A child is a beam of sunlight from the Infinite and Eternal, with possibilities of virtue and vice- but as yet unstained.

The very essence of rationalism is that it assumes that the reason is the highest faculty in man and the lord of all the rest.

The highest qualities of character... must be earned.

Patience is passion tamed.

And so out of Letters of Layman grew, I myself hardly know how, this simple story of a layman's life in a country parish.

And Christian faith wins its victories only when by its own - heart life it gives some glimpse of this hidden world and sends the rationalist, Columbus-like, on an unknown sea to search for this unknown continent.

Religion is not a conclusion of the reason.

Every life is a march from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or vice.

Whether that rationalism leads to orthodox or heterodox conclusions, whether it issues in a Westminster Assembly's Confession of faith or a Positivist Primer is a matter of secondary importance.