"Do you promise before God and men to teach N. or M. from the dawn of his reason to adore God, to cherish (_chérir_) his fellows, and to make himself useful to his country?" And the godfather, holding the child towards heaven, replied, "I promise." Then followed the inevitable "discourse," and a hymn of which the concluding lines were: "Puisse un jour cet enfant honorer sa patrie, Et s'applaudir d'avoir vécu." So much must suffice as to the Natural Church during the time that it existed among men as a fact, or, in the words of the author of "Ecce Homo," as "an attempt to treat the subject of religion in a practical manner." But, backed as it was by the influence of a despotic government, and _felix opportunitate_ as it must be deemed to have been in the period of its establishment, very few were added to it. Whereupon, as the author of "Ecce Homo" relates, not without a touch of gentle irony, La Reveillère confided to Talleyrand[39] his disappointment at his ill-success. "'His propaganda made no way,' he said, 'What was he to do?' he asked. The ex-bishop politely condoled with him, feared indeed it was a difficult task to found a new religion--more difficult than could be imagined, so difficult that he hardly knew what to advise! 'Still'--he went on, after a moment's reflection--'there is one plan which you might at least try: I should recommend you to be crucified, and to rise again the third day'" (p. 181). Is the author of "Ecce Homo" laughing in his sleeve at us? Surely his keen perception must have suggested to him, as he wrote this passage, "mutato nomine, deme." It may be confidently predicted that, unless he is prepared to carry out Talleyrand's suggestion, the Natural Religion which he exhibits "to meet the wants of a sceptical age" will prove even a more melancholy failure than it proved when originally introduced a century ago by La Reveillère-Lepeaux. V. Are we then thrown back on Pessimism--"the besetting difficulty of Natural Religion" (p. 104), as the author of "Ecce Homo" confesses? Is that after all the key to the enigma of life? And is the prospect before the world that "universal darkness" which is to supervene, when, in the noble verse of the great moral poet of the last century--the noblest he ever wrote-- "Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires, And unawares morality expires; Nor public flame, nor private, dares to shine, Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine."