SECTION III. 270 s1igion, you grant there is no salvation. But may not a deist be as sincere and upright as a christian, both in the searching out his religion, and in the ;practice of it? The great God who cre- ated us, knows the frailty of our natures, he sees the prejudices with which we are surrounded, and the weaknesses to which we are continually exposed, and if he will make allowances to chris- tians in the practice of'their religion, why may we not suppose, his merciful nature will incline him to make the same compas- sionate allowances to the sincere and honest infidels, while they are seeking after the right way to please him. I answer, First. The light of evidence and the force of argument, wherewith the gospel issurrounded in the present age, seems to me to be so strong and convincing, that. I cannot but . say there is great reason to doubt, whether in the enlightened. towns and cities of Great Britain, there can any man live anddie an honest and sincere unbeliever, that is, whether any man who bath a mind sincerely ready to submit to evidence, and hath used his utmost diligence in searching out the truth, can always re- main a professed infidel ; this I have intimated before, and I shall give the reasons of this opinion more plainly under the next question. But I proceed now to a second answer : The chris- tian who feels and mourns thus over the weakness of human na- ture, the strength and bias of the passions, the powerful preju- dices which stand round us, and the many frailties that attend and defile our best endeavours has greatly the advantage of the infidel in this case. For the bible, which . we believe to be the word of God, is thebook of his grace, and there he has promised favour to the upright, he has taught us what a door of mercy he has opened for repentance, under our returning frailties, and what compassionate allowances he will make for the transgres- sions and failings, and lamented weaknesses of 'those who are in the main, sincere and diligent 'in their service of God; and it is in these promises the christian finds hope : But the light of na- ture and reason, which is the only hope and refuge of the deist, can never give solid rest and peace to his soul, under a sense of these frailties ; for it cannot assure him that God will make any of these allowances,or that he will accept of any repentance. The great and holy God, who sees all the vicious turnings of our spirits, whether we be deists or christians, and who beholds all the criminal inclinations, and false biasses which our minds have indulged, can discover all these in a glaring light to the eye of our souls, and lay us under the evident and heavy con- demnation of our own consciences. Now when this is done, the deist beingmade deeply sensible of the defects and flaws of his own sincerity, throughout the coarse of his life, has nothing to plead or hope but unpromised and tuicovenanted mercy : The christian sees and confesses himself guilty before God, repents
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