them to look facts in the face
and to suppress vain repinings by strenuous action instead of luxurious
dreaming.

And hence, too, the time is come for speaking plainly. If you would wait
to speak the truth until you can replace the old decaying formula by a
completely elaborated system, you must wait for ever; for the system
can never be elaborated until its leading principles have been boldly
enunciated. Reconstruct, it is said, before you destroy. But you must
destroy in order to reconstruct. The old husk of dead faith is pushed
off by the growth of living beliefs below. But how can they grow unless
they find distinct utterance? and how can they be distinctly uttered
without condemning the doctrines which they are to replace? The truth
cannot be asserted without denouncing the falsehood. Pleasant as the
process might be of announcing the truth and leaving the falsehood to
decay of itself, it cannot be carried into practice. Men's minds must be
called back from the present of phantoms and encouraged to follow the
only path which tends to enduring results. We cannot afford to make the
tacit concession that our opinions, though true, are depressing and
debasing. No; they are encouraging and elevating. If the medicine is
bitter to the taste, it is good for the digestion. Here and there, a
bold avowal of the truth will disperse a pleasing dream, as here and
there it will relieve us of an oppressing nightmare. But it is not by
striking balances between these pains and pleasures that the total
effect of the creed is to be measured; but by the permanent influence on
the mind of seeing things in their true light and dispersing the old
halo of erroneous imagination. To inculcate reticence at the present
moment is simply to advise us to give one more chance to the development
of some new form of superstition. If the faith of the future is to be a
faith which can satisfy the most cultivated as well as the feeblest
intellects, it must be founded on an unflinching respect for realities.
If its partisans are to win a definitive victory, they must cease to
show quarter to lies. The problem is stated plainly enough to leave no
room for hesitation. We can distinguish the truth from falsehood, and
see where confusion has been reproduced, and truth pressed into the
service of falsehood. Nothing more is wanted but to go forward boldly,
and reject once for all the weary compromises and elaborate adaptations
which have become a mere vexatio