the attaining of it, appears in that the first
Christians were mean and illiterate People; to which part of Mankind
the Gospel may rather be thought to have had a more especial regard
than that they are any way excluded from the Benefits thereof by
incapacity in them to receive it. In the Apostles Days _there were not
many Wise who were call'd_, and he tells us that _after that the World
by Wisdom knew not God: it pleased God by the foolishness of Preaching
to save them that believe_, and tho' _to the perfect_ the same Apostle
says, he did _Preach Wisdom_, yet it was the simplicity and plainness
of the Christian Religion that made it _to the Jews a stumbling block,
and to the Greeks foolishness_. From whence, we see that all Theorems
too abstruse for Vulgar Apprehensions, which Christianity is believ'd
to Teach, however Divine Truths, are yet no part of the Doctrine of
Salvation. There is not therefore this pretence to impose upon any one
the belief of any thing which they do not find to be reveal'd in
Scripture; the doing of which, has not only caus'd deplorable
dissentions among Christians, but also been an occasion to multitudes
of well meaning People of having so confus'd and unsatisfactory
conceptions and apprehensions concerning the Christian Religion as
tho' perhaps not absolutely, or immediately prejudicial to their
Salvation, yet are so to their seeing clearly that Christianity is a
rational Religion; without which few will be very secure from the
infection of Scepticism, or Infidelity, where those are become
fashionable, and prevailing. A danger to which many Women are no less
expos'd than Men, and oftentimes, more so. Whence it is but needful
that they should so well understand their Religion as to be Christians
upon the Convictions of their Reason; which is indeed no more than one
would think it became every Christian, as a rational Creature, to be;
were this not requisite in regard of Scepticism, and Infidelity, as
to some it is not; there being, no doubt, many a Country Gentlewoman
who has never in her Life heard Question'd, or once imagined that any
one in their Wits could Question the Articles of her Faith; which yet
she her self knows not why she believes.

From the too Notorious Truth of what has been said in reference to the
little that Women know concerning Religion, it must be granted that
the generality of them are shamefully Ignorant herein. As for other
Science, it is believ'd so improper for, an