ke it," that
the felicity of man depends entirely on the improvement of legislation;
and in the survey of the history of Europe to which the last Book of
his work is devoted, his view is generally optimistic. [Footnote:
cp. Raynal, Histoire, vii. 214, 256. This book was first published
anonymously; the author's name appeared in the edition of 1780.]

5. Baron d'Holbach had a more powerful brain than Helvetius, but his
writings had probably less influence, though he was the spiritual father
of two prominent Revolutionaries, Hebert and Chaumette. His System of
Nature (1770) develops a purely naturalistic theory of the universe, in
which the prevalent Deism is rejected: there is no God; material Nature
stands out alone, self-sufficing, dominis privata superbis. The book
suggests how the Lucretian theory of development might have led to the
idea of Progress. But it sent a chilly shock to the hearts of many
and probably convinced few. The effective part was the outspoken and
passionate indictment of governments and religions as causes of most of
the miseries of mankind.

It is in other works, especially in his Social System, that his views
of Progress are to be sought. Man is simply a part of nature; he has
no privileged position, and he is born neither good nor bad. Erras, as
Seneca said, si existumas vitia nobiscum esse: supervenerunt, ingesta
sunt. [Footnote: Seneca, Ep. 124.] We are made good or bad by education,
public opinion, laws, government; and here the author points to the
significance of the instinct of imitation as a social force, which a
modern writer, M. Tarde, has worked into a system.

The evils, which are due to the errors of tyranny and superstition, the
force of truth will gradually diminish if it cannot completely banish
them; for our governments and laws may be perfected by the progress
of useful knowledge. But the process will be a long one: centuries of
continuous mental effort in unravelling the causes of social ill-being
and repeated experiments to determine the remedies (des experiences
reiterees de la societe). In any case we cannot look forward to the
attainment of an unchangeable or unqualified felicity. That is a mere
chimera "incompatible with the nature of a being whose feeble machine
is subject to derangement and whose ardent imagination will not always
submit to the guidance of reason. Sometimes to enjoy, sometimes to
suffer, is the lot of man; to enjoy more often than to suffer is what