The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Volume 4Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
Religion
The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Volume 4
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
Literature -- History and criticism
Ib. p. 478.
'In fine.'
To what purpose were these Reflections, taken as a whole, written? I
cannot answer. To dissuade men from reasoning on a subject beyond our
faculties? Then why all this reasoning?
Vol. IV. p. 28. Deism Revealed.
'Shepherd'. Were you ever at Constantinople, Sir?
'Dechaine'. Never.
'Shep.' Yet I believe you have no more doubt there is such a city,
than that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two
right ones.
'Temp.' I am sure 1 have not.
'Dech.' Nor I; but what then?
'Shep.' Pray, Mr. Dechaine, did you see Julius Cæsar assassinated in
the Capitol?
'Dech.' A pretty question! No indeed, Sir.
'Shep.' Have you any doubts about the truth of what is told us by the
historians concerning that memorable transaction?
'Dech.' Not the least.
'Shep.' Pray, is it either self-evident or demonstrable to you, at
this time and place, that there is any such city as
Constantinople, or that there ever was such a man as Cæsar?
'Dech.' By no means.
'Shep.' And you have all you know concerning the being of either the
city, or the man, merely from the report of others, who had it
from others, and so on, through many links of tradition?
'Dech.' I have.
'Shep.' You see then, that there are certain cases, in which the
evidence of things not seen nor either sensibly or
demonstrably perceived, can justly challenge so entire an
assent, that he who should pretend to refuse it in the fullest
measure of acquiescence, would be deservedly esteemed the most
stupid or perverse of mankind.
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