As the reader has probably perceived, the second part of this
book, called "Wrestling Jacob," is an attempt to give a symbolical
description of the religious struggles of the author, and as such it
is a failure. Therefore it has only remained a fragment, and, like
all religious crises, has ended in a chaos. The inference seems to
be that all investigation of the secrets of Providence, like all
attempts to take heaven by storm, are struck with confusion, and that
every attempt to approach religion by the way of argument leads to
absurdities. The reason is that religion like science begins with
axioms, whose peculiarity is that they do not need to be proved, and
_cannot_ be proved, so that when we try to prove self-evident necessary
pre-suppositions we fall into absurdities.
When the author, in 1894, gave up his scepticism, which threatened to
make havoc of the whole of his intellectual life, and began to place
himself experimentally at the stand-point of a believer, there opened
to him a new spiritual life, which is described in the _Inferno_ and
in these _Legends_. As time went on, and the author had given up all
resistance, he found himself attacked by influences and powers which
threatened to destroy him. Feeling himself sinking, he clutched at
lighter objects which might keep him afloat; but these also began to
give way, and it was only a question of time when he would perish.
At such moments the terror of the drowning man takes a straw for a
support, and then the faith, to which he is compelled, lifts him out of
the waves in which he is sinking, so that he can walk upon the water.
Credo quia absurdum. I believe, because the absurdity which reasoning
leads to, shows me that I was trying to prove an axiom. And thus we are
linked to what is above us.