Chapter I: Preface

_To those_, _I think a lessening number_, _who may find themselves at variance with_ “_my Rector’s_” _theology_, _I tender the following quotation from one of the ablest and deepest thinkers of the past century_:

“If, instead of the ‘glad tidings’ that there exists a Being in whom
all the excellences which the highest human mind can conceive exist
in a degree inconceivable to us, I am informed that the world is
ruled by a Being whose attributes are infinite, but what they are we
cannot learn, nor what are the principles of his government, except
that ‘the highest human morality which we are capable of conceiving’
does not sanction them; convince me of it, and I will bear my fate as
I may. But when I am told that I must believe this, and at the same
time call this Being by the names which express and affirm the
highest human morality, I say in plain terms I will call no being
good who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my
fellow-creatures.”—J. S. MILL, _Examination of Sir W. Hamilton’s
Philosophy_, pp. 102, 103 (Criticism of Mansel).

_I have omitted from the above the author’s peroration_, _which is couched in language too strong to suit the taste of the present generation_.

_That the Bible is our one and only true guide_, _we believe_; _but we are nowhere instructed to make an idol and a fetish of the form in which it is presented_. _It was written to suit all times_; _we must read it in the language of to-day_.

_In the controversy between the Squire and himself the Rector is by no means guiltless of plagiarism_. _Ford_, _who knew Spain as intimately as an Englishman can ever know it_, _advances the self-same arguments in his comments on the national sport_.

_A word more and I have done_. _It is reported on good authority that one of our greatest divines—the author of_ ‘Butler’s Analogy’—_held a confident belief in the re-existence of animals_. _They share our doom of suffering and death_: _why not our promise of happiness beyond_? _They have done nothing to forfeit their reward_.

_A. P._

CAMBRIDGE,
_August_, 1904.