soul, did not for all that defile herself the less by the most degrading
superstitions; we have in her, sufficiently summed up, the religious
history of all antiquity."[12] As regards the civilization which
flourished in India, M. Adolphe Pictet, in his learned researches on the
subject of the primitive Aryas, arrives, in what concerns the religious
idea, at the following conclusion: "To sum up: primitive monotheism of a
character more or less vague, passing gradually into a polytheism still
simple, such appears to have been the religion of the ancient
Aryas."[13] One of our fellow-countrymen, who cultivates with equal
modesty and perseverance the study of religious antiquities, has
procured the greater part of the recent works published on these
subjects in France, Germany, and England. He has read them, pen in hand,
and, at my urgent request, he has kindly allowed me to look over his
notes which have been long accumulating. I find the following sentence
in the manuscripts which he has shown me: "The general impression of
all the most distinguished mythologists of the present day is, that
monotheism is at the foundation of all pagan mythology."

The savants, I repeat, do not unanimously accept these conclusions:
savants, like other men, are rarely unanimous. It is enough for my
purpose to have shown that it is not merely the grand tradition
guaranteed by the Christian faith, but also the most distinctly marked
current of contemporary science, which tells us that God shone upon the
cradle of our species. The august Form was veiled, and idolatry with its
train of shameful rites shows itself in history as the result of a fall
which calls for a restoration, rather than as the point of departure of
a continued progress.

The august Form was veiled. Who has lifted the veil? Not the priests of
the idols. We meet in the history of paganism with movements of