infallible Church should not make her less
infallible in our mind, it simply demands a clearing away-Theological
difficulties should not surprise a novice in theological matters; they
are only misunderstandings that militate less against the Church than
against the erroneous notions we have of her. To allow such
difficulties to undermine faith is like overthrowing a solid wall with
a soap-bubble. Common sense demands that nothing but clearly
demonstrated falsity should make us change firm convictions, and such
demonstration can never be made against our faith.

Not from difficulties, properly speaking, but from our incapacity for
understanding what we accept as true, results a certain obscurity,
which is another feature of faith. Believing is not seeing. Such
strange things we do believe! Who can unravel the mysteries of
religion? Moral certitude is sufficient to direct one's life, to make
our acts human and moral and is all we can expect in this world where
nothing is perfect. But because the consequences of faith are so
far-reaching, we would believe nothing short of absolute, metaphysical
certitude.

But this is impossible. Hence the mist, the vague dimness that
surrounds faith, baffling every effort to penetrate it; and within, a
sense of rarefied perception that disquiets and torments unless
humility born of common sense be there to soothe and set us at rest.
Moral truths are not geometric theorems and multiplication tables, and
it is not necessary that they should be.

Of course, if, as in science so in faith, reason were everything, our
position would hardly be tenable, for then there should be no vagueness
but clear vision. But the will enters for something in our act of
faith. If everything we believe were as luminous as "two and two are
four," a special act of the will would be utterly uncalled for. We must
be able, free to dissent, and this is the reason of the obscurity of
our faith.

It goes without saying that such belief is meritorious. Christ Himself
said that to be saved it is necessary to believe, and no man is saved
but through his own merit. Faith is, therefore, gratuitous on His part
and meritorious on ours. It is in reality a good work that proceeds
from the will, under the dictates of right reason, with the assistance
of divine grace.

CHAPTER XXII.
FAITH AND ERROR.

INTOLERANCE is a harsh term. It is stern, rigid, brutal, almost. It
makes no compromise, combats a outrance and exacts