hey made
themselves the administrators of the goods of the poor, the distributors
of alms, the depositaries of charities; thereby they extended and
sustained at all times their power over the unfortunates who usually
compose the most numerous, the most anxious, the most seditious part of
society. Thus the greatest evils are made profitable to the ministers
of the Lord.

The Christian priests tell us that the goods which they possess are the
goods of the poor, and pretend by this title that their possessions are
sacred; consequently, the sovereigns and the people press themselves to
accumulate lands, revenues, treasures for them; under pretext of
charity, our spiritual guides have become very opulent, and enjoy, in
the sight of the impoverished nations, goods which were destined but for
the miserable; the latter, far from murmuring about it, applaud a
deceitful generosity which enriches the Church, but which very rarely
alleviates the sufferings of the poor.

According to the principles of Christianity, poverty itself is a virtue,
and it is this virtue which the sovereigns and the priests make their
slaves observe the most. According to these ideas, a great number of
pious Christians have renounced with good-will the perishable riches of
the earth; have distributed their patrimony to the poor, and have
retired into a desert to live a life of voluntary indigence. But very
soon this enthusiasm, this supernatural taste for misery, must surrender
to nature. The successors to these voluntary poor, sold to the religious
people their prayers and their powerful intercession with the Deity;
they became rich and powerful; thus, monks and hermits lived in
idleness, and, under the pretext of charity, devoured insultingly the
substance of the poor. Poverty of spirit was that of which religion made
always the greatest use. The fundamental virtue of all religion, that is
to say, the most useful one to its ministers, is faith. It consists in
an unlimited credulity, which causes men to believe, without
examination, all that which the interpreters of the Deity wish them to
believe. With the aid of this wonderful virtue, the priests became the
arbiters of justice and of injustice; of good and of evil; they found it
easy to commit crimes when crimes became necessary to their interests.
Implicit faith has been the source of the greatest outrages which have
been committed upon the earth.

CLXX.--CONFESSION, THAT GOLDEN MINE FOR THE P