to extend his code to the more minute exigencies and relations of familiar life. It will, perhaps, be objected to the Writer of these pages, that she has shewn too little method in her distribution of the parts of her subject, and too little system in her arrangement of the whole; that she has expatiated too largely on some points, passed over others too slightly, and left many unnoticed; that she has exhibited no history of the life, and observed no regular order in her reference to the actions, of the Apostle. She can return no answer to these anticipated charges, but that, as she never aspired to the dignity of an Expositor, so she never meant to enter into the details of the Biographer. Formed as they are upon the most extensive views of the nature of man, it is no wonder that the writings of Saint Paul have have been read with the same degree of interest, by Christians of every name, age, and nation; the principles they contain, are in good truth absolute and universal and whilst this circumstance renders them of general obligation, it enables us, even in the remotest generation, to judge of the skilfulness of his addresses to the understanding, and to feel the aptitude of his appeals to the heart. To the candour of the reader,- a candour which, though perhaps she has too frequently tried, and too long solicited, she has, however, never yet failed to experience, -she commits this little work. If it should set one human being on the consideration of objects hitherto neglected, she will account that single circumstance, success;-nay, she will be reconciled even to failure, if that failure should stimulate some more enlightened mind, some more powerful pen, to supply, 4 in a future work on the same subject, the deficiencies of which she has been guilty, to rectify the errors which she may have committed, to rescue the cause which she may have injured. Barley-Wood, January 20, 1815. |