offices have still greater reason, as more depends on the due exercise of their authority, to be watchful for the community. The good of society must be influenced by their conduct and example one way or other. Great officers of justice cannot be useless without being pernicious.

If a regard for the public is not a motive strong enough in this case, let every magistrate consider that there is another of infinite importance to himself; for if all power be the ordinance of God, he will undoubtedly demand an account of the exercise of it; and who is he that has so little to answer for on his own account, as willingly to subject himself to be answerable for the sins of others, which either by his encouragement or his connivance he makes his own? Pardon the freedom of this address; I honor and reverence your office, and I hope I give you no occasion to despise mine.

Next to those in public offices of power and trust, the happiness of the public depends on those who have the government in private families. Here it is that the youth of the nation must be formed, and if they are suffered to be corrupted in their religion or morals before they come into the world, there is little hope that the world will reform them. All wise men, legislators, and princes, have acknowleged not only the use, but the necessity of an early education to form the mind, whilst tender, to the principles of honor and virtue; and what is more, the wisest of all, the writers inspired by the Holy Spirit, have required it as a duty from parents, and as part of the obedience they owe to God. Even our unbelievers have seen how far religion depended on this care; and under a pretence of maintaining the liberty of the human mind, and guarding it against early prejudices, they have endeavored to persuade the world that children should be taught nothing of religion, but be left to form notions for themselves. They have had but too great success, and we begin to see the fruits of it. The children of this age grow soon to be men and women, and are admitted to be partners and witnesses to the follies and vices of their paThus trained and educated, when they come to be masters and mistresses of families, they answer fully what was to be expected from them; they are often a torment to each other

rents.

and to themselves, and have reason to bemoan themselves for the indulgence shown them in their early days.

Would you see the effects of this education in all orders among us, look into the many public assemblies; sometimes you may see old age affecting the follies of youth, and counterfeiting the airs of gaiety; sometimes men lying in wait to seduce women, and women to seduce men; and even children seriously employed at the gaming table, as if their parents were concerned to form them early to the taste of the age, and were afraid that they should not soon enough of themselves find the way to their ruin.

Look near home: see the temptations of this sort which surround these cities, and are indeed so many snares to catch your sons and daughters and apprentices. Can you look on and be unconcerned? For God's sake, and for the sake of your children and your country, take the courage to act like parents and masters of families: reformation must begin in private families; the law and the magistrate can punish your children when they become wicked; but it is you who must make them good by proper instruction and proper government. If you suffer them to meet temptation where temptation is sure to meet them, never complain of him who corrupts your child; you are the corrupter yourself; to you he owes it that he is undone. And perhaps there is not a more provoking circumstance, nor a greater call for divine vengeance on a wicked nation than this; that the youth are prepared and brought up to inherit all the vices of their fathers, which cuts off all prospect of reformation, and stands as a bar between us and mercy.

On you therefore, fathers and mothers, your country and the church of God call for assistance; your endeavors may go a great way towards saving us, and this wicked generation may be spared, for the hope of seeing the next better.

In a word, let every man, whatever his station is, do his part towards averting the judgments of God: let every man reform himself, and others as far as his influence goes: this is our only proper remedy; for the dissolute wickedness of the age is a more dreadful sign and prognostication of divine anger than even the trembling of the earth under us.

To our own endeavors, let us add continual and fervent supplications to the Almighty, that he would spare us, and not deal with us according to the multitude of our sins;' that he would give us the grace of repentance, and open our eyes to see, before it is too late, the things which belong to our salvation.'

May the God of all mercy hear you in this day of your distress! To his protection, and the grace of our Lord Jesus I earnestly recommend you. I am,

Your affectionate brother, and

Servant in Christ Jesus,

THOMAS LONDON.

SUMMARY.

NOTICE taken of the bishop's complaint of having been unhandsomely treated by Dr. Snape and the committee of the Lower House of Convocation. He charges them with exposing him, vilifying him, and using him as they pleased. Refutation of the charge of exposing him, in all improper senses of the word; wherein particular notice is taken of the true and the false notion of prayer, as expressed by his lordship. Charge of vilifying him next repelled; nothing having been alleged against him but his own words. Answer to the charge of using him as they pleased, in which it is shown that his lordship makes use of a term which is at once a charge and a defiance, highly indecorous to be used towards a court of judicature like the Convocation. Notice taken of the Preservative, a book written by the bishop against the principles and practices of the non-jurors. Strictures on its title-page, which, by an insertion of the words, an appeal to the conscience and common sense of the laity, would imply that the clergy are deficient in both those qualities. His lordship's six reasons for thus addressing the laity discussed. His opinion of the clergy may be disregarded, after his condemnation of all the ancient writers, bishops, and martyrs of the Christian church. Inquiry into the kind of entertainment which his lordship has provided for the common sense of the laity. His reasons for the support of the established church would not have been less weighty if they had been urged with more modesty. Certain expressions of the bishop, such as comprehensive principles, wide and strong foundations, newinvented engine of courting some among us, commented on, and

condemned in their use and application. The same and others ridiculed, under the notion of their being taken up and applied by Mr. Powel, at Bath, to the wooden heads of his raree-show. Consideration of the bishop's candid intimation that he suffers for his affection to the present establishment, and consequently that his opponents are disaffected to the government. Vindication of both Houses of Convocation. Reproach of the bishop for his treatment of his clerical brethren, in a passage of great eloquence. Consideration of his services done to the government, on which so much stress is laid. His method stated to be directly at variance with the true interests of government. Proposition laid down, " that it is the real interest of government to have all the people made easy in their submission and obedience to it; and that it is of no consequence to ask on what principles or views men come to be satisfied with it, provided they yield an intire and cheerful obedience." But the bishop endeavors to beat down all arguments for obedience except one, which is his own: all others are set aside to make room for his comprehensive principles. It is shown how he thus raises as courtly a doctrine out of his principles of resistance, as the most servile preacher of passive obedience ever did. His lordship's political writing having been thus exposed, it is next considered whether his divinity was conceived under better auspices, or is likely to be attended with better consequences. Consideration of the fears of the nation lest the fences of the establishment should be broken down. These fears instilled into their minds, and augmented by the joint efforts of Jacobites and dissenters, in order that the people might be shaken in their affection towards the government. Riotous assemblies, and destruction of the meeting-houses. Certain wise politicians ridiculed, who gravely judged that the people were really indignant against the Pretender, and that their zeal against the meetinghouses was but a pretence. The people's fears were, in fact, for the church. In this state of things the proper part of one