Page:Ernestus Berchtold or the Modern Œdipus.djvu/117

 The conversation to which I was now present, seemed to rest upon the entire conviction, that all I believed was false. Yet this was not satisfactory. I heard arguments adduced in support of one assertion which seemed irresistible; but what was my surprise, on another evening to hear the same person adduce more than plausibilities in favour of the contrary hypothesis. I at last was bewildered, I was unwilling to believe the human mind incapable of truth, the more I examined, the more difficulty I found in the attainment of it. I heard the deist and the atheist contend; following but one of the chains of argument, I was convinced; looking at them together, I saw the lustre of truth equally on both; I knew not which to choose. I was a sceptic in fact, not in name. Night after night upon my sleepless touch, I called upon the God, whose existence I doubted, to visit me, as if God heeded the belief of an individual, as if the happiness of an infinite being like