connection with each other; and yet, all SERM. this while, fet up for clofe reafoners, and VI. free enquirers! - -Never, furely, was the name of rational liberty so grossly abused! For fuch a conduct as this, this way of believing upon no foundation at all, and concluding that because one thing is false, another, which is abfolutely diftinct from it, is fo likewise, argues a very shallow judgment, great confusion of thought, and strong prejudice.

Another abuse of the principle of liberty is this, that fome men seem to think, that because they have a right to reject all pretended principles of religion, which are contrary to reason, to the perfections of the fupreme being, and the eternal laws of piety and virtue, they may likewife, throw off the belief of every thing that they can't fully account for; and are no more oblig'd, for example, to believe a providence, because the visible courfe of things is perplex'd and intricate, full of diforder and seeming injustice, and not fuch, as they

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SERM. imagine it would be, if the universe VI. was govern'd by an abfolutely wife and

good being; than they are to receive fuch doctrines as affert that God is a rigorous, fevere and inexorable fovereign, one that delights in the misery of his creatures, &c. and destroy the neceffary and unalterable distinction between moral good and evil. This, I fay, is another too common abufe of the principle of liberty, leading to a disbelief even of the first principles of natural religion; an abufe that argues great narrowness of mind, and is what perfons of any compass and freedom of thought can't be guilty of.

They are only little understandings that are inclin'd to be prophane and atheiftical, from their ignorance of particular events in the course of providence; whilft those of a more refined genius, and the niceft obfervation, always abound in such reflections as these. "We can't de"scribe the thousandth part of the beau

ty, and much lefs of the usefulness, "of the minuteft work of the great Cre66 ator,

ator, and shall we pretend to arraign SERM. " and cenfure the whole course of his VI. providential government? As far as "we understand of nature, all the parts "of it appear to be contrived and form"ed to the utmost advantage; every thing has its proper use, and nothing "is fuperfluous or defective. And as "far as we understand of providence, all "its operations are in admirable wif"dom, and with the most kind and be"nevolent defign. And is not this a "reasonable prefumption, that what appears confused and intricate to us is perfectly harmonious and beautiful, wife, juft and good? This is certainly the most natural conclufion we can make, if we confider the narrow compass of the human understanding, and "the fcantiness of its most extended

knowledge; that we can't compre"hend the whole fcheme of God's go"vernment, and, confequently, may eafily err in judging of particular providences; and that there muft, of ne"ceffity, be fome things, in the tranf "actions

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SERM." actions of an infinite mind, unfathom

VI.

"able by finite reafon." These will be the reflections of a judicious enquirer, who has any knowledge of himself, and of nature. And all fuch, on the other hand, are but vain pretenders to rational freedom, who prefume to measure all things by the standard of their imperfect reason, and will admit nothing to be true, if they can't folve every difficulty that attends it; not even that God governs the world, if he does it in a way above their conceptions, i. e. in other words, in a way, in which ignorant and fallible men could not, themselves, direct the affairs of it. Such perfons, I fay, are but vain pretenders to free enquiry, which neceffarily fuppofes, as the foundation of it, a modeft temper of mind, conscious of its own weaknefs and imperfection; and as it prompts us to examine all things, that are within the sphere of our knowledge, with care and impartiality, to reject as falfe whatever is contrary to plain and certain principles of reafon, and embrace nothing as

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true,

true, but upon proper evidence; fo itSERM.. always reftrains from paffing a judgment, VI. or determining concerning the truth or falfhood of things, about which we have no ideas, and which are beyond the reach of our present faculties. For all judgments and decifions of this kind, which are above our understandings, and confequently can have no rational foundation to support them, are not only the heighth of enthusiasm, but the utmost pitch of vanity and arrogance.

Some, again, seem to mistake liberty for a right to dispute every thing, and cavil at all religious principles, which are commonly received, merely to fhew that they are free-thinkers. The great delight of these people, who are often to be met with, is to puzzle a controverfy, and ftart objections against fome point or other of revealed religion; not from a defire of having them confidered and folued; but, either to fhew their parts, or for the fake of embarraffing and diftreffing weak minds, who having, perhaps, neither capacity, nor leifure for VOL. I.

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