infinite--which supposition is very just. This infinite succession
of combinations of atoms is, as I showed before, a more absurd
chimera than all the absurdities some men would explain by that
false principle. No number, either successive or continual, can be
infinite; from whence it follows that the number of atoms cannot be
infinite, that the succession of their various motions and
combinations cannot be infinite, that the world cannot be eternal,
and that we must find out a precise and fixed beginning of these
successive combinations. We must recur to a first individual in the
generations of every species. We must likewise find out the
original and primitive form of every particle of matter that makes a
part of the universe. And as the successive changes of that matter
must be limited in number, we must not admit in those different
combinations but such as chance commonly produces; unless we
acknowledge a Superior Being, who with the perfection of art made
the wonderful works which chance could never have made.


SECT. LXXVII. The Epicureans take whatever they please for
granted, without any Proof.


The Epicurean philosophers are so weak in their system that it is
not in their power to form it, or bring it to bear, unless one
admits without proofs their most fabulous postulata and positions.
In the first place they suppose eternal atoms, which is begging the
question; for how can they make out that atoms have ever existed and
exist by themselves? To exist by one's self is the supreme
perfection. Now, what authority have they to suppose, without
proofs, that atoms have in themselves a perfect, eternal, and