very essence of man? Must he not seek, desire, love that which is,
or that which he believes to be, essential to his happiness? Must he not
fear and avoid that which he judges injurious or fatal to him? Excite
his passions by useful objects; let him attach himself to these same
objects, divert him by sensible and known motives from that which can do
him or others harm, and you will make of him a reasonable and virtuous
being. A man without passions would be equally indifferent to vice and
to virtue.

Holy doctors! you constantly tell us that man's nature is perverted; you
tell us that the way of all flesh is corrupt; you tell us that nature
gives us but inordinate inclinations. In this case you accuse your God,
who has not been able or willing to keep this nature in its original
perfection. If this nature became corrupted, why did not this God repair
it? The Christian assures me that human nature is repaired, that the
death of his God has reestablished it in its integrity. How comes it
then, that human nature, notwithstanding the death of a God, is still
depraved? Is it, then, a pure loss that your God died? What becomes of
His omnipotence and His victory over the Devil, if it is true that the
Devil still holds the empire which, according to you, he has always
exercised in the world?

Death, according to Christian theology, is the penalty of sin. This
opinion agrees with that of some savage Negro nations, who imagine that
the death of a man is always the supernatural effect of the wrath of the
Gods. The Christians firmly believe that Christ has delivered them from
sin, while they see that, in their religion as in the others, man is
subject to death. To say that Jesus Christ has delivered us from sin, is
it not claiming that a judge has granted pardon to a guilty man, while
we see him sent to torture?

CLXIV.--OF JESUS CHRIST, THE PRIEST'S GOD.

If, closing our eyes upon all that transpires in this world, we should
rely upon the votaries of the Christian religion, we would believe that
the coming of our Divine Saviour has produced the most wonderful
revolution and the most complete reform in the morals of nations. The
Messiah, according to Pascal, [See Thoughts of Pascal] ought of Himself
alone to produce a great, select, and holy people; conducting and
nourishing it, and introducing it into the place of repose and sanctity,
rendering it holy to God, making it the temple of God, saving it from
the wrath of God