gustine:--"I found,"
says this writer, "the Life of St. Augustine saying, that, though the
pretended visit of St. Peter to England wanted _historic evidence_,
'yet it has undoubtedly been received as a _pious opinion_ by the
Church at large, as we learn from the often-quoted words of St.
Innocent I. (who wrote A.D. 416) that St. Peter was instrumental in
the conversion of the West generally.'"--p. 21. He brings this
passage against me (with which, however, I have nothing more to do
than he has) as a great misdemeanour; but let us see what his
criticism is worth. "And this sort of argument," continues the
passage, "though it ought to be kept _quite distinct from_
documentary and historic proof, will _not be without its effect_ on
devout minds," etc. I should have thought this a very sober doctrine,
viz. that we must not confuse together two things quite distinct from
each other, criticism and devotion, so proof and opinion--that a
_devout_ mind will hold _opinions_ which it cannot demonstrate by
"historic _proof_." What, I ask, is the harm of saying this? Is
_this_ my assailant's definition of opinion, "a thing which _can_ be
proved?" I cannot answer for him, but I can answer for men in
general. Let him read Sir David Brewster's "More Worlds than
One;"--this principle, which is so shocking to my assailant, is
precisely the argument of Sir David's book; he tells us that the
plurality of worlds _cannot_ be _proved_, but _will_ be _received_ by
religious men. He asks, p. 229, "_If_ the stars are _not_ suns, for
what conceivable _purpose_ were they created?" and then he lays down
dogmatically, p. 254, "There is no _opinion_, _out of_ the region of
_pure demonstration_, more universally _cherished_ than the doctrine
of the Plurality of worlds." And in his title-page he styles this
"opinion" "the _creed_ of the philosopher and the _hope_ of the
Christian." If Brewster may bring devotion into astronomy, why may
not my friend bring it into history? and that the more, when he
actually declares that it ought to be kept _quite distinct_ from
history, and by no means assumes that he is an historian because he
is a hagiographer; whereas, somehow or other, Sir David does seem to
me to show a zeal greater than becomes a _savant_, and to assume that
he himself is a theologian because he is an astronomer. This writer
owes Sir David as well as me an apology. Blot _twenty_.

He ought to wish his original charge against me in the magazin