The importance, as an educative instrument, of the demands on faith made by the absence of overwhelmingly conclusive and unalterable evidence in matters spiritual, is again illustrated in that remarkable little poem _Fears and Scruples_, following _Easter Day_ after an interval of more than a quarter of a century (pub. 1876). The writer there declares his personal preference for the condition of life ultimately the choice of the First Speaker, in which uncertainty may admit of hope, even though the future should prove such hope fallacious. The old theory is advanced beneath the illustration of relationship to an absent friend, proofs of whose affection, of whose very existence, rest upon the evidence of letters, the genuineness of which has been called in question by experts. Nevertheless, the friend at home, the soliloquist of the poem, refuses to yield credence to calumny. His faith in the friend, if misplaced, has been hitherto a source of spiritual elevation and inspiration. Even though the truth be ultimately proved but falsehood, he is yet the better for those days in which he deemed it truth. Therefore, One thing's sure enough: 'tis neither frost, No, nor fire, shall freeze or burn from out me Thanks for truth--though falsehood, gained--though lost. All my days, I'll go the softlier, sadlier, For that dream's sake! How forget the thrill Through and through me as I thought "The gladlier Lives my friend because I love him still!" The parallel is enforced by the suggestion at the close-- Hush, I pray you! What if this friend happen to be--God? (_F. and S._, viii, ix, xii.)