The Holy Scriptures are every where mentioned by him with the greatest reverence. He calls them the Holy Books, the Sacred Text, Holy Writ, and Divine Revelation; and exhorts Christians to betake themselves in earnest to the study of the way to salvation, in those Holy Writings wherein God has revealed it from Heaven, and proposed it to the world; seeking our religion where we are sure it is in truth to be found, comparing spiritual things with spiritual." And, in a letter written the year before his death to one who asked this question, “What is the shortest and surest way for a young gentleman to attain to a true knowledge of the Christian religion, in the full and just extent of it ?" his answer is: "Let him study the Holy Scriptures, especially the New Testament. Therein are contained the words of eternal life. It has God for its Author; salvation for its end; and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter." A direction that was copied from his own practice, in the latter part of his life, and after his retirement from business; when for fourteen or fifteen years he applied himself especially to the study of the Holy Scriptures, and employed the last years of his life hardly in any thing else. He was never weary of admiring the great views of that Sacred Book, and the just relation of all its parts.

He every day made discoveries in it, that gave him fresh cause of admiration."

Of St. Paul in particular, upon several of whose Epistles he drew up a most useful Commentary, he says, "That he was miraculously called to the ministry of the Gospel, and declared to be a chosen vessel :-that he had the whole doctrine of the Gospel from God by immediate revelation that, for his information in the Christian knowledge, and the mysteries and depths of the dispensation of God by Jesus Christ, God himself had condescended to be his instructor and teacher: that he had received the light of the Gospel from the Fountain and Father of Light himself :-and that an exact observation of his reasonings and inferences, is the only safe guide for the right understanding of him, under the Spirit of God, that directed these Sacred Writings."

And the death of this great man was agreeable to his life; for we are informed by one who was with him when he died, and had lived in the same family for seven years before, that the day before his death he particularly exhorted all about him to read the Holy Scriptures: that he desired to be remembered by them at evening prayers; and being told, that if he would, the whole family should come and pray by him in his chamber, he

answered, he should be very glad to have it so, if it would not give too much trouble. That an occasion offering to speak of the goodness of God, he especially exalted the love which God shewed to man, in justifying him by faith in Jesus Christ; and returned God thanks in particular for having called him to the knowledge of that Divine Saviour.

About two months before his death he drew up a letter to a gentleman (who afterwards distinguished himself by a very different way of thinking and writing), and left this direction upon it, "To be delivered to him after my decease." In it are these remarkable words: "This life is a scene of vanity that soon passes away, and affords no solid satisfaction, but in the consciousness of doing well, and in the hopes of another life. This is what I can say upon experience, and what you will find to be true, when you come to make up the account."

Sir Isaac Newton, universally acknowledged to be the ablest philosopher and mathematician that this or perhaps any other nation has produced, is also well known to have been a firm believer and a serious Christian. His discoveries concerning the frame and system of the universe were applied by him, as Mr. Boyle's inquiries into nature had been, to demonstrate, against Atheists of all

kinds, the being of a God, and illustrate His power and wisdom in the creation of the world. Of which a better account cannot be given, than in the words of an ingenious person who has been much conversant in his philosophical writings :"At the end of his Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy he has given us his thoughts concerning the Deity, wherein he first observes, that the similitude found in all parts of the universe, makes it undoubted that the whole is governed by one Supreme Being, to whom the original is owing of the frame of nature, which evidently is the effect of choice and design. He then proceeds briefly to state the best metaphysical notions concerning God. In short, we cannot conceive either of space or time otherwise than as necessarily existing; this Being therefore, on whom all others depend, must certainly exist by the same necessity of nature; consequently, wherever space and time are found, there God must And as it appears impossible to us that also be. space should be limited, or that time should have had a beginning, the Deity must be both immense and eternal."

This great man applied himself, with the utmost attention, to the study of the Holy ScripEures, and considered the several parts of them with an uncommon exactness; particularly as to

the order of time, and the series of prophecies and events relating to the Messiah. Upon which head he left behind him an elaborate discourse, to prove that the famous prophecy of Daniel's weeks, which has been so industriously perverted by the Deists of our times, was an express pro. phecy of the coming of the Messiah, and fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

Mr. Addison, so deservedly celebrated for an uncommon accuracy in thinking and reasoning, has given abundant proof of his firm belief of Christianity, and his zeal against infidels of all kinds, in the writings that are here published; of which it is certainly known that a great part of them were his own compositions.

I mention not these great names, nor the testimonies they have given of their firm belief of the truth of Christianity, as if the evidences of our religion were to be finally resolved into human authority, or tried in any other way than by the known and established rules of right reason; but my design in mentioning them is,

First, To shew the very great assurance of those who would make the belief of Revelation inconsistent with the due use of our reason; when they have known so many eminent instances, in our own time, of the greatest masters of reason not only believing Revelation, but zealously concerned to establish and propagate the belief of it.