Roger Williams, for example, for all his insistence on the separation of church and state, believed that such general
religion was essential for what he called «government and order in families, towns, etc.» Such general
religion is, he believed, «written in the hearts of all mankind, yea, even in pagans,» and
consists in belief in God, in the afterlife, and in divine punishments.2 Benjamin Franklin for all his differences from Roger Williams believed essentially the same thing, as indicated in the quotation from his autobiography in my original article on
civil religion.