ABSTRACT
'What is this nineteenth-century religion for which all things have been preparing?'1 Richard William Church's question, half-ironic, half-puzzled, reflected the state of debate in the churches in the 1860s. The question was prompted by a reading of, among other things, Essays and Reviews, a book which claimed that the atmosphere of religion had altered entirely, and a new age of meaning had dawned. As Benjamin Jowett, its inspirer and principal contributor, had said,
