letter (1 July 1717), see B. M. Sloane MSS. 4282, f. 137.

18. Pp. 46-99.

19. See, for example, the statement of John Conybeare, Bishop of Bristol, in Joseph Spence, Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books and Men, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, sect. 992.

20. Essay, pp. 329-333 (for Whiston’s statement of sources); pp. 334-335 (for his defense of literal interpretation). The bracketed material indicates Whiston’s manuscript emendations of his own printed text; see the British Museum’s copy of the Essay (873. 1. 10) which originally belonged to the mathematician. See Collins, Grounds and Reasons, pp. 98-99, for the summary of Whiston’s attack upon allegorical interpretation.

21. Grounds and Reasons, pp. 20, 48-50.

22. This terse summary of the persona’s argument was correctly made by Warburton, III, 232.

23. Scheme, p. 391.

24. Discourse of Free-Thinking, pp. 15-17, 38, 171.

25. Eight Sermons, pp. 1, lxi.

26. Marshall, pp. 301, 337. For Samuel Chandler’s contribution, see his Reflections on the Conduct of the Modern Deists (London, 1727); for Chubb’s contribution see Some Short Reflections on the Grounds and Extent of Authority and Liberty, With respect to the Civil Government (London, 1728).

27. Marshall’s reluctance to support Rogers’s extremism is seen in the funeral sermon he preached at the latter’s death (A Sermon Delivered in the Parish Church of St. Giles Cripplegate, May 18, 1729. Upon Occasion of the Much Lamented Death of the Rev^d. John Rogers [London, 1729]). He made only the most casual and indifferent reference to Rogers’s work. So obvious was this slight that it called for a rebuttal; see Philalethes (A. A. Sykes [?]), Some Remarks Upon the Reverend Dr. Marshall’s Sermon on Occasion of the Death of the Rev^d D^r Rogers (London, 1729).

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