The System of Nature, or, the Laws of the Moral and Physical World. Volume 2Holbach, Paul Henri Thiry, baron d'
Religion
The System of Nature, or, the Laws of the Moral and Physical World. Volume 2
Holbach, Paul Henri Thiry, baron d'
Materialism; Philosophy and religion; Psychology
Atheism, as it is termed, is only so rare, because every thing conspires
to intoxicate man with a dazzling enthusiasm, from his most tender age;
to inflate him from his earliest infancy, with systematic error, with
organized ignorance, which of all others is the most difficult to
vanquish, the most arduous to root out. Theology is nothing more than a
science of words, which by dint of repetition we accustom ourselves to
substitute for things: as soon as we feel disposed to analyze them, we
are astonished to find they do not present us with any actual sense.
There are, in the whole world, very few men who think deeply: who render
to themselves a faithful account of their own ideas; who have keen
penetrating minds. Justness of intellect is one of the rarest gifts
which nature bestows on the human species. It is not, however, to be
understood by this, that nature has any choice in the formation of
her beings; it is merely to be considered, that the circumstances very
rarely occur which enable the junction of a certain quantity of
those atoms or parts, necessary to form the human machine in such due
proportions, that one disposition shall not overbalance the others; and
thus render the judgment erroneous, by giving it a particular bias.
We know the general process of making gunpowder; nevertheless, it will
sometimes happen that the ingredients have been so happily blended, that
this destructive article is of a superior quality to the general produce
of the manufactory, without, however, the chemist being on that account
entitled to any particular commendation; circumstances have been
decidedly favorable, and these seldom occur. Too lively an imagination,
an over eager curiosity, are as powerful obstacles to the discovery of
truth, as too much phlegm, a slow conception, indolence of mind, or
the want of a thinking habit: all men have more or less imagination,
curiosity, phlegm, bile, indolence, activity: it is from the happy
equilibrium which nature has observed in their organization, that
depends that invaluable blessing, correctness of mind. Nevertheless,
as we have heretofore said, the organic structure of man is subject
to change; the accuracy of his mind varies with the mutations of his
machine: from hence may be traced those almost perpetual revolutions
that take place in the ideas of mortals; above all when there is a
question concerning those objects, upon which experience does not
furnish any fixed basis whereon to rest their merits.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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