ey are prevented from exercising their wickedness.

XLV.--CONTINUATION.

Supposing God to be the author and the motor of nature, there could be
no disorder relating to Him; all causes which He would have made would
necessarily act according to their properties the essences and the
impulsions that He had endowed them with. If God should change the
ordinary course of things, He would not be immutable. If the order of
the universe--in which we believe we see the most convincing proof of His
existence, of His intelligence, His power, and His goodness--should be
inconsistent, His existence might be doubted; or He might be accused at
least of inconstancy, of inability, of want of foresight, and of wisdom
in the first arrangement of things; we would have a right to accuse Him
of blundering in His choice of agents and instruments. Finally, if the
order of nature proves the power and the intelligence, disorder ought to
prove the weakness, inconstancy, and irrationality of Divinity. You say
that God is everywhere; that He fills all space; that nothing was made
without Him; that matter could not act without Him as its motor. But in
this case you admit that your God is the author of disorder; that it is
He who deranges nature; that He is the Father of confusion; that He is
in man; and that He moves man at the moment when he sins. If God is
everywhere, He is in me; He acts with me; He is deceived when I am
deceived; He questions with me the existence of God; He offends God with
me. Oh, theologians! you never understand yourselves when you speak of
God.

XLVI.--A PURE SPIRIT CAN NOT BE INTELLIGENT, AND TO ADORE A DIVINE
INTELLIGENCE IS A CHIMERA.

To be what we call intelligent, we must have ideas, thoughts, will; to
have ideas, thoughts, and will, we must have organs; to have organs, we
must have a body; to act upon bodies, we must have a body; to experience
trouble, we must be capable of suffering; from which it evidently
follows that a pure spirit can not be intelligent, and can not be
affected by that which takes place in the universe.

Divine intelligence, divine ideas, divine views, you say, have nothing
in common with those of men. So much the better! But in this case, how
can men judge of these views--whether good or evil--reason about these
ideas, or admire this intelligence? It would be to judge, to admire, to
adore that of which we can form no idea. To adore the profound views of
divine wisdom, is it not t