Part 54 (2/2)
”No; there is no proper age for it. It will never be explained to her. Neither Flora nor her father will ever understand anything about it. But they will always believe it. Am I old enough to understand it? Explain it to me. No one yet has ever attempted to do so; and yet my education was not neglected.”
Wilkinson had too great a fear of his friend's powers of ridicule to venture on an explanation; so he again suggested that they should change the subject.
”That is always the way,” said Bertram. ”I never knew a clergyman who did not want to change the subject when that subject is the one on which he should be ever willing to speak.”
”If there be anything that you deem holy, you would not be willing to hear it ridiculed.”
”There is much that I deem holy, and for that I fear no laughter. I am ready to defy ridicule. But if I talk to you of the asceticism of Stylites, and tell you that I admire it, and will imitate it, will you not then laugh at me? Of course we ridicule what we think is false. But ridicule will run off truth like water from a duck's back.
Come, explain to me this about the resurrection of the body.”
”Yet, in my flesh, shall I see G.o.d,” said Arthur, in a solemn tone.
”But I say, no. It is impossible.”
”Nothing is impossible with G.o.d.”
”Yes; it is impossible that his own great laws should change. It is impossible that they should remain, and yet not remain. Your body--that which we all call our body--that which Flora b.u.t.tercup believes to be her body (for in this matter she does believe) will turn itself, through the prolific chemistry of nature, into various productive gases by which other bodies will be formed. With which body will you see Christ? with that which you now carry, or that you will carry when you die? For, of course, every atom of your body changes.”
”It little matters which. It is sufficient for me to believe as the Scriptures teach me.”
”Yes; if one could believe. A Jew, when he drags his dying limbs to the valley of Jehoshaphat, he can believe. He, in his darkness, knows nothing of these laws of nature. But we will go to people who are not in darkness. If I ask your mother what she means when she says--'Not by confusion of substance; but by unity of person,' what will she answer me?”
”It is a subject which it will take her some time to explain.”
”Yes, I think so; and me some time longer to understand.”
Wilkinson was determined not to be led into argument, and so he remained silent. Bertram was also silent for awhile, and they walked on, each content with his own thoughts. But yet not content.
Wilkinson would have been contented to be let alone; to have his mind, and faith, and hopes left in the repose which nature and education had prepared for them. But it was not so with Bertram. He was angry with himself for not believing, and angry with others that they did believe. They went on in this way for some ten minutes, and then Bertram began again.
”Ah, that I could believe! If it were a thing to come at, as a man wishes, who would doubt? But you, you, the priest, the teacher of the people, you, who should make it all so easy, you will make it so difficult, so impossible. Belief, at any rate, should be easy, though practice may be hard.”
”You should look to the Bible, not to us.”
”Yes; it is there that is our stumbling-block. A book is given to us, not over well translated from various languages, part of which is history hyperbolically told--for all Eastern language is hyperbolical; part of which is prophecy, the very meaning of which is lost to us by the loss of those things which are intended to be imaged out; and part of which is thanksgiving uttered in the language of men who knew nothing, and could understand nothing of those rules by which we are to be governed.”
”You are talking of the Old Testament?”
”It is given to us as one whole. Then we have the story of a mystery which is above, or, at least, beyond the utmost stretch of man's comprehension; and the very purport of which is opposed to all our ideas of justice. In the jurisprudence of heaven can that be just which here, on earth, is manifestly unjust?”
”Is your faith in G.o.d so weak then, and your reliance on yourself so firm, that you can believe nothing beyond your own comprehension?”
”I believe much that I do not understand. I believe the distance of the earth from the sun. I believe that the seed of a man is carried in a woman, and then brought forth to light, a living being. I do not understand the principle of this wondrous growth. But yet I believe it, and know that it is from G.o.d. But I cannot believe that evil is good. I cannot believe that man placed here by G.o.d shall receive or not receive future happiness as he may chance to agree or not to agree with certain doctors who, somewhere about the fourth century, or perhaps later, had themselves so much difficulty in coming to any agreement on the disputed subject.”
”I think, Bertram, that you are going into matters which you know are not vital to faith in the Christian religion.”
”What is vital, and what is not? If I could only learn that! But you always argue in a circle. I am to have faith because of the Bible; but I am to take the Bible through faith. Whence is the first spring of my faith to come? where shall I find the fountain-head?”
”In prayer to G.o.d.”
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