This comprehensive and important word, (which has upon occasion puzzled me more than any other in the English language,) is “_superstition_:”—whereof one of the definitions given by the Doctor, in his Lexicon, appears to be rather inconsiderate, namely,—“religion without morality.”—Now, I freely and fully admit that I am _superstitious_, yet I think it is rather severe and somewhat singular in the Doctor to admit my religion and extinguish my morality, which I always considered as marching hand in hand—or, in truth, I thought the latter should go foremost.
When Dr. Johnson began to learn his own ideas of morality does not appear (certainly not from his friend Savage):—I suppose not until he got an honorary degree from the pedants of Oxford. Collegiate degrees in general, however, work no great reformation, I am inclined to believe, in morality; at least I am certain that when I became a Doctor of Laws I did not feel my morals in the least improved by my diploma. I wish the candid Boswell had mentioned the precise epocha of the Doctor’s reformation (for he admits him to have been a _little_ wild in his youth); and then we might have judged under what state of mind he gave the strange definition of “_religion_ without _morality_.”
For myself, I consider _faith_, grounded on the phenomena of _Nature_, not the faith of sectarianism or fanaticism, as the true source and foundation of morality;—and morality as the true source and foundation of religion.
No human demonstration can cope with that presented by the face of Nature. What proof so infallible as that the sun produces light and heat and vegetation?[23]—that the tides ebb and flow—that the thunder rolls—that the lightning flashes—that the planets shine?[24] Who can gaze on the vast orb of day without feeling that it is the visible demonstration of a superior Being, convincing our reason and our senses, and even the scanty reason of illiterate savages?
The following lines are by Miss M. Tylden, the young poetess whom I have before mentioned, and shall again allude to more fully. In my humble opinion, there are not fourteen consecutive lines in the English language superior in true sublimity both of thought and language: