BURNET, a Scotsman, deeply versed in every branch of theology, diligent as a parish priest, assailing the lukewarmness of the Scottish Bishops, and eminent as Professor of Divinity in Glasgow, was afterwards conspicuous as an active English prelate, and learned ecclesiastical writer. His History of the Reformation is a valuable mine of intelligence, and received the thanks of both Houses of Parliament. Burnet had, in 1676, refused the bishopric of Chichester, tendered on condition of his coming entirely into the royal interest. Many anecdotes evince the genuine disinterestedness of his character. His History of his own Times exhibits minute and faithful details; but the style is awkward, and his accumulations of indiscriminate incident are unreadably heavy. The leaning of Burnet to the Low Church party is as manifest as Heylin's contrary bias. The Account of Rochester * is an interesting and uscful example of the conversion of an infidel to belief, and of a profligate to decency.

Burnet, in politics, had a considerable share in the Revolution; and his latter History might well have been preceded by the motto Quorum pars magna fui. His Pastoral Care is an excellent Tule for the duties of a parish priest, and was

• Rochester's Life, by Burnet, says Johnson, the critic ought to read for its elegance, the philosopher for its arguments, and the saint for its piety.

fully realized by himself, both in his capacities of private minister and of Bishop. His Treatise on the Thirty-nine Articles nearly exhausts the subject. In his illustration of the 17th, he has unfolded the whole strength of the Calvinist and Arminian controversy, without inclining to either side. He died in the year

1714.

The History of his own Times was assailed by Pope and Swift;

Yet Burnet's page may lasting glory hope,
Howe'er insulted by the spleen of Pope:

Though his rough language haste and warmth denote,
With ardent honesty of soul he wrote.

The critic censures on his work may shower;

Like faith, his freedom has a saving power.

LOCKE, who flourished in this reign, deserves a place among its constellation of divines, by' reason of his Letters on Toleration, and his Reasonableness of Christianity. Toland and some Unitarians availed themselves of several passages in his Essay on the Human Understanding, to assert that Christianity contained nothing above human comprehension. This circumstance induced Stillingfleet, Bishop of Worcester, in his Defence of the Trinity, to assail some passages in the Essay, as subverting the fundamental principles of the Christian faith; an attack which occasioned a controversy that only termi

nated with that Prelate's death, which, as has just been said, it is believed to have hastened.

Bishop KENN is chiefly known as the author of the Morning and Evening Hymns, still sung in all our churches. He used to travel with his shrowd in his portmanteau. He wrote an Exposition of the Church Catechism, and Prayers for the use of Winchester College.

Of BAXTER we have already unfolded the character, and mentioned many of the writings. His Call to the Unconcerted is his best-known work, among all the 145 Treatises which he published. Of this, 20,000 were sold in one year; and it was translated into all the European languages. His "Saints' everlasting Rest" has diminished in popularity. Baxterianism is a medium between the Calvinistic and Arminian systems, asserting some to be absolutely elected, and the rest left free in their choice.

CHANDLER, another eminent Dissenter, wrote a Vindication of the Christian Religion, and entered deeply into the controversy on the Test and Subscriptions. FLAVEL, also a devout Nonconformist, lives in his Husbandry and Navigation spiritualized.

The Sermons of Archbishop Tillotson were long regarded as models of pulpit oratory, pure language, vigorous thought, and happy simplicity; a praise to which both Addison and Dryden subscribed. But Melmoth, in his Fitz

osborne's Letters, detracts from these eulogies, by styling his words ill-chosen, his periods inharmonious, and his metaphors mean; nor is the criticism altogether unjust. Tillotson took a zealous part in the outcry against Popery.

Swift is more known as a wit than as a divine. His Tale of a Tub is an excellent satire on the Catholic superstition; and he has left a few Sermons, of no peculiar merit. He wrote on Religion and Government, and on the Sacramental Test. His Argument against the Abolition of Christianity, exhibits a specimen of his admirable grave irony.

Bishop Hare published a few Sermons, now forgotten, and a Treatise on Hebrew Metre, which Lowth refuted. His chief work, on the Difficulties attending the Study of the Scriptures, is an excellent specimen of ironical writing.

Samuel Clarke wrote many admirable Sermons, in which the reasoning is close and strong; and likewise a Paraphrase on the Four Gospels; but he is suspected, and with reason, of Semiarianism. He opposed Hobbes, by proving the existence of a Deity, in the à priori demonstration. This work was a digest of his Sermons at Boyle's Lecture. The more orthodox and excellent WATERLAND checked his movements, in various defences of the Trinity, as able as any that have been written.

A variety of polemical works proceeded from the pen of DoDWELL, who seems to have loved the element of hot water. He spouted forth treatises against the Roman Catholics on the one hand, and defended episcopal government, in controversy with the Nonconformists, on the other. He wrote a Dissertation on Irenæus, and attacked Toland, who had replied to it. He was an enemy to occasional conformity, and spent several years in pointing out its evils,

XIV. The Society for propagating Christianity in foreign Parts* had been originally instituted by an Act of Parliament, A. D. 1647: but the civil commotions ensuing, the execution of that project was suspended, until the year 1661, in the reign of Charles II. King William in 1701 enriched that valuable establishment with new donations and privileges. Under the bounty and protection of succeeding monarchs, it has continued to dispense the glorious light of truth to nations which sat in darkness; and is to this day, by the orthodox and rational zeal with which it is managed, not less than by the piety of its missionaries and usefulness of its publications, an essential instrument in the hand of Providence for diffusing the knowledge of God over most parts of the habitable globe. As emulation is ever a spring

* See Humphreys's Account.