'And this dust, Elinor, to which you settle that, finally, all will be mouldered or crumbled;--fear you not that its every particle may possess some sensitive quality? When we cease to speak, to move, to breathe, you assert the soul to be annihilated: But why? Is it only because you lose sight of its operations? In chemistry are there not sundry substances which, by certain processes, become invisible, and are sought in vain by the spectator; but which, by other processes, are again brought to view? And shall the chemist have this faculty to produce, and to withdraw, from our sight, and the Creator of All be denied any occult powers?' 'Nay, Albert, "how can we reason but from what we know?"--Will you compare a fact which experiment can prove, which reason may discuss, and which the senses may witness, with a bare possibility? A vague conjecture?' 'Is nothing, then, credible, Elinor, that is out of the province of demonstration? nothing probable, that surpasses our understanding?--nothing sacred that is beyond our view? Are we so perfect in our knowledge, even of what we behold, or possess, as to draw such presumptuous conclusions, of the self-sufficiency and omnipotence of our faculties, for judging what is every way out of our sight, or reach? Do we know one radical point of our existence, here, where "we live, and move, and have our being?" Do we comprehend, unequivocally, our immediate attributes and powers? Can we tell even how our hands obey our will? how our desires suffice to guide our feet from place to place? to roll our eyes from object to object? If all were clear, save the existence and the extinction of the soul, then, indeed, we might pronounce all faith, but in self-evidence, to be folly!' 'Faith! Harleigh, faith? the very word scents of monkish subtleties! 'Tis to faith, to that absurd idea of lulling to sleep our reason, of setting aside our senses, our observation, our knowledge; and giving our ignorant, unmeaning trust, and blind confidence to religious quacks; 'tis to that, precisely that, you owe what you term our infidelity; for 'tis that which has provoked the spirit of investigation, which has shewn us the pusillanimity and imbecility of consigning the short period in which we possess our poor fleeting existence, to other men's uses, deliberations, schemes, fancies, and ordinances. For what else can you call submission to unproved assertions, and concurrence in unfounded belief?'