The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eclipse of Faith, by Henry Rogers

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Title: The Eclipse of Faith
Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic

Author: Henry Rogers

Release Date: October 13, 2005 [EBook #16866]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ECLIPSE OF FAITH ***

Produced by Michael John Madden

THE ECLIPSE OF FAITH;

OR

A VISIT TO A RELIGIOUS SCEPTIC.

FIFTH EDITION.

BOSTON: CROSBY, NICHOLS AND COMPANY,
111 WASHINGTON STREET.

1854.

AMERICAN PREFACE.

The effect of the perusal of this book, and the estimate put
upon it by a reader, will depend upon his taking with him a
right view of its design. That design seems in the mind of
the writer to have been very definite and very restricted. If
he should be thought to have intended an answer to all the
elaborate objections from criticism and philosophy recently or
renewedly urged against faith in the Christian revelation,
and, still more, if the reader should suppose that the author
had aimed to remove all the difficulties in the way of
such a faith, he would equally insure his own disappointment,
and wrong the writer. The book comes forth anonymously, but it
is ascribed to Mr. Henry Rogers, some of whose very able
papers in the Edinburgh Review have been republished in two
octavo volumes in England, and one of whose articles, that on
"Reason and Faith," dealt with some of the topics which form
the subject-matter of this volume.

The author seems to have viewed with a keenly attentive and
anxious mind the generally unsettled state of opinion, equally
among the literary and some of the humbler classes in England,
concerning the terms and the sanction of a religious faith,
especially as the issue bears upon the contents and the
authority of the Bible. That he understands the state of things
in which he proposes himself as one who has a word to utter,
will be allowed by all candid judges, whatever criticism they
may pass upon the effectiveness of his own argument. There is
abundant evidence in this book of his large intimacy with
the freshest forms of speculation, as developed by the free
thought of our age. While he identi