passed through various philosophical phases, became imbued with Hegelianism, and his course of lectures in 1828 were not without some reason charged with pantheism; nay, possibly his sympathy with Spinoza is owing to this. Nevertheless, as we have already said, he soon escaped from the temptation, and his school-owing more especially to the action of Maine de Biran-is decidedly anti-Spinozist. Accordingly it is in another school-but slightly philosophical, and more taken up with social economy than with metaphysic— that we see explicitly and characteristically professed the dogma of the unity of substance, and of a God who is at once spirit and matter. We refer to the St. Simonian school, which taught that in addition to the religion of nature (which was Paganism), and the religion of the spirit (Christianity), there was still room for further progress, and for a new dogma that should blend in one and the same substance both matter and spirit. "God is one," said Bazard; "God is all that is; all is in Him; all is by Him; all is Him. The Infinite Being manifests Himself to us under two principal aspects, as spirit and as matter, as intelligence and as force, as wisdom and as beauty." "God is all that is," said Enfantin; "not one of us exists outside of Him. . . . Each of us lives with His life, and we have all communion with each other in Him, for He is all that is." And yet, while professing principles so analogous to those of Spinoza, the St. Simonians endeavoured at the same time to separate themselves from him by reproaching him with having imagined a dead and abstract world, and with not having recognized the essential attributes of divinity-love and life. Pierre Leroux's teaching led up to these ideas, both in his article on "God," in the New Encyclopedia, and in his work on Humanity. Literature and poetry equally felt the influence of these same doctrines: Georges Sand, Edgar Quinet, even Lamartine, in some passages of "Jocelyn," and, later, Michelet, are all more or less imbued with pantheism, but that rather through the action of the spirit of the age than owing to any direct influence, or even to an exact knowledge, of the writings of Spinoza. It is especially since 1850 that the doctrine of the unity of substance has begun to assert itself in a more severe and strictly philosophical sense; and we may cite M. Vacherot as the thinker who has given most importance to this point of view, and defended it with the greatest power of thought and style, both in his "History of the School of Alexandria" (which led to his deprivation), and in his work on the "Metaphysic of Science." The last testimony of respect and admiration shown by France to Spinoza, which remains to be mentioned, is the brilliant and noble oration pronounced at the Hague on the 21st of February last-the anniversary of Spinoza's death-by M. Ernest Renan.* In his summary of the opinions of the illustrious philosopher, the speaker has prominently expressed his own. He distinguishes between the supernatural and the ideal : "The cause of the supernatural," he said, "is compromised; the cause of the ideal is untouched, it ever will be. The ideal remains the soul of the world, the permanent God, the primordial, efficient, and final cause of the universe. This is the basis of eternal religion. We, no more than Spinoza, need, in order to adore God, miracles or self-interested prayers. So long as there be in the human heart one fibre to vibrate to the sound of what is true, just, and honest; so long as the instinctively pure soul prefers purity to life; so long as there be found friends of truth ready to sacrifice their repose to science, friends of goodness to devote themselves to useful and holy works of mercy, woman-hearts to love whatever is worthy, beautiful, and pure, artists to render it by sound and colour and inspired accents,-so long will God live in us. Est Deus in nobis.” This vague Spinozism, it will be easily understood, is full of attraction; philosophers, indeed, may perhaps find something lacking in the matter of precision; but one can hardly, in the midst of so vast an audience, explain oneself with rigid accuracy on a subject like this.† To conclude. We think that this rapid historical survey affords reason to believe that the genius of Spinoza is not well adapted to the nature of the French mind. France is not mystical, she lays great stress on exact and well-defined ideas. She has a keen sentiment of man and of humanity, and will never take delight in a philosophy that too much absorbs man in the great whole. If ever Spinozism becomes acclimatised in France it must be through considerable modification, and by translating itself distinctly either into the meaning of those who affirm, or those who deny, the reality of spirit. The noble, the really superior portions of Spinozism are such as an enlightened spiritualism not only can, but ought to appropriate, leaving to its adversaries the lesser only. In this way Spinoza would come to be divided into two, and one half would be claimed by the disciples of Descartes, the other by those of Diderot. * See CONTEMPORARY REVIEW for April, 1877, p. 763. PAUL JANET. To avoid omitting any feature of French homage to Spinoza, we may say, that in order to collect subscriptions for his statue, a committee was formed of learned men of every shade of thought, viz., MM. Claude Bernard, Berthelot, A.Franck, Koenigswarter, Paul Janet, Littré, Jules Simon, Renan, and Taine. This committee decided upon a public meeting in Paris, on Easter Monday, at which two discourses on Spinoza should be pronounced by M. Renan and M. Adolphe Franck. And finally, we may add, that the writer of this article has devoted his entire course of lectures for the year, at the Sorbonne, to the examination of Spinoza's philosophy. MUHAMMADAN LAW: ITS GROWTH AND CHARACTER. I.—THE FOUR ORTHODOX IMAMS. THE Muhammadan religion has often been praised for its free THE Muhammadan dom from a complicated and cumbersome ritual. Wherever, it is said, the true believer finds himself, on land or on the sea, alone or in company, that spot becomes at the appointed hour a temple, whence he can address his prayers to God. Hence, it has been supposed, that the Moslem passes through life with an immediate consciousness of the divine presence special and peculiar to men of his creed. This consciousness has survived the vicissitudes of history and the darkening effects of intellectual scepticism. Amid revolution, disaster, and anarchy, it is supposed to burn on with a clear and steady light, illuminating the bosoms of the Faithful in every part of the world, and binding all their hearts together. Therefore it is that all Islam is animated by a single spirit; that all its pulses vibrate in unison; and all its swords are ready to leap from their scabbards in obedience to a single call. Like so much which has been written upon the creed of Muhammad, these notions are directly the reverse of the truth. The intellectual immobility of the Muhammadan world proceeds, not from an inner consciousness of the divine presence, but from the total want of it. According to the Moslem belief, the spirit of man is incapable of holding converse with the spirit of God. Apart from the indications of His will contained in the Book and the Traditions, man neither knows nor can know anything about Him and His ways. All search, therefore, into the constitution of the Universe, or the mind of man, the Moslem condemns at the outset, as certainly useless, and probably impious. And hence, also, there is no creed the inner life of which has been so completely crushed under an inexorable weight of ritual. For that deep, impassable gulf which divides man from God, empties all religious acts of spiritual life and meaning, and reduces them to rites and ceremonies. They are laws to be obeyed. They do not imply that a way has been opened out between the visible and invisible world. Hence, also, there is not, nor ever has been, any "solidarity" in Islam. The resistless sovereignty of an inscrutable God has obliterated the notion of progress, and effectually prevented the idea of a national life from coming into existence. God is supreme; what He wills, can only be known by what He brings to pass; and against His decrees as manifested in the progress of events, it is idle to strive. Such is, and always has been, the political philosophy of the followers of Muhammad. To sketch the process of education which has achieved this result, is the object of the present paper. The Arab of Muhammad's day conceived of religion as altogether a ceremonial affair. He believed in a God, and he believed that this deity had commanded him to perform, every year, the ceremonies of the pilgrimage. But why had God done this? What pleasure could a rational being find in these absurd and meaningless rites? What profit could they be to Him, or wherein lay their advantages to men? Such inquiries never entered the mind of the Arab. It was the will of God; and regarding the why and the wherefore he never cared to speculate. The Prophet, a creature of his time if ever there was one, was as much a slave to this formalism as his countrymen about him. He, no more than they, felt the need of a logical connection between his speculative idea of God, and the expressions of His character in the visible world. He never attempted to regard life as a whole, or to say to himself, if God be such an one as I have depicted Him, then this and that custom which prevail among men must be utterly hateful to Him. The Prophet knew of no life but the life of the desert Arab, and without further question he accepted that life as being modelled after the divine wish. The Prophet knew of no religious life where the external rite was not deemed of greater importance than the inner state, and, in consequence, he gave that character to Islam also. Hence there are no moral gradations in the Koran. All precepts proceed from the will of God, and all are enforced with the same threatening emphasis. A failure of performance, in the meanest trivialities of civil life, involves the same tremendous penalties as apostasy or idolatry. In the Traditions this moral confusion is even more startlingly apparent. These traditions are a record of the answers and acts of the Prophet in response to the inquiries of his followers; and those who have not studied them know nothing whatever of the true spirit of Islam. They accumulated in this way. So long as Muhammad lived, the Faithful were in possession of a door communicating with the Throne of God. At this door they had but to knock, state their perplexities, and a response came to them from "the Lord of the Glorious Throne." As Muhammad taught, and the Faithful believed, that the least transgression of the divine commands brought down the same punishments as the greatest, it is not strange that they availed themselves of this privilege freely. The Prophet accepted his position, as an essential part of the prophetic office, and never doubted of his capacity to make known the will of God regarding any matter submitted to his judgment. Thus the religion of Islam was gradually provided with an exceedingly rigorous and complicated ritual. But the point to be noted is the extreme stress laid upon the accurate observance of this ritual. The mind. of the believer literally counts for nothing. No ardour of faith, no purity of intention, can make up for a ceremonial defect. There was a right way and a wrong way of performing all religious acts whatsoever; and the Arab could not conceive that aught was indifferent or optional. "I asked Ayesha," said al Harith, one of the early Moslems, "Did the Prophet read the Koran at nights loud or low?" She said, "Sometimes loud; at other times in a low tone of voice." "Allah ho Akbar!" shouted the delighted inquirer: "Praise be to God! who has made religion so spacious and unconfined!" That the amazement of al Harith, at the discovery of this "spacious and unconfined" freedom was by no means unnatural will be apparent if I quote a few of the directions regarding prayer. "When any one of you says his prayers, he must have something in front of him; but if he cannot find anything for that purpose, he must put his walking-stick into the ground; but if the ground be hard, then let him place it lengthwise before him; but if he has no staff, he must draw a line on the ground; after which there will be no detriment in his prayers from any one passing in front of it." This passing in front of a man is a terrible crime, and exceedingly detrimental to prayer, though it does not altogether nullify it. The Prophet empowered a believer annoyed in this way to "draw his sword" upon the intruder and "cut him down;" and further declared that if "a passenger did but know the sin of passing before a person employed in prayer, he would find it better for him to sink into the earth.” Equally important is the manner of performing the ablutions previous to prayer. When the Prophet performed these, "he took a handful of water, and raised it to the under part of his chin, and combed his beard with his hand, and said, 'In this way has my Lord ordered me.'" And on a certain occasion, when a party of his followers, performing their ablutions in a hurry, had omitted to wet the soles of their feet, the Prophet said, "Alas on the soles of their feet, for they will be in hell-fire!" For sin, according to |