The submerged, the canaille, fierce and hungry-eyed, were among the street crowds to see him who had pleaded against a criminal code which punished petty theft, blasphemy, and desertion in time of peace, by death; meted to the hapless imbeciles, called sorcerers, the vengeance of superstition and
“TRIOMPHE DE VOLTAIRE”
From a Contemporary Print
fear; and robbed the children of the condemned by confiscating their goods to the King.
Court and Church paid him the higher compliment of fearing him.
The preachers denounced the apostate from their pulpits. Here is he who has not only, having examined the evidences of Christianity, boldly declared that he finds them absurd and inadequate, but has also dared to attack the evil lives of the believers, tyranny, oppression, persecution, calling them the inevitable consequence of the Faith, and so the most powerful of all arguments against it.
Anti-Christ! Anti-Christ!
King and ministers turned and looked at each other in consternation. Surely there was somewhere an edict of banishment against this person? But where? If it had been found, no one would have dared to put it into execution.