THE CONTROVERSIALIST 211 



immoral character. I verily believe that the great 

 good which has been effected in the world by Chris- 

 tianity has been largely counteracted by the pestilent 

 doctrine on which all the Churches have insisted, that 

 honest disbelief in their more or less astonishing 

 creeds is a moral offence, indeed, a sin of the deepest 

 dye, deserving and involving the same future retribu- 

 tion as murder and robbery. If we could only see, 

 in one view, the torrents of hypocrisy and cruelty, 

 the lies, the slaughter, the violations of every obliga- 

 tion of humanity, which have flowed from this source 

 along the course of the history of Christian nations, 

 our worst imaginations of hell would pale beside the 

 vision. 1 



As to the use of the term "agnostic," Huxley 

 says — 



When I reached intellectual maturity and began to 

 ask myself whether I was an atheist, a theist, or a 

 pantheist ; a materialist or an idealist ; a Christian or 

 a freethinker ; I found that the more I learned and 

 reflected, the less ready was the answer ; until, at 

 last, I came to the conclusion that I had neither art 

 nor part with any of these denominations, except the 

 last. The one thing in which most of these good 

 people were agreed was the one thing in which I 

 differed from them. They were quite sure they had 

 attained a certain " gnosis," — had, more or less suc- 

 cessfully, solved the problem of existence ; while I 

 was quite sure I had not, and had a pretty strong con- 

 viction that the problem was insoluble. 2 



At any rate, whatever explanation of the universe 

 there may be, Huxley was satisfied that theology had 

 1 lb., p. 241. 3 Coll. Essays, v. p. 238. 



