orld neither of
nothing, nor of something, nor of himself; that he was free in creating,
but that nevertheless he could not but create; that there is in matter
a matter which is not matter; that the archetypal ideas of the world are
separated from each other, in the Divine mind, by a division which is
obscure and unintelligible, and yet substantial and real, which involves
intelligibility, &c. We meet with like contradictions concerning the
origin of evil. To explain this problem,--one of the profoundest in
philosophy,--M. Lamennais at one time denies evil, at another makes God
the author of evil, and at still another seeks outside of God a
first cause which is not God,--an amalgam of _entites_ more or less
incoherent, borrowed from Plato, Proclus, Spinoza, I might say even from
all philosophers.

Having thus established his trinity of hypotheses, M. Lamennais
deduces therefrom, by a badly connected chain of analogies, his whole
philosophy. And it is here especially that we notice the syncretism
which is peculiar to him. The theory of M. Lamennais embraces all
systems, and supports all opinions. Are you a materialist? Suppress,
as useless _entites_, the three persons in God; then, starting directly
from heat, light, and electro-magnetism,--which, according to the
author, are the three original fluids, the three primary external
manifestations of Will, Intelligence, and Love,--you have a
materialistic and atheistic cosmogony. On the contrary, are you wedded
to spiritualism? With the theory of the immateriality of the body, you
are able to see everywhere nothing but spirits. Finally, if you incline
to pantheism, you will be satisfied by M. Lamennais, who formally
teaches that the world is not an EMANATION from Divinity,--which is pure
pantheism,--but a FLOW of Divinity.

I do not pretend, however, to deny that "L'Esquisse" contains some
excellent things; but, by the author's declaration, these things are not
original with him; it is the system which is his. That is undoubtedly
the reason why M. Lamennais speaks so contemptuously of his predecessors
in philosophy, and disdains to quote his originals. He thinks that,
since "L'Esquisse" contains all true philosophy, the world will lose
nothing when the names and works of the old philosophers perish. M.
Lamennais, who renders glory to God in beautiful songs, does not know
how as well to render justice to his fellows. His fatal fault is this
appropriation of knowledge, which