death, together with the act of dying, is a sufficient argument for some future compensation, and being convinced also of the predominance of human bliss, could not think that God would expose it at last to such rude interruption, and suffer the life of his favourite creature to close in grief, in anguish, or in despair.' p. 53, 54.

We fear it will be thought that we have already bestowed an unwarrantable degree of attention on a work so worthless for any purpose which it professes to answer, and replete with sentiments so pernicious. We will not plead the importance of the subject merely--we will not adduce the imposing or at least attractive appearance of the title, or the assurance of Professor Martyn that he had little doubt of the favourable reception of the work by a candid public,'-as a sufficient apology; but will hasten to notice the concluding part of the Treatise, in which those passages occur which led us to judge of the author's design more favourably than some of the sentiments he has advanced would seem to justify. The 2nd part of the Treatise is on the nearly equal distribution of happiness among the several ranks of mankind.' In this we are gravely told that wisdom and knowledge are not necessary to happiness,' and in Professor Martyn's Analysis, that virtue and vice have not so great an influence as some contend for on the happiness and misery of mankind ;—also, that they are distributed in portions somewhat similar to those of happiness and misery :'-to such lengths of atrocious folly will a writer sometimes suffer himself to be borne in his endeavour to establish a favourite theory!-The 3d part is designed to prove that true happiness is to be found only in the practice of the Christian religion:' and in this the author seems, however undesignedly, to admit and to condemn the utter uselessness, not to say the desperate absurdity, of all his preceding labours.

In what has been hitherto delivered on the subject of human felicity, my principal aim has been to establish this point:-That the degrees of happiness are pretty equally divided among the several ranks and classes of mankind.

But still, no doubt, it will be said, that there can be little reason to boast of any considerable usefulness from the present attempt; since it is not so much the distribution of this contemptible pittance of human felicity, as a much larger and more exalted portion, that the restless enquirers after it demand. So that, instead of being satisfied with the poor amount of what has hitherto been advanced, they will be inclined to sit down in silence and despair, or break out into some such warm and passionate expostulation, as that of the Gentiles to the Apostle, "What shall we do to be substantially happy?"

Nay, rather will they not cry, in the still more pathetic language of Esau to Isaac, "Are we disappointed at last in what we esteemed the birthright of mankind? and hast not thou yet "one blessing for us, O Father Almighty?"

:

But let them be comforted, he has one that is as pure, as the others are mixed; one that is as durable, as the others are transient; one that is superior to all the accidents of life, and whose all-ruling influence no affliction can subdue.

'Let it be also added for their farther consolation, that this blessing is as certain in its attainment, as it is great in its nature. It de pends not upon outward things, or upon the breath and favour of our fellow-creatures, for which, after having used our utmost efforts, we may pine in vain; but one, from which chance is utterly excluded, and which it is in every one's power to bestow on him self.' p. 227-9.

sound Divine' need not We shall give a few

The theological sentiments of this be more particularly commented on. short extracts from this last part of the work, in which are found many passages that surprise us, after what we have seen, by the justness of their remarks, and which at least please by a frequently singular felicity of expression.

In other religious systems, it was held sufficient to have a proper sense of virtue, and regularly to practise it in our lives. In the Christian, we are commanded to pursue it with all the powers and faculties of our souls. We are to have such an earnest and vehement desire for it, as is not to be compared, but with the keenest sensations of hunger and thirst. But then these desires cannot be more eager and fierce, than the gratification of them will be complete and full And herein consists the visible superiority of this Christian beatitude over any other that the world can give. Our appetites in the pursuit of other objects, are oftener disappointed than satisfied; and even when the satisfaction is most complete. it generally leaves inquietude and listlessness behind. At the best, their cravings can only be allayed for a while; and they will always be liable to that sad result which our Saviour mentions to the woman of Samaria, "Whoever drinketh of this water, shall thirst again." Not so with those who hunger and thirst after righteousness; it is their peculiar felicity, that they can neither be disappointed of their object, nor languish in its pursuit, but that their appetite for it, and the gratification it yields, shall continue to increase for

ever,

Of near affinity with this, is that height, and fervour, and continuance of devotion, which naturally becomes a means of softening the passions, subduing temptations, and ennobling the affections of our nature.

Under the influence of this devoutness of spirit, we scon see through the corruption of our hearts, the blindness of our appetites, and the vanity of sublunary things. We enter into the

world of spirits, and contract, as it were, a familiarity with our Maker. We taste, in some measure, the pleasures of the new world, before we have left the old, and begin to act like angelic and immaterial beings, before we are yet refined and purified from the dregs of matter.

One particular branch of devotion, much exercised in the primitive times, and much recommended by the apostles, has, perhaps, a still greater influence on human happiness, and that is intercession; which is never mentioned by St. Paul, without his adding the express testimony of its kindly influence. my God upon every remembrance of you always, in every prayer of mine for you all, making my request with joy."

"I thank

And a joy of no mean sort it must surely be, to find, that as we habituate ourselves to the performance of this duty, it chases away all the low and sordid passions, makes the heart grow great and generous, and inspires it with ardour for the common good." pp. 231-4.

We have not room for the beautiful quotation which is given from Law.

In a word, the so much talked of regeneration which Christianity effects, is in no part more conspicuous than in the exaltation of our bliss. The joy, which is justly thought to have been that of our first ancestors in a state of innocence, is likewise that of the true Christian in a state of redemption. It is not that trivial, vanishing, superficial thing, which only gilds the imagination, and plays upon the surface of the soul, but one that fills it, as God does the universe, silently and without noise. It is refreshing and exhilarating, yet composed, like the pleasantness of youth mixed with the sobriety of age, or the mirth of a festival enjoyed with the stillness of contemplation.

The sense of this is in some sort delivered to us by St. Paul, in that concise description of his own condition, as well as that of his fellow labourers in the school of Christ: "As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing."

Sorrowful, but in the outward visage-rejoicing, in the inmost heart: sorrowful sometimes, and by fits- rejoicing, in one even and constant tenour: sorrowful, but by the absence of the common incentives to festivity and mirth-rejoicing, in the higher and nobler incitements of charity and love: sorrowful, but in the eyes of those incurious observers, who think no joy considerable without revelling and noise-rejoicing, in the soberer and more impartial judgment of them, who know that the extremes both of joy and grief are still; sorrowful, it must be granted, when exposed to infamy, to torture, and to death -but rejoicing even then, in the hopes of eternity, with a joy that appears, both from its composure and duration, to be far beyond those short-lived and tumultuous sallies, which are the portion of sensual and worldly minds." pp. 257-9.

There is danger, in all other persuasions which have no solid found ation, lest their respective votaries should suddenly awake from their

dream of enthusiasm, and by some gradual dawnings of recovered reason be convinced, that the happiness they had in view was either chimerical in itself, or unsuitable to the nature of a rational creature. While the christian, on the contrary, grows more confirmed, as he views the nature of his happiness, and more certain, as he examines its claim and pretensions. To the secret wish and incli nation of his heart, are added the suggestions of uncorrupted reason; and to both, the voice and declaration of heaven. So that, at length, the two vital and animating principles of our holy faith, in a manner, work themselves into his very frame, and his whole life becomes one scene of perpetual rejoicing, that he is under the protection of a providence that will never forsake him, and in pursuit of a happiness that will never decay.' p. 243.

Our readers will, we think, coincide in our expressions of regret, that a man who was capable of writing these latter paragraphs, should not have acquired a more accurate knowledge of human nature, by walking the hospital of real life, and should not have more accurately acquainted himself with the remedy as well as the diseases of our degraded condition before he undertook to medicate the mind. One is led to apply to him what he himself quotes from Lactantius, in respect to the ancient Philosophers, that they rather dreamt of God, than knew him.' As a preacher, we are told he was much admired. Our business is not with the man, but with his book. The grave has closed upon his lips, and our sentence can neither avail nor disturb him. But we cannot forbear the grateful and animating reflection, that preachers of a different stamp-divines of another school-are succeeding to general estimation. We cannot avoid thinking with what advantage this polished and popular orator might have become the scholar of one of those faithful but less literate teachers, on whose characters and humble efforts he might probably have looked down with contempt, but who understand at least two things-human nature, and the gospel; of one who, perhaps with rude hand, would brush away all the flimsy speculations and refined sophistry of the philosopher; and who, making his appeal at once to the wants and feelings of the heart, would confound, by the very foolishness of preaching, the specious wisdom of the wise. That there is some truth at the bottom of this author's representations we are not disposed to deny: we readily concede that the ways of God, in respect to the distribution of the means of happiness, are more equal than may appear at first sight;that God has set one thing over against another' in the different allotments of his providence. It will not be disputed that there is a tendency in the human heart to despise or to depreciate the mercies of God, and to exaggerate the evils of our condition, in the language of rebellious murmuring, or ungrateful despon

dency. We are disposed, also, to believe that the indiscriminate representations which some writers have given of this world, as being a scene of continued tribulation, are very injudicious. The language of allegory has often been indulged in to an excess, in point of minuteness and extent of application, which is not correspondent to the truth of things; and expressions, which originally referred to times of fierce persecution and cruelty, to the sufferings of martyrs and distinguished confessors, have been, with too little qualification, applied to the general experience, the common lot' of mankind. If the world is a 'wilderness,' it is not so as being barren of pleasures, for however unsubstantial and transitory the enjoyments of this life may be in comparison with the hope, and peace, and joy of the Christian, those who cannot make this comparison, will with reason deny such a statement. If it is a wilderness, it is so as it yields no nourishment to the immortal principle, and supplies no vital pleasure to the soul-because in regard to all that respects our moral wants, any substantial consolation, or any balm to the wounded spirit, it is a desert: because the life of the soul must be immediately derived from God. But though the world is a wilderness, there are in it at least some fair Oases insulated by the waste; and there is sun-shine every where. There is such a thing as human happiness. In the excursions of the intellect, in the expansion of the affections, in the discoveries of science and the creations of fancy, in the contemplation of all that beauty and glory which invest the material creation, in an affectionate and delightful sense of the divine perfections'-in the practice of virtue and in the hope of Glory'-there is a happiness to be found, not unmingled, nor uninterrupted; yet such as to entitle the possessors of it, to be distinguished from mankind as the happy; and to lay the foundation of those peculiar duties which the happy owe to the unhappy.'-This, after all, is the point to which all treatises on human happiness should conduct us; to make us identify our interests more closely with those of the great family of man, to teach us to renounce the dictates of selfish indolence, and, under a sense of high obligation, to cultivate a holy sensibility to the groans of the creation,' especially to the moral miseries of our fellow creatures. Let us not think we are at liberty to live for ourselves, content with, though they may be, the innocent enjoyments of life, without doing something by our actual exertion, however inconsiderable the effect, to abate the evils or assuage the sufferings of existence, and to promote the moral and eternal welfare of society.