nd what is now received as revelation, tell us
fairly how much of the doctrines popularly taught they
conceive to be adequately established, how much to be
uncertain, and how much, if anything, to be mistaken;
there is scarcely perhaps a single serious inquirer who
would not submit with delight to a court which is the
highest on earth.

Mr. Mansell tells us that in the things of God reason
is beyond its depth, that the wise and the unwise are on
the same level of incapacity, and that we must accept
what we find established, or we must believe nothing.
We presume that this dilemma itself is a conclusion of
reason. Do what we will, reason is and must be our
ultimate authority; and were the collective sense of
mankind to declare Mr. Mansell right, we should submit
to that opinion as readily as to another. But the
collective sense of mankind is less acquiescent. He
has been compared to a man sitting on the end of a
plank and deliberately sawing off his seat. It seems
never to have occurred to him that, if he is right, he has
no business to be a Protestant. What Mr. Mansell says
to Professor Jowett, Bishop Gardiner in effect replied
to Frith and Ridley. Frith and Ridley said that
transubstantiation was unreasonable; Gardiner answered
that there was the letter of Scripture of it, and that the
human intellect was no measure of the power of God.
Yet the Reformers somehow believed, and Mr. Mansell
by his place in the Church of England seems to agree
with them, that the human intellect was not so wholly
incompetent. It might be a weak guide, but it was
better than none; and they declared on grounds of mere
reason, that Christ being in heaven and not on earth,
'it was contrary to the truth for a natural body to be in
two places at once.' The common sense of the country
was of the same opinion, and the illusion was at an
end.

There have been "Aids to Faitti" produced lately, and
"Replies to the Seven Essayists," "Answers to Colenso,"
and much else of the kind. We regret to say that they
have done little for us. The very life of our souls is at
issue in the questions which have been raised, and we
are fed with the professional commonplaces of the
members of a close guild, men holding high office in
the Church, or expecting to hold high office there; in
either case with a strong temporal interest in the defence
of the institution which they represent. We desire to
know what those of the clergy think whose love of truth
i