x natural days, or that the deluge was universal; perhaps even
went so far as to question the literal accuracy of the story of Eve's
temptation, or of Balaam's ass; and, from the horror of the tones in
which they were mentioned, I should have been justified in drawing the
conclusion that these rash men belonged to the criminal classes. At the
same time, those who were more directly responsible for providing me
with the knowledge essential to the right guidance of life (and who
sincerely desired to do so), imagined they were discharging that most
sacred duty by impressing upon my childish mind the necessity, on pain
of reprobation in this world and damnation in the next, of accepting, in
the strict and literal sense, every statement contained in the
Protestant Bible. I was told to believe, and I did believe, that doubt
about any of them was a sin, not less reprehensible than a moral delict.
I suppose that, out of a thousand of my contemporaries, nine hundred, at
least, had their minds systematically warped and poisoned, in the name
of the God of truth, by like discipline. I am sure that, even a score of
years later, those who ventured to question the exact historical
accuracy of any part of the Old Testament and _a fortiori_ of the
Gospels, had to expect a pitiless shower of verbal missiles, to say
nothing of the other disagreeable consequences which visit those who, in
any way, run counter to that chaos of prejudices called public opinion.

My recollections of this time have recently been revived by the perusal
of a remarkable document,[8] signed by as many as thirty-eight out of
the twenty odd thousand clergymen of the Established Church. It does not
appear that the signatories are officially accredited spokesmen of the
ecclesiastical corporation to which they belong; but I feel bound to
take their word for it that they are "stewards of the Lord who have
received the Holy Ghost," and, therefore, to accept this memorial as
evidence that, though the Evangelicism of my early days may be deposed
from its place of power, though so many of the colleagues of the
thirty-eight even repudiate the title of Protestants, yet the green bay
tree of bibliolatry flourishes as it did sixty years ago. And, as in
those good old times, whoso refuses to offer incense to the idol is held
to be guilty of "a dishonour to God," imperilling his salvation.

It is to the credit of the perspicacity of the memorialists that they
discern the real nat