confined, and the two instances wherein those virtues arrived at the
greatest height were Socrates and Cato. But neither these, nor any
other virtues possessed by these two, were at all owing to any
lessons or doctrines of a sect. For Socrates himself was of none at
all; and although Cato was called a Stoic, it was more from a
resemblance of manners in his worst qualities, than that he avowed
himself one of their disciples. The same may be affirmed of many
other great men of antiquity. Whence I infer that those who were
renowned for virtue among them were more obliged to the good natural
dispositions of their own minds than to the doctrines of any sect
they pretended to follow.

On the other side, as the examples of fortitude and patience among
the primitive Christians have been infinitely greater, and more
numerous, so they were altogether the product of their principles
and doctrine, and were such as the same persons, without those aids,
would never have arrived to. Of this truth most of the Apostles,
with many thousand martyrs, are a cloud of witnesses beyond
exception. Having, therefore, spoken so largely upon the former
heads, I shall dwell no longer upon this.

And if it should here be objected, Why does not Christianity still
produce the same effects? it is easy to answer, first, that,
although the number of pretended Christians be great, yet that of
true believers, in proportion to the other, was never so small; and
it is a true lively faith alone that, by the assistance of God's
grace, can influence our practice.

Secondly, We may answer that Christianity itself has very much
suffered by being blended up with Gentile philosophy. The Platonic