Although about forty-five works are now ascribed to D'Holbach, not one of them was published during his life-time in his own name. The manuscripts were taken to Amsterdam by Naigeon, and there printed by Michael Rey. D'Holbach never talked publicly of his literary productions himself and his secrets seem to have been well kept by his friends. Several of the works were condemned and suppressed by the government; but D'Holbach lived unsuspected and unmolested. The expression used by the Avocat, General Seguier, in his réquisitoire against the "System of Nature" is worthy of notice. The Avocat General said—"The restless spirit of Infidelity, inimical to all dependence, endeavors to overthrow all political constitutions. Its wishes will not be satisfied until it has destroyed the necessary inequality of rank and condition, and until it has degraded the majesty of kings, and rendered their authority subordinate to the caprices of the mob." Note the three words we have italicised. For the first read unnecessary; for the second, voice; for the third, peoples. We trust that Free-thought never will be satisfied until it has destroyed the unnecessary inequalities of rank and condition, and rendered it impossible for the authority of kings to be enforced in opposition to the voice of the people.
The following description of D'Holbach is given in a little sketch, published by Mr. Watson in 1834, as taken from Grimm's "Correspondence:"—"D'Hol-bach's features were, taken separately, regular, and even handsome, yet he was not a handsome man. His forehead, large and open, like that of Diderot, indicated a vast and capacious mind; but his forehead having fewer sinuosities, less roundness than Diderot's, announced less warmth, less energy, and less fecundity of ideas. A craniologist would say that in both D'Holbach and Diderot, the philosophical organs were largely developed, but that Diderot excelled in ideality; D'Holbach's countenance only indicated mildness, and the habitual sincerity of his mind. He was incapable of personal hatred. Though he detested priests and Jesuits, and all other supporters of despotism and superstition; and though when speaking of such people, his mildness and good temper were sometimes transformed into bitterness and irritability; yet it is affirmed that when the Jesuits were expelled from France, D'Holbach regarded them as objects of commiseration and of pity, and afforded them pecuniary assistance."
The titles of D'Holbach's works may be found in Barbier's "Dictionary of Anonymous Works," and in St. Surins's article in the "Biographie Universelle," so in the little tract before mentioned as published by J. Watson. D'Holbach contributed largely to the first French Encyclopaedia, and other works of a like character. Of the "System of Nature" we have already spoken, and shall rather leave our readers to the work itself than take up more space in discussing its authorship.
After having lived a life of comfort, in affluent circumstances, and always surrounded by a large circle of the best men of the day, D'Holbach died on January the 21st, 1789, being, then sixty-six years of age. The priests have never pictured to us any scene of horror in relation to his dying moments. The good old man died cheered and supported in his last struggle by those men whom he had many times assisted in the hard fighting of the battle of life. J. A. Naigeon, who had been his friend for thirty years; paid an eloquent tribute to D'Holbach's memory, in an article which appeared in the "Journal de Paris" of February the 9th, 1789, and we are not aware that any man has ever written anything against D'Hol-bach's personal character.
EXTRACTS FROM "THE SYSTEM OF NATURE."
Although we may not attempt to express a decided opinion as to the authorship of "Le Système de la Nature," we feel it our duty to present some of its principal arguments to the consideration of our readers. The author opens his work with this passage:—
"Man always deceives himself when he abandons experience to follow imaginary systems. He is the work of nature. He exists in nature. He is submitted to her laws. He cannot deliver himself from them. He cannot step beyond them even in thought. It is in vain his mind would spring forward beyond the visible world: an imperious necessity ever compels his return—for a being formed by Nature, who is circumscribed by her laws, there exists nothing beyond the great whole of which he forms a part, of which be experiences the influence. The beings his imagination pictures as above Nature, or distinguished from her, are always chimeras formed after that which he has, already seen, but of which it is utterly impossible he should ever form any correct idea, either as to the place they occupy, or their manner of acting—for him there is not, there can be nothing out of that nature which includes all beings. Instead, therefore, of seeking out of the world he inhabits for beings who can procure him a happiness denied by Nature, let him study this nature, learn her laws, contemplate her energies, observe the immutable rules by which she acts."
Speaking of the theological delusions under which many men labor, and of the mode in which man has been surrounded by those delusions, he says:—
"His ignorance made him credulous: his curiosity made him swallow large draughts of the marvellous: time confirmed him in his opinions, and he passed his conjectures from race to race, for realities; a tyrannical power maintained him in his notions, because by those alone could society be enslaved. It was in vain, that some faint glimmerings of Nature occasionally attempted, the recall of his reason; that slight corruscations of experience sometimes threw his darkness into light; the interest of the few was bottomed on his enthusiasm; their pre-eminence depended on his love of the wonderful; their very existence rested on the solidity of his ignorance they consequently suffered no opportunity to escape, of smothering even the lambent flame. The many were thus first deceived into credulity, then coerced into submission. At length, the whole science of man became a confused mass of darkness, falsehood, and contradictions, with here and there a feeble ray of truth, furnished by that Nature of which he can never entirely divest himself, because, without his knowledge, his necessities are continually bringing him back to her resources."
Having stated that by "nature" he means the "great whole," our author complains of those who assert that matter is senseless, inanimate, unintelligent, etc., and says, "Experience proves to us that the matter which we regard as inert or dead, assumes action, intelligence, and life, when it is combined in a certain way:"—