How then shall we decide in its favour? How prove the validity of its pretensions? Has it any superior qualities, by which it merits the preference? And if so, what are they? Does it, better than any other, make us acquainted with the nature and essence of God? Alas! it only renders them more incomprehensible. It represents him as a capricious tyrant, whose whimsies are sometimes favourable, but more commonly injurious to mankind. Does it render mankind better? Alas! it arms them against each other, renders them intolerant, and forces them to butcher their brethren. Does it render empires flourishing and powerful? Wherever it reigns, do we not see the people debased, destitute of energy, and ignorant of true morality? What then are the proofs which are to establish the superiority of the Christian religion over all others? We are answered, "miracles, prophecies, and martyrs." But these are to be found in all religions of the earth. There are in all nations men, who, being superior to the vulgar in science and cunning, deceive them with imposture, and dazzle them with performances which are judged to be supernatural, by men ignorant of the secrets of nature and the resources of art. If the Jew cite the miracles of Moses, I see them performed before a people most ignorant, abject, and credulous, whose testimony has no weight with me. I may, also, suspect that these pretended miracles have been inserted in the sacred books of the Hebrews long after the death of those who might have testified the truth concerning them. If the Christians cite Jerusalem, and the testimony of Gallilee, to prove the miracles of Christ, I see them attested only by an ignorant populace; or I demand how it could be possible that an entire people, who had been witnesses to the miracles of Christ, should consent to his death, and even earnestly demand it? Would the people of London, or Paris, suffer a man who had raised the dead, restored the blind to sight, and healed the lame and paralytic, to be put to death before their eyes? If the Jews demanded the death of Jesus, all his miracles are at once annihilated in the mind of every unprejudiced person. May not we, also, oppose to the miracles of Moses, and Christ, those performed by Mahomet in presence of all Mecca and Arabia assembled? The effect of his miracles was, at least, to convince the Arabians that he was a divine person. The miracles of Jesus convinced nobody of his mission. Saint Paul himself, who afterwards became the most ardent of his disciples, was not convinced by the miracles, of which, in his time, there existed so many witnesses. A new one was necessary for his conviction. And by what right do they at this day demand belief of miracles; which could not convince even in the time of the Apostles; that is to say, a short time after they were wrought?