Lubienitsky's, see his Theatrum Cometicum, Amsterdam, 1667, in part
ii: Historia Cometarum, preface "to the reader." For Petit, see his
Dissertation sur la Nature des Cometes, Paris, 1665 (German translation,
Dresden and Zittau, 1681).

All these were denounced as infidels and heretics, yet none the less did
they set men at thinking, and prepare the way for a far greater genius;
for toward the end of the same century the philosophic attack was taken
up by Pierre Bayle, and in the whole series of philosophic champions he
is chief. While professor at the University of Sedan he had observed the
alarm caused by the comet of 1680, and he now brought all his reasoning
powers to bear upon it. Thoughts deep and witty he poured out in volume
after volume. Catholics and Protestants were alike scandalized. Catholic
France spurned him, and Jurieu, the great Reformed divine, called his
cometary views "atheism," and tried hard to have Protestant Holland
condemn him. Though Bayle did not touch immediately the mass of mankind,
he wrought with power upon men who gave themselves the trouble of
thinking. It was indeed unfortunate for the Church that theologians,
instead of taking the initiative in this matter, left it to Bayle; for,
in tearing down the pretended scriptural doctrine of comets, he tore
down much else: of all men in his time, no one so thoroughly prepared
the way for Voltaire.

Bayle's whole argument is rooted in the prophecy of Seneca. He declares:
"Comets are bodies subject to the ordinary law of Nature, and not
prodigies amenable to no law." He shows historically that there is no
reason to regard comets as portents of earthly evils. As to the fact
that such evils occur after the passage of comets across the sky, he
compares the person believing that comets cause these evils to a woman
looking out of a window into a Paris street and believing that the
carriages pass because she looks out. As to the accomplishment of some
predictions, he cites the shrewd saying of Henry IV, to the effect that
"the public will remember one prediction that comes true better than all
the rest that have proved false." Finally, he sums up by saying: "The
more we study man, the more does it appear that pride is his ruling
passion, and that he affects grandeur even in his misery. Mean and
perishable creature that he is, he has been able to persuade men that he
can not die without disturbing the whole course of Nature and obliging
the heavens to