Pursuing his idea of the influence of the aspect of nature on man, Mr. Buckle, who has a theory for everything, discovers that the cause of Catholicism lies in earthquakes : —
"The peculiar province of the imagination," he informs us, "being to deal with the unknown, every event which is unexplained as well as important, is a direct stimulus to our imaginative faculties. . . . Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are more frequent and more destructive in Italy and in the Spanish and Portuguese Peninsula than in any other of the great countries, and it is precisely there that superstition is most rife, and the superstitious classes most powerful. Those were the countries where the clergy first established their authority, where the worst corruptions of Christianity took place, and where superstition has during the longest period retained the firmest hold."
In other words, sequence is cause, as Hume proves ; whence post hoc, ergo propter hoc, the great logical principle of the positivists. But increase of Popery follows increase of earthquakes ; therefore, the consequence is clear. And not only is Christianity extracted out of earthquakes, but also, by a similar chemistry, Providence is derived from the plague.
Our ignorance about another life,he says, is complete: —
On this subject the reason is perfectly silent ; the imagination, therefore, is uncontrolled. . . . The vulgar universally ascribe to the intervention of the Deity those diseases which are peculiarly fatal. The opinion that pestilence is a manifestation of the Divine anger, though it has long been dying away, is by no means extinct, even in the most civilised countries. Superstitions of this kind will, of course, be strongest either where medical knowledge is most backward, or where disease is most abundant.
It is in tropical climates that nature is most terrible ; and here, says our author, "imagination runs riot, and religion is founded on fear ; while in Europe nature is subject to man, and reason rules supreme." This theme he illustrates by the extreme instances of India and Greece ; and he generalises his conclusions into the statement that "the tendency of Asiatic civilisation was to widen the distance between men and their deities ; the tendency of Greek civilisation was to diminish it." Hence "in Greece we for the first time meet with hero-
