OF THE

EVIDENCES

TEXAS

OF

CHRISTIANITY.

En Three Parts.

BY WILLIAM PALEY, D.D

ARCHDEACON OF CARLISLE.

A NEW EDITION.

NEW YORK:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,

329 & 331 PEARL STREET,

FRANKLIN SQUARE

1856.

249511

HONOURABLE AND RIGHT REVEREND

JAMES YORK, D.D.

LORD BISHOP OF ELY.

MY LORD,

WHEN, five years ago, an important station in the University of Cambridge awaited your Lordship's disposal, you were pleased to offer it to me. The circumstances under which this offer was made, demand a public acknowledgment. I had never seen your Lordship; I possessed no connexion which could possibly recommend me to your favour; I was known to you, only by my endeavours, in common with many others, to discharge my duty as a tutor in the University; and by some very imperfect, but certainly well-intended, and, as you thought, useful publications since. In an age by no means wanting in examples of honourable patronage, although this deserves not to be mentioned in respect of the object of your Lordship's choice, it is inferior to none in the purity and disinterestedness of the motives which suggested it.

How the following work may be received, I pretend not
to foretel. My first prayer concerning it is, that it may do
good to any: my second hope, that it may assist, what it
nath always been my earnest wish to promote, the religious
part of an academical education. If in this latter view it
might seem, in any degree, to excuse your Lordship's judg-
ment of its author, I shall be gratified by the reflection, that,
to a kindness flowing from public principles, I have made
the best public return in my power.

In the mean time, and in every event, I rejoice in the
opportunity here afforded me, of testifying the sense I
entertain of your Lordship's conduct, and of a notice which
I regard as the most flattering distinction of my life.
I am, MY LORD,

With sentiments of gratitude and respect,
Your Lordship's faithful

And most obliged servant,
W. PALEY.