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they are damnable. Have faith in what I tell you, and save your souls !“ In
which of these conflicting doctrines are we to place our faith if we are not
to hear all sides, and to rely upon our own judgment in the end? Are we to
understand that it is the duty of man to be credulous in accepting whatever
the priest in whose neighbourhood he happens to reside may say? Is it to
believe whatever his parents may have lovingly taught him? There are a
vast number of foolish men and women in the world who marry and have
children, and because they deal lovingly with their children it does not at
all follow that they can instruct them wisely. Or is it to have faith in what
the wisest men of all ages have found peace in believing? The Catholic
phrase, “quod semter quod ubique quod omnibus “—“that which has been
believed at all times, in all places, and by all men “—has indeed a fine
rolling sound, but where is the dogma that satisfies its requirements? Or is
it, such and such really good and wise men with whom you are
acquainted, and whom, it may be, you have the privilege of knowing,
have lived consistent lives through the guidance of these dogmas, how can
you who are many grades their inferior in good works, in capacity and in
experience, presume to set up your opinion against theirs? There ply is,
that it is a matter of history and notoriety that other very good, capable,
and inexperienced men have led and are leading consistent lives under the
guidance of totally different dogmas, and that some of them a few
generations back would have probably burned your modern hero as a
heretic if he had lived in their times and they could have got hold of him.
Also, that men, however eminent in goodness, intellect, and experience,
may be deeply prejudiced, and that their judgment in matters where their
prejudices are involved cannot thenceforward be trusted. Watches as
electricians know to their cost, are liable to have their steel work
accidentally magnetised, and the best chronometer under those conditions
can never again be trusted to keep correct time.
Lastly, we are told to have faith in our conscience? well we know now
a great deal more about conscience than formerly. Ethnologists have
studied the manifestations of conscience in different people, and do not
find that they
