 principle that underlies it.
    »You see,« continued Mr. Shaw, »these writers are all paid advocates. They
get their living by writing in a certain way, and the more they write in that
way, the more they are likely to get on. You should not call them dishonest for
this any more than a judge should call a barrister dishonest for earning his
living by defending one in whose innocence he does not seriously believe; but
you should hear the barrister on the other side before you decide upon the
case.«
    This was another facer. Ernest could only stammer that he had endeavoured to
examine these questions as carefully as he could.
    »You think you have,« said Mr. Shaw; »you Oxford and Cambridge gentlemen
think you have examined everything. I have examined very little myself except
the bottoms of old kettles and saucepans, but if you will answer me a few
questions, I will tell you whether or no you have examined much more than I
have.«
    Ernest expressed his readiness to be questioned.
    »Then,« said the tinker, »give me the story of the Resurrection of Jesus
Christ as told in St. John's gospel.«
    I am sorry to say that Ernest mixed up the four accounts in a deplorable
manner; he even made the angel come down and roll away the stone and sit upon
it. He was covered with confusion when the tinker first told him without the
book of some of his many inaccuracies, and then verified his criticisms by
referring to the New Testament itself.
    »Now,« said Mr. Shaw good-naturedly, »I am an old man, and you are a young
one, so perhaps you'll not mind my giving you a piece of advice. I like you, for
I believe you mean well, but you've been real bad brought up, and I don't think
you have ever had so much as a chance yet. You know nothing of our side of the
question and I have just shown you that you do not know much more of your own,
but I think you will make a kind of Carlyle sort of a man some day. Now go
upstairs, and read the accounts of the resurrection, not as wanting to find the
story true but as wanting to find out whether it is true or not. When you can
say the four accounts of the resurrection correctly without mixing them up, and
have got a clear idea of what it is that each writer tells us, then if you feel
inclined to pay me another visit I shall be glad
