former shrunk, grown vague and
questionable; as the one has more and more filled the sphere of
action, so has the other retreated into the region of meditation, or
vanished behind the screen of mere verbal recognition.

Whether this difference of the fortunes of Naturalism and of
Supernaturalism is an indication of the progress, or of the regress,
of humanity; of a fall from, or an advance towards, the higher life;
is a matter of opinion. The point to which I wish to direct attention
is that the difference exists and is making itself felt. Men are
growing to be seriously alive to the fact that the historical
evolution of humanity, which is generally, and I venture to think not
unreasonably, regarded as progress, has been, and is being,
accompanied by a co-ordinate elimination of the supernatural from its
originally large occupation of men's thoughts. The question--How far
is this process to go?--is, in my apprehension, the Controverted
Question of our time.

* * * * *

Controversy on this matter--prolonged, bitter, and fought out with the
weapons of the flesh, as well as with those of the spirit--is no new
thing to Englishmen. We have been more or less occupied with it these
five hundred years. And, during that time, we have made attempts to
establish a _modus vivendi_ between the antagonists, some of which
have had a world-wide influence; though, unfortunately, none have
proved universally and permanently satisfactory.

In the fourteenth century, the controverted question among us was,
whether certain portions of the Supernaturalism of mediaeval
Christianity were well-founded. John Wicliff proposed a solution of
the problem which, in the course of the following two hundred years,
acquired wide popularity and vast historical importance: Lollards,
Hussites, Lutherans, Calvinists, Zwinglians, Socinians, and
Anabaptists, whatever their disagreements, concurred in the proposal
to reduce the Supernaturalism of Christianity within the limits
sanctioned by the Scriptures. None of the chiefs of Protestantism
called in question either the supernatural origin and infallible
authority of the Bible, or the exactitude of the account of the
supernatural world given in its pages. In fact, they could not afford
to entertain any doubt about these points, since the infallible Bible
was the fulcrum of the lever with which they were endeavouring to
upset the Chair of St. Peter. The "freedom of private j