This EMPIRE is the WORLD; this MONARCH GOD; his MINISTERS are the PRIESTS; his SUBJECTS MANKIND.
2.
There is a science that has for its object only things incomprehensible. Contrary to all other sciences, it treats only of what cannot fall under our senses. Hobbes calls it the kingdom of darkness. It is a country, where every thing is governed by laws, contrary to those which mankind are permitted to know in the world they inhabit. In this marvellous region, light is only darkness; evidence is doubtful or false; impossibilities are credible: reason is a deceitful guide; and good sense becomes madness. This science is called theology, and this theology is a continual insult to the reason of man.
3.
By the magical power of "ifs," "buts," "perhaps's," "what do we know," etc., heaped together, a shapeless and unconnected system is formed, perplexing mankind, by obliterating from their minds, the most clear ideas and rendering uncertain truths most evident. By reason of this systematic confusion, nature is an enigma; the visible world has disappeared, to give place to regions invisible; reason is compelled to yield to imagination, who leads to the country of her self-invented chimeras.
4.
The principles of every religion are founded upon the idea of a GOD. Now, it is impossible to have true ideas of a being, who acts upon none of our senses. All our ideas are representations of sensible objects. What then can represent to us the idea of God, which is evidently an idea without an object? Is not such an idea as impossible, as an effect without a cause? Can an idea without an archetype be anything, but a chimera? There are, however, divines, who assure us that the idea of God is innate; or that we have this idea in our mother's womb. Every principle is the result of reason; all reason is the effect of experience; experience is acquired only by the exercise of our senses: therefore, religious principles are not founded upon reason, and are not innate.