The next adversary was a Mr. Dalton. Father Spencer expends some very good arguments on him, among others, the following in the first letter: "You and other Protestants may say that they consider this doctrine (transubstantiation) unscriptural; but the arguments by which you endeavour to impugn it never are scriptural. I once used to argue against it myself, and the best arguments I could find were from {233} reason." There may be fault found with this argument, because a thing could be unscriptural, though its denial or refutation were not; but F. Spencer establishes the positive side of the question afterwards. And the argument was good thus far that its denial is an Article of the 39, which should be proved by "sure warranty of Scripture." He does so in a passage which begins thus: "If Scripture be appealed to simply, I know not how any one can deny that it speaks altogether in our favour, whenever the Eucharist is mentioned or alluded to. When we are asked for proofs of our doctrine we invariably begin by an appeal to the simple words of Christ given in Scripture. 'This is my body,' 'This is my blood,' which, taken as they stand, can agree with no doctrine but the Catholic." F. Spencer thought he had a gentleman to deal with in his adversary, but found that he had overrated the attributes his charity supposed him to possess. He pointed an argument upon the unity of our teachers as contradistinguished from sectarian ones, by bringing in Mr. Dalton and his brother us an example. At this Dalton took offence, and F. Spencer made a most ample and beautiful apology. This evoked all the bile of his opponent in a flourish of trumpets, by which he boasted of a post relinquished in the argument, which really argued gain in F. Spencer as a Christian antagonist. He flung out then in glorious confusion--imperfect councils, bad popes, Spanish inquisitions, just as they came to hand. When Spencer saw this, he thought of answering him according to his folly, and instead of analyzing his "concentrated lozenge," wrote something in the style of cudgelling him for the fun of the thing next time. Here is an extract from his next letter, which is produced more as a specimen of his humour than of his logic:-- A sentence of Mr. Dalton's letter ran thus: "But let me first remind you what our view of private judgment is. Do we mean that every man may set up as an interpreter of Scripture, that every shoemaker and ploughman (as Catholics say) may become a preacher? By no means; we recognise authority when it is scriptural, and believe that an authorized ministry is God's mode of extending the Bible." {234} Father Spencer replies:--