s
"much too much") amongst ourselves. The humor, however, is not general.

The teachers who reformed our religion in England bore no sort of
resemblance to your present reforming doctors in Paris. Perhaps they
were (like those whom they opposed) rather more than could be wished
under the influence of a party spirit; but they were most sincere
believers; men of the most fervent and exalted piety; ready to die (as
some of them did die) like true heroes in defence of their particular
ideas of Christianity,--as they would with equal fortitude, and more
cheerfully, for that stock of general truth for the branches of which
they contended with their blood. These men would have disavowed with
horror those wretches who claimed a fellowship with them upon no other
titles than those of their having pillaged the persons with whom they
maintained controversies, and their having despised the common religion,
for the purity of which they exerted themselves with a zeal which
unequivocally bespoke their highest reverence for the substance of that
system which they wished to reform. Many of their descendants have
retained the same zeal, but (as less engaged in conflict) with more
moderation. They do not forget that justice and mercy are substantial
parts of religion. Impious men do not recommend themselves to their
communion by iniquity and cruelty towards any description of their
fellow-creatures.

We hear these new teachers continually boasting of their spirit of
toleration. That those persons should tolerate all opinions, who think
none to be of estimation, is a matter of small merit. Equal neglect is
not impartial kindness. The species of benevolence which arises from
contempt is no true charity. There are in England abundance of men who
tolerate in the true spirit of toleration. They think the dogmas of
religion, though in different degrees, are all of moment, and that
amongst them there is, as amongst all things of value, a just ground of
preference. They favor, therefore, and they tolerate. They tolerate, not
because they despise opinions, but because they respect justice. They
would reverently and affectionately protect all religions, because they
love and venerate the great principle upon which they all agree, and the
great object to which they are all directed. They begin more and more
plainly to discern that we have all a common cause, as against a common
enemy. They will not be so misled by the spirit of faction as not to
d