EASTER .SIR. —Mr. Richards seems to be the disputer over words.
He makes an arbitrary contrast between 'his- '.01 rical fact' and 'fervour-bred myth and symbol.' There are no 'historical facts,' there can only be impressions, mediated through the senses of those who experience them, and, if they are to continue in time, set down in words. The argument seems to turn on the kind of impressions the writers of the Gospels were trying to describe. We have no means whatever of lowing what 'actually' happened two thousand Years ago, all we have to go on is a record, set down in the. terms of two thousand years ago, of certain exPenences. 'Fervour-bred myth' is nonsense as it stands. The experiences were far too vital to be dis- trdssed in such a way, but obviously they did have to be clothed in myth in order to express fully their universal significance. To quote a single example over which I should imagine there could be no disagree- ment. Luke, who 'dearly loves a good miracle,' describes what could only have been a subjective experience, the descent of the Spirit at our Lord's baptism, as a dove coming down 'in bodily form' (somatikos). That is how l..uke pictured it; but could anyone be found who would assert the Holy Spirit, at a certain historical moment, metamorphosed into a member of the pigeon family, columbidce?—Yours faithfully,
AUSTIN LEE Sedge brook Rectory, Grantham
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