things, and his neighbour as himself, as all that is necessary to
salvation. When he describes the last judgment, he does not examine what
sect, or what church, men were of, but how far they had been beneficent
to mankind. Faith cannot determine reward or punishment, being
involuntary, and only the consequence of conviction: we do not believe
what we please, but what appears to us with the face of truth. As I do
not mistake exclamation, invective, or ridicule for argument, I never
recriminate on the lives of their popes and cardinals, when they urge
the character of Henry the Eighth; I only answer, good actions are often
done by all men through interested motives, and 'tis the common method
of Providence to bring good out of evil: history, both sacred and
profane, furnishes many examples of it. When they tell me I have forsook
the worship of my ancestors, I say I have had more ancestors heathen
than Christian, and my faith is certainly ancienter than theirs, since I
have added nothing to the practice of the primitive professors of
Christianity. As to the prosperity or extent of the dominion of their
church, which Cardinal Bellarmin counts among the proofs of its
orthodoxy, the Mahometans, who have larger empires, and have made a
quicker progress, have a better plea for the visible protection of
Heaven. If the fopperies of their religion were only fopperies, they
ought to be complied with, wherever it is established, like any
ridiculous dress in fashion; but I think them impieties: their devotions
are scandal to humanity from their nonsense; the mercenary deceits and
barbarous tyranny of their ecclesiastics, inconsistent with moral
honesty. If they object the diversity of our sects as a mark of
reprobation, I desire them to consider, that objection has equal force
against Christianity in general. When they thunder with the names of
fathers and councils, they are surprised to find me as well (often
better) acquainted with them than themselves. I show them the variety of
their doctrines, their virulent contests and various factions, instead