300 Education, 



called,*" describe in such glowing colours, and ex- 

 pect with so much confidence. The believers in 

 the former expect it to be produced by the preva- 

 lence of that divine illumination, and that evange- 

 lical holmess which have already been found so 

 transcendantly efficacious in promoting the virtue 

 and happiness of men, notwithstanding the obsta- 

 cles which have stood in the way of their benign 

 operation ; while Helvetius, Condorcet, God- 

 win, and their disciples, expect every thing to be 

 accomplished by the progress of knowledge, which 

 has been so thoroughly tried, and proved so la- 

 mentably ineffectual. The Millennium of scripture 

 is represented as a period of knowledge, benevo- 

 lence, peace, purity, and universal holiness; but 

 the millennium depicted in philosophic dreams, is 

 an absurd portrait of knowledge without real 

 wisdom, of benevolence without piety, and of 

 purity and happiness without genuine virtue. 



It will be readily granted, indeed, to the advo- 

 cates of this delusive system, that education is ex- 

 tremely powerful; that much of the difference we 

 observe in the talents and dispositions of men is 

 to be ascribed to its efficacy; and that the lovers 

 of knowledge may be expected hereafter to make 

 such improvements in literature, such discoveries 

 in science, and such useful reforms in the plans 

 of instruction, as exceedingly to promote the gene- 

 ral improvement of man. But before the doctrine 

 of perfectibility can be adopted, the nature of man 

 must be totally changed; his present habits and 

 wants must cease; and he must become a being of 

 an essentially different character from that which 

 his Creator has given him. The husbandman, by 

 skilful and patient culture, may highly improve the 



m It is to be regretted that the word philosophy, so noble and elevated 

 in its original and only pioper meaning, should be so often prostituted by 

 ,.n application to the reveries of pride, ignorance and vanity. 



