would scarcely find one person in a thousand amid all the tribes of the earth, who was entitled to be considered as a pure theist, or at least, who was single-minded in the exercise of his religious devotion.  The generality of mankind, in short, are like a certain people of old,—­they fear the Lord, and worship their own gods.  Then again as to the disinterestedness of the Otaheitan devotees, Dr Hawkesworth egregiously blunders—­as if it were conceivable, or any way natural, that they or any other people could possibly serve their divinities without entertaining the hope that they should be served by them in turn.  This were to exceed even Homer in his exaggerating human nature at the expence of the gods.  That poet puts a curious speech in the mouth of Dione, the mother of Venus, when addressing her daughter, who had been wounded by Diomede:—­

   My child! how hard soe’er thy sufferings seem,
   Endure them patiently, since many a wrong
   From human hands profane the gods endure,
   And many a painful stroke mankind from ours.

But Dr H. it is probable, had embraced the fanatical and monstrous notion of some specialists, that God and religion were to be loved for their own sakes; not because of the benefits they confer; and he wished to exalt the characters of these islanders by representing them as acting on it.  This, however, is as irrational in itself, as it is impracticable by such a creature as man.  Self-love, directed by wisdom, is perhaps the best principle that can actuate him.  Considering scripture as an authority, there is a high degree of commendation implied in what is said of Moses by an apostle, when speaking of his faith and obedience, and accounting for it, “he had respect unto the recompence of reward;” and of one higher than Moses it is related, that, “for the joy set before him, (certainly not then possessed,) he endured the cross.”  Were man always to act from a sense of what he has received, and the hope of what he may receive, he would never do wrong.  He, on the other hand, that attempts to serve God out of pure benevolence, and without expectation of advantage, will soon spurn archangels, and may set up for a God himself, on any day he shall think he has succeeded in accomplishing such super-eminent disinterestedness.  On the whole, it may be remarked, that the Dr seems correct enough in his notions of religion, considered as founded on reason; but is far from being so in those concerning its foundation in the principles of human nature.  This, however, seems the consequence of inattention to the subject as a speculation, rather than of studied disregard to those secret surmisings which every human heart will oftentimes experience to carry it beyond the brink of perishable things, and to give it a birth amid the realities of wonder, fear, and hope.  Far be it from the writer to class him amongst those whom the poet Campbell so pathetically, and yet so indignantly describes in the beautiful lines,—­