gofpel. This he does more especially in the introduction to this epiftle to the Ephefians. It is, indeed, of great importance that our minds. fhould always be impreffed with a fenfe of what we owe to the fountain of all good in this most important refpect, efpecially as, having never ourselves feen, or known, much of heathenifm, we are too apt to think less of the happiness of our emancipation from it. And as I am now come to the conclufion of thefe Difcourfes on the Evidence of Divine Revelation, I fhall endeavour to bring to your recollection the feveral particulars of which the knowledge we derive from revelation, and more especially from Chriftianity, confifts.

But I fhall firft confider the propriety of having recourse to any measures whatever on the part of the Divine Being, farther than the natural means that he had employed for the moral improvement of mankind.

That the Divine Being has really made provision for promoting the virtue and happiness

piness of men in the constitution of nature and of the world, is not to be denied. There are numberlets particulars in the make of our bodies, and in the faculties of our minds, which, if attended to, will teach us that vice and wickednefs (confifting in the exceffive and irregular indulgence of our paffions) is hurtful to man; that it tends to debafe our natures, and fubjects us to pain and anguish; and that if we would live in the greatest dignity and happiness, we must live in the habitual practice of all virtue. Some will, therefore, afk, Is not nature alone a fufficient guide to virtue and happiness? and may not men, by thefe helps, and the proper ufe of the reafon with which they are endued, be their own inftructors? Why might not mankind have been left to themfelves, when their own reafon, affifted by obfervation and experience, would teach them to correct their vices, and improve their natures to the utmoft and when the Divine Being had done thus much for us, what occafion was there for his doing any thing more?

In replying to this, it must be acknowledged that, if men would make the most of their reason, and confcientiously obey all its dictates, it would be a fufficient director in the conduct of life. But what muft we fay if, from whatever caufe, and through whatever foreign influence, men become indifpofed to make this right use of their reafon, and efpecially if they be not fufficiently apprized of all the confequences of their conduct; and if, in that state of ignorance and darkness, they want ftronger motives than will ever occur to themselves, to the practice of universal virtue. In thefe circumftances it was furely highly expedient that the great parent and friend of mankind should interpofe, to apprize them of these confequences, that he fhould fend proper perfons, duly authorized, to engage their attention, and thus to inform their judgment, interest their affections, and direct their conduct.

I must farther obferve, in anfwer to those who object to the scheme of such occafional interpofitions, and who are struck with the idea of the fuperior dignity of an

abfolutely

abfolutely uninterrupted operation of the eftablished laws, that we are not at liberty to fuppofe either man, or the world, to be constituted differently from what they are; because we are no proper judges of fuch different arrangements of things and their confequences. And confidering how men are actually conftituted, we may fafely conclude that if it was at all neceffary (as we cannot but fuppofe it to be) that fuch beings as we are fhould keep up an attention to their Maker, this great end will be better answered by his maintaining fome visible intercourfe with them, than by a rigorous adherence to any original conftitution of things whatever, while himself was kept out of view.

The bulk of mankind (and by this we are to judge) do not naturally inquire into the cause of what they fee to be conftant and invariable. They fee, for example, the fun to rife and fet, and all the changes of the feasons to take place, without ever reflecting on their author, or final caufe, or at leaft acquiefcing in any lame account of them;

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them; so that something out of the common courfe of nature was neceffary to arrest their attention, and lead them to think of the Author of Nature, of what they see and experience every day.

The authors of the Greek and Roman theology never went farther in their fpeculations than the vifible universe. They had gods in great abundance, but imagined the world to be more ancient than them all; and the great object of the most ancient idolatry were the fun, moon, and stars, the earth, and other parts of nature, having never imagined that these had any author. Befides, in order that man may keep up an idea of God, as a perfon, a being with whom they have to do, as the inspector and judge of their conduct, it seems neceffary that there should be on his part some perfonal acts, fuch as promulgating laws, fending meffengers, expreffing his pleasure or displeasure at their conduct, and the like. Without fomething of this kind, the courfe of nature, though bearing infinite marks of intelligence, might never fuggeft the idea

of