words and verses in the Hebrew and Septuagint, which are not in the Samaritan. Is it unreasonable for me to ask how so many blunders have got into this book, if it contains a revelation from God? Then I come to try to get a clue from the Gospels, and I find again that no man knows when they were written, where they were written, or by whom they were written. Clergymen of the Church have invented arguments from the first century fathers for the existence of the Gospels. I used to believe that such testimony existed; I could not suppose that writers like Dr. Paley had invented testimony of the fathers, but when I went to the great libraries to verify authorities, and I found that he manufactured evidence, I ask, was I, as a sceptic, a reasonable man in challenging the Church? The Bishop says a Sceptic is not to be attacked because he doubts, but because of his reason for the doubt. I doubt because I cannot help it. Is that a good reason or not? Is the Church entitled to say “It is not true, you might believe if you like?” And mark, the Bishop had the audacity to declare that Christianity is not intolerant of the doubter, but of the spirit of doubt. The Church used to burn the doubter, and then it burnt his books, and locked him up in prison. It now gathers 3,000 people into the nave of the Cathedral to hear the attack on the doubter, and refuses to grant the use of any place for a reply. It is not intolerant to the doubter, it is only intolerant of the spirit of doubt! I learned from the Bishop that a man might be a religious believer, and at the same time a sceptic, and in explaining this he used language of an astounding character. He said if a man were to say, _I_ cannot believe in the existence of God till I have it demonstrated to me as clearly as that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles, then he is in principle a sceptic, because if he had not that sort of proof, he would begin to doubt of the existence of God; all this time his assent to the existence of God would have rested on a sceptical foundation. This was one of the most marvellous pieces of nonsense that any one could talk. How can any one, while assenting to God’s existence, say, I cannot believe in God till it is proved to demonstration? He makes the true believer commence by saying he cannot believe in God till it is proved. If anyone here had used that language, I should have said that he did not understand what he was talking about; but when a Bishop, a learned Bishop, the paragon of eloquence and logic, brought here as more competent than your own Bishop, talks such nonsense, how am I to reply? Let us take a startling contrast which the Bishop thought right to give us. He contrasted Thomas the doubter with Simon Peter the believer. I have read the Bible a little, and I think that of all the cowardly rascals of whom I ever read, the greatest rascal was Simon Peter. He was called under great advantages;