APOLOGY FOR THE BELFAST ADDRESS 217 



the sanctification of the soul. I tried, moreover, in my 

 ponderings to realize not only the lawful, but the expedi- 

 ent; and to permit no fear to act upon my mind, save 

 that of uttering a single word on which I could not take 

 my stand, either in this or in any other world. 



Still my time was so brief, the difficulties arising from 

 my isolated position were so numerous, and my thought 

 and expression so slow, that, in a literary point of view, 

 I halted, not only behind the ideal, but behind the pos- 

 sible. Hence, after the delivery of the Address, I went 

 over it with the desire, not to revoke its principles, but 

 to improve it verbally, and above all to remove any word 

 which might give color to the notion of "crudeness, hurry, 

 or haste. ' ' 



In connection with the charge of Atheism my critic 

 refers to the Preface to the second issue of the Belfast 

 Address: "Christian men," I there say, "are proved by 

 their writings to have their hours of weakness and of 

 doubt, as well as their hours of strength and of convic- 

 tion; and men like myself share, in their own way, these 

 variations of mood and tense. Were the religious moods 

 of many of my assailants the only alternative ones, I do 

 not know how strong the claims of the doctrine of 'Ma- 

 terial Atheism' upon my allegiance might be. Probably 

 they would be very strong. But, as it is, I have noticed 

 during years of self -observation that it is not in hours 

 of clearness and vigor that this doctrine commends itself 

 to my mind ; that in the presence of stronger and healthier 

 thought it ever dissolves and disappears, as offering no 

 solution of the mystery in which we dwell, and of which 

 we form a part. ' ' 



With reference to this honest and reasonable utterance 



SCIENCE VI 10 



