Peter Adamson
speaker
1,322 appearances
7 recordings
1 series
first heard Jun 2026
last heard today
Peter Adamson’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 7 in all, peaking in Sep 2026 with 2.
Appearances
On the other side of the ledger, he's downright dismissive of arguments in favor of God's existence.
His scorn is directed especially at the quiet thinker Fenelon, and a work he wrote attempting to demonstrate God.
Messlet wrote critical comments in his copy of Fenelon's treatise and takes aim at him here in the Testament as well.
Against Fenelon's claim that the perfect design of the world shows that it has a perfectly wise creator, Meslier says that if perfect things need creators, then presumably this perfect creator would need a creator too, leading to an infinite regress.
Instead, given that the physical universe clearly exists, why not stop with it, rather than positing imaginary invisible causes to explain what needs no explanation?
This is all heady stuff, which is probably raising two questions in your mind.
First, why have you never heard of this guy?
And second, why wasn't he at least arrested, if not put to death?
Both questions have the same answer.
Meslier was a bold and fearless thinker, but not so bold and fearless to publish these extravagantly heretical ideas in his own lifetime.
Instead, near the end of his life he wrote out three copies of his testament and left them for posterity.
He professed to be unconcerned with his postmortem reputation, ending the work with the bleak sentiment, I am hardly more than nothing, and soon I will be nothing.
Thus his message was delivered only posthumously.
But he clearly did want it to be received.
The Testament often makes appeals to potential readers, calling upon them to abandon superstition and also rise up against the tyrannical political rule that he saw as inextricably linked to religion.
The very idea of God was first invented by human rulers who claimed divinity for themselves, the better to oppress others, and the passage of centuries had only confirmed the link between despotism and devotion.
Religion, Methelier writes, supports the political government as malicious as it may be, and in turn, the political government supports religion, as vain and false as it may be.
Nesselet goes on to endorse communism, envisioning a society where all possessions are held in common.
Predictably, he refers to Plato's Republic as a model.
So, on the list of accusations that would have been aimed at Meslier, you can add sedition to the blasphemy and heresy.
Showing 121–140 of 1,322 · page 7 of 67
← Previous
Next →