[18] L’Avenir de la Science, pp. 436, 437; Eng. trans., p. 410.
“Supprimer Dieu, serait-ce amoindrir l’univers?”
asks Guyau in one of his Vers d’un Philosophe.’[[19]] Renan observes that if we tell the simple to live by aspiration after truth and beauty, these words would have no meaning for them. “Tell them to love God, not to offend God, they will understand you perfectly. God, Providence, soul, good old words, rather heavy, but expressive and respectable which science will explain, but will never replace with advantage. What is God for humanity if not the category of the ideal?”[[20]]
[19] “Question,” Vers d’un Philosophe, p. 65.
[20] L’Avenir de la Science,” p. 476; Eng. trans., p. 445.
This is the point upon which Vacherot insisted in his treatment of religion. He claimed that the conception of God arises in the human consciousness from a combination of two separate ideas. The first is the notion of the Infinite which Science itself approves, the second the notion of perfection which Science is unable to show us anywhere unless it be found in the human consciousness and its thoughts, where it abides as the magnetic force ever drawing us onward and acts at the same time as a dynamic, giving power to every progressive movement, being “the Ideal” in the mind and heart of man.
Similar was the doctrine of Taine, who saw in Reason the ideal which would produce in mankind a new religion, which would be that of Science and Philosophy demanding from art forms of expression in harmony with themselves. This religion would be free in doctrine. Taine himself looked upon religion as “a metaphysical poem accompanied by belief,” and he approached to the conception of Spinoza of a contemplation which may well be called an “intellectual love of God.”
II
Like Renan, Renouvier was keenly interested in religion and its problems; he was also a keen opponent of the Roman Catholic Church and faith, against which he brought his influence into play in two ways—by his néo-criticisme as expressed in his written volumes and by his energetic editing of the two periodicals La Critique philosophique and La Critique religieuse.
In undertaking the publication of these periodicals Renouvier’s confessed aim was that of a definite propaganda. While the Roman Church profited by the feelings of disappointment and demoralisation which followed the Franco-Prussian War, and strove to shepherd wavering souls again into its fold, to find there a peace which evidently the world could not give, Renouvier (together with his friend Pillon) endeavoured to rally his countrymen by urging the importance, and, if possible, the acceptance of his own political and religious convictions arising out of his philosophy. The Critique philosophique appeared weekly from its commencement in 1872 until 1884, thereafter as a monthly until 1889. Among its contributors, whose names are of religious significance, were A. Sabatier, L. Dauriac, R. Allier[[21]] and William James.