or artifices of reasoning, men could destroy our confidence in the
existence of a Supreme Being: morality, being detached from the opinions
which sustain it, would remain a wavering, unsupported notion, only
defended by a policy, whose power time would insensibly weaken. A fatal
languor invading every mind, where would be that universal interest,
that sentiment felt by all men, and proper to form a general alliance
between them? Then those, who, with pure intentions, can only be guided
and sustained by an intimate persuasion, would retire sad, and leave to
others the care of supporting moral order by fictions and falsehoods;
they would pity that dismayed race, called to appear and pass away like
flowers, which bloom but for a day; they would despise those animated
phantoms which only come to make a buz with their vanity and trivial
passions, and fall in a little while into eternal oblivion. All that
appears beautiful in the universe, and excites our enthusiasm, would
soon lose its splendour and enchantment, if we perceived nothing in this
brilliant scene but the play of some atoms, and the uniform walk of
blind necessity; for it is always because a thing may be otherwise, that
it acquires a claim to our admiration: in short, that soul, that spirit,
which vivifies man, that faculty of thought which surprises and
confounds those who reflect, would only appear a vain movement, if
nothing was before, or was to follow, if some unknown breath, or general
intelligence, did not animate nature. But we have dwelt too long on
those gloomy thoughts; reassume your light and life, admirable works of
God; come and confound the pride of some, and comfort others; come and
take possession of our souls, and direct our affections towards Him whom
we ought to love, towards Him who is the eternal model of perfect
wisdom, and unlimitted goodness!
I shall not endeavour to prove that there is a God, by reciting all the
wonders the works of nature display to our eyes; several celebrated
writers have already done it, and have missed their aim. Infinity can
only be represented by astonishment and respect, which overwhelms all
our thoughts: and when we labour to explain the successive and varied
picture of the wonders of nature, this change of objects is more
calculated to relax our admiration than to increase it; for any change
eases our mind, by affording those relaxations which our weakness has
need of; and if we were to investigate only one phœnomenon, we should
soon discover the utmost extent of our faculties. We find the limits of
our understanding in the examination of the organization of the smallest
insect, as well as in observing the faculties of the soul; and the
mysteries of the simplest vegetation is as far above the reach of our
intelligence, as the principal agent of the universe.
It is then as a hymn of praise to the Supreme Being, and not as
necessary instruction that I freely follow the course of my thoughts. I
shall begin by throwing a rapid glance on the principal characters of
wisdom and grandeur, which we are all equally struck with, when we
contemplate the wonder of the universe.
What a sight is that of the world! What a magnificent picture for those
who can be roused out of the state of indifference, in which habit has
thrown them. We know not where to begin, or stop, when we expatiate on
so many wonders; and the most noble of all is, the faculty which has
been bestowed on us of admiring and conceiving them. What an astonishing
and sublime relation is that of the innumerable beauties of nature, with
the intelligence which permits us to enjoy, and to be made happy by
them! What relation so surprising, as that of the order and harmony of
the universe, with the moral intelligence which enables us to anticipate
the enjoyments of wisdom and unclouded knowledge! Nature is immense, and
all that it contains, all that it spreads with so much splendour, seems
within the reach of our sensibility, or the powers of our mind; and
these faculties, invisible and incomprehensible, unite to form, that
wonder of wonders, which we call felicity. Let not these plain words
turn our attention from the magical ideas which they represent. It is
because the grand phœnomena of our existence cannot either be defined or
expressed many ways, that they are so much more wonderful; and those
words, used by common consent, soul, mind, sensation, life, happiness,
and many others besides, which we pronounce so slightly, confound not
less our understanding, when we wish to discuss the essence of the
properties of which they are the sign. It is for this reason, among
several others, that the admiration of particulars, in the works of
nature, is always insufficient for those who have sensibility, as such
admiration is necessarily placed between two ideas susceptible of being
known; ideas which we connect through the aid of our own knowledge; but
the charm of our relation with the wonders which surround us, arises
from experiencing every instant the impression of an infinite grandeur;
and feeling the necessity of flying to that mild refuge of ignorance and
weakness, the sublime idea of a God. We are continually carried towards
this idea by the vain efforts which we make, in order to penetrate the
secrets of our own nature; and when I fix my attention on those
astonishing mysteries, which seem to terminate, in some manner, the
power of our thoughts, I represent them with emotion, as the only
barrier which separates us from the infinite spirit, the source of all
knowledge.
Men endowed with the greatest genius, perceive quickly the bounds of
their faculties when they wish to go very far in the study of abstract
metaphysical truths; but the simplest and least exercised mind, can
distinguish the proofs of that order, which announces with so much
splendour the end and design of sovereign wisdom. It seems, that all the
knowledge proper to interest men has been placed within their reach. The
learned astronomer, observing the course of our globe round the sun,
perceives the cause of that regular succession of repose and vegetation,
which secures the earth its fecundity, and adorns every season with
renewed beauties; but the simple cultivator, who sees the treasurers of
the earth renovated every year, and answer, with singular precision, to
the wants of animated beings, is not less a witness of a phœnomenon
which is sufficient to excite his admiration and gratitude! Newton
analyzed light, and calculated the swiftness with which it runs over the
immensity of space; but the ignorant herdsman, who sees, when he wakes,
his hut enlightened by the same rays which animate all nature, is
equally benefitted by them. The indefatigable anatomist attains a just
idea of our inimitable structure, and the ingenious texture of our
different organs; but the man most devoid of instruction, who reflects
an instant on the pleasures, and the variety of the sensations, which we
find ourselves susceptible of, partakes the blessing equally.
The transcendent knowledge of some people, is a degree of superiority
which disappears when contrasted with the incomprehensible grandeur of
nature; when we contemplate infinity, those talents which exalt one man
above another are no more seen; and probably it is beyond the limits of
our intelligence that the greatest wonders of nature begin. The
knowledge of all ages has not explained what is the imperious authority
of our will over our actions, nor how our thoughts could reach the most
remote ages, how our souls could investigate that innumerable multitude
of present objects, of recollections and anticipations; neither has it
informed us how all those excellencies of the mind, sometimes remain
unknown to itself, nor how they are sometimes at its command, issuing
out of their long obscurity, and succeeding each other with method, or
are profusely poured forth. At the sight of these astonishing phœnomena,
we think man presumptuous, when, puffed up with pride, he mistakes the
measure of his strength and wishes to penetrate into the secrets, whose
confines are shut by an invisible hand. He should be content to know,
that his existence is united to so many wonders; he should be satisfied
with being the principal object of the liberality of nature, and he
should adore with reverential respect that powerful Sovereign, who
bestows so many blessings on him, and who has made him to sympathize
with all the powers of heaven and earth.
The globe on which we live runs over every year a space of two hundred
millions of leagues; and in this immense course, its distance from the
sun, determined by immutable laws, is exactly proportioned to the degree
of the temperature necessary to our feeble nature, and to the successive
return of that precious vegetation, without which no animated being
could subsist.
That celestial body, which fertilizes the seeds of life shut up in the
bosom of the earth, is, at the same time, the source of that light which
opens to our view the glorious sight of the universe. The rays of the
sun run over in eight minutes about thirty millions of leagues: such an
impetuous motion would be sufficient to pulverize the largest masses of
matter; but, by an admirable combination, such is the incomprehensible
tenuity of these rays, that they strike the most tender of our organs,
not only without wounding it; but with a measure so delicate and
precise, that they excite in us those extatic sensations, which are the
origin and the indispensable condition of our greatest enjoyments.
Man, in immensity, is only an imperceptible point; and yet, by his
senses and intelligence, he seems in communication with the whole
universe; but how pleasant and peaceable is this communication! It is
almost that of a prince with his subjects: all is animated round man,
all relates to his desires and wants; the action of the elements, every
thing on earth, like the rays of light, seems to be proportioned to his
faculties and strength; and whilst the celestial bodies move with a
rapidity which terrifies our imagination, and whilst they hurry along in
their course our dwelling, we are tranquil in the bosom of an asylum,
and under the protecting shelter allotted us; we enjoy there in peace a
multitude of blessings, which, by another wonderful affinity, ally
themselves to our taste, and all the sentiments we are endowed with.
In short, and it is another favour, man is permitted to be, in some
things, the contriver of his own happiness, by his will and ingenuity;
he has embellished his habitation, and united several ornaments to the
simple beauties of nature; he has improved, by his care, the salutary
plants; and even in those which seemed the most dangerous he has
discovered some wholesome property, and carefully separated it from the
envenomed parts which surrounded it; he can soften metals, and make them
serve to augment his strength; he obliges the marble to obey him, and
assume what form he desires; he gives laws to the elements, or
circumscribes their empire; he stops the invasion of the sea; he
restrains the rivers in their natural bed, and sometimes obliges them to
take a different course, in order to spread their benign influence; he
erects a shelter against the fury of the winds, and by an ingenious
contrivance, makes use of that impetuous force, which he could not at
first dream of defending himself from; even the fire, whose terrible
action seems to presage destruction, he subjugates, and renders it, if I
may so express myself, the confident of his industry, and the companion
of his labours.
What a source of reflections is this dominion of the mind over the most
dreadful effects of the movement of blind matter. It seems as if the
Supreme Being, in submitting thus to the intelligence of men the most
powerful elements, chose to give us an anticipation of the empire which
His sovereign wisdom has over the universe.
However, it is in the influence of our spiritual faculties on
themselves, that we observe, above all, their admirable nature; we see,
with astonishment, the perfections which they acquire by their own
action. Intelligence, considered in a general manner, undoubtedly is a
great phœnomenon; but it is a still greater wonder, to see the thoughts
of a man reach, by the most ingenious means, the knowledge of others,
and form an alliance between the past and present productions of the
mind. It is by such an alliance that the sciences have been improved,
and that the mind of man has been acquainted with all its strength. The
mighty of the earth cannot break this association, nor subject to their
tyrannic divisions the noble heritage of knowledge; this gift, so
precious, preserves the stamp of a divine hand;—and no one has yet been
able to say it is mine.
The most noble use that has ever been made of the admirable union of so
many talents, and so much knowledge, was to demonstrate how every thing
in nature relates to the idea of a first cause; which forcibly announces
a design full of wisdom, and a beneficent intention; but now, unhappily,
these proofs of the existence of a God are not sufficient; imperious
philosophers have laboured to subvert every thing founded on the
connection and wonderful harmony of the system of nature; it is not
sufficient to oppose to these new opinions the mere authority of final
causes; they do not contest that there is a perfect conformity between
our desires and wants, between our senses and the bounties of nature;
they do not contest, from the cedar to the hyssop, from the insect to
man, that there is a beauty of proportion in the whole, which is to be
found equally in the relation that objects have with each other, as well
as in their different parts; but this admirable harmony, in which the
pious man, the man of feeling, perceives with delight the stamp of an
eternal intelligence; others less fortunate, undoubtedly, obstinately
present it to us as a fortuitous collision, as a play of atoms agitated
by a blind movement, or as nature itself, existing thus from all
eternity. What trouble they take to invent and defend these systems
destructive of our happiness and hopes! I prefer my feelings to all this
philosophy; but, to avoid an encounter would be to favour their
presumption, and give additional strength to their opinions.
Thus I shall treat the most important question that man can consider. I
shall endeavour first to show, that the different conjectures on the
origin of the world all centre in the single opinion of the eternal and
necessary existence of every thing which is; and I shall afterwards
compare the basis of that system with the reason of that happy and
simple belief which unites the idea of a Supreme Being with all we see
and know; in short, to the universe, the most unlimitted of our
conceptions.
CHAP. XIII.
_The same Subject continued._
When we see the authors of the different systems, concerning the
formation of the world, reject the idea of a God, under the pretext,
that this idea is foreign to the nature of our perceptions, should we
not have a right to expect some better substitute for it? But, far from
answering our expectations, they abandon themselves to all the
wanderings of the most fantastic imagination. In fact, whether we refer
the origin of the universe to the effect of hazard, the fortuitous
concourse of atoms, or whether we establish another hypothesis derived
from the same principle, it is necessary at least to suppose the eternal
existence of an innumerable multitude of little particles of matter,
placed without order in the immensity of space; and to suppose,
afterwards, that these atoms, disseminated to infinity, attracted each
other, and corresponded by the inherent properties of their nature; and
that there resulted, from their adhesion, not only organized, but
intelligent faculties; it is necessary, in short, to suppose, that all
those incomprehensible atoms have been settled with admirable order
through the effect of a blind motion, and by the result of some of the
possible chances in the infinity of accidental combinations. Indeed,
after so many suppositions without example or foundation, that of an
Intelligent Being, soul and director of the universe, had been more
analogous and more consonant with our knowledge.
Let us return to the hypothesis we have just mentioned. We shall then
recognize the trifling habit of the mind; it is accustomed to proceed
from simple to compound ideas, every time it meditates, invents, or
executes: thus, by an inverse method, the composers of systems have
thought, that, in order to connect the universe to its origin, it was
sufficient to detach, by the exercise of thinking, all its parts, and to
break and subdivide them afterwards to infinity; but whatever may be the
tenuity of these atoms, their existence, having organized and
intellectual properties, which we should be obliged to grant them, would
be a wonder almost equal to those phœnomena which surround us.
When we see a plant grow, embellished with different colours, we only
think of the period when its vegetation may be perceived by our senses;
but the seed of this plant, or if you like better, the organized atoms,
the first principle of this seed, would have offered also a grand
subject of admiration, if we had been endowed with the faculties
necessary to penetrate into the occult secrets of nature. But perhaps,
in transforming into an imperceptible powder all the parts of matter,
which have been collected to compose the world, we have only before our
eyes a fugitive vapour, to which even our imagination cannot reach; and
those who unfortunately love and defend this admiration, find besides,
in the system of divisible atoms, means to defer, according to their
fancy, the moment of their astonishment.
All these fantastic combinations serve only to lead us astray in our
researches; and I do not think it a matter of indifference to make a
general observation. The study of the first elements, of all the
sciences which we acquire, such as geometry, languages, civil
legislation, and several others, appear to us the simplest parts of our
instruction. It is not the same, when we seek to know the laws of the
physical world; for the works of nature never appear more simple than in
their compounded state; they are then, to our mind, that which harmony
is to the ear; it is the agreement of all parts which forms a union
perfectly proportioned to our intelligence. Thus, man, for example, that
wonderful alliance of so many different faculties, does not astonish our
understanding, but appears to us in one point of view, a simple idea;
but we are troubled, and, as it were, dismayed, when we try to analyze
him, or mount to the elements of his liberty, will, thought, and all the
other properties of his nature.
We only advance towards infinity, and consequently towards the most
profound darkness, when we destroy the world in order to divide it into
atoms, out of the midst of which we make it issue afresh, after having
rallied all we have dispersed.
Let us admit, for a moment, that there exists organized and intelligent
atoms, and that they are such, either by their nature, or by their
adhesion to other atoms. We are now, of all these scattered atoms, to
compose the universe, that master-piece of harmony, and perfect
assemblage of every beauty and variety, that inexhaustible source of
every sentiment of admiration; and in rejecting the idea of a God,
creator and preserver, we must have recourse to the power of chance,
that is to say, to the effects of an unknown continual motion, which,
without any rule, produces, in a limited time, all the combinations
imaginable; but, in order to effect an infinite variety of combinations,
it is not only necessary to admit a continual motion, but besides, to
suppose this continual motion changes its direction in all the parts of
space subject to its influence. The existence of such a change, and a
similar diversity in the laws of motion, is a new supposition which may
be ranked with the other wild ones.
However, after these chimerical systems have been granted, we are not
freed from the difficulties which the notion of the formation of the
world by a fortuitous concourse of atoms produces.
It is difficult to comprehend how particles of matter, agitated in every
manner, and susceptible, as has been supposed, of an infinity of
different adhesions, should not have formed such a mixture, such a
contexture, as would have rendered, the harmonious composition of the
universe in all its parts, impossible.
When we represent to ourselves, abstractedly, the unlimmitted number of
chances that may be attributed to a blind movement, the imagination,
unable to conceive, is left to guess how an infinite number of atoms,
endowed with a property of uniting themselves, under an infinite
diversity of movements, could compose the heavenly bodies; but, as long
before that period, when such an accidental throw would become probable;
these same atoms might have formed an innumerable multitude of partial
combinations; if one of these combinations had been incompatible with
the harmony and composition of a world, that world could not have been
formed.
The same considerations may be applied to animated beings: chance might
have produced men susceptible of life, and the transmission of it, long
before chance gave them all the faculties which they enjoy; and if they
had been formed with only four senses, they could not have acquired a
fifth; for the same reason that we do not see a new one spring up.
Besides, the chance which might have produced living beings, must have
always preceded the chance which afforded those beings every thing
necessary for their subsistence and preservation.
It may indeed be supposed, that atoms assembled in a manner incompatible
with the disposition of the universe, have been separated by the
continuation of the motion introduced into the immensity of space; but
this continual motion, sufficient to sever that which it has joined,
would it not have destroyed that harmony which has been the result of
one of the fortuitous chances to which the formation of the world has
been attributed?
Will some object, that all the parts of matter, once united in the
masses and proportions which constitute the heavenly bodies, have been
maintained by the impression of a predominant force at the same time
invariable? But how is it possible to reconcile the existence and
dominion of such a force with that continual motion, which was requisite
for the composition of the universe?
It may be also demonstrated, that the formation of worlds, by the
chances of a blind motion, and their regular continuity of existence,
are two propositions which disagree. Let us explain this idea. The play
of atoms, necessary in order to produce the unformed masses of the
heavenly bodies, being infinitely less complicated than that which is
necessary to produce them, inhabited as they are with intelligent
beings, must have happened long before the other. Thus, in the system of
the composition of the universe, by the fortuitous concourse of atoms,
it is necessary to suppose, that these atoms, after having been united
to form the heavenly bodies, have been severed, and united again, as
many times as was necessary, to produce a planet inhabited by
intelligent beings. Since beings thus endowed add nothing to the
stability of the world, since they do not contribute to the grand
coalition of all its parts; why the same blind motion which has united,
dissolved, and assembled so often every part of the earth, before it was
composed, such as it is; why does it not produce some alteration now? It
should again reduce to powder our world, or at least, let us perceive
the commencement of some new form.