第96章 MADAME SAND AND THE NEW APOCALYPSE(10)

Later still, you will see how that power has attained its end, and passed beyond it.You will see it, having chained and conquered princes, league itself with them, in order to oppress the people, and seize on temporal power.Schism, then, raises up against it the standard of revolt, and preaches the bold and legitimate principle of liberty of conscience: but, also, you will see how this liberty of conscience brings religious anarchy in its train; or, worse still, religious indifference and disgust.And if your soul, shattered in the tempestuous changes which you behold humanity undergoing, would strike out for itself a passage through the rocks, amidst which, like a frail bark, lies tossing trembling truth, you will be embarrassed to choose between the new philosophers--who, in preaching tolerance, destroy religious and social unity--and the last Christians, who, to preserve society, that is, religion and philosophy, are obliged to brave the principle of toleration.Man of truth! to whom I address, at once, my instruction and my justification, at the time when you shall live, the science of truth no doubt will have advanced a step.Think, then, of all your fathers have suffered, as, bending beneath the weight of their ignorance and uncertainty, they have traversed the desert across which, with so much pain, they have conducted thee! And if the pride of thy young learning shall make thee contemplate the petty strifes in which our life has been consumed, pause and tremble, as you think of that which is still unknown to yourself, and of the judgment that your descendants will pass on you.Think of this, and learn to respect all those who, seeking their way in all sincerity, have wandered from the path, frightened by the storm, and sorely tried by the severe hand of the All-Powerful.Think of this, and prostrate yourself; for all these, even the most mistaken among them, are saints and martyrs.

"Without their conquests and their defeats, thou wert in darkness still.Yes, their failures, their errors even, have a right to your respect; for man is weak.....Weep then, for us obscure travellers--unknown victims, who, by our mortal sufferings and unheard-of labors, have prepared the way before you.Pity me, who have passionately loved justice, and perseveringly sought for truth, only opened my eyes to shut them again for ever, and saw that I had been in vain endeavoring to support a ruin, to take refuge in a vault of which the foundations were worn away."....

The rest of the book of Spiridion is made up of a history of the rise, progress, and (what our philosopher is pleased to call) decay of Christianity--of an assertion, that the "doctrine of Christ is incomplete;" that "Christ may, nevertheless, take his place in the Pantheon of divine men!" and of a long, disgusting, absurd, and impious vision, in which the Saviour, Moses, David, and Elijah are represented, and in which Christ is made to say--"WE ARE ALLMESSIAHS, when we wish to bring the reign of truth upon earth; we are all Christs, when we suffer for it!"And this is the ultimatum, the supreme secret, the absolute truth!

and it has been published by Mrs.Sand, for so many napoleons per sheet, in the Revue des Deux Mondes: and the Deux Mondes are to abide by it for the future.After having attained it, are we a whit wiser? "Man is between an angel and a beast: I don't know how long it is since he was a brute--I can't say how long it will be before he is an angel." Think of people living by their wits, and living by such a wit as this! Think of the state of mental debauch and disease which must have been passed through, ere such words could be written, and could be popular!

When a man leaves our dismal, smoky London atmosphere, and breathes, instead of coal-smoke and yellow fog, this bright, clear, French air, he is quite intoxicated by it at first, and feels a glow in his blood, and a joy in his spirits, which scarcely thrice a year, and then only at a distance from London, he can attain in England.Is the intoxication, I wonder, permanent among the natives? and may we not account for the ten thousand frantic freaks of these people by the peculiar influence of French air and sun?