"Once I had some principles, some truths clearly defined; but now I
know nothing distinctly, believe nothing. The more I read and study
the more obscure seem the questions I am toiling to answer. Is this
increasing intricacy the reward of an earnestly inquiring mind? Is
this to be the end of all my glorious aspirations? Have I come to
this? 'Thus far, and no farther.' I have stumbled on these
boundaries many times, and now must I rest here? Oh, is this my
recompense? Can this be all? All!" Smothered sobs convulsed her
frame.
She had long before rejected a "revealed code" as unnecessary; the
next step was to decipher nature's symbols, and thus grasp God's
hidden laws; but here the old trouble arose. How far was
"individualism" allowable and safe? To reconcile the theories of
rationalism, she felt, was indeed a herculean task, and she groped
on into deeper night. Now and then her horizon was bestarred, and,
in her delight, she shouted, "Eureka!" But when the telescope of her
infallible reason was brought to bear upon the coldly glittering
points, they flickered and went out. More than once a flaming comet,
of German manufacture, trailed in glory athwart her dazzled vision;
but close observation resolved the gilded nebula, and the nucleus
mocked her. Doubt engendered doubt; the death of one difficulty was
the instant birth of another. Wave after wave of skepticism surged
over her soul, until the image of a great personal God was swept
from its altar. But atheism never yet usurped the sovereignty of the
human mind; in all ages, moldering vestiges of protean deism
confront the giant specter, and every nation under heaven has reared
its fane to the "unknown God." Beulah had striven to enthrone in her
desecrated soul the huge, dim, shapeless phantom of pantheism, and
had turned eagerly to the system of Spinoza. The heroic grandeur of
the man's life and character had strangely fascinated her; but now,
that idol of a "substance, whose two infinite attributes were
extension and thought," mocked her; and she hurled it from its
pedestal, and looked back wistfully to the pure faith of her
childhood. A Godless world; a Godless woman. She took up the lamp
and retired to her own room. On all sides books greeted her; here
was the varied lore of dead centuries; here she had held communion
with the great souls entombed in these dusty pages. Here, wrestling
alone with those grim puzzles, she had read out the vexed and vexing
questions, in this debating club of the moldering dead, and
endeavored to make them solve them. These well-worn volumes, with
close "marginalias," echoed her inquiries, but answered them not to
her satisfaction. Was her life to be thus passed in feverish toil
and ended as by a leap out into a black, shoreless abyss? Like a
spent child she threw her arms on the mantelpiece and wept
uncontrollably, murmuring: "Oh, better die now than live as I have lived, in perpetual
stragglings! What is life worth without peace of mind, without hope;
and what hope have I? Diamonded webs of sophistry can no longer
entangle; like Noah's dove, my soul has fluttered among them,
striving in vain for a sure hold to perch upon; but, unlike it, I
have no ark to flee to. Weary and almost hopeless, I would fain
believe that this world is indeed as a deluge, and in it there is no
ark of refuge but the Bible. It is true, I did not see this souls'
ark constructed; I know nothing of the machinery employed; and no
more than Noah's dove can I explore and fully understand its secret
chambers; yet, all untutored, the exhausted bird sought safety in
the incomprehensible, and was saved. As to the mysteries of
revelation and inspiration, why, I meet mysteries, turn which way I
will. Man, earth, time, eternity, God, are all inscrutable mysteries
My own soul is a mystery unto itself, and so long as I am impotent
to fathom its depths, how shall I hope to unfold the secrets of the
universe?"