“It’s Shelley,” answered Donal, recovering himself.
The minister had never read a word of Shelley, but had a very decided opinion of him. He gave a loud rude whistle.
“So! that’s where you go for your theology! I was puzzled to understand you, but now all is plain! Young man, you are on the brink of perdition. That book will poison your very vitals!”
“Indeed, sir, it will never go deep enough for that! But it came near touching them as I sat eating my bread and cheese.”
“He’s an infidel!” said the minister fiercely.
“A kind of one,” returned Donal, “but not of the worst sort. It’s the people who call themselves believers that drive the like of poor Shelley to the mouth of the pit.”
“He hated the truth,” said the minister.
“He was always seeking after it,” said Donal, “though to be sure he didn’t get to the end of the search. Just listen to this, sir, and say whether it be very far from Christian.”
Donal opened his little volume, and sought his passage. The minister but for curiosity and the dread of seeming absurd would have stopped his ears and refused to listen. He was a man of not merely dry or stale, but of deadly doctrines. He would have a man love Christ for protecting him from God, not for leading him to God in whom alone is bliss, out of whom all is darkness and misery. He had not a glimmer of the truth that eternal life is to know God. He imagined justice and love dwelling in eternal opposition in the bosom of eternal unity. He knew next to nothing about God, and misrepresented him hideously. If God were such as he showed him, it would be the worst possible misfortune to have been created.
Donal had found the passage. It was in The Mask of Anarchy. He read the following stanzas:—