Out of doors much is said against passive resistance, but in prison it is the only resistance possible, and is often very effective, If you speak or act, you are at the mercy of those in whose power you are. Take any aggressive step and your gaoler knocks you down, or locks you up in a moment. But if you simply will not do a thing, if without bluster or bravado you leave it to them to make you do it, or to do it themselves, they often find it of rather awkward accomplishment. To carry me to prayers or to dress me every morning was far more offensive and troublesome to them than breaking my head, so they left me alone. Old Mr. Jones, the magistrate, paid me frequent visits. One day he took me to the door, and pointing upwards, asked, 'did I not see there proofs sufficient of the existence of a God?' I answered, that 'when the boundless expanse of the skies had been before me I had been unable to think so, and now the few square feet, which the high walls of the gaol permitted me to see, were still less likely to inspire me with that conviction.' A little reflection ought to have shown these gentlemen, who made these appeals to me, that the time and place were both inauspicious in which to address to me such interrogatories. Indeed it was offensive, and on more than one occasion I told them, that having undertaken to compel my acquiescence with them by imprisonment, I could never divest myself of the conviction that it was superfluous to pretend to win me by argument. The last visit Mr. Jones paid was to read me a psalm. As on my trial I had complained of the discourtesy of their calling me a fool, the old man was particularly anxious to justify himself. He found what seemed to him a favourable opportunity in the circumstance that a German scholar had at this time published a new translation of the Psalms of David. As I had spoken favourably of German theologians, he concluded that this one would have weight with me. He brought down the book, summoned the whole class of prisoners, and we stood twelve or eighteen in a row. Proclaiming attention, he said he wished to read to us, and particularly to me, the 14th Psalm. Reading aloud the first verse where David observes 'the fool hath said in his heart there is no God,' Mr. Jones said, 'Now, Holyoake, you complained that we called you a fool--you see David says you are a fool.' The old man looked round with an air of triumph, which was considerably moderated when I gently but distinctly observed that 'I no more liked rudeness in the mouth of David than in the mouth of a magistrate.' My fellow-prisoners glanced around in consternation at my audacity, and expected to hear me ordered into the dark cell, but old Mr. Jones turned round, shut up his book, and walked away without saying a word, and I never saw him afterwards.