Fleming, some things I have had thereanent that seem so strange and marvellous that I forbear to set them down.  And in Halyburton’s priceless Memoirs we read:  “Hereby I was brought into a doubt about the truths of religion, the being of God, and things eternal.  Whenever I was in dangers or straits and would build upon these things, a suspicion secretly haunted me, what if the things are not?  This perplexity was somewhat eased while one day I was reading how Robert Bruce was shaken about the being of God, and how at length he came to the fullest satisfaction.”  And in another place:  “Some days ago reading Ex. ix. and x., and finding this, ’That ye may know that I am God’ frequently repeated, and elsewhere in passages innumerable, as the end of God’s manifesting Himself in His word and works; I observe from it that atheism is deeply rooted even in the Lord’s people, seeing they need to be taught this so much.  The great difficulty that the whole of revelation has to grapple with is atheism; its whole struggle is to recover man to his first impressions of a God.  This one point comprehends the whole of man’s recovery, just as atheism is the whole of man’s apostasy.”  And, again, in another part of the same great book, Halyburton says:  “I must observe, also, the wise providence of God, that the greatest difficulties that lie against religion are hid from atheists.  All the objections I meet with in their writings are not nearly so subtle as those which are often suggested to myself.  The reason of this is obvious from the very nature of the thing—­such persons take not a near-hand view of religion, and while persons stand at a distance neither are the advantages nor the difficulties of religion discerned.”  And now listen to Bunyan, that arch-atheist:  “Whole floods of blasphemies both against God, Christ, and the Scriptures were poured upon my spirit, to my great confusion and astonishment.  Against the very being of God and of His only beloved Son; or, whether there were, in truth, a God and a Christ, or no.  Of all the temptations that ever I met with in my life, to question the being of God and the truth of the Gospel is the worst, and the worst to be borne.  When this temptation comes it takes away my girdle from me, and removeth the foundation from under me.”

   “Fool, said my Muse to me, look in thy heart and write.”

And John Bunyan looked into his own deep and holy heart, and out of it he composed this incident of Atheist.

3.  It may not be out of place at this point to look for a moment at some of the things that agitate, stir up, and make the secret atheism of our hearts to fluctuate and overflow.  Butler has a fine passage in which he points out that it is only the higher class of minds that are tempted with speculative difficulties such as those were that assaulted Christian and Hopeful after they were so near the end of their journey.  Coarse, commonplace, and mean-minded men have their probation appointed them among coarse,