ed to reason, and had, by a different path, reached moral
conclusions with Fitzjames thoroughly agreed. Doctrines, says Fitzjames,
which _prima facie_ conflict with our belief in a benevolent Creator,
such as the theory of vicarious suffering, are not indeed capable of
being refuted by Parker's summary method; but he fully agrees that they
could only be established by very strong evidence, which he obviously
does not believe to exist. To appeal, then, to the conscience on behalf
of the very doctrine which has been destroyed by the revolt of our moral
feelings is obviously impossible. Newman, when he notices that the
modern world rejects the sacrifice theory, explains it by saying that
the conscience of the modern world has decayed. But it is a mere playing
fast and loose with logic when you deny the authority of the court to
which you appeal as soon as it decides against you. To Fitzjames, at any
rate, who regarded these doctrines as radically immoral, the argument
could have no application.

Finally, the desire for some infallible guide in the midst of our doubts
and difficulties is equally wide of the mark. It is so because, though
the desire for truth is perfectly natural or highly commendable, there
is not the slightest ground for supposing that it implies any royal road
to truth. In all other matters, political, social, and physical, we have
to blunder slowly into truth by harsh experience. Why not in religious
matters? Upon this Fitzjames frequently insists. Deny any _a priori_
probability of such guidance, he says, and the Catholic argument
vanishes. Moreover, as he argues at length in his review of the
'Apologia,' it is absolutely inconsistent with facts. What is the use of
saying that man's nature demands an infallible guide, when, as a matter
of admitted fact, such a guide has only been granted to one small
fraction of mankind? For thousands of years, and over the great majority
of the present world, you admit yourselves that no such guide exists.
What, then, is the value of an _a priori_ argument that it must exist?
When Newman has to do with the existence of the Greek Church, he admits
it to be inconsistent with his theory, but discovers it to be a
'difficulty' instead of an 'objection.' That is to say that an argument
which you cannot answer is to be dismissed on pretence of being only a
'difficulty,' as nonsense is to be admitted under the name of a
'mystery.' If you argued in that way in a court of justice