This modern reproduction of the ancient prophet, with his "Thus saith
the Lord," "This is the work of the Lord," steeped in supernaturalism
and glorying in blind faith, is the mental antipodes of the philosopher,
founded in naturalism and a fanatic for evidence, to whom these
affirmations inevitably suggest the previous question: "How do you know
that the Lord saith it?" "How do you know that the Lord doeth it?" and
who is compelled to demand that rational ground for belief, without
which, to the man of science, assent is merely an immoral pretence.
And it is this rational ground of belief which the writers of the
Gospels, no less than Paul, and Eginhard, and Fox, so little dream
of offering that they would regard the demand for it as a kind of
blasphemy.