FAITH MAKES HOLY AND CONDEMNS.—A Christian who happened upon forbidden paths of thought might well ask himself on some occasion whether it is really necessary that there should be a God, side by side with a representative Lamb, if faith in the existence of these beings suffices to produce the same influences? If they do exist after all, are they not superfluous beings? For all that is given by the Christian religion to the human soul, all that is beneficent, consoling, and edifying, just as much as all that depresses and crushes, emanates from that faith and not from the objects of that faith. It is here as in another well-known case—there were indeed no witches, but the terrible effects of the belief in witches were the same as if they really had existed. For all occasions where the Christian awaits the immediate intervention of a God, though in vain (for there is no God), his religion is inventive enough to find subterfuges and reasons for tranquillity. In so far Christianity is an ingenious religion.—Faith, indeed, has up to the present not been able to move real mountains, although I do not know who assumed that it could. But it can put mountains where there are none. 226. THE TRAGI-COMEDY OF REGENSBURG.—Here and there we see with terrible clearness the harlequinade of Fortune, how she fastens the rope, on which she wills that succeeding centuries should dance, on to a few days, one place, the condition and opinions of one brain. Thus the fate of modern German history lies in the days of that disputation at Regensburg: the peaceful settlement of ecclesiastical and moral affairs, without religious wars or a counter-reformation, and also the unity of the German nation, seemed assured: the deep, gentle spirit of Contarini hovered for one moment over the theological squabble, victorious, as representative of the riper Italian piety, reflecting the morning glory of intellectual freedom. But Luther’s hard head, full of suspicions and strange misgivings, showed resistance. Because justification by grace appeared to him _his_ greatest motto and discovery, he did not believe the phrase in the mouth of Italians; whereas, in point of fact, as is well known, they had invented it much earlier and spread it throughout Italy in deep silence. In this apparent agreement Luther saw the tricks of the devil, and hindered the work of peace as well as he could, thereby advancing to a great extent the aims of the Empire’s foes.—And now, in order to have a still stronger idea of the dreadful farcicality of it all, let us add that none of the principles about which men then disputed in Regensburg—neither that of original sin, nor that of redemption by proxy, nor that of justification by faith—is in any way true or even has any connection with truth: that they are now all recognised as incapable of being discussed. Yet on this account the world was set on fire—that is to say, by opinions which correspond to no things or realities; whereas as regards purely