from such rites, and can none the less live in a state of blessedness. (62)
We have an example of this in Japan, where the Christian religion is
forbidden, and the Dutch who live there are enjoined by their East India
Company not to practise any outward rites of religion. (63) I need not cite
other examples, though it would be easy to prove my point from the
fundamental principles of the New Testament, and to adduce many confirmatory
instances; but I pass on the more willingly, as I am anxious to proceed to
my next proposition. (64) I will now, therefore, pass on to what I proposed
to treat of in the second part of this chapter, namely, what persons are
bound to believe in the narratives contained in Scripture, and how far they
are so bound. (65) Examining this question by the aid of natural reason, I
will proceed as follows.

(66) If anyone wishes to persuade his fellows for or against anything which
is not self-evident, he must deduce his contention from their admissions,
and convince them either by experience or by ratiocination; either by
appealing to facts of natural experience, or to self-evident intellectual
axioms. (67) Now unless the experience be of such a kind as to be clearly
and distinctly understood, though it may convince a man, it will not have
the same effect on his mind and disperse the clouds of his doubt so
completely as when the doctrine taught is deduced entirely from intellectual
axioms - that is, by the mere power of the understanding and logical order,
and this is especially the case in spiritual matters which have nothing to
do with the senses.

(68) But the deduction of conclusions from general truths . priori, usually
requires a long chain of arguments, and, moreover, very great caution,
acuteness, and self-restraint - qualities which are not often met with;
therefore people prefer to be taught by experience rather than deduce
their conclusion from a few axioms, and set them out in logical order. (69)