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CRABB ROBINSON'S DIARY, ETC.
291

but they who are sent sometimes go further than they ought.'[1]

Calvin. I saw nothing but good in Calvin's house. In Luther's there were Harlots. He declared his opinion that the earth is flat, not round, and just as I had objected the circumnavigation dinner was announced. But objections were seldom of any use. The wildest of his assertions was made with the veriest indifference of tone,[2] as if altogether insignificant. It respected the natural and spiritual worlds. By way of example of the difference between them, he said, 'You never saw the spiritual Sun. I have. I saw him on Primrose Hill.' He said, 'Do you take me for the Greek Apollo?' 'No!' I said. 'That (pointing to the sky) that is the Greek Apollo, He is Satan.'

Not everything was thus absurd. There were glimpses and flashes of truth and beauty: as when he compared moral with physical evil. 'Who shall say what God thinks evil? That is a wise tale of the Mahometans—of the Angel of the Lord who murdered the Infant.'—The Hermit of Parnell, I suppose. 'Is not every infant that dies of a natural death in reality slain by an Angel?'

And when he joined to the assurance of his happiness, that of his having suffered, and that it was necessary, he added, 'There is suffering in

  1. 'Dante saw Devils where I saw none' crossed out.
  2. 'Most unconscious simplicity' crossed out.