noza, a
"God-intoxicated man," and a philosophical genius, but not a pillar
of ecclesiastical orthodoxy. Vestiges of Creation, which had
appeared in 1844, woke Oxford to the discovery that physical science
might have something to say about the origin, or at least the
growth, of the universe. The writer, Robert Chambers, whose name was
not then known, so far anticipated Darwin that he dispensed with the
necessity for a special creation of each plant and animal. He did
not, any more than Darwin, attack the Christian religion, and he did
not really go much farther than Lucretius. But he had more modern
lights, he understood science, and he wrote in a popular style. He
made a lively impression upon Froude, who learnt from him that
natural phenomena were due to natural causes, at the same time that
he acquired from Spinoza a disbelief in the freedom of the will.
When Dr. Johnson said, "Sir, we know that the will is free, and
there's an end on't," he did not understand the question. We all
know that the will is free to act. But is man free to will? If
everything about a man were within our cognisance, we could predict
his conduct in given circumstances as certainly as a chemist can
foretell the effect of mixing an acid with an alkali. I have no
intention of expressing any opinion of my own upon this subject. The
important thing is that Froude became in the philosophic sense a
Determinist, and his conviction that Calvin was in that respect the
best philosopher among theologians strengthened his attachment to
the Protestant cause.

Protestantism apart, however, Froude's position as a clergyman had
become intolerable. He had been persuaded to accept ordination for
the reason, among others, that the Church could be reformed better
from within than from without.

But there were few doctrines of the Church that he could honestly
teach, and the straightforward course was to abandon the clerical
profession. Nowadays a man in Froude's plight would only have to
sign a paper, and he would be free. But before 1870 orders, even
deacon's orders, were indelible. Neither a priest nor a deacon could
sit in Parliament, or enter any other learned profession. Froude was
in great difficulty and distress. He consulted his friends Arthur
Stanley, Matthew Arnold, and Arthur Clough. Clough, though a layman,
felt the same perplexity as himself. As a Fellow and Tutor of Oriel
he had signed the Articles. Now that he no longer believed in them,
ought