our moral obligations may be. The religion of nature, therefore, teaches the latter independently of the former. There may be rewards and punishments reserved to another life; but whether there are, or are not, the religion of nature teaches, that morality is our greatest interest, because it tends to the greatest happiness of our whole kind in this life, and our greatest duty, because it is made such by the will of that Supreme Being who created us, and the system to which we belong. It is false, therefore, and impious to assert, as these divines do, that, if there is no other life, there are no moral obligations; or, as Paschal does, that if there were no other life, the directions of reason for our conduct in this world would not be such as they are.

But to have done with such absurdities for good and all. I cannot close these minutes better, than by observing how wide a difference there is between natural and artificial religion. It has been observed,* that the difference between the things of nature and those of art appears to our great surprise, since microscopes have been in use: and this surprise increases in proportion as they are improved. The things of nature appear to be adapted to useful purposes, wherever these purposes can be discerned; they are elegant, they are finished, and the mind is ravished into admiration. The things of art are adapted often to purposes that are hurtful, and to whatever purposes they are adapted, when we see them such as they really are, they appear to be clumsy, bungling, coarse, and imperfect instruments. A just and easy application of this remark might be made to things intellectual, and especially to those of a theological kind, and to the reasonings of men about them. Thus, to take an instance of the highest and most important object of human speculation, let us reflect once more on the notions that philosophers and divines have entertained and propagated concerning the Deity: for these are the fountains of all religions; and as they are pure, or impure, so must the streams that flow from them be. Right reason neither stops too short, nor goes too far in attempts to frame such notions as these. She frames them in that light which comes reflected from the works of God, and in which alone we may say that he shows himself to man. Imagination, on the contrary, knows no bounds, but proceeds from one hypothetical reasoning to another, till she has framed all those notions of the Deity, which the prepossessions, the habits, the professions, and the interests of the men, who give her this loose, require. The consequence has been, and it could be no other, that natural religion represents an all perfect Being to our adoration, and to our love; and the precept, "thou shalt love the

By Bishop Wilkins in his Treatise on Nat. Rel.

Lord thy God with all thy heart," will be effectual in this system. In the other, in that of artificial theology, I apprehend that it cannot be so; for I have learned from Doctor Barrow,* that in the frame of the human soul "the perceptive part doth always go before the appetitive; that affection follows opinion; and that no object otherwise moves our desire than as represented by reason, or by fancy, good unto us. This," he says, "is our natural way of acting; and, according to it, that we may in due measure love God, he must appear proportionably amiable and desirable to us. He must appear to be the fountain of all good, the sole author of all the happiness we can hope for."Can any man now presume to say, that the God of Moses, or the God of Paul, is this amiable Being? The God of the first is partial, unjust, and cruel; delights in blood, commands assassinations, massacres, and even exterminations of people. The God of the second elects some of his creatures to salvation, and predestinates others to damnation, even in the womb of their mothers. This precept of the gospel, therefore, cannot refer to such a God as either of these: and indeed, if there was not a Being infinitely more perfect than these: there would be no God at all, nor any true religion in the world. But there is most assuredly such a Being; and he who proposes any system of religion, wherein this all-perfect Being is not to be found, may say that he is no atheist, but cannot say with truth that he is a theist.

* Ser. xxiii.

Abstract terms, iii, 120, 123 note, 304; Agents, rational, iv, Ibid.

Abuses, reform of, an expedient for pay- Aglaophemus, iii, 528.

Accused, should always be heard in their | Aix la Chapelle, treaty of, ii, 264.

Anaxagoras, i, 185; ii, 485; iii, 100, 272, Areopagus, court of, undermined by Peri-

Ann had no intention to set aside the Aristoxenus, i, 193.
Hanover succession, ii, 432.

Ann, her private papers very improperly
inspected, iv, 432.