Browsing: Diary of Charles Francis Adams, Volume 2

Still rainy, attended the Meeting in Federal Street and heard Mr. Gannet preach a Sermon upon the utility of Controversial Religion, very little of which I could admire or assent to. Such a minister, with such ideas and feelings, is as shocking to my notions as possible, for it assumes severity as the garb of holiness. Why is man created with a sense of pleasure if he is not allowed to indulge it moderately? Why is a man indulged with reasoning powers if he cannot use them for himself with due diffidence? But to make it the duty of all men to worry and molest the opinions of others because they implicitly believe in the truth of their own, is to send the world into madness at once. I rode to Medford in the afternoon, and passed the evening as usual, pleasantly enough.