 Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian Life (1705) develops Lady Masham’s views on practical morality that she had set out in A Discourse. The book is also, in part, an answer to Mary Astell’s The Christian Religion as Professed by a Daughter of the Church which was published as a reply to A Discourse Concerning the Love of God. In a discussion of the role of reason in religious matters and the relationship between religion and virtuous conduct, Lady Masham sets out to defend reasonable Christianity from Deism on the one hand and superstition on the other. Against the Deists, Masham insists on the importance of revelation and faith and denies that natural religion based purely on reason is possible. On the other hand religious belief that ignores the role of reason in religion is mere superstition and will result in bigotry and atheism, because “an Irrational Religion can never Rationally be conceived to come from God” (Occasional Thoughts, p. 36). (In Masham’s view, Roman Catholicism, with its stress on the externals of religion is largely superstition). For her part, Lady Masham emphasises the moral aspect of religion, its practical application, rather than doctrinal content. She shares Locke’s view that virtuous living is more important than religious ceremonial. Like Locke in the Epistola de tolerantia, she argues that moral conduct is central to religious practice. Accordingly she argues that morality and religion should not be separated in religious instruction. Furthermore, civil and religious liberties are necessary for the exercise of virtue. 