it is plain that they are indebted for the like from man!  And whether it is not conceivable that, if Moses and Socrates and Paul could do so much for them, God could do a trifle more?  You will say, perhaps, on the old plea, that these profounder spirits only made articulate that which already existed inarticulately in the hearts of those whom they addressed; that they only chafed into life the marble statue of Pygmalion,—­the dormant principles and sentiments which had a home in the human heart before, only they were unluckily treated as strangers.  Well; the same thing may the apologist for the Bible say,—­merely adding, that it does more effectually the business of thus awakening ‘dormant’ powers, and giving a substantive form to the shadowy conceptions of mankind.  But it is still, in either case, to the bulk of the world an external revelation, an outward aid which gives them the actual conscious possession of spiritual light, and secures the vaunted progress of humanity.  Such are some of my difficulties respecting your theory of the impossibility and inutility of any and all external revelations.  I must, in candor, say that our discussion has left them where they were.”

“There is one thing,” he added, “about your system which I acknowledge would be consolatory to me if it were but true.  If man be really in possession of an internal and universal revelation of moral and spiritual truth, you neither can nor need take any trouble to enlighten and convert him.  It relieves one of all superfluous anxiety on that score.”

“Pardon me,” said Fellowes, “it is Mr. Newman’s spiritual theory alone which does allow the prospect of success to any such efforts.  As he truly says, when the spiritual champion has thrown off the burden of an historical Christianity, he advances, as lightly equipped as Priestley himself.  I should say much more lightly.  ‘What,’ says he, ’may we now expect from the true theologian when he attacks sin, and vice, and gross spirituality?’ ‘The weapon he uses,’ to employ Mr. Newman’s own language, ’is as lightning from God, kindled from the spirit within him, and piercing through the unbeliever’s soul, convincing his conscience of sin, and striking him to the ground before God; until those who believe receive it not as the word of man but as what it is, in truth, the word of God.  Its action is directly upon the conscience and upon the soul, and hence its wonderful results; not on the critical faculties, upon which the spirit is powerless.’(Soul, p. 244) Again, he says that such a preacher ’will have plenty to say, alike to the vulgar and to the philosophers, appreciable by the soul.’  Hear him again:  ’Then he may speak with confidence of what he knows and feels; and call on his hearers of themselves to try and prove his words.  Then the conversion of men to the love of God may take place by hundreds and thousands, as in some former instances.  Then, at length, some hope may dawn that Mohammedans and Hindoos may be joined in one fold with us, under one Shepherd, who will only have regained his older name of the Lord God.’” (Soul, p. 258)