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Upon the words of Tacitus we may build the following observations:—

is good. Be kindly affectioned one to another, but that they were wont to meet together on a with brotherly love; in honour preferring one stated day before it was light, and sing among another: not slothful in business; fervent in spirit; themselves a hymn to Christ as a God, and to bind serving the Lord: rejoicing in hope; patient in themselves by an oath, not to the commission of tribulation; continuing instant in prayer: distri- any wickedness, but, not to be guilty of theft, robbuting to the necessity of saints; given to hospita-bery, or adultery; never to falsify their word, nor lity. Bless them which persecute you; bless, and to deny a pledge committed to them, when called curse not. Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and upon to return it. weep with them that weep. Be of the same mind one towards another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men. If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. Avenge not your selves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine: I will repay, saith the Lord: therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him if he thirst, give him drink: for, in so doing, thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.

First; That we are well warranted in calling the view under which the learned men of that age beheld Christianity, an obscure and distant view, Had Tacitus known more of Christianity, of its precepts, duties, constitution, or design, however he had discredited the story, he would have respected the principle. He would have described the religion differently, though he had rejected it. It has been satisfactorily shown, that the "superstition" of the Christians consisted in worshipping a person unknown to the Roman calendar; and that the "perniciousness," with which they were reproached, was nothing else but their opposition to the established polytheism; and this view of the matter was just such a one as might be expected to occur to a mind, which held the sect in too much contempt to concern itself about the grounds and reasons of their conduct.

"Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be, are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist, shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is Secondly; We may from hence remark, how good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for little reliance can be placed upon the most acute he is the minister of God to thee for good. But judgments, in subjects which they are pleased to if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he despise; and which, of course, they from the first beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the mi- consider as unworthy to be inquired into. Had nister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon not Christianity survived to tell its own story, it him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs must have gone down to posterity as a "pernibe subject, not only for wrath, but also for con- cious superstition;" and that upon the credit of science' sake. For, for this cause pay ye tribute Tacitus's account, much, I doubt not, strengthenalso for they are God's ministers, attending con-ed by the name of the writer, and the reputation tinually upon this very thing. Render therefore of his sagacity. to all their dues: tribute, to whom tribute is due; custom, to whom custom; fear, to whom fear; honour, to whom honour.

"Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another, hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Thirdly; That this contempt prior to examination, is an intellectual vice, from which the greatest faculties of mind are not free. I know not, indeed, whether men of the greatest faculties of mind, are not the most subject to it. Such men feel themselves seated upon an eminence. Looking down from their height upon the follies of mankind, they behold contending tenets wasting their idle strength upon one another, with the common disdain of the absurdity of them all. This habit of thought, however comfortable to the mind which entertains it, or however natural to great parts, is extremely dangerous; and more apt, than almost any other disposition, to produce hasty and contemptuous, and, by consequence, erroneous judgments, both of persons and opinions.

"And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand; let us there- Fourthly; We need not be surprised at many fore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put writers of that age not mentioning Christianity at on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as all; when they who did mention it, appear to in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness, not in have entirely misconceived its nature and chachambering and wantonness, not in strife and en-racter; and in consequence of this misconception, vying."

Read this, and then think of "exitiabilis superstitio!!"-Or if we be not allowed, in contending with heathen authorities, to produce our books against theirs, we may at least be permitted to confront theirs with one another. Of this "pernicious superstition," what could Pliny find to blame, when he was led, by his office, to institute something like an examination into the conduct and principles of the sect? He discovered nothing,

Romans xii. 9; xiii. 13.

to have regarded it with negligence and contempt.

To the knowledge of the greatest part of the learned Heathens, the facts of the Christian history could only come by report. The books, probably, they never looked into. The settled habit of their minds was, and long had been, an indiscriminate rejection of all reports of the kind. With these sweeping conclusions, truth hath no chance. It depends upon distinction. If they would not inquire, how should they be convinced? It might be founded in truth, though they, who made no search, might not discover it.

So far as the epistles are argumentative, the nature of the argument which they handle accounts for the infrequency of these allusions. These epistles were not written to prove the truth of Christianity. The subject under consideration was not that which the miracles decided, the reality of our Lord's mission; but it was that which the miracles did not decide, the nature of his person or power, the design of his advent, its effects, and of those effects the value, kind, and extent. Still I maintain, that miraculous evidence lies at the bottom of the argument. For nothing could be so preposterous as for the disciples of Jesus to dispute amongst themselves, or with others, concerning his office or character, unless they believed that he had shown, by supernatural proofs, that there was something extraordinary in both. Miraculous evidence, therefore, forming not the texture of these arguments, but the ground and substratum, if it be occasionally discerned, if it be incidentally appealed to, it is exactly so much as ought to take place, supposing the history to be true.

"Men of rank and fortune, of wit and abilities, are often found, even in Christian countries, to be surprisingly ignorant of religion, and of every thing that relates to it. Such were many of the Heathens. Their thoughts were all fixed upon other things; upon reputation and glory, upon wealth and power, upon luxury and pleasure, upon business or learning. They thought, and they had reason to think, that the religion of their country was fable and forgery, a heap of inconsistent lies; which inclined them to suppose that other religions were no better. Hence it came to pass, that when the apostles preached the Gospel, and wrought miracles in confirmation of a doctrine every way worthy of God, many Gentiles knew little or nothing of it, and would not take the least pains to inform themselves about it. This appears plainly from ancient history."* I think it by no means unreasonable to suppose, that the Heathen public, especially that part which is made up of men of rank and education, were divided into two classes; those who despised Christianity beforehand, and those who received it. In correspondency with which division of character, the writers of that age would also be of two classes; those who were silent about Christianity, and those who were Christians. "A good man, who attended sufficiently to the Christian affairs, would become a Christian; after which his testimony ceased to be Pagan, and became Christian."+ I must also add, that I think it sufficiently proved, that the notion of magic was resorted to by the Heathen adversaries of Christianity, in like manner as that of diabolical agency had before been by the Jews. Justin Martyr alleges this as his reason for arguing from prophecy, rather than from miracles. Origen imputes this evasion to Celsus; Jerome to Porphyry; and Lactantius to the Heathen in general. The several passages, which contain these testimonies, will be produced in the next chapter. It being difficult however to ascertain in what degree this notion prevailed, especially amongst the superior ranks of the To prove the similitude which we allege, it may Heathen communities, another, and I think an be remarked, that although in Saint Luke's Gosadequate, cause has been assigned for their infi-pel the apostle Peter is represented to have been delity. It is probable, that in many cases the two causes would operate together.

CHAPTER V.

That the Christian Miracles are not recited, or

appealed to, by early Christian Writers them selves, so fully or frequently as might have been expected.

As a farther answer to the objection, that the apostolic epistles do not contain so frequent, or such direct and circumstantial recitals of miracles as might be expected, I would add, that the apostolic epistles resemble in this respect the apostolic specches; which speeches are given by a writer who distinctly records numerous miracles wrought by these apostles themselves, and by the Founder of the institution in their presence: that it is unwarrantable to contend, that the omission, or infrequency, of such recitals in the speeches of the apostles, negatives the existence of the miracles, when the speeches are given in immediate conjunction with the history of those miracles: and that a conclusion which cannot be inferred from the speeches, without contradicting the whole tenor of the book which contains them, cannot be inferred from letters, which, in this respect, are similar only to the speeches.

present at many decisive miracles wrought by Christ; and although the second part of the same history ascribes other decisive miracles to Peter himself, particularly the cure of the lame man at the gate of the temple, (Acts iii. 1,) the death of Ananias and Sapphira, (Acts v. 1.) the cure of Eneas, (Acts ix. 34,) the resurrection of Dorcas; (Acts ix. 40,) yet out of six speeches of Peter, reference is made to the miracles wrought by preserved in the Acts, I know but two in which Christ, and only one in which he refers to miraI SHALL Consider this objection, first, as it ap-culous powers possessed by himself. In his speech plies to the letters of the apostles, preserved in the upon the day of Pentecost, Peter addressed his New Testament; and secondly, as it applies to audience with great solemnity, thus: "Ye men the remaining writings of other early Christians. of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a The epistles of the apostles are either hortatory man approved of God among you, by miracles, or argumentative. So far as they were occupied and wonders, and signs, which God did by him in delivering lessons of duty, rules of public order, in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know,"* admonitions against certain prevailing corruptions, &c. In his speech upon the conversion of Corneagainst vice, or any particular species of it, or in lius, he delivers his testimony to the miracles perfortifying and encouraging the constancy of the formed by Christ, in these words: "we are witdisciples under the trials to which they were ex-nesses of all things which he did, both in the land posed, there appears to be no place or occasion for more of these references than we actually find.

* Jortin's Disc. on the Christ. Rel. p. 66. ed. 4th. ↑ Hartley, Obs. p. 119.

of the Jews, and in Jerusalem."+ But in this latter speech, no allusion appears to the miracles wrought by himself, notwithstanding that the † x. 3).

*Acts ii. 22.

those parts of the Christian dispensation in which the author perceived a resemblance. The epistle of Clement was written for the sole purpose of quieting certain dissensions that had arisen amongst the members of the church of Corinth, and of reviving in their minds that temper and spirit of which their predecessors in the Gospel had left them an example. The work of Hermas is a vision: quotes neither the Old Testament nor the New; and merely falls now and then into the language, and the mode of speech, which the author had read in our Gospels. The epistles of Polycarp and Ignatius had for their principal ob

they addressed. Yet, under all these circumstances of disadvantage, the great points of the Christian history are fully recognised. This hath been shown in its proper place.*

miracles above enumerated all preceded the time | in which it was delivered. In his speech upon the election of Matthias,* no distinct reference is made to any of the miracles of Christ's history, except his resurrection. The same also may be observed of his speech upon the cure of the lame man at the gate of the temple: the same in his speech before the Sanhedrim; the same in his second apology in the presence of that assembly. Stephen's long speech contains no reference what ever to miracles, though it be expressly related of him, in the book which preserves the speech, and almost immediately before the speech, "that he did great wonders and miracles among the peo-ject the order and discipline of the churches which ple."'s Again, although miracles be expressly attributed to Saint Paul in the Acts of the Apostles, first generally, as at Iconium, (Acts xiv. 3,) during the whole tour through the Upper Asia, (xiv. 27; xv. 12,) at Ephesus: (xix. 11, 12:) secondly, in There is, however, another class of writers, to specific instances, as the blindness of Elymas at whom the answer above given, viz. the unsuitaPaphos, the cure of the cripple at Lystra, of bleness of any such appeals or references as the the Pythoness at Philippi,** the miraculous liber-objection demands, to the subjects of which the ation from prison in the same city, the restora-writings treated, does not apply; and that is, the tion of Eutychus, the predictions of his ship- class of ancient apologists, whose declared design wreck, the viper at Melita, the cure of Pub-it was to defend Christianity, and to give the realius's father, TT at all which miracles, except the sons of their adherence to it. It is necessary, first two, the historian himself was present: not- therefore, to inquire how the matter of the objec withstanding, I say, this positive ascription of mi- tion stands in these. racles to Saint Paul, yet in the speeches delivered by him, and given as delivered by him, in the same book in which the miracles are related, and the miraculous powers asserted, the appeals to his own miracles, or indeed to any miracles at all, are rare and incidental. In his speech at Antioch in Pisidia,*** there is no allusion but to the resurrection. In his discourse at Miletus,ttt none to any miracle; none in his speech before Felix; none in his speech before Festus; §§§ except to Christ's resurrection, and his own conversion.

Agrecably hereunto, in thirteen letters ascribed to Saint Paul, we have incessant references to Christ's resurrection, frequent references to his own conversion, three indubitable references to the miracles which he wrought; four other references to the same, less direct, yet highly probable; ¶¶¶ but more copious or circumstantial recitals we have not. The consent, therefore, between Saint Paul's speeches and letters, is in this respect sufficiently exact: and the reason in both is the same; namely, that the miraculous history was all along presupposed, and that the question, which occupied the speaker's and the writer's thoughts, was this: whether, allowing the history of Jesus to be true, he was, upon the strength of it, to be received as the promised Messiah; and, if he was, what were the consequences, what was the object and benefit of his mission?

The most ancient apologist, of whose works we have the smallest knowledge, is Quadratus. Quadratus lived about seventy years after the ascension, and presented his apology to the emperor Adrian. From a passage of this work, preserved in Eusebius, it appears that the author did directly and formally appeal to the miracles of Christ, and in terms as express and confident as we could desire. The passage (which has been once already stated) is as follows: "The works of our Saviour were always conspicuous, for they were real; both they that were healed, and they that were raised from the dead, were seen, not only when they were healed, or raised, but for a long time afterward: not only whilst he dwelled on this earth, but also after his departure, and for a good while after it; insomuch as that some of them have reached to our times." Nothing can be more rational or satisfactory than this.

Justin Martyr, the next of the Christian apolo gists whose work is not lost, and who followed Quadratus at the distance of about thirty years, has touched upon passages of Christ's history in so many places, that a tolerably complete account of Christ's life might be collected out of his works. In the following quotation, he asserts the perform ance of miracles by Christ in words as strong and positive as the language possesses: "Christ healed those who from their birth were blind, and deaf, The general observation which has been made and lame; causing by his word, one to leap, anupon the apostolic writings, namely, that the sub- other to hear, and a third to see: and having raised ject of which they treated, did not lead them to the dead, and caused them to live, he, by his any direct recital of the Christian history, belongs works, excited attention, and induced the men of also to the writings of the apostolic fathers. The that age to know him. Who, however, seeing epistle of Barnabas is, in its subject and general these things done, said that it was a magical apcomposition, much like the epistle to the He-pearance, and dared to call him a magician, and a brews; an allegorical application of divers passages of the Jewish history, of their law and ritual, to

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deceiver of the people."

In his first apology,§ Justin expressly assigns the reason for his having recourse to the argument from prophecy, rather than alleging the miracles of the Christian history: which reason was, that

* See pages 297, 298, &c. ↑ Euseb. Hist. l. iv. c. 3.
↑ Just. Dial. p. 258. ed. Thirlby.
§ Apolog. priin. p. 48. ed. Thirlby.

the persons with whom he contended would ascribe | these miracles to magic; "Lest any of our opponents should say, What hinders, but that he who is called Christ by us, being a man sprung from men, performed the miracles which we attribute to him, by magical art?" The suggestion of this reason meets, as I apprehend, the very point of the present objection; more especially when we find Justin followed in it by other writers of that age. Irenæus, who came about forty years after him, notices the same evasion in the adversaries of Christianity, and replies to it by the same argument: "But if they shall say, that the Lord performed these things by an illusory appearance, (,) leading these objectors to the prophecies, we will show from them, that all things were thus predicted concerning him, and strictly came to pass."* Lactantius, who lived a century lower, delivers the same sentiment, upon the same occasion; "He performed miracles-we might have supposed him to have been a magician, as ye say, and as the Jews then supposed, if all the prophets had not with one spirit foretold that Christ should perform these very things."+

But to return to the Christian apologists in their order. Tertullian :-"That person whom the Jews had vainly imagined, from the meanness of his appearance, to be a mere man, they afterward, in consequence of the power he exerted, considered as a magician, when he, with one word, ejected devils out of the bodies of men, gave sight to the blind, cleansed the leprous, strengthened the nerves of those that had the palsy, and, lastly, with one command, restored the dead to life; when he, I say, made the very elements obey him, assuaged the storms, walked upon the seas, demonstrating nimself to be the Word of God."+

Next in the catalogue of professed apologists we may place Origen, who, it is well known, published a formal defence of Christianity, in answer to Celsus, a Heathen, who had written a discourse against it. I know no expressions, by which a plainer or more positive appeal to the Christian miracles can be made, than the expressions used by Origen; "Undoubtedly we do think him to be the Christ, and the Son of God, because he healed the lame and the blind; and we are the more confirmed in this persuasion, by what is written in the prophecies: Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear, and the fame man shall leap as a hart.' But that he also raised the dead; and that it is not a fiction of those who wrote the Gospels, is evident from hence, that, if it had been a fiction, there would have been many recorded to be raised up, and such as had been a long time in their graves. But, it not being a fiction, few have been recorded: for instance, the daughter of the ruler of a synagogue, of whom I do not know why he said, She is not dead but sleepeth, expressing something peculiar to her, not common to all dead persons: and the only son of a widow, on whom he had compassion, and raised him to life, after he had bid the bearers of the corpse to stop; and the third, Lazarus, who had been buried four days." This is positively to assert the miracles of Christ, and it is also to comment upon them, and that with a considerable degree of accuracy and candour. In another passage of the same author, we meet

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with the old solution of magic applied to the miracles of Christ by the adversaries of the religion. "Celsus," saith Origen, “well knowing what great works may be alleged to have been done by Jesus, pretends to grant that the things related of him are true; such as healing diseases, raising the dead, feeding multitudes with a few loaves, of which large fragments were left." And then Celsus gives, it seems, an answer to these proofs of our Lord's mission, which, as Origen understood it, resolved the phenomena into magic; for Origen begins his reply by observing, "You see that Celsus in a manner allows that there is such a thing as magic."+

It appears also from the testimony of Saint Jerome, that Porphyry, the most learned and able of the Heathen writers against Christianity, resorted to the same solution: "Unless," says he, speaking to Vigilantius," according to the manner of the Gentiles and the profane, of Porphyry and Eunomius, you pretend that these are the tricks of demons. "+

This magic, these demons, this illusory appearance, this comparison with the tricks of jugglers, by which many of that age accounted so easily for the Christian miracles, and which answers the advocates of Christianity often thought it necessary to refute by arguments drawn from other topics, and particularly from prophecy, (to which, it seems these solutions did not apply,) we now perceive to be gross subterfuges. That such reasons were ever seriously urged, and seriously received, is only a proof, what a gloss and varnish fashion can give to any opinion.

It appears, therefore, that the miracles of Christ understood as we understand them, in their literal and historical sense, were positively and precisely asserted and appealed to by the apologists for Christianity; which answers the allegation of the objection.

I am ready, however, to admit, that the ancient Christian advocates did not insist upon the miracles in argument, so frequently as I should have done. It was their lot to contend with notions of magical agency, against which the mere production of the facts was not sufficient for the convincing of their adversaries: I do not know whether they themselves thought it quite decisive of the controversy. But since it is proved, I conceive with certainty, that the sparingness with which they appealed to miracles, was owing neither to their ignorance, nor their doubt of the facts, it is, at any rate, an objection, not to the truth of the history, but to the judgment of its defenders.

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that the evidence of their religion possesses these | qualities. They do not deny that we can conceive it to be within the compass of divine power, to have communicated to the world a higher degree of assurance, and to have given to his communication a stronger and more extensive influence. For any thing we are able to discern, God could have so formed men, as to have perceived the truths of religion intuitively; or to have car-done, and to build any propositions upon such inried on a communication with the other world, whilst they lived in this; or to have seen the individuals of the species, instead of dying, pass to heaven by a sensible translation. He could have presented a separate miracle to each man's senses. He could have established a standing miracle. He could have caused miracles to be wrought in every different age and country. These, and many more methods, which we may imagine, if we once give loose to our imaginations, are, so far as we can judge, all practicable.

The question, therefore, is, not whether Christianity possesses the highest possible degree of evidence, but whether the not having more evidence be a sufficient reason for rejecting that which we have.

Now their appears to be no fairer method of judging, concerning any dispensation which is alleged to come from God, when a question is made whether such a dispensation could come from God or not, than by comparing it with other things which are acknowledged to proceed from the same counsel, and to be produced by the same agency. If the dispensation in question labour under no defects but what apparently belong to other dispensations, these seeming defects do not justify us in setting aside the proofs which are of fered of its authenticity, if they be otherwise entitled to credit.

trivance ?-The observation, which we have exemplified in the single instance of the rain of heaven, may be repeated concerning most of the phenomena of nature; and the true conclusion to which it leads is this: that to inquire what the Deity might have done, could have done, or, as we even sometimes presume to speak, ought to have done, or, in hypothetical cases would have quiries against evidence of facts, is wholly unwarrantable. It is a mode of reasoning which will not do in natural history, which will not do in natural religion, which cannot therefore be applied with safety to revelation. It may have some foundation, in certain speculative a priori ideas of the divine attributes; but it has none in experience, or in analogy. The general character of the works of nature is, on the one hand, goodness both in design and effect; and, on the other hand, a liability to difficulty, and to objections, if such objections be allowed, by reason of seeming incompleteness or uncertainty in attaining their end. Christianity participates of this character. The true similitude between nature and revelation consists in this; that they each bear strong marks of their original; that they each also bear appearances of irrregularity and defect. A system of strict optimism may nevertheless be the real sys tem in both cases. But what I contend is, that the proof is hidden from us; that we ought not to expect to perceive that in revelation, which we hardly perceive in any thing; that beneficence, of which we can judge, ought to satisfy us, that optimism, of which we cannot judge, ought not to be sought after. We can judge of beneficence, because it depends upon effects which we experience, and upon the relation between the means which we see acting and the ends which we see produced. Throughout that order then of nature, of which We cannot judge of optimism, because it neces God is the author, what we find is a system of sarily implies a comparison of that which is tried, beneficence: we are seldom or ever able to make with that which is not tried; of consequences out a system of optimism. I mean, that there are which we see, with others which we imagine, and few cases in which, if we permit ourselves to concerning many of which, it is more than probarange in possibilities, we cannot suppose some-ble we know nothing; concerning some, that we thing more perfect, and more unobjectionable, have no notion. than what we see. The rain which descends If Christianity be compared with the state and from heaven, is confessedly amongst the contri-progress of natural religion, the argument of the vances of the Creator, for the sustentation of the animals and vegetables which subsist upon the surface of the earth. Yet how partially and irregularly is it supplied! How much of it falls upon the sea, where it can be of no use! how often is it wanted where it would be of the greatest! What tracts of continent are rendered deserts by the scarcity of it! Or, not to speak of extreme cases, how much, sometimes, do inhabited countries suffer by its deficiency or delay!-We could imagine, if to imagine were our business, the matter to be otherwise regulated. We could imagine showers to fall, just where and when they would do good; always seasonable, every where sufficient; so distributed as not to leave a field upon the face of the globe scorched by drought, or even a plant withering for the lack of moisture. Yet, does the difference between the real case and the imagined case, or the seeming inferiority of the one to the other, authorize us to say, that the present disposition of the atmosphere is not amongst the productions or the designs of the Deity? Does it check the inference which we draw from the confessed beneficence of the provision? or does it make us cease to admire the con

objector will gain nothing by the comparison. I remember hearing an unbeliever say, that, if God had given a revelation, he would have written it in the skies. Are the truths of natural religion written in the skies, or in a language which every one reads? or is this the case with the most useful arts, or the most necessary sciences of human life? An Otaheitean or an Esquimaux knows nothing of Christianity; does he know more of the princi ples of deism, or morality? which, notwithstanding his ignorance, are neither untrue, nor unimportant, nor uncertain. The existence of the Deity is left to be collected from observations, which every man does not make, which every man perhaps, is not capable of making. Can it be argued, that God does not exist, because, if he did, he would let us see him, or discover himself to mankind by proofs (such as, we may think, the nature of the subject merited,) which no inadvertency could miss, no prejudice withstand?

If Christianity be regarded as a providential instrument for the melioration of mankind, its progress and diffusion resemble that of other causes by which human life is improved. The diversity is not greater, nor the advance more slow, in reli

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