Without doubt the more to perplex matters, theologians have chosen to
say nothing about what their God is; they tell us what He is not. By
negations and abstractions they imagine themselves composing a real and
perfect being, while there can result from it but a being of human
reason. A spirit has no body; an infinite being is a being which is not
finite; a perfect being is a being which is not imperfect. Can any one
form any real notions of such a multitude of deficiencies or absence of
ideas? That which excludes all idea, can it be anything but nothingness?
To pretend that the divine attributes are beyond the understanding of
the human mind is to render God unfit for men. If we are assured that
God is infinite, we admit that there can be nothing in common between
Him and His creatures. To say that God is infinite, is to destroy Him
for men, or at least render Him useless to them.

God, we are told, created men intelligent, but He did not create them
omniscient: that is to say, capable of knowing all things. We conclude
that He was not able to endow him with intelligence sufficient to
understand the divine essence. In this case it is demonstrated that God
has neither the power nor the wish to be known by men. By what right
could this God become angry with beings whose own essence makes it
impossible to have any idea of the divine essence? God would evidently
be the most unjust and the most unaccountable of tyrants if He should
punish an atheist for not knowing that which his nature made it
impossible for him to know.




XXX.--IT IS NEITHER LESS NOR MORE CRIMINAL TO BELIEVE IN GOD THAN NOT TO