Here are, it seems, _two natures_; they may be as different as good and evil; yet as they are both _natures_, both _internal light_, how shall a man know which he follows? He does not know which was first, or why he should call one first, and the other second; they are both internal, and without any thing to distinguish them. And as he is not to resist the motions of nature, or stifle its directions; so he must be as obedient to the directions of the second, as of the first nature, because he does not perceive their difference, nor has any means to distinguish their operations. He therefore that asserts the light of nature to be a sufficient unerring guide in divine matters, ought either to shew, that our _second_ nature is as _safe_ a guide as the first; or that though it is nature, yet it has no _natural powers_ over us. For since every man is _necessitated_ to take upon him a second nature, which he does not _know_ to be a second, or _when_ it began, or _how far_ it has proceeded, or how _contrary_ it is to his first nature; he that would prove the light of nature to be so perfect, that nothing can be added to it, is obliged to prove, that our second nature, which we receive by education, has the same degree of perfection. For so far as our second nature is different from the first, so far it has changed the first; and if we are to follow nature exclusive of revelation, we may take _revenge_, _self-murder_, _incontinence_, _sensuality_, _pride_, _self-conceit_, and a _contempt_ of all things sacred, to be the true dictates of nature. For it often happens to people, to be thus educated; so if education is a second nature, and nature is to be esteemed a _true_ and _perfect_ guide; a man thus educated, has all his vices made so many glorious laws of nature; and thro’ the strength of his natural light, he condemns humility, self-denial, and devotion, as foolish bigotry. This writer says, “Natural religion, _that is, the religion of nature_, is a perpetual standing rule for men of the meanest, as well as the highest capacities, and carries its own evidence with it, those internal, inseparable marks of truth.¹ _But if education is a |second nature|, and, as this writer affirms, |has the force of a second nature even in things unreasonable and unnatural|; then this second nature has not only its natural religion, which is also |a perpetual standing rule for men of the meanest, as well as the highest capacities; which carries its own evidence with it, those internal, inseparable marks of truth|; but it may also have a natural religion, both |unreasonable and unnatural|; since education has the force of nature even in things of this kind._” ¹ Page 243.