were some of the most distinguished men of the day. There were seldom, he was told, more than seven or eight present, but these made a point of studying the questions with the greatest care; and all expressed their opinions with the utmost freedom-it being a special rule of the society that no one could be called to account for any sentiment he might express, unless it were personal to some one present. Wilton was greatly pleased with his evening's entertainment, and full of impatience to enter on his career as a debater. Before retiring to rest, he even composed and delivered an oration on the subject he had heard discussed; in which he exposed not only the shallow flimsiness and the narrow bigotry of the first two speakers, but the fallacies also of Lambton's compromises, with more logical acumen than Powell had displayed, but with equal earnestness and fire. He might have continued his speech still further, if his vehemence had not roused from his slumbers his next-door neighbour, an impetuous Irishman, who had only just fallen asleep after a stiff day's hunting, and caused him to intimate, by several loud knocks of a boot against the partition, that Wilton's eloquence, however admirable in itself, was not free from objection at one o'clock in the morning. Somewhat ashamed of his enthusiasm, Wilton extinguished his candle, and retired to bed.

CHAPTER VII.

RESPONSIONS.

ILTON was duly elected a member of the
Bentham Club, and began to attend its
debates with all the zest of a new proselyte.
The first meeting was held about ten days
There was

after the commencement of the spring term.
an unusually large muster, he was told-as many as ten
attending, and amongst them the ablest members of the
club. The subject proposed for discussion was one which
at first startled Wilton a good deal-" Whether there be
any such thing as objective truth." Its existence was
denied by several speakers, who maintained that what
had been regarded by some, not only as truth, but as truth
of vital importance, had been slighted or absolutely con-
demned by others-that the ablest intellects had de-
duced different conclusions from the same phenomena.
Yet it was impossible to suspect either the honesty or the
abilities of the parties in either instance. That, however,
one speaker contended, it was in no way necessary to do,

because if the view was honestly and conscientiously maintained, it was the truth-the thing he "troweth"to each individual man. The same argument was carried

further by another, who affirmed that if absolute and entire freedom from error were necessary to constitute truth, no man whose intellect was not perfect could apprehend it, and thus there could be no such thing as truth in this world at all, though there might be elsewhere. The conclusion to which he himself inclined to come, he said, was that every man should be free to hold, without blame, whatever opinions commended themselves most to him; that it would serve the cause of truth most effectually if every man were free to do this, not only without incurring punishment for so doing, but even without incurring hostile criticism.

Wilton went home greatly impressed by the speeches he had heard, and devoted a very considerable portion of the next fortnight to the study of the next question to be brought forward, which was, "How far miracles were reconcileable with, and how far they were opposed to, the deductions of science." This proposition, when the time came, was handled quite as freely as the previous one-more than one speaker boldly maintaining that where recorded miracles were directly in the teeth of the principles of scientific knowledge, a wise man should require the fullest proof of their having occurred, before he would admit them. No one absolutely said that such proof did not exist in the instance of the gospel miracles. That aspect of the question was kept out of sight, whether intentionally or not Gerald could not say. But the impression left on his mind was that some of the speakers,

H