erse? They
answer, _it is a spirit_.

21.

The savage, when he speaks of a spirit, affixes, at least, some idea to
the word; he means thereby an agent, like the air, the breeze, the breath,
that invisibly produces discernible effects. By subtilizing every thing,
the modern theologian becomes as unintelligible to himself as to others.
Ask him, what he understands by a spirit? He will answer you, that it is
an unknown substance, perfectly simple, that has no extension, that has
nothing common with matter. Indeed, is there any one, who can form the
least idea of such a substance? What then is a spirit, to speak in the
language of modern theology, but the absence of an idea? The idea of
_spirituality_ is an idea without model.

22.

Is it not more natural and intelligible to draw universal existence from
the matter, whose existence is demonstrated by all the senses, and whose
effects we experience, which we see act, move, communicate motion, and
incessantly generate, than to attribute the formation of things to an
unknown power, to a spiritual being, who cannot derive from his nature
what he has not himself, and who, by his spiritual essence, can create
neither matter nor motion? Nothing is more evident, than that the idea
they endeavour to give us, of the action of mind upon matter, represents
no object. It is an idea without model.

23.

The material _Jupiter_ of the ancients could move, compose, destroy,
and create beings, similar to himself; but the God of modern theology is
sterile. He can neither occupy any place in space, nor move matter, nor
form a visible world, nor create men or gods. The metaphysical God is fit
only to produce confusion, reveries, follies, and disputes.

24.

Since a God was indispensably requisite to men, why did they not worship
the Sun, that visible God, adored by so many nations? What being had
greater claim to the homage of men, than the day-star, who enlightens,
warms, and vivifies all beings; whose presence enlivens and regenerates
nature, whose absence seems to cast her into gloom and languor? If any
being announced to mankind, power, activity, beneficence, and duration, it
was certainly the Sun, whom they ought to have regarded as the parent of
nature, as the divinity. At least, they could not, without folly, dispute
his existence, or refuse to acknowledge his influence.

25.

The theologian exclaims to us, that God wants neither hands nor arms