Not only
did court ignorance persecute him, but the malignant influence of a few
so-called men of letters was let loose against him. What in England had
produced merely a few philosophical disputes, produced in France the
most cowardly atrocities; a Frenchman suffered by Locke.
There have always been in the mud of our literature more than one of
these miscreants who have sold their pens, and intrigued against their
benefactors even. This remark is rather foreign to the article
SOUL; but should one miss an opportunity of dismaying those who
make themselves unworthy of the name of men of letters, who prostitute
the little mind and conscience they have to a vile self-interest, to a
fantastic policy, who betray their friends to flatter fools, who in
secret powder the hemlock which the powerful and malicious ignoramus
wants to make useful citizens drink?
In short, while we worship God with all our soul, let us confess always
our profound ignorance of this soul, of this faculty of feeling and
thinking which we possess from His infinite goodness. Let us avow that
our feeble reasonings can take nothing away from, or add anything to
revelation and faith. Let us conclude in fine that we should use this
intelligence, the nature of which is unknown, for perfecting the
sciences which are the object of the "Encyclopedia"; just as watchmakers
use springs in their watches, without knowing what a spring is.
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