know the truth, here is enough of it to leave you
in repose. But if you desire with all your heart to know it, it is not
enough; look at it in detail. This would be sufficient for a question in
philosophy; but not here, where it concerns your all. And yet, after a
trifling reflection of this kind, we go to amuse ourselves, etc. Let us
inquire of this same religion whether it does not give a reason for this
obscurity; perhaps it will teach it to us.

227. Order by dialogues.--What ought I to do? I see only darkness
everywhere. Shall I believe I am nothing? Shall I believe I am God?

"All things change and succeed each other." You are mistaken; there is...

228. Objection of atheists: "But we have no light."

229. This is what I see and what troubles me. I look on all sides, and I see
only darkness everywhere. Nature presents to me nothing which is not matter
of doubt and concern. If I saw nothing there which revealed a Divinity, I
would come to a negative conclusion; if I saw everywhere the signs of a
Creator, I would remain peacefully in faith. But, seeing too much to deny
and too little to be sure, I am in a state to be pitied; wherefore I have a
hundred times wished that if a God maintains Nature, she should testify to
Him unequivocally, and that, if the signs she gives are deceptive, she
should suppress them altogether; that she should say everything or nothing,
that I might see which cause I ought to follow. Whereas in my present state,
ignorant of what I am or of what I ought to do, I know neither my condition
nor my duty. My heart inclines wholly to know where is the true good, in
order to follow it; nothing would be too dear to me for eternity.

I envy those whom I see living in the faith with such carelessness and who
make such a bad use of a gift of which it seems to me I would make such a
different use.

230. It is incomprehensible that God should exist, and it is
incomprehensible that H