CCV.—­WE COULD NOT REPEAT TOO OFTEN HOW EXTRAVAGANT AND FATAL RELIGION IS.

Every man who has the boldness to announce truths to the world, is sure to receive the hatred of the priests; the latter loudly call upon the powers that be, for assistance; they need the assistance of kings to sustain their arguments and their Gods.  These clamors show the weakness of their cause.

“They are in embarrassment when they cry for help.”

It is not permitted to err in the matter of religion; on every other subject we can be deceived with impunity; we pity those who go astray, and we have some liking for the persons who discover truths new to us.  But as soon as theology supposes itself concerned, be it in errors or discoveries, a holy zeal is kindled; the sovereigns exterminate; the people fly into frenzy; and the nations are all stirred up without knowing why.  Is there anything more afflicting than to see public and individual welfare depend upon a futile science, which is void of principles, which has no standing ground but imagination, and which presents to the mind but words void of sense?  What good is a religion which no one understands; which continually torments those who trouble themselves about it; which is incapable of rendering men better; and which often gives them the credit of being unjust and wicked?  Is there a more deplorable folly, and one that ought more to be abated, than that which, far from doing any good to the human race, does but blind it, cause transports, and render it miserable, depriving it of truth, which alone can soften the rigor of fate?

CCVI.—­RELIGION IS PANDORA’S BOX, AND THIS FATAL BOX IS OPEN.

Religion has in every age kept the human mind in darkness and held it in ignorance of its true relations, of its real duties and its true interests.  It is but in removing its clouds and phantoms that we may find the sources of truth, reason, morality, and the actual motives which inspire virtue.  This religion puts us on the wrong track for the causes of our evils, and the natural remedies which we can apply.  Far from curing them, it can but multiply them and render them more durable.

Let us, then, say, with the celebrated Lord Bolingbroke, in his posthumous works:  “Theology is the Box of Pandora; and if it is impossible to close it, it is at least useful to give warning that this fatal box is open.”

*****

I believe, my dear friends, that I have given you a sufficient preventative against all these follies.  Your reason will do more than my discourses, and I sincerely wish that we had only to complain of being deceived!  But human blood has flowed since the time of Constantine for the establishment of these horrible impositions.  The Roman, the Greek, and the Protestant churches by vain, ambitious, and hypocritical disputes have ravaged Europe, Asia, and Africa.  Add to these men, whom these quarrels murdered, the multitudes of monks and of nuns, who became sterile by their profession, and you will perceive that the Christian religion has destroyed half of the human race.