PRINTED FOR WILLIAM COLLINS; OLIVER & BOYD, WM. WHYTE & CO. AND WM. OLIPHANT, EDINBURGH; INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. FEW undertakings can be much more difficult than to write any thing in the way of introduction to the following work. It requires no introduction. It is a matter of history. It has been read and admired by one generation, is already in the hands of a second, and will soon pass down to a third. It is this last circumstance, indeed, which may perhaps apologize for an attempt, which must otherwise be exposed to the charge of rashness. The young have a right to ask what were the circumstances of the first publication of such an important volume, what the impression which it left on the minds of men, what its connection with the general interests of religion, what its place in the moral history of our time. To such inquiries, we shall endeavour, in the present Essay, to furnish a reply. We presume not to do more than to assist the reader who shall, for the first time, take up the work, in forming some judgment upon its merits. Our main object will be to illustrate that great revival of the influence of real Christianity amongst us, which it was the Author's design to promote, and which his work |