to human happiness as one the most fiendish. We are told of
a whole people who used to murder their guests, not from ferocity or
interest, but from the pure and praiseworthy motive of obtaining the
good qualities, which they believed, by the murder of the deceased,
devolved upon them!] But what, if neither sincerity nor zeal was
sufficient to constitute goodness; what if in the breasts of the
best-intentioned crime had been fostered the more dangerously because
the more disguised,--what ensued? That the religion which they
professed, they believed, they adored, they had also misunderstood; and
that the precepts to be drawn from the Holy Book they had darkened by
their ignorance or perverted by their passions! Here then, at once,
my enigma was solved; here then, at once, I was led to the goal of my
inquiry! Ignorance and the perversion of passion are but the same thing,
though under different names; for only by our ignorance are our passions
perverted. Therefore, what followed?--that, if by ignorance the greatest
of God's gifts had been turned to evil, Knowledge alone was the light
by which even the pages of Religion should be read. It followed that the
Providence that knew that the nature it had created should be constantly
in exercise, and that only through labour comes improvement, had wisely
ordained that we should toil even for the blessing of its holiest and
clearest laws. It had given us in Religion, as in this magnificent
world, treasures and harvests which might be called forth in
incalculable abundance; but had decreed that through our exertions only
should they be called forth a palace more gorgeous than the palaces
of enchantment was before us, but its chambers were a labyrinth which
required a clew."

"What was that clew? Was it to be sought for in the corners of earth, or
was it not beneficially centred in ourselves? Was it not the exercise
of a power easy for us to use, if we would dare to do so? Was it not the
simple exertion of the discernment granted to us for all else? Was it
not the exercise of our reason? 'Reason!' cried the Zealot, 'pernicious
and hateful instrument, it is fraught with peril to yourself and to
others: do not think for a moment of employing an engine so fallacious
and so dangerous.' But I listened not to the Zealot: could the steady
and bright torch which, even where the Star of Bethlehem had withheld
its diviner light, had guided some patient and unwearied steps to the
very throne