venture to proceed a Step farther? Methinks I fee your thoughtful penetrating Genius at a great Difficulty ; retreat you cannot, as a Philofopher :-Advance you dare not, as a good Chriftian. Methinks I hear you fay, or I am fure you think, with a Kind of religious Horror-What then must be the Confequence !— If they are immaterial and fpiritual, they muft, by unavoidable Confequence, be immortal, which has. been generally the Medium to prove the Immortality of human Souls, which has the terrible Appearance of philofophical Herefy.-Courage, Madam,never fear; we will pursue this Thought no farther than we have the Light of Reason and Revelation to guide us; wherever that fails to direct us, we will be content to fit down in Ignorance and Darkness, and it must be our own Fault, if we go wrong under fuch Direction.-It has been an invariable Rule with me, in all Cafes, (Love and Politics always excepted) never to ftifle a certain Truth, for fear of Confequences. Juft and honeft Premises are a Kind of loving Things, which never fail to beget juft and honeft Conclufions, which, being the legitimate Offspring of virtuous Parents and Heirs-apparent to the found and virtuous Conftitution of their Progenitors, cannot fail to fubfift upon the Integrity of the Family; therefore e'en let them turn out, and shift for themselves.

Why, fay you, will you dare to pronounce that the Souls of Brutes are immortal! No, truly, Madam, not I; but you fhall pronounce for yourself, according to the Evidence that shall be given. Pray what think you was their original State and Condition in their firft happy Settlement in Paradise, when all the Works of God were pronounced to be very good? Will you

fay

fay they were mortal? Could any Creature be mor→

tal before Death entered into the World? And was not Death the immediate, the neceffary, Confequence of Sin? So the Apostle tells us, Rom. v. 12. By one Man Sin entered into the World, and Death by Sin. And was not Sin an accidental Tranfgreffion of the Law of God, a Violation of the Laws of Truth and Order, a Breach of the Harmony of Nature, and, by confequence, a Contradiction to the Will of the Creator? Now, if Death was the Confequence of Sin, the Effect of the Tranfgreffion, which we are affured of, both by Reason and Revelation, is it confiftent either with Philofophy or Religion, to suppose that the Effect should precede the Cause, that the Execution should anticipate the Sentence of Condemnation, and the Sentence the Tranfgreffion? In this View of the Cafe, therefore, there feems to be a ftrong Prefumption, that, in the Intention of their Creator in their original Frame, and their Relation to the universal System, they were to be Partakers of that Blessing and Immortality which was the Privilege of the whole Creation, till Man, by his Difobedience, forfeited it for himfelf, and, by confequence, for them. Can any Man prefume to fay, that infinite Wisdom created any thing in vain? That, in the infinite Variety of Creatures, there was fo much as one that was fuperfluous or useless? That he who proportioned and formed the whole Syftem in Number, Weight, and Meafure, Wifd. xi. 20. did not intend even the minutest Portion of it to be a Monument of his infinite Wifdom and Goodnefs, by contributing to the Beauty, the Order, and Harmony of the whole? And if the Prefervation of the Species was neceffary to perpetuate

the

the Harmony of the whole, what probable or por fible Reason can be affigned for the Deftruction of the Individuals? I am apt to believe it will be difficult to affign any that will not as ftrongly conclude against the Individuals of our own Species, as of any other, and what Occafion can there be for indulging bold Conjectures, and ftriking out new Hypothefes, to depreciate the Wifdom, debafe the Goodnefs, and limit the Power of the Almighty, and all this to folve Difficulties, and anfwer Objections, proceeding purely from Prejudice, and Ignorance of the Divine Wisdom and Power. The Mercies of God are over all bis Works. He made them all to be happy, as exquifitely happy, as infinite Goodness, Wisdom, and Power could make them, and their Rank and State in Nature was capable of receiving; and it is not owing to any Mutability in the Counfels of God, to any Fault of their own, that they have loft any Degree of that Happiness they were created to enjoy ; but it is the fatal and neceffary Confequence of the Relation. they stood in to their unhappy rebellious Lord, and the dreadful Confufion which his Difobedience has brought upon the whole vifible Creation, who were thereby made fubject to Vanity, i. e. Pain and Misery, Corruption and Death. Rom. viii. 20. Do but examine your own compassionate Heart, ine, Do you not think it a Breach of natural Juftice, wantonly, and without Neceffity, to torment, much more to take away, the Life of any Creature, except for the Prefervation and Happiness of our own Being; which, in our prefent State of Enmity and Difcord, is fometimes unavoidable? I know you do: And can you think that infinite Mercy, who made

and tell

them

them to be happy, could, in the primary Intention of their Nature, refolve to deprive them of that Happiness (or at least a Poffibility of recovering it again) by an utter Extinction of their Being? If you or I could be fso happy as to be able to build a House, to lay out a Garden, to contrive a Machine, to draw a Picture, to compose a Poem, or a Piece of Music, fo exquifitely perfect, that all the Connoiffeurs in the several Arts could not be able to correct, or Envy itself to cenfure, I dare answer for you, as well as for myself, that we fhould be as ambitious to preferve, as we were to produce, them; and think it the highest Felicity to be able to perpetuate the Works of our Hands, or the Labour of our Brains, by making them immortal. To build up, only in order to pull down; to produce, or create, in order to deftroy; in fhort, to do, and to undo, without an apparent Neceffity, is a Reflection upon common Sense; and shall we, dare we, impute to infinite Wifdom, Goodness, and Power an Infirmity which a Man of common Senfe would blush to be guilty of? Were we the Owners of Animals, in their several Kinds perfectly useful, beautiful, and good, fhould we not be follicitous for their Prefervation, much lefs fhould we wantonly destroy them? But farther yet, Were we the Creators of those Animals, had we brought them into Being by the mightiest Efforts of human Benevolence, Wifdom, and Power, fhould we not watch over them with the most endearing Marks of Tenderness and Affection? And can we (a Race of evil, weak, and partial Creatares) have more Regard for our own Works than the Almighty has for his? Much less can we prefume to fay, that we have more Compassion

for

for any of his Creatures than he that made them, 2 Efd. v. 33. And if our own Hearts affure us, that we would not wantonly torment or deftroy any of God's Creatures, it will, I think, amount almoft to a Demonstration, that the Father of Mercies will not caufelefly destroy the Work of his own Hands, or put an end to the Being of any Creature, whom he created capable of eternal Happiness.

But I expect you will tell me, as many grave Authors of great Learning and little Understanding have done before you, that there is not even the Appearance of Injuftice or Cruelty in this Procedure; that, if the Brutes themselves had Power to speak, to complain, to appeal to a Court of Juftice, and plead their own Caufe, they could have no juft Reafon for Complaint: This you may fay, but I know you too well to believe you think so; but it is an Objection thrown in your Way by some serious Writers upon this Subject; they tell you that their Existence was given them upon this very Condition, that it should be temporary and fhort; that after they had fluttered, or crept, or swam, or walked about their respective Elements for a little Seafon, they fhould be fwept away by the Hand of Violence, or the Course of Nature, into an intire Extinction of Being, to make room for their Succeffors in the fame Circle of Vanity and Corruption. But pray who told them fo? Where did they learn this Philosophy? Does either Reason or Revelation give the least Countenance to fuch a bold Affertion? So far from it, that it seems a direct Contradiction to both. The wife Preacher has given us a deeper and fafer Foundation for our Philofophy, Ecclef. iii. 14. I know that whatsoever God doeth, it

fball