Part 8 (1/2)

It is here almost as if Browning cannot restrain the expression of his own personal feeling, so markedly characteristic is this pa.s.sage of his general teaching. That which holds good of all struggle is applicable also to the contest between faith and doubt. That implicit faith of mediaeval times, which exerted too little influence on practical life, was in character less virile, a factor less potent for good than is the Bishop's own limited belief, constantly a.s.sailed by doubt. Good strengthened by the contest with evil, faith increased by the conflict with doubt. The creed of Browning, in brief:

I shew you doubt, to prove that faith exists.

The more of doubt, the stronger faith, I say, If faith o'ercomes doubt. How I know it does?

By life and man's free will, G.o.d gave for that! (ll. 602-605.)

Let doubt occasion still more faith. (l. 675.)

Words recalling Tennyson's reference to the spiritual struggles of a more finely tempered nature than that of Blougram:

He fought his doubts and gather'd strength, He would not make his judgment blind, He faced the spectres of the mind And laid them: thus he came at length

To find a stronger faith his own.[60]

And the Bishop may not unjustly claim

The sum of all is--yes, my doubt is great, My faith's still greater, then my faith's enough. (ll. 724-725.)

These higher utterances, intermingled as they are with the openly expressed tenets of the opportunist; whilst testifying most clearly to the genius of Browning in its penetrative comprehension of human nature, that admixture of n.o.ble aspiration and base compromise; find their counterpart in the memorable advice of Polonius to Laertes, const.i.tuted for the main part of prudential maxims regulating the social comportment of the successful worldling; then, almost suddenly, as it were, at the close, breaking through to deeper ground and striking upon that unalterable principle of life, of universal import, of inexhaustible illuminative power, since it treats only of that which is in its essence infinite--

To thine ownself be true; And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Though the life which the Bishop defends may not be the highest measured by the standard of his own ideal, yet, ”truth is truth, and justifies itself in undreamed ways.” And there _is_ truth in the recognition that the faith to which he looks for inspiration and guidance is a faith barely capable of holding its own in face of the battalion of a.s.sailant doubts.

It may yet be that ”the dayspring's faith” shall finally crush ”the midnight doubt.” Some solution of the problems of life must be sought, and why should that alone be rejected which alone offers a satisfactory clue?

There is perhaps no finer pa.s.sage in Browning, certainly none more melodious, than that in which Blougram, after comparing the relative positions of faith and unbelief as influencing life, concludes with this query.

Just when we are safest, there's a sunset-touch, A fancy from a flower bell, some one's death, A chorus-ending from Euripides,-- And that's enough for fifty hopes and fears As old and new at once as nature's self, To rap and knock and enter in our soul, Take hands and dance there, fantastic ring, Round the ancient idol, on his base again,-- The grand Perhaps! We look on helplessly.

There the old misgivings, crooked questions are-- This good G.o.d,--what he could do, if he would, Would, if he could--then must have done long since: If so, when, where and how? Some way must be,-- Once feel about, and soon or late you hit Some sense, in which it might be, after all.

Why not, ”The Way, the Truth, the Life?” (ll. 182-197.)

It must be left to the individual decision to acquit or condemn the Bishop. The decision may perhaps depend upon the acceptance or rejection of the alternative, ”Whole faith or none?” And ”whole faith” as defined by the Apology is that which accepts all things, from the existence of a G.o.d down to the latest ecclesiastical miracle. Such an att.i.tude is possible only to the uncritical mind. The spheres of faith and reason are not identical. The childlike intelligence may receive without question or effort of faith all that is offered it of things spiritual. It sees no cause for question, hence doubt does not arise. The logical and critical faculties have not been developed. But in the mind of the thinker, the logician, the metaphysician, reason will a.s.sert itself; judgment will not be blindfolded. If the postulates of faith are capable of proof by reason, then is faith no longer necessary; its sphere is usurped by reason which has become all-sufficient. To the man, therefore, whose intellect questions, a.n.a.lyses, dissects truths as they present themselves to him, a proportionately stronger faith is a necessity: the doubts so arising being, ”the most consummate of contrivances to teach men faith.”

Having once satisfied the insistent yearning of a nature which declares, I ...

want, am made for, and must have a G.o.d ... No mere name Want, but the true thing with what proves its truth, To wit, a relation from that thing to me, Touching from head to foot--which touch I feel. (ll. 846-850.)

(With this compare Mr. W. Ward on Cardinal Wiseman, ”his own early doubts ... had been the alternative to a pa.s.sionate, mystical, and absorbing faith.”) This relation having been attained, the speaker is prepared

To take the rest, this life of ours.

Faith in the greatest having been a.s.sured, faith in that which is less may or may not follow. He who feels in touch with the Divine may well endure the existence of doubts and questionings inevitable in matters of less vital import. To the child ”who knows his father near” tears are not an unalloyed bitterness; or, to adopt the Bishop's own simile, so be it the path leads to the mountain top, a break or two by the way matters little.

LECTURE IV