And many a golden vale and mead But ah!-how chang'd!-thine ion hand compell'd This ingenious little poem has now spoken fufficiently for itfelf, and therefore we shall difmifs it with a Plaudite! A Sermon preached at the Affizes bolden at Durham, August 15, 1764. By Robert Lowth, D. D. Prebendary of Durham, and Chaplain in ordinary to his Majefty. 4to. 6d. Millar. TH HE literary reputation of Dr. Lowth will be a fufficient apology for exempting this Difcourfe from our ufual Ca talogue of Sermons, and the plain manly eloquence, and folid fenfe of the Difcourfe itself will render the following extracts from it very acceptable to our Readers. The happiness we derive from our religious eftablishment, particularly with regard to fentimental liberty, is placed in a very clear and affecting light. In the first place, let us reflect on the greatest and most important of all bleffings which God hath bestowed upon us, our most holy religion; that pure and uncorrupted form of Chriftianity, which by his good providence hath been established among us, and through fo many dangers preferved to us. We enjoy in its full light the compleat revelation of God's will to mankind, delivered by Jefus Chrift; true and genuine Chriftianity, reformed from the grofs errors of popery; reduced to the original standard of the Gofpel; in doctrine regulated altogether by the holy Scriptures; in order and worship as nearly as may be, conformed to the model of the apoftolical and primitive times. The Church of England profeffeth to found all her doctrines upon the holy Scriptures alone; fo that whatfoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requifite or neceffary to falvation." And her Ministers act agreeably to this principle: they do not affect a dominion over the faith of the Laity; they do not pretend to lord it over God's heritage; to dictate doctrines, to which the people are bound to give an implicit affent, or precepts to which they are to yield a blind fubmiffion: they fend. you to the law, and to the teftimony," they exhort you to fearch the holy Scriptures, which lie open before you; to make a diligent and impartial impartial enquiry into the truth of what they themselves deliver, to fee with your own eyes, and to judge with your own underftandings. And as our religious Establishment is founded on the right of private judgment, fo it freely allows to others that liberty, which it hath vindicated to itself: it disclaims all coercive methods, neither forcing others into fubjection, nor retaining its own Members by violence; it gives all reasonable indulgence to weak and fcrupulous confciences, and treats with charity and forbearance those who think themselves obliged to diffent from it. In matters of order and decency, in the form and manner of worship, our Church hath moft judiciously and Happily attained the due mean between Superftition and Enthufiafm; not fubject to ordinances, nor yet wholly difdaining the use of them; not indulging, on the one hand, a vain oftentation of pompous ceremonies, or attributing imaginary efficacy to empty fhews and mere outfide performances; nor, on the other, rejecting fuch order as the decency and folemnity of religious worship require, or leaving devotion to the dangerous guidance of wild fancy and inflamed imagination. Her public offices are conceived in the true fpirit of fincere, rational, well-inftructed piety; delivered in language intelligible, fimple, unaffected, yet in the highest degree folemn and powerful; by an expreffive plainuefs informing the understanding; by a well-judged variety awakening the attention; by a fervent ftrain of devotion warming the heart, and engaging the affections.' The excellence of our civil Conftitution, and the peculiar felicity we enjoy, or might enjoy, from the diftinct powers of Government, mutually reftraining and reftrained, are defcribed with perfpicuity and precision. • Our civil Government is happily placed between the two extremes of defpotic power and popular licentiousness: it is wifely compofed of fuch a due mixture of the feveral fimple forms of Government, those of one, of a few, and of many, as to retain as far as poffible the advantages, and to exclude the inconveniences, peculiar to each; and the parts are so nicely combined and adjufted, that the feveral powers co-operate and move on together in concert and agreement, mutually tempering, limiting, and reftraining, yet at the fame time aiding, fupporting, and ftrengthening each other. The harmony of the whole arifes from the mutual connection, and the mutual oppofition, of the several constituent parts. The three different orders which compofe the fyftem, including every part of the community, and poffeffing the unlimited authority of the whole, are connected together by a power of ordaining, belonging jointly to them all; they are opposed to one another by a power of hindering, belonging feparately to each: by by the former they are enabled to provide for the good of the community in general; by the latter, they are disabled from encroaching on each others rights, or oppreffing any part. The Sovereign power is the main fpring of the machine; it is not only the first mover, but the principal regulator of the whole movement: and the reftraining principle is fo difpofed, as to direct and moderate, without obftructing the motion. Every one of the three Powers is a moderating Power, placed between two others, and ready to exert its force on either hand; to aid or refift, to incite or reprefs, as the exigence may demand. Thus the aristocratical Power is as it were the isthmus between the regal and popular Powers, keeping each within its due bounds, nor fuffering either to overflow its fhores. Each of the others in its turn hath a like influence in tempering the Powers on each fide of it*: nor is the influence of the collective body of the people wholly excluded by devolving its rights on the Representative; for it not only creates the representative body, but holds it when created in continual reftraint by the freedom and the frequency of a new choice. Such are the fundamental principles, fuch the general plan of our fyftem of Go. vernment: a fyftem, beautiful and admirable in theory, beyond all the ideal forms that political wifdom hath ever conceived; ufeful and falutary in practice, beyond all the real examples that civil history can furnish. The first and most obvious excellence of our civil Conftitution, appears in the due diftribution of the legislative Power among the several orders of the Community, and the large share of it into which the people are admitted. The greatest and most important privilege that any people can poffibly enjoy, is to be governed by laws framed by their own advice or confent. Now as the people in their collective body are not, by reason of their multitude, capable of difcuffing affairs, of confulting and debating in an orderly manner, and of forming well-weighed refolutions; all this can be no otherwife managed than by representation and the act of Representatives freely chofen by themfelves, is justly esteemed their own act. If abufes in this part are complained of, let it be confidered, from whence the abufe originally fprings. There can be no stronger proof of the true liberty of any people, than that they cannot be deprived of any part of their liberty, or of the benefits of it, but by their own fault. Freedom in its very nature is liable to abuse; and national freedom, in which confifts civil dignity, is like the free Here the learned Dr. feems inadvertently to have fallen into a confufion of images; for if the pofition of the ariftocratical power be between the regal and the popular, how can either of the last mentioned powers be conceived to have a power on each side of it? will of man, which is the foundation of all moral worth; they are both precious talents committed by Almighty God to our care, and we are accountable for the management of them to our country, to our own confcience, and to God: to bind them up by any neceflary reftraint from abufe, would be in effect to annul and to deftroy them. It must be allowed then, that the people of this nation do enjoy, as fully as in the nature of things they are capable of enjoying, and as far as they have the will and the virtue to enjoy it, the great advantage of being governed by laws of their own framing, or to which they give their free affent. And this great privilege alone manifeftly includes in it the fecurity of life, of freedom, of property, of every thing that is valuable or dear to man. As the legislative power, which requires much counsel and mature deliberation, is very properly placed in the hands of many, and thofe of different ranks, that the interefts of all may be confulted; fo is the executive power, which requires immediate action, with equal propriety committed to one. The adminiftration of Government refides in the Sovereign; who, of all earthly Monarchs, approaches neareft in the nature of his government, to the great Governor of the universe; who governs by fixt and ftated laws; whofe power is exercised in aiding, protecting, relieving; in juftice, in mercy, and goodness; but is incapable of being employed in injury and wrong. As the whole Government is diftributed by commiffion to Ministers and Officers, and every part is to be executed by them agreeably to known rules, and in fubfervience to the laws; thefe become refponfible for mal-adminiftration, and are accountable to the Reprefentatives of the people, and to the fupreme Judicature of the kingdom. Thus is the dignity of the Sovereign confulted, and the welfare of the people moft effectually fecured. The Prince has the honour of being the Minister of God for good to his people; of ruling fubjects, not flaves; of governing by law, not by arbitrary will and caprice: and the people are happy in obeying a legal Monarch, not a tyrant; in fecurity from oppreffion under the protection of their own laws; in a power of doing whatever the laws permit, and of not being compelled to do what the laws do not command; in which the very nature of true and perfect civil Liberty confifts." The Doctor takes a fhort view likewife, of the power of Judicature, and expatiates very properly on the excellent manner in which it is conducted: after which he fets before us the comparative happinefs we enjoy from thefe feveral circumstances; and forgets not to remind us of that obedient gratitude which is due to the Giver of fo many good gifts. A Letter A Letter to the Rev. Dr. Thomas Leland, Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. In which his late Differtation on the Principles of human Eloquence is criticized; and the Bishop of Gloucester's Idea of the Nature and Character of an infpired Language, as delivered in his Lordship's Doctrine of Grace, is vindicated from all the Objections of the learned Author of the Differtation. 8vo. Is. 6d. Wilkie. TH HIS Letter-Writer fets out thus I have read your Differtation on the principles of human Eloquence, and thall very readily, I dare fay, be indulged in the liberty I am going to take, of giving you my free thoughts upon it. I fhall do it with all the regard that is due from one Scholar to another; and even with all the civility which may be required of ONE, who hath his reafons for addreffing you, in this public manner, without a name,' Upon reading this, we were naturally led to expect a liberal, candid, and polite Letter, fuch as becomes one Gentleman to write to another; but we foon found that this Letter-Writer is either entirely ignorant of what is due from one Scholar to another, or never intended to keep his promife. A fpirit of info lence breathes through the whole Letter, with an academical pertnefs, unworthy of a polite Scholar, and, in an anonymous Writer, extremely mean and cowardly. Whatever advantage this Author, or his admirers, may imagine he has over Dr. Leland in point of argument and critical acumen, he is certainly much inferior to him in good breeding. In regard to the merit of his defence of the Bishop of Glou cefter, we fhall only fay, that it is fpecious and plaufible, but far from being folid and fatisfactory. It would be to no purpose to detain our Readers with a particular account of what he has advanced; fuch of them as have read the learned Prelate's work, and are Judges of the fubject, must have formed their opinion of it long before now. It is incumbent upon us, however, to give a fpecimen of our Author's manner of writing, in order to vindicate the character we have given of it. We hall, therefore, lay before our Readers the conclufion of this Letter, leaving them to determine whether it is or is not agreeable to the beginning of it. I will not deny, fays he, that the mere Juftice due to a great character, whom I found fomewhat freely, not to fay injuriously, treated by you, was one motive with me to hazard this addrefs to you. If I add another, it is fuch as I need not difown, and REV. Oct. 1764. X which |