Nor do I admit it to be an argument either for Revelation or Natural Religion, that the same turn for speculation that would convert a christian into a theist, will carry him on to be an atheist, though I know the argument has been often used.  If upon sick beds or in dying moments men revert to their old weakness and superstitions, their falling off may afford triumph to religionists; for my part I care not so much for the opinions of sick and dying men, as of those who at the time are strong and healthy.  But in the opinion of the one or the other I put no great stress.  My faith is in reasoning, for though ridicule is not a complete test of truth, reasoning I hold certainly to be so.  I own belief may be imprest on the mind otherwise than by the force of reason.  The mind may be diseased.  All I shall say is that though I have formerly believed many things without reason, and even many against it, as is very common, I hope I shall never more.  My mind (I was going to say, thank God) is sane at present, and I intend to keep it so.  I am aware that at the expression just used some will exclaim in triumph, that the poor wretch could not help thinking of his God at the same time he was denying him.  The observation would hold good, if it were not that we often speak and write unpremeditately and though what is in this manner unpremeditately expressed upon a revision should be certainly expunged, yet I chuse to leave the expression to shew the force of habit.

In fear lies the origin of all fancied deities, whether sole or numberless.

          Primus in orbe Deos fecit Timor.

But the great debasement of the human mind is evidenced in the instance of attributing a merit to belief, which has come at last to be stiled a virtue, and is dignified by the name of faith, that most pitiful of all human qualities.  When the apostle spoke of faith, hope and charity, he might as well have exclaimed the least of the three is faith, as the greatest is charity.

One enthusiast cries out un Roi and another un Dieu.  The reality of the king I admit, because I feel his power.  Against my feeling and my experience I cannot argue, for upon these sensations is built all argument.  But not all the wondrous works of the creation, as I hear the visible operations of nature called, convince me in the least of the existence of a Deity.  By nature I mean to express the whole of what I see and feel, that whole, I call self-existent from all eternity; I admit a principle of intelligence and design, but I deny that principle to be extraneous from itself.  My creed in fine is the same with that of the Roman poet;

          "Deus est ubicunque movemur."