iling virtues and the real success which had alone introduced
them to your knowledge. It is a dangerous frame of mind. That you may
understand how dangerous, and into what a situation it has already
brought you, we will (if you please) go hand-in-hand through the
different phrases of your letter, and candidly examine each from the
point of view of its truth, its appositeness, and its charity.

Damien was _coarse_.

It is very possible. You make us sorry for the lepers, who had only a
coarse old peasant for their friend and father. But you, who were so
refined, why were you not there, to cheer them with the lights of
culture? Or may I remind you that we have some reason to doubt if John
the Baptist were genteel; and in the case of Peter, on whose career your
doubtless dwell approvingly in the pulpit, no doubt at all he was a
"coarse, headstrong" fisherman! Yet even in our Protestant Bibles Peter
is called Saint.

Damien was _dirty_.

He was. Think of the poor lepers annoyed with this dirty comrade! But
the clean Dr. Hyde was at his food in a fine house.

Damien was _headstrong_.

I believe you are right again; and I thank God for his strong head and
heart.

Damien was _bigoted_.

I am not fond of bigots myself, because they are not fond of me. But
what is meant by bigotry, that we should regard it as a blemish in a
priest? Damien believed his own religion with the simplicity of a
peasant or a child; as I would I could suppose that you do. For this, I
wonder at him some way off; and had that been his only character, should
have avoided him in life. But the point of interest in Damien, which has
caused him to be so much talked about and made him at last the subject of
your pen and mine, was that, in him, his bigotry, his intense and narrow
faith, wrought potently for good, and strengthened him to be one of the
world's heroes and exemplars.

Damien _was not sent to Molokai_, _but went there without orders_.

Is this a misreading? or do you really mean the words for blame? I have
heard Christ, in the pulpits of our Church, held up for imitation on the
ground that His sacrifice was voluntary. Does Dr. Hyde think otherwise?

Damien _did not stay at the settlement_, _etc._

It is true he was allowed many indulgences. Am I to understand that you
blame the father for profiting by these, or the officers for granting
them? In either case, it is a mighty Spartan standard to issue from