"I think so," said Eugene; "and by this measure, the great mass of population must be as essentially, pagan as they were in the days of Mars, Jupiter, Bacchus, and Apollo."
"I fear many will be found so," said M. Bertolot. "Men appear to be more eager than ever they were for exterior improvements; they are fast losing hold of the aspirations of the past; they have destroyed old theories, and substituted new philosophies and new remedies for evil that our sapping the very foundations of spiritual truth in men's minds. Yet man cannot utterly stifle his inward yearnings, nor annihilate his spiritual affinities. The soul who rejects the true worship bows, although unconsciously, to inferior agencies, and animal magnetism and spirit-rappings provide their poisoned food for the sickly appetite, and exercise their baneful empire ever the craving souls who reject the hallowing operations of religion. Meantime the world is in a miserable state of trouble and confusion."
"Yes," said Eugene, "but modern philosophy ascribes this state to ignorance, and says a proper educational development would obviate all. If so, what becomes of the fall of man?"
"If so! rather a large if," said M. Bertolot. "The world is nearly six thousand years old, and is it but now to begin to discover truth? and is that beginning to be the laying aside of all received traditional lore? Well! it is a new era, and everything will wear a new aspect soon. It is as though it were in the councils of the Most High, that every form of man's folly and self-seeking should have full development. Good, if he learn at last that from God alone, by supernatural means, comes true light to the soul. Good, if when all other means have been tried and found to fail, he seek it there at last. Good, if at length he recognizes the fact, that the soul's proper sphere is divine, is supernatural; that it is a consequence as legitimate for the purified soul to tower above, to command matter, as it is for heat to melt ice. Good, if he become aware that from the Eternal alone proceeds light and warmth and power and due action, and that the human soul, the proper recipient of these graces, cannot exercise its own proper vitality (so to speak) without these gifts from God, which form at once its nutriment and its stimulus. Now, the unbeliever uses not the means, consequently feels not the divinity stir within him; and that positive inertia of his spiritual existence is the great cause of his remaining an unbeliever. It is as though a man were to refuse to believe that equal proportions of sulphuric acid and of water, being mixed together at the temperature of fifty degrees, the compound will immediately acquire a temperature as high as boiling water, and not believing it possible, he refuses to test it, and so remains unconvinced. Nevertheless, the rise of temperature in this case is as certain a fact in chemistry as the fact in theology is certain, of the rise in the soul, when it approaches God by the means he himself has appointed."
"But," said Eugene, "if I understand you theologians aright, it is the prayer of faith that pierces the clouds. How am I to attain this faith?"
"Begin with the graces which you have already: I mean that of a sincere desire of truth, and that of the consciousness that you have not truth in actual possession yet. These two facts of your mind are gifts immensely great. Follow them closely and in simplicity, and greater results will follow. They contain already the germs of faith, and if you are true to their teachings you will be led to throw yourself, in child-like abandonment, into the arms of God, and contentedly follow where he leads. Your yearning for truth will then be gratified."
"And how am I to discover which historic facts are true? By divine light also?"
"Divine light will aid you even here. Yet in this case you must use the best human means you can command. You must study the evidences, examine the prophecies, and contemplate the manner in which these prophecies have been fulfilled. You must endeavor to penetrate the spiritual meaning of all the types, of all the allusions. You must mark well the connection between the old law and the new law, and distinguish the essential differences between what revelation from God is, and that which is simply man's idea of what a revelation from God should be. Study the developments of heathenism, modern as well as ancient; you will find more similarity than at first appears on the surface: and you will also easily trace therein, the divine truth, borrowed from the first traditions, and from the developments of revelation, which mingled with their perversions form the basis of their system, a system which is built on a materialized version of a spiritual teaching, which, parted from the centre of good, went astray by following its own fancies, relying on its own unassisted judgment. Finally, meditate sedulously the truths of the religion taught at the foot of the cross. Do not wait till you believe ere you do this, but learn what religion is as taught by Christian apostles; then, if you reject Christianity, you will at least know what you reject, and if you embrace it you will find many of your difficulties melt away, as if the very atmosphere dissolved them. But through every process, 'pray.'"
"I will," said Eugene, "certainly I will; until I have found the truth it is but reasonable that I should submit to your guidance. Yes, for a while I will study, meditate, pray, and endeavor to keep my mind unbiassed." Mentally he added, "Yes, Euphrasie, I will endeavor for a while to forget all that could bias me—even you."