lem which he felt to be hopelessly
insoluble.

But, whatever might be the views of the philosopher as to the arguments
for theism, the historian could have no doubt respecting its many-shaped
existence, and the great part which it has played in the world. Here,
then, was a body of natural facts to be investigated scientifically, and
the result of Hume's inquiries is embodied in the remarkable essay on
the _Natural History of Religion_. Hume anticipated the results of
modern investigation in declaring fetishism and polytheism to be the
form in which savage and ignorant men naturally clothe their ideas of
the unknown influences which govern their destiny; and they are
polytheists rather than monotheists because,--

" ... the first ideas of religion arose, not from a contemplation
of the works of nature, but from a concern with regard to the
events of life, and from the incessant hopes and fears which
actuate the human mind ... in order to carry men's attention beyond
the present course of things, or lead them into any inference
concerning invisible intelligent power, they must be actuated by
some passion which prompts their thought and reflection, some
motive which urges their first inquiry. But what passion shall we
have recourse to, for explaining an effect of such mighty
consequence? Not speculative curiosity merely, or the pure love of
truth. That motive is too refined for such gross apprehensions,
and would lead men into inquiries concerning the frame of nature, a
subject too large and comprehensive for their narrow capacities. No
passions, therefore, can be supposed to work on such barbarians,
but the ordinary affections of human life; the anxious concern for
happiness, the dread of future misery, the terror of death, the
thirst of revenge, the appetite for food and other necessaries.
Agitated by hopes and fears of this nature, especially the latter,
men scrutinize, with a trembling curiosity, the course of future
causes, and examine the various and contrary events of human life.
And in this disordered scene, with eyes still more disordered and
astonished, they see the first obscure traces of divinity."--(IV.
pp. 443, 4.)

The shape assumed by these first traces of divinity is that of the
shadows of men's own minds, projected out of themselves by their
imaginations:--

"There is an universal t