by an intelligent desire of knowledge. That an unenquiring
submission produces characters of great and varied beauty; that it has
inspired the most splendid acts of endurance which have given a lustre
to humanity, no one will venture to deny. A genial faith is one of that
group of qualities which commend themselves most to the young, the
generous, and the enthusiastic--to those whose native and original
nobleness has suffered least from contact with the world--which belong
rather to the imagination than the reason, and stand related to truth
through the emotions rather than through the sober calculations of
probability. It is akin to loyalty, to enthusiasm, to hero-worship, to
that deep affection to a person or a cause which can see no fault in
what it loves.

'Belief,' says Mr. Sewell, 'is a virtue; doubt is a sin.' Iago is
nothing if not critical; and the sceptical spirit--_der Geist der stets
verneint_--which is satisfied with nothing, which sees in everything
good the seed of evil, and the weak spot in every great cause or nature,
has been made the special characteristic--we all feel with justice--of
the devil.

And yet this devotedness or devotion, this reverence for authority, is
but one element of excellence. To reverence is good; but on the one
condition that the object of it be a thing which deserves reverence; and
the necessary complement, the security that we are not bestowing our
best affections where they should not be given, must be looked for in
some quality which, if less attractive, is no less essential for our
true welfare. To prove all things--to try the spirits whether they be of
God--is a duty laid upon us by the highest authority; and what is called
progress in human things--religious as well as material--has been due
uniformly to a dissatisfaction with them as they are. Every advance in
science, every improvement in the command of the mechanical forces of
nature, every step in political or social freedom, has risen in the
first instance from an act of scepticism, from an uncertainty whether
the formulas, or the opinions, or the government, or the received
practical theories were absolutely perfect; or whether beyond the circle
of received truths there might not lie something broader, deeper, truer,
and thus better deserving the acceptance of mankind.

Submissiveness, humility, obedience, produce if uncorrected, in politics
a nation of slaves, whose baseness becomes an incentive to tyranny; in
r