sonings of Newton, and to turn us from the opinions of Kepler.

It is said that science leads away from God, and that faith continues to
be the lot only of the ignorant. Listen on this head first of all to the
Italian Franchi. "The class of society in which infidels and sceptics
especially abound is that of savants and men of letters,--men, in short,
who have gone through studies, in the course of which they have
certainly become acquainted with the famous demonstrations of the
existence of God. But no sooner have they examined them with their own
eyes, and submitted them to the criterion of their own judgment, than
these demonstrations no longer demonstrate anything; these reasonings
turn out to be only paralogisms."[100] Here we have the thesis in its
general form: to become an infidel or a sceptic, it is enough to be a
well educated man. The German Buechner will now show us the application
of this notion to the special study of nature. "At this day, our hardest
laborers in the sciences, our most indefatigable students of nature,
profess materialistic sentiments."[101] The same tendencies are often
manifested among French writers. The author of a recent astronomical
treatise, for example, draws a veil of deceitful words over the profound
faith of Kepler, and takes evident pleasure in throwing into relief the
tokens of sympathy bestowed unfortunately by the learned Laplace upon
atheism.[102] Here then we have open attempts to found a prejudice
against religion on the authority of science; and these attempts disturb
the minds of not a few. I ask two questions on this head. Is it true, in
fact, that modern naturalists are generally irreligious? Is it possible
that the science of nature, rightly considered, should lead to
atheism?[103]

Let us begin with the question of fact; and first of all let us settle
clearly the bearing and object of this discussion. I wish to destroy a
prejudice, and not to create one. I am not proposing to you to take the
votes of savants, in order to know whether God exists. No. Though all
the universities in Europe should unite to vote it dark at mid-day, I
should not cease on that account to believe in the sun, and that,
Gentlemen, in common with you all, and with the mass of my fellow-men. I
have instituted a sort of inquiry in order to ascertain whether modern
naturalists have in general been led to atheistical sentiments, as some
would have us believe. In appealing to the recollections of my