ellectual responsibility, by a school that
is anything rather than political.

Theology has borrowed, and coloured for her own use, the principles
which were first brought into vogue in politics. If in the one field it
is the fashion to consider convenience first and truth second, in the
other there is a corresponding fashion of placing truth second and
emotional comfort first. If there are some who compromise their real
opinions, or the chance of reaching truth, for the sake of gain, there
are far more who shrink from giving their intelligence free play, for
the sake of keeping undisturbed certain luxurious spiritual
sensibilities. This choice of emotional gratification before truth and
upright dealing with one's own understanding, creates a character that
is certainly far less unlovely than those who sacrifice their
intellectual integrity to more material convenience. The moral flaw is
less palpable and less gross. Yet here too there is the stain of
intellectual improbity, and it is perhaps all the more mischievous for
being partly hidden under the mien of spiritual exaltation.

There is in literature no more seductive illustration of this seductive
type than Rousseau's renowned character of the Savoyard
Vicar--penetrated with scepticism as to the attributes of the deity, the
meaning of the holy rites, the authenticity of the sacred documents; yet
full of reverence, and ever respecting in silence what he could neither
reject nor understand. 'The essential worship,' he says, 'is the worship
of the heart. God never rejects this homage, under whatever form it be
offered to him. In old days I used to say mass with the levity which in
time infects even the gravest things when we do them too often. Since
acquiring my new principles [of reverential scepticism] I celebrate it
with more veneration: I am overcome by the majesty of the Supreme Being,
by his presence, by the insufficiency of the human mind, which conceives
so ill what pertains to its author. When I approach the moment of
consecration, I collect myself for performing the act with all the
feelings required by the church and the majesty of the sacrament. I
strive to annihilate my reason before the Supreme Intelligence, saying,
Who art thou that thou shouldst measure infinite power?'[17]

The Savoyard Vicar is not imaginary. The acquiescence in indefinite
ideas for the sake of comforted emotions, and the abnegation of strong
convictions in order to make room for fr