THE RECONCILIATION. 123 



ceives the functions of these various conflicting creeds, 

 should above all other men display. Doubt- 



less whoever feels the greatness of the error to which 

 his fellows cling and the greatness of the truth which 

 they reject, will find it hard to show a due patience. 

 It is hard for him to listen calmly to the futile argu- 

 ments used in support of irrational doctrines, and to 

 the misre}3resentation of antagonistic doctrines. It is hard 

 for him to bear the manifestation of that pride of ignorance 

 which so far exceeds the pride of science. Naturally enough 

 such a one will be indignant when charged with irreligion 

 because he declines to accept the carpenter-theory of crea- 

 tion as the most worthy one. He may think it needless as it 

 is difficult, to conceal his repugnance to a creed which tacit- 

 ly ascribes to The Unknowable a love of adulation such as 

 would be despised in a human being. Convinced as he is 

 that all punishment, as we see it wrought out in the order of 

 nature, is but a disguised beneficence, there will perhaps 

 escape from him an angry condemnation of the belief that 

 punishment is a divine vengeance, and that divine ven- 

 geance is eternal. He may be tempted to show his con- 

 tempt when he is told that actions instigated by an unselfish 

 sympathy or by a pure love of rectitude, are intrinsically 

 sinful; and that conduct is truly good only when it is due 

 to a faith whose openly-professed motive is other-worldli- 

 ness. But he must restrain such feelings. Though he may 

 be unable to do this during the excitement of controversy, 

 or when otherwise brought face to face with current super- 

 stitions, he must yet qualify his antagonism in calmer mo- 

 ments; so that his mature judgment and resulting conduct 

 may be without bias. 



To this en(J let him ever bear in mind three cardinal 

 facts — two of them already dwelt upon, and one still to be 

 pointed out. The first is that with which we set out ; 



namely the existence of a fundamental verity under all 

 forms of religion, however degraded. In each of them 



