and it was imperfectly appreciated by his
contemporaries.

It is easy to see why. His theories are buried in his multitudinous
projets. If, instead of working out the details of endless particular
reforms, he had built up general theories of government and society,
economics and education, they might have had no more intrinsic
value, but he would have been recognised as the precursor of the
Encyclopaedists.

For his principles are theirs. The omnipotence of government and laws to
mould the morals of peoples; the subordination of all knowledge to the
goddess of utility; the deification of human reason; and the doctrine
of Progress. His crude utilitarianism led him to depreciate the study of
mathematical and physical sciences--notwithstanding his veneration for
Descartes--as comparatively useless, and he despised the fine arts as
waste of time and toil which might be better spent. He had no
knowledge of natural science and he had no artistic susceptibility. The
philosophers of the Encyclopaedia did not go so far, but they tended
in this direction. They were cold and indifferent towards speculative
science, and they were inclined to set higher value on artisans than on
artists.

In his religious ideas the Abbe differed from Voltaire and the later
social philosophers in one important respect, but this very difference
was a consequence of his utilitarianism. Like them he was a Deist, as we
saw; he had imbibed the spirit of Bayle and the doctrine of the English
rationalists, which were penetrating French society during the later
part of his life. His God, however, was more than the creator and
organiser of the Encyclopaedists, he was also the "Dieu vengeur et
remunerateur" in whom Voltaire believed. But here his faith was larger
than Voltaire's. For while Voltaire referred the punishments and rewards
to this life, the Abbe believed in the immortality of the soul,
in heaven and hell. He acknowledged that immortality could not be
demonstrated, that it was only probable, but he clung to it firmly and
even intolerantly. It is clear from his writings that his affection for
this doctrine was due to its utility, as an auxiliary to the magistrate
and the tutor, and also to the consideration that Paradise would add to
the total of human happiness.

But though his religion had more articles, he was as determined a foe of
"superstition" as Voltaire, Diderot, and the rest. He did not go so
far as they in aggressive rationalism--he