or denied in others. But it should be remembered how much he wrote during a life in itself not long, and, in its circumstances, by no means favourable to active research or calm reasoning. Nor can it be a subject of surprise, that a poor and oppressed man should be sometimes hurried too far in opposition to his persecutors, or that one who had so little leisure for the correction of his works, should occasionally be found to contradict or repeat himself.

'I have already had occasion to point out the versatility of his talents, which, though uniformly exerted on subjects appropriate to his profession, are distinguished, where such weapons are needed, by irony and caustic humour, as well as by those milder and sublimer beauties of style and sentiment, which are his more familiar and distinguishing characteristics. Yet to such weapons he has never recourse wantonly or rashly. Nor do I recollect any instance, in which he has employed them in the cause of private or personal, or even polemical hostility, or any occasion where their fullest severity was not justified and called for by crimes, by cruelty, by interested superstition, or base and sordid hypocrisy. His satire was always kept in check by the depth and fervour of his religious feelings, his charity, and his humility. It is on devotional and moral subjects, however, that the peculiar character of his mind is most, and most successfully developed. To this service he devotes his most glowing language; to this his aptest illustrations; his thoughts, and his words,

at once burst into a flame, when touched by the coals. of this altar; and whether he describes the duties, or dangers, or hopes of man, or the mercy, power, and justice of the Most High; whether he exhorts or instructs his brethren, or offers up his supplications in their behalf to the common Father of all,-his conceptions and his expressions belong to the loftiest and most sacred description of poetry, of which they only want, what they cannot be said to need, the name and the metrical arrangement.

It is this distinctive excellence, still more than the other qualifications of learning and logical acuteness, which has placed him, even in that age of gigantic talent, on an eminence superior to any of his immediate cotemporaries; which has exempted him from the comparative neglect, into which the dry and repulsive learning of Andrews and Sanderson has fallen;-which has left behind the acuteness of Hales, and the imaginative and copious eloquence of Bishop Hall, at a distance hardly less than the cold elegance of Clarke, and the dull good sense of Tillotson; and has seated him, by the almost unanimous estimate of posterity, on the same lofty elevation of Hooker and with Barrow.

Of such a triumvirate, who shall settle the precedence? Yet it may, perhaps, be not far from the truth, to observe, that Hooker claims the foremost rank in sustained and classic dignity of style, in political and pragmatical wisdom; that to Barrow the praise must

be assigned of the closest and the clearest views, and of a taste the most controlled and chastened; but that in imagination, in interest, in that which more properly and exclusively deserves the name of genius, Taylor is to be placed before either. The first awes most, the second convinces most, the third persuades and delights the most; and, (according to the decision of one, whose own rank among the ornaments of English literature yet remains to be determined by posterity,) Hooker is the object of our reverence, Barrow of our admiration, and Jeremy Taylor of our love.'

ON THE

DIFFERENCES OF OPINION

AMONG CHRISTIANS.

FROM THE LIBERTY OF PROPHESYING.

THE infinite variety of opinions in matters of religion, as they have troubled Christendom with interests, factions, and partialities; so have they caused great divisions of the heart, and variety of thoughts and designs amongst pious and prudent men. For they all, seeing the inconveniences which the disunion of persuasions and opinions have produced directly or accidentally, have thought themselves obliged to stop this inundation of mischiefs, and have made attempts accordingly. But it hath happened to most of them, as to a mistaken physician, who gives excellent physic but misapplies it, and so misses of his cure; so have these men, their attempts have therefore been ineffectual ; for they put their help to a wrong part, or they have endeavoured to cure the symptoms, and have let the