The great mass of pious people in all past ages have been so ignorant, and so little accustomed to reasoning or observation, that they have never observed, that, although many cases are reported of Providence interfering to save the life of a child who fell from the window of a basement-story, none are recorded of his saving a child that fell from the fifth story. Why is this? Does not this fact suggest a scientific lesson? But the heads of the great mass of the people have been so filled with creeds and catechisms that they have no room for science. It will be time enough to talk about special providences after a case is known of a man escaping with his life after a cannonball has passed through his head, or a bullet through his heart. The belief in special providences is calculated to paralyze human effort in times of danger, and thus suffer the consequences to be more frequently fatal. Let a man believe, while a ship is being wrecked in a storm, dashing against rocks and billows, and her deck overflowed with water, that there is a Providence in the case, and he will naturally labor with less zeal and effort to save the vessel. If the case is in the hands of God, and it is his good pleasure that they should be lost, it is of but little use to work the pumps; and, if it is his will that they should be saved, they will be saved without much effort on their part. There can be no doubt but that millions of pious people have been restrained on various occasions from putting forth their strongest efforts to arrest a threatening disaster, from the conviction that the hand of God was in it, and that no human efforts could change the fate he had decreed for them. And thus the doctrine, in its practical consequences, has been pernicious. But, in this age of reason and scientific illumination, men are beginning to learn, that, in cases of threatening danger and destruction, muscle is more necessary than "Providence;" that, when a ship is sinking in mid-ocean, pumps are more efficacious than prayers; and, when a building is on fire, they can better do without the assistance of Providence than without water, firemen, and engines. CHAPTER XLIII.--FAITH AND BELIEF, BIBLE ERRORS RESPECTING. "Faith" and "belief" seem to be among the most important words in the Christian New Testament. No words are much more frequently used. They occur in nearly every chapter, and are used more than two hundred times. The following is a specimen of the manner in which these words are used:--