The history of all religions clearly attests that there are two orders of principles--the _natural_ and the _positive_, and, in some measure, two authorities of religious life which are intimately related without negativing each other. The characteristic of the natural is that it is _intrinsic_, of the positive, that it is _extrinsic_. In all ages men have sought the authority of the positive in that which is immediately _beyond_ and above man--in some "voice of the Divinity" toning down the stream of ages, or speaking through a prophet or oracle, or written in some inspired and sacred book. They have sought for the authority of the natural in that which is immediately _within_ man--the voice of the Divinity speaking in the conscience and heart of man. A careful study of the history of religion will show a reciprocal relation between the two, and indicate their common source. We expect to find that our hypothesis will be abundantly sustained by the study of the _Religion of the Athenians_. CHAPTER III. THE RELIGION OF THE ATHENIANS. "All things which I behold bear witness to your carefulness in religion (δεισιδαιμονεστέρους). For as I passed through your city, and beheld the objects of your worship, I found amongst them an altar with this inscription--'TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.' Whom therefore ye worship...."--ST. PAUL. Through one of those remarkable counter-strokes of Divine Providence by which the evil designs of men are overruled, and made to subserve the purposes of God, the Apostle Paul was brought to Athens. He walked beneath its stately porticoes, he entered its solemn temples, he stood before its glorious statuary, he viewed its beautiful altars--all devoted to pagan worship. And "his spirit was stirred within him," he was moved with indignation "when he saw the city full of images of the gods."[95] At the very entrance of the city he met the evidence of this peculiar tendency of the Athenians to multiply the objects of their devotion; for here at the gateway stands an image of Neptune, seated on horseback, and brandishing the trident. Passing through the gate, his attention would be immediately arrested by the sculptured forms of Minerva, Jupiter, Apollo, Mercury, and the Muses, standing near a sanctuary of Bacchus. A long street is now before him, with temples, statues, and altars crowded on either hand. Walking to the end of this street, and turning to the right, he entered the Agora, a public square surrounded with porticoes and temples, which were adorned with statuary and paintings in honor of the gods of Grecian mythology. Amid the plane-trees planted by the hand of Cimon are the statues of the deified heroes of Athens, Hercules and Theseus, and the whole series of the Eponymi, together with the memorials of the older divinities; Mercuries which gave the name to the streets on which they were placed; statues dedicated to Apollo as patron of the city and her deliverer from the