he is the channel of Divine inspiration; all his wisdom is
ignorance, but he has written one book of which every line is absolutely
perfect: and meanwhile that which one man singles out as the Divine
element is to another the diabolical, so strangely dim is our vision,
and so imperceptible is the difference between the Infinite and the
infinitesimal.

Or, again, we are to deny ourselves as Christ denied himself. But what
are the limits and the purpose of this self-denial? Am I to carry on an
indefinite warfare against the body, which you say that God has given
me, and to crush the physical for the sake of the spiritual element?
What is the line between the spirit which is of God, and the body which
is hopelessly corrupt? All sound reasoning prescribes a training with
the given purpose of bringing the instincts of the individual into
harmony with the interests of the whole social organism. Theology trying
to lay down an absolute law sometimes encourages the extremes of
asceticism, sometimes it inclines to antinomianism; and sometimes
sanctions the condonation of sin in consideration of acts of
humiliation.

We are to resign ourselves to God's will, say theologians, but what is
God's will? If it is the inevitable, then theology falls in with free
reason. But if God's will be, as theologians maintain, something which
we are at liberty to resist or to obey, then resignation implies our
ignoble yielding to evils which might be extirpated. Theology deifies
the force of circumstances, when our life should be a victory over
circumstances, and encourages us to repine over misfortunes, where all
repining is useless.

Christ, you say, died for us; and Butler, in the book which still
receives more praise than any other attempt at reconciling philosophy
and theology, tries to show that here, at least, the two doctrines are
in harmony. He has probably produced, in men of powerful intellects,
more atheism than he has cured; for he tries to demonstrate explicitly
what is tacitly assumed by most theologians--the injustice of God. The
doctrine may be horrible, but he says that facts prove it to be true.
His whole logic consists in simply begging the question by calling
suffering punishment. That the potter should be angry with his pots is
certainly inconceivable; but when you once attempt to trace the
supernatural in life, it undoubtedly follows that God is not only weak
with the creatures he has made, but punishes the innocent for th