he had left us to examine, patiently, carefully, earnestly, and without
bias of any kind, firstly the evidences in support of the Sunchild's
claim to be the son of the tutelar deity of this world, and secondly the
precise nature of his instructions as regards the future position and
authority of the Musical Banks.

"My friends, it is easy to understand why the Sunchild should have given
us these instructions. With that foresight which is the special
characteristic of divine, as compared with human, wisdom, he desired that
the evidences in support of his superhuman character should be collected,
sifted, and placed on record, before anything was either lost through the
death of those who could alone substantiate it, or unduly supplied
through the enthusiasm of over-zealous visionaries. The greater any true
miracle has been, the more certainly will false ones accrete round it;
here, then, we find the explanation of the command the Sunchild gave to
us to gather, verify, and record, the facts of his sojourn here in
Erewhon. For above all things he held it necessary to ensure that there
should be neither mistake, nor even possibility of mistake.

"Consider for a moment what differences of opinion would infallibly have
arisen, if the evidences for the miraculous character of the Sunchild's
mission had been conflicting--if they had rested on versions each
claiming to be equally authoritative, but each hopelessly irreconcilable
on vital points with every single other. What would future generations
have said in answer to those who bade them fling all human experience to
the winds, on the strength of records written they knew not certainly by
whom, nor how long after the marvels that they recorded, and of which all
that could be certainly said was that no two of them told the same story?

"Who that believes either in God or man--who with any self-respect, or
respect for the gift of reason with which God had endowed him, either
would, or could, believe that a chariot and four horses had come down
from heaven, and gone back again with human or quasi-human occupants,
unless the evidences for the fact left no loophole for escape? If a
single loophole were left him, he would be unpardonable, not for
disbelieving the story, but for believing it. The sin against God would
lie not in want of faith, but in faith.

"My friends, there are two sins in matters of belief. There is that of
believing on too little evidence, and that of r