The language of St.Thomas Aquinas, that many a heathen has had an "implicit faith," is but another way of expressing St.Paul's statement that "not having the law they were a law unto themselves, and showed the work of the law written in their hearts." [49] To them the Eternal Power and Godhead were known from the things that do appear, and alike from the voice of conscience and the voice of nature they derived a true, although a partial and inadequate, knowledge.

To them "the voice of nature was the voice of God." Their revelation was the law of nature, which was confirmed, strengthened, and extended, but _not_ suspended, by the written law of God.[50] [Footnote 49: Rom.i.

2.] [Footnote 50: Hooker, _Eccl.Pol_.iii.

8.] The knowledge thus derived, i.e.the sum-total of religious impressions resulting from the combination of reason and experience, has been called "natural religion;" the term is in itself a convenient and unobjectionable one, so long as it is remembered that natural religion is itself a revelation.

No _antithesis_ is so unfortunate and pernicious as that of natural with revealed religion.