[Transcriber's note: This production is based on https://archive.org/details/meditationsmoral00guiz/page/n3] {1} Meditations And Moral Sketches. _By M. Guizot._ Translated From The French By John, Marquis Of Ormonde, K. P. "M. Guizot has recently collected his essays on religion, philosophy, and education into a single volume, under the title of 'Meditations and Moral Studies.' This work, which at present is scarcely known in England, deserves particular attention."--_Quarterly Review_, No. 187, Dublin: Hodges And Smith, 104, Grafton Street. 1855. {2} Dublin: Printed By R. D. Webb, Gt. Brunswick-St. {3} _Translator's Preface._ The three following Essays, although written some time back, appear to bear so strongly on a question daily and hourly discussed among ourselves, that I make but one apology for presenting them in an English form, which is to the illustrious author, whose sentiments (notwithstanding all the attention I have given to the task) I cannot but fear I may yet have failed in representing. {4} The Translation contained in the following pages originated in the simple desire to facilitate the access to sentiments deemed beneficial. He who undertook this pleasing and benevolent task, has been removed from this earthly scene. Let it be hoped that this solemn truth may add interest to his labours for others, and that his earnest wishes for their benefit may be in some measure realized. {5} Preface. When I collected these moral sketches, which were written at different times and under varying circumstances, I did not think that I needed to add anything to them. A recent event, however, has determined me, in now publishing them, to say a few words more. Having been called upon on the 30th of last April to take the chair at a meeting of the Protestant Bible Society, I expressed myself in these terms:-- What is after all, speaking religiously, the great question, the most important question which at present occupies the minds of men? It is the question in debate between those who acknowledge and those who deny a supernatural, certain, and sovereign order of things, although inscrutable to human reason. The question in dispute, to call things by their right names, between supernaturalism and naturalism. On the one side, unbelievers, pantheists, pure rationalists, and sceptics of all kinds. On the other, Christians. "Amongst the first, the best still allow to the statue of the Deity, if I may make use of such an expression, a place in the world and in the human soul; but to the statue only,--an image, a marble. God himself is no longer there. Christians alone possess the living God. {6}