Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again | Page 6

midst of a world of interesting objects, and yet, instead of seeing things, as we see them, have nothing but a confounding and distressing sensation. Seeing, as we see, is the result of habit, acquired by long-continued use. The new-born babe must have time to exercise its eyes, and exercise its little mind as well, before it can distinguish face from face, and form from form. The man who has just received his sight must have time for similar exercise, before he can enjoy the rich pleasures and advantages of sight to perfection. Even we who have had our sight for fifty years do not see as many things in a picture, a landscape, or a bed of flowers, when we see them for the first time, as those who have been accustomed to inspect and examine such objects for years.
'And so it is with mental and moral vision. Something more than a mind, and instruction, and mental objects are necessary to enable a man to understand religion and duty. Attention, study, comparison, continued with calmness, and candor, and patience, for days, for months, or for years, may be necessary to enable a skeptic to understand, to believe, and to feel like those who have long been disciples of Christ.
'And a change of habits, continued till it produces a change of tastes and desires, is necessary to prepare the sensualist to judge correctly with regard to things moral and religious. We must not therefore expect a good lecture, or an able book, to cure a skeptic of his doubts at once. It may produce an effect which, in time, if the party be faithful to duty, will end in his conversion at a future day. The seed committed to the soil does not produce rich harvests in a day. A change of air and habits does not at once regenerate the invalid. The husbandman has to wait long for his crop: and the physician has to wait long for the recovery of his patient. And the skeptic has to wait long, till the seed of truth, deposited in his soul, unfolds its germs, and produces the rich ripe harvest of faith, and holiness, and joy.
'And preachers and teachers must not think it strange, if their hearers and readers are slow to change. Nor must they despond even though no signs of improvement appear for months or years. A change for the better in a student may not be manifest till it has been in progress for years. It may not be perfected for many years. You cannot force a change of mind, as you can force the growth of a plant in a hot-house. An attempt to do so might stop it altogether. Baxter said, two hundred years ago, 'Nothing so much hindereth the reception of the truth, as urging it on men with too much importunity, and falling too heavily on their errors.'
'Have patience, then. Teach, as your pupil may be prepared to learn, but respect the laws of the Eternal, which have fixed long intervals for slow and silent processes, between the seed-time and the harvest-home.'
While I am in doubt as to whether I have put into my book too much on some subjects, I am thoroughly convinced that I have put into it too little on others. I have not said enough, nor half enough, on Atheism. I ought to have exposed its groundlessness, its folly, and its mischievous and miserable tendency at considerable length.
This defect I shall try to remedy as soon as possible, and in the best way I can.
Some weeks ago I read a paper before the M. E. Preachers' Meeting of Philadelphia, on ATHEISM,--what can it say for itself? The paper was received with great favor, and many asked for its publication. It will form the first article in my next volume.
I expect, in fact, to give the subject of Atheism a pretty thorough examination in that volume, and to show that it is irrational and demoralizing from beginning to end, and to the last extreme.
John Stuart Mill, the head and representative of English Literary and Philosophical Atheists, has left us a history of his life, and of his father's life. In this work he presents us with full length portraits of himself and his father, and both gives us their reasons for being Atheists, and reveals to us the influence of their Atheism on their hearts and characters, as well as on their views on morality, politics, and other important subjects.
And though the painter, as we might expect, flatters to some extent both himself and his father, yet he gives us the more important features of both so truthfully, that we have no difficulty in learning from them, what kind of creatures great Philosophical Atheists are, or in gathering from their works