us, and would we take away the greatest, perhaps the only, topic we have left for it? Who would ever have suspected Asgill for a wit, or Toland for a philosopher, if the inexhaustible stock of Christianity had not been at hand to provide them with materials? What other subject throughout all nature or art could have produced Tindal for a profound author, or furnished him with readers? It is the wise choice of the subject that adorneth and distinguisheth the author. For had a hundred such pens as these been employed on the side of religion, they would have immediately sunk into oblivion.

Nor do I think it wholly groundless, or my fears altogether imaginary, that the abolishing of Christianity may perhaps bring the church into danger, or at least put the senate to the trouble of another securing vote. I desire I may not be misunderstood; I am far from presuming to affirm or think that the church is in danger at present or as things now stand, but we know not how soon it may be, when the Christian religion is repealed. As plausible as this project seems, there may be a dangerous design lurking under it. Nothing can be more notorious than that the atheists, deists, socinians, and other subdivisions of free-thinkers are persons of little zeal for the present ecclesiastical establishment. Their declared opinion is for repealing the sacramental test; they are very indifferent with regard to ceremonies; nor do they hold the jus divinum of episcopacy. Therefore this may be intended as one politic step toward altering the constitution of the church established, and setting up presbytery in its stead; which I leave to be further considered by those at the helm.

And therefore if, notwithstanding all I have said, it shall still be thought necessary to have a bill brought in for repealing Christianity, I would humbly offer an amendment, that instead of the word Christianity, may be put religion in general; which I conceive will much better answer all the ends proposed by the projectors of it; for, as we leave in being a God and his providence, with all the necessary consequences which curious and

inquisitive minds will be apt to draw from such premises, we do not strike at the root of the evil, although we should ever so effectually annihilate the present scheme of the Gospel. For of what use is freedom of thought, if it will not produce freedom of action, which is the sole end, how remote soever in appearance, of all objections against Christianity. And therefore the free-thinkers consider it a sort of edifice, wherein all the parts have such a mutual dependence on each other, that if you happen to pull out one single nail, the whole fabric must fall to the ground.

HENRY ST. JOHN BOLINGBROKE.

HENRY ST. JOHN, VISCOUNT BOLINGBROKE, was born A.D. 1678, and served Queen Anne as Secretary at War, and Secretary of State; at her death he retired to France to avoid a threatened impeachment, and there entered into the service of the Pretender; receiving a full pardon in 1723, he returned to England, and occupied himself in writing against the Walpole administration; again he fled to France in 1735, returning after seven years' exile, and spent the remaining ten years of his life at his native place, Battersea, in literary pursuits. His works, published in five volumes, consist of Letters On the Study of History, On the Uses of Retirement, Reflections On Exile, on Patriotism, etc.

EXILE AN IMAGINARY EVIL.

To live deprived of one's country is intolerable. Is it so? How comes it then that such numbers of men live out of their countries by choice? Observe how the streets of London or Paris are crowded; call over these thousands by name, and ask them one by one, of what country they are; how many will you find who from different parts of the earth come to inhabit these great cities, which afford the largest opportunities and the largest encouragements to virtue or vice. Some are drawn by ambition, some are sent by duty; many resort thither to improve their minds, and many to improve their fortunes; others bring

their beauty, and others their eloquence to market. Remove from hence, and go to the utmost extremities of the east or west: visit the barbarous nations of Africa, or the inhospitable shores of the north; you will find no climate so bad, no country so savage, as not to have some people who come from abroad and inhabit those by choice.

Among numberless extravagancies which pass through the minds of men, we may justly reckon for one that notion of a secret affection, independent of our reason, and superior to our reason, which we are supposed to have for our own country; as if there were some physical virtue in every spot of ground which necessarily produced this effect in every one born upon it. "Amor patriæ ratione valentior omni." This notion may have contributed to the security and grandeur of states. It has therefore not unartfully been cultivated, and the prejudice of education has been with care put on its side. Men have come in this case, as in many others, from believing that it ought to be so, to persuade others, and even to believe themselves, that it is so.

Whatever is best, is safest, lies out of the reach of human power, can neither be given nor taken away. Such is this great and beautiful work of nature, the world. Such is the mind of man, which contemplates and admires the world, whereof it makes the noblest part. These are inseparably ours, and as long as we remain in one, we shall enjoy the other.

Let us march therefore intrepidly, wherever we are led by the course of human accidents. Wherever they lead us, on what coast soever we are thrown by them, we shall not find ourselves absolutely strangers. We shall meet with men and women, creatures of the same figure, endowed with the same faculties and born under the same laws of nature. We shall see the same virtues

and vices flowing from the same principles, but varied in a thousand different or contrary modes, according to that infinite variety of laws and customs which is established for the same end, the preservation of society. We shall

feel the same revolution of the seasons, and the same sun and moon will guide the course of our year. The same azure vault, bespangled with stars, will be everywhere spread over our heads. There is no part of the world from whence we may not admire the planets which roll, like ours, in different orbits round the same central sun; from whence we may not discover an object still more stupendous, the army of fixed stars hung up in the immense space of the universe, innumerable suns, whose beams enlighten and cherish the unknown worlds which roll around them; and whilst I am ravished by such contemplations as these, whilst my soul is thus raised up to heaven, it imports me little what ground I tread upon.

JOSEPH ADDISON.

JOSEPH ADDISON had a reputation scarcely, if at all, inferior to that of Pope, in what was somewhat pompously styled the Augustan age of English Literature. Neither his poems nor his tragedy of Cato have sustained for him that proud position in the eyes of posterity; but his essays in the Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian, may even now be read as models of correctness, ease and elegance in style. Born A.D. 1672; died 1719.

SIR ROGER DE COVERLY AND THE GIPSIES.

As I was riding out in the the fields with Sir Roger, we saw at a little distance from us a troop of gipsies. Upon the first discovery of them, my friend was in some doubt whether he should not exert the Justice of Peace upon such a band of lawless vagrants; but not having his clerk with him, who is a necessary counsellor on these occasions, and fearing that his poultry might fare the worse for it, he let the thought drop; but at the same time gave me a particular account of the mischief they do in the country, in stealing people's goods and spoiling their servants. a stray piece of linen hangs upon the hedge, says Sir Roger, they are sure to have it; if the hog loses his way in the

If

field, ten to one but he becomes their prey; our geese cannot live at peace for them; if a man persecutes them with severity, his hen-roost is sure to pay for it; they generally set into these parts at this season of the year, and put the heads of our servant maids so agog for husbands, that we do not expect to have any business done while they are in the country. I have an honest dairy maid who crosses their hands with a piece of silver every summer, and never fails being promised the handsomest young fellow in the parish for her pains. Your friend the butler has been fool enough to be inveigled by them, and though he is sure to lose a fork or a spoon every time his fortune is told him, generally shuts himself up in the pantry with an old gipsy for half an hour once a twelvemonth. Sweethearts are the things they live upon, which they bestow very plentifully upon all who apply for them. You see now and then, too, some handsome jades among them; the sluts have often white teeth and black eyes.

Sir Roger, observing that I listened with great attention to his account of a people who were so entirely new to me, told me that if I would, they should tell us our fortunes. A Cassandra of the crew, after having examined my lines very diligently, told me, that I loved a pretty maid, with some other particulars which I do not think it proper to relate. My friend alighted from his horse, and exposing his palm to two or three who stood by, they crumpled it into all shapes, and scanned every wrinkle that could be made in it; till one of them, who was older and more sunburnt than the rest, said, that he had a widow in his line of life: upon which the knight cried, "Go, go, you are an idle baggage," and at the same time he smiled upon me. The gipsy, finding he was not displeased, after a further inquiry into his hand, said that his true love was constant, and would dream of him to-night; my old friend cried, "Pshaw," and bade her go on. The gipsy told him he was a bachelor, and that he was dearer to somebody than he thought; the knight still repeating that she was an idle baggage, and bidding her go on. "Ah! master," says the gipsy, "that roguish leer of yours makes a pretty woman's