or
common, and particular or singular. The universal indeed is affected by
the natural faculties of the mind, and other helps of the universal
nature of things, by which man is led to conceive and cultivate the
knowledge of divine things. That we call _particular_ and _mediate_, in
a sense different from the elder writers, which is contained in the
compass of things happening according to nature, by which, God being the
author, some men are excited above others to attain the principles of
true religion, and to impart with signal success those things,
accommodated indeed to the desires of their countrymen, and sanctioned
by some particular form of religious instruction. A revelation of this
kind consists as well in singular gifts of genius and mind, with which
the messenger, and, as it were, its interpreter, is perceived to be
furnished, as in illustrious proofs of divine providence, conspicuous in
his external life. But the more agreeably to the will of that same God
he uses these helps to be ascribed to God, and full of a certain divine
fervor, and excelling in zeal for virtue and piety, the more he scatters
the seeds of a doctrine truly divine, _i. e._, true in itself, and
worthy of God, and to be propagated by suitable institutions, the more
truly will he flourish amongst other men with the authority of a divine
teacher or ambassador. For as our mind partakes of the divine nature and
disposition (2 Peter i. 4), so without the favor and help of the Deity
it is not carried out to a more true species of religion.

"But whatever narrations especially accommodated to a certain age, and
relating miracles and mysteries, are united with the history and
subject-matter of revelation of this kind, these ought to be referred to
the natural sources and true nature of human knowledge. By how much the
more clearly the author of the Christian religion, not without the help
of Deity, exhibited to men the idea of reason imbued with true religion,
so as to represent as it were an _apaugasma_ of the divine reason, or
the divine spirit, by so much the more diligently ought man to strive to
approach as nearly as possible to form that archetype in the mind, and
to study to imitate it in life and manners to the utmost of his ability.
Behold here the intimate and eternal union and agreement of Christianity
with Rationalism."

Staeudlin, at first a Rationalist, but in later life more inclined to
supernaturalism, says: "I do not now look to t