Such alone
can bear rule in that kind. They blame him for pulling down cathedrals,
and so forth, as if he were a seditious, rioting demagogue: precisely
the reverse is seen to be the fact, in regard to cathedrals and the rest
of it, if we examine! Knox wanted no pulling-down of stone edifices; he
wanted leprosy and darkness to be thrown out of the lives of men. Tumult
was not his element; it was the tragic feature of his life that he
was forced to dwell so much in that. Every such man is the born enemy
of Disorder; hates to be in it: but what then? Smooth Falsehood is
not Order; it is the general sum total of _Dis_order. Order is
_Truth_--each thing standing on the basis that belongs to it: Order
and Falsehood cannot subsist together.
Withal, unexpectedly enough, this Knox has a vein of drollery in him;
which I like much, in combination with his other qualities. He has a
true eye for the ridiculous. His _History_, with its rough earnestness,
is curiously enlivened with this. When the two Prelates, entering
Glasgow Cathedral, quarrel about precedence; march rapidly up, take to
hustling one another, twitching one another's rochets, and at last
flourishing their crosiers like quarter-staves, it is a great sight for
him everywhere! Not mockery, scorn, bitterness alone; though there is
enough of that too.
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