If, however, it should be maintained, that the due ex ercise of reason will necessarily lead us to some know ledge of God, we have no wish to dispute the assertion : we only affirm that we have no instance on record, in which it can be proved that men have come by their re ligion in this manner : all the religions with which we are acquainted, bear evident marks of a different origin : and before the competency of human reason, to discover the most obvious truths of religion, can be ascertained, it would be necessary to find a nation entirely destitute of every notion of religion ; to watch its progress in know ledge, and carefully to observe the result of its experi ence. But, indeed, there is every probability that a na tion, circumstanced as we have supposed, if unaffected by any external impulse, and unassisted by extraneous example, would remain for ever in the barbarism in which it was found. No nation, how ever, has been found in this state of absolute ignorance; by whatever means men have come by their knowledge, they have always been found to have some idea of a superior power ; and, possessing this as the rudiments of religious knowledge, we might naturally have expected that they would have made progress in a science so interesting. This expec tation will not be realized ; for we discover none of that elasticity of mind, which prompts to ulterior improve ment in religious knowledge: all the efforts of philan thropy have scarcely been able to shake the inveterate prejudices of error, or to preserve alive the seeds of knowledge, where they have been sown. IF the know ledge of God and his attributes, then, be the result of human reason, the mind goes through a process on this subject, entirely different from that which it follows with regard to any other of its attainments. It advances uni formly and steadily in all those improvements which re sult from study or experience, and length of time never fails to give maturity and stability to the principles of knowledge. But, in religion, the process is reversed ; and lapse of time invariably leads to degeneracy and cor ruption. The most ancient writings of the human race approach nearest to the truth on some of the fundamen tal principles of religion. Thus, we find the unity of the divine nature explicitly stated in some of the most ancient of the Braminical writings, whilst the doctrine is totally unknown among the modern Hindoos, who are, and have been from time immemorial, the grossest ido laters in the world.
Let it be remembered, that we are only stating the aberrations of human reason on the grand fundamental principles of religion and morals ; and we do not posi tively affirm that the mind is absolutely incompetent to discover the important truth of the being of God ; but facts authorize us to conclude that it never could turn this important truth to any profitable account, without ulterior assistance ; for it is instantly disfigured by the prejudices arising from human passions, and thus be comes the means of perversion rather than of improve ment ; as men canonize their own vices by exalting them into attributes of their gods.
We conceive it, then, to be absolutely impossible to found a system of morals on the basis of natural religion, which, if cognizable by human reason, is nevertheless, in every instance, so grossly abused as to become a source of error rather than of knowledge. The bountiful au thor of our nature has delivered us from this perplexity, by giving us a revelation containing rules of duty, which our consciences must instantly approve, and which, on examination, are found to be perfectly consistent with the light of reason, with the interests of man, and with the ordinary arrangements of providence. These rules,
however, are not, in general practice, deduced step by step from the elements into which they may be analysed : they resemble, in this respect, the rules deduced from science, or experience, which are delivered to practical artists, and which lead them as immediately to the at tainment of their object, as if they thoroughly understood the principles on which the rules were founded. It is evident that some rule of this kind is absolutely neces sary for regulating the moral conduct of men ; for few have time or talents for ingenious or laborious investi gations ; and were man left to discover the rules by which his conduct is to be guided, the best of his life would be past before he had learned how to live. Reve lation unfolds the rule at once, without explaining the principles on which it is founded, farther than by assur ing us that it is the will of God, who always consults our happiness. To analyse these rules, however, which have been beneficently revealed for the regulation of our con duct, and to discover their coincidence with the mast ob vious principles presented to the senses and reason of man, is a luxury reserved for those whose talents and education enable them to trace the chain of proximate causes, till they can connect it with the supreme law giver.
It might reasonably be supposed that the will of God, and the order of nature, would tend mutually to illustrate and explain each other. This must necessarily happen, provided that which is communicated as the will of God be indeed from heaven; for the same God who arranged the order of nature, cannot, consistently with any notions which we entertain of his perfections, give a revelation which contradicts it.
" Nunquam aliud natura, aliud sapientia dixit." This argument has been carrieo by Hume to an un warrantable and unphilosophical extreme in the case of miracles, which are a suspension, or contravention, of the ordinary laws of nature. • Were miracles contrary not only to the established laws of nature, but to the known power and perfections of God, it would be impos sible to believe them. But when we see that they are not inconsistent with divine power, since he who gave matter its properties, can as easily alter them ; when we see that they are obviously useful in promoting some be neficent end, which could not be accomplished without them ; and when, in addition to all this, we have a posi tive proof in the existing state of nature, that a nai•acle must have been performed before things were as they are ; (for if the calling of light out of darkness, of order out of confusion, of substance out of nonentity, be not a miracle, we do not know what is—or if any one should insist that there never was any creation, but that all things have always existed as we see them, that man holds a creed more marvellous than any miracle ;) tak ing all these considerations together, there can be no ob jection to miracles in the nature of things, and their cre dibility, in every instance, must depend on the evidence by which they are attested.