Our teachers pretend to understand the soul well; they profess to be able to distinguish it from the body; in short, they can do nothing without it; and therefore, to keep up the farce, they have been compelled to admit the ridiculous dogma of the Persians, known by the name of the _resurrection_. This system supposes that the particles of the body which have been scattered at death will be collected at the last day, to be replaced in their primitive condition. But that this strange phenomenon may take place, it is necessary that the particles of our destroyed bodies, of which some, have been converted into earth, others have passed into plants, others into animals, some of one species, others of another, even of our own; it is requisite, I say, that these particles, of which some have been mixed with the waters of the deep, others have been carried on the wings of the wind, and which have successively belonged to many different men, should be reunited to reproduce the individual to whom they formerly belonged. If you cannot get over this impossibility, the theologians will explain it to you by saying, very briefly, "Ah! it is a profound mystery, which we cannot comprehend." They will inform you that the resurrection is a miracle, a supernatural effect, which is to result from the divine power. It is thus they overcome all the difficulties which the good sense of a few opposes to their rhapsodies. If, perchance, Madam, you do not wish to remain content with these sublime reasons, against which your good sense will naturally revolt, the clergy will endeavor to seduce your imagination by vague pictures of the ineffable delights which will be enjoyed in Paradise by the souls and bodies of those who have adopted their reveries; they will aver that you cannot refuse to believe them upon their mere word without encountering the eternal indignation of a God of pity; and they will attempt to alarm your fancy by frightful delineations of the cruel torments which a God of goodness has prepared for the greater number of his creatures. But if you consider the thing coolly, you will perceive the futility of their flattering promises and of their puny threatenings, which are uttered merely to catch the unwary. You may easily discover that if it could be true that man shall survive himself, God, in recompensing him, would only recompense himself for the grace which he had granted; and when he punished him, he punished him for not receiving the grace which he had hardened him against receiving. This line of conduct, so cruel and barbarous, appears equally unworthy of a wise God as it is of a being perfectly good.