It has been since its commencement the
author of happiness and virtue to millions and millions of the human
race. Who is there that would not wish his son to be a Christian?
Christianity also, in every country in which it is professed, hath
obtained a sensible, although not a complete influence upon the public
judgment of morals. And this is very important. For without the
occasional correction which public opinion receives, by referring to
some fixed standard of morality, no man can foretel into what
extravagances it might wander. Assassination might become as honourable
as duelling: unnatural crimes be accounted as venal as fornication is
wont to be accounted. In this way it is possible that many may be kept
in order by Christianity who are not themselves Christians. They may be
guided by the rectitude which it communicates to public opinion. Their
consciences may suggest their duty truly, and they may ascribe these
suggestions to a moral sense, or to the native capacity of the human
intellect, when in fact they are nothing more than the public opinion,
reflected from their own minds; and opinion, in a considerable degree,
modified by the lessons of Christianity.
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