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 reformation, or, at the very least, of religious transformation:  Buddhism is a memorable example of this; but it is not a return towards the pure traditions of India or of Egypt which has caused us to know the God whom we adore.  Has the veil been lifted by reflection, that is to say by the labors of philosophers?  Philosophy has rendered splendid services to the world.  It has combated the abominations of idolatry; it has recognized in nature the proofs of an intelligent design; it has discerned in the reason the deeply felt need of unity; it has indicated in the conscience the sense of good, and shown its characteristics; it has contemplated the radiant image of the supreme beauty—­still it is not philosophy which has restored for humanity the idea of God.  Its lights mingled with darkness remained widely scattered, and without any focus powerful enough to give them strength for enlightening the world.  To seek God, and consequently to know Him already in a certain measure; but to remain always before the altar of a God glimpsed only by an elite of sages, and continuing for the multitudes the unknown God:  such was the wisdom of the ancients.  It prepared the soil; but it did not deposit in it the germ from which the idea of the Creator was to spring forth living and strong, to overshadow with its branches all the nations of the earth.  And when this idea appeared in all its splendor, and began the conquest of the universe, the ancient philosophy, which had separated itself from heathen forms of worship, and had covered them with its contempt, contracted an alliance with its old adversaries.  It accepted the wildest interpretations of the common superstitions, in order to be able to league itself with the crowd in one and the same conflict with the new power which had just appeared in the world.  And this sums up in brief compass the whole history of philosophy in the first period of our era.