those who approve it, are a great majority among the men of taste. Yet there have been two or three treatises written exprefsly against it, befides many others that have flirted at it occafionally, without one fyllable having been ever published in its defence, or even quotation to its advantage, that I can remember; exept by the polite author of a late difcourfe between a Deift and a Socinian. Therefore, fince the book feems calculated to live at least as long as our language and our taste admit no great alterations, I am content to convey fome apology along with it. The greateft part of that book was finished about thirteen years fince, 1696; which is eight years before it was published. The author was then young, his invention at the height, and his reading fresh in his head. By the affiftance of fome thinking, and much converfation, he had endeavoured to ftrip himself of as many real prejudices as he could: I fay, real ones; because under the notion of prejudices, he knew to what dangerous heights fome men have proceeded. Thus prepared, he thought the numerous and grofs corruptions in religion and learning might furnish matter for a fatire, that would be useful and diverting. He refolved to proceed in a manner that should be altogether new; the world having been already too long naufeated with endless repetitions upon every fubject. The abuses in religion he propofed to fet forth in the allegory of the coats, and the three brothers; which was to make up the body of the difcourfe: Thofe in learning he chofe to introduce by way of digreffions. He was then a young gentleman much in the world; and wrote to the taft e of those who were like himself: Therefore, in order to allure them, he gave a liberty to his pen, which might not fuit with maturer years, or graver characters; and which he could have eafily cor rected rected with a very few blots, had he been master of his papers for a year or two before their publication. may Not that he would have governed his judgment by the ill-placed cavils of the four, the envious, the ftupid, and the tastelefs; which he mentions with difdain. He acknowledges there are feveral youthful fallies, which, from the grave and the wife, deferve a rebuke. But he defires to be anfwerable no farther than he is guilty; and that his faults may not be multiplied by the ignorant, the unnatural, and uncharitable applications of those, who have neither candor to fuppofe good meanings, nor palate to diftinguish true ones. After which, he will forfeit his life, if any one opinion can be fairly deduced from that book, which is contrary to religion or morality. Why should any clergyman of our church be angry to fee the follies of Fanaticism and Supersti tion expofed, though in the most ridiculous manner? fince that is perhaps the moft probable way to cure them, or at leaft to hinder them from farther fpreading. Befides, though it was not intended for their perufal, it rallies nothing but what they preach against. It contains nothing to provoke them by the leaft fcurrility upon their perfons or their functions. It celebrates the church of England as the most perfect of all others in difcipline and doctrine; it advances no opinion they reject, nor condemns any they receive. If the clergy's refentments lay upon their hands, in my humble opinion, they might have found more proper objects to employ them on. Nondum tibi defuit hoftis; I mean thofe heavy, illiterate fcriblers, pro ftitute in their reputations, vicious in their lives, and ruined in their fortunes; who, to the fhame of good fenfe, as well as piety, are greedily read, merely upon the ftrength of bold, falfe, impious affertions, mixed with unmannerly reflections upon the priesthood, and openly intended against all re A 2 ligion ligion; in fhort, full of fuch principles as are kindly received, because they are levelled to remove thofe terrors, that religion tells men will be the confequence of immoral lives. Nothing like which is to be met with in this discourse, though fome of them are pleafed fo freely to cenfure it. And I wish there were no other inftance of what I have too frequently obferved, that many of that Reverend body are not always very nice in diftinguishing between their enemies and their friends. Had the author's intentions met with a more candid interpretation from fome, whom out of refpect he forbears to name, he might have been encouraged to an examination of books written by fome of thofe authors above defcribed; whofe errors, ignorance, dulnefs, and villany, he thinks he could have detected and expofed in fuch a manner, that the perfons who are most conceived to be infected by them, would foon lay them afide, and be ashamed. But he has now given over those thoughts; fince the weightiest men * in the weightieft ftations, are pleafed to think it a more dangerous point, to laugh at thofe corruptions in religion, which they themselves must disapprove, than to endeavour pulling up thofe very foundations wherein all Chriftians have agreed. He thinks it no fair proceeding, that any perfon should offer determinately to fix a name upon the author of this difcourfe, who hath all along concealed himself from moft of his nearest friends: Yet feveral have gone a farther ftep, and pronounced another book * to have been the work of the fame hand with this; which the author directly affirms to be a thorough mistake, he having yet never fo * Alluding to Dr. Sharp Archbishop of York's representation of the author. * Letter concerning enthusiasm. much much as read that difcourfe: A plain inftance how little truth there often is in general furmifes, or in conjectures drawn from a fimilitude of ftyle, or way of thinking. Had the author written a book to expofe the abufes in law, or in phyfic, he believes the learned profeffors in either faculty would have been fo far from refenting it, as to have given him thanks for his pains; especially if he had made an honourable refervation for the true practice of either fcience. But religion, they tell us, ought not to be ridiculed; and they tell us truth: yet furely the corruptions in it may; for we are taught by the triteft maxim in the world, that religion being the best of things, its corruptions are likely to be the worft. There is one thing which the judicious reader cannot but have obferved, that fome of thofe paffages in this difcourfe, which appear moft liable to objection, are what they call parodies, where the author perfonates the ftyle and manner of other writers, whom he has a mind to expofe. I fhall produce one inftance; it is in fect. 1. parag. 3. from the end, Dryden, L'Eftrange, and fome others I fhall not name, are here levelled at; who, having spent their lives in faction, and apoftafies, and all manner of vice, pretended to be fufferers for loyalty and religion. So Dryden tells us, in one of his prefaces, of his merits and fufferings; thanks God, that he poffeffes his foul in patience; in other places he talks at the fame rate; and L'Eftrange often uses the like ftyle; and I believe the reader may find more perfons to give that paffage an application. But this is enough to direct those who may have overlooked the author's intention. There are three or four other paffages, which prejudiced or ignorant readers have drawn, by great force, to hint as ill meanings; as if they glanced at fome tenets in religion. In anfwer to A 3 all all which, the author folemnly protests he is entirely innocent; and never had it once in his thoughts, that any thing he said would in the least be capable of fuch interpretations; which he will engage to deduce full as fairly from the most innocent book in the world. And it will be obvious to every reader, that this was not any part of his scheme or defign; the abufes he notes, being fuch as all churchof-England men agree in : nor was it proper for his fubject to meddle with other points, than fuch as have been perpetually controverted fince the reformation. To inftance only in that paffage about the three wooden machines mentioned in the introduction: In the original manufcript there was a description of a fourth, which thofe who had the papers in their power, blotted out, as having fomething in it of fatire, that, I fuppofe, they thought was too particular; and therefore they were forced to change it to the number three; from whence fome have endeavoured to fqueeze out a dangerous meaning, that was never thought on. And indeed the conceit was half spoiled by changing the numbers; that of four being much more cabalistic, and therefore better expofing the pretended virtue of numbers; a fuperftition there intended to be ridiculed. Another thing to be obferved is, that there generally runs an irony through the thread of the whole book; which the men of taste will obferve and diftinguish, and which will render fome objections that have been made, very weak and infignificant. This apology being chiefly intended for the fatisfaction of future readers, it may be thought unneceffary to take any notice of fuch treatifes as have been written againft the enfuing difcourfe; which are already funk into wafte paper and oblivion, after the ufual fate of common anfwerers to books |