One evidence of the normality of religious faith is the vacuum or sense of loss which continues to be felt in the life of those who have lost it. If we need God, as Augustine says, in order that the soul may live, it is natural that there should be a feeling of spiritual starvation without God. The two classical instances of this "aching void the world can never fill" are those of two well-known scientists, one writing in the eclipse, apparently permanent, of his faith, and the other after its restoration. Says W. K. Clifford: "Whether or no it be reasonable and satisfying to the conscience, it cannot be doubted that theistic belief is a comfort and a solace to those who hold it, and that the loss of it is a very painful loss.... We have seen the spring sun shine out of an empty heaven, to light up a soulless earth; we have felt with utter loneliness that the Great Companion is dead. Our children, it may be hoped, will know that sorrow only by the reflex light of a wondering compassion."[95] It is a sad consolation that children will be spared the loss, because they have not known the joy, of religious faith. 95: "Lectures and Essays," 2d ed., p. 389. Romanes, during the eclipse of his faith, found that success, intellectual distraction, reputation and artistic pleasure were "all taken together and well sweetened to taste ... but as high confectionery to a starving man." He adds: "I take it then as unquestionably true that this whole negative side of the subject proves a vacuum in the soul of man which nothing can fill save faith in God."[96] Such modern instances show the normality of religion, and are an impressive commentary upon the words of the Psalmist, "My soul is athirst for God," and upon those of Augustine, "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee." 96: "Thoughts on Religion," 2d ed., pp. 161, 162. The normality of religion is further shown in the instinctive turning of the soul to God, or to some higher power, in times of crisis and danger. The religious consciousness is best interrogated, not in times of mechanical routine or worldly preoccupation, but in those moments when we seem to ourselves to be most religious, in moments of clearest insight, or of deepest emotion, or of some crisis in action. The story of one of the survivors of the _Titanic_ disaster is in point: