I. The Awakening Of Christianity In France In The Nineteenth Century 13 II. Spiritualism 218 III. Rationalism 245 IV. Positivism 267 V. Pantheism 310 VI. Materialism 330 VII. Skepticism 350 VIII. Impiety, Recklessness, And Perplexity 369 {12} {13} Meditations On The Actual State Of The Christian Religion. First Meditation. The Awakening Of Christianity In France In The Nineteenth Century. In 1797, La Réveillière-Lépeaux, one of the five Directors who then constituted the government of France, having just read to that class of the Institut [Footnote 1] of which he was a member a memorial respecting Theophilanthropism, and the forms suitable for this new worship, consulted Talleyrand upon the subject; the latter replied, "I have but a single observation to make: Jesus Christ, to found his religion, suffered himself to be crucified, and he rose again. You should try to do as much." [Footnote 1: The class of moral and political sciences.] {14} Nor was it long before events justified the ironical counsel. In 1802, hardly four years afterward, Theophilanthropism and its apostle, the dream and the dreamer, had disappeared from the stage where they had been powerless in influence, barren in consequence. The strong hand of Napoleon again solemnly set up in France the religion of Christ crucified and Christ risen, and in that same year the brilliant genius of Chateaubriand again placed before the eyes of his countrymen the beauties of Christianity. The great politician and the great writer bowed each of them before the Cross; the Cross was the point from which each started--the one to reconstruct the Christian Church in France, the other to prove how capable a Christian writer is of charming French society and of stirring its emotions. {15}