by Mr. Voysey. At that time Thomas Scott was an old man, with
beautiful white hair, and eyes like those of a hawk gleaming from
under shaggy eyebrows. He had been a man of magnificent physique, and,
though his frame was then enfeebled, the splendid lion-like head kept
its impressive strength and beauty, and told of a unique personality.
Well born and wealthy, he had spent his earlier life in adventure in
all parts of the world, and after his marriage he had settled down at
Ramsgate, and had made his home a centre of heretical thought. His
wife, "his right hand," as he justly called her, was young enough to
be his daughter--a sweet, strong, gentle, noble woman, worthy of her
husband, and than that no higher praise could be spoken. Mr. Scott for
many years issued monthly a series of pamphlets, all heretical, though
very varying in their shades of thought; all were well written,
cultured, and polished in tone, and to this rule Mr. Scott made no
exception; his writers might say what they liked, but they must have
something to say, and must say it in good English. His correspondence
was enormous, from Prime Ministers downwards. At his house met people
of the most varied opinions; it was a veritable heretical _salon_.
Colenso of Natal, Edward Maitland, E. Vansittart Neale, Charles Bray,
Sarah Hennell, and hundreds more, clerics and laymen, scholars and
thinkers, all coming to this one house, to which the _entrée_ was
gained only by love of Truth and desire to spread Freedom among men.
For Thomas Scott my first Freethought essay was written a few months
after, "On the Deity of Jesus of Nazareth," by the wife of a benefited
clergyman. My name was not mine to use, so it was agreed that any
essays from my pen should be anonymous.

And now came the return to Sibsey, and with it the need for definite
steps as to the Church. For now I no longer doubted, I had rejected,
and the time for silence was past. I was willing to attend the Church