and the best minds of
all ages, comes from this, that the wise men perceived the fetters which
superstition wished to place upon the human mind, which it fain would
keep in eternal infancy, that it might be occupied with fables, burdened
with terrors, and frightened by phantoms which would prevent it from
progressing. Incapable of perfecting itself, theology opposed
insurmountable barriers to the progress of true knowledge; it seemed to
be occupied but with the care to keep the nations and their chiefs in
the most profound ignorance of their true interests, of their relations,
of their duties, of the real motives which can lead them to prosperity;
it does but obscure morality; renders its principles arbitrary, subjects
it to the caprices of the Gods, or of their ministers; it converts the
art of governing men into a mysterious tyranny which becomes the scourge
of nations; it changes the princes into unjust and licentious despots,
and the people into ignorant slaves, who corrupt themselves in order to
obtain the favor of their masters.

CXCIX.--HISTORY TEACHES US THAT ALL RELIGIONS WERE ESTABLISHED BY THE AID
OF IGNORANCE, AND BY MEN WHO HAD THU EFFRONTERY TO STYLE THEMSELVES THE
ENVOYS OF DIVINITY.

If we take the trouble to follow the history of the human mind, we will
discover that theology took care not to extend its limits. It began by
repeating fables, which it claimed to be sacred truths; it gave birth to
poesy, which filled the people's imagination with puerile fictions; it
entertained them but with its Gods and their incredible feats; in a
word, religion always treated men like children, whom they put to sleep
with tales that their ministers would like still to pass as
incontestable truths. If the ministers of the Gods sometimes made useful
discoveries, they always took care to hide them in enigmas and to
envelope them in shadows of mystery. The Pythagorases and the Platos, in
order to acquire some futile attainments, were obliged to crawl to the
feet of the priests, to become initiated into their mysteries, to submit
to the tests which they desired to impose upon them; it is at this cost
that they were permitted to draw from the fountain-head their exalted
ideas, so seducing still to all those who admire what is unintelligible.
It was among Egyptian, Indian, Chaldean priests; it was in the schools
of these dreamers, interested by profession in dethroning human reason,
that philosophy was obliged to borr