The true progress of Christian enlightenment in the pursuits of philosophy and science, I shall have occasion to mention afterwards. The principle of toleration, which was solidly established by the German treaty of religious peace, became an essential element of social illumination. By degrees this principle was admitted throughout almost all Europe--yet we must observe that its adoption cannot be determined by one uniform, invariable rule in all countries, but that local circumstances, respecting which it is often difficult for the distant observer to come to a right judgment, must and ought to produce numerous modifications in the application of the principle. That wide toleration which in Holland and North America has for a long time incorporated into the state a multitude of petty sects, would not be practicable or expedient in other countries. The religious liberty which in the Russian Empire is extended even to Mahometans, and to certain tribes of Buddhists and Pagans, would not apply to the circumstances of most other civilized countries. There are in the deep-rooted habits of nations, and in the constitution of individual states, very peculiar, and often apparently singular, circumstances and combinations, which no man should judge of hastily, and according to abstract principles, until he has obtained a close, accurate, and deep insight into the historical condition and situation of a country. Thus while England is intolerant in her Constitution at home, she gives the fullest latitude in Canada to the North American principle of religious freedom; and the whole British Empire in India is founded on toleration--that is to say, on the principle of governing the Indians according to their own laws, manners, customs, and opinions. By this policy the English have become almost complete masters of this great and fertile country; and their enlightened rule forms a strong contrast to the earlier tyranny of the Mahometans, who hold the Indian idolatry in the utmost abhorrence; although that idolatry, amid a chaos of errors and fables, contains many better and higher vestiges of ancient truth, than the mere negative and fanatic superstition of Mahomet. Even the French, when they had a firm footing in India, committed a capital fault in forming alliances more with the Mahometans than with the native Indian powers.