Page:Tolstoy - Pamphlets.djvu/162

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THOUGHTS ON GOD
21

So says the Agnostic, and in not admitting the possibility of any other knowledge but what is acquired by observation and the analysis of obser- vation, he is, if not right, at least quite logical and consistent.

The Christian, on the other hand, acknowledging God, says, "I am con- scious that I exist only because I feel myself to be a rational being. And in feeling myself to be so, I cannot but recognise that my life and that of all that exists must be equally rational. And in order to be so it must have an object. The object of my life must be outside myself, in that Being for which both I and all that exist serve as instruments for the attainment of the object of life. This Being does exist, and I must, in my life, fulfil its law or will. Questions as to the nature of this Being which demands of me the fulfilment of its law, and as to when and how, in time and space, this rational life originated in me, and originates in other beings — that is, 'What is God?' Is He personal or impersonal?' 'Did He create the world, and how?' 'When did a soul awake in me?' 'At what time, and how did it originate in others?' 'Whence has it come and whither will it go?' 'In what part of the body does it reside?' — all these questions I