side, the duties on the other, is authoritative or not? If he says, "Yes," then I presume the argument from objections becomes, even on his own showing, as perfectly legitimate on the one side as the other; if he says, "No" (as, perhaps, considering the apologetic tone in which he speaks of "serious Atheists," who, though they do not believe "in a personal God at all,” yet believe the "more fundamental truth of a fixed moral basis"; and his equally apologetic tone in speaking of idolatry, a crime which his definition so nearly annihilates), — if, I say, Mr. Newman says, that, though he believes his system is the true one, it is not authoritative, and that it really matters very little whether a man is a "serious Atheist," a sincere Buddhist, or a Fetichist, then, undoubtedly, it is hardly worth while to consider whether the objections against Christianity can be retorted with interest against such a theory; and for this simple reason, that it cannot, on such a theory, matter one doit whether a man be a Christian or not. Certainly, take it at the worst, he may as well remain as he is, unless it be contended that, though a man may be anything else, it is at his peril that he remains a Christian; or that, though he may be a votary of any religion which does not claim to be authoritative, woe be to him if he professes one that does!

But I should be disposed to show the futility of this argument on yet another ground. I contend that the argument from objections may be, and often is, perfectly valid. I believe it is so in the controversy between Deism and Christianity. He who is persuaded of the truth of any system, even though he cannot answer all the objections against it, may most legitimately consider whether or not there are not equal or greater objections against the systems it is proposed he should adopt in its stead; and if he finds that there are

greater, it may be quite sufficient to justify him in resolving that at least he will have nothing to do with them. A man may not see that his house is perfectly convenient; he may fancy at times that certain modifications would improve it, and perhaps be mistaken in that fancy; but as to changing it, it is quite sufficient to decide him against that, if he be offered nothing better than a dark cellar under ground or a balloon in the air. The former is the choice residence to which Atheism or Pantheism dooms him, and the other the mansion provided by the tumid but unstable systems of our modern spiritualists.

Mr. Newman says, that I have endeavored to "break his and Mr. Parker's heads" against one another. I should not presume; and it is quite unnecessary, for they have "broken their own heads together" with sufficient violence. In virtue of their spiritual apparatus, they have arrived, as usual, at very different conclusions on most momentous points; and though it is not of the smallest consequence as long as they are merely attempting to destroy historical Christianity, yet the moment people ask, "And what are we to believe?" it becomes of vital importance.

SECTION XI.

MR. NEWMAN'S CHAPTER ON 66 THE MORAL PERFECTION OF CHRIST."

وو

MR. NEWMAN founds another charge of "very gross garbling" on my strictures upon his too celebrated comparison of Fletcher of Madeley with Jesus Christ. Fellowes represents Mr. Newman as having read the "Life of Fletcher" when a boy, and as having then thought him a more perfect man than Jesus Christ; and as having said in the " Phases," that, if he were to read the book again, he should most probably still be of that opinion. Mr. Newman's exact words in the "Phases are these: "Heroes are described in superhuman dignity, why not in superhuman goodness? Many biographies overdraw the virtue of their subject. An experienced critic can sometimes discern this; but certainly the uncritical cannot always. I remember, when a boy, to have read the Life of Fletcher of Madeley,' written by Benson; and he appeared to me an absolutely perfect man; and, at this day, if I were to read the book afresh, I suspect I should think his character a more perfect one than that of Jesus.” *

Now, Mr. Newman says, that when he read the "Life of Fletcher," as a boy, he made no formal comparison with Jesus Christ. I thought, indeed, that the three last lines of the extract implied the contrary; but I see that that was an inadvertence of mine; he merely

* Phases, p. 184.

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thought at that time that Fletcher was an absolutely perfect man. Still, that my mistake was neither "stealthy misrepresentation" nor gross garbling appears plainly from this, that the proposed correction makes nothing to the argument, but rather renders the absurdity somewhat more flagrant. I charitably supposed him, as a child, to have first made the comparison (which was certainly childish enough), and then afterwards, without verifying his early impressions by a reperusal of Fletcher's Life, to have proceeded to presume its accuracy on the strength of his early impressions. This would have been strange enough; but it now appears that the comparison itself was not the reflex of a childish fancy, hastily adopted, but the mellow fruit of maturer years; that, as a boy, he thought Fletcher an absolutely perfect man, and that though at a later period he did not think so, yet that, without staying to see, by a reperusal of the Life, how far Fletcher fell short of that ideal, he presumes so far to trust his impressions as to say that, if he did reperuse the book, he should give to Fletcher the palm over Jesus Christ! If this will help Mr. Newman, he is very welcome to it, and I accept his emendation with all thanks. "When I was a child," says the Apostle, "I spake as a child, I thought as a child, I understood as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things." How far the readers of Mr. Newman will think he did so, I leave them to judge.

I had said, "Christianity is willing to consider the arguments of men, but not the impressions of boys." On this Mr. Newman remarks, "No one can possibly read this without understanding that I recommended my boyish impressions as something trustworthy, something for which I claimed respect from Christianity."

* Reply, p. 15.

I answer, that the words were intended to convey precisely what they do convey, that the unverified impressions of boyhood had been made the basis of a most offensive attack on the character of Christ, and that to such impressions Christianity can hardly be expected to pay much attention.

Mr. Newman, in reprinting the notable paragraph, incloses the three last lines in brackets, and says that he now sees that these would have been "better omitted," as they seem to have "distracted the mind from his argument."* Perhaps now he does see; but they were not omitted. They gave, and could not but give, substantially, the impression of his sentiments which not only I, but I believe every other reader of the book, entertained; and that these impressions were essentially correct, his most offensive chapter on "The Moral Perfection of Christ," whom "in consistency of goodness" he places "far below vast numbers of his unhonored disciples," proves ad nauseam.

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As to the bracketed lines distracting my mind from his "argument," as he calls it, and from the occasion on which he gave expression to his sentiments in the Phases," I answer, that I had nothing in the world to do with either. It was with the fact merely that I had then to do;- that a person had avowed the preposterous sentiments in question. The Author of "The Eclipse" and Mr. Fellowes were discussing the "Evidences of Christianity," among which it is mentioned that the entire character of Christ, but especially as the Moral Ideal of Humanity, was not likely to have been of human origination, least of all among those to whom history restricts the problem. Mr. Fellowes replies, "that it is not so clear to everybody that Jesus Christ