From this time onward he occupied himself with the composition of his chief work, The Light of Nature Pursued, of which in 1763 he published a specimen under the title of "Free Will."
But in Protestantism reason and the light of nature are in themselves as impotent as in the Roman Church.
But there are many reasons to show why, in the 17th century, men should have set themselves with a new zeal, in politics, law and theology, to follow the light of nature alone, and to cast aside the fetters of tradition and prescriptive right, of positive codes, and scholastic systems, and why in England especially there should, amongst numerous free-thinkers, have been not a few free writers.
On the one hand, it widened his sympathies, gave him confidence in himself and supplied him with many poetical themes; on the other, it traditionalized his mind, coloured for him the pure light of nature and rendered him in some measure unfit to feel or express the spirit of American nature and life.
All acts of natural virtue are implicitly included within the scope of this law of nature; but in the application of its principles to particular cases - to which the term " conscience " should be restricted - man's judgment is liable to err, the light of nature being obscured and perverted by bad education and custom.
