 Popkin argues that the skepticism introduced into theology in the sixteenth century eventually led to the atheism and irreligious “free-thinking” of the Enlightenment. After all, Hume says essentially the same thing as the so-called fideists when he writes that “[o]ur most holy religion is founded on faith, not on reason” (140), except that by the eighteenth century this had been transformed into an implicit – if not-so-subtle – reproach. Thus, Hume proceeds to add that since “[m]ere reason is insufficient to convince us of its veracity…whoever is moved by faith to assent to [Christianity] is conscious of a continued miracle in his own person which subverts all the principles of his understanding and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience” (141). The sarcasm here is hard to miss.