Page:The reflections of Lichtenberg.djvu/108

 consolation in trouble, as well as the strength to combat it, by no other means but the thought of God. I have known men to whom their good fortune was God. They believed in their good fortune, and the belief gave them courage; courage brought them good fortune, and good fortune courage. To have lost the conviction that the world is ruled by a Wise Being is a great deprivation. Yet this is in my opinion the necessary consequence of any study of philosophy and nature. One does not indeed lose one’s faith in a God, but it is no longer the succouring God of one’s childhood: it is a Being whose ways are not our ways, whose thoughts are not our thoughtsand this is not much use to the helpless. It is a golden rule that one should never judge men by their opinions, but rather by what these opinions lead them to be. It is in many instances easy to recognize an honest man, but not in all. The case is the same as with minerals: some are easily recognized at sight; with others chemical analysis is necessary. But who troubles himself about chemical analysis in judging character, or how many have the skill to employ it? Rapidity of decision in this matter is mainly to be attributed to the laziness of human nature; so that in practice the laboured chemical process gains few devotees. It is sufficient justification if a man has so lived as