338 AGNOSTICISM AND CHRISTIANITY ix 



over-stepped the bounds of fair play, at the end of 

 the struggle ? Surely, we must agree with Dr. 

 Newman that, if all these camels have gone down, 

 it savours of affectation to strain at such gnats as 

 the sudden ailment of Arius in the midst of his 

 deadly, if prayerful, 1 enemies ; and the fiery explo- 

 sion which stopped the Julian building operations. 

 Though the words of the " Conclusion " of the 

 "Essay on Miracles" may, perhaps, be quoted 

 against me, I may express my satisfaction at finding 

 myself in substantial accordance with a theologian 

 above all suspicion of heterodoxy. With all my 

 heart, I can declare my belief that there is just as 

 good reason for believing in the miraculous slay- 

 ing of the man who fell short of the Athanasian 

 power of affirming contradictories, with respect to 

 the nature of the Godhead, as there is for believing 

 in the stories of the serpent and the ark told in 

 Genesis, the speaking of Balaam's ass in Numbers, 

 or the floating of the axe, at Elisha's order, in the 

 second book of Kings. 



It is one of the peculiarities of a really sound 



1 According to Dr. Newman, "This prayer [that of Bishop 

 Alexander, who begged God to ' take Arius away '] is said to 

 have been offered about 3 p. M. on the Saturday ; that same 

 evening Arius was in the great square of Constantine, when he 

 was suddenly seized with indisposition" (p. clxx). The 

 "infidel" Gibbon seems to have dared to suggest that "an 

 option between poison and miracle" is presented by this 

 case ; and, it must be admitted, that, if the Bishop had been 

 within the reach of a modern police magistrate, things might 

 have gone hardly with him. Modern " Infidels," possessed of a 



