238 Moral Obfervations on Capital Punishments. I fhall next mention a young man (about twenty) who, at the laft affize held for the county of Wilts, was tried, condemned, and executed, for robbing his master, to the great concern of every one (my correfpondent informs me) except his faid mafter, who, it is faid, might have procured him a reprieve, but would not; tho' a clergyman, a minifter of the gospel of Chrift,the mild, the gentle, the benevolent, forgiving, Jefus, who came not to defroy men's lives, but to fave them; and who faid to the woman taken in adultery, whom the Scribes and Pharifees were intent upon ftoning---neither do I condemn thee, go and fin no more. What pains were taken by his mafter to convince the poor young man of his guilt and bring him to repentance, I know not; but the regard I have for the gentlemen of his character induces me to hope, that he ufed his endeavours to prepare him for death, though he had no mind to preferve him from it. I would hope too that fuch endeavours (by the divine bleffing) were fuccefsful, and that the young man was truly penitent in confequence of his matter's inftructions, exhortations, expoftulations, and pray ers. 1 If to---one would be apt to imagine, his matter fhould be inclined to intercede for him, as there would be reafon, in that cafe, to hope that his life would be spared to fome valuable purposes; and that, if confined to hard labour for a time, he might prove an ufeful member of fociety. But if, on the other hand, his mafter found him unaffected --- unimprefjed, without any marks of concern, or forrow, for what he had done; fo that May no rational hope of his falvation could be entertained:---could it yield this reverend gentleman any fatisfaction, to confider himself as the chief inftrument in fending him out of the world, and destroying body and foul at once; and, at the fame time, incurring the cenfures of his more confiderate and compaffionate neighbours, who are acquainted with the affair; before the fad conclufion of which, they might well fuppofe his fuperior knowledge, and jufter fenfe of things, would have led and difpofed him thus to reflect?" This young fellow has robbed me? but what has he taken from me? that which is really of very little value. But what am I about to do ---to take away his life, which is infinitely valuable. To deprive him of that which is abfolutely irrecoverable: and as I am afraid he will die impenitent, he will, in that cafe, by my means fuffer a lofs for ever irretrievable; and be delivered into the bitter pains of eternal death! Will this conduct of mine bear a calm review ?--Is not he my fellow-creature ---placed in the fame rank of being with myfelf? and am not I a miferable offender as well as he? and though I have not made myself obnoxious to the fentence of the law in like manner; yet, as I have lived much longer, can I fay, I am not to great a criminal in the fight of God as he? And if he should be allowed to live longer, may he not reform, how little profpect of it foever there is at prefent? If he lives to work and fare hard, and thus to fuffer the punishment of his iniquity, may not a hap py change be hereby wrought? cannot divine almighty grace foften the hardeft heart? and have not fuch means been frequently rendered effectual to fo defirable a purpose ?--If they be bound in fetters (fays Elihu, Job xxxvi. 8.) and bolden in cords of affliction; then he hereth them their work, and their tranfgreffions that they bave exceeded. He openeth also their ear to difcipline, &c. The young prodigal in the parable, having by his vicious courfes brought himfelf into circumftances of fore diftrefs, foon formed a refolution of returning to his father. Who knows but that this young man may at length bethink himself? and that his fin having found bim cat, and 1769. Strictures on the Character of Charles I. and he finding himself doomed to an ignominious fervitude, and thus to eat the fruit of his own aways, may grieve and be in bitterness at the remembrance of what he has done, while he feels the effects of it? And that, almighty God granting him true repentance, and his holy spirit, the rest of bis life may hereafter be pure and boly, fo that be may at last come to bis eternal jeg, through Jefus Chrift our Lord. In hope of this, though I was obliged to profecute him, I will now do what I can to fave him. What profit is there in his blood? What good end will be anfwered by cutting him off, and making him foon forgotten? Will it not he better to make him a ftanding example, to deter others from the like practices, as well as to give him space for repentance? The more I think of it, the more fully perfuaded I am, that my preferving bis life will not only conduce to the comfort of my own, but to the public good and that in confequence of my obtaining his reprieve, I fhall be more eafy in my own mind, as well as ferviceable to the community. To fay the leaft, he destruction is, I think, unnecessary; and why then fhould I not, if poffible, prevent it? This I am determined to do." Such fentiments, fuch reafonings, and refolutions as thefe, if I am not greatly mistaken, would have highly become this reverend divine before the execution of his poor unhappy fervant. If this fhould fall under his eye, I cannot but hope he will now take it into ferious confideration: and if he should think fit to make any remarks upon it, and you afford them a place in your much-efteemed Magazine, I fhall not fail (if God permit) to give a due attention to them; being defirous of knowing, and difpofed to weigh and confider what the learned and wife have to offer on a fubject which has much einployed my thoughts, and which I take to be very confiderable confequence. For which reafon I beg you would be fo good as to infert this in your next, and thus oblige afresh of Your, &c. PHILANTHROPOS. To the Author of Pietas Oxonienfis. SIR, 239 tween you and the Rev. Dr. Nowell, relative to the expulfion of the fix ftu dents from the university of Oxford, muft, I think, be convinced that it was arbitrary and iniquitous. That the Doctor's aníwer to your Pietas Oxonienfis, is very little to the purpofe; and your reply to it unanswerable. I was therefore greatly furprized to find you agreeing with the Doctor in his opinion of that arbitrary monarch, Charles the Firft. His ftyling him the beft of kings, occafioned my writing him a letter, which was inferted in the London Magazine for February laft. You, fir, very little differing from him, ftyle him, one of the best of kings: which certainly he could not be, if the tree is known by its fruit. And I am forry I am obliged to fay, your giving him this character difcovers you to be less an enemy to despotic and unjuft measures than one is apt to infer from the cenfures you have paffed on the gentlemen EXPELLERS at Oxford. Be fo good as to inform the world, by a few lines in the aforefaid Magazine, what it is that has poffeffed you with a belief, that Charles the First was one of the beft of kings. And that you may write to the purpofe, let me intreat you to confider, that his poffeffing fome virtues (whilft deftitute of others) is no proof of what you affert. His being in a great meafure free from the enormities of the brutal fenfualift, when it is fo evident that the diabolical vices of pride, diffimulation, cruelty, &c. were fo prevalent in him, will not intitle him to this character. You cannot, fir, be infenfible that there is no better rule whereby to judge of the GOODNESS of any thing than it's fitnefs to answer the end for which it is made and defigned. A king therefore who is not difpofed and qualified to govern well; who confults not the happinefs of his people, for the promotion of which he is placed in his fuperior station, but invades their rights. and liberties, inftead of protecting them in the enjoyment of them. Such a one, whatever he be befides, cannot be a good king. To prove Charles fuch, it will not be sufficient to say, that he was no debauchee, no drunkard,、 no EVERY unprejudiced and impar- adulterer, as his fon and fucceffor was, tial reader of what has paffed be nor expended the publick money on wh..es 240 A Defence of the Confeffional. wh--es and b--ds as be did-that he Your humble fervant, In Defence of the Confeffional. SIR, H AD it not been for fome marks of extreme malignity, and a certain incendiary difpofition, I should have fufpected one Touchstone in your Magazine for February, to have been playing booty in his invective against the Confeffional. For he abfolutely advances nothing in difproof of that noble work, but fome general com mon-place declamation, which, to a difcerning and difpaffionate reader, would fuggeft, that there must be fomewhat excellent, where not fo much as one falle fact, or bad argument, could be difcovered. His trite harangue upon overturning all order, and bringing in confufion, is a calumny against the holy fcripture, because it is this in it's purity, for which the Confeffional pleads. Had fuch orators, of the ftamp of one Demetrius in the book of the Acts, been listened to, we might now have been bowing before Thomas à Becket's fhrine, or worshipping a wafer deity of the prieft's making. What would be fay, if the prefbyterian church of Scotland should give itself the fame fuperior airs, that it tolerates our church, that he does in saying, that the church of England tolerates dif May fenters here? But the cafe is exactly the fame And the truth is, neither of them can be faid to tolerate the other. The ftate has with great wifdom and juftice deprived all chriftian focieties, or churches, of any temporal power over others, or even over their own members, as well knowing, from uncontradicted experience of all ages, that fuch a power would be abufed. It is the ftate which tolerates, or allows, all the different churches, or fects, of profeffing Chriftians amongst us. And it is the accident of a public maintenance from the ftate, which gives that feeming fuperiority and preference to the church of England in South-Britain, and the presbyterian church in North-Britain. A more complete ignorance and affurance feldom have met together than in this blufterer. He feems to have no fenfe of moral honesty or confcience; no idea of a juft reli gious liberty. He never once names the holy fcripture as the only standard of a christian man's faith. And he is for anathematizing, and curfing by bell, book, and candle, the author of the Confeffional, as difcarding all articles of belief, although that author is a profeffed advocate for every article of belief in holy fcripture; but indeed, for fuch only; and here I fuppofe lies the great offence. But, to his honour be it named, he only ftands up for the prerogative of the word of God above that of man, and for the common principle of all proteftants, the principle of truth itfelf, namely, the fufficiency of holy fcripture to all the purposes of eternal falvation. Upon this principle our forefathers, thofe noble reformers, feparated from the church of Rome, and never dreamed of erecting their decifions as to be for ever fubmitted to in lieu of the infallible popish Dagon which they had pulled down. The Confeffional feeks to bring us all back, in deeds as well as words, to this first principle. And in this, the author has the fecret prayers, and open approbation, of thousands of our prefent clergy, who have long groaned under the burthen of fubfcription to articles, which few think neceffary to be believed, and scarce any that examines can believe. He has alfo the concur rence of many illuftrious predeceffors upon 1769. Meditations on a Teapot. 241 fketch of anatomy and of our dissolution, expreffes it the pitcher (or water pot) is broken at the fountain. But to proceed. In this faid warehouse we fee things of the fame material and compofition; though differently modified. Thefe are ranged only in different orders; each in its own, fome in higher and fome in more inferior ftations, fome of finer clay and of more gaudy outfides, fome made to honour and fome to difhonour. But alas! all are alike as to the colour and make of parts within: and both high and low are fubject to the fame difafters, though not equally;; the high being more out of reach: but thofe that are higher are liable to greater falls, and to be broken into fmaller fragments; all alike must be mended by the fame ways and means, if mended at all, and when not to be mended, muft meet with one common fate, be fwept among the mafs of things and forgotten. upon record; all thofe much injured men, the puritans, from Dean Sampfon down to old Mr. Dodd; Lord Treafurer Burleigh, Lord Chancellor Bacon, the Bishops Rudd, Bilfon, Ufher, Williams, Brownrigg, Sander fon, and Dr. Hammond, before the restoration: fince that period, Lord Keeper Bridgman, Lord Chief Juftice Hale, the Bishops Wilkins, Croft, Stillingfleet, Wettenhall, Tillotson, Burnet; ftill nearer to us, the venerable names of Prideaux, Whiston, Clarke, Sir Haac Newton, Wake before he was archbishop, Sir Peter King before he was lord chancellor, Bishop Hoadley, Hare, Dr. Whitby, &c. &c. All these were openly for a farther reformation, more or lefs, in harmony with the candid difquifition, who were all members of our own church, fome of them very diftinguithed, fome now living, others gone to their long home, ere long to awake to the reward of their faithful though fruitless virtuous endeavours; in har- As to man, the teapot, the epitome mony alfo with the author of the of this warehoufe, who makes fo reConfeffional, whofe work will live fpectable a figure in it, was he not and flourish to support the caufe of formed out of clay, like his brother? truth and chriftian liberty, till it fhall Was he not originally manufactured have answered it's great end of abo- in the Afiatic country? Is he not equalhhing for ever all fyftematic confefly as brittle in his texture, as eafily fions of faith in the churches of proteftants of all denominations and all countries. I am, fir, Your humble fervant, HUBERT. Meditations on a Teapot. T certainly may be excufed if men and best being often fo) and carry their speculations beyond the bounds of reality and fanciful people, by right reafon, can never be convinced of their mistakes. Pray reader be ferious while I set down one of my reveries. What is the world faid I. to myself but a large china warehouse? And what is man, who makes fo useful a part of it, but a china teapot ? St. Paul fays, man is of the earth earthy, divines call him a tenement of clay, philofophers and phyficians affert that the stamina of the buman body are mere earth, chemifts find, by an analyfis, that white earth is all that remains of us at the bottom of the crucible, the preacher, in his elegant May, 1769. broken, and when broken, does he not as readily return to, and mix with earth, his first principle? And this analogy has been very happily and justly confidered by one of our most celebrated poets, who fays, or rather fings, Here, living teapots ftand, one arm held out, One bent, the handle this and that the spout. A walking tripod is mentioned by Homer, and two fpeaking pots by Alop. Does not a teapot, as well as man, it's femblance, contain the four elements, air and water, earth and fire? Is it not, as well as man, devoted moftly to the fervice of women, who, after thofe principles are exhausted,' pay as little regard to either as to a potter's common eaftern veffel? Has it not been obferved that foreigners have been often more courted, and had higher places affigned them, than our own natives? And is not every teapot, of external excellence from the Indies, placed in the most confpicuous. Hh That is, in this world of China ware. place, 242 Different Sentiments on the Refurrection. Is not a fine lady a veffel of penciled china? Is not her reputation as frail? Can you folder up the flaws either of the one or the other fo compleatly as not to be pried into and com. mented on? If white lead repairs the blemishes of a lady's face, does it not alfo repair the cracks and defects of china? And are not both liable to a failure in the fame places where they were mended before? If then mortal man be a teapot, in this world of china ware, would it not be a laudable custom to try fufficiently the ware we want, to be harp fighted with regard to defects before we buy, and wink wilfully at, or be blind to defects after the ware is called our own, fuit as we ring and examine fufpected veffels before we purchase them, and pretend not to fee afterwards thofe parts that are clouded with impurities? And might not this practice prevent that loathing and diflike we thew to living veffels, which for fome time have ornamented our houfes, and made a confiderable, at least a fhowy part of our furniture, and not treat thofe faid living veffels as we do a piece of vulgar china ware, fuffering them to be foiled with dirt, and placed fo low as to be infulted by every common broom? No wonder, gentle reader, after thofe fublime meditations, that I thould fancy myself a TEAPOT. To the AUTHOR of the LONDON May ducees concerning the refurrection. The Pharifees conceived that certain paffages of fcripture implied, that there would be a refurrection of the body. Obferving a promise alfo, in the law of Mofes, of such external bleffings as thofe of milk and honey in the land of Canaan, and being fenfible_that fuch promife was not made good, in any extraordinary degree, and that no very diftinguishing bleffings of this nature were conferred on them in that land in this life; they inferred from these premises, that the happines which was to be enjoyed by them af ter the refurrection, would confift in corporal and carnal pleasures and gratifications. This notion they extended even to the enjoyment of women. The Sadducees, who held that there would be no refurrection, puzzled them with this query, Whole wife fhall a woman be at the refurrection, that has had feven husbands? This queftion was propofed to our Saviour, who, though denying the happiness of a future ftate to be of fuch a grofs nature, as to admit of carnal enjoyments; by no means fays, that there will be no diftinction of fex in that ftate. Nor can fuch a change of the body be deemed needful, there being no reason for fuppofing fuch an inclination between the fexes in a future ftate, wherein propagation will be un neceffary (even as it is among the bleffed and immortal angels), as there is in a state wherein propagation is neceffary. But yet he allows, as appears from the tenor of his argument, that the bleffings of a future life are of fuch a nature, that they cannot be enjoyed by a difembodied fpirit. And indeed if they could, where would be the benefit of a refurrection? I conceive then, that the bodies, to which our fouls will be united at the refurrection, will confift of flesh and blood, and bones, even as our Saviour's refurrection and afcenfion-body did, as was evident to the fenfes of his difciples; but yet that they will be entirely free from thofe qualities and properties, that now belong to them. For whereas our bodies are now weak, terrestrial, and corruptible, they will then be glorious, fpiritual, and powerful; be divefted of the principle of fermentation and corruption, of gravitation and all other earthly qualities; and poffeffed not only of very different, but |