"Thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven--" another proposition tainted with heresy, for it said again and again in the Scriptures that God reigns eternally. Moreover it is very rash to ask that His will may be done, since nothing is or can be done but by the will of God. "Give us this day our daily bread"--a proposition directly contrary to what Jesus Christ uttered on another occasion: "Take no thought, saying what shall we eat? or what shall we drink?... for after all these things do the Gentiles seek.... But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." "And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors--" a rash proposition, which compares man to God, destroys gratuitous predestination, and teaches that God is bound to do to us as we do to others. Besides, how can the author say that we forgive our debtors? We have never forgiven them a single crown. No convent in Europe ever remitted to its farmers the payment of a sou. To dare to say the contrary is a formal heresy. "Lead us not into temptation--" a proposition scandalous and manifestly heretical, for there is no tempter but the devil, and it is expressly said in St. James' Epistle: "God is no tempter of the wicked; He tempts no man."--_"Deus enim intentator malorum est; ipse autem neminem tentat."_ You see, then, said Doctor Tamponet, that there is nothing, though ever so venerable, to which a bad sense may not be given. What book, then, shall not be liable to human censure when even the Lord's Prayer may be attacked, by giving a diabolical interpretation to all the divine words that compose it? As for me, I tremble at the thought of making a book. Thank God, I have never published anything; I have not even--like brothers La Rue, Du Ceveau, and Folard--had any of my theatrical pieces played, it would be too dangerous. If you publish, a parish curate accuses you of heresy; a stupid collegian denounces you; a fellow that cannot read condemns you; the public laugh at you; your bookseller abandons you, and your wine merchant gives you no more credit. I always add to my paternoster, "Deliver me, O God, from the itch of bookmaking." O ye who, like myself, lay black on white and make clean paper dirty! call to mind the following verses which I remember to have read, and by which we should have been corrected: _Tout ce fatras fat du chauvre en son temps,_ _Linge il devint par l'art des tisserands;_ _Puis en lambeaux des pilons le pressèrent_ _Il fut papier. Cent cerveaux à l'envers_ _De visions à l'envi le chargèrent;_ _Puis on le brûle; il vole dans les airs,_ _Il est fumée aussi bien que la gloire._ _De nos travaux voilà quelle est l'histoire,_ _Tout est fumée, et tout nous fait sentir_ _Ce grand néant qui doit nous engloutir._