thy soN defcended from heaven "to plant, and to root out the know"ledge and the love of thee from the "earth."

Here are no rhetorical figures, no hyperboles or exaggerations. The matter is even fo. I appeal, in the face of the world, Sir, to yourself, and to every man, who can read and understand the writings of Mr. HUME, whether this be not, in plain, honest English, the drift of his philofophy as it is called; for the propagation of which alone he wifhed to live; and concerning which you are pleafed to fay coolly, "men will judge variously, every one approving or condemning

66

these opinions, according as they happened to coincide, or disagree "with his own.*” Our thoughts are very naturally carried back, upon this

* LIFE, &c. p. 59

occafion, to the author of the first philofophy, who likewife engaged to open the eyes of the Public-He did fo; but the only difcovery they found themselves able to make, was,- that they were NAKED.

You talk much, Sir, of our philofopher's gentleness of manners, good nature, compassion, generofity, charity. Alas, Sir, whither were they all fled, when he so often fate down calmly and deliberately to obliterate from the hearts of the human fpecies every trace of the knowlege of GOD and his difpenfations; all faith in his kind providence, and fatherly protection; all hope of enjoying his grace and favour, here, or hereafter; all love of him, and of their brethren for his fake; all the patience under tribulation, all the comforts, in time of forrow derived from thefe fruitful and

perennial fources? Did a good man think himself able, by the force of metaphyfic incantation, in a moment, to blot the fun out of heaven, and dry up every fountain upon earth, would he attempt to do it?-TULLY had but a faint glimpse of the country towards which we are all travelling; yet fo pleafing was any the most imperfect and fhadowy profpect into futurity, that TULLY declared, no man fhould ravish it from him*. And furely, TULLY was a philofopher, as well as HUME. O had he feen the light which fhone upon HUME, he would not have clofed his eyes against it; had the fame cup been offered to him, he would not have dashed it untafted from him!

* Quod fi in hoc erro, quod animos hominum immortales effe credam, libenter erro; nec mihi hunc errorem, quo delector, dum vivo, extorqueri volo. DE SENECTUTE, ad Fin.

66

"Perhaps our modern fceptics are

ignorant, that without the belief of "a GOD, and the hope of immortality, "the miferies of human life would "often be infupportable. But can I

fuppofe them in a state of total and "invincible stupidity, utter ftrangers "to the human heart, and to human "affairs? Sure, they would not thank "me for fuch a fuppofition. Yet this "I muft fuppofe, or I must believe "them to be the most cruel, the "moft perfidious, and the most profligate of men. Careffed by "thofe who call themfelves the great,

66

ingroffed by the formalities of life, "intoxicated with vanity, pampered "with adulation, diffipated in the tu"mult of business, or amidst the vis "ciffitudes of folly, they perhaps "have little need and little relish for "the confolations of religion. But

"let them know, that in the folitary "fcenes of life, there is many an "honeft and tender heart pining "with incurable anguifh, pierced "with the fharpeft fting of difap"pointment, bereft of friends, chilled "with poverty, racked with disease, fcourged by the oppreffor, whom "nothing but truft in Providence, "and the hope of a future retribu"tion could preferve from the ago"nies of defpair. And do they, with facrilegious hands, attempt to vio"late this laft refuge of the mifera"ble, and to rob them of the only "comfort that had furvived the ra66 vages of misfortune, malice, and "tyranny? Did it ever happen, that "the influence of their execrable te"nets disturbed the tranquillity of "virtuous retirement, deepened the

66

gloom of human distress, or aggra