unfathomable sea and bound to the same as yet unseen harbor.

But after all, there is not enough theology, good or bad, in these papers
to cause them to be inscribed on the Protestant Index Expurgatorius; and
if they are medicated with a few questionable dogmas or antidogmas, the
public has become used to so much rougher treatments, that what was once
an irritant may now act as an anodyne, and the reader may nod over pages
which, when they were first written, would have waked him into a paroxysm
of protest and denunciation.

November, 1882.




PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION

This book is one of those which, if it lives for a number of decades, and
if it requires any Preface at all, wants a new one every ten years. The
first Preface to a book is apt to be explanatory, perhaps apologetic, in
the expectation of attacks from various quarters. If the book is in some
points in advance of public opinion, it is natural that the writer should
try to smooth the way to the reception of his more or less aggressive
ideas. He wishes to convince, not to offend,--to obtain a hearing for
his thought, not to stir up angry opposition in those who do not accept
it. There is commonly an anxious look about a first Preface. The author
thinks he shall be misapprehended about this or that matter, that his
well-meant expressions will probably be invidiously interpreted by those
whom he looks upon as prejudiced critics, and if he deals with living
questions that he will be attacked as a destructive by the conservatives