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THE

HISTORY OF RELIGION.

A RATIONAL ACCOUNT

OF

THE TRUE RELIGION.

BY

JOHN EVELYN,

AUTHOR OF "SYLVA," ETC.

NOW FIRST PUBLISHED,

BY PERMISSION OF W. J. EVELYN, ESQ., M.P.,

FROM THE ORIGINAL MS. IN THE LIBRARY AT WOTTON.

"Be ready always to give an answer to every man, that asketh you a reason of the
hope that is in you, with meekness and fear."-I. PET., iii., 15.

"I am verily persuaded that errors shall not be imputed to them as sin, who use
such measures of industry in finding Truth, as human prudence and ordinary dis-
cretion (their abilities and opportunities, their distractions and hindrances, and all
other things considered) shall advise them to."-CHILLINGWORTH,

EDITED, WITH NOTES,

BY THE REVEREND R. M. EVANSON, B.A.,

RECTOR OF LANSOY, MONMOUTHSHIRE.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

LONDON:

HENRY COLBURN, PUBLISHER,

GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.

1850.

EDITOR'S PREFACE.

"He, being dead, yet speaketh."

After a peaceful slumber of nearly two centuries in the Wotton Library, the original manuscript from which this work is printed was last year brought into light and notice by the publication of the "Life of Mrs. Godolphin," from the pen of the same Author. This circumstance directed fresh attention to the collection of manuscripts still in the possession of his representative, W. J. Evelyn, Esq., M.P., at the family-seat in Surrey, by whose permission the fruit of his literary labours, in a new and most important department, is now, for the first time, given to the world. It is but due to the Publisher to relate, that it was mainly owing to his suggestions that the manuscript was carefully examined; and though, perhaps from its bulk, the grave theological character of

its contents, and the exceeding minuteness of the writing, it seems to have possessed few charms for the eyes of those who hitherto have been permitted to inspect the Wotton manuscripts, yet, upon patient investigation, it proved to be a work of considerable learning and research; and, being partly devoted to the examination of doctrines then current or opposed, was thought not ill adapted to a controversial agenay, in some measure, calculated to soften the peculiar prejudices of our times; to lead men to allow that all catholicity of mind is not Romanism; nor attachment to the pure teaching of the English Church incompatible with unqualified rejection of Romish error; nor Christian charity of necessity violated by a calm and fearless exhibition and condemnation of the fallacies of dissent.

To this end, the well-known piety of the Author, coupled with the trying times in which he lived, must greatly contribute. Himself a layman, he is free from suspicion of priestcraft. His religious attachment to the Church of his Baptism is no fair-weather conformity in her

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