“I cannot say,” he answered, “that I know it as I know a proposition in Euclid, or as I know that I must not do what is wrong.” “Then what right have you to go and make people miserable by saying there is no God--as if you, being an honest man, knew it, and would not say it if you did not know it? You take away the only comfort left the unhappy! Of course you have a right to say you don't believe it--but only that! And I would think twice before I said even that, where all the certainty was that it would make people miserable!” “I don't know anybody it would make miserable,” said Richard. “It would make me dead miserable,” returned Barbara. “I know many it would redeem from misery,” rejoined Richard. “To believe in a cruel being ready to pounce upon them is enough to make the strongest miserable.” “The cruel being that made the world, you mean?” “Yes--if the world was made.” “If one believes in any God, it must be the same God that made this lovely night--and the gladness it would give me, if you did not take it from me!” Richard was silent for a moment. “How can I take it from you?” he said, “if you think what I say is not true?” “You make me fear lest it should be true; and then farewell to all joy in life--not only for want of some one to love right heartily, but because there is no refuge from the evils that are all about us. I have no quarrel with you if you say these evils are brought upon us by an evil being, who lives to make men miserable; there you leave room to believe also in one fighting against him, to whom we can go for help! The God our parson believes in he calls 'God, our saviour.' To take away the notion of any kind of God, is to make life too dreary to live!” “Yours is the old doctrine of the Magians,” remarked Richard. “Well?” “I could accept it easily beside what people believe now.” “What do they believe?” “They believe in the God of the Bible, who makes pets of a few of his creatures, and sends all the rest into eternal torment. Would you comfort people with the good news of a God like that?” “Such a God is not to be believed in! Deny him all you can. But because there cannot be an evil God, what right have you to say there cannot be a good one? That is to reason backward! The very notion of a night like this having no meaning in it--no God in it who intends it to look just so, is enough to make _me_ miserable. But I will _not_ believe it! I shall hate you if you make me believe it!” “The Bible says there is an evil being behind it!” “I don't know much about the Bible, but I don't believe it says that.” “Of course it _calls_ him good, but it says he does certain things which we know to be bad.”