Not only, however, does our belief in the supreme benevolence and justice of the deity, force upon us the conviction of a future state of rewards and punishments; but the very contemplation of the human mind, with its faculties and passions, points us to another world. We have faculties which are capable of ranging beyond the sphere in which we move. We have longings which this world, with all its stores of provisions, cannot satisfy. These faculties and these longings point distinctly to another world. Lord Bacon has truly asserted, that if the child in its mother's womb could reason like a philosopher--could survey its little hands, mouth, eyes, feet, lungs, &c. and perceive that they discharged no adequate functions in the womb, he would, if impressed with the belief of the wisdom and design of creation, come necessarily to the conclusion that this was not the place of his permanent abode--that he was ultimately to be ushered into some other world, where all his physical energies and intellectual powers would be brought into play, and have an ample field to range in. So likewise, if I may use the beautiful language of Dugald Stewart, "When tired and disgusted with this world of imperfections, we delight to contemplate another, where the charms of nature wear an eternal bloom, and where new sources of enjoyment are opened, suited to the vast capacities of the human mind." And thus do we find both instinct and reason contending alike for the truth of the great principles of religion. With these preliminary remarks, I will now proceed to examine into the differences between the sexes in a religious point of view; and here I may assert at once, without the fear of contradiction, that woman always has been, and is now, in almost every country upon the face of the globe, more religious than man. This difference between the sexes is still more striking under the christian dispensation, than under any other religion perhaps, which has ever existed in the world. In our own country, we all know that the female communicants form an immense majority in all our churches. "Very many of them (says Timothy Dwight in the 4th vol. of his Travels, and no one was better qualified to speak on this subject)--very many of them are distinguished for moral excellence--are unaffectedly pious, humble, benevolent, patient and self-denying. In this illustrious sphere of distinction, they put our own sex to shame. Were the church of Christ stripped of her female communicants, she would lose many of her brightest ornaments, and I fear, _two-thirds_ of her whole family."[1] [Footnote 1: I have no doubt that President Dwight has underrated the number of female communicants in the United States. From conversations with the most intelligent of the clergy, I should be disposed to say they formed three-fourths, or four-fifths of the communicants.]