242 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



himself to the system of Descartes. He is 

 said to have been strictly just and warmly 

 benevolent, attending regularly and faith- 

 fully to his clerical duties, and at the end 

 of each year giving what remained of his 

 salary to the poor of his parish. 



The following incident is recorded as 

 illustrative of his character ; " The lord of 

 his village, M. de Touilly, having ill-treated 

 some peasants, he refused to pray for him 

 in his service. M. de Mailly, Archbishop 

 of Eheims, before whom the case was 

 brought, condemned him. But, the Sunday 

 which followed this decision, the Abbot 

 Meslier stood in his pulpit and complained 

 of the sentence of the cardinal. ' This is,' 

 said he, ' the general fate of the poor coun- 

 try priest ; the archbishops, who are great 

 lords, scorn them, and do not listen to them. 

 Therefore, let us pray for the lord of this 

 place. We will pray for Antoine de Touilly, 

 that he may be converted, and granted the 

 grace that he may not wrong the poor and 

 despoil the orphans.' His lordship, who 

 was present at this mortifying supplication, 

 brought more complaints before the same 

 archbishop, who ordered the curate Meslier 

 to come to Douchey, where he ill-treated 

 him with abusive language." 



So there was nothing remai'kable or un- 

 usual about the outward career of this coun- 

 try preacher that was not suitable to be 

 immediately buried in oblivion. But he had 

 been long and quietly at work in a way that 

 was calculated to give interest and notoriety 

 to his name after he had finally left the scene 

 of his labors, where he died in the odor of 

 sanctity. Meslier, it must be said, to the 

 great scandal of his name, did not believe in 

 the theology that he preached. But he lived 

 in times in which men were not very pow- 

 erfully solicited to express their indepen- 

 dent opinions, and, as Meslier said he did 

 not want to be burned alive on account of 

 what he thought, he prudently followed the 

 example of Copernicus and postponed pub- 

 lishing his real views till after he was out 

 of the way. When Meslier was gone, there 

 was found in his house a manuscript volume 

 entitled " Common-Sense," written in his 

 hand, and addressed as " My Testament ". to 

 his parishioners. The book was printed, and 

 went through various editions in the eigh- 

 teenth century, and it is this which is now 



revised and translated by Miss Knoop. Of 

 its quality the reader can judge from a re- 

 mark of Voltaire in a letter to D'Alembert, 

 which is as follows : " They have printed 

 in Holland the Testament of Jean Mesher ; 

 I trembled with horror in reading it. The 

 testimony of a priest who, in dying, asks 

 God's pardon for having taught Christian- 

 ity, must be a great weight in the balance 

 of liberals. I will send you a volume of 

 this testament of the anti-Christ, because 

 you desire to refute it." 



We have not read this book, and are, 

 therefore, unable to form a critical judg- 

 ment of it ; but Mr. James Parton writes 

 to its translator concerning it as follows : 

 " The work of the honest pastor, Jean 

 Meslier, is the most curious and the most 

 powerful thing of the kind which the last 

 century produced. Thomas Paine's 'Age 

 of Reason ' is mere milk-and-water to it, 

 and Voltaire's ' Philosophical Dictionary ' 

 is a basket of champagne compared with a 

 cask of fourth-proof brandy. Paine and 

 Voltaire had reserves, but Jean Meslier had 

 none. He keeps nothing back ; and yet, 

 after all, the wonder is not that there should 

 have been one priest who left that testi- 

 mony at his death, but that all priests do 

 not. True, there is a great deal more to be 

 said about religion, which I believe to be an 

 eternal necessity of human nature, but no 

 man has uttered the negative side of the 

 matter with so much candor and complete- 

 ness as Jean Meslier. You have done a 

 virtuous and humane act in translating his 

 book so well." 



The American Antiquarian : A Quarterly 

 Journal devoted to early American His- 

 tory, Ethnology, and Archseology. Ed- 

 ited by Rev. Stephen D. Peet, Fnion- 

 ville, Ohio. Cleveland, Ohio : Published 

 by Brooks, Schinkel & Co. Price, §2 a 

 year, or 50 cents a number. 



The rapid growth of the biological sci- 

 ences, initiated by the publication of the 

 " Origin of Species " nearly twenty years 

 ago, has brought into especial prominence 

 the great questions of the origin, antiquity, 

 and development of man; and from sub- 

 jects of theological speculation has trans- 

 formed them into well-recognized problems 

 of physical science. All the various lines 



