Beginning in 1689, Jean Meslier worked for around forty years as the priest of the small town of Etripigny, France. When he died, his parishioners were astonished to find his last testament to them: a refutation of every religious doctrine he had advocated in life. This is the testament, with preface by Voltaire, who exhorted his own daughter to read it again and again. The Godless Heritage Series is a project dedicated to bringing hard-to-find works of atheist and secularist history back into print in an accessible way. Our goal is to bring back works that allow us to rediscover the lives of atheists, agnostics, and secularists from across cultures and through the ages.

In this groundbreaking work, the author traces both the understanding and practice of atheism in the ancient pagan world. Drachmann brings to life these ancient atheists, and their sometimes problematic interactions with theist society.