nvoluntary
ignorance of God, they "worship the creature instead of the Creator,"
and violate a law of duty of which they have no possible means to attain
the barest knowledge.

2. This theory is utterly inadequate to the explanation of the
_universality_ of religious rites, and especially of religious ideas.

Take, for example, the idea of God. As a matter of fact we affirm, in
opposition to Watson, the universality of this idea. The idea of God is
connatural to the human mind. Wherever human reason has had its normal
and healthy development[87], this idea has arisen spontaneously and
necessarily. There has not been found a race of men who were utterly
destitute of some knowledge of a Supreme Being. All the instances
alleged have, on further and more accurate inquiry, been found
incorrect. The tendency of the last century, arbitrarily to quadrate all
the facts of religious history with the prevalent sensational
philosophy, had its influence upon the minds of the first missionaries
to India, China, Africa, Australia, and the islands of the Pacific. They
_expected_ to find that the heathen had no knowledge of a Supreme Being,
and before they had mastered the idioms of their language, or become
familiar with their mythological and cosmological systems, they reported
them as _utterly ignorant of God_, destitute of the idea and even the
name of a Supreme Being. These mistaken and hasty conclusions have,
however, been corrected by a more intimate acquaintance with the people,
their languages and religions. Even in the absence of any better
information, we should be constrained to doubt the accuracy of the
authorities quoted by Mr. Watson in relation to Hindooism, when by one
(Ward) we are told that the Hindoo "believes in a God destitute of
_intelligence_" and by another (Moore) that "Brahm is the one eternal
_Mind_, the self-existent, incomprehensible Spirit". Learned and
trustworthy critics, Asiatic as well as European, however, confidently
affirm that "the ground of the Brahminical faith is Monotheistic;" it
recognizes "an Absolute and Supreme Being" as the source of all that
exists.[88] Eugene Burnouf, M. Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire, Koeppen, and
indeed nearly all who have written on the subject of Buddhism, have
shown that the metaphysical doctrines of Buddha were borrowed from the
earlier systems of the Brahminic philosophy. "Buddha." we are told, is
"_pure intelligence_" "_clear light_", "_perfect wisdom_;" the same as