and create beings, similar to himself; but the God of modern theology
is sterile. He can neither occupy any place in space, nor move matter,
nor form a visible world, nor create men or gods. The metaphysical God
is fit only to produce confusion, reveries, follies, and disputes.


24. Since a God was indispensably requisite to men, why did they
not worship the Sun, that visible God, adored by so many nations?
What being had greater claim to the homage of men, than the day-star,
who enlightens, warms, and vivifies all beings; whose presence enlivens
and regenerates nature, whose absence seems to cast her into gloom
and languor? If any being announced to mankind, power, activity,
beneficence, and duration, it was certainly the Sun, whom they ought
to have regarded as the parent of nature, as the divinity. At least,
they could not, without folly, dispute his existence, or refuse to
acknowledge his influence.


25. The theologian exclaims to us, that God wants neither hands nor
arms to act; that _he acts by his will_. But pray, who or what is that
God, who has a will, and what can be the subject of his divine will?

Are the stories of witches, ghosts, wizards, hobgoblins, etc., more
absurd and difficult to believe than the magical or impossible action
of mind upon matter? When we admit such a God, fables and reveries
may claim belief. Theologians treat men as children, whose simplicity
makes them believe all the stories they hear.


26. To shake the existence of God, we need only to ask a theologian