nd that in its turn to the religion of the Egyptians and Chaldeans,
or, in other words, to the idolatry which was greatly anterior to
Moses. For thousands of years it was universally believed that the sun
revolved round the earth, which remained immovable; and yet it is not
the less true that the sun is fixed, and the earth moves around that.
Besides, it is evident that the Christianity of to-day is not what it
formerly was. The continual attacks that this religion has suffered
from heretics, commencing with its earliest history, proves that there
never could have existed any harmony between the partisans of a
pretended divine system, which offended all rules of consistency and
logic in its very first principles. Some parts of this celestial
system were always denied by devotees who admitted other parts. If
infidels have often attacked religion without apparent effect, it is
because the best reasons become useless against the blindness of a
superstition sustained by the public authority, or against the torrent
of opinion and custom which sways the minds of most men. With regard
to the persecutions which the church suffered on the part of the
pagans, he is but slightly acquainted with the effects of fanaticism
and religious obstinacy who does not perceive that tyranny is
calculated to excite and extend what it persecutes most violently.

You are not formed to be the dupe of names and authorities. The
defenders of the popular superstition will endeavor to overwhelm you
by the multiplied testimony of many illustrious and learned men, who
not only admitted the Christian religion, but who were also its most
zealous supporters. They will adduce holy divines, great philosophers,
powerful reasoners, fathers of the church, and learned interpreters,
who have successively advocated the system. I will not contest the
understanding of the learned men who are cited, which, however, was
often faulty, but will content myself with repeating that frequently
the greatest geniuses are not more clear sighted in matters of
religion than the people themselves. They did not examine the
religious opinions they taught; it may be because they regarded them
as sacred, or it may be because they never went back to first
principles, which they would have found altogether unsound, if they
had considered them without prejudice. It may also have happened
because they were interested in defending a cause with which their own
position was allied. Thus the