It will, I confess, come very much within the compass of this part of my discourse, to give an account, _or at least make an essay toward it_, of the share _the Devil_ has had in the spreading religion in the world; and especially of dividing and subdividing opinions in religion; perhaps, to eke it out and make it reach the farther; and also to shew how far he is or has made himself a missionary of the famous clan _de propaganda fide_; it is true, we find him heartily employ'd in almost every corner of the world _ad propagandum errorem_: But that may require a history by it self. As to his propagating religion, 'tis a little hard indeed, at first sight, to charge _the Devil_ with propagating religion, that is to say, if we take it literally, and in the gross; but if you take it as the _Scots_ insisted to take the oath of fidelity, _viz._ with an _explanation_, it is plain _Satan_ has very often had a share in the method, if not in the design of propagating the _christian faith_: For example. I think I do no injury at all to the Devil, to say that he had a great hand in the old _holy war_, as it was ignorantly and enthusiastically call'd; stirring up the christian princes and powers of _Europe_ to run a madding after the _Turks_ and _Saracens_, and make war with those innocent people above a thousand miles off, only because they entred into God's heritage when he had forsaken it; graz'd upon his ground when he had fairly turn'd it into a common, and laid it open for the next comer; spending their nation's treasure, and embarking their kings and people, (I say) in a war above a thousand miles off, filling their heads with that religious madness, call'd, in those days, _holy zeal_ to recover the _terra sancta_, the sepulchers of Christ and the Saints, and as they call'd it falsly, the _holy city_, tho' true religion says it was the accursed city, and not worth spending one drop of blood for. This religious _Bubble_ was certainly of _Satan_, who, as he craftily drew them in, so like a true _Devil_ he left them in the lurch when they came there, fac'd about to the _Saracens_, animated the immortal _Saladin_ against them, and manag'd so dexterously that he left the bones of about thirteen or fourteen hundred thousand Christians there as a trophy of his infernal politicks; and after the christian world had run _a la santa terra_, or in _English_ a _saunt'ring_, about a hundred year, he dropt it to play another game less foolish, but ten times wickeder than that which went before it, _namely_, turning the crusadoes of the Christians one against another; and, as _Hudibras_ said in another case, "Made them fight like mad or drunk "For dame religion as for punk.