with many leffons of inftruction whofe force they may fully comprehend. Thus much was neceffary to render the fcriptures fit for common use.

However it is one argument, amongst many, of the divinity of the holy fcriptures, that these feemingly unconnected parts do all yet unite in one great plan. Scattered like the stars in the firmament of heaven, like them too they are the parts of an harmonious fyftem. The defigns of the Almighty are diftinguished from thofe of man, by being of an extent far beyond all the powers of human execution. The work of revelation taking its rife in the beginning of things, advanced flowly through many ages towards its accomplishment. Many were the agents commiffioned by heaven to labour in the progrefs of this great work. And while each feemed to ftudy only his own times, and to be intent only on the execution of his own particular part, he was working on the vaft defign of heaven, in concert with those who had lived many ages before him, or were to arise in ages yet to come. And what could give confiftency to the labours of men thus fituated in times and countries the moft remote from each other, amongst whom no human means of communication could poffibly lie open, but that the guiding hand of him who "knows "the end from the beginning," and before whom the fecrets of all future ages are unfolded, conducted the whole, and led each, unknown to himself, to fill up his part of the immense plan? Whilft therefore the common eye fees nothing in the volume of revelation, but separate predictions and miracles, diftinct hiftories, undigested laws, and detached events; the juft and attentive obferver beholds an amazing chain of connection running throughout the whole, beholds the strongest union under an apparent diforder, and difcerns what at first fight feemed perplexed and void of defign, to be, as was beautifully faid of the ways of providence, a "regular confufion."

It muft neceffarily happen, that many parts of revelation, at the same time that they served a more limited purpose, muft have been planned in fubfervience to this great defign. And therefore, if we overlook this reference, we can never be master of their true force, nor underftand their full effect. It is the business of the faithful teacher of God's word, to study these relations, and to compare the revelation of one age with that of another. By this means, many of thofe paffages which are otherwife hard to be understood," will be cleared up, many nev lights will be obtained, many truths better fupported, and, every part mutually fuftaining each other, revelation will stand firm and unfhaken, and will appear, in the beautiful image of the royal pfalmift, like "a city that is at unity in itfelf." And thus will the faithful minifter of God's word be enabled, by the divine

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divine bleffing, to lead others more fteadily in their duty, and to protect from error thofe who do not enjoy his abilities or opportunities. He will go before them like a fkilful guide, who is not barely acquainted with one fingle beaten path, and therefore may eafily be thrown beyond his knowledge, but is mafter of the whole country through which he is appointed to lead them.

Thus it is, that revelation hath, by the wife author of it, been at once adapted to the capacities of the vulgar, and to the moft improved understandings; affording, at the fame time, exercife for the brightest talents, and inftructions fuited to the vulgar mind. Nor is it neceffary that the common Chriftian should be in poffeffion of all thofe hidden ftores in the fyftem of revelation which learning gives accefs to; no more than the peafant fhould understand all those wonders of nature, hidden from the vulgar eye, with which every part of the world around him is enriched. Both enjoy the fruits of thefe wonders, without understanding the fources from whence they flow.

But whilft this admirable difpofition of the whole work of revelation gives many advantages to the fincere and able interpreter of God's word it must neceffarily lay it open to numberlefs mif- representations when it comes into the hands of the ignorant or ill-difpofed. When the blind will undertake to lead the way, and ignorance, with that confidence which is peculiar to itself, boldly fteps into the feat of inftruction, what wonder that we find errors multiplied; paffages explained, not only without any regard to the general defign of revelation, but even without attending to the purpose of the writer, or the tenour of the difcourfe to which they belong; and doctrines drawn from them, which are abfolutely irreconcileable to the attributes, of God, and repugnant to every other piain and undoubted doctrine of fcripture? Hence the unity of the church is violated, and all order is fubverted; every contriver of new opinions, or reviver of those which have been long exploded, becomes the leader of a fect; and he who can build the moft myfterious doctrine on fome obfcure text, no matter how little, understood the doctrine be, or, as far as it can be understood, how little confiftent with every clearer part of fcripture; he who can, by thefe aits involve the whole body of revelation in thofe clouds which dwell on fome myfterious part, is regarded as one favoured with new lights, and whilft he labours to render every thing obfcure, is held in adiniration, as the only clear interpreter of the oracles of God.

Amidst all these jarring opinions, one point only feems to remain uncontroverted, that faith is neceffary in order to falvation; faith in name at leaft, fince they are much divided about the true import and extent of this term. 6

Taking

Taking therefore our beginning from that in which all seem to agree, let us enquire into the nature, the origin, foundation and evidence, the tendency and operations of faith.'

Our Author now proceeds, in the second section, to enquire into the true nature of faith, and observes that this enquiry cannot be long nor difficult to any one who is contented to underftand the gospels in their plain and natural meaning.-The Apoftles were appointed to convert the world to the Chriftian faith, and to convey to all mankind the glad tidings of redemption. When therefore they received their commiffion to execute this great work, one would expect to find fome clear account of that faith which they were to implant in the minds of mankind, and which was to be the foundation of the religion they were to propagate. Accordingly the words of our Saviour's commiffion to them are these :-Go ye unto all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth, &c.

Were we poffeffed, Mr. Rotheram fays, only of this plain account of faith, no honeft and well-meaning Chriftian could be at a lofs to understand the nature of that faith which he profeffes. It would then no longer be reckoned a thing which can neither be explained nor comprehended, nor would there be any room for thofe confufed and myftic defcriptions of it, which are calculated rather to perplex than to inform. The fingle act of the mind concerned in faith, as it is described by our Saviour himself, is that of believing; and the object of faith is that history of redemption delivered by the first inspired preachers of the gospel, and now recorded in their writings. This then, our Author fays, is to be confidered as the fundamental rule of faith, to which all fubfequent accounts of it are to be referred. And if we meet with difficulties in any part of the fcripture where this fubject is treated of, to this test must we bring them, and by this great original muft they be cleared up; both because, in all reafon, that which is obfcure fhould be explained by that which is manifeftly clear; and because the the facred writers must be fuppofed always to have preferved a confiftency with that great commiffion, by virtue of which they acted. Accordingly, Mr. Rotheram produces a variety of inftances to fhew that this rule of faith was ftrictly adhered to, and strongly confirmed in their practice.

The act of the mind then concerned in faith, he obferves, is fimple, but the object is complex and extensive. The object of faith includes a great variety of matter, through which there runs one grand divifion that we must carefully attend to. It contains an history and a revelation; an hiftory of the whole progrefs of redemption, from the firft unfolding of the defign foon after the fall, till its completion in the death and refurrection of our Lord; and a revelation of whatever belongs to a future P 3 ftate,

ftate, to heaven, and to eternity. When faith looks back on all that our bleffed Saviour hath done and suffered for us, it is closely connected with gratitude and love; when it looks forward to all those scenes of blifs and glory that are in reserve for us, it is then more immediately united with truft and hope.— The hiftorical object of faith was at firft fmall; but as acts of divine mercy were multiplied, and the records of them enlarged, this part of the object increased. And as it encreased we find the promises of God, which were at first revealed in general terms, growing at the fame time more diftinct and explicit. The horizon, which bounds the view, enlarges as we advance forward in the hiftory of revelation, fo that each fucceeding patriarch or prophet had a fuller profpect of the bleffings and the promifes of God, than thofe that went before him. The hiftory of paft, and the promises of future mercies, were ftill encreafing together, till, at length, to us who have the happiness, of fecing the work of redemption accomplished, and whatever concerns our eternal ftate placed in the cleareft light, the object of faith is completely revealed, and appears before us in its full magnitude.

In the third fection, Mr. Rotheram endeavours to fhew, that the diftinction already remarked in the object of faith, and confequently in faith itself, as connected on one hand with love, on the other with truft, is the only diftinction that is well founded in fcripture, or that is of any confequence in the ftudy of our religion; that we may lay afide all other diftinctions,. as of no importance to common Chriftians at least, as tending only to encumber and embarrass their minds, and to open the way to a train of needlefs difficulties and groundless fufpicions.

If we are content to follow the fimplicity of the gospel, we fhall find, that there is in reality one kind of faith: faith being every where a belief of redemption, and of all the bleffings and promises that belong to it, as far as they are revealed. To us therefore, who have the happiness to fee revelation finished and compleated in the gospel, and all faving truths there fummed. up and concentered, faith, our Author fays, may be defined, a belief of the gospel.

This fimple idea, we are told, will be found to answer every purpose, and to be the bafis of every character afcribed to faith in the holy fcriptures. All that the infpired writers affirm of faith, arifes from this fundamental idea, which, like a cen-. tral light, discovers to us the fymmetry of the whole Chriftian fyftem, and clears up the difficulties which must ever be inexplicable to fuch as attach themselves to fome inferior part only, regardless of what is principal or dependent in the fyftem, and lofing fight of that grand order and connection which run through all the works of the Almighty,

Mr.

Mr. Rotheram, in the fourth fection of his work, confiders the origin of faith; but what he fays upon this fubject was published fome time ago in a fingle difcourfe, which, he tells us, has gone through two impreffions.

In the remaining fections, he treats of the tendency and operation of faith, of regeneration, of good works, &c. and concludes the whole fubject with an addrefs, first to those who maintaining the fufficiency of reafon, do blindly reject the affistance of revelation and fecondly, to those who imagine, that reve lation doth wholly fuperfede the ufe of reafon, and exclude its exercife from the nobleft fubject on which it can be employed, the fubject of religion.

As to the merit of Mr. Rotheram's effay, we can only fay, that those who are acquainted with the fubject will find little that is entirely new in it; they will be much pleased, however, with his manner of writing, which is very sprightly and very agreeable.

The Sermons of Mr. Yorick*. Vol. 3d. and 4th. 12mo. 6 s. bound. Becket and De Hondt.

Hether all the fermons contained in these two volumes were preached or not, we cannot inform our Readers. We would willingly believe, for the fake of the Author's credit, that they were not: there is an air of levity in fome of them, altogether unbecoming the dignity and seriousness of pulpit-difcourfes, and which no brilliancy of wit, luxuriance of fancy, nor elegance of compofition can atone for. Propriety is a rule as neceffary to be obferved in writing, as decorum is in conduct; and whoever offends against the one, muft neceffarily incur the juft cenfure of every competent judge, as, much as he who offends against the other.

Serious fubjects, indeed, feem but little fuited to Mr. Sterne's genius; when he attempts them, he feldom fucceeds, and makes but an aukward appearance. He is poffeffed, however, of such a fund of good humour, and native pleafantry, and feems, at the fame time, to have fo large a fhare of philanthropy, that it is impoffible, for us at least, to be long displeased with him.→ His fermons, if they must all be called by that name, contain many pertinent and ftriking obfervations on human life and manners: every subject, indeed, is treated in such a manner as fhews the originality of his genius, and as will, in fome measure,

There is a different Title to the 4th. Vol. which fays, Sermons by Laurence Sterne, M. A. Prebendary of York, and Vicar of Sutton on the Forest, and of Stillington near York.

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foften.