400 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



is either new in principle or expressed with the same 



lucidity and elegance. We may, in fact, say what has 



been said of one of the philosophers of the Eestoration, 



that French thought is prophetic ; giving in rare 



instances, emphatic and seemingly premature expression 



to arguments which have taken a long time to become 



popularly understood.^ This is eminently the case with 



two of the points urged by de Lamennais in his cele- 



^ 77. brated ' Essai sur I'lndifference en matiere de Eelig-ion.' ^ 

 De ^ 



Lamennais. Disregarding, for our present purpose, the local and tem- 

 poral circumstances which caused its great reputation, 

 we find that the author emphasised two important points 

 which have since occupied religious thinkers every- 

 where. The first point dealt with by de Lamennais in 

 his first volume was the growing spirit, not of unbelief, 

 but of indifference towards religious questions. He 

 foretold that religious thought was tending towards in- 

 difference. The other point with which he dealt in the 

 second volume was the problem of certitude, the question 



^ Paul Jauet, iu ' La Philosophie I pouniuoi la vie de Lamennais est 

 de Lamennais' (1890, pp. 2 and 3), un drame dans lequel se concentre 



sees in de Lamennais (1782-1854) 

 one of the great problems of the 

 century condensed in a single mind 

 and a unique moment. It is the 



tout un siecle. . . .' De meme que, 

 dans les tragedies, I'intei-et, pour 

 etre dramatique, doit se concentrer 

 dans une action unique : de meme 



transition from the idea of authority j le combat du siecle entre le passe 



to that of revolution. " D'autres et I'avenir, pour apparaitre dans 



que lui, sans doute, ont pass^ aussi toutesa grandeur, adu se condenser 



de la cause de I'autorite a celle de dans une seule ame et en un 



la revolution : Lamartine, Victor moment unique. Tel est le haut et 



Hugo, Chateaubriand lui-meme, . persistant interiit que presente la 



malgr^ sa fidelite d'oflfice li la legiti- vie de Lamennais, et qui donne a 



mite; mais aucun d'eux n'otait tous ses ecrits et aux phases diverses 



pretre, apotre, jirophute ; aucun de sa philosophie un caractere si 



n'avait pris parti avec tant de 1 emouvant." 



violence et d'exagdration en faveur -Vol. i., 1817; vol. ii., 1820; 



des doctrines du passe. C'est I vols. iii. and iv., 1S23. 



