IN the present state of literature, I am doubtful
whether it be an evidence of merit, that a fourth edition of this book is called for. The popularity which the dullest performances can, under certain circumstances, obtain, robs my friend Mr. OLIVEBRANCH of this ground of self-commendation; or, at best, leaves it very equivocal. The absence of those circumstances, which bring to the productions of the day their popularity, should be shown, before this testimony is cleared of its ambiguity, and public favour becomes an argument of genuine desert. These papers will demonstrate for themselves, how far they are entitled to this distinction, to such as are disposed and qualified to examine their spirit and tendency. To those, however, whose observations have led them to draw no favourable inferences from public patronage, I deem it a respect due to their prejudices to assure them, that, by this little work of my friend's, religion is not philosophised, and philosophy is not sophisticated; truth is not made to consist in infidelity; and the old distinctions of virtue and vice are maintained. Magnetically fixed on an axis of immutable direction, the tenor of these volumes have kept at polar distances