REMARKS

On a Book entitled

DEISM fairly Stated, &c.

SIR,

T was by mere Accident that your Book, entitled Deifm fairly Stated, &c. came in my Way.

It is called a Letter to a Friend;

and by the Beginning one might fuppofe it was written and intended only as private Correfpondence: Why it is published in Print we are only to guess: Could not your Friend have " favoured you with his Thoughts

on Philofophical and Theological Subjects, "which (you fay) may be comprized in one, "viz. Moral Philofophy.*---I fay, could not your Friend have favoured you with his Thoughts upon thefe Subjects, "in a friendly

Deifm fairly Stated, &c. P. 1. and 2.

Epifle," as you defire, without being call'd upon in fo publick a Manner? Whether your Friend has complied with your Request, either privately, or in Print, I know not; but as you have, in the Course of your Work, given a Sort of Challenge to any of the Profeffors of Chriftianity, to answer your Reasonings, I fhall take the Liberty to make fome Remarks upon them.

The Book which you have undertaken particularly to defend,has been so well answer'd by Dr. Thomas Randolph; and the Christian Religion has been fo well defended, and fo clearly proved to be a rational Affent, by Dr.Randolph, and many other Perfons, eminent for Learning, Integrity, and good Senfe; that I think I shall have Occasion to say very little in the further Defence of it. I shall therefore take the Method which you seem rather to defire, viz. to examine your own Scheme, and endeavour to fhew you, upon your own Principles, that you are in the wrong.

That you are an Infidel, you yourself have frankly acknowledged; how honest an one

is best known to your own Conscience, and to God, the Searcher of Hearts.

I do not intend to treat you in any unhandsome Manner, as you seem to think the

Deists have been treated by fome Writers in Defence of Christianity.

My Design is, firft, to make a few Remarks upon your Way of Reasoning, and then more particularly to fhew you the Inconfiftency of your own Scheme: That it is an irrational and immoral Undertaking: That it is utterly impoffible to make Deism, or what you call the Religion effential to Man, a Syftem of Religion to be believed and practised by the People; and confequently impracticable to be fettled and established in any Society. In the next Place, I fhall endeavour to convince you, that the publishing your Speculations may do much Harm, but cannot rationally be expected to do any Good, in any Manner whatsoever. And lastly, I shall leave you to confider, whether you, in publishing these your Notions of Religion, have acted like that good and honeft

B 2

honeft Man, that Moral Philofopher, you pretend to be.

The first Remark I have to make is, that you are angry with the Clergy, for dropping fome fevere Expreffions against the Deifts; and yet you and other Deifts are endeavouring to deprive them of the Religion which we and our Ancestors have been in poffeffion of for Ages; and you wonder that they should be displeased, or take it ill at your Hands. You think yourselves at liberty to say as many fevere Things of the Clergy as you please; and if any of them pretend to refent fuch hard Ufage (as in fuch a numerous Body of Men, it is not to be imagined that all of them can be fo cool and phlegmatick to take it patiently) then you complain, and say that you are ill used. You do all you can to provoke a great Number of Men, and then you pretend to wonder that any of them should be

angry.

The Writers of your Side are certainly the Aggreffors, they give the firft Attack, they befiege theClergy in their StrongHolds, of which, as I faid, they have been long in poffeffion;

and