THE REV. JAMES MARTINEAU. 517 



Beyond this I defy him to go; and yet he rashly it 

 might be said petulantly kicks away the only philosophic 

 foundation on which it is possible for him to build his 

 religion. 



He twits incidentally the modern scientific interpretation 

 of nature because of its want of cheerfulness. " Let the 

 new future," he says, " preach its own gospel, and devise, 

 if it can, the means of making the tidings glad." This is 

 a common argument: "If you only knew the comfort of 

 belief!" My reply is that I choose the nobler part of 

 Emerson, when, after various disenchantments, he ex- 

 claimed, " I covet truth! " The gladness of true heroism 

 visits the heart of him who is really competent to say this. 

 Besides, "gladness" is an emotion, and Mr. Martineau 

 theoretically scorns the emotional. I am not, however, 

 acquainted with a writer who draws more largely upon this 

 source, while mistaking it for something objective. " To 

 reach the Cause," lie says," there is no need to go into the 

 past, as though being missed here, He could be found 

 there. But when once He has been apprehended by 

 the proper organs of divine apprehension, the whole life 

 of Humanity is recognized as the scene of His agency." 

 That Mr. Martineau should have lived so long, thought so 

 much, and failed to recognize the entirely subjective 

 character of this creed, is highly instructive. His " proper 

 organs of divine apprehension" given, we must assume, 

 to Mr. Martineau and his pupils, but denied to many of 

 the greatest intellects and noblest men in this and other 

 ages lie at the very core of his emotions. 



In fact, it is when Mr. Martineau is most purely 

 emotional that he scorns the emotions; it is when he is 

 most purely subjective that he rejects subjectivity. He 

 pays a jnst and liberal tribute to the character of John 

 Stuart Mill. Bat in the light of Mill's philosophy, 

 benevolence, honor, purity, having "shrunk into mere 

 unaccredited subjective susceptibilities, have lost all 

 support from Omniscient approval, and all presumable 

 accordance with the reality of things." If Mr. Martineau 

 had given them any inkling of the process by which he 

 renders the " subjective susceptibilities " objective, or how 

 he arrivesat an objective ground of " Omniscient approval," 

 gratitude from his pupils would have been his just meed. 

 But, as it is, he leaves them lost in an iridescent cloud of 



