How often, I fay it with horror, might not God change his • mind?

Will it be urged, as an answer to what has been faid that the explanations and additions, which have been made, were made by the fame authority that made the original covenant, in order to ascertain the terms, and to fecure the effect of it, and that there is therefore no reason to find fault that they were made. But if this should be said, inftead of removing one abfurdity and profanation, it will only ferve to advance another. The force of the objection refts on the very affertion contained in the answer, on the fameness of the authority. If the additions were not faid to be made by the fame authority, they would be entitled to little regard, and the objection would vanish. But fince they are faid to be fo made, and fince they make a change in the covenant, for a covenant is changed by additional conditions, tho' the original remain ftill in force, the objection is confirmed by the anfwer, and a farther abfurdity arifes from it, or the fame abfurdity appears in a new light. If it was neceffary that the apoftles, who were filled with the holy Ghoft, or other inspired perfons, fhould publish by the affiftance of the fpirit any knowledge neceffary to falvation, which Jefus had not taught: or explain the covenant of grace more perfectly than he had done, it follows that the third perfon of the trinity was employed to affift the second, ⚫ in making a more full and perfect publication of the gospel, which comes too near the cafe of poor mortals, who want <this affiftance to receive and practise the gospel as they ought, and to whom it is given to fupply the imperfection of their nature. Upon the whole, have we not reafon to distinguish with an holy fear between the original fyftem of Chriftianity, and the very best, if that could be ascertained, of all thofe difcordant fyftems into which the pure ore of the gofpél has been fo often melted down, and caft anew, during fe• venteen centuries, at different times, and every time with fuch a mixture of human allay, that no one of them can carry, without fraud, the image and fuperfcription of our heavenly Cafar

Christianity, as it ftands in the gofpel, contains not only a complete but a very plain fyftem of religion; it is in truth the fyftem of natural religion, and fuch it might have continued to the unspeakable advantage of mankind, if it had been propagated with the fame fimplicity with which it was originally taught by Chrift himfelf; but this could not have ⚫ happened, unless it had pleased the divine providence to pre ⚫ ferve

" ferve the purity of it by conftant interpofitions, and by ex⚫traordinary means fufficient to alter the ordinary tourse of things. Such a conftant interpofition, and fuch extraordinary means, not being employed, Chriftianity was left very foon to fhift for itself, in the midst of a frantic world, and in an age when the moft licentious reafonings, and the most extravagant fuperftitions, in opinion and practice, prevailed univerfally under the refpectable names of theology and me6 taphyfics; and when the Jews themselves, on whofe reliC gion, and on the authority of whofe fcriptures Christianity < was founded, had already gone far in corrupting both, by oral traditions and cabalistical whimfies, by a mixture of ⚫ notions taken from the Chaldaic philofophy during their captivity, and from the Grecian philofophy fince the expedition of Alexander. The traces of these mixtures are discernible. • Those of Greek origin moft manifeftly; and among them, • thofe of Platonism are so ftrongly marked, that it is imposfible to mistake them. This philofophy was the very quint❝ effence of the theology and metaphyfics which Plato, and Pythagoras before him, had imported into Greece. It had ⚫ been extracted by the intense heat of the warmest imagination that ever Greece produced, and had contributed more than any other fyftem of paganism to turn theifts into enthufiafts, and to confirm that fondness for mystery, without an air of which no doctrine could pass for divine: what • effect all these circumstances had on Christianity, and how they served to raise an intricate, voluminous, and conten• tious science on foundations of the greatest fimplicity and plainnefs, it may be worth while to examine more particuJarly, and in fuch a detail as the nature of these effays, which are not defigned to be treatifes, and my confined knowledge of antiquity, permit. The extent of one and the other will he fufficient, perhaps, for our purpose.'

After this his Lordfhip difcourfes largely upon the unintelligibility of St. Paul's gofpel, and endeavours to fhew that where it is intelligible it is often abfurd, or profane, or trifling. The doctrine of paffive obedience, which he fuppofes the apostle to teach, is produced as an inftance of its being most intelligibly abfurd; that of abfolute predeftination, which he likewife fuppofes the apoftle to teach, of its being most intelligibly profane: the one, 'tis faid, is repugnant to common fenfe; the other to all the ideas of God's moral perfections, and either of them would be fufficient to shake the credit even of Chrift's gofpel, if they were contained in it. He likewise difcourfes largely upon the theology of Plato, in order to fhew

the

the more fully and clearly on what original authority we rest in matters of religion, and because Plato's works have been made, after the writings of St. Paul, a principal foundation of all that theology which has occafioned fo many disputes in the world, and has rendered the Chriftian religion obnoxious to the cavils of infidels, one of which cavils his Lordhip undertakes to refute, by fhewing that it is not religion, But theology, which has done all the mifchief complained of fo loudly and fo juftly.

He goes on to enquire after the caufes of that ftrange multiplication of fects, which have grown up from the apoftolical age to this, among Chriftians, and thinks that they are to be found in the metaphyfical madness of philofophers mixing with the enthusiasm of the first Chriftians, in the cabaliftical practice of giving different fenfes to the fame paffages of holy writ, in the uncertainty of tradition, and in the ufe that a diftinct order of men has made, in every Chriftian ftate, of these and other circumftances to acquire dominion over private confciences. On the last of thefe caufes he dif courses at great length, and with it concludes all he advances concerning authority in matters of religion: part of what he fays is,

• That religion is neceffary to ftrengthen, and that it contributes to fupport government cannot be denied, I think, without contradicting reafon and experience both. This adds he, fome men have been extravagant enough to do directly whilft others, have contradicted reafon and experience, just as much, in a manner more likely to impose, and therefore more likely to do hurt, by propagating falfe conceptions of the Supreme Being, by perplexing the notions of religion, and by affociating to it fuch as are really diftinct from it. From hence all the evil confequences, that are imputed to religion, have flowed immediately and it is neceffary, therefore, in defence of it, to diftinguish clearly between what is really religion, and what has been induftriously, and is now habitually, confounded with it, and made to pass for it.

Civil obligations are impofed by the laws of man; religious obligations by thofe of God; and as the authority of the legiflator is far greater in one cafe than in the other, fo is the fanction of the law, eternal punishment in another ⚫ life, instead of temporal pains and penalties in this. If it ⚫ be faid, that befides this difference, we are to confider how ⚫ much religion has a farther influence than civil government • can have, because the former reaches to the inward-difpofi

no

<tions of the heart and mind, whilft the other goes no fare
<ther than to regulate outward conduct; I fhall neither deny
the propofition, nor admit all the use that is made of it: but
I fhall conclude from thence, how neceffary it is to the
peace and welfare of mankind, that they be kept from jar-
ring, which cannot be effectually prevented, unless the
entire power of both remains in the fame hands.
As long
as natural religion is alone concerned, this fhould not feem
fo difficult; but when revealed religions are established,
the difficulty becomes almoft infuperable. The principles
and duties of natural religion arife from the nature of things,
and are difcerned by the reafon of man, according to that
order which the author of all nature, and the giver of all
reafon, has eftablished in the human fyftem. From hence
too would arife the inftitutions of civil government, in a
• natural ftate, if the minds of legiflators were not corrupted
previously by fuperftition. In these cafes, religion and civil
government, arifing from the fame fpring, their waters
would be intermixed, they would run in one ftream; and
they might be eafily confined to the fame channel; if reve-
lation did not introduce myfterious doctrines and rites,
which it becomes foon a trade to teach and to celebrate.

Neither nature, nor reason, could ever lead men to imagine two diftinct and independant focieties in the fame fociety. This imagination was broached by ecclefiaftical ambition; and when it was once broached, it was fure to be propagated by the self-intereft of a whole order of men in every country, and by the fuperftition of all the reft. A respect for religion begot a refpect for this order. The idea of religion came to be affociated to that of church, or rather to be confounded with it, and church came to fignify this order • of men even exclufively. This church, this religious fociety, grew up in fome countries to be the tyrant, in others to be the rival of the ftate, on the authority of pretended revelations among the heathens: and it is a melancholy truth, that the fame monftrous growth has been seen and felt, on the pretended authority of real revelations among Chriftians. Such is the knavery and fuch the folly of mankind, that a example, antient nor modern, pagan nor Chriftian, can be ⚫ produced of fuch an order of men once established that has not aimed at acquiring from their inftitution, and that has not acquired, fooner or later, immoderate wealth and ex• orbitant power.

'

6

.

Few men are fo little acquainted with the hiftory of the < Chriftian world as not to know, that the wealth of this church

is equal, at least in many countries, to that of the Egyptian church; that the influence of the antient could not be greater than that of the modern magi over all ranks of men; and ⚫ that the bishop of Rome has exercifed, even over kings in ⚫ many countries, a power which he claimed, in all, of the fame nature with that of the Ethiopian church over kings • of one country.

A religious fociety, by which is meaned, on this occafion, a clergy, is, or is not the creature of the state. If the first, it follows, that this order, no more than others, which the ftate has inftituted for the maintenance of good government, can affume any rights, or exercife any powers, except fuch as the state has thought fit to attribute to it; and that the ftate may, and ought to keep a conftant controul over it, not only to prevent ufurpations and abuses, but to direct the public and private influence of the clergy, in a ftrict conformity to the letter and fpirit of that conititution, the fervants of which, in a much truer fense they are, than what they affect fometimes to call themselves, the < ambassadors of God to other men. If the laft is faid, if it ⚫is afferted, that the church is in any fort independant on the state, there arifes from this pretenfion the greatest abfurdity imaginable, that I mean of Imperium in Imperio: an em<pire of divine in an empire of human inftitution. It is in truth fo exprefsly contained in the very terms of the affertion, that none of the tedious fophiftical reasonings, which have been employed for the purpose, can evade or difguife it.

One of thefe I will mention, because it has a certain air of plaufibility, that impofes on many, and because, if it cannot ftand a fhort and fair examination, as I think it cannot, the whole edifice of ecclefiaftical independency and grandeur falls to the ground. It has been faid then, that ⚫ religious and civil focieties are widely diftinguifhed by the diftinct ends of their inftitutions, which imply neceffarily diftinct powers and a mutual independency; that the end ❝ of one is the falvation of fouls, and that of the other the • fecurity of temporal interefts; that the ftate punishes overtacts, and can punish nothing elfe, because it can have cognizance of nothing that paffes in the mind and does not • break out into criminal actions; but that the church employing her influence to temper the paffions, to regulate the inward difpofitions, and to prevent fins as well as crimes," is that tribunal at which even intentions are to be tried, and