Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 3.djvu/715

 CHATEAUBRIAND

641

CHATEAUBRIAND

"Le g<5nie du Christ ianisme", his colouring is vivid and peerless, and his phraseology most harmonious. "He plays the harpsichord on all my heartstrings", said a great lady of the early nineteenth century (II joue du clavecin sur toutes mes fibres). Without ap- parent effort he gives to his thoughts a luxuriant opulence of expression, richness, and elegance, even also a certain grandiloquence which may now appear somewhat antiquated. On the other hand, upon opening one of his political books one will find him bright, crisp, and incisive. Nor must it be said, as indeed it has been, that Chateaubriand's delightful and masterly style only serves to conceal deplorable poverty of thought, like a gorgeous drapery thrown over a feeble and insignificant body. Chateaubriand has beautiful ideas; on the past, in his historical pages; on the present, in his political writings, though the latter may not be free from error; and he has abundant views on the future, particularly on the subject of religion and the social role which he be- lieved it called upon to play. His influence on literature is unanimously acknowledged. Roman- ticism may be traced back to him, and it may even lie said that the whole literary movement characteristic of the nineteenth century begins with him. Admit- ting that he had predecessors, and that his style is reminiscent of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, he undoubtedly inaugurated a new literature.

Despite lamentable moral infirmities, Chateau- briand was a sincere Christian from the time of his conversion until his death. For he had need of con- version. Not, indeed, that his education was not religious. He himself relates with what pious zeal he prepared for his First Communion, and what memorable emotions that solemn day awakened within his heart. Some sixteen years later, in 1 7*. Mi, he published t he scept teal " Essai sur les revolutions". In the interval ( hateaubriand's youthful mind had been contaminated by t he anti-Christian spirit then pervading France, by the reading of dangerous especially those of J.-J. Rousseau, and by his 'Hon with the infidel literary men of Paris between 17S7 and 1791. When, at t lie age of twenty- one, he sailed for America, his faith was but a flicker- ing flame likely to be extinguished at any moment. Finally, the miserable life that he was afterwards obliged to lead in London so harassed his soul as to turn him against everything, both institutions and men.

It was indeed a rude shock that awoke his dormant religion. On the 1st of July, 179S, his sister, Mme de Farcy, wrote him of his mother's death, adding that, grief-stricken at his abandonment of the Faith — in inn Badly manifest in his " Essai sur les revo- lutions" — she had made it her dying request that he would become reconciled to it. Chateaubriand heeded the appeal. It seemed to come as a last prayer, a tear-laden supplication from the tomb that enclosed tin- mortal remains of one who had loved him devotedly, and whose anguish he had so ruth- lessly augmented. His heart was touched by the recollection of his childhood's days, by the pious memories with which the picture of his mother was inseparably connected, and. comparing the awful void made within his soul by false philosophy with the ineffable peace with which his religion hart form- erly filled it, his cruel doubts were suddenly sub- merged in a flood of tears. " I wept ", said he, "and I believed" (Preface to the first edition of " Le genie du Christianismi •"). This change of heart is the more easily explained as it was brought about by the progress of his ideas. His "I'.ssai" is not the work

of a confirmed infidel. If occasionally the author speaks like an eighteenth-century philosopher, he also speaks as a < Ihristian; he believes and doubts by turns. The mind is not always the dupe of the heart, it is sometimes its debtor. Chateaubriand's mind lit. -41

oscillated between the faith of the Christian and the incredulity of the sceptic, but his heart, never wholly indifferent, threw its entire belief into the scale, and faith triumphed forever.

On the strength of Chateaubriand's moral short- comings Sainte-Beuvc has insinuated that he was not genuinely Christian; but this is a calumny. Chateaubriand, unfortunately, was not the only man who, though strong in his faith, was weak in his con- duct. His religious sincerity is a well-established fact, and the critic of the day does homage to it. Indeed, this sincerity must be acknowledged, even though his word was not strictly reliable in less serious matters. For instance, J. Bodier tried to prove that the "Voyage en Amcrique" was a. mere fiction, maintaining that the traveller had not the means of accomplishing such a tour within the five months spent on the American continent. Hut this position cannot be accepted. In a work entitled " Sainte-Beuve et Chateaubriand" it has been di mon- strated that the illustrious writer had all the time required for the journey, which he actually made and did not merely imagine, as Bedier had claimed.

Having had the misfortune to attack the Faith, Chateaubriand craved the honour of defending it, and in various parts of his writings he realized this ambi- tion, but most especially in " Le genie du Chris- tianisme". His defence of religion presented in this celebrated book is invested with a new character. Moreover, the sub-title of the first edition clearly indicates that the writer's intention was to point out the "Beauties of the Christian Religion". The apology is based on the esthetic, and I he fundamen- tal argument of the work is thus expressed in its closing lines: "Though we have not employed the arguments usually advanced by the apologists of Christianity, we have arrived by a different chain of reasoning at the same conclusion: Christianity is perfect; men are imperfect. Now, a perfeel conse- quence cannot spring from an imperfect principle. Christianity, therefore, is not. the work of men." This argument certainly has great intrinsic weight, but it must be admitted that here and there the writer insists on details which contribute nothing to its strength, while, on the other hand, he omits views which might have established it more solidly. Be- sides, considered apart from its literary merit, the real apologetic value of "Le genie du Christ ianisme" is but relative. It was due to circumstances; the work came at the right moment and was what it should have been at that moment; hence ifs success. In his "Memoircs" the author was clearsighted enough to see this and courageous enough to admit it. The eighteenth century had sought to destroy Chris- tian dogmas by holding them up to ridiculd, and had thus deluded cultivated minds. Chateaubriand took up the challenge; he proved t hat I his derided religion was the most beautiful of all. and likewise the most favourable to literature and the arts. It was just then that Bonaparte was rebuilding overthrown altars, and the author of " Le genie " and t he victorious general worked towards the same end, each in hi way.

Chateaubriand's influence is incontestable. The Abbe Pradt, a writer who was hostile to his book, said in 1818: "He reinstated religion in the world, establishing it on a better footing than it had occu- pied, for until then it had followed, 80 to speak, in the wake of society, and since then it has marched visibly

at the head." This apology, moreover, ezerci ed a great influence upon the apologists. In the cou

the nineteenth century Chateaubriand's idea taken up; the beauty of Christian doctrine and its profound harmony with the inspirations of humanity were no longer studied from a mi etic, but

from a social and moral point of view. It is the glory of pioneers to open up productive ways in