I PROLOGUE 19 



weakness of a priori philosophising, no less than 

 the moral frivolity common to their age ; while a 

 singular want of appreciation of history, as the 

 record of the moral and social evolution of the 

 human race, permitted them to resort to pre- 

 posterous theories of imposture, in order to 

 account for the religious phenomena which are 

 natural products of that evolution. 



For the most part, the Romanist and Protestant 

 adversaries of the free-thinkers met them with 

 arguments no better than their own ; and with 

 vituperation, so far inferior that it lacked the wit. 

 But one great Christian Apologist fairly captured 

 the guns of the free-thinking array, and turned 

 their batteries upon themselves. Speculative 

 " infidelity " of the eighteenth century type was 

 mortally wounded by the Analogy ; while the pro- 

 gress of the historical and psychological sciences 

 brought to light the important part played by the 

 mythopceic faculty; and, by demonstrating the 

 extreme readiness of men to impose upon them- 

 selves, rendered the calling in of sacerdotal 

 cooperation, in most cases, a superfluity. 



Again, as in the fourteenth and the sixteenth 

 centuries, social and political influences came into 

 play. The free-thinking philosopkes, who objected 

 to Rousseau's sentimental religiosity almost as 

 much as they did to Ulnfdme, were credited with 

 the responsibility for all the evil deeds of 

 Rousseau's Jacobin disciples, with about as much 



