upernatural inspiration of the Bible?" Most of them are obliged to
confess that at best they are in a state of doubt. On Sunday three
Anglican clergymen are imported on a steam launch from a watering place
some ten miles off, where they are attending a clerical Congress--an
Evangelical, a Broad Churchman, and a Ritualist; and they administer to
the company three competitive sermons.

These performances leave confusion worse confounded; and the guests
during the following days set themselves to pick their own beliefs to
pieces. At last they come back to the question of free will, especially
as related to science and what is called scientific materialism. Then
the question arises of "What do we mean by matter?" and then the
question of the possible goodness of a God who, if he is really the
power behind evolution, is constantly sacrificing the unit to the
development of the race or species. This last difficulty is expressed by
one of the disputants in a poem which had been written many years ago,
and which, by request of the company, he recites. In this poem the man,
who is vowed to abandon every belief for which science can make no room,
is represented by a wanderer who finds himself at last conducted to a
bare region where no living thing is discernible, but one shining
apparition standing on the brink of a promontory which juts into a
sailless sea. He approaches, and addresses it thus:

"Oh, angel of the heavenly glow,
Behold I take thine hands and kneel.
But what is this? Thy brows are snow,
Thy hands are stone, thy wings are steel.

"The radiant pureness of thy face
Has not the peace of Paradise,
Those wings within the all-holy place
Were never folded o'er thine eyes.

"And in thine eyes I see no bliss,
Nor even the tenderness of tears.
I see the blueness of the abyss,
I see the icebergs and the spheres.

"Angel whose hand is cold in mine,
Whose seaward eyes are not for me,
Why do I cry for wings like thine?
I would leave all and follow thee."

To this the apparition, who is the Spirit of Science, replies:

"Ah, rash one, pause and learn my name.
I know not love, nor hate, nor ruth.
I am that heart of frost and flame
That knows but one desire--the Truth.

"Thou shalt indeed be lifted up
On wings like mine, 'twixt seas and sky.
But can'st thou drink with me my cup,
And can'st thou be