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114 immersion. His mother—his Alma Mater—still holds him by the heel. It is in consequence, with a sort of heel of Achilles that he enters upon divinity; and over this he draws a stocking with a large hole in it just where the wear of the heel comes hardest. That stocking (containing forty stripes save one) is the Thirty-nine Articles. It has been loosely knit, it is warranted to shrink the longer he wears it, and the hole in consequence gets larger.

There you have the weakness of the Church of England. Nobody to-day in his senses is prepared to die for the Thirty-nine Articles. Yet to hold ministry in the Church he has to swear by them, and thus at the very beginning of his ministerial career discreditable conduct is imposed on him.

It is no wonder that upon that basis the Church of England is permeated with unbelief in the things that it professes. A Church, a religion, may be full of credulity, bigotry, superstition—and with all those things it may yet have a true and a living faith: it may breed martyrs and inquisitors in equal numbers and with equal facility; but, in order to do so it must have at its back something definite and distinctive that its members are prepared to die for. And if it has not that, it is bound to become before long a discredited institution.

It is an interesting and a hopeful trait in human nature that it will only believe obstinately, continuously, and in spite of persecution, in those things which seem greatly to matter,