500 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF THE LATE REV. DR CHALMERS. 
of human intellects. In the dedication of his Bridgewater Treatise to the BisHop 
of Lonpon, he thus expressed his admiration: ‘I have derived greater aid from 
the views and reasonings of Bishop Butter, than I have been able to find besides 
in the whole range of our existent authorship.” On one occasion, when some 
person present was animadverting upon the wealth of the Church of England, and 
gave, as an example of its over-abundance, the revenues of the See of Durham, the 
Doctor exclaimed, with characteristic eagerness, “Sir, if all that has been re- 
ceived for the Bishopric of Durham since the foundation of the See, were set down 
as payment for BuTLer’s Analogy, I should esteem it a cheap purchase.” We are 
not to consider his admiration of BuTLER’s works as proceeding from the same- 
ness or resemblance of their mode of reasoning, but rather from the difference. 
ButLer excogitated masses of profound thought, and left them nearly as raw ma- 
terial, costly indeed, but not elaborated for use, except for the purpose of furnishing 
him with examples of analogy between natural and revealed theology. CHALMERS 
found, in this storehouse, abundant substance for practical application to the busi- 
ness and improvement of life. He polished and carved, and adjusted the stone 
which he had dug from the quarry. And thus, both as an able quarryman, and 
as an accomplished dresser, he has erected graceful, durable, and useful edifices 
for mankind. His method of exhibiting truths, in so many and in such attractive 
positions, has deeply impressed the minds of thousands, not only of those who 
were amongst his stated hearers as pupils, but amongst readers of his works ge- 
nerally. Although Dr CHaumers’ mode of treating his subjects was such as I 
have described, and though his usual mode of handling was to exhibit one great 
and leading topic, illustrated and enforced with all the profusion and imagery of 
a rich fancy and a powerful imagination, we should, at the same time, observe 
that the method is frequently applied with great ability, and with great effect in 
bringing forward two ideas where one is required to check or modify an exclusive 
attention to the other. Thus, for instance, in his Sermons, though he dwells upon 
the doctrine of the corruption of human nature, and the utter insufficiency of all 
mere natural efforts to merit the Divine favour, and to claim a reward at God’s 
hand, he runs, as it were, parallel with this great truth another truth, equally im- 
portant and equally authoritative, viz., that virtue in itself is beautiful, that the 
generous affections and good feelings must not be undervalued or depreciated, 
but are, in fact, desirable and estimable in their own place and their own charac- 
ter, and require only the right motives to render them acceptable. I know no 
writer who has more successfully elaborated this important subject. He has shewn 
the harmony and consistency of the two doctrines. He has upheld and vindicated 
the dignity and the loveliness of virtue. He has cut away all ground of merit and of 
human dessert before God. In the same manner, as a predestinarian, he has ably 
and powerfully (in some instances sternly) put forward the proofs of God’s pre- 
science and omnipotence over all his works; but, in conjunction with that great 
truth, he has upheld, with unflinching fidelity, the necessity of human exertion, 




