In short, progress exists, but not all along the line. As thought travels slowly in its own domain, so mental science is behindhand. A true idea is not mechanically reproduced, it must be tended for it to bear fruit, but what tendance would avail, if it is only with difficulty that we discriminate between what we know already, and what we do not yet know, for this distinction must accompany conscious progress.
Everything around us tends to keep us in this penumbra, which is so favourable to inertia, ignorance, sleep. Certain groups of philosophical ideas become condensed and systematised; in some systems there are one or two great thoughts only. This suffices—these systems remain, germinate and direct contemporaneous generations as well as those of the future. It may also happen that these same ideas invade brains little prepared to receive them, and thus deviate from their course, err as they advance, and end by becoming so travestied that it is no longer possible to know what they were at their origin—a swerving movement has taken place, which causes suffering to contemporaries, and, still more, to those who come after. Thus the bulk increases, the bulk of truth and the bulk of error; and this fatal expansion of the true and the false, intertwined the one with the other, pursues its encroaching and troublous way.
This confusion is something impersonal; it is an opaque body which interposes itself between the truth and ourselves, and prevents us from contemplating it; but the confusion may also arise directly from those whose mission it is to guide us. I open a book written by some grave thinker who, I imagine, knows his subject thoroughly, and I begin to read in all confidence; at first I think I understand him; then I am stopped by a word, and I wonder what meaning the author has attached to it; a little further I come upon the same word, which now seems invested with another signification; this disconcerts me, and I close the book. I take another, but the same disagreeable surprise awaits me, and I find everywhere terms whose meaning varies to suit the convenience of the author; and what we are to understand by these words is nowhere explained. These defects arise probably from the fact that certain philosophers, taking their confused opinions for new ideas, seek for words in which to express them, and not finding them in their vocabulary, they coin them, using terms to which no precise meaning is attached; which terms remain more or less enigmatical to the authors themselves, and, consequently, unintelligible to the readers; in this way does the confusion of ideas arise and is propagated. A philosopher, I think it was Haman, made the following very true and very alarming statement: “Language is not only the basis of our power of thought, but also the point from which our misunderstandings and errors spring”; and Hobbes also says: “It is obvious that truth and falsehood dwell only with those living creatures who have the use of speech.”
But all that I have just said indicates merely a superficial portion of my passing impressions; in going below the surface I find in the past other causes for our present perturbation of mind. For centuries we have frequented schools in order to learn to distinguish truth from error, yet it is always a mixture of truth and error that we are taught. What result had we attained on the eve of the twentieth century? We are still asking ourselves whether science does or does not harmonise with religion. After that we cannot but give ourselves up to the deepest despondency, we cannot but fold our arms in despair and question whether we shall ever see things clearly.
Amongst our ancestors there were sometimes found men of great resolution who, in order to punish themselves for cowardice and luxury, administered discipline to themselves; the idea is not so extravagant as it appears to some people. A few good strokes of the whip might result in reviving or strengthening the will, and in forcing it to resist the moral supineness which is so apt to increase; but physical discipline is no longer in use amongst us, and in my own case I have substituted an illustration of which I try never to lose sight. I picture to myself an ideal potter, whose whole ambition would be to make good vessels, and, having succeeded in making some of great solidity, he would choose out those of the finest shape for the market. He attains success, and his thoughts being occupied with his pottery only, at last he makes vases of absolute perfection. With what feelings of envy I contemplate this creature of my imagination, who is to serve as my model, and yet whom the want of concentration of thought prevents me from imitating.
It would have been perhaps prudent on my part to follow the example of this workman, and to accustom myself to reflect on subjects less immeasurably above me than those which have such a powerful attraction for me; but I yield to the impulse—once given. I often lose myself when pondering on the world where destiny has placed me; and I ask myself—How did life first appear on the earth? Was there nothing but a cellule from whence all that fills space came? Was there one cellule for the vegetables and another for the animals? If man did not spring from the cradle of all things that live and grow on the surface of the globe, was he an individual of his own species at the beginning, or two individuals, or many? After what fashion did man speak at his first appearance? What were his thoughts? “How can it be explained,” I asked myself again, “that of all the members of the animal kingdom, one only should have marvelled at and pondered on his position with regard to the universe and himself? That one only should have manifested the desire to understand his role in life, whilst all the creatures that surrounded him, lived contentedly in blissful ignorance? It would be impossible to conceive of a horse, an elephant, or a mammoth disquieting itself concerning its origin and the end of its being; why has man only sought a solution of these problems?” The learned scholars who occupy themselves with these questions are far from agreeing unanimously concerning them; thus I—I, who am only one link in the interminable chain of units which composes humanity, past, present and future; I, in my own individuality must live and die in my ignorance. I revolt against this prospect, which I yet recognise as inevitable; I refuse to acknowledge myself beaten, and I feel myself irresistibly driven to seek for more knowledge; then feeling unable to supply the lack, I cease to be anxious, and fall asleep again.
Sometimes when led to investigate the inner tribunal, conscience, I contemplate a phenomenon purely intellectual and moral, which the uproar raised by the conflict of so many heterogeneous ideas cannot make me forget, although it does not intrude itself upon me with violence; on the contrary, it waits with an unparalleled patience and discretion at my door. It is the phenomenon named religion.
We read in the Bible that Moses, having noticed a burning bush that yet was not consumed, went up to it, the more closely to investigate this marvel. For many people religion has borne the same aspect that the burning bush did for Moses, and those, like Moses, have approached it in the endeavour to discover what it could be. Religion has always compelled attention, its metaphysical side has been described in voluminous theological and philosophical treatises; historians on their side have made many researches concerning the forms in which it has clothed itself on earth during a long succession of centuries, and amongst many peoples; it is even said there are learned men who have studied all the Bibles and catechisms; and it is added that few amongst them know what religion really is. It does not on that account play a less important part in our existence; it is from religion that all those acts of devotion and charity spring, to which millions of human creatures give themselves. There are few who ask themselves whence comes this breath which inspires them so fully, and since when has its influence extended itself amongst us; to be nourished with its fruits sufficed. Such is the disposition of soul of the majority of those for whom religion is more than a name—whatsoever it be—pronounced in an unknown tongue. Would it not be natural to desire to make its acquaintance more closely? Apparently not; we accept it as something known by intuition, without concerning ourselves with its aspect.
This strange fact I have also noticed. When studying history very attentively, and with an attitude of mind free from all prejudice, it is possible to fix the exact period at which errors, more or less generally acknowledged as such, have first crept into the world; but I have vainly sought in history for the corresponding moment when truths first made their appearance; truths, which have been accepted, if only by a few isolated individuals, or by certain groups of individuals, of whatever race, or of whatever period of the life of humanity they might be. But as it is acknowledged that amongst the errors which trouble us, we possess some truths, it is evident that they have manifested themselves; but when and how? At this I do not arrive.
This silence of history indicates, I think, that the truths of which we seek the commencement have been revealed to man in prehistoric days. I do not feel that I know positively concerning the first human beings who appeared on the earth; I picture them like soft wax ready to receive a definite form from the hand which created them. These first comers who knew nothing, never having had any training, and possessing only their five senses to aid them in arriving at knowledge, were infinitely better placed than I am to embrace truth, since I should have to disentangle myself from a vast mass of ideas which disfigure the natural simplicity of my soul; I should have to forget, even the truths which I believed myself to possess, and to transform myself into white plastic blank wax, with no impress whatsoever, and to wait until my Creator traced the image He wished; this is now not possible. I should not be now here if I could have been contemporaneous with my ancestors, and I had been permitted to follow in the steps of their pilgrimage, this would have pleased me well.