It was the weakness and unsightly decrepitude of the ecclesiastics which opened the way for the thinkers.
This victory, however, was not yet.

Diderot had still a dismal wilderness to traverse.

He was not without secret friends even in the camp of his enemies.
After his reply to Pere Berthier's attack on the Prospectus, he received an anonymous letter to the effect that if he wished to avenge himself on the Jesuits, there were both important documents and money at his command.

Diderot replied that he was in no want of money, and that he had no time to spare for Jesuit documents.[132] He trusted to reason.
Neither reason nor eloquence availed against the credit at court of the ecclesiastical cabal.

The sale of the second volume of the Encyclopaedia was stopped by orders which Malesherbes was reluctantly compelled to issue.