I say the sole efficacious solution. Efficacy is, in truth, the peculiar, the essential characteristic of Christianity. However high-reaching the ambition of philosophy is, it is infinitely less so than that of religion. The ambition of philosophers is purely scientific. They study, observe, discuss; their labours produce systems, schools. The Christian Religion is a practical work, not a scientific study. At the base of its dogmas and of its precepts there is certainly a philosophy, and, in my opinion, the true philosophy; but this philosophy is only the point from which Christianity departs, not its object. The object is to induce the human soul to govern itself according to the divine law; and to attain this object it deals with man's nature as it is, in its entirety, with all its different elements, all its sublime aspirations. There, to borrow the language of strategy, we see the basis of operation of Christianity; the basis upon which it enters upon its moral struggle, and upon which it undertakes to ensure the triumph in man of good over evil, and to procure the salvation of man by his reformation.
When I published, two years ago, the Second Series of these Meditations—the subject of which is the actual state of the Christian Religion—I essayed to characterise therein the fundamental errors of the different philosophical systems which combat it. I sent, according to my custom, the volume to my companion in life, and my confrère at the Institute, M. Cousin, with whom, notwithstanding our differences of opinion, I maintained always very friendly relations. On the 1st June, 1866, he wrote to me from the Sorbonne the following letter:—
"My dear Friend,
"As soon as I received your book I hastened to read it, and I tell you very sincerely that I am very content with it. The little difference between our opinions, which you have not pretended to conceal, are inevitable, because they are the consequence of a general dissimilarity in the manner in which we form our conceptions of the nature of philosophy and of the nature of religion. These two great powers may and ought to be in accord, still they are different. To Religion belongs an influence of an elevated and universal kind; to philosophy an influence more restricted, and still very elevated. The one addresses itself to the entire soul, comprising in it the imagination; the other only addresses itself to the reason. The first sets out from mysteries, without which there is no religion; the second sets out from clear and distinct ideas, as has been said both by Descartes and by Bossuet. This distinction is the foundation of my philosophy and of my religion; and this distinction is also, in my view, the principle of their harmony. To confound them is, I think, an infallible mode of confusing them each by the other, as Malebranche has done. To absorb philosophy in religion gave, in Pascal, the result of a faith full of contradiction and of anguish; to absorb religion in philosophy is an extravagant enterprise, of which sound philosophy must disapprove. To admit them both, each in its place, is truth, grandeur, and peace.
"Hence you perceive the reason of our differences of opinion, which are no more hurtful to our union, than they are to our old and sincere friendship."
I replied to him on the 13th of June:—
"I count, as well as you, my dear friend, upon our dissentiments not being hurtful to our old and sincere friendship; and I feel the more pleasure in so counting, because, independently of our particular and petty dissentiments, there is, as you say, between us a general, a profound difference of opinion. I think, as you do, that philosophy is not to be confounded or absorbed in religion, nor religion in philosophy. I regard them both as free in their manifestations and in their influence; but I do not found their distinction or their accord upon the same grounds as you do. To me, philosophy is but a science, that is the work of man, limited in its sphere and reach, as is man's mind itself. Religion, in its principle and its history, is of divine origin and institution. The one springs from man's avidity of knowledge; the other is the light coming from God, 'which shines upon every man that comes into the world,' and which God continues to maintain and to shed over the world, according to his impenetrable designs, by the act, general or special, of his free will.
"I will not say more. We know, both of us, how far our opinions are in the same road, and where is the point of divergence."
I had left Paris when I received M. Cousin's letter. He was at Cannes when I returned to Paris. We never saw each other afterwards. He has preceded me to that region where light is shed upon the mysteries of this life. But in our last correspondence we had each touched in a few words upon the knot of the whole question. It is this—What are the points of resemblance, and what of difference, between Religion and science, between Christianity and philosophy? Although M. Cousin and I agreed as to the reciprocal rights of these two influences to liberty of action, we entertained different sentiments as to their origin and their nature, and consequently as to the boundaries of their empire, and the character of their mission.