he took all the talk of the table into his own hands, abused every one of the company, and flung a bottle at the gentleman's head who treated him. This has given me occafion to reflect upon the ill effects of a vicious modefty, and to remember the faying of Brutus, as it is quoted by Plutarch, that the perfon has had but an ill education, who has not been taught to deny any thing." This falfe kind of modesty has, perhaps, betrayed both fexes into as many vices as the most abondoned impudence, and is the more inexcufable to reafon, because it acts to gratify others rather than itfelf, and is punished with a kind of remorfe, not only like other vicious habits when the crime is over, but even at the very time that it is committed..

Nothing is more amiable than true modefty, and nothing is more contemptible than the falfe. The one guards virtue, the other betrays it. True modefty is alhamed to do any thing that is repugnant to the rules of right reafon falfe modefty is afhamed to do any thing that is oppofite to the humour of the company. True modefty avoids every thing that is criminal, false modefty every thing that is unfashionable. The latter is only a general undetermined inftin&t; the former is that inftinct, limited and circumfcribed by the rules of pru dence and religion.

We may conclude that modefty to be false and vicious which engages a man to do any thing that is ill or indifcreet, or which retrains him from doing any thing that is of a contrary nature. How many men, in the common concerns of life, lend fums of money which they are not able to fpare, are bound for perfons whom they have but little friendship for, give recommendato y characte s of men whom they are not acquainted with, bestow places on those whom they do not efteen, live in fuch a manner as they themselves, do not approve, and all this merely because they have not the confidence to refift folicitation, importunity, or example?

Nor does this falfe modelty expofe us only to fuch actions as are indifcreet, but very often to fuch as are highly criminal. When Xenophanes was called timorous, because he would not venture his money in a game at dice: I confefs,' faid he, that I am exceeding

N° 458. timorous, for I dare not do an ill thing.' On the contrary, a man of vicious modelty complies with every thing, and is only fearful of doing what may look fingular in the company where he is engaged. He falls in with the torrent, and lets himtelf a go to every action or difcourfe, however unjustifiable in itself, fo it be in vogue among the prefent party. This, though one of the moft common, is one of the most ridiculous difpofitions in human nature, that men fhould not be ashamed of speaking or acting in a diffolute or irrational manner, but that one who is in their company fhould be ashamed of ing himself by the principles of reafon and virtue.

govern.

In the fecond place we are to confider false modesty, as it reftrains a man from doing what is good and laudable. My reader's own thoughts will fuggeft to him many inftances and examples under this head. Ifhall only dwell upon one reflection, which I cannot make without a fecret concern. We have in England a particular bashfulness in every thing that regards religion, A well-bred man is obliged to conceal any ferious fentiment of this nature, and very often to appear a greater libertine than he is, that he may keep himself in countenance among the men of mode. Our excefs of modesty makes us fhame-faced in all the exercises of piety and devotion. This humour prevails upon us daily; infomuch, that at many well-bred tables, the mafter of the houfe is fo very modeft a man, that he has not the confidence to fay grace at his own table: a custom which is not only practifed by all the nations about us, but was never omitted by the heathens themfelves. English gentlemen who travel into Romancatholic countries, are not a little furprised to meet with people of the best quality kneeling in their churches, and engaged in their private devotions, though it be not at the hours of public worship. An officer of the army, or a man of wit and pleasure in thofe countries, would be afraid of paffing not only for an irreligious, but an illbred man, fhould he be feen to go to bed, or fit down at table wi hout offering up his devotions on fuch occafions. The fine fhow of religion appears in all the foreign reformed churches, and enters fo much in their ordinary converfation, that an Englishman is apt to term them hypocritical and precife.

This little appearance of a religious deportment in our nation, may proceed in fome meafure from that modeity which is natural to us, but the great occafion of it is certainly this: thofe fwarms of fectaries that overran the nation in the time of the great rebellion, carried their hypocrify fo high, that they had converted our whole language into a jargon of enthufiafm; infomuch that upon the restoration men thought they could not recede too far from the behaviour and practice of thofe perfons, who had made religion a cloak to so many villanies. This led them into the other extreme, every appearance of devotion was looked upon as puritanical, and falling into the hands of the ridiculers who flourished in that reign, and attacked every thing that was serious, it has ever fince been out of countenance among us. By this means we are gradually fallen into that vicious modefty, which has in fome measure worn out from among us the appearance of christianity in ordinary life and converfation, and which distinguishes us from all our neighbours.

Hypocrify cannot indeed be too much detefted, but at the fame time is to be preferred to open impiety. They are both equally deftructive to the perfon who is poffeffed with them; but in regard to others. hypocrify is not fo pernicious as barefaced irreligion. The due mean to be observed is to be fincerely virtuous, and at the fame time to let the world fee we are fo. I do not know a more dreadful menace in the Holy Writings, than that which is pronounced against those who have this perverted modefty, to be ashamed before men in a particular of fuch unspeakable importance.

C.

N° 459.

Saturday, August 16.

-Quicquid dignum fapiente bonoque eft.

HOR. Ep. 4. I. 1. v. 5

What befits the wife and good.

RELIGION

CREECH.

ELIGION may be confidered under two general heads. The firft comprehends what we are to believe, the other what we are to practise. By thofe things which we are to believe, I mean whatever is revealed to us in the Holy Writings, and which we could not have obtained the knowledge of by the light of nature; by the things which we are to practife, I mean all those duties to which we are directed by reafon or natural religion. The first of these I fhall diftinguish by the name of faith, the fecond by that of morality,

If we look into the more ferious part of mankind, we find many who lay fo great a ftrefs upon faith, that they neglect morality; and many who build fo much upon morality, that they do not pay a due regard to faith. The perfect man fhould be defective in neither of these particulars, as will be very evident to those who confider the benefits which arife from each of them, and which I shall make the fubject of this day's paper.

Notwithstanding this general divifion of chriftian duty into morality and faith, and that they have both their peculiar excellencies, the firft has the pre-eminence in feveral respects.

Firft, because the greateft part of morality, as I have stated the notion of it, is of a fixed eternal nature, and will endure when faith fhall fail, and be lost in conviction.

Secondly, becaufe a perfon may be qualified to do greater good to mankind, and become more beneficial to the world, by morality without faith, than by faith without morality.

Thirdly, becaufe morality gives a greater perfection to human nature, by quieting the mind, moderating the pallions, and advancing the happiness of every man in his private capacity.

Fourthly, because the rule of morality is much more certain than that of faith, all the civilized nations of the world agreeing in the great points of morality, as much as they differ in those of faith.

Fifthly, because infidelity is not of fo malignant a nature as immorality; or to put the fame reafon in another light, because it is generally owned, there may be falvation for a virtuous infidel, particularly in the cafe of invincible ignorance, but none for a vicious believer.

Sixthly, because faith feems to draw its principal, if not all its excellency, from the influence it has upon morality; as we fhall fee more at large, if we confider wherein confifts the excellency of faith, or the belief of revealed religion; and this I think is,

First, in explaining, and carrying to greater heights feveral points of morality.

Secondly, in furnishing new and ftronger motives to enforce the practice of morality.

Thirdly, in giving us more amiable ideas of the Supreine Being, more endearing notions of one another, and a truer ftate of ourselves, both in regard to the grandeur and vileness of our natures.

Fourthly, by fhewing us the blackness and deformity of vice, which in the chriftian fyftem is fo very great, that he who is poffeffed of all perfection and the fovereign judge of it, is reprefented by feveral of our divines as hating fin to the fame degree that he loves the facred perfon who was made the propitiation of it.

Fifthly, in being the ordinary and prefcribed method. of making morality effectual to falvation.

I have only touched on these several heads, which every one who is converfant in difcourfes of this nature will eafily enlarge upon in his own thoughts, and draw conclufions from them which may be useful to him in the conduct of his life. One I am fure is fo obvious, that he cannot miss it, namely, that a man can

not be perfect in his fcheme of morality, who does