If a historian were to relate truthfully all the crimes, weaknesses, and disorders of mankind, his readers would take his work for satire rather than for history.

About Pierre Bayle

Pierre Bayle (; French: [pjɛʁ bɛl]; 18 November 1647 – 28 December 1706) was a French philosopher, author, and lexicographer. He is best known for his Historical and Critical Dictionary, whose publication began in 1697. Many of the more controversial ideas in the book were hidden away in the voluminous...