Page:War and the Christian Faith.pdf/48

Pickwick, who never existed? Yet, without these and many other irrational habits, interests, ceremonies, life would degenerate into brutish and intolerable savagery, or what is worse—Gradgrindery. Very good; but the most frequent of the sham arguments of our Freethinker is that the Faith is irrational. Of course it is irrational; like all the things of life which are worth anything, or worth talking about. The truth is that, whether we like it or not, we live, if we live well, in and by and through mysteries. We do not live by bread alone, even so far as mere bread, and our mere physical nourishment and well-being are concerned, but by bread eaten in cheerfulness and with charity. We call a good dinner a feast; but it is no feast at all—save to a hog—if joy and mirth be absent from it.