Lovely day. Services as usual. Evening at the Mansion.

I passed the morning, devoting the usual portion of time to Louisa, and reading the two first dialogues of Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher. This is quite a celebrated work of Berkeley to prove the truth of Religion.1 As yet I find little that appears to me like serious argument in the Dialogue. Alciphron is made to talk for the purpose of being confuted.

Attended divine service and heard Mr. Morison of New Bedford preach from Acts 17. 23. “For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To the unknown God,” and also from Luke 15. 23. “Let us be merry.” One of my uncontrollable fits of abstraction prevented me from deriving as much good from these Sermons as perhaps I ought to have done. I regret them even when I find myself unable to correct myself of them.

Read a discourse of the Reverend John Balguy upon the conduct of the Bereans in being convinced of the truth of Christianity by examination. Acts 17. 11. “These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” This finishes the third volume of the English Preacher. Evening at the Mansion. Mr. Price Greenleaf was there. Dull political conversation.