8 REPLY TO THE CHARGES 



knew only one thing — his own ignorance. Were Socrates 

 to shew his head above ground just now, he must conclude, 

 either that he himself had completely mistaken the road to 

 knowledge, or that his successors had accomplished the 

 journey, and had penetrated into the sanctuary of the 

 temple. For, in the modern philosophy, doubting is pro- 

 scribed, as the source of all mischief; and an overbearing 

 dogmatism, even on the most abstruse and difficult ques- 

 tions, is held forth as a wiser course than the modest con- 

 fession of ignorance. 



When favourite speculations have been long indulged, 

 and much pains have been bestowed on them, they are 

 viewed with that parental partiality, which cannot bear to 

 hear of faults in the object of its attachment. The mere 

 doubt of an impartial observer is offensive ; and the dis- 

 covery of any thing like a blemish in the darling, is not only 

 ascribed to an entire want of discrimination and judgment, 

 but resented as an injury. The irritation rises higher in 

 proportion to tlie coolness of the object which excites it ; 

 as Sir Anthony Absolute in the play, while swelling with 

 rage, and boiling over with abuse on the persons around 

 him, begins to damn them again with tenfold energy, be- 

 cause they cannot keep their tempers, because they cannot 

 be as cool as he is. 



By a curious inconsistency in the human mind, difference 

 of opinion is more offensive and intolerable in proportion as 

 the subject is of a more refined nature, and less susceptible 

 of direct proof. Hence the rancorous intolerance excited 

 by the minute and almost evanescent shades of opinion that 

 distinguish many religious sects. The quarrels of the Ho- 

 moousians and the Homoiousians filled the Roman empire 

 for a long series of years with discord, faction, persecution, 

 and civil war. Yet the point at issue, actually comprised 

 in the variation of a single diphthong, is so minute as to be 

 " scarcely visible to the nicest theological eye,"* and cer- 

 tainly, in reference to either faith or practice, is not a jot 

 more important than the controversy which divided the 

 mighty empire of Lilliput, respecting the right end to break 



* Gibbon. 



