Truth of; and therefore for that Reafon, they will disbelieve that, and all Revealed Religion. Now fome of these Gentlemen, being Men of Parts and Letters, and able to manage an Argument, they generally fet upon Jome unlearned Chriftian; they puzzle and confound him with Philofophick Terms and Experiments, and with a Set of Fefts and Bantering Expreffions against Scripture; and when thus they have beat the poor Man out of his Road, they think they have for ever triumphed over Chriftianity. -Pudet hæc opprobria nobis, Thefe Confiderations have put me upon Writing the following Dialogues, and have encouraged me to confider the chief of their Arguments, which they are wont to make ufe of in their Difcourfe, or which have been published of late in Atheistical Wrie tings: To the End that well-meaning and religious Men, whofe Leifure or Education will not let them fearch fo narrowly into thefe Difputes, may from this Treatife Treatife be furnished with fufficient Anfwers to fuch Infidel Arguments. Now thefe Objections are part of them taken from the Difcourfe of fome Deifts, whom I bave cafually converfed with; but mostly out of a Book published fome Tears ago, called Oracles of Reafon, the firft Book I ever faw which did openly avow Infidelity. As for the Objections I have taken out of that Book, I have not always kept my Self strictly to the Words I found there, but chiefly to the Senfe; because otherwife, fometimes the Argument would be too long, and fometimes too obfcure: And I have generally dreffed up the Arguments with that little varnish, which they ufually appear in from the Mouths of Infidels; because for the most Part their frothy Wit is the principal Part of their Objection and therefore I have made Philologus talk all along in their Vein, left otherways they might pretend the Argument was marred. And this I hope will Excufe me to pious Ears, for those bold and irreligious Expreffions, they will meet withal in the Mouth of my Deift; A 4 which which they must confider are not mine, but theirs; and when repeated in the Perfon of an Infidel, I hope will not appear grating or profane. For after all the Objections which I have beard against fuch a free Way of urging the Theiftical Arguments in Dialogue, I still think it is more like to da good among Infidels, than a methodical Difcourfe, ranged into Chapter and Secti on; for those that are tainted with these Opinions, are generally a fort of faftidious Students, who though they talk much, read but very little, and every Thing which is defigned for their Use must be attempered to their Palates, to make it go down with them. Now the dialogical Way of all others is most apt to excite Attention, by conftantly Springing up new Objections, which fet a continual Edge upon the Mind, and make it eager to Jee them removed; fo that the Author. of a Dialogue has this Advantage a bove others, that he carries the Reader's Thoughts always fresh along with him, which are generally loft, or at least often grow languid in a continued Dif courfe courfe of any confiderable Length. I have not indeed brought in fuch fre quent Interlocutions as are requifite for a juft Dialogue, like thofe of Plato and Lucian; for that would have taken up a great deal more Paper to little Purpofe, only to please a few curious Criticks; and at last the Argument would be but the more obfcured by it. And on the other fide I have avoided the dry Method of the fcholaftick Objection and Solution; where the Objection is proposed without any Manner of Life, only in order to be refuted; which can never be pleasant to the Reader, whe at first Sight fees that the Author Sets it up only as a Man of Straw, which when he fights with, he fhall be fure to get the better of. I have therefore made ufe of the middle Way, in clothing the Objections in fuch a Drefs, as two Men that had a Mind to convince one another, can be fuppofed to use. And this is the Pattern which the best of Writers, Cicero, in his Philofophical Tracts, has fet us; whofe very Faults I Ahould never be afbamed to imitate. As in As to thofe Tragical Exclamations which fome honeft People have made, concerning my urging the Infidels Arguments with that little Wit and Brisknefs, with which they are ufually talked in; and putting Some Expreffions my Deift's Mouth, which reflect upon Chriftianity; I cannot, upon the moft ferious Confideration, approve their Zeal: For when I was to write a Dialogue upon this Subject, I must make the Theift fay fomething or other; and I think I Should but little have observed the Rules of Decency, to have made the Infidel talk in the Language of a grave Theologue. For, I am fure, if I had done fo, I had made more People laugh at me, than now I have made angry. Befides, I have the whole World before me for Precedents in this Matter. Thofe Atheistical Profopopœa's, which are brought in by Solomon in Ecclefiaftes, are urged with a peculiar Poignancy of Wit, which the Atheists of all Times have endeavoured to excel in. And Cicero, in his Book de Natura Deorum, frames the |