! Had he been as unacquainted with their religion, as they were with his, he had wanted the appropriate ground on which to build his instruction. He seized on the inscription of their own pagan altar, as a text from which to preach the doctrine of Christianity. From his knowledge of their errors, he was enabled to advance the cause of truth. He made their poetry, which he quoted, and their mythology which he would not have been able to explode, if he had not understood it, a thesis from which to deduce the doctrine of the Resurrection; thus softening their prejudices, and letting them see the infinite superiority of that Christianity which he enforced, to the mere learning and mental cultivation on which they so highly valued themselves. By the same sober discretion, acute reasoning, and graceful elegance, he afterward obtained a patient hearing, and a favorable judgment from King Agrippa."

"It has always appeared to me," returned Dr. Barlow, "that a strong reason why the younger part of a clergyman's life should be in a good measure devoted to learning is, that he may afterward discover its comparative vanity. It would have been a less difficult sacrifice for St. Paul to profess that he renounced all things for religion, if he had had nothing to renounce; and to count all things as dross in the comparison, if he had had no gold to put in the empty scale. Gregory Nazianzen, one of the most accomplished masters of Greek literature, declared that the chief value which he set upon it was, that in possessing it, he had something of worth to esteem as nothing in comparison of Christian truth. And it is delightful to hear Selden and Grotius, and Pascal and Salmasius, whom I may be allowed to quote, without being suspected of professional prejudice, as none of them were clergymen, while they warmly recommended to others that learning of which they themselves were the most astonishing examples, at the same time dedicating their lives to the advancement of religion. It is delightful, I say, to hear them acknowledge that their learning was only valuable as it put it in their power to promote Christianity, and to have something to sacrifice for its sake."

"I can willingly allow," said Mr. Tyrrel, "that a poet, a dramatic poet especially, may study the works of the great critics of antiquity with some profit; but that a Christian writer of sermons can have any just ground for studying a pagan critic, it is to me quite inconceivable."

"And yet, sir," replied Mr.
