vantage to mankind, and was hardly confiftent with a future. ftate of rewards and punishments.

Socrates, and after him Plato, feems to have believed the immortality of the foul, and a future ftate, and to have argued for it. They affert many excellent things concerning the happiness to be enjoyed in a future life; they speak of going to good men; to the Gods who are abfolutely good; and of obtaining the best of good things after their departure out of this Fife. But all this feems to have been reprefented as the special privilege of thofe, who having an earnest thirst after knowlege, addicted themselves to the ftudy of philofophy; that as for the common fort of good men, who had exercised juftice and temperance, that they went into the bodies of animals of a gentle nature, or returned into human bodies, fuch as they had before. They both of them feem to have believed in general, that there would be a difference made in a future ftate, between good and bad men, and that the one fhould be in a greater or less degree punifhed, and the other rewarded: but it must be acknowleged, that they greatly obfcured and weakened the doctrine in point of moral influence, by fometimes mixing other fictions with it, and at other times talking very uncertainly about it.'

The fentiments of Cicero and Plutarch are likewife examined upon this fubject, with great accuracy and candour; from the whole of which the Doctor feems juftly to be of opinion, That the doctrine of eternal life and happinefs, provided for all good men without exception, whether in a high or low condition, learned or unlearned, who live foberly, righteously, and godly in the world, was not taught by the most eminent of those Philofophers, who profefled to believe the immortality of the foul and a future ftate.'

To all this it is added, That the most strenuous Advocates for the immortality of the foul, did not pretend to any certainty about it; this uncertainty appeared upon many ferious and important occafions; not only in their philofophical debates, but efpecially in their confolatory difcourfes on the death of their friends; and from hence they were led to affert the self-sufficiency of virtue for compleat happinefs, without a future recompence; and that a short happiness is as good as an eternal one.'

The Doctor once more obferves, and with great propriety and importance, That a ftate of future rewards neceflarily implies in it, or, to ufe his own term, connotes, future punishments that the belief of the former without the latter, might be of pernicious confequence. The ancient Philofophers and Legiflators were fenfible of the importance and neceffity of the doctrine of future punishments; yet they generally rejected

them as vain and fuperftitious terrors: and it appears to be true in fact, that the generality of the people, efpecially in the politer nations of Greece and Rome, had, in a great meafure, fallen from all belief of this kind, before the time of our Saviour's appearing.

In thefe circumstances it pleafed God in his great wisdom and goodness, to grant a new revelation of his will to mankind, by our Lord Jefus Chrift, who hath brought life and immortality to the most clear and open light, in his gofpel; which contains the fullest affurance of that everlafting happiness, which is prepared for good men in a future ftate; and moft express declarations concerning the punishment which will be inflicted upon the wicked; the importance and expediency of which, to the interefts of virtue and religion in the world, must be acknowleged by every fenfible and thinking man.'

This is as fair and just a representation of the work now before us, as it was poffible for us to give in the limits to which we are obliged to confine ourselves: the whole is brought to a conclufion with the following obfervations.

1. We may hence fee, that Reafon, if left merely to itself, in the present state of mankind, is not a fafe and certain guide in matters of religion.

2. We fhould fet a high value on the Gospel of Jefus, which is the perfection of all the divine revelations that have been given to mankind, and to which the feveral prior revelations were defigned to be preparatory.

3.

Chriftianity, truely believed and practifed, tends to the advantage of fociety, to promote the welfare of kingdoms and ftates, and to preferve good order in the world.

It is aftonishing, fays our worthy Author, to think, that there fhould be perfons found among us, who feem defirous to extinguish this glorious light, and to return to the ancient darknefs of Paganifm again: who feem weary of the Gospel, and with a prepofterous zeal, endeavour to fubvert its proofs and evidences, and to expofe it, as far as in them lies, to the derifion and contempt of mankind. But the attempts of fuch men against our holy religion, fhould only quicken our zeal and heighten our efteem for it, and make us more earnestly defirous to build up ourselves in our most holy faith, and to adorn it with an exemplary converfation, becoming the Gospel of Chrift. Chriftianity is not a bare fyftem of fpeculative opinions, but a practical inftitution, a fpiritual heavenly difcipline, all whofe doctrines, precepts, promifes, and ordinances, are defigned to form men to a holy and virtuous temper and practice. The

moft

most effectual way therefore we can take to promote its facred interefts is, to fhew the happy influence it hath upon our hearts and lives, by abounding in the fruits of piety, righteousness, and charity, and thus making an amiable representation of it to the world.'

Lettres, Memoires, et Negociations particulieres du Chevalier D'Eon. Or, Letters, Memoirs, and Negociations of the Chevalier D'Eon, late Minifter Plenipotentiary from the Court of France to that of Great Britain. 4to. Il. Is. Dixwell.

F all the minifterial Negociations that have made their public public appearance in the world, the Chevalier D'Eon's are certainly the most remarkable: were they but as interesting and important as they are minute and fingular, they might prove a valuable acquifition to the public in general, and an inftructive leffon to all foreign Minifters in particular. Luckily, however, for the French Miniftry, M. D'Eon feems not to have been employed in affairs of very great moment: he was made the Meffenger, indeed, to carry over the ratification of the peace to Verfailles; but as this might have been made a postboy's bufinefs, fo he complains he was paid little better than a poft-boy for his labour. If to this job we add his fending over the Reviews, for the ufe of the Journal Litteraire, Mrs. Stephens's pills for Madame Victoire; a dog, and two bitches, with a set of pretty pictures, for the Duke de Praflin, and his establishing the houfhold of Count de Guerchy, the prefent Ambassador; thefe feem to be all the commiffions he was charged with: at least these are all he hath thought proper as yet to communicate to the public, and he appears by the voluminous fize of his work, to have been in an excellent humour for publishing all he knew. It is well alfo for the communicative Chevalier himself, that he was never concerned in robbing churches, or plotting against the Government, for he would certainly have had fo little prudence in his anger, as to have divulged the whole, at the hazard of his neck. It is really strange, that men of fenfe and abilities, should have fo little government over their temper, as to run fuch unaccountable lengths, to the ruin of themselves, and the mortification of their friends and acquaintance. The vivacity, or rather violence of temperament and difpofition in the French*, feems to lead them into these er

*This impetuofity of the French is fo notorious to all men of sense, even of their own nation, that the Duke de Nivernois himself rallies them upon it, in one of his letters. I have got here, fays he, Condamine and Du Clos, who can no more agree about morality than phyfics. I wish they do not go to loggerheads together."

rors,

rors, more frequently than the Saturnine genius of other nations. It is not long ago that a refpectable Academician of that nation, coming over here on a vifit, abfurdly took offence at the manners of a common lodging-house, and in the heat of his jaloufie d'honneur, publicly impeached the juftice and humanity of the whole English nation, on account of his ridiculous fquabble with a house-maid. Soon after this, our news-papers informed us of another as idle a quarrel, between the two Reprefentatives of his moft Chriftian Majefty, on account of one of them, a Minifter Plenipotentiary, threatening, in the prefence of an English Secretary of State, to break the laws of our country, by fighting a duel with an obfcure individual, who had affronted him. And now, behold! we have a book published by the fame hand, containing near five hundred pages in quarto, to expose the characters, abilities, and employments of the feveral perfonages he was concerned with in his minifterial capacity. Such being the intent of this publication, it may be fuppofed to afford little or no information or entertainment, except to fuch Readers as are acquainted with those elevated perfonages. It prefents, however, no incurious amufement to those who entertain no high opinion of the Great; and may poffibly prove an inftructive leflon to others, who form mistaken notions of the vaft importance and capacity of ministerial Agents and Agencies. Be it in these refpects as it will, the very extraordinary ftep the Author hath taken in the publication of this work, added to other fingularities, hath made fo much noise, both in France and England, that we cannot avoid taking a more particular notice of it, than might otherwise be expedient in a literary Journal.

M. D'Eon introduces his Letters and Memoirs with a preliminary discourse, containing an explicit account of himself, and an enumeration of his fervices to the Crown of France. The two first paragraphs of this difcourfe, may serve as a specimen at once of his ftyle, and, indeed, give the judicious Reader fome light into his character and manner of thinking:

• Surge, Deus-Judica terram-Juftum et impium-et vincas cum Judicaris. Pfal. lxxxii. 8. Ecclef. iii. 17.

Deliberer longtems et chercher la vérité avec application, c'eft, felon les Princes et les Grands, l'emploi du vulgaire. On voudroit avoir la gloire d'aimer la vérité, et la fatisfaction de ne l'entendre jamais.

Elevé parmi les rochers et les montagnes, une éducation mâle m'a donné le courage de dire cette verité et la force de l'ècouter; elle m'a donné une trempe d'ame, qui ne peut fe plier ni au manége ni aux bafieffes des Courtifans: auffi ai-je fait la REV. May, 1764. Ff trifte

trifte experience que l'innocence et la droiture nous brouillent fouvent, prefque autant, avec la cour, que pouroit le faire le contraire.

It is very certain, that in the particular instance that originally gave rise to the prefent publication, M. D'Eon's trempe d'ame was by no means fo fupple and pliant as his intereft required. It is pity, that as his natural difpofition and education had rendered him fo unfit for a Courtier, he had not stuck entirely to his profeffion of arms. There are a thousand things that are excufable, and would be even becoming, in a Captain of Dragoons, that are by no means tolerable in a Secretary of an Embaffy; who certainly ought to be as trimming and pliant an animal as any in the creation, if he means, in due time, to arrive at being a Minifter himself. But our Author had already arrived at that honour, and therefore, thinking his day of probation over, it is no wonder a man of his turn fhould take fire at the propofal for divesting him of the latter character, and fubjecting him again to the former. Hinc ille lachrymae! M. D'Eon, who had been Secretary to the Embaffy under the Duke de Nivernois, and, thro' the intereft of that Nobleman, was afterwards appointed Refident and Minifter Plenipotentiary, thought it the highest indignity offered him, that the French Miniftry propofed his acting as Secretary to the Embassy under the Count de Guerchy. No, fays M. D'Eon, Aut Cafar aut nihil. Once a Minifter and always a Minifter: Lamberti, and Wicquefort, for that. It was to no purpose that our Author's friends in Paris laboured to perfuade him, that his honour would not be hurt, by fuch conceffion, while his interefts would be much advanced. No, he had been made a Politician and a Minifter in spite of his teeth, and, therefore, in spite of theirs he would remain fo, or have nothing at all to do with the Embaffy. In this refolution he was fo fixed, that he tells the Duke de Nivernois, in one of his letters, Nothing upon earth, not even death, fhall make me change my mind; nay, if I thought I should be mean enough to do it to-morrow, I would throw myfelf into the Thames to-night.' And again, in a postscript, to the fame Nobleman, If God, in his anger, had made a Bifhop of me against my will, I would defie the devil himself to eject me from my fec.' Would not one imagine, that the emoluments annexed to M. D'Eon's refidentfhip were very great, that he seems so extravagantly tenacious of it. It appears, however, by his own account, to the contrary, and that he neither could obtain from his Court a decent establishment for himself here, nor a farthing of remittances, for an old debt, due to him on account of his former fervices in Ruffia. The honour was al;