CONCLUSION. 225 



A little petty perfecting of knowledge, such as we 

 have aspired after, we shall never have; they tell 

 us most truly who tell us so. God forbid we should 

 forbid that His givings should be limited by our 

 desires ; His bountiful surprises by our anticipations. 

 But, darkened by our own expectations, arid seeing 

 nothingj^ut their failure, we do not see that they fail 

 only because a success altogether beyond any pos- 

 sible expectations is placed in our hands ; nay, that 

 in this very failure that greater and better success 

 consists. 



We may see this greater success involved in our 

 seeming failure in two ways : 



First. If we find that all our attempts to fathom 

 existence by thought are in vain, and that we can 

 only arrive at conceptions which cannot be the truth 

 because they involve contradictions; then how can 

 we fail to see the different attitude in which our 

 emotions and our moral feelings are placed in regard 

 to our belief? If that which we can conceive cannot 

 be true, then why may not our moral powers be, in 

 respect to truth, the guide and judge? The idea, 

 which naturally arises when the short-coming of the 



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