and strong, in both its parts, under the effusion of the Holy Spirit. On the declension of this, toward the latter end of the third century, a lower form of christianity, even in real saints, obtained, and our history is still travelling through the twilight. The taste of this lower form was to know the law in its spirituality, but not the gospel in its consolations. Of this form was Ephraim, one of the most holy men in this period, and I scarce have found a saint, who had better views, since the days of Cyprian, unless we except Ambrose, of Milan. But by far the greater part of real good men, in this whole century, and the latter part of the last, lived, comparatively, in bondage, looking to Jesus, sincerely, though confusedly. One person, however, was training up under the special guidance of God in the latter part of this century, whose superior light was appointed to illuminate the next, as we shall see by and by. But how does the piety, the humility, the conscientiousness of such men as Ephraim, with all their abject superstition, rebuke the pride and carelessness and levity of many now evangelized in the head, and not in the heart, who trifle with the light, and live in sin, because they conceive grace to abound?

I shall dismiss this saint, after I have taken a little notice of one of his companions named Abraham, whose life he has written, and whom he admires extremely. For fifty years, he lived an Ascetic, in the strictest observations of monastic rules, and confined himself principally to his cell; though the intelligent reader will think he acted most like a christian in those intervals, when he left it; in one of them particularly, to which alone I shall confine my attention. was a great desert in the neighbourhood of the city, (Edessa I suppose,) in which the inhabitants were all idolators to a man ;* and though many presbyters and deacons had been sent to them by the bishop of the city, yet they had all returned without effect, unable to bear the persecution of the pagans. One day, the

There

bishop observed among his clergy, that he knew of no person so devoted to God as Abraham, and therefore he would ordain him as an evangelist of these pa gans. At first he intreated him, but in vain; Abraham begged to be permitted to bemoan his own evils. The bishop, however, insisting on the obedience, which he owed to authority, and how much better it was to be employed in the salvation of many, than of one soul only, Abraham at length submitted. He began his work with fervent prayer for the divine blessing, and having erected a church, he supplicated in it, for the conversion of the people. His next step appears not so proper; he threw down the idols and altars of the pagans; the consequence of which was, that, with much ill usage, he was expelled from the country. He returned, however, to the village, and resumed his work of prayer in the church, to the astonishment of the pagans: who coming from time to time to him, he began to exhort them to turn from idols to the living God, on which he was worse treated than before. For three years, he bore their insults, and a constant series of persecution. His patience, however, and meekness, were admirable, and at length the people began to be softened, and comparing his preaching with his practice, they concluded that God must be with him, and offered themselves voluntarily to receive his doctrine. The saint, rejoicing at the event, desired them to give glory to God, who had enlightened the eyes of their hearts to know him. In fine, he gathered them into a church, daily opening to them the scriptures. At length, when he saw them confirmed in the faith of the gospel, and bringing forth the fruits of it with steadiness, he abruptly retired from them to his former solitude. The work, however, remained firm and strong, and the bishop visited and exhorted them, from the word of God, and ordained pastors from among themselves.

How much better would Abraham have been thus. employed during the fifty years of his solitude? but such were the times. While the world proceeded in

its usual wickedness, those who were best calculated to reform it, had a strong tendency to live a recluse life; and false fear and bondage kept many from the pastoral office, who might have been its brightest ornaments. The mischief of this was inexpressible; the extension of the gospel was checked; and every cir cumstance shewed, that the spirit of God was no longer poured out, in his fulness among men.

CHAPTER XXII.

Hilary of Poictiers.

AN account of the life of Hilary is delivered by one Fortunatus, who wrote about two hundred years after him. This biographer, according to the taste of the age, which was still more credulous and superstitious than that of Hilary, is extremely barren in matters, which really deserve attention, and is full of prodigies and fictions. The best account of him therefore is to be drawn from his contemporaries, and the ecclesiastical historians, and above all from his own writings. Of his life and actions little is known, that deserves to be recorded: yet so great a man merited a distinct attention.

He was born at Poictiers in France, and being of a very noble family, and distinguished by a liberal education, he was enabled to throw a lustre on christianity, after he received it. In his book on the Trinity he gives us some account of his conversion.* He seriously considered the folly and vanity of idolatry, and was led to conclude, that its professors could not possibly be competent to lead men to happiness. He contemplated the visible frame of things, and inferred an Omnipotent Eternal Being, as their Maker and Preserver. He observes, that happiness consists not in any external things, nor in the bare knowledge of the

first principles of good and evil, but in the knowledge of the true God. By reading the books of Moses and the prophets, he found his mind enlightened and his judgment confirmed in these ideas. The short, but comprehensive account of God, in the book of Éxodus, "I am that I am," affected him with admiration. When he was carried forward to the New Testament, there he learnt, that there is an eternal world, the Son of God made man, who came into the world, to communicate to it the fulness of grace. His hope of happiness was now enlarged: "since the Son of God was made man, men may become the Sons of God. A man, who with gladness receives this doctrine, renews his spirit by faith, and conceives a hope full of immortality. Having once learned to believe, he rejects the captious difficulties, and no longer judges after the maxims of the world. He now neither fears death, nor is weary of life, and presses forward to a state of a blessed immortality." In such a manner, does Hilary give us the history of his own mind in religion. And when he enters on the subject of the Trinity, he gives an excellent admonition; humility at least will think so, though pride will object to it. It is, that the reader would think of God according to the light of faith, and agreeably to the testimony of God himself, divesting his mind of the meanness of human opinions. "For the chief qualification required in a reader is, that he be willing to take the sense of an author from what he reads, and not give him one of his own. He ought not to endeavour to find, in the passages which he reads, that, which he presumed ought to be there. In such passages, as describe the character of the Supreme Being particularly, he ought at least to be persuaded, that God knew himself." And in another part of the

* Du Pin.

I apprehend, if this method had been followed in all ages, there would never have been found any one to oppose the doctrine of the Trinity. Agreeably to this, it appears that Hilary, by the study of the scriptures alone, had obtained and steadily professed the Nicene faith, before he had ever seen the creed of that name, or knew any thing of the Arian controversy.

same treatise, he makes this observation. "The blasphemies of the heretics oblige us to do those things which are forbidden us, to search into mysteries incomprehensible, to speak things ineffable, and to explain that which we are not permitted to examine. And instead of performing with a sincere faith that which is commanded us, (which were otherwise sufficient,) namely, to worship the Father and the Son, and to be filled with the Spirit, we are obliged to employ our weak reasonings in explaining things incomprehensible." Every sincere believer, in every age, has had occasion to make the same remark, when called to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints.

His views of the Three Persons in the Trinity are remarkably perspicuous and scriptural. In speaking of the Holy Spirit, he says, that he enlightens our understandings, and warms our hearts,* that he is the author of all grace, and will be with us to the end of the world; that he is our comforter here while we live in expectation of a future life, the earnest of our hopes, the light of our minds, and the warmth of our souls. He directs us to pray for this Holy Spirit, to enable us to do good, and to persevere in faith and obedience.

There will be no occasion to take any farther notice of his writings, unless it be to mention his addresses to the emperor on the same subject. Two he wrote with decency and moderation; in the third, he appears, evidently to smart under the wound of persecution, and treats the prince with an unchristian asperity, for which no other apology can be made, than the same which must be made for Athanasius, namely, "that oppression maketh a wise man mad." In general, there is a proportion preserved in the church between doctrinal light and holy practice. Sanctification is carried on by the knowledge of the truth. And the superior degree of that knowledge, in the first and

Thus owning his influence on the two leading powers of the human mind, the understanding, and the will; not on one alone, but on both, agreeably to the views of the best and wisest in all ages.