21. But though we may thus prepare ourselves to assent to the possibility, or even probability, of such a Divine Interposition, exercised for the purpose of establishing upon earth a Divine Society: it would be a rash and unauthorized step,--especially taking into account the vast differences between material and spiritual things,--to assume that such an Interposition would have any resemblance to the commencement of a New Period in the earth's history, analogous to the Periods by which that history has already been marked. What the manner and the operation of such a Divine Interposition would be, Philosophy would attempt in vain to conjecture. It is conceivable that such an event should produce its effect, not at once, by a general and simultaneous change in the aspect of terrestrial things, but gradually, by an almost imperceptible progression. It is possible also that there may be such an Interposition, which is only one step in the Divine Plan;--a preparation for some other subsequent Interposition, by which the change in the Earth's inhabitants is to be consummated. Or it is possible that such a Divine Interposition in the history of man, as we have hinted at, may be a preparation, not for a new form of terrestrial life, but for a new form of human life;--not for a new peopling of the Earth, but for a new existence of Man. These possibilities are so vague and doubtful, so far as any scientific analogies lead, that it would be most unwise to attempt to claim for them any value, as points in which Science supplies support to Religion. Those persons who most deeply feel the value of religion, and are most strongly convinced of its truths, will be the most willing to declare, that religious belief is, and ought to be, independent of any such support, and must be, and may be, firmly established on its own proper basis.