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           to the People of Great Britain                    23

was not able to convince even themselves. One of the most eminent of them (Voltaire) who had been a theist, a materialist, a disbeliever of a future state all his days, asked with evident anxiety a few years before his death, Is there a God such as men speak of? Is there a soul such as people imagine? Is there any thing to hope for after death? He seems to have been consist- ent in nothing, hut in his hatred of that gospel which would have enlightened the obscurity in which he was involved, and at once dissipated all his doubts. As to his notions of government, he appears to have been as unsettled in them as in his religious sentiments; for though he had been one of the most zealous apostles of liberty and equality, though he had attacked monarch- ical governments in all his writings with great bitter- ness, yet he at last confessed to one of the greatest princes then in Europe, that he did not love the go- vernment of the lowest orders—that he did not with the re-establishment of Athenian democracy.

Such are the inconsistencies of men who, by their profane disputation against religion, have disturbed the consciences of individuals; who, by their senseless railing against government, have endangered the tran- quility of every nation in Europe! And it is against such men I warn you.

Are any of you oppressed with poverty, disease, and wretchedness? Let none of these men beguile you of your belief that “ God is, and that he is the rewarder “ of them that diligently seek him,”—the protestor of “ them that trust in him.”—Are any of you afflicted in mind, despairing of mercy through the multitude of your sins? Let none of these men stagger your per- suasion that the gospel is true; for therein you will read that “ Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners,”—repent, and the gospel will give you conso- lation. Are any of you prosperous in your circum- stances, and easy in your consciences? Let none of these men, by declaiming against defects in our con- stitution, or abuses in government, betray you into an opinion that, were the present order of things over- turned, a better might, by their counsels, be establish- ed;