Page:Job Abbott.djvu/29



we enter upon our "Reasons" for abandoning certain, systems of religious doctrine, we think it may be well to offer some remarks in defence of such changes generally.

We not unfrequently find an adherence to the religious opinions in which a person has been educated, applauded as something exceedingly meritorious, while the abandonment of them is stigmatized as if it were a proof of weakness, if not of wickedness. And supposing a person not only to abandon "the religion of his forefathers," but also to see reason afterwards to change his newly-adopted sentiments, the admirers of "things as they are," are ready to regard such an "apostate" as little better than a pest and outcast of society ; nay, more, some persons will even speak of such an individual as if he had set a worse example to his fellow-creatures than the drunkard or the brawler. "But is there no merit then, it may be asked, in consistency?" Undoubtedly there is, if by consistency be meant consistency of conduct, as implying a uniform adherence, in practice, to the principles professed. This, assuredly, is the highest degree of merit. Until finite creatures,. how-