Now those who have the Direction of Young Ladies in their Youth, so soon as past Child-hood, whether they be the Parents, Governesses, or others, do not, most commonly, neglect the Teaching them That which is the Ground and Support of all the Good Precepts they give them; because that Principles of Religion are by them believed to be unnecessary; or are not in their Thoughts; but because they presume, as has been said, that those now under their Care are already sufficiently instructed herein; viz.  When their Nurses, or Maids, Taught them their Catechisms; that is to say, Certain Answers to a Train of Questions adapted to some approv’d System of Divinity.

That this is sufficient Instruction in Religion, is apparently a Belief pretty general:  And not only such Young Ladies as have newly put off their Bibs and Aprons, but even the greatest Number of their Parents, and Teachers themselves, would, yet less than They, be pleas’d if one should tell them that those who know so much as this, may nevertheless be very Ignorant concerning the Christian Religion; these Old People no more than the Young Ones, being able to give any farther Account thereof than they have thus been taught.  It is yet true that many who have Learn’d, and who well remember long Catechisms, with all their pretended Proofs, are so far from having that Knowledge which Rational Creatures ought to have of a Religion they profess to Believe they can only be Sav’d by, as that they are not able to say, either what this Religion does Consist in, or why it is they Believe it; and are so little instructed by their Catechisms, as that, oftentimes, they understand not so much as the very Terms they have Learn’d in them:  And more often find the Proportions therein contain’d, so short in the Information of their Ignorance; or so unintelligible, to their Apprehensions; or so plainly contradictory of the most obvious Dictates of common Sense; that Religion (for the which they never think of looking beyond these Systems) appears to them indeed a thing not Built upon, or defensible by Reason:  In consequence of which Opinion, the weakest attaques made against it, must needs render such Persons (at the least) wavering in their Belief of it; Whence those Precepts of Vertue, which they have receiv’d as bottom’d thereon, are, in a Time wherein Scepticism and Vice, pass for Wit and Gallantry, necessarily brought under the suspicion of having no solid Foundation; and the recommenders thereof, either of Ignorance, or Artifice.

But the not making Young People understand their Religion, is a fault not peculiar in regard to the instruction of one Sex alone, any otherwise than as consider’d in its Consequences; whereby (ordinarily speaking) Women do the most inevitably suffer; as not having the like Advantage (at least early enough) of Correcting the Ignorance, or Errors of their Child-hood that Men have.