be enjoyed without an inward Taste for such things. There must be a something in the frame congenial with them; a kind of new Sense; analogous, in its nature, to that, by which we are capacitated to enjoy all the varieties of animal Sensation.

A person, who has no Taste for Musick, Painting, Architecture, or the numerous beauties of Nature, and Art, which might be detailed, can form no idea of the pleasures, they receive from these things, who have. To him, it appears all romance, conceit, and the sport of Imagination.-To cultivate this Taste for right Reason, and christian Philosophy, is the sublime

of wisdom.

7.

SIMPLICITY, and INTEGRITY, are es sential to the christian Character.

Αφελεις πελεσθαι οφειλομεν. Because, neither can Truth be discovered, nor Virtue

attained, nor Happiness enjoyed, without this. Ου δέρκεσι αίγλην οι σχετλιοι*.

Simplicity and Integrity are those moral excellencies, by which the Understanding, the Will, and the Affections are carried on in a direct line towards that which is absolutely the best, both in point of Virtue, and of Happiness: for Virtue and Happiness must never be disjoined.

The noblest Minds are always the most ingenuous, the most undisguised, and the least reserved: they are the farthest removed from that dissimulation, subtilty, and guile, which belong to the meridian

«The fullest sunshine cannot enlighten those, who close their eyes against its luminous influence. Truth is a hidden Treasure, which none can discover, but those, who search after it with a generous mind, and upright heart, and are resolute to sacrifice every thing to the love of it, when known. Whoever does not find in himself these dispositions, is not yet prepared for the search of Truth and, without this preparation of the heart, it is almost needless to read this, or any other work, which professes to plead the cause of pure, genuine Christianity."

of this world. They are a sort of transparent Beings. The wisdom of God has therefore honoured them with the very exalted title of," The Children of Light." Expies Sinceri; quasi wew Ειλικρινεις" εν είλη; those, who will bear to be examined by the beams of the Sun -"The Sun of Righteousness."

One of the sacred penmen has called this Sincerity, Exgivεia Oe8. 2 Cor. i. 12. For, there is a Sincerity of a very different stamp, and which is often commended to a very dangerous degree. Can there be any thing more ignorant, or more subversive of all true Religion, and Virtue, than that too common maxim, which has obtained among us, which makes Sincerity the Standard of Goodness, Excellence, and moral Character? May not one man be as sincerely in the wrong, as another is in the right? was not Saul, the unconverted Persecutor, and Blasphemer, as sincere, as Paul the Christian, and the Apostle? But, will you be so irrational, so inconsiderate, I

will add, so impious, as to place them on a level in your estimation? Who can be so undiscerning, as not to know, that this person may preach, or believe, a falsehood, with as much sincerity, as that person does the truth: but, is there not an essential difference between them?

The maxim, here protested, will afford a sanction for all the errors, heresies, and abominations, that the human intellect can broach; and, in its immediate tendency, is calculated to render the Christian Revelation futile and useless. Our public Teachers would, I humbly apprehend, do well and wisely, to consider this matter; as it be longs more especially to their province.

8.

THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTIANITY is a Spirit of Humility, and an essential Qualification for eternal Bliss.*

I call that essential, without which any thing cannot be as when I say, that the faculty of Reason is essential

Ιλησι τοις ταπεινοις ο Σωτηρ, και ολυμπε αυτοίς θυραν ανοιγει . .. Ου καθαρει αμαρτήματα, ο αρνέμενος. Οια η οίζυς προς οικτον κελευθος Ευχαι αγερώχων ψωα εμπροσθεν τε Θε8. ΑΠΙ these Maxims of pith, and wisdom, are confirmed by the voice of Revelation, in passages so numerous, that it is hardly possible to place your eye on a single page of the sacred Volume, in which we are not taught the odiousness of Pride, and the excellence of Humility.*

to a rational Being, and that divine Grace is essential to the formation of the christian Character: so here, I mean to afirm, that Glory, Honour, and Immortality in a future state, are provided only for those, who are cloathed with Humility, in the present life.

*. The least self-attribution, self-appropriation, or self-complacency, in the divine gifts, graces, and commu nications, is an usurpation on the rights of God. On the contrary, self-preterition, self-evacuation, and selfannihilation, of the infinitely little, before the infinitely great, is the eternal sacrifice, which created beings owe to the absolute Infinite." Such are the celestial ideas exhibited for our learning and imitation, in Is. vi. 1—3. Rev. iv.