s it with the
savage, free in the desert, clothed in his nudity, listening to the sun,
talking to the sea, sublime and always true in his deeds whatever they
may be; or shall we find it in civilized man, who derives his chief
enjoyments through lies; who wrings Nature and all her resources to put
a musket on his shoulder; who employs his intellect to hasten the hour
of his death and to create diseases out of pleasures? When the rake of
pestilence and the ploughshare of war and the demon of desolation have
passed over a corner of the globe and obliterated all things, who will
be found to have the greater reason,--the Nubian savage or the patrician
of Thebes? Your doubts descend the scale, they go from heights to
depths, they embrace all, the end as well as the means.

"But if the physical world seems inexplicable, the moral world presents
still stronger arguments against God. Where, then, is progress? If all
things are indeed moving toward perfection why do we die young? why do
not nations perpetuate themselves? The world having issued from God and
being contained in God can it be stationary? Do we live once, or do
we live always? If we live once, hurried onward by the march of the
Great-Whole, a knowledge of which has not been given to us, let us act
as we please. If we are eternal, let things take their course. Is the
created being guilty if he exists at the instant of the transitions? If
he sins at the moment of a great transformation will he be punished for
it after being its victim? What becomes of the Divine goodness if we are
not transferred to the regions of the blest--should any such exist?
What becomes of God's prescience if He is ignorant of the results of the
trials to which He subjects us? What is this alternative offered to man
by all religions,--either to boil in some eternal cauldron or to walk
in white robes, a palm in his hand and a halo round his head? Can it
be that this pagan invention is the final word of God? Where is the
generous soul who does not feel that the calculating virtue which seeks
the eternity of pleasure offered by all religions to whoever fulfils
at stray moments certain fanciful and often unnatural conditions, is
unworthy of man and of God? Is it not a mockery to give to man impetuous
senses and forbid him to satisfy them? Besides, what mean these ascetic
objections if Good and Evil are equally abolished? Does Evil exist?
If substance in all its forms is God, then Evil is God. The fac