difficult to express it; and said that perhaps the best way to compare the morality of the New Testament with the ethical system of any philosopher, or the code of any legislator, would be to imagine them all universally adopted, and see how much would have to be objected to,—­how much “brick” was mingled with the “porphyry.”  “If, for example,” said I, “Plato, who, I admit, so flashes upon us the sublimest and most comprehensive principles of morals, and whose ethical system you say is identical with that of Christianity, had the forming of a republic, you would have community of women property, —­women trained to war,—–­infanticide certain circumstances,—­young children led to battle (though at a safe distance), that ’the young might early scent carnage, and be inured to slaughter!  Both with him and Aristotle slavery would be a regularly sanctioned and perfectly natural institution.  Not only did they entertain very lax notions of the relation of the sexes, but the tone in which they speak of most abominable corruptions—­I do not except cannibalism—­to which humanity has ever degraded implied that they regarded such things as comparatively venial.  I know no greater single names than these, and I presume that these points you would find so, difficulty in digesting.”  He admitted it.

I told him I supposed he would take equal objections to the Gentoo, or the Roman, or the Spartan code, as also to the Koran.  He admitted all this too.

“But now, if we take the Christian code, and suppose the New Testament made the literal guide of in every man, tell me, Mr. Fellowes, what would the consequence?  What would you wish otherwise?”

“Why,” said Harrington, smiling, “he would, perhaps, object that there would be no more war, and that retaliation would be impossible.”

“The former,” said I, “we could all endure, I suppose; nor be unwilling to give up the latter, seeing that there would, in that case, be no wrongs to avenge.  It would not matter that you would be compelled to turn your right cheek to him who smote you on the left (let the interpretation be as literal as you will), since no one would strike you on the left; nor that you must surrender your cloak to him who took away your coat, since no one would take your coat.  But tell me, is there any thing more serious that would follow from the literal and universal adoption of the ethics of the New Testament?” Fellowes acknowledged that he knew of nothing, unless it was a sanction of slavery.

“I do not admit that the New Testament sanctions it,” I replied; “and I will, if you like, give my reasons in full, another time.  But is there any thing else?”

He said he did not recollect any thing.

“But you would recoil from the literal realization of the systems and codes we have mentioned.”  He confessed this also.