MEMOIR OP BUFPOK. 33 



tvnat appeared wanting or defective in his great works 

 openly, indeed, was the freedom of his religious opi- 

 nions expressed/ that the indignation of the Sorbonne 

 was provoked. He had to enter into an explanation 

 which he in some way rendered satisfactory; and while 

 he afterwards attended to the outward ordinances of 

 religion, he considered them as a system of faith for 

 the multitude, and regarded those most impolitic who 

 openly opposed them. 



Painful as a detail of such opinions must be, 

 it is the duty of every biographer to mention them ; 

 and our readers may compare the splendid talents 

 and humble piety of the subject of our first memoir, 

 with the highly cultivated mind, the bright abilities 

 of the present, but where they were coupled with the 

 disavowment of the Being from whom all these pre-. 

 cious gifts were derived. 



The works by which Buffon is now best known, 

 are those upon Natural History. The first of these, 

 " Natural History, General and Particular," was com- 

 pleted in 1767, and amounted to fifteen volumes 

 quarto, thirty-one octavo ; in the anatomical depart- 

 ment he was assisted by M. D'Aubenton, and a sup- 

 plementary volume afterwards appeared. This con- 

 tained only the Natural History of Quadrupeds. On 

 account of his illness, the first volumes of the History 

 of Birds did not appear till 1771 ; in which he was 

 assisted by M. Gueneau de Montbeillard, and in the 

 three last he received help from the Abbe Beron. 



