The Anatomy of Melancholy

But the equal of them all, the most extensive refuter of atheists, is Marin Mersenne in his commentaries on Genesis, together with Campanella’s Atheism Conquered. He sets out at length the causes of this brutish passion—seventeen, I believe—and answers all their arguments and sophisms, arranging them under twenty-six heads. At the same time, he proves his own assertion with thirty-five reasons: there is a God, a God of this kind, the true and only God. His concluding section explains how to resist and suppress atheism; for that purpose he adds four particular means or methods, which anyone interested may read with profit.