Page:Essay on the First Principles of Government 2nd Ed.djvu/209

 call an arbitrary connection between the observance of certain religious rites, and the continuance of certain states; and that the gods, who were particularly attentive to their preservation, would withdraw their protection, upon the disuse of those ceremonies.

The Bishop of Gloucester seems to agree with me in this, for he says, "The unity of the object of faith, and conformity to a formulary of dogmatick theology, as the terms of communion, is the great foundation and bond of religious society. Now this the several societies of pagan religion wanted, in which there was only a conformity in national ceremonies."

Had the antient heathens entertained any such notion of the direct subserviency of religion to civil policy (i. e. in a moral view) as the advocates for church power endeavour to avail themselves of at this day, they would have made a