The movement’s ostensible ambition was no less than to rebuild the Tower of Babel, restoring harmony to the world.

less than persecution—but hardly likely. Moreover, circumstances had changed: governments were stronger, while society was gentler. Manners had softened, and philosophy had disarmed superstition. The present was an age of reason, and reason was ‘the one slow but infallible route towards enlightenment’. In short, intolerance of the kind so cruelly d

Man was not naturally sociable, but had become so in time: the problem of sociability had been solved historically, as men became aware of the law of nature, before there was agreement on the institution of the state.

The most notorious such denunciation was that of the Abbé Barruel, who alleged in 1797 that the Revolution was the direct outcome of an anti-Christian philosophe conspiracy.

The Treatise was deliberately unsystematic, its tone mocking. Since the Reformation, Voltaire remarked, it was religious fanatics who had been the greatest disturbers of the peace of society in France. Persecuted by the Catholics, the Huguenots had resisted with violence. It was possible that tolerance would provoke them no

As societies became more civilized, their members learned to treat each other with greater respect, informed by an understanding of the behaviour of the ancient Greeks and Romans, and indeed of Christ’s own teaching.

Mandeville underlined the economic benefits of luxury consumption: it created employment, encouraged commerce, and promoted diversity. It was a system in which hypocrisy was indeed inevitable; but the benefits, in terms of wealth distribution and individual self-esteem,

political economy as the prospect of human betterment,

What it did hold, nevertheless, was a real prospect of material human betterment.