THE

CHRISTIAN HERO:

OR,

No Principles but thofe of

RELIGION

SUFFICIENT TO MAKE A

GREAT MAN.

T is certainly the most useful task we can poffibly undertake, to rescue our minds from the prejudice with which a false and unreasonable fondness of ourselves has enflaved us. But the examination of our own bosoms is fo ungrateful an exercife, that we are forced upon a thousand little arts, to lull ourfelves into an imperfect tranquility, which we might obtain fincere and uninterrupted, if we had courage enough to look at the ghaftly part of our condition: but we are still flatterers to ourselves, and hypocrites the wrong way, by chufing, instead of the folid fatisfaction of innocence and truth, the returning pangs of conscience, and working out our damnation as we are taught to do our happiness, "with fear and trembling."

But this misfortune we owe, as we do most others, to an unjust education, by which we are infpired

with

with an ambition of acquiring fuch modes and accomplishments, as rather enable us to give pleasure and entertainment to others, than fatisfaction and quiet. to ourselves: fo phantaftical are we as to dress for a ball when we are to set out on a journey, and upon change of weather, are justly derided, not pitied by the beholders. How then fhall we prepare for the unaccountable road of life, when we know not how long or how fhort it will prove, or what accidents we fhall meet in our paffage? Can we take any thing with us that can make us cheerful, ready and prepared for all occafions, and can support us against all encounters? Yes, we may (if we would receive it) a confidence in God. Yet, left this be impofed upon men by a blind force of cuftom, or the artifice of fuch perfons whose interest perhaps it may be to obtrude upon our mirth, and our gaiety, and give us -. a melancholy prospect (as fome men would perfuade us) to maintain themselves in the luxury they deny us; let us not be frighted from the liberal use of our fenfes, or meanly refign our present opinions, till we are convinced from our own reflection alfo, that there is fomething in that opinion which can make us lefs infolent in joy, lefs depreffed in adverfity, than the methods we are already engaged in. And indeed the chief caufe of irrefolution in either state, muft proceed from the want of an adequate motive to our actions, that can render men dauntless and invincible both to pleasure and pain,

It were not then, methinks, an useless enquiry to fearch into the reason that we are fo willing to arm ourselves against the affaults of delight and forrow, rather with the dictates of morality than those of religion; and how it has obtained, that when we fay as

5

thing was done like an old Roman, we have a gene-
rous and fublime.idea, that warms and kindles in us,
together with a certain felf-difdain, a defire of imita-
tion; when, on the other fide, to fay, It was like a
primitive Chriftian, chills ambition, and feldom rifes
to more than the cold approbation of a duty that
perhaps a man wishes he were not obliged to. Or,
in a word, Why is it that the Heathen ftruts, and
the Chriftian fneaks in our imagination? If it be as
Machiavil fays, That religion throws our minds be-
low noble and hazardous purfuits, then its followers
are flaves and cowards; but if it gives a more hardy
and afpiring genious than the world before knew,
then he, and all our fine obfervers, who have been
pleased to give us only heathen portraitures, to say
no worse, have robbed their pens of characters the
moft truly gallant and heroic that ever appeared to
mankind.

About the time the world received the best news t'. it ever heard, The men whofe actions and fortunes t are most pompously arrayed in ftory, had just acted or were then performing their parts, as if it had been the defign of providence to prepoffefs at that time, after a more fingular manner than ordinary, the minds of men, with the trappings and furniture of glory and riches, to heighten the virtue and maginanimity of those who were to oppose them all, by paffing through wants, miferics, and difgraces; and indeed the fhining actions of thefe illuftrious men do yet glare fo much in our faces, that we lose our way by following a falfe fire, which well confidered is but a delufive vapour of the earth, when we might enjoy the leading conftant light of heaven.

To make therefore a juft judgment in our con

duct,

4

duct, let us confider two or three of the moft 'eminent Heathen, and obferve whether they, or we, are better appointed for the hard and weary march of human life; for which examination we will not look into the closets of men of reflection and retirement, but into the practice and refolution of thofe of action and enterprize. There were never perfons more confpicuously of this latter fort, than thofe concerned in the fortunes and death of Cæfar; and fince the pulse of man then beat at the highest, we will think it fufficient to our purpose carefully to review him, and them, as they march by us, and if we can fee any apparent defect in their armour, find out some But it will require all way to mend it in our own. our patience, by taking notice of the minutest things, to come at (what is abfolutely neceffary to us) the receffes of their hearts, and folds of their tempers.

Salluft has tranfmitted to us two very great, but very different perfonages, Cæfar and Cato, and placed them together in the most judicious manner for appearing to advantage, by the alternate light and Thade of each other: Cæfar's bounty, magnificence, popular and fumptuous entertainments ftole an univerfal affection; Cato's parfimony, integrity, auftere and rigid behaviour, commanded as univerfal reverence: none could do an ungentile thing before Cafar, none a loose one before Cato: to one it was recommendation enough to be miserable, to the other to be good: to Cæfar all faults were pardonable, to Cato none: one gave, obliged, pitied, and fuccoured indifferently; the other blamed, opposed, and condemned impartially: Cæfar was the refuge of the unhappy, Cato the bane of the wicked: Cato had rather be than feem good; Cæfar was careless of ei

ther,

ther, but as it ferved his interests: Cato's fword was the fword of justice, Cæfars that of ambition: Cæfar had an excellent common fenfe and right judgment of occafion, time, and place; the other blunt man understood not application, knew how to be in, the right, but was generally fo, out of feafon: Cafar's manner made even his vice charming, Cato's even his virtue difagreeable: Cæfar infinuated ill, Cato intruded good: Caefar in his fayings, his actions, and his writings, was the firft and happient of all men in his difcourfe he had a conftant wit and right reafon; in his actions, gallantry and fuccefs; in his writings, every thing that any author can pretend to, and one which perhaps no man elíe ever had; he mentions himfelf with a good grace. Thus it was very natural for Cæfar, adorned with every art, mafter of every neceffary quality, either for ufe or ornament, with a steady and well-placed induftry to out-run Cato, and all like him, who had none, and defired none, but (an ever weak party), the good for his friends.

Now this fort of men were Cæfar and Cato, and by thefe arts they arrived at that height, which has left one's name proverbial for a noble and princely nature, the others for an unmoved and inexorable, honefty: yet without following them through all the handfome incidents and paffages of life, we may 'know them well enough in miniature, by beholding them only in their manner of dying: for in those laft minutes, the foul and body both collect all their force, either bravely to oppofe the enemy, or gracefully receive the conqueror, death.

Cæfar, by a long tract of fucceffes, was now become apparent mafter of his country, but with a fe