times and manners of changing; there were to be no exceptions and no
contradictions; all things were to be perfectly consistent, and all
premises to be carried with extremest rigour to their legitimate
conclusions. Heaven was to be very neat (for he was always tidy
himself), and free from sudden shocks to the nervous system, such as
those caused by dogs barking at him, or cows driven in the streets.
God was to resemble my father, and the Holy Spirit to bear some sort
of indistinct analogy to my mother.

Such were the ideal theories of his childhood--unconsciously formed,
but very firmly believed in. As he grew up he made such
modifications as were forced upon him by enlarged perceptions, but
every modification was an effort to him, in spite of a continual and
successful resistance to what he recognised as his initial mental
defect.

I may perhaps be allowed to say here, in reference to a remark in the
preceding paragraph, that both my brother and myself used to notice
it as an almost invariable rule that children's earliest ideas of God
are modelled upon the character of their father--if they have one.
Should the father be kind, considerate, full of the warmest love,
fond of showing it, and reserved only about his displeasure, the
child having learned to look upon God as His Heavenly Father through
the Lord's Prayer and our Church Services, will feel towards God as
he does towards his own father; this conception will stick to a man
for years and years after he has attained manhood--probably it will
never leave him. For all children love their fathers and mothers, if
these last will only let them; it is not a little unkindness that
will kill so hardy a plant as the love of a child for its parents.
Nature has allowed ample margin for many blunders, provided there be