ly, may have attacked our
reputation, and wounded our character. She commands not the shew, but
the reality of meekness and gentleness; and by thus taking away the
aliment of anger and the fomenters of discord, she provides for the
maintenance of peace, and the restoration of good temper among men, when
it may have sustained a temporary interruption.

It is another capital excellence of Christianity, that she values moral
attainments at a far higher rate than intellectual acquisitions, and
proposes to conduct her followers to the heights of virtue rather than
of knowledge. On the contrary, most of the false religious systems which
have prevailed in the world, have proposed to reward the labour of their
votary, by drawing aside the veil which concealed from the vulgar eye
their hidden mysteries, and by introducing him to the knowledge of their
deeper and more sacred doctrines.

This is eminently the case in the Hindoo, and in the Mahometan Religion,
in that of China, and, for the most part, in the various modifications
of ancient Paganism. In systems which proceed on this principle, it is
obvious that the bulk of mankind can never make any great proficiency.
There was accordingly, among the nations of antiquity, one system,
whatever it was, for the learned, and another for the illiterate. Many
of the philosophers spoke out, and professed to keep the lower orders in
ignorance for the general good; plainly suggesting that the bulk of
mankind was to be considered as almost of an inferior species. Aristotle
himself countenanced this opinion. An opposite mode of proceeding
naturally belongs to Christianity, which without distinction professes
an equal regard for all human beings, and which was characterized by her
first Promulgator as the messenger of "glad tidings to the poor."

But her preference of moral to intellectual excellence is not to be
praised, only because it is congenial with her general character, and
suitable to the ends which she professes to have in view. It is the part
of true wisdom to endeavour to excel there, where we may really attain
to excellence. This consideration might be alone sufficient to direct
our efforts to the acquisition of virtue rather than of knowledge.--How
limited is the range of the greatest human abilities! how scanty the
stores of the richest human knowledge! Those who undeniably have held
the first rank, both for natural and acquired endowments, instead of
thinking their pre-emine