Society, some say, is at present filled with persons, who, to borrow the expression of the times, are absolutely disengaged from every kind of prejudice, who believe not even the existence of a Supreme Being; and yet, their conduct appears as regular as that of the most religious men. Before replying to this objection I ought to make an important observation. The detractors of a religious spirit habitually confound, in their discourse, devotion and piety; they attribute besides to devotion an exaggerated sense, which its natural definition will not bear; and derive from this misconception a great advantage. Piety, simple in its sentiments and deportment, commonly escapes the heedless glance of a man of the world; and the greater part of those who speak of it, would have some difficulty to delineate it well; devotion, on the contrary, such as we are accustomed to represent, seems to attach some value to appearances; it displays itself, it makes a parade of the austerity of its principles; and often soured by the sacrifices, of the constraint, which it has imposed on itself as a law, it contracts a rough and inflexible spirit, which banishes sentiment, amiable and indulgent: in short, devotion is sometimes mixed with hypocrisy, and then it is only a despicable assemblage of the most contemptible vices. It is easy to judge, from these two pictures, that judicious piety, rational and indulgent, forms the true characteristic of a religious spirit, considered in its purity. It is then with morality, inspired by a like spirit, that it is necessary to compare those men, who are guided only by the principles they frame to themselves; and I believe, that one of these two systems of morality is far superior to the other; but we run a risk of deceiving ourselves in our observations, when we do not extend them beyond the narrow circle, known amongst us by the name of _society_. Men, in the circumscribed relations which arise from the communications of idleness and dissipation, require of each other, only qualities applicable to these kind of relations; their code of laws is very short, integrity in the commerce of life, constancy in friendship, or, at least, politeness in our intercourse, a kind of elevation in their discourse and manner; in short, probity is the grand outline; and this is all that is required, in order to display ourselves to the best advantage in the midst of the active scenes which surround us, where we sometimes form a confederacy proper to serve as a support of the great virtues; but what they wish for before every thing is, a grant of indulgence in favour of vices, which do not disturb the order or the peace of their pleasures, and which only render unhappy parents, husbands, and creditors, vassals and the commonalty. Far distant, indeed, from a like tolerance, are those collective obligations which morality dictates, obligations, of which I made a concise sketch, when I compared them with those which are imposed by civil laws.