How general was the ferment of discussion may be gathered from Dryden's Religio Laici (1682), addressed to the youthful Henry Dickinson, translator of Père Richard Simon's Critical History of the Old Testament (Fr. 1678). The French scholar was suspect to begin with; and Bishop Burnet tells that Richard Hampden (grandson of the patriot), who was connected with the Rye House Plot and committed suicide in the reign of William and Mary, had been "much corrupted" in his religious principles by Simon's conversation at Paris. In the poem, Dryden recognizes the upsetting tendency of the treatise, albeit he terms it "matchless":-- For some, who have his secret meaning guessed, Have found our author not too much a priest; and his flowing disquisition, which starts from poetic contempt of reason and ends in prosaic advice to keep quiet about its findings, leaves the matter at that. The hopelessly confused but musical passage: Dim as the borrowed beams of moon and stars, To lonely, weary, wandering travellers, Is Reason to the soul, begins the poem; but the poet thinks it necessary both in his preface and in his piece to argue with the deists in a fashion which must have entertained them as much as it embarrassed the more thoughtful orthodox, his simple thesis being that all ideas of deity were débris from the primeval revelation to Noah, and that natural reason could never have attained to a God-idea at all. And even at that, as regards the Herbertian argument: No supernatural worship can be true, Because a general law is that alone Which must to all and everywhere be known: he confesses that Of all objections this indeed is chief To startle reason, stagger frail belief; and feebly proceeds to argue away the worst meaning of the creed of "the good old man" Athanasius. Finally, we have a fatherly appeal for peace and quietness among the sects:-- And after hearing what our Church can say, If still our reason runs another way, That private reason 'tis more just to curb Than by disputes the public peace disturb; For points obscure are of small use to learn, But common quiet is mankind's concern.