But I turn from this to the brighter side of my life, the intellectual and social side, where I found a delight unknown in the old days of bondage.  First, there was the joy of freedom, the joy of speaking out frankly and honestly each thought.  Truly, I had the right to say:  “With a great price obtained I this freedom,” and having paid the price, I revelled in the Liberty I had bought.  Mr. Scott’s valuable library was at my service; his keen brain challenged my opinions, probed my assertions, and suggested phases of thought hitherto untouched.  I studied harder than ever, and the study now was unchecked by any fear of possible consequences.  I had nothing left of the old faith save belief in “a God”, and that began slowly to melt away.  The Theistic axiom:  “If there be a God at all he must be at least as good as his highest creature”, began with an “if”, and to that “if” I turned my attention.  “Of all impossible things”, writes Miss Frances Power Cobbe, “the most impossible must surely be that a man should dream something of the good and the noble, and that it should prove at last that his Creator was less good and less noble than he had dreamed.”  But, I questioned, are we sure that there is a Creator?  Granted that, if there is, he must be above his highest creature, but—­is there such a being?  “The ground”, says the Rev. Charles Voysey, “on which our belief in God rests is man.  Man, parent of Bibles and Churches, inspirer of all good thoughts and good deeds.  Man, the master-piece of God’s thought on earth.  Man, the text-book of all spiritual knowledge.  Neither miraculous nor infallible, man is nevertheless the only trustworthy record of the Divine mind in things perhaps pertaining to God.  Man’s reason, conscience, and affections are the only true revelation of his Maker.”  But what if God were only man’s own image reflected in the mirror of man’s mind?  What if man were the creator, not the revelation of his God?

It was inevitable that such thoughts should arise after the more palpably indefensible doctrines of Christianity had been discarded.  Once encourage the human mind to think, and bounds to the thinking can never again be set by authority.  Once challenge traditional beliefs, and the challenge will ring on every shield which is hanging in the intellectual arena.  Around me was the atmosphere of conflict, and, freed from its long repression, my mind leapt up to share in the strife with a joy in the intellectual tumult, the intellectual strain.

At this time I found my way to South Place Chapel, to which Mr. Moncure D. Conway was attracting many a seeker after truth.  I was fortunate enough to be introduced to this remarkable religious leader, and to his charming wife, one of the sweetest and steadiest natures which it has been my lot to meet.  It was from.  Mrs. Conway that I first heard of Mr. Bradlaugh as a speaker that everyone should hear.  She asked me one day if I had been to the Hall of Science, and I said, with the stupid, ignorant reflexion of other people’s prejudices which is but too common: