mind of the age, that they seem ready to repeat to young people dazzled
by their success, the lesson which Gilbert had expressed in these terms:


Between ourselves--you own a God, I fear!
Beware lest in your verse the fact appear:
Dread the wits' laughter, friend, and know your betters:
Our grandsires might have worn those old-world fetters;
But in our days! Come, you must learn respect,--
Content _your age to follow_, not direct.[51]


To believe in God would be vulgar; to deny the existence of God would be
a want of taste; the divine world must remain as a subject for poetry.
So our critics speak. Their direct affirmation is scepticism. But they
follow the destinies of the positivist school; they do not succeed in
maintaining their balance between the affirmation and negation of God.
Alfred de Musset has described this position of the soul, and its
inevitable issue. Must I hope in God? Must I reject all faith and all
hope?


Between these paths how difficult the choice!
Ah! might I find some smoother, easier way.
"None such exists," whispers a secret voice,
"God _is_, or _is not_--own, or slight, His sway."
In sooth, I think so: troubled souls in turn
By each extreme are tossed and harassed sore:
They are but atheists, who feel no concern;
If once they doubted they would sleep no more.[52]