The sects which exist in the United States are innumerable. They all
differ in respect to the worship which is due from man to his Creator,
but they all agree in respect to the duties which are due from man to
man. Each sect adores the Deity in its own peculiar manner, but all
the sects preach the same moral law in the name of God. If it be of the
highest importance to man, as an individual, that his religion should be
true, the case of society is not the same. Society has no future life to
hope for or to fear; and provided the citizens profess a religion, the
peculiar tenets of that religion are of very little importance to its
interests. Moreover, almost all the sects of the United States are
comprised within the great unity of Christianity, and Christian morality
is everywhere the same.

It may be believed without unfairness that a certain number of Americans
pursue a peculiar form of worship, from habit more than from conviction.
In the United States the sovereign authority is religious, and
consequently hypocrisy must be common; but there is no country in the
whole world in which the Christian religion retains a greater influence
over the souls of men than in America; and there can be no greater proof
of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its
influence is most powerfully felt over the most enlightened and free
nation of the earth.

I have remarked that the members of the American clergy in general,
without even excepting those who do not admit religious liberty, are
all in favor of civil freedom; but they do not support any particular
political system. They keep aloof from parties and from public affairs.
In the United States religion exercises but little influence upon the
laws and upon the details of public opinion, but it directs the manners
of the community, and by regulating domestic life it regulates the
State.

I do not question that the great austerity of manners which is
observable in the United States, arises, in the first instance, from
religious faith. Religion is often unable to restrain man from the
numberless temptations of fortune; nor can it check that passion for
gain which every incident of his life contributes to arouse, but
its influence over the mind of woman is supreme, and women are the
protectors of morals. There is certainly no country in the world
where the tie of marriage is so much respected as in America, or where
conjugal happiness is more highly or w