se principles necessarily involve them. Nevertheless,
this word is not enough to impose upon us; the reverend doctors do not
themselves understand the things about which they incessantly speak.
They invent words from an inability to explain things, and they give
the name of _mysteries_ to what they comprehend no better than
ourselves.

All the religions in the world are founded upon predestination, and
all the pretended revelations among men, as has been already pointed
out to you, inculcate this odious dogma, which makes Providence an
unjust mother-in-law, who shows a blind preference for some of her
children to the prejudice of all the others. They make God a tyrant,
who punishes the inevitable faults to which he has impelled them, or
into which he has allowed them to be seduced. This dogma, which served
as the foundation of Paganism, is now the grand pivot of the Christian
religion, whose God should excite no less hatred than the most wicked
divinities of idolatrous people. With such notions, is it not
astonishing that this God should appear, to those who meditate on his
attributes, an object sufficiently terrible to agitate the
imagination, and to lead some to indulge in dangerous follies?

The dogma of another life serves also to exculpate the Deity from
these apparent injustices or aberrations, with which he might
naturally be accused. It is pretended that it has pleased him to
distinguish his friends on earth, seeing he has amply provided for
their future happiness in an abode prepared for their souls. But, as I
believe I have already hinted, these proofs that God makes some good,
and leaves others wicked, either evince injustice on his part, at
least temporary, or they contradict his omnipotence. If God can do all
things, if he is privy to all the thoughts and actions of men, what
need has he of any proofs? If he has resolved to give them grace
necessary to save them, has he not assured them they will not perish?
If he is unjust and cruel, this God is not immutable, and belies his
character; at least for a time he derogates from the perfections which
we should expect to find in him. What would you think of a king, who,
during a particular time, would discover to his favorites traits the
most frightful, in order that they might incur his disgrace, and who
should afterwards insist on their believing him a very good and
amiable man, to obtain his favor again? Would not such a prince be
pronounced wicked, fanciful