Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1883-03-31
LOSING FAITH IN GOD.

LOSING FAITH IN GOD.
Can we, in fact, conceive of
any calamity that could befall a rational
man in this life greater than the blotting
out of all faith, all trust, all hope in
Godp What would compensate a soul
even here for such a loss? When the
loss is total and ~irretrievable. what is
left? No doubt it was both total and
irretrievable in the case of Judas lscari-
OF; and to him there was nothing left
but despair and fearful doom. But in
the case of the philosophical and litera-
ry skeptics OF our unbelieving age, the
strong probability is that, notwithstand-
ing their professions, they are not quite
as far from God as they aver. There
is a lingering of the faith of child
hood and of godly ancestry left which
still supports and cheers the soul in
the dismal outlook of the eternal flu
ture.
Still, the fact can not be denied, for it
is q matter of record, that not a few
highly-cultivated minds Of our day have
argued themselves into the conviction
that there is no God in the universe and
Ao me !Oi Hill UeyoAu GAc PicSCAlo
world. They have not only lost all
faith in God and immortality, but some
of them, like Harriet Martineau,
have reasoned themselves into the
belief that this loss of faith is a
great gain, a ground of satisfaction
while living, and of heartfelt Joy at the
prospect of death. When near the ter
minus of her long life Harriet Martineau
did not hesitate to say: 81 feelno solic-
itude about a parting which will bring
no pain. I am frankly satisfied to have
done with life. 1 have had a noble
share of it, and l desire no more. l
neither wish to live longer here, nor to
find life again elsewhere. 1t seems to
me simply absurd to expect it." This
tone of serene and self-complacent ex-
ultation in the prospectDf humiliation,
expressed by the aged atheist, is very
far from being the experience of all
who have renounced the God and the
Heaven of the Bible. Far more natural,
and probably sincere. too, is the esti-
mate which another disciple of the new
philosophy places upon this total loss of
faith in God. He says: 1.-The theory of
Theism in any shape is. scientifically
considered, superhuous; and l am not
ashamed to confess that, with this vir-
tual negation OF God, the universe, to
me, has lost its soul of loneliness; and
when at times i think, as think at times
l must, of the appalling contrast be-
tween the hallowed glory of that creed
which once wa mine and the lonely
mystery of existence as l now find it, [
shall yer feel it impossible to avoid the
sharpest pang of which my nature is
susceptible" This is but the creed of
the heart protesting against its greatest
loss.
When we read the histories of the
grs at and good men, who, through all
past ages, have lived and died with an
mistaken faith in God, and a blessed
hope of immortal life through brist, it
seems, indeed, a strange h~allucination
that leads SO many educated people of
our day to relinquish these exalted
hopes for the improved negations of
what is at best mere speculation
and con. -t,rc. Well may this writer
speak of atheism a, a ..superiuous
theory" Impossible OF proof in the
very nature of the. case, as John Foster
and Thomas Chalmers long ago showed,
it a eve be anything better
than a ''superfuous theory which
solv no mystery, explains no ex-
listing facts, and brings no real salts
faction to a Genealogical mind. Why,
then, should an intelligent man sacri-
flee the historic and hallowed glory OF
the Christian creed, whose tir.t po>tu-
late is: Eye believe in God, believe also
in Me- for the empty husks, of this un-
satisfying and superhu IL: dogma of no
God and no immortality? 1t is alleged by
the leaders of modern free thought that
Christianity has been discrcdited, that its
facts and doctrin IS are not proved.
What has discrcdited it? Have
tie mere theories and speculations
OF philosophy dscreditea it? Certain
ly there are no facts known to
atheism or agnosticism, which have dis-
proOad the existence of God, or the rea-
sonab1eness of a life to come. With all
our advance in science, these two old
doctrines of the Christian creed .tand
to-day where they have always stood
every principle OF mans constitution at
testing them, all the phenomena and
analogies of the universe suggesting and
confirming them, every page OF inspired
history in the Bible affirming them, and
not a single fact known to science or
philosophy discrediting them. In this
state of the argument is it the wise man.
or is it the foolish, who loses faith in
God. abandons the Bible and takes ref
dge in atheism? Where is the logic of
such a surrender to atheism?
For what, then, should a man be will
ing to sell his birthright of faith in
sod? Atheism certainly has nothing
adequate to pay for it. Nor has any
other form of speculative unbelief. Said
The eminent English scientist, Sir
Humphrey Davy, when near the close
Of his brilliant career: IL envy no
quality of mind or intellect in others.
1or genius, power, wit, or fancy; but if
J could choose what would be most de-