Ixxji P Pv E F A G E. 



iny memory being impaired, more I believe by committing my thougbts 

 fo mucb to writing rban by age, wben I want to enjoy over again any 

 jpeculation wbicb once gave me pleafure, or to find out upon wbat 

 .authority I have advanced certain fads and arguments, I have recourfe 

 to the works I liave printed, of which I have a much readier ufe 

 than of thofe that are lying by me in manufcript. I have therefore 

 no reafon to accufe the Public of ingratitude, however ill they may 

 receive my work ; and the Gentlemen .Reviewers arc at full liberty 

 to reproach me, as I hear fome of them do, with the fmall demand that 

 there is for my works, or to blame me for preferring the old mufty phi- 

 lofophers to fuch a philofopher of this age as Mr. David Hume; and to 

 obfcrve that my ftyle is not elevated \ by which I underftand that they 

 judge of ftyles as Mr. Bayes does in the Rehearfal, and only praife a 

 ftyle that elevates ajid fur prizes ; whereas I am contented if my ftyle 

 be fimple and natural, without any other ornament befides propriety 

 and pcrfpicuity. Such readers and critics will pardon me, if I neither 

 fuit my matter to their capacity, nor my ftyle to their tafte ; for my 

 work is not at all of the popular kind, and fuch is the fafliionable tafte 

 of writing at prefent, that if it pleafed much, I fliould be afraid it re- 

 fembled fome late publications that have had a great vogue. There are 

 however certain critics, fome of whom I have the honour and pleafure 

 of knowing, who, if they did not approve of my matter and ftyle in 

 general, though they may differ from me in fundry particulars, I 

 fhould indeed be foundly mortified. Of my intention in writing, I 

 think it is impoflible but that every good man muft approve, fmce 

 it is no other, than, firft, to put dov/n that matcrialifm, which, 

 if it go on, will put an end to the belief of a God, at leaft among thofe 

 who think thcmfelves Philofophers, and then to ftiew that the Pro- 

 vidence of God is over all His works, the moral as well as the natural 

 world, and that it is as confiftent with His wifdom and goodnefs, that 

 the fpecies man ftiould decay and decline, as that the individual ftiould 

 do fo, and that both are equally neceffaiy in the fyftem of the 

 . Univerfe. 



