depends upon the works it produces? "Faith "without works being dead." Fourthly, that punishment for the want of it confifts chiefly in the ill confequences attending this want? And, Fifthly, that if the Deity fignifies his mind and will to men, he always does it in the most effectual manner? For can we fuppofe God has given a revelation. to man, and ordained that his falvation fhall depend upon believing it, and not made it as clear as the fun at noon-day, either that what he has revealed is true, or that 'tis true he hath revealed it?

Mankind one day ferene and free appear;
The next they're cloudy, fullen, and fevere:
New paffions new opinions ftill excite,
And what they like at noon, they hate at night.

I

Garth's Dispensary, Canto III.

F it be true that Democritus was always laughing at the world, and Heraclitus always weeping over it, this different behaviour was much more owing to the different tempers of these philofophers, than that the world is a proper object of constant scorn or forrow.

WHAT a delightful place is this world! fays one man: What à fcene of mifery! fays another: yet both in health, and the former lives in a cottage, and the latter in a palace.

How

How bright and charming did every thing appear yesterday? how gloomy and hideous, to the fame perfon, do all things feem to day? yet nothing is changed but the man's temper. What excellent peaches and nectarines, says one old fellow to another, with a difh of fruit before them, had we when we were young, and how four and crabbed are they now? Aye, aye, replies his companion,they might well be fo, for then what a warm fun we had ?

FOR what reafon did our amorous poet Waller write fo much of the love of women when he was young, and of divine love in his old age? Very probably for the fame reafon that Solomon, as the rabbies fay, wrote the Canticles in his youth, the Proverbs when he was of riper years, and the Ecclefiaftes when he was old. Men, add these Jewish writers, ufually compofe fongs when they are young, parables when they are grown to be perfect men, and difcourfes of the vanity of things in their declining years.

MÆCENAS folicited Horace, in his advanced age, to write again in the lyric ftrain: but he excufed himself, and fays,

Non eadem eft atas, non mens.

And a little after adds,

I think there is fomething like this in Gil Blas.

Nunc itaque et verfus et cætera ludicra pono:
Quid verum atque decens curo et rogo, et omnis in hoc fum:
Condo et compono, quæ mox depromere possim*.

FROM whence did it proceed that Erafmus acknowledged, if he were put to the trial of fuffering martyrdom for his religion, he believed he should imitate St. Peter? and that Luther, when told by his friends, if he went to the diet of Worms, he would share the fame fate with John Hufs, who was burnt alive for a heretic, answered, he would go thither, (to defend his religious opinions) if there were as many devils combined against him in that city as tiles upon the houses ?

WHY is Dr. ********* so flamingly zealous? And why does he treat every one, who differs from him in opinion, with afperity and abuse? And why doth the bishop of *** ****** behave to all men and all parties with affability and humanity?

WHAT may be the reason that the Rev. Mr. H**** y endeavours to terrify his auditors into the belief and practice of religion by telling them, that hell is opening her mouth to fwallow them up in endless perdition, the indignation of an almighty God ready to fall upon them, and worse than ten thousand falling mill-ftones, ready to grind

e. Lib. I. ep. I.

grind them to powder? And why does Dr. *** persuade men to be virtuous and religious by fetting before them the defor mity of vice, the amiableness of virtue, the beauty of holiness, and the infinite goodness of their Creator?

IRACUNDUS has knowledge and learning, and every quality to make an agreeable companion, but one: for want of that he is fhunned by all who know him. If you oppofe any of his fentiments, you immediately fee his countenance alter: upon the flightest contradiction the blood feems ready to start through his face, and his opponent is very lucky if he comes off without a challenge.

To what cause is it owing that fome men, and many more women, are fo full of rapture in their devotion? And from whence does it proceed that they talk of the love of God whom they have not seen, in the fame ftrain, and with the fame amorous expreffions, as they would of a paramour before their eyes?

"O love of fweetnefs," fays St. Austin, "O fweetness of love, that doft not torment, but delight, that doft always burn, and art never extinct! fweet Chrift, good Jefus, my God, my love, kindle me all "over with thy fire, with the love of thee, with thy fweetnefs, thy joy, thy pleasure, "and