Paris, Debure l'aine, 12mo, p. 150. Same under title Reflexions
importantes sur la religion, etc., 1785.

12. 1788, Paulian, A. J., Le veritable systeme de la nature, etc.,
Avignon, Niel, 2 vols., 12mo.

13. 1803, Mangold, F. X. von, Unumstossliche Widerlegung des
Materialismus gegen den Verfasser des _Systems der Natur_.
Augsburg, 1803.


Of these and other refutations of materialism such as Saint-Martin's
_Des erreurs et de la verite_, Dupont de Nemours' _Philosophie de
l'univers_, Delisles de Sales' _Philosophie de la nature_, etc.,
which are not directed explicitly against the _Systeme de la Nature_,
the works of Voltaire and Frederick the Great are the most interesting
but by no means the most serious or convincing. Morley finds Voltaire
very weak and much beside the point, especially in his discussion of
order and disorder in nature which Holbach had denied. Voltaire's
argument is that there must be an intelligent motor or cause behind
nature (p. 7). This is God (p. 8). He admits at the outset that all
systems are mere dreams but he continues to insist with a dogmatism
equal to Holbach's on the validity of his dream. He repeatedly asserts
without foundation that Holbach's system is based on the false experiment
of Needham (pp. 5, 6), and even goes so far as to ridicule the
evolutionary hypothesis altogether (p. 6). He speaks of the necessity
of a belief in God, by a kind of natural logic. God and matter exist
in the nature of things, "Tout nous announce un Etre supreme, rien ne
nous dit ce qu'il est." God himself seems to be a kind of fatalistic
necessity. "C'est ce que vous appellerez Nature et c'est ce que j'appelle