The State of Society in France Before the Revolution of 1789 / And the Causes Which Led to That Event

by Alexis de Tocqueville

From the time of the great Revolution of the sixteenth century, when the spirit of free inquiry undertook to decide which were false and which were true among the different traditions of Christianity, it had never ceased to engender certain minds of a more curious or a bolder stamp, who contested or rejected them all. The same spirit that, in the days of Luther, had at once driven several millions of Catholics out of the pale of Catholicism, continued to drive in individual cases some few Christians out of the pale of Christianity itself. Heresy was followed by unbelief.

It may be said generally that in the eighteenth century Christianity had lost over the whole of the continent of Europe a great part of its power; but in most countries it was rather neglected than violently contested, and even those who forsook it did so with regret. Irreligion was disseminated among the Courts and wits of the age; but it had not yet penetrated into the hearts of the middle and lower classes. It was still the caprice of some leading intellects, not the opinion of the vulgar. ‘It is a prejudice commonly diffused throughout Germany,’ said Mirabeau, in 1787, ‘that the Prussian provinces are full of atheists; when, in truth, although some freethinkers are to be met with there, the people of those parts are as much attached to religion as in the most superstitious countries, and even a great number of fanatics are to be found there.’ To this he added, that it was much to be regretted that Frederick II. had not sanctioned the marriage of the Catholic clergy, and, above all, had refused to leave those priests who married in possession of the income of their ecclesiastical preferment; ‘a measure,’ he continued, ‘which we should have ventured to consider worthy of the great man.’ Nowhere but in France had irreligion become a general passion, fervid, intolerant, and oppressive.

There the state of things was such as had never occurred before. In other times, established religions had been attacked with violence; but the ardour evinced against them had always taken rise in the zeal inspired by a new faith. Even the false and detestable religions of antiquity had not had either numerous or passionate adversaries until Christianity arose to supplant them; till then they were quietly and noiselessly dying out in doubt and indifference—dying, in fact, the death of religions, by old age. But in France the Christian religion was attacked with a sort of rage, without any attempt to substitute any other belief. Continuous and vehement efforts having been made to expel from the soul of man the faith that had filled it, the soul was left empty. A mighty multitude wrought with ardour at this thankless task. That absolute incredulity in matters of religion which is so contrary to the natural instincts of man, and places his soul in so painful a condition, appeared attractive to the masses. That which until then had only produced the effect of a sickly languor, began to generate fanaticism and a spirit of propagandism.

The occurrence of several great writers, all disposed to deny the truths of the Christian religion, can hardly be accepted as a sufficient explanation of so extraordinary an event. For how, it may be asked, came all these writers, every one of them, to turn their talents in this direction rather than any other? Why, among them all, cannot one be found who took it into his head to support the other side? and, finally, how was it that they found the ears of the masses far more open to listen to them than any of their predecessors had done, and men’s minds so inclined to believe them? The efforts of all these writers, and above all their success, can only be explained by causes altogether peculiar to their time and their country. The spirit of Voltaire had already been long in the world: but Voltaire himself, in truth, could never have attained his supremacy, except in the eighteenth century and in France.

It must first be acknowledged that the Church was not more open to attack in France than elsewhere. The corruptions and abuses which had been allowed to creep into it were less, on the contrary, there than in most other Catholic countries. The Church of France was infinitely more tolerant than it had ever been previously and than the Church still was in other nations. Consequently, the peculiar causes of this phenomenon must be looked for less in the condition of religion itself than in that of society.

For the thorough comprehension of this fact, what was said in the preceding chapter must not be lost sight of—namely, that the whole spirit of political opposition excited by the corruption of the Government, not being able to find a vent in public affairs, had taken refuge in literature, and that the writers of the day had become the real leaders of the great party which tended to overthrow the social and political institutions of the country.

This being well understood, the question is altered. We no longer ask in what the Church of that day erred as a religious institution, but how far it stood opposed to the political revolution which was at hand, and how it was more especially irksome to the writers who were the principal promoters of this revolution.

The Church, by the first principles of her ecclesiastical government, was adverse to the principles which they were desirous of establishing in civil government. The Church rested principally upon tradition; they professed great contempt for all institutions based upon respect for the past. The Church recognised an authority superior to individual reason; they appealed to nothing but that reason. The Church was founded upon a hierarchy: they aimed at an entire subversion of ranks. To have come to a common understanding it would have been necessary for both sides to have recognised the fact, that political society and religious society, being by nature essentially different, cannot be regulated by analogous laws. But at that time they were far enough from any such conclusion; and it was fancied that, in order to attack the institutions of the State, those of the Church must be destroyed which served as their foundation and their model.

Moreover, the Church was itself the first of the political powers of the time; and, although not the most oppressive, the most hated; for she had contrived to mix herself up with those powers, without having any claim to that position either by her nature or her vocation; she often sanctioned in them the very defects she blamed elsewhere; she covered them with her own sacred inviolability, and seemed desirous of rendering them as immortal as herself. An attack upon the Church was sure at once to chime in with the strong feeling of the public.