was zealous for religion because religion promoted his objects. Philip
was so because he had real faith in it. The former let loose the fire and
the sword upon thousands for the sake of a dogma, while he himself, in
the person of the pope, his captive, derided the very doctrine for which
he had sacrificed so much human blood. It was only with repugnance and
scruples of conscience that Philip resolved on the most just war against
the pope, and resigned all the fruits of his victory as a penitent
malefactor surrenders his booty. The Emperor was cruel from calculation,
his son from impulse. The first possessed a strong and enlightened
spirit, and was, perhaps, so much the worse as a man; the second was
narrow-minded and weak, but the more upright.

Both, however, as it appears to me, might have been better men than they
actually were, and still, on the whole, have acted on the very same
principles. What we lay to the charge of personal character of an
individual is very often the infirmity, the necessary imperfection of
universal human nature. A monarchy so great and so powerful was too
great a trial for human pride, and too mighty a charge for human power.
To combine universal happiness with the highest liberty of the
individual is the sole prerogative of infinite intelligence, which
diffuses itself omnipresently over all. But what resource has man
when placed in the position of omnipotence? Man can only aid his
circumscribed powers by classification; like the naturalist, he
establishes certain marks and rules by which to facilitate his own
feeble survey of the whole, to which all individualities must conform.
All this is accomplished for him by religion. She finds hope and fear
planted in every human breast; by making herself mistress of these
emotions, and directing their affections to a single object, she
virtually transforms millions of independent beings into one uniform
abstract. The endless diversity of the human will no longer embarrasses