his attitude to religion perhaps more faithfully than anything in The
Fair Haven: "What, after all, is the essence of Christianity? What
is the kernel of the nut? Surely common sense and cheerfulness, with
unflinching opposition to the charlatanisms and Pharisaisms of a
man's own times. The essence of Christianity lies neither in dogma,
nor yet in abnormally holy life, but in faith in an unseen world, in
doing one's duty, in speaking the truth, in finding the true life
rather in others than in oneself, and in the certain hope that he who
loses his life on these behalfs finds more than he has lost. What
can Agnosticism do against such Christianity as this? I should be
shocked if anything I had ever written or shall ever write should
seem to make light of these things."

R. A. STREATFEILD.
August, 1913.



BUTLER'S PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION



The occasion of a Second Edition of The Fair Haven enables me to
thank the public and my critics for the favourable reception which
has been accorded to the First Edition. I had feared that the
freedom with which I had exposed certain untenable positions taken by
Defenders of Christianity might have given offence to some reviewers,
but no complaint has reached me from any quarter on the score of my
not having put the best possible case for the evidence in favour of
the miraculous element in Christ's teaching--nor can I believe that I