The twelfth then relates to the whole party the story he has just heard: after that the original written document is read. {401} The wit or fun of the transmitted story is invariably gone, and nothing but an unmeaning platitude generally remains.
One very interesting case occurred a few years ago in which the wit of the original story had evidently been lost, but had afterwards been revived in a different form in the latter part of its transmission. The story at starting consisted of the following anecdote:—
The Duke of Rutland and Theodore Hook having dined with the Lord Mayor, were looking for their hats previously to their departure. The Duke, unable to find his own, said to his friend: “Hook, I have lost my castor.” The Lord Chief Baron, Sir Frederick Pollock, was at that moment passing down the stairs. Hook perceiving him, replied instantly, “Never mind, take Pollock’s” (Pollux).
The story told at the conclusion, after a dozen transmissions, was thus:—
Theodore Hook and the Duke of Rutland were dining with the Bishop of Oxford. Both being equally incapable of finding their respective hats, the Duke said to the wit, “Hook, you have stolen my castor.” “No,” replied the prince of jokers, “I haven’t stolen your castor, but I should have no objection to take your beaver;” alluding to Belvoir Castle, the splendid seat of the Duke of Rutland, which in the language of the clay is pronounced precisely in the same way as the name of that animal whom man robs of his great-coat in order to make a covering for his own skull.
It requires considerable training to become an accurate witness of facts. No two persons, however well trained, ever express, in the same form of words, the series of facts they have both observed.
〈THE BELIEF IN THE CREATOR FROM HIS WORKS.〉
3. There remains a third source from which we arrive at {402} the knowledge of the existence of a supreme Creator, namely, from an examination of his works. Unlike transmitted testimony, which is weakened at every stage, this evidence derives confirmation from the progress of the individual as well as from the advancement of the knowledge of the race.
Almost all thinking men who have studied the laws which govern the animate and the inanimate world around us, agree that the belief in the existence of one Supreme Creator, possessed of infinite wisdom and power, is open to far less difficulties than the supposition of the absence of any cause, or of the existence of a plurality of causes.