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condemned. But any tenets, however subversive of the truth, which promised men liberty from the oppressive tyranny of the sectaries, was welcomed by the unreflecting,-and they are always a very large class in society, without inquiry into their real nature and tendency. Hobbes was followed by Blount, Toland, and Lord Shaftsbury; the latter, at one time, a favourite minister of Charles; Anthony Collins, to whom Locke was so enthusias tically attached, that in his correspondence with him, he calls him, “a man whom he values in the first rank.” Then followed Woolston, in his attempt "to allegorize away the miracles of scripture, as Collins had done the prophecies:" Tindal, Morgan, Lord Bolingbroke, Chubb, and Hume, continued, though with unequal ability and success, to wage their anti-christian war.

It was impossible for churchmen to breathe long in so tainted an atmosphere, and not suffer in common, with all others, from its effects. And the church is only now being partially purified from its malign influence. We have, therefore, little reason to look back with satisfaction, upon a period so disastrous to the church and state; though some good, as is ever the case, has resulted from extensive evil.

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