This systematical design to destroy Christianity, which Voltaire and his accomplices formed, found its first expressions in the compilation of the _Encyclopédie_, the formation of a new sect of philosophers to engineer the assaults upon the church, the prostitution of the French Academy to the purposes of this sect, and the dissemination of infidel books and other publications, all of which were so prepared “as to catch the feelings, and steal upon the approbation, of every class of men.”[663] Eventually the labors of this group of men and their disciples were widened so as to include not only religion but morality and civil government as well, with the object in view of unhinging “gradually the minds of men, and destroying their reverence for everything heretofore esteemed sacred.”[664] Simultaneously the Masonic Societies of France and Germany had been drawn away from the pursuit of the objects of friendly and convivial intercourse for which they were originally instituted, to the employment of their secret assemblies in the discussion of “every novel, licentious, and alarming opinion”[665] that innovators and other restless spirits might choose to advance. Thus, Minds already tinged with philosophism were here speedily blackened with a deep and deadly die; and those which came fresh and innocent to the scene of contamination became early and irremediably corrupted.... In these hot beds were sown the seeds of that astonishing Revolution, and all its dreadful appendages, which now spreads dismay and horror throughout half the globe.[666] The Society of the Illuminati, springing up at this time and professing itself to be a higher order of Freemasonry, availed itself of the secrecy, solemnity, and mysticism of Masonry, of its system of correspondence, to teach and propagate doctrines calculated to undermine and destroy all human happiness and virtue. Thus God’s being was derided, while government was pronounced a curse, civil society an apostasy of the race, the possession of private property a robbery, chastity and natural affection groundless prejudices, and adultery, assassination, poisoning and other infernal crimes not only lawful but even virtuous.[667] To crown all, the principle that the end justifies the means was made to define the sphere of action for the members of the order.