on all hands, a perfect simplicity of "deference to the Bible, there is a nearer approach "to it than has perhaps ever existed defusedly through "the church since the days of the Apostles: and happily also, there are strong indications of an in

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creasing deference to the only standard of truth and "morals. This, by eminence, is the bright omen of "the times.”—Every true friend of the Bible must hail this "omen of the times" with pleasure, and rejoice in anticipating its future results. The multitude of controversies at this moment afloat in the Christian community may seem, indeed, at first view, to afford no very inviting or promising exemplification of these results. But the introduction of a principle in itself good, may, for a season, by the operation of other con