"the hours of ten in the morning and two "in the afternoon, to preach eight Divinity "Lecture Sermons, the year following, at "St. Mary's in Oxford, between the com"mencement of the last month in Lent "Term, and the end of the third week in "Act Term.

"Also I direct and appoint, that the eight

Divinity Lecture Sermons fhall be preach"ed upon either of the following fubjects "to confirm and establish the Chriftian Faith, and to confute all heretics and fchif"matics-upon the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures upon the authority of "the writings of the primitive Fathers, as "to the faith and practice of the primitive "Church upon the Divinity of our Lord "and Saviour Jesus Christ-upon the Divinity of the Holy Ghoft-upon the Articles "of the Christian Faith, as comprehended "in the Apostles' and Nicene Creeds.

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"Alfo I direct, that thirty copies of the eight Divinity Lecture Sermons shall be always printed, within two months after

they are preached, and one copy fhall be

given to the Chancellor of the University, "and one copy to the Head of every Col

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lege, and one copy to the Mayor of the City of Oxford, and one copy to be put "into the Bodleian Library; and the ex"pence of printing them fhall be paid out "of the revenue of the Lands or Eftates

given for establishing the Divinity Lecture "Sermons; and the Preacher fhall not be paid, nor be entitled to the revenue, before they are printed.

"Also I direct and appoint, that no per"fon fhall be qualified to preach the Di

vinity Lecture Sermons, unless he hath "taken the Degree of Master of Arts at "leaft, in one of the two Univerfities of "Oxford or Cambridge; and that the fame perfon fhall never preach the Divinity "Lecture Sermons twice."

DISCOURSE

DISCOURSE Í.

JOHN XVIII. 38.

Pilate faith unto him, What is Truth?

T

HIS queftion, of all by far the most important, was put to our bleffed Saviour by the Roman Governour, perhaps careleffly, perhaps contemptuously, but certainly without the leaft with for information. In much the fame spirit of fcorn, or with fimilar indifference, the fame question is every day in the mouths, fometimes of sceptics and fcoffers, and fometimes of men of a more ferious caft, who affect to be perfuaded that we cannot, and, it may be, defire not to give them fatisfaction. Unhappily, the Christian world is divided and subdivided almoft infi

nitely; it is parcelled out into sectaries of a thousand denominations. The fact is, though the right of private judgment in matters of religion, which has been exercised from the beginning, was justly and neceffarily afferted by the leaders and friends of the REFORMATION, it must be acknowleged, folly, perverseness, pride, and enthusiasm, have, by feverally maintaining it, been productive of that strange multiplicity of religious fentiment which we have fo much caufe to lament; of that fchifm, herefy, fcepticism, and infidelity, which have all along disturbed the Church, but fix a mark of peculiar difgrace on the last and present century.

1

And indeed, when it is confidered, that the Scriptures are on many accounts particularly liable to be mifapplied, perverted, or mifconftrued ; (a) that fome paffages are to be understood in a literal, and fome in a figurative fenfe; that fome things are expreffed agreeably to the modes of common speech, and fome in pure condefcenfion to the human capacity; that paffages are to be compared