Our most assured likings have for the most part been arrived at neither
by introspection nor by any process of conscious reasoning, but by the
bounding forth of the heart to welcome the gospel proclaimed to it by
another. We hear some say that such and such a thing is thus or thus,
and in a moment the train that has been laid within us, but whose
presence we knew not, flashes into consciousness and perception.

Only a year ago he had bounded forth to welcome Mr Hawke's sermon; since
then he had bounded after a College of Spiritual Pathology; now he was in
full cry after rationalism pure and simple; how could he be sure that his
present state of mind would be more lasting than his previous ones? He
could not be certain, but he felt as though he were now on firmer ground
than he had ever been before, and no matter how fleeting his present
opinions might prove to be, he could not but act according to them till
he saw reason to change them. How impossible, he reflected, it would
have been for him to do this, if he had remained surrounded by people
like his father and mother, or Pryer and Pryer's friends, and his rector.
He had been observing, reflecting, and assimilating all these months with
no more consciousness of mental growth than a school-boy has of growth of
body, but should he have been able to admit his growth to himself, and to
act up to his increased strength if he had remained in constant close
connection with people who assured him solemnly that he was under a
hallucination? The combination against him was greater than his unaided
strength could have broken through, and he felt doubtful how far any
shock less severe than the one from which he was suffering would have
sufficed to free him.

CHAPTER LXV

As he lay on his bed day after day slowly recovering he woke up to the
fact which most men arrive at sooner or later, I mean that very few care
two straws about truth, or have any confidence that it is righter and
better to believe what is true than what is untrue, even though belief in
the untruth may seem at first sight most expedient. Yet it is only these
few who can be said to believe anything at all; the rest are simply
unbelievers in disguise. Perhaps, after all, these last are right. They
have numbers and prosperity on their side. They have all which the
rationalist appeals to as his tests of right and wrong. Right, according
to him, is what seems right to the majority of sensible, well-t