Many who never dream of doubting the certainty of human knowledge, in so far as it relates to their secular or scientific pursuits, are prone to cherish a skeptical spirit in regard to religious or spiritual truths; and this, not because they have examined and weighed the evidence to which Theology appeals, and found it wanting, but rather because they have a lurking suspicion that men, with their present faculties, are incapable of rising to the knowledge of supernatural things, and that they could attain to no certainty, while they might expose themselves to much delusion, by entering on the inquiry at all.

This is their apology for _ignoring_ Religion altogether, and contenting themselves with other branches of knowledge, which are supposed to be more certain in themselves as well as more conducive to their present welfare.

In this respect, it is deeply instructive to remark that Infidelity has been singularly at variance with itself.

At one time, in the age of Herbert, human reason was extolled, to the disparagement of Divine Revelation; it was held to be so thoroughly competent to deal with all the truths of Theology, and to arrive, on mere natural grounds, at such an assured belief in them, that no supernatural message was needed either to illustrate, or confirm, or enforce the lessons of Nature: but now, when the lessons of Nature herself are called in question, human reason is disparaged as incompetent to the task of deciphering her dark hieroglyphics, and while she can traverse with firm step every department of the material world, and soar aloft, as on eagle's wings, to survey the suns and systems of astronomy, she is held to be incapable alike of religious inquiry and of divine instruction! There is, indeed, a striking contrast between the high pretensions of Reason in matters of philosophy, and the bastard humility which it sometimes assumes in matters of faith.
But there is another, and a still more subtle, form of Partial or Religious Skepticism.

It does not absolutely deny the possibility of religious knowledge, nor does it dogmatically affirm that man, with his present faculties, can have no religious convictions; it contents itself with saying, and attempting to prove, that the certitude of religious truth cannot be evinced by any legitimate process of reasoning.