p. 7 | An Infidel Recants by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Jun 10, 1915

An Infidel Recants

By C. M. S.

ONE of the most bitter atheists of France was M. Lavredeau, the poet and novelist. He expressed his hatred of religion in most scornful songs and poems and prose productions. But he seems now to have thrown his infidelity to the winds and is publishing his profession of faith in the most radical journals. He says:—

I laughed at faith and held myself a wise man. I stood on the road and looked at the soldiers. There they marched cheerfully onward to death. I asked, “What makes you so calm?” and they began to pray, and say, “I believe in God.” How hard it is in this national cemetery to be an atheist. I cannot, I cannot. I have deceived myself and you, too, who have read my books and sung my songs. To forsake God is to be lost indeed. I say to my friends, Lavredeau does not dare to die as an atheist. It is not hell that dismays me, but the thought, “There is a God, and you stand so far from him.” Rejoice, O my soul, that I am permitted to know this hour in which I can kneel and say, “I believe in God.”

Not many who have gone so far as Lavredeau went in scorn of religion and in denial of God ever turn from that path of death to tread in the path that leads to life. It is to be hoped that, having found the way out of the quicksands of infidelity, Lavredeau may lead many of his skeptical admirers to a belief in God.

C. M. S.