and what it is
that this Religion does consist in: and He who when he comes to be a
Man, shall remember that being a Boy he has been check'd for doubting,
instead of being better inform'd when he demanded farther proof than
had been given him of the Divine Authority of the Scriptures: or that
he has been reprehended for thinking that the Word of God contradicted
some Article of his Catechism; has just ground, when he reflects
thereupon, to question, whether or no, the Interaction of his
Childhood has not been an Imposition upon his Reason; which he will no
doubt be apt to believe the more, when others shall confidently affirm
to him that it has been so: And in that Age of Men's Lives when they
are in the eagerest pursuit of Pleasure, it is great odds (as has been
already observ'd) that if, in regard of Religion, they come to lose
the belief of what they have once thought unquestionable, they will
more often be perswaded that there is no Truth at all therein, than
set themselves seriously to find out what is so.

How dangerous a thing then is such Instruction in Religion, as teaches
nothing unless it be to stifle the Suggestions of our Natural Light?
But that such Instruction as this, is all that the far greatest Number
of People have, there is too much ground to conclude, from the
visible Ignorance even of the most of Those who are Zealous in some
Profession of Christian Faith, and Worship: Few of These not being at
a loss to answer, if ask'd, either, _What the Faith of a Christian
does consist in_? Or, _Why they believe such Articles concerning it,
as they profess to believe_?

That their God-fathers, and God-mothers ingag'd for them that they
should believe so; is a reason for their doing it that I suppose,
there are but Few who would not be asham'd to give; as seeing that a
_Mahumetan_ could not be thought to assert his Faith more absurdly in
the Opinion of any indifferent By-stander, and yet it is evident that
no better a reason than this have very many for their Belief.

_What is the chief and highest end of Man_? is a Question which,
methinks, supposes the resolution of more antecedent Questions, than
Children, untaught, can be presum'd to be resolv'd in. But be this
Question ever so proper to begin a Catechism withal, the answer
hereto, _viz. That Man's chief and highest end is to glorifie God, and
enjoy him for ever_; is not surely very instructive of an ignorant
Child. It is a good Question in the same Catec