If there be any question which ought to be debated with scrupulous calmness and fairness, it is the question whether it is just that human laws should prevent and punish the publication of views commonly regarded as blasphemous.  I deny Mr. Buckle’s statement, that all belief is involuntary.  I say that in a country like this, every man of education is responsible for his religious belief; but of course responsible only to his Maker.  Thus, on totally different grounds from Mr. Buckle, I agree with him in thinking that no human law should interfere with a man’s belief.  I am not prepared, without much longer thought than I have yet given to the subject, to agree with Mr. Buckle and Mr. Mill, that human law should never interfere with the publication of opinions, no matter how blasphemous they may be esteemed by the great majority of the nation to which they are published.  I might probably say that I should not interfere with the publication of any book, however false and mischievous I might regard the religious doctrines it taught, provided the book were written in the interest of truth—­provided its author manifestly desired to set out doctrines which he regarded as true and important.  But if the book set out blasphemous doctrine in such a tone and temper as made it evident that the writer’s main intention was to irritate and distress those who held the belief regarded as orthodox, I should probably suppress or punish the publication of such a book.  Sincere infidelity is a sad thing, with little of the propagandist spirit.  Even if it should think that those Christian doctrines which afford so much comfort and support to men are fond delusions, I think its humane feeling would be,—­Well, I shall not seek to shatter hopes which I cannot replace.  I know that such was the feeling of the most amiable of unbelievers—­David Hume.  I know how he regularly attended church, anxious that he might not by his example dash in humble minds the belief which tended to make them good and happy, though it was a belief which he could not share.  My present nolion is, that laws ought to punish coarse and abusive blasphemy.  They may let thoughtful and philosophic scepticism alone.  It will hardly reach, it will never distress, the masses.  But if a blackguard goes up to a parsonage door, and bellows out blasphemous remarks about the Trinity; or if a man who is a blockhead as well as a malicious wretch writes blasphemous words upon a parsonage gate, I cannot for an instant recognize in these men the champions of freedom of religious thought and speech.  Even Mr. Buckle cannot think that their purpose is to teach the clergymen important truth.  They don’t intend to proselytize.  Their object is to insult and annoy and shock.  And I think it is right to punish them.  They are not punished for setting out their peculiar opinions.  They are punished for designedly and maliciously injuring their neighbours.  Mr. Justice Coleridge punished the blasphemer in Cornwall, not because he held wrong views, not because