complaints of that heathen philosopher, who found that
reason was a very troublesome present sent to us by the gods for our
ruin; for he supposed, that reason busied herself in our affairs,
whereas the truth of it is she never meddles in the least with them.
We act nothing but with prejudice, by instinct, by self-love, and the
sudden starts of a thousand passions, which drag and turn our reason as
they will, insomuch that one may most justly define the principle which
rules and domineers over us, a mass of prejudices and passions which
knows how to draw consequences. I remember to have seen a man, who
having never heard mention made of the Cotta of Cicero, said
nevertheless as well as he, that it would have been much better that God
had not made us reasonable, since reason poisons all our affairs, and
makes us ingenious to afflict ourselves, upon which a certain person
said to him in raillery, That he had what he desired; that he had
received so small a share of reason that it was not worth his while to
complain. For my part, I turned the thing otherwise, that people were
much in the wrong to murmur against reason, since it is not that which
guides us; and that it is not too possible it should, without
overthrowing the order which has reigned so long in the world. The
learned Erasmus, continued I, deserves the highest praise in this
respect; he has written The Praise of Folly, wherein he shews that she
sheds every where her influence, and without her, the whole world would
in a short time be turned topsy turvy. I make no doubt, sir, but you
know the merit of that work. The author speaks, though in a merry
manner, the greatest truths in the world; and I do not know whether he
believed himself as profound a philosopher, as he really was in that
ingenious satire."

Secondly, This is not all, "[2]It is sometimes necessary, for the
general good of the world, to follow prejudices, popular errors, and the
blind instincts of nature, rather than the distinct ideas of reason."
Mr. Bayle extends himself farther on this idea in another place[3],
which I shall here insert. "Errors," says he, "irregular passions, and
unreasonable prejudices, are so necessary to the world to make it a
theatre of that prodigious diversity of events which make one admire his
providence. So that he who would reduce men to do nothing but according
to the distinct ideas of reason, would ruin civil society. If man was
reduced to this condition, he would ha