It is impossible, in this volume, to consider all George Sand’s works.  Some of her others are charming, but the whole series would perhaps appear somewhat monotonous.  There is, however, one novel of this epoch to which we must call attention, as it is like a burst of thunder during calm weather.  It also reveals an aspect of George Sand’s ideas which should not be passed over lightly.  This book was perhaps the only one George Sand wrote under the influence of anger.  We refer to Mademoiselle La Quintinie.  Octave Feuillet had just published his Histoire de Sibylle, and this book made George Sand furiously angry.  We are at a loss to comprehend her indignation.  Feuillet’s novel is very graceful and quite inoffensive.  Sibylle is a fanciful young person, who from her earliest childhood dreams of impossible things.  She wants her grandfather to get a star for her, and another time she wants to ride on the swan’s back as it swims in the pool.  When she is being prepared for her first communion, she has doubts about the truth of the Christian religion, but one night, during a storm, the priest of the place springs into a boat and goes to the rescue of some sailors in peril.  All the difficulties of theological interpretations are at once dispelled for her.  A young man falls in love with her, but on discovering that he is not a believer she endeavours to convert him, and goes moonlight walks with him.  Moonlight is sometimes dangerous for young girls, and, after one of these sentimental and theological strolls, she has a mysterious ailment. . . .

In order to understand George Sand’s anger on reading this novel, which was both religious and social, and at the same time very harmless, we must know what her state of mind was on the essential question of religion.

In the first place, George Sand was not hostile to religious ideas.  She had a religion.  There is a George Sand religion.  There are not many dogmas, and the creed is simple.  George Sand believed firmly in the existence of God.  Without the notion of God, nothing can be explained and no problem solved.  This God is not merely the “first cause.”  It is a personal and conscious God, whose essential, if not sole, function is to forgive—­every one.

“The dogma of hell,” she writes, “is a monstrosity, an imposture, a barbarism. . . .  It is impious to doubt God’s infinite pity, and to think that He does not always pardon, even the most guilty of men.”  This is certainly the most complete application that has ever been made of the law of pardon.  This God is not the God of Jacob, nor of Pascal, nor even of Voltaire.  He is not an unknown God either.  He is the God of Beranger and of all good people.  George Sand believed also, very firmly, in the immortality of the soul.  On losing any of her family, the certainty of going to them some day was her great consolation.

“I see future and eternal life before me as a certainty,” she said; “it is like a light, and, thanks to its brilliancy, other things cannot be seen; but the light is there, and that is all I need.”  Her belief was, then, in the existence of God, the goodness of Providence and the immortality of the soul.  George Sand was an adept in natural religion.