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ceives, with Socrates, that nothing could be more 

 desirable than that the Eternal should break the 

 silence of nature, and proclaim His character and 

 His will to His rational offspring. He is thus 

 prepared for receiving the truths of revelation. 



Now, in examining the scriptures, which pro- 

 fess to contain communications from Heaven, 

 we find a most striking analogy between these 

 communications and the ordinary operations of 

 Providence ; and, what is more, they afford the 

 very information of which we are in want, and 

 fill up the blank which we discovered in the vo- 

 lume of nature, It is on this view that Butler 

 has founded his celebrated argument in favour 

 of revealed religion ; and assuredly it is an argu- 

 ment well calculated to arrest the attention and 

 allay the doubts of a sceptical rnirid. A philoso- 

 pher speculating in his closet on the Divine at- 

 tributes, comes naturally to the conclusion, that 

 a Being of infinite perfection can leave nothing 

 imperfect in His works ; but when he descends 

 from these high arid abstract musings into the 

 realities of the world in which he lives, an order 

 of things opens to his view, very different from 

 that which he had been led to anticipate. There 

 is a distinct arid strikingly peculiar character in- 

 scribed on creation. It is a stupendous system, 

 consistent and uniform indeed in itself, but very 

 far from being deducible from CL priori argu- 

 ments, or consonant to preconceived opinions. 

 In deriving our ideas of the Creator from the 

 character of Himself which He has caused to be 



