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Abstract:

In 1907, the religious situation attracted the attention of the editors of “Mercure de France”. They launched an international survey and collected responses to the following question: “Are we witnessing a dissolution or an evolution of the religious idea and feeling?” In a series of publications and then in a separate edition, the publishers presented their readers with a unique discourse on intellectual change in society. The article only considers the reactions of Russian correspondents, a complete analysis of the published responses being well beyond the scope of our study. First of all, we sought to know the reasons for the use of Russian authors, to trace the mutual influence of French and Russian literature. Particular attention was paid to the collaboration between the “Mercure de France” editions and the Merezhkovsky–Minsky duo. Indeed, it is pointed out that Dmitri Merezhkovsky and Nicolas Minsky posed similar questions during their philosophical and religious meetings in 1901– 1903, four years before the publication of the survey. In response, Merezhkovsky developed his ideas of a “New religious consciousness”, and Minsky advocated his unique religion, meonism. Furthermore, the article elucidated the difference between Minsky’s core ideas and those of Merezhkovsky. Finally, their ideas were contrasted with those of their Russian counterparts.