nurture to these ideas. Herder was the German writer with whom I was
most familiar. His vast views delighted me, and I said to myself, with
keen regret, if I could but think all that like a Herder and remain a
priest, a Christian preacher. But with my notions at once precise
and respectful of Catholicism, I could not succeed in conceiving
any honourable way of remaining a Catholic priest while retaining my
opinions. I was Christian after the fashion of a professor of theology
at Halle or Tuebingen. An inward voice told me: "Thou art no longer
Catholic; thy robe is a lie; cast it off."

I was a Christian, however; for all the papers of that date which I
have preserved give clear expression to the feeling which I have since
endeavoured to portray in the _Vie de Jesus_, I mean a keen regard
for the evangelic ideal and for the character of the Founder of
Christianity. The idea that in abandoning the Church I should remain
faithful to Jesus got hold upon me, and if I could have brought myself
to believe in apparitions I should certainly have seen Jesus saying
to me: "Abandon Me to become My disciple." This thought sustained and
emboldened me. I may say that from that moment my _Vie de Jesus_ was
mentally written. Belief in the eminent personality of Jesus--which is
the spirit of that book--had been my mainstay in my struggle against
theology. Jesus has in reality ever been my master. In following out
the truth at the cost of any sacrifice I was convinced that I was
following Him and obeying the most imperative of His precepts.

I was at this time so far removed from my old Brittany masters
in respect to disposition, intellectual culture and study that
conversation between us had become almost impossible. One of them
suspected something, and said to me: "I have always thought that you
were being overdone in the way of study." A habit which I had acquired
of reciting the psalms in Hebrew from a small manuscript of my own
which I used as a breviary, surprised them very much. They were half
inclined to ask me if I was a Jew. My mother guessed all that was
taking place without quite understanding it. I continued, as in my
childhood, to take long walks into the country with her. One day, we
sat down in the valley of Guindy, near the Chapelle des Cinq Plaies,
by the side of the spring. For hours I read by her side, without
raising my eyes from the book, which was a very harmless one--M. de
Bonald's _Recherches Philosophiques._ Nev