The present is by no means an age for indulging ignorance. A person, who thinks to have any credit among mankind, or to make any figure in conversation, must absolutely resolve to take some pains in improving himself. We find more true knowledge at present in shops and counting houses, than could have been found an age or two ago in universities. For the bulk of the knowledge of those times consisted in subtle distinctions, laborious disquisitions, and endless disputes about words. The universal diffusion of knowledge, which we observe at present among all ranks of people, took its rise from the publishing those admirable essays, the Spectator, Tatler, and Guardian, in which learned subjects were, by the elegant and ingenious authors, cleared from the scholastic rubbish of Latin and logic, represented in a familiar style, and treated in a manner which people of plain common sense might comprehend. The practice of exhibiting courses of experiments in London, and other great cities, which was first introduced by Whiston, Disaguliers, and others, has likewise greatly contributed to the spreading a taste for knowledge among the trading people, who now talk familiarly of things, their grandfathers would have thought it as much as their credit was worth to have been thought to know.

There is indeed greater danger, lest the flood of luxury and vice, which overruns the nation, go on increasing, till it destroys all that is truly noble and valuable in the people. I need not say danger. There is not the least doubt but the debauchery of modern times will shortly make an end, either of the nation or of itself. The histories of all the states of former times, where luxury has prevailed, sufficiently show what we have to expect. However, at present, it is absolutely necessary, in order to be on a footing with others, that we take a little pains to improve ourselves, especially in those parts of knowledge which enter commonly into conversation, as morals, history, and physiology.

Nothing makes a greater difference between one being and another, than different degrees of knowledge. The mind of an ignorant person is an absolute void. That of a wrongheaded person may be compared to a town sack, ed by an enemy, where all is overturned, and nothing in

its proper state or place. That of a wise man is a magazine richly furnished. Their important truths are stored up in such regular arrangement, that reflection sees at once through a whole series of subjects, and observes distinctly their relations and connexions. We may consider the mind of an angelic being as a vast palace, in which are various magazines stored with sublime truths, the contemplation of whose connexions, relations, and various beauties, must afford a happiness to us inconceivable.— The Divine mind (if it may be allowed us to attempt to form any faint idea of the Original of all perfection) may be considered as the immense and unbounded treasure of all truth, where the original ideas of all things that ever have been, that now are, and that ever shall be, or that are barely possible, are continually present; the continual contemplation of which infinitude of things, with the infinite beauties resulting from their various relations and connexions, must (if we may take the liberty of the expres sion) afford infinite entertainment and delight.

Thus, in proportion to the rank which any being holds in the universe, such are his views and his comprehension of things. And I know not whether the difference be greater betwixt the most enlightened of our species, and the lowest order of angelic beings; than downward from the most knowing of our species to the most ignorant. To compare an illiterate clown, or even a nobleman sunk in sensuality and ignorance, (for it is the same thing whether you choose out of the great vulgar or the small) with a Newton or a Clarke; to compare, I say, two minds, of which the one is wholly blind and insensible to every thing above the mere animal functions, of which a brute is as capable as he ; and the other is raised habitually above the regards of sense, and is employed in the contemplation of great and sublime truths, in searching into the glo. rious works of his Almighty Maker in the natural world, and his profound scheme of government in the moral, and, by the force of a stupendous sagacity, is able, to penetrate into, and lay open to others, truths seemingly beyond human reach; by knowing more of the Divine works, is capable of forming more just conceptions of the glori ous Author of all, and consequently of paying him a more rational obedience and devotion, of approaching nearer to

him; to compare two minds so immensely different in their capacities and endowments, what likeness appears to determine us to regard them as of the same species, and not rather to pronounce the one an angel, and the other a brute?

We see, therefore, that though there may be no room for pride or self-conceit on account of our attainments in knowledge, since the highest pitch we can possibly soar to, will be but inconsiderable in comparison with what we never can reach; yet there is a great deal of room for laudable ambition; since we see it is possible to excel the bulk of our species, for any thing we know, almost as much as an angel does a brute.

All endowments and acquisitions must have a beginning. Time was, when Sir Isaac Newton did not know the letters of the alphabet. And the time may, and, no doubt will come, when the meanest of my readers, if he makes a proper use of the natural abilities, and providential advantages given him, and studies to gain his favour, in whose disposal all gifts and endowments are, will exceed not only the pitch to which the above-mentioned pro. digy of our species reached, but will rise to a station above that which the highest archangel in heaven fills at present, though the distance must still continue. And no one knows what immense advantage it may be of, to have endeavoured, even in this imperfect state, to get our minds opened, by the access of new ideas and views; to have habituated ourselves to examine, to compare, to reflect, and distinguish. It is evident that all these exer cises of the understanding must be absolutely necessary in any future state whatever, for enlarging the sphere of our knowledge, and ennobling our minds. And what an advantage must it be for future states to have begun the work here that is to be carried on to eternity? To what end does religion, and even reason direct us to mortify our passions and appetites, to habituate our minds to the contemplation of those high and heavenly things we hope to come one day to the enjoyment of? No doubt, it is ne. cessary, in the nature of things, that our minds, in their present infant state (as this may very properly be called) be formed and disciplined, by custom and habit, to that temper and character, which is to be hereafter their glory,

their perfection, and their happiness. Transfer the view from practice to knowledge, and you will find, that the analogy will hold good there likewise. It is necessary that we cultivate to the utmost all the faculties of our souls in the present state, in order to their arriving at higher degrees of perfection hereafter. And no rational mind ever will, or can rise to any high degree of perfection in any state whatever, and continue in ignorance. For if the definition of a rational mind be, "A being endowed with understanding and will," (I mention only the two principal faculties) there is no doubt but it is equally necessary to the perfection, and consequently to the happiness of every rational being, that its understanding be enlarged and improved by knowledge, as that its will be formed and directed by a sense of duty. To put the matter upon its proper footing, we ought to consider the improvement of every faculty of our minds as a part of virtue, of which afterwards. And in doing so, we shall find, that there ought to be no distinction between the love of knowl edge and of virtue; it being evident, that the proper improvement and due conduct of the understanding is an indispensable part of the duty of every rational being. Just sentiments of the supreme governor of the world, of our own nature and state, of the fitness and propriety of moral good, and the fatal effects of irregularity, are the only sure foundation of goodness. Now, to attain full and clear notions of these, it will be necessary to make pretty extensive inquiries, to carry our researches a considerable way into the works of God, from whence we draw the clearest conceptions of his nature and attributes; to study our own nature and state, with the various passions, appetites, and inclinations which enter into our constitution; the connexions and relations we stand in to one another; and the different natures and consequences of actions, according to the motives they spring from, and the circumstances which diversify them. All this, I say, will be of immense advantage for raising us above vice, and confirming us in a steady course of virtue, which is the direct tendency of all true knowledge, and the effect it never fails to produce in every honest and uncorrupted mind.

And though it must be owned, that an illiterate daylabourer who earns his living by hedging and ditching,

who is devout toward his God, and benevolent to his neighbour, is a much nobler and more valuable being in the sight of his Maker, than the most accomplished courtier, who supports his grandeur by the wages of iniquity; nay, though it is evident, that great knowledge will even make a wicked being the worse, as it enables him to be more extensively wicked; it does not therefore follow, that knowledge is of no consequence to virtue; but only that vice is of so fatal and destructive a nature, as to poison and pervert the best things where it enters. If the above day-labourer, by the mere goodness of his heart, may be acceptable to God, and esteemed by all good men, how much higher might he have risen, with the addition of extensive improvements in knowledge? Could ever a Woolaston or a Cudworth have formed such just, or such sublime notions of virtue and of spiritual things? Could they ever have arrived at the pitch of goodness themselves reached, or could they have represented it in the amiable lights they have done, so as to gain others to the study and practice of it, without extensively improved abilities?

Enough, methinks, has therefore been said to invite readers, especially the younger sort, to engage in the truly noble and worthy labour of improving their minds, rather than indulging their senses: of cultivating the immortal part, rather than pampering the body; of aspiring to a resemblance of the nature of angels, rather than sinking themselves to the rank of brutes.

It is amazing and delightful to consider, what seemingly difficult things are done by means of human knowledge, sc..nty and confined as it is. The wonders performed by means of reading and writing are so striking, that some karned men have given it as their opinion, that the whole was communicated to mankind originally by some superior being. That by means of the various compositions of about twenty different articulations of the human voice, performed by the assistance of the lungs, the glottis, the tongue, the lips, and the teeth, ideas of all sensible and intelligible objects in nature, in art, in science, in history, in morals, in supernaturals, should be communicable from one mind to another; and again, that signs should be contrived, by which those articulations of the human voice should be expressed, so as to be communicable from one