The First French Republic 453 five to ten years old shall not be less than sixty years of age. . . . The education of children from ten to sixteen shall be military and agricultural. Every man twenty-one years of age shall publicly state in the temples who are his friends. This declaration shall be renewed each year during the month Ventose. If a man deserts his friend, he is bound to explain his motives before the people in the temples; if he refuses, he shall be ban- ished. Friends shall not put their contracts into writing, nor shall they oppose one another at law. If a man com- mits a crime, his friends shall be banished. Friends shall dig the grave of a deceased friend and prepare for the obse- quies, and with the children of the deceased they shall scat- ter flowers on the grave. He who says that he does not believe in friendship, or who has no friends, shall be ban- ished. A man convicted of ingratitude shall be banished. The French people recognize the existence of the Su- preme Being and the immortality of the soul. The first day of every month is consecrated to the Eternal. Incense shall burn day and night in the temples and shall be tended in turn for twenty-four hours by the men who have reached the age of sixty. The temples shall never be closed. The French people devote their fortunes and their children to the Eternal. The immortal souls of all those who have died for the fatherland, who have been good citizens, who have cher- ished their father and mother and never abandoned them, are in the bosom of the Eternal. The first day of the month Germinal the republic shall celebrate the festival of the Divinity, of Nature, and of the People ; the first day of the month Floreal, the festival of the Divinity, of love, and of husband and wife, etc. 1 1 Robespierre, in a remarkable report made to the Convention, May 7, 1794, on the relations of religious ideas to republican principles, ex- hibits the same confidence in festivals. Among the sentiments which he would celebrate are liberty, equality, glory, immortality, frugality, disinterestedness, stoicism, old age, and misfortune {Histoire Parle- mentaire, Vol. XXXII, pp. 353 sqq.). See also another similar report submitted on February 5, 1794 (Histoirc Parlemenlaire, Vol. XXXI,
