will arise the questions I
have been endeavouring to answer in this little book. The clergy behaved
very well during the war, short of volunteering in any conspicuous
number for active service; but what is the sense of this lofty message
of "peace on earth and good-will among men" which never produces any
result? The Churches are fairly eager to join in the work of peace now
that it is being promoted by large associations of laymen; but where, in
the name of heaven, were they during these "ages of faith" which they
bemoan? God may conceivably have been at work somewhere among the
batteries or the infantry of the Allies--it is so very difficult to
analyse these things--but we should be infinitely more grateful if he
had asserted his power earlier and spared us all the bloodshed. He may
be a very stern schoolmaster, teaching us a valuable lesson by means of
this war; but we were really quite open to conviction if he had sent us
the lesson in a more humane form. A great many good people may have
derived spiritual advantages from the war, but the price was stupendous,
and we would rather they got their spiritual advantages in another way.

These questions and reflections must surely arise, and they will lead to
larger reflections. Men will perceive the antithesis I pointed out
between all that is claimed for Christianity in Europe and the actual
condition of Europe; between the supposed luminous traces of the finger
of God in the non-human world and the complete absence of them from the
human world. From the samples of clerical eloquence which we have
examined, we can hardly suppose that the clergy will have great success
in meeting the inquirers. An enormous proportion of their followers, of
course, will not ask questions, or will be satisfied with anything in
the nature of an answer. I heard a group of men discussing the subject
in a rural ale-house, and the most intelligent man in the group, to
whom, as an educated visitor, the natives looked up with respect, said:
"War is God's way of purifying and bracing nations from time to time."
This sort of stuff pacifies hundreds of thousands: like the stuff that
Archbishop Carr found it possible to put before his Australian
Catholics. But inquiry and reflection grow among the adherents of the
Churches, and, although the Press generally refuses to bring books of
this character to the notice of the public, and clergymen often stoop to
the most despicable means to exclude them from