is exerted in great and little things, and your lordship may sometimes exercise, on a harmless game, those abilities which have been so happily employed in the service of your country.

I am, my Lord,

Your Lordship's most obliged, most obedient, and most humble servant,

WILLIAM PAYNE.

The EVANGELICAL HISTORY of JESUS CHRIST harmonized, explained, and illustrated. 2 vols. 8vo. 1758.

To the LORDS Spiritual and Temporal, and COMMONS in Parliament assembled.

THAT We are fallen upon an age in which corruption is barely not universal, is universally confessed. Venality sculks no longer in the dark, but snatches the bribe in publick; and prostitution issues forth without shame, glittering with the ornaments of successful wickedness. Rapine preys on the publick without opposition, and perjury betrays it without inquiry. Irreligion is not only avowed but boasted; and the pestilence that used to walk in darkness, is now destroying at noon-day.

Shall this be the state of the English nation, and shall her law-givers behold it without regard? Must the torrent continue to roll on till it shall sweep us into the gulph of perdition? Surely there will come a time when the careless shall be frighted, and the sluggish shall be roused: when every passion shall be put upon the guard by the dread of general depravity; when he who laughs at wickedness in his companion, shall start from it in his child: when

the man who fears not for his soul, shall tremble for his possessions: when it shall be discovered that religion only can secure the rich from robbery, and the poor from oppression: can defend the state from treachery, and the throne from assassination.

If this time be ever to come, let it come quickly: a few years longer, and perhaps all endeavours will be vain. We may be swallowed by an earthquake, we may be delivered to our enemies, or abandoned to that discord, which must inevitably prevail among men that have lost all sense of divine superintendence, and have no higher motive of action or forbearance, than present opinion of present interest.

It is the duty of private men to supplicate and propose; it is yours to hear and to do right. Let religion be once more restored, and the nation shall once more be great and happy. This consequence is not far distant: that nation must always be powerful where every man performs his duty: and every man will perform his duty that considers himself as a being whose condition is to be settled to all eternity by the laws of Christ.

The only doctrine by which man can be made wise unto salvation, is the will of God revealed in the books of the Old and the New Testament.

To study the scriptures, therefore, according to his abilities and attainments, is every man's duty, and to facilitate that study to those whom nature hath made weak, or education has left ignorant, or indispensable cares detain from regular processes of inquiry, is the business of those who have been blessed with abilities and learning, and are appointed the instructors of the lower classes of men, by that common father, who distributes to all cre

ated beings their qualifications and employments; who has allotted some to the labour of the hand, and some to the exercise of the mind; has com manded some to teach, and others to learn; has prescribed to some the patience of instruction, and to others the meekness of obedience.

By what methods the unenlightened and ignorant may be made proper readers of the word of God, has been long and diligently considered. Commentaries of all kinds have indeed been copiously produced but there still remain multitudes to whom the labours of the learned are of little use, for whom expositions require an expositor. To those, indeed, who read the divine books without vain curiosity, or a desire to be wise beyond their powers, it will always be easy to discern the strait path, to find the words of everlasting life. But such is the condition of our nature, that we are always attempting what it is difficult to perform : he who reads the scripture to gain goodness, is desirous likewise to gain knowledge, and by his impatience of ignorance, falls into errour.

This danger has appeared to the doctors of the Romish church, so much to be feared, and so dif ficult to be escaped, that they have snatched the Bible out of the hands of the people, and confined the liberty of perusing it to those whom literature has previously qualified. By this expedient they have formed a kind of uniformity, I am afraid too much like that of colours in the dark: but they have certainly usurped a power which God has never given them, and precluded great numbers from the highest spiritual consolation.

I know not whether this prohibition has not brought upon them an evil which they themselves have not discovered. It is granted, I believe, by the Romanists themselves, that the best commentaries on the Bible have been the works of Protestants. I know not, indeed, whether, since the celebrated paraphrase of Erasmus, any scholar has appeared amongst them, whose works are much valued, even in his own communion. Why have those who excel in every other kind of knowledge, to whom the world owes much of the increase of

light which has shone upon these latter ages, failed, and failed only when they have attempted to explain the scriptures of God? Why, but because they are in the church less read and less examined, because they have another rule of deciding contro versies, and instituting laws.

Of the Bible some of the books are prophetical, some doctrinal and historical, as the gospels, of which we have in the subsequent pages attempted an illustration. The books of the evangelists contain an account of the life of our blessed SAVIOUR, more particularly of the years of his ministry, interspersed with his precepts, doctrines, and predictions. Each of these histories contain facts and dictates related likewise in the rest, that the truth might be established by concurrence of testimony; and each has likewise facts and dictates which the rest omit, to prove that they were wrote without communication.

These writers, not affecting the exactness of chronologers, and relating various events of the same life, or the same events with various circum

stances, have some difficulties to him, who, without the help of many books, desires to collect a series of the acts and precepts of Jesus Cbrist; fully to know his life, whose example was given for our imitation; fully to understand his precepts, which it is sure destruction to disobey.

In this work, therefore, an attempt has been made, by the help of harmonists and expositors, to reduce the four gospels into one series of narration, to form a complete history out of the different narratives of the evangelists, by inserting every event in the order of time, and connecting every precept of life and doctrine, with the occasion on which it was delivered; showing, as far as history or the knowledge of ancient customs can inform us, the reason and propriety of every action; and explaining, or endeavouring to explain, every precept and declaration in its true meaning.

Let it not be hastily concluded, that we intend to substitute this book for the gospels, or obtrude our own expositions as the oracles of God. We recommend to the unlearned reader to consult us when he finds any difficulty, as men who have laboured not to deceive ourselves, and who are without any temptation to deceive him: but as men, however, that, while they mean best, may be mistaken. Let him be careful, therefore, to distinguish what we cite from the gospels, from what we offer as our own: he will find many difficulties removed; and if some yet remain, let him remember that God is in heaven and we upon earth, that our thoughts are not God's thoughts, and that the great cure of doubt is an humble mind.