If ever poor fellow was confounded, it was Tom Fletcher. Had he been sitting on a furze bush, he could hardly have been more fidgetty. He got out a few words, but they were very scarce and a long way apart; and as he could’nt well put ’em together, no wonder that I can’t.
Well, I had only been firing at him, as it were, a pop, now and then, from a long way off, but now I was determined to bear upon him all at once.
“It isn’t for me, Tom,” says I, “that am not what I ought to be by a great deal—it isn’t for me, knowing as I do a little of the wickedness of my own heart, to deal out fire and brimstone against my fellow sinners, and to pretend that I am white as snow and they as black as soot; but for all that, Tom, we may be too tender with one another. If I see an adder lying in a thoroughfare where he may sting the passer by, I’m bound to disable him; and if I see a mad dog, foaming at the mouth, running through the crowded street, I’m bound, if I can, to kill him. Now the adder and the mad dog are not likely to do half the mischief that your books are, and therefore I hold up both my hands, and cry out aloud against them.
“Look you,” says I, “Tom, there lies the Bible. It condemns every thing that is evil, even every sinful thought, and upholds every thing that is good. It teaches me to fear God, and to love my neighbour; and tells me, sinner as I am, that there is mercy for me through Jesus Christ who died for sinners. It gives me comfort in life, it promises me support in death, and holds up before me the bright prospect of a happy eternity; and it has done this for thousands who have left this world in peace, and who are now, as I believe, in a world of glory.
“And there, Tom, be your wretched books, which tell me, that is, if I at all understand them, that there is no God; that the Bible is a lie; that marriage is a foolish institution; that men ought to live just as they think proper; that theft, adultery, blasphemy and murder are no crimes; that there is neither hell nor heaven; and that it is idle to dream of a hereafter.
“If I know my own heart, Tom, or even any part of it, I wouldn’t knowingly say a cruel thing of a butcher’s dog; but this I will say, that I should as soon expect to be taught manners by a Hottentot, cleanliness by a sweep, honesty by a highwayman, and godliness by a heathen, as to be made either wiser, better, holier, or happier by having any thing to do with Socialism. But what says that book? ‘The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works,’ Titus ii. 11–14.”