If Religion and Philosophy be the two poles of a battery, whose is the battery Religion and Philosophy have been made the poles of? Is the change in the relation of the wires any presumption of a removal of the managers? We know pretty well who handled the instrument: has he resigned or been[77] turned out? Has he been put under {38} restriction? A fool may ask more questions than twenty sages can answer: but there is hope; for twenty sages cannot ask more questions than one reviewer can answer. I should like to see the opposite sides employed upon the question, What are the _commoda_, and what the _pericula_,[78] of the current approximation of Religion and Philosophy? All this is very profane and irreverent! It has always been so held by those whose position demands such holding. To describe the Church as it is passes for assailing the Church as it ought to be with all who cannot do without it. In Bedlam[79] a poor creature who fancied he was St. Paul, was told by another patient that he was an impostor; the first maniac lodged a complaint against the second for calling St. Paul an impostor, which, he argued, with much appearance of sanity, ought not to be permitted in a well regulated madhouse. Nothing could persuade him that he had missed the question, which was whether _he_ was St. Paul. The same thing takes place in the world _at large_. And especially must be noted the refusal to permit to the _profane_ the millionth part of the licence assumed by the _sacred_. I give a sound churchman the epitaph of St. John Long; the usual pronunciation of whose name must be noted-- "Behold! ye quacks, the vengeance strong On deeds like yours impinging: For here below lies St. John Long[80] Who now must be _long singeing_." How shameful to pronounce this of the poor man! What, Mr. Orthodox! may I not do in joke to one pretender what {39} you do in earnest--unless you quibble--to all the millions of the Greek Church, and a great many others. Enough of you and your reasoning! Go and square the circle!