Book 1
5
Are you certain that you are awake? am not, replies such a person, for neither am I certain when in dreaming I appear to myself to be awake. Is there no difference, then, between these appearances? None. Shall I argue with this man any longer? For what steel or what caustic can I apply, to make him sensible of his paralysis? If he is sensible of it, and pretends not to be so, he is even worse than dead. He sees not his inconsistency, or, seeing it, holds to the wrong. He moves not, makes no progress; he rather falls back. His sense of shame is gone; his reasoning faculty is not gone, but brutalized. Shall I call this strength of mind? By no means,—unless we allow it to be such in the vilest debauchees publicly to speak and act out their worse impulses.
Of providence.
6
For every event that happens in the world it is easy to give thanks to Providence, if a person has but these two qualities in himself: a habit of closely considering what happens to each individual, and a grateful temper. Without the first, he will not perceive the usefulness of things which happen; and without the other, he will not be thankful for them. If God had made colors, and had not made the faculty of seeing them, what would have been their use? None. On the other hand, if he had made the faculty of observation, without objects to observe, what would have been the use of that? None. Again, if he had formed both the faculty and the objects, but had not made the light of day? Neither in that case would they have been of any use.
