The Eclipse of Faith; Or, A Visit to a Religious ScepticRogers, Henry
Religion
The Eclipse of Faith; Or, A Visit to a Religious Sceptic
Rogers, Henry
Skepticism -- Controversial literature
"Well," said Fellowes, "I cannot help agreeing with Mr. Newman in
thinking that, when one hears men made the objects of extravagant eulogy,
it almost 'tempts one, even though a stranger to their very name,
to "pick holes," as the saying is.'"
"It may be so," said I; "but it is a tendency against which we should
guard. It would lead us, like him of Athens, to ostracize Aristides: we
should be weary of hearing him continually called 'The Just.'"
"However." rejoined Fellowes, "I am weary of hearing Christ so
perpetually called our example. As Mr. Newman says, he cannot, except
in a very modified sense, be such. 'His garments will not fit us.'"
"Did you ever hear," said I. "that fathers and mothers ought to set
an example to their children?"
"Certainly."
"Yet surely not in all things can they be such. Their garments surely
will not fit their children."
"No." said Harrington; "those of the father at all events will not,
if they are girls, nor of the mother, if they are boys. Fellowes, I
think you had better say nothing on this subject. If men of fifty
can, in all essential points, be beautiful examples to girls of
ten,--in gentleness, in patience, in humility, in kindness, and
so forth,--and all the more impressively for the wide interval between
them, why, I suppose Jesus Christ may be as much to his disciples."
"But, again," urged Fellowes to me, "you, like so many men, seem to
lay such stress on the superiority of the morality of the New Testament.
I cannot see it. I confess, with Mr. Foxton and many more, that it
seems to me that it has not such a very great advantage over that
of many heathen moralists who have said the same things,--Plato,
for example."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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