It is understood, I believe, that a child, or even a man, is
likely to be most sincere while persevering in that religion in
whose belief he was born and educated; we frequently detract from,
seldom make any additions to it: dogmatical faith is the effect of
education. In addition to this general principle, which attached me to
the religion of my forefathers, I had that particular aversion our
city entertains for Catholicism, which is represented there as the
most monstrous idolatry, and whose clergy are painted in the
blackest colors. This sentiment was so firmly imprinted on my mind,
that I never dared to look into their churches- I could not bear to
meet a priest in his surplice, and never did I hear the bells of a
procession sound without shuddering with horror; these sensations soon
wore off in great cities, but frequently returned in country parishes,
which bore more similarity to the spot where I first experienced them;
meantime this dislike was singularly contrasted by the remembrance
of those caresses which priests in the neighborhood of Geneva are fond
of bestowing on the children of that city. If the bells of the
viaticum alarmed me, the chiming for mass or vespers called me to a
breakfast, a collation, to the pleasure of regaling on fresh butter,
fruits, or milk; the good cheer of M. de Pontverre had produced a
considerable effect on me; my former abhorrence began to diminish, and
looking on popery through the medium of amusement and good living, I
easily reconciled myself to the idea of enduring, though I never
entertained but a very transient and distant idea of making a solemn
profession of it.
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