[Footnote 16:  “In this passage,” says Scott, “the author’s High Church principles, and jealousy of the Dissenters, plainly shew themselves; and it is, perhaps, in special reference to what is here said, that he ranks it among the pamphlets he wrote in opposition to the party then in power.” [T.  S.]]

To all this I answer:  that there is one darling inclination of mankind, which usually affects to be a retainer to religion, though she be neither its parent, its godmother, or its friend; I mean the spirit of opposition, that lived long before Christianity, and can easily subsist without it.  Let us, for instance, examine wherein the opposition of sectaries among us consists, we shall find Christianity to have no share in it at all Does the Gospel any where prescribe a starched, squeezed countenance, a stiff, formal gait, a singularity of manners and habit, or any affected modes of speech different from the reasonable part of mankind?  Yet, if Christianity did not lend its name to stand in the gap, and to employ or divert these humours, they must of necessity be spent in contraventions to the laws of the land, and disturbance of the public peace.  There is a portion of enthusiasm assigned to every nation, which, if it hath not proper objects to work on, will burst out, and set all into a flame.  If the quiet of a state can be bought by only flinging men a few ceremonies to devour, it is a purchase no wise man would refuse Let the mastiffs amuse themselves about a sheep’s skin stuffed with hay, provided it will keep them from worrying the flock The institution of convents abroad, seems in one point a strain of great wisdom, there being few irregularities in human passions, which may not have recourse to vent themselves in some of those orders, which are so many retreats for the speculative, the melancholy, the proud, the silent, the politic and the morose, to spend themselves, and evaporate the noxious particles, for each of whom we in this island are forced to provide a several sect of religion, to keep them quiet And whenever Christianity shall be abolished, the legislature must find some other expedient to employ and entertain them For what imports it how large a gate you open, if there will be always left a number who place a pride and a merit in not coming in?[17]

[Footnote 17:  So the “Miscellanies” (1711) and Hawkesworth Faulkner, Scott, and Craik print, “in refusing to enter.” [T.  S.]]

Having thus considered the most important objections against Christianity, and the chief advantages proposed by the abolishing thereof, I shall now with equal deference and submission to wiser judgments as before, proceed to mention a few inconveniences that may happen, if the Gospel should be repealed, which perhaps the projectors may not have sufficiently considered.

And first, I am very sensible how much the gentlemen of wit and pleasure are apt to murmur, and be choqued[18] at the sight of so many draggled tail parsons, that happen to fall in their way, and offend their eyes, but at the same time, these wise reformers do not consider what an advantage and felicity it is, for great wits to be always provided with objects of scorn and contempt, in order to exercise and improve their talents, and divert their spleen from falling on each other or on themselves, especially when all this may be done without the least imaginable danger to their persons.