It was not the fact of most men
being liars that shocked him- that was all right enough; but even
the momentary doubt whether the few who were not liars ought not to
become liars too. There was no hope left if this were so; if this were
so, let him die, the sooner the better. "Lord," he exclaimed inwardly,
"I don't believe one word of it. Strengthen Thou and confirm my
disbelief." It seemed to him that he could never henceforth see a
bishop going to consecration without saying to himself: "There, but
for the grace of God, went Ernest Pontifex." It was no doing of his.
He could not boast; if he had lived in the time of Christ he might
himself have been an early Christian, or even an Apostle for aught
he knew. On the whole, he felt that he had much to be thankful for.
The conclusion, then, that it might be better to believe error
than truth, should be ordered out of court at once, no matter by how
clear a logic it had been arrived at; but what was the alternative? It
was this, that our criterion of truth -i.e., that truth is what
commends itself to the great majority of sensible and successful
people- is not infallible. The rule is sound, and covers by far the
greater number of cases, but it has its exceptions.
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