r. I would sooner,
with the old-time Egyptians, adore a well-behaved cat or a toothsome
cucumber than with certain modern feather-heads and gum-drop hearts,
sing hymns to a shapely foot or dimpled cheek and offer incense to
"divinities," godlike forms, etc. The way hearts and souls are thrown
around from one to another is suggestive of the national game; while
the love they bear one another is always infinite, supreme, without
parallel on earth or in heaven.

No, perhaps they do not mean what they say; but that helps matters very
little, for the fault lies precisely in saying what they do say; the
language used is idolatrous. And a queer thing about it is that they do
mean more than half of what they say. When degenerate love runs riot,
it dethrones the Almighty, makes gods of clay and besots itself before
them.

What is superstition and what is a superstitious practice? It is
something against the virtue of religion; it sins, not by default as
unbelief, but by excess. Now, to be able to say what is excessive, one
must know what is right and just, one must have a measure. To attempt
to qualify anything as excessive without the aid of a rule or measure
is simply guesswork.

The Yankee passes for a mighty clever guesser, outpointing with ease
his transatlantic cousin. Over there the sovereign guesses officially
that devotion to the Mother of God is a superstitious practice. This
reminds one of the overgrown farmer boy, who, when invited by his
teacher to locate the center of a circle drawn on the blackboard, stood
off and eyed the figure critically for a moment with a wise squint; and
then said, pointing his finger to the middle or thereabouts: "I should
jedge it to be about thar'." He was candid enough to offer only an
opinion. But how the royal guesser could be sure enough to swear it,
and that officially, is what staggers plain people.

Now right reason is a rule by which to judge what is and what is not
superstitious. But individual reason or private judgment and right
reason are not synonyms in the English or in any other language that is
human. When reasoning men disagree, right reason, as far as the debated
question is concerned, is properly said to be off on a vacation, a
thing uncommonly frequent in human affairs. In order, therefore that
men should not be perpetually at war concerning matters that pertain to
men's salvation, God established a competent authority which even
simple folks with humble minds and