ificial_;
in keeping with their artificial ideas and artificial sentiments; which,
if they were expressed in natural tones, would excite universal contempt
and derision.

Now this solemnity is the best trick in the priest's game. Gravity is
always mistaken by the multitude for wisdom. A round-faced merry fellow
shall make a bright, sensible speech, and he will be voted frivolous;
but a long-faced, saturnine fellow shall utter a string of dull
platitudes, and he will be voted a Solon. This is well known to the
clergy, who have developed a perfect art of dullness. They talk an
infinite deal of nothing, use a multitude of solemn words to hide an
absurdity or no meaning at all, and utter the inherited shibboleths of
their craft like the august oracles of a recent revelation.

Concede them the advantage of solemnity, or reverence, or whatever else
it is called, and you give them the victory at the beginning of the
battle. If _you_ pull a long face over their nonsense, the spectators,
after all your arguments, will say, "There _must_ be something in it,
though, for see how _serious_ he is." Whereas a light jest and a merry
smile will show you are heart-free, and beyond the range of clerical
artillery.

I do not pretend, however, that the efforts of Free-thought critics
should have no background of seriousness. Wit without reason, says
Heine, is but a sneeze of the intelligence. But has not wit ever been
the keenest weapon of the great emancipators of the human mind? Not
the mere plaything of an idle mind in an idle hour, but the coruscating
blade to pierce the weak places of folly and imposture. Aristophanes,
Lucian, Rabelais, Erasmus, and Voltaire--to take a few great
instances--were all serious in aim and intention. They valued truth,
goodness, and beauty, as much as the dreariest preachers. But they felt,
because of their temperament, that while the dry light of the intellect
is suited to the study of science, it is inadequate in the realm of
political, social, and religious debate, where everything is steeped in
feeling, and hopes and fears strive together, and imagination kindles
the very senses into keener play.

After all, perhaps, this word _temperament_ is a solution in itself.
When Bishop South was taken to task by a brother bishop for his
witticisms, he replied, "Do you mean to say that if God had given you
any wit you would not have used it?" Thus is wisdom justified of her
children.

My friendly though s