er or the more sorrowful for their
pretended tenets. This is simply because they stand in no need of
the admirable correctives supplied by your new theology; the present
engrosses their solicitudes and affections; and the mere talk of the
belief or the no-belief suffices to hush and tranquillize the heart
in relation to those most momentous subjects, on which if man has
not thought at all, he is a fool indeed. In either case the 'future'
and the 'eternal' seem so far removed that they seem to be an 'eternal
futurity.' Such parties look at that distant future much as children
at the stars; it is a point, an invisible speck, in the firmament.
A sixpence held near the eye appears larger; and brought sufficiently
close shuts out the universe altogether. But let us also forget the
future, and have a little talk of the past."

They resumed their conversation on subjects indifferent as far as this
journal is concerned, and I bade them good night.

---

July 5. We were sitting in the library after breakfast. The two
college friends soon fell into chat, while I sat writing at my
separate table, but ready to resume my capacity of reporter, should
any polemical discussion take place. I soon had plenty of employment.
After about an hour I heard Harrington say:--

"But I shall be happy, I assure you, to fill the void whenever you
will give me something solid wherewith to fill it."

It was impossible that even a believer in the doctrine that no
"creed" can be taught, and that an "external revelation" is an
impossibility, could be insensible to the charm of making a
proselyte.

"What is it," said Fellowes, "that you want?"

"What do I want? I want certainty, or quasi-certainty, on those
points on which if a man is content to remain uncertain, he is a
fool or a brute; points respecting which it is no more possible
for a genuine sceptic--for I speak not of the thoughtless lover
paradox, or the queer dogmatist who resolves that nothing is
true--to still the soul, than nakedness can render us insensible
to cold; or hunger cure its own pangs by saying, 'Go to, now; I have
nothing to eat.' The generality of mankind are insensible to these
questions only because they imagine, even though it may be falsely,
that they possess certainty. They are problems which, whenever there
is elevation of mind enough to appreciate their importance, engage
the real doubter in a life-long conflict; and to attempt to appease
restlessness of such a mi