speaks, shall come; and that then, and not before, shall be the Resurrection of the Just, which is called the first Resurrection; and after that the Dead so arisen, with the Living, then alive, shall have learned this faith, which shall qualify them to be caught up together in the air, then shall be the General Resurrection, after which Time shall be no more.

"The beginning of this faith, like all other parts of the Kingdom of Heaven, will be like a grain of mustard seed, spreading itself by degrees till it overshadow the whole earth. And since the things concerning Him must have an end,' in order to this they must have a beginning. But whoever leads the van will make the world start, and must expect for himself to walk up and down, like Cain, with a mark on his forehead, and run the gauntlet for an Ishmaelite, having every man's hand against him because his hand is against every man; than which nothing is more averse to my temper. This makes me think of publishing with as much regret as he that ran away from his errand when sent to Nineveh : but being just going to cross the water-" (he was going to Ireland,-) "I dared not leave this behind me undone, lest a Tempest send me back again to do it. And to shelter myself a little, (though I knew my speech would betray me,) I left the Title page anonymous. Nor do I think that any thing would now extort my name from me but the dread of the sentence, he that is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will I be ashamed before my Father and his Angels:' for fear of which I dare not but subscribe my argument, though with a trembling hand; having felt two powers within me all the while I have been about it, one bids me write, and the other bobs my elbow. But since I have wrote this, as Pilate did his inscription, without consulting any one, I'll be absolute as he was; what I have written, I have written.'

"Having pursued that command, 'Seek first the Kingdom of God,' I yet expect the performance of that promise, to receive in this life an hundred fold, and in the world

to come life everlasting.' I have a great deal of business yet in this world, without doing of which Heaven itself would be uneasy to me: but when that is done I know no business I have with the dead, and therefore do depend that I shall not go hence by 'returning to the dust,' which is the sentence of that law from which I claim a discharge but that I shall make my exit by way of translation, which I claim as a dignity belonging to that Degree in the Science of Eternal Life of which I profess myself a graduate. And if after this I die like other men, I declare myself to die of no religion. Let no one be concerned for me as a desperade: I am not going to renounce the other part of our religion, but to add another article of faith to it, without which I cannot understand the rest. And if it be possible to believe too much in God, I desire to be guilty of that sin.

"Behold ye despisers and wonder! Wonder to see Paradise lost, with the Tree of Life in the midst of it! Wonder and curse at Adam for an original fool, who in the length of one day never so much as thought to put forth his hand, for him and us, and pull and eat and live for ever! Wonder at and damn ourselves for fools of the last impression, that in the space of seventeen hundred years never so much as thought to put forth our hands, every one for himself, and seal and execute the Covenant of Eternal Life.

"To be even with the World at once, he that wonders at my faith, I wonder at his unbelief. The Blood of Christ hath an incident quality which cleaneth from sin; and he that understands this never makes any use of his own personal virtues as an argument for his own salvation, lest God should overbalance against him with his sins; nor doth God ever object a man's sins to him in the day of his faith; therefore till I am more sinful than He was holy, my sins are no objection against my faith. And because in Him is all my hope, I care not (almost) what I am myself.

"It is observed in the mathematics that the practice doth not always answer the

theory; and that therefore there is no dependence upon the mere notions of it as they lie in the brain, without putting them together in the form of a tool or instrument, to see how all things fit. This made me distrust my own thoughts till I had put them together, to see how they would look in the form of an argument. But in doing this, I thank God I have found every joint and article to come into its own place, and fall in with and suit one another to a hair's breadth, beyond my expectation: or else I could not have had the confidence to produce this as an engine in Divinity to convey man from Earth to Heaven. I am not making myself wings to fly to Heaven with, but only making myself ready for that conveyance which shall be sent me. And if I should lose myself in this untrodden path of Life, I can still find out the beaten Road of Death blindfold. If therefore, after this, 'I go the way of my fathers,' I freely waive that haughty epitaph, Magnis tamen excidit ausis, and instead knock under table that Satan hath beguiled me to play the fool with myself, in which however he hath shewed his

master-piece; for I defy the whole clan of Hell to produce another lye so like to truth as this is. But if I act my motto, and go the way of an Eagle in the air, then have I played a trump upon Death, and shewn myself a match for the Devil.

“And while I am thus fighting with Death and Hell, it looks a little like foul play for Flesh and Blood to interpose themselves against me. But if any one hath spite enough to give me a polt, thinking to falsify my faith by taking away my life, I only desire them first to qualify themselves for my executioners, by taking this short test in their own consciences: whoever thinks that any thing herein contained is not fair dealing with God and Man, let him or her — burn this book, and cast a stone at him that wrote it."

CHAPTER CLXXIII.

MORE CONCERNING ASGILL. HIS DEFENCE IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, HIS EXPULSION, FARTHER SPECULATIONS AND DEATH.

Let not that ugly Skeleton appear!

Sure Destiny mistakes; this Death's not mine!
DRYDEN.

THE substance of Asgill's argument has been given in his own words, but by thus abstracting and condensing it his peculiar manner is lost. This, though it consisted more perhaps in appearance than in reality, is characteristic of the author, and may be well exemplified in the concluding passage of one of his political pamphlets:

"But I shall raise more choler by this way of writing, For writing and reading are in themselves commendable things,

But 'tis the way of writing at which offence is taken,
And this is the misfortune of an Author,
That unless some are angry with him, none are pleased.
Which puts him under this dilemma,

That he must either ruin himself or his Printer.

But to prevent either, as far as I can, I would rather turn Trimmer and compound too. And to end all quarrels with my readers (if they please to accept the proposal,

And to shew withal that I am no dogmatical Author,)

I now say to them all, in print, what I once did to one of them, by word of mouth. Whoever meets with any thing in what I publish, which they don't like,

Let 'em strike it out.

But to take off part of the Odium from me,
They say others write like me,
In short paragraphs:

(An easy part of a mimick,)
But with all my heart!

I don't care who writes like me,
So I don't write like them."

Many a book has originated in the misfortunes of its Author. Want, imprisonment, and disablement by bodily infirmity from active occupation, have produced almost as many works in prose or rhyme, as leisure, voluntary exertion, and strong desire. Asgill's harmless heresy began in an involuntary confinement to which he was reduced in consequence of an unsuccessful specula

tion. He had engaged in this adventure (by which better word our forefathers designated what the Americans call a spec,) with the hope of increasing his fortune, instead of which he incurred so great a loss, that he found it necessary to keep his chamber in the Temple for some years. There he fell to examining that "Book of Law and Gospel," both which we call the Bible; and examining it as he would have perused an old deed, with the hope of discovering in it | some clause upon which to ground a claim at law, this thought, he says, first came into his head; but it was a great while coming out. He was afraid of his own thoughts, lest they were his own only, and as such a delusion. And when he had tried them with pen, ink and paper, and they seemed to him plainer and plainer every time he went over them, and he had formed them into an Argument, "to see how they would bear upon the proof," even then he had no intention of making them public.

"But writing an ill hand," says he, "I resolved to see how it would look in print. On this I gave the Printer my Copy, with money for his own labour, to print off some few for myself, and keep the press secret. But I remember before he got half way through, he told me his men fancied I was a little crazed, in which I also fancied he spoke one word for them and two for himself. However I bid him go on; and at last it had so raised his fancy, that he desired my leave to print off one edition at the risque of his own charge, saying he thought some of the Anabaptists would believe it first. I being just then going for Ireland, admitted him, with this injunction, he should not publish them 'till I was got clear out of Middlesex; which I believe he might observe; though by what I heard afterwards, they were all about town by that time I got to St. Albans: and the book was in Ireland almost as soon as I was, (for a man's works will follow him,) with a noise after me that I was gone away mad."

Asgill was told in Ireland that the cry which followed him would prevent his practice; it had a contrary effect, for "people

went into Court to see him as a Monster and heard him talk like a man." In the course of two years he gained enough by his profession to purchase Lord Kenmure's forfeited estate, and to procure a seat in the Irish House of Commons. The purchase made him enemies; as he was on the way to Dublin he met the news that his book had been burnt by Order of the House. He proceeded however, took the oaths and his seat, and the Book having been condemned and executed without hearing the author in its defence, nothing more was necessary than to prove him the Author and expel him forthwith, and this was done in the course of four days. After this he returned to England and obtained a seat for Bramber, apparently for the mere sake of securing himself against his creditors. This borough he represented for two years; but in the first Parliament after the Union some of the Scotch Members are said to have looked upon it as a disgrace to the House of Commons, that a man who enjoyed his liberty only under privilege should sit there, and instead of attempting to remedy a scandal by straightforward means, they took the easier course of moving for a Committee to examine his book. Their report was that it was profane and blasphemous, highly reflecting upon the Christian Religion. He was allowed, however, to make his defence, which he thus began.

"Mr. Speaker, this day calls me to something I am both unapt and averse toPreaching. For though, as you see, I have vented some of my thoughts in religion, yet I appeal to my conversation, whether I use to make that the subject of my discourse. However that I may not let this accusation go against me by a Nihil dicit, I stand up to make my defence. I have heard it from without doors that I intended to withdraw myself from this day's test and be gone; which would have given them that said it an opportunity to boast that they had once spoken truth. But quo me fata trahunt, I'll give no man occasion to write fugam fecit upon my grave-stone."

He then gave the history of his book and of his expulsion in Ireland, and thanked the

House for admitting him to a defence before they proceeded to judgment. "I find," said he, "the Report of the Committee is not levelled at the argument itself which I have advanced, nor yet against the treatise I have published to prove it, but against some expressions in that proof, and which I intend to give particular answers to. But there is something else laid to my charge as my design in publishing that argument, of higher concern to me than any expressions in the treatise, or any censure that can fall on me for it; as if I had wrote it with a malicious intention to expose the Scriptures as false, because they seemed to contain what I asserted; and that therefore if that assertion did not hold true, the Scripture must be false. Now whether this was my intention or no, there is but one Witness in Heaven or Earth can prove, and that is He that made me, and in whose presence I now stand, and Who is able to strike me dead in my place; and to Him I now appeal for the truth of what I protest against: that I never did write or publish that argument with any intention to expose the Scriptures; but on the contrary, (though I was aware that I might be liable to that censure, which I knew not how to avoid,) I did both write and publish it, under a firm belief of the truth of the Scriptures: and with a belief (under that) that what I have asserted in that argument is within that truth. And if it be not, then I am mistaken in my argument, and the Scripture remains true. Let God be true and every man a lyar. And having made this protestation, I am not much concerned whether I am believed in it or not; I had rather tell a truth than be believed in a lie at any time."

He then justified the particular passage which had been selected for condemnation, resting his defence upon this ground, that he had used familiar expressions with the intent of being sooner read and more readily understood. There was indeed but a single word which savoured of irreverence, and certainly no irreverence was intended in its use; no one who fairly perused his argument but must have perceived that the levity

of his manner in no degree detracted from the seriousness of his belief. "Yet," said he, "if by any of those expressions I have really given offence to any well-meaning Christian, I am sorry for it, though I had no ill intention in it: but if any man be captious to take exceptions for exception sake, I am not concerned. I esteem my own case plain and short. I was expelled one House for having too much land; and I am going to be expelled another for having too little money. But if I may yet ask one question more; pray what is this blasphemous crime I here stand charged with? A belief of what we all profess, or at least what no one can deny. If the death of the body be included in the Fall, why is not the life of the body included in the Resurrection? And what if I have a firmer belief of this than some others have? Am I therefore a blasphemer? Or would they that believe less take it well of me to call them so? Our Saviour in his day took notice of some of little faith and some of great faith, without stigmatizing either of them with blasphemy for it. But I do not know how 'tis, we are fallen into such a sort of uniformity that we would fain have Religion into a Tyrant's bed, torturing one another into our own size of it only. But it grows late, and I ask but one saying more to take leave of my friends with. I do believe that had I turned this Defence into a Recantation, I had prevented my Expulsion: but I have reserved my last words as my ultimate reason against that Recantation. He that durst write that book, dares not deny it!"

"And what then ?" said this eccentric writer, when five years afterwards he published his Defence. "Why then they called for candles; and I went away by the light of 'em and after the previous question and other usual ceremonies, (as I suppose) I was expelled the House. And from thence I retired to a Chamber I once had in the Temple; and from thence I afterwards surrendered myself in discharge of my bail, and have since continued under confinement. And under that confinement God hath been pleased to take away the Desire of mine