Page:Literary studies by Joseph Jacobs.djvu/155

 of his dialectic there is a subtlety of distinction which recalls the legal quibble, and at times even the legal fiction. It was a crude feeling of this that caused Kingsley to ask his famous question, 'What, then, does Dr. Newman mean?' to which he obtained so crushing a reply. To the Philistine truth is a matter of yea or nay; there is no place for subtle gradations of meaning and reference. Kingsley was, with all his powers, something of a Philistine, and required this sharpness of outline in what we may term truths of the emotions. Newman easily overthrew the contention, but the very subtleties which he had to introduce into his defence, in all parts of it that were not merely personal, gave the British public an uneasy feeling that there was some justification for Kingsley's general position. Newman amply vindicated his own personal veracity, but he was scarcely so successful in removing all suspicion of what is euphemistically termed 'economy of truth' in the practice of the Church he had joined, and in his own method of dealing with theological problems. It was the nisi prius tone that left this impression, and it was generally this legal and quibbling tone in the treatment of religious topics that helped to undermine Newman's influence from the time of the appearance of 'Tract No. xc.'