One ought to make allowance for the fact that they are tied and bound by the chain of their Thirty-nine Articles; that at three-and-twenty they shut the doors deliberately on any new and possibly unorthodox idea; and it is consequently unreasonable to expect from them any genuine freedom or originality of thought.

I can forgive them their assumption of superiority, their inability to meet honest scepticism with anything like fairness, their continual bickering among themselves; but I cannot forgive them the harm they are doing to religion, the discredit they are bringing upon it by their bigoted views and obsolete ideas.

They busy themselves doing good--that is the worst of it; they mean well, but they do not see that, in the mean while, their Church is being left unto them desolate; though perhaps, after all, the Church having come to be what it is, that is the best thing that can happen." "There are men among the clergy who will not come under that sweeping accusation," said Ruth.

"Look at some of the London churches.

Are they desolate?
Goodness and earnestness will be a power to the end of time, however narrow the accompanying creed may be." "That is true, but we have heads as well as hearts.