Abram Herbert Lewis - Spiritual Sabbathism
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THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL 57<br />
reflection. If this is true of common life, how<br />
much truer it is of speculation. If the need for<br />
rest does not cut short our philosophizing, some<br />
inscrutable paradox finally does. Jehovah shuts<br />
the way with a dilemma, saying, "Your thoughts<br />
are not my thoughts," and sends us back to experience<br />
for a wider range of materials. In all<br />
the centuries Christians have known that certain<br />
things have been concealed from the wise and<br />
prudent. They have been obliged to act, and<br />
action requires faith.<br />
Surely In the main this must be our attitude on<br />
perceiving that as to "time" the masters disagree and<br />
leave us darkling. They plunge us Into a dilemma.<br />
They lead us to an intellectual impasse, a blank stone<br />
wall. To be sure, our very method has precipitated<br />
the result, for we have abstracted merely the conclusions<br />
from systems already abstract enough.<br />
Yet if the great critical thinkers had achieved<br />
any real definition of either time or eternity, even<br />
the bare conclusions should have agreed. Our<br />
degree of success in explaining the antinomy by philosophical<br />
aid has not been such as to warrant our<br />
continuing the speculation. We have failed. What<br />
then? Shall we turn from metaphysics in despair<br />
as well as In defeat?<br />
Christians have often done so.<br />
The theologian
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