eligion, they produce the consecration of falsehood, poperies,
immaculate conceptions, winking images, and the confessional. The spirit
of enquiry if left to itself becomes in like manner a disease of
uncertainty, and terminates in universal scepticism. It seems as if in a
healthy order of things, to the willingness to believe there should be
chained as its inseparable companion a jealousy of deception; and there
is no lesson more important for serious persons to impress upon
themselves than that each of these temperaments must learn to tolerate
the other; faith accepting from reason the sanction of its service, and
reason receiving in return the warm pulsations of life. The two
principles exist together in the highest natures; and the man who in the
best sense of the word is devout, is also the most cautious to whom or
to what he pays his devotion. Among the multitude, the units of which
are each inadequate and incomplete, the elements are disproportionately
mixed; some men are humble and diffident, some are sceptical and
enquiring; yet both are filling a place in the great intellectual
economy; both contribute to make up the sum and proportion of qualities
which are required to hold the balance even; and neither party is
entitled to say to the other, 'Stand by; I am holier than thou.'

And as it is with individuals, so is it also with whole periods and
cycles. For centuries together the believing spirit held undisputed
sovereignty; and these were what are called 'ages of faith;' ages, that
is, in which the highest business of the intellect was to pray rather
than to investigate; when for every unusual phenomenon a supernatural
cause was instinctively assumed; when wonders were credible in
proportion to their magnitude; and theologians, with easy command of
belief, added miracle to miracle and piled dogma upon dogma. Then the
tide changed; a fresh era opened, which in the eyes of those who
considered the old system the only right one, was the letting loose of
the impersonated spirit of evil; when profane eyes were looking their
idols in the face; when men were saying to the miraculous images, 'You
are but stone and wood,' and to the piece of bread, 'You are but dust as
I am dust;' and then the huge mediaeval fabric crumbled down in ruin.

All forms of thought, all objects of devotion, are made thus liable to
perpetual revision, if only that belief shall not petrify into habit,
but remain the reasonable conviction of a