Page:An analysis of religious belief (1877).djvu/7



The appearance, a few months ago, of caused not a little excitement in England, and its introduction into our country had much the same effect here. While many were more or less shocked by the Viscount's boldness of language in examining the sources of the religious creeds of the world, and at the freedom with which he removed the sacred mask from many antique myths and superstitions, the thoughtful and the enquiring were furnished with a fund of material for new thought, and largely-increased facilities for investigating and comparing the creeds and dogmas which have made up the ruling religious faiths of mankind.

When the Viscount's high birth is remembered; that he was the son of Lord John Russell, one of the first and oldest Peers of England; that he was thus closely connected with the aristocracy of that country; that he had been carefully nurtured within the fold of the Christian Church; that he had received the instruction of a pious Christian mother, from the days of his early childhood, that the influence of his parents and his early companions was to draw him him under the control of the popular system of religion which rules in his country, it is not a little remarkable that he had the independence and moral bravery to come out in opposition to all his near friends, and to avow his unbelief in a code of ethics and opinions unlike those taught him in his childhood and youth, an unusual interest attaches to the work which he produced.

When it is borne in mind that his amiable and sympathetic wife toiled with him and rendered him essential service in collecting and arranging the matter for his two volumes; that she was taken from him by the hand of death before his work was completed; that he also sank under the hand of disease and