Evidences of Christianity

Excerpt

When, five years ago, an important station in the University of
Cambridge awaited your Lordship’s disposal, you were pleased to offer it
to me.  The circumstances under which this offer was made demand a public
acknowledgment.  I had never seen your Lordship; I possessed no
connection which could possibly recommend me to your favour; I was known
to you only by my endeavour, in common with many others, to discharge my
duty as a tutor in the University; and by some very imperfect, but
certainly well-intended, and, as you thought, useful publications since. 
In an age by no means wanting in examples of honourable patronage,
although this deserve not to be mentioned in respect of the object of
your Lordship’s choice, it is inferior to none in the purity and
disinterestedness of the motives which suggested it.