The sermon on Natural Religion as distinguished from Revealed, which Dr. Gay delivered as the Dudleian lecture at Harvard, in 1759, showed the reasonable and progressive spirit of his preaching. He claimed that there is no antagonism between natural and revealed religion, and that, while revealed religion is an addition to the natural, it is not built on the ruins, but on the everlasting foundations of it. Revelation can teach nothing contrary to natural religion or to the dictates of reason. "No doctrine or scheme of religion," he said, "should be advanced or received as Scriptural and divine which is plainly and absolutely inconsistent with the perfections of God, and the possibility of things. Absurdities and contradictions, are not to be obtruded upon our faith. No pretence of revelation can be sufficient for the admission of them. The manifest absurdity of any doctrine is a stronger argument that it is not of God than any other evidence can be that it is." Jonathan Mayhew, the son of Experience Mayhew, of Martha's Vineyard, was settled over the West Church of Boston in 1747. He was even then known as a heretic, who had read the most liberal books of the English philosophers and theologians, and who had boldly accepted their opinions as his own. On the occasion of his ordination not one of the Boston ministers was present, although a number of them were well known for their liberal opinions. The ordination was postponed, and later several men of remoter parishes joined in inducting this young independent into his pulpit. No Boston minister would exchange pulpits with him, and he was not invited to join the ministerial association. He was shunned by the ministers, and he was dreaded by the orthodox; but he was gladly heard by a large congregation, which grew in numbers and intelligence as the years went on. He had among his hearers many of the leading men of the town, and to him gathered those who were most thoughtful and progressive. Boston has never had in any of its pulpits a man of nobler, broader, more humane qualities, or one with a mind more completely committed to seeking and knowing the truth, or with a more unflinching purpose to speak his own mind without fear or favor. His influence was soon powerfully felt in the town, and his name came to stand for liberty in politics as well as in religion. His sermons were rapidly printed and distributed widely. They were read in every part of New England with great eagerness; they were reprinted in England, and brought him a large correspondence from those who admired and approved of his teaching. Though he died in 1766, at the age of forty-six, his work and his influence did not die with him.