294 RELIGIOUS VIEWS. 



for the most part, any long or laboured deduction, 

 to give them their effect on the mind. On the 

 contrary, they have, in every age and country, 

 produced their impression on multitudes who 

 have not instituted any formal reasonings upon 

 the subject, and probably upon many who have 

 not put their conclusions in the shape of any 

 express propositions. The persuasion of a 

 superior intelligence and will, which manifests 

 itself in every part of the material world, is, as 

 is well known, so widely diffused and deeply 

 infixed, as to have made it a question among 

 speculative men whether the notion of such a 

 power is not universal and innate. It is our 

 business to show only how plainly and how 

 universally such a belief results from the study 

 of the appearances about us. That in many 

 nations, in many periods, this persuasion has 

 been mixed up with much that was erroneous 

 and perverse in the opinions of the intellect or 

 the fictions of the fancy, does not weaken the 

 force of such consent. The belief of a super- 

 natural and presiding power runs through all 

 these errors : and while the perversions are 

 manifestly the work of caprice and illusion, 

 and vanish at the first ray of sober enquiry, the 

 belief itself is substantial and consistent, and 

 grows in strength upon every new examination. 

 It was the firmness arid solidity of the convic- 

 tion of something Divine which gave a hold and 



