However, the Christian and the Deist unite, in some manner, in the ultimate tendency of their thoughts; they meet when they throw their attention on civil society, and when they seek to determine the duties of men; for a wise man must ever pay homage to the morality of the gospel, and the philosopher could not have imagined a more reasonable system, or one more conformable to our situation[6]. If it is then true, that opinions, in appearance opposite, approach, at their extremities; and if it is true, that the adoration of a God, and respect for morality, form by uniting, the circle of evangelical doctrines, it very little concerns the reasonable philosopher, that the Christian faith is placed between those two grand ideas; if he thinks he can himself explore the space which separates man from his Creator, for what reason would he condemn with bitterness the sentiments of those who are attached to the comfortable system of intercession and redemption, of which Christianity has laid the foundation? In short, were they even not to agree in every opinion with the interpreters of the Christian doctrine, this would not be a sufficient reason for breaking the religious alliance which ought to subsist amongst men; an alliance represented and rendered authentic, in every nation, by the public worship which has been made choice of by the government. What idea then should we have of the genius or the abilities of a philosopher, who, at the sight of the ceremonies of the public worship which disgust him, could not rise above them, so as to consider them, in some measure, as the atmosphere of religious opinions, which turning his attention from the importance of those opinions, could not preserve, at least, some respect for all the dependencies of the most sublime and salutary thought? It is easy, however, to perceive, that, for the generality of men, the duties of morality, religion, and all the exterior homage rendered to the Deity, compose a whole so closely connected, that the basis is in danger when the outworks are attacked. The imagination of the vulgar cannot be guided in the same manner as that of the solitary thinker; and it would be committing a great error, to try to influence the opinions of the generality by the same considerations which are sufficient for the man who profoundly reflects: there is a system proportionate to the different faculties of intelligent beings, as there is one applicable to the varied forces of their physical nature.