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bility of Doubt, (which yet, from the manner of our acquiring and affociating Ideas, and forming judgements, is impoffible to be conceived, without reverfing the whole frame of the human Mind; neither would that appear to be at all defirable, as we have feen above) it must I fay, either be inconfiftent with the exercise of our other most valuable Faculties, or it would come to the fame thing with the present use of them and prove alike capable of being equally neglected or oppos'd, corrupted or destroy'd: it would have no higher Evidence than in fome cafes the common Principles of Reafon have; nor could it lay any stronger Obligation on us to obey its Dictates. The fame will be the cafe with it confidered as an Impulfe, or Impreffion on the Mind, inciting it to follow each determination of the

fulness, and of a Kind perhaps very complex, as arifing from variety of causes accidentally affociated; yet neither is the kind, nor the degree of this Delight fo intenfe, and exquifite, as that which ufually accompanies thofe points which we work out ourselves; which we properly make our own, by a free, fair investigation. Thefe Truths, though of no more importance in themfelves, or their confequences, than any others that are either forcibly obtruded on us, or fortuitously thrown into our way, yet are attended with a fort of self ap probation, and complacency, which both accompanys the firft Discovery, the tranfporting ivgnxa; and will continue after it, and bear Reflection; and which makes them infinitely exceed all others in our estimation. The fame thing, as it is come at in the one or the other of these ways, is evidently not the fame to us: which I can afcribe to nothing more than a consciousness that in the former cafe we have contributed somewhat to the acquifition of it, and to ourown improvement by that acquifition; or an Idea of Merit, conftantly affociated with this kind of Acquifitions, and which is perhaps the very strongest, and the moft agreeable of all our Affociations.

From whence alfo we may collect how neceflary it is to the Happiness of Man that he fhould appear to himself to

be

Judgement, and phyfically connecting Thought with Action; fince this Connection, if much altered from that which is obfervable in the present State, or increased to any confiderable Degree above that Harmony which now fubfifts among our natural Powers, would be attended with the very fame Confequences.* Farther, as all this must be tranfacted in a Man's own breaft, and fo long as it is limited as above, or he retains the leaft degree of Liberty, is capable of being stifled there; every one might, and moft probably would foon difregard it, as much as he does now the many good Thoughts, Motions and Suggestions, which arise daily in his Mind. Nor is there lefs likelihood of its being perverted to the worst purposes, as Intereft, Vice, or Vanity might direct:of its foon filling the World with rank Enthufiafm,

be free, in the Exercise of the Faculties of his Mind, as well as the Powers of his Body; to be in fome degree active in the Attainment of his Knowledge, as well as any other Attainments; and how far this will go towards proving him to be really fo, I leave to be confidered. If he has any real Liberty, there will be a good reason for annexing this double Pleasure to the exercife of it, both to excite him to Action in cafes of Difficulty, and afterwards to justify him for engaging in fuch; and enable him to go through all the Toil, and Hazard that attends them. If he has none, won't it be a little hard to point out, either the Rife or Reasonablenefs of this fo conftant, and fo general a Delufion; and to account for fuch Ideas as thofe of Merit, Efteem, Reward, &c. which are entirely founded in it? Whether the refolv ing all, with a late Author, into the deceitful feeling of Liberty, be attended with lefs Difficulties than those which this Hypothefis is calculated to remove, must be fubmitted to the thoughtful Reader. See Mr. Hume on Liberty and Neceffity. Effays on the Principles of Morality and Natural Religion. Part. I.

See Hutchefon on the Paffions, p.179, 200, &c. or King, N. 28, &c.

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or the most wicked and abfurd Impoftures; and when it is thus once perverted, there feems to be no room for any remedy upon this Scheme; no

The fubtile Author of Chriflianity not founded on Argument, feems to adopt this fecond method of communicating a Religion to Mankind, and carries it fo far as to fuperfede all other Means, Divine or Human, that have ever been made ufe of to fupport it in the World. He contends for a *conftant and particular Revelation imparted Separately and fupernaturally to every Individual, p.112. This he terms Infpiration, and infufed Evidence, p. 58. feeling, and internal Senfe, ib, and of a nature but little differing from that of Intuitien, p. 59. In fhort, it is what will difpatch the whole bufinefs of Religion at once, without either Time or Teaching, p. 17. reading or reafoning, the ufe of our Understandings, or the Evidence of our Senfes.

'Tis hard to guefs upon what Plan this Author would defend himself if he were preffed, but for the prefent he admits one general external Revelation to have been made and recorded [though both upon his Principles must have been extremely unneceffary] and yet labours to diffwade us from examining the Contents of it, and moft inconfiftently attempts to fhew, as well from Reafon as this very Revelation, that we ought not to employ our Reafon at all, either in the Proof, or the Interpretation of it, or in any thing else relating to the Subject. p.7. &c. A felf-deftructive Scheme! which were it really, as he pretends to prove, laid down by Chrift and his Apoftles, and in the Nature of the thing, or from the Practice of Mankind ever fo neceffary, yet could not poffibly be kept clear of the Confequences abovementioned which more hereafter. But that this is far from being the cafe may eafily be fhewn. That Chrift and his Apoftles both encourage and enjoin the exercife of Reafon in Religious Matters is plain enough from thefe few Texts, Matth. 13. ∙19, 23. Mark 8.17, 18. Luke 1,4. 12, 57. John 5, 39. Acts 17. 11, 17. Rom. 10, 17. 11, 1. 1 Cor. 10, 15. 14, 29. 2 Cor.13.5. 1 Tim. 4. 13, 14, 15. 2 Tim. 3, 15. 17ohn 4, 1. 1 Pet. 3, 15. Do fuch Texts as thefe fuppofe Conviction to precede the Evidence? p. 37. to which add i The 5, 21. where S. Paul treating of Spiritual Gifts themfelves, exhorts his followers to prove all things [a hopeful Tafk! fays our Author. p. 76.] and Rom. 10, 2. where the fame great Apoftle is recommending Zeal according to Knowledge; though this Writer is pleated to

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means are left us to detect the Fraud, or Folly of any religious pretences whatsoever; no method of rescuing Mankind from perpetual Delufion.

tell us, that fuch Zeal will fearce ever deferve the name; p.25.

However, to give this extraordinary Scheme of his a fpiritual air, he lays hold on fome paffages of Scripture History [of which in their proper place] and draws in feveral detacht parts of Texts about the Spirit of God, or fuch as found that way, which he applies to his point indifcriminately, whether they concern thofe ordinary Affiftances and imperceptible Operations that may be expected from the Holy Ghoft in every Age, or are confined to his extraordinary, miraculous Gifts, that were, we think, peculiar to the first publication of the Gofpel, and produced thofe wonderful Effects which this Writer alludes to; and which he, with some modern Sectaries, feems ftill to claim, upon that ever weak foundation of believing ftrongly that he has the fame, without being able to bring any of the fame proofs in juftification of fuch his Belief. Though even here he ought to be reminded that most of thefe very fupernatural Gifts were fo far from exerting themselves independently on any natural Attainments, that they moft commonly acted in conjunction with, and were adminiftred conformably to fuch, and were themselves improved by Labour, Diligence and Study, or impaired and quite extinguished by Neglect: [See Whitby and others, on 2 Tim. 1,6.] that all of them were fubject to the Will and Reason of those who poffeffed them; and to be by them carefully and prudently applied to the particular Exigences of the Church, and the most ufeful Purposes of Edifying; fo as to conftitute the whole a Reasonable Service. God, when he makes the Prophet, does not unmake the Man. He leaves all his Faculties in their natural state, to enable him to judge of his Infpirations, whether they be of Divine Origi ⚫nal or no. When he illuminates the Mind with fupernatural Light, he does not extinguish that which is natural. If he would have us affent to the Truth of any Propofition, he either evidences that Truth by the ufual Methods of natural Reafon, or elfe makes it known to be a Truth which he would have us affent to, by his Authority, and convinces us that it is from him, by fome Marks which • Reason cannot be mistaken in. Reafon must be our last Judge and Guide in every thing.' Locke on Enthusiasm: A Chapter which I would beg leave to recommend to this

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Nor, in the Third place, would lefs Inconveniences attend the frequent republication of Reli

extraordinary Writer; and when he fhews us any of the fame Infallible Marks of Inspiration, that were formerly exhibited; when he communicates fome of that infufed Evidence, which he can make appear not to have been derived from other Sources, we may be oblig'd implicitly to follow his Directions; but till then are, I humbly apprehend, at liberty to fuppofe that he himself is only following his own Spirit, and has feen nothing; and that all thefe Feelings (if he be in earnest in pretending to them;) are no more than the Effects of his own warm Imagination. For that the ordinary Operations of the Spirit do not fuggeft any thing of this kind; that they are never diftinguishable from the natural workings of our Minds, much lefs in any respect fubverfive of them; that they are perfectly confiftent with the most free ufe of all our rational Powers, which are the Gift of the fame Author, and given to be ufed by us; and that thefe generally attend upon their regular Exercife, and were defigned rather to preferve, affift, improve, than to obftruct and fuperfede it; is I think now pretty well agreed. See King's Origin of Evil, N. 71. p. 422. &c. 3d Edit.

Nor can he fhew that Reafon, thus affifted, will be infufficient for the purposes of true Religion; or make out from the Nature of these two, that they ought to have no Communication with each other. His firft allegation, that Men by the exercife of their Reafon do not, nor can be required to think all alike, will not come up to his point, as it is neither true, nor neceffary. 'Tis falfe in many matters both of Fact and Reafon, on which all men, that think at all, think in one way; and he has yet to fhew why the Effentials of the Chriftian Inftitution may not be included among fuch; I mean as they lie in the Bible, and fo far as our affent is there explicitly required to them, in one and the fame precife determinate manner, on pain of forfeiting the Privileges of that Inftitution. Thefe effentials he will find to be very few and plain. But though he allows the whole of Chriftianity to be true and reasonable, yet he feems all along, to beg the Queftion, by fuppofing that it is of fuch a nature as is incapable of being made to appear fo to each person, so far as he is concerned to know, either the fubftance of it, or its grounds. Hence all the formidable Objections against Reafon's judging of the Gofpel-Truths; which yet hold equally

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