'Nothing,' says a penetrating
writer, 'is more like firm conviction than simple obstinacy. Plots and
parties in the state, and heresies and divisions in the church alike
proceed from it.' Let any honest man take that sentence and carry it
like a candle down into his own heart and back into his own life, and
then with the insight and honesty there learned carry the same candle
back through some of the plots and parties, the heresies and schisms of
the past as well as of the present day, and he will have learned a lesson
that will surely help to cure himself, at any rate, of his own remaining
obstinacy. All our firm convictions, as we too easily and too fondly
call them, must continually be examined and searched out in the light of
more reading of the best authors, in the light of more experience of
ourselves and of the world we live in, and in that best of all light,
that increasing purity, simplicity, and sincerity of heart alone can
kindle. And in not a few instances we shall to a certainty find that
what has hitherto been clothing itself with the honourable name and
character of a conviction was all the time only an ignorant prejudice, a
distaste or a dislike, a too great fondness for ourselves and for our own
opinion and our own interest.
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