Something spoke then within him, so vividly that Reuben imagined at first he was recalling some remark of Mr. Welland's; but casting back, he felt certain that in their few meetings of the last weeks, the doctor had said no such thing: _Learning begins now._ Simply his own thought, taking on a verbalized form of uncommon clearness, of imperative power: LEARNING BEGINS NOW. Ben had drifted back into his country of dream. Kate was, abnormally, not talking. Having breakfasted early as usual with Mr. Kenny, who had left for Boston, Mr. Hibbs was waiting in the schoolroom--perhaps not too impatiently, since work could always be done in odd moments on the immortality of the soul. The kitchen, not oppressed by dining-room demands of dignity, was rich with pleasant smells and the warmth of May. Reuben refilled his coffee cup. If learning begins (ever) it must somehow begin with premises that will not betray. All men are mortal; Ben and I are men.... Death is the conclusion of known life. I am forced to doubt, what once upon a time I believed, that a knowable life continues in a heaven or hell; therefore I am forced to doubt, what once upon a time I did believe, that Ben (or I, or Mother, or honest Jan Dyckman) can continue beyond the conclusion we call death. Knowledge (Mr. Welland said last Saturday) pertains to what can be proven by the carnal senses. Faith is belief in a proposition that cannot be established by the carnal senses--("_My faith is like that of a man on a cloudy day...._") Faith cannot be supported by knowledge, for if proof is found the proposition becomes knowledge and faith is no longer relevant; if it be not found, the proposition comes not within the region of knowledge. Hope and desire--(_must you rattle those pots, Kate, at this especial mortal moment?_)--hope and desire may derive partly from knowledge, but cannot possess the force of it, for they are directed to the future, which does not exist. Therefore faith, hope and desire are all in the same class: to say that once upon a time I had faith in a heaven is no more than to say that I desired it, or hoped for it, or was told I ought to desire it--all without knowledge. They say: "Help thou mine unbelief!" But belief and unbelief are no more to be helped or hindered than the eyes' perception of a cloud. If the eyes carry out their function and if the cloud be there, I shall see it. Why, so far as belief and unbelief are concerned, will, desire, hope, fear, pain have no part to play at all, let them be cruel as flame or powerful as time. The mind, he understood, would continue proposing premises for all its life: some false, to be rejected; some (so far as the senses themselves can be trusted) true; every one of them to be examined in the atmosphere of doubt. Since without faith there is no other atmosphere.