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The Genius of Christianity
1802 · translated from the French · 1060 pages
The Genius of Christianity
by François-René de Chateaubriand
Chateaubriand lost his faith entirely to the philosophes and spent years an unbeliever before news of his mother's death, reaching him in exile in London, broke him open. The Genius of Christianity is the book that came out of that return, and it argues on ground no apologist had used so boldly: that Christianity is true to the depths of human nature, and that the proof is in what it has made — its cathedrals, its poetry, its charities, its way of dying.
The convert behind the argument
Chateaubriand was raised Catholic in Brittany, lost his religion to the sceptical writers of the eighteenth century, and lived through the Revolution and emigration as an unbeliever whose published work was tinctured with the infidelity of the times. In 1798, in London, he learned that his mother had died with his errors on her mind. His own account of the moment is four words long: 'I wept and I believed.'
Summary
The book's premise is a reversal of the usual apologetic order. Chateaubriand does not begin with evidence for the truth of Christianity and proceed to its effects; he begins with the effects and argues backward, on the principle that a religion so productive of beauty, tenderness and moral grandeur answers something real in human nature.
The four parts move through dogma and doctrine, the poetic of Christianity, the fine arts and literature, and worship. The most famous sections treat Gothic architecture — which he did much to rehabilitate for a generation that had dismissed it as barbarous — the ruins, the bells, the missions, and the Christian handling of death and burial. The novellas Atala and René were originally published as episodes within it.
Published in 1802, in the same season as Napoleon's Concordat restored Catholic worship in France, it was enormously and immediately influential — the book that made Christianity respectable again to the French literary imagination after a decade of official de-Christianisation. Its argument is unapologetically emotional, and has been criticised on exactly that ground ever since.
Who was François-René de Chateaubriand?
François-René de Chateaubriand (1768–1848) was a Breton nobleman, writer and diplomat, generally counted the founder of French Romanticism. He travelled in North America, fought briefly with the émigré army, and spent years of poverty in exile in London, where he wrote sceptical work in the manner of the philosophes he had absorbed.
His return to the faith dates from 1798 and the news of his mother's death; The Genius of Christianity followed in 1802. He later served as ambassador to Britain and as foreign minister, and wrote the Mémoires d'outre-tombe, the memoir on which much of his modern reputation rests.
Common questions
- What is The Genius of Christianity about?
- It argues for Christianity from its fruits rather than from proofs — that the beauty of its art and architecture, the depth of its poetry, its charities and its treatment of death show it to be true to human nature. It was published in 1802 and is credited with restoring Christianity's standing in French literary culture after the Revolution.
- Was Chateaubriand a convert?
- He was raised Catholic but lost his faith entirely to eighteenth-century scepticism and lived for years as an unbeliever. His return came in 1798, in exile in London, on learning of his mother's death — an episode he summed up in the phrase 'I wept and I believed.'
A note on the text. The Genius of Christianity is in the public domain. What you're buying is our edition: the careful typesetting and correction. The original text is also available free here.