and they thought they received but a poor recom pence for this disappointment, in seeing every mode of religion attacked in a lively manner, and the foundation of every virtue, and of all government, fapped with great art and much ingenuity. What advantage do we derive from fuch writings? What delight can a man find in employing a capacity which might be usefully exerted for the noblest purposes; in a fort of fullen labour, in which, if the author could fucceed, he is obliged to own, that nothing could be more fatal to mankind than his fuccefs?

> I cannot conceive how this fort of writers propofe to compafs the defigns they pretend to have in view, by the inftruments which they employ. Do they pretend to exalt the mind of man, by proving him no better than a beaft? Do they think to enforce the practice of virtue, by denying that vice and virtue are diftinguished by good or ill fortune here, or by happiness or mifery hereafter? Do they imagine they shall increase our piety, and our reliance on God, by exploding his providence, and infifting that he is neither just nor good? Such are the doctrines which, fometimes concealed, fometimes openly and fully avowed, are found to prevail throughout the writings of Lord BOLINGBROKE; and fuch are the reasonings which this noble writer and feveral others have been pleased to dignify with the name of philofophy. If thefe

are

are delivered in à fpecious manner, and in a ftyle above the common, they cannot want a number of admirers of as much docility as can be wifhed for in difciples. To thefe the editor of the following little piece has addreffed it: there is no reafon to conceal the defign of it any longer.

*

: The defign was, to fhew that, without the exertion of any confiderable forces, the same engines which were employed for the destruction of religion, might be employed with equal fuccefs for the fubverfion of government; and that specious arguments might be ufed against those things which they, who doubt of every thing else, will never permit to be queftioned. It is an obfervation which I think Ifocrates makes in one of his orations against the fophifts, that it is far more easy to maintain a wrong caufe, and to fupport paradoxical opinions to the fatisfaction of a common auditory, than to eftablish a doubtful truth by folid and conclufive arguments. When men find that fomething can be faid in favour of what, on the very propofal, they have thought utterly indefenfible, they grow doubtful of their own reafon; they are thrown into a fort of pleasing furprife; they run along with the fpeaker, charmed and captivated to find fuch a plentiful harvest of reafoning, where all feemed barren and unpromifing. This is the fairy land of philofophy. And It very frequently happens, that thofe pleafing impreffions

it

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preffions on the imagination, fubfift and produce their effect, even after the understanding has been fatisfied of their unfubftantial nature. There is a fort of glofs upon ingenious falfehoods, that dazzles the imagination, but which neither belongs to, nor becomes the fober aspect of truth. I have met with a quotation in Lord Coke's reports that pleased me very much, though I do not know from whence he has taken it: "Interdum fucata "falfitas, (fays he) in multis eft probabilior, et fæpe "rationibus vincit nudam veritatem." In fuch cases, the writer has a certain fire and alacrity inspired into him by a consciousness, that let it fare how it will with the fubject, his ingenuity will be fure of applause; and this alacrity becomes much greater if he acts upon the offenfive, by the impetuofity that always accompanies an attack, and the unfortunate propenfity which mankind have to the finding and exaggerating faults. The editor is fatisfied that a mind, which has no reftraint from a fenfe of its own weakness, of its fubordinate rank in the creation, and of the extreme danger of letting the imagination loose upon fome fubjects, may very plaufibly attack every thing the most excellent and venerable; that it would not be difficult to criticise the creation itself; and that if we were to examine the divine fabricks by our ideas of reafon and fitness, and to use the fame method of attack by which some men have affaulted revealed religion

religion, we might with as good colour, and with the fame fuccefs, make the wisdom and power of God in his creation appear to many no better than foolishness There is an air of plaufibility which accompanies vulgar reasonings and notions taken from the beaten circle of ordinary experience, that is admirably fuited to the narrow capacities, of fome, and to the laziness of others. But this advantage is in great measure loft, when a painful, comprehensive furvey of a very complicated matter, and which requires a great variety of considerations, is to be made; when we must seek in a profound fubject, not only for arguments, but for new materials of argument, their measures and their method of arrangement; when we must go out of the sphere of our ordinary ideas, and when we can never walk fure, but by being fenfible of our blindness. And this we must do, or we do nothing, whenever we examine the refult of a reafon which is not our own. Even in matters which are, as it were, juft within our reach, what would become of the world, if the practice of all moral duties, and the foundations of fociety, refted upon having their reasons made clear and demon. strative to every individual?

The editor knows that the fubject of this letter is not fo fully handled as obviously it might; it was not his defign to say all that could poffibly be B 4

faid.

faid. It had been inexcufable to fill à large vớlume with the abufe of reafon; nor would fuch an abuse have been tolerable even for a few pages, if fome under-plot of moré confequence than the apparent defign, had not been carried on.

Some perfons have thought that the advantages of the state of nature ought to have been more fully displayed. This had undoubtedly been a very ample fubject for declamation; but they do not confider the character of the piece. The writers against religion, whilft they oppofe every system, are wifely careful never to fet up any of their own. If fome inaccuracies in calculation, in reafoning, or in method, be found, perhaps these will not be looked upon as faults by the admirers of Lord BOLINGBROKE; who will, the editor is afraid, obferve much more of his Lordship's character in fuch particulars of the following letter, than they are like to find of that rapid torrent of an impetuous and overbearing eloquence, and the variety of rich imagery for which that writer is justly admired.

A LETTER