[ 29 ] 



to a race of men incapable of either, the fagacity of a dog 

 would appear more furprizing than the efFeds and efforts of 

 their own untutored reafon. Neither can this preference, 

 however whimfical, be deemed unnaturally abfurd by us, who, 

 even at this day, in the pride of our wifdom, are more apt to 

 admire the tricks of a monkey than what we are in the 

 hourly ufe of feeing performed by our own fpecies. The 

 ufefulnefs alfo of animals would be contrafted with the mif- 

 chievous and inimical qualities of man to man. The cow 

 would be worfhipped for her milk ; and, in a nation addicfled 

 to hunting, the primitive occupation of mankind, the dog 

 would be adored as the inftrument of their favourite fport^ 

 and the fure means of providing food. That fagacity of fmell, 

 by which he is enabled to purfue his unfeen game, would be 

 deemed more ufeful, and far more admirable, than the faculty 

 of reafoning to which men were habituated, and which, for 

 want of improvement and exertion, would be, in effedl, little 

 fuperior to inflindl, and far lefs certain in its operations. 



Another caufe may yet be added which might not have been 

 wholly inoperative : — Even in an age of the groffeft ignorance 

 foxne men muft have exlfted fuperior in intelledl to their fellows. 

 Thefe comparative philofophers, on whom the regulation of 

 national religion would naturally devolve, either from fome 

 remaining trace of tradition, or from the fuperior ftrength of 

 their own underftanding, would have been apt to frame idols 

 to be adored rather as typical reprefentations of thofe divine 

 qualities, which even favages could not fail to attribute to the 

 fupreme being, than as real Gods to be perfonally worfhipped ; 



' and 



