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Rh formed which does not proceed from its dogma, that religion runs inevitably to its destruction, and will find it impossible to recover its authority; for the contest will not cease, until the two adversaries, after many alternate victories and defeats, sink exhausted on the field. France, especially during the last century, affords a striking example of this fact; Roman Catholicism and Philosophy waged there a relentless warfare, sometimes open, sometimes concealed; and this war will only cease, when the destruction of both, shall give place to the true christian religion and true philosophy.

These contests, more or less prolonged, which are everywhere found since the earliest ages recorded by history, are the result of the spiritual liberty which our Lord gave to man on his creation—Liberty, without which he would have been a brute, and not a human being. By the possession of this liberty man fell; it is by this that he must become regenerate; but as he cannot be freely brought from this deep spiritual degradation, into the true religion, but by the operation of such religious principles, of which his fallen nature is susceptible, our Lord has permitted the establishment of religions suited to the state of each nation; and as all religion which is not the true religion, has a tendency to remain ever stationary, and will not suffer itself to be transformed into one less impure (for its directors strive to preserve it thus entire, in order to enjoy the worldly advantages which it procures them); therefore, our Lord has permitted these contests between each religion, and the philosophy which springs up sooner or later, notwithstanding the pressure kept continually on the minds of men. Thus is manifested, and more especially in our day, the law of progress. If, as in the present day, the entire world is shaken in its old religious belief, what is it but a part of that same providential plan, which will, by degrees, conduct all the inhabitants of the globe, by spiritual liberty, to the true religion. Could the nations under the dominion of Ismalism, could the Indians, the Chinese, the Australians, and all the in