s which revelation and modern science exhibit of
the order, extent, and economy of the universe. It is lamentable to
reflect that so many thousands of beings endowed with the faculty of
reason, who can not by any means be persuaded of the motion of the
earth, and the distances and magnitudes of the heavenly bodies, should
swallow, without the least hesitation, opinions ten thousand times more
improbable. Notwithstanding the mathematical certainty of the truth of
the Copernican system of astronomy, I have never yet become extensively
acquainted with any community in which I have not found many persons
professing a respectable degree of intelligence, and even official
members of orthodox churches, who entirely discredit its sublime
teachings; and yet some of these very persons find little difficulty in
believing that an old woman can transform herself into a hare, and wing
her way through the air on a broomstick. What contracted notions such
persons must have of the almightiness of the Deity, and of the infinite
depth of meaning of the following and like passages of Scripture: The
heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handy
work. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth
knowledge.--_Ps._ xix., 1-2.

It has been already remarked, that the whole history of the world
justifies the statement that ignorant and uncultivated mind is prone to
sensuality and cruelty. Spain and Hungary were referred to in
illustration. We are now prepared to remark, what is worse still, that
where such superstitious notions as we have been considering are held,
even by persons who are somewhat educated, they almost invariably lead
to the perpetration of deeds of cruelty and injustice. Many of the
barbarities committed in pagan countries, both in their religious
worship and their civil polity, and most of the cruelties inflicted on
the victims of the Romish Inquisition, have flowed from this source.[33]
Nor are the annals of Great Britain and the United States deficient in
examples of this kind. About the commencement of the last century, the
belief in witchcraft, which was almost universal throughout Christendom,
was held in both of these countries. The laws of England, which admitted
its existence and punished it with death, were adopted by the Puritans
of New England, and in less than twenty years from the founding of the
colony, one individual was tried and executed for the supposed crime.
Half a centu