ll find that even the sandy desert in which we are asked
to live, rests everywhere on the firm foundation of that primeval, yet
indestructible granite of the human soul,--religious faith.

There are other philosophers again who would fain narrow the limits of
the Divine government of the world to the history of the Jewish and of
the Christian nations, who would grudge the very name of religion to
the ancient creeds of the world, and to whom the name of natural
religion has almost become a term of reproach. To them, too, I should
like to say that if they would but study positive facts, if they would
but read their own Bible, they would find that the greatness of Divine
Love cannot be measured by human standards, and that God has never
forsaken a single human soul that has not first forsaken Him. 'He hath
made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of
the earth; and hath determined the times before appointed, and the
bounds of their habitation: that they should seek the Lord, if haply
they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from
every one of us,' If they would but dig deep enough, they too would
find that what they contemptuously call natural religion, is in
reality the greatest gift that God has bestowed on the children of
man, and that without it, revealed religion itself would have no firm
foundation, no living roots in the heart of man.

If by the essays here collected I should succeed in attracting more
general attention towards an independent, yet reverent study of the
ancient religions of the world, and in dispelling some of the
prejudices with which so many have regarded the yearnings after truth
embodied in the sacred writings of the Brahmans, the Zoroastrians, and
the Buddhists, in the mythology of the Greeks and Romans, nay, even in
the wild traditions and degraded customs of Polynesian savages, I
shall consider myself amply rewarded for the labour which they have
cost me. That they are not free from errors, in spite of a careful
revision to which they have been submitted before I published them in
this collection, I am fully aware, and I shall be grateful to any one
who will point them out, little concerned whether it is done in a
seemly or unseemly manner, as long as some new truth is elicited, or
some old error effectually exploded. Though I have thought it right in
preparing these essays for publication, to alter what I could no
longer defend as true, and also,