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which Mr. Bayle calls poor ones, will be found to have their weight. But he goes on, and tells us, that Pomponatius brings a better argument from fact, where he takes notice of several, who denied the immortality of the soul, and yet lived as well as their believing neighbours. This is indeed a good argument to the purpose, for which it is employed by Pomponatius; but whether it be so to that, for which, Mr. Bayle imagined, he employed it, shall be considered hereafter, when we come to meet with it again in this later writer's apology for atheism. But Mr. Bayle was so full of his own favourite question, that he did not give due attention to Pomponatius's; and having, as I observed above, refuted a vulgar error with regard to this famous tract, and imagining that the impiety, so generally charged on it, was solely founded in that error, he goes on insulting the enemies of Pomponatius in this manner : "If the charge of impiety, of which Pomponatius "hath been accused, was only founded on his book

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of the immortality of the soul, we must needs say "there was never any accusation more impertinent or

a stronger instance of the iniquitous perversity of "the persecutors of the philosophers*." But Pomponatius will not be so easily set clear: For let him think as he would concerning the soul, yet the account he gives of the origin of Religion, as the contrivance of statesmen, here produced, from this very tract De immortalitate animæ, is so highly impious, that his

* Si l'on n'a fondé les impietez, dont on l'accuse, que sur son livre de l'immortalite de l'ame, il n'y eut jamais d'accusation plus impertinente, que celle-la, ni qui soit une marque plus expresse de l'entetement inique des persecuteurs des philosophes,

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enemies will be hardly persuaded to give it a softer name than downright atheism. Nor is it impiety in general, of which, we endeavour to acquit him, but only that species of it, which teaches that Religion is useless to Society. And this we think we have done; although it be by shewing him to have run into the opposite extreme, which would insinuate it was the creature of politics.

Cardan comes next to be considered: and him nobody hath injured. He, too, is under Bayle's delusion, concerning Pomponatius: For, writing on the same subject*, he borrows the Peripatetic's arguments to prove that Religion was even pernicious to Society. This was so bold a stroke, that Mr. Bayle, who generally follows him pretty closely, drops him here: Nor do I know that he ever had a second, except it was the unhappy philosopher of Malmsbury; who, scorning to argue upon the matter, imperiously pronounced, that he who presumed to propagate Religion in a Society, without leave of the Magistrate, was guilty of the crime of Lese Majesty, as introducing a power superior to the Leviathan's. But it would be unpardonable to keep the reader much longer on this poor lunatic Italian, in whom, as Mr. Bayle pleasantly observes, sense was, at best, but an appendix to his folly. Besides,

* De immortalitate animorum liber, Lugd. ap. Gryph. 1545; et Opera omnia, fol. Lugduni, 1663, Tom. II. P. 458.

+ The charming picture he draws of himself, and which he excuses no otherwise than by laying the fault on his STARS, will hardly prejudice any one in favour of his opinions. How far it resembles any other of the brotherhood they best know, who have examined the genius of modern

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infidelity.

Besides, there is little in that tract, but what he stole from Pomponatius; the sirength of which, to support Cardan's paradox, hath been considered already; or what Mr. Bayle hath borrowed from him; the force of which shall be considered hereafter: But that little is so peculiarly his own, that as no other can claim the property, so no one hath hitherto usurped the use. Which yet, however, is remarkable; for there is no trash so worthless, but what some time or other finds a place in a Free-thinker's system. We will not despair then but that this paltry rubbish may one day or other have an honourable station in some of these fashionable fabrics. And, not to hinder its speedy preferment, I shall here give it the reader in its full herẻ force, without answer or reply. He brings the following argument to prove that the doctrine of the immortality of the soul is even destructive to society;— "From this flattering notion of a FUTURE STATE, ill

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men get opportunity to compass their wicked designs and, on the same account, good men suffer "themselves to be injuriously treated. Civil laws,

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infidelity, However, thus he speaks of his own amiable turn of mind: "In diem viventem, nugacem, religionis " contemptorem, injuriæ illatæ memorem, invidum, tristem, "insidiatorem, proditorem, magum, incantatorem, suorum ❝osorem, turpi libidini deditum, solitarium, inamonum, "austerum; sponte etiam divinantem, zelotypum, obscœ

num, lascivum, maledicum, varium, ancipitem, impurum, "calumniatorem," &c. We have had many Free-thinkers, but few such Free-speakers. But though these sort of writers are not used to give us so direct a picture of themselves, yet it hath been observed, that they haye unawares copied from their own tempers, in the ungracious drawings they have made of HUMAN NATURE and RELIGION,

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"relying on this fanciful assistance, relax their neces$6 sary severity; and thus is the opinion productive of "much mischief to mankind *." And then, by another argument as good, he shews the benefits accruing to the state from the belief of the soul's mortality: "Those who maintain that the soul dies "with the body, must needs be, by their principles, "hopester men than others, because they have a "peculiar interest in preserving their reputation; "this being the only future property they pretend to: "And the Profession of the Soul's mortality being

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generally esteemed as scandalous as that of usury, "such men will be most exact and scrupulous in point "of honour, as your usurer, to keep up the credit of "his calling, is of all men the most religious observer "of his word t."

SECT. IV.

MR. BAYLE, the last supporter of this parodox, is of a very different character from these Italian Sophists A writer, who, to the utmost strength and clearness of reasoning, hath added all the liveliness, and delicacy of wit: who, pervading human nature at his ease, struck into the province of PARADOX, as an exercise for the unwearied vigour of his mind: who, with a soul superior to the sharpest attacks of fortune, and a heart practised to the best philosophy, had not yet enough of real greatness to overcome

* De immortalitate animorum, cap. ii.
+ Cap. xxxiii. ejusd. tract,

that

that last foible of superior minds, the temptation of honour, which the ACADEMIC EXERCISE OF WIT is conceived to bring to its professors.

A writer of this character will deserve a particular regard for paradores, which in the hands of a Toland or a Tindal end in rank offensive impiety, will, under the management of a BAYLE, always afford something for use or curiosity: Thus, in the very work we are about to examine*, the " admirable obsermany vations on the nature and genius of polytheism, happen to be a full answer to all which the Author of Christianity as old as the Creation hath advanced against the use of Revelation. For a skilful chemist, though disappointed in his grand magisterium, yet often discovers, by the way, some useful and noble medicament; while the ignorant pretender to the art, not only loses his labour, but fills all about him with the poisonous steams of sublimate.

The professed design of Mr. Bayle's work is to enquire, which is least hurtful to mankind, ancient idolatry, or modern atheism: And had he confined himself to that subject, we had had no concern with him, but should have left him in the hands of Mess. Jacquelot and Bernard. I freely own they are both stark naught: All the difference is, that Atheism directly excludes and destroys the true sense of moral right and wrong; and Polytheism sets up a false species of it.

* Pensées diverses, ecrites à un docteur de Sorbonne à l'occasion de la comete qui parût au mois de Decembre, 1680. &-Continuation des Pensées diverses, &c. ou Reponse à plusieurs difficultez, &c.

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