That is how things go among us.
That was not how things went with the Roman senate which was almost
entirely composed of atheists in theory and in practice, that is to say,
who believed in neither a Providence nor a future life; this senate was
an assembly of philosophers, of sensualists and ambitious men, all very
dangerous, who ruined the republic. Epicureanism existed under the
emperors: the atheists of the senate had been rebels in the time of
Sylla and Caesar: under Augustus and Tiberius they were atheist slaves.
I would not wish to have to deal with an atheist prince, who would find
it to his interest to have me ground to powder in a mortar: I should be
quite sure of being ground to powder. If I were a sovereign, I would not
wish to have to deal with atheist courtiers, whose interest it would be
to poison me: I should have to be taking antidotes every day. It is
therefore absolutely necessary for princes and for peoples, that the
idea of a Supreme Being, creator, ruler, rewarder, revenger, shall be
deeply engraved in people's minds.
Bayle says, in his "Thoughts on the Comets," that there are atheist
peoples. The Caffres, the Hottentots, the Topinambous, and many other
small nations, have no God: they neither deny nor affirm; they have
never heard speak of Him; tell them that there is a God: they will
believe it easily; tell them that everything happens through the nature
of things; they will believe you equally.
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