‘ 
226 = =©6©Extracts from the Port-folio of a Man of Letters. [April 1, 
The Christian heart reveres the sclemn 
sound, 
And deeply humbled, treads the sacred 
ground ! 
Owns the injunction’s undisputed claim 
Its awful import, and its glorious aim. 
But here a difference mutual zeal excites, 
You plead for outward, we for mental, rites. 
We think the Gospel’s hallowed page in- 
spires 
Superior efforts, nor one type requires 
Since no lavations can effectual prove 
The innate stains of nature to remove. 
No mode of words can Heavenly Grace im- 
part 
To an infantile and unconscious heart: 
We hence, as vain and useless, disallow 
- The faithless surety and unbinding vow; 
As being shadows which men may observe, 
Yet from the substance’ in their conduct 
swerve. 
Whilst superstitious rites their time divide, 
They cease to follow virtue as their guide: 
Misled by canons, and the various rules 
OF councils, synods, colleges, and schools. 
Thus might mankind, for some an ample 
field, 
To circumcision’s ancient custom yield: 
Or, humbly prostrate in the public street, 
With blind devotion wash each other’s feet. 
*Tis thus that holiness to form gives place, 
And solemn trifling frustrates Christian grace. 
In Jordan’s pool, well pleas’d, th’Almighty 
saw 
His Son belov’d, submitting to the law : 
But his Apostles through the world he sent, 
With a baptizing power beyond th’element. 
‘This power does all true ministry attend, 
*T was promis’d, and will never have an end: 
This mighty power his herald did proclaim, 
«¢ He shall baptize you with a holy flame.” 
Tho’ water was in use, an acient rite, - 
Allow’d the common way to proselyte 5 
Yet no dependence plac’d thereon you'll 
see, 
And Paul and Peter in that point agree. _ 
Thus real Christians, with illumin’d thought, 
View truth unbiass’s, as its author taught. 
No temporary shadows are rever’d, 
Where their immortal substance has appeéar’d. 
Fox preach’d this doctrine to a seeking age ; 
- it shines in Barclay’s unrefuted page. 
¥ g 
Simple their scheme, no mean seli-love they 
knew, 
But freely preach’d without a sordid view; ~ 
With hearts devoted, Gospel truths sisplay’d, 
And scorn’d to make Divinity a trde. 
No juggling arts are us’d, no low disguise, 
O’er obvious texts and sense to tyrannize. ' 
Discerning truth by its own native light, 
They-by its guidance practis’d what was right. 
This state attain’d, external rites no more 
Require observance, as in days of yore. 
°Tis Grace alone, we by experience find, 
Imparts instruction to th’ attentive mind 5 
Convicts of error, and restrains irom sin, 
For what thes¢ are it manifests within: 
Each wayward passion by its aid subdu’d, 
The soul’s enthron’d in native rectituies 
Cleans’d from its stains,. and sprinki’d froma ~ 
above, . 
With pure descendings of attoning love. 
If short of this, redemption we may find, 
Then Christ by figure only sav’d mankind. _ 
Let this alone my suppliant spirit crave, 
Since but one Lord, ene faith, one baptism, 
can save. 
Extraéts from the Pori-folio of a Man of Letters. 
—— a 
Original Letter from Arthur Bedford 
to Dr. Charlet, relating to the founda- 
tion of a Syriac Professorship in the 
Oniversity of Oxford. 
Newton St. Loe, Dec. 11,1719. 
« REVEREND SIR, 
5g: INTENDED to have given you 
some account of the nature and 
usefulness of the Chaldee and Syriack 
languages; but, since all that I can say, 
and more than can be comprehended in 
a letter, is contained in Mr. Ockley’s In- 
troduction to the Oriental Languages, in 
the Appendix to the Polyglott Bible, and 
in the Appendix to Bishop Beveridge’s 
Syriack Grammar, I must desire.to be €x- 
cused and refer you thither. 
¢ T cannot but highly approve of the 
design of founding a professorship in Ox- 
ford, for the Syriack language; and have 
reason te hope, what I heartily wish, that 
> 
the pious and charitable benefactor, who 
promotes the study of that language 
which our blessed Saviour spoke when he 
was on earth, will hear him say, ‘ Come, 
ye blessed,’ at his return from heaven. 
“ The manner how such a design may 
be made most useful, ean be better 
concerted among those who are skilled 
in those studies, in so famous an Univer- 
sity as Oxford is. But since you were 
pleased to desire an account thereof 
from me, I shall,‘ with submission to 
their judgement, give you my thoughts 
chergoe : ee ; i 
“ T believe that it would be better to 
settle a professor of the Chaldee and Sy- 
riack lancuage, than of the Syriack alone; 
.“ For first: the Chaldee and Syriack 
differing little more than the fonick and 
Dorick dialects among the Greeks, may 
easily be carried on by the same profes- 
ears 
