Bishop Burnet wrote the preface to them, though without his name to it; and he observes, that they might be of use to such of the Roman Catholics as are perswaded, that those who deny the infallibility of their church, take away all certainty of the Christian religion, or of the authority of the scriptures.  This is the main topic of those two letters, and the point was considered by our author as of such importance, that she procured her friend Mrs. Burnet to consult Mr. (afterwards Dr.) Clark upon it, and to show him a paper, which had been put into her hands, urging the difficulties on that article, on the side of the Papists.  The sentiments of that great man upon this subject are comprised in a letter from Mrs. Burnet to Mrs. Trotter, of which our editor has given a copy, to which we refer the reader in the 31st page of his account.

In 1708 our author was married to Mr. Cockburn, the son of Dr. Cockburn, an eminent and learned divine of Scotland, at first attached to the court of St. Germains, but obliged to quit it on account of his inflexible adherence to the Protestant religion; then for some time minister of the Episcopal church at Amsterdam, and at last collated to the rectory of Northaw in Middlesex, by Dr. Robinson bishop of London, at the recommendation of Queen Anne.  Mr. Cockburn, his son, soon after his marriage with our author, had the donative of Nayland in Sussex, where he settled in the same year 1708; but returned afterwards from thence to London, to be curate of St. Dunstan’s in Fleet-street, where he continued ’till the accession of his late majesty to the throne, when falling into a scruple about the oath of abjuration, though he always prayed for the King and Royal Family by name, he was obliged to quit that station, and for ten or twelve years following was reduced to great difficulties in the support of his family; during which time he instructed the youth of the academy in Chancery-Lane, in the Latin tongue.  At last, in 1726, by consulting the lord chancellor King and his own father, upon the sense and intent of that oath, and by reading some papers put into his hands, with relation to it, he was reconciled to the taking of it.  In consequence of this, being the year following invited to be minister of the Episcopal congregation at Aberdeen in Scotland, he qualified himself conformably to the law, and, on the day of his present Majesty’s accession, preached a sermon there on the duty and benefit of praying for the government.  This sermon being printed and animadverted upon, he published a reply to the remarks on it, with some papers relating to the oath of abjuration, which have been much esteemed.  Soon after his settlement at Aberdeen, the lord chancellor presented him to the living of Long-Horsely, near Morpeth in Northumberland, as a means of enabling him to support and educate his family; for which purpose he was allowed to continue his function at Aberdeen, ’till the negligence and ill-behaviour of the