ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION.
Reading edition
The Author of the following Tract cannot hope that he has said any thing new upon this important subject; but having had occasion to consider the objections usually made by young persons, to excuse their non-attendance on this sacred ordinance, he trusts he has been able to place the answers to those objections in a new point of view, and to compress in a few pages, what his reading and memory supplied from various sources.
The Letter, as it purports to have been, was written to a gentleman, who had expressed to the Author many of the scruples here obviated; and by the strong solicitation of two or three respectable friends, who were of opinion that it was calculated to do much good, he was induced to give it a more extensive circulation. That much good has been done by the publication of this little Tract the Author has the comfort and satisfaction of knowing upon undoubted testimony. And when his Bookseller informs him, that in a period of less than nine months the whole of the first impression, consisting of three thousand copies, has been disposed of, may he not be allowed to hope that it has done much more extensive good than can possibly be known? [4a] The Author, therefore, though a Layman, and though to the clergy is more peculiarly committed the charge of bringing men to the love and obedience of Jesus Christ, trusts he is not offending against the respect and reverence due to their sacred function and ministry, if “with Christian solicitude, seizing every opportunity which his station affords him of strengthening others in genuine faith, and of upholding and advancing them in holiness,” [4b] he sends forth a second large and improved edition of a Tract, for which there has been so great a demand.
September, 1804.