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ΑΝ

Hiftorical ACCOUNT

OF THE

LIFE and REIGN

O F

DAVID,

KING of ISRAEL:

Interspersed with Various
CONJECTURES, DIGRESSIONS,
and DISQUISITIONS.

In which (among other Things)

Mr. BAYLE'S Criticisms upon the Conduct and
Character of that PRINCE, are fully confidered.

And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of
water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his feafon.
His leaf alfo fhall not wither. Pfalm I.

By the Author of Revelation Examin'd with Candour.

BOOK III. VOL. III.

LONDON:

Printed for J. OSBORN, at the Golden Ball in Pater-nofter Row;
and Sold by S. BIRT, and B. DODD, in Ave-Mary Lane;
C. HITCH, in Pater-nofter Row; S. AUSTEN, J. HINTON,
and J. RIVINGTON, in St. Paul's Church-Yard; T. HARRIS,
on London-Bridge; and W. SANDBY, near Temple-Bar.

M. DCC.

$85 32450

3

To His GRACE the

Primate of IRELAND.

May it please your Grace,

TAKE this occafion, as I Thall every fhall every other, of publicly avowing the honour I bear you : although with little advantage to you, or distinction to myself; unless merely in the manner of profeffing that veneration and esteem, which is borne you, alike, by every man of this nation; where you are juftly confidered as a public parent, equally loved and honoured. How well you are intitled to this appellation, will fufficiently appear, when it is A 2

re

[iv]

remembred, that to you, under GOD, this nation owes the main fupport of her Poor, in their late general calamity. The famine was far extended, and the mortality begun; when your unexampled and unbounded charity, like the facred cenfer in the hand of Aaron, interpofed between the living and the dead, and the plague was flayed.

THE prefent age fufficiently acknowledge this, and pofterity will know it, without the aid of this anonymous and fhort-lived letter; and perhaps may learn from this, and other coeval (tho iefs eminent) instances, that wealth is fometimes more useful in the hands of the clergy, than fome of their lay-brethren have always been willing to allow. It

may

[v]

may prove an occafion of letting their own equal inquiries inform them, in what hands it is more virtuously or honourably imployed, in the profperous days of the community; or with more public spirit, and Christian beneficence, in those of its distress. Yours, my Lord, was then confeffedly a public Fund, a pure and falutary fountain, from whence all that thirfted might draw and drink; and did fo, by many thousands a day; to the faving of fuch a multitude of lives, as will be utterly incredible with pofterity.

MAY the Providence of GOD, (clearly feen in your advancement to this high ftation) that Providence, which hath remarkably blessed you with very uncommon vigour, both of body and mind, to

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