Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/261

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A THOUSAND YEARS HENCE.
243

not?" Their solution was completely different. They first defined the figure in question to be a circular square, and then, whatever that might be, they believed it accordingly.

These Reason-Reconciliationists record other victories. The Ultra-Wesleyans had complained that, in the terrible Calvinistic system, the divine hate seemed far broader cast than the divine love; whereas with them, on the contrary, the love so overflowed, as well-nigh to put the other out of sight. There ought, as they contended, to be, at the least, an equality. But the Reason-Reconciliationists hastened to explain. They frankly admitted that, on a merely numerical consideration their opponents might be right. But, on the other hand, as to that prime difficulty, the comparative handful of the saved, the unutterable infinity of the love, and that too from all eternity, and wholly without reference to personal deserts in its objects, made up altogether a leverage sufficient to bring the balance to an even beam.

A zealous Ultra-Mormon elder had challenged all outer Gentile error to a discussion upon proofs of Mormon truth; and the challenge had been accepted, not without general surprise, by a quiet Anglican bishop. On the principle, once for all, that one ultra-zealot could be out-argued only by another zealot still more ultra than himself, these ultra-type sectaries were usually let alone by all quiet and sensible mortals. And how, then, fared this exceptional case? The account of it, transmitted by the Mormon side, is very awful indeed, as illustrating the natural depravity and unreason existing everywhere outside of Mormon truth. When that truth was vindicated by such con-