198

French testimony to

[LECT.

of his existence without committing a sort of fraud; but the savage was his own master as soon as he was able to act; parental authority was scarcely known to him; he had never bent his will to that of any of his kind, nor learned the difference between voluntary obedience and a shameful subjection; and the very name of law was unknown to him. Truly, an ideal individualism! Without religion, without parental authority, without law. What more could be desired by Col. Ingersoll or any of his friends?

But it will be pled that it is inferiority of race which produces these melancholy results. The reply is ready that wherever individualism has asserted itself, free from the bonds of religion, the dissolution of society has inevitably followed.

I have here before me a pamphlet1 written by a distinguished journalist of Paris, M. Reveillaud. The introduction states that it is a work written in good faith, but not a work of faith. The author is not a believer. He would desire to be one, he says, but the intellectual difficulties in the way are too great.2 He is one of those who are called free-thinkers, and belongs to that numerous army who are fanatics for liberty of conscience, for the progress of human enlightenment, for the glory and honour of their country.

The pamphlet is a testimony in favour of the pure form of Christianity known as Protestantism. It is not written in the spirit of propagandism, but with a view to the preservation of society. The author speaks as a politician, not as an apostle or missionary.

Morality, he says, as necessary to the development and maintenance of societies as to the happiness and equilibrium of individual men, has its true and solid support only when it leans on the double belief in God and in the immortality of the soul.

1 La Question Religieuse et la Solution Protestante. Paris: 1878.

2 He is now a Christian pastor.

IV.]

the need of religion.

199

If we give up these healthy beliefs, it is not only morality, social and individual, which would be in danger of overthrow, but hope itself would disappear from the earth, the sacred flame of poetry would die out, and the dignity of life, even to the motive for living, would vanish. He quotes from Victor Hugo

:

"Let us not forget, let us teach it to all," says that great French writer, "there would be no dignity in living and it would not be worth our while to live, if we had to die completely. What lightens labour, sanctifies work, renders man brave, good, wise, patient, benevolent, just; at once humble and great, worthy of knowledge, worthy of liberty, is the fact that he has before him the perpetual vision of a better world shining across the shadows of this life. As for myself, I believe profoundly in this better world, and after many struggles, much study and many trials, it is the supreme assurance of my reason as it is the supreme consolation of my soul." Again, in another passage: "There is an evil in our time: I will almost say there is only tendency to place everything in this life. end and for aim the earthly and material life, we aggravate all miseries by the negation which is at the end; we add to the dejection of the unfortunate the unbearable load of nothingness; and of what was merely suffering, or the law of God, we make despair, or the law of hell. Hence profound social convulsions.

one evil: a certain In giving to man for

Assuredly I am of those who wish,-I do not say sincerely, for the word is too feeble ;-I wish with an unutterable ardour, and by all possible means, to better in this life the lot of those who suffer, but the first amelioration is the gift of hope. How little do finite miseries seem, when an infinite hope mingles with them! It is a duty incumbent on all of us, whoever we be, politicians or bishops, priests or authors, to bring into play in every possible manner, every social energy to battle against and destroy misery, and at the same time to raise the heads of

200

Philosophy inadequate.

[LECT.

all towards heaven, to direct the souls and turn the attention of all towards an after life, where justice shall be done and amends made. Let us say it aloud, no one will find that he has suffered unjustly or in vain. Death is a restitution. Equilibrium is the law of the material world; equity the law of the moral. God is discovered at the end of everything."

The objection is made that a good and sound philosophy taught expressly in the schools and from university chairs would serve the desired end quite as well. Would it not suffice to teach men the two or three articles of the creed that may be denominated social, since no society can exist without professing it: God, the immortality of the soul, recompense for the just, punishment for the wicked? Why graft on that a worship, embarrass ourselves with a religion, become members of a church?

Reveillaud confesses that he would admit the reasonableness of this disinclination to ally philosophy with anything alien, if he believed that philosophy, even the most spiritual, could ever meet the religious needs of humanity, and fill the place that has been occupied up to the present day by religions. But philosophy has never entered into the popular domain, and its lofty speculations have produced an effect only upon a small aristocracy of minds. Its teachings, frigid and bare, address themselves to the reason, but have never known the road to the heart. But it is the heart of the people that must be touched; and for this we need symbols, a faith, a worship. The logical outcome moreover of a spiritual philosophy is a worship. How can we recognize a God without adoring him, and showing him our gratitude?

He then goes on to show that a further proof of the need of a religion, if further proof were necessary, is the history of the attempt to found new religions, or to accommodate the old religions to the taste of the day. We have the festivals in

V.]

Saint Simon's testimony.

201

honour of the Supreme Being instituted by Robespierre, the worship of the Goddess Reason under the auspices of Chaumette, the theophilanthropic experiments of La Réveillère Lepeaux, the Saint-Simonian religion of P. Enfantin.

Saint-Simon the

A few words about the last mentioned. younger, Count Claud Henry, not to be confounded with his distinguished grand-uncle Duke Louis, who wrote the Mémoires, had a very varied and eventful career. A captain in the French army at seventeen years of age, he fought in America under Washington, after which he visited Holland and Spain. Of the stirring events of the French Revolution he was merely a spectator. A fortune made in speculating in national bonds gave him leisure for the study of sociology, which he prosecuted with ardour. The following was his scheme of existence. To spend one's vigorous youth in a manner the most original and active possible; to gain a knowledge of all human theories and practices; to mingle with all classes of society, placing one's self in all possible situations and even creating situations that do not exist; to spend one's old age in reviewing one's observations, and in establishing principles. He gathered a band of ardent disciples about him, his last words to whom were: "It has been imagined that all religion whatever ought to disappear; but religion cannot disappear from the world; it can only change its form." The church his followers founded, torn by schism, has long since ceased to exist, for religio, ut poeta, nascitur, non fit-religion, like the poet, is born, not made; but his words are as significant as ever.

Rites and symbols, some recognition of a supernatural world, the people will have. Free-thinkers are numerous if we judge of them from their conversation, and the profession they make; but few indeed go so far as to reject when dying the last consolations of religion, and almost none care to be buried without funeral rites, without the prayers of the church. If a

202

Liberty cannot exist

[LECT.

religion did not exist it would be necessary to invent one; but we cannot invent one, therefore we must fall back upon one which exists.

Now Jesus, says Reveillaud, has planted his standard so high above the earth, that all humanity can take refuge in its folds. Only by fighting under his standard can we wage successful war against superstition and despotism.

Reformed Christianity has joined to faith, that powerful support of duty, liberty, that essential foundation of right; and this fruitful alliance has renewed without violent shocks, without blind reactions, with the sole help of time, the morals, the legislation, and the institutions of Protestant countries.

Such is a brief resumé of an important portion of M. Reveillaud's pamphlet. An argument more directly bearing on the condition of affairs in this country could not be found; and it has the merit of being impartial and thoroughly sincere. Thoughtful minds in Europe are far from revelling in the glory of the present; its shadows are many and they might darken at any time into the gloom of night where no high faith knits together the units that compose our modern nations. "A despotism may exist without a religion, liberty never"-another profound remark of de Tocqueville's. If a nation would advance without fear of retrogression, it must place its confidence in something higher and nobler and more satisfying than commerce, or parliaments, or schools; its citizens must build up homes where the lamp of religion is kept burning. To keep alive the faith of a people is a difficult task, and few can undertake it; but to throw obstacles in the way of religion, or even to be wholly indifferent to it, is a political sin. If it is written on the page of history that there is a power in the world making for righteousness, the community which conforms to that law will be determining its course in the right direction. A modern community can effect this only through the individual