C/ORIOLANUS\ in D/IONYSIUS\,[3] have an influence in every affair;
but above all, in war; where the event is so uncertain. All human
life, especially before the institution of order and good
government, being subject to fortuitous accidents; it is natural,
that superstition should prevail every where in barbarous ages, and
put men on the most earnest enquiry concerning those invisible
powers, who dispose of their happiness or misery. Ignorant of
astronomy and the anatomy of plants and animals, and too little
curious to observe the admirable adjustment of final causes; they
remain still unacquainted with a first and supreme creator, and with
that infinitely perfect spirit, who alone, by his almighty will,
bestowed order on the whole frame of nature. Such a magnificent idea
is too big for their narrow conceptions, which can neither observe
the beauty of the work, nor comprehend the grandeur of its author.
They suppose their deities, however potent and invisible, to be
nothing but a species of human creatures, perhaps raised from among
mankind, and retaining all human passions and appetites, together
with corporeal limbs and organs. Such limited beings, though masters
of human fate, being, each of them, incapable of extending his
influence every where, must be vastly multiplied, in order to answer
that variety of events, which happen over the whole face of nature.
Thus every place is stored with a crowd of local deities; and thus
polytheism has prevailed, and still prevails, among the greatest
part of uninstructed mankind.[4]

     Any of the human affections may lead us into the notion of
invisible, intelligent power; hope as well as fear, gratitude as
well as affliction: But if we examine our own hearts, or observe
what passes around us, we shall find, that men are much oftener
thrown on their knees by the melancholy than by the agreeable
passions. Prosperity is easily received as our due, and few
questions are asked concerning its cause or author. It begets
cheerfulness and activity and alacrity and a lively enjoyment of
every social and sensual pleasure: And during this state of mind,
men have little leisure or inclination to think of the unknown
invisible regions. On the other hand, every disastrous accident
alarms us, and sets us on enquiries concerning the principles whence
it arose: Apprehensions spring up with regard to futurity: And the
mind, sunk into diffidence, terror, and melancholy, has recourse to
every method of appeasing those secret intelligent powers, on whom
our fortune is supposed entirely to depend.

     No topic is more usual with all popular divines than to display
the advantages of affliction, in bringing men to a due sense of
religion; by subduing their confidence and sensuality, which, in
times of prosperity, make them forgetful of a divine providence. Nor
is this topic confined merely to modern religions. The ancients have
also employed it. <Fortune has never liberally, without envy>, says
a G/REEK\ historian,[5] <bestowed an unmixed happiness on mankind;
but with all her gifts has ever conjoined some disastrous
circumstance, in order to chastize men into a reverence for the
gods, whom, in a continued course of prosperity, they are apt to
neglect and forget>.

     What age or period of life is the most addicted to
superstition? The weakest and most timid. What sex? The same answer
must be given. <The leaders and examples of every kind of
superstition>, says S/TRABO\,[6] <are the women. These excite the
men to devotion and supplications, and the observance of religious
days. It is rare to meet with one that lives apart from the females,
and yet is addicted to such practices. And nothing can, for this
reason, be more improbable, than the account given of an order of
men among the> G/ETES\, <who practised celibacy, and were
notwithstanding the most religious fanatics>. A method of reasoning,
which would lead us to entertain a bad idea of the devotion of
monks; did we not know by an experience, not so common, perhaps, in
S/TRABO'S\ days, that one may practise celibacy, and profess
chastity; and yet maintain the closest connexions and most entire
sympathy with that timorous and pious sex.

 S/ECT\. IV. <Deities not considered as creators or formers of the

                              world>.

                                  

     The only point of theology, in which we shall find a consent of
mankind almost universal, is, that there is invisible, intelligent
power in the world: But whether this power be supreme or
subordinate, whether confined to one being; or distributed among
several, what attributes, qualities, connexions, or principles of
action ought to be ascribed to those beings, concerning all these
points, there is the widest difference in the popular systems of
theology. Our ancestors in E/UROPE\, before the revival of letters,
believed, as we do at present, that there was one supreme God, the
author of nature, whose power, though in itself uncontroulable, was
yet often exerted by the interposition of his angels and subordinate
ministers, who executed his sacred purposes. But they also believed,
that all nature was full of other invisible powers; fairies,
goblins, elves, sprights; beings, stronger and mightier than men,
but much inferior to the celestial natures, who surround the throne
of God. Now, suppose, that any one, in those ages, had denied the
existence of God and of his angels; would not his impiety justly
have deserved the appellation of atheism, even though he had still
allowed, by some odd capricious reasoning, that the popular stories
of elves and fairies were just and well-grounded? The difference, on
the one hand, between such a person and a genuine theist is
infinitely greater than that, on the other, between him and one that
absolutely excludes all invisible intelligent power. And it is a
fallacy, merely from the casual resemblance of names, without any