Page:An Essay on the Principle of Population (1798).djvu/419

 way by their own intrinsic excellence; and, by operating as moral motives, gradually to influence and improve, and not to overpower and stagnate the faculties of man.

It would be, undoubtedly, presumptuous to say, that the Supreme Being could not possibly have effected his purpose in any other way than that which he has chosen; but as the revelation of the divine will, which we possess is attended with some doubts and difficulties; and as our reason points out to us the strongest objections to a revelation, which would force immediate, implicit, universal belief; we have surely just cause to think that these doubts and difficulties are no argument against the divine origin of the scriptures; and that the species of evidence which they possess is best suited