to discover truth? What other passion but ungovernable
pride can make men so savage, revengeful, and void of indulgence and
gentleness? What can be more presumptuous, than to arm nations and deluge
the world in blood, in order to establish or defend futile conjectures?

You say, that presumption alone makes Atheists. Inform them then what your
God is; teach them his essence; speak of him intelligibly; say something
about him, which is reasonable, and not contradictory or impossible. If
you are unable to satisfy them, if hitherto none of you have been able to
demonstrate the existence of a God in a clear and convincing manner; if
by your own confession, his essence is completely veiled from you, as from
the rest of mortals, forgive those, who cannot admit what they can neither
understand nor make consistent with itself; do not tax with presumption
and vanity those who are sincere enough to confess their ignorance; do
not accuse of folly those who find themselves incapable of believing
contradictions; and for once, blush at exciting the hatred and fury of
sovereigns and people against men, who think not like you concerning a
being, of whom you have no idea. Is any thing more rash and extravagant,
than to reason concerning an object, known to be inconceivable? You say,
that the corruption of the heart produces Atheism, that men shake off the
yoke of the Deity only because they fear his formidable judgments.
But, why do you paint your God in colours so shocking, that he becomes
insupportable? Why does so powerful a God permit men to be so corrupt? How
can we help endeavouring to shake off the yoke of a tyrant, who, able to
do as he pleases with men, consents to their perversion, who hardens, and
blinds them, and refuses them his grace, that he may have the satisfaction
to punish them eternally, for having been hardened, and blinded, and for
not having the grace which he refused? Theologians and priests must be
very confident of the grace of heaven and a happy futurity, to refrain
from detesting a master so capricious as the God they announce. A God,
who damns eternally, is the most odious of beings that the human mind can
invent.

189.

No man upon earth is truly interested in the support of error, which is
forced sooner or later to yield to truth. The general good must at length
open the eyes of mortals: the passions themselves sometimes contribute
to break the chains of prejudices. Did not the passions of sovereig