"What is there that you can't believe?"

"Well, there is the Bible, for instance."

"Don't you believe the Bible?"

"About as I believe Robinson Crusoe."

"Do you think the trouble is with the Bible, or with yourself? Don't you
think that, if you had faith, as a Christian man, the Bible would be a
different book to you?"

"That looks easy; of course, if I had faith I would be just as you are.
But how can a man believe what he does not believe?"

"Did you ever hear about prayer?"

"Yes, I have heard something about it."

"Don't you think that there is something in it?"

"Yes, I am inclined to think there is." (I could not honestly deny it in
the light of my experience.)

"Well, don't you think that if you were to pray to God for faith, God
would give it to you?"

This question touched the spring of memory, and conscience showed me
what it thought of me. I was ashamed of my littleness and of my
unscientific attitude of mind in wilfully ignoring the greatest facts of