said Socrates, "we asked for only one virtue, and the admirable Menon presents us with a whole collection." Our modern philosophers have treated reason in the same way as Menon treated virtue.

Observe carefully the men who rail at reason, and see if they have not some interest to keep you in darkness, for reason, as we have already said, is the light.

Let us then conclude that, though reason explains nothing, yet it shows us God as the explanation of all. In fact, all the problems which the understanding presents, all the phenomena which nature exhibits, can only be resolved in God; and it is thus that reason arrives at their solution. If then, from the testimony of the senses, man knows that the world exists; so by the testimony of reason, he knows that the world has an author. And this is not merely the reason of a man, it is the reason of the whole human race.

Reason-a faculty of the soul. The fourth light which radiates towards God.

CHAPTER XIV.

CONSCIENCE-A FACULTY OF THE SOUL.

"Nous formons notre conscience au gré de nos passions, et nous croyons avoir tout gagné pourvu que nous puissions nous tromper nous-mêmes."

BOSSUET.

CONSCIENCE becomes awakened by the notions of good and evil of justice and injustice. It is the first faculty of the soul which appears in us; it is powerful, but blind. He who deceives his conscience may become a Ravaillac or

a Marat. Man is not always innocent when his conscience absolves him; he is not always guilty when his conscience accuses him. Have a care, young mother, now is the time; free thy reason in order to expand thy soul, for it is about to pass entirely into the soul of the child. Ah! do not suffer any other thoughts than thine own to penetrate into that sanctuary. It is a question between vice and virtue, between the joy or remorse of a whole life; thou engravest upon brass. The earliest education is effected entirely in the conscience, and conscience is only good when enlightened by reason.

Conscience is the executioner of our bad passions; it has joys which raise us up to heaven, and pains which precipitate us into hell. Inflexible to fortune, power, and pleasure, conscience only gives way before repentance and

virtue.

From it we derive faith. Conscience and faith, like two blind men, cast themselves groping in the paths of fanaticism, of superstition, and of idolatry, and arrive ultimately at God. There the human race meet; the want of belief, the sense of the beautiful, the contemplations of the infinite, bring man constantly to this point. Thus, on every side, the soul makes its way through the senses, it breaks out in matter, as the fire in darkness. It wills that one should see it, that one should know it; manifesting its existence by the sentiment of virtue, its greatness by the thought of God, it spreads over this terrestrial life, sublime lights, the source of which exist only in heaven.

Conscience-a faculty of the soul. The fifth light which radiates towards God.

CHAPTER XV.

CONCLUSIONS FROM THE FIVE PRECEDING CHAPTERS.

"Et c'est ainsi, dis-je a mon ame,

Que l'ombre de ce bas lieu,

Tu brules invisible flamme

En la presence de ton Dieu."

LAMARTINE, Harmonies.

THUS, the direction of all the faculties of the soul indicates a point of meeting placed beyond the boundary of this life.

Thus, the veritable man, freed from matter, is an essence which tends towards God, by all the points of his being.

Thus, there is an universal truth, the authority of which is infallible, not because it is universal, for universal errors are known to exist, but because it is in us, because it appears divinely at each birth to constitute the testimony of the human race. This truth is God.

All the faculties of the soul discover him. His existence is the condition of our greatness. His existence is the consolation of our misery. His existence explains all.

God does not prove himself. No animal faculty, no faculty of the intellect reaches up to him. Logic denies him, reasoning denies him, metaphysics deny him, the passions deny him. What matters! the soul perceives him.

This fruitful truth is the source of all truth; this celestial instinct is the source of all virtue. God has not confided us to an unstable intellect, which has equal argument for falsehood and for truth; he has placed us above

reasonings, in the unchangeable sanctuary of conscience, of reason, of the beautiful, the good, and the infinite; he has placed us in his own attributes, as if to instruct us of our glorious destinies; by impressing his name on his work, God has consecrated our immortality. Thus, two natures exist in animals; the instinct which attaches them to earth; intelligence which unites them to man.

Two natures exist in man: intelligence which unites him to created beings; the instinct of the soul which reveals to him a God.

The sphere of creation extends from matter to mind, from nought to eternity.

CHAPTER XVI.

OF THE INTERNAL ANTAGONISM OF MAN.

"Whenever I will examine my own conduct and judge it, it is evident that I divide myself, so to speak, into two persons, and that the self (moi), who judges, is different from the self whose conduct is examined and judged."

SMITH'S Theory of Moral Sentiments.

FROM this separation of the two natures of man, we see originate this fact, worthy the attention of the philosopher.

All the faculties of the intelligence tend towards earth. All the faculties of the soul tend towards heaven.

The one kind of faculties are ideas: the others are sentiments. Two natures, two empires reign in the same being death and immortality.

According as these two natures are more or less developed, our ideas are more or less terrestrial: our sentiments are more or less religious.

And in these matters the power of man is the greatest that can be conceived.

I would then engrave in letters of fire on the heart of every mother-I would proclaim to the whole world this truth:-"THE FACULTIES OF THE INTELLECT GROW AND BECOME STRONGER BY LABOUR. THE TERRESTRIAL PASSIONS ACQUIRE STRENGTH BY OUR WEAKNESS. THE SENTIMENTS OF THE SOUL ACQUIRE STRENGTH BY THE EXERCISE OF OUR WILL.

This difference is characteristic, it contains the proof of our moral liberty. Thou shalt be an animal, intelligent, and given up to thy passions, if thou abandonest thyself to thy material appetites like animals. Thou shalt be a free being, an immortal substance, a man, if thou so willest it.

Mark well, that the sentiment of God is bestowed upon minds of the most limited calibre; whilst some lofty intellects lose themselves in the abyss of atheism. Complete incredulity, if it exist, explains itself by the slumber of all the faculties of the soul.

The developement of only one of these faculties suffices to show us God: all together do not enable us to comprehend him.

And yet they cannot be wanting to us, without every thing being wanting. The brightest geniuses among the incredulous, are always incomplete beings; they give us the work of the intellect religious geniuses give us the work of the intellect and of the soul. Thus we may see the superiority of Socrates, Descartes, Newton, and Fenelon, over all the intellectual powers which have advocated the doctrines of annihilation.