say, that he never felt any Fear of an invisible Cause, that was not owing to Education, I believe him as much as I do a young married Woman in Health and Vigour, who tells me, that she never felt any Love to a Man, that did not proceed from a Sense of her Duty. Hor. Does this Fear, this Acknowledgment of an invisible Cause, dispose or excite men any more to the true Religion, than it does to the grossest and most abominable Idolatry? Cleo. I don't say it does. But there is no Passion in Human Nature so beneficial, that, according as it is managed, may not do Mischief as well as good. What do you think of Love? If this Fear had not been common to the whole Species, none could have been influenc'd by it; the Consequence of which must have been, that Men would have rejected the true Religion as well as the false. There is Nothing that Men may differ in, in which they will ever be all of the same Opinion: And abstruse Truths do often seem to be less probable than well dress'd Fables, when they are skilfully accommodated to our Understanding, and agreeable to our own Way of thinking. That there is but one God, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, that is an all-wise and perfectly good Being, without any Mixture of Evil, would have been a most rational Opinion, tho' it had not been reveal'd. But Reasoning and Metaphysicks must have been carried on to a great Height of Perfection, before this Truth could be penetrated into by the Light of Nature. _Plutarch_, who was a Man of great Learning, and has in many Things display'd good Sense and Capacity, thought it impossible, that one Being should have been the Cause of the Whole, and was therefore of Opinion, that there must have been Two Principles; the one to produce all the Good; and the other all the Evil that is in the World. And Some of the greatest men have been of this Opinion, both before and since the Promulgation of the Gospel. But whatever Philosophers and men of Letters may have advanced, there never was an Age or a Country where the Vulgar would ever come into an Opinion that contradicted that Fear, which all men are born with, of an invisible Cause, that meddles and interferes in Human Affairs; and there is a greater Possibility, that the most Senseless Enthusiast should make a knowing and polite Nation believe the most incredible Falsities, or that the most odious Tyrant should persuade them to the grossest Idolatry, than that the most artful Politician, or the most popular Prince, should make Atheism to be universally received among the Vulgar of any considerable State or Kingdom, tho' there were no Temples or Priests to be seen. From all which I would shew, that, on the one Hand, you can make no Multitudes believe contrary to what they feel, or what contradicts a Passion inherent in their Nature, and that, on the other, if you humour that Passion, and allow it to be just, you may regulate it as you please. How unanimous soever, therefore, all Rulers and Magistrates have