A VINDICATION
THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON "FIAT LUX."
CHAPTEE I.
Sir, I HAVE received your epistle, and therein your excuse for your long silence; which I willingly admit of, and could have been contented it had been longer, so that you had been advantaged thereby to have spoken any thing more to the purpose than I find you have now done : " Sat cito si sat bene." Things of this nature are always done soon enough when they are done tuell enough, or as well as they are capable of being done. But it is no small disappointment to find andpazag dvri rou '^ridavpov, a fruitless flourish of words, where a serious debate of an important cause was expected and looked for. Nor is it a justification of any man, when he has done a thing amiss, to say he did it speedily, if he were no way necessitated so to do. You are engaged in a cause, unto whose tolerable defence, " opus est Zephyris et hirundine multa," Hor. Ep. vii. 13 : though you cannot pretend so short a time to be used in it Avhich will not by many be esteemed more than it deserves; for all time and pains taken to give countenance to eiTOr is undoubtedly misspent. Ob duvd/xi^d n zard rrig dXrtkiag, dXX' h-iTip Trig dXriSiiag, saitli the great apostle [2 Cor. xiii. 8] ; — " We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth : " which rule had you observed, you might have spared your whole time and labour in this business. However, T shall be glad to find that you have given me just cause to believe what you say, of your not seeing the "Animad- versions" on your hook he/ore Fehruary. As I find you observant of truth in your progress, or failing therein, so shall I judge of your vera- city in this unlikely story; for every man gives the best measure of him- self And though I cannot see how possibly a man could spend much time in trussing up such a fardel of trifles and quibbles as your epistle
181 A YIXDICATIOX OF THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON FIAT LUX,
is, yet it is somewhat strange, on the other side, that you should not in eight months' space — for so long were the "Animadversions" made public befoi'e February — set eye on that which, being your owTi especial concernment, was, to my knowledge, in the hands of many of your party. To deal friendly with you, " Nolim coeterarum rerum te socordem eodem mode." Yea, I doubt not but you use more diligence in your other affairs; though in general the matter in debate between us seems to be your principal concernment. But now you have seen that discourse, and, as you inform me, "have read it over;" which I believe, and take not only upon the same score of present trust, but upon the evidence also which you give unto your assertion, by your careful avoiding to take any farther notice of the tilings that you found too difficult for you to reply unto. For any impartial reader, that shall seriously consider the " Anim- adversions" with your epistle, will quickly find that the main artifice wherein you confide is a pretence of saying somewhat in general, whilst you pass over the things of most importance, and which most press the cause you defend, with a perpetual silence: these you turn from, and fall upon the person of the author of the " Animadver- sions." If ever you debated this procedure with yourself, had I been present with you when you said with him in the poet, " Dubius sum quid faciam — Tone relinquam an rem?" I should have replied with him, "Me sodes;" but you were otherwise minded, and are gone
before, —
" Ego (ut contendere durum est
Cum victore) sequar." Hor. Sat. i. 9, 42.
I will follow you with what patience I can, and make the best use I am able of what offers itself in your discourse.
Two reasons, I confess, you add why you chose "vadimouium deserere," and not reply to the "Animadversions;" which, to deal plainly with you, give me very little satisfaction. The first of them, you say, is, " because to do so would be contrary to the very end and design of ' Fiat Lux;'" which shall immediately be considered. The other is, " the threats which I have given you, that, if you dare to write again, I will make you know what manner of man I am." Sir, though it seems you dare not reply to my book, yet you dare do that which is much worse; you dare write palpable untruths, and such as yourself know to be so, as others also who have read those papers. By such things as these, with sober and ingenuous persons, you cannot but much prejudice the interest you desii'e to promote, as well as in yourself you wrong your conscience and ruin your repu- tation. Besides, all advantage springing from untruth is fading; neither will it admit of any covering but of its own kind, which can never be so increased but that it will rain through. Only, I confess
PEEFACE TO THE REPLY CONSIDERED. 185
thus far you have promoted your design, that you have given a new and cogent instance of the evils attending controversies in religion, which you declaim about in your "Fiat;" which yet is such as it had been your duty to avoid. What it is that you make use ot to give countenance unto this fiction (for " malum semper habitat in alieno fundo"), I shall have occasion afterward to consider. For the present I leave you to the discipline of your own thoughts: —