rwise they would not have look'd upon it as a Rule. Now, as they
could not know that God would not punish their Disobedience to That
which they look'd upon as obliging them to Obedience; but, on the
contrary, had more, or less, Reason to apprehend that he would do so,
They therefore (thinking him to be an exorable as well as an
Omniscient, and Omnipotent Being) were hereby on These occasions
taught to deprecate his Vengeance, and implore his Mercy: And hence
the more Guilty and Fearful came to invent Attonements, Expiations,
Penances and Purgations, with all that various Train of Ceremonies
which attended those Things; Naturally imagining that the Divine
Nature resembled their own; and thence believing that they should the
more easily appease his Anger, and avert the effects of his Wrath, if
by such means, as these, they did, as it were, in Gods behalf Revenge
upon themselves their Disobedience to him. And as the Solemnity of
these Matters requir'd peculiar Hands to Execute them; and Devotion
exacted that such should be liberally rewarded, and highly respected
for their Pious performances; from hence the profit which some reap'd
by these things, as well as the satisfaction that others found
therein, who were unwilling to be rigorously restrain'd by the Rule of
their Actions, yet were uneasie under the reproaches of their
Consciences when they transgressed against it, made these Inventions,
and the value set upon them, to be daily improv'd; till Men at last
have sought to be, and have effectually been perswaded that they
might render themselves acceptable to God without indeavouring
sincerely to obey the Rule by which they profess'd to believe they
were oblig'd to live; and that even when they did think that this was
a Law giv'n them by God himself.

Now the great practicers, and promoters of the abovesaid things, are
every where Those who are generally esteem'd, and call'd _Religious_.
Whence the Term _Religion_ appears ordinarily to have stood for
nothing else, but _some Expedient, or other, found out to satisfy Men
that God was satisfied with them, notwithstanding that their
Consciences reproach'd them with want of Conformity to the
acknowledg'd Rule, or Law of their Actions._

Having premis'd thus much concerning the Notions Men vulgarly have had
of _Vertue_ and _Religion,_ let us now proceed to see how it has come
to pass, That they have with Allowance, Approbation, and oftentimes,
with injunction of their Lawmake