nvisible powers; unless mankind
were then very different to what it is now: For I look upon the mass or
body of our people here in England, to be as freethinkers, that is to
say, as staunch unbelievers, as any of the highest rank. But I conceive
some scattered notions about a superior power to be of singular use for
the common people, as furnishing excellent materials to keep children
quiet when they grow peevish, and providing topics of amusement in a
tedious winter-night.

Lastly, 'tis proposed as a singular advantage, that the abolishing of
Christianity will very much contribute to the uniting of Protestants, by
enlarging the terms of communion so as to take in all sorts of
dissenters, who are now shut out of the pale upon account of a few
ceremonies which all sides confess to be things indifferent: That this
alone will effectually answer the great ends of a scheme for
comprehension, by opening a large noble gate, at which all bodies may
enter; whereas the chaffering with dissenters, and dodging about this or
t'other ceremony, is but like opening a few wickets, and leaving them at
jar, by which no more than one can get in at a time, and that, not
without stooping, and sideling, and squeezing his body.[16]

[Footnote 16: "In this passage," says Scott, "the author's High Church
principles, and jealousy of the Dissenters, plainly shew themselves; and
it is, perhaps, in special reference to what is here said, that he ranks
it among the pamphlets he wrote in opposition to the party then in
power." [T. S.]]

To all this I answer: that there is one darling inclination of mankind,
which usually affects to be a retainer to religion, though she be
neither its parent, its godmother, or its friend; I mean the spirit of
opposition, that lived long before Christianity, and can easily subsist
without it. Let us, for instance, examine wherein the opposition of
sectaries among us consists, we shall find Christianity to have no share
in it at all Does the Gospel any where prescribe a starched, squeezed
countenance, a stiff, formal gait, a singularity of manners and habit,
or any affected modes of speech different from the reasonable part of
mankind? Yet, if Christianity did not lend its name to stand in the gap,
and to employ or divert these humours, they must of necessity be spent
in contraventions to the laws of the land, and disturbance of the public
peace. There is a portion of enthusiasm assigned to every nation, which,
if it