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can we arrive at the truth.
But what I am going to try to do in this chapter is to examine the theory by virtue of which my book is condemned, and I am going to try to give the fullest weight to the considerations urged against it. I am sure there is something in what the critics say, but I believe that where we differ is in this. The critics who disapprove of my book seem to me to think that all men are cast in the same mould, and that the principles which hold good for some necessarily hold good for all. What I like best about their criticisms is that they are made in a spirit of moral earnestness and ethical seriousness. I am a serious man myself, and I rejoice to see others serious. The point of view which they seem to recommend is the point of view of a certain kind of practical strenuousness, the gospel of push, if I may so call it. They seem to hold that people ought to be discontented with what they are, that they ought to try to better themselves, that they ought to be active, and what they call normal; that when they have done their work as energetically as possible, they should amuse themselves energetically too, take hard exercise, shout and play,
"Pleased as the Indian boy to run And shoot his arrows in the sun,"
and that then they should recreate themselves like Homeric heroes, eating and drinking, listening comfortably to the minstrel, and take their fill of love in a full-blooded way.
That is, I think, a very good theory of life for some people, though I think it is a little barbarous; it is Spartan rather than Athenian.
Some of my critics take a higher kind of ground, and say that I want to minimise and melt down the old stern beliefs and principles of morality into a kind of nebulous emotion. They remind me a little of an old country squire of whom I have heard, of the John Bull type, whose younger son, a melancholy and sentimental youth, joined the Church of Rome. His father was determined that this should not separate them, and asked him to come home and talk it over. He told his eldest son that he was going to remonstrate with the erring youth in a simple and affectionate way. The eldest son said that he hoped his father would do it tactfully and gently, as his brother was highly sensitive, to which his father replied that he had thought over what he meant to say, and was going to be very reasonable. The young man arrived, and was ushered into the study by his eldest brother. "Well," said the squire, "very glad to see you, Harry; but do you mean to tell me that your mother's religion is not good enough for a damned ass like you?"
Now far from desiring to minimise faith in God and the Unseen, I think it is the thing of which the world is more in need than anything else. What has made the path of faith a steep one to tread is partly that it has got terribly encumbered with ecclesiastical traditions; it has been mended, like the Slough of Despond, with cartloads of texts and insecure definitions. And partly too the old simple undisturbed faith in the absolute truth and authority of the Bible has given way. It is admitted that the Bible contains a considerable admixture of the legendary element; and it requires a strong intellectual and moral grip to build one's faith upon a collection of writings, some of which, at all events, are not now regarded as being historically and literally true. "If I cannot believe it all," says the simple bewildered soul, "how can I be certain that any of it is indubitably true?" Only the patient and desirous spirit can decide; but whatever else fades, the perfect insight, the Divine message of the Son of Man cannot fade; the dimmer that the historical setting becomes, the brighter shine the parables and the sayings, so far beyond the power of His followers to have originated, so utterly satisfying to our deepest needs. What I desire to say with all my heart is that we pilgrims need not be dismayed because the golden clue dips into darkness and mist; it emerges as bright as ever upon the upward slope of the valley. If one disregards all that is uncertain, all that cannot be held to be securely proved in the sacred writings, there still remain the essential facts of the Christian revelation, and more deep and fruitful principles than a man can keep and make his own in the course of a lifetime, however purely and faithfully he lives and strives. To