ABSTRACT
DURING his last year at Bourbon College, Taine plunged seriously into philosophic studies, producing, among others, an essay on Spinoza's pantheism! and a treatise 'On Human Destiny'.2 In the 'Introduction' already referred to, he described how Guizot's lectures on Civilization in Europe started him on the search for laws of history and he became a 'sceptic in science and ethics'. 3 The philosophy of Spinoza came to his rescue:
'During the first months of the philosophy class, that state became insupportable to me . ... Then, wearied by contradictions, I placed my spirit in the service of the newest and most poetical opinion; I defended pantheism to the death .... That was my salvation.'4
