“One delusion and temptation must be spoken of, which I hardly know how to describe, as I never read or heard of anything like it. By the stress of my many temptations I was driven--though by God’s grace I was never utterly torn from faith and hope of heavenly aid--to doubt as to Holy Scripture and the essence of God himself. In the struggle with the other temptations there was some respite, and a refuge of hope remained. In this I knew no alleviation, and when formerly I had been strengthened by the sacred book and had fought against the darts of death with the arms of faith and hope, now, shut round with doubt and mental blindness, I doubted whether there was truth in Holy Scripture and whether God was omnipotent. This broke over me with such violence as to leave me neither strength of body nor strength of mind, and I could not see or hear. Then sometimes it was as if a voice was whispering close to my ear: ‘Why such vain labourings? Can you not, most foolish of mortals, prove by your own experience that the testimony of Scripture is without sense or reason? Do you not see that what the divine book says is the reverse of what the lives and habits of mankind approve? Those many thousands who neither know nor care to know its doctrine, do you think they err?’ Troubled, I would urge, as if against some one questioning and objecting: ‘How then is there such agreement among all the divinely inspired writings when they speak of God the Founder and of obedience to His commands?’ Then words of this kind would be suggested in reply: ‘Fool, the Scriptures on which you rely for knowledge of God and religion speak double words; for the men who wrote them lived as men live now. You know how all men speak well and piously, and act otherwise, as advantage or frailty prompts. From which you may learn how the authors of the ancient writings wrote good and religious sayings, and did not live accordingly. Understand then, that all the books of the divine law were so written that they have an outer surface of piety and virtue, but quite another inner meaning. All of which is proved by Paul’s saying, The letter killeth; the spirit, that is the meaning, maketh to live. So you see how perilous it is to follow the precepts of these books. Likewise should one think concerning the essence of God. And besides, if there existed any person or power of an omnipotent God there would not be this apparent confusion in everything,--nor would you yourself have had all these doubts which trouble you.’” The last diabolically insidious suggestion was just the one to bring despair to the unaided reason seeking faith. Othloh’s soul was passing through the depths; but the path now ascends, and rapidly: