dead, and thofe that are to rife, proves the fame. As to the fathers it is needlefs to quote them. The fame Burnet, and fuch Proteftants as admit none to the full enjoyment of the divine effence, until after the found of the laft trumpet, admit an intermediate state between Heaven and Hell, from death to the refurrection; in which ftate, departed fouls have not thei rfull completion of happiness or mifery.

Whatever wrangles divines may have about a text of fcripture, they should not indulge their warmth to fuch a degree, as not to listen to cool reason. It is not contrary to religion or reafon to believe that alms and prayers for our deceafed friends, can do them no harm. In the very uncertainty of alms and prayers being useful to the dead, they are not useless to those who offer them, from a principle of charity. For a good intention gives merit to an action which in itself is harmless and inoffenfive.

Sir Ifaac Newton may defcribe the course of thofe heavenly bodies which swim in the planetary region; our mariners may fail round the world, and our divines, in a paroxyfm of zeal against Popery, may be wafted down the stream of allegory in explaining the preacher's tree that falleth to the North or to the South. I fhall never acknowledge them fo well verfed in the geography of the other world, as to be able to perfuade me,

that

that there are only two places in it, until they remain there for fome time; and after making their observations and remarks, return with a well authenticated map of that unknown country, from whofe bourne no traveller ever returns.

The pains of the other world, differ from the pains of this life, only in quality and duration. God can punish or reward his creatures here or hereafter, according to his juftice or mercy. Reason, then, divested of prejudice, will never discover any abfurdity, in the infliction of a temporary punishment beyond the grave, when reafon and religion combine to inform us that God can inflict punishments, beyond the grave, that are lafting and eternal. The learned author, then, who in attacking the common antagonist of the Christian religion, turns his arms against one of his own allies and confederates, is miftaken when he affigns the council of Florence as the first æra of Purgatory. He is, in like manṇer, mistaken in quoting St. Auftin, who, according to him, fays, "Tertium locum ig"noramus." For St. Auftin prayed for his mother, and if that paffage be his, in which he fays, that he does not acknowledge a third place, he means after the day of judgment. But the paffage is taken from the works of Mercator, Pelagian, in difputing about the state of infants, who die without baptifm. Calvin is more can

did; for he acknowledges, that all the fathers believed and afferted a purgatory but fays this author, they were all mistaken; whether he or they were more fo, I fhall not now difcufs. The graffy graves of our fathers, erected above the furface of the earth in our churchyards, remind us of their bodies that lie beneath; and I shall never deem it error or fuperftition to fay, God have mercy on their fouls. But we are engaged in a common caufe; Purgatory then, and the council of Florence, I leave to my unfociable fellow foldier, who would fain try my skill at fencing, in inducing me to skirmish with him, about one of the branches of religion, whilft the ax of Deifm is laid to the root of the tree, and myself expofed to the two-edged fword of an old warrior, who fought Mofes in Genesis; Christ in the gospel; the fathers of the laft general council, in Trent; and the pope in the Revelations. To him alfo, I leavethe council of Trent, and the pope, with the Revelations of St. John, of which I do not understand three chapters, though I have read them twelve times over. I understand what Mead and others have written on them; but it is Mead and others, not St. John, I understand.

But to whom shall I leave the horns, which the doctor has tranfplanted from the isle of Patmos to Rome, to grace the pope's forehead?

I leave

I leave them to all the deifts and free-thinkers, who would fain perfuade us that we have no fouls, and make materialifm our family-catechifm. Let them once perfuade their wives that they have no fouls: let them inftil the fame doctrine into their children :-unfaithful wives, unchafte daughters, and rebellious fons, will be the bleffed fruits of their philofophy.

For the immortality of the foul is the foundation of morality and morality should be carefully inculcated, in order to fecure, inviolate, the rights of the marriage-bed; and to enforce the refpect and fubordination due from the child to the parent.

But the doctor believes, "that we will be changed into fpirits, at the last day, when the "world will perish, for want of vegetable "food" though he will not allow that our bodies will rife.

It is, certainly, the fittest time to change our mouths and ftomachs into spirits, when we will have nothing to eat : for, after the refurrection, the hillocks will no longer file with the beauty of the vine; the fields will no longer curl with ears of corn. Our bodies then are useless.

Befides: In this religious chemistry, we meet with an ample compenfation: for, as we are nothing

nothing but bodies now, we will be all fpirits hereafter and the gentleman, who grants us neither foul here, nor body hereafter, grants us both by turns,-bodies, when we have enough to eat,-fpirits, when we have no food. Pray, fir, between spirit and matter, is not there an infinite diftance? Are not their properties fo diftinct, as mutually to exclude each other? God, then, muft destroy the nature of the one, before he can change it into the other. A new creation muft enfue: and one being must be fubftituted in the room of another. A fpirit, then, thus created, and coming from the hands of God, whose works are pure, is it to fuffer for the crimes of a Nero or a Caligula, committed thousands of years before its exiftence? If those monfters of human nature, whose names ftand for the most odious crimes, are to be punished in a future ftate, is any part of the body, in which they committed the most abominable actions, to be joined to this pretended fpirit? If fo, fpirit and body can be united together. If no part of the body is to be joined to this fpirit, then it is a spirit immediately created by the Almighty, and immediately punished, without any previous fin of its own. Reconcile this, if you can, to the juftice of God, who rewards or punishes every one according to his works.

Let