contradict a pofitive Law of God. But to abstain, upon certain Days, from the 'comfortable Ufe of God's good Creatures, which ought to be received with Thankfulness, out of a vain Pretence to please him, or to promote our own Salvation, is a strange and barbarous Chimera, which the Law of Nature abhors; and can be the Effect of nothing but Distraction in the People, or Craft in the Priests. We might as rationally imagine, that going naked at certain severe Seafons of the Year, would draw us nearer Heaven; and that the afflicting our Skins with Froft and Snow would do great Service to our fhivering Souls; and that though Self-prefervation be an effential Law of Nature, yet Self-deftruction is also an effential Law of Nature.

FASTING, therefore, being no Part of the Law of Nature, the Jewish Law of Ceremonies, which is abolished, cannot make it a Duty And for the Examples of Fafting, taken from the Prophet Daniel, and other holy Men of the Old Teftament; they were either voluntary, fuch as any one may perform when he is in a fafting Humour, which nobody pretends to restrain; or they were the Effect of Sorrow, when Grief had deftroyed Appetite, and then there was no Devotion in them; or they were extraordinary, and fupernatural, and

being inimitable, cannot be neceffary. Miraculous Fafting cannot be a Duty, where the Gift of Miracles is not given.

As to the New Teftament, there is not a ftated Faft appointed in it: We are indeed commanded to faft and pray; but we are no-where told how much, or how often, we are to do either ; but are left to chuse proper Occafions, and proper Inclinations, for doing both. St. Paul is fuch a generous Advocate for Liberty of this Kind, that he condemns all those who condemn others for taking it: Let not, fays he, him that eateth, defpife him that eateth not: And let not him which eateth not, judge him that eateth; for God hath received him. One Man efteemeth one Day above another: Another efteemeth every Day alike. Let every Man be fully perfuaded in his own Mind (Rom. ch. xiv. ver. 3, and 5.). The fame Spirit of Charity, and the fame good-natured rational Advice, runs through the whole Chapter.

THE Inftitution of Lent was founded upon our Saviour's Faft of Forty Days in the Wildernefs; as if weak impotent Mortals could imitate the Omnipotent Son of God, in Works done by Divine Power only! They might as well pretend to walk upon the Sea once a Year,

or.

or to raise the Dead at all times: Befides, our Saviour performed this Faft but once, and his Apoftles never, as far as we know. Once a Twelve-month you must keep Lent, is not a Gospel Precept.

No Society, therefore, of Men can injoin any Time, or Measure, of Fafting (except where the Law directs the fame) without departing from the Gospel, contradicting St. Paul, and fetting up their own Authority in Defiance of both the Gospel and the Saint. Such an Injunction would be impracticable, and even cruel. To many Constitutions it might be dangerous, and even fatal; and to all Men it would render Life wretched and burdenfome. The good God has no-where commanded frail Men to worship him with Pain and Sickness of Body, nor to haften their own Death by the Means of their Devotion. This would be to represent him as delighting in human Mifery, and human Sacrifices; a fort of Worship suitable to the terrible Spirit of Moloch, or any other Demon, but no wife acceptable to the God of Mercy, and the God and Father of our Lord Jefus Chrift.

THE Popish Priefts know well, that it is intirely impoffible, that all Men fhould comply with this their Discipline of Hunger; and per

haps

haps that very Impoffibility is their best Reason for maintaining it. It is certain, that from hence they draw vaft Gain, by hiring out Dispensations for Eating on the Days of Fasting; and the Lucre which they make by breaking the Canon, is an unanswerable Argument for defending it. No Man is denied the Privilege of breaking Lent, who can pay for breaking it. He who cannot faft at all, may, for a competent Fee, eat Fish, which is a more luxurious Diet than Flesh; and he who cannot fast upon Fish, may, for a more competent Fee, fast upon a Belly-full of Roaft-beef; which, tho' a chafter fort of Food than Fish, is more strictly forbidden by that Church.

INDEED, fuch are the vaft Fees arifing to the Popish Church, from Licences for a Liberty to eat, when it is a Duty to faft, that the whole Institution of Fafting there, feems only a religious Roguery, design'd for ftarving the People, to feed the Priests. For myself, I think the Parfon has fo little to do with this Matter, that I do not think, that any Direction ought to be taken about Fafting, but from our Constitution, or our Physician. If it be our Duty to faft on certain Days, no Tribe of Priests can difpenfe with the Pleasure and the Laws of Almighty God; though it is a

Task

Task which (for Money) they never refufe: And if it be not our Duty, it is infolent and wicked in them to command what neither God nor Nature requires; and it is in us a Sin and a Folly to obey them. Even the Proteftant Priefts, long fince the Reformation, have known how to make the right Ufe of this Power. I myfelf have feen feveral formal Difpenfations, figned by Archbishop Sheldon, under the Archiepifcopal Seal, to license the eating of Flesh in Lent; which Difpenfations, I prefume, were not granted without Application and Fees.

RELIGION is a voluntary Thing; it can no more be forced than Reason, or Memory, or any Faculty of the Soul. To be devout against our Will, is an Abfurdity; and it is ridiculous in others to hope to make us fo, in fpite of ourselves. We have no Power over the Appetites of others, no more than over their Confciences. Neither a Man's Mind, nor his Palate, can be subject to the Jurifdiction of another; and whoever takes upon him to regulate one's Throat and Stomach, and direct one how much to fwallow, may (with equa Reafon) affume Dominion over the other Offices of Nature, and dictate how much one ought to discharge. If Fafting be good and