The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-02-01

After that came Stello, Grandeur and
Servitude, The Poem, The Destinies, and
some dramas. He was elected to the
French Academy in 1851
Nothing is more nonsensical than the
routine of classical study for all. The
ancient writings are excellent to form
style, but what need have all for style?
Those who are to become professors,
rhetoricians, or by chance very great
writer's and poets, this is we'll. But for
the majority of the nation the reed is
for an education professional and special.
The imagination adds so much to life
that it often seems as if my life has al
ready been of more than two hundred
years.
One finds it difficult to imagine Robes
pierre as child carried by his nurse, on
whom his mother smiled, and of him
others saying: "What pretty little
boy!'
From his twelfth to his thirtieth year
the life of Christ is unknown,-what the
clergy call the hidden life."
What book this life would make, por-
trayed. rendering the growth and expert
ence in him of his belief in his divine
nature!
The idea of the country native land)
lid not exist in France before Louis
XIII. The great lords allied to foreign
wives and possessing great holdings in
Spain, Germany and England as we'll as
q France, had their hearts as much
broad as at home and willingly betrayed
the interests Of one country for another.
The increasing power of the middle and
united class gave to the nation the SEN
timent of citizenship.
The cowardly animals go in troops.
The lion marches alone in the desert.
Thus goes even the poet.
There are men like Descartes and
Spinoza who burying their head in their
hands have sought in all sincerity:
l. How does creation really appear?
2. What we're the process and what
the end of this creation according to cal
culations the most probable and the
most reasonableY
1t was belief that they sought.
Other men like Saint Augustine, Bous-
suet and Fenelon thought of things re-.
ligiously, and l think we find them more
human. but more superficial. They con-
sidered the universe as constructed for
certain small insects and God himself
descending upon little planet distin-
guished by him in giving to it special
legislation.
They sought religion.
The question enclosed in these things
is to know whether one ought to place
himself at the point Of view OF the i'm
mensity of the universe and seek to draw
sort Of perspective Of our planet as
seen from Saturn or Jupiter, or whether
one should place himself in the midst of
the human species and consider religion
according to the utility it may have as a
support to morality.
The first point of view is evidently the
grandest, the most divine, in that it is
inspired by sacred love for truth which
lifts the soul toward the Creator and
the center of creation.
The second point OF view is the best
for the amelioration of human society;
this cannot be contested and from this
point of view Christianity is today the
system of which the truth would be most
desirable than that of any other system.
But one feels how research is interdict-
ed and truth narrowed.
Had men the force of mind, the first
should draw them.
But having passions, the need of a
correctional police, one feels that the
other for the mass of men is only posi-
BILE il not best.