I PROLOGUE 21 



evangelical flood had a little abated and the tops 

 of certain mountains were soon to appear, chiefly 

 in the neighbourhood of Oxford ; but when never- 

 theless, bibliolatry was rampant; when church 

 and chapel alike proclaimed, as the oracles of God, 

 the crude assumptions of the worst informed and, 

 in natural sequence, the most presumptuously 

 bigoted, of all theological schools. 



In accordance with promises made on my 

 behalf, but certainly without my authorisation, I 

 was very early taken to hear "sermons in the 

 vulgar tongue." And vulgar enough often was 

 the tongue in which some preacher, ignorant alike 

 of literature, of history, of science, and even* of 

 theology, outside that patronised by his own 

 narrow school, poured forth, from the safe 

 entrenchment of the pulpit, invectives against 

 those who deviated from his notion of orthodoxy. 

 From dark allusions to " sceptics " and " infidels," 

 I became aware of the existence of people who 

 trusted in carnal reason ; who audaciously doubted 

 that the world was made in six natural days, or 

 that the deluge was universal ; perhaps even went 

 so far as to question the literal accuracy of the 

 story of Eve's temptation, or of Balaam's ass ; and, 

 from the horror of the tones in which they were 

 mentioned, I should have been justified in drawing 

 the conclusion that these rash men belonged to the 

 criminal classes. At the same time, those who 

 were more directly responsible for providing me 



