Perhaps we shall find in the end that the two systems,
despite their seeming opposition, are both true and essentially
identical: in that case, the infallibility of human reason, in
its collective manifestations as well as its studied
speculations, would be decisively confirmed.--In a word, until we
have verified to man the hypothesis of God, there is nothing
definitive in the atheistic negation.
It is, then, a scientific, that is, an empirical demonstration of
the idea of God, that we need: now, such a demonstration has
never been attempted. Theology dogmatizing on the authority of
its myths, philosophy speculating by the aid of categories, God
has existed as a TRANSCENDENTAL conception, incognizable by the
reason, and the hypothesis always subsists.
It subsists, I say, this hypothesis, more tenacious, more
pitiless than ever. We have reached one of those prophetic
epochs when society, scornful of the past and doubtful of the
future, now distractedly clings to the present, leaving a few
solitary thinkers to establish the new faith; now cries to God
from the depths of its enjoyments and asks for a sign of
salvation, or seeks in the spectacle of its revolutions, as in
the entrails of a victim, the secret of its destiny.
Pages:
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63