ir closet, when out of them they are content with
fables, though they know well they are fables. They do more; they
deliver to the executioner the excellent men who have said it. How many
Atheists and profane persons have brought holy men to the stake under
the pretext of heresy? Every day, hypocrites consecrate the host and
cause it to be adored, although firmly convinced as I am that it is
nothing more than a piece of bread.'

Whatever may be urged in defence of such execrable duplicity, there can
be no question as to its anti-progressive tendency. The majority of men
are fools, and if such 'sensible' politicians as our Doctor and the
double doctrinising ecclesiastics, for whose portraits we are indebted
to Mosheim and Beausobre, shall have the teaching of them, fools they
are sure to remain. Men who dare not be 'mentally faithful' to
themselves may obstruct, but cannot advance, the interests of truth. In
legislation, in law, in all the relations of life, we want honesty _not_
piety. There is plenty of piety, and to spare, but of honesty--sterling,
bold, uncompromising honesty--even the best regulated societies can
boast a very small stock. The men best qualified to raise the veil under
which truth lies concealed from vulgar gaze, are precisely the men who
fear to do it. Oh, shame upon ye self-styled philosophers, who in your
closets laugh at 'our holy religion,' and in your churches do it
reverence. Were your bosoms warmed by one spark of generous wisdom,
_silence_ on the question of religion would be broken, the multitude
cease to _believe_, and imposters to _triumph_.

London: Printed by Edward Truelove, 240, Strand.

[ENDNOTES]

[4:1] 25th November, 1845.

[4:2] Vide 'Times' Commissioner's Letter on the Condition of Ireland,
November 28, 1845.

[8:1] 'Essay on Providence and a Future State.'

[9:1] Essay of the Academical or Sceptical Philosophy. [9:2] Critical
remarks on Lord Brougham's 'Lives of Men of Letters and Science, who
flourished in the time of George III.'--The _Times_, Wednesday, October
1, 1845.

[10:1] History of American Savages.

[11:1] Appendix the Second to 'Plutarchus and Theophrastus on
Superstition.'

[11:2] Philosophy of History.

[12:1] See a Notice of Lord Brougham's Political Philosophy, in the
number for April, 1845.

[15:1] 'Apology for the Bible,' page 133.

[15:2] Unusquisque vestrum non cogitat prius se debere Deos nosse quam
colere.

[2