the brutal part of our nature, is indeed reprefented as a compound diffoluble, and actually diffolved by death: But the nous, or to egemonikon, the mind, or ruling principle, he held to be of a pure celestial nature, theou apospafma, a particle of God, which he fends back intire to the ftars and the Divinity. Befides, among all his magnificent leffons, and fplendid fentiments, upon the force and beauty of virtue, he is pofitive as to the being of God, and that not merely as a plastic nature, or foul of the world, but in the ftrict sense of a Providence, in fpecting and taking care of human affairs. *

The ftoics, therefore, though their ftile was high, and often above truth and nature, yet it cannot be said, that they fo refolved every motive to a virtuous life into the fole beauty of virtue, as to endeavor to destroy the belief of the immortality of the foul, and a distributive Providence. After all, allowing the disinterested ftoics (therein not unlike our modern quietists) to have made virtue its own fole reward, in the most rigid and absolute fense, yet what is this to those who are no ftoics? If we adopt the whole principles of that sect, admitting their notions of good and evil, their celebrated apathy, and, in one word, setting up for complete ftoics, we may poffibly maintain this doctrine with a better grace: at leaft, it will be of a piece, and confiftent with the whole. But he who fhall borrow this fplendid patch from the ftoics, and hope to make a figure by inferting it in a piece of modern compofition, seasoned with the wit and notions of these times, will indeed make a figure, but perhaps it may not be, in the eyes of a wife man, the figure he intended.

XV. Though it must be owned, the present age is very indulgént to every thing that aims at profane raillery; which is alone fufficient to recommend any fantaftical compofition to the public. You may behold the tinfel of a

Marc. Antonin. 1. 2. §. II.

modern author pafs upon this knowing and learned age for good writing; affected ftrains for wit; pedantry for politeness; obscurities for depths; ramblings for flights; the most aukward imitation for original humor; and all this upon the fole merit of a little artful profaneness.

ALC.-Every one is not alike pleased with writings of humor, nor alike capable of them. It is the fine irony of an author of quality, That certain reverend authors, 'who can condefcend to lay-wit, are nicely qualified to hit ❝ the air of breeding and gentility, and that they will in ' time, no doubt, refine their manner to the edification of ⚫ the polite world; who have been so long feduced, by 'the way of raillery, and wit.' The truth is, the various taste of readers, requireth various kinds of writers. Our fect hath provided for this, with great judgment. To profelyte the graver fort, we have certain profound men at reafon and argument. For the coffee-houses, and populace, we have declaimers of a copious vein. Of fuch a writer, it is no reproach to say, fluit lutulentus; he is the fitter for his readers. Then, for men of rank and politenefs, we have the finest, and wittiest Railleurs in the world, whofe ridicule, is the fure teft of truth.

EUPH.-Tell me, Alciphron, are thofe ingenious Railleurs, men of knowledge?

ALC.-Very knowing.

EUPH.-Do they know, for instance, the Copernican fyftem, or the circulation of the blood?

ALC.-One would think you judged of our fect, by your country neighbors: There is nobody in town, but knows all those points.

EUPH.--You believe then, antipodes, mountains in the moon, and the motion of the earth.

ALC.-We do.

EUPH. Suppose, five or fix centuries ago, a man had maintained thefe notions among the beaux efprits of an English court; how do you think they would have been received?

T

ALC.-With great ridicule.

EUPH. And now, it would be ridiculous to ridicule them.

ALC.-It would.

EUPH.-But truth was the fame, then and now.

ALC.-It was.

EUPH.--It should feem, therefore, that ridicule is no such sovereign touchstone, and test of truth, as you gentlemen imagine.

ALC.--One thing we know: Our raillery and sarcasms gall the black tribe, and that is our comfort.

CRI.-There is another thing, it might be worth your while to know: That men, in a laughing fit, may applaud a ridicule, which fhall appear contemptible when they come to themselves: Witness the ridicule of Socrates by the comic poet, the humour and reception it met with, no more proving that, than the fame will your's, to be juft, when calmly considered by men of sense.

ALC.-After all, thus much is certain, our ingenious men make converts by deriding the principles of religion. And, take my word, it is the most successful and pleafing method of conviction. Thefe authors laugh men out of their religion, as Horace did out of their vices: Admiffi circum præcordia ludunt. But a bigot cannot relish or find out their wit.

XVI. CRI. Wit without wisdom, if there be fuch a thing, is hardly worth finding. And, as for the wisdom of these men, it is of a kind fo peculiar, one may well fufpect it. Cicero was a man of sense, and no bigot, nevertheless he makes Scipio own himself much more vigilant and vigorous in the race of virtue, from supposing heaven the prize.* And he introduceth Cato declaring, he would never have undergone thofe virtuous toils for the service of the public, if he had thought his being was to end with this life.t

ALC.-I acknowledge Cato, Scipio, and Cicero, were very well for their times: But you must pardon me, if I do not think they arrived at the high consummate virtue of our modern free-thinkers.

EUPH. It fhould feem then, that virtue flourisheth

more than ever among us.

ALC.-It fhould.

EUPH. And this abundant virtue is owing to the method taken by your profound writers to recommend it.

ALC.-This I grant.

EUPH.-But you have acknowledged, that the enthufiastic lovers of virtue are not the many of your fect, but only a few select fpirits. To which Alciphron making no anfwer, Crito addreffed himself to Euphranor: To make, faid he, a true estimate of the worth and growth of modern virtue, you are not to count the virtuous men, but rather to confider the quality of their virtue. Now you must know, the virtue of these refined theorists is something fo pure and genuine, that a very little goes far, and, is in truth, invaluable. To which that reasonable, interested virtue, of the old English, or Spartan kind, can bear no proportion.

EUPH.-Tell me, Alciphron, are there not difeafes of the foul, as well as of the body?

ALC.-Without doubt.

EUPH. And are not those diseases, vicious habits?
ALC.-They are.

EUPH.-And, as bodily distempers are cured by phyfic, those of the mind are cured by philofophy: are they not? ALC.-I acknowledge it.

EUPH.-It seems, therefore, that philofophy is a medicine for the foul of man.

ALC.--It is.

EUPH.-How shall we be able to judge of medicines, or know which to prefer? Is it not from the effects wrought by them?

ALC.--Doubtlefs.

EUPH.-Where an epidemical diftemper rages, fuppofe a new phyfician fhould condemn the known established practice, and recommend another method of cure: would you not, in proportion as the bills of mortality increased, be tempted to suspect this new method, notwithstanding all the plaufible difcourfe of its abettors?

ALC.-This ferves only to amufe and lead us from the queftion.

CRI.---It puts me in mind of my friend, Lamprocles, who needed but one argument against infidels. I obferved, faid he, that, as infidelity grew, there grew corruption of every kind, and new vices. This fimple obfervation, on matter of fact, was fufficient to make him, notwithstanding the remonftrance of feveral ingenious men, imbue and feafon the minds of his children betimes with the principles of religion. The new theories, which our acute moderns have endeavored to fubftitute in place of religion, have had their full courfe in the prefent age, and produced their effect on the minds and manners of men. That men are men, is a fure maxim: But it is as fure, that Englishmen are not the fame men they were: whether better or worse, more or lefs virtuous, I need not say. Every one may fee and judge. Though, indeed, after Ariftides had been banished, and Socrates put to death at Athens, a man, without being a conjurer, might guess what the beauty of virtue could do in England. But there is now neither room nor occafion for gueffing. We have our own experience to open our eyes; which yet if we continue to keep shut, till the remains of religious education are quite worn off from the minds of men; it is to be feared we shall then open them wide, not to avoid, but to behold and lament our ruin.

ALC.---Be the confequences what they will, I can never bring myself to be of a mind with thofe, who measure truth by convenience. Truth is the only divinity that I adore. Wherever truth leads, I fhall follow.