confonant to human Reason, that men were apt to mistake them for the production of it. CICERO (and I quote him as of fuperior authority) understood much better the true limits and extent of human knowledge. He owns the state of natural Reason to be just what is here delivered; clear enough to perceive Truth, when propofed, but not, generally, ftrong enough to difcover it. His remarkable words are thefe-"Nam neque ❝tam eft acris acies in naturis hominum, & inge“niis, ut res tantas quifquam, NISI MONSTRATAS, poffit videre: neque tanta tamen in rebus obfcu❝ritas, ut eas non penitus acri vir ingenio cernat, * fi modo adfpexerit "." HAVE now gone through the second general propofition, which is, THAT ALL MANKIND, ESPECIALLY THE MOST WISE AND LEARNED NATIONS OF ANTIQUITY, HAVE CONCURRED IN BELIEVING, AND TEACHING, THAT THE DOCTRINE OF A FUTURE STATE OF REWARDS AND PUNISHMENTS WAS NECESSARY TO THE WELL-BEING OF SOCIETY. In doing this, I have prefumed to enter the very Penetralia of Antiquity, and expofe its moft venerable fecrets to open day. Some parts of which having been accidentally and obfcurely feen by the owl-light of infidelity, were imagined by fuch as Toland, Blount, and Coward, (as is natural for objects thus feen by false Braves) to wear strange gigantic forms of terror: and with these they have endeavoured to disturb the fettled piety of fober Chriftians. z De Orat. 1. iii. c. 31. The The ridiculous ufe these men have made of what they did not underftand, may perhaps recal to the reader's mind that ftale atheistical objection, that RELIGION IS ONLY A CREATURE OF POLITICS, a State-engine, invented by the Legislator, to draw the knot of Civil Society more close. And the rather, because that objection being founded on the apparent use of Religion to Civil Policy, I may be fuppofed to have added much ftrength to it, by thewing in this work, in a fuller manner than, perhaps, has been done before, the EXTENT OF THAT UTILITY; and the large fphere of the Legislator's agency, in the application of it. For thus ftood the cafe: I was to prove Moses's divine effiftance, from his being ABLE to leave out of his Religion, the doctrine of a future ftate. This required me to fhew, that this doctrine was naturally of the utmost importance to Society. But of all the arguments, by which that importance may be proved, the plainest, if not the strongest, is the conduct of LAWGIVERS, Hence the long detail of circumftances in the second and third books. But indeed it not only ferved to the purpose of my particular queftion, but, appeared to me, to be one of the least equivocal proofs of the truth of RELIGION in general; and to deferve, in that view only, to be carefully examined and explained. 1 confidered this part, therefore, and defire the reader would fo confider it, as a whole and feparate work of itself, to PROVE THE TRUTH OF RELIGION IN GENERAL, FROM ITS INFINITE SERVICE TO HU MAN SOCIETY, though it be but the introduction to the truth of the MOSAIC. Let us examine it: Lawgivers have unanimously concurred in propagating Religion. This could be only from a sense and experience of its UTILITY; in which they could not be deceived: Religion there therefore has a general utility. We defire no more to eftablish its truth. For, TRUTH AND GENERAL UTILITY NECESSARILY COINCIDE; that is, Truth is productive of Utility; and Utility is indicative of Truth. That truth is productive of utility, appears from the nature of the thing. The obferving truth, is acting as things really are: he who acts as things really are, muft gain his purpofed end; all disappointment proceeding from acting as things are not; Just as in reafoning from true or falfe principles, the conclufion which follows must be neceffarily right or wrong. But gaining this end is utility or happinefs; difappointment of the end, hurt or mifery. If then Truth produce utility, the other part of the propofition, that utility indicates truth, follows of neceffity. For not to follow, fuppofes two differ ent kinds of GENERAL UTILITY relative to the fame creature, one proceeding from truth, the other from falfhood; which is impoffible; because the natures of those utilities must then be different, that is, one of them muft, at the fame time, be, and not be, utility. Wherever then we find general utility, we may How expedient it was to give this detailed proof of the coincidence of truth and general utility, may be seen by the ftrange embarras which perplexes that ingenious Sceptic, Rouffeau of Geneva, when he treats of this fubject. "Je vois, (fays he, in his letter to the Arch Bishop of Paris) deux manieres d'examiner & comparer les Religions diverses, l'une felon le vrai & le faux, qui s'y trouvent l'autre felon leurs effets temporels & moraux fur la terre, felon le bien ou le mai qu'elles peuvent faire a la Societé et au gendre humain. Il ne faut pas, pour empêcher ce double examen, commencer par decider que ces deux chofes vont toujours enfemble, et que la Religion la plus vraye eft auf la plus fociable. But then again he fays,-Il paroit pourtant certain, je l'avoue, que fi l'homme eft fait pour la Societé la Religion la plus vraye eft aufi la plus fociale & la plus humaine-Yet for all this he concludes Mais ce fentiment, tout probable qu'il eft, eft fujet a de grandes difficultés par l'historique et les faits qui le contra may certainly know it for the product of Truth, which it indicates. But the practice of Lawgivers fhews us, that this utility refults from Religion. The confequence is, that RELIGION, or the idea of the relation between the creature and the creator, is true. However, as the unanimous concurrence of Lawgivers to fupport Religion, hath furnished matter for this poor infidel pretence, I shall take leave to examine it more thoroughly. Our Adverfaries are by no means agreed amongft themselves: Some of them have denied the truth of Religion, because it was of no UTILITY; Others, because it was of so GREAT. But commend me to the man, who, out of pure genuine spite to Religion, can employ thefe two contrary fyftems together, without the expence fo much as of a blush". However the Syftem most followed, is the political invention of Religion for its ufe: the other being only the idle exercise of a few Dealers in paradoxes*. I have begun these volumes with an examination of the first of these systems; and shall now end them with a confutation of the other. For the Unbeliever driven from his first hold, by our fhewing the utility of religion, prepofterously retires into this, in order to recover his ground. CRITIAS of Athens, one of the thirty tyrants, and the most execrable of the thirty, is at the head of this division; whofe principles he delivers in the most beautiful Iambics. His words are to this contrarient." p. 71-2. But Antiquity, which had intangled itfelf in this question, apparently drew him, in. The Sages of old faw clearly that Utility and Virtue perfectly coincided. They thought Utility and Truth did not; as conceiving the constitution of things to be fo framed, that falsehood (as it was circumstanced) might at one time be of general benefit, just as Truth is at another. See Blount's Anima Mundi, and Original of Idolatry, • Such as the Author of Du Contract Social, Ch. VIII. p. 192. purpose: purpose: "There was a time when man lived like a favage, without government or Laws, the σε minifter εἮν χρόνῳ ὅτ ̓ ἦν ἄτακις. ἀνθρώπων βίΘ, δοκεῖ Πυκνός τις ἄλλοι κα σοφός γνώμης ανής Ως ἐσὶ Δαίμων ἀφθίτῳ θάλλων βίω, Εάν τε σὺν σιγῇ τι βελεύης κακὸν, Τῦτ ̓ ἐχὶ λήσει τὰς θεός· τὸ γὰρ φρονῶν Ψευδεῖ καλύψας τὴν ἀλήθειαν λίγω There |