omnipotence.

_Amb_.--You mistake me: as to their influencing or affecting the supreme
mind it is out of the question, but they affect your own mind, they
perpetuate a habit of gratitude and of obedience which may gradually end
in perfect faith, they discipline the affections and keep the heart in a
state of preparation to receive and preserve all good and pious feelings.
Whoever passes from utter darkness into bright sunshine finds that he
cannot at first distinguish objects better in one than in the other, but
in a feeble light he acquires gradually the power of bearing a brighter
one, and gains at last the habit not only of supporting it, but of
receiving delight as well as instruction from it. In the pious
contemplations that I recommend to you there is the twilight or sober
dawn of faith which will ultimately enable you to support the brightness
of its meridian sun.

_Onu_.--I understand you, but your metaphor is more poetical than just;
your discipline, however, I have no doubt, is better fitted to enable me
to bear the light than to contemplate it through the smoked or coloured
glasses of scepticism.

_Amb_.--Yes, for they not only diminish its brightness but alter its
nature.




DIALOGUE THE THIRD. THE UNKNOWN.