es and the Koran
were inspired; he merely dispensed with all that was supernatural and
miraculous and mystical! The Deist laughed, and told him that he
believed just as much, if that constituted a Christian. "I believe,"
said he, "that the New Testament is quite as much inspired as the
Koran of Mahomet; and that it contains more of ethical truth (however
it came there) than is to be found in any other book of equal bulk.
But," he proceeded, "if you dispense with all that is miraculous in
the facts, and all that is peculiar and characteristic in the
doctrines,--that is, all which discriminates Christianity from any
other religion,--I am afraid that your Christianity is own born
brother to my Infidelity. As for your reverence for this inspired
book, since you must reject ninety per cent. of the whole, it seems
to me very gratuitous; equally so, whether you suppose the compilers
believed or disbelieved the facts and doctrines you reject; if the
former, and they were deceived, they must have been inspired
idiots; if the latter, and were deceiving others, they were surely
inspired knaves. For my part," he continued, "while I hold that the
book somehow does unaccountably contain more of the morally true
and beautiful than any book of equal extent, I also hold that
Christianity itself is a pure imposture from beginning to end."

This coarse avowal of adherence to the elder, and, after all, more
intelligible deism, brought down upon him at once two of the company.
One was the disciple of Strauss (I mean as regards his theory of the
origin of Christianity, not as regards his Pantheism); the other a
Rationalist, with about the same small tatters of Christianity
fluttering about him, but who was a little disposed, like so many
German theologians, to consider Strauss as somewhat passe. Unhappily,
got athwart each other's bows shortly after they into action. They
both enlarged--really in a edifying manner, I could have listened
to them an hour--on the absurdity of the Deist's argument! "What!"
cried one; "the purest system of ethics from the most shameless
impostors!" "And what do you make of the infinitely varied and
inimitable marks of simplicity and honesty in the writers?" cried
the other. "And who does not see the impossibility of getting up the
miracles so as to impose upon a world of bitter and prejudiced enemies
in open day?" exclaimed the Rationalist. "They were obviously mere
myths," cried the Straussian. "That I must beg