A reverent and rational liberty in criticism (within the limits of
orthodoxy) is, I have always supposed, the right of every Cambridge
man; and I was therefore the more shocked, for the sake of free
thought in my University, at the appearance of a book which claimed
and exercised a licence in such questions, which I must (after
careful study of it) call anything but rational and reverent. Of
the orthodoxy of the book it is not, of course, a private
clergyman's place to judge. That book seemed dangerous to the
University of Cambridge itself, because it was likely to stir up
from without attempts to abridge her ancient liberty of thought; but
it seemed still more dangerous to the hundreds of thousands without
the University, who, being no scholars, must take on trust the
historic truth of the Bible.
For I found that book, if not always read, yet still talked and
thought of on every side, among persons whom I should have fancied
careless of its subject, and even ignorant of its existence, but to
whom I was personally bound to give some answer as to the book and
its worth. It was making many unsettled and unhappy; it was (even
worse) pandering to the cynicism and frivolity of many who were
already too cynical and frivolous; and, much as I shrank from
descending into the arena of religious controversy, I felt bound to
say a few plain words on it, at least to my own parishioners.
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