The Eclipse of Faith | Page 2

are not even excluded from the incidental adjuncts of Strauss's
mythical theory. It might also be urged, that, allowing the question to
be paramount in its relation to the whole issue, it is one which is not so
judiciously dealt with in the discursiveness of dialogues after dinner, as
in the solitary study, with piles of huge tomes, lexicons, and
manuscripts that require a most deliberate examination. But to leave the
merits and the relative importance of this question undebated, it might

have been more generous in the Reviewer to have confined his
criticisms to a decision upon what the author has endeavored to
accomplish, instead of impugning his judgment in the selection of the
points on which to employ his pen. How ever desirable it may be that
we should have in another form what Mr. Norton has presented so
thoroughly in his work on the Genuineness of the Gospels, it is enough
to answer to the Reviewer in the Prospective, that the writer of this
volume addressed himself to a different course of argument, starting
from other divergences of opinion, philosophical rather than critical in
their relations. He certainly was free to select the method and the
direction of his argument, if he candidly represented the answering
point of view of those to whom he opposed himself.
Amid many episodes and interludes of fancy and narrative, it will be
found that the volume arrays its force of argument against two of the
assumptions alike of modern and of ancient scepticism; namely, that a
revelation from God to men through the agency of a book is an
unreasonable tenet of belief; and that it is impossible that a miracle
should occur, and impossible that its occurrence should be
authenticated. There is a vigorous and logical power displayed in the
discussion of these two points. The discomfiture of those who urge
these assumptions does not of course convince all scepticism, or
substitute faith for it, but it is something to discomfit such pleas, and to
expose the fallacies which confuse the minds of their advocates. The
matters of debate are lofty, and there is no levity in their treatment.
ADVERTISEMENT.
He who reads this book only superficially will at once see that it is not
all fiction; and he who reads it more than superficially will as easily see
that it is not all fact. In what proportions it is composed of either would
probably require a very acute critic accurately to determine. As the
Editor makes no pretensions to such acumen,--as he can lay claim to
only an imperfect knowledge of the principal personage in the volume,
and never had any personal acquaintance with the singular youth, some
traits of whose character and some glimpses of whose history are here
given, --he leaves the above question to the decision of the reader. At

the same time, it is of no consequence in the world. The character and
purport of the volume are sufficiently disclosed in the parting words of
the Journalist. "It aspires," as is justly said, "to none of the appropriate
interest either of a novel or a biography." It might have been very
properly entitled "Theological Fragments."
March 31, 1852.
INTRODUCTION
A GENUINE SCEPTIC
A VERSATILE BELIEVER
PURITAN INFIDELITY
LORD HERBERT AND MODERN DEISM
SOME CURIOUS PARADOXES
PROBLEMS
A DIALOGUE SHOWING THAT "THAT MAY BE POSSIBLE
WITH MAN WHICH IS IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD"
SCEPTIC'S FAVORITE TOPICS
UNSTABLE EQUILIBRIUM
A SCEPTICS FIRST CATECHISM SOME LIGHT ON THE
MYSTERY
BELIEF AND FAITH
THE "VIA MEDIA" OF DEISM
A SCEPTIC'S SELECT PARTY
HOW IT WAS THAT INFIDELITY PREVENTED MY BECOMING

AN INFIDEL
SKIRMISHES
CHRISTIAN ETHICS
THE BLANK BIBLE
A DIALOGUE IN WHICH IT IS CONTENDED "THAT MIRACLES
ARE IMPOSSIBLE, BUT THAT IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVE IT"
THE ANALOGIES OF AN EXTERNAL REVELATION WITH THE
LAWS AND CONDITIONS OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
ON A PREVAILING FALLACY
HISTORIC CREDIBILITY
A KNOTTY POINT
MEDICAL ANALOGIES
HISTORIC CRITICISM
THE "PAPAL AGGRESSION" PROVED TO BE IMPOSSIBLE
THE PARADISE OF FOOLS
A FUTURE LIFE
A VARIABLE QUANTITY
DISCUSSION OF THREE POINTS
THE LAST EVENING
THE ECLIPSE OF FAITH.
To E. B*****, Missionary in ------, South Pacific.

Wednesday, June 18, 1851.
My Dear Edward:--
You have more than once asked me to send you, in your distant
solitude, my impressions respecting the religious distractions in which
your native country has been of late years involved. I have refused,
partly, because it would take a volume to give you any just notions on
the subject; and partly, because I am not quite sure that you would not
be happier in ignorance. Think, if you can, of your native land as in this
respect what it was when you left it, on your exile of Christian love,
some fifteen years ago.
I little thought I should ever have so mournful a motive to