After Homer, planets were assigned to the gods; but there was no more reason for men to place a god in the moon than for the inhabitants of the moon to place a god in our planet of the earth. Juno and Iris had no other palaces assigned them but the clouds, where there was no place to rest the soles of their feet. Among the Sabæans every deity had its star. But as the stars are little suns, it would be impossible to live there without partaking of the nature of fire. Upon the whole, then, it is needless to inquire what the ancients thought of heaven; since the best answer that can be given is, they thought nothing about it. [65] Matthew xxii. 1–13. [66] St. Luke xiv. [67] It was indeed very difficult, not to say impossible, for the Jews to comprehend, without an immediate revelation, the ineyable mystery of the incarnation of God, the Son of God. In the sixth chapter of Genesis we find the sons of great men called “the sons of God.” In like manner the royal Psalmist calls the tall cedars “the cedars of God.” Samuel says, “The fear of God fell upon the people”; that is, a violent fear seized them. A great tempest is called the wind of the Lord, and Saul’s distemper, the melancholy of the Lord. Nevertheless, the Jews seemed to have clearly understood that our Saviour called Himself the Son of God in the proper sense of that word; and if they looked upon this as a blasphemous expression, it is an additional proof of their ignorance of the incarnation, and of God, the Son of God, being sent upon earth for the redemption of mankind. [68] Matthew xxvi. 61–64. [69] See that excellent book, entitled, “The Manual of the Inquisition.” [70] Now Bona, a town of Constantine in Africa. St. Augustine was bishop of this see above forty years. It now belongs to Algiers. TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES Original printed spelling and grammar are retained, with a few exceptions noted below. Small caps are changed to all capital letters. Italics _look like this_. The original page numbers have been removed. The four illustrations were originally printed full page, with their captions printed alone on an adjacent page. In this edition, the captions are combined appropriately with the illustrations, which are moved to locations near their original locations, but between paragraphs of text. Scans of the original book may be found at archive.org—search for “worksofvoltaire04voltiala”. There were seventy level-one footnotes, some extending over several pages, and nine level-two footnotes anchored within level-one footnotes. The level-one footnotes were renumbered, and are moved to the ends of their two sections—_Dialogue Between Madame de Maintenon and Mdlle. de l’Enclos_ and _A Treatise on Toleration_. The nested footnotes remain near their anchors.