tudes of human affairs, and a certain degree of fenfibility in early life, which has connected pleasing ideas with the fcenes of infancy and youth. A very great proportion of mankind are, in a great measure, incapable either of the one or of the other; and, fuffering themselves to be carried quietly along with the ftream of fashion, and finding their opinions and their feelings always in the fame relative fitua tion to the fleeting objects around them, are perfectly unconscious of any progress in their own ideas, or of any change in the manners of their age. In vain the philofopher reminds them of the opinions they yesterday held; and, forewarns them, from the fpirit of the times, of those which they are to hold tomorrow. The opinions of the present moment seem to them to be infeparable from their conftitution; and when the profpects are realifed, which they lately treated as chimerical, their minds are fo gradually prepared for the event, that they be hold it without any emotions of wonder or curiofity; and it is to the philofopher alone, by whom it was predicted, that it appears to furnish a subject worthy of future reflection.

The prejudices to which the last observations relate, have their origin in that difpofition of our nature, which accommodates the order of our ideas, and our various intellectual habits, to whatever appearances have been long and familiarly prefented to the mind. But there are other prejudices, which, by being intimately affociated with the effential principles of our conftitution, or with the original and univerfal laws of our belief, are incomparably more inveterate in their nature, and have a far more extenfive influence on human character and happiness.

III. The manner in which the affociation of ideas operates in producing this third clafs of our speculative errors, may be conceived, in part, from what

was formerly faid, concerning the fuperftitious obfervances, which are mixed with the practice of med icine among rude nations. As all the different circumstances which accompanied the first adminiftration of a remedy, come to be confidered as effential to its future fuccefs, and are blended together in our conceptions, without any discrimination of their relative importance, fo, whatever tenets and ceremonies we have been taught to connect with the religious creed of our infancy, become almost a part of our conftitution, by being indiffolubly united with truths which are effential to happiness, and which we are led to reverence and to love, by all the best difpofitions of the heart. The aftonishment which the peasant feels, when he fees the rites of a religion different from his own, is not lefs great than if he faw fome flagrant breach of the moral duties, or fome direct act of impiety to God; nor is it easy for him to conceive, that there can be any thing worthy in a mind which treats with indifference, what awakens in his own breaft all its beft and fublimeft emotions. "Is it poffible," (fays the old and expiring Bramin, in one of Marmontel's tales, to the young English officer who had faved the life of his daughter,)" is it poffible, that he to whofe compaf"fion I owe the prefervation of my child, and who "now foothes my laft moments with the confolations "of piety, fhould not believe in the god Vistnou, and "his nine metamorphofes !"

What has now been faid on the nature of religious fuperftition, may be applied to many other fubjects. In particular, it may be applied to thofe political prejudices which bias the judgment even of enlight ened men in all countries of the world.

How deeply rooted in the human frame are those important principles, which intereft the good man in the profperity of the world; and more efpecially in the profperity of that beloved community to which

he belongs! How fmall, at the fame time, is the number of individuals who, accustomed to contemplate one modification alone of the focial order, are able to diftinguish the circumftances which are ef sential to human happiness, from those which are indifferent or hurtful! In fuch a fituation, how natural is it for a man of benevolence, to acquire an indifcriminate and fuperftitious veneration for all the inftitutions under which he has been educated; as these institutions, however capricious and abfurd in themselves, are not only familiarifed by habit to all his thoughts and feelings, but are confecrated in his mind by an indiffoluble affociation with duties which nature recommends to his affections, and which reafon.commands him to fulfil. It is on these accounts that a fuperftitious zeal against innovation both in religion and politics, where it is evidently grafted on piety to God, and good-will to mankind, however it may excite the forrow of the more enlightened philofopher, is juftly entitled, not only to his indulgence, but to his esteem and affection.

The remarks which have been already made, are fufficient to fhew, how neceffary it is for us, in the formation of our philofophical principles, to exam. ine with care all thofe opinions which, in our early years, we have imbibed from our inftructors; ; or which are connected with our own local fituation. Nor does the univerfality of an opinion among men who have received a fimilar education, afford any prefumption in its favor; for however great the difference is, which a wife man will always pay to common belief, upon those fubjects which have employed the unbiaffed reafon of mankind, he certainly owes it no refpect, in so far as he suspects it to be influenced by fashion or authority. Nothing can be more juft than the obfervation of Fontenelle, that "the number of those who believe in a fyftem already established in the world, does not, in the

"leaft, add to its credibility; but that the number of those who doubt of it, has a tendency to dimin"ifh it."

The fame remarks lead, upon the other hand, to another conclufion of ftill greater importance; that, notwithstanding the various falfe opinions which are current in the world, there are fome truths, which are infeparable from the human understanding, and by means of which, the errors of education, in moft inftances, are enabled to take hold of our belief.

A weak mind, unaccustomed to reflection, and which has paffively derived its most important opinions from habit or from authority, when, in confequence of a more enlarged intercourfe with the world, it finds, that ideas which it had been taught tó regard as facred, are treated by enlightened and worthy men with ridicule, is apt to lofe its reverence for the fundamental and eternal truths on which these acceffory ideas are grafted, and eafily falls a prey to that fceptical philofophy which teaches, that all the opinions, and all the principles of action by which mankind are governed, may be traced to the influence of education and exmaple. Amidst the infinite variety of forms, however, which our versatile nature affumes, it cannot fail to strike an attentive obferver, that there are certain indelible features common to them all. In one fituation, we find good men attached to a republican form of government; in another, to a monarchy; but in all fituations, we find them devoted to the fervice of their country and of mankind, and difpofed to regard, with reverence and love, the most abfurd and capricious inftitutions which cuftom has led them to connect with the order of fociety. The different appearances, therefore, which the political opinions and the political conduct of men exhibit, while they demonftrate to what a wonderful degree human nature may be influenced by fituation and by early

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inftruction, evince the existence of fome common and original principies, which fit it for the political union, and illuftrate the uniform operation of those laws of affociation, to which, in all the stages of so. ciety, it is equally subject.

Similar obfervations are applicable, and, indeed, in a ftill more ftriking degree, to the opinions of mankind on the important queftions of religion and morality. The variety of fyftems which they have formed to themselves concerning these fubjects, has often excited the ridicule of the fceptic and the libertine; but if, on the one hand, this variety fhews, the folly of bigotry, and the reasonablenefs of mutual indulgence; the curiofity which has led men in every fituation to fuch fpeculations, and the influ. ence which their conclufions, however abfurd, have had on their character and their happiness, prove, no lefs clearly, on the other, that there must be fome principles from which they all derive their origin; and invite the philofopher to afcertain what are these original and immutable laws of the human mind.

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"Examine" (fays Mr. Hume)" the religious prin"ciples which have prevailed in the world. " will scarcely be perfuaded, that they are any thing "but fick men's dreams; or, perhaps, will regard "them more as the playfome whimfies of monkeys "in human shape, than the ferious, pofitive, dog"matical affeverations of a being, who dignifies him"felf with the name of rational.". "To oppose

"the torrent of fcholaftic religion by fuch feeble "maxims as these, that it is impoffible for the fame "thing to be and not to be; that the whole is great"er than a part; that two and three make five; is pretending to ftop the ocean with a bulruth." But what is the inference to which we are led by thefe obfervations? Is it, (to use the words of this ingenious writer,) "that the whole is a riddle, an ænigma, an inexplicable myftery; and that doubt,