the accents of fanaticism, superstition, and bigotry[91]. {239} Jesuits were the avowed heralds of these _degrading_ lessons, they were not philosophers. "No," says D'Alembert, one of the fathers of the new system, "the Jesuits have been teaching {240} philosophy two hundred years, and they have never yet had a philosopher in their body." In the meaning of these writers, the charge must be fully admitted. Never did Jesuits harbour within their walls the maxims or the doctrines of modern sophisters. They acknowledged no philosophy, that appeared to infringe revelation or morals; but not on that account did they forego a modest claim to the title of philosophers. Those among them, who best deserved it, were actively employed in detecting, exposing, and refuting the fallacies of the modern Voltairian school; and, without affecting the peculiarity of the name, they were satisfied with being philosophers in the ancient acceptation of the term; that is, while they inculcated respect for divine revelation, and for established authority, they never ceased, during two hundred years, to furnish a succession of professors, who unfolded the principles of natural and of moral knowledge. And what branch of human {241} science was banished from their schools? Their public lessons might be called _elementary_ by deep proficients; but they were accommodated to the capacity of the bulk of their youthful auditors; their object was to awaken in them the love of science, to lay the foundation on which the edifice of deep knowledge was afterwards to rise. It is allowed, that the most distinguished scholars in every branch, in past times, generally had been trained in the Jesuits' schools; and can it be said, with truth, that none of the masters, who had taught them, ever rose to eminence; that none of them were philosophers? That they never affected to assume the title is allowed: their philosophy was more circumspect. On their first principle they accepted, and they taught others to accept, without hesitation, the oracles of the church of Christ; they never blushed for their faith, or, as it was miscalled, their credulity. They believed sublime truths, that surpassed comprehension, because they feared God, who attests them, and knew that he cannot deceive. {242} Fixed in this first principle, they conceived no incongruity in joining to it eager researches into the secrets of nature, steady pursuit of improvement in every human science. If eminence in these justly confers the title of _philosopher_, it is strange, that the doctors of the new antichristian school should have overlooked the names of innumerable Jesuits in every branch of science, who were respected as philosophers, until faith in divine revelation was reckoned to depreciate all literary merit. It would be tedious to rehearse the multitude of names, which might be adduced; but I must observe, that the succession of them was never discontinued; and that, in the very last state