" Look neither for truth," she says, " nor consolation from men.
I am she who framed you, and who alone can teach you what
you are. But you are not now in the state in which I framed
you. I created maa holy, innocent, perfect ; I filled him with
light and intelligence ; I communicated to him my glory and my
wondrous acts. The eye of man beheld then the majesty of
God ; he was not then in the darkness which blinds him, nor
subject to death and the miseries which afflict him. But he
could not bear so great a glory without falling into pride. He
would make himself his own centre, and independent of my aid.
He withdrew himself from my rule ; and when he made himself
equal to me by the desire of finding his happiness in himself, I
gave him over to self. Then setting in revolt the creatures that
were subject to him, I made them his enemies ; so that man is
now become like the beasts, and removed from me until
there scarce remains to him a confused ray of his Creator, so
far has all his knowledge become e^^tinguished or disturbed.
His senses, never the servants, and often the masters of reason,
have carried him astray in pursuit of pleasure. All creatures
either torment or tempt him ; and have dominion over him,
either as they subdue him by their strength, or as they melt him
by their charms, a tyranny more terrible and more imperious.
** Such is the present state of man. There remains to him some
feeble instinct of the happiness of his primitive nature, and he is
plunged in the misery of his blindness and his lusts, which
have become his second nature.
