'Tis ftrange that men fhould thus abuse the talents they are favoured with by Almighty God.

Mr. Williams begins his introduction, with the common definition of infanity, and after producing proofs of it, that have been urged, he prudentially informs us, that they are not applicable to himself, and then mentions the following facts to clear himself from fuch an imputation. Which, as they imply the hiftory of the inftitution in Margaret-Street, confifting of public worship, on the univerfal principles of morals, we will lay them before our readers.

"I quitted the customary offices of the profeffion to which I was educated, for reafons which have been already affigned. But either because religion is effential to the mind; or because the habits of a profeffion are, like all others, very difficult to be fufpended, I could not reft fatisfied out of my employment. On intimating my fituation, I had hopes given me of the most flattering encouragement. But on feeing my plan extended beyond the limits of the Chriftian church, they were withdrawn, and my papers were put up, for I had none of the views of reformers and apoftles; and it was my intention not to engage, until it appeared to be for the fervice and pleasure of others as well as my

own,

"In converfation with a man of the first rank in the present age, as a philofopher and politician, this fubject was introduced; and his fentiments and wishes agreeing with mine, fome perfons of our acquaintance were applied to, who were found fo well-difpofed, that several meetings were appointed; and the Liturgy which I had drawn up, underwent four or five impreffions, for the purpofes of being corrected and accommodated to their judgment and tafte.

"Thefe circumftances are mentioned to obviate the charge of prefumption; and to teftify, that in a great and important undertaking, every step in my power was taken to fhew repeated that public, whofe prepoffeffions I might affect; and did not ruth before it, with the hafty and infolent impetuofity of an infatuated enthufiaft.

"I am fenfible the plan may be injuriously degraded, by appearing to be the unadvised project of any individual, for his own emolument and advantage; a circumstance which could not fail of claffing it with the defign of fanaticks to reform churches, or of miffionaries to gain dominion by new opinions.

"This business has not any thing in common with fuch defigns. The Liturgy on the univerfal principles of religion and morality, was first intended as a gratification and pleasure, to a fmall number of perfons, who could worship on no other; to be publickly ufed, on the fuppofition that it would afford the fame gratification and

* Vide Appendix to the 2d. Edition of Effays on Public Worship, pleafure,

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pleasure, to great numbers in the fame circumftances, and bring me fome recompenfe for my trouble in ufing it.

"When the defign was made public, the expectations entertained by fome, and the apprehenfions of others were equally ill founded and extravagant. Nay, the opinions formed on the steps which have been hitherto taken, are not the moft judicious. Experiments may be to the public as fallacious as fables; they often occafion as many errors, and are always expected to prove too much. If the inftitution in Margaret-Street were only to prove that a Liturgy may be drawn up, on principles which all man kind acknowledge, and may be used without offence even to fectaries and bigots, it would deferve confideration and refpect. A bishop, quitting his diocefe, and attended by both Houses of Par liament, in the fame experiment, might have given it more eclat, but not more certainty. In the prefent cafe, it is a difcovery made by a private man, at fome rifque and at fome expence, It holds up to the world a fact, which has at all times been deemed incredible; the importance of which to morals and policy, may be understood, when men raise their thoughts from the elementary to the intellectual world; and the benefits of which may be enjoyed in future, by perfons, who might not have undergone the apprehenfions, anxieties and inconvenicies, by which it has been afcertained.

"That good men of all nations and all religions; that believers in Mofes, Chrift, and Mahomet, Free-thinkers, Deists, and even Atheists, who acknowledge beneficent principles in nature, may unite in a form of public worship, on all the great and most im portant truths of piety and morality, can no more be a question;

for it is demonftrated, not by the arts of logic, or the declamation of oratory in books; but by a stated public fervice, to which any man may have recource for fatisfaction."

Here we have indeed a motly company huddled together. A little farther on Mr. Williams tells us, that " The Lectures," here presented to the public, were read at the chapel in Margaret-Street; where the Liturgy, on the univerfal principles of religion and morality, is ufed on Sunday mornings,"

"They were drawn up," fays he, " with all the ability and care I could bestow on them. They are arranged as they were delivered; and may be obferved to be part of a methodical series of lectures on thofe principles and duties which are acknowledged by all mankind."

This performance confifts of forty-fix Lectures, fome on fpeculative, and others on moral fubjects. Many fophifins, in Mr. Williams's fpeculations, are plainly difcer nible. His fcheme is founded on the law of nature, which he hath rafhly reprefented as perfect and unchangeable, This method of reafoning entirely fuperfedes the neceffity of a re

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velation.

velation. But this, you will fay, was Mr. Williams's ultimate object.

If we rightly underftand Chriftianity we fhall find that it is fomething vaftly above what reafon could difcover or procure for us. It confirms incidentally the law of nature, and appeals to it; it harmonizes throughout with that and every other prior revelation of God's will, as it could not but do, if it were indeed (as it moft certainly is) derived from the fame eternal source of light and truth. But, for all that, it is no more a fimple republication of the natural than of any other divine law. It is a new and diftinct revelation that perfects and compleats all the reft. It is the confummation of one great providential scheme, planned before the ages, and totally executed in due time, for the redemption of mankind from fin and death, through the mercies of God in Chrift Jefus.

Now, in this view, which is that which Christianity exhibits of its own purpose, the scheme of the gospel is not only of the moft tranfcendent ufe, as it confirms, elucidates, enforces the moral law, but of the most absolute necessity.*

The law of nature had not the promife of eternal life. Can that law then be faid to be perfect? No man of a found and unbiaffed judgment will fay fo. The promife of eternal life was referved, that the grace of God might be manifested and illuftrated by the everlasting gofpel of his beloved Son; for he brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.

Mr. Williams betrays mock modefty in the following paffage, with regard to the name of Deift.

Men fhould be fo far from being ashamed or afraid to be called after the name of the Deity, that they fhould glory in it, as their highest honour. Nay, no religious appellation should be applied to men, who would act on the principles of univerfal benevolence, which refers to any being but Almighty God. I fpeak, therefore, for myfelf, and from my foul, that when I have been reproached by ignorance with the name of Deift, I felt no other regret than that I was not worthy of that noblest of all appellations. I could look up to Jupiter and Apollo, Mars and Venus, to Mofes, Chrift, and Mahomed; and not even from my errors and faults be afraid to wear their names; but to be called after a name appropriated to that perfectly wife and perfectly good being, who animates and blefies the univerfe, feems to call for a character of understanding and virtue, which is alarming; and though I fhould rejoice in deferving, I fhould be very cautious in affuming it.

* Vide Bishop Hurd's Sermon, page 13.

As

As Mr. Williams, "even from his errors and faults, is not afraid to wear the name of Jupiter, we will fix on him the appellation of the JUPITER of the Freethinkers; and this liberty we think we may be indulged in with greater propri'ety, as he hath afferted in another part of his Lectures, that 66 every religion has its Jupiter, more or lefs excellent according to the character of its founder."

After fpeaking of prayer in a ftrain of contempt, and shewing in his way, that it is ufelefs our author delivers his free fentiments on what " appears to him to be the whole doctrine of devotion."

"All the great principles which influence mankind have arifen from fome truths in nature, which have been mifapprehended, abufed, and artfully and wickedly applied. The firft child of nature bowed to the rifing fun; the firit man who, in the difficulties and diftreffes occafioned by darkness, faw the moon and worshipped her as a kind deity, acted purely from the gratitude of his heart, and did his duty. This was probably the first religion. The abufe commenced, when men wished to engage thefe deities on their fides, to the neglect, and even to the injury of other people. When knowledge advanced, fo as to give us views of the univerfe, and of power, intention, and benevolence in the government of it, the firft fentiments of men, on contemplating the works of God, were right; they were admiration and gratitude and joy. They found a pleasure and benefit in repeating this contemplation, as thofe great fentiments were renewed, and a most fublime and charming character held before them, by which they might form and improve their own. This is the real principle of devotion, and the proper ground of all rational and ufeful worship. On this principle, when men asked they found, and were never difappointed. They never contemplated the works of God without raifing in their own minds the most pleafing and moft ufeful fentiments, when they confidered the perfections difplayed in nature, with a view to improve the virtues of their own minds, they never failed of fuccefs; for the most noble and commendable ambition was excited in them to become wife and good, by viewing the great wisdom and goodness which every part of God's works exhibited. This appears to me to be the whole doctrine of devotion, and it would be difficult to deduce any duty more clearly than this, from the foundest and moft rational principles of nature. And though moralifts may clafs it among thofe virtues which they fhould have called elementary, rather than cardinal, yet all wife and good men, who understand thofe great and combined princi ples which actuate focieties, will fee this duty in its proper light, and practife it as its usefulness and importance deferves.

But it requires uncommon ftrength of mind to keep clear of the marvellous on every fubject, where the imagination is at all employed; or even where the heart is warmly interested. The

firft abuses of devotion probably arofe, like the extravagancies of love, from indulging warm imaginations. The bounds of nature once tranfgreffed, by the well-intended fictions of poetry, all the exceffes of fuperftition were produced; and artful men laid hold of them, for the purposes of avarice and ambition. Hence the ido latry of the antients, most of which we can trace, even at this time, into a poetical mythology, and the ufe of fymbols, which were originally reprefentations of rational fentiments. As a natural and reafonable worship would have fecured the improvement and virtue of the people, we fee in fact that the absurdities and extravagancies of fuperftition rivetted on them the chains of ignorance and vice. When christianity was first introduced, the author of it aimed to reduce this doctrine to its first principles. His apoftles deviated but little from his defign; and the church, for a few centuries, had a worship different from that of the heathens But when christianity entered into an alliance with the ftate, and was established by Conftantine, and made an engine of tyranny to enflave the people, the gods and goddeffes of antiquity only changed names for thofe of Chrift, the virgin, angels and apoftles; the gods were chriftened, Mars into Peter, and Diana or Venus into the Virgin Mary: the altars remained, and all the ceremonies of their worship were heightened, or rendered more abfurd, and then transferred to the chriftian faints. There is hardly any part of the public worship of Europe, which may not be traced to an idolatrous cuftom of the heathens. The abfurdity of these things is fo glaring, that men who have not great fagacity, great candour, and great patience, are very apt to turn from public worship with difguft, as wholly founded in ignorance and fuperftition. The very language it has adopted is puerile, and one might imagine our religious affemblies crouching before a capricious tyrant, or endeavouring to amufe and coax into good humour fome fluctuating, wavering, and paffionate being.

Prayer feems to make no part of Mr. Williams's profession. He hath obferved that we have no reafon to apprehend that we ever obtain any thing of God for afking." The conclufion to be drawn is, that a man of fuch a belief thinks it an unneceflary work to pray to God.

Men in a ftate of mind fo abandoned, (if there be really any fuch) will not hesitate to fay unto God," Depart from us, for we defire not the knowledge of thy ways. What is the Almighty that we fhould ferve him? And what profit fhall we have if we pray unto him?" Perhaps many ask this daring question through infolence, and "anfwer themselves according to their folly." Folly of the utmoft extravagance!

The duty of prayer is indifpenfible. This is a making known our lawful defires to Almighty God in the name of Christ. But then it is not to be vainly and negligently performed.

God