fented it; but according to my poor notions, it is the fpirit and tenor of your pamphlet that carry the awful appearance.

As the character you have given of the new fcheme, and us the patrons of it, lies fcattered in very diftant places of your work, and as my remarks upon it, though connected, have taken up a good deal of room; I fhall, for your benefit, and that of our readers, bring the feveral parts of it together. By this means, those who are acquainted with us will be better able to judge of the likeness, and of your skill in drawing. Alfo if any foreigner fhould think it worth his while to draw up an account of the several sects of upstart chriftians in England, he may find that of the new fchemers done to his hand.

According to you, Sir, then, we infatuated new schemers, believing fin to be the unavoidable confequence of the imperfection of creatures, think it unmanly and illiberal to suppose the wrath of God to be due to it. In confequence of this, there is not, in all our writings, a fingle word concerning the heinous nature of fin, or a trace of evangelical humiliation for it, and about the efficacy of prayer we are filent as death. We claim heaven by our own works, difcard the doctrine of a mediator, or redeemer, and preach a religion which contains no remiffion of fin. Bloated with the conceit of our own rare abilities, as the only connoiffeurs in religion, we rely on the force of the human understanding, and not on divine teachings, and think

our

ourselves better judges than God himself, of what is proper to be revealed to us. When the revelation is made, we not only make no fcruple, but infift upon a right, to reject whatever appears to us unreasonable, how plain foever it be expreffed in the books which contain the revelation. But this is not to be wondered at, fince we believe nothing of the infpiration, or divine authority of the books, and confider the bible as the word of man, and not as the word of God. If, however, we think it worth our while, and that it will answer any end, to have recourfe to the fcriptures, being fond of fophiftry, dextrous in the management of it, and loud and violent in the ufe of it, we read with a ftudied design to pervert the words of it, and employ elaborate devices to give views of things totally different from what they are in reality. As to the Reformers, who lay fuch a foolish ftrefs on the fcriptures, believing them to be the rule of faith and manners, we are their determined adverfaries, and look upon them all as a parcel of old fools. Indeed, as to knowledge of any kind, we think it of no fort of confequence, believing it to be as good for the foul to be without it, as to excel in it. Rejecting the bible, as a book which contains a great deal of fome kind of knowledge, we fink revealed religion into mere deism; and no wonder, fince, at the bottom, we are no better than rank deifts ourselves, and are paving the

way

way for an open revolt from all revealed religion.

When we preach, if we enforce virtue and diffuade from vice at all, it is by means of moral arguments, fcorning to make ufe of the authority of God, or the peculiar motives of the gospel. But, indeed, the promoting of virtue is no part of our concern, for we flatter men's vices, and give no fort of moleftation to those who are addicted to them. Through a blind rage, we strike at the power of godliness itself, and cannot help bewraying the state of our hearts. We are the fons of pride, and cannot be endued with a fingle grain of fincerity.

In confequence of all this, our preaching is obferved not to have the effect that is promised to the preaching of the truth, but all manner of vice and wickednefs prevail among us. After the profligate lives we lead, we comfort ourfelves, when we come to die, with the belief that future punishment, and the wrath of God against fin, are mere bugbears. We fay no barm can happen to us, fince there is no knowledge in the Moft High. If these confolations fail, we make no fcruple of dispatching ourselves, I fuppofe, that we may get to hell the fooner; and in order that our companions in infidelity and wickedness may follow us as faft as poffible, we, are careful to leave behind us arguments in defence of fuicide. This I fhould imagine, you, Mr. Venn, would think a very happy iffue,

pro

provided we did but all do it at once, that so the earth might be fairly rid of fuch monsters; and that you, and thofe whom you call the orthodox, the faints, and the whole body of real chriftians, might have it all to yourselves.

CER

SECTION III.

ERTAINLY, Sir, when you were collecting materials for your answer to my treatife, you raked together the opinions of all kinds of unbelievers, of chriftianity or orthodoxy, without diftinction, and without confidering how inconsistent many of them were with others, have heaped them indifcriminately on my devoted head.

In this manner have you been dreffing up a bugbear out of your own imagination, and having the best right, that of creation, to give it what name you please, have called it a new Schemer, and have been combating it with all imaginable fuccefs, to your own great fatisfaction, no doubt, and that of your admirers. It is a fatiffaction which I by no means envy you. I might,

in

my turn, have replied, by exhibiting a frightful picture of your peculiar fcheme of religion, and of its effects upon the lives and hearts of men: for, notwithstanding your boafting, I really believe it to be not very favourable to

virtue

virtue and genuine chriftianity; and I should have had little occafion to look farther than the pamphlet before me, for the proof of my af fertion; but I fhall not do any thing of this nature in my answer to you.

What I fay, is not out of any prejudice against you perfonally, or as a Calvinist, but merely in vindication of my own character, and that of those whom you call new schemers. As far as you are of the truth, and preach the truth as it is in Jefus, fo far I heartily wish you God speed.

I firmly believe there is a wife fuperintending providence, with refpect to all the fects and parties into which the chriftian name is broken, and I believe there is not one of them without its ufe in the whole fcheme.

I rejoice in the peculiarly feasonable rise and fpread of Methodifm, in all its forms, as calculated to excite an attention to a future world, and a regard to that temper and conduct which will fit us for it, in many people, who were out of the reach of other methods of inftruction. This, I hope, is the great object of the leading men among the Methodists, notwithstanding the heterogeneous matter which, through human infirmity, has mixed itfelf with their scheme. In other refpects, too, I confider the Methodifts, and those of the more ferious clergy who favour them, and in fome measure join them, in a light of importance.

Both they and you may do fome kinds of good that are not eafily within my reach; and,

far