of the time, the uneasy and bewildered
state of every one's conscience on the morrow of a period of religious
wars, harassed by passions. In the dull tranquillity that succeeded,
in the nullity of the present, the past would rise up in glowing
colours, and the remembrance of it become the more importunate. Then
was awakened in many minds, especially among weak and impassioned
women, the terrible question of eternal bliss or woe.

The whole fortune of the Jesuits, and the confidence placed in them by
the nobles and fine ladies, arose from the clever answer they gave to
this question. It is, therefore, indispensable to say a few words
about it.

Who can save us? The theologian on the one hand, and the jurist or
philosopher on the other, give diametrically opposite answers.

The theologian, if he be really such, attributes the greatest share to
Christianity, and answers, "It is the grace of Christ, which serves us
as a substitute for justice[1], and saves whomsoever it will. A few
are predestined to be saved, the greater number to be damned."

The jurist answers, on the contrary, that we are punished or rewarded
according to the good or bad use that we freely make of our will; that
we are paid according to our works, according to justice. This is the
eternal debate between the jurist and the theologian, between justice
and predestination.[1]

In order to have a clearer idea of the opposition of these two
principles, let us imagine a mountain with two declivities, its summit
terminating in a very narrow ridge, with the edge as sharp as a razor.
On one side is predestination that damns, on the other, justice that
strikes--two terrible monsters. Man is on the top, with one foot on
one slope and one on the other, ever on the point of slipping.

And when was the fear of sliding stronger than after those great crimes
of the sixteenth century, when Man was top-heavy, and lost his balance?
We know the religious horror of Charles IX. after the massacre of Saint
Bartholomew: he died for want of a Jesuit confessor. John III., King
of Sweden, who killed his brother, did not die of remorse: his wife
took care to send for the good Father Possevino, who purified him and
made him a Catholic.

The means employed by the Jesuits to calm consciences fill us, at first
sight, with surprise. They adopted both skilfully and carefully; still
they did adopt the principle of the jurists, namely, that man is saved
or lost by his work