Under pretext of instructing and enlightening men, religion really holds
them in ignorance, and deprives them even of the desire of understanding
the objects which interest them the most. There exists for the people no
other rule of conduct than that which their priests indicate to them.
Religion takes the place of everything; but being in darkness itself, it
has a greater tendency to misguide mortals, than to guide them in the
way of science and happiness. Philosophy, morality, legislation, and
politics are to them enigmas. Man, blinded by religious prejudices,
finds it impossible to understand his own nature, to cultivate his
reason, to make experiments; he fears truth as soon as it does not agree
with his opinions. Everything tends to render the people devout, but all
is opposed to their being humane, reasonable, and virtuous. Religion
seems to have for its object only to blunt the feeling and to dull the
intelligence of men.
The war which always existed between the priests 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 borrow its first rudiments. Obscure or
false in its principles, mingled with fictions and fables, solely made
to seduce imagination, this philosophy progressed but waveringly, and
instead of enlightening the mind, it blinded it, and turned it away from
useful objects. The theological speculations and mystical reveries of
the ancients have, even in our days, the making of the law in a great
part of the philosophical world. Adopted by modern theology, we can
scarcely deviate from them without heresy; they entertain us with aerial
beings, with spirits, angels, demons, genii, and other phantoms, which
are the object of the meditations of our most profound thinkers, and
which serve as a basis to metaphysics, an abstract and futile science,
upon which the greatest geniuses have vainly exercised themselves for
thousands of years. Thus hypotheses, invented by a few visionists of
Memphis and of Babylon, continue to be the basis of a science revered
for the obscurity which makes it pass as marvelous and Divine. The first
legislators of nations were priests; the first mythologists and poets
were priests; the first philosophers were priests; the first physicians
were priests. In their hands science became a sacred thing, prohibited
to the profane; they spoke only by allegories, emblems, enigmas, and
ambiguous oracles--means well-suited to excite curiosity, to put to work
the imagination, and especially to inspire in the ignorant man a holy
respect for those whom he believed instructed by Heaven, capable of
reading the destinies of earth, and who boldly pretended to be the
organs of Divinity.
CC.--ALL RELIGIONS, ANCIENT AND MODERN, HAVE MUTUALLY BORROWED THEIR
ABSTRACT REVERIES AND THEIR RIDICULOUS PRACTICES.
The religions of these ancient priests have disappeared, or, rather,
they have changed their form. Although our modern theologians regard the
ancient priests as impostors, they have taken care to gather up the
scattered fragments of their religious systems, the whole of which does
not exist any longer for us; we will find in our modern religions, not
only the metaphysical dogmas which theology has but dressed in another
form, but we still find remarkable remains of their superstitious
practices, of their theurgy, of their magic, of their enchantments.
Christians are still commanded to regard with respect the monuments of
the legislators, the priests, and the prophets of the Hebrew religion,
which, according to appearances, has borrowed from Egypt the fantastic
notions with which we see it filled. Thus the extravagances invented by
frauds or idolatrous visionists, are still regarded as sacred opinions
by the Christians!
If we but look at history, we see striking resemblances in all
religions. Everywhere on earth we find religious ideas periodically
afflicting and rejoicing the people; everywhere we see rites, practices
often abominable, and formidable mysteries occupying the mind, and
becoming objects of meditation. We see the different superstitions
borrowing from each other their abstract reveries and their ceremonies.
Religions are generally unformed rhapsodies combined by new Doctors of
Divinity, who, in composing them, have used the materials of their
predecessors, reserving the right of adding or subtracting what suits or
does not suit their present views. The religion of Egypt served
evidently as a basis for the religion of Moses, who expunged from it the
worship of idols. Moses was but an Egyptian schismatic, Christianity is
but a reformed Judaism. Mohammedanism is composed of Judaism, of
Christianity, and of the ancient religion of Arabia.