as you please, I affirm that the erection and establishment of a national Church, whether the doctrines fhe teaches are in themselves orthodox or otherwife, true or falfe, is as fairly defenfible upon rational and proteftant grounds, as the inftitution of any religious fect, or society whatsoever.

True it is that men, inflamed with false zeal, or misled by wrong judgment, may depart both from proteftant and Christian principles; and at their peril it will be. The Church of Rome endeavoured to extirpate what the called berefy by the very fame means which in early days Paganifm employed for the overthrow of the Chriftian faith itself. And what was the confequence? The inhumanity of persecution afforded to every thinking mind a very strong argument of the corruption of that Church in which it was countenanced; it frightened men into their Senfes; it helped to open their understandings; and Popery may upon the matter be faid to have been burnt out of the kingdom. I undertake not to prove, that in our own Church

Church zeal has always been fufficiently governed by prudence, or tempered with charity. There is no occafion to recur to a few disagreeable inftances, or the tranfactions of untoward times. But, I truft, I fhall be abundantly warranted in afferting, that he who at this day fhall charge the Church of England, or any confiderable number of her members, with a want of due moderation, knows not of what manner of Spirit we are of. And yet, if the author of the Confeffional is to be credited, we are relapfing gradually into Popery, both in our doctrines and our practices. We are given to understand, in the feventh Chap. of that work, that "Some "competent obfervers have grounds for "more than a fufpicion, that the Church of

England has been, and still is, though by "degrees imperceptible to vulgar eyes, edg"ing back once more towards Popery." Sure thefe obfervers are much more sharp-fighted than their neighbours! I do not well know what thefe Gentlemen are afraid of; but I know true Chriftianity to be moft in danger from the diametrically oppofite quarter; not

fo

fo much from men of too great, as from people of too little faith; not fo much from the triple-mitre of the Roman pontiff, as from the many-headed hydra of infidelity. The truth of the matter is, the author before us and his friends do not fpeak out, as our open enemies have done, and as themselves were called upon to do, by every maxim of justice, candor, and generofity. They are in no dread of fire and faggot; they are offended, not by the difcipline, but by certain doctrines of the Church of Rome, which we hold in common with her, (even the doctrines I have been defending,) and which they moft infidiously and industriously labour to confound with the abfurdities which are justly had in derifion, or in abhorrence among us, and of which the credit vifibly diminishes every day. Errors may be grafted upon the ftock of truth; which in itself is not the less pure, or the lefs amiable, because it may be bolden in folly as well as in unrighteousness. To an ardent longing to fee these common doctrines expunged from our Articles and Creeds, we are unquestionably to ascribe that profufion

profufion of spleen, malevolence, and rancour with which fo many pages, of the Confeffional, and of other treatifes are shamefully defiled. But for thefe doctrines, I am thoroughly perfuaded, the reasonableness, and utility, not to fay neceffity of Church-eftablishments, would generally be admitted, and even contended for. That nicety of human wisdom which ftrains at two or three of our Articles could, I am apt to think, well enough digeft the remainder of the thirty nine. But as matters are circumftanced, the principle I have been combating is far from being an unpopular one. The privilege, or right of private judgment, in the fenfe of our adverfaries, reduces in fome fort all men to an equality, and is extremely foothing to vain and to weak minds. The fact is, there is no difficulty in declaiming from standing and fpecious topics either of eulogy, or invective. An affected zeal for reformation, and an avowed anxiousness for the revival of gofpel fimplicity, have a verv ingratiating tendency with the bulk of mankind. Liberty. of confcience, Freedom of sentiment, (qq) ecclefiaftical

fiaftical tyranny, violence of bigotry, arbitrary injunctions, fpiritual impofitions, &c. are, I grant, expreffions, fufficiently fonorous and amufing, and many may pass with for argument; though at the fame time, looseness of principle, Stubbornness of fchifm, rankness of herefy, arrogance of felf-fufficiency,' perversenefs of oppofition, and petulance of temper, &c. are phrases which must be allowed by "competent" judges to found quite as well, and to mean full as much.

To conclude. That there is nothing in the least exceptionable in our whole ecclefiaftical fyftem; nothing that might reasonably be retrenched; nothing that could poffibly be amended even in our Articles, as well as worship, rites, and usages, we by no means affirm: but refpectfully leaving these things to the confideration of them that are over us in the Lord, we utterly deny that there is any thing fundamentally wrong, or effentially erroneous in our fpiritual conftitution. (rr) Men may be, and we find them to be bigots in the cause of infidelity; nor

can