Wesley Corpus

120 REV. J. WESLEY'S [April, 1778. expense to the Government. They exercised every day ; and, ifthey answer no other end,at least keep the Papists in order; who were exceedingly alert, ever since the army was removed to America. Mon. 27. In going to Bandon, I readAbbéRaynal's " His- tory of the Settlements and Trade of the Europeans in the Indies." I would be glad to propose a few queries. I ask, 1. Is not this " Philosophical History" (so called) in many parts profoundly dull; exactly fitted to spread a pleasing slumber over the eyes of the gentle reader ? 2. Are there not several pas- sages quite obscure ? Is this the fault of the author or the trans- lator? 3. Are there not several assertions which are false in fact ? Such as that of the healthiness of Batavia, one of the unhealthiest places in the known world. 4. Do not many of his assertions so border upon the marvellous, that none but a disciple of Voltaire could swallow them ? As the account of milk-white men, with no hair, red eyes, and the understanding of amonkey. 5. Is not Raynal one of the bitterest enemies of the Christian Revelation, that ever set pen to paper ? Far more determined, and less decent, than Voltaire himself? As, where he so keenly inveighs against that horrid superstition, the depriv- ing men of their natural liberty ofwhoredom ! Doeshenot take every opportunity ofwounding Christianity through the sides of superstition or enthusiasm ? Is notthe whole laboured panegyric on the Chinese and the Peruvians, a blow at the root of Chris- tianity ; insinuating all along, that there are no Christians in the world so virtuous as these Heathens ? Prove this fact, and it undeniably follows that Christianity is not of God. But who canprove it ? Not all the baptized or unbaptized Infidels in the world. From what authentic history of China is that account taken? From none that is extant ; it is pure romance, flowing from the Abbé's fruitful brain. And from what authentic his- tory ofPeru is the account ofthe Peruvians taken ? I suppose from that pretty novel of Marmontel, probably wrote with the same design. 6. Is not Raynal one of the most bitter enemies of Monarchy that ever set pen to paper ? With what acrimony