He complied with my request; and in the course of conversation
informed me of many circumstances which had formed steps in that slow
gradation by which he had reached his present state of mind; a state
which he did not affect to conceal. But still I felt sure there were
other causes which he did not mention.

At length I said, "You must give me the title of an old friend,
--a father, Harrington, I might almost say,"--and the tears came
into my eyes,--"to talk hereafter fully with you of your so certain
uncertainty about the only topics which supremely affect the
happiness of man."

I told him, and I spoke it in no idle compliment, that I was
convinced he was far enough from being one of those shallow fools
who are inclined to scepticism because they shrink from the trouble
of investigating the evidence; who find so much to be said for this,
and much for that, that they conclude that there is no truth,
simply because they are too indolent to seek it. "This," said I,
"is the plea of intellectual Sybarites with whom you have nothing
in common. And as little do you sympathize with those dishonest,
though not always shallow thinkers, who take refuge in alleged
uncertainty of evidence, because they are afraid of pursuing it
to unwelcome conclusions; who are sceptics on the most singular and
inconsistent of all grounds, presumption. I know you are none
of these."

"I am, I think, none of these," said he quietly.

"You are not: and your manner and countenance proclaim it yet more
strongly than your words. The only genuine effect of a sincere
scepticism is and must be, not the complacent and frivolous humor
which too often attaches to it, but a mournful confession of the
melancholy condition to which, if true, the theory reduces the
sceptic himself and all mankind."

Of all the paradoxes humanity exhibits, surely there are none more
wonderful than the complacency with which scepticism often utters
its doubts, and the tranquillity which it boasts as the perfection
of its system! Such a state of mind is utterly inconsistent with
the genuine realization and true-hearted reception of the theory.
On such subjects such a creature as man cannot be in doubt, and
really feel his doubts, without being anxious and miserable. When I
hear some youth telling me, with a simpering face, that he does
not know, or pretend to say, whether there be a God, or not, or
whether, if there be, He takes any interest in human affairs; or
whether,