Religion + 

Note B + 

St. Athanasius is not the author of the Creed which bears his name. It did not, in fact, exist within a century after his death. It originally appeared in a Latin text, and consequently in the Western provinces. Gennadius, Patriarch of Constantinople, was less tolerant of its eccentricities, or more sensible to its sublimity even than myself, for he was so amazed at the extraordinary character of its composition that he frankly pronounced it to be the work of a drunken man. See Petav. Dogmat. Theologica, tom. II lvii c. 8, p. 687; and Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, vol. iv p. 335. If we may trust La Bletterie for the character of Athanasius, nothing is more improbable than that he could be the author of the Creed still preserving his name. “He was,” says La Bletterie, “the greatest man of his age, and perhaps the greatest that the Church has ever possessed. He was endued with a well-balanced, a lively, and penetrating mind; a generous and disinterested heart; a courage and heroism always equal; a lively faith, and a charity without bounds; a profound humility; a Christianity bold, but simple and noble as the Gospel. His eloquence was natural, distinguished by a rare precision of speech.” + 

The foundation of all religion is the belief in a God, and that He exists in certain relation with His creatures. Such belief necessarily leads to the consciousness of some obligation towards the Deity; and this consciousness suggests the duty of worship; and in the selection of the form of this worship originates the various creeds which distinguish and distract mankind. There is a sort of geography of religion; and I regret to think that the majority of mankind take their creed from the clime in which they happen to be born; and that many, and not an inconsiderable portion of mankind, suffer the sacred torch to burn out altogether, in their contact with the world, and then vainly imagine that they can recover the sacred fire by striking a spark out of dogmatic theology! + 