tyrs? of a Cranmer, a Latimer, or a Ridley? No! But we can appeal to the history of a Berkely, to prove the difinterested conduct of the defenders of religion, and of the pastors of our Church; and we may add, that the Clergy have fhewn, and it is humbly prefumed still display, a noble and a generous zeal for the cause in which they are engaged.

What must be the dying reflections of that man, who has risked eternal happiness for the chance of a profligate reputation, or who from deliberate malice has endeavoured to injure the cause of religion? Will he not then be reminded by confcience, that he has contributed to contaminate innocence, to defile virtue, to weaken the blissful fuggeftions of hope, to add pangs to doubt, to sharpen the agonies of despair and the ftings of remorse, to fhed darkness over the dawn of inquiry, to indurate the feelings, to nip the bloffoms of expectation, and to render the whole of present existence wretched and inconfolable? that he has endeavoured to shake the bafis of all truth, to injure the best interests of man, to teach children ingratitude, governors tyranny, and subjects rebellion? that he has endeavoured to disturb focial order, and to introduce anarchy and confusion in its place? How dreadful must

his dying reflection be, who has invented a more efficacious and active poison, who has given occafion to all posterity to bewail the perverfion of his talents, and to lament the hour of his birth; who has contributed to accelerate the corruption of youth, and the forrows of grey hairs! Such are the fruits of infidelity! Such are the thorns which must render the bed of death more painful! Compare this with the departing hour of his life, who can recollect the utility of his days; who has contrived new modes of reducing the miseries, or of adding to the comforts of existence; who has enlarged the dominion of goodness, and turned many to righteousness.

Finally; from the contrast, let me be permitted to caution the younger part of my hearers against the fallacious and feductive perfuafions of infidelity. Be affured, that however the unbeliever may be elated with his own imaginary triumphs, yet happily he cannot support his arguments by proof: he has no demonstration: he may irritate our feelings, but cannot confound the hope that is in us: if you hear his objection and his affurances, you will find, on examination, that the first are merely negative, the other groundless. The pretender to Atheism will tell you that there

is no God, and confequently no hope or fear from futurity. From him your own observation will induce you to turn with disdain, because every thing within you, and every thing without, confute his affertions. Be affured, that while he would thus rob you of confidence, he will cast a dismal gloom over the whole of your existence, present and future; that he will steal the light from you, and confign you to a depth of tenfold darkness. The Deift chills the foul with a frigid apathy. He will tell you that God is good; but has not condefcended to bestow his attention on his creatures. Thus he will teach you to hunger for the bread of life, but forbid you to expect to taste of it. Cruel and melancholy profpect! more embittered. by the affurance of the, reality of that goodness, which you are not to expect to share. If then God regard us not, if he have not been pleased to reveal his will to us, if all the expectation on which we have been taught to rely be without foundation, in what are you to truft? In this child of duft and ashes, in this fallible individual, who affures us that he has a system, which is to fupport and direct us under every trial; a discovery, which has escaped all penetration but his own? He recommends to us a diftruft of

the wisdom of an infinite Being, and invites us to confide in the infect of a day. He takes away the foundation of hope; he leaves us nothing to cheer the fadness, or to foothe the pains of existence. We are overwhelmed with misfortune; we are excruciated by pain; we linger under the tortures of disease; we pine under the languor of ill-health. Where is our confolation? Only the help of man; of a being who, in fuch cafes, often cannot relieve us. We find ourselves finking into the grave; that grave which he has made for us a land of doubt and of darkness. We are forbid to trust in the only power which can help. The bitter nefs of death is rendered ftill more bitter. We are to fee our deareft connections and friends dropping around us. Thofe whom we tenderly love are torn asunder with the diftracted fear of eternal feparation. Under fuch circumftances, we are perfuaded to reject that divine. Comforter who offers and can give that peace of mind, which the world cannot give. We are to reject the promises of revealed religion, which alone afford rational hope and firm con-. viction. Virtue ftruggling to improve in the fchool of affliction is to fink into forgetfulness, and all moral excellence to perish. Charity and goodness, which, if not immortal, must be al

lowed to merit immortality, are to be scattered like the fragrance in the air. When we are folicited by fome urgent temptation, we are not to ask grace or affiftance of God, but to recal to mind the beauty of virtue; as if present gratification could be refifted by abstract conceptions. Can this be expected by the found philofopher? Does not this betray an ignorance of human nature? Is not this to forget that men often admire what they cannot love, and that action and speculation are very distinct? That this picture is not overcharged, must be evident to all who think coolly and impartially. Let us then turn from this dreary profpect, to the confolatory invitation of the glorious Gospel of Jefus Chrift: Let us hold faft the profeffion of our faith without wavering, and take heed that none of us entertain an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

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