--But, mind
you, at this table I think it is very different. I shall express my
ideas on any subject I like. The laws of the lecture-room, to which my
friends and myself are always amenable, do not hold here. I shall not
often give arguments, but frequently opinions,--I trust with courtesy and
propriety, but, at any rate, with such natural forms of expression as it
has pleased the Almighty to bestow upon me.
A man's opinions, look you, are generally of much more value than his
arguments. These last are made by his brain, and perhaps he does not
believe the proposition they tend to prove,--as is often the case with
paid lawyers; but opinions are formed by our whole nature,--brain,
heart, instinct, brute life, everything all our experience has shaped for
us by contact with the whole circle of our being.
--There is one thing more,--said the divinity-student,--that I wished to
speak of; I mean that idea of yours, expressed some time since, of
depolarizing the text of sacred books in order to judge them fairly. May
I ask why you do not try the experiment yourself?
Certainly,--I replied,--if it gives you any pleasure to ask foolish
questions.
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