ry
notion of common sense, than to believe, that a supremely good, wise,
equitable and powerful being presides over nature, and by himself directs
the movements of a world, full of folly, misery, crimes and disorders,
which by a single word, he could have prevented or removed? In fine,
whenever we admit a being as contradictory as the God of theology, how can
we reject the most improbable fables, astonishing miracles, and profound
mysteries.

118.

The Deist exclaims: "Abstain from worshipping the cruel and capricious God
of theology; mine is a being infinitely wise and good; he is the father of
men, the mildest of sovereigns; it is he who fills the universe with his
benefits." But do you not see that every thing in this world contradicts
the good qualities, which you ascribe to your God? In the numerous family
of this tender father, almost all are unhappy. Under the government of
this just sovereign, vice is triumphant, and virtue in distress. Among
those blessings you extol, and which only enthusiasm can see, I behold a
multitude of evils, against which you obstinately shut your eyes. Forced
to acknowledge, that your beneficent God, in contradiction with himself,
distributes good and evil with the same hand, for his justification you
must, like the priest, refer me to the regions of another life. Invent,
therefore, another God; for yours is no less contradictory than that of
theologians.

A good God, who does evil, or consents to the commission of evil; a
God full of equity, and in whose empire innocence is often oppressed; a
perfect God, who produces none but imperfect and miserable works; are not
such a God and his conduct as great mysteries, as that of the incarnation?

You blush for your fellow-citizens, who allow themselves to be persuaded,
that the God of the universe could change himself into a man, and die upon
a cross in a corner of Asia. The mystery of the incarnation appears to you
very absurd. You think nothing more ridiculous, than a God, who transforms
himself into bread, and causes himself daily to be eaten in a thousand
different places. But are all these mysteries more contradictory to
reason than a God, the avenger and rewarder of the actions of men? Is man,
according to you, free, or not free? In either case, your God, if he has
the shadow of equity, can neither punish nor reward him. If man is free,
it is God, who has made him free; therefore God is the primitive cause of
all his actions;