the nobleft office of criticifm; to fupply defects, and to remedy abufes in fuch eftablishments is admirable, if what is proposed to be gained on one hand is not balanced, perhaps exceeded, by fome disadvantage on the other. But when (as perfons of a mifanthropic turn conceive that they ought to fufpect every man of being an enemy, whom they do not know to be a friend) certain philofophers lay down for a maxim that each individual fhould confider every perfuafion as falfe till the truth of it has been proved to his particular conviction, and reject every fyftem as erroneous till he has feen its excellence demonftrated, the maxim is either infidious, or formed without fufficient attention to the actual circumftances of a great majority of mankind. Every prejudice, it is faid, is an impediment in the search of truth: as an abstract principle this is readily admitted; fhall parents therefore fcruple to interpose authority to check the fuch just grounds of probability, that nothing less than the production of facts manifeftly inconfiftent with them, or the failure of confequences that must have refulted from them, had they been true, can be allowed to fet them afide. Here the wifeft philofophers have stopped, or, if in any inftance they have been tempted further, have propofed their fentiments with the diffidence that becomes conjecture. But when, paffing these limits, man would penetrate the inmoft receffes of nature, and explain, not only the actual connection of caufes and effects, but the mode in which her mysterious operations are conducted, the means of conviction fail him; he must addrefs his theories to the imagination, not to the understanding; it is well if he can render them intelligible: fooner or later the perplexity and difficulties that attend them will be pointed out by fome ingenious rival, who has, perhaps, new ones ftill more exceptionable to propofe. By fuch unfuccefsful attempts the credit of what is fufficiently proved is weakened in the minds of these, and they are always the greater number, who do not carefully diftinguish the limit at which evidence ceafes, and conjecture begins. THE fame general principles are applicable to the conduct of philofophical and of religious inquiries: the contents of the book of revelation are intelligible in the fame degree with thofe of the book of nature: in many points indeed the contents of both are the fame; fuch parts of the system of the divine œconomy, as were collected by the fages of antiquity from obfervation and reflection, are confirmed as far as they extend by the teftimony of fcripture: there are other points which we know from that teftimony alone; that the love of Christ, confpiring with the love of God God towards mankind, procured the pardon of fins, la difpenfation in which the wisdom of the means is as confpicuous as the benevolence of the end, fince no other can be conceived fo conducive to the promotion of virtue:) that as man is redeemed by the Son of God, he is fanctified by the Spirit of God, if he avails himself of the means prescribed for obtaining that holy influence. It is not neceffary, however, to enumerate the doctrines of this class; they will readily occur to perfons at all converfant in the facred writings, and it is to such perfons only that the present argument can be addreffed; but it may be observed of them in general, that the authenticity of the volume in which they are delivered is fupported by the ftrongeft teftimony, and by teftimony of that kind of which reafon is competent to judge; that they appear, confidered with respect to their final causes, replete with wifdom, and worthy of their author; author; that there is nothing in them contradictory to the clearest notions men have of phyfical or of moral poffibility, nor inconfiftent with any other part of the plan of providence. On the contrary, the more accurately things are examined in this view, the more harmonious and beautiful does the system appear; but when the precise nature of the union between the divine perfons concerned in our redemption, or the precife mode and degree in which the graces of the holy fpirit are communicated (and many inftances of the fame kind may be felected among the doctrines of natural, as well as of revealed religion;) is pursued through the labyrinth of metaphyfical fubtlety, doubts arife, and cavils are objected; to which the true answer is, that other faculties than those which we poffefs at prefent are neceffary to difcover, and probably to conceive, an adequate folution of them. But the pride of human fagacity prompts men |