taught that God has created numbers of men for no purpose but to damn them? "Quisquis prædestinationis doctrinam invidiâ gravat," says Calvin, "apertè maledicit deo." Let us say, "Quisquis prædestinationis doctrinam asserit, blasphemat." Let us not impute such cruel injustice to the All-perfect Being. Let Paul, and Austin, and Calvin, and all those who teach it be answerable for it alone. You may bring "fathers" and "councils" as evidences in the cause of artificial theology: but "reason" must be the judge, and all I contend for is, that she should be so in the breast of every Christian that can appeal to her tribunal.

Will you tell me that even such a private examination of the Christian system as I propose that every man, who is able to make it, should make for himself, is unlawful, and that if any doubts arise in our minds concerning religion, we must have recourse for the solution of them to some of that "holy order " which was instituted by God himself, and which has been continued by the imposition of hands in every Christian society from the apostles" down to the present "clergy?" My answer shall be shortly this, it is repugnant to all the ideas of wisdom and goodness to believe that the universal terms of salvation are knowable by the means of one order of men alone, and that they continue to be so even after they have been published to all nations. Some of your directors will tell you, that whilst Christ was on earth, the apostles were the church, that he was the bishop of it, that afterwards the admission of men into this order was approved, and confirmed by visions and other divine manifestations, and that these wonderful proofs of God's interposition at the ordinations, and consecrations of presbyters, and bishops lasted even in the time of St. Cyprian, that is, in the middle of the third century. It is pity that they lasted no longer for the honor of the church, and for the conviction of those who do not sufficiently reverence the religious society. It were to be wished perhaps, that some of the secrets of electricity were improved enough to be piously, and usefully applied to this purpose. If we beheld a Shecinah, or divine presence, like the flame of a taper, on the heads of those who receive the imposition of hands, we might believe that they receive the "Holy Ghost" at the same time. But as we have no reason to believe what superstitious, credulous, or lying men, such as Cyprian himself was, reported formerly, that they might establish the proud pretensions of the clergy; so we have no reason to believe that five men of this order have any more of the divine spirit in our time, after they are ordained, than they had before. It would

* Cal. Ins. lib. 3, c. 21.

be a farce to provoke laughter, if there was no suspicion of profanation in it, to seem them gravely laying hands on one another, and bid one another receive the Holy Ghost.

Will you tell me finally, in opposition to what has been said, and that you may anticipate what remains to be said, that laymen are not only unauthorised, but quite unequal without the assistance of divines to the task I propose? If you do, I shall make no scruple to tell you, in return, that laymen may be, if they please, in every respect as fit, and are in one important respect more fit than divines to go through this examination, and to judge for themselves upon it. We say that the Scriptures, concerning the divine authenticity of which all the professors of Christianity agree, are the sole criterion of Christianity. You add tradition, concerning which there may be, and there is much dispute. We have then a certain invariable rule, whenever the Scriptures speak plainly. Whenever they do not speak so, we have this comfortable assurance, that doctrines, which nobody understands, are revealed to nobody, and are therefore improper objects of human inquiry. We know too, that if we receive the explanations and commentaries of these dark sayings from the clergy, we take the greatest part of our religion from the word of man, not from the word of God. Tradition indeed, however derived, is not to be totally rejected; for if it was, how came the canon of the Scriptures, even of the Gospels, to be fixed? How was it conveyed down to us? Traditions of general facts, and general propositions plain and uniform may be of some authority and use. But particular, anecdotical traditions, whose original authority is unknown, or justly suspicious, and that have acquired only an appearance of generality, and notoriety, because they have been frequently, and boldly repeated from age to age, deserve no more regard, than doctrines evidently added to the Scriptures under pretence of explaining, and commenting them, by men as fallible as ourselves. We may receive the Scriptures, and be persuaded of their authenticity on the faith of ecclesiastical tradition; but it seems to me, that we may reject, at the same time, all the artificial theology which has been raised on these Scriptures by doctors of the church, with as much right as they receive the Old Testament on the authority of Jewish scribes, and doctors, whilst they reject the oral law, and all rabbinical literature.

He who examines on such principles as these, which are conformable to truth and reason, may lay aside at once the immense volumes of fathers, and councils, of schoolmen, casuists, and controversial writers, which have perplexed the world so long. Natural religion will be to such a man no longer intricate; revealed religion will be no longer mysterious, nor the word of

God equivocal. Clearness and precision are two great excellences of human laws. How much more should we expect to find them in the law of God? They have been banished from thence by artificial theology; and he who is desirous to find them must banish the professors of it from his councils, instead of consulting them. He must seek for genuine Christianity with that simplicity of spirit, with which it is taught in the gospel by Christ himself. He must do the very reverse of what has been done by the persons you advise him to consult.

You see that I have said what has been said on a supposition, that, however obscure theology may be, the Christian religion is extremely plain, and requires no great learning, nor deep meditation to develop it. But if it was not so plain, if both these were necessary to develop it, is great learning the monopoly of the clergy since the resurrection of letters, as little learning was before that era? Is deep meditation, and justness of reasoning confined to men of that order by a peculiar and exclusive privilege? In short, and to ask a question which experience will decide, have these men, who boast that they are appointed by God to be the interpreters of his secret will, to represent his person, and answer in his name, as it were, out of the sanctuary,* have these men, I say, been able in more than seventeen centuries, to establish a uniform system of revealed religion, for natural religion never wanted their help, among the civil societies of Christians, or even in their own?t They do not seem to have aimed at this desirable end. Divided as they have always been, they have always studied in order to believe,‡ and to take upon trust, or to find matter of discourse, or to contradict and confute, but never to consider impartially, nor to use a free judgment. On the contrary, they who have attempted to use this freedom of judgment have been constantly, and cruelly persecuted by them.

The first steps towards the establishment of artificial theology, which has passed for Christianity ever since, were enthusiastical. They were not heretics alone, who delighted in wild allegories, and the pompous jargon of mystery. They were the orthodox fathers of the first ages, they were the disciples of the apostles, or the scholars of their disciples; for the truth of which I may appeal to the epistles, and other writings of these men that are extant, to those of Clemens, of Ignatius, or of Irenæus, for instance, and to the visions of Hermes that have so near a resemblance to the productions of Bunyan.

N. B.-I choose to borrow these expressions from Calvin, in order to show how much they ascribe who are supposed to ascribe the least to this order.

† Cal. Ins. l. 4, c. 3.

+ Bacon's Essays.

The next steps of the same kind were rhetorical. They were made by men who declaimed much, and reasoned ill, but who imposed on the imaginations of others by the heat of their own, by their hyperboles, their exaggerations, the acrimony of their style, and their violent invectives. Such were the Chrysostoms, the Jeromes, a Hilarius, a Cyril, and most of the fathers.

The last of the steps I shall mention were logical, and these were made very opportunely, and very advantageously for the church, and for artificial theology. Absurdity in speculation and superstition in practice had been cultivated so long, and were become so gross, that men began to see through the veils that had been thrown over them, as ignorant as those ages were. Then the schoolmen arose. I need not display their character, it is enough known. This only I will say, that having very few materials of knowledge, and much subtilty of wit, they wrought up systems of fancy on the little they knew, and invented an art, by the help of Aristotle, not of enlarging, but of puzzling knowledge with technical terms, with definitions, distinctions, and syllogisms merely verbal: they taught what they could not explain, evaded what they could not answer, and he who had the most skill in this art, might put to silence, when it came into general use, the man who was consciously certain that he had truth, and reason on his side.

The authority of the schools lasted till the resurrection of letters. But as soon as real knowledge was enlarged, and the conduct of the understanding better understood, it fell into contempt. The advocates of artificial theology have had, since that time, a very hard task. They have been obliged to defend in the light what was imposed in the dark, and to acquire knowledge to justify ignorance. They were drawn to it with reluctancy. But learning, that grew up among the laity, and controversies with one another, made this unavoidable, which was not eligible, on the principles of ecclesiastical policy. They have done with these new arms, all that great parts, great pains, and great zeal could do under such disadvantages, and we may apply to this order, on this occasion, si pergama dextrâ, &c. But their Troy cannot be defended, irreparable breaches have been made in it. They have improved in learning and knowledge; but this improvement has been general, and as remarkable, at least among the laity as among the clergy. Besides which, it must be owned that the former have had in this respect a sort of indirect obligation to the latter, for whilst these men have searched into antiquity, have improved criticism, and almost exhausted subtilty, they have furnished so many arms the more to such of the others as do not submit implicitly to them, but examine and judge for themselves. By refuting one another

when they differ, they have made it no hard matter to refute them all when they agree: and, I believe, there are few books written to propagate, or defend the received notions of artificial theology, which may not be refuted by the books themselves. I conclude on the whole, that laymen have, or need to have, no want of the clergy in examining, and analysing the religion they profess.

But, I said, that they are in one important respect more fit to go through this examination without the help of divines than with it. A layman, who seeks the truth, may fall into error; but as he can have no interest to deceive himself, so he has none of profession to bias his private judgment, any more than to engage him to deceive others. Now the clergyman lies strongly under this influence in every communion. How indeed should it be otherwise? Theology is become one of those sciences which Seneca calls "scientiæ in lucrum exeuntes:" and sciences, like arts, whose object is gain, are, in good English, trades. Such theology is; and men who could make no fortune, except the lowest, in any other, make often the highest in this; for the proof of which assertion I might produce some signal instances among my lords the bishops. The consequence has been uniform, for how ready soever the tradesmen of one church are to expose the false wares, that is, the errors and abuses of another, they never admit that there are any in their own: and he who admitted this, in some particular instance, would be driven out of the ecclesiastical company, as a false brother, and one who spoiled the trade.

Thus it comes to pass that new churches may be established by the dissensions, but that old ones cannot be reformed by the concurrence, of the clergy. There is no composition to be made with this order of men. He, who does not believe all they teach in every communion, is reputed nearly as criminal, as he who believes no part of it. He, who cannot assent to the Athanasian creed, of which archbishop Tillotson said, as I have heard, that he wished we were well rid, would receive no better quarter than an atheist from the generality of the clergy. What recourse now has a man who cannot be thus implicit? Some have run into scepticism, some into atheism, and, for fear of being imposed on by others, have imposed on themselves. The way to avoid these extremes, is that which has been chalked out in this introduction. We may think freely, without thinking as licentiously as divines do, when they raise a system of imagination on true foundations; or as sceptics do when they renounce all knowledge; or as atheists do when they attempt to demolish the foundations of all religion, and reject demonstration. As we think for ourselves, we may keep our thoughts to ourselves, or communicate