"Can't recollect them!... I wish you would tell me what you understand by the word 'believe.'" "I'm very doubtful. It just depends on how I use it. When I tell my wife that I believe her letter has gone to the Post, my meaning is clear. I mean that I didn't see it on the hall-table when I last looked. When I say that I believe I am engaged on Thursday, it is equally unmistakable. I mean that I don't want to meet the So-and-so's at your house, morning-dress. But when I say, as I am apt to do, that I believe in God Almighty, I do so with a misgiving that my meaning is not intelligible to myself. Perhaps I regard my speech as a civility to the absolutely Unknown--I really couldn't say. Or it may be I only use it in fulfilment of a convention which, so long as I comply with its conditions, binds all the other signatories not to bother." "You always make me think you are going to be serious, and then you go off at a tangent. I never have any doubt what I mean by the word...." "What, for instance?" "Whatever my mind does not question, I believe." "Then the Creed might be reworded, 'I don't and won't question the existence of God the Father,' and so on. Somehow it doesn't sound convincing." "Because it seems to imply that the question is an open one." "And saying you believe it doesn't? I'm agreeable, if you're satisfied. But, then, you see, I stop away from Church, by hypothesis. And I should do so just the same if the re-wording were made. Nokes and Stokes and Styles and Brown and Thompson in a row, shouting that they didn't and wouldn't question the existence of God Almighty, would keep me out just as much as if they said they 'believed' in Him." They walked on a little in silence, the Rector very thoughtful. Presently he said, rather as one who comes to a sudden conclusion: "My definition of the word doesn't cover it. One means more...." "And doesn't exactly know what," said Challis. "Precisely. But isn't it possible that the common use of a word long received among many people may, from the habit of its usage, acquire a meaning to each and all alike, and yet continue to baffle definition?"