which it had subdued. It seems evident, that the more the barriers are
removed which separate nation from nation amongst mankind, and citizen
from citizen amongst a people, the stronger is the bent of the human
mind, as if by its own impulse, towards the idea of an only and
all-powerful Being, dispensing equal laws in the same manner to every
man. In democratic ages, then, it is more particularly important not
to allow the homage paid to secondary agents to be confounded with the
worship due to the Creator alone.

Another truth is no less clear--that religions ought to assume fewer
external observances in democratic periods than at any others. In
speaking of philosophical method among the Americans, I have shown that
nothing is more repugnant to the human mind in an age of equality than
the idea of subjection to forms. Men living at such times are impatient
of figures; to their eyes symbols appear to be the puerile artifice
which is used to conceal or to set off truths, which should more
naturally be bared to the light of open day: they are unmoved by
ceremonial observances, and they are predisposed to attach a secondary
importance to the details of public worship. Those whose care it is to
regulate the external forms of religion in a democratic age should pay
a close attention to these natural propensities of the human mind, in
order not unnecessarily to run counter to them. I firmly believe in the
necessity of forms, which fix the human mind in the contemplation of
abstract truths, and stimulate its ardor in the pursuit of them, whilst
they invigorate its powers of retaining them steadfastly. Nor do I
suppose that it is possible to maintain a religion without external
observances; but, on the other hand, I am persuaded that, in the ages
upon which we are entering, it would be peculiarly dangerous to multiply
them beyond measure; and that they ought rather to be limited to as much
as is absolutely necessary to perpetuate the doctrine itself, which is