directing their chief attention to thefe Beings, with whom they fuppofed they had more immediately to do, they would in time entirely lofe fight of the one Supreme. They would have no act of worship directed to him, but would confine their regards to the inferior, and therefore imperfect Beings; and they would unavoidably form their ideas of their characters from what they fuppofed to proceed from them; judging from what they felt themselves, and observed in other perfons, what they muft be, in order to do as they did. Accordingly, we find among Heathen nations characters of their gods, little, if at all, fuperior to thofe of men; fome revengeful, fome capricious, and fome even libidinous; for proof of which we need only appeal to Homer, and the Grecian mythology in general. It was in order to render themselves acceptable to fome of these deities that they inflicted the greatest cruelties upon others, and even upon themfelves, courting their favour by the most expensive facrifices, and the most painful mortifications; and to recommend themD felves selves to others, they indulged in fuch abominable practices, as on any other occasion they could not help regarding with deteftation. When once the worship of the one true God, a Being of perfect purity, as well as infinitely powerful and benevolent, was abandoned, the reft followed of course; and that it was natural, is evident from a fimilar idolatry, and fimilar rites of worship, having been instituted in all ages, and in all parts of the world, among the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, and alfo in Hindoftan, Mexico, and Peru. prone We shall not much wonder at mankind in very early ages imagining fuch bodies as the fun, moon, and stars, and other natural objects, to be animated, if we confider how children are to perfonify every thing that affects them, fo as to feel real anger against any thing that is the occafion of pain to them. Even many perfons grown up will frequently, before they reflect, be affected in a fimilar manner. Whole nations of men, whofe minds have not been cultivated, at this very day entertain notions exactly fimilar to thofe of the antients, which led the way to idolatry. Thus the people of Sumatra, as Dr. Marsden inform us, have the most fuperftitious refpect for the fea, imagining its various motions to be voluntary, and not the effect of the action of the wind upon it. The arts of magic and divination were equally owing to men's ignorance of the natural causes of events, and their taking up with fanciful caufes inftead of them. Nor shall we wonder at the fuperftition of the antients, when we reflect upon fimilar fuperftition, owing to fimilar ignorance, in many perfons of this enlightened age, in all countries, Chriftians not excepted. The antient Greeks and Romans, in order to obtain their revenge upon any perfon, made images of wax, wool, and other things, with certain ceremonies, and fupposed that by melting, tearing, and otherwise abufing those images, the perfons whom they reprefented would fuffer in the same manner. But notions exactly fimilar to these (the remains, no doubt, of Heathen fuperftition) exift at this very day. I myfelf was intimately acquainted with a perD. 2 fon fon of confiderable property, who, imagining his sheep to have fuffered by witchcraft, drove a stake through one of them while it was alive, and left it to perish in that condition; really thinking that the perfon who had bewitched them would perish at the fame time that the sheep did, though it was not poffible for him to have any idea of the manner in which the fuffering of the animal could be the cause of the suffering of the witch; and it was not in my power, though he was a man of much knowledge of the world, and of good fense in other refpects, to convince him that he had done wrong. • How many have there been, if they cannot be fo readily found at prefent, who have profeffed to cure wounds by practising on the weapon with which they were made, to cure warts by burying in the ground pieces of flesh with which they have been rubbed, which flesh, it is further curious to obferve, must have been ftolen; and how many are there who still pretend to cure the ague, and other difeafes, by various charms, without any pro per per medical treatment. All these prac tices were fuggested by ideas exactly fimilar to those which were the foundation of all the fuperftition and idolatry of the Heathens; proceeding from an equal ignorance of the caufes of natural effects, and men's fubftituting imaginary caufes in their places. The antient Heathens judged of the fuccefs of enterprizes by certain animals croffing their paths in particular directions, or certain birds appearing to the right hand or to the left of them. But there are fimilar appearances that are deemed lucky or unlucky among all ignorant perfons. Do not failors fancy they can procure a wind by whistling? and do not fome gamefters really think to change their luck, as they call it, at cards, by changing their places at the table, or even turning round their chairs? Where there is equal ignorance, there will be equal fuperftition. As to fortune-telling by numberlefs appearances, and by aftrology, or the positions of the stars and planets, there is at this day almost as much of it in practice, among ignorant peo |