otion of what goes on in minds very different from his
own, and moreover to be stone-blind to his ignorance. A modest man or
a philosopher would have scrupled to treat with scorn and scoffing,
as Mr. Kingsley does in my own instance, principles and convictions,
even if he did not acquiesce in them himself, which had been held so
widely and for so long--the beliefs and devotions and customs which
have been the religious life of millions upon millions of Christians
for nearly twenty centuries--for this in fact is the task on which he
is spending his pains. Had he been a man of large or cautious mind,
he would not have taken it for granted that cultivation must lead
every one to see things precisely as he sees them himself. But the
narrow-minded are the more prejudiced by very reason of their
narrowness. The apostle bids us "in malice be children, but in
understanding be men." I am glad to recognise in Mr. Kingsley an
illustration of the first half of this precept; but I should not be
honest, if I ascribed to him any sort of fulfilment of the second.

I wish I could speak as favourably either of his drift or of his
method of arguing, as I can of his convictions. As to his drift, I
think its ultimate point is an attack upon the Catholic Religion. It
is I indeed, whom he is immediately insulting--still, he views me
only as a representative, and on the whole a fair one, of a class or
caste of men, to whom, conscious as I am of my own integrity, I
ascribe an excellence superior to mine. He desires to impress upon
the public mind the conviction that I am a crafty, scheming man,
simply untrustworthy; that, in becoming a Catholic, I have just found
my right place; that I do but justify and am properly interpreted by
the common English notion of Roman casuists and confessors; that I
was secretly a Catholic when I was openly professing to be a
clergyman of the Established Church; that so far from bringing, by
means of my conversion, when at length it openly took place, any
strength to the Catholic cause, I am really a burden to it--an
additional evidence of the fact, that to be a pure, german, genuine
Catholic, a man must be either a knave or a fool.

These last words bring me to Mr. Kingsley's method of disputation,
which I must criticise with much severity;--in his drift he does but
follow the ordinary beat of controversy, but in his mode of arguing
he is actually dishonest.

He says that I am either a knave or a fool, and (