To-day I read Hume’s life—­by himself—­very striking.  You will find it generally at the beginning of his History of England.  There have been saints among infidels too, e.g., Hume and Spinoza, on behalf of whom I think it a duty to say something as the Church has devoted them to eternal flames.  To use a German phrase, “They were ‘Christians in unconsciousness.’” That describes a good many people.  I believe that as Christians we should get rid of a good many doubtful phrases and speak only through our lives.

Believe me, my dear Margaret,

Yours truly and affectionately,

B. Jowett.

Balliol, Sunday. 1893.

My dear Margaret,

I quite agree with you that what we want most in life is rest and peace.  To act up to our best lights, that is quite enough; there need be no trouble about dogmas, which are hardly intelligible to us, nor ought there to be any trouble about historical facts, including miracles, of which the view of the world has naturally altered in the course of ages.  I include in this such questions as whether Our Lord rose from the dead in any natural sense of the words.  It is quite a different question, whether we shall imitate Him in His life.

I am glad you think about these questions, and shall be pleased to talk to you about them.  What I have to say about religion is contained in two words:  Truth and Goodness, but I would not have one without the other, and if I had to choose between them, might be disposed to give Truth the first place.  I think, also, that you might put religion in another way, as absolute resignation to the Will of God and the order of nature.  There might be other definitions, equally true, but none suited better than another to the characters of men, such as the imitation of Christ, or the truth in all religions, which would be an adequate description of it.  The Christian religion seems to me to extend to all the parts and modes of life, and then to come back to our hearts and conscience.  I think that the best way of considering it, and the most interesting, is to view it as it may be seen in the lives of good men everywhere, whether Christians or so-called heathens—­ Socrates, Plato, Marcus Aurelius, St. Augustine, as well as in the lives of Christ, or Bunyan, or Spinoza.  The study of religious biography seems to me one of the best modes of keeping up Christian feeling.

As to the question of Disestablishment, I am not like Mr. Balfour, I wobble rather, yet, on the whole, I agree with Mr. Gladstone, certainly about the Welsh Church.  Churches are so worldly and so much allied to the interests of the higher classes.  I think that a person who belongs to a Church should always endeavour to live above his Church, above the sermon and a good part of the prayer, above the Athanasian Creed, and the form of Ordination, above the passions of party feelings and public meetings.  The best individuals have always been better than Churches, though I do not go so far as a German professor, who thinks that people will never be religious until they leave off going to church, yet I am of opinion that in every congregation the hearers should attempt to raise themselves above the tone of the preacher and of the service.