“Your Bible, Mr. Laicus,” said he, “sets apart one day for the Lord and gives all the rest to the world, the flesh, and the devil.  I believe all days are divine, all days are the Lord’s, all hours are sacred hours and all ground is holy ground.”

I wanted to tell him that my Bible did no such thing.  But I had fully considered what I would do before I had sought this interview.  I had resolved that nothing should tempt me into a contradiction or an argument.  I had studied Jennie’s method, and I reserved my fire.

“Your Bible tells me,” said he, “that God wrote his laws with his finger on two tables of stone; that he tried to preserve them from destruction by bidding them be kept in a sacred ark; and that despite his care they were broken in pieces before Moses got down from the mountain top.  I believe he writes them impartially in nature and in our hearts, that science interprets them, and that no Moses astonished out of his presence of mind can harm them or break the tablets on which they are engraven.”

So true, yet oh so false.  Oh God! help me to teach him what my Bible really is and what its glorious teachings are.

“I don’t believe the Bible is the Word of God.  I can’t believe it.  I don’t believe the laws of Moses are any more inspired than the laws of Solon, or the books of Samuel and Kings than the history of Tacitus, or the Psalms of David than the Paradise Lost of Milton, or—­you’ll think me bold indeed to say so Mr. Laicus,” (he was cooler now and spoke more slowly), “the words of Jesus, than the precepts of Confucius or the dialogues of Plato.”

In that sentence he gave to me my clue.  I seized it instantly, and never lost it from that moment.  Never case in court so thrilled me with excitement as I too arose and leaned against the mantel-piece.  And never was I, in tone and manner, calmer.

“As much so?” I asked carelessly.

“Yes.....” said he, hesitatingly, “yes..... as much so I suppose.”

“The ten commandments have been before the world for over three thousand years,” said I.  “The number that have learned them and accepted them as a guide, and found in them a practical help is to be counted by millions.  There is hardly a child in Wheathedge that does not know something of them, and has not been made better for them; and hardly a man who knows Solon even by name.  We can hardly doubt that the one is as well worth studying as the other, Mr. Gear.”

“No,” said Mr. Gear.  “I don’t deny that they are worth studying.  But I do deny that they are inspired.”

“The Psalms of David have supplied the Christian church with its best psalmody for nearly three thousand years,” continued I.  “They constitute the reservoir from which Luther, and Watts, and Wesley, and Doddridge, and a host of other singers have drawn their inspiration, and in which myriads untold have found the expression of their highest and holiest experiences, myriads who never heard of Homer.  They are surely as well worth studying as his noble epics.”