AN EXPLANATION TO PROF. HUXLEY. 349 



labor of years, endeavored at all events, whether successfully or 

 not, to place the most correct version possible of the Holy Script- 

 ures in the hands of the English people. I agree with him most 

 cordially in seeing in the wide diffusion and the unprejudiced 

 study of that sacred volume the best security for " true religion 

 and sound learning." It is in the open Bible of England, in the 

 general familiarity of all classes of Englishmen and English- 

 women with it, that the chief obstacle has been found to the 

 spread of the fantastic critical theories by which he is fascinated ; 

 and, instead of Englishmen translating the Bible into the lan- 

 guage of their natural experiences, it will in the future, as in the 

 past, translate them and their experiences into a higher and a 

 supernatural region. — Nineteenth Century. 



«»» 



AN EXPLANATION TO PEOF. HUXLEY. 



By W. C. McGEE, Bishop of Peterbokotjgh. 



IN the February number of this review Prof. Huxley put into 

 the mouth of Mr. Frederic Harrison the following sentence : 

 u In his [the agnostic's] place, as a sort of navvy leveling the 

 ground and cleansing it of such poor stuff as Christianity, he is a 

 useful creature who deserves patting on the back — on condition 

 that he does not venture beyond his last." The construction 

 which I put upon these words — and of which I still think them 

 quite capable — was that the professor meant to represent Mr. 

 Harrison and himself as agreed upon the proper work of the 

 agnostic, and as differing only as to whether he might or might 

 not " venture beyond " that. On this supposition, my inference 

 that he had called Christianity " sorry," or, as I ought to have 

 said, " poor stuff " (the terms are, of course, equivalent), would 

 have been perfectly correct. 



On re-reading the sentence in question, however, in connection 

 with its context, I see that it may more correctly be regarded as 

 altogether ironical ; and this, from the professor's implied denial 

 in his last article of the correctness of my version, I conclude that 

 he intended it to be. I accordingly at once withdraw my state- 

 ment, and express my regret for having made it. May I plead, 

 however, as some excuse for my mistake, that this picture of him- 

 self when engaged in his agnostic labors is so wonderfully accu- 

 rate and life-like that I might almost be pardoned for taking for 

 a portrait what was only meant for a caricature, or for supposing 

 that he had expressed in so many words the contempt which dis- 

 plays itself in so many of his utterances respecting the Christian 

 faith ? 



