THE WAY OF DOUBT.
IN a book of some ability, in which " The Pilgrim's Progress " is rewritten for modern Agnostics,* the key-note of the thought is given in the declaration made by the teacher, Experi- ence, to the pilgrim, whose name is Qurester (a dubious etymo- logical equivalent, we suppose, for Seeker), that " only through Doubt can faith in the True be reached. Blind superstition is no faith. The Wicket-gate of Doubt is the first stage in the pilgrimage to the Home of Truth." Now, this seems to ns very far indeed from being a true maxim, much less, as it is clearly assumed by the writer to be, one self-evident to the modern world. It is the Poet-Laureate who is responsible for that favourite saying of the modern world that " there is more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds," a maxim which may be true enough of the doulutei who refuses, in its name, to smother his doubt, and who gives that maxim as his warrant for honestly facing it; but which is not true at all if it is construed, as the author of "The Agnostic's Progress" would apparently construe it, to mean that there is more faith to be got out or meeting and facing doubt than can ever be got out of a belief which in its deepest foundations has never been shaken at all. Indeed, if it were certain that the only • The Agnottic'e Progress from the Shown N the Uanoton. Londoif: Williams sad Norval% legitimate path to Truth leads through Doubt, it would obviously be equally certain that the present life is meant to be, at least for the highest minds, in the main, one of bewilderment and sus- pense of judgment on the highest questions,—that man's nature in the present world is not a nature adapted for faith, but only for suspense of judgment,—adapted, perhaps, event- ually to gain, faith, but in the meantime to do without it, and to move in an atmosphere of mere expectant attention and hesitating purpose. Now, the very machinery of the allegory which the author of " The Agnostic's Progress from the Known to the Unknown" has tried to adapt to this new conception of the true nature of life's pilgrimage, rebels against the purpose to which he has turned it. It has to be assumed, in the first place, that " the Home of Truth" is a reality, and is attainable by the human spirit ; and this surely is an immense assumption for one whose first fixed point is "the Wicket-gate of Doubt," and who is received at that wicket-gate by the door- keeper " Suspense." Surely, if Suspense had been worthy of his name. he would have addressed the pilgrim in some
such words as these I cannot tell you, perhaps no man can ever tell you, whether there really be such a place as " the Home of Truth " at all. That is the very first point on which you must learn to suspend your judg- ment. Experience will have taught you that there are such things as truth and falsehood, at least as regards the smaller conditions of your life here. You may see things as they are, or you may deceive yourself into seeing them as you wish them to be. But so far as regards the existence of any ultimate goal of the spirit to which you desire to find your way, and where you will enjoy the blessedness of resting in the truth, that is the very ques- tion which you have to solve, and which may prove to be simply insoluble. Unless you are prepared to begin by giving up all absolute confidence in the power of attaining truth, you had better not start on your pilgrimage at all. For if you do pre- sume to feel certain that troth by which you can live is really attainable, you will be guilty of that very disloyalty to truth,—the assumption of a foregone conclusion,—which must render the whole pilgrimage on which you have entered utterly vain.' Such would, in our view, be the right kind of address for Suspense, as keeper of the Wicket-gate of Doubt, to deliver to the pilgrim who has set out for the purpose of testing every step by the staff of Experience. The very assumption that there is a straight path to " the Home of Truth " is, on that view, a radically untrustworthy hypothesis. If Doubt is the right way, and the only way, the ultimate question is,- ' Is then any Home of Truth for the soul of man at all ; and if there be, in what direction ? Must not all directions be tried, and tried impartially, instead of taking for granted that there is any Home of Truth, or any single direction, by adhering to which alone, it can be reached ? ' Really, the narrative of this pilgrim- age assumes from the very first what is fatal to the teaching that Doubt is the only gate to Truth,—namely, that Truth is to be found, and is to be found by holding faithfully to a straight and narrow path. If that be so, the greatest doubt of all is condemned already, the doubt, namely, whether you can get beyond Doubt, whether Doubt itself be not the true goal of the pilgrim's course. He who as- sumes that Doubt is only the way, and that Truth is the end, has-prejudged the question in his heart, and is no longer in the deepest sense a doubter at all.
Forour own parts, we'do not in the least believe, nay, we ques- tion whether any one who speaks of Doubt as a mere passage-gate to Truth, can at bottom believe, that the way to Truth must necessarily go through Doubt. Is it necessary for the healthy appetite to doubt that there is such a thing as food, before it can profit by food ? Is it necessary for a healthy conscience to doubt whether there be such a thing as goodness, before it can do what is right ? Is it necessary for a healthy reverence to doubt the existence of the qualities revered, before it can profit by the spirit of reverence ? If none of these things be true,—and even the author of "The Agnostic's Progress" does not pretend that any of them are true,—then it cannot possibly be necessary for a healthy nature to doubt the highest spiritual truth as the only condition of attaining that truth. When Superstition reproaches the pilgrim of this new allegory for Agnostics, with desiring to get rid of faith in order that he may "live at ease in his sins,"'the pilgrim replies with righteous indignation, " Yon belie me ; weak I am, and ignorant, but I hate Sin with a perfect hatred "—a very good reply; but how far is it consistent with the teaching that the only way to true faith is through the Wicket-gate of Doubt P Ought one who trusts to the staff of Experience alone to hate sin " with a perfect hatred" without first trying what Sin is like ? Ought any of the natural instincts of man, physical, moral, or spiritual, to be trusted implicitly by one who assumes that the only right way to reach truth is by the Wicket-gate of Doubt ? We believe that so far from Doubt being the right and natural passage-gate to all Truth, it is rather the side-way back to Truth for those only who, through some morbid conditions,—whether of their age or of their individual minds,—have wandered from the natural path of spiritual development, and have had to come back to it through the postern of Doubt. To our minds the ultimate faith of all, the faith in God's perfect goodness, is as natural to a fully-developed conscience as the faith in the real existence of an external world is natural to fully-developed senses ; and the truly natural growth is the growth of that mind in which this faith is never for an instant shaken. Nay, we maintain that the very conception of a " Home of Truth " implies this, and is inconsistent with the view that all true faith comes through Doubt.. For a " Home of Truth " means the possession of that kind of truth which gives to us the sense of home ; and it is certainly not odds-and-ends of experience which can give to the human spirit the sense of home. The sense of home appeals to the affections more than to the reason. And he who assumes that there must be somewhere, so long as he is faithful, a home for his spirit, assumes that there is One behind the veil of Nature to whom the spirit naturally turns as to its true home, and from whom it never can turn except under the influence of some morbid and potent illusion. We are not denying for a moment that some of the very noblest of all natures may be overridden, especially in an age of extreme self-consciousness, by such a morbid and potent illusion, nor that such may attain by the way of Doubt to a faith nobler and purer than that which represents in a great many others a trust which has never suffered any disturb- ance at all. But we do assert this, that if the way of Doubt be the way of Nature, and the way of Nature for all rightly-balanced intellects and spirits, then the way to Truth is not a straight one, the end is not a sure one, and the whole conception of a pil- grimage is a false one. In that case,—for anything we know indeed as probably as not,—the whole problem may be indeterminate. We have no right to say that fidelity will solve it ; we have no right even to assume that fidelity itself is the way to solve it. In that case, we must start with no confidence that there is an end to reach, and with no right to assume that one way rather than another is the true way to bring the matter to a test. And since a condition of things which leaves us so utterly at sea is essen- tially an unnatural one, one which paralyses us for this life as well as for the other,—if another there be,—surely we are safe in assuming that it is not the condition of things for which the heart of man is suited, or to which it can really adapt itself. Doubt,—limited doubt at least, not universal doubt,—is one gate by which faith may be reached. But it is not the appropriate gate for any one who has not first strayed from the natural path of spiritual growth.
Previous page
