rearing, outside of national establishments, of men of the [xxi]
highest spiritual significance. These two are the Roman Catholic and
the Jewish. And these, both of them, rest on Establishments, which,
though not indeed national, are cosmopolitan; and perhaps here, what
the individual man does not lose by these conditions of his rearing,
the citizen, and the State of which he is a citizen, loses.

What, now, can be the reason of this undeniable provincialism of the
English Puritans and Protestant Nonconformists, a provincialism which
has two main types,--a bitter type and a smug type,--but which in
both its types is vulgarising, and thwarts the full perfection of our
humanity? Men of genius and character are born and reared in this
medium as in any other. From the faults of the mass such men will
always be comparatively free, and they will always excite our
interest; yet in this medium they seem to have a special difficulty
in breaking through what bounds them, and in developing their
totality. Surely the reason is, that the Nonconformist is not in
contact with the main current of national life, like the member of an
Establishment. In a matter of such deep and vital concern as
religion, this separation from the main current of the national life
has [xxii] peculiar importance. In the following essay we have
discussed at length the tendency in us to Hebraise, as we call it;
that is, to sacrifice all other sides of our being to the religious
side. This tendency has its cause in the divine beauty and grandeur
of religion, and bears affecting testimony to them; but we have seen
that it has dangers for us, we have seen that it leads to a narrow
and twisted growth of our religious side itself, and to a failure in
perfection. But if we tend to Hebraise even in an Establishment,
with the main current of national life flowing round us, and
reminding us in all ways of the variety and fulness of human