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things from the best of Beings by that which is best and most excellent in us; and this is intellect which does not need any organ or instrument of speech." And Porphyry adds, "That we must worship him in silence and pure thought." Thus, under pretence of inward religion and pure devotion, the outward expressions of it were to be neglected, and the only true God, who alone deserves to be worshipped, is not to have any outward homage rendered to him at all. And this seems to be the foundation of the absurd religion of the quakers. Leland on Christian Revelation, vol. i. p. 374.

Theodoret speaks of some Christians who were called Euchita, because they were for prayers without sacraments, and of some who conceived so highly of the spiritual nature of Christianity, that they would allow of no matter or element whatsoever. They had the name of Ascodruta, Aoxode, and they are more worthy of notice, as their notion seems to be the same with that of our modern quakers, though the quakers are said, by Mosheim, to have had their rise about the middle of the seventeenth century. The etymology of Ascodruta is not well understood: even Theodoret (Hæret. Fab. lib. i. cap. 10) seems at a loss about them, and I have consulted a number of books about the name without obtaining any satisfaction. They seem to have made this their fundamental principle, that invisible things are not to be completed by visible, of course they baptised not; but, moreover, they had no 9x pornga, divine mysteries. Theodoret next speaks of some called Archontici, Agxoro, with whom a knowledge of God, of the mystic sort, seems to have been all in all. These went so far as to anathematise το λετρον, και την γων μυτηρίων μετάλέψιν, baptism, and the receiving of the holy mysteries. Hey's Divín. Lect. vol. iv. p. 196.

μυσηρία,

The rejection of the two sacraments, baptism and the Lord's supper, by the quakers seems to have been borrowed from the Paulicians, who treated both these institutions as mere allegorical ceremonies. Mosheim's Ecc. Hist. vol. ii. 8vo.

Baptism not only unnecessary but unlawful, a tenet of quakers, a doctrine first broached by Socinus. That baptism is not superseded by extraordinary gifts of the spirit, which quakers profess themselves endowed with, proved from Acts x. 47. Quakers claim our attention and submission to their doctrines as the infallible dictates of the Holy Spirit speaking in them, and will not suffer any carnal reasonings to be offered in restraint of authority. Rogers's 12 Serm. p. 136.

Are not these pretensions equally as arrogant and unfounded as the infallibility of the church of Rome?

It is something extraordinary that Beattie ranks ROUSSEAU amongst the moral writers of true genius, when he has professedly wrote against the miracles of Christ; and more truly deserves a place with those writers, Hume, Hobbes, &c. to whom he has contrasted him. See Beattie and Munter's Conversion of Count Struensee.

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It was the nonsense and knavery of such doctrines, i. e. the merit of good works and supererogation, together with the infamous trade of retailing indulgences and pardons, that offended all sober, honest, and sensible, men, and contributed greatly to bring on the REFORMATION. But the zeal of the reformers against such abuses seems to have inclined some of them towards the contrary extreme; to depreciate good works and to set up faith in opposition to them; though Christian faith, right'y understood, always implies Christian obedience. Jortin's Serm. vol. i.

p. 98.

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Our Saviour's argument, Matthew, xxii. 32, in the opinion of many, seems rather directly to prove a future state, or another life, or the permanency of the soul, than a RESURRECTION, by which a dead man shall become a living man again. But it seems most probable that our Saviour intended to convince the Sadducees of the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, and it was a good argument ad hominem. But here observe, that a living state of the same person, after this and besides this present state, may justly be called a resurrection, and is as much as the word resurrection, áváros, considered in itself, ever implies. They, therefore, who, in the text abovementioned, look for a proof of the rising of that body which died, are seeking what they will not find. The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead undoubtedly contains thus much, that a dead man shall be a living man again, and the same person that he was before; and this sufficeth for moral and practical purposes. All beyond this is of the speculative and metaphysical kind, in which religion seems not to be concerned. Jortin's Sermons, vol. vii. p. 342, 343; and vol. iv. p. 134.

But, if the resurrection of the same body is not intended, how can it with any propriety be called a resurrection? And why is not the identity of the body necessary to constitute the same person, as well as the identity of the soul?'

Man is, in his original constitution, an embodied spirit. Though the rational soul is the noblest part of our nature, yet it is not the whole of it; nor could the whole man be properly said to be made perfect in bliss, if the body, which was from the beginning a constituent part of his frame, in which he lived and acted during his abode on earth, were left utterly to perish in the grave. Eternal life, therefore, as it signifies the happiness of our entire nature, takes in not merely the immortality of the soul, but the resurrection of the body too, and the immortal existence of the whole man, soul and body united, in a state of felicity and perfection. Leland on Christian Revel. vol. ii. p. 448.

It is not improbable that some notion of the resurrection of the body might have been part of the original tradition derived, along with the notion of the immortality of the soul, from the first ages. And some learned persons have supposed that the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, which became very general, was a corruption and depravation of that doctrine. Perhaps, also, it was owing to a corruption of the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, that, in many parts of the world, where they Hh

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held a life after this, the notion they had of it seems to have been this, that it shall be a life perfectly like the present, with the same bodily wants, the same exercises and employments, and the same enjoyments and pleasures, which they had here. Leland pn Christian Revel. vol. ii. p. 438. 15.

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Christ being called the first fruits of them that slept, and Paul saying, (1 Cor. xv. 49) that, “ as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly," we seem to be authorised to conclude, that the essential properties of our future bodies will be the same with those of Christ's after his resurrection; but what those were we have no sufficient data from which to draw a certain inference. After his resurrection, Jesus appeared to be in all respects the very same that he had been before. He had, as he himself says, flesh and bones, was capable of being handled, and also of eating and drinking, But then, as he appeared with the wounds in his hands, feet, and side, that peculiar change, adapted to his future and permanent mode of existence, did not probably take place till after his ascension, nor till he had been seen by Paul, to whom he no doubt appeared, as he had done to the other apostles, in all respects the same that he had been before. Indeed, without this, it might not have been possible to identify his person, so that he could not have been a proper witness of his resurrection, and consequently could not have had the requisite qualifications of an apostle. Priestley's Evidences, vol. ii. p. 231.

This power of raising the dead, however, Jesus was careful to observe was not naturally inherent in him, but what was imparted to him by God, as well as his other extraordinary powers. Priestley's Evidences, vol. ii. p. 196.

But how is this consistent with John, ii. 19, vi. 40, 54?, 11

Harrison asserts that 72,000 criminals were executed, during the reign of Henry VIII. for THEFT and ROBBERY, which would amount nearly to 2000 a year. He adds, that, in the latter end of, Elisabeth's reign, there were not executed 400 a year, It appears that in all England there are not at present 40 executed for those crimes. If these facts be just, there has been a great improvement in morals since the reign of Henry VIII Hume's Hist. vol. iv. p. 276.

And may not this improvement be very fairly attributed to the reformation?

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Several considerations make it highly probable that RELIGION first entered into the world by divine revelation; that it was not merely the result of men's own unassisted reason, or the effect of learning and philosophy, which had made little progress in those early ages, but owed its original to a revelation communicated from God to the first parents of the human race. From them, it was delivered down by tradition to their descendants; though, in process of time, it became greatly obscured and cor rupted with impure mixtures, Leland on Christian Revel 4to, vol.i: p. 68.. Can

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¡ Can there be a stronger confirmation of the necessity of divine revelation than the declaration of Socrates, in Xenophon's Memorab. lib. iv. c. 4, sect. 19.

οι Αγράφους δὲ τινας οἶσθα, ἔφη, ὦ Ιππία, νόμους, τας γ' εν πάση, ἔφη, χώρα κατὰ ταὐτὰ νομιζομένες ἔχοις ἂν οὖν εἰπεῖν, ἔφη, ὅτι οἱ ἄνθρωποι αὐτὸς ἔθεντος καὶ πῶς ἂν, ἔφη, ὅτι οἱ ἄνθρωποι αὐτὸς ἔθεντο ; καὶ πῶς ἂν ἔφη, οἴε συνελθεῖν ἅπαντες αν δυνήθειες, οὔτε ὁμόφωνοι εἰσι ; τίνας οὖν, ἔφη, νομίζεις τεθεικίναι τις νόμους τέτες, εγώ μεν, ἔφη, θεὺς οἶμαι τὰς νόμος τέτες τοῖς ἀνθρώποις θεῖναι. καὶ γὰρ παρὰ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώ τοὺς πρῶτον νομίζεται, ο τὸς θεὸς σέβιω.”

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As certain as it is that Adam, or man, had an intelligent and wise author of his being, so certainly we may conclude that he originally formed and designed him for religion. And, if so, it is reasonable to think, that, whenever he formed man, he pos him, at his first creation, into an immediate capacity of answering this end of his -And it is most reasonable to suppose that being, and entering on a life of religion. the wise author of his being, at his first creation, communicated to him such a know ledge of religion as enabled him immediately to know his maker and the duty required of him; in which case it cannot be denied that the first notions and discoveries of religion came to the parents of the human race by immediate revelation from God himself. For, if man, or Adam, at his first creation, be supposed to have had an excellent understanding and powers of reason, yet, if his mind at his first formation had been without any ideas but what he gradually acquired, he must have been a long time before he attained to the knowledge of divine and invisible things, or could form a language capable of expressing and communicating those ideas." Leland on the Christian Revel. 4to, vol. i. p. 48, 51. tunika ila wo ag deion to repa Hence, also, it may be inferred that he was inspired to speak a language without any previous application.

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The forms of our RUBRIC are certainly, on the whole, good with respect to their manner and language; they are instruments well adapted to promote true and rational piety. God is addressed in them with simplicity, yet with dignity. There is warmth enough in them for the rational worshipper, though not perhaps for the enthusiasti and the ceremonies, with which our forms are accompanied, are few, decent, and intelligible. But, allowing our public forms all this merit, for one party to suppose them perfect, and for the other to reprobate them for not being so, is equally unreas sonable. Perfect they could not be; and they would be unlike all other human performances, if they were not capable of improvement in a long course of time. A revision of our forms by authority would do honour to our church; it would give it the true merit of being really more perfect, at the expense only of parting with an imaginary notion of perfection. An impropriety has, in some instances, arisen from a change in the manner and time of performing the public services of the church. Some of those, which were originally intended for different times, are now used together: for this reason, they appear not well united; there are unnecessary repeti Hh 2

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tions now in them which were not in their separate state, and the whole is rendered too long and less uniform, The Scripture, though, we allow it all to be of divine, authority, yet is not in all its parts equally fit for public and popular use. In this view I cannot help thinking that even some of the psalms are not proper for a part of the service which occurs so frequently. I should suppose, too, that lessons might be selected for Sundays and holidays, more improving than the present, more applicable to the belief and conduct of a Christian. Some of the Apocrypha in particular, to which indeed, we attribute no divine authority, has so much the air of legend and fable, that it by no means deserves a place in the service of our church. Sturges's Letters, p. 140, &c.

Courayer, in his notes on Sleidan, speaking of the liturgy composed in Edward the VI.'s reign, says, "La liturgie Romaine me semble moins s'écarter des anciennes que la 2me liturgie d'Edouard, que l'on a voulu rendre trop conforme aux nouveaux dogmes, dont les anciennes liturgies étoient fort éloignées." Vol. ii. p. 257.

? But by antient liturgies he seems here only to speak of those framed by the church of Rome in earlier times..

The RELIGIOUS establishment of the Church of England is founded on the right of private judgement, and freely allows to others that right which it hath vindicated to itself. It disclaims all coercive methods, neither forcing others into subjection nor retaining its own members by violence. In matters of order and decency, in the form and manner of worship, our church hath most judiciously and happily attained the due mean between superstition and enthusiasm: not subject to ordinances, nor yet wholly disdaining the use of them; not indulging, on the one hand, a vain ostentation of pompous ceremonies, or attributing imaginary efficacy to empty shews and mere outside performances; nor, on the other, rejecting such order as the decency and solemnity of religious worship require, or leaving devotion to the dangerous guidance of wild fancy and inflamed imagination. Her public offices are conceived in the true spirit of sincere, rational, well-instructed, piety; delivered in language intelligible, simple, unaffected, yet in the highest degree solemn and powerful, by an expressive plainness informing the understanding; by a well-judged variety awakening the attention; by a fervent strain of devotion warming the heart and engaging the affections. Lowth's Assize-Sermon, August 15, 1764.'

It is this injudicious historian's method, (RAPIN,) wherever he finds a good character among our kings, to load it with reproach; wherever he meets a bad one, to extenuate its guilt; so that every monarch is levelled by him to one common standard of indifference. His remarks upon particular facts are similar to his characters; whatever other historians have laid down as motives he undertakes to contradict, and fancies that he thus acquires an air of impartiality. Lyttleton's Letters, letter 38.

Paulatim

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