1863.


"SIR,

...."You have a full right to make use of my name: for although I
generally avoid mixing up things sacred and things profane, I have,
on one occasion, written and published a passage which accords to
you this right, and which I maintain. I send you a copy of it. I
hope you will find nothing in any other part of my researches, to
contradict or weaken in any way whatever the sense of this passage.

"I beg you to transmit my best remembrances to my friend M. de la
Rive...."


The passage thus indicated establishes a line of demarcation, very
strongly (perhaps too strongly) drawn between researches of the reason
and the domain of religious truth, and contains a profession of positive
faith in Revelation. The author affirms that he has never recognized any
incompatibility between science and faith, and makes the following
declaration: "Even in earthly matters I reckon that 'the invisible
things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being
understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and
Godhead.'"

A literary man of Paris declares to us that natural science leads away
from God: one of the first savants of our time informs us that the
scientific contemplation of nature renders the wisdom of God manifest.
The question is one of fact. To whom shall we give our confidence? For