Change in him, in whatever direction it seemed to proceed, meant primarily the dropping off of accidental excrescences.

There was nothing radical in it.

What he once held with the settled allegiance of his intelligence he held always, adding to or developing it further as fast as the clouds were blown away from his mental horizon.

From the standpoint of personal experience he could fairly criticise, as he did in conversation some few years before his death, Cardinal Newman's dictum that "conversion is a leap in the dark." "I say," he went on, "that it is a leap in the light." _"Into_ the light, but through the dark," was suggested in reply.
"No," he answered.

"If one arrives at a recognition of the truth of Catholic doctrine through one or other form of Protestant orthodoxy, then the difficulties of ordinary controversy will indeed leave him to the very end in the dark.