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.

She did not accept the idea of any revealed religion, and there was one
of these revealed religions that she execrated. This was the Catholic
religion. Her correspondence on this subject during the period of the
Second Empire is most significant. She was a personal enemy of the
Church, and spoke of the Jesuits as a subscriber to the _Siecle_ might
do to-day. She feared the dagger of the Jesuits for Napoleon III, but at
the same time she hoped there might be a frustrated attempt at murder,
so that his eyes might be opened. The great danger of modern times,
according to her, was the development of the clerical spirit. She was
not an advocate for liberty of education either. "The priestly spirit
has been encouraged," she wrote.(53) "France is overrun with convents,
and wretched friars have been allowed to take possession of education."
She considered that wherever the Church was mistress, it left its marks,
which were unmistakable: stupidity and brutishness. She gave Brittany as
an example.