FAITH AND CREDULITY 83 



government, a hierarchy, and if mankind are in a 

 lost and rebellious condition with reference to the 

 head of this government or hierarchy, then does the 

 idea of an infallible pope and all the saving ordi- 

 nances of the church harmonize perfectly with this 

 conception. 



When you once assume the existence of the 

 supernatural, you adjust your reason to that assump- 

 tion. " If the supernatural exists," says a Catholic 

 writer, " it is reasonable that it should exist ; it is 

 reasonable that it should present difficulties, that we 

 should be able to apprehend it only in part, that we 

 should need a special endowment of power or in- 

 sight, called faith, to fully enter into it ; it is reason- 

 able that faith should not obliterate the inferior 

 intellectual faculties, but should supplement and 

 raise them ; it is reasonable that there should be a 

 revealed religion, and that this religion should pos- 

 sess mysteries." 



St. Paul's definition of faith the religious mind 

 has clung to very fondly — namely, " the substance 

 of things hoped for, the evidence of things not 

 seen ; " and Dr. Fisher's new version of the passage 

 — to wit, " the firm assurance of things hoped for, 

 the being convinced of things not seen" — can 

 hardly take its place in the popular conscience. It 

 is true, but not taking. Paith is neither evidence 

 nor substance, though the religious world is con- 

 stantly persuading itself that it is. " It makes real 

 to the mind objects of hope " — so real that " they 

 exercise a due control in the shaping of conduct." 



