d to reverent treatment. No body of great
and good men can at any time credit and take comfort from a lie pure and
simple; and if an extinct creed appears to lack that foundation of truth
which makes creeds tolerable, it is safer to assume that it had a
meaning and a truthfulness, to those who held it, that lapse of time
has tended to destroy, together with the creed itself, than to condemn
men wholesale as knaves and hypocrites. But the particular subject which
has here been dealt with will surely be considered to be specially
entitled to respect, when it is remembered that it was once an integral
portion of the belief of most of our best and bravest ancestors--of men
and women who dared to witness to their own sincerity amidst the fires
of persecution and in the solitude of exile. It has nearly all
disappeared now. The terrific hierarchy of fiends, which was so real, so
full of horror three hundred years ago[1], has gradually vanished away
before the advent of fuller knowledge and purer faith, and is now hardly
thought of, unless as a dead mediaeval myth. But let us deal tenderly
with it, remembering that the day may come when the beliefs that are
nearest to our hearts may be treated as open to contempt or ridicule,
and the dogmas to which we most passionately cling will, "like an
insubstantial pageant faded, leave not a wrack behind."

[Footnote 1: Perhaps the following prayer, contained in Thomas Becon's
"Pomander," shows more clearly than the comments of any critic the
reality of the terror:--

"An infinite number of wicked angels there are, O Lord Christ, which
without ceasing seek my destruction. Against this exceeding great
multitude of evil spirits send Thou me Thy blessed and heavenly angels,
which may deliver me from then tyranny. Thou, O Lord, hast devoured
hell, and overcome the prince of darkness and all his ministers; yea,
and that not for Thyself, but for those that believe in Thee. Suffer me
not, therefore, to be overcome of Satan and of his servants, but rather
let me triumph over them, that I, through strong faith and help of the
blessed angels, having the victory of the hellish army, may with a
joyful heart say, Death, where is thy sting? Hell, where is thy
victory?--and so for ever and ever magnify Thy Holy Name. Amen." Parker
Society, p. 84.]

* * * * *

111. Little attempt has hitherto been made, in the way of direct proof,
to show that fairies are really only a