Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian lifeMasham, Damaris, Lady
Religion
Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian life
Masham, Damaris, Lady
Christian life -- Anglican authors
This is generally, I think, the Sense of Men concerning the Knowledge
which Ladies ought to have of Religion: And thus much, I doubt not may
suffice for their Salvation. But the saving of their Souls (tho' it
were herein as sure as it is possible) is not, I suppose, all that
Men are Solicitous for in regard of their Wives; their own Honour in
that of those so near to them, does I think, much more frequently and
sensibly employ their Care: And that, too often, appears to be but
very weakly secur'd by such an implicit Faith as this. For these
Believers (especially if they are thought to have any Wit, as well as
Beauty) will hardly escape meeting some time or other, with those who
will ask them _why they Believe_; and if they find then that they have
no more Reason for going to Church than they should have had to go to
Mass, or even to the Synagogue, had they been bred amongst Papists or
Jews, they must needs, at the same time, doubt whether, or no, the
Faith they have been brought up in, is any righter than either of
these; from whence they will, (by easy steps) be induc'd to question
the Truth of all Religion, when they shall be told by those who have
insinuated themselves into their Esteem and good Graces, that indeed
All Religions are, alike, the Inventions and Artifices of cunning Men
to govern the World by; unworthy of imposing upon such as have their
good Sense: That Fools only, and Ignorants are kept in Awe, and
restrain'd by their Precepts; which, if they observe it, they shall
ever find, are the lest obey'd by those who pretend the most to
obtrude them upon others.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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