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what they do actually seem to effect, but by what they would effect if mankind did their part, the part which is justly put and left upon them."1

Having, through the goodness of God, chosen my religion, not inconsiderately, but upon mature deliberation, I do not find those, you call atheists, such formidable adversaries as those that are afraid to hear them do, by that apprehension, appear to think them. And, indeed, I have observed the physical arguments of the atheists to be very few, and those far from being unanswerable.2

We claim for our religion a divine original, because no adequate cause for it can be found in the powers or passions of human nature, or in the circumstances under which it appeared; because it can only be accounted for by the interposition of that Being to whom its first preachers universally ascribed it, and with whose nature it perfectly agrees.

3

The Christian religion does not only serve its faithful disciples as the polar star does pilots, to direct them in the course of their navigation, but furnishes them, from above, strength to sail in that course that it does from Heaven direct them to steer.1

It is the peculiar excellency of our religion, that it prescribeth an accurate rate of life, most congruous to reason, and suitable to our nature; most

1 C.

2 Boyle, v. 515. 4to.
3 Channing (Serm. on the Evidences), 210.
4 Boyle, vi. 794.

conducible to our welfare and our content; most apt to procure each man's private good, and to promote the public benefit of all.

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Our religion hath also this especial advantage, that it setteth before us a living copy and visible standard of good practice, wherein we have all its precepts compacted, as it were, into one body, and at once exposed to our view. Example yieldeth the most compendious instruction, together with the most efficacious incitement to action; but never was there, or could be, any example comparable to this; never was any so thoroughly perfect in itself, so purposely designed, so fitly accommodated for imitation, or so forcibly engaging thereto as this.'

An honest pagan historian saith of the Christian religion, that nil nisi justum suadet ac lene; the which is a true, though not full, character thereof. It enjoineth us that we should sincerely and tenderly love one another, earnestly desire and delight in each other's good, heartily sympathise with all the evils and sorrows of our brethren, and be ready to lend them all the help and comfort we are able; not confining our charity to any particular sorts of men, but, in conformity to our heavenly Father's boundless goodness, extending it to all; that we should bear with one another's infirmities, mildly resent and freely remit all injuries, all discourtesies. done unto us, retaining no grudge in our hearts, executing no revenge, but requiting them with

1 Barrow, Serm. xvi. ii. fol.

2 Ammianus Marcellinus.

good wishes and good deeds. It chargeth us to be quiet and orderly in our stations, diligent in our callings, veracious in our words, upright in our dealings, observant of our relations, obedient and respectful toward our superiors, meek and gentle to our inferiors, modest and lowly, candid and benign in our censures, courteous and obliging in all our behaviour toward all persons.1

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It enjoineth us to have sober and moderate thoughts concerning ourselves, suitable to our total dependence upon God, to our own natural meanness and weakness; that we be content in every condition, and entertain patiently, at all events, yea, accept joyfully from God's hand whatever he reacheth It commandeth us to restrain our appetites, to be temperate in all our enjoyments, and finally to fix our thoughts, our desires, our endeavours, upon objects high and heavenly, pure and spiritual, stable and durable; "not to love the world and the things therein;" to be careful for nothing, but to cast all our care upon God's providence; not to trust in uncertain riches, but to have our treasure, our heart, our hope, our conversation, above in heaven.2

Practical Christianity may be comprised in three words: devotion, self-government, and benevolence. The love of God in the heart is the fountain from which these three streams of virtue flow.3

The light of revelation, which sets us right in

1 See Barrow, Serm. xvi. vol. 2. fol.
3 Paley, Sermons.

2 Ibid.

many things, the manner whereof our poor reason can by no means make out to us.'

It is impossible to say who would have been able to have reasoned out the whole system which we call natural religion; there is certainly no ground to affirm that the generality could; if they could, there is no sort of probability that they would. Admitting there were, they would highly want a standing admonition to remind them of it and inculcate it upon them; so that to say revelation is a thing superfluous, what there was no need of, and what can be of no service, is, I think, to talk quite wildly and at random.2

No revelation would have been given, had the light of nature been sufficient. No man, in seriousness and simplicity of mind, can possibly think it so, who considers the state of religion in the heathen world before revelation, and its present state in those places which have borrowed no light from it.3

God, in the New Testament, our best guide, is represented to us in the kind, condescending, amiable, familiar light of a parent; and, in my poor mind, 't is best for us so to consider him, without indulging too bold conceptions of his nature.

Before the Christian religion had, as it were, humanized the idea of the Divinity, and brought it somewhat nearer to us, there was nothing said of the love of God.4

2 Butler, Anal. 196.

4 Burke, Works, i. 176.

1 Locke.
3 Ibid. 195.

What proved Jesus Christ the Son of God hardly less than his miracles? His moral precepts.1

I will affirm that, from the sublimity, excellence, and purity of his doctrine and precepts, unparalleled by all the aggregate wisdom and learning of many preceding ages, though, to appearance, he himself was the obscurest and most illiterate of our species, therefore, Jesus Christ was from God."

If they who promote innovations would show us, either in themselves or in their disciples, that morality and virtue increase as the Christian religion loses ground, they would have something to say in their own excuse; but, on the contrary, the direct reverse is the case.

Christians are, at all events, on the safest side of the question, and have greater hopes, and nothing to fear as to another life, if they are mistaken; and is it not plainly most reasonable, if each of the opposite reasons were doubtful and uncertain, yet, by all means, to embrace and entertain that which brings some hope with it, rather than that which brings none?3

I shall not offend your rational piety by saying that modes and opinions appear to me matters of secondary importance; but I can sincerely declare that Christianity, in its genuine purity and spirit, appears to me the most amiable and venerable of all the forms in which the homage of man has ever been offered to the Author of his being."

1 Byron, Letter to Bowles.

2 Burns.

3 Wightwick (Remarks on Chubb, 135.); and see Arnob. adv. Gentes, lib. 2. 4 Mackintosh, Life, i. 97.

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