different forms of Christianity,
and between Christianity and an elevated natural religion: and the
search can never therefore be in vain for a pervading religious
sentiment among the various religious institutions of any and every
people.

It is, of course, more difficult to discover this religious sentiment
among a nation enlightened enough to be divided in theological matters,
than among a rude people who regulate their devotions by the bidding of
a single order of priests. The African traveller, passing up the Niger,
sees at a glance what all the worshippers on the banks feel, and must
feel, towards the deities to whom their temples are erected. A rude
shed, with a doll,--an image of deformity,--perched on a stand, and
supposed to be enjoying the fumes of the cooking going on before his
face;--a place of worship like this, in its character of the habitation
of a deity, and of a sensual deity, leaves no doubt as to what the
religious sentiment of a country must be where there is no dissent from
such a worship. In such a society there are absolutely none to feel that
their deep palm groves are a nobler temple than human hands can rear.
There are none who see that it is by a large divine benignity that all
the living creatures of that region are made happy in their rank
seclusion. There is no feeling of gratitude in the minds of those who
see the myriads of gay butterflies that flit in the glare of noon, and
the river-horse which bathes in the shady places of the mysterious great
stream. There a god is seen only in his temple, and there is nothing
known of any works of his. That he is great, is learned only through the
word of his priests, who say that yams are too common a food for him,
and that nothing less than hippopotamus' flesh must be cooked beneath
his shrine. That he is good is an idea which has not yet entered any
mind.--In other places, the religious sentiment is almost equally
unquestionable; as when every man in Cairo is seen in his turn to put on
the dress of pilgrimage, and direct his steps to Mount Arafat. Here the
sentiment is of a higher order, but equally evident and uniform.--A
further advance, with somewhat less uniformity of sentiment, is found
among the followers of the Greek church in a Russian province. The
peasants there make a great point of having time for their devotions;
and those who have the wherewithal to offer some showy present at a
shrine are complacent. They make the sign of the cr