the present state of the Jews was foretold by our Lord; that it is agreeable to many prophecies in the Old Testament; that it affords reason to believe that the Messiah is already come; that it furnishes an argument for the divine authority of the gospel; and that it exhibits an attestation to divers things upon which some evidences of christianity depend."

In 1745, he published the sixth volume of the second part of his "Credibility ;" and the same year, he received a diploma from the Marischal college of Aberdeen, conferring upon him the degree of doctor in divinity. In 1748, he published the seventh volume of the second part of his "Credibility," and the eighth volume two years after. In 1750, he published a volume of valu. able sermons, the subjects of which are entirely of a practical na

ture.

The following year, he resigned the office of morning preacher at Crouched-Friars. His reasons for this determination were, the increase of his deafness, the smallness of his auditory, and his desire for finding time for the completion of his long work. His

Credibility" was not completed till the year 1755, when the twelfth and last volume appeared. The ninth, tenth, and eleventh volumes, were published some time before. As the latter volumes did not sell so readily as the former, during Dr. Lardner's own life, he was considerably out of pocket by this great and important work, in which he had employed so many laborious years. He afterwards published a very valuable supplement in three vols. 8vo. and "A large Collection of ancient Jewish, and Heathen Testimonies, to the Truth of the Christian Religion," in three volumes, 4to. He occasionally published some smaller pieces, particularly one in 1759, without his name, under the following title: "A Letter written in the year 1730, concerning the question, whether the Logos supplied the place of a human soul in the person of Jesus Christ?"?

Dr. Kippis remarks, that "Providence spared the life of Dr. Lardner to a long term; and his hearing excepted, he retained to the last the use of his faculties in a remarkably perfect degree. At length, in the summer of 1768, he was seized with a decline, which carried him off in a few weeks, at Hawkherst, the place of his nativity, and where he had a small paternal estate. He had

been removed thither, in the hope that he might recruit his strength, by a change of air, and relaxation from study. The day of his deecase was the 24th of July, in the 85th year of his age. His remains were conveyed to town, and deposited in Tindall's burying ground, commonly called Bunhill-fields. At his particular request, no sermon was preached on the occasion of his death. Thus did his modesty and humility accompany him to the last moment of his earthly existence. Some time after his decease, a stone was erected to his memory, with an English inscription.

It is also observed by the same learned biographer, that there have been few names more truly entitled to be remembered with veneration and applause, than that of Dr. Lardner. The sincerity of his piety was manifested on a variety of occasions. "Indeed," says Dr. Kippis, "a regard to God appears to have been ever the governing principle of his actions. His piety too was of the most rational kind, being founded on just and enlarged views concerting the nature of religion."- "Correspondent to our author's piety was his love of truth; as is manifest from the whole of his works. No one seems ever to have preserved a greater impartiality in his enquiries, or to have been more free from an undue bias. He followed truth wherever it led him; and for the attainment of truth he was admirably qualified, both by the turn of his disposition and his understanding. With a mind so calm and unprejudiced, with a judgment so clear and distinct, he could scarcely fail of forming right apprehensions concerning most of the subjects which the course of his studies enabled him to investigate.

“The candour and moderation with which Dr. Lardner main tained his own sentiments, constituted a prominent feature in his character. Those he differed from in opinion, he always treated with gentleness and respect; and in the controversies he carries on with them, there is no severity of censure, no harshness of language. This circumstance is the more worthy to be mentioned and applauded, as it is so different from what we often meet with in the present day. Many of our writers seem to be reverting to that abuse of each other, which was common among scholars some. time after the revival of literature. They are not satisfied without casting illiberal reflections on the persons of the men whose tenets

they oppose, and arraigning, the motives of their conduct. What renders this disposition the more ridiculous is, that it is frequently. exerted on the most trivial occasions. Apprehended mistakes in philology, or diversities of judgment in matters of mere taste, are treated with as great a bitterness as if they were crimes of the deep. est dye. How much more beautiful, and more worthy of imitation, was the manner of conducting disputable questions which was pursued by Dr. Lardner! Such a method will be found in the end, more favorable to the diffusion of truth, and more condu. cive to a lasting reputation.,Circumstances indeed may arise, in which a sharpness of chastisement may appear to be justifiable. Uncommon insolence and uncommon bigotry may deserve to be strongly exposed: and yet even here, a manly neglect and contempt of unmerited censure, may be the most honorable and the most useful mode of behaviour.

"Benevolence, as well as piety, entered deeply into Dr. Lardner's character. Though his retired life prevented him from taking a very active part in public designs, he was ready to promote every good work. To persons in distress he was ever willing to contribute, to the highest degree which his fortune would admi:. On some occasions, he exerted himself with great vigour and success. When a gentleman came to London, in 1756, to solicit contributions towards building a church for the protestants of Thorn, in Poland, our author was particularly serviceable to him, both by his advice and recommendation. He in a great measure took upon himself the management of the affair ; on which account, he afterwards received the thanks of the president and fellows of the college of Thorn, in an elegant Latin letter. Near the time of his decease, he was engaged in assisting and recommending the rev. Mr. Finman, minister of the reformed congregation at Rutzow, in the dutchy of Mecklenberg Schwerin, who had come over to England for a like purpose. Upon this occasion, a letter was written to Dr. Lardner, by Dr. Secker, archbishop of Canterbury, which was the conclusion of a very long correspondence between two eminent persons, who were now each of them on the verge of dissolution. In his private deportment," proceeds Dr. Kippis, "Dr. Lardner was very amiable. His manners were polite, gentle, and obliging; and he was attentive in every respect to the laws of decorum."

On the learning of Dr. Lardner, it is not necessary to enlarge, since his character in this respect is known to all the world. With regard to that species of literature which was cultivated by him, he was accurate and profound in the greatest degree. Some bran ches of knowledge there were to which he did not apply his atten tion; for who is adequate to every object? but as a divine, and especially with relation to his acquaintance with the new Testament, and with christian antiquity, perhaps he never had his équal.

A new edition of Dr. Lardner's works was published in 1788, in eleven volumes, 8vo. which was revised by the rev. Mr. Bexter Cole, and to which was prefixed a valuable life of the anthor by Dr. Kippis, to which we have been indebted for the materials of our account of him. The merit of Dr. Lardner's writings have occasioned them to be translated into Latin, and into several modern languages.

Bishop Watson, in his catalogue of books of divinity, having mentioned Dr. Lardner's Letter on the Logos, immediately subjoins some judicious reflection which we shall here insert : " Newton and Locke," says his lordship, "were esteemed Socinians, Lardner was an avowed one; Clerke and Whiston were declared Arians; Bull and Waterland were professed Athanasians. Who will take upon him to say, that these men were not equal to each other in probity and scriptural knowledge! and if that be admitted, surely we ought to learn no other lesson from the diversity of their opinions, except that of perfect moderation and good-will towards all those who happen to differ from ourselves. We ought to entertain no other wish, but that every man may be allowed, without loss of fame or fortune, et sentire qua velit, et qua sentiat dicere. This absolute freedom of enquiry, it is apprehended, is the best way of investigating the sense of scripture, the most probable means of producing an uniformity of opinion, and of rendering the Gospel dispensation as intelligible to us in the eighteenth century, as we presume, it was to christians in the first."

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49

THE LIFE OF

WILLIAM HOGARTH.

[A. D. 1698, to 1764.]

This celebrated artist was born in London, in the parish of St. Bartholomew, in the year 1698. His father had been a country school-master, and afterwards became a corrector of the press in London. Young Hogarth was put apprentice to Ellis Gamble, a silver-smith, in Cranbourn-street, Leicester fields. It is said that it is not usual in this profession to bind apprentices to the sin gle branch of engraving arms and cyphers on every species of metal; and in that particular department of the business young Hogarth was employed. "But before his time was expired," says Mr. Horace Walpole, he felt the impulse of genius, and felt it directed him to painting.

During his apprenticeship, he set out one Sunday, with two or three companions, on an excursion to Highgate, The weather being hot, they went into a public-house, where they had not been long, before a quarrel arose between some persons in the same room. One of the disputants struck the other on the head with a quart pot, and cut him very much. The blood running down the man's face, together with the agony of the wound, which had distorted his features into a most hideous grin, presented Hogarth, who shewed himself thus early apprised of the mode nature had intended he should pursue, with too laughable a subject to be overlooked. He drew out his pencil, and produced on the spot one of the most ludicrous figures that ever was seen. What rendered this piece the more valuable was, that it exhibited an exact likeness of the man, with the portrait of his antagonist, and the figures in caricature of the principal persons gathered round

him.

C

"His apprenticeship was no sooner expired," says Mr. Walpole," than he entered into the academy in St. Martin's lane, and studied drawing from the life, in which he never attained to great excellence. It was character, the passions, the soul, that

VOL. IV.