[82] Maury, Hist. de l’ancienne Académie des Inscriptions, 1864, pp. 312–13. [↑]
[83] Journal historique de Barbier, 1847–56, iv, 304. [↑]
[84] Astruc, we learn from D’Alembert, connected their decline with the influence of the new opinions. “Ce ne sont pas les jansenistes qui tuent les jésuites, c’est l’Encyclopédie.” “Le maroufle Astruc,” adds D’Alembert, “est comme Pasquin, il parle quelquefois d’assez bon sens.” Lettre à Voltaire. 4 mai, 1762. [↑]
[85] Cp. pref. (La Vie de Salvien) to French tr. of Salvian, 1734, p. lxix. I have seen MS. translations of Toland and Woolston. [↑]
[86] MS. statement, in eighteenth-century hand, on flyleaf of a copy of 1755 ed. of the Grands hommes, in the writer’s possession. [↑]
[87] Lettre à D’Alembert, 16 Octobre, 1765. [↑]
[88] Of the works noted below, the majority appear or profess to have been printed at Amsterdam, though many bore the imprint Londres. All the freethinking books and translations ascribed to d’Holbach bore it. The Arétin of Abbé Dulaurens bore the imprint: “Rome, aux dépens de la Congrégation de l’Index.” Mystifications concerning authorship have been as far as possible cleared up in the present edition. [↑]
[89] Given by Brunet, who is followed by Wheeler, as appearing in 1732, and as translated into English, under the title Dying Merrily, in 1745. But I possess an English translation of 1713 (pref. dated March 25), entitled A Philological Essay: or, Reflections on the Death of Freethinkers.... By Monsieur D——, of the Royal Academy of Sciences in France, and author of the Poetae Rusticantis Literatum Otium. Translated from the French by Mr. B——, with additions by the author, now in London, and the translator. [A note in a contemporary hand makes “B” Boyer.] Barbier gives 1712 for the first edition, 1732 for the second. Rep. 1755 and 1776. [↑]
[90] There is no sign of any such excitement in France over the translation as was aroused in England by the original; but an Examen du traité de la liberté de penser, by De Crousaz, was published at Amsterdam in 1718. [↑]
[91] This was probably meant to point to the Abbé de Marsy, who died in 1763. [↑]