6 CARNOT. 
of his friends thought at one time of putting him into’ 
holy orders. ‘They were strengthened in this idea by the 
recollection of the great number of ecclesiastical dignita- 
ries of which this honourable family could boast, amongst 
whom figured canons, vicaires-généraux of the diocese of 
Chalon, doctors of the Sorbonne, and an abbé of Citeaux. 
However, the career of military engineer carried the day, 
and young Carnot was sent to Paris to a special school, 
there to prepare for his examination. The comrades 
whom he met there had certainly not been brought up at 
the Seminary; for the profound piety of the new scholar, 
of which he would by no means make a mystery, became 
the subject of their continual sarcasms. Sarcasms are 
not reasons. Carnot was not therefore staggered by 
them ; but he felt the necessity of maturing, by reflection 
and study, ideas and sentiments to which his pure and 
candid soul had hitherto given itself up with perfect good- 
will and confidence.. Theology, then, became, for some 
months, the only occupation of an apprenti-officier, or 
military novice. No one can tell what was the effect of 
these meditations ; for, at all periods of his life, Carnot 
carefully avoided, even in the intimacy of the domestic 
circle, any discussions,—nay, more, any simple conversa- 
tions—relating to religion. We only know that he pro- 
fessed principles now adopted by all good and enlightened 
minds. “Universal tolerance,” said he, when, proscribed 
and wandering in a foreign land, he had to ward off the 
spiteful darts of calumny,—“universal tolerance, that is 
the dogma which I decidedly profess ..... I abhor 
fanaticism, and I believe that the fanaticism of irreligion, 
brought into fashion by such men as Marat and Pere 
Duchésne, is the most fatal of all. We must not kill men 
to force them to believe: we must not kill them to pre- 
