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Title: Meditations And Moral Sketches
Author: François Guizot
Translator: John Marquis Of Ormonde, K. P.
Release Date: November 16, 2019 [EBook #60705]
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MEDITATIONS AND MORAL SKETCHES ***
Produced by Don Kostuch
[Transcriber's note: This production is based on
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{1}
Meditations And Moral Sketches.
_By M. Guizot._
Translated From The French By
John, Marquis Of Ormonde, K. P.
"M. Guizot has recently collected his essays on religion,
philosophy, and education into a single volume, under the title
of 'Meditations and Moral Studies.' This work, which at present
is scarcely known in England, deserves particular
attention."--_Quarterly Review_, No. 187,
Dublin:
Hodges And Smith, 104, Grafton Street.
1855.
{2}
Dublin:
Printed By R. D. Webb,
Gt. Brunswick-St.
{3}
_Translator's Preface._
The three following Essays, although written some time back,
appear to bear so strongly on a question daily and hourly
discussed among ourselves, that I make but one apology for
presenting them in an English form, which is to the illustrious
author, whose sentiments (notwithstanding all the attention I
have given to the task) I cannot but fear I may yet have failed
in representing.
{4}
The Translation contained in the following pages originated in
the simple desire to facilitate the access to sentiments deemed
beneficial.
He who undertook this pleasing and benevolent task, has been
removed from this earthly scene. Let it be hoped that this solemn
truth may add interest to his labours for others, and that his
earnest wishes for their benefit may be in some measure realized.
{5}
Preface.
When I collected these moral sketches, which were written at
different times and under varying circumstances, I did not think
that I needed to add anything to them. A recent event, however,
has determined me, in now publishing them, to say a few words
more.
Having been called upon on the 30th of last April to take the
chair at a meeting of the Protestant Bible Society, I expressed
myself in these terms:--
What is after all, speaking religiously, the great question,
the most important question which at present occupies the
minds of men? It is the question in debate between those who
acknowledge and those who deny a supernatural, certain, and
sovereign order of things, although inscrutable to human
reason. The question in dispute, to call things by their right
names, between supernaturalism and naturalism. On the one
side, unbelievers, pantheists, pure rationalists, and sceptics
of all kinds. On the other, Christians.
"Amongst the first, the best still allow to the statue of the
Deity, if I may make use of such an expression, a place in the
world and in the human soul; but to the statue only,--an image,
a marble. God himself is no longer there. Christians alone
possess the living God.
{6}
"It is the living God whom we need! Our present and future
safety requires that faith in supernatural order, that respect
for and submission to supernatural order should again pervade
the world and the human soul,--the greatest minds as well as
the simplest, the most elevated classes as well as the most
humble. The truly efficacious and regenerating influence of
religious belief depends on this condition. Without it, all is
superficial, almost worthless.
"We may, at this day, with safety strive to re-animate and
propagate the Christian faith; for liberty--religious and civil
liberty--is abroad to prevent faith begetting tyranny and
oppression of the conscience--another sort of impiety. The
friends of liberty of conscience may fearlessly return to the
God of the Christian; there are no longer, nor will there ever
henceforth be, captives or slaves around his altars. Let, then,
Christian faith and piety return; they will bring back in their
train neither injustice nor violence. Doubtless, much care must
be taken and many contests sustained, in order that religious
liberty may be preserved unharmed in the midst of growing
religious fervour; but this beautiful harmony will be attained,
and will do honour to our time. Between Christians of different
communions there may exist henceforth but those struggles of
free faith and piety, which alone are permitted by the law of
God, and are alone worthy of His attention."
{7}
These words have been remarked upon, and either approved of or
objected to, in very different senses, by philosophers and by
Christians.
On the day after they had been uttered, Mr. Louis Veuillot said
in _l'Univers_,--"Monsieur Guizot made a speech which we
have read with a sentiment of respect and sympathy, mingled with
some grief. It would be impossible for us to do otherwise than
highly honour the man who makes, even _a-propos_ of a
movement which we do not approve and which is far from being
good, so noble a profession of Christian faith. It would be
impossible for us not to regret deeply that so great and generous
a spirit, one so well formed to comprehend unity, and so
naturally disposed to submit himself to it, not only does not
perceive that he is out of place amidst the separated members of
the mother church, but even takes the lead in a movement which
has been and still is opposed strongly to the doctrine of that
church. What is Christianity? It is authority. What is
Protestantism? It is free inquiry; and the Protestant Bible
Society is the practice of free inquiry driven to its last and
indefinite limit."
On the same day M. Charles Gourand said in _l'Ordre_--
"Monsieur Guizot's speech breathes at once the spirit of faith in
revelation and love of religious liberty. But he must conform his
practice to his precepts.
{8}
If it is thought that there exists no serious difference between
a rationalist, however thoroughly convinced and honest he may be,
whether called Plato, Descartes, or Leibnitz, and an atheist; if
it is thought that apart from the teaching of the church all
religious belief is superficial and nearly vain; then there is no
room for hesitation, it is within the pale of the true church, of
that great Catholic Church, which from St. Paul to De Maistre,
has bent under the same discipline so many haughty spirits and
great minds, that an asylum and pardon are to be sought. For if
it be allowable to insinuate that atheism is logical rationalism,
it is still more so to say that Protestantism is but inconsistent
rationalism. In fact, either private judgment has the sway in
matters of faith; and has it entirely, for who can flatter
himself that he can take a part in free enquiry and say to it,
'Thus far shalt thou go, and no further!' or else it is authority
which bears rule. But neither can she, any more than private
judgment, do so by halves; she must have all or nothing. A
compromise between the two systems is chimerical; _fusion_
is still more hopeless, if possible, in religious than in
political systems."
I shall not discuss the matter; I shall lay aside every personal
question, every controverted point, every argument. Controversy
opens the abyss which it pretends to fill, for it adds the
obstinacy of self-love to differences of opinion. To overcome
objections raised by honourable and sincere men gives me but
little pleasure. I have a higher desire. I aspire to unite myself
with them in the truth. Two ideas fill my mind, and predominate
on this subject. I wish to set them forth in pure and bright
light. If I succeed, if I can transfuse them into other minds,
they will do their own work, and render unnecessary the
controversy from which I abstain.
{9}
It would not be worth while to live if we gathered from a long
life, no other fruit than a little experience and prudence in the
affairs of this world, against the moment of leaving it. The
prospect of human affairs, and the inward trials of the soul,
afford brighter gleams, which spread themselves over the
mysteries of nature and the destiny of man, and of this universe
in the midst of which man is placed. I have received from
practical life, deeper insight into these formidable questions,
than meditation and science have ever given me.
The first and most important is this. The world and mankind do
not explain themselves naturally and simply by themselves, by the
sole virtue of the fixed laws which preside over them, or of the
passing determinations which display themselves. Neither nature
and her power, nor man and his acts, suffice to explain the
prospect which human intellect contemplates or catches a glimpse
of.
Then, as nature and man are insufficient to explain themselves,
it follows that they are equally so to govern themselves. The
government of the universe and of the human race differs from
that aggregate of natural laws and facts which human reason
observes there, as much as from the accidental laws and facts
which human liberty introduces.
That is to say, that beyond the natural and human order which
falls under our notice, is the supernatural and superhuman order
which God directs and developes beyond the reach of our
researches.
{10}
And when man ceases to believe this to be the case, ceases to
believe in this supernatural order, and to live under the
influence of this belief, then disorder intrudes among men and
societies of men, and there commits ravages which would
infallibly lead to their destruction, did not the wise goodness
of God restrain them in their faults, and render them incapable
of absolutely withdrawing themselves from the empire of truth,
much as they may misunderstand it.
That the religious question is now fairly raised between those
who, more or less explicitly and from a variety of motives, do
not admit this supernatural order of things, that is, the greater
number of philosophers whatever their denomination; and those who
really admit it, that is, all Christians; is what no serious mind
can deny.
Do I mean then to put on a level and confound all who disallow
supernatural order, whether unbelievers or sceptics, atheists or
rationalists?
God forbid I should imagine, far less express, anything so
absurdly and heinously wicked! I know the happy inconsistencies
of the mind of man, and the clouds which, to the eyes of the most
learned, cover the paths they are treading.
{11}
Surely, between the impious man who denies God, and the
rationalist who is satisfied that, without going further than
nature leads, and taking for granted I know not what
transformation, he has found and established a God,--the interval
is immense; immense, doubtless, in the eye of divine justice, as
well as of human equity. And such is our levity and intellectual
depravity, that in this vast space eminent minds and ingenuous
hearts may, and, alas! probably always will be met, at every step
between gross materialism and pure deism. The variety and forms
of error are infinite and infinitely varied; and man, when
falling into it, makes infinite efforts to retain some fragments
of truth; and God permits him to succeed or honestly persuade
himself he has done so, which will one day prove his excuse or
else be to him a plank of safety.
I admit all distinctions, all inequalities, all sincerity. I only
affirm two things; one, that all the philosophic schools of our
day, different as may be their systems and merits, have this in
common, that they deny this supernatural order, and strive to
explain and govern man and the world without its aid; the other,
that where faith in this order does not exist, the bases of moral
and social order are deeply and increasingly shaken, man having
ceased to live in presence of the only power which really
surpasses him, and which is able at once to satisfy and direct
him.
Natural order is the field open to man's knowledge. Supernatural
order is so in degree to his faith and hope; but knowledge does
not penetrate it. In the order of nature man exercises a share of
action and power; in supernatural order he has but to submit. It
has been said in the spirit of conciliation and peace, "Religion
and Philosophy are sisters who should mutually respect and
protect each other."
{12}
The words bear the stamp of the chimæras of human pride.
Philosophy springs from man; it is the work of his mind. Religion
comes from God; man receives it, and often alters it after
reception, but he does not create it. Religion and philosophy are
not sisters. They are daughters, the one of "Our Father which is
in Heaven," the other of mere human genius. And their condition
in this world is no more equal than their origin. Authority is
the apanage of religion; liberty is that of philosophy.
I now approach the second of the dominant ideas, more than ever
essential to true order, and which I wish to bring prominently
forward.
"Christianity," says M. Veuillot, "is authority." It is true;
Christianity is authority, but it is not authority only; it is
the entire man, all his nature and all his destiny. Now, moral
obedience is the nature and destiny of man; that is, obedience in
a state of liberty. God created man to obey His laws; he created
him free that he might morally obey. Liberty, like authority, is
of divine institution; the work of man is revolt and tyranny.
In the social state, authority and liberty need protection, and
both have a right to it. There is need of control, both for the
governors and the governed, for both are men. Hence political
laws and institutions which now sustain, now limit power; that
is, which decide on what conditions and by what means authority
is to be exercised and liberty secured.
{13}
What is the measure of authority necessary for Government, what
the extent of liberty possible in human society? What are the
means of action, what the pledges to be given alike to authority
and religion? Matters depending on circumstances, variable
according to the times, the social condition, the manners, races,
and different degrees of civilization amongst nations. It belongs
to the politician to solve these questions.
When Christianity appeared in the world, appeal was first made to
liberty, the moral liberty of man. This was necessary, as it came
to abolish ancient creeds which were protected by the established
powers. In this struggle, not only did growing Christianity never
attack or question the existing authorities, but it formally
acknowledged their rights, and while respecting them herself
ordered others to respect them also. But at the same time, as
regards the relations of men towards God, she appealed to the
free consciences of men, and affirmed in principle the same
liberty which she practised. "We must obey God rather than man,"
said St. Peter. "Try the spirits whether they be of God," said
St. John. "I speak as to wise men, judge ye what I say," said St.
Paul.
At the creation God prescribed obedience to men under penalty of
death; in the day of regeneration God set man's liberty in motion
to begin the work of salvation.
{14}
There is no partiality with God, no void in his designs; when he
acts upon man he takes human nature as a whole; our inclinations,
our wants, our interests, our various rights are all before his
eyes. He at the same time provides for and satisfies all;
authority as well as liberty, liberty as well as authority. It is
a dangerous mistake to misapprehend this complete and harmonious
character of the divine work, and to mutilate it by seeking
weapons in it for our human dissensions. Christ came to save
mankind, not to give a party triumph. Christianity began by
invoking liberty and giving her action. She then overcame, and
set forth her authority. She then accommodated herself to the
various forms and degrees of authority and liberty which the
course of events brought out here and there in the world.
Associated with the destinies and deeds of the human race,
Christianity has suffered for our mistakes and faults, and has
been often altered and compromised by the waywardness of human
liberty and authority. But by her origin and essence she is
beyond the reach of their struggles, inexhaustible in her virtue
to heal contradictory evils, and always ready to afford help on
the side where danger threatens or redress is needed.
In the actual state of society and disposition, it is authority,
and with authority order, which are in danger: Christianity owes
them all her support. I know of no greater falsehood or more
gross perversion than that of the men who in this day strive to
turn the Christian religion to the promotion of that brutal and
foolish anarchy which they denominate social democracy. The
gospel and history are equally repugnant to this absurd
profanation.
{15}
The cause of civil authority and of the Christian religion is
clearly common. Divine order and human order, the State and the
Church, have common dangers and common enemies. May God grant
them common wisdom; for while at the same time each separately
and both in concert must re-establish authority in her position
and rights, they must also solve another and newer problem, and
satisfy other and pressing wants.
I have nothing to say to those men who think that for many ages
society in Europe, and especially in France, governments as well
as the minds of men, have pursued a totally wrong road, and that
there is nothing in the prevailing character and tendency of our
actual civilisation but error, corruption and decay. I understand
that, thinking thus, they deem retrograde reaction necessary as
well as legitimate, and venture upon it accordingly. As regards
such, I can but express my profound conviction; that they will
have no success. Even were they right, they would have no
success. If they were right, modern society would be condemned to
perish; we should make progress in decay; but we should not
return to what is past. But they are not right. No one is more
convinced than I am of the immense mistakes and fatal errors of
our day. No one more fears and abhors the influence which the
revolutionary spirit exercises among us, and the danger with
which that threatens us; a human Satan, at once sceptical and
fanatical, anarchical and tyrannical, eager to deny and to
destroy, incapable alike of creating aught that can live or of
allowing aught to be created and exist under its eye.
{16}
I am one of those who think it absolutely necessary to overcome
this fatal spirit, and to replace in honor and power the spirit
of order and faith, which is the spirit of life and safety. But I
do not believe that this revolutionary spirit preponderates in
modern minds. I do not believe that our civilization has been for
ages mere mistake and corruption. I do not believe in the
irremediable evil, or inevitable decay of my time and of my
country.
The characteristic, the most important part of modern
civilisation is the prodigious increase of the ambition and power
of man. Recall what has taken place in past ages and that which
now goes on, the long series and vast mass of human toil and
success of all kinds in all places, the many secrets laid bare by
science, the many monuments raised by genius, the riches created
by industry, the progress of justice, the ease introduced into
the condition of the lowly as well as the great, the weak as well
as the strong; man marching as a master over the whole space of
the earth which he inhabits, and gauging with an accurate eye the
worlds which he cannot reach; the mind spreading her discoveries
and ideas through every recess of human society; matter in its
every form subjected and made subservient to man's use; this
expansive and ascendant ardour which circulates in the whole
social body; this activity universal, incessant, and unceasingly
fruitful, which puts every thing in motion, and works for the
general good. Never has man advanced so rapidly to the conquest
and dominion of the world; never in his capacity and with the
powers of man has he exercised such a rule over nature and
society.
{17}
I know how much there is here of evil and danger, of intoxication
and miscalculation; these, however, are not the symptoms of
decline, they are those of greatness and futurity. It is with
this great fact, this enormous increase of the power and ambition
of humanity, that Church and State, Christian and civil
government have to deal henceforth. When, with the help of God
and outward circumstances, they shall have brought man back to
respect those eternal laws which he has so foolishly
misconstrued; when they shall have again placed bounds to his
power, and subdued the vanity of his pride, man will still remain
powerful and haughty, conscious of his strength and full of
desire for the rights which have excited his ambition. Where
there is strength, by natural harmony and in a certain measure,
power and liberty follow. What hereafter will be that measure?
What share of influence will man, each individual man, exercise
on his own and the public destiny? That is the problem; it may be
solved, it cannot be eluded. The spirit of liberty has entered
society in the train of the labours and progress of humanity; it
may be kept in its proper sphere, it cannot be expelled.
{18}
Everywhere civil governments are aware of this, and act
accordingly. I see the deepest injustice prevailing towards the
governments of our day. It is false that they are indifferent to
the welfare and progress of nations. It is false that they only
look to stability and tyranny. They may doubtless feel personal
passions, old errors; but whatever their form, they are all, from
motives of prudence or duty, seriously impressed with the
necessity of respecting the rights and ameliorating the condition
of men. And those most opposed to liberal appearances make every
day, in their laws and practice, a multitude of changes
favourable to justice and liberty.
I say, too, that European governments, amidst the storms of the
last sixty years, have conducted themselves, taking all into
account, with great moderation. Their dignity incessantly
insulted, their existence attacked, they have not given way,
either during the struggle or after the victory, to those
excesses of passion or power with which the history of the world
has been so long filled. They may be shewn to have been neither
foreseeing nor able in their methods, whether of resistance or
concession to the new-born spirit; but it is unjust to set them
down as its intractable adversaries. In the formidable strife of
our day between governments and revolutions, history will surely
not impute to the former the most insolent contempt of justice
and liberty. And if the spirit of revolution were as moderate in
its pretensions and acts, as governments have shown themselves
disposed to be towards the spirit of progress, the great problem
of the conciliation of order and liberty, in civil society, would
be near its solution.
{19}
The government of religious society, or to speak with greater
accuracy and freedom, the Catholic Church, has an analogous
problem to solve; the more important because if the state of the
minds of men is closely watched, it is seen that it is in the
religious order that the idea of liberty is strongest and most
deeply rooted. The right of conscience before God appears and is,
in fact, very superior to that of conscience before men. If there
be, in the life of the soul, one portion in which the
intervention of force is more than elsewhere unrighteous and
odious, it is clearly when the relation of the soul with her
Creator and Judge is in question, and when the question for her
is of eternity and salvation. Here, moreover, is a feeling which
we have all experienced, a principle to which we have all paid
homage. Christians or philosophers, Catholics or Protestants, we
have all had and still have, even amidst the most civilized
nations, need to invoke in our turn religious liberty, as that
which, of all the cries for liberty, most surely arouses in the
heart the idea of a sacred right and necessity, that which
excites the most lively susceptibility and most general sympathy.
I feel a profound respect for the Catholic Church. She has been
during centuries the Christian Church of all Europe. She is the
great Christian Church of France. I look upon her dignity, her
liberty, her moral authority, as essential to the fate of entire
Christianity; and did I believe that the Catholic church could
not, without self-abjuration, accept in the State the principle
of religious liberty, I should be silent; for above all things I
detest hypocrisy and subtlety. _But it is not so_.
{20}
Let the Catholic Church maintain fully her fundamental
principles, her permanent inspiration, her doctrinal
infallibility, her unity. Let her by her laws and internal
discipline interdict to her faithful followers all that may tend
to the injury of these; it is her right as well as her faith. But
let her at the same time fully admit, not of the separation of
the Church and State, that clumsy expedient which lowers and
weakens both under the pretext of freeing both, but of the
separation of spiritual and temporal order, of the civil and
religious state, and acknowledge the illegality of all forcible
interference in spiritual order, albeit in the cause of truth.
Let her thus accept religious liberty as a law, not of religious
society, but of policy, as a right not of the Christian, but of
the citizen. At once will the pretended incompatibility between
modern society and the Catholic Church disappear. The problem of
peace between civil and religious society will be solved.
The Catholic Church can pursue this course; for all that
religiously constitutes it, all her spiritual order thus remains
intact and independent: and if she so pursues it; if, while she
firmly upholds her principles and rights as a religious society,
she accepts loyally the principles of our political order and the
religious liberty which forms a part of it; not only will she lay
the foundation of peace between herself and civil society, but
she will assure to herself great strength and a great future.
{21}
Christianity has many conquests to make and to repeat. For the
re-establishment of social order and the moral welfare of the
soul, she must regain much ground. Nor is it known how rapidly
obstacles and resistance would disappear before her, if the dread
of her old intolerance were dispelled, and respect for religious
liberty on the part of the Catholic Church herself considered as
assured.
I would go still further, and submit to Christians another
consideration.
There is amongst Christians of whatever church a common faith.
They believe in a divine revelation contained in the gospels, and
in Jesus Christ who came upon earth to save the world.
For Christians of whatever church there is now a common cause.
They have to maintain Christian faith and law against impiety and
anarchy.
This faith and this necessity, common to all Christians, are of
infinitely greater moment than all the differences which separate
them.
Do I say that they ought at all hazards to set aside those
differences, and in the name of their common faith and common
danger undergo fusion,--to use an expression of the day,--and
form hereafter but one and the same church?
{22}
I do not dream of it. The re-establishment of unity in the bosom
of Christianity by the re-union of all Christian churches, has
been the desire and the endeavour of the greatest minds, both
Catholic and Protestant. Bossuet and Leibnitz have attempted it.
Even now the idea is present to many noble spirits, and pious
bishops have so expressed it to me, with a confidence by which I
feel profoundly honoured. I respect the sympathetic wish, but I
do not believe that it can be realised. Between temporal order
and human interests, fusion, difficult as it may be, is always
possible; for interests may be made to agree through the force
and in the name of necessity. In spiritual order and between
religious beliefs, no such agreement is possible, for necessity
can never become truth. Faith does not admit of fusion; she
insists on unity.
But where the unity of the church does not exist, when the fusion
of different churches is impossible, and when religious liberty
is established, there is room for practical good sense and
Christian charity. Good sense tells Christians that they are all
in front of the same enemy, much more dangerous to them than they
can be to each other; for should he triumph, the blow will fall
on each. Amongst the upper classes, the war against religion
manifests itself only under the forms of reserved scepticism or
rationalism; timid, often serious and polite, rather seeking to
screen than display itself. But at the bottom of society, and
amidst the masses, it is passionate impiety which is at work, and
for the sake of victory becomes subservient to the most gross and
furious interests. The Christian faith, in its essential and
vital character, that is, faith and submission to supernatural
Christian order, is alone capable of sustaining the contest.
{23}
Let Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant, be convinced of
it, the loss of credit and authority on either side would redound
to the advantage not of Protestantism or Catholicism, but of
impiety. It is then for all Christians, whatever their
differences in their Christian sphere, an obvious interest and
imperative duty to accept and maintain each other as natural
allies against anti-christian impiety. It will require all their
strength, all their united efforts, to triumph finally in this
warfare, and save at once Christianity and society.
What interest dictates to Christians, Christian charity commands.
I use without hesitation plain words to express the ideas and
sentiments which I feel, and even amidst the coldness of heart
which is one of the most melancholy evils of my day, I feel no
embarrassment in speaking to Christians of Christian charity.
When religious struggles are the ruling passion and great
practical business of an epoch,--when different creeds are
arrayed, wielding temporal as well as spiritual arms, with the
mutual hope of subjecting if not of extirpating,--I feel that
Christian charity is difficult to exercise. The temptations are
too strong, the interests too pressing to be surmounted. The
Chancellor De L'Hopital and the President De Thou, though
recommending peace to Catholics and Protestants, would hardly
have dreamt, on the eve or the morrow of a massacre or a battle,
of speaking to them of charity.
{24}
But when material strife has ceased, when religious liberty is
established in manners as well as in the laws, when in fact and
truth the different religious creeds are obliged to live
peaceably one with another, why should not the desire arise of
adorning and furthering peace by the exercise of charity? When
the coarser passions are powerless, why should not the more mild
and equitable feelings develope themselves? I know the force of
traditions, of recollections, as well as the permanent
differences which tend to support controversy, even when purely
speculative. Nevertheless, prolonged peace and freedom have much
influence in calming the soul. At this day we have before us a
signal instance, and I do not hesitate to repeat that to which I
gave utterance in the Bible Society:--"See what is passing in
England; there, doubtless, the irritation of the Protestants is
great, there is a general and passionate movement in favour of a
popular and powerful faith. The government itself associates with
and follows this movement. English Protestantism shows itself
strongly inclined to seek security and satisfaction at the
expense of the religious liberty of the Catholics. Well! although
matters wear this appearance, nothing is really done; they dare
not; they cannot; and in the bottom of their hearts they desire
not to do so. Amidst this Protestant excitement, the religious
liberty of English Catholics still remains and extends. They have
liberty of worship; their churches are open, nay, increasing in
number; their priests perform their duties without interruption:
they possess the liberty of the press; they publicly defend their
creed and their conduct, and have freedom of speech and power of
voting in parliament, where they strenuously uphold their cause."
{25}
A noble sight, which, after having justly filled the friends of
religious liberty with uneasiness, ought now to give them every
satisfaction. The spirit of persecution had reappeared, that of
justice and liberty met it face to face, and in spite of
appearances remained master of the field. May Christians,
Catholic and Protestant, at last acknowledge it; it will be
hereafter more natural than they imagine, to live in the exercise
of Christian charity, for they have lost the habit, almost the
power of efficacious oppression.
A few words more, and I have done. Under a well grounded and well
understood system of religious freedom, not only can different
religious sects live peacefully and harmoniously together, but
can contribute, by their pacific co-existence, to their mutual
religious prosperity. What has been for Catholicism in France one
of the most glorious and pious periods? Surely, the seventeenth
century. French Catholicism then flourished in the presence of
Protestantism, which was still tolerated, and Jansenism, then in
full vigour. What has prevented the Anglican church from falling
into that apathy which has appeared more than once ready to
overcome her? What but the neighbourhood of opposing and half
free sects, who have always kept her in play, and forced her to
overcome her langour? There is no establishment, no power, that
is not benefited by a sense of control, and by the necessity of
making an effort to maintain its position.
{26}
It is good to overcome, not to exterminate an enemy; and in
spiritual as in temporal orders, the reign of liberty bestows on
all their just rewards. While it preserves their rights to the
weak, it incessantly regenerates the victorious.
Doubtless, Catholicism leans on the principle of authority; but
without detaching itself from this base, it can admit, and in the
course of its career has often admitted, very different degrees
of liberty. From the eleventh to the fourteenth century, while
the Catholic church was for civil society a great school of
authority, she was in her own bosom a great theatre of freedom.
For in her councils, her congregations, her correspondence with
the faithful, discussion between her chiefs was ever open and
animated. It is not for me to ask whether our times advise or
warrant a return to such methods of government; and I am rather
disposed to hesitate than undertake the task. But one great fact
strikes me; one which deserves, if I mistake not, the entire
attention of the Catholic clergy: it is that the disposition of
the mind and heart of the faithful who are under their charge is
not always the same, and neither the same measure nor the same
quality of religious nutriment is requisite at all times, if I
may so speak, for Christian souls. After the fall of the Roman
empire, when the mission of the Catholic clergy was to convert
the barbarians, and to cause a little moral light to penetrate
amongst the rude conquerors, and the miserable population who
lived under their yoke, it was above all by the firm and striking
exercise of religious authority that the priests were enabled to
attain their end.
{27}
They found amongst the Christian population, high and low, many
passions to repress, and but few intellectual wants to satisfy.
There was greater need to strike and to govern the imagination
than to nourish and direct mental activity. Time and individuals
are now different. Minds are now active, varied, curious, eager.
The spiritual life of faithful Christians, of the most faithful
as well as the most wavering, is infinitely more animated than it
was formerly. Souls so disposed require a moral rule
proportionably animated; one which, while it guides, may give to
their innate activity a greater share of satisfaction. I am
expressing a profound conviction,--one, I will venture to say,
free from any reservation or ill-will,--when I say that
henceforth the Catholic church, without any sacrifice of
authority, will be obliged, for the government of the soul, to
admit of more intellectual and spontaneous movement on the part
of the faithful than was required in other times. Yet I am
convinced that when once the Catholic church shall herself have
acknowledged this new moral state of Christian society, she will
also know how to provide for it.
{28}
In a recent publication, [Footnote 1] a justly eminent stranger,
M. Donoso Cortes, speaking of me in terms which I cannot allow
myself to repeat, said, "The great mistake into which M. Guizot
has fallen, in his 'History of European Civilization,' is the
having attempted the impossible task of explaining visible things
by visible things, natural things by natural things; which is as
superfluous as to explain a fact by itself, a thing by the thing
itself; because all visible and natural things, considered as
visible and natural, are one and the same thing."
[Footnote 1: Essai sur le Catholicisme, le Liberalisme, et le
Socialisme, par M. Donoso Cortes, Marquis de Valdegamas, p.
99-105.]
M. Donoso Cortes will be convinced, I hope, that such is not my
idea; and that, far from resting satisfied with visible and
natural things, I believe in supernatural order, and in its
necessity to explain and govern the world. Philosophers, I think,
will on their side acknowledge that if I reject their doctrine, I
do not abandon their right. I do not say this with the view of
seeking the frivolous honour of maintaining at the same time two
great causes, but to affirm a double truth to which I yield my
entire conviction and devotion, Christian faith and religious
freedom. The welfare of all nations demands these as its price.
Guizot.
Val Richer, September, 1851.
{29}
Essay I.
On The State Of Men's Souls.
{30}
{31}
On The State Of Men's Souls.
(_October_, 1838.)
The sublimity of the gospel consists in two sentiments, which
manifest themselves in it simultaneously,--hatred of evil, and
tenderness for man who does evil; horror of sin, to speak as the
gospel speaks, and love of the sinner.
How profound a depth of judgment as well as of moral justice! How
admirable a knowledge of things as well as of men! For evil is
truly hateful both in itself and in its effects; and men, the
best of men, are surcharged with evil. Yet, at the same time, man
is infinitely capable of good, infinitely worthy of affection;
and with all his imperfections, a being to be loved beyond
expression.
How great, too, the knowledge displayed of the true conditions of
moral authority! It is not acquaintance with the nature of man,
but power over him, that the Gospel seeks. Yet to influence men
morally, it is needful both to love and reform them; to win their
confidence by love and their respect by severity.
{32}
Severity and love are the two engines wherewith to control the
heart of man, for men know by instinct their moral wants--those
which press them down as well as those which please them. They
are deeply troubled by the sense of their imperfections; they
wish to be raised. Love felt and inspired is at once their
noblest and their most lively joy; they desire to love and be
beloved. Complete control over them, I mean moral control,
involves these two conditions,--that much be required from them
of virtue, much be bestowed on them of love.
The last century had thus much good; it loved mankind and men. It
bore a really deep affection to them, and wished them well. But
as it was a critical and reasoning age, the sentiment of love
often disguised itself in the dress and shape of controversy and
analysis. Nevertheless, the feeling was there, sincere and
powerful. That spirit of universal justice and humanity which
characterized the epoch, whence did it spring if not from a
lively sympathy with man, and a tender interest in his welfare?
But, together with this virtue, the last century certainly
exhibited one great defect; it did not feel for evil the aversion
it deserves. Not only as regarded certain rules of conduct and
certain duties, but as concerned a rule in general and the very
principle of duty, the spirits of the day were victims to doubt,
that great corrupter of the human heart. In the moral system,
stability and elevation go together; to waver is to descend;
uncertainty is the sign and the cause of abasement. Not knowing
where the evil existed, or even if it did exist, the eighteenth
century denied or excused it when met with, instead of execrating
and opposing it to the utmost.
{33}
And with the fixed points the long perspectives disappeared. By
an admirable law of his nature, in order that man may hope he
must believe, and believe in good. Virtue alone demands an
eternity. Doubting about duty, they doubted their own future.
Moral faith tottered; God veiled his countenance.
In such a state of mind, in an age which loved man and interested
itself about him, man must have been an object of pity. What a
destiny was that of a creature thus powerful yet faltering;
always in motion, yet not knowing where to fix his foot firmly in
this world, or where to fix his gaze beyond it! To aspire so
high, in order to fall low and pass away so quickly! Such
ambition without a worthy object! Such labour without any sure
results! What father, if he thought his child were reserved for
such a lot, but would feel overwhelmed by compassion and grief?
But no! at the same time that the last century loved men it
admired them; and I can understand this. God and duty being
abandoned, what remains of great and good if it be not man?
Imperfect as is human nature, a mixture of good and evil, good is
found there; the power of good makes itself felt. All that it
possesses of what is elevated, rich, tender, or attractive, does
not necessarily vanish because the mind misunderstands its source
and government.
{34}
And if it should happen, as it then did, that these great mental
errors should occur in the midst of a period of great
intellectual developement, of a great outflowing of sympathetic
and noble sentiments, of a great march in the condition of
mankind; if, at the moment when man rises highest and shines with
most brilliancy, he loses sight of his compass, his God, how can
he do otherwise than admire himself? how avoid a feeling of
pride? He has no longer faith or hope on high, yet he advances,
prospers, becomes rich, triumphs. He must believe; he must hope
in himself; he must worship himself. Does religion fall? Then
idolatry must arise, the idolatry of man for man. Man was the god
of the eighteenth century, the object of worship as well as of
love. Thence a great and deplorable leaning to human nature, to
its weaknesses and inclinations. It was loved, but with a blind
and weak love, which could only approve, caress, and promise,
having nothing to advise, nothing to require.
Thence an immoderate thirst, in the name of and for man, of
immediate worldly and palpable happiness. Loving man truly, and
having nothing to offer him in this world superior to this
world's happiness, nothing better or eternal beyond, it was
necessary that men should be happy, that all should be happy here
below; as here below their destiny and their treasure were
contained.
{35}
To accept the imperfect condition of humanity may be the part of
selfishness which cares for nothing, and of faith which hopes for
everything; but he who loves men, and yet can only dispose in
their favour the blessings of this life and this world, cannot
resign himself to a lot for the most part so rude, to progress so
slow and always so incomplete. He is compelled to find much more
to bestow on men, to distribute something, and at once, to all.
And as spirits imbued with so noble a longing do not dream of the
impossibility of satisfying it, they are compelled to assign to
the sufferings and hardships of the human state an accidental and
factitious cause, one which human wisdom and power can overcome.
Hence the other maxim of the last century, that, left to
themselves and their natural equilibrium, men and things go on
well; that evil proceeds not from our innate nature and state,
but merely from the ill regulated state of society, where the few
have substituted their will and interest for the wills and
interests of the many; that it is society and not men that need
reformation, as the latter would not need it had not society
corrupted him.
A maxim which has given rise, and naturally, to the sorest and
most plausible of modern grievances, that incurable impatience of
whatever is, that boundless disquiet, that insatiable thirst for
change in the pursuit of a social condition which shall give at
last to man, to every man, all the happiness to which he aspires.
{36}
This is the state in which the eighteenth century has placed
men's souls. And I here speak of upright, honest, and sincere
minds, not carried away by selfishness, not domineered over by
evil passions, which think of others, and only wish for
themselves as well as for those others what they consider
legitimate.
The great mistakes and ills of any epoch are those of the good.
These must be looked to and provided against, for there lies the
hidden danger. Who can struggle against ill if the good are
themselves infected with it?
I have seen the last of the master spirits of the eighteenth
century--those who had remained faithful to it. I have seen them
emerging from our revolution after their fearful experience of
it. The condition of their minds was a touching and instructive
spectacle. They were sorrowful, but not discouraged; full of
esteem and affection for mankind; full of confidence and hope
despite so many mistakes and reverses. The same fertility of wit,
the same generosity of heart, the same spirit of justice and
progress animated them. They accounted for their momentary
failure by the violence of passion, the force of old habits, the
want of public intelligence, the too hasty application of good
principles carried to too great a length. And while their
explanation bore witness to their sincerity and perseverance,
still there was visible and perceptible in them at every step a
persistance in the same mistakes; the same absence of moral dogma
and religious faith; the same idolatry of man, the same
tenderness towards him, the same pretensions for him. They had
lost nothing of their noble ambition or tender sympathy for human
nature, but they had learned nothing of its inward laws nor of
the true methods for its government.
{37}
Thus a secret feeling of disquiet was apparent through the
constancy of their ideas and of their hope; and they remained
melancholy after their explanation, as if hardly satisfied with
it themselves.
We are far in advance of our fathers. "I was carried here by a
cannon shot," said Danton to M. de Talleyrand, who saw him at the
Ministere de la Justice. The same shot has carried us all a
hundred leagues from our cradle. We have learnt much. We have
seen novel appearances under a new light. The intelligence and
power of man; his reason, his morality, his power of action, and
resistance to direction and restraint in the affairs of the
world; all has been put to the proof, gauged, and measured. We
know how deeply seated and closely hidden is the evil in our
nature, yet how readily and terribly it occasionally breaks out.
We know the bounds both of our spirit and of our will. We have
been powerful, immensely powerful; and yet we have been unable to
accomplish our will because it was in opposition to the laws of
eternal wisdom, and our power was shivered against them like
glass. At this price, we have acquired a more accurate and
profound knowledge of ourselves and our condition. We no longer
put ourselves off with desires or arguments, appearances or
hopes. We see that which is. We live more than our fathers did in
the truth. We are wiser and more modest.
{38}
But our wisdom has one grave defect. It is still, if I may so
speak, but an outward good, which influences our life and
conduct, but has not yet penetrated our soul and become for us a
moral property, a moral wealth. It redounds to the honour and
greatness of man that he is not content with what _is_,
merely because it is. The mere fact does not suffice; he wishes
to see more. For the fact he would discover an end, a reason. He
wishes to attach it to the laws of his own inward nature, his own
destiny; to feel it in relation to and harmony with his soul.
Then only in man's eyes does a fact assume a moral aspect and
acquire a moral power; then only does man accept it and obey it
with respect as truth, instead of yielding and submitting to it
with pain as a necessity. Moreover, we do not yet understand all
the lessons of experience which we have received and recognized.
They have not yet assumed in our moral being the rank which
belongs to them. They are for us unimpeachable facts rather than
great and good laws; and mistakes rather than progress. They
direct more than they have enlightened us, and if we conform our
actions and thoughts to them, it is because we are subdued rather
than convinced.
Were it not so, why this dejection, this secret disgust, this
indifference, this bluntness, this chill which now so often
accompany wisdom and sound sense? You say you are discouraged,
you do not hope, you do not dare any more to attempt aught that
is difficult and great. What then has happened?
{39}
What has this experience, at the same time so much vaunted and so
mournful, taught you? That duty, not interest or passion, is the
principle of morality; that God has not ceased to watch over the
world; that he resists the proud and punishes the guilty; that
order has her natural and inviolable laws, and avenges herself on
those who mistake them; that evil, always present, always at our
door, in us and about us, needs to be incessantly resisted. Of
what do you complain? These are advances, not mistakes; truths
reconquered, power recovered, not hopes thrown away. It is true,
man was carried away by an ambition beyond his strength and
right; it must be brought down, his reason and his will must
agree to restore what they attempted to usurp. Instead of setting
up and adoring himself as a monarch, man here must acknowledge
his primitive imperfection, his definite insufficiency, and yield
submission in thought and life on the bosom of liberty. But is it
nothing that this liberty is now more firmly established than man
has ever known it? Is the general progress of justice and
happiness in the world nothing? Is there not therein a fitting
reward for the toils and sufferings of our age? Is there not,
after so many mistakes, enough to satisfy the most exacting, to
refresh the most exhausted?
Let us look higher. In return for the sacrifices required from
our pride, in compensation for the demonstrated weakness of our
nature and the marked bounds of our power, has nothing been given
to us?
{40}
Do we not regain more than we lose? Do we not ascend more than we
have been forced to descend? The eighteenth century had inflated
us with pride, yet had in reality only lowered us. In making us
monarchs of this world, it had at the same time confined and
reduced us to it alone. No more immensity, no more eternity for
the soul; no longer a bond of kindred between God and man. We
came and passed over the earth like all that springs from and
returns to it. Our noblest ambition, our purest desires, our most
sublime flights, all that there is in us of noble and truly
divine, was no more than a delusion and a burden. Not only in
respect of our worldly goods and joys, but of ourselves and for
ever, we had to exclaim, "vanity of vanities, all is vanity." We
have escaped; we are leaving this confined and low condition; we
are rising; we are again about to attain our dignity, our hope,
our futurity, our soul. We can no more parade ourselves in our
pride, but we are no longer plunged into and abandoned in misery;
we find again a Master here below, and also "our Father which is
in heaven."
I know how much there is of the frivolous and superficial in the
return of our time to religious hopes and beliefs. I know how
much even serious minds are doubtful and agitated upon this
subject, the evils that are still at work, the problems that
await solution, and that perhaps a tardy one. Nevertheless, we
have got back to the right track. Man does not increase his
distance from God; he has turned towards the East; he seeks the
light.
{41}
Here we still yield rather to the force of facts than of ideas;
and experience is credited rather than conviction. Still we
believe in experience rather than in our own talent, and submit
to facts though we hardly render a free and enlightened homage to
the truths of which they witness.
It is not yet adoration, but it is the fear of God, that
beginning of wisdom.
Had we already reached the point of adoration--were the wisdom
for which we have so dearly paid really established amongst us,
in the affairs of this world and in those of eternity, in
questions political, moral, and religious, in short, in
everything; and were we fully satisfied as to the rational
lawfulness and practical utility of her counsels, if she
enlightened our understandings as she rules our conduct--we
should be far other than we are; more tranquil, more confiding,
more firm, more worthy, more exalted. We should distinguish
further; we should advance higher and faster in the paths of new
and amending progress, in which we now walk slowly and with
bended head, as if constrained and humbled.
But, I repeat, it is needful, for this salutary transformation of
our ideas to be accomplished, that our experience may become our
reason. We have more good sense than enlightenment; we act better
than we think. Inwardly and deeply we are imbued with prejudices
which fetter although they do not rule us; we are still doubtful
about the very truths by which we test our deeds; only doubt has
changed its form and language. With our fathers it was infatuated
and bold; with us it is detracting and useless.
{42}
Pride has turned it into contempt; and because we do not
experience for human nature the unbounded ambition and chimerical
hopes which formerly prevailed, we no longer love men tenderly,
nor think well of their nature, nor take an interest in their
destiny. We imagine that wisdom binds us to indifference and
immobility.
Many, too, of the ills of the eighteenth century, which sprung
from the maxims then prevalent, and which, to all appearance,
ought to have expired with them, still exist. We no longer have
the same tenderness for man, nor do we show greater aversion to
evil. Indifference has not made us more strict. For though human
nature is no longer judged with the same blind partiality, we are
still full of indulgence towards it, and cowardly in our
treatment of it; we exhibit towards it the same complaisance,
without feeling the former esteem and love. Materialist and
impious doctrines are on the decline, but we are more than ever
tormented by an eager thirst for immediate material happiness.
Is it true then, as is said, that we are in a state of moral
decay? Is our age destined to continue the evil of its precursor,
and while losing its virtues add to it its own evils?
I confidently answer in the negative. Nothing would tempt me to
flatter the age I live in, but I love it. I am struck by its
evil; I think a remedy urgently called for, an immediate struggle
necessary; I also see in it much good, a good deep and fruitful
and sufficient with the help of God to resist and conquer the
evil.
{43}
I said just now that the great mistakes, the serious maladies of
any period are those of the good. On the other side, it is in the
sound ideas and good dispositions of the same class that the
moral force of an epoch and its means of safety are to be found.
Now the general and ruling disposition of the good at the present
day is the spirit of order, the deep desire for order after so
much trouble and contest.
This is said to be merely the result of prudence, of a clear idea
of interest, not of morality.
In my opinion this is an inconsiderate sentence; one which shows
little knowledge of man and of what passes within him, of which
he is often himself unconscious. There is morality, true
morality, in the spirit of order, especially when largely
developed and hardly tried. The word _interest_ is
pronounced disdainfully, as if it implied pure selfishness, and
excluded virtue. Thanks be to God, who has created legitimate
interests. Interests inherent to legitimate situations and
relations are essentially moral and animated by moral impulsion.
The father of a family who protects his household, the labourer
who takes care of the fruit of his industry, act for their own
interest it is true, and according to the dictates of prudence.
But around and connected with this interest are grouped the most
praiseworthy feelings, domestic affections, respect of the law,
care for the future, defence of right, fulfilment of duty,
efforts, devotion, sacrifice.
{44}
Who will refuse to these the name of morality? Public instinct
answers this question. "There are but two parties," said a man of
simple mind, and a stranger to all sophism, "that of honest men
and that of rogues." When it was desired to define and rally
under one banner the party of order in France, it was inscribed
"The Charter and Property." [Footnote 2]
[Footnote 2: "La Charte et les gens de bien."]
In fact, at the present day the ideas of honesty, dignity,
morality, and virtue are closely allied with that of order.
Public morality is in the general mind the cause of order as well
as of individual security. It is because, after so many
convulsions as corrupt as painful, the taste for and love of
order are amongst us the first effect, the first symptom of
attachment to the maxims and practice of duty.
Besides, democratic societies, still so novel and mysterious, are
little known and ill understood. Their virtues want the éclat,--I
will go further, want the finish, the charm which belong to the
elevation of persons, the beauty of form, the influence of time,
the complete, varied and harmonious developement of great and
glorious human nature. Yet they want neither virtue itself nor
morality. There will be found in these crowded and unknown
masses, in their laborious and modest lives, much uprightness,
much simple justice, much active benevolence, much submission to
law, much resignation to their lot, a rare power of effort and
sacrifice, a noble and touching disposition to forgetfulness of
self, without pretension, without noise, without reward.
{45}
Even the jealousy of all superiority, the passion of envy--that
poison of democratic society,--does not always affect as much as
might be apprehended their moral judgment. This venom has
affected us deeply; nevertheless, excellence is met with joy and
welcomed with gratitude as a service done to society, which feels
the necessity of being elevated and purified. Respect is more
genuine, taste more correct while it remains a stranger to
systematic opinions, to mere flights of fancy, and to all
romantic emphasis. By a singular and very significant phenomenon,
the exaggeration and emphasis of the present period tend towards
evil and disorder. The declaimer plunges into the mire. Our times
wish good to be true, simple, sedate, and sensible. It is only
because it is good, a moral good, that it is esteemed and loved.
It is asked to appear but what it is.
Where such a disposition prevails; where good is thus honored for
itself, and for itself alone, there may still be much evil, and
very serious evil; but such can hardly be the lot of the future.
We are hardly yet advancing towards a future. As yet we have
struggled, and still strive to acquire from the heritage of the
last century a spoil that suits us; a heritage so loaded, so
mingled, that it has plunged us in confusion. We have co-existing
in us good and bad, true and false, in direct opposition.
{46}
We bear about in ourselves the most contradictory ideas and
sentiments. We are driven about and stagger under their varying
influence. Now we try to reject all absolutely, now to forget all
and live from day to day without thought or design. Vain efforts!
The problem harasses every soul, agitates or wearies it, leaves
it in doubt or inactivity. None can elude it. A solution is
necessary in moral as well as in political order, for individuals
as for the state. For this is not a purely political question,
which can be settled wholly and completely by charter, law, or
cabinet. It is a matter which comes home to each of us; one for
which each of us individually has to provide. We must keep, apart
from the impulse which the eighteenth century has given to the
world and the minds of men, that which agrees with the eternal
order which that era often mistook for the world and the human
mind. The new truths and laws which come to us from that date, as
well as the immutable truths and laws which it overlooked, must
live and reign together in our thoughts; we must know for a
certainty and unhesitatingly practice what they demand from us.
On this condition only shall we see the end of that mixture of
agitation and depression, this doubting both of well and ill
regulated minds, this barrenness of movement as of wisdom which
are the peculiar evils of our era. Government and people
reciprocally accuse each other of this evil, and charge on each
other the task of applying a remedy. "Let Power be dignified,
firm, active, fertile," says the one; "let it sustain and
animate, rule and aid society; society will assist, evils will be
remedied, good will be done; but it is for Power to take the
initiative and responsibility in all this."
{47}
"How can I do it?" replies Power. "How undertake the
responsibility? It is in society itself--in the mind itself--that
the evil exists. They are weak, tottering, inactive; full of
doubts and fears. Let people ascend in the social scale; let them
show self-control. I do not prevent them. No one can ask me to do
more; I can do no more."
The defence of both weakness of mind and heart is bad. The
regeneration of our time demands from all both duty and exertion.
From power, because it is set on high, it sees and is seen; it
shows the light and holds the standard. If it lowers them,
society falls into darkness and disorder. From society too, from
every individual, for we are all infected by the evil which we
call upon power to cure. Yet power of itself is not able to cure,
individually and collectively, the evils for which we ask a
remedy. Our active and intelligent co-operation is indispensible.
And it is precisely in this coalition of public power and
individual will that the value and honor of free governments
consist. Hence they are morally and politically powerful,
salutary for immortal souls as for temporal occasions.
This good must be the work of all. Power or society, rulers or
plain citizens, let us each look to our own share in the great
work, and perform our own part of the general duty. To him who
shall be able the best and speediest to fulfil his, will belong
the glory as well as the power inherent to success.
{48}
{49}
Essay II.
On Religion In Modern Societies.
{50}
{51}
On Religion In Modern Societies.
(_February_, 1838.)
It is the fashion of the day loudly to lament over the condition
of that great mass--the people. Their wants and sufferings are
paraded. We are told of their lives so burdened and monotonous,
so rude and precarious, so much fatigue, yet so little effect, so
much danger and ennui, work so heavy, repose so slight, a future
so uncertain.
This is true. The condition of the masses in this world is
neither easy, cheerful, nor certain. It is impossible to
contemplate without deep commiseration so many human creatures
carrying, from their cradle to their tomb, so grievous a burden,
and withal scarcely able to meet their wants, the wants of their
children, of their father, their mother; incessantly seeking some
necessary of life for those most dear, yet not always finding it;
having it perhaps to-day, uncertain of it tomorrow; and
continually preoccupied about their material existence, scarcely
able to give a thought to their moral being.
{52}
It is painful, most painful to witness, most painful to reflect
on. Yet is much reflection necessary. It were a grievous wrong
and a grievous danger to forget it. More or less thought has been
ever given to the subject. What said they who thought the most
thereon?
They advised those who were the fortunate of this world to
practise justice, goodness, charity; to apply themselves to
seeking out and relieving the unhappy. To the unfortunate they
recommended good conduct, moderate desires, submission to
authority, resignation, and hope. They explained the destiny of
man, showed all it possesses of sadness and sublimity, the
compensations which are found in the different states, the
pleasures which are common to all. They tried to cure, amongst
the ills of men, those which men can cure; and, with regard to
those which are incurable here below, they strove to raise men's
eyes to the remedies in God's hands. This was the language of
religion. These were the words and advice she addressed to high
and low, rich and poor, to children in her catechisms, to men in
her sermons, from the pulpit and from the sanctuary, by the sick
bed, to all, at all seasons, and by every means.
The means of publicity and popular movement at that time belonged
almost exclusively to religion. What the tribune, the press, the
post--these trumpets of modern civilization--now are, the
churches, the pulpit, religious instruction, pastoral
superintendence formerly were Religion then addressed the masses.
She never forgot the people. She was ever able to gain access
there.
{53}
And while she thus interested herself for them, and strove to
lighten or partly bear the burden of life, she also sympathised
with men of all classes and all conditions, and with the burdens
all bear, the blows which reach all, the wounds which all receive
as they tread their appointed path.
To-day, while occupying ourselves much and justly with the
material sufferings and fatigue which are shared by so many, we
forget too much the moral fatigues and sufferings of which all
partake; the trials, the agonies of the soul, the mistakes, the
ennui, the anguish, in short, the universal lot of man--which are
the more poignant as the mind has more freedom and life more
leisure.
High or low, rich or poor, the _elite_ or the multitude, let
us pity each other, let us pity every one. We are all, as we
advance in our career, "weary and heavy laden"; we all deserve
pity.
We deserve it now more than ever. Never, it is true, has the
condition of man been more equal or better. But the desires of
men have far outrun their progress. Never was ambition more
impatient and widespread. Never were so many hearts a prey to the
thirst for wealth and pleasure. Pleasures refined and grovelling,
a thirst of material well-being and of intellectual variety, a
spirit of activity and luxury, of adventure and idleness:
everything appears possible, desirable, and accessible to all. It
is not that passion is strong, or that man is disposed to take
much trouble for the gratification of his desires.
{54}
He wishes feebly, desires immoderately; and the great scope of
his desire throws him into a state of uneasiness, in which all
that he already possesses appears but as the drop of water
forgotten as soon as swallowed, and which irritates thirst
instead of quenching it. The world has never seen such a conflict
of imperfect desires, fancies, pretensions, exactions; never
heard such a clamour of voices demanding together as their right
all they have not and all that pleases them.
And these voices are not raised to God. Ambition, is at once
extended and debased. When the teachers of the people were
religious preceptors, they tried to detach the popular thought
from the things of earth, and by raising desires and hopes to
heaven, to restrain and calm them here. They knew that here, do
what they might, satisfaction was impossible. The popular
teachers of this day think otherwise and speak another language.
In the presence of the hard lot and burning ambition of man, at
the very time that they are displaying their misery and fomenting
their desires, they are telling them that this earth contains
what will satisfy them; and that if each be not as happy as he
would be, it is not in the nature of things nor of his own nature
that he should complain, but of the vices of society, and the
usurpations of a certain class of men. All are placed in this
world to be happy; all have the same right to happiness; the
world can afford happiness to all.
Words like these resound daily in the ears of all, knock at the
portals of every heart, penetrate by every crevice into the most
remote folds of society.
{55}
And then we are astonished at the deep agitation and uneasiness
under which nations and individuals, states and souls are
labouring! For myself, I wonder the uneasiness is not greater,
the agitation more violent, the explosion more sudden. Such ideas
and such words are enough to set humanity astray and rouse it to
revolt. And the preserving care of Providence, the innate and
spontaneous wisdom which men cannot absolutely shake off, must be
powerful to prevent such language--unceasingly repeated and
universally heard--from plunging the world again into chaos.
No, it is not true that this earth possesses that which will
suffice for the ambition and happiness of her inhabitants. It is
not true that the untoward results or vices of human institutions
are the sole or even the principal causes of the sad and painful
lot of so many among men. Let these institutions become daily
more just, more careful of the general welfare; it is the right
of mankind. It is to the honour of our age that it adopted this
thought and perseveres in trying to accomplish it. Former times
took too light a share in the sufferings of the multitude. Their
pretensions were too humble as regards justice and happiness for
all. Ours are more extended, more lofty; and we give, with good
reason, to our advance in this path the noble name of
civilization. God forbid that we should turn aside from the noble
work, or be discouraged about such a noble hope. But we must not
feed ourselves with pride and illusion, we must not promise to
ourselves that which we cannot expect to attain of ourselves and
by our ingenuity.
{56}
There is a defect in our nature and an evil in our condition
which eludes all human efforts. The disorder is within ourselves,
and were every other source dried up, would arise from ourselves
and our own will. An inequality of suffering is amongst the
providential laws of our destiny. It is at once superiority and
infirmity, greatness and misery. As free beings, we can create
and do in fact without ceasing create evil. As immortal beings,
neither the secrets of our lot nor the limits of our ambition are
on this earth, and the life we lead here is but a very short
scene of the unknown life which awaits us. Regulate institutions
as you will, distribute all enjoyment as you please, neither your
wisdom nor your wealth will fill the abyss. The liberty of man is
stronger than the institutions of society. The mind of man is
greater than worldly goods. There will always be found in him
more desires than social knowledge can regulate or satisfy, more
sufferings than it can either prevent or cure.
"Religion, religion!" is the cry of universal man everywhere, at
all times, except in some day of awful extremity or shameful
degradation. Religion, to restrain or crown man's ambition.
Religion, to sustain or support us in our griefs, whether
referring to body or soul. Let not policy the most strong, the
most just, flatter itself that it can effect this without
religion. The greater and more extensive the social movement, the
less able is it to direct tottering humanity. A higher power than
any on earth is needed, a longer prospect than that of this life.
God and eternity are necessary.
{57}
We require harmony also and agreement between religion and
policy. Called to act on the same individual, and as a final
attempt for the same result, how can they work together unless
possessing a common basis of thought, sentiments, and designs?
Whatever distance may intervene, there is an intimate connection
between the earthly and religious ideas of men, between their
desires for time and those for eternity. Did incoherence and
contradiction alone exist, were our affairs, opinions, and hopes
here completely estranged from those beyond this world, were
religion capable only of improving and sustaining our actual life
and society, their ideas, works, institutions and manners, far
from serving the cause of, and mutually assisting each other
would reciprocally fetter and weaken one another. The world would
jest at piety, piety would take offence at the world, and that
which should be upon earth the source of order and peace would
become a fresh spring of anarchy and war.
And let neither religion or policy be alarmed about its
independence and dignity. I do not wish that either should
purchase by cowardly concession or costly sacrifice the harmony
which ought to prevail between them. On the contrary, I wish they
should on all occasions act according to the pure truth of
things, and accomplish together their special and peculiar
mission.
{58}
Clever men have looked upon religion as a source of order, a sort
of social police, a useful and even indispensable matter, but
otherwise without intrinsic value or any real and definite
importance to the individual, unless to afford a chimerical
satisfaction to certain weaknesses of the human mind and heart.
Thence arises a superficial and hypocritical respect, which
barely covers a disdainful coldness ill-calculated to resist any
prolonged trial, which humiliates religion if she is content with
it, or otherwise irritates and misleads her.
Great and religious men have in their turn looked on the world
and the life of the world, either generally or at certain
periods, as an evil in itself, an essential obstacle to the
empire of divine laws, and to the accomplishment of our moral
destiny. Hence the follies of ascetics and sectarians; hence,
too, theocratic pretensions, pitiable mistakes of the spirit of
religion, which has thus entered into hostility with human
society, wishing now to flee from it, now to subdue it.
The errors on both sides are great and dangerous. Religious
creeds seek to solve the fundamental problems of our nature and
individual destiny. That is their first and chief design, greater
even in their eyes than the maintenance of order in society. For
this reason, and for this reason especially, respect is due to
them; they deal with that which is most inward, most powerful,
and most noble in man. And the policy which does not discern
these facts, or discerning does not respectfully bow before them,
shows itself futile, ignorant of the nature of man, incapable of
guiding him at moments of importance.
{59}
On the other hand, this earth is not a place of banishment where
man lives an exile. Society is not a scene of perdition, which a
man must go through with disgust and terror. The earth is man's
first country; God has placed him here. Society is the natural
condition of man; God has made it for him. This world and social
life do not bound our destiny; but it is in this world and by
this social life that our destiny is begun and developed. We owe
to society our assistance, given affectionately and respectfully,
whatever the form of its organisation and the difficulties of our
task. These forms and difficulties change with places and times,
but they possess only a secondary importance, and make no change
in the general condition or fundamental duty of man.
Religion, without being indifferent to what there is of true or
false, good or bad, in the casual and variable part of the social
world, attaches herself to what is essential and permanent,
training men to go straight towards heaven beneath every sky and
by every road.
It is the glory of Christianity to have been the first to place
religion on this height, and in this the only religious point of
view. And yet, neither reasons nor temptations were wanting at
its origin, to make it denounce temporal society, and either
separate from or declare war against it. Still it never dreamt of
such a course. At the moment when the Christian faith restored to
man his lost dignity and raised him to his forfeited position,
she made herself liable for him without a murmur to slavery,
despotism, iniquities, inequalities, incomparable miseries.
{60}
Not one revolutionary intention or idea, to use a modern phrase,
is to be traced near the cradle of Christianity. Christians in
the name of their faith heroically resist persecution and
tyranny, but they do not undertake to change the state of society
or of mankind. They share in it, they adapt themselves to it,
whatever its principles, forms, consequences. They do more. The
world is old and corrupt; they denounce and vigorously resist its
corruptions and vices: but they do not curse, they do not avoid
the world. They view it with indignation yet with affection, with
grief yet with hope. Rigid minds, ardent imaginations, take
fright at the sight of the world, and fly to the deserts of the
Thebais or retreat within the walls of a cloister. Brilliant
apparitions are those who impress the minds of nations, and renew
the well-nigh forgotten strife between austere and impure
passions; but these are only exceptions in the history of
Christianity, imposing and powerful indeed, but they do not
characterise the Christian religion, do not predominate in it, do
not constitute its essence and general tendency. Christianity has
made monks, yet never was a religion less monkish. Never was a
religion introduced into the world which entered more into it,
more easily accommodated itself to it, to all its phases and all
its facts. Opposed to this day in the very country which saw its
birth, Christianity spreads to the east and west, to the north
and south.
{61}
It penetrates the old monarchies of Asia and the deep forests of
Germany, the schools of Athens and of Rome, the wandering tribes
of the desert; and nowhere does it disturb itself about
traditions, institutions, governments; it allies itself and lives
in peace with the most diverse societies. It knows that
everywhere and amidst all the variety of social forms it can
pursue its own work, that truly religious work, the regeneration
and safety of the soul.
In later days, after a definite victory, amidst Roman ruins and
barbarian chaos, through necessity as well as love of power,
Christianity has sought and exercised a more direct and
commanding influence over civil society; an influence sometimes
salutary, sometimes opposed to the nature of things, and often
injurious to religion itself. Yet taking things as a whole, and
setting aside some remarkable deviations, the Christian Church
has with admirable wisdom been a stranger, in her intercourse
with the world, to all narrow and exclusive spirit; has never
attached to any peculiar social _regime_ her honor and
destiny. She has lived in kindly and intimate relation with the
most different governments, with social systems the most opposed,
monarchy, republic, aristocracy, democracy. Here on a level with
the state, there subordinate, elsewhere independent. Broad and
varied in her internal organization, as called for by her
external relations; always sedulous to maintain between social
and religious life, between the ideas and feelings by which men
hold to earth or ascend to heaven, that harmony by which heaven
and earth both profit.
{62}
In our days, owing to the course of events and reciprocal faults,
this harmony has been profoundly affected. Religion and society
have for some time ceased to comprehend and agree with each
other. The ideas, sentiments, and interests which now prevail in
temporal life are and have often been condemned and reproved in
the name of those which pertain to eternal life. Religion
sometimes pronounces her anathemas upon the new world, and keeps
herself aloof from it. The world seems ready to abide by both
anathema and separation.
The evil is immense; it is one which aggravates all our other
ills, which takes from social order and private life their
security and dignity, their repose and hope.
To cure this evil, to bring together the spirit of Christianity
and the spirit of the age, the old religion and new society, to
end their hostility, and to induce a mutual understanding and
acceptance, is the origin of a work too little known, that called
the "_Universite Catholique_" which its authors have
continued for three years with the most praiseworthy
perseverance.
Thanks be theirs; thanks to men so truly pious, so truly
catholic, who cast over new society, over constitutional France,
a glance so equitable and affectionate. This gleam of justice
towards our day, this hope loudly declared that it will accept
eternal truth and must not be cursed in her name, is a proof of
high intelligence on their part. God forbid that with frivolous
blindness we should soothe each other with flattery.
{63}
Our society has gone astray more than once on the most important
matters, and even while triumphant is smitten with a serious
disorder. And yet our time is a great time, which has done great
things and opened great destinies. This society, so stormy, so
confused, so tottering, sometimes so chimerical and arrogant,
sometimes so material and grovelling, has nevertheless done
homage and lent force to that which is most elevated and divine
within us, our intelligence and justice. Much truth is contained
in the motto of her banner; and wishing that this truth might be
efficacious; she has displayed, in order to make it penetrate
into deeds, an energy and ability which have astonished the world
and drawn it after her. Such boldness of conception, such power
of execution, such a development of mind, of passion, of
strength, so many results positive and visible obtained rapidly,
the general progress of happiness, wealth, and order, of
practical and plain justice in social relations and affairs,--is
there nought here but error? Are these the symptoms of decline?
Do we not rather recognise one of those formidable but beneficial
crises brought on by providence when desirous to renew the world?
Proclaim without reserve to society the evil it has done, the
evil it is undergoing; point out in all their extent and gravity
its errors, its faults, its omissions, its weaknesses, its
excesses, its crimes; but do not expect her to yield to injustice
or wrong. She knows what she is and what she may become. The good
she has devised, the good she has done to mankind, she would have
honoured and loved. On these terms only will she redress and
direct.
{64}
She is in the right. One must seek for, listen to, and trust
severe though stern friends. Confidence should never be placed in
an enemy.
I do not think that the authors of _l'Université Catholique_
render to society all the justice it deserves; but they have no
concealed ill-will to it, no design against it. They understand
and admit the essential principles upon which it is founded, and
they try seriously and sincerely to re-establish between these
principles and catholic doctrines, a harmony which shall not be
merely superficial and apparent. Their plan is simple. After
having traced a general outline of human sciences, together with
the ties which unite them either among themselves or to the
sublime unity to which they tend, they place therein special
courses for each different science of material as of intellectual
order, and try in those courses how to make religion penetrate
into science, how science into religion, keeping both in sight,
so that they may recognise, approach, and unite with each other
in their common progress; consequently their body is a dumb
university, where all science is taught by writings according to
and in a catholic spirit, as they would be _viva voce_ at a
real university, where all the professors would be Catholics,
truly devoted to their faith and their science.
{65}
I have no design of entering into the scientific merits of these
courses, or of disputing all their assertions and ideas. Some, as
the "Course of introduction to the study of Christian Truths," by
M. l'Abbe Gerbet; the "Course on Christian Art," by M. Rio; the
"Course on the General History of Hebrew Literature," by M. de
Cazelès; contain real instruction, elevated and ingenious views,
and sometimes rare talent in style, and much attraction for the
reader. In a literary review joined to these "Courses" one finds
occasional articles, amongst others those by M. le Comte de
Montalembert, full of curious research and noble sentiments;
written too with a moral earnestness which pleases and touches,
even when it goes beyond what is true. It would be easy to
collect from the entire work sufficiently numerous traces of
superficial science, somewhat vague philosophy, or declamatory
literature. I might here and there detect, and this is more
important, some traces of old habits, and of that old spirit of
hostility from which the authors of the collection have in
general tried to keep themselves clear. Possibly, had I the honor
of seeing them, I might venture in the freedom of conversation to
urge them to weigh carefully in this respect their sentiments and
language, to preserve constantly between their ideas and
expressions, agreement with the general intentions which animate
them and at which they aim. Let them be in this sense strict
censors of their own work. As for me, I cannot be one; I cannot
seek underhand means as regards the execution of a great and just
idea to which I wish success. I admit of incompleteness and
imperfection, even incoherency in a human work, provided it be in
itself good, and that good predominates in its effects as well as
intentions. The pleasure of criticism is mean; and for my own
part I feel none in pointing out faults which I should like to
efface.
{66}
I prefer congratulating the authors of _l'Université
Catholique_ on the firmness and fidelity with which they have
remained faithful to their name and standard. In their excellent
design, and on account of the conciliatory spirit which pervaded
it, they encountered a shoal under their prow. They ran the
danger of being induced to become effeminate and enervated, to
pervert their own doctrines, the Catholic doctrines and spirit,
in order to render their accommodation more in accordance with
the ideas and spirit of the age. More than once analogous
attempts, conceived in the best intentions, have split on this
rock. It is thus that we have heard applied to natural religion
and the general spirit of religion; these maxims that the dogma
is of little consequence, the moral only being of importance,
that various creeds must be brought back to those portions which
they hold in common, and formulas and prayers be drawn up which
may suit all alike: thence the desire to transform the great
principles and facts of Christianity into symbols left to the
interpretations of philosophy; those strange efforts also to
unite the revolutionary with the religious spirit; or, lastly,
those attempts to deny, or at least consign to oblivion the past
of the Catholic church, her traditions, her customs, which ages
and events have united with her, and substitute, under the name
of Primitive, a newly invented Catholicism.
{67}
False conceptions, vain endeavours, from which pious feeling and
a certain knowledge of our social state have not always been
free, but which denote little knowledge of human nature or
religion, and a superficial appreciation of the means by which
great institutions, whether religious or civil, are founded and
endure. No doubt but that Catholicism has something, has much to
do in order to adapt itself to all that is new in the world, and
to take in our social system the place and part suitable to it.
But let it be true to itself, let it not deny its origin, its
history, its doctrine, its law; let it not stoop to cowardice or
hypocrisy. It would lose its dignity which is essential to its
strength, it would fail in obtaining the new strength which it
needs. Were I not convinced that harmony may be re-established
between the old religion and modern society with truth and honor
to both, I would not counsel the attempt. God does not admit of
the possibility of falsehood in such high positions for such
great objects.
Let, then, _l'Université Catholique_ proceed in its course
of exact and scrupulous orthodoxy. It is said, I hope truly, that
she has many of the clergy for readers. They should be on their
guard against attacks on these points. Sometimes, despite
appearances of moderation, the attempts succeed, and strike a
blow on the vital conditions of their existence. By others they
are drawn into the very passions and pursuits from which their
mission is mainly intended to keep mankind. Generally such have
hitherto had but little success.
{68}
The most recent example, that of M. l'Abbé de Lamennais, has
eventuated in one of the most melancholy spectacles of error and
fall that man can present. Surely there are here just reasons for
distrust and hesitation. The authors of _l'Université
Catholique_ are clearly aware of it themselves; for they have
been careful to keep themselves clear of these unhappy flights,
and to remain, in their own words, "immovably attached to the
rock of the Church." They doubtless are so from conviction and
duty. They should also be so from prudence, and attend to all the
sentiments, scruples, and susceptibilities of the Catholic
portion of the public. It is this public especially whom they
address, it is the public whom they wish to enlighten, satisfy,
reassure, and reconcile with the true progress, the accomplished
facts and necessities of our time. That is really the great
service wanted by modern society. Let them never lose sight of
this essential end. And as to that part of the public which is
ruled by the spirit of the age, no doubt their language should
reassure and quiet it also, and draw it back to religion, for it
has very justly its own susceptibilities and distrusts. But let
not the authors of _l'Université Catholique_ deceive
themselves; they will inspire the public with the greater respect
and confidence according as they are themselves found serious and
faithful. The public will be the more easily attracted to
religion, as she presents herself stable and lofty; for, in the
uneasiness which is now prevalent, the public aspire to something
fixed and elevated, despite of the passions which still keep it
wavering and abased.
{69}
Whilst in Catholicism this new religious and social movement, of
which _l'Université Catholique_ appears to be the most
serious manifestation, is beginning, an analogous work is going
on in the other Christian communions, and reveals itself by
remarkable signs. For many years something fruitful and active
has been at work in French Protestantism. Almost immediately
after the establishment of peace and international relations in
1814, the English dissenters, struck by the languid state of
religion in France, and animated by faith and a strong desire for
proselytism, undertook the task of awaking amidst their
continental co-religionists the religious spirit, or, more
precisely, Protestant Christian feelings. Journeys,
correspondence, publications, sermons, pious associations--of
which some, as the Bible Society, the Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel, the Religious Tract Society, possess extent and
notoriety--were the instruments used to forward their design; a
design which excited and still excites in French Protestantism
some trouble and embarrassment. The established Protestant church
was moved. Indifference took offence. Toleration and reason felt
some alarm. Impressions not altogether at first void of reason;
facts which deserve observation and watchfulness, but of which
the importance in our society, and with the guarantees of our
laws and customs, is, in my opinion, much less than that of the
religious feeling which roused them, and its character and
results.
{70}
The Christian faith, the real and profound faith in the
constituent dogmas of Christianity, is springing up again amidst
Protestants, but accompanied by that liberty and assiduous search
which alter the form of unity but keep up religious vitality;
which cares less for the government of men's minds than for the
internal life of their souls. This life has its instincts, its
imperious and everlasting wants. There is no indifference, no
authority, which does or can abolish or cause to be long
forgotten the essential and eternal problems of our nature and
destiny. Whence does evil spring in the world and in ourselves?
How is it to be escaped? Is our own liberty sufficient? Is God's
power over and in us needed? What are the relations here below
and hereafter between God and our souls? What lot awaits us
beyond this life, and how far do our resolutions and actions
influence it? This is the definite and practical object of
religion. These the questions to which mankind has, through all
ages, in all the earth, in every condition, in the confusion of
controversy, in the secret heart desired and asked an answer.
This is promised to him by Christianity. The dogmas of that faith
are replies to these questions, so vital to man generally and
individually. These replies are contained in Christian books, and
are succeeded by the precepts, the consolation, and the hopes
which flow from them. To seek them there, to read them, to draw
continually from that spring the means of opposing the evil
inclinations, the passions, the weaknesses, the disquiet, the
langour of the soul, thereby sustaining it in this world and
regenerating it for eternity; such is the Christian Protestant
spirit, the spirit which is again animating the French
Protestants; the spirit which has had and may again have its
faults, like all great ambitions and all great aspirations of the
human soul, but which is nevertheless a spirit of true piety and
true morality; which suffices for our most exalted intellects,
and exercises for all, in all, the most salutary influence over
our inward dispositions and outward actions.
{71}
Many periodical works, amongst them the _Semeur_, [Footnote
3] and the _Archives of Christianity in the XIX. Century_,
are devoted to this spirit, and seek to satisfy and spread it.
[Footnote 3: The _Semeur_ has ceased to appear.]
In them all publications, all the incidents which belong at home
or abroad to Christian life, are examined, commented on, debated
with a reality and earnestness of conviction always rare, but now
especially so. Men of rare ability, too, and first of all M.
Vinet, professor of French literature at Lausanne, write for the
_Semeur_, and often with the most distinguished talent. I
might find in these works, even without going very deeply into
the question of their doctrines, some traces of political
radicalism, very injurious to religion; and also, in matters of
religion, traces of a severe and somewhat exclusive spirit,
which, when dominant, tends to sectarianism and fanaticism. But
clearly here as elsewhere the good spirit of the age, the spirit
of light, of justice, and universal benevolence will every day
make its way; will clothe the religious spirit of ideas and
sentiments in words which will suit them admirably, but which
they have not always worn.
{72}
And thus here as elsewhere I prefer dwelling on what is good to
what is evil. When the movement which is good preponderates, I
believe in its power; I trust to it, strenuous as may be the
opposition, tardy as its progress may appear.
Have we not besides, in liberty, liberty of conscience and
speech, the most certain and efficacious of guarantees against
fanaticism and religious despotism. _L'Université
Catholique_ maintains, and will unceasingly uphold the maxims,
traditions, and laws of Catholicism. At her side, the spirit of
Protestantism reveals herself full of faith and vigour. And as in
the bosom of Protestantism the _Semeur_ and the _Archives
of Christianity_ do not express the feelings of all, other
collections--the _Protestant Review_, the _Free
Enquiry_, the _Evangelist_--labour to make clear and
nourish another idea, more scientific, more attached to modern
notions and a national church, more occupied in enlightening than
deeply stirring the mind.
I do not doubt but that, in this fresh springing up of different
beliefs, men interested in their success, and the different
sections of the public whom they address, reciprocally inspire
but little mistrust or disquiet; that the remembrance of ancient
dislikes, ancient animosity still lurk in many a heart, and may
break out afresh. It may be occasionally discerned, with all its
want of reflection and its harshness. However, take it
altogether, the spirit of antipathy and contest, which has so
long prevailed in the religious sphere, is becoming weaker and
less common.
{73}
Each creed is more occupied about itself than about others; more
anxious to impress the hearts that are inclined to its reception
or have received it, than quarrel with those who maintain their
own belief. This is the natural result of liberty, and the check
imposed on every belief by the civil power which sustains it. It
is also the most favourable condition for the very creeds
themselves, as obliging them to proceed directly towards their
true object, and prevents them from turning aside to alter or
lower themselves in despotism or rebellion.
The spirit of religion comes again into the world to conquer but
not to usurp. Religious creeds rise and increase together, at
once free and contented; free to elevate themselves, to elevate
souls to heaven, restrained by their mental liberty and by the
independence of the civil power. Let us honor the community in
the bosom of which such a sight is possible! It needs, it
absolutely needs that religion should step in to purify and
strengthen it; but religion can do her work there without
dishonor or sacrifice, and when she can, it becomes her bounden
duty to do so.
{74}
{75}
Essay III.
Catholicism, Protestantism, And Philosophy In France.
{76}
{77}
Catholicism, Protestantism, And Philosophy In France.
(_July_, 1838.)
It is of Catholicism and Protestantism, not of religion or even
Christianity in general, that I wish to speak.
I regret that I cannot find a word to suit me better than
_Philosophy_. The nature of things forbids it. But in order
to make myself at once and clearly understood, I hasten to say
that I here call _Philosophy_ every opinion which disclaims,
under whatever name or shape, any faith as restrictive of human
thought, and which leaves thought, in religious matters as in all
others, free to believe or not to believe, and guide itself by
its own authority.
It is also of France, and France alone, that I speak. The
condition of Catholicism, Protestantism, and Philosophy is not
the same in France and elsewhere, after our moral and social
revolutions, as it is in countries which have not undergone such
changes. I wish to say nothing but that which results from and
applies to precise facts. The time has arrived in such matters
for dealing with real facts, and setting aside general terms
which avoid the questions they affect to settle.
{78}
I am convinced that Catholicism, Protestantism, and Philosophy,
in the bosom of the novel state of society in France under the
Charter, can live peaceably, both as regards themselves and
society; in peace not only material but moral, not only
obligatory but voluntary,--without submission, without
abasement,--both with truth and with honor.
I wish to prove it.
I repeat my first position. This peace must be established; it is
necessary.
Look at the state of things.
Catholicism, Protestantism, Philosophy, and modern French society
can neither destroy one another, nor change nor remodel
themselves as they wish.
They are facts, old, powerful, living, and indestructible from
the remotest times. They have resisted the longest and most
severe trials, ages of order and days of chaos.
For ages has new France, the France of the Charter, been forming
itself and increasing. Every thing has opposed it, yet everything
has contributed to its triumph, the church, nobility, royalty,
the court, the greatness of Louis XIV., the inactivity of Louis
XV., the wars of the empire, the peace after the restoration. She
has surmounted even her own faults, as well as the efforts of her
enemies.
{79}
Catholicism was born at the same time and in the same cradle as
modern Europe. It has associated itself with all the labours of
European civilization. It has survived all its transformations.
In our own days it has sustained the most terrible shock that has
ever been encountered by a creed and a church. It has been raised
up again by the hands of the very destroyers themselves. It
appears again. Enter the family circle, traverse the country,
then will be seen what the power of Catholicism is, in spite of
the lukewarmness of many of the faithful members--even of many of
the priests.
The lot of Protestantism in France has been hard. It has had
against it the king and the people, the literati of the
seventeenth, the philosophers of the eighteenth century; at one
time it appeared as if extirpated by Catholicism, at another as
absorbed by philosophy. It has yielded neither to persecution nor
ridicule. It still exists, and is no sooner restored to liberty
than it exhibits all its ancient fervour.
As for Philosophy, she has sustained many checks amidst her
triumphs. It is easy to set forth her follies and mistakes. She
has much to amend in what is past, but nothing to fear for the
future. Most of the principles which she proclaimed have become
rights. The rights have become facts. The new social condition to
which philosophy has given rise will not be more averse to her
than the old one which she has overcome.
These are all clearly powers full of life, and which a long
futurity awaits. They have struggled roughly but in vain. They
have been unable to destroy each other.
{80}
They will neither change or perish. No doubt they will modify
themselves according to their new position. They will listen to
reason. They will bow to necessity, but without renouncing their
principles or sacrificing their nature. They can make no such
concession. What characteristics and vitality they have must
remain. To renounce this would be to die.
Thus, without metamorphosis and as God and time have made them,
are these powers called to dwell side by side under the same
social roof.
What will happen if they do not live in peace, sincere peace?
Shall we again see the old wars which our fathers have seen?
War between Catholicism and Protestantism? Between religious
creeds and philosophy? Between the Church and the new-modelled
State? Shall we see a revival of every fanaticism, lay and
clerical, philosophic and religious?
It is not likely. Here and there, indeed, in books, in
newspapers, even in the gravest publications, hints are given of
such a restoration of things: attacks by Catholics on Protestant
impiety, by Protestants against popish idolatry, by devotees
against reason and its lights, by philosophers against faith and
the clergy. A war of words, often sincere, frequently cold,
always powerless. Doubtless, the old leaven of hatred and war,
deep laid in every human heart, still exists, but it will no more
arouse society. Customs as well as laws will prevent this. Even
the inclination will soon fail those most anxious for it.
{81}
The voices which still preach this strife, passionate, radical,
and mortal, either of Christian communities between themselves,
or of Philosophy against Christianity, are the voices of dying
men, already deserted on the battle-field where they persist in
staying. This is rather what will happen.
Living neither in peace nor at war, forced to admit vicinity
without friendship, and distrust without violence, Catholicism,
Protestantism, Philosophy, and in their train society in general,
will descend, grow cold, and languish. The dignity and power
which spring from truly moral communications will be equally
wanting in all. A dry and barren spirit will prevail in relations
which are purely official and matters of routine; and we should
see spreading and strengthening itself, becoming permanent and in
some sort legally consecrated, that spirit of indifference at the
same time disdainful yet subordinate, cold yet insecure. This is
the lot of societies which are kept together by the bond of
administrative regulations alone, void of moral life, that is, of
faith and devotion.
Was it then to arrive at this state of things, that for ages
human genius displayed itself so gloriously in our country? Was
it to end at last in this degradation that all the great creeds,
all the moral forces, have contended with so much eagerness and
glory for the empire of our society?
They must save it and themselves from this disgraceful peril.
They must accept, respect, and loyally serve the new social
state; they must learn to live amicably together in its bosom.
{82}
I say _they must!_ It is an immense point in a great work to
look upon success as indispensable and vital. The feeling of
necessity gives to those whom that necessity pleases, much power;
to the opposite party much resignation. A passionate desire
supports even more than it deceives. And here there is indeed
room for such a desire; for, during a long future, the honor and
moral repose of society are at stake. It cannot remain in this
state of apathy and uneasiness in which the mind languishes and
exhausts itself. Man desires for his soul more activity and more
security, a firmer ground, a higher flight. The true agreement of
the great intellectual powers can alone grant him these.
How can this be accomplished?
I grapple at once with the more notorious and serious of the
difficulties,--the nature of Catholicism and the conditions of
its agreement with the new state of society which has attacked
it, and been in its turn so roughly attacked.
I set aside, too, without hesitation, the questions of religion,
properly so called; questions which concern the dealings of God
with man, questions about the safety of the human soul.
Not that I look on them with indifference, or that their
importance is not now as it has always been, overwhelming and
immense. It ought, on the contrary, to be frequently repeated,
for in our day it has been too much forgotten, and it is the real
object, and substance, nay, the essence of religion. The moral
quality, the rule of conduct for man in his relations with man,
is important.
{83}
The mental calm and resignation of men in the trials of life is
important. The Christian religion teaches these, and thence its
great position upon earth and in society. But it does more, it
goes far beyond human society and this world. It binds man to
God, it reveals to him the secret of this awful tie, it teaches
him what he ought to believe and do in respect to his relation to
God and his prospect of eternity. Imperishable things from which
man may turn aside his gaze, but which do not disappear from his
nature; sublime wants from which he cannot free himself, though
he may mistake and deny them--the law of these things, the
satisfying of these wants, that is to say, the dogma and its
consequences, constitute the Christian religion, the first which
has really understood and embraced its object.
But in these questions and in the dogmas which reply to them,
nothing can now arouse between Catholicism and civil society
either conflict or embarrassment. In this matter, the State
proclaims not only the liberty but the right of the church, and
declares itself absolutely incompetent to interfere. And here
lies whatever truth exists in that deplorable and confused saying
which has excited so much comment, "_The law is
atheistical_." Surely not so. The law is not atheistical. How
should it be so? Is the law a real living being, a being with a
soul which approaches to or recedes from God, which may be lost
or saved? "Human societies," says M. Royer Collard, "live and die
on the earth, there they fulfil their destinies." But they do not
comprehend man as an entire.
{84}
After he has bound himself to society there still remains to him
the noblest part of himself, the high faculties by which he
raises himself to God, to a future life, to unknown good in an
invisible world. We, as individuals, as beings endowed with
immortality, have a different destiny from states.
And it is on this account that the State should not interfere
with that other destiny. As its nature and aim are different from
her own, as the two have nothing in common, to interfere must
produce confusion and usurpation.
That which the state now proclaims was taught to it by the
Church, the Catholic Church. During centuries when the state
wished to interfere in matters of opinion and salvation, did not
the Church distinctly reject such pretensions. And how did she do
so? By the distinction of temporal and spiritual, of terrestrial
and eternal life, that is, by the incompetence of the state to
deal with the relations of the soul with God.
And the Catholic Church was right in sustaining this principle,
the forgetfulness of which has cost her much. How did she lose a
portion of her empire? How came Henry VIII. amongst others to
separate from her? By proclaiming the temporal power competent to
matters of faith and salvation. Let Catholicism go back to the
sixteenth century, to the history of the reformation. It is by
the confusion of the two powers, by this religious competence of
the state, that she has suffered the rudest shocks.
{85}
The Catholic Church has no more dangerous enemies than lay
theologians, whether princes or doctors.
They are the more dangerous foes because religious motives are
not those which alone may animate them, and lay usurpations in
matters of faith have often served as a veil to the most worldly
interests. Had the religious incompetence of the state always
been acknowledged, the church would not so often have seen her
property as well as her power in danger or lost.
She has henceforth nothing similar to fear. Usurpation is on both
sides forbidden. Her kingdom belongs to herself alone; she
possesses it completely and securely.
On this side, the great side of Christian religion in this world,
peace is easy and may be sincere between Catholicism and the new
social state.
Let us see where the real difficulty exists.
The government of the Catholic Church is a power invested in her
own domain, and in matters of faith and salvation, with the
character of infallibility.
I put aside, great as they are, all secondary questions, such as
the knowledge of the conditions and limits in which infallibility
exists, to whom it belongs, to the Holy Seat or to Councils, or
to the Holy Seat and Councils united. I look to the one principle
which is found in every combination and form of Catholic belief.
The principle itself is founded on the perpetuity of divine
revelation, faithfully preserved in the church by means of
tradition, and renewed when needful by the inspiration of the
Holy Spirit, which ceases not to descend on the successor of St.
Peter who was placed at the head of the church by Jesus Christ
himself.
{86}
This is the essential and vital principle, the base and summit,
the Alpha and Omega of Catholicism.
Against a power of such a nature and origin, where it really
manifests itself, all discussion, resistance, and separation are
unlawful.
The new state of society and constitutional France has its
principle also, which has become that of its government.
All human power is fallible, and must be controlled and limited.
Every human society has the right of controlling and limiting,
directly and indirectly, in such and such measures, and under
such or such form, the power which it obeys.
I do not soften the problem. I set forth the two principles. They
are essentially different; they are said to be hostile.
They would be so indeed, could they meet and display themselves
in the same sphere. But here I find the remedy I sought.
When ages ago the church so loudly and vehemently insisted on the
distinction of the spiritual and temporal, she was acting in the
interest of her own dignity and founding her own liberty. She was
doing more. She thereby maintained the dignity of man, and laid
the foundations of liberty of conscience.
{87}
The separation of spiritual from temporal, the doctrine of the
church; and the separation of the religious and civil state, the
doctrine of our constitutional regime; the independence of
religious society in matters of faith, conquered by the church in
the earlier days of modern Europe; and liberty of conscience, a
victory achieved by modern society,--have one and the same
principle at the root. The application and form may be different,
the origin and moral signification entirely agree.
Hence the means of peace and harmony between Catholicism and our
new society.
Suppose that the two principles, the separation of spiritual and
temporal, of the religious and civil state, were (and it is
possible, since at the root they agree) sincerely and completely
allowed, respected and practised by church and state; whence
would the conflict spring?
The Catholic church would loudly maintain her infallibility in
the religious sphere, that is, as regards the connexion between
spiritual power and the faithful. The state would insist upon
liberty of conscience and thought in the social sphere, that is,
in the relations of the temporal power with the citizens. Each
power would advance according to its principles, parallel, and
without collision.
What then is the obstacle?
It is rather historical than reasonable. It arises from the
passed deeds and ancient life of the two powers, rather than from
their essential principles and actual relations.
{88}
The separation of the spiritual and temporal originates in the
chaos of the middle ages. It sprung from thence, as the sun
appears through a dark and stormy sky. Principles and powers,
ideas and situations, all have been in our Europe wonderfully
obscure, confused, incoherent, incomplete. There has long been a
depth of temporal affairs mixed with spiritual, spiritual with
temporal, in the existence and constitution of the church and
state. Hence the temptations and attempts, both frequent and
terrible, at reciprocal usurpation. The confusion of facts and
violence of passions struggled incessantly against the principle
which strove to restrain them.
That is the lot of truth here. It is boasted of but disdained,
invoked yet rejected, at once admitted and proscribed; here
supreme, there powerless. Man deserves no better, the world fares
no better than that.
However, after many efforts on certain memorable days some truth
does detach itself, and rises so high that she shines brightly
and commands respect.
The separation of the spiritual and temporal has had this
fortune. Church and state, bishops and philosophers, opinion and
law have contributed in turn to secure it for her. It is a
principle now so well established amongst us, that neither
persons nor things, neither mind nor art, could be kept long
clear from its influence.
Since the great ambitions which have disturbed the world be but
foolish pretensions, it behoves them carefully to avoid the last
risk they can run, that of becoming ridiculous squabbles.
{89}
Let the two powers, instead of painfully lowering themselves to
seize though but for a few days, some fragments from the past
confusion, admit fully both as regards right and deed their
mutual incompetence; let each establish itself firmly in its
special sphere, let each loudly proclaim its principle--the
Catholic church, its infallibility in religious orders; the
State, the liberty of thought in social concerns. Not only will
they then live in peace, but they will respect and serve
themselves really in spirit and in truth, and not in a
superficial appearance which is unworthy of both.
I say they will respect each other in spirit and in truth, and I
regret that I can but glance at the subject. Certainly, setting
aside all faith and law, the vital principle of Catholicism, the
religious infallibility of the church,--and the vital principle
of our civil society, the liberty of conscience and
thought,--have a right to the respect, the former of the boldest
thinkers, the latter of the most pious and the strictest minds.
But I have not room here to enter suitably on such a question; I
may attempt it some day.
As to the practical benefits of a true pacification to the
Catholic Church and to constitutional France, they are immense.
What is the prevailing ill of our temporal society?
{90}
The weakening of authority. I do not allude to that strength
which insists on being obeyed. Never had power greater command of
it; never perhaps so much. I allude to that authority recognized
beforehand on principle in a general way, received and felt as a
right which is not obliged to resort to force; that authority
before which the spirit bows without abasement of heart, and
which speaks from on high with the influence not of constraint,
but nevertheless of necessity.
That is truly authority. It is not the only principle of the
social state. It does not suffice for the government of men. But
without it nothing will suffice; neither argument unceasingly
persevered in, nor well-understood interest, nor the material
preponderance of numbers. Where authority is wanting, whatever
the force, obedience is precarious or mean, even near the extreme
of rebellion or of servility. Catholicism has the essence of
authority; it is authority itself, systematically conceived and
organised. It lays it down in principle, and puts it in practice
with great firmness of teaching, and a rare intelligence of human
nature.
Did this spirit prevail in our society, or did it lean towards
it, there would be need to seek elsewhere counterbalances and
limits. But the danger is clearly not there; and whilst our
institutions and manners cherish in us the spirit of individual
independence in thought as well as life, it is a great blessing
to society, to its morality as well as its repose, that other
causes, other methods of teaching maintain the principle of
authority and the spirit of internal submission.
"I learnt in the army what one learns no where else--respect;"
said an old retired non-commissioned officer of the Imperial
Guard, in 1820.
{91}
Catholicism is the greatest, the most holy school of respect that
the world has ever seen. France was brought up in this school, in
spite of the ill use which human passions have often made of her
precepts. The abuse is now little formidable; the benefit ought
to be great, for we have great need of it.
Catholicism itself is suffering at present from a grievous
malady.
This is the prevailing coldness and routine, the predominance of
form over foundation, of external practice over internal
feelings.
This arises from the often hypocritical incredulity of the
eighteenth century, not very distant from the nineteenth; and
also from the preponderance, which has long been excessive, in
the church, of the government over the vital principle, of
ecclesiastical authority over religious life.
Some analogy existed in this respect between the church and state
in the last century. On both sides power was afoot with its old
organization, in the hands of its former possessors; but amongst
the subjects there was little faith and little love.
What is it, nevertheless, that has saved Catholicism from
shipwreck? It is that it was a popular religion and faith. The
Catholic government yielded, the Catholic people survived. M. de
Monlosier was right; in our days, too, it was the cross of wood
which saved the world.
{92}
The safety is yet incomplete. The church has risen, but many a
soul languishes. Catholicism needs faith, a more inward and
lively faith.
It is the vague and ill-regulated feeling of this want, which has
for some time inspired those dreams of absolute independence, of
rupture between church and state, those shiverings of the fever
of democracy, which, under the name of M. l'Abbé de Lamennais,
have scandalised the faithful and made the indifferent smile.
Mad, shameful dreams which urge Catholicism to abjure her
principles and history, to hand herself over to the contagion of
modern evil and to dishonour while she destroys herself.
It is not in such devious ways that Catholicism will find
religious life. This will, on the contrary, be found by her
remaining faithful to herself in the new position frankly
accepted. This position is worthy, strong, favorable to the
progress of faith and fervour. It possesses towards the state a
fair measure of liberty and alliance, towards the faithful the
suitable independence as well as the needful intimacy; no evil
hopes, no worldly distractions, nothing which can render zeal
impure or even suspected; but nothing, on the other hand, which
attacks the traditions or customs of the Church, nothing which
tends to deprive it of the august character of elevation and
stability. The Catholic Church is thus placed in constitutional
France; and success, religious and social, belong to the use of
proper measures, as by proper measures success is certain.
{93}
The situation of Protestantism is more simple: some persons even
affect to consider it more favourable. The general feeling which
prevails in our days, our political and domestic alliances, the
analogy of principle between constitutional France and Protestant
England, all seem to say that Protestantism is in favour. There
are some even who pretend to the discovery of a plot to make
France Protestant.
This does not deserve even a passing remark.
There was a time, not very distant, when Protestantism did not
seem so well placed in France. I do not speak of the Restoration;
even under the empire it was often said that Protestantism had a
republican tendency, that her maxims were contrary to stability
and power. The spirits of Protestantism and revolution were
considered as related.
This is still repeated. It has become a party theme; and
Protestantism is perseveringly represented as incompatible with
social order, peaceful dispositions, and monarchy.
Happily, Protestantism is not a thing of yesterday in Europe; it
appeals to history and facts for a reply.
If there be any where three countries which, for fifty years,
amidst the overthrow of ideas, states, and dynasties have given
striking proofs of affection for their institutions and princes,
for the conservative and monarchical spirit, they are assuredly
England, Holland, Prussia--three Protestant countries,
_the_ three Protestant countries _par excellence_ in
Europe; countries, too, wonderful for order, for industry, and
for prosperity; countries which greatly conduce to the power and
glory of modern civilization. There can be no more decisive
answer to the worn out declamations of ancient party spirit, nor
do they deserve more ample discussion.
{94}
French Protestantism is peculiarly free from this ridiculous
reproach. It has not been remarkable for receiving too much
protection or justice. It enjoys them as a new acquisition, with
modesty and gratitude. Never was a religious society disposed to
evince towards the civil power greater deference and respect.
Protestantism, by a singular amalgamation, has been blamed for
too much deference even in this respect. It has been accused of
lowering religion, and making the church subservient to the
state. This, it is said, is the consequence of the fall of the
ecclesiastical hierarchy, the great governing power of the
Catholic church, which Protestantism has attacked. Thus the
division between spiritual and temporal has disappeared; the
spiritual has fallen under the yoke of the civil power.
I have already said sufficient of the separation of spiritual and
temporal, to avoid the suspicion of thinking ill of it. It is one
of the most glorious forms which, in modern Europe, the
independence of thought and faith has assumed. It is the
principle in virtue of which Catholicism must, in the midst of
modern institutions and ideas, assume a worthy and secure place.
{95}
But in spiritual as in temporal order, it is necessary that
liberty have but one aspect and be exclusively attached to this
or that combination. Religion has more than one method of
preserving her dignity and independence; God plants it and causes
it to prosper in more than one soil, in more than one climate.
In fact, taking things together, faith has been strong, and
conscience has displayed itself with energy in Protestant
countries, in spite of the doubtful lines of demarcation between
the two domains, and the too frequent intervention of the civil
power in religious matters.
This is because the civil power has never made religious matters
its chief concern. Politics, governments, properly so called,
have absorbed its attention and power. Sooner or later, it has
ended by leaving consciences to themselves; it has, at all
events, left the reins more loose and the field more free than
has been the case in Catholic countries, where there has been a
power devoted to the sole task of ruling spiritual society.
Thus, too, there is in every society, political or religious, a
certain intimate and permanent tendency which gets the better of
all forms of organization and all accidents of situation.
Protestantism sprang from free enquiry. It is her standard. It
has never been abandoned by her, whatever share she may have
taken in the civil rule; I will go so far as to say, the civil
despotism. In short, human thought, in religion as in every other
matter, has displayed itself with infinite activity and freedom
in Protestant countries.
{96}
Do we forget, besides, the first and most powerful cause of
spiritual independence? It is that Protestantism,--she cannot
avoid it,--admits into her bosom great differences of faith and
practice, dissents, separations, sects in short. She may have
often condemned and persecuted them, but she has never deemed
herself obliged to curse and extirpate them. They have lived and
multiplied under Protestantism, in the teeth of the national
church; ill-treated, humiliated, but never forced from some last
retreat; always, to a certain degree, protected by the spirit of
free enquiry, its examples and recollections. This affords a
strong pledge for liberty of conscience, and opens an asylum to
all who may have been attacked or vexed on account of their faith
by the civil power. If the Anglican church has, with some
justice, though much exaggeration, been accused of complaisance
towards the temporal sovereign, the English dissenters have, on
the other hand, unceasingly proclaimed their haughty independence
of her. The shield which the Catholic church has found in the
separation of the spiritual and temporal, has been found by
Protestantism in the freedom, even though incomplete, of
religious dissent and the multiplicity of sects.
And as a just reward for this dawn of liberty, the Protestant
sects are not so widely severed as they appear to be from the
national Church and the State. Persecuted, irritated, even
rebellious, they have nevertheless strongly adhered, with hidden
yet deep feeling, to the common centre of belief and the public
destiny. An ardent Puritan was, under Queen Elizabeth, sent to
the pillory and condemned to have his hand cut off.
{97}
The hand falls; with his left, he raises his large hat, crying
"God save the Queen!" Almost invariably in critical
circumstances, when the vital interests of the national religion
or of the country appeared to be compromised, the English
dissenters have rallied round the state, and though forsaking her
religious banner, have still served her with exemplary devotion.
I have little taste for sectarian spirit, but never should
Protestantism when in power set up as a national church, and
treat dissenters with rigour or disdain; for it owes in part to
them the maintenance of its dignity, as well as the fervour of
faith and the progress of liberty of conscience. Above all, never
should our constitutional monarchy trouble itself about dissent,
should it one day arise, in French Protestantism. It could not
possess political importance, or tend to weaken the tie which
binds the Protestants of France to the new social condition and
its governing power.
Protestantism, while free from political danger, has, in a purely
religious point of view, much good to do in France; not by
drawing France to her standard, by converting her, to use the
customary phrase. Conversions on either side are and will
henceforward be few, and the importance which some persons attach
to them as a matter of joy or regret is somewhat puerile. It is a
step and a most important step for the individuals, but one of no
social moment. France will not become Protestant. Protestantism
will not become extinct in France. One reason among many is
decisive.
{98}
The struggle of these days of ideas and empire is not between
Catholicism and Protestantism. Impiety and immorality are the
enemies which both have to resist. To restore the spirit of
religion is the work to which both are called. The work, like the
evil, is immense. A slight probing of the wound, a short but
serious glance at the moral state of the masses of men, whose
minds are so fluctuating, whose hearts so empty, who desire so
much and hope so little, who pass so rapidly from the excitement
of fever to mental torpor,--and the observer will be penetrated
with sadness and alarm. Catholics or Protestants, priests or
laymen, be ye whom ye may, do not, if believers, be uneasy about
each other; reserve that for those who believe not. There is the
field for work, there the harvest. The field is open to
Protestantism as to Catholicism; work will not be wanting to
either; each has the aptitude and peculiar qualities to enable it
to labour with success.
We suffer from very different moral complaints.
Some are above all things wearied and disgusted with the
uncertainty and disorder of men's minds. They need a harbour
sheltered from every point, a light which is ever steady, a
guiding hand which never trembles. They ask from religion rather
support to weakness than aliment for activity. They require her,
while elevating, to sustain them; while touching their hearts, to
keep down their understandings; while animating their inward
life, to give them at the same time, and above all else, a deep
sense of security.
{99}
Catholicism is wonderfully adapted to this frame of mind, now so
common. She has gratifications for desires, remedies for
suffering. She knows how at once to subdue and to please. Her
grasp is strong, her prospects full of charm for the imagination.
She excels in occupying while soothing the soul, which she suits
after periods of great fatigue; for without leaving it cold or
idle, she saves it much trouble, and undertakes for it the burden
of responsibility.
For another class of minds, though also suffering and separated
from religion, more intellectual and physical activity is
required. They too feel the need of returning to God and the
faith; but they are used to examine everything themselves, and
only to receive that which they acquire by their own labour. They
wish to shun incredulity, but liberty is dear to them; there is
in their religious tendency more thirst than lassitude. To such,
Protestantism may gain access, for while it speaks to them of
piety and faith, it encourages and invites them to make use of
their reason and liberty. It has been accused of coldness. That
is a mistake. In ceaselessly appealing to free and personal
examination it takes deep root in the soul, and becomes easily an
inward faith, in which the activity of the understanding keeps up
instead of extinguishing the fervour of the heart. And hence its
connexion with the modern spirit, which formerly in its youth was
at the same time reasoning and enthusiastic, eager for conviction
as for liberty, and which, despite its momentary quiescence, has
retained its old nature and will infallibly resume its double
character.
{100}
Catholicism and Protestantism must never lose sight of our system
of society, for it is on this that they must work. Let each of
them appeal to it in its own way, looking for and attending to
the wounds or wants for the cure or satisfaction of which they
are best calculated. That is their true, their efficacious and
disinterested mission, not looking at each other and seeking a
renewal of controversy.
In general, I believe controversy is but of little use, and has
little religious effect. In every age it has taken but a small
part in the triumph of great moral truths. They establish
themselves, especially at their first appearing, by direct and
dogmatic exposition. We have in the gospels the most remarkable
and august example. From their earliest day, neither motive or
occasion of controversy was wanting with Jew or pagan. Yet we
scarcely meet with it in the preaching either of Jesus Christ or
of the apostles. They lay down their rule of faith, their
precepts; they knock without ceasing at the doors of the hearts
which they desire to enter. They do not trouble themselves to
argue with their adversaries. Controversy arises later, and when
it does, it soon disfigures the truth, for it distributes it in
fragments among parties, sects, men; and each holds fast, with
the intractable blindness of self-love, to the fragment which has
fallen to his lot, in which he wishes to see, and that others
should see, truth in her entirety.
{101}
Let them keep clear of controversy; let them attend little to
each other, much to themselves and their task. Catholicism and
Protestantism will then dwell peaceably, not only within its new
state, but together.
I know that this peace will not be that spiritual unity which has
been so talked of. Spiritual unity, beautiful in itself, is in
this world chimerical; and from chimerical it becomes tyrannical.
As finite and free beings, that is to say, incomplete and
fallible, unity escapes us, and we constantly miss it.
Harmony in liberty is the only unity to which men here below can
pretend. Or, rather, it is for them the best, the only mode of
elevation towards that true unity which all violence, all
constraint,--that is, every invasion of spiritual by material
order,--throws back and obscures, under the pretext of attaining
it.
Harmony in liberty is the spirit of Christianity. It is charity
united with zeal. It is also the object of philosophy, for it is
the true, the moral sense of the principle of toleration and
equal protection of the rites of worship; a principle which
impiety has violated by trying to set it up as the standard of
indifference and contempt for religion, but which allies itself
wondrously with zeal and faith, for on _their_ right it is
itself founded.
The alliance must be ratified. I say _must_ in concluding,
as I did when beginning. Peace between religious creeds is now
imposed on all alike by our social condition. Harmony in liberty
is their legal condition, their charter. Let them yield to it in
spirit as in act; let them love it while obeying it. I fear not
the fate of a false prophet, when I predict that religion will be
thereby as great a gainer as society.
{102}
As to Philosophy, she has in our days the glory of not having
remained a Utopia. From discoveries she has proceeded to
conquests. She has metamorphosed her ideas into facts and
institutions; a formidable change, as it reveals not only the
errors of the first thought, but for a time misleads and corrupts
it by plunging it into the vortex of human passions; nevertheless
a great glory, and one which assigns to philosophy a high
position in the new social state.
It is a rare privilege to be able, without embarrassment,
worthily to acknowledge and abjure error. Philosophy can do this,
for, politically speaking, victory belongs to her, and not only
victory but power. Though much self-deceived, she has done much.
She has reason for pride as well as for modesty. She can afford
to show herself just, benevolent, and respectful to her former
adversaries. She cannot be charged with weakness or cowardice.
Practically, experience has enlightened her. She knows better
than she did the true condition of morality and human society.
She knows that she herself is not all-sufficient, that she
suffices not entirely for souls or nations, that in human nature
and in the general course of affairs the share due to religion is
immense, and that philosophy should not contest it with her.
{103}
To go still deeper, philosophy herself is about to become
seriously and sincerely religious. Like Catholicism, like
Protestantism, she cannot change her nature, she must remain
philosophy, that is to say free and independant thought, whatever
her field of action. But as regards religious questions, she sees
that she has often been short-sighted and hasty, that neither
impiety nor indifference constitutes true knowledge, that the
proudest spirit may humble itself before God, and that there is
philosophy in faith itself.
All this is still very vague, and I speak but vaguely of it.
However, so it is. It is on this slope that philosophy is now
placed, and along it that she must hereafter advance. Her future
must be great in the midst of that society which she has formed.
The future must be great for spiritual order as a whole,
religious and philosophical. May this destiny be accomplished!
May spiritual order recover her activity and renown, with a peace
and harmony hitherto unknown. Therein consists the dignity of
man! therein the strength of society.
End.
[Transcriber's note: The following text is not part of the
originals book, but seems worthy of inclusion.
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