destruction? The God who peoples the air with birds, the earth with
animals, the waters with fishes--the God who animates all nature--is he
then a God of ruins and tombs? Demands he devastation for homage, and
conflagration for sacrifice? Requires he groans for hymns, murderers for
votaries, a ravaged and desolate earth for his temple? Behold then, holy
and believing people, what are your works! behold the fruits of your
piety! You have massacred the people, burned their cities, destroyed
cultivation, reduced the earth to a solitude; and you ask the reward
of your works! Miracles then must be performed! The people whom you
extirpated must be recalled to life, the walls rebuilt which you have
overthrown, the harvests reproduced which you have destroyed, the waters
regathered which you have dispersed; the laws, in fine, of heaven and
earth reversed; those laws, established by God himself, in demonstration
of his magnificence and wisdom; those eternal laws, anterior to all
codes, to all the prophets those immutable laws, which neither the
passions nor the ignorance of man can pervert. But that passion which
mistaketh, that ignorance which observeth neither causes nor effects,
hath said in its folly: "All things flow from chance; a blind fatality
poureth out good and evil upon the earth; success is not to the prudent,
nor felicity to the wise;" or, assuming the language of hypocrisy, she
hath said, "all things are from God; he taketh pleasure in deceiving
wisdom and confounding reason." And Ignorance, applauding herself in her
malice, hath said, "thus will I place myself on a par with that science
which confounds me--thus will I excel that prudence which fatigues and
torments me." And Avarice hath added: "I will oppress the weak, and
devour the fruits of his labors; and I will say, it is fate which hath
so ordained." But I! I swear by the laws of heaven and earth, and by the
law which is written in the heart of man, that the hypocrite shall be
deceived in his cunning--the oppressor in his rapacity! The sun shall
change his course, before folly shall prevail over wisdom and knowledge,