THE DISCIPLE THE DISCIPLE BY PAUL BOURGET NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 1901 COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS Norwood Press: Berwick & Smith, Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. CONTENTS PAGE I. A MODERN PHILOSOPHER 13 II. THE GRESLON AFFAIR 43 III. SIMPLE GRIEF 65 IV. CONFESSION OF A YOUNG MAN OF THE PERIOD 90 I. My Heredities 94 II. The Medium Of Ideas 120 III. Transplantation 144 IV. The First Crisis 179 V. The Second Crisis 230 VI. The Third Crisis 255 VII. Conclusion 289 V. TORMENT OF IDEAS 294 VI. COUNT ANDRÉ 317 _TO A YOUNG MAN_ I DEDICATE this book to you, my young countryman, with whom I am so well acquainted, although I may not know your place of birth, your name, your parents, your fortune or your ambitions--nothing but that you are over eighteen and under twenty-five years of age, and that you will search in our books for the answers to the questions which are troubling you. And the answers which you will find depend a little upon your moral life, a little upon your own soul, for your moral life is the moral life of France itself--your soul is her soul. In twenty years from now you and your brothers will hold in your hands the destiny of this ancient country, which is our common mother--you will be the nation itself. What will you have learned from our teachings? No man of letters, however insignificant he may be, but should tremble at the responsibility.