Ebook: The System of Nature OR Laws of the Moral and Physical World [2 Volumes]

We have commenced the library with a translation of Baron d’Holbach’s System of Nature, because it is estimated as one of the most able expositions of theological absurdities which has ever been written. It is in reality a System of Nature. Man is here considered in all his relations both to his own species and those spiritual beings which are supposed to exist in the imaginary Utopia of religious devotees. This great work strikes at the root of all the errours and evil consequences of religious superstition and intolerance. It inculcates the purest morality; instructing us to be kind one to another, in order to live happily in each other’s society — to be tolerant and forbearing, because belief is involuntary, and mankind are so organized that all cannot think alike — to be indulgent and benevolent, because kindness begets kindness, and hence each individual becomes interested for the happiness of every other, and thus all contribute to human felicity.



Let those who declare the immorality of sceptical writings, read the System of Nature, and they will be undeceived. They will then learn that the calumniated sceptics are incited by no other motives than the most praiseworthy benevolence; that far from endeavouring to increase that misery which is incidental to human life, they only wish to heal the animosities caused by religious dissensions, and to show men that their true polar star is to be happy, and endeavour to render others so. But above all, let those read this work who seek to come at a “knowledge of the truth;” — let those read it whose minds are harassed by the fear of death, or troubled by the horrible tales of a sanguinary and vengeful God. Let them read this work, and their doubts will vanish if there is any potency in the spear of Ithuriel. If the most profound logic, the acutest discrimination, the keenest and most caustic sarcasm, can reflect credit on an author, then we may justly hail Baron d’Holbach as the greatest among philosophers, and an honour to infidels. He is the author of many celebrated works besides the System of Nature, among which we may number, Good Sense, The Natural History of Superstition, Letters to Eugenia, and other famous publications.