The great conflict of the spiritual world is not, as it is often said to

be, the combat of idealism against materialism. Idealism begins well,

and we must not refuse to acknowledge the services which it has rendered

to the cause of truth. But philosophy must follow the road traced out in

an ancient adage: _Ab exterioribus ad interiora, ab interioribus ad

superiora_.[67] If the mind does not go to the end of this royal road;

if idealism, having surmounted the fascinations of the senses, remains

in ideas, without ascending to the supreme Mind, the worship of matter

and the worship of the idea call mutually one to another, and revolve in

a fatal circle. The struggle between these two forms of atheism reminds

one of those duels, in which, after having satisfied honor, the

adversaries breakfast together, and gather strength to combat, in case

of need, a common enemy. The great combat which forms the main subject

of the history of ideas is the combat between belief in God and an

atheistical philosophy. Whether atheism admits for its first principle

an atom without a Creator, or a reason without an Eternal Mind, is a

fact very important for the history of philosophy, but the importance of

which is small enough in regard to the interests of humanity.

We passed the Rhine in order to penetrate into Germany, let us now cross

the British Channel, and observe what is going on in England.

England, at the close of the seventeenth and the beginning of the

eighteenth century, was the principal centre of irreligion. France gave

the patent of European circulation to ideas which proceeded in part

from this foreign source. An active propaganda for the diffusion of

impious and immoral writings had been established in Great Britain. A

strong reaction set in, and, dating from the year 1698, we see formed

various societies having for their object the diffusion of good books

and respectable journals.[68] These efforts were crowned with success.

England, by its zeal in the work of Missions, by its sacrifices for the

diffusion of the Holy Scriptures, and by its respect for the

Lord's-day,[69] assumed[70] the characteristic marks of a Christian

nation. Grand measures adopted in the interests of liberty and humanity,

placed it at the same time at the head of a seriously philanthropic

civilization; but as Père Gratry has remarked, "more than in any other

people, there are in the English people the old man and the new."[71]

The strange contrasts which are presented by the political action of

this double-people are found also in the productions of its thought, in

which, while the spirit of piety is displayed full of life, the spirit

of irreligion is also manifested with terrible energy. A book is

instanced, of materialistic tendency,[72] published in 1828, of which a

popular edition was printed with a view to extend the opinions which it

advocated. There was sold of this edition, in a short time, more than

eighty thousand copies. A thoughtful writer, Mr. Pearson, mentions a

statistical statement, according to which English publications, openly

atheistical, reached, in the year 1851, a total of six hundred and forty

thousand copies.[73]

If we pass from the current literature to scientific publications, we

shall meet with facts of the same order. The Hegelianism and the

scepticism of the critical school are creeping into the works of some

theologians. The theories of positivism, reduced to shape in France,

have passed the channel, and have obtained in England more attention

perhaps than in the country of their origin. They have been adopted by

a distinguished author, Mr. Stuart Mill; and a female writer, Miss

Martineau, has set them forth, in her mother-tongue, for the use of her

fellow-countrymen.[74] Positivism is even in vogue, and has become

"_fashionable_" amongst certain literary and intellectual circles in

Great Britain.[75]

In less elevated regions of the intellectual world of England, an

organized sect commends itself to our attention. This sect has given to

its system of doctrine the name of _Secularism_. It has a social

object--the destruction of the Established Church and the existing

political order. It has a philosophy, the purport and bearing of which

we will inquire of Mr. Holyoake. The following is the answer of the

chief of the secularists:--"All that concerns the origin and end of

things, God and the immortal soul, is absolutely impenetrable for the

human mind. The existence of God, in particular, must be referred to

the number of abstract questions, with the ticket _not determined_. It

is probable, however, that the nature which we know, must be the God

whom we inquire after. What is called atheism is found _in suspension_

in our theory."[76] The practical consequence of these views is, that

all day-dreams relating to another world must be put aside, and we must

manage so as to live to the best advantage possible in the present

life.[77] Hence the name of the system. _Secularism_ teaches its

disciples to have nothing to do with religion in any shape, that they

may confine themselves strictly to the present life. It is an attempt of

which the express object is to realize life without God.

These doctrines formed the subject of public discussions, in London in

1853, and at Glasgow in 1854. The meeting at Glasgow numbered, it is

said, more than three thousand persons.[78] The sect employs as its

means of action open-air speeches, the publication of books and

journals,[79] and assemblies for giving information and holding debates

in lecture-rooms. There are five of these lecture-rooms in London. I

have seen the programme, for 1864, of the meetings held at No. 12,

Cleveland Street, under the direction of Messrs. Holyoake and J. Clark.

There are, every Sunday,--a discourse at eleven o'clock, a discussion at

three o'clock, a lecture at seven o'clock. The programme invites all

free-thinkers to attend these meetings. Some of the assemblies are

public; for others a small entrance fee is demanded. London is the

principal centre of the association; but it has branches all over the

country, and it numbers in Great Britain twenty-one lecture-rooms,

particularly at Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, and

Edinburgh.[80] Secularism naturally seeks to magnify, as much as may be,

its own importance; and it is not to the declarations of its apostles

that we must refer in order to estimate the extent and influence of its

action. At the same time the existence of a society, the avowed object

of which is the diffusion of practical atheism, cannot be regarded with

indifference. At the present moment the affairs of the sect would not

appear to be flourishing. A year ago a secularist orator had delivered a

vehement speech in favor of virtue. Just as he had resumed his seat, a

policeman entered the room and took him into custody. A few days

afterwards the _Times_ informed its readers that the orator of virtue

had just been condemned for theft to twelve months' hard labor.[81] In

the _Secular World_ of the 1st January, 1864, Mr. Holyoake complains

that a great many _mauvais sujets_ seem to seek in secularism a kind of

cheap religion. He declares that he is going to use energetic efforts to

purify the sect, and seems to intimate that he shall retire if his

efforts fail. Let us leave him to wrestle against the invasion of the

orators of virtue, and let us pass from England into Italy.

While Italy is seeking to deliver itself from the bayonets of Austria,

it is threatened with subjection to the influence of the most pernicious

German doctrines. After having bent, like nearly all Europe, in the

eighteenth century, beneath the blast of sensualism, Italy made a noble

effort to renew more generous traditions. Two eminent men, Rosmini and

Gioberti, the second especially, succeeded in exciting in the youth of

Italy a passionate interest in doctrines in which liberty and vigor of

thought were united with the confidence of faith. This intellectual

movement preceded and prepared a national movement, the course of which

has been precipitated by the intrigues of politics and the intervention

of the arms of the foreigner. At the present time the influence of

Rosmini and of Gioberti is on the decline. Hegelianism is being

installed with a certain _éclat_ in the university of Naples. Nothing

warrants us in hoping that this system will not produce upon the shores

of the Mediterranean the same depravation of philosophic thought which

it has produced in Germany. In the ancient university of Pisa, M.

Auguste Conti, a brave defender of Christian philosophy, steadfastly

maintains the union of religion and of speculative inquiry,[82] and the

centre of Italy is less affected perhaps than the extremities of the

Peninsula by the spirit of infidelity. But as we go further north, we

encounter in the writings of Ferrari the utterance of a gloomy

scepticism, and in those of Ausonio Franchi, formerly a journalist at

Turin, and now a Professor at Milan, the manifestations of an almost

undisguised atheism. Ausonio Franchi, or rather the man who assumes that

pseudonyme, is an ex-priest, who, "while maintaining severely the rule

of good morals and the dignity of life,"[83] has turned with violent

animosity against his former faith. He exerts some influence over the

youth of Italy, and has met with warm admirers in England and Germany.

Franchi's profession of faith reduces itself to these very simple

terms:--"The world is what it is, and it is _because it is_; any other

reason whatever of its essence and of its existence can be nothing but a

sophism or an illusion."[84] All inquiry into the origin of things is a

pure chimera, and we must therefore limit ourselves to the experience of

the present life, and look for nothing beyond it. The author treats with

sufficient disdain arguments which satisfied Descartes, Newton, and

Leibnitz. It has seemed to me that his understanding, a little obscured

by passion, misconceives the true purport of the reasonings which it

rejects, and by thus impairing their force, assumes to itself the right

to despise them.

The religious negations of Ausonio Franchi do not stop at Christian

dogma. He denies all value to those higher aspirations of the human soul

which constitute _reason_, in the philosophical meaning of the term.

Now, this radical negation of the reason is what those Italians who do

not scruple to practise it denominate _Rationalism_. And this very

unwarrantable use of a word is in fact only a particular case of a

general phenomenon. To criticise, means to examine the thoughts which

present themselves to the mind in order to distinguish error from truth.

The Frenchmen, who call themselves the _critics_, are men who require

that the intellect shall make itself the impartial mirror of ideas, but

shall renounce the while all discrimination between truth and error. The

term scepticism, in its primary signification, contains the idea of

inquiring, of examining; and they give the name of _sceptics_ to the

philosophers who declare that there is nothing to discover, and

consequently nothing to examine, or to search for! One is a

_free-thinker_ only on the express condition of renouncing all such

free exercise of thought as might lead to the acceptance of beliefs

generally received. This is verily the carnival of language, and the

_bal masqué_ of words. These corruptions of the meaning of terms are

highly instructive. Doctrines contrary to the laws of human nature bear

witness in this way to a secret shame in producing themselves under

their true colors. Just as hypocrisy is an homage which vice pays to

virtue, so these barbarisms are an homage which error pays to truth.

To return to Italy: that beautiful and noble country has not escaped the

revival of atheism. The intoxication of a new liberty, and the political

struggles in which the Papacy is at present engaged, will favor for a

time, it may be feared, the development of evil doctrines.[85] But the

lively genius of the Italians will not be long in attaching itself

again to the grand traditions of its past history; and the inhabitants

of the land, whose soil was trodden by Pythagoras and Saint Augustine,

will not link themselves with doctrines which always run those who hold

them aground sooner or later upon the sad and gloomy shores of a vulgar

empiricism.

We have not leisure, Gentlemen, to extend our study to all parts of the

globe, and besides, there are countries with regard to which information

would fail me. Therefore I say nothing of Holland, where we should have,

as I know, distressing facts to record. The silence imposed on Spain

upon the subjects which we are discussing would render the study of that

country a difficult one. I am wanting in data regarding America. Let us

conclude our survey by a few words about Russia.

If we are warranted in making general assertions in speaking of that

immense empire, we may say that the Russian people, taken as a whole, is

good and pious, badly instructed, and often the victim of ignorance or

of superstition, but disposed to open its heart to elevated and pure

influences. The clergy is ignorant, though with honorable and even

brilliant exceptions. It is too much cut off from general society, and

consigned to a sort of caste, of which it would be most desirable to

break down the barriers, in order to allow the influence of the

representatives of religion to extend itself more freely. The young

nobles, and the university students in general, are, in too large a

proportion, imbued with irreligious principles. Various atheistical

writings, those of Feuerbach amongst others, have been translated into

Russian, printed abroad, and furtively introduced into the empire. M.

Herzen, a well-known writer, has published, under the pseudonyme of

Iscander, a work full of talent, but in which come plainly into view the

worst tendencies of our time.[86] In his eyes, life is itself its own

end and cause. Faith in God is the portion of the ignorant crowd, and

atheism, like all the high truths of science, like the differential

calculus and the laws of physics, is the exclusive possession of the

philosophical few. When Robespierre declared atheism aristocratic, he

was right in this sense, for atheism is above the reach of the vulgar;

but when he concluded that atheism was false, he made a great mistake.

This error, which led him to establish the worship of the Supreme Being,

was one of the causes of his fall. When he began to follow in the wake

of the _conservatives_, as a necessary consequence he would lose his

power.[87] The writings of Iscander have exerted a veritable influence

in Russia. M. Herzen appears to have lost much of his repute, by the

exaggerated and outrageous course he has taken in politics; but it is to

be feared that the traces of his action are not altogether effaced.

The Russian Empire has been for a long time, in the eyes of the West,

only an immense garrison; but now for some years past it has been taking

rank among the number of intellectual powers, and nowhere in Europe is

the ascending march of civilization displaying itself by signs so

striking. The summons to liberty of so many millions of men, which has

just been accomplished by the generous initiative of the ruling power,

and with the consent of the nation, testifies that that vast social body

is animated by the spirit of life and of progress. But in the solemn

phase through which she is passing, Russia is exposed to a great danger.

She is running the risk of substituting for a national development,

drawn from the grand springs of human nature, a factitious civilization,

in which would figure together the fashions of Paris, the morals of the

_coulisses_ of the Opera, and the most irreligious doctrines of the

West. May God preserve her!

We have passed in review some of the symptoms of the revival of atheism,

and it is impossible not to acknowledge the gravity of the facts which

we have established. What must especially awaken solicitude is, that the

irreligious manifestations of thought have assumed such a character of

generality, that the sorrowful astonishment which they ought to produce

in us is blunted by habit. Fashionable reviews, (I allude especially to

the French-speaking public), widely-circulated journals which take good

care not to violate propriety, and which could not with impunity offend

the interests or prejudices of the social class from which their

subscribers are recruited, are able to entertain without danger, and

without exciting energetic protestations, the productions of an open, or

scarcely disguised, atheism. Here are ample reasons for thoughtfulness;

but this thoughtfulness must not be mingled with fear. We have to do

with a challenge the very audacity of which inspires me with confidence,

rather than with dread. In fact all the productions of irreligious

philosophy rest on one and the same thought, the common watchword, of

the secularism of the English, of the rationalism of the Italians, of

the positivism of the French, and which may even be recognized, with a

little attention, under the haughty formulas which bear the name of

Hegel. And the thought is this: The earth is enough for us, away with

heaven; man suffices for himself, away with God; reality suffices for

us, away with chimeras! Wisdom consists in contenting ourselves with the

world as it is. It is attempted ridiculously enough to place this wisdom

under the patronage of the luminaries of our age. We are bidden,

forsooth, to see in the negation of the real and living God, a conflict

of progress with routine, of science with a blind tradition, of the

modern mind with superannuated ideas.[88] We know of old this defiance

hurled against the aspirations of the heart, the conscience, and the

reason. We know the destined issue of this ancient revolt of the

intellect against the laws of its own nature. There were atheists in

Palestine in the days when the Psalmist exclaimed, "The fool hath said

in his heart, There is no God."[89] There were atheists at Rome when

Cicero wrote,[90] that the opinion which recognizes gods appeared to him

to come nearest to the resemblance of truth. A poet of the thirteenth

century has expressed in a Latin verse the thoughts which are in vogue

among a great many of our contemporaries: "He dares nothing great, who

believes that there are gods."[91] There were atheists in the

seventeenth century, when Descartes exerted himself to confound them,

and they reckoned themselves the fine spirits of their time.[92] And

who, again, does not know that in the eighteenth century atheism

marched with head aloft, and filled the world with its clamors. The

attempt to do without God has nothing modern about it, it is met with at

all epochs. The means employed now-a-days to attain this end have

nothing new about them. Atheism exhibits itself in history with the

characters of a chronic malady, the outbreaks of which are transient

crises. The moment the negation is blazoned openly, humanity protests.

Why? Because man will never be persuaded to content himself with the

earth, and with what the earth can give him: his nature absolutely

forbids it. When we compare the reality with the desires of our souls,

we can all say with the aged patriarch Jacob: "Few and evil have been

the days of my pilgrimage;"[93] we can all say with Lamartine:

Though all the good desired of man

In one sole heart should overflow,

Death, bounding still his mortal span,

Would turn the cup of joy to woe.[94]

And it is not the heart only which is concerned here; without God man

remains inexplicable to his own reason. The spiritual creature of the

Almighty, free by the act of creation, and capable of falling into

slavery by rebellion,--he understands his nature and his destiny; but it

is in vain that the apostles of matter and the worshippers of humanity

harangue him in turn to explain to him his own existence. Man is too

great to be the child of the dust; man is too miserable to be the divine

summit of the universe. "If he exalts himself, I abase him; if he abases

himself, I exalt him; and I contradict him continually, until he

understands at last that he is an incomprehensible monster."[95]

"The proper study of mankind is man;" and man remains an enigma for man,

if he do not rise to God. So it is that our very nature is a living

protest against atheism, and never allows its triumphs to be either

general, or of long duration. A solid limit is thus set to our

wanderings; and, to the errors of the understanding, as to the tides of

the ocean, the Master of things has said, "Ye shall go no further."

Therefore atheists may become famous, but, destitute of the ray which

renders truly illustrious, humanity refuses them the aureole with which

it encircles the brows of its benefactors. This aureole it reserves for

the sages which lead it to God, for the artists which reveal to it some

of the rays of the immortal light, for all those who remind it of the

titles of its dignity, the pledges of its future, the sacred laws of the

realm of spirits. Humanity desires to live; and to live it must believe;

for it must believe in order to love and to act. Atheism is a crisis in

a disease, a passing swoon over which the vital forces of nature

triumph. Now the vital forces of humanity are neither extinct nor

stupefied in our time. The world of literature is sick, and grievously

sick in some of its departments; but even there again are manifesting

themselves noble and powerful reactions. Then look in other directions.

Contemplate the religious movement of society at large, the wide efforts

making in the domain of active beneficence, the progressive conquests of

civilization, the awakening of conscience on many subjects:--I could

easily instance numerous facts in proof of what I advance, and say to

you:

Know, by these speaking signs, a God to-day

As yesterday the same--the same for aye:

Veiling, revealing, at His sovereign will,

His glory,--and His people guarding still.[96]

Wrestle then against the invasion of deadly doctrines, wrestle and do

not fear. If men rise against God in the name of the modern mind, of the

science of the age, of the progress of civilization, do not suffer

yourselves to be stunned by these clamors. Let the past be to you the

pledge of the future! To make of atheism a novelty, is an error. To make

of it, in a general way, the characteristic of our epoch, is a calumny.

FOOTNOTES:

[40] Xenophon, _Memorab. of Socrates_, Bk. iv. 10.

[41] _La Religion naturelle_. Preface.

[42] Emile Saisset, in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, of March, 1845.

[43] See the _Lettres sur les vérités, les plus importantes de la

révélation_, by Albert de Haller, translated into French by one of his

grandsons. Lausanne, Bridel, 1846.

[44] _La Métaphysique et la Science_, 2 tom. Oct. 1858.

[45] _Notice sur M. Littré_, page 57.

[46] _Paroles de philosophie positive_, page 33.

[47] _Idem_, page 30.

[48] _Paroles de philosophie positive_, page 34.

[49] _Aperçus généraux sur la doctrine positiviste_, par M. de Lombrail,

ancien élève de l'école polytechnique. The author says in his preface:

"Auguste Comte examined this work with the conscientious attention which

he was accustomed to give to the simplest task. He desired by his useful

counsels to render it worthy of publication."

[50] _Revue des Deux Mondes_, of 15th Jan. 1860, page 367.

[51]

Je soupçonne entre nous que vous croyez en Dieu.

N'allez pas dans vos vers en consigner l'aveu;

Craignez le ridicule, et respectez vos maîtres.

Croire en Dieu fut un tort permis à nos ancêtres.

Mais dans notre âge! Allons, il faut vous corriger

_Et suivre votre siècle_, au lieu de le juger.

[52]

Entre ces deux chemins j'hésite et je m'arrête.

Je voudrais à l'écart suivre un plus doux sentier.

Il n'en existe pas, dit une voix secrète:

En présence du Ciel, il faut croire ou nier.

Je le pense, en effet: les âmes tourmentées

Vers l'un et l'autre excès se portent tour à tour;

Mais les indifférents ne sont que des athées;

Ils ne dormiraient plus, s'ils doutaient un seul jour.

[53] See, for example, _La Religion naturelle_, by Jules Simon; _Essai

de philosophie religieuse_, by Emile Saisset; _De la connaissance de

Dieu_, by A. Gratry; _La raison et la christianisme, douze lectures sur

l'existence de Dieu_, by Charles Secrétan; _Essai sur la Providence_, by

Ernest Bersot; _De la Providence_, by M. Damiron; _L'Idée de Dieu_, by

M. Caro; _Théodicée, Etudes sur Dieu, la Création et la Providence_, par

Amédée de Magerie.

[54] See, for example, the _Etudes orientales_ of M. Franck, the

_Bouddha_ of M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire; _L'Histoire de la philosophie

au XVIIIe siécle_, of M. Damiron.

[55] _Philosophie de la liberté_, vol. i. p. 225.

[56] _Toutes ces révoltes de la matière en furie._

[57] _Revue des Deux Mondes_, April, 1850.

[58] _Qu'est-ce la religion?_ page 586 of the translation of Ewerbeck.

[59] _Revue des Deux Mondes_ of 15th April, 1850, p. 288.

[60] General Report addressed to the _Conseil d'Etat_ of Neuchâtel on

the secret German propaganda, and on the clubs of Young Germany in

Switzerland, by Lardy, Doctor of law. Neuchâtel, 1845.

[61] _Pourvu qu'on le délivre d'une vertu bourgeoise et d'une morale

d'honnêtes négociants_. Blätter der Gegenwart für sociales Leben.

[62] See the _Chroniqueur Suisse_ of 19 Jan. 1865.

[63] April, 1850, p. 292.

[64] _Force et Matière_, by Louis Büchner, Doctor in medicine:

translated into French from the seventh edition of the German work, by

Gamper, Leipzig, 1863.

[65] My object is to point out the atheistical systems which are being

produced in various parts of Europe, and not to estimate, in a general

way, the tendency of contemporary philosophies. The reader, who would

understand the position occupied by materialism in relation to German

thought in general, may consult with advantage, _Le Matérialisme

contemporain_, by Paul Janet, Paris, 1864; and the review of this work

by M. Reichlin-Meldegg (_Zeitschrift für Philosophie_,

Sechsundvierzigster Band). A Swiss writer, M. Böhner, has lately

published a learned work on the subject entitled: _Le Matérialisme au

point de vue des sciences naturelles et des progrès de l'esprit humain_,

by Nath. Böhner, member of the _Société helvétique des sciences

naturelles_, translated from the German, by O. Bourrit, 1 vol. 8vo.

(_Genève, imprimerie Fick_), 1861.

[66]

... Ces enfants de l'effroi,

Ces beaux riens qu'on adore, et sans savoir pourquoi,

Ces dieux que l'homme a faits et qui n'ont pas fait l'homme.

CYRANO DE BERGERAC.

[67] From outer to inner things, and from inner to higher.

[68] See the Report of Mr. H. Roberts, in the _Comptes rendus du Congrès

international de bienfaisance de Londres_, vol. ii. page 95, and the

23rd _Bulletin de la Société genevoise d'utilité publique_, 1863.

[69] Par son respect pour le jour du Dimanche.

[70] revêtit.

[71] _La Paix méditations historiques et religieuses_, par A. Gratry,

prêtre de l'Oratoire.--Septième méditation: l'Angleterre.

[72] _The Constitution of Man_, by G. Combe. The popular edition was

printed at the expense of Mr. Henderson.

[73] _Infidelity: its aspects, causes, and agencies_, by Thomas Pearson.

People's edition, 1854, page 263.

[74] _Auguste Comte et la Philosophie positive_, par E. Littré, page

276.

[75] "Positivism, within the last quarter of a century, has become an

active, and even fashionable mode of thought, and nowhere more so than

amongst certain literary and intellectual circles in England." _The

Christ of the Gospels and the Christ of modern Criticism, Lectures on M.

Renan's 'Vie de Jésus,'_--by John Tulloch, D.D., Principal of the

College of St. Mary in the University of St. Andrew. Macmillan and Co.,

1864.

[76] See Pearson: _Infidelity_, particularly page 316, and _Christianity

and Secularism, the public discussion_--, particularly page 8.

[77]--_dans le siècle_.

[78] Vapereau's _Dictionnaire des contemporains_--Art. HOLYOAKE.

[79] I have had in view here the first numbers of _The Secular World_,

and of _The National Reformer, Secular Advocate_, for 1864.

[80] _The National Reformer_ of 2nd Jan. 1864.

[81] MS. information.

[82] Readers unacquainted with the Italian language will find a

compendious exposition of M. Conti's philosophy, in a small volume

published, in 1863, under the title of _Le Camposanto de Pise ou le

Scepticisme_. (Paris, librairies Joël Cherbuliez et Auguste Durand; I

vol. in-18.)

[83] Such is the testimony rendered to him by M. Aug. Conti in his work,

_La Philosophie italienne_. (Paris, Joël Cherbuliez et Auguste Durand;

one small vol. 18mo.)

[84] _Le Rationalisme_ (in French), published with an introduction, by

M. D. Bancel, Brussels, 1858, page 27.

[85] The learned author appears to intimate that the distractions of the

Papacy, consequent on its political struggles for temporal power, hinder

the salutary influence which it might otherwise exercise in the

suppression of evil doctrines. The Translator feels it due to himself to

state here, once for all, that he has no sympathy whatever with such a

view of the influence of the Papacy. On the contrary, he is disposed to

attribute to the Church of Rome most of the evils which afflict, not

Italy only, but all the countries over which she has any power. Perhaps,

having "felt the weight of too much liberty" in his own Church, the

excellent author, fundamentally sound in his own views of Christian

doctrine, as is proved abundantly by his writings, has been led by a

natural reaction to give too much weight to the opposite principle of

authority. The concluding pages of his former work, _La Vie Eternelle_,

indicate a mind too painfully and sensitively averse to all controversy

with a corrupt Church, in consideration of the acknowledged excellences

of many of her individual members,--her Pascals, Fénélons, Martin Boos,

Girards, Gratrys, and Lacordaires.--_Translator_.

[86] _De l'autre rive_ (in Russian).

[87] _De l'autre rive_. v. Consolatio.--This chapter is a dialogue

between a lady and a doctor. I have considered the doctor as expressing

the thoughts of the writer. The form of dialogue, however, always allows

an author to express his thoughts, while declining, if need be, the

responsibility of them.

[88] _Le Rationalisme_, par Ausonio Franchi, page 19.--_Force et

matière_, par le docteur Büchner, page 262.--_Paroles de philosophie

positive_, par Littré, page 36.--_La Métaphysique et la Science_, par

Vacherot, page xiv. (Première edition.)

[89] Ps. xiv. 1.

[90] De Naturâ Deorum.

[91] Nil audet magnum qui putat esse Deos.

[92] See Bossuet: _Sermon sur la dignité de la religion_.

[93] Gen. xlvii. 9.

[94]

Quand tous les biens que l'homme envie

Déborderaient dans un seul coeur,

La mort seule au bout de la vie

Fait un supplice du bonheur.

[95] Pascal.

[96]

Reconnaissez, _Messieurs_, à ces traits éclatants,

Un Dieu tel aujourd'hui qu'il fut dans tous les temps.

Il sait, quand il lui plaît, faire éclater sa gloire,

Et son peuple est toujours présent à sa mémoire.

LECTURE IV.

_NATURE._

(At Geneva, 27th Nov. 1863.--At Lausanne, 25th Jan. 1864.)

GENTLEMEN,

The thoughts of man are numberless; and still, in their indefinite

variety, they never relate but to one or another of these three objects:

nature, or the world of material substances, which are revealed to our

senses; created spirits, similar or superior to that spirit which is

ourselves; and finally God, the Infinite Being, the universal Creator.

Therefore there are two sorts of atheism, and there are only two. The

mind stops at nature, and endeavors to find in material substances the

universal principle of existence; or, rising above nature, the mind

stops at humanity, without ascending to the Infinite Mind, to the

Creator. We have seen how clearly these two doctrines appear in

contemporary literature. We have now to enter upon the examination of

them, and this will afford us matter for two lectures.

The word nature has various meanings; we employ it here to designate

matter, and the forces which set it in motion, those forces being

conceived as blind and fatal, in opposition to the conscious and free

force which constitutes mind. Matter and the laws of motion are the

object of mechanics, of chemistry, and of physics. Do these sciences

suffice for resolving the universal enigma? Such is precisely the

question which offers itself to our examination.

Let us first of all determine what, in presence of the spectacle of the

universe, is the natural movement of human thought, when human thought

possesses the idea of God. I open a book trivial enough in its form, but

occasionally profound in its contents: the _Journey round my room_, of

Xavier de Maistre. The author is relating how he had undertaken to make

an artificial dove which was to sustain itself in the air by means of an

ingenious mechanism. I read:

"I had wrought unceasingly at its construction for more than three

months. The day was come for the trial. I placed it on the edge of a

table, after having carefully closed the door, in order to keep the

discovery secret, and to give my friends a pleasing surprise. A thread

held the mechanism motionless. Who can conceive the palpitations of my

heart, and the agonies of my self-love, when I brought the scissors near

to cut the fatal bond?--Zest!--the spring of the dove starts, and begins

to unroll itself with a noise. I lift my eyes to see the bird pass; but,

after making a few turns over and over, it falls, and goes off to hide

itself under the table. Rosine (my dog), who was sleeping there, moves

ruefully away. Rosine, who never sees a chicken, or a pigeon, or the

smallest bird, without attacking and pursuing it, did not deign even to

look at my dove which was floundering on the floor. This gave the

finishing stroke to my self-esteem. I went to take an airing on the

ramparts.

"I was walking up and down, sad and out of spirits as one always is

after a great hope disappointed, when, raising my eyes, I perceived a

flight of cranes passing over my head. I stopped to have a good look at

them. They were advancing in triangular order, like the English column

at the battle of Fontenoy. I saw them traverse the sky from cloud to

cloud.--Ah! how well they fly, said I to myself. With what assurance

they seem to glide along the viewless path which they follow.--Shall I

confess it? alas! may I be forgiven! the horrible feeling of envy for

once, once only, entered my heart, and it was for the cranes. I pursued

them, with jealous gaze, to the boundaries of the horizon. For a long

while afterwards, motionless in the midst of the crowd which was moving

about me, I kept observing the rapid movement of the swallows, and I was

astonished to see them suspended in the air, just as if I had never

before seen that phenomenon. A feeling of profound admiration, unknown

to me till then, lighted up my soul. I seemed to myself to be looking

upon nature for the first time. I heard with surprise the buzzing of the

flies, the song of the birds, and that mysterious and confused noise of

the living creation which involuntarily celebrates its Author. Ineffable

concert, to which man alone has the sublime privilege of adding the

accents of gratitude! Who is the author of this brilliant mechanism? I

exclaimed in the transport which animated me. Who is He that, opening

his creative hand, let fly the first swallow into the air? It is He who

gave commandment to these trees to come forth from the ground, and to

lift their branches toward the sky!"

Here is a charming page, and containing, though apparently trivial in

style, a good and sound philosophy. Let us translate this delightful

description into the heavier language of science.

The intellect is one of the things with which we are best acquainted;

logic is the science of thought, and logic is perhaps, among all the

sciences, the one best settled on its bases. The intellect discovers

itself to us in the exercise of our activity. We pursue an object, we

combine the means for attaining it, and it is the intellect which

operates this combination. What happens if we compare the results of our

activity with the results of the power manifested in the world? When we

consider in their vast _ensemble_ the means of which nature disposes,

when we remark the infinite number of the relations of things, the

marvellous harmony of which universal life is the produce, we are

dazzled by the splendor of a wisdom which surpasses our own as much as

boundless space surpasses the imperceptible spot which we occupy upon

the earth. Think of this: the science of nature is so vast that the

least of its departments suffices to absorb one human lifetime. All our

sciences are only in their very beginning; they are spelling out the

first lines of an immense book. The elements of the universe are

numberless; and yet, notwithstanding, all hangs together; all things are

linked one to another in the closest connection. The _savants_ therefore

find themselves in a strange embarrassment. They are obliged to

circumscribe more and more the field of their researches, on pain of

losing themselves in an endless study; and, on the other hand, in

proportion as science advances, the mutual relation of all its branches

becomes so manifest that it is ever more and more clearly seen that, in

order to know any one thing thoroughly, it would be necessary to know

all. It needs not that we seek very high or very far away for occasions

of astonishment: the least of the objects which nature presents to our

view contains abysses of wisdom.

The acquired results of science appear simple through the effect of

habit. The sun rises every day; who is still surprised at its rising?

The solar system has been known a long while; it is taught in the

humblest schools, and no longer surprises any one. But those who found

out, after long efforts, what we learn without trouble, the discoverers,

reckoned their discoveries very surprising. Kepler, one of the founders

of modern astronomy, in the book to which he consigned his immortal

discoveries, exclaims:[97] "The wisdom of the Lord is infinite, as are

also His glory and His power. Ye heavens! sing His praises. Sun, moon,

and planets, glorify Him in your ineffable language! Praise Him,

celestial harmonies, and all ye who can comprehend them! And thou, my

soul, praise thy Creator! It is by Him, and in Him, that all exists.

What we know not is contained in Him as well as our vain science. To Him

be praise, honor, and glory for ever and ever!" These words, Gentlemen,

have not been copied from a book of the Church; they are read in a work

which, as all allow, is one of the foundations of modern science.

I pass on to another example, and I continue to keep you in good and

high company. Newton set forth his discoveries in a large volume all

bristling with figures and calculations.[98] The work of the

mathematician ended, the author rises, by the consideration of the

mutual interchange of the light of all the stars, to the idea of the

unity of the creation; then he adds, and it is the conclusion of his

entire work: "The Master of the heavens governs all things, not as being

the soul of the world, but as being the Sovereign of the universe. It is

on account of His sovereignty that we call Him the Sovereign God. He

governs all things, those which are, and those which may be. He is the

one God, and the same God, everywhere and always. We admire Him because

of His perfections, we reverence and adore Him because of His

sovereignty. A God without sovereignty, without providence, and without

object in His works, would be only destiny or nature. Now, from a blind

metaphysical necessity, everywhere and always the same, could arise no

variety; all that diversity of created things according to places and

times (which constitutes the order and life of the universe) could only

have been produced by the thought and will of a Being who is _the

Being_, existing by Himself, and necessarily."

Here, Sirs, are noble thoughts, expressed in noble style. I recommend

you to read throughout the pages from which I have quoted a few

fragments. Let us now analyze the ideas of this great astronomer as thus

expounded. We may note these three affirmations:

1. The universe displays an admirable order which reveals the wisdom of

the Power which governs it.

2. The universe lives; it is not fixed, and its variations suppose an

intelligent Power which directs it.

3. The variable existence of the universe shows that it is not

necessary; it must have its cause in a Being who is _the_ Being,

necessarily, by His proper nature.

Such are the views of Newton. Examine this course of thought, and see if

it is not natural. Observation reveals to us facts. Facts in themselves,

isolated facts, are nothing for the mind; but in the facts of nature,

human reason discovers an order, and in that order it recognizes its own

proper laws. To keep within the domain of astronomy--there is harmony

between our mind and the course of the stars. If you have any doubt

about this, I appeal to the almanac. We there find it stated that in

such a month, on such a day, at such an hour, there will be an eclipse

of the sun or of the moon. How comes the editor of the almanac to know

that? He has learnt it from the savants who have succeeded in explaining

the phenomena of the skies. The savant therefore can in his study meet

with the intelligence which directs the universe. If he makes no mistake

in his calculations, the eclipse begins at the precise hour which he has

indicated. If the eclipse did not take place at the instant foreseen, no

one would suspect Nature of not following the course prescribed by the

directing intelligence; the inference would be that there had been a

fault in observation, or an error of figures on the part of the

astronomer.

When science, then, does its part well, the mind of man encounters

another mind which is governing the world and maintaining it in order.

The special science of nature stops there, as we shall explain further

on; but this is not all that man requires, when he makes use of all his

faculties. All is passing and changing in the domain of experience; and

reason seeks instinctively the cause of changeable facts in an

unchangeable Being, the cause of transient phenomena in an eternal

Being. Nature, therefore, does not suffice to account to us for itself.

It demands a power to direct it, an intelligence to regulate it; an

absolute eternal Being as its cause. This is what reason imperatively

requires; and when we possess the idea of God, nature reveals to us His

power and His wisdom.

This is an old argument, and they call it commonplace. It is

commonplace, in fact; it has appeared over and over again in the

discourses of Socrates, in the writings of Galen, of Kepler, of Newton,

of Linnæus. Yes, this argument has fallen so low as to be public

property, if we can say that truth falls when it shines with a splendor

vivid enough to enlighten the masses. If I desired to bring together

here the testimony of all the savants who have seen God in nature, the

song of all the poets who have celebrated the glory of the Eternal as

manifested by the creation, the enumeration would be long, and I should

soon tire out your patience. You can understand therefore that if there

are, as the misanthrope Rousseau says there are, philosophers who hold

in such contempt vulgar opinions that they prefer error of their own

discovery to truth found out by other people, then the ancient argument,

which infers the wisdom of the Creator from the order of the creation,

must be the object of but small esteem with them. Still I for my part

take this old argument for a good one, and I mean to defend it.

Nature is verily and indeed a marvel placed before the observation of

our minds. The growth of a blade of grass, the habits of an ant, contain

for an attentive observer prodigies of wisdom. A drop of dew reflecting

the beams of morning, the play of light among the leaves of a tree,

reveal to the poet and the artist treasures of poetry. But too often,

blinded by habit, we are unable to see; and when our mind is asleep, it

seems to us that the universe slumbers. A sudden flash of light can

sometimes arouse us from this lethargy. If science all at once delivers

up to us some one of those grand laws which reveal in thousands of

phenomena the traces of one and the same mind, the astonishment of our

intellect excites in our soul an emotion of adoration. When the first

rays of morning light up with a pure brightness the lofty summits of our

Alps; when the sun at his setting stretches a path of fire along the

waters of our lake, who does not feel impelled to render glory to the

supreme Artist? When dark cold fogs rest upon our valleys at the decline

of autumn, it only needs sometimes to climb the mountain-side, in order

to issue all at once from the gloomy region, and see the chain of high

peaks, resplendent with light, mark themselves out upon a sky of

incomparable blue. Often have I given myself the delight of this grand

spectacle, and always at such a time my heart has uttered spontaneously

from its depths that hymn of adoration:

Tout l'univers est plein de sa magnificence.

Qu'on l'adore, ce Dieu, qu'on l'invoque à jamais![99]

Such is, in the presence of nature, the spontaneous movement of the

heart and of the reason. But a false wisdom obscures these clear

verities by clouds of sophisms. When your heart feels impelled to render

glory to God, there is danger lest importunate thoughts rise in your

mind and counteract the impulse of your adoration. Perhaps you have

heard it said, perhaps you have read, that the accents of spiritual

song, those echoes, growing ever weaker, of by-gone ages, are no longer

heard by a mind enlightened by modern science. I should wish to deliver

you from this painful doubt. I should wish to protect you from the

fascinations of a false science. I should wish that in the view of

nature, even those who have as yet no wish to adore, with St. Paul, Him

whose invisible perfections are clearly seen when we contemplate His

works, may at least feel themselves free to admire, with Socrates, "the

supreme God who maintains the works of creation in the flower of youth

and in a vigor ever new." Let us examine a few of the prejudices which

it is sought to disseminate, in order to deprive of their force the

reasonings of Newton, and to turn us from the opinions of Kepler.

It is said that science leads away from God, and that faith continues to

be the lot only of the ignorant. Listen on this head first of all to the

Italian Franchi. "The class of society in which infidels and sceptics

especially abound is that of savants and men of letters,--men, in short,

who have gone through studies, in the course of which they have

certainly become acquainted with the famous demonstrations of the

existence of God. But no sooner have they examined them with their own

eyes, and submitted them to the criterion of their own judgment, than

these demonstrations no longer demonstrate anything; these reasonings

turn out to be only paralogisms."[100] Here we have the thesis in its

general form: to become an infidel or a sceptic, it is enough to be a

well educated man. The German Büchner will now show us the application

of this notion to the special study of nature. "At this day, our hardest

laborers in the sciences, our most indefatigable students of nature,

profess materialistic sentiments."[101] The same tendencies are often

manifested among French writers. The author of a recent astronomical

treatise, for example, draws a veil of deceitful words over the profound

faith of Kepler, and takes evident pleasure in throwing into relief the

tokens of sympathy bestowed unfortunately by the learned Laplace upon

atheism.[102] Here then we have open attempts to found a prejudice

against religion on the authority of science; and these attempts disturb

the minds of not a few. I ask two questions on this head. Is it true, in

fact, that modern naturalists are generally irreligious? Is it possible

that the science of nature, rightly considered, should lead to

atheism?[103]

Let us begin with the question of fact; and first of all let us settle

clearly the bearing and object of this discussion. I wish to destroy a

prejudice, and not to create one. I am not proposing to you to take the

votes of savants, in order to know whether God exists. No. Though all

the universities in Europe should unite to vote it dark at mid-day, I

should not cease on that account to believe in the sun, and that,

Gentlemen, in common with you all, and with the mass of my fellow-men. I

have instituted a sort of inquiry in order to ascertain whether modern

naturalists have in general been led to atheistical sentiments, as some

would have us believe. In appealing to the recollections of my own

earlier studies and subsequent reading, I have marked the names of the

men best known in the various sciences, and I have inquired what

religious opinions they may have publicly manifested. I will now give

you briefly the result of my labor.

I have left astronomy out of the question, considering that,

notwithstanding the great notoriety of Laplace, we have in Kepler and

Newton a weight of authority sufficient to counterbalance that which it

is desired to connect with his name. Descending to the earth, we

encounter first of all the general science of our globe, or geography.

In this order of studies a German, Ritter, enjoys an incontestable

preeminence. He is called, even in France, the "creator of scientific

geography." Scientific geography rests for support on nearly all the

sciences: it proceeds from the general results of chemistry, physics,

and geology. Had then the vast knowledge of Ritter turned him away from

God? I had read somewhere[104] that he was one of those savants who have

best realized the union of science and faith. One of my friends who was

personally acquainted with him has described him to me, not only as a

man who adored the Creator in the view of the creation, but as an

amiable and zealous Christian, who exerted himself to communicate to

others his own convictions.

From the general study of the globe, let us pass to that of the

organized beings which people its surface. Does botany teach the human

mind to dispense with God? Let us listen to Linnæus. I open the _System

of Nature_,[105] and on the reverse of the title-page I read: "O Lord,

how manifold are Thy works! in wisdom hast Thou made them all: the earth

is full of Thy riches."[106] I turn over a few leaves, and I meet with a

table which comprises, under the title, _Empire of Nature_, the general

classification of beings. The commencement is as follows: "Eternal God,

all-wise and almighty! I have seen Him as it were pass before me, and I

remained confounded. I have discovered some traces of His footsteps in

the works of the creation; and in those works, even in the least, even

in those which seem most insignificant, what might! what wisdom! what

inexplicable perfection!--If thou call Him _Destiny_, thou art not

mistaken, it is He upon whom all depends. If thou call Him _Nature_,

thou art not mistaken, it is He from whom all takes its origin. If thou

call Him _Providence_, thou speakest truly; it is by His counsel that

the universe subsists." Another great naturalist, George Cuvier, takes

care to point out that "Linnæus used to seize with marked pleasure the

numerous occasions which natural history offered him of making known the

wisdom of Providence."[107] Thus modern botany was founded in a spirit

of piety. Has it, at a later period, made any discoveries calculated to

efface from the life of vegetables the marks of Divine intelligence?

Allow me to introduce here a personal _souvenir_. I received lessons in

my youth from an old man, who, having once been the teacher of De

Candolle, remained his friend.[108] By a rather strange academical

arrangement, M. Vaucher found himself set to teach us--not botany, for

which he possessed both taste and genius,[109] but a science of which he

knew but little, and which he liked still less. So it came to pass that

a good part of the hour of lecture was often filled up with familiar

conversations. These conversations took us far away from church history,

which we were supposed to be learning. The misplaced botanist reverted,

by a natural impulse, to his much-loved science; and I have seen him

shed tears of tender emotion, in his Professor's chair, as he spoke to

us of the God who made the primrose of the spring, and concealed the

violet under the hedge by the wayside. Therefore is the recollection of

that old man not only living in my memory, but also dear to my heart.

Still he was a savant, an enthusiastic naturalist; and, in the broad

light of the nineteenth century, he felt and spoke like Linnæus.

Let us pass to the study of animals. I had the wish, some years ago, to

procure the best of modern treatises upon physiology. I was directed to

the work of Professor Müller, of Berlin. This book has not lost its

value,--for, this very morning, a student of our faculty of sciences

came to me to borrow it, by the advice of his masters. Müller was a

great physiologist, and he made an open profession of the Christian

religion. Have we not the right to conclude that he believed in God? In

France, I could cite more than one name in support of my thesis; I

confine myself to a single fact. The attention of the scientific world

has very recently been occupied with the discoveries of M. Pasteur. M.

Pasteur has ascertained that the decomposition of organized bodies,

after death, is effected by the action of small animals almost

imperceptible, the germs of which the larger animals carry in

themselves, as living preparatives for their interment. The design of

Providence reveals itself to his understanding, and he writes: "The

immediate elements of living bodies would be in a manner indestructible,

if from the beings which God has created were taken away the smallest,

and, in appearance, the most useless. Life would thus become impossible,

because the return to the atmosphere and to the mineral kingdom of all

that has ceased to live would be all at once suspended."[110] In other

words: I have studied facts hitherto incompletely observed, and my study

has revealed to me a new manifestation of that Divine wisdom of which

the universe bears the impression.

England possesses a naturalist of the first order, whom his

fellow-countrymen take a pleasure in comparing to George

Cuvier--Professor Owen. This savant lectured, a few months ago, before a

numerous auditory, on the relations of religion and natural

science.[111] He is fully possessed of all the information which the

times afford,--is not ignorant of modern discoveries,--is, in fact, one

of the princes of contemporary science. Well, Gentlemen, Mr. Owen

repeats, with reference to animals, what Newton was led to say by his

contemplation of the heavens, and Linnæus by his study of the plants. He

is not afraid to admire with Galen the marvellous wisdom which presided

over the organization of living bodies. His discourse is entitled, _The

Power of God in His Animal Creation_. The more we understand, he says,

the more we admire, the more we adore. He pauses in view of the

marvellous productions of nature, beside which the most delicate works

of human industry appear, beneath the microscope, but coarse, rough

hewings; he compares our most highly finished machines to the living

machines made by the hand of God, and infers that, not to discern

intelligence in the relation of means to ends, necessarily implies in

the mind a defect similar to that of eyes which are unable to

distinguish colors. Mr. Owen declares that such a state of mind and

feeling in a naturalist may provoke blame from some and pity from

others, and remains for him, so far as he is concerned, absolutely

incomprehensible.

Again, do the most learned chemists find in the study of the elements of

matter a revelation of atheism? M. Liebig, I have been told, is one of

the first chemists of our epoch. He believed he had discovered an

application of chemistry to agriculture, the effect of which would be to

furnish a remedy to the exhaustion of the soil. His discovery turned out

false, and a more attentive study of his subject led him to ascertain

that the object which he was pursuing was actually realized by Divine

Providence in a way of which he had had no suspicion. The following is

his own account of this, published in 1862: "After having submitted all

the facts to a new and very searching examination, I discovered the

cause of my error. I had sinned against the wisdom of the Creator, and I

had received my just punishment. I was wishing to perfect His work, and,

in my blindness, I thought that in the admirable chain of laws which

preside over life at the surface of the earth, and maintain it ever in

freshness, there was wanting a link which I, feeble and impotent worm,

was to supply. Provision had been made for this beforehand, but in a way

so wonderful, that the possibility of such a law had not so much as

dawned upon the human understanding."[112] Here is a confession very

noble in its humility; and to this chemist, who thus renders glory to

God, no one of his colleagues could say: "If you had as much science as

we, you would say no more about the wisdom of the Creator."

Let us pass on to natural philosophers. I have taken a special interest

in this part of my inquiry, because I had read in the productions of a

literary man of Paris, that modern physics have placed those at fault

who defend the doctrine of the living and true God. I inquired

accordingly of a man, very well able to give me the information, whether

there exists in Europe a natural philosopher holding a position of quite

exceptional distinction. I received for reply: "You may say boldly that,

by the unanimous consent of men of science, Mr. Faraday, in regard both

to the greatness and range of his discoveries, is the first natural

philosopher living." After having thus made myself sure, therefore, on

this point, I took the liberty of writing to Mr. Faraday the following

letter:

"GENEVA, 30th October, 1863.

"SIR,

"I have the intention of commencing shortly, at Geneva, and for an

auditory of men, a course of lectures designed to combat the

manifestations of contemporary atheism. To this deplorable error I

desire to oppose faith in God, as it has been given to the world by

the Gospel, faith in the Heavenly Father.

"One of my lectures will be specially devoted to the removal of

prejudices against religion which have their origin in natural

science. It is said very often, and very boldly, that modern

physics and modern chemistry demonstrate the unfounded character of

religious beliefs. These theses are maintained at Geneva as

elsewhere. I should wish to reply that natural science does not of

itself turn men from God, and that without being able to give

faith, it confirms the faith of those who believe: this I should

wish to establish by citing names invested, in science, with an

incontestable and solid renown. Will you, Sir, authorize me to make

use of your name?"

Mr. Faraday, in reply, sent me the following letter, dated 6th Nov.

1863.

"SIR,

...."You have a full right to make use of my name: for although I

generally avoid mixing up things sacred and things profane, I have,

on one occasion, written and published a passage which accords to

you this right, and which I maintain. I send you a copy of it. I

hope you will find nothing in any other part of my researches, to

contradict or weaken in any way whatever the sense of this passage.

"I beg you to transmit my best remembrances to my friend M. de la

Rive...."

The passage thus indicated establishes a line of demarcation, very

strongly (perhaps too strongly) drawn between researches of the reason

and the domain of religious truth, and contains a profession of positive

faith in Revelation. The author affirms that he has never recognized any

incompatibility between science and faith, and makes the following

declaration: "Even in earthly matters I reckon that 'the invisible

things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being

understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and

Godhead.'"

A literary man of Paris declares to us that natural science leads away

from God: one of the first savants of our time informs us that the

scientific contemplation of nature renders the wisdom of God manifest.

The question is one of fact. To whom shall we give our confidence? For

my part, since it is natural philosophy which is in question, I rank

myself on the side of the Natural Philosopher.

We will here terminate this review. It is time, however, which fails us,

not subject-matter, for continuing it. You may have noticed that the

name of no one of the savants of Switzerland figures in this inquiry.

Nevertheless our country would have furnished a rich mine for my

purpose. It contains (and it is one of its best privileges) a goodly

number of savants, whom the observation of the facts of matter have not

caused to forget the claims of mind, and who know how to raise their

souls to the Author of the marvels which they study. You will understand

therefore that it has not been from anxiety for my cause, but from a

motive of discretion, that I have forborne to bring into this discussion

the names of men in whom we have a near interest, and many of whom

perhaps are present in this assembly. I will take advantage of Mr.

Faraday's letter to make a single exception, by naming M. de la Rive.

More than once, and in public, we have heard him distinctly point out

the place occupied by the sciences of mind in relation to the natural

sciences, and render glory to the Creator. And I do not think that any

one, in Switzerland or elsewhere, can claim to speak with disdain, in

the name of the physical sciences, of the religious convictions boldly

professed by our learned fellow-countryman.[113]

Recollect, Gentlemen, that I have not undertaken to prove the existence

of God, by making appeal to the authority of men of science. All I have

sought to do has been to destroy a prejudice. They tell us, and scream

it at us, that the best naturalists become atheists. This is not true,

as I think I have shown. There do exist atheists who cultivate the

natural sciences,--no doubt of the fact. But even though half the whole

number of naturalists were atheists, inasmuch as other naturalists, and

those some of the greatest, find in their studies new motives to

adoration, we are forced to the conclusion, that the true cause why

these savants repudiate religion has nothing to do with their science.

We shall come to be more strongly confirmed in this opinion, if we pass

now from the question of fact to considerations of sound reason.

The weakness of the human mind leads it to forget the facts with which

it is not occupied. All special culture of the intellect risks

consequently the paralyzing a part of our faculties. Hegel, lost in

abstractions, persuades himself that he will be able to construct by

pure reasoning the history of nature and that of the human race. A

geometrician, who no longer saw in the world anything but theorems and

demonstrations, asked, after the representation of a dramatic

masterpiece, "And what does that prove?" A physiologist absorbed in the

study of sensible phenomena says: "Where is that soul they talk of? I

have never seen it." These are phenomena of the same order. This

infirmity of the mind, which leads certain savants to think that the

ordinary subject of their studies is everything, must not be imputed to

science. A man accustomed to the exclusive observation of material

phenomena, may become a materialist by the effect of his mental habits,

and this really happens, in fact, in too many instances; but the study

in itself is not responsible for this result. Let us endeavor to prove

this, by clearly defining the object of the natural sciences.

When the matter of a phenomenon is given to us, the understanding

proposes to itself three questions:

1. How does the fact manifest itself? what is the mode of its existence?

The answer gives us the law of the phenomenon. Bodies fall to the ground

at a determined rate of speed: the determination of this rate is the law

of their fall.

2. What is the real effective power which produces the phenomenon? This

is the inquiry after the cause.

3. What is the intention which presided at the production of the

phenomenon? This is the search after the object, which philosophers call

the final cause.

What we call understanding or explaining a fact, is answering these

three questions; it is finding the law, the cause, the end. This

analysis was made by Aristotle, and seems to have been well made. The

science of nature, as it is conceived by the moderns, does not undertake

to satisfy entirely the desires of the human mind. It confines itself

to the first question; it classes phenomena; it then seeks their law;

arrived at this, it stops. The cause and design of things remain out of

the sphere of its investigations; the question of God therefore

continues foreign to it.

A story is told that when Buonaparte expressed his astonishment that the

Marquis de la Place could have written a large book on the system of the

universe, without making any mention of the Creator, the learned

astronomer replied to his sovereign: "Sire, I had no need of that

hypothesis." The answer is admissible if we regard only the science of

nature. An astronomer has no need of God in order to follow out the

series of his calculations, and compare their results with the course of

the stars; a chemist has no need of God in order to ascertain the simple

elements combined in composite bodies; a natural philosopher has no need

of God in order to determine the laws of waves of sound or of electric

currents. The science of nature does not demonstrate the existence of

God; still less can it deny His existence. To deny God, it would be

necessary for science to demonstrate that there is no order, and

consequently no cause of the order to discover; for when we point out

the harmony of the universe, we manifestly prepare a basis for the

argument which, from the intelligence recognized in the phenomena, will

infer the intelligence of the Power which governs them. To prove that

there is no order would be to prove that there is no science. For any

one who well understands the value of terms, the words _atheistical

science_ contain a contradiction; they signify science which proves that

there is no science.

Such, Gentlemen, is the real state of the question. Our savants, when

they remain faithful to their method, seek to determine the laws of

phenomena, and do not occupy themselves either with the First Cause of

nature, or with its general object; they leave the question of God on

one side. Whence come then the negations of naturalists? They arise in

this way: those savants who succeed in strictly confining themselves

within the limits of their science are rare exceptions. Almost always

the _man_ introduces his thoughts into the work of the savant, and the

results of his study appear to him religious or irreligious, according

to his views of religion. Newton ends his book with a hymn to the

Creator; but it is not the _mathematical principles_ of nature which

have revealed to him the Sovereign God. He perceives the rays of His

glory because he believes in Him. In the same way, the atheist thinks

that his researches disprove the existence of God, because God is veiled

from his soul. In both cases it is a doctrine foreign to pure natural

science which gives a color to its results. Self-deception is very

common in this matter, and in both directions. The religious mind does

not understand how it is possible to contemplate the universe, and not

see inscribed upon it distinctly the name of its Author; and the

intrusion of atheism into the sciences of observation is veiled beneath

confusions of ideas which it is of importance for us to dissipate.

Modern science, as we have said, stops at laws, without troubling itself

with causes. The laws which determine the series of facts as they offer

themselves to observation express the mode of the action of the causes.

There are here two ideas absolutely distinct: the power which acts, and

the manner in which it acts. If the naturalist thinks that his science

is everything, he must conclude that we can know nothing beyond the

laws, and that an insuperable ignorance hides from our view the power of

which they express the action. But he rarely succeeds in keeping this

position, and deceives his reason by confounding the laws which he

discovers with the causes with which his mind is not able to dispense.

He says first of all with Franchi, "the universe is what it is"; this is

the general formula of all the truths of experience; then he adds with

the same author, "it is because it is." This _because_ means nothing, or

means that laws are their own causes. If it is asked, What is the cause

of the motion of the stars? they will give for answer the astronomical

formulæ which express this motion, and will think that they have

explained the phenomena by stating in what way they present themselves

to observation. This is a curious example of that confusion of ideas

which opens the door to atheism.

An English naturalist, Mr. Darwin, has shown that in the successive life

of animal generations, the favorable variations which are produced in

the organization of a being are transmitted to its descendants and

insure the perpetuity of its race, while the unpropitious variations

disappear because they entail the destruction of the races in which they

are produced. He tells us: "This preservation of favorable variations

and the rejection of injurious variations, I call Natural

Selection."[114] What does the author understand by law? He answers:

"the series of facts as it is known to us."[115] Here we have the true

definition of law: it is the simple expression of the series of the

facts; the cause remains to be sought for. I open the book in another

part. The author is speaking of the eye; and his doctrine is that the

eye of the eagle was formed by the slow transformations of an extremely

simple visual apparatus. There will have been then, in the development

of animal existence, first of all a rudimentary eye, then an eye

moderately well formed, and then the eye of the eagle, because the

favorable modifications of the organ of sight will have been preserved

and increased in the course of ages. Such is the series of facts, such

is the law; suppose we grant it. What is the cause? The optician makes

our spectacles; who made the eye of the eagle, by directing the slow

transformations which at length produced it? Let us listen to the

author: "There exists an intelligent power, and that intelligent power

is natural selection, constantly on the watch for every alteration

accidentally produced in the transparent layers, in order carefully to

choose such of those alterations as may tend to produce a more distinct

image.... Natural selection will choose with infallible skill each new

improvement effected."[116] Natural selection is a law; a law is the

series of facts; it seems that we must seek for the power which directs

this series of facts; but, lo, the series of facts itself is transformed

into a power--into an intelligent power--into a power which chooses with

infallible skill! The confusion of ideas is complete. The mind is on a

wrong scent; it concludes that the law explains everything, and has

itself no need of explanation. The idea of the cause disappears, and, as

Auguste Comte expresses it, "science conducts God with honor to its

frontiers, thanking Him for His provisional services."[117] This is not

perhaps the idea of Mr. Darwin, but it is at any rate the idea of some

of his disciples, as we shall see by-and-by.

Thus the idea of the cause is kept out of sight. Let us now see the fate

to which are consigned those other requirements of the reason--the

eternal and the infinite. I take up Dr. Büchner's book, and I read: "We

are incapable of forming an idea, even approximately, of the _eternal_

and the _infinite_, because our mind, shut up within the limits of the

senses, in what regards space and time, is quite unable to pass these

bounds so as to rise to the height of these ideas." I follow the text,

and thirteen lines further on, in the same page, I read, "Therefore

matter and space must be eternal."[118] Observe well the use which this

writer makes of the great ideas of the reason. Is it desired to employ

them to prove the existence of God? He will have nothing to do with

them. Is the object in question to deny God's existence? He makes use of

them; and all in the same page. This is coarse work, no doubt, and Dr.

Büchner damages his cause; but, under forms, often more subtle and more

intelligent, the same sophism turns up in all systems of

materialism.[119] It is affirmed that we have no real idea of the

infinite, and it is sought at the same time to beguile the need which

reason feels of this idea by applying it to matter.

Pray do not suppose that I am here attacking the natural sciences, in

the interest of metaphysics. I am not attacking but defending them. I am

endeavoring, as far as in me lies, to avenge them from the outrages

which are offered to them by materialism, while it seeks to cover with

their noble mantle its own shameful nakedness. Naturalists on the one

hand, and theologians and philosophers on the other, are too often at

war. They are men, and as nothing human is foreign to them, they are not

unacquainted either with proud prepossessions, or with jealous

rivalries, or with the miserable struggles of envy: with these things

the passions are chargeable. But never render the sciences responsible

for the errors of their representatives. Take away human frailties, and

you shall see harmony established; the study of matter will thus agree

with the study of mind, and the idea of nature with the idea of God. You

will see all the sciences rise together in a majestic harmony. I say

rise, and I say it advisedly; for the sciences also form a part of that

golden chain which should unite the earth to heaven.

The assertion that the science of nature leads away from God, expresses

nothing but a prejudice. It is not true in fact, and on principles of

right reason it is impossible: the demonstration is complete. Atheism is

a philosophy for which the natural sciences are in no degree

responsible. We shall not undertake here the general discussion of this

philosophy. Let us confine ourselves to the examination of the pretence

which it puts forward to find a new support in the results of modern

science.

The nineteenth century bestows particular attention upon history, and it

is not only to the annals of the human race that it directs its

investigations. Geology and palæontology dive into the bowels of the

earth in order to ask of the ground which carries us testimony as to

what it carried of old. Astronomy goes yet further. It endeavors to

conjecture what was the condition of our planet before the appearance of

the first living being. It remarks that the sun is not fixed in the

heavens, and that our earth does not twice travel over the same line in

its annual revolutions. It appears that stars are seen in course of

formation; it is suspected that some have wholly disappeared. Nature is

not fixed, but is undergoing modifications--lives, in fact. The actual

state of the universe is but a momentary phase in a development which

supposes thousands of ages in the past, and seems to presage thousands

more in the future. These conceptions are the result of solid and

incontestable discoveries. They have disturbed men's minds, but what is

their legitimate import? Why, Newton's argument receives new force from

them. From a blind metaphysical necessity, everywhere and always the

same, said this great man, no variation could spring. The more it is

demonstrated that the universe is in course of development and

modification, the more clearly comes into view the necessity of the

supreme Power which is the cause of its modifications, and of the

Infinite intelligence which is directing them to their end. This appears

to be solid reasoning, and nevertheless atheism has endeavored to strike

its roots in the ground of modern discoveries. It does this in the

following way.

If the universe as it is, with the infinite variety of beings which

people it and the marvellous relations which connect these beings

mutually together, could be shown to have sprung all at once from

nothing, or to have emerged from chaos at a given instant, in its full

harmony, the boldest mind would not venture to regard this miracle of

intelligence as the product of chance. But modern science, it is said,

no longer admits of this simple explanation of things: "God created the

heavens and the earth." This phrase is henceforward admissible only in

the catechism. We know that all has been produced by slow degrees,

starting from weak and shapeless rudiments. This grand marvel of the

universe was not made all of one piece. Man is of recent date;

quadrupeds at a certain epoch did not exist; animals had a beginning,

and plants also. The earth was once bare. Formerly, it was perhaps only

a gaseous mass revolving in space. In course of time, matter was

condensed; in time it was organized in living cellules; in time these

cellules became shapeless animals; in time these animals were perfected.

Time appears therefore to be the "universal factor"; and for the ancient

formula, "the universe is the creation of God," we are able to

substitute this other formula, the result, most assuredly, of modern

science, "the universe is the work of time."

In all this, Gentlemen, I have invented nothing. All I have done has

been to put into form the theory, the elements of which I have met with

in various contemporary productions.[120] They bewilder us by heaping

ages upon ages, and in order to explain nature they substitute the idea

of time for the ideas of power and intelligence. They seem to suppose

that what is produced little by little is sufficiently explained by the

slowness of its formation.

These aberrations of thought have recently been manifested in a striking

manner on the occasion of the publication of Mr. Darwin's book. This

naturalist has given his attention to the transformation of organized

types. He has discovered that types vary more than is generally

supposed; and that we probably take simple varieties for distinct

species. His discoveries will, I suppose, leave traces strongly marked

enough in the history of science. But Mr. Darwin is not merely an

observer; he is a theorist, dominated evidently by a disposition to

systematize. Now minds of this character, which render, no doubt, signal

services to the sciences of observation, are all like Pyrrhus, who,

gazing on Andromache as he walked by her side,

Still quaffed bewildering pleasure from the view.[121]

Their theory is their lady-love; they love it passionately, and

passionate love always strongly excites the imagination. Mr. Darwin then

has put forth the hypothesis, that not only all animals, but all

vegetables too, might have come from one and the same primitive type,

from one and the same living cellule. This supposes that there was at

the beginning but one single species, an elementary and very slightly

defined organization, from which all that lives descended in the way of

regular generation. The oak and the wild boar which eats its acorn, the

cat and the flea which lodges in its fur, have common ancestors. The

family, originally one, has been divided under the influence of soil,

climate, food, moisture, mode of life, and by virtue of the natural

selection which has preserved and accumulated the favorable

modifications which have occurred in the organism. Mr. Darwin, I repeat,

appears to me a man strongly disposed to systematize, but I do not on

this account conclude that he is mistaken. The question is, what opinion

we must form of his doctrine on principles of experimental science?

Professor Owen[122] does not appear to allow it any value; M. Agassiz

does not admit it at all;[123] and, without crossing the ocean, we

might consult M. Pictet,[124] who would reply, that judging by the

experimental data which we have at present, this doctrine is an

hypothesis not confirmed by the observation of facts. We will leave this

controversy to naturalists. What will remain eventually in their science

of the system under discussion? The answer belongs to the future

enlightened by experience and by the employment of a sage induction.

What is the relation existing between these systematic views and the

question of the Creator? This is the sole object of our study.

The opinions of the English naturalist are very dubious as to the vital

questions of religious philosophy. I have pointed out to you the

confusion of his ideas in the use which he makes of natural selection.

In the text of his book, he admits, in the special case of life, the

intervention of the Creator for the production of the first living

being, and he does not speak of man, except in an incidental sentence,

which only attentive readers will take any notice of. If we do not take

the liberty to look a little below the surface, we must say that Mr.

Darwin remains on the ground of natural history. Therefore I spoke to

you of the aberrations of philosophic thought which have been produced

_on the occasion_ of his book. These aberrations are the following:

First of all, natural selection has been taken for a cause, or rather as

dispensing with the necessity for a cause, by means of a confusion of

ideas for which the author is responsible. The system has therefore been

understood as implying, that organized beings were formed without plan,

without design, by the mere action of material causes, and as the result

of modifications casual at first, and slowly accumulated. Divine

intelligence and creative power thus seemed to be disappearing from the

organization of the universe, and to disappear especially before the

lapse of time and the infinitely slow action of physical causes. But

while the system was taking wing, and soaring aloft, lo! the Creator at

the commencement of things, and man conceived as a distinct being at the

highest point of nature, have risen up as two idols and paralyzed its

flight. To Mr. Darwin, however, have speedily succeeded disciples

compromising their master's authority, and addressing him in some such

language as this: "You, our master, do not fully follow out your own

opinions; you strain off gnats,[125] and swallow camels. It is not more

difficult to see in the living cellule a transformation of matter, and

in man a transformation of the monkey, than to point out in a sponge the

ancestor of the horse. Cast down your idols, and confess that matter

developed in course of time, under favorable circumstances, is the

origin of all that is." Matter, time, circumstances--these things have

taken the place of God.

This, Gentlemen, is a philosophy, properly so called, which vainly

pretends to find a support in the observation of facts. Geoffroy

Saint-Hilaire, the rival of Cuvier, set forth views analogous to those

which Mr. Darwin has lately reproduced. But in his replies to the

attacks which were made upon his system, he affirmed that his theory

offered "one of the most glorious manifestations of creative power, and

an additional motive for admiration, gratitude, and love."[126] Two

different interpretations may therefore be given to the system. I wish

to show you that these interpretations proceed in all cases from

considerations external to the system. The system in itself, as a theory

of natural history, could not in any way affect injuriously the great

interests of spiritual truth.

In order solidly to establish this assertion, I will suppose the

hypotheses of the most advanced disciples of Mr. Darwin to have been

verified by experimental science. I take for granted that it has been

proved that all plants and all animals have descended, by way of regular

generation, from living cellules originally similar; and that the

material particles of the globe, at a given moment, drew together to

form these cellules. And now where do we stand? Will God henceforward be

a superfluous hypothesis? Do the atheistical consequences which it is

desired to draw from this doctrine proceed logically from it? Most

certainly not!

I observe first of all that there exists a great question relative to

the beginning of things. Matter is perfected and organized in process of

time--but whence comes matter itself? Is it also formed little by little

in process of time? Does non-existence become existence little by

little? So it is said in the preface to the French translation of Mr.

Darwin's book. But this appertains to high metaphysics; and I pass on.

If time is the factor of all progress by a necessary law, this necessity

must be everywhere the same. Have the elements of matter all the same

age? If so, why have some followed the law of progress, and others not?

Why has this mud and this coal remained mud and coal, age after age,

while these other molecules have risen, in the hierarchy of the

universe, to the dignity of life? Why have these mollusks remained

mollusks throughout the succession of their generations, while others,

happily transformed, have gradually mounted the steps of the ladder up

to man? Whence comes this aristocracy of nature? Are the beings which we

call inferior only the cadets of the universe, and are they too in their

turn to mount all the steps of the ladder? Must we admit that there is

going on the continual production, not only of living cellules which are

beginning new series of generations, but also of new matter, which,

setting out from the most rudimentary condition, is beginning the

evolution which is to raise it into life? They do not venture to put

forth theses of this nature, and, in order to account for the diversity

of things, recourse is had to circumstances. The diversity of

circumstances explains the diversity of developments. But whence can

come the variety of circumstances in a world where all is produced in

the way of fatal necessity, and without the intervention of a will and

an intelligence? This is the remark of Newton. Study carefully the

systems of materialism: their authors declare that to have recourse to

God in order to account for the universe is a puerile conception

unworthy of science, because all explanation must be referred to fixed

and immutable laws; and then you will be for ever surprising them in the

very act of the adoration of _circumstances_. Convenient deities these,

which they summon to their aid in cases which they find embarrassing.

But we will not insist on these preliminary considerations. We have

allowed, for argument's sake, that all organized beings have proceeded

by means of generation from cellules presenting to sensible observation

similar appearances. Natural history cannot prove, nor even attempt to

prove, more. Let us transport ourselves, in thought, to the moment at

which the highest points of the continents were for the first time

emerging from the primitive ocean. We see, on the parts of the soil

which are half-dried, and in certain conditions of heat and electricity,

particles of matter draw together and form those rudiments of organism

which are called living cellules. These cellules have the marvellous

faculty of self-propagation, and the faculty, not less marvellous, of

transmitting to their posterity the favorable modifications which they

have undergone. Generations succeed one another; gradually they form

separate branches. New characteristics show themselves; the organisms

become complicated, and becoming complicated they separate. The

vegetable is distinguished from the animal; the plant which will become

the palm-tree is distinguished from the oak which is in course of

formation, and the ancestor of the future bird is already different from

that of the fish. We follow up this great spectacle. The ages pass, they

pass by thousands and by millions, they pass by tens of millions. We

need not be stinting in our allowance of time; our imagination will be

tired of conceiving of it sooner than thought of supplying it. And at

what shall we have arrived at last? At the universe as it has been for

some few thousands of years past; at the world with its vegetables of a

thousand forms, grouped by classes and series, with the families of

animals, with the relations of animals to plants, with the unnumbered

harmonies of nature. Let us choose out one particular, on which to fix

our attention. Shall it be a she-goat--

Upstretched on fragrant cytisus to browse?

This will suit our purpose, although the cytisus, unless I am mistaken,

has no perfume except in M. de Lamartine's verses. Let us fix our

attention on a cytisus with its yellow clusters hanging down, and the

goat bending its pliant branches as it browses on the foliage. Here is a

very small detail in the ample lap of nature. Let us come closer, and to

help our ignorance, let us provide ourselves with a naturalist who will

answer for us the questions suggested by this simple spectacle. And what

have we now before us? The various relations of the animal's

organization to the vegetables on which it feeds. In the organization

and functions of these two living beings, in the equilibrium and

movements of their frames, in the circulation of sap and of blood, we

have the application of the most secret laws of mechanism, of physics,

and of chemistry. Then again, in the relations which the animal and the

plant sustain with the ground which bears them, with the air they

breathe, with the sun which enlightens them, with heat and light, with

the moisture of the air and its electricity--in all this we see the

universal relations which connect all the various parts of the wide

universe with each one of its minutest details. In this simple spectacle

we have, in fact, reciprocal relations, the balance of things, the

harmony which maintains the universal life--intelligence, in short, in

the organization of beings, in the characteristics which divide them, in

the classes which unite them, in the relations of these classes amongst

themselves;--wonders of intelligent design, of which the sciences we are

so proud of are spelling out, letter by letter, line after line, the

inexhaustible abysses: this is what we find everywhere. Let us now come

back to our primitive cellules.

All the living beings which people the surface of the globe are composed

materially of some of the elements of the earth's substance. The birth

therefore of the first living beings could only offer to the view the

bringing together of some of the elements of the soil; this is not the

matter in question. The primitive cellules were to all appearance

alike. Weighed in scales, opened by the scalpel, placed beneath the

microscope, they would have offered no appreciable difference; I grant

it: it is the supposition we have agreed to make. Therefore they were

identical, say you. I deny it, and here is my proof: If the cellules had

been identical, they would not have given, in the successive development

of their generations, the diverse beings which people the world, and the

relations which unite them. Alike to your eyes, the cellules differed

therefore by a concealed property which their development brought to

light. You have told me as a matter of history how the organization of

the world was manifested by slow degrees; you have given me no account

of the cause of that organization.

It is said in reply: "We do know the origin of those developments which

you refer to a supposed intelligence. The living beings are transformed

by the action of food, climate, soil, mode of life. They experience

slight variations in the first instance; but these variations are

established, and increase; and where you see a plan, types, and species,

there is really only the result of modifications slowly accumulated.

Nature disposes of periods which have no limit, and everything has come

at its proper time, in the course of ages." They are always proposing to

us to accept of time as the substitute for intelligence. I am tempted to

say with Alcestis:

Time in this matter, Sirs, has nought to do.[127]