few cenfurers; for to have none, is a bleffing which never was defigned for a writer on Ecclefiaftical fubjects. For this, and for other good reafons, Authors fhould avoid, as much as they can, replies and rejoinders, the ufual confequences of which are, lofs of time, and lofs of temper. Happy is he who is engaged in controverfy with his own paffions, and comes off fuperior; who makes it his endeavour that his follies and weakneffes may die before him, and who daily meditates on mortality and immortality. LET us hear a wife man, who thus fpeaks to himself, and to us: May my last hours find me occupied in amending and improving my heart! that I may be able to fay to God, Have I violated thy commands? have I ever accufed thee, and complained of thy government? I have been fick and infirm, because it was thy appointment; and jo have others, but I willingly. I have been poor, according to thy good pleafure, but contented. I have had no dignities: thou hast withheld them, and I have not thought them even worthy of a wish. Didft thou fee me fad and dejected on these accounts? Did I not appear before thee with a Jerene countenance, and cheerfully complying with thy facred orders? Deal with me and difpofe of ne as thou wilt; thy will is mine; and if any one fhall fay that thou hast been unkind to me, I wil defend and maintain thy caufe against him. Wilt thou that I depart bence? I go; and I return thee my fincereft thanks that thou haft vouchsafed to call call me hither to this great affembly and entertain- It is needless to fay whence these reflexions are taken; the owner is fo well known: but they can never be too often cited, and if the Stoical self-sufficiency which breathes in fome parts of them were corrected by Chriftian hu- mility, they would be to many of us a proper Leffon for the day, and remind us of the refig- Ircumftances of the Roman Empire Whether Tiberius propofed to deify Chrift Conjecture on a paffage in Juvenal |